idk how to explain it but there's a specific genre of chinese fiction where the male lead is the target that the fem lead needs to "conquer" (often romantically) and i've been listening to those fics way too much so
🍎 - centre of the story, main target for salvation. very, very tired of living.
📻 - an npc in the storyline who suddenly gained conciousness
timeloop au where 🍎 is assigned the role of "needs to be saved." someone will always appear to undertake the task of saving 🍎, if they fail, someone new will appear, and so on until someone succeeds. the world is a fictional storyline, completing the mission earns money.
📻 is a writer/journalist whose role in the storyline is simply to write articles that serve as narrative pieces (like, if there's a scandal involving the main characters, he writes the article). an npc that has no effects on the plot.
this shasha timeloop fic really is just like "what if i took the loneliest girl in the world and i made her functionally immortal in a really awful way to further isolate her from any real human connections she could try to forge"
Everything around him burnt and prickled at his skin like a thousand suns, yet, somehow, the hands tenderly cradling his face ran hotter than everything else, their touch like molten lava, scorching his skin and sealing his screams deep in his mind.
He was agonising. He didn't know how he knew but he was sure; the afterlife felt far away but he was certain that his body would be unable to withstand this pain for much longer.
Until he was plunged into ice and the shock forced his eyes open.
His body twisted in itself and he doubled on his side as he coughed out mouthfuls of salty sea water.
A hand ran over his back soothingly, helping get it all out and calming the instinctual screams of his hind mind.
He panted, slowly regulating his breath and stretching his limbs on the floor, laying on his back.
Deuce kneeled by his side, sighing in relief when he noticed he was conscious and well. Kotatsu headbutted his hand before laying softly on top of him. Looking around he found Wallace running a towel over his head, talking to Saber; Mihar watching from a half opened window and Banshee and Cornelia standing at the sides of a draped, wet figure sitting with it's hands on its knees, with Skull crouched almost in front of it.
Cold crystal blue eyes glared at him.
The eyes were familiar but the coldness in that gaze was not.
He turned around to sit, Kotatsu chirped in protest but made way for him.
The disheveled redhead's frown deepened.
“Hey,” his voice came out raspy after his coughing fit “Are you-?”
“Are you stupid?”
There were the clicks of several guns ready to fire.
He laughed - he didn't know why he was laughing - “Is that really what you want to say right now?”
Beside him, Deuce sighed, defeated.
“It's a fair question,” the redhead's mouth twisted downward - a part of his mind told him it was a new look on that face, the other giggled at the familiar sight - “What kind of devil fruit user jumps into the water to save someone?”
“In my defense, I haven´t been an user for *that* long, and, well, I guess it became a bit of a reflex after jumping into so many times to rescue my little brother”
“I'm not your little brother”
He shrugged “Anyway, are you not going to dry yourself? The wind is pretty chilly and you're completely soaked, aren't you cold?”
“My core runs hot, I'm more resistant to the cold that others”
He shared a look with Deuce, who clicked his tongue, got up and walked away to get some towels.
“Right, but back to the other thing, before you interrupted me-” he said with good humour, the redhead huffed “Are you alright? Those guys got you pretty bad”
And he looked roughed up, messy and dirty all over, his uniform torn, boot broken and gloves missing, his shattered sunglasses laid at his feet.
“They only caught me by surprise, and most of the damage was done by you…”
“I guess that makes sense, you're pretty resilient after all,” he didn't know why he knew that, he was sure they had never fought before - but his body disagreed, his muscles remembered the feeling of their numerous clashes - “so, I guess you're going to stay for now, right?”
Deuce returned, he threw a towel at the red head and gave the other to his captain.
“Won't that be dangerous?” Asked Wallace, now dry and with a change of clothes.
“I mean,” he mused, “What can he do? He's injured, weaponless and we're stronger than him”
“Don't be so cocky, Portgas”
“Well, you still haven't managed to defeat and capture me so I think I'm safe to say that I'm stronger.” He chuckled.
The redhead pouted.
A strangely cute - and familiar and strange - expression that caught him off guard.
“I'll ready a space for our guest,” said Banshee, turning to leave her post next to the redhead.
“Yes, thank you, Ma'am” he nodded at the retreating woman then turned back to appraise their surprise guest, who, noticing that, flushed a pretty pink “Yeah, I think my clothes will fit you,”
“I don't -”
“What? Do you carry spare clothes hidden somewhere?” said Cornelia with a hint of mockery “Just calm down and accept Cap’s kindness.”
The redhead had an indignant look on his face, clearly unhappy but without many options to choose from.
He laughed, he got on his feet and finished half-drying his head “Right, we gotta shower if we don't want to get sick, come Red”
“*What?* Portgas! I am not-”
He found himself smiling at the redhead's surprising - but it wasn't surprising, he knew how shy he could actually be - shyness and his crew's guffaws.
He found himself looking forward sailing together for whatever short while - but part of his mind kept screaming, they had been sailing together since the beginning -
ANYWAY SO I HAVE AN ACECHIJI ANGSTY TIME LOOP AU
K, soooooo
Basically
Ichiji is trapped in a loop, from when Ace sets sail to become a pirate, to whenever Ichiji dies. So he's trapped trying and failing to save Ace's life.
The constants in the loops are: Ichiji meeting Ace during missions, joining the spades and later Whitebeard, and Judge (one way or another) getting in the way of him saving Ace, Judge dragging him to Germa after Marineford.
HOWEVER
This, ofc, has a happy ending.
In the last loop, after having tried pretty much everything, he finally gives in to his last option.
So he calls Sanji.
He has grown to understand/respect Sanji after meeting and interacting with him in several loops.
Later, he runs away from Germa (with his siblings' help) and, injured, arrives at the Baratie, where he stays until Ace and his still small crew arrive (he's afraid of going with Ace and suffering that heartbreak again, but, with a little push from Sanji and Zeff - and their other siblings with whom they kept touch as much as possible -).
He finally succeeds at saving Ace, and Ace is wracked by bad fevers as he starts remembering all the other loops uwu
There´s also some comedy bit with Sanji since, because of everything that happened with Ichiji, is now in touch with his other siblings thanks to Germa´s tech and some signal jammers and whatever else, so, sometimes while on the Merry and later the Sunny, they recieve calls from strangers (024) demanding to speak with Sanji (also exchanges letters with them and Ichiji) and noone explains nothing about the strangers and their relationship to Sanji to the crew.
so so excited to share this au i’ve been actually planning,,, basic loop au with twists only i know. Very tempted to make a blog for them when i finish the story. Oh and Gordons a bit of an ass in this house sorry lawl😞
I know Colette and Gordon are never seen interacting like ever but they’re basically best friends in this au so hell yeah gshsgsh yeah i’ll stop talking now okay bye.
Just saw your blog and got obsessed! Question tho, what is the loop thing? Like ik it's the JD support group but what exactly is happening? They got forced to kill and hurt each other and whenever they die, they revive/loop and forget about the past loop before they died?
I genuinely tried to write a response to this like three times but I just can not think. Basically we made up some lore around the hunger games simulator involving pinkie promising to win the games for a dying friend and then getting stuck in a time loop.
"Yeah, um well, you used to ask for it, I've started just bringing it, saves time."
Eddie nodded, he was taking it better than Steve expected, he'd not told Eddie about the loop before.
"How many times?"
"Lost count," Steve lied.
"Do I die?"
"Didn't the first time." It's a good enough answer for now. He doesn't want to tell Eddie that he's died the most. Doesn't want to tell him Steve knows how many minutes it takes him to run through the woods, how many last words he's heard, how many last breaths he's watched.
"Do you die?"
"Only once." But I shared that day with you.
"Don't make a habit of it ok?"
"Sure, Eds." Promises are easy when you don't have to keep them.
"You're taking this easier than I thought you would, the others sometimes think I'm crazy."
"Well it's all crazy isn't it, don't think you're the lying kind, plus, you look tired."
The boys are quiet for the rest of the walk through the forest.
Eddie dies again.
"Don't cry big boy, you'll see me again soon, yeah?"
This is what poped up in my mind when I wrote this but it's more like loop then time-travel
So let's think about if it swap to Spider is the one who back to the day he got kidnapped
Of course he would still loyal to the Sullys to death but if that's how the loop begin? every times he died he would be sent back to that day, where he knew in his heart no one will go after to rescue him, and he would definitely died over and over again that he forgot how many times he had been.
The limit will reach him in the end when he finally broken, just like everyone want, and when the RDA strapped him in that machine Spider, groaned, belike " c'mon we can talk this out in peace, no need this damn machine, no need to shout, no need to drag me,"
" just ask me nicely, and I will tell you what you want im so sick of all this shit anyways "
but Ardmore didn't trust him, still strapped him in that machine but this time he let out just some information easily, he just let his mind say any shit it want(it's mostly still useless to the RDA but they got clues). So they didn't sped up and Quaritch still stop it like every loop Spider had been through (only differ is this time hes not too late).
They threw him in the cell Spider didn't have energy or heart to do anything he still thought that this time he would die as well so he just lay and let the time take his life and wait for another sent back but that's never come this time cuz he didn't die!
I don't really plan about what is coming up after this(and I don't think I will, my head end here) it's can be Quaritch being nice or not or Spider gradually break each loop until he can't be fixed. But I think Spider in this AU can't really bring himself to choose either na'vi or human side, hes just done, so so done with everything.
I know this kinda nonsense cuz Spider would try to not get caught (but he want to make sure the others won't get caught instead of him as well) or actually he would warn them to not go to that place and warn Jake about the Recoms' comming
But that's can be another route I wanna think about loop-plot so let's set this at Spider was sent back to when Neytiri appear and everything endlessly repeat until he try to change his own fate by tell something to RDA.
Again; my brain stopped process this plot(or prompt idk) here and I don't know which way this gonna go so there's no continuing of this but if I suddenly have some hc maybe I will post it just not so soon.
