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cas-rivaille · 3 years

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Hi! Can I request a obey me hc where the MC is a leader of a very big mafia gang in the human world?

YES !??!?

(ahaha this def isn't the plot of one of my scripts where i run a mafia gang because i thought it would be cool and it's amazing you requested this)

tags: mentions of weapons, mild swearing, protective brothers and datables (i didn't include luke because it's a mafia gang thing and he's precious child and i want abt to put him in harms way)

a/n: i also didn't write the thoughts for dia, barb, simeon, or solomon because i honestly couldn't think of anything i'm sorry

MC as a Mafia leader in the human world

When you came to the Devildom, you were in another world, rendering everything in the human world useless. You spent so much time trying to adjust, that your life in the human world was almost forgotten.

Almost.

It wasn't long before Lord Diavolo announced you would be going on a trip to the human world. Suddenly you remembered everything you would go back to. If only you were aware of the chaos that would unfold. When you got to the human world, in your town you previously lived in, there was maybe a minute of peace before chaos erupted.

Once you stepped out of the alleyway that Diavolo teleported the group of you into, nearly half the people on the street turned and looked at you. Some of them ran, others pulled out their phones and made calls, and about four or five came rushing towards you asking where you'd been.

You recognized the men that had the gall to come up to you, they were some of the more high ranking commanders. However, your second in command was not among them. The brothers protectively stepped around you, not knowing who these people were. Clearly that was the wrong move.

In an instant the street was clear of citizens and there were members of your gang with their weapons drawn or their hands near their weapon. Diavolo stood behind you, glaring at the men in front. Simeon and Solomon were on edge. The atmosphere was tense. Barbatos was the first to speak.

"I'd advise you stand down," He spoke with a hum in his voice to the men in your gang.

"I could say the same to you," Said a voice emerging from the other side of the street. Slowly the person walked forward. It was your second in command.

"Who are you to be acting like this around our commander ? They disappeared four months ago and show up again like nothing ? Forgive us if we're a little curious," Your second spoke in a teasing manor, eyeing everyone carefully.

Lucifer -

- commander ?

- who ? mc a commander ? of what ?

- who are these people and where did they come from ?

- *protection mode activated*

- the only reason he's not in demon form and ready to attack is bc diavolo is here

- looks at all his brothers and makes sure they understand exactly what he means with one look

- this man is next to dia full on ready to fight

"Who are you calling com-"

You interrupt Lucifer.

"Everyone stand down, this is all just a bit misunderstanding," You say as quickly as possible to stop any conflict. Everyone directs their attention towards you.

"Commander who are these people ?" Your second asks.

"They're my friends, there's no need to be hostile. Everyone stand down," You say, looking around at all the people. They immediately lower their weapons, some of them even holster them. Your second on the other hand, known for standing up to you, doesn't lower their weapon.

"All due respect commander, but I won't stand down until I know they aren't a threat," You second looks you dead in the eye. You sigh. You then direct your attention to the boys surrounding you.

"Guys, back off a bit please. I'm fine. They aren't a threat," You say, tired.

The brothers ease up a bit, but you can still see the tension in their muscles. Diavolo, Barbatos, Simeon, and Solomon stood behind you protectively still, but also stepped back.

Lucifer steps forward and makes eye contact with you.

"What's going on MC ?" Lucifer asks.

"Okay so, gang this is Lucifer, Mammon, Levi, Satan, Beel, Asmo, Barbatos, Belphie, Solomon, Simeon, Barbatos, and Diavolo. Boys, this is my gang," You say while pointing to everyone and talking as fast as possible.

Mammon -

- he eased up on his defensive stance, but he never let your hand go

- as to be expected because you're HIS human

- anyways

- gang ??

- what do you mean gang ??

- like a club or should he be running

- very confused boi but just wants to protect you no matter what

Mammon squeezes your hand lightly. You look at him.

"What do you mean gang ?" He asks.

"I- uh.. well you see, it's exactly how it sounds," You respond.

The confusion on Mammon's face only grows.

"I am the leader of a gang. Here in the human world?" You say while shrugging your shoulders.

The boys all look at you like you've grown a second head.

"You run a gang ?" Mammon says after a moment of silence between all of them.

"Is that so surprising ?" Your second asks.

Leviathan -

- surprising ??

- surprising ??????

- the same mc that would stay up until two am playing animal crossing with him ?

- the same mc that bought him plushies of his favorite characters ?

- mc who would cosplay with him

- how could someone who makes sure he takes care of himself and basically babies him but on a friend level, be the commander of a gang ?

- lowkey thinks it's badass because he is the grand admiral of his own army

- gets distracted and starts fangirling over you

"How long have you been the commander of a gang?" Levi excitedly asks.

"Two years, before I went to the devildom that is," You respond, slightly bouncing off Levi's excitement.

"The what?" Your second asks, interrupting.

"The- oh. Wait a minute," You say and turn to Diavolo.

"Am I allowed to tell them ?" You half whisper to Dia.

"If you see fit. This situation is entirely new to me," Dia half whispers back. Barbatos leans in and joins the conversation.

"I sense utter loyalty to you, MC, if you trust them then I advise we should too," Barbatos speaks quietly.

You turn back to your gang.

"Okay so the reason I vanished for four months is because I went to 'hell' as an exchange student. Now I realize that may sound crazy, but these guys are all demons," You say while roughly gesturing to the brothers, Dia, and Barbatos, "He's an angel," You say and point to Simeon, "And he's a human, but immortal, I think. I don't really know Solomon is the textbook definition of an enigma," You say while waving at Solomon in gesture.

Your gang stares at you, bewildered. The person next to your second starts laughing hysterically. Your second glares at him but the laughter doesn't stop.

Levi, knowing exactly how it feels to be laughed at and not believed, starts talking.

"Need proof ?" He asks. In the blink of an eye he's in his demon form.

Your gang steps back, eyes wide, their hands near their weapons.

Satan -

- there's no way satan isn't dragging you back to his room after this to talk about your gang

- thinks it's attractive as hell, MC in a position of power ? that's the stuff

- takes a moment to register why levi is in his demon form, but feels his wrath and changes too

- steps closer to you

- he's still mad you never told him, but he won't take it out on you

- honestly just wants to know the truth

After Satan changes too, the rest of the brothers join in

Except Lucifer, who looks very displeased. Diavolo laughs at Lucifer's discontentment. Satan smirks as well, knowing he made Lucifer angry.

Your second is the first to speak.

"Okay what the fuck," Is the only thing said.

"MC did explain that we're demons, were you listening ?" Satan asks coyly.

"Right then. So it's actually true ?" Your second asks, looking at you.

"Yes, why would I lie ?" You say back.

There is a moment of silence. No one moves or says anything.

"So I take it this means we can't tell anyone ?" Your second asks.

"No, you cant. But I know you're all more than capable of keeping secrets," You laugh a little. The atmosphere lightens up. Your second laughs with you.

Asmo -

- your laugh is so adorable to him

- not the time thoughts

- he also thinks it's attractive you run a gang

- admires how you were able to change the atmosphere and how these people listen to you

- will totally tease you and call you commander

- joins in on lightening the mood

"Right then, how about we all go get a drink and discuss the events of the last four months over dinner ?" Asmo says.

"Is there even a restaurant big enough to hold all of us ?" Satan asks.

"Yeah, we can use the base," You say.

"Of course, it's still the same as you left it commander," Your second joins in.

"Then it's settled, let's go !" Asmo smiles.

Beel -

- definitely not opposed to having food

- is a little hurt you didn't tell him, but ultimately understands

- he wants to hear about your adventures

- wonders if he can spend more time with you to hear about said adventures

- does this mean you can fight ?

- if so can you train with him ?

"Does this mean we get human world food ?" Beel asks, looking at you.

"Yep !!" You respond.

Beel changes out of his demon form with a smile on his face.

"I'll also show you guys our base of operations and give you a tour. I can also show you where I used to live too !!" You say excitedly.

The other brothers change out of their demon forms.

Your second starts to walk and lead the way to the base. Everyone follows.

Belphie -

- to be honest he doesn't care you're a gang leader

- he just wants to sleep and spend time with you

- if those two things coincide then good for him

- he does think it's cool tho

"So, you're gonna tell us everything right ?" Belphie asks.

"Yes. I'll tell you guys about my life here and then I'll tell my gang about my life with you all," You say.

"Good, as long as things get cleared up," Belphie says and yawns.

----

SORRY IT GOT REALLY SHORT AT THE END IM REALLY TIRED BUT THANK YOU FOR THE REQUEST I HOPE YOU LIKE IT !!

- cas :)

#mars on earth #obey me #obey me shall we date #mammon headcanons #obey me headcanons #leviathan headcanons #lucifer headcanons #asmo headcanons #beel headcanons #belphie headcanons #satan headcanons #omswd #obey me levi #obey me asmo #obey me satan #obey me beel #obey me belphie #obey me lucifer #obey me mammon

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2manyfandoms2count · 3 years

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I love you (not) - Chapter 4

Slightly late for @marichatmay day 4, yesterday was kind of a long day and this chapter just kept getting longer. Oops. Ft. real cats, and a nod to Star Wars day (belated May the Fourth be with you). Enjoy!

First | Previous | AO3 | Next

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Chapter 4: In which the flirting continues and an attempt to break up is thwarted. Again.

Marinette almost turned around the moment she saw Chat Noir standing next to the café, looking at the cats on the other side of the window.

Well, had it just been her partner, she would have walked straight up to him without a second thought, and diligently sat through their date, only to apologise at the end of it, saying that she’d fallen in love with an image, and that she didn’t think they belonged together.

What (for ‘who’ was a little presumptuous a pronoun) stood in front of her was a figure in a cardboard rendering of Chat Noir’s suit, complete with paper bell, tail, and cardboard baton. She would have forgiven its use as a disguise, even though the details kind of defeated the purpose, had the reflection of the headpiece’s eye hole not revealed that he was actually transformed underneath.

Nope , she thought at the sight. Can’t do this, nope, nope, nop-

“Marinette!” Chat Noir spotted her just as she was about to leave, and started enthusiastically waving at her.

She plastered a smile on her face, and clutched her purse as she made her way towards him. Kwami, give me strength . She wondered if ridicule was a good enough excuse to break up with someone. It wasn’t very nice, but she was getting desperate for an excuse.

“Cardboard Noir, I presume?” Her voice had an exasperated edge to it, which Chat didn’t pick up on.

“The one and only!” He twirled around to give her the full 360° view of the costume. She could tell that he was grinning under the helmet.

“To what do I owe the… pleasure?”

“Anonymity, obviously.” He rolled his eyes. “Wouldn’t want this date to finish in the tabloids, am I right?”

Sure, because somebody in a piece of cardboard is so much more inconspicuous than somebody who might be wearing a Chat Noir cosplay in a cat café , she rolled her eyes as she saw people passing by and doing double takes as they walked past him, but kept her point to herself.

“How... thoughtful of you.” She smiled slightly tensely.

“Isn’t it?” Chat Noir extended his kraft paper-covered arm and she took it awkwardly for the couple of steps that separated them from the café’s door.

Chat hurried forward to open the door for her. “After you, my… Princess.” He bowed.

She bit back a smug smile as the bells jingled above her head. The nickname "my Lady" would totally have been justified in this situation, yet he’d refrained from using it. She deduced that it must be too attached to Ladybug; maybe there was hope that he still had a crush on her alter ego. She could work with that.

She walked into the shop, and almost tripped on an orange tabby cat who’d apparently been making the most of the sunspot on the other side of the door. It looked up at her indignantly even as she petted him to apologise, but didn’t move.

Behind her, a grey sphynx tried to make a run for it, but Chat picked it up and closed the door before he could cross the threshold.

“Hi there! Welcome to the C afé des Chats . How can I help you today?” A woman emerged from the back room, wiping her hands on her cat-themed apron. Her name, Cathy, was embroidered on it.

“Hello! Could we get a table for two, please?” Marinette smiled.

“Of course! Pick a spot!”

Marinette looked around the room. Apart from a small group of friends sitting near the window, and who were too engrossed in laughing and taking pictures of the cats to acknowledge their presence, all the seats were empty.

“How about that table over there?” Chat leaned towards her ear and pointed towards a cozy booth at the back of the room. She jumped slightly at the sudden proximity. He didn’t notice, as the cat in his arms started meowing, and Cathy came out from behind the counter to take it in her arms.

“Oh, let me take Yoda off your hands. Did he try running away again?” She cradled him, the cat purring as she did.

“Yes, I feel like he might take after his namesake and like the outdoors more.” Chat joked.

“Maybe I should have picked another name for him, then. It would save me a lot of time looking for him around the neighborhood.” Cathy laughed. “I’ll let you two get installed, I’ll be right with you.”

The pair made their way towards their table, Chat letting Marinette take the couch while he pulled out the chair facing her. He sat on the very edge of his seat, the cardboard taking up most of the space. They both picked up the menu, and ordered their drinks (and a lightsaber-themed pistachio éclair for Chat), when Cathy came around.

Marinette tapped her fingers together as they waited, trying to find a conversation topic. She decided to acknowledge the smaller elephant in the room.

“You know, I think we’re okay now, you can take off your costume.” Marinette pointed out. He looked like he could fall off his chair at any moment.

“Are you ashamed of me?” His hand flew to his chest, almost knocking his paper bell off.

“Me? Never!” she scoffed.

“Good, because this isn’t coming off anytime soon.” Chat Noir crossed his arms over his chest. She could tell he was smirking under his headpiece.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that…” It was Marinette’s turn to smirk, as Cathy arrived and put down two cups of hot chocolate, and Chat’s pâtisserie, in front of them.

“Is that a challenge?” Chat’s eyebrow shot up, and he turned towards Cathy. “Excuse me, Ma’am, would you happen to have a straw I could use?”

The lady blinked at him a couple of times, perplexed, before realising he was serious. “I probably do, let me go check in the pantry.”

“You’re not seriously doing this.” Marinette facepalmed.

“I’m just showing the one thing you should know about me if you want to date me; I don’t back down from challenges.” He thanked Cathy, who’d returned, and started poking a hole in his headset.

Trust me, I know that , Marinette sighed. “I take it back. It’s not a challenge. Just take your… mask off, and enjoy your order. Please?”

Chat Noir squinted at her suspiciously. “You pawmise that you’re fine with this?”

“Absolutely. I just want you to be more comfortable.”

“Fine.” He took off his headpiece, making his hair stick up from static electricity.

Marinette stifled a giggle.

“What?”

“Nothing,” she cleared her throat, pulled her phone out and snapped a picture, before showing the screen to him. “I just like what you did to your hair.”

“Ah, yes. Beautiful,” her partner laughed. “I wonder what Gabriel Agreste would think about it.”

“I actually think he’d love it. It kind of looks like his haircut.” Marinette snorted.

“Yeah, that won’t do.” Some colour drained from his cheeks as he shook his head and tried to flatten his hair. The real bell under his costume jingled as he did so.

Marinette was about to ask why he seemed so upset about the comparison when a black cat jumped up on their table, looking at Chat’s éclair with interest.

“Hey, Chat Noir? Looks like you have some competition for your tea…” She took a sip of her hot chocolate and sighed happily as the rich aroma hit her taste buds.

“What?” He stopped wiggling around, his hair having regained its normal appearance. “Oh. No, no, kitty, this isn’t for you.” He slid the plate away from it. The cat tilted its head and meowed. “Being all cute won’t work on me, I’m cuter. Meow .”

“Hmm, I’m not sure about that.” Marinette stroked the cat’s head, making it walk towards her and purr. “This one is pretty adorable. Pincushion,” she read off its tag. “How original.”

“You’re not even saying it’s a claw-se call? You wound me, Marinette.” Chat gasped, before taking a bite of his éclair. “You know, I’m not sure I could be with someone who doesn’t think I’m cute.”

Marinette rolled her eyes affectionately. “Kitty, I think you know very well what I think,” she replied, putting a hand over his on the table. He gulped down the rest of his éclair, and stared into her eyes.

Pincushion meowed again after what she knew was too long for friends to gaze at each other, and Marinette jolted, feeling herself blush. Why had she done that? She should have just gone with it, it would have made everything easier. You know, Chat Noir, I definitely don’t think you’re cute. Let’s get the bill and be on our way…

Chat Noir cleared his throat, and waved towards Cathy. “Well, this was nice, but it’s getting a little late, isn’t it? Could I have the bill, please?”

“Yes, you’re right, we should probably get going… Wait a second, what do you mean could I have the bill? We’re splitting this.”

“No we’re not. I ordered the most.” Chat shot her a pointed look.

“Fine, then let me pay for my own drink, then.”

“Meow way! I invited you! I meant it when I said my treat!”

“Yes, but…” Marinette scrambled for an excuse, cursing her brain which had decided to notice that Chat’s cheeks seemed quite pink, and that she thought it looked good on him, especially combined to his slightly dishevelled hair.

“I’ll tell you what; if you really think I don’t owe you anything, then just consider this an advance for my birthday. You can pay me back in macarons.” Chat’s eyes lit up hungrily as he interrupted her.

“Your birthday?” Marinette tilted her head quizzically. “Is that soon?”

Chat froze in his seat. Ladybug had warned him about this. They weren’t supposed to share anything about their personal lives, with anyone. Just in case it landed in the wrong ears.

Besides, his birthday wasn’t until September. Which, since he’d invited her on this date, she could interpret as him thinking their relationship would last that long. Which he really hoped it wouldn’t (the romantic one, that is - he still wanted to be friends with Marinette behind the mask).

“Erm, yeah, it’s… Next week?” He scratched the back of his neck nervously. That seemed alright in terms of timeline.

“So soon…” Marinette trailed off, looking at the empty cup before her. Her partner’s birthday seemed like something she should know, yet as much as she raked her brain, she couldn’t recall a single conversation they’d had on the topic. “Does Ladybug know?”

“Oh, no. I wouldn’t want her to make a fuss.” He waved her concern away, and swiftly stole the credit card machine from Cathy as she returned with it. He tapped his card on it, looking Marinette straight in the eye as he did.

“Chat Noir!” She cried out indignantly. She’d been too engrossed in the consideration that she couldn’t decently break up with him now when his birthday was just around the corner, to anticipate his next move.

“Sorry, Princess.” He smiled smugly as he thanked the café owner and took his receipt. “In my defence, it makes me feel better about eating so much when I came over to your place for lunch, when I’d only brought a flower as a present.”

Marinette held his gaze for a bit, and, seeing his earnestness, she sighed. “Fine.”

“Thank you.” He nodded, and then turned towards Cathy, who was awkwardly shuffling next to their table.

“Is everything alright, Ma’am?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t want to intrude, but… are you really Chat Noir?” She asked hopefully.

“See, the costume is inconspicuous!” Chat Noir exclaimed, sticking his tongue out at Marinette. “I mean, yes, I am.”

“I’d totally understand if you said no, but would you mind taking a picture with some of the cats? I’m happy to keep it to myself, and not put it up with the other cat pictures if you’d prefer, it’s just that I’m such a huge fan…”

“I’d love to!” Chat Noir jumped to his feet and started peeling his disguise off. “Would it be okay if my… Marinette was in the picture with me?” He winced at the formulation of his question. He wasn’t sure if it was worse than if he’d called her his girlfriend.

“Yes, of course! Here, let me grab Yoda, and maybe Pincushion and…”

Marinette didn’t have time to explore the warm feeling Chat calling her “his” Marinette, in a very excited and pure way, had elicited in her chest, as Cathy shoved a cat in her arms and pushed Chat next to her on the couch. She grinned for the photographer, feeling a blush creep up her cheeks.

“Purr-fect!” Chat beamed as Cathy showed them the picture.

She melted a little at how happy he looked, chatting away to figure out a way to get a copy of the picture. I can’t hurt him, not now , she thought as she nodded along and gave her number to Cathy so she could send her the shot.

What she could do, though, was try to figure out a birthday present for him. Something useful, that he’d be able to keep when she broke up with him after they broke up, probably a week after she gave it to him.

She thought about it all the way Home.

#yoda is actually a real cat from a parisian cat café #he was cute #marichat may 2021 #marichat may #miraculous ladybug #the miraculous tales of ladybug and cat noir #ml #miraculous fanfiction #miraculous fanfic #marichat #marinette dupain-cheng #chat noir #day 4: café #elle writes #love you (not)

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crystalrose555 · 3 years

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Don't make me slap you pt 20

Oh boy, this one’s a long noodle~

“How about this one?”

“No.” “Ok, this one?” “No.”

“Levi, why did you bother tagging along if you are just going to turn down every outfit?”

“Because I still think that Marley shouldn’t go. She should stay home with me.”

“Over my dead body, Levi. This is one of the biggest parties of the year, anyone who's anyone is going to be there and Mochi and I are going to be stunning together~” Levi groaned as he looked around Majolish, seeing the vast amount of customers looking for clothing and outfits for the upcoming event. Meanwhile, Marley sighed as she placed clothing back on the rack and turned to the brothers.

“Yeah, I don’t think this is going to work. You demons sure are long, have any of you heard of the terms ‘plus and petite’?”

“See? Look, it’s fate, Marley and I are just going to stay home and marathon The Magical Ruri Hanai: Demon Girl.” Levi sharply proclaimed with a triumphant smile on his face.

Asmo gave a flat look at Levi before turning to Marley with a beaming smile.

“Mochi honey, why don’t we ask Levi to make your outfit?” Levi nearly choked on air as he realized what was happening.

“Wait, Levi, you know how to sew clothing?”

“Y-yeah, I just sew together cosplays and stuff, it’s not a big deal.”

“It’s a pretty big deal to me, all I can are patch-up jobs. It’s really impressive.” Marley smiled at the nervous demon.

Levi’s face quickly heated up as a crooked smile formed across his face. Asmo, seeing his brother falling for his bait, turned and held Marley close, sealing the deal.

“Don’t worry, Mochi, I’ll design something beautiful for you so that you don’t look like a costume disaster~”

“Like hell, normie! For your information, I’ve done custom requests that have won many cosplay competitions, so I can make something that will look great on her!”

“Oh really, then I assume you won’t need any help with Mochi’s measurements~”

“Her m-measurements?” Levi stammered out.

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“Alright, make sure you are all on your best behavior. This may be a party but I don’t want an incident like last time, do you hear me?”

“Oi, why are you starin’ at me when you say that?” “Because you are usually the first one to cause trouble.”

Lucifer sighed as he took a good look at his brothers in their polished demon forms. Surely, there will be a day when they would be able to carry themselves like proper lords of Devildom but sadly this party wasn’t one of them. He peered through his fingers and took a glance down to see a grumpy Marley who had a purple bow on top of her head for the occasion. He smirked at the sight and took his leave, disappearing into the crowd to go to Diavolo’s side in the far distance. His brothers took a sigh of relief while Marley tried to scratch off the stubborn accessory.

“It’s no use, Mochi. It’s enchanted to stay on during the party.” Satan declared while stroking his chin.

She just snorted at him, flipped on her back, and flailed about wildly on the floor. Spectators stared and giggled at the fuzzy animal flopping on the marble, leaving the demon brothers looking away in embarrassment. In a haste, Mammon squatted down to her while his brothers tried to block some of the gazes.

“Hey, it ain’t comin’ off, so quit flippin’ out like a fuckin’ tuna!” He barked.

Marley stopped and barked back at Mammon’s face, causing him to fall back on his bottom. At that exact time, Asmo turned up his natural charm and drew the eyes of all the spectators to his form. Satan sighed and gave a slight nod to Beel who then picked up the irritated seal and quickly walked off with her slapping against his forearm in annoyance.

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Levi paced back and forth in a less crowded spot in the grand hall while Satan and Mammon stared at him in disapproval.

“Levi, will you stop? You’re going to wear out the floor at that rate.” Satan pointed out.

“Why am I the only one who’s worried? This is a major story event and it always gets crazy during story events!”

“Can you translate? I don’t speak nerd.” Mammon jeered.

“I’m saying something already went wrong! She shouldn’t need this long to shed her skin, she was dressed back at the house!” “Hmm, maybe that bow had a stronger effect than we thought.” Satan contemplated.

“Naw, that ain’t it, take a look.”

Suddenly, Mammon pointed in the distance, drawing his brothers’ attention to Asmo leading Marley to the opposite side of the room.

“That dirty double-crossing normie!” Levi hissed as he slithered through the crowd, leaving Satan and Mammon to follow.

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“Isn’t she the cutest when she’s next to me?” Asmo chimed as he held Marley tightly while showing her off.

Simeon and Solomon chuckled while Luke and Marley shared a sigh from Asmo’s enthusiasm of showing her off as much as possible.

“Yes, she’s very lovely, Asmo, but maybe you would like to let your friend breathe on her own.” Simeon gently suggested.

Pouting, Asmo released Marley from his grip and then latched onto Solomon’s arm. Marley straightened up and gently straightened her outfit with a sigh of relief while everyone else gave into soft laughter.

“But truthfully, you look astonishing tonight, Marley. I take it that Asmo designed it himself?” Simeon pointed out.

Marley looked down at herself with slight embarrassment before answering.

“Levi and Asmo made it for me when we couldn’t find anything on the rack. I have to say that when I heard about a party, I wasn’t expecting this.” She claimed while looking around at the extravagant hall.

“Hmph, I guess demons can throw a pretty decent party once in a while.” Luke snarked.

“Luke, don’t be rude, besides you’ve been eating everything from the desserts since we’ve got here.”

“Only for research! Besides, I wanted to see Mochi again since I can barely find her at school.” Luke stammered out with a red face.

“You really like Mochi, don’t you, Luke?” Simeon teased.

Luke turned his head with a hmph and rushed over to the dessert spread in the distance. Simeon shook his head and followed after him, leaving Marley alone with Asmo and Solomon chuckling. The music picked up and swelled as demons began to swarm the dance floor in couples.

“Marley, any chance I can have your first dance?” Solomon asked with a smile.

Marley tilted her head gently to the side.

“I guess so but I don’t know how to waltz.”

“Don’t worry, Solomon is a great dancer, Marley. I’m leaving you in good hands, so have fun~”

With that, Asmo left the duo alone to attend to his admirers. Taking his hand, Marley followed Solomon to the dance floor and slowly joined the musical current that had trapped all the dancers.

“See, you’re a natural Marley.”

“Really? I was worried I wouldn’t be able to keep up.” “I don’t think that’s what you’re really worried about. You’re worried that someone will recognize you from school, am I right? It would be bad for anyone to realize that you party-crashed this event.”

“I guess you got me there, but Levi and Asmo placed an enchantment on my dress to make me unrecognizable to everyone here unless I reveal myself to them.”

“I remember that spell, Asmo had me develop it so he could see what people say about him but that only lasted an hour or so before he wanted attention again.” He sighed causing Marley to chuckle.

“I have to admit, I’m having more fun dancing than I thought.” “I’m glad, it’s a lot easier to waltz on two feet than four flippers, huh?” “Yea-”

Marley’s mouth snapped shut as she shot a sharp glare on the white-haired sorcerer who smiled carelessly. Her grip tightened into a vice as cold air radiated from her body. Ice crystals started to form on Solomon’s shoulder as she dug her nails in.

“Easy, easy, that spell won’t last if you cause a scene,” Solomon warned with a smile.

Marley turned her head away from him, her eyes glanced over coldly.

“Come now, don’t give me the cold shoulder. I finally got a chance to talk to you. ” He chuckled.

“...How?”

“I had a bit of a feeling since seals aren’t common as witch familiars but Asmo confirmed my suspicions.”

Marley’s icy gaze returned along with her biting cold.

“Don’t be mad at Asmo, he had the best intentions. You want to go home, right? I’m surprised you lasted so long without returning to the sea but I guess hanging out with Leviathan has its advantages.”

The duo continued to dance and swirl while Marley remained silent.

“...What do you want then? There’s no reason for you to help me and you don’t seem the type to completely give in to Asmo.”

Solomon offered a warm smile in return.

“I just want a chance to talk with you, I’ve always wanted to meet a selkie. Your people are such rare creatures and whenever I find one, they always turn back into a seal and swim away.”

“Are you sure it isn’t the fact you’re a shady magician?”

“Come on, now that’s mean! ”Solomon laughed out hardily as they continued to spin.

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b1ksh88p · 4 years

Text

Be Mine ⛏

Plot Plot: You’ve been in a few relationships, unfortunately all ending in tragedy. You had a reputation for being a bad omen. Truly you were a sweet girl but it seemed like every single one of your lovers ended up dead or horrendously disfigured in the long run. This Valentine’s Day your boyfriend decides to jump ship for some blonde crushing the little hope you had left for your love life. In a slightly drunken haze you sneak into the mines for a rant about the cursed corporate holiday and to drown your sorrows in the solitude of the mines. But it seems like you’ve got a listener.

Tags/Warnings: Lots of cursing | Sprinkle of angst | Fluff

The cold air of the abandoned labyrinth did nothing to cool you down as you ventured further into its clutches. To put it lightly you were on fire. Every part of you wanted to tear someone apart. The auburn liquid sloshed around as you clumsily stomped past heaps of forgotten debris. If not for your drunken stupor you would’ve turned back. Everyone knew the horrific tale of the pickaxe cannibal murder. Although you were sure the story was somewhat embellished you’ve heard worse. Poor fuck did what he had to do to survive. Anyone else would’ve done the same, it’s human nature to do anything no matter how gruesome to survive.

“Give a girl a box of cheap chocolates and a fucking bouquet of withering roses and she’s supposed to repay ya by sucking your fucking dick and acting like yer the best thing since sliced bread.” You grumble.

The deeper you go the darker it gets. Stone walls become suffocating and everything looks like the enemy. A fight or flight response may have kicked in but you were in no place to think rationally. When your heel broke you fucking snapped.

“Stupid Roses, fuck ass chocolates, fake relationships for fake people who wouldn’t know love if it fucking stabbed them in the face!” You yell throwing the broken heel piece deep into the darkness. “A corporate holiday with no fucking insignificance! Just a money plot and a excuse to fuck and act like you like that worthless pathetic fuck you’re dating that you like them. When all 364 days you’ve been with em ya fucking loathe them!” You continue on tearing up the damned holiday in partially incoherent babbling until you hear glass break.

Despite your conditions you aren’t stupid. “Fuck is that?” You call out whilst backing up. At first you’re sure it’s a group of horny teenagers but through the gritty lights you see a single foreboding silhouette. This was where you run. Or at least you should’ve. Instead you squint your eyes like some tourist taking in the sights and step forward. “Bud y’know the mines are abandoned cuz of the poor guy who had to eat his friends right?” You call out. “I mean do you if this is your thing I support it but it’s kinda weird since you look exactly like the serial killer guy. Spot on cosplay.” You compliment. The figure doesn’t move. It doesn’t even look like he’s breathing. You feel your hairs start to stand up and goosebumps pepper you skin. It seems your liquid courage was fading.

“Welp I’ll leave you be, don’t wanna bore you with the details of this fucked up holiday.” You let out a wry laugh before turning your back on the figure. You get about 12 good steps in before the stride of death crescendos behind you. Now you were running. Your broken heels doing wonders at making this chase the easiest for your attacker. In the midst of running you take them off and throw them off behind you. Now look you weren’t aiming for the guy but when you heard the hit connect and a surprised grunt you got the feeling you were fucked. Instead of running in a straight line you dip into a little crawl space. Maybe he’d give up and fuck off you. To your horror the man crouches down and starts to crawl his way inside.

Without thinking you take the whiskey bottle and crash it on his head. “Leave me alone I don’t even like this fuckass holiday you fucking weirdo!” You cry. He looks up at you and stops trying to fit.

“Why not.” His voice was eerily calm. As if he weren’t some insane pickaxe murderer but a man.

“Well because it’s stupid and to lovy dovy. And because it feels wrong to celebrate it when such a tragedy had occurred.” You explain. “And...and I got dumped today so there’s that.” You huff.

“...You pity me?”

You shake your head. Words weren’t really your strong point and you didn’t need him thinking you were coddling him or anything. Instead you just stare into the glossy eyeholes with your own praying he’d just fuck off. You practically shit yourself when he continued to scramble through and stand up. You grab a rock and stand ready to knock him upside the head with it only have your wrist harshly grabbed mid throw.

“I don’t want your pity.”

This was it. You were gonna die. And it was gonna be painful and super fucking lame. On your headstone it would say:

“Loser girl no one cares about got dumped on Valentine’s Day...also got murdered lol”

Even though you wanted to sob and cry your eyes out you were way to stubborn to go out pleading and begging. “I was being empathetic you weirdo! We do what we gotta do to survive, and you did just that. You aren’t some crazy murderer. You’re just angry and traumatized and that’s ok!” The grip on your wrist only tightened. “Gah! Th-the system failed you dude. The whole fucking city failed you and still is failing you! You ha-have a right to be mad! I’m not excusing what you’ve done b-but shit I would’ve done the same!” You squeal feeling the blood flow completely cease as he tightened his grip.

Suddenly the pain stopped. You open your eyes and rub your poor wrist hoping the feeling would return. He seemed more docile. It was as if his entire aura had changed. The man sat down on a hunk of rubble, his weapon clenched in his grip. If you didn’t know better you could’ve sworn he was crying. It was a silent sob. Nothing overtly dramatic, kind of how like you’d expect a man who’s rarely cried to cry. It was unnerving. The only man you’ve ever seen cry was your dad and that was when he laughed to hard. This...this was gut wrenching.

This monster that was hellbent on killing you seconds ago was now a sad man huddled up in a corner like a child. You could never feel the pain he’s felt, relive the days of utter darkness and skewed rations. Never could you imagine the gritty taste of human flesh. The depravity one must have for themselves. The survivors guilt. The nightmares he must relive. He kept muttering something about the dark and the how he wasn’t a monster. How he just wanted to see the light again.

“It’s ok.”

You weren’t sure you could touch him so you just sat in front of him. He was still shaken up but the sound of your voice seemed to get through to him. “It’s ok and you’re safe. I’m here. I won’t go anywhere I’d you don’t want me to...” You could bare the cold for a night. You’d rather be frozen to death then brutally murdered.

Both of you sat there for what seemed like ages until he moved. You were on the edge of slumber before seeing a gloved hand slither towards yours. You wanted to move it. Make haste and dip but your body had become heavy. Your eyes seemingly weighed down by stones. Before you knew it he was oddly holding your hand. You saw him looking at you intently. Probably waiting for you to scream or pull away but you stayed put. One hand held up your head whilst the other was his to experience. It had probably been awhile since he’s been so vulnerable so you let him have this. It wasn’t like you had anything else to do tonight but sleep and pray that the hang over didn’t beat your ass in the morning. Before you could fall asleep he pulls you into a really awkward half ass embrace against the cold stained suit. It was far more comfortable than the back straining position you were in a second ago but man this guy was bad at ‘snuggling’. You felt like he was gonna smother you! When he found a comfortable position he rested that stupid ass mask on top of your head with a satisfied grunt before you gave up on protesting and fell asleep. How the hell were you gonna get home

When you wake there’s no cold embraces or odd masked men. Instead you find yourself wrapped in some dusty old quilt at the entrance of the mine. For a moment you think everything that occurred was a mere fever dream. A whiskey fueled hallucination. You scramble to your feet and notice a little note that had fallen from the tattered cloth. The paper, or what you hoped was paper and not dried human skin, had fairly neat handwriting. It was short and morbidly sweet.

Thank you.

There was a part of you that was absolutely mortified. The note solidified your suspicions of what had taken place last night. But the other part of you was strangely elated. You turn to the mine and put your hands to your mouth to amplify your words. “THANKS FOR NOT KILLING ME ILL MAKE IT UP TO YOU!!!!!!” You yell happily before heading back into town. You were pretty sure he didn’t hear you but it calmed you to know that he not only spared you but someone actually appreciated your presence.

This was definitely not your final encounter ⛏

#⛏

#slasher #horror #slashers #harry warden #my bloody valentine #slasher x s/o #slasher x reader #im not good at writing lmao #potential series maybe idk #i really loved writing this 🙈#harry warden x reader

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hermitcraftheadcanons · 4 years

Text

Zombie Apocalypse AU Masterpost

"There are a few groups that aren't aware of each other's existence. (Architechs, NHO, Convex, ect.) The NHO are made up of all men from millitaries across the globe. Cleo isn't a zombie either, she is a zombie whisperer. She can communicate slightly with zombies and they aren't usually negotiable."

(Paraphrased,) from @creator0fchaos' Zombie Apocalypse AU entry for The Follower Input AU.

Headcanons to start us off:

-Convex were two men from a small buisness. Jellie is also around but she's injured and is mostly carried around by Scar.

-Etho got bit pretty early on and everyone in the NHO knows they're gonna have to do something about it but they're putting it off. Etho seems fine.

-Bdubs is slowly going completely feral. (Possible reference to season 5's jungle feral?) DocM joked he had rabies and the two got into a fight.

-Iskall lost his eye after Mumbo accidentally slashed him with a knife while trying to protect Grian from a hoarde. Iskall ended up getting lumped in with the Architech group because Mumbo feels super guilty about it.

-Xisuma and Keralis came into contact with the NHO for a bit. Keralis and Bdubs nearly became friends but Beef and Doc scared em away. Angst.

-The zombies fear False.

-XB originally planned to just stay in his house and not go out. He was prepared, okay? He had tinned food to last him at least a decade, zombie proof armour and god knows what else supplies. His friend, Hypnotizd, is fleeing to there because he knows XB knows what he's doing.

-Wels wears armour because it's the best he had. Same with Biffa and Xisuma. In this AU, they probably wouldn't be wearing armour if not given the circumstances.

-Jevin has turned this into a game to kill as many zombies as possible.

-Impulse, Tango and Zedaph are all just having a good time trying to survive in the woods. Their main goal is to open a tin of beans Zed has but they don't have a tin opener.

-Rendog found a tin of dog food while scavenging. He was hungry and ate it. He now has an addiction to tinned dog food.

-Wels wears medieval armour in the zombie au because at one point he was trapped in a museum by a horde and like, the armour was technically there. On display. No one was using it.

-Etho wears the mask as kind of a mental reminder not to bite his friends.

-Joe and Stress are hanging with Cleo and even if the small group isn’t the best equipped or prepared, they have thrived thanks to Cleo’s ability to whisper to zombies. It might not stop the zombies but it buys the group time to escape.

–Zombie!Etho is hiding the fact that he’s turning, if not already turned into a zombie, from the rest of the NHO because he loves being with his friends. The problem is that it’s getting harder every day to control himself and he’s constantly fighting between telling the rest of them about it, and having them put him out of his misery to keep them safe, or just keep hiding it, afraid that one day it’ll be too late he won’t be able to control himself and bite them all.

-Someone gets like a really bad case of the flu, this is problem because usually survivors have to stay in the move consistently to survive and that’s hard when someone is really sick, it also bad because all pharmacies have been raided and there’s no medicine.

-Grian originally came from Sam and Taurtis's group but due to Sam's insanity, Grian pulls away and went surviving on his own. That when Mumbo came to photo and knowing that he won't survive the zombie wasteland alone, Grian took it as his task to convince Mumbo make a partnership with him.

-Joe was playing D&D when the outbreak started, and Cleo was in his group. They treat it as a game sometimes, though they toned it down a bit when Stress joined because she was still grieving Iskall. Stress makes them stay around where she lost Iskall, but Joe and Cleo don't mind because she has a base set up there.

-For no fault of his own, the nHo crumbles while doc is in control. They had been losing members for a while but when beef, Bdubs, etho, and doc part ways it’s the draw the broke the camels back, so doc is the only one left of the nho, the rest of them, having either left or died. Doc blames himself for everything going so wrong.

-For the zombie AU because nobody's representing my boy X: Xisuma is known as a master at evading the zombies (he can fight them well if needed but he is best at avoiding incidents altogether). He claims to wear the mask for practical reasons, but what the others don't know is that it hides how terrified he is. He hides his fear because he doesn't want people to lose confidence in him, but getting turned and losing control of his mind is his worst nightmare.

-TFC’s gone for a bunker theme for s6+s7, so maybe, he finds a nHo member, and just drags them down into his bunker, probably chewing them out for walking around alone?

-For the zombie au is ethos mask like a medical one, or was he in a kakashi cosplay for some reason and kept it because all the pockets were practical and then started wearing the mask because he got infected.

-After Stress and Iskall reunite, Joe and Cleo join the Architechs. False joins them after seeing Cleo whisper to the zombies and realizing that the group severely lacks fighters. I need the hermits to (at least mostly) get together!

-TFC is obviously a disaster prepper who has a fully furnished bunker that can house a lot of people. He has been broadcasting this to other survivors using a radio. Unfortunately, he lives in the middle of nowhere and it is a trek to get there, but the Vault (as he calls it) is self-sustaining. (I know this is obvious, but nobody has done anything with TFC yet, and that's a shame)

-Even though he’s scared about not being alert enough to protect his team, Xisuma hides his sickness, which is easy with the helmet, because he’s the leader and he can’t be weak. Due to the pain of the flu and the heat of fever staying trapped inside his helmeted eventually falls to his knees and breaks down.

-Mumbo is wearing a suit because he was on his way to a job interview when the outbreak started, he just never bothered to change clothes.

-Etho used to love making up little tunes, and that hasn't changed since he was bitten. Nevertheless, the others in his group haven't heard him make music since. He blames a lack of instruments because of being on the run from zombies. The morning after he left, though, they find an old recorder where his sleeping bag was, and once they hit play they're greeted with songs in a familiar style, backed by improvised instruments.

Even without saying anything they *know* what had happened, and the recorder is taken along on their journey to a safe haven. Sometimes, when the feeling of missing their friend gets too much, they put on the music in the evening and just allow themselves to cry.

-Well, i was thinking maybe stress was a loner, but like, not completely alone, she was with someone else, probably Cleo or Iskall, but they got bit, she felt too bad to kill them so she wanders around with a zombie friend on a madeup leash, sorry if it sounds sad but i like angst and it seemed like a good headcanon -🐿️

-TFC is the one to get to Beef and break down the wall he had built up after a while of wandering alone after breaking off from the nHo. He finds Beef fighting a group of zombies and after observing how violently Beef was hacking down the zombies, TFC did not see a hardened fighter, but a broken man and went to talk with him.

-Alternate timeline idea when grian was still traveling with Sam and tortoise. Sam end up doing something that results in grian and tortoise getting bitten, because of that Sam leaves them. Now grian is not a normal zombie he doesn’t crave human flesh but rabbit flesh because he’s so hell-bent on getting revenge for what Sam did to him and tortoise, tortoise ends up tagging along. Cleo ends up finding them and discover their not normal zombies and inviting them to stay with her group.

-For the zombie apocalypse AU, RE: Cleo and Joe's DND game - imagine them going into a fight and just screaming "ROLL INITIATIVE!"

-Ok but imagine if like that one anon said, grian was already a zombie but like, one that only wants animals. I imagine they could probably get him to behave normally and imagine the mumbo turning angst but grian is already a zombie and just helps him not loose himself.

-For the Zombie Au, instead of killing Mumbo before he turns, the group locks him in a room and leave him there in hopes that they can bring him back once theres a cure. Whether or not, Mumbo wants to be saved is up to you. If Cleo's still in the group then you could have her "talk" to Zombie Mumbo for bonus angst.

-After finding out that Etho's still out there, Beef becomes more determined than ever to help find a cure. In the bunker he often ends up buzzing around Scar and Cub, desperate for something to do to help. It can get a bit awkward but they understand he's just desperate to see his friend again and are usually able to provide small tasks to help him keep his mind busy (with something other than worrying for Etho) while they continue working toward a cure.

(All those above in red are from our community's lovely Anons!)

-Vintagebeef was the first to notice something was off about Etho. He asked Etho about it but Etho assured him he was fine. Beef asked, 'what if you spread it to the other people in group?' Etho claimed that 'if it was contagious without physical contact, everyone would have caught it by now.'

-Speaking of Vintage Beef, he feels the most lonely and hopeless out of all the NHO members. Etho is probably gonna die from being a zombie soon. Bdubs and Doc are always at each other's throats and Beef fears one of them may accidentally kill the other. He's terrified that he may be the only one left.

-Hypnotizd is the most likely to be bit next. Dude’s running to XB’s house basically defenseless until he gets there, we have no clue how far he has to travel.

(-@tomcatacaphe.)

-You could very easily bring s5 nho angst into this au... Etho leaves to protect his friends from himself, Beef leaves because he can't bare to see his friends fight so much, Bdubs and Doc get in a fight and Bdubs storms off, and Doc is left to try and lead the nho by himself (since you said it's a kind of paramilitary thing here). Ouch.

-Knowing Mumbo's love for bunkers and the dragon bro bunker from s6, the architechs have probably settled somewhere underground to have a somewhat normal life. And, given the combined tech prowess of Iskall and Mumbo, they could easily rig up defence systems to help.

-in regards to that ask about X getting ill, maybe that's where Keralis joins him! He's totally the type to stay with you when sick! :D

-Continuing from that anon, if I may. So far we have Griam, Mumbo, Iskall, Stress, Joe, Cleo, and False all living together... The chaos xD ! You could even bring in hermit challenges as smth they make to, y'know, lighten the mood :D

(-@rebloging-extravaganza.)

-OOF I never thought about Taurtis wandering alone but that's sad. Iskall was also originally with Stress. They are wandering together until a snow storm separates them. Iskall finds Mumbo and Grian and then Mumbo thought he was a zombie cause this man just came out of nowhere. Grian and Mumbo took him in. When Iskall came back to the place where him and Stress gets separated, they saw each other again. What's the first thing he did? He hugged the hell outta her.

-Stress was tired cause the next thing she knew after the storm is that she’s alone. So, she thought for the worst, she thought Iskall was dead. She made a small shelter in the place, tamed a lot of dogs and even made a gravestone for Iskall.

When Stress saw him, her first thought was to get the weapon from the sheath and attack but Iskall started talking. The next thing she knew was she is crying and hugging him tight.

(-@penumbra-rui.)

-After Beef leaves the nHo, he becomes quite a loner. He gets a nickname from other groups even though they don’t know who he is: the Butcher. He gets the name because when groups are being seized down by dozens of zombies, Beef comes in and kills the zombies - every single one - with only his token bloodied apron left behind, waving on a stick. He has hundreds of those aprons and is never seen killing the zombies by the besieged groups.

-When Impulse runs away, he runs into BDubs while in a run down brick building with part of it having been blown up in what looks like a plane bomb. The building seems to have been a local demolition business known simply as ‘Boomers.’

-Before the apocalypse began, Scar was an upper level agent of the FBI tasked with protecting top level cancer researchers across the United States. One of those top cancer researchers was patient 0 and was the original discoverer of the zombie infection (patient 0 was not a Hermit). However, Scar believes it’s his fault for not having intervened when he could have. It’s now his mission to find a way to fix it. He comes across business mogul Cub, who may have the funds to help.

-https://hermitcraftheadcanons.tumblr.com/post/618407386827423744/hypno-has-been-living-with-xb-for-the-last-two XB and Hypno meet: A post too long to copy paste here.

(-@creator0fchaos.)

-After Tango explodes the beans Impulse claims he’s leaving. Z and T think he just kidding but when they wake up the next morning Inpulse is gone. Now Zed and Tango are on a mission to find impulse while also terrified that he’s been bit.

-Continuation of the impulse leaves thing, tango and Zed find and save him just in time. They all reunite and are happy. The problem is that Zed was bit in the process, for now he’s binding it, because tango and impulse were so happy to be reunited and zed didn’t want to ruin it.

-Zed never ends up telling his friends that he was bit, the figure out themselves a few days after it happens. At first they’re mad that zed hid it from them, telling him how he could have turned and hurt them. But a minute late they break down in tears realizing what the bit means for them all. They will discuss what to do in the morning but for now they will grieve.

-Even more of the zit story: In the morning they decide to keep zed around until he really starts turning, they will then kill him so he’s not a zombie, zed protests this wanting them to kill him now, fearing for the other’s safety, but he’s actually really happy to have a bit longer with his friends. Impulse feels guilty because this never would have happened if he hadn’t left, tango also feels guilty because if he never exploded the beans, then impulse wouldn’t have left and zed would be fine.

(-@lookitsspacekween.)

-Xisuma is known as a master at evading the zombies (he can fight them well if needed but he is best at avoiding incidents altogether). He claims to wear the mask for practical reasons, but what the others don't know is that it hides how terrified he is. He hides his fear because he doesn't want people to lose confidence in him, but getting turned and losing control of his mind is his worst nightmare.

-Xisuma could be that person who gets the flu from an earlier submission! It would really scare him because of not being as alert or functional to avoid the zombies. I feel like he doesn't have a set group of people he stays with, so someone would probably find him holed up somewhere with a bad fever and decide to stay with him.

-If Mumbo ever gets bitten his zombie form is his cursed skin from after he sold his bits, it NEEDS to be lol.

-I came here to post immune!Rendog only to find that someone already did! Anyway, Ren is immune, which is good because the man gets bitten A LOT (the diggity dawg is not the best fighter). I feel like he gets lost and comes across the NHO base, and Doc won't let him in at first because he's covered in bites. He probably puts him in a containment cell out of typical Doc paranoia but eventually figures it out.

-Doc tried his hardest to be distant with Ren (because he thought he was going to turn/die soon and didn't want to get attached) but Ren just asks questions and talks 24/7 until Doc gives in and talks to him out of loneliness. Doc probably keeps him in containment for a really long time, first for fear of him turning and then because he's afraid Ren will leave (like everyone else left him.)

-Ren is very calm and cheery through the whole containment thing because he FULLY believes this is all a dream. Like, okay, this German robot man says I'm going to die in a week? Cool! Have to remember to write this one down when I wake up. Doc cannot convince him otherwise and it frustrates him to no end (when he does realize it's real though he's going to have a full breakdown.)

-Mumbo focuses in way too hard when he's working and blocks out everything else. If he gets bitten it will be because he was too absorbed in a redstone project and forgot to check his surroundings.

-When Mumbo gets bitten, Grian makes it his duty to comfort him and keep him calm until the end. Iskall, however, is overcome by guilt. He had been out for supplies when it happened; usually it was his job to watch Mumbo's back while he worked, alternating between fighting zombies and giving jokingly snarky commentary on Mumbo's redstone. He definitely blames himself and won't let the others out of his sight afterward.

-A break from angst! Zombie whisperer!Cleo's talents work by communicating with the infection in the zombies' bodies. Immune!Rendog has the infection, it just doesn't affect him in a dangerous way. Therefore, Cleo is now a Ren whisperer. Hilarity ensues.

-Once Xisuma starts feeling a bit better, he organizes his group to dig underground tunnels for people to travel with less chance of zombie attack (construction Keralis is a big help!) The leadership comes naturally to him, and the hard work is a good way of building up his strength again. Working late into the night on the tunnels is also the perfect excuse not to sleep....

-(post-cure). It takes several weeks, but Doc finally manages to find Etho. When he receives the cure his first words are "Thank you" and "I'm so sorry" (like a true Canadian). While his mind is returned to him, some parts of his body are too decayed to be salvaged, but that's no obstacle for Doc. He builds custom cybernetics and eagerly welcomes his old friend back to the land of the living.

(-@shadeswiftdraws.)

-Mumbo, being really good with redstone, obviously has anti-zombie weapons he made himself. One day he goes out scavenging to find Grian fighting zombies armed with only a large hunting knife, a sledgehammer (probably from whatever build he was working on at the time of the outbreak), and his tiny gremlin speed and agility. (-@my-cat-is-a-bastard.)

-One of the Hermits (up to you which one) is somehow immune to the zombie virus. The catch: they don't know until they get bit. Them and the rest of their group is scared and prepares to kill them when the transformation is complete, but it never happens. The scientist of their group does a couple of tests and discovers their immunity!

-I was thinking about it for a bit, and I doesn’t seem like there’s been much done with Ren... (besides eating dog food lol)

-Happy ending time 'cause I can't stand seeing them all turn! Once Doc realizes Ren is immune, they venture out trying to find another group to create a cure. After gathering some/most of the other Hermits, they come across Scar, and they work on and create a cure/vaccine. The rest of the Hermits take it, and maybe they're even able to cure Etho and the other zombified Hermits! (Sorry if this is too cheesy/happy; I just want everything to be okay, y'know?)

-All everyone speaks of are the physical changes, but one must set the record straight: No matter how horrifying the outward changes are, the mental and emotional ones are far worse. Your friend’s behavior will take a turn for the worse. They’ll become more aggressive, more impulsive, less cautious. They’ll start fights for a laugh, they’ll yell and thrash and scream at the mildest inconvenience, their mind will devolve and fade away. By the time you must say your goodbyes, they will no longer be the friend you knew. They will be childish, angry, insane, and horrible in every way. Even if they fight the illness and outer changes, their behavior will still be impacted and subject to change.

Be wary of this if you choose to let your friend live, and prepare not only your body, but your mind, for the worst.

-Patient Zero could be GenerikB.

(-@12u3ie.)

-I feel like team ZIT keeps putting off taking care of Impulse. Like Etho, Impulse just keeps fighting the changes. They all expect him to wither away, fall down and die one day, isn't that how it always goes?, but that's not how the infection works. They don't get sicker and weaker, in fact most of the people who die from one bite actually die from gangrene and/or septic shock. (Human mouths are GROSS.) But our boys don't know this. They've taken good care of his bite, even if it felt pointless at first, and avoided infection, and as a result he's physically completely healed now. So they end up never NEEDING to kill Impulse, but at what cost? He's constantly anxious about losing control. He can barely even sleep, what if it makes him sleepwalk and he bites his friends then? Tango and Zedaph see him changing still. They see his skin getting pale and dull, his eyes growing hollow, even see he's losing a lot of weight, but they put it up to his sleeplessness, to how they have to remind him, almost force him to eat real food. What sort of life does Impulse really have now? Is it really better to just end it? (What if he and Etho meet?)

Sorry, I've just seen the way this subversion of the Zombie Bite = Zombie Dead trope is going with Etho, and I HAD to get bitten!Impulse in on it as well. Now I can't stop thinking about exactly how this virus works, so I'm gonna hit post before I get WAY too into it and make a text wall.

-https://hermitcraftheadcanons.tumblr.com/post/618456845293633536/the-first-thing-you-notice-is-the-bite-it-stings How the virus works. (Tw gore, worms.)

(-@basaltdragon.)

-Bdubs definitely slept through the beginning of the apocalypse and had no idea what was going on for a while. He just kept doing his normal thing until someone told him what was happening. (-@miss-oleum.)

-I saw a post that mentioned Taurtis in the zombie apocalypse au, so I think this idea would be cool? I think from context clues Etho and Beef are kinda traveling together, but what if they run into Pause! Pause is super stoked to finally be around people in this mess (Team Canada, no less!!) but the dread kicks in when he notices the look in Etho's eyes, and how much paler he is than usual. Maybe he even notices the signs before Beef (who prolly def. noticed but is in severe denial about it). (-@853dragons.)

-https://hermitcraftheadcanons.tumblr.com/post/618477192694939648/you-know-what-im-just-going-to-add-my-2-cents-on

-To the surprise (and delight) of everyone in the Bunker, Beef is a deasent Redstoner. He's still a bit rusty at it tho. But he Knows how to work around those dust if he put his mind it. And after the... Insident with Mumbo, they need all the help they can get with the Redstone. And the first time he fix a redstone contraption on his own he said to his spectators (any Hermit of your choice), "What? You thought I was all Beef but no Brains?"

(-@tearosepedall.)

And now, Writing!

-It's the hunger that's the worst. Gnawing and ever-present, no matter what he eats, he can't escape the emptiness that's settled into his stomach. Etho stares dully down at the can someone - probably Beef - had pushed into his hands, before spearing a handful of syrupy fruit and swallowing it. It does little to satiate the hunger crawling through his every being. And why would it? It's not fruit he's hungry for anymore. (Anon.)

-Fear curls around him like an unwanted friend, a fiend of mist and smoke that blankets his nerves and quickens his heart. He stares dully at the scene before him, at the massacre his group had just barely avoided, as an awful storm of what-ifs swirl through his mind. His hands shake. "X?" Someone asks, "Are you okay?" Xisuma sucks in a deep breath, curls his hands into fists, and turns towards Keralis. "I'm fine," he lies. (Anon.)

-"Hello there. If you are listening to this, we are gone and long forgotten. This base of ours is yours to use now. I'm sure there'll still be some supplies and cans of food left-" "Not if I eat them first!" "Gr- Grian! I'm recording!" "I know that, you spoon." Grian took a few steps forward and stuck his face up to the camera lens. "Hi there!" "Grian! This is serious work." "C'mon, we're always serious! What's wrong with a little bit of fun during the zombie apocalypse?" (12u3ie.)

-(Biffa's POV) I met Xisuma a couple weeks ago. He saved my life, and I joined his crew. We're good friends now, and I hope he trusts me. It just seems like there's something off about him, but not in a zombie way. The way he hesitates before saying he's fine, how his eyes widen for just a moment before battle... the way he mumbles in his sleep about an evil counterpart... (12u3ie.)

-Hands corral him, pushing him forward. Mumbo twists and writhes, trying to escape from the iron grip pulling him forward. Where his tongue still capable of forming complex sounds, he would be protesting vehemently. Nowadays, words are harder to come by, too clunky and heavy for his tongue to try. As it is, he can barely even manage the word no. 'I don't want this!' He screams, but only Cleo spares him a glance. Her eyes shine, wet with tears and pity that turns his stomach.

"We'll find a cure," Someone else promises. From a haze of shattered memories, a face forms. It takes another moment for him to remember a name. Grian. His voice is flat, toneless, but edged with iron and a promise. With one final pull, he's dragged into the windowless room, lined with lockers and benches. Mumbo's breath rattles heavily in his chest, as the iron door swings shut behind him. "I'm so sorry." Whispers seep through the thin walls. "I can't believe he bit Ren." (Anon.)

More to be added!

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cetaceans-pls · 3 years

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Fandom: Batman - All Media Types Relationships: Jason Todd/Bruce Wayne Characters: Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne Additional Tags: Established Relationship, Attempted Kidnapping, Date Night at an Aquarium, Gone Terrifically Wrong, Dom/sub Undertones Series: Part 4 of Third Thursdays

A plainclothes mission at the Gotham Aquarium quickly goes off the rails when Jason and Bruce find themselves on the wrong end of a kidnapping attempt. A billion-dollar target out of the Batsuit, Bruce gets taken.

Jason comes fetch.

Happy late Lunar New Year + Valentine’s! Why do I keep forgetting to post things to my tumblr! Life’s full of mysteries!

Anyways, please enjoy the weird result of me thinking too much about aquariums and helmets that look like jackals, and have a good week 🙏

Fic also available below the cut:

Jason studiously doesn’t mess with his cuffs, tug on his necktie, or pull off his sunglasses. He hates being forced to manifest in a suit and tie; it’s a misery every single time he has to. However, knee-deep in the bowels of a pandemic that just won’t freakin’ quit, needs must. Sometimes a man’s got to cosplay as a high-tier bodyguard to fit in a date night on a Thursday, so sometimes a man will.

He fiddles with his earpiece, expression serious even though he’s really just trying to get the volume up on his audiobook. It adds to the aura of stern, scary bodyguard man, and it means that the wobbly-lipped, handsy director cuts short his long, long thank you speech to Bruce and waves them inside for their all-access tour of the Gotham Aquarium after dark. It’s a performance he and Bruce have repeated for most of a year now, and it’s the main avenue for Jason to work through his massive collection of audiobooks. Once a month or so Billionaire Fuckboy Bruce Wayne will get it into his head to book a library or a park or a zoo or a planetarium all to himself for fuck knows what, and he’ll be good and won’t break any social distancing rules or any furniture because it’s just him and his bodyguard staying through the night. Come morning the establishment will find themselves the recipients of a donation generous enough to keep their heads above water, while Brucie floats away on a cloud of expensive scotch to find his next flex.

Bruce has more money to his name than anybody ever, ever should, and these days he uses it to buy literal breathing space for much of Gotham’s public facilities struggling to stay afloat.

This is their first visit to the aquarium, because the social media intern-turned-manager here had managed to keep finances fiercely healthy by selling videos of aquarium creatures with personalised messages. Dick himself had commissioned a 30-second video of an aquarium worker whispering ‘wiggle wiggle wiggle’ into a microphone while the camera zoomed in and out from the moon jelly exhibition, and the number of Gothamites keeping their spirits up exclusively thanks to a video of a gently floating manatee quietly murmuring “You’re doing your best” is alarming.

That’s why it’s taken them a while to work their way here, but Jason has to admit he’s looking forward to a relaxing night walking around in mood lighting with B, heckling the occasional fish. Their last date night keeping Gotham’s ‘non-essential’ attractions open had been at the rec centre in the Narrows that’s been shut for months. Romance was thin on the ground there, because mid-date the Bat had taken over Bruce and decided that they owed it to the people of the city to make a few simple adjustments to improve water quality in the swimming pools.

Elbow-deep in an ancient pump and filtration system, Jason’s hand had gotten tangled in something while pulling out the filters. It had turned out to be a tangled, sopping wet mass of human hair the size of a cat, and for the first time in a while, he had wished he was dead and actually kind of meant it.

Tonight, though, promises to be smoother sailing. The aquarium’s not in dire disrepair, the staff have been instructed to keep out of their way and respect their privacy, and he has burritos and two bottles of mini-Merlot tucked in holsters that would hold guns on a lesser man. It’s perfect prep for a relaxing supper in front of the open water tank.

The director leads them in through the main entrance, still talking Bruce’s ear off while he gestures nervously around them and swipes at his thinning white hair. Jason follows after them, hand to his ear as he says a bunch of menacing gibberish into empty air. He and Bruce are incredibly dull on nights out like this, and have by Alfred’s decree been cut-off from work comms to decrease the chance of anyone on duty being rude jealous assholes. No one’s listening right now, but growling ‘Code Esper’ into his jacket has the director sweating even harder, which is the intended outcome. With a messily-babbled “Goodnight and goodbye Mister Wayne!” and an unwelcome pat on the small of Bruce’s back, the man disappears the way they came, heavy glass doors swinging shut.

Finally, the night’s starting to look better.

First thing Jason does is rip off his stupid sunglasses. It’s certainly an Expected Look for a bodyguard, but it’s 11 PM on a weekday night and on top of it being a hideous accessory, it sets his teeth on edge to have his vision obscured even while off-duty.

He also whips his tie off, because there’s a time and a place for choking and it’s not here, not yet. Jason runs his hand through his hair to break through the gel and scowls to see the black residue on his fingers. Makeup on his face, makeup in his hair, makeup pasted on to hide him in plain sight when other people get to go to Wendy’s barefaced and hand-in-hand as they pleased, urgh.

The world’s extra rough on the legally dead, even if he’s immediately mollified by Bruce sidling up to him, close enough that their hips bump and their fingers tangle.

Christ, rich man shampoo smells a whole lot different to the stuff you can get by the half-gallon in your local bodega. Jason is tempted to bite Bruce, find the closest cleaning cupboard and get up to some defilement, but it's a big aquarium and it’s a long night, so there's no rush.

The CCTV cameras aren't live, no red lights blinking, and it's supremely helpful how much privacy gets afforded to a billionaire and his potential debauchery in return for a big cheque. Jason slings an arm around Bruce's waist, because these are hard rights hard earned, and just grins at Bruce's long-suffering sigh. "Shut the hell up, this is crazy romantic. What do you want to see first?"

The answer is, inexplicably, the tropical freshwater exhibit, where they spend a solid half hour with an arapaima swimming up-down up-down a false river designed to look like the Amazon, their tiny bottles of wine in hand. Jason loses his mind first, pacing along the tank to follow the path of a fish longer than he or Bruce are tall, but within a minute Bruce is in lockstep with him as they stalk an innocent fish while they talk about not very much at all.

Bruce looks at the murkiness of the water and the cinematic dead leaves floating all over, expression gravely concerned. “They could do with a bigger aquarium.”

Jason groans, thumb absently picking at the label on his bottle. “Stop communing with the fish. It’s only barely cute when Damian gets really intense about animals, and the charm’s completely gone once you crack 6 feet.”

In his head, though, he can’t help but feel that yeah, more space for the arapaima would be nice, but hey.

Jason’s singularly terrible with small, tight spaces, so.

“C’mon,” he says, nudging Bruce so hard it’s mostly a shove. “Time to find out what sharks look like after-hours.”

“What’s normal operating hours for a shark?” Bruce asks just to be a pain, easily going where lead.

“Keep at it and I’ll shove you in the tank so you can find out.”

There’s a loose ceiling tile near the information counter in the main hall, right by the entrance leading to the enormous, floor-to-ceiling open water exhibit. There's a loose ceiling tile there because Jason had cased this joint a week ago, the way he checks out every place Bruce decides to take them to on nights like this, and that’s where he had decided to hide his kit. While Bruce walks from end to end of the tank, committing to pointless memory the names and traits of a hundred fish, Jason climbs up and into the ceiling to grab their party pack.

Tepid beer, pretzels, spicy chicken-flavoured chips, wet wipes. A heavy blanket, a bottle of hand sanitiser, Alfred’s cold-brew tea that could grow chest hairs on a rock. He’s even got a bottle of antacids to cover burrito-related maladies shoved into a first-aid kit so complete it could maybe, just maybe, regrow a limb. He dusts the heavy blanket off before he spreads it across the floor, where they have the best view of the most unbearably beautiful manta ray that could possibly exist.

Jason maybe preens a little when Bruce comes back from the edge and greets the spread with a bit of a smile. “Hurry it up already, dinner’s gonna get cold.”

The burritos get pulled out of their holsters as Bruce settles on the ground in the exacting, ginger manner of a man of a certain age whose knees have unfortunately passed their prime. They sit and eat while inoffensive jazz plays quietly over the speakers and fish go up and down and all around.

Ah, beats the ball of human hair by a country mile.

“This is nice,” Bruce says quietly, shrugging out of his coat and loosening his tie. There’s a sharp, bright gloss to him when he’s in Bruce-Wayne-Public-Performance mode, but Jason likes dishevelled, run-down Bruce who’s a little absent-minded and a lot human the best.

He likes this Bruce he’s earned.

“One of our better dates.” Jason holds up his bottle of beer expectantly, and feels profoundly smug when Bruce raises his to knock in a gentle toast. “Fuck, I can’t remember the last time I came to the aquarium. Must have been before.”

“Same,” Bruce says, and Jason wonders for a brief, harrowing moment if this holds true for the zoo and the planetarium and the rec centre and the public library and the-

He doesn’t get the time to linger on the thought and ponder, check to see if this is Bruce on a mission to form new memories in places that had held some from before a death in the family, because they’re interrupted by the sudden scream of a fire alarm.

They both tense where they’re sat, at the ready to fly into a fight in a suit and tie, but wherever the emergency might be it isn’t in here with them. Jason looks around, tries to catch smoke on the air, but it’s all stillness and the scent of disinfectant spray. Weird, that there’s no quiet stampede of night-time crew rushing to rescue their watery wards, no security guard sent on a quick mission by the director to save their cash cow.

Jason’s got a bad feeling about this. He gets to his feet and hauls the bag containing the first aid kit and other supplies up on his shoulder. “What the hell is going on?”

Bruce is fiddling with his phone, working through the security system of the aquarium. “All the cameras are down, so we have no visuals. The fire alarm in the deep sea exhibit was tripped manually, not by the smoke detector.” He frowns. “Carbon monoxide monitors didn’t register anything, and the sprinklers haven’t been triggered either. Could just be a fluke.”

Bruce doesn’t sound convinced, and neither is Jason. Assuming harmlessness is a great way to incur harm, and that’s something you learn damn early after starting up a vigilante lifestyle. Jason can only assume foul play of some sort, likely relating to Bruce, but there’s no way that an aquarium as big as this wouldn’t have night staff; civilians might be in danger.

Fuck, give him gross filters jammed with 27 years worth of dead skin cells over this. “I’ll go and check on the deep sea room.” If there’s no trouble, Jason’s mighty tempted to create some. “You should head back to the entrance, meet up with the sweaty director dude and evacuate. I’ll catch up with you after everything’s handled.”

Bruce looks pretty irritated to be asked to meekly make his way to safety, but pulling a Bat move right now would be incredibly bad optics. They both know his hands are tied, and Bruce sighs and climbs to his feet. “If I don’t get an update from you in fifteen minutes, I’m coming back in,” he tells Jason, crumpling the foil of his burrito and fastidiously stowing it away in the pocket of his slacks. “Comms check.”

They both tap at their discreet earpieces, and both wince at the screech of feedback when the comms activate and pair.

“Fifteen’s plenty.” Jason hikes his kit bag further up his shoulder, and pretends he’s not embarrassed when he tries to activate night vision on a mask he isn’t wearing.

“Jason,” Bruce says, calm, commanding, and quiet.

“What?”

“Be good.” It’s said like an order no one could want to refuse, but before Jason can get over his shivery shock and snap something back, Bruce is waving and disappearing out the hall, pulling on the skin of a simpler man.

Jason rubs at his neck and misses his helmet more keenly. This unbearable transparency of being; almost thirty whole ass years old and it’s astonishing how underneath it all he can still be so hideously eager to please.

“Please let there be a fucking crime,” Jason murmurs to himself, and disappears.

There is a crime, but it’s not even a good one.

Jason breaks into the deep sea exhibit through a utility hatch designed to access the cooling pipes for an elaborate sea sponge display. He’s quiet and mostly invisible when he surfaces in the room, and after a minute of letting his eyes adjust to the curated darkness, it’s easy to spot a man in a balaclava with a gun trained on the only door leading to the room.

He also quickly spots the terrified hostages huddled together under a display of what looked like demon jellyfish made of LEDs and blood. It’s easy to see the shape of the crime now; set off an alarm in an isolated area with only one known entrance and exit, and subdue people as they arrive. As long as the alarm kept blaring, staff would keep on coming, and by not triggering any of the smoke or carbon monoxide detectors the fire department remain clueless.

Excellent plan, great for catching anyone who hadn’t, oh, spent a solid 12 hours going through the schematics of the entire building out of an obsessive desire to create a space a Bat could relax in. Jason counts 11 hostages and just the one gunman, and tries not to groan.

There’s not much money to be had by robbing an aquarium, and judging by the degree of weaponry this isn’t some anti-aquarium demonstration organised via Facebook groups, powered by pandemic blues. No one’s liberating a shark or freeing Willy or anything nearly as fun. Ringing the alarm’s just an excellent, excellent way to control the movement of people.

There are only two ways to go; towards the fire or towards safety.

If you’re looking to net yourself a big fish, two small teams with a couple of free-roaming agents would be enough to ensure a catch rate of almost 100%. Jason highly, highly doubts that this whole song-and-dance was designed to abduct a frazzled researcher wearing a fuzzy sweater in radiant orange, or a stern-faced woman in a janitor’s uniform who looks alarmingly close to hulking out and breaking out of her bonds. He highly, highly suspects that there’s a reason outside of billionaire-envy to explain why the director of the aquarium had looked so dodgy and sweaty when he had welcomed Bruce.

Jason’s proven unfortunately right when the radio at the gunman’s hip crackles to life.

“We got Wayne.”

Of course they did. Bruce could hardly go to town and take down a bunch of armed kidnappers, especially if there are civilians near him. Jason tugs out his phone to update the Cave while the gunman grunts his reply and moves to turn off the fire alarm. Alfred asks Jason if he needs reinforcements as the guy tells the huddled terrified masses that he’ll kill them if they move, and Jason texts back a ‘no thank you’ as the goon strides out of the room, locking the door behind him.

The group of tied-up people burst into panicked chatter as soon as the gunman’s gone, and Jason uses the noise as cover for unzipping his bag and getting changed. Unlike Bruce, pulling on his second skin takes a lot longer, but once Jason tugs his red hood up and shucks off the bodyguard suit to stretch in his skin-tight armour, he feels twice the man and thrice as happy.

There’s no gun in the bag, there’s no gun anywhere near him, because it’s a self-imposed rule Jason has recently given himself for date nights. Bruce has been known to use anything from a screwdriver taped to a plank of wood to his literal bare stupid hands to pry things open in a whole-hearted effort to avoid having a crowbar anywhere in the Manor or in his life, and Jason wanted to repay like with like.

Doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck to not have his go-to weapon, though. He sighs as he straps a taser strong enough to knock God unconscious to his thigh, and sighs again when he pulls out a sickle in its leather holster. Alfred’s gotten terribly creative with what he packs for their nights out, but who is Jason to stand in the way of a man’s artistic expression?

Fully kitted-out, hood drawn and mask glowing, Jason shoves the bag back down the hatch and vaults over the top of the aquarium he was crouched behind, landing to the wild, panicked screams of the assembled staff.

His flashy entrance is totally unnecessary, and he knows the lights on the new helmet make him look less like a human and more like an abstract cryptid with a muzzle lined in blood. It’s spectacularly dramatic, but it releases some of the tension that’s been building in his body ever since he and Bruce split up.

He holds his hands up, forgetting the sickle in his fist, and the screaming hits a crescendo any opera would be proud of. It’s a little fucking hysterical, but Jason’s on the clock right now so he can’t savour this situation as much as he would have liked. “Calm the hell down, it’s just Red Hood here to save the day.”

The screaming eases up, though a gentleman in thick glasses and a threadbare labcoat does give a good ol’ screech when he comes closer towards them with the sickle set free. Jason ignores him and crouches down to cut the janitor lady free first. She spares a second to presumably calculate the chances of her beating him in a fight before she comes to a conclusion, shrugs, and turns to immediately start picking at the knots of the person next to her. Within a couple of minutes everyone is free, and everyone is scrambling to grab at things to arm themselves with. Jason eyes the selection of brandished pens and water bottles with mild delight, and nods respectfully at his lady and her bottle of bleach off the janitor’s cart because real recognises real. He does a quick scan to make sure there are no serious injuries or emergencies, and gets to his feet.

“All right, so this is apparently an attempt to kidnap Wayne, and you guys are just collateral. They’ll be clustered towards the main entrance, so get out through the most secret employees-only door you know. Stay together and stay quiet, and it’s gonna be fine. The Bat knows what’s going on, if that makes anyone feel better.” He considers how much he does and doesn’t want to share with the people assembled, before he decides that fuck it, being a shit-stirrer is pretty fun. “Pretty sure your big boss is in on it too, so if there’s an exit that guy won’t be familiar with, use that one.”

There’s a sharp intake of communal breath, before a young woman wearing waders and rubber gloves up to her shoulders raises her hand. “Do you mean Dr. Stevens?”

Jason shrugs. “Maybe?”

“Uhm. Short, all white hair, super skinny. Looks like someone you wouldn’t trust in a lab alone with a stressed-out postdoc of any gender because he gives off the vibe of a creep with varied tastes?”

Jason frowns at what the girl is saying, and the grim looks of much of the rest of the room. “Sounds about right.”

At least three separate people hiss motherfucker under their breaths, and three more say some version of I fucking knew it. The aquarium might not have had any severe financial issues, but oh, they’ve found a mess worse than too much human hair, looks like. Jason’s keener than ever to murder this Stevens dude, but he really, really doesn’t have the time to chair a HR complaint for the aquarium right now.

“Look, whatever goes down tonight I’m gonna give a Red Hood guarantee that the guy won’t be your boss anymore. Hell, Wayne’s going to be so grateful when I rescue him that I could get him to elect a different person to be in charge of this place even if this guy isn’t in cahoots with the kidnappers. So consider it handled, okay?” He straps the sickle back at his waist. “Now get the hell out of here. I’m counting on you.”

He nods at his bleach-wielding lady, and she nods back like the truest sort of comrade-in-arms.

Reassured, Jason kicks the door down and moves the fastest anyone’s ever moved in an aquarium, a red-faced wraith on a hunt.

Bruce courteously gasps when a hood is thrown over his head and secured, even though he had guessed the shape of the night’s events the moment he had reached the lobby and seen the half-wobbly half-cocky look to the director’s face from across the way. “What are you doing?” he demands in a shaky voice as he puts up token resistance, enough to look panicked but not enough to tempt someone into knocking him out and hauling him away.

Far too many questions to answer as to why a loafer coasting on generational wealth has more muscle mass than your average highly-trained mercenary, after all.

He counts his steps and tries to carve little signs into the pile of the carpeting with the toe of his loafers as he’s marched off, though he doubts Jason will need this trail of breadcrumbs to find him. “Let me go!” he yells, navigating the blueprint of the aquarium in his mind. Everyone ignores him, and his captors are none-too-gentle as they force him up some metal stairs.

Forty steps from the entrance to the lobby, a right, thirty steps, a left, a quiet beep, and now stairs. My, my, my, seems like they’ll be paying Dr. Stevens’ sea slug lab a visit. It’s a good location for a quick regroup, tucked away and locked behind several layers of security. Bruce imagines they won’t be here long; a good kidnapper doesn’t keep their victim where they found them, after all.

He’s roughly shoved into a chair and tied to it, rendered immobile by cuffs on his hands and rope round his legs, but it’s a cheap office chair and there’s give in his binds. He’s immobile, but only theoretically. Bruce keeps tugging at his bonds and cursing under his breath while he hopes that Stevens doesn’t bother to ask where his bodyguard has gone, has thought the worst of Jason and assumed that he had just run off.

It would make a rescue attempt much easier, though Bruce isn’t particularly worried. It’s a kidnapping force of, oh, five? Maybe six? Carpet muffles footsteps more than wooden floorboards do, but Bruce is pretty confident of his estimate. Six at most, with at least another team responsible for the fire alarm, so a worst-case scenario of twelve. As long as his measure of their competence isn’t too wrong, Bruce doesn’t anticipate anything worse than a couple of through-and-throughs if he has to fight through this himself.

He knows he won’t have to, though.

The people around him fall silent when their radio comes to life, a panicked man shouting “There’s someone here with us! It’s the Red-” before there’s a loud bang! followed by a terrifying silence.

“Ten,” someone yells tersely back. “Come in, Ten. What the hell was that?”

There’s a general rumble of unease in the room now, and Bruce is allowed a vicious, nasty smile because no one can see him under here. At least ten people are in on this, and about half of those are in here with him while the rest are out there with Jason. He considers making an effort to tap out in Morse how many goons are with him right now, since Jason has half a dozen ways to track his location with all the kit Bruce has on him, but decides against it.

Let the boy have some fun.

“Let me go, I’ll do anything you want,” he calls out half-heartedly, but no one gives a shit because there’s another panicked broadcast by another panicked man that cuts off abruptly. The tension in the room is palpable, feels more solid than the sack on his head, and it goes frizzy with electricity when the Red Hood’s terrifying static growl comes through on the radio.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are,” Jason’s mangled voice croons through the line. Bruce feels goosebumps ripple up his arms, and feels oddly, hideously proud. “Two down, a few more to go. Hope you’ll put up more of a fight.”

Then there’s a sharp crack, and the line goes quiet.

“You promised me this would be just in-and-out! You said that Wayne would be out of here as soon as you got him! You didn’t say anything about a vigilante running me down in my own building!”

Ah, that’s Dr. Stevens losing his nerve. His tirade is cut short by a hard slap, it sounds like, and the voice Bruce thinks of as One is the only thing to be heard above the quiet whimpers of a panicking doctor.

“You agreed to do anything that needed to be done as long as you got a cut of the pay,” One says coldly. “Too late to get cold feet now, doctor.” There’s the sound of the walkie-talkie being turned back on. “Transport is incoming. Disappear and make your way out, regroup in safe house Gamma. It’s just one man against all of us, so don't lose your heads and we’ll get our money.”

Nobody responds verbally, probably because radio silence is golden when trying to beat a hasty retreat. Bruce feels his ropes come loose, and he’s forced to his feet as the kidnappers discuss their plans with more discretion than Stevens shooting off his mouth. He catches bits and pieces of conversation, mentions of the docks and allusions to the highest bidder, but everything goes instantly, deathly silent when the radio comes to life again.

“Three down, four down, five down. Be seeing you real soon, Mr. Wayne.”

Bruce doesn’t need to pretend to take in a shaky breath.

God, code names are an absolute necessity when carrying out this sort of dirty work, but Jason wants to have a sit-down with whoever decided to go with numbers for this little shindig. First man taken out and he already knows this goes at least ten fuckers deep. The leader’s figured out that yelling the number of men he has in his employ down a radio the enemy has access to isn’t a great idea, but somebody with an army of a hundred wouldn’t have been so concerned with the downing of one, so Jason’s pretty much got confirmation that this is a small-scale, quick-in quick-out kind of affair.

They’ll be looking to move Bruce, with that whole ‘transport incoming’ message. Jason’s got Bruce’s location pulled up, B’s comms actively recording vitals and transmitting its location, and from the lack of movement it’s easy to tell they’re planning a getaway through the front entrance.

He’s also happy to note that Bruce’s resting heart rate’s still at an insulting 45 beats a minute mid-kidnapping, though boy it sure did spike every time Red Hood sent out a message. Good to know, real fucking good to know.

After taking out the fifth guy, Jason doesn’t run into anybody else on his way to the main entrance, and he doesn’t particularly care if some small fry are getting away. The priority is getting Bruce to safety, and then doing clean-up on the kidnappers and Dr. Creepazoid. A showdown within the lobby is endlessly preferable to a showdown outside, if only because it’s easier to keep track of people if they can’t run away from you. Double-checking that Bruce actually is being slowly moved towards the main entrance from wherever they stashed him, Jason happily beats them to the front doors and barricades them in with him, stacking tables and chairs and cupboards into a heavy, impenetrable mess.

Sure, whoever’s coming to pick them up might be armed enough to break on through, but Jason has intimate knowledge of what mercenaries are like. Thoughts like ‘I sure as hell am not paid enough to deal with this’ are common and powerful enough to dissuade most mercs in this situation. It’s what you get when you team-build on money instead of insane, intangible things like love and loyalty, losers.

Jason looks around at the arena of his making and makes a quick decision to climb up a display case stuffed full of the toys kids can expect to see in the gift shop. It’s sturdy enough, though the thin metal frames groan a little under his weight. Jason sheathes his sickle and powers down the lights lining his helmet, lies in wait like a hungry dog in the dark as he calms his breathing and imagines what it will be like to beat the living daylights out of people who think it’s cool to disrupt a well-earned date on a much-anticipated night.

It’s another ten minutes or so before he picks up the sound of heavy feet trying to be unnaturally quiet on cheap carpet. They haven’t rounded the corner and they’re still out of sight, but with his helmet enhancing his hearing Jason’s already getting plenty of information. At least five people with heavy, careful steps, likely the assailants heavy in their armour and weapons. One set of footsteps shuffling along the carpet, all hesitance and distaste, and that’s got to be Stevens.

And in the middle of it all, walking in a weird off-kilter rhythm like a man who either has a stone in his shoe or is determined to make as distinctive a walk as possible, is Bruce. Up and walking of his own power, which is excellent. Jason doesn’t need to go into this fight concerned with keeping an unconscious Bruce safe. This is going to be an activity with full participation by all parties, hell yeah.

Speaking of participation.

Jason taps the side of his helmet and connects to Bruce’s comms. “B,” he says, low and sweet just to unsettle Bruce. “I’ve got altitude on a cabinet on the eastern wall of the entrance. I’ll see you right as you come in, and I’m gonna attack before anybody knows what’s happening. Get behind the reception desk if you can. Do you copy?”

As per the training handbook for situations when you’re too deep behind enemy lines to do much of anything, Bruce registers his acknowledgment with three sharp clicks, teeth clacking against each other in rapid succession.

Jason arches his back, loosening his muscles before he curls up again, ready to literally pounce. The footsteps are drawing closer, and they have just a few seconds before shit is going to hit the fan. He unhooks his sickle, and grins at absolutely nothing.

“Oh, and B?”

A click.

“Be good for me.”

Bruce’s heart rate spikes just as the group of men round the corner, and Jason’s laughing like a loon as the lines of his helmet burn back to life and he descends on the kidnappers, a hound out of hell.

There’s something primordially terrifying about seeing a fury in red and black descend on you from the sky. Bruce knows what the plan is, knows exactly how menacing a figure Jason can cut when he wants to be dramatic, but even then he couldn’t stop instinctively reaching for the handy, wicked little pocket knife in his pocket the second he saw the lines of the helmet glowing through the dark of his hood.

In the panicked yelling as Jason leaps into the fray and starts systematically annihilating a group of heavily armed men who can’t fight back without shooting each other, it’s easy for Bruce to break free of his captors and rip the sack off his head. He ducks under the flailing butt of a gun and takes a moment to shatter someone’s kneecap with the metal cuffs on his wrists before he’s rolling out of the way, belly-crawling towards the sturdy reception desk.

Dr. Stevens is yelling and trying to run away but Jason keeps plucking at him and pulling him back into the brawl with a vengeance Bruce grudgingly admires. By the time Bruce has climbed up on a chair to get a better view of the fight while staying mostly out of sight, half the men are already a groaning pile on the ground.

By the time Bruce has freed himself from his handcuffs, Stevens is an unconscious mess on the ground, and by the time Bruce has texted home and requested that Alfred call the police, it’s just Jason and One circling each other, both their faces hidden, blades in their hands.

Bruce notes with some interest that where Jason had kept his sickle sheathed and mostly used the blunt outer curve to knock people unconscious, the wicked edge is now out and gleaming as One strikes at him with a nasty Bowie knife. The hand-to-hand is quick and brutal, both of them trading hits and jabs. Whatever armour One is wearing is holding up well against Jason’s sickle, which is fair enough.

Bruce would need to get closer to know for sure, but it certainly looks like the sickle Alfred uses to carefully weed the tulip bed. No point in sharpening a gardening tool to be sharp enough to bite into flesh.

Less pleasing is how One’s knife doesn’t seem to struggle much with cutting through Jason’s costume. The new mesh Bruce had designed in response to Jason’s irritated demand for a slimmer, sleeker costume was supposed to be able to withstand most edged weapons, but even in the dark it’s easy to see where the black fabric has been cut and Jason’s skin and blood are visible instead. Trust Jason to do quality testing in the absolute worst times.

Back to the drawing board it is. One is taunting Jason, allowing Jason to swipe ineffectively at him before laughing and slashing back. “Is this all you got?” the man crows from behind his balaclava, radiating smugness. “I don’t know what I was worried about. I’ll have you and Wayne brought in for sale, and I wonder who the highest bidder will be.” Another quick jab, and Jason’s forearm is marked. “Wonder which of you Mister J would want more as a playmate.”

At that, Jason goes stock still. It’s so sudden that it clearly startles One, who retreats a little, knife up and ready to go. Bruce finds himself with his jaw clenched shut, teeth grinding so hard it’s like lockjaw in three seconds or less.

Of all the things some no-name budget kidnapper could have said. Bruce taps on his comms, opens a line to Jason, because if One keeps push push pushing like this, he won’t live to see morning.

One might not live to see the next minute, if Jason’s slow, terrifying stride towards him means anything.

“Jason,” Bruce whispers into the comm. “Jason, enough. You’ve done enough. Stop playing with your food, come here and let me check on you.”

Across the lobby, Jason once against draws to a halt, but it doesn’t stick. One figures out that actually, the Red Hood had been getting sliced up into ribbons more as a weird exploratory experience than because of a lack of skill, and he figures it out by way of Jason coming right up to him in the blink of an eye, disarming him by snapping the wrist of the hand holding the knife, and grabbing him by the throat with a grip tight enough to kill.

One is currently absolutely sure that he’s about to die.

So is Bruce, who knows that he cannot reach the man faster than Jason can snap a neck. “Jason!” he damn near bellows down the comms, damn near shouts across the room. “Enough. You come when called. You come when I call.”

And like a miracle, like the time Jason came back all those years ago and all the times Jason’s come for him ever since, it works.

One is dropped to the ground, unconscious and foaming at the mouth, and Jason’s barrelling towards Bruce.

As Bruce is swept up and back into the depths of the evacuated aquarium, he finds himself thinking we’ve had worse.

Jason isn’t sure why his first instinct after being called off of the murder of a singularly horrible man is to haul Bruce up and run to the deep sea exhibit, but he’s willing to admit to himself that calm only comes back to him when they’re finally buried in the quiet dark of a room of things softly bioluminescing.

He’s got no love lost for the Joker, has fought the bastard enough times since that it’s not residual fear that snapped him. Here, far far away from the wreckage, it’s easy to identify that his trigger had been superimposing the many, many horrors Jason has personally died from and lived through onto Bruce. Bruce who in many ways has the worst luck of any person he’s ever known, Bruce who would sooner rip into himself than be put into a Pit, Bruce who has to be careful with his burritos and his knees, put under the loveless purview of a madman with a crowbar.

Being protective of other people is generally a good thing, but trust Jason to wield care like a bludgeon. He scoffs, and drops Bruce unceremoniously next to the trapdoor. He could take off his helmet, no one and nothing could see him here, but the mortification of being seen out of control makes it really fucking unappealing.

Bruce sits up and looks around, acting like not a single weird thing has happened this entire night. “I’ve never seen the deep sea exhibition,” he says, like he’s having a normal conversation, like this is just the middle of a perfectly pleasant, perfectly average date.

“I saw a poster, they only built this section after I died,” Jason says dully.

Bruce hums like that’s information enough. “I’m glad we’re getting to see it then.” He tugs at Jason’s leg. “Sit.”

And Jason does, his legs folding underneath him before a thought’s even fully formed. He remembers when he was redesigning the helmet and was struggling to pick a look that was both menacing and just plain cool. The one he settled on had been one of Damian’s designs, all geometric shapes and the suggestion of creature. It had reminded him of a jackal, of Anubis, like death come in the shape of this thing with a muzzle and teeth.

Right now it feels like he’d chosen the look of a dog, a dog with the brand of bat to describe its master, and he feels like a mangy, wild thing desperate for Bruce, just for Bruce.

He takes back every mean, unkind thought he’s ever had about the date at the rec centre. Let him bury his hands into a dozen masses of gelatinous hair than force him to think about things like this, think about himself like this.

Jason’s tight with tension, but Bruce doesn’t push him to talk. Bruce doesn’t force him to do anything, just has a hand wrapped around the nape of Jason’s neck, thumb rubbing at the seam where metal helmet meets skin. They sit in this weird, tingly silence even as Alfred’s pings requesting an update become more urgent, and Jason realises that they’ll stay in this weird, tingly silence until he makes a move.

“What the fuck are we doing, B?” he says at last.

“Whatever we want to, Jaybird.” Bruce is ignoring a lot of his own damn rules about names in uniform, but he still seems remarkably unconcerned about everything. “How are you?”

Jason groans, giving up and tipping over so that he’s sprawled uncomfortably over Bruce’s legs. “Feel fucking awful. I can’t believe I’m the kind of guy that loses his shit just because some asshole said something vaguely threatening to you.”

“I think it shows good character.” Bruce rests a hand on Jason’s shoulder, the other still carefully cradling his head. “But I’m not a good judge of character, so take that with a grain of salt.”

Jason barks out a laugh at that. “You sure fucking are. I knew that director guy was skeezy the moment I saw him. Can’t believe he didn’t set off alarm bells in your head within the first thirty seconds, B.”

Bruce just shrugs. “If I reacted badly to everyone that I thought I couldn’t trust, I’d rarely get to stop.”

Well, the man’s got a point. “Still. He’s apparently shitty with staff too, so at least we’re solving a bunch of problems all at once with this night out.”

“Couldn’t have done it without you, Jason.”

Jason forces himself to sit back up, a little alarmed by the little note that’s appeared informing him that the police are about five minutes away from the aquarium. “That’s a damn lie and you know it.” Even the strongest of the kidnappers wasn’t anything much above average for a night out on patrol, and Bruce is nothing if not ruthlessly efficient when the fight’s in a public place.

Bruce gets to his feet, careful and ginger, and Jason can’t help but just stare at his stupid wholly-human knees. Bruce doesn’t mention it, doesn’t draw attention that renowned vigilante and crime boss the Red Hood has his head not a foot away from his legs, and just holds his hand out to him instead. “How about, I wouldn’t have enjoyed this night without you?”

Jason takes a moment to pretend to think about it, but he knows his answer. “I”ll take it.” Like he takes Bruce’s hand, like he takes things from Bruce because it’s what he wants and it’s what he’s earned. “I should get out of here before the pigs show up.”

“See you back at the Manor?” It’s only half past midnight, which means this date’s ended a good three hours earlier than their usual. Bruce looks like he’s asking only as an afterthought; of course Jason’s coming home with him.

Jason struggles to think of anything more pleasant than sitting out on their balcony in the dark with a hot drink in hand, electric blanket doggedly trying to keep them warm even as the outlet threatens to explode from the snow that’s supposed to start at 2 AM.

He also struggles to imagine how he’s going to be good company when his head is in as much disarray as it currently is. How open is Bruce to some heavy petting outdoors if Jason can’t convince himself to take his helmet off the whole time? How likely is the night to devolve into them sitting awkwardly in frigid silence until someone snaps and starts an argument just for the sake of a change of pace?

“Yeah, I’m thinking that’s not a good idea.”

That gets Bruce to stop shabbying himself up to look like an actual kidnapping victim, cuffs already locked again. “I see. Why is that?”

Jason shrugs, and is glad that his face is still unseen even if it feels like his whole damn body is letting B in on the secret. “It’s a 'feeling kinda feral' kinda day. I’m going to go blow off some steam.” Run a couple of laps around the lake in the memorial park, and if he gets close enough to hypothermia he might start forgetting the quiet kshkshh sound of delicate neck bones grinding under his hand.

He feels violence wiggling just an inch under his skin, and that’s another self-imposed rule for nights out with Bruce. Any time his grip on himself feels even a pound looser than it should be, Jason’s going to take time for himself because this deep into this relationship he’s surer than ever that there’s a hell of a lot of brutality he could let loose and Bruce would just take it and take it and take it.

Jason will not bite his mas-

He’s forcibly taken out of his thoughts by a sharp rap against his helmet. He strikes out instinctively, and catches Bruce's hand in a tight grip. “What the hell, B.”

“You weren’t responding,” Bruce tells him matter-of-factly, not pulling away. “I said, you can go and run yourself ragged. After that, you come home.”

“And why should I listen to you?”

Bruce smiles a proper smile, sharp and smug and sweet, and leans over to press a kiss to Jason’s hand wrapped around his own. “Because, Jason, I listened when you told me to keep away and keep safe. Isn’t it your turn now?”

It’s all about that give-and-take baby, and Jason just might fucking howl.

He releases Bruce in a flash, and his helmet’s unlatched and crashing to the ground not a second later. Bruce could have aikido’d him over his shoulder and flung him clear across the room because Jason’s not the most coordinated he’s ever been right now, but instead the man just widens his stance and wholly and easily accepts Jason throwing himself at Bruce face first.

It’s a maddening kiss, because Jason’s just shoved Bruce against the blood jelly tank so that he can get into position for a good grind when an alert goes off from his helmet, and Alfred’s too-loud voice calls out to tell them that “The police officers have arrived, sirs.”

Jason groans and pulls back slightly, trying to catch his breath as he digs his teeth into Bruce’s shoulder despite the three layers of expensive fabric in the way. “I hate everything,” he says, half-heartedly groping at Bruce’s chest.

“Hate it in your free time,” Bruce mutters into his hair, before choking a little because he caught a mouthful of semi-permanent dye. “On our nights, be good.”

Relationships are a contract, and Jason’s willingly agreed to these terms for, ah, close to a year now. It doesn’t mean he won’t grumble, or mess up Bruce’s perfectly styled hair just to make him grumble too. “Yeah, yeah, old man, I know what I’m about. Go and distract the cops already, I need to get away.”

Bruce lazily salutes him, looking dishevelled and mussed and suitably victimised. Jason is one damn inch away from dragging B down to the ground and reinstating his territory, god. Instead, he grabs his bag and picks up his helmet, and dawdles a little by the hatch. “You gonna be okay, old man?”

“Of course,” Bruce says confidently, ripping buttons off his coat and toeing one shoe off to look extra pathetic. “I have a hot date to keep. I’ll see you at home, Jason.”

What’s a man to do when given an order like that?

Jason obeys.

A/N: i’ve literally had ‘king tide come through’ listed as a title i wanted for something since last year?? it doesn’t even really mean anything i just love that the highest high tides are kings and it’s got such a nice ring to it. my approach to titling things is that it has to slap, thanks for coming to my TED talk ;9

#brujay #bruce wayne #jason todd #whale writing #i haven't been to many aquariums at all but #generally my idea of a good time is me being close to a Big Body Of Water #as long as i don't obsess on the survival rates of the lads in the tanks #being that close that much water is inexplainably soothing #and bc feb has been all sorts of miserable for me personally #i wanted some soothing

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babysprouseisart · 4 years

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Honestly more things are pointing to a permanent separation for SH. No indications of any reconciliation sadly. And it makes it even harder without the confirmation. I guess when they start to get papped with their new SOs will be the day that it is confirmed they are done. And I hope it is soon. This push and pull with them is exhausting

Good day, anon, and welcome to hell. Screams for help will not save you, alas, because when it comes to a topic in which I am 99, 9% sure, I have no equals. I'm sorry you probably got the wrong address, but it's too late. I am merciless and bloodthirsty with anyone who tries to contradict my faith, tries to correct my point of view and convince me of their own, although I did not give it a reason. Because it's my fucking blog where I for x-billionth time has already expressed my exact points and agreed with some people which think and proved the exact opposite to all that you are saying. So be prepared to be slowly but surely tortured by my long ass post.

So, let's start with what I said about my blog: only good vibes here. I am not interested/concerned about other opposite/negative feedings. I just don't want to make a big deal about it. Here, in my blog, we support Lili Pauline Reinhart and Cole Mitchell Sprouse in any case as couple as well as individuals.

This means that under no circumstances do we talk about them, their relationships, their projects, their family, or their decisions in a negative way. Yes, we may disagree with something they do, where they do it, and how they do it (what they post, what they like/don't like, write or repost, who they meet, with whom they decide to be, live and communicate with, what they archive/unarchive, and so on), but we do not have the right to judge them or decide how to act. We also can't control it and it's none of our business.

I repent if I once made the appearance of a person condemning one of them or their family for their actions and possible causes of the separation, it was only my objective external disagreement, points and thoughts aloud, nothing more rude, involved and inappropriate. And I think with many of my words said earlier (or the words of those I follow and reblog their posts) about the behavior of family/friends of Lili, Cole, and so on, people with brains and common sense could agree. Remember this, or write it on your forehead, so that the next time you write to me, you will see these words.

Moving on, taking into account all of the above, I would like to tell you that it probably won't be enough for one blog to explain to you point by point all my beliefs and points of view on this subject, to prove to you that every fucking word you say is illogical shit and the most real nonsense. It feels like you're an alien who fell from another planet and decided to crawl into our hole with your impressions of a newborn baby who doesn't understand much about the world and its creators. Although in this case, I'm more of the opinion that you are a little asshole, in which the vein of hatred is boiling and you like to come to this and some other blogs to tell us your agenda although we have no idea where you have such rash thoughts, perhaps you have an extra chromosome? Dude, treat your paranoia.

Further, given that I don't have much time and desire to describe all my points of view point by point, which, unlike your random set of words, really makes sense for hundreds or even thousands of people who have the gray matter to be able to think, I will attach my long - standing post, indicating all the facts at that time proving the opposite to yours. Although, I will try to supplement everything else as much as I can.

While, we all ( I hope) already realized and accepted that for many reasons, during this quarantine, Lili and Cole had some problems, were distant and ended up apart for a certain period of time, immediately after the end point of the explosion and informing us of all these public actions on social media (I hope you understand), then after a few weeks, they were already confidently moving towards resolution and recovery and that's why:

https://babysprousehart.tumblr.com/post/618026656780648448/hello-i-hope-this-doesnt-come-off-negatively

This was written long before, but still has many valid points and I just want to widen some of them.

Take a sit and follow me word by word.

I shall start my addition of evidence, based on all the guesses and great opinions of others, as well as hints from the Lili and Cole themselves. I would like to start with a significant event and the day when Lili posted a photo from the Antelope Valley on April 28th, well, or 27th, depending on where you are.

Perhaps we lose some missing pieces in this puzzle and forget about something that was done earlier, but I just want to start counting from this moment.

A few facts about this photo/photos:

1) It was posted exactly 3 years later from their famous photoshoot, when very, very, very many people, mostly in media, began to suspect that there is something between them in a romantic way. It was exactly in the same place, exactly with the same style, exactly in a similar image (waving curly hair, light flying dress, black and white effect) and even without a capture. The picture marked the anniversary and is very important for the two of them. An undeniable fact, beat me.

2) That photo was definitely taken by Cole. Why?

Here are a couple more facts in addition to the first:

They have the quality of captured on professional camera.

You can see, that Lili did not tag the photographer and said jokingly that the photo was taken by Milo, why would she lie, or hide that it was anyone else, because clearly she just hid that because it was Cole.

You may have noticed that Austin, when asked who took the photo, whether she took it and whether she is a good photographer, says no and her reaction with a grin and laugh is priceless. She also didn't tag nor the photographer, neither Lili in her photos from there.

You can watch the vlog in the Colleen blog and see there are very similar figures to Cole, Lili and Milo walking along the valley, because, duh, they were there.

You can view her post, where you can see Cole from the back (notice his dark clothing, the same as on one of his post in the profile, which he has already deleted, as well as his position from which the photo of Lili was supposedly taken and it is just in the same place).

You can observe his style of photography and how similar the theme is to the photos from 2017.

You can see the same poppy behind his ear in one of the past stories.

You may have noticed that the photo of Lili is processed with the same effect as several photos in Cole's profile, and I can tell you as an amateur photo editor that it is very identical.

Question: why arrange such a significant photoshoot with your ex after a few weeks of separation? Why is Cole smiling in a photo (black and white one with a mustache and black clothes) probably taken there? Why is everything so secretive if they broke up? Why even post a photo that your ex-boyfriend definitely took? How can you calmly go to this place, which reminds you of your joint travels with your former lover? Therefore, this photo and later another one from there were the first iron arguments in confirming the improvement of things.

I would like to continue with another ironclad proof.

Lili in early may very fiercely, after a few weeks of Cole's statements about slander and threats, which she did not respond to so clearly at the time, defended Cole and pointed out the private relationship and literally said that people should stop it and even though should hurt and bully her, but not him.

Question: did she defend her ex so publicly? Would Lili talk about a private relationship if that was the way her past relationship was most often? Would she have written anything at all if she didn't care about him and didn't feel something towards him? I don't think so, so it's gibberish to say so (about the break up) when it's the second unquestionable argument.

Next, we need to talk about the general activity of Cole and Lili in social media. I just want to list some observations, in different order, but it seems like everything we have now:

If earlier it was visible in the posts of Lili that it was clearly a show off, then over time and after the published photos, she began to behave more sincerely and tenderly, began to publish Milo less, began to say that there was only the two of them less, has stopped showing how good she is without certain someone, as if for Cole showing that she could cope without him, which was visible in the posts and stories, she began to talk more about improving her mental health as a result of training, spoke about how later she was feeling better and that she was grateful for those who were with her and difficult times and in light moments, that you just need to live and enjoy.

Additionally, I can say how she shone with each photo, and it was a natural glow of happiness and settling down. She no longer sang sad songs or posted sad songs, on the contrary, posted sexy, funny and relaxed ones. She appeared more in photos taken by paparazzi. She posted sexy, energetic, romantic movies, funny cartoons, watched funny clips, was excited about her project, laughed, danced with her dog, played with a dog with macaroni, cosplayed Willy Wonka (we all have a feeling it’s Cole’s thing, no?), playing with sand, puzzles, posted funny memes in story, which unfortunately coolly accepted as the opposite, posted a poem with a typo and funny answered to a fan who corrected it, told more about poems and attached a photo with a fragment of a poem about love from her upcoming book. She liked some photos from the anniversary of the last episode of the series, where we remember there was a hot scene of her and Cole's character, she liked a Bughead drawing. Yesterday, she actually posted one of the sexiest videos that will not be posted, being single and lonely, we saw that she actually spent more personal time with Cole (I am not saying they weren’t doing t back then), which was investigated thanks to many amazing people here, and even if they don't live together yet, they are more likely to meet and have met with each other, and more hints on sexy times (because, come one, maybe Milo was the one who left a hickey on her neck, huh?), which is undeniable, just compare the fact that she is no longer in the old rental, and he is not in Kj's house, she then posted a photo from some place, which is very similar to where Cole shot a video with Jimmy Fallon.

He also began to be more active in social networks, exactly after she started posting photos of the Antelope Valley, he posted a series of photos of the kissing couple, even if it was a gay drawings, they were filled with love, there was a photo of him with cattle with the sarcastic caption, then the photo about porn bots, with funny ask to leave him alone and saying it’s not allowed to be horny on quarantine, again a photo of himself with heart eyes that I talked about above, he posted a very funny video recently. There were more photos from the paparazzi after some time when Lili's usually flashed, and then it stopped, then his humorous photo in the washing machine appeared, which she probably had taken, and why so I explained in the attached post, he posted a photo from the walk, which was also probably taken with her, because again, she had a similar location, then he jokingly called Tommy ‘the’ muse, maybe roasting fans, but he didn’t use ‘my’, so, indicating he still has his own muse, then we saw him at that damn party, which caused people's panic, although he is an ordinary person and has the right to relax, and by the way at this party he was very happy and frisky, but nothing bad or shameful happened and he is innocent, then we even saw Cole, after Lili, delete many of the photos, although he had also unarchived some of them several times, as she had, which means that he did not delete them completely, but just removed many of them, leaving the most tender photo after or before the kiss at the famous moment when Lili wanted a toast and eggs at 1 am, or many photos reflecting her body, which also marks not a bad phenomenon, but a simple trolling from them. Proof of this trolling and unarchiving is on the vastness of other blogs and on Twitter, thanks to that girl's video.

The way their condition and activity on social networks have changed is very noticeable and is also third undeniable fact of denial of the break up. You can compare photos of Cole taken by Alex, where he is clearly very sad and depressed, because it was taken somewhere in the interval of their real breakup. And compare this with his smiling and playful state during the interview with Jimmy, where he also sparkled with happiness and fun, constantly smiling and seemed to be aroused about something (or someone). I think even a newcomer will notice a change in their mood and attitude. You will see the difference. And this does not happen when going through the break up after 4 years of deeply imbued with love relationships. Please understand, damn it.

I have listed alas not everything that speaks so vividly about things going in the right positive direction and is evidence that everything is getting better again, there will be only more I assure you and you will kiss my ass, as Cole said.

Execution cannot be pardoned.

You have one attempt to put a comma and decide your fate, but I think you’ll fail because you are a total sucker anyway.

Bye!

#cole sprouse #lili reinhart #sprousehart #sprousehart positivity #sh positivity #bughead #only good vibes here #positivity #anon hate #anon ask #ask #cole and lili #relationship #break up #not a break up #shut up dumbass

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random-mha-thoughts · 4 years

Text

Long Distance (Midoriya x Reader)

Pairing: Midoriya x Reader

Genre: Fluff/slight angst, no quirks AU

Summary: Long distance relationships an be equal parts exhilarating and equal parts difficult.

Inspo: "Face to Face" by Ruel

Word count: 1,777

Tags: @liviitehe @iamsoftsodonttoucheume-blog @bunnythepipsqueak @yuki-osaki

a/n: Who’s not a sucker for fluffy Izu? Come on, you love this freckled face

Since this is 3rd person and I wanted to keep it gender neutral, I used they/them pronouns instead of you. The ending scene of this was originally supposed to be Midoriya's Valentine's Special for Just One Day, and it would've been more fitting, but it was too angsty for what I wanted to put out for Valentine's Day, but I held onto it for the past month so I could expand on it and spin it into something more substantial and emotional.

Sorry for the messy and rushed ending, I'm still recovering from my sickness that was handicapping me for the past few days and I'm falling asleep writing the end of this. But I'm better for the most part! Which hopefully means one or two more posts before I have to reconfigure my entire schedule doing online classes next week... I hate school.

Also huge thank you again for 700 follower guys, you’re too much for me to handle. Thank you sosososoooo much!

The past few months for Izuku have been both exhilarating and miserable.

While at an anime convention last summer, he'd stumbled around alone because Katsuki didn't want to be anywhere near nerd culture with his nerd friend. Izuku had been disappointed since it was his first con and didn't want to go alone, but it couldn't be helped. He cosplayed as his favorite hero from his favorite show, resolving to hopefully meet some new friends while he was there.

Izuku was easily overwhelmed by the gigantic venue and the endless number of people in attendance. It was something like a dream, but at the same time gave him anxiety. How was he supposed to navigate something this enormous alone without getting swept up somewhere?

For the first half of the first day, he managed to survey the layout of the center, taking pictures with a few cosplayers he knew and almost emptying his wallet on some merch. He found himself losing energy fairly quickly and resolved to search for the rest area. The tired boy buries his nose in his map, mumbling how he hopes he doesn't end up getting lost.

His view being obstructed by the unfolded paper, he bumps into someone's back. Izuku fervently apologizes, prematurely thinking he had bothered them and now they wish to kill him. Instead, he was met with a wide toothy smile and even wider, excited eyes. The boy looks them up and down, realizing their cosplay is of his character's sidekick.

The other person breaks out into a haughty dialogue fitting their character, using the hero's name to ask what was the matter. Izuku, after some stumbling, breaks out his amazing mimicry skills to play along with their new game, responding that he's looking for the rest area. Staying in character, the sidekick leads him in the opposite direction Izuku was going. The two recite more lines from their characters' show until they reach their destination.

The stranger finally breaks character with a hearty laugh, settling in a couch with Izuku. They hit it off immediately, bonding over their shared love of their favorite show, how amazing each other's costume looks, and repeating their favorite lines of other franchises they enjoy. Izuku feels like this is exactly what he wanted to find in a con: someone who shares the same love and passion for his favorite thing. Finally, he won't have to be alone navigating this giant complex.

The two continue bonding over lunch, getting to know each other more personally, though their personalities were so compatible their conversations flow naturally. Izuku finds out that his new friend is around the same age as him, and this isn't their first con. They ended up coming alone because their friend bailed on them at the last second because of a sickness. Unfortunately, they live in a different country; they just couldn't miss the panel with one of their favorite voice actors at this con. The freckled boy can't say he wasn't disappointed that someone he'd hit it off so perfectly with was from somewhere else, but at least he found someone he can spend the rest of the con with.

And they did have the funnest time together. They shared so many memories eating, posing for pictures, filming their own videos, and just talking; at the end of everything, Izuku felt like he'd known them forever. Actually, he felt himself falling for his con companion, which is why parting ways on the last day was the hardest thing he thought he would have to do.

Thankfully, his new friend also found it hard to say goodbye, so they proposed the idea of staying long-distance friends. It was such an obvious progression that Izuku almost slapped himself for not thinking of it. The two exchanged messenger information and hugs before finally parting ways. The freckled-cheek boy rejoiced, bouncing the entire way home and buzzing with excitement. Until post-con depression hit him, and with it came the fear that his new friend and crush would lose interest and never contact him.

But he was wrong. They texted religiously all day every day, keeping each other updated on all the details of their daily nerdy lives. A flicker of hope burned inside Izuku that his crush was interested enough in him to keep in contact. They both kept up with each other's social media posts and commented on all of them. They even video chatted at least twice a week. It made Izuku feel his life had a purpose, and it was apparent to everyone around him. Even Katsuki would gruffly question why he was always smiling at his phone.

But the initial glamour eventually wore off. There would be days when Izuku's friend wouldn't respond to his messages and the boy would fly into a frenzy, wondering what he did wrong and retracing their entire conversation. Even though they would reply again a few days later and apologize about leaving Izuku in the dark, it would bother the boy a little. It sobered him up to realize he spends a lot of his day talking to a screen, and he still has no idea if they feel the same way as he felt in his heart. There's a small amount of jealousy he feels as he stalks their social media responding to other people. He dislikes that pettiness, but he only does it because he's head over heels for them. There are moments when his heart would race at the prospect of them exhibiting the same feelings as him, but he would immediately second guess those thoughts as him simply getting ahead of himself.

Izuku would scroll through the pictures and cosplay videos of them daily, smiling at them as he imagined what if they would meet face to face again as his heart longs for them. He wants to be able to confess in person, feel their warmth close to him, hear their laughter free of digital filter. Is that too much for him to ask?

Izuku practically bounces in a bundle of anticipation and nerves as he stands in the crowded airport terminal. He didn't imagine his wishes coming true so soon, but here he is. Ever since a week ago when his crush had surprised him with their flight itinerary, casually asking him to pick them up, the broccoli-haired boy couldn't have been more excited for anything in his life.

And as with everything the sometimes-neurotic boy does, he planned heavily for their arrival. They were only visiting for about a week while visiting family, coinciding nicely with Izuku's school break. He searched for countless highly-rated restaurants specializing in different foods, photo spots that tourists agree yield the best social media photos, and even a few theme parks to visit. He complied all of these spots into a giant list and was about to send them to his crush when they messaged him before he got the chance.

"Don't go overboard planning like I know you do, Bean, I just want to spend quality time with you :)"

Izuku's heart soared with that text, although it rendered his hard work and stress slightly useless.

And now he's waiting impatiently for them to come from their plane ride, craning his neck every which way in hopes to spot them before they find him. His entire body has washed over in anxious, feet-tapping cold.

"Izuku!"

Looking to the side, he sets his eyes on a figure steamrolling towards him dragging a suitcase as they bound up to him. All his anxiety fades as soon as he lays eyes on them. He outstretches his arms, ready to welcome them in a hug. "(Y/n)!" he mimics their excited giggle-call.

Izuku underestimated how much force they were putting into their hug, effectively being knocked off balance as both of them fall backwards to meet the floor beneath them. Despite the strange glares from onlookers, they laugh at the less-than-graceful greeting they shared. To Izuku, it was the perfect heartfelt greeting.

Catching his breath for a moment, his heart rejoices, relishing the almost romantic moment. It's strange to see them, the person he's seem through a screen for most of the time, in his arms. The last time they saw each other in person, they were in slightly uncomfortable costumes that didn't allow for too much mobility and hid most of their true faces. It's almost like meeting a complete stranger in person for the first time, yet they know each other so well.

"I'm so happy you're this excited to see me." He sits up, still embracing his crush in his lap. He's so close to them, sharing their personal space. If only he can brush his hands through their hair lovingly and embrace them close to him as he's craved for months. "I was so worried it would be too awkward, and you wouldn't want to hug me and-"

"Why wouldn't I want to absolutely tackle you, Bean?" they squeeze him tighter, the grin still plastered on their face as they gaze up at Izuku. They reach behind the boy to retrieve the red beanie that fell off his head at their landing. "You're my favorite person in the world!"

Izuku freezes at the words, letting them tug the knitwear over his fluffy hair. He knows yet another part of his heart was just stolen.

"Oh, before all the adrenaline suddenly flushes out of me and I lose all confidence to do this-"

They place a chaste kiss on Izuku's lips, rendering the boy flustered and speechless as a bolt of electricity zaps through him. Did they really just-?

"I really like you, Izuku," they confess in earnest, doe eyes boring into his emerald pair. "I've been waiting to say it in person because it's so lame and impersonal to say it over text or in video chat. Please tell me you accept me."

It takes the boy a moment to formulate proper words, the only thing pouring out of his mouth is sputters. He's floating on Cloud nine right now. He should've known that his crush not only holds the same feelings for him, but also has the immense confidence to suck it up and confess first. With a chuckle and almost teary eyes, Izuku sniffs out, "Y-You beat me to it!"

They erupt into a fit of satisfied squeaks. "I knew I would!" they beam as they nearly knock the boy over in another tackle-hug. "Now, at least we get to do everything we wanted to as a couple, not just as friends."

Izuku can't agree more, admiring how they always manage to take the words right out of his mouth.

#midoriya x reader #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #midoriya fluff #midoriya izuku #izuku midoriya #slight angst #no quirks au #gender neutral reader #midoriya imagine #midoriya scenario #mha midoriya #mha deku #bnha deku #bnha midoriya #mha x reader #bnha x reader #mha fanfiction #bnha fanfiction

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vvakarians · 3 years

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I need to be vulnerable for a second.

It’s been a year. I’ve made a lot of progress and am still uprooting shit I’ve been wading in for a while now. I’m growing and learning. But I’ve never gone into detail really, maybe on twitter and mentioned it a couple times but yeah. Been thinking a lot.

TW for Homophobia / Abuse

TLDR; My best friend was a shitlord and I spent ten minutes painfully sobbing about it. I’m fine lmao just needed to make a messy post.

Won’t be mentioning who they were on SM here but if mutuals who are and were friends w/ both of us want to know, hmu lmao. I sincerely hope y’all didn’t get shit on like I did

I’m so tired. I’m tired of knowing that someone I used to call my best friend literally cyberstalked me in a discord server and when I told them I wanted to have a space without them/wouldn’t be interacting with their character, they lost it.

I’ll call this person A. They were there for me through a lot but it got weird towards the end for sure. A was always clingy, always needed to be right (passed it off as an OCD thing), and always felt like they needed to be included in things I was doing. Abandonment issues due to trauma they said, still doesn’t excuse it but you know? Fine.

I identified as aro/ace for a long time bc I was severely traumatized. Someone thirst followed me and cornered me into a relationship/took my kindness for granted (Not A, not yet). A’s reaction was to assume I would never have time for them and we would drift apart, just because I had a partner. They complained about this to me and said that even if I was just their friend and QPP (we were both aro/ace) that they still felt I would abandon them. I tried to calm them down the entire time, this was October 2018. Three days later I had a severe PTSD break (unrelated trauma) and broke up with my ‘boyfriend’. A said it was the right decision and we left it at that.

Cut to me a year later having recovered a bit and realizing I had romantic feelings still. That I *wanted* to kiss and take someone out, and do heavily romantic things. During this time A and I had severe issues with D&D parties also where they would break down if they didn’t know everything and said that I couldn’t produce any part of my worlds for profit bc theh had contributed in a small way. It was a bad time. It lead to the complete disintegration of two relationships that I can...probably never get back. One of which I’m not sure I *want* back, but that’s a different story.

Basically they wanted to be the DM with half the credit despite only making npcs I could easily replace or cut out entirely. Now that I started playing again, I have.

I still was friends with them, still waveringly QPP’s with them. Though I’d often feel my skin crawl when they touched me or wanted to be in my space. This was all the time, not when I got triggered into a PTSD episode. I was annoyed when they wanted to always be in my space and have all my attention. But I felt obligated to A and had been recently traumatized again.

Even with all of this I wanted to come out as gay / mlm but still keep part of my aceness with me. Of course in feeling this, I approached A to let them know. Their response was to immediately come back with ‘we can do all of those things you want to do with a romantic partner’. Which I felt may be true for some aspecs but not me. I wanted to *be* with someone and not just...a friend. I wanted to have a boyfriend and be cheesy. I told A that it was probably true but I wanted something else. That I wanted space to think on what they had said. They came back with ‘you’re abandoning me. You just don’t like me. Everyone always leaves me’. Once again with the ‘you get a bf you’ll forget I exist’ rhetoric 🙃.

I told them that they weren’t the person I wanted to be romantic with. I was looking for someone else. I wasn’t attracted to them that way. They took that as an insult. Though to me they relented. Come to find out A got one of our mutual friends involved bc they lived in the same area. They vented and complained to them that I was going to abandon them, that I was punishing them, that they didn’t know what they did wrong. Which was behavior my parents exhibited when I was forced out as trans to them. That Inwas punishing them somehow for a misdeed or that they knew me better, they did something ‘wrong’.

The only outlet I had away from A was TikTok, we weren’t really doing D&D anymore because the party had dissolved due to their controlling habits. Every account I had was heavily monitored by A, I would vent and they would immediately pull it up and ask if I was okay. Even if I had explicitly said before that I was alright and needed some space. But TikTok was a place they barely went on. So I cosplayed more after our last visit (October 2019), and got a small following after joining a lovely d&d tag ran by one of my now closest friends. I also met my boyfriend through this tag, and several other very close friends. I made an oc that I integrated in one or two sessions of D&D before I completely stopped DMing.

Now, it gets worse. I get a following for cosplaying my oc Asariel Whately, join a server, and for a time have a pretty okay place away from A. Some breathing room. When I mentioned that Asariel (who we had talked about maybe being w/ an oc of theirs) was going to romance my now boyfriends oc in the tag, they got upset. They said that they were sad to see them with someone else, and asked if it could all be before my campaign/not actually be real. I told them no and that I’d continue doing what I wanted.

Well, after that and scouring my TikTok (i made the mistake of saying anything in the first place), they got invited to the server and started RPing/cosplaying in the tag. Which they’re allowed to do, but A has a history of wanting to be in my things and being the center of attention. When I say A got involved with *several* other characters, including a possible *minor*, that doesn’t even cover the worst of it. They got involved in a huge polyam relationship (which is fine, i’ll explain why their behavior was weird tho) that LITERALLY took up chunks of the whole server. Any time my bf and I got into chat to rp out some scene for Asariel and Fraanic, A was there to bury our scene in their own garbage. Could have been conicidence but who knows. Then the minor got added into the mix and most of us just had the server on mute/rped in DMs. It was so bad that other people noticed their bad behavior, meta gaming, and needing to be right.

Our relationship ended when someone from a private close knit server made up of all the people who wanted to remove ourselves from the toxic environment, outed our server. Said there was an nsfw server and A immediately jumped to say they wanted an invite. I panicked and DMed them for the first time in weeks to say that they couldn’t. That I needed space from them and this was the one place I had. We had a fight, they said ‘they’re my friends too’ and I pointed out that they had forced their way in, that I said I needed space. Eventually they gave up on it, thank god. But it left me wrecked for months. I didn’t create, I retreated into a two person server with my best friend who is now my boyfriend and just never looked back.

While I’m grateful that this massive upheaval gave me a new support network, got me into a good place for a romantic partnership, and allowed me to heal...I still have a lot of pain. I felt like I had been commodiefied, like an object because of how kind and soft and pliable I was. Because someone thought I was beautiful and *theirs* in the worst way. My ocs who are some of my largest coping mechanisms were tainted, I could barely play Dragon Age, couldn’t think about it. Because someone had conpletely obliterated my love for it. I hate to think they then continued to do that same thing to other people but I honestly have no clue what A is doing now. They dropped off the planet and honestly good riddance.

#i dont even know what to tag this as #personal #idk my person tags change a lot #tw homophobia #tw abuse

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theharellan · 4 years

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THE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE; Mun & Muse - Meme.

fill out & repost ♥ This meme definitely favors canons more, but I hope OC’s still can make it somehow work with their own lore, and lil’ fandom of friends & mutuals. Multi-Muses pick the muse you are the most invested in atm. tagged by: stolen from @dansiere tagging: @ghiassan, @deathsreflection, @altuspavus, @windrunnerrs (velanna), @hopewrought, @willbeshot, @seahaloed (iron bull), @asterfed (noctis), @ anyone who wants to steal it! also multis feel free to choose a different character

My muse is: canon / oc / au / canon-divergent / fandomless / complicated (i’m open to roleplaying with non-dragon age characters, and have AUs for other fandoms)

Is your character popular in the fandom? YES / NO. solas is both wildly popular and wildly hated. he’s been more consistently popular than the controversial women in the series, like sera or vivienne, who have only recently begun to get to the point where their tags are less vitriolic (although i’m sure it’s still out there), but there’s still a sizable hatedom that can’t have his name breathed in their vicinity w/o them talking abt how much they hate him. even if you’re currently cosplaying him!

Is your character considered hot™ in the fandom? YES / NO / IDK. again, you have ppl who are super into him and ppl who think he’s ugly. my personal opinion is that i think he’s weirdly pretty, and wish ppl would commit more to his unconventional features rather than try to chisel him into sb more traditionally attractive and that ppl who don’t find him attractive would maybe chill w/ calling him ugly. find him unattractive by all means, but lets embrace the fact that inquisition let their love interests have skin flaws etc and accept that some won’t be our cups of tea.

Is your character considered strong in the fandom? YES / NO / IDK. its hard to deny at this point tbh.

Are they underrated? YES / NO / IDK. frustrating as the hate in the tags he has enough fans that i couldnt say he’s underrated w/ a straight face.

Were they relevant for the main story? YES / NO. he’s the reason the game starts with a bang and not the inevitable dissolution of the conclave b/c the sides are disparate.

Were they relevant for the main character? YES / NO / THEY’RE THE PROTAG. regardless of solas’ relationship with the inquisitor, there are parallels and contrasts in their stories and he also is the reason they survive inquisition.

Are they widely known in their world? YES / NO. fen’harel is well-known and revered, if feared, among the dalish, yet at the same time he’s not remembered for a lot besides locking the gods away-- and the context of that decision has also been lost. as solas he’s relatively unknown until inquisition and especially trespasser.

How’s their reputation? GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL. again, polarising!! he has loyal agents and people are willing to speak well of him despite everything, including his enemies sometimes (depending mostly on the inquisitor).

How strictly do you follow canon? — generally i try to have a canon basis for my interpretation, even if i interpret the text differently than the author.

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutuals. — solas is an immortal who is simultaneously jaded and very much invested in the small moments of life. far from being weary of the day-to-day lives of ordinary people, it is systems and orders he is most tired of. he walks an interesting line that feels far less misanthropic than other immortal characters i’ve experienced, yet still he’s quite cynical. as a character who has fought against religious based tyranny before, but in a completely different era, he is in a unique position where what he sees around him is both horrifyingly familiar and yet completely new. it allows an exploration of the wrongs of thedas’ society from an outsider’s perspective. his motivations are complex and multifaceted, often condemnable and yet also understandable. his character arc in inquisition (if befriended, or regardless in the case of my solas) takes him from a dispassionate, disconnected antagonist to someone deeply invested in the people of thedas, deeply conflicted and actively hoping he will be proven wrong again. i think his story is a testament to human (or elven, or dwarven, or-) connection and how even when we resist we can’t resist creating bonds with the people in our lives. i personally see this bond going beyond the inquisitor hence why i play low-approval solas as conflicted as high-approval, if not when it comes to the inquisitor.

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?). — solas is selfish and motivated solely by revenge, he’s clinging to a past that clearly no longer exists, if you ignore all the people from it who are still alive. he’s totally unaware of all his flaws and never owns up to any mistakes ever. no, i haven’t listened to a single word solas has said in my life why do you ask. he’s also critical of my faves which means he’s #cancelled, there is clearly no validity to what he’s saying. ksjdf no but in all seriousness i think a lot of reasons ppl don’t find solas interesting are just... weird readings of his character that sometimes have no basis in the text of inquisition, but also there are plenty of perfectly valid reasons to not find him interesting. usually those ppl don’t like... talk abt how much they don’t find him interesting constantly tho. they just chill and aren’t invested in this particular villain. for one thing i think the game missed out on opportunities for exploring how someone who may not have even had a body at the beginning of his existence would feel about gender and sexuality, so making him presumably straight and cis was a boring choice. i also think that the dragon age games being very protagonist-centric hurts solas’ character, there’s no real reason why the inquisitor is the only one who can throw his plans into question but making the player the center of the universe means he’s not allowed to change due to the effects of other companions or NPCs. thank god this is rp and i do what i want.

What inspired you to rp your muse? — i have a history degree so when the inquisition companions were being teased, solas describing bias in primary sources from the memories he’s seen got me interested in him. but my first playthrough i didn’t actually take him with me all too often, i think my main party was dorian-blackwall-varric. i liked him, and i think he or dorian were my first friends in skyhold, but my initial interest was in other characters. between his dialogue that appealed to the historian in me tho and how his spirit opinions sort of turned everything i’d felt about spirits in the last two games on its head, i started vibing with him more the farther i went in. like merrill set me up for the “spirits are people” thing and solas hit it out of the park. then temple of mythal happened, and i did bring solas with me there. i found his dialogue fascinating and also suspicious, i’d just finished masked empire like the day before da:i came out so i definitely thought solas was an ancient elf in the same vein as felassan. it was after temple of mythal that i actually decided to make his blog, although like as one idk linchpin to cement my status as solas trash... i was hit BAD by the banter bug on my first playthrough, probably got like a dozen banters total. but then at some point late in the game i took solas to the forbidden oasis and he wouldn’t stop talking to people, and i really loved his banter with the rest of my party at the time.

What keeps your inspiration going? — replaying inquisition, new DA content when the bioware gods deign to grant us a lifeline, but the biggest thing is my rp partners. i wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the people i write with, new and old. my activity of late hasn’t been the best, work and the summer heat has really been sapping me of energy, and does even during years when we aren’t going through a pandemic. but it’s the thought of my rp partners and love of solas that keeps me coming back.

Some more personal questions for the mun.

Give your mutuals some insight about the way you are in some matters, which could lead them to get more comfortable with you or perhaps not.

Do you think you give your character justice? YES / NO / I SINCERELY HOPE I DO? i have my doubts sometimes, but i think i do ok.

Do you frequently write headcanons? YES / NO / SORT OF? there is no headcanon too small for me.

Do you sometimes write drabbles? YES / NO. but not lately * gestures to the low activity * i’ve been in this cycle where i get anxious abt late replies, so prioritise them, then burn myself out and can’t write the fics i want. i’ve had two i’ve been DYING to write tho i just... need to find the space in my brain to let myself.

Do you think a lot about your Muse during the day? YES / NO. i mean it depends on the day. if i work closing shifts at my store it gets very quiet and boring around 8:30 so i spent the next 90 minutes thinking about character stuff.

Are you confident in your portrayal? YES / NO / SORT OF?

Are you confident in your writing? YES / NO / SOMETIMES.

Are you a sensitive person? YES / NO / SORTA.

Do you accept criticism well about your portrayal? — i’m going to say ‘no’ because like, i don’t ask for criticism. this is a hobby based on my interpretation of a character, if you think i write solas too soft then you’re welcome to think that, but i’m happy with the balance i’ve struck with his internal versus external behaviour and how he changes based upon who he’s speaking to. if you think i’m erasing straight people by making solas pan then ksjdfs. ok.

Do you like questions, which help you explore your character? — yes!!! even if they retread ground already trodden, a) my interpretation may have adjusted since the last time i played or b) a reminder is nice. if it’s new stuff then it’s fun to think about.

If someone disagrees to a headcanon of yours, do you want to know why? — it’d depend on why they disagree. if they just disagree on a subjective opinion about what i took from a certain line, then they’re welcome to their opinion but i don’t necessarily care to hear it. if it is unintentionally hurtful then i would like to know. although rather than a comment i’d rather a non-anonymous message.

If someone disagrees with your portrayal, how would you take it? — same as the above.

If someone really hates your character, how do you take it? — if they’re vocal about it i typically just unfollow / softblock if i was following in the first place. people can feel how they want about solas, but i’ve found over the years that if people really hate solas ooc it can often bleed into their ic interactions. it’s really weird seeing your character being brought up repeatedly in threads with others specifically to dunk on, for no reason other than i guess solas is living rent free in their heads, so at least we have that in common. but anyway unfollowing is just the best choice to avoid getting kinda pressed if i’m having a bad day.

Are you okay with people pointing out your grammatical errors? — roleplay is the wild west of writing, so i think it’d depend on what the error was. coming at me like “you shouldn’t start a sentence with a preposition” would get a laugh, but i don’t edit my replies much if at all and mistakes will 100% happen. pointing out typos is chill so long as you do it politely.

Do you think you are easy going as a mun? — it depends! i’ve learned that being too easy going actually just means i’m subjecting myself to negative emotions to please people. so i’ve gotten less easy going as the years go by. how does one define “easy going” anyway? does asking that question mean i am objectively not easy going? the longer this thought goes on the more the answer seems to be “probably not,” but i like to think it could be a lot worse.

#( long post )#( ooc )#( about me )

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erintoknow · 4 years

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the truth won’t die when they pull that trigger

Spiraling - A Fallen Hero: Rebirth Fan-fiction

Keep working that crack brigger. One day it’ll be wide enough for you to walk on through. [Stigmata]

[Read on AO3]

Holding your breath, you fall from the top of the bridge strut to the traffic below, jets slowing your descent. You’d tagged the car in your HUD and timed the jump, but it’s another to actually do it.

The limousine bounces as you hit the roof. Tug at the mind of the driver and she settles back into her focus. Another nudge and she hits the button to bring up the privacy screen between her and the backseat.

Here we go.

You’re in control.

The past month has been burned on following up the lead from Marconi. Nudging open the cracks. And where you can’t get Jane to snoop around, Ghost is there to pick up the slack. You put your left hand to the roof and wake up the Nanovores. They open up a circle just big enough for you to drop through, landing next to your target.

George Vanderpoel looks up from his cellphone, a look of shock on his face.

“Oh, don’t bother calling for help.” You cross your legs, gesturing towards the driver. “She can’t hear us.”

He swallows, putting his phone down with trembling hands. “Stay away from me…”

“Mr. Vanderpoel,” You laugh, the distortion turning it into a flat, ugly sound. “I’m not going to hurt you.” You pause, make a show of shrugging. “Probably.”

He doesn’t dare look away. “What do you want?” His voice cracks.

“Just a chat. Between friends.”

“I know who you are.”

“You don’t. But, I know you. Mayor Alvarez’s personal aide.”

He frowns, tries to keep a stone face. But his hands give it away even if his internal screaming didn’t. “What do you want with me?”

“You’re a man of integrity.” You lie. “Tough on criminals.”

His expression remains guarded. “You’re a criminal.”

“Maybe. But there’s worse ones out there.” You hand dips down to your belt. There’s no small amount of satisfaction at watching him squirm, heartbeat pounding. You pull out a photocopied piece of paper, pass it over to him. “This look familiar?”

He frowns, not sure what to think, who to believe. “I didn’t sign this.”

“Thought so.” You sigh. “Oh, Mr. Vanderpoel, someone close to you has been very naughty.” You hand dips down to your belt again. Pulling out a card, you flick it towards him as well. “Your buddy, Ava? That’s the code for her safe. Give it a look.” The Chief of Staff’s personal safe might be out of yours or Jane’s reach for now. But no one will suspect Vanderpoel.

He turns the card over in his hands. Suspicion mixed with worry starting to win out over fear. “What? What’s your game here, Ghost?”

“There’s no game.” You lie, again. And then, since you’re already lying and you need him on your side; “I’m not the bad guy here, despite what a few suits want you to think.” You add a telepathic weight to your words, willing him to believe it. “It’s a shame. Can’t trust anyone these days.”

“I don’t–” The car slams to a halt, sending both of you rocking forwards.

You straighten up, on alert. The Rat-King pulls your attention past the driver’s panicked alarm and towards someone coming straight towards you. You stand up. “It’s been good talking with you, Mr. Vanderpoel.” You drop your voice, “Stay out of trouble now.”

Climbing back out onto the roof of the car, you take stock of the scene. Almost at the other end of the bridge and this whole lane of traffic has come to a halt. A glint of movement catches your eye and – there! Some asshole is weaving his motorcycle across traffic. Straight at you.

Knew you would be here? And which car?

Hrm.

The Rat-King braces you as you reach out, grab the offending mind and pull. Force him to drive in a straight line towards you. He doesn’t get far before a car slams into his motorcycle, sending him rolling across the pavement. You hop down to the road, wincing behind your helmet.

The traffic slows to a stop around the both of you as the other man gets to his feet. Rubberneckers. Who’s the interloper? Not one of Vanderpoel’s men. Not a Ranger. Dip in a little further, get the name ‘The Handyman.’ There’s a name you recognize. No mods, not a boost. Just some fancy gadgets and a preoccupation with playing detective.

You hum to yourself, watch him hold a hand to his bleeding head. He really doesn’t belong here. Can feel Vanderpoel’s eyes on you as you step forward. The performance never ends.

You let The Handyman take off his helmet, smooth back his black hair before tucking on a cap. “You’re not who I expected to show up.”

The Handyman’s eyes flash behind his diamante mask. “Disappointed?”

You shrug. “Don’t care.” You plant your feet, watching for any sudden moves. “Stalking Vanderpoel?”

“I have my sources.” The Handyman pulls out a wrench, spins it in his hand. “We knew you’d be targeting him.” He flashes a grin. “And this is a perfect ambush spot.”

You tsk, shaking your head. “And you didn’t think to warn him?” You shrug, hands palm up in an exaggerated gesture. He’s making this so easy. “What if I blew the poor guy up?”

“You wouldn’t.” He sounds more like he’s trying to convince himself. “I had a hunch.”

“Horrible.” You sigh, “risking someone’s life on a hunch.” You glance back at Vanderpoel. He’s still listening, good. “Hoping I’d take him out for you?”

“That’s not true and you know it.”

You step towards him, pulling your cape around you. “I’m not the one to convince here.”

The Handyman takes a step back. Reaches a hand back to his belt. “Don’t think you can trick me.”

Take a breath. Can already hear the distant thrum of helicopters in the distance.

Time to stop stalling.

You rush the man as he pulls a gun from the holster on his belt. The shot goes wide, as you slide under his aim. Rise up and grab his arm, snapping it backwards and twisting his thumb until he drops the weapon in a cry of pain. A hand comes down on the back of your helmet sending an electrical charge coursing through the suit system.

Panic shoots through you. Ortega!? Here!? You drop The Handyman, scanning the perimeter. Sweep your arm behind your head and you find the EMP charge. Your sigh of relief is met with a knee in your abdomen. Reeling backwards and coughing for breath you grab at the offending leg, twist the foot sharp the wrong direction.

The Handyman screams, collapsing to the road. You don’t give him a chance to recover. Kicking him in the ribs. “You – you really think you… had a shot against me?”

“I’m not…” He wheezes, pulling himself to his feet, one hand clutching his side. Favoring his uninjured ankle. “I’m not done yet.”

“Very heroic.” You hiss. “Give up.”

He tosses something at you, pellets that explode in a burst of light and chaff. You don’t need sight to pick out his mind however. To re-close the distance and kick the second gun out of his hand. Follow up with a punch to the face that lays him out back on the ground.

His hand goes for something else on his belt and you bring your boot down, pinning his wrist to the asphalt. “Stand down.” For just once could someone admit they’re beaten and go away already?

He’s grinning up at you with a bloody smile. Irritating. You press your boot against his wrist. You’ll give him something to smile about.

The Rat-King pulls at your attention with a chirp of alarm. You twist sideways, dodging silver claws. As if by magic, Lady Argent stands over The Handyman’s beaten body. An irritated scowl on her face. Late to the party? Shame about that LD traffic, huh?

Argent glances down at him, “Can you move?”

“Y–yeah…” He half-gasps it, voice rasping in pain as he pulls himself away. Hoping for a hand-up. It doesn’t come. Oh, this guy has a lot to learn about Argent it appears.

She shifts focus away from him, no longer concerned. “Then get out of here. I’ll wrap up our project.”

Really?

You can’t help the laugh as you clap your hands together. “The Rangers were in on this scheme?” Sure, let’s just have all your enemies discredit each other on live broadcast. Make this real easy. Who in the Farm wants to take the hit? You rest your hands on your hips, let The Handyman crawl away, he doesn’t matter. “Lady Argent…” You shake your head. “Of course you’re the one needlessly risking lives.”

“Whatever.” She bristles, flipping back her hair. “I’m not the one that set this up.” She glances back at The Handyman, takes a step forward to put herself between the two of you. “He had a plan, I liked it.”

He raises a shaky thumbs-up. “Not… the first trap we’ve sprung together.” His grin is triumphant despite being spotted with blood. “I set them up, she knocks them down…”

“...don’t say it…” Argent groans, pressing her fingers to the bridge of her nose.

“Gotta use the right tool for the right job.”

“...why do they always need to talk…”

You glance between the two. “Adorable.” Vanderpoel is still watching. Still listening. Jesus. This has gone phenomenally better than you could have expected. Rangers and vigilantes working together – knowingly putting city officials at risk? “So you’re in on it.”

“I’m not. I’m just here to bring you in.” Lady Argent drops her hands to her side, flexing her fingers as she shifts her stance.

They just can’t help themselves, can they? “Not to protect Mr. Vanderpeol?”

She snorts, waves the idea away. “He’s perfectly safe. Don’t play politics with me.”

“You ought to pay more attention when a banshee gives you a warning.”

“Yeah, whatever. Your cosplay doesn’t impress me.”

You frown. “That overconfidence is going to ruin you.”

She eyes you, shifts position again as her fingers elongate into claws. “I’d like to see you try, villain.”

Argent moves faster than you’d expected. But you’re still faster. Dodging some strikes, deflecting others with the armored plating on your arms. Your first match-up was abbreviated – already exhausted both body and soul.

There’s no point in waiting for your death any more. You’re past it. Past living. There’s only this moment, this fight. Either you win or you die. And that’s still a win.

Argent’s movements are quicker, anticipating you with an unnerving accuracy. Can pick up her surface thoughts, that she’s been studying the recordings of your fights.

Fair enough. So have you.

You roll out of reach of her arms, the two of you pausing for breath. This is the third time since the Marconi fiasco that Argent’s cut an operation of yours short. It’s starting to feel like she’s hounding you specifically. You watch her, waiting for movement. “I’m not the one that put all these people in danger.”

Not this time.

Not anymore.

What more do you need to prove?

Argent narrows her eyes at you. “Don’t try that with me. I don’t give a damn about politics.”

She really can’t help herself, can she?

You twist out of the way of her claws, catch a knee to your chest. Moving with the blow you slide back, grab her leg and flip her off her feet, sending her rolling backwards. “Why?” You yell after, “Afraid I’ve got a point?”

She gets to her feet, snarling. “Shut up and fight already, cheater.” She tenses, ready to jump.

You grin behind your helmet. “No tricks that time.”

She grins, a predatory smile, and jumps towards you. At the last minute you step aside. Her claws catch your arm, pulling you backwards with her.

Wait – shit –

Argent hits the ground, pulling you down. And then she’s on you, hands digging into the sides of your suit, trying to slip razors in between the plates. Heart pounding in your throat, you buck under her, grabbing her hands and twist her off.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck

this has to stop right now, needs to end fuck shit piss goddamnit

Argent’s eyes glance down at your hands, pick up a note of confusion. You don’t get time to examine it because you replace it with punching her in the face. She reels back, gouging more groves into your ablative plates.

It’s just Argent. You’re just fighting Argent. That’s all. Just a woman that can crack open your suit like a can-opener. Nothing to freak out over.

It’s fine.

You’re fine.

You. Are. In. Control.

Take the chance to step backwards, hand touching the guardrail. Let the nanovores get to work. Roll to the side as Argent comes after you. Touch another point on the rail. A chunk of the railing drops to the road. Tripping hazard.

You’ll trick her over the edge. If she can survive being flushed down sewers, she can survive a swim.

Or that’s the plan – a kick catches you in the back as you try to put distance between the two of you, send you to the ground. Roll out of the way and hit her in the ribs as she tries to follow-up.

It’s getting harder and harder to predict her attacks. Her mind focused solely on your next movement. It’s unsettling, like looking at the reflection of yourself in her silver skin. Distorted.

Can’t let it get to you.

Catch her on the next attack, grab and swing, bringing your knee up and pushing her back. She staggers backwards. Rights herself just before she would have tripped over the edge.

Damn it.

She launches herself at you and – fuck, this is the wrong direction to do the whole ‘over the edge trick’ now. You just need her out of the way. A crowd is gathering around the two of you now. Standing there, gawking. Watching. Always fucking watching and doing nothing.

Maybe it’s time for the audience participation round…

Roll backwards out of Argent’s reach. Snare the mind of the nearest civilian. Young woman. Dazed, she doesn’t back up in time. You grab her, pulling her in front of you.

Argent stops, flexing her fingers. “Coward.”

“Don’t care.” The woman in your grip struggles until you twist her arm back, just painful enough to give her the idea. She freezes. Hyperventilating. Fuck. Is this really what you’re reduced to now? You feel sick.

“Let her go.”

“No.” You grit your teeth. “You go.”

Argent drops her hands to her sides. Still watching you. “You’re no killer.”

“You – you willing to bet on that?”

She takes a step forward. “Yes.” She takes another step.

“Let her go. Don’t bring other people into our fight.”

Panicked thoughts in the head next to yours and it sets your teeth on edge. The Rat-King curls protectively around you, trying to dull the worst of it. This is… what’re you doing?

Really?

You let her go.

Neither you nor Argent move as the woman, weeping, scrambles back into the crowd, into someone’s embrace.

Argent braces herself again. “See? That’s better.”

“Fuck you.” You snarl.

Why the fuck did you do that? Hostage taking isn’t going to help Ghost’s public image. And it – it… fuck, that woman –

A spike of alarm from the Rat-King pulls you out of it just in time to dodge the kick in your direction. You twist sideways, intending to get Argent from behind. Instead your foot catches on something and you stumble. Argent is on you immediately, and something sharp pierces your side.

Shove her away and stagger backwards, you hit something with the back of your foot. The railing. Back here again. Fuck. Okay. Take 2.

Argent moves to press her advantage. You twist out of the way, using your cape to obscure the movement. She slashes at the fabric, hissing and you spin around to kick her over the edge.

She anticipates you – catches your leg and pulls you off balance. For a moment you’re in the air and there’s a hint of green on the horizon –

and then you’re falling again.

#fallen hero: rebirth #fallen hero fanfic #fanfiction #fhr/Ariadne

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