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hallelujahmeatgod · 4 years ago

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HAIKYUU CHARACTERS WHEN YOU PRANK THEM TELLING THEM YOU DON’T WANT TO SHARE A STRAW

+warning/s: There’s really none, just cursing is all.

+word count: 2227

+note: The characters are very random because they’re the first ones I had an idea for. I want to write for the other ones too, so please do tell me what you guys think about this one.

KUROO

"What did you just say?" He asked, eyes wide from shock.

"I said, grab another straw if you want to take a sip of my drink. I don't want to share a straw." I said, as calmly as I can, immediately looking away from him. Because Lord knows I just want to laugh at his dumbfounded face right now.

He gave me a sarcastic laugh. A laugh that says "are you serious right now?"

I raised a brow at him acting like I don't have a clue as to why he's acting the way he is.

And that was the last straw for him.

"So you literally shove your tongue down my throat and you wouldn't share a straw with me? What's that about?" He said angrily, looking at me with daggers in his eyes.

I laughed and instantly covered his mouth, looking around at the café. "Bitch, shut your mouth. I was just playing with you." I whisper-yelled, while trying to control my laughter.

He rolled his eyes and snatched away my drink. Muttering a "not funny" under his breath, as I continue laughing at him.

KIYOOMI

"Can I try yours?" Omi asked calmly.

I nodded, but before he could grab my drink I pulled it back a bit. "Oh-- can you not use my straw though?" I said as innocently as I can.

He rolled his eyes at me then scoffed. I thought he's actually gonna get riled up, but that's until he said "Brave of you to assume that I'll share a straw with you."

I gave him a dumb look. What?

He raised his brows at me, a sly smirk making its way to his lips. "I'm literally afraid of all kinds of germs, and you are no exception."

Did I really just forget that I'm in a relationship with a germaphobe?

"Whatever" I said, pouting.

I handed him a new straw but then he gave me a look of disgust.

Can I be any more disgusting to this guy?

"Now you're trying to give me a plastic straw? You turtle murderer! Get that animosity away from me." He said, as he dramatically whipped a metal one from his bag.

Just how many does he have in his bag?

"Now, repent from your sins and start using this babe."

BOKUTO

"WHAT?!" His dramatic ass yelled.

"Sit your ass down, right now!" I ordered like a mom.

I pulled him back beside me on the couch as he looked at me sadly.

"What do you mean we can't share a straw? We kiss all the time though and we share more saliva doing that than just sharing a straw." He pouted.

Which is so cute that I had to stop myself from just pinching his cheeks and hugging him.

"I just don't want to share a straw today, okay? Just get another one. I have some in one of the drawers in the kitchen." I said, scrolling through my phone so that it'll seem like it's not a big deal.

I kept on scrolling, but then I realized after a while that he's still beside me.

When I looked at him, I KID YOU NOT, there's tears welling on his eyes threatening to fall. His lips even quivering as he tried holding back the tears.

I instantly held his face and pulled him close. "Oh my, Bo, what's wrong?"

When asked he became more emotional and the tears finally fell. "You wouldn't share a straw with me." He said, sobbing. So I pulled him into a hug.

"Bo, stop crying. I was literally just joking, no need to cry you big baby." I said, chuckling lightly as I ruffled his hair.

He instantly pulled away, looking at me expectantly. "Huh? You're not for real? I can use your straw? You're not disgusted?" He asked and I nodded, giving him a warm smile.

He jumped at me and gave me a bear hug. "I don't like that joke though" He said, pulling away enough so he could look at me.

"I'm sorry, Bo. I won't do it again."

"YAYYYYYY!" He exclaimed, as snot trickled down from his nose. This kid.

"Let's wipe that snot away first though before you come close to my straw, yeah?"

OIKAWA

(Now this is about to turn into a soap opera. Everyone knows this dude is the queen of all drama queens)

"Tooru, baby, use another straw." I said, not even sparing him a glance. Eyes focused on the anime we’re watching.

No reply. No reaction. No movements for a solid moment.

Eventually, he sighed then stood up. I heard him shuffling around so I thought he's actually gonna grab a straw for himself. Y'know, be compliant for once?

But since we're talking about a professional drama queen here, that obviously isn't happening. Duh.

"28th of August, in the year of the Lord. It's a warm afternoon, an afternoon filled with sunlight. Everything's bright, sunny, and happy. But just as everything is fitting into place, everything turned dark '' He monologues, standing at my balcony.

Oh Lord, save me.

"It is on that one afternoon, that Oikawa Tooru's heart has been shattered into million little pieces. It's shattered so good that no glue, not even E6000 glue, can put it back together." He continued, fake crying. Looking back at me once in a while to see if I'm looking at his drama. Then just exaggerating even more, putting his all into it.

I rolled my eyes at him, completely done with him.

"I thought there was love. I thought we felt the same way, that we're on the same page. But I was greatly mistaken! Nothing's fine. I'm torn. I'm all out of faith and this is how I feel. I'm cold and I'm ashamed, not lying naked on the floor-- but I'll think about it. Illusions never change into something real--"

"DUMBASS JUST TAKE A FUCKING SIP. JUST SHUT UP"

And that's all that needs to be said. He darted towards me and easily drank half of my drink, cuddling next to me.

"Now is that hard? It isn't right?" He teased, which earned him a solid smack on the head.

ASAHI

"Grab another straw for you to use, Asahi" I called out to him as he stood up to get some more snacks after he announced that he wanted to try my drink.

"What did I do this time?" He asked quietly when he got back, dropping the snacks on the table.

"What do you mean? Did you do anything?" I asked him back.

He crouched down in front of me so we're at eye level. "You just told me to use another straw. So what did I do, woman?"

At this I immediately broke into a fit of laughter, which made him confused yet concerned.

"You're scaring me right now babe."

"Ohhh~ Asahi, you really are too precious."

"Are you being sarcastic right now? Is that you getting more angry at me for whatever reason? Wait! Are you actually angry at me? What did I do--"

"YO! Breathe." I clamped a hand on his mouth. "Who said I was angry?"

"Well you don't wanna share a straw so I'm assuming you hate me right now" He shrugged.

I ruffled his hair and lightly pinched his cheek.

"I was just messing with you, so no need to be a panic mess." I reassured, caressing his face ever so softly.

His face instantly calmed as he leaned onto my hand. "Don't do that. You know I panic easily over the smallest things. I was about to have a heart attack." he pouted.

I kissed his cheek and offered him my drink, and he happily took a sip.

"Wait till Daichi hears this" I chuckled, earning a groan from him as he hid his face from me.

KAGEYAMA

I'm getting so impatient.

Impatient for Kageyama to ask for a sip of my drink so I can mess with him.

Why wouldn't he just ask? He kept on eyeing it yet still wouldn't ask for a sip.

"You know, eyeing my drink like that wouldn't make you taste it. If you want a sip, get another straw." I said as if I don't care, when in reality I'm watching his every move and expression.

His eyes then diverted from the drink to me, raising a brow. What's he raising his brow for?

"Bold of you to assume I'd like any of that." He said lazily.

Me=Jaw dislocated.

I looked at him not knowing what to say. What does he mean?

"Huh?" Was all my dumbass could muster.

"As if I'd drink that '' He said, sticking out his tongue in disgust. He took a sip from his milk and smiled, completely satisfied. "I'm all good with my milk, it makes my bones stronger. You can close your mouth now."

"B-but you kept on eyeing it"

"Yeah I did. Cause I was asking myself how someone can even consider that a drink."

USHIJIMA

"Can I please have a small sip of your drink? That seems like a new flavor I have yet to try. So if you don't mind." Ushijima asked beside me, looking straight into my eyes as he did so.

Does he really have to be this serious and proper asking for a sip?

I'll never understand how his robotic self works, but I still love it though. I actually find it cute, so it took a lot from me to not break character.

"Sure thing. Just get yourself a new straw." I said, pushing my drink towards him.

I can see he's quite surprised by that since he didn't just do it right away. He gave me a look but then again didn't really say anything. He stood up from our booth and went to get a new straw.

I almost facepalmed when he did so, but then again what was I expecting? That he'd go crazy over it? That he'd have a big reaction? This is Ushijima we're talking about. The only time you'll see a big reaction from him is when that kid Hinata goes head to head with him or when he sees Oikawa CAUSE WHY THE HECK DIDN'T YOU ATTEND SHIRATORIZAWA, DUMMY!

Ushijima is very simple and calm, so he doesn't make a fuss about things easily.

When he got back he just silently put his straw in and took a sip. "That's quite good but not as good as the one you always get." He said honestly. Typical Ushijima.

We were silent for a little bit. Usually I'd be talking his ears off by now with all the gossip I've found out. But I'm still a tiny bit down because of his lack of reaction.

"You're weird today" He said out of the blue.

"What?" I asked, choking a bit from my drink.

Lost. That's what I am. He doesn't really blurt out things like that. I mean, yeah, if he finds something weird, mostly if you're asking him about it he'll say it's weird. But he doesn't really just blurt it out the way he just did.

"You never had problems sharing with me. You don't mind me biting into your food, drinking from your bottle, making me eat the ice cream when you only want the cone, yet you made me get a new straw. It's just new, I guess. That's why it's kind of weird."

He said calmly and I can tell that he's genuinely calm. Like he isn't trying to be calm or he's mad deep down. He's simply sharing his thoughts.

"So you did notice." I pouted. He looked at me and nodded for me to continue talking. "I was actually just doing this thing I saw on YouTube, telling your boyfriend you don't wanna share a straw."

"Oh" He nodded in understanding. "No wonder you're weird today. You'd never do that." He actually said in a very humorous tone, with a small smile on his face.

I beamed and sat closer to him, resting my head on his arm. "Sorry for that."

He shook his head and gave me head pats. "It's fine. And of course I'd notice, I prefer it when you share with me, it makes me feel closer to you. And you've always been sweet to me even though I can't do it well, so I instantly caught on to it."

"You're sweet in your own unique way, more than you realize, Ushi" I said, smiling at him. He returned the smile with an even bigger one. My heart is about to burst, it's not everyday I see this guy grin like this. This smile might be a small one to others but for me this is a whole ass beam!

"Can we share properly now?" He asked, very VERY cutely. It almost brought tears to my eyes. And when I say cutely I mean him just looking at me seriously. In conclusion whatever this giant does I find cute, okay? I'm whipped and I'll even write it on my forehead if I have to.

"By all means"

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delimeful · 4 years ago

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you cant go back (3)

warnings: panic, miscommunication, trafficking, non-consensual drug use, suicidal thoughts, food, mentions of torture, cliffhanger, these tags make it sound worse than it is tbh

When Virgil first opened his eyes, jerked out of sleep by sharp instinctual alarm, he’d thought for a moment that he was still dreaming.

It was the same face, after all, even with how frighteningly close it was, even with a vastly different expression painted across it. He’d been confused, almost relieved-- had they gotten away after all?-- and then he’d realized just what the Deathworlder had in their arms.

He’d lunged and come up short, forced to watch as the Human kept their arms locked around Patch even as the creature made unhappy little noises he’d never heard from it before.

It was so small compared to the Human, easily tucked under an arm and managed regardless of protests. Did they have no respect for the deadly grace of the other creatures on this planet?

They’d circled him from a distance, ignoring his warning twitches and outright hisses as thoroughly as they ignored Patch, and all he could do was watch, locked in place, hoping that Human prey drive wasn’t as high as all the rumors said.

And then the Human had left, taking Patch with them, and Virgil had been left to watch their fading heat signature and pray to Seryl that whatever the Human did would be quick. For both of them.

It wasn’t that easy, of course. The Human wanted something from him, badly.

He thought he had a fair idea of what-- or rather, who-- it was.

After all, he’d seen a near-perfect mirror of them, sitting bound and muzzled in their transfer ship’s holding cell where a Human absolutely shouldn’t be. Leond and her Second had been unnaturally gleeful for rotations before Virgil finally found out about the ‘successful pickup’, namely through stumbling across it by doing the routine security and safety checks that he didn’t trust the rest of these idiots to do themselves.

They’d cut him off before he could get to a comm to tell Janus, cornered him in the tight cell block hall, and offered him a deal: his silence for a cut of the immense earnings they would make from renting out a Human to any and all fighting rings.

He remembered the way the Human’s gaze had flickered between him and the others curiously as he argued, the way they’d struggled to bare their teeth derisively at Leond, even through the bars of their muzzle and the haze of whatever they’d been drugged with. It was one of the last things he’d seen before he’d ‘made a fuss’ big enough that his own crew had tranq’d him and ditched him on-planet to die.

“You’re right,” Leond had said, face smooth in the way that meant smug satisfaction for her species. “We haven’t fulfilled our half of the exchange, have we? We took an alien from that planet, so it’s only fair that we leave one behind.”

His limbs had been defensively raised since the beginning of the argument, but Virgil had fought side by side with these people before. They knew how to guard his blind spots, which meant that they knew his blind spots.

The Human had tried to speak through the muzzle, just before he’d heard the discharge sound of a tranq gun too close to dodge. He thought it might have been an attempted warning.

It hadn’t changed anything. He’d been the only one on that ship who’d opposed the Human’s abduction, and as a reward, he was going to be slowly interrogated to death by one of their clutchmates. The level of cruel irony was like something from one of Jan’s stupid operas.

Virgil felt another shudder of exhaustion. Stars, he hoped Janus would get out of there once he realized what they’d brought back. His best friend knew better than to fuck with Humans, and the crew clearly wasn’t going to listen to any interplanetary ethics lectures, so the best thing he could do was skip town. Better to rebuild than fall with the nest.

He hadn’t slept after the Human had left, flipping to his heat sensor vision and watching all night for their return, unable to relax after one of the most unpleasant awakenings of his life. And if it meant he didn’t dream about what could have happened to Patches, all the better.

The next day had come, and the Human returned, wielding that dull stick and asking more angry questions that Virgil couldn’t understand, let alone respond to.

The thing was, given enough time and exposure, he actually would be able to understand the specifics of what was wanted from him.

Like most long-term interstellar travelers, he had a Lator implant, and the more the Human talked at him, the more linguistic patterns and trends would be picked up and catalogued, making it much easier for him to put the pieces together.

Unfortunately, time wasn’t something he had an excess of.

Janus would have figured out at least the basics by now; in addition to being better with words, he’d gotten a more recent, effective upgrade to the implant’s software. Virgil had turned the offer down for himself, knowing that they needed to save money where they could, and figuring that he didn’t really need it. His job was to defend Janus. His First could handle the talking part of their missions on his own with ease, the chatterbox that he was.

It had seemed obvious at the time. A lot of good that logic was doing him now.

The Human said something at him, flashing his bone-white teeth as he spoke. Humans didn’t have guard plates over their mouths at all, and so every time this one turned to him, he felt as though they were either acting sickeningly overfamiliar or that they might lunge forward and try to bite him at any moment. He’d carefully kept his own plates locked, not willing to expose any teeth and have it mistaken for a challenge.

The Human was waiting expectantly. Virgil took a deep breath and replied, the same as he had every time he could, though he doubted Humans had access to translator implants.

“I am not here to harm anyone. I was abandoned here against my will. I can’t understand what you’re saying,” he recited in Guard-tongue, keeping the sentences brief and repetitive for easy translation pattern recognition.

The Human wasn’t extending him the same courtesy, his own sentences long-winded and full of unfamiliar concepts that kept tripping up the Lator programming. References, probably.

There was one Human word that he’d figured out fairly early on: Brother.

Clutchmate, family, the lookalike that was probably long gone by now.

He was almost glad that he couldn’t speak coherently. As it was, he didn’t have to be the one to break the news.

Almost, because the Human was stubbornly finding new and creative ways to freak him the hell out with each visit.

First, they’d figured out fairly quickly that he was slowly starving.

Virgil had flooded his plates right to pitch on their first meeting, and hadn’t been calm enough to stop the defensive reaction since, which had quickly drained what little hydration stores he’d had left. Between the drying out of his plates and the fact that he’d gotten too worked up and blacked out for a moment during an interrogation, his fading health wasn’t exactly subtle.

He’d panicked, because any enemy knowing his weakness was generally pretty fucking bad, let alone an enemy with personal motive and ability to twist that weakness like a knife in the spine.

The Human had verbally freaked out (a regular occurrence) and vanished for a while, before returning to the barn with an entire array of items (not a regular occurrence). They’d set the items out on flat fiber ‘plates’ and then slid them into range with that stupid stick.

Virgil had stabbed a few of them on principle before realizing that this was food, aided by the Human rolling his eyes pointedly-- a derisive gesture, he’d gathered-- and eating something from a plate of their own.

At that point, Virgil had been willing to risk poison. The way he saw it, he either died, or he ate something, and either way it meant stopping the slow, aching pain eating away at the pit of his stomach.

He’d even been willing to tolerate the Human staring at him, since apparently they didn’t have the manners to not watch a stranger eat. Or that wasn’t a thing on this planet. It didn’t really matter.

After a significant amount of time spent using his auxiliary limbs to delicately maneuver Human produce and meats into inspection range, he settled for what smelled the least concerning, avoiding any that smelled or looked too bright to be safe.

(The scrunched-up look the Human had given him after he’d crunched an egg in his throat had been hard to interpret, though.)

Anything he could safely ingest, he’d eaten. After the Human left, he’d even attempted the indignity of trying to lift the bowl of water in range with wobbly limbs, though he’d almost immediately spilled the majority of it all over himself. It didn’t matter, he could pull any and all hydration from what he’d eaten, though he didn’t dare get used to it.

This wasn’t his first time above the nest, and he hadn’t fooled himself into believing that this shocking show of generosity would last. The Human had only done it to make sure that their hostage wouldn’t keel over.

Starvation and dehydration were more-than-effective methods of hands-off torture, after all, and the Human really only needed to give him enough to keep him alive.

The impending mistreatment shouldn’t have shaken him as much as it did. He had the advantage of the Human’s ignorance on how much Chelcerae ate, and his own resilience, developed from years of scraping by on the barest of rations. He was lucky, really, to be one of the species with a water-storing organ.

Still, he spent the night wondering if it was worth it to keep fighting. There was no escape, so wouldn’t it be better to go out on his own terms, before anything truly horrendous could happen to him?

Probably. The real question was: would he have the fortitude to turn down food all the way to a slow and painful death-via-starvation?

He wasn’t sure, and he continued to be resentful of the fact that he even had to make such a choice all the way up until the next day, when the Human walked in with a plate covered in everything he’d eaten yesterday and slid it over to him, simple as anything.

“What?” the Human snapped after a moment of Virgil watching them for any indication of what to do, and he’d hurriedly flickered his heat sensor eyes in hopes of placating any offense. The Human had grumbled indistinctly, but didn’t attempt to remove the plate or even threaten to do so.

The next day was the same. Though the Human continued to try and interrogate and occasionally intimidate him, the food and drink was provided without stipulation or hesitation. It was… strange.

Virgil refused to read into it. Perhaps Humans just had meals so frequently that skipping a single day would be as barbaric as weeks of starvation for Chelcerae. Maybe once the Human had enough of his noncompliance, they were going to feast on his flesh and didn’t want a stringy meal. It was impossible to know.

The generous feeding schedule was nothing, though, compared to some of the other questionable tendencies the Human had.

They traversed the grounds in and around the barn with little wariness, apparently quite confident in their ability to defend themself on the Deathworld they’d grown up on. They brushed insects and plant matter alike off their person with little care for poisons or bites.

Their body language seemed to consist of every threat display in the wayfarer guidebook, and worse, only a quarter of these threat displays seemed intentional. Virgil was constantly tense, attempting to figure out which were intended to cow him, and how to keep his own body language from worsening the damage. Any signal of terrified compliance, even the obvious tremor of his auxiliary limbs, only seemed to prompt wariness and confusion from the Human.

They’d found his helmet and immediately put it on, which had made his fuzz prickle with hope for a moment, before remembering that the reserve battery of the headset was well and truly dead. No emergency translators for the Human, and no upturns in luck for Virgil.

Maybe it was better. Even if the Human could talk to him, he would seem just as guilty for their brother’s disappearance in their eyes. It wasn’t even an accusation he could reasonably defend against; if things had gone differently, if he’d made smarter choices, maybe he could have gotten the captured Human free.

Janus would have managed it. He’d always been a quicker mind than Virgil.

It’d been three days since the Human had found him, and Virgil had barely managed to parse a handful of imperatives and nouns from someone who was basically just yelling the same things at him over and over.

“You can’t ---- the ---- ---------, you ----- --------! I ---- what I ---- and --- ----- to it!” the Human yelled, essentially proving his point. Virgil resisted the urge to let his chin drop down to his collar in exhausted resignation.

It was difficult to focus past the old pains from the fight with Leond, and the new pains from being strapped upright for days on end. Even if he could bring himself to pay closer attention, it wouldn’t make it easier to parse words he had no context for. Lator technology worked best when both parties were exchanging words, or at the very least, when there was more than one native speaker prattling on at you!

The Human inhaled to continue and then froze, prompting Virgil to slink his shoulders up slightly, something that had worked to show his non-aggression once or twice before. The Human wasn’t focused on him, though, whirling around to face the barn doors with their body rigid.

Because he’d never been good at uncertainty, Virgil flicked his heat-sensor eyes open just as another Human-sized mass reached the doors, moving in a predator’s stalk.

Well, he thought as the door creaked open, I’m screwed.

#sanders sides #sanders sides fic #alien au #humans are space orcs #ts virgil #ts roman #ycgb #you cant go back #my writing #writing #space au #sorry for the late posting my nap ran long #food tw

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ichika27 · 4 years ago

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Mairimashita! Iruma-kun s2 ep12

We’re halfway through the second season, I suppose?

This episode gives us a little glimpse of the home life of the Abnormal Class students and also a bit of insight about Kalego-sensei himself.

Grandpa Sullivan is excited for the coming vacation as it means he could spend time with his grandson. Opera then tells him he still has some work to do before then including a request from Opera themselves. As repayment for helping him look cool in front of Iruma and friends in the party episode, Grandpa Sullivan agrees to Opera's request and says he, too finds it interesting.

Okay, just a thought but I heard the episode with the party was a filler? Like, it wasn’t in the manga or something or did I get that wrong? Or did they decide to connect it to the story?

At school, Kalego-sensei gets a special task from the school principal: to visit the homes of the Abnormal Class students before the vacation starts. He hates it but he has no choice. He decides to just go in, talk to the parents, go out and to end this as quickly as possible.

First up is Asmodeus! Azz mother unfortunately isn't home though (Azz purposely not let his mom know about the meeting) so his butler is the adult there with him. Kalego-sensei then asks him if he's told his parents about school matters and Azz replies that he does... talk about Iruma and his achievements. Sensei gets annoyed as he was supposed to talk about himself but Azz said he excels at school all the time so there's no need to say anything about it.

Two cute girls (who are relatives, calling Azz "brother") comes out and agrees that Azz is amazing although they hate it that he had been too preoccupied with Iruma recently that they don't hang out as much anymore. Azz apologizes to them... and says Iruma comes first. This led the two kids to get mad at Iruma and insult him. Azz runs after them trying to change their minds.

The butler then talks to Sensei a bit about Azz's past and says the boy has changed and had become happier after enrolling at Babyls and meeting Iruma. Kalego-sensei says he understands cause as demons, becoming the subordinate of someone who beat you is a normal thing. He does note though that if Asmodeus stops being too narrow-minded and only thinking about Iruma, he’d grow and become better and if that happens, he’d become a better subordinate to Iruma. He does tell the butler that he won’t be telling Azz this as the guy has to figure it out by himself.

Next is Clara's family who even gives him a warm welcome. There's also a musical number much to his annoyance. He absolutely doesn't like it in there and wanted to leave lol. The anime really made musical numbers the Valac Family thing, huh?

Poor Sensei is at their mercy haha.

Just when he couldn't take it anymore, Clara's older brother finally makes his appearance and apologizes to Sensei for the trouble. Urara, unlike everyone else in the family is polite and mature making Kalego-sensei question if the boy really is a part of the family or if he was kidnapped from somewhere else lol. Sensei was able to talk to them normally for a while before they start their antics again. Sensei was able to give advice about Clara though. He mentions how Clara is a bit insensitive (as she doesn’t consider how her actions affect others) and causes trouble but is good in a sense that she could make people follow her own pace.

Oh and Clara’s mom mentioned that someone like Urara does come into their family from time to time. Like, most of them will act like the typical Valac family member but once in a while, they’d produce someone like Urara whose different. I think this is interesting since they have been hinting about him from season 1 and now he’s here and there’s something about him that’s different.

The other students homes aren't any better and Sensei had to deal with whatever trouble or craziness that'd be there waiting for him. By the end of it all, he was tired.

In a way, he should’ve expected this. I mean, this is the Abnormal Class we;re talking about. He got a lot of souvenirs from them all though and has a bad full of random stuff by the end (most came from Clara’s family).

The final visit was to Iruma's house. Kalego-sensei just wanted things to be over with but his fears came go be realized when he meets the one person he didn't want to see: Opera who used to be his senpai.

Sensei seem to be scared or at least very wary of Opera that he uses Iruma as a shield lol.

Grandpa shows up and shows what Kalego-sensei looked like when he was young. He then proceeds to drop some details about Kalego-sensei as a student (as Sensei complains about it).

It seems that back in his school days, Kalego-sensei gets challenged to fights often and rumors about him pop up as well which he finds to be a pain. The only person he could talk to was Baram-sensei who was also a student back then. The two talked about what's going on and realized Kalego-sensei must've been mistaken by others as someone else. There was no student council back then so things were also more chaotic (It seems Ameri’s influence made a big difference to how school operates now).

He then later learns who everyone mistook him for. The person who the rumors talk about that could defeat many demons: Opera. Since then, Opera had been sort of bossing Kalego-sensei around and it seems sensei might be a bit traumatized as he uses Iruma as shield once again.

Nice. We get a little backstory not just about Kalego-sensei but also about Opera who was a delinquent. Opera seem to still enjoy making Kalego feel bad.

They eventually proceed with the parent-teacher meeting although not without pestering Kalego-sensei for a moment. Sensei talked about the troubles Iruma got into but he also mentioned his accomplishments. Grandpa then takes the record book sensei is holding and reveals it's entirely about Iruma.

Iruma then realizes the hard work Kalego-sensei does as he probably wasn't the only one who sensei had looked into. Sensei takes his book back and gives Iruma proper advice. He says Iruma shouldn’t mix up responsibility with self-sacrifice and should be careful with the actions he takes.

When it was finally over and he could finally leave, Opera forces Kalego-sensei to stay and even had him turned into his familiar form.

The next day, Sensei thanks everyone for letting him into their homes but informs them that he'd be increasing the number of their homework and everyone complains while Sensei is happy to see them struggling.

Later, as vacation finally comes close, the class goes to Iruma’s house to invite him to Walter Park. Iruma agrees of course and the group excitedly talked about what they'd do next.

I really liked this episode. It’s nice to see more of Iruma’s classmates even if it’s just for a few seconds each. We also get more info on Clara and Asmodeus and about their family members who hadn’t appeared til now. Also backstory about Opera!

The thing I liked the most about this however, is seeing what kind of person Kalego-sensei is. He’s strict and gets easily angry and seems to not like his students. He would be what we’d describe as a “terror teacher” but surprisingly, he isn’t unfair. He wouldn’t randomly flunk a student because he doesn’t like them and does take his job seriously. He doesn’t disregard the good points of a troublesome student and also looks into how a student could better themselves. He likes seeing them struggle but would acknowledge their accomplishments (we also see this back at the end of the exams where he disappointingly announced that everyone passed). Grandpa Sullivan even mentioned how he’s glad Kalego-sensei is the teacher in-charge. No wonder everyone at school respects Kalego-sensei - it’s not just about his strength or how scary he is but it’s cause he truly is a responsible, reliable, and competent teacher.

I like how we’re learning a lot about other characters this season. It makes them more likable and makes it more fun to watch their interactions with one another.

I guess the Walter Park arc would be next? I hear it’s action-packed so I look forward to it.

Thank you for reading this far!

#Mairimashita! Iruma-kun #welcome to demon school iruma-kun #anime #sana_post

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literally-ritsu · 4 years ago

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Rom-com anon here and I back because you people have been creating too much angst I need to balance it out. So let’s talk Kisa in this au.

Mainly how Takano is hilariously jealous of Kisa for something that he himself is the indirect cause of. Because in this au, Ritsu has like 90% of his trauma removed, actually has adequate nutrition & sleep, and over all been pampered by Takano for the past decade that had kept his youthful, innocent appearance.

Which means there’s been far too many incidents where Kisa & him, good friends they are, have been mistaken for a couple far too many times for his liking and Takano has been accused as being a cradle robber to the point he is down right insulted, no matter how many times Ritsu assured him he looks young.

So poor Kisa is pretty much exactly the same he is in canon and is just trying to be a good friend to Ricchan and occasionally using Ritsu to get out of Takano’s demonic scoldings only he also sometimes gets Takano glaring daggers at him because Takano is verrrrryy jealous of anyone who has been mistaken as dating Ritsu. Kisa has so much on his plate right now, experiencing his first love, doing his job, watching the Emerald soap opera that is TakuRitsu thinking they’re hiding their relationship, and now he has to deal with a jealous Takano sulking in the corner as he & Ritsu are once mistaken as high school students.

Kisa also the one who totally started the bet about when TakaRitsu finally realizes they are not subtle in the slightest. This man is fighting viciously with Yokazawa on the side for the pay out for this bet because once again Yokazawa has been like a long suffering third wheel for like 8 years at this point and Kisa has been living with being Takano’s imaginary secret love rival for three months and both absolutely need financial compensation for putting up with this shoujo manga style couple.

Though Kisa does like how they foster so much inspiration to give feedback/suggestions to artists while editing. Like they’re so ridiculously sappy, they provide so much content that everyone uses them as free inspiration references.

(Yukina, once he learns of all the details, thinks the whole thing is absolutely hilarious. Except for the mistaken as dating part where he can actually sympathize with Takano...)

I have envisioned... Ritsu and Kisa dragging their half dead selves to a coffee shop and suffering together, simply trying to work together. And I am also imagining Takano glaring at them (mostly Kisa) from a table nearby and pouting because Ritsu told him not to bother them. And I am imagining him noticing a sparkly dude with a sketchbook also glaring at Kisa and then Yukina notices Takano noticing him and they Telepathically Bond. They have a Comrade. Thank you, that is all 💜

#ask #cammie babbles #nostalgia things #i love u rom com

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nobloodneeded · 4 years ago

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Please please PLEASE tell us more about Lara Shepard!!!! 🙏 like her personality, backstory, disposition... Favorite food? Idk I think I'm in love with her

Hi!!! I’m on mobile more than the computer and it did not alert me to this message, so sorry if this is late, but I could talk about any of my bioware ocs 5ever - so THANK you.

Ok, so official canon backstory: Lara Shepard is a Colonist, Sole Survivor, Engineer - Paragon.

Now the fun personal headcanons:

Lara grew up as a tomboy; she always liked her hair cropped short and was often mistaken for a boy, though she never really minded. She was almost always covered in bruises and dirt; because of this her parents called her “spud.” She was spunky and outgoing in her youth, some might have called her combative, but only in defense of others. She once defended a smaller friend from bullies who were three years older and, though she came out with a number of scrapes and a black eye, she ultimately bested them and they never bothered her friend again.

Her personality did change after the trauma of losing her family, friends, and later her entire unit. She became more reticent and withdrawn, her toothy grin replaced with tighter features, however her eyes still give her away as they are very expressive. While the rest of her face was trained to be impassive, her eyes tend to either sparkle or flare with emotion depending on the situation.

Overall, Lara is like a crab: hard exterior, gushy interior. She is generally rational and level-headed, but has to work very hard to be that way because she still leads with her heart.

She cares VERY deeply for her comrades and is fiercely loyal. She does have difficulty letting people in after witnessing the slaughter of her family AND unit, but once they’re in - they are in for life.

She has PTSD and anxiety. Art, “squeezies (incredibly strong, crushing, hugs)”, and long hot showers help when medication can’t.

Lara is a dead-pan snarker and enjoys witty banter. Humor and deflection are the coping mechanisms she uses the most; levity helps lift the burden of her responsibilities, if only for that moment. She likes being around Joker and Garrus the most for this reason.

She has a respect for the chain of command, though at times it’s begrudging (so much so that she’ll need to ball her fists to diffuse her emotions before she gets censured). That being said, she has definitely made fun of the Council privately in her quarters or with Joker, after ensuring the comms were offline.

Lara is decisive, whether it’s the right or wrong decision, once she’s made up her mind that’s it. Outwardly, she says she prefers to move forward than look back. Privately, she reflects on things to death and it keeps her up a lot more nights than she’d admit. While her strength and stoicism is no facade, she has had many shower-breakdowns over the burdens placed on her. To her own detriment, she would rather shoulder every problem than have someone else deal with those consequences.

Her favorite musicians would be: Joan Jett, Pat Benatar, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Green Day, Rob Zombie, and Linkin Park.

Given her more reserved outward demeanor, it’s a shock to most that when she’s comfortable around a person she will cut loose and ABSOLTELY belt along uninhibited, and her voice is quite lovely. She especially loves to dance, though she is...not lovely at it. She’s all elbows and knees, but that doesn’t stop her.

Lara is bisexual and while she currently only holds a flame for Garrus, she does harmlessly flirt with Kelly often.

Her favorite food would be anything spicy and her favorite guilty pleasure program would be Elcor soap operas. She wishes more people were as candid with their emotions as the Elcor.

Her closest relationships so far are with Anderson, Joker, Garrus, Wrex, and Tali. These are all people who see a very different, more personal, side to her than anyone else.

Lara has an extreme admiration and respect for Anderson. She strives to make him proud and thinks on his advice over the years before she continues with most aspects of her life, especially tactically. She would do almost anything for him. When she saved the Council, she made sure they put him in the available human seat. She detested Udina and trusted Anderson with her life, it was the easiest decision she had ever made.

Joker is like the brother she never had and she wouldn’t make it if anything were to happen to him. She relies on Joker not only as her pilot, but emotional compass sometimes. He has a knack for figuring out which situation calls for levity and which calls for sympathy and she finds his presence alone an aid to her weary heart. They have a running game where they pull faces at each other as inconspicuously as they can and whoever gets caught by another crewmate loses. So far it’s 27 to 19, Joker in the lead.

Lara fell for Garrus instantaneously. She likes a person with their own moral code and a staunch will to serve and protect. She also has a weakness for seemingly-imposing men with hearts of gold and his dorky charm cut through her defenses like a hot knife through butter. She knew it was impolite to stare, but despite how many humans felt, Turians especially fascinated her and having one so close gave her plenty of opportunity to study their features. This backfired as she found him more and more intriguing - even handsome with those rugged planes and angular features - rather than a curious case study.

Garrus was passionate, driven, and endearing and though it is hard for her to make emotional connections, she is a romantic at heart and craves companionship and his personality compliments hers perfectly. After every mission, Lara would touch base with her comrades on the Normandy and she noticed her feet moved quicker and her heart beat faster the closer she got to Garrus, but she forced herself to bury that feeling. There were more pressing matters to attend to with her new status as a Spectre, commanding the Normandy, and the Saren/Reaper invasion.

When she saw Garrus on Omega, though, those feelings came flooding back with such a force, she nearly reeled. She had to force herself not to crash into him in an embrace, but she did cheer upon seeing him. When he was felled by Tarak, her mind went into a frenzy and she could scarcely think or speak coherently until he was stabilized. When he walked in, the ache in her heart at his condition was muted by the immense relief and wash of emotion that came over her. His joke about scars made her smile for the first time in a long time; and she knew at that point it was too late to quell these feelings and she would have to do something about them.

Similar to Anderson, Lara has a staunch respect and admiration for Wrex. She appreciated his input on missions and he was a constant companion for his battle prowess. She for sure used him as a shield a few times with his larger frame and tougher skin. He provided unique perspectives on Krogan life and it helped her overcome societal prejudices she unknowingly harbored; even going so far as being a major defender of him and his people. She was delighted every time he said her name in greeting and she would mimic his voice with his name in kind. He found it amusing and they were endeared to each other pretty quickly.

Where Joker was the brother Lara never had, Tali was the sister she always wanted. Lara could listen to Tali talk for days. Her voice was entrancing, her stories were fascinating, and her personality was adorable. Lara was fiercely protective and proud of Tali and went above and beyond to make sure she felt like the Normandy was a home away from home. Tali was the only crewmate allowed in Lara’s quarters and the two would talk late into the night sometimes. Lara even taught Tali some card games to bring back to the Floatilla and her joy brought a light to Lara’s heart.

This was way more information than you asked for, but I love her ;A;

#kj plays me #laniardraws

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crbcmasterlist · 5 years ago

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(Art by the lovely and wonderful @eldstunga)

Character Dossier - Captain Ela Kira. Pirate, Smuggler, Thief, Lover, PITA.

Name - Ela Kira (Possibly not born name)

Age - Unknown, Approx late twenties to early thirties by Galactic Standard Calendar.

Birthplace - Unknown (Possibly space born. Paperwork has conflicting statements. Possible forgery.)

Citizenship - Iridonian and Republic citizenship. Unconfirmed Imperial Citizenship.

Occupation - Transport Hauler Captain. Former military service, possibly Republic, but unverified.

Affiliation - Neutral and largely independent, but unconfirmed Imperial connections.

Hair colour - Silver gray

Eye colour - Orange

Skintone - Tanned and light orange

Height - 5'8

Weight -

Build - Strong and toned figure.

Tattoos - Iridonian Zabraki facial tattoos, star system right forearm, tech styled left forearm.

Augmentation - Minor eye modification. Unknown purpose - eyes have noticeable glow to iris with faint visible black lines, sclera darker and more grayish in colour.

Other notes - Scar lines on right cheek

Ela Kira is a pirate, a thief, a smuggler, and a criminal by all accounts and definitions under the Republic. A trail of boarding actions, heists, contraband and broken laws follow her across her over a dozen major systems, along with as many small bounties often placed by corporations seeking reprisal.

The oddity lies in the fact that while she fits all those descriptions - Ela does not fit them. Of all 47 confirmed piracy raids linked to her - only 6 had cases of minor bodily harm to sentients, with the situations being either someone attempting to surprise her or otherwise. Ela either seems to convince her targets into cooperation or stuns them and leaves them safely out of the way. It has been noted several crews report 'extremely annoying behaviour' from her, such as singing over the ship PA or playing Hutt Opera music, but otherwise no abusive or hostile behaviour to them.

Ela's preference for non-violence and non-lethal even extends to rivals and foes, with reports collected by several saying she famously doesn't hold grudges - even against repeated attempts on her by some of them. Most of her direct rivals seem annoyed by her at worst, but lack the usual murderous ill will found amongst most pirates. The limit of this ‘no grudges’ rule isn’t clear, as most of the ones we spoke to were unaware of anyone pushing her too far, though rumours exist.

Many bounty hunters we spoke to also reported this, some even remarking she seemed happy to see them, flirting and providing banter to 'regular' hunters who arrested her. She has even been cooperative at times out of familiarity.

It should be noted that several hunters confirmed her attitude has worked to some degree. A few admitted to successfully catching her, only to release her on, to quote a specific hunter; "very good and happy terms until round two for usual fun" - they refused to clarify further. One commented in passing that Ela is, using an exact quote, 'A better snuggler than she is smuggler' but also refused to clarify on this.

Further inspection into her piracy reveals a pattern and motive that helps explain this unusually friendly attitude towards her.

Ela focuses largely on stealing either credits or raiding corporate transports carrying very specific cargo. Twelve of her raids all involved her stealing medical equipment and supplies that had been sent for disposal and destruction - despite being functional and useful still. The fact said equipment has been tracked to sentientarian aid vessels and work only adds to the unusual behaviour of Ela.

To put it simply, she seems to steal from the rich corporations to give to the poor and in need of aid. Most credits she takes have been tracked to funding relief and medical efforts, as do most things she steals. The rest of the credits are seemingly dispensed across a dozen cantinas, clubs, and bars.

It has even been noted that several transport captains in the sectors Ela operates know of her and, like her rivals and hunters, treat her as a frustrating nuisance at worst. Some have been accused of aiding her through leaking the contents of their cargo, but this has been proven false on all accounts. They have been accused of being ‘overly cooperative’ as well, which is an unusual accusation and often dropped after the captains and crew point out they’re still being held at blasterpoint or stunned by the pirate.

It is, however, very clear she has supporters and sympathisers who do leak such things as her as the method and nature of her methods are too organised not to have such intel given to her.

Ela largely works alone, with the exception of making use of various droids to assist her larger or more complex operations. The few instances of her working with other sentients has seemingly always via her being hired, and only when the job follows her interests.

The pirate is often described as an open and energetic character, with a cheerful friendliness that can easily be mistaken as naiveness and innocence. Ela is neither, having proven herself as cunning and intelligent, but seems more than happy to play dumb for fun or her own odd amusement at times. Combined with her martial skills and piracy experienced, she is proven very capable of holding her own as needed, or outdoing opponents in other manners.

Overall, Captain Ela Kira is something of a decent person who's taken to piracy and heists for her own goals and excitement, with no apparent care to enrich herself on a financial level. Whilst she is still very much an issue and a criminal, it's of a better class than most of the more murderous characters. Attempting to get her to work towards our own goals and as an ally might be possible, if not for an apparent backer who already has the strings to pull her out of most arrests and prisons without too much fuss.

Additional note - She dislikes Kowakian monkey-lizards (and some sister species) with some passion and has been known to be openly hostile towards them. Given the nature of Kowakians this isn't a large surprise, however she is seemingly struck with very bad luck when dealing with them. Several escalations involving the creatures have gone poorly for Ela, which only furthers her negative views on them. This only powers the cycle of behaviour towards and from them.

It isn't clear what has caused this dislike to occur beyond the abrasive nature of the average Kowakian, but it seems to be going well in their favour more than Ela's.

#Character Dossier #SWTOR #Star Wars #old republic #Swtor oc #star wars oc #Zabrak #Pirate #Ela Kira #Smuggler

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wrathfulspark · 5 years ago

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@garridansblood

“Yes...it was nonetheless, ah--discouraging, which is why...I tend to be so...I tend to be much more involved, I would say.” He flashed a nervous smile. The blond perked up significantly as Elidi didn’t seem to think of his soft-heart as being weak, or a negative aspect. It was quite refreshing, and all the more made him feel rather comfortable being within the magika’s presence. “Ah-? W-well...thank you, Elidi.” He spoke softly.

He all the more agreed with his guest’s advice; and felt a rush of reassurance provided her hopeful outlook. Yes, there had to be someone lurking within the city that had a profound respect for the deceased, someone who wouldn’t mind what the job entailed. Though Garridan loved his work, he understood that dealing with bloated corpses, having to make an attempt to repair bodies that were more or less desecrated by violence or accident--it wasn’t an easy task, oh not at all.

At first, Elidi’s words caused a look of worry to trace his face--had he done something wrong? However; it vanished into near thin air as she once again reassured him. Yes, Elidi was a kind woman no doubt. Though the blond continued to view Elidi as more of a superior rather than a friend, she had been a wonderful guest so far; and Kiki had more than enough praise for her mentor.

“You’re too kind, Elidi...much too kind.”

His hues seemed to lighten up as Elidi spoke of her own preferences. How refreshing it was, having someone who seemed to be as avid a fan of romance novels as he! “W-why ofcourse, I...I would absolutely love to exchange novels. In fact, I ah--I recently lent out my copy of Phantom of the Opera...” Upon feeling his cheeks grow cold from embarrassment, the vampire shyly averted his gaze towards one of his well-organized book piles. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to...” He paused, a thoughtful expression appearing on his face. Garridan was about to apologize for rambling once more, but Elidi’s words entered his head: You are not rambling, I enjoy listening to you speak, you don’t do it very often. This provided the vampire with a newfound sense of self-confidence in that he wasn’t being a bother.

He observed the way Elidi seemed to gaze upon her bracelet, and Garridan felt tempted to take a glimpse himself; but refrained. No need to be invasive, though he found himself wishing to compliment the magika’s jewelery. It seemed quite regal, refined, and to a degree seemed to embody the woman quite well.

“I’ve read The Price of Salt before...what an intricate story. So beautiful, and it...it really seemed disheartening at times--though...I suppose the ending was rather hopeful, if my ah--if my memory serves correct.” The vampire rubbed his arm, hoping he hadn’t mistaken the plot with another novel he’d read.

“I already ah, stated Phantom of The Opera is a favourite...let’s see. Maurice was a rather hopeful, especially due to the time in w-which it was written...I found it ah, rather...reflective of my own experiences.” Tilting his head, the vampire seemed to retreat into his thoughts as he attempted to think of other titles that called to him. “The Night Circus was also...quite lovely--a bit more recent, though...it had a surreal, though dream-like ah, plot.”

"I can't say I've read that one, though I know it's fairly well known. It has a movie as well doesn't it? I seem to never have the time to finish up a movie, either I fall asleep in between, something comes up, work or I'm spending my spare time with Tamryn." At the mention of her girlfriend, Elidi shifted in her seat, thoughts brought back to her precious curiosity. Her hand rubbed at the nape of her neck, silent for a stretch as she summoned the appropriate wording.

"I noticed.. you get a little rigid around Tamryn. At first I thought perhaps it was me and I freaked you out a little but sitting here with you and chatting has definitely changed my mind. Your energy, aura is calm -- well calm enough." Her head tilted as she observed the vampire, scarred brow arching, "Did something happen between the two of you? She wouldn't hurt you, you know." The witch paused, illuminated hues averting to the corner of her eye, "Well, she wouldn't kill you anyways."

Her posture straightens as she recenters her focus, clearing her throat as her brows knitted together, "You don't have to answer if you don't want too. I was just curious is all. Besides we're having such a lovely chat, I'd hate to ruin the atmosphere that we've got going." Nervously she sipped from her tea, gratefully still warm as she swallows the liquid. Ever since she made her promise to Tamryn, she's avoided any sort of encounters with suspects as much as possible, only finding it excusable if she encountered a situation while working. She wondered how the Alpha was fairing on her end, they didn't necessarily discuss that. A thoughtful hum resonated from within her, her head shaking dismissively at her own thoughts. Of course Tamryn would follow her promise.

#trch:garridan #her: DOUBT - nah

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the-marx-brothers-will-live-on · 5 years ago

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Leonard Joseph "Chico" Marx (March 22, 1887 – October 11, 1961) was an American comedian, musician, actor and film star. He was a member of the Marx Brothers (with Groucho Marx, Harpo Marx, and Zeppo Marx). His persona in the act was that of a charming, uneducated but crafty con artist, seemingly of rural Italian origin, who wore shabby clothes and sported a curly-haired wig and Tyrolean hat. On screen, Chico is often in alliance with Harpo, usually as partners in crime, and is also frequently seen trying to con or outfox Groucho. Leonard was the oldest of the Marx Brothers to live past early childhood (first-born Manfred Marx had died in infancy). In addition to his work as a performer, he played an important role in the management and development of the act in its early years.

Chico was born in Manhattan, New York City, on March 22, 1887. His parents were Sam Marx (called "Frenchie" throughout his life), and his wife, Minnie Schoenberg Marx. Minnie's brother was Al Shean. The Marx family was Franco-German Jewish. His father was a native of Alsace who worked as a tailor and his mother was from East Frisia in Germany.

Billing himself as Chico, he used an Italian persona for his onstage character; stereotyped ethnic characters were common with vaudevillians. His non-Italian-ness was specifically referred to twice on film. In their second feature, Animal Crackers, he recognizes someone he knows to be a fish peddler impersonating a respected art collector:

Ravelli (Chico): "How is it you got to be Roscoe W. Chandler?"

Chandler: "Say, how did you get to be an Italian?"

Ravelli: "Never mind—whose confession is this?"

In A Night at the Opera, which begins in Italy, his character, Fiorello, claims not to be Italian, eliciting a surprised look from Groucho:

Driftwood (Groucho): "Well, things seem to be getting better around the country."

Fiorello (Chico): "I don't know, I'm a stranger here myself."

A scene in the film Go West, in which Chico attempts to placate an Indian chief of whom Groucho has run afoul, has a line that plays a bit on Chico's lack of Italian nationality, but is more or less proper Marxian wordplay:

S. Quentin Quayle (Groucho): "Can you talk Indian?"

Joe Panello (Chico): "I was born in Indianapolis!"

There are moments, however, where Chico's characters appear to be genuinely Italian; examples include the film The Big Store, in which his character Ravelli runs into an old friend he worked with in Naples (after a brief misunderstanding due to his accent), the film Monkey Business, in which Chico claims his grandfather sailed with Christopher Columbus, and their very first outing The Cocoanuts, where Mr. Hammer (Groucho) asks him if he knew what an auction was, in which he responds "I come from Italy on the Atlantic Auction!" Chico's character is often assumed to be dim-witted, as he frequently misunderstands words spoken by other characters (particularly Groucho). However, he often gets the better of the same characters by extorting money from them, either by con or blackmail; again, Groucho is his most frequent target.

Chico was a talented pianist. He originally started playing with only his right hand and fake playing with his left, as his teacher did so herself. Chico eventually acquired a better teacher and learned to play the piano correctly. As a young boy, he gained jobs playing piano to earn money for the Marx family. Sometimes Chico even worked playing in two places at the same time. He would acquire the first job with his piano-playing skills, work for a few nights, and then substitute Harpo on one of the jobs. (During their boyhood, Chico and Harpo looked so much alike that they were often mistaken for each other.)

In the brothers' last film, Love Happy, Chico plays a piano and violin duet with 'Mr. Lyons' (Leon Belasco). Lyons plays some ornate riffs on the violin; Chico comments, "Look-a, Mister Lyons, I know you wanna make a good impression, but please don't-a play better than me!"

In a record album about the Marx Brothers, narrator Gary Owens stated that "although Chico's technique was limited, his repertoire was not." The opposite was true of Harpo, who reportedly could play only two tunes on the piano, which typically thwarted Chico's scam and resulted in both brothers being fired.

Groucho Marx once said that Chico never practiced the pieces he played. Instead, before performances he soaked his fingers in hot water. He was known for 'shooting' the keys of the piano. He played passages with his thumb up and index finger straight, like a gun, as part of the act. Other examples of his keyboard flamboyance are found in A Night at the Opera (1935), where he plays the piano for a group of delighted children, and A Night in Casablanca (1946), where he performs a rendition of "The Beer Barrel Polka".

Chico became the unofficial manager of the Marx Brothers after their mother, Minnie, died in 1929. As manager, he cut a deal to get the brothers a percentage of a film's gross receipts—the first of its kind in Hollywood. Furthermore, it was Chico's connection with Irving Thalberg of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that led to Thalberg's signing the Brothers when they were in a career slump after Duck Soup (1933), the last of their films for Paramount.

For a while in the 1930s and 1940s, Chico led a big band. Singer Mel Tormé began his professional career singing with the Chico Marx Orchestra. Through the 1950s, Chico occasionally appeared on a variety of television anthology shows and some television commercials, most memorably with Harpo in "The Incredible Jewelry Robbery", a pantomime episode of General Electric Theater in 1959.

His nickname (acquired during a card game in Chicago in 1915) was originally spelled Chicko. It was changed to Chico but still pronounced "Chick-oh" although those who were unaware of its origin tended to pronounce it "Cheek-oh". Numerous radio recordings from the 1940s exist where announcers and fellow actors mispronounce the nickname, but Chico apparently felt it was unnecessary to correct them. As late as the 1950s, Groucho was happy to use the wrong pronunciation for comedic effect. A guest on You Bet Your Life told the quizmaster she grew up around Chico (California) and Groucho responded, "I grew up around Chico myself. You aren't Gummo, are you?" Groucho is heard in videos pronouncing it "Chicko", as in a Dick Cavett episode with Groucho talking to Dan Rowan.

During Groucho's live performance at Carnegie Hall in 1972, he states that his brother got the name Chico because he was a "chicken-chaser" (early 20th century slang for womanizer).

As well as being a compulsive womanizer, Chico had a lifelong gambling habit. His favorite gambling pursuits were card games, horse racing, dog racing, and various sports betting. His addiction cost him millions of dollars by his own account. When an interviewer in the late 1930s asked him how much money he had lost from gambling, he answered, "Find out how much money Harpo's got. That's how much I've lost." Gummo Marx, in an interview years after Chico's death, said: "Chico's favorite people were actors who gambled, producers who gambled, and women who screwed." Referring to Chico's love life, George Jessel quipped, "Chico didn't button his fly until he was seventy."

Chico's lifelong gambling addiction compelled him to continue in show business long after his brothers had retired in comfort from their Hollywood income, and in the early 1940s he found himself playing in the same small, cheap halls in which he had begun his career 30 years earlier. The Marx Brothers' penultimate film, A Night in Casablanca (1946), was made for Chico's benefit since he had filed for bankruptcy a few years prior. Because of his out-of-control gambling, the brothers finally took the money as he earned it and put him on an allowance, on which he stayed until his death.

Chico had a reputation as a world-class pinochle player, a game he and Harpo learned from their father. Groucho said Chico would throw away good cards (with the knowledge of spectators) to make the play "more interesting". Chico's last public appearance was in 1960, playing cards on the television show Championship Bridge. He and his partner lost the game.

Chico was married twice. His first marriage was to Betty Karp in 1917. Their union produced one daughter named Maxine (1918–2009). His first marriage was plagued by his infidelity, ending in divorce in 1940; he was very close to his daughter Maxine and gave her acting lessons.

Chico's second marriage was to Mary De Vithas. They married in 1958, three years before his death.

In the 1974 Academy Awards telecast, Jack Lemmon presented Groucho with an honorary Academy Award to a standing ovation. The award was also for Harpo, Chico, and Zeppo, whom Lemmon mentioned by name. It was one of Groucho's final major public appearances. "I wish that Harpo and Chico could be here to share with me this great honor," he said, naming the two deceased brothers (Zeppo was still alive at the time and in the audience). Groucho also praised the late Margaret Dumont as a great straight woman who never understood any of his jokes.

Chico died of arteriosclerosis at age 74 on October 11, 1961, at his Hollywood home. He was the eldest brother and the first to die.

Chico is entombed in the mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California. Chico's younger brother Gummo is in a crypt across the hall from him.

#marx brothers #chico marx #classic hollywood #comedians

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alj4890 · 6 years ago

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None But You

(Thomas x Amanda) in a regency AU as requested by @pixieferry

(Thomas Hunt x oc*Amanda) A Choices Red Carpet Diaries Fan Fiction

Chapter 5

A/N Here we go again. I decided we needed one more Choices character to pop up. I have a feeling another shall show up in the next one. Won't this couple act right and allow these interruptions to stop? Again, the chapter got away from me. Hopefully, Lord Thomas can remedy things.

Summary: Lord Thomas introduces Lady Amanda to a possible suitor. At a dinner party and recital (aka torture for our characters) Lady Amanda has an unfortunate encounter with that lecherous duke. Screeches that are claimed to be music and depraved nobles, surely nothing worse can happen...right?

@graceful-popcorn @krsnlove @alleksa16 @hopelessromantic1352 @pixieferry @emceesynonymroll @buzz-bee-buzz @hopefulmoonobject @cora-nova @rainbowsinthestorm @lxaah11 @dr-nancy-house @friedherringclodthing @aworldoffandoms @i-bloody-love-drake-walker

Masterlist

Chapter 5

"Where the devil is Hunt?" Lord Ryan muttered.

"He did not say much in the note he sent this morning." Sir Chris explained. "He only asked that I escort Lady Amanda here."

The two gentleman scanned the grounds of Hyde Park while Lady Amanda and Lady Millie egged each other on with much laughter as they raced down Rotten Row.

"Chestnut will never allow that tiny excuse of a horse of yours to beat him again." Amanda teased. "I believe the only reason he has lost a few times is because he is quite skittish around insects and mistakes her for one."

"Ha! Bold words about that weak gelding of yours." Millie's blue eyes glowed with laughter. "Persephone knows nothing but winning." She patted her black mare while crooning how wonderful she was.

"Ignore them, Chestnut." Amanda whispered. "Millie has no appreciation for magnificent horse flesh."

Her horse tossed his head as if in agreement, drawing a laugh from his mistress. She sat up straight and searched the grounds again. Where was Lord Thomas? She had hoped to see him this morning.

After a night spent thinking on all he had said the previous day, she needed to observe his behavior toward her. Could an attachment be developing? She found her heart race faster than the horses at the very thought. No wonder so many ladies sighed over his appearance in a room. He was a man one would have difficulty ignoring.

"I wonder where he is?" Millie whispered to her.

"Who?" Amanda feigned ignorance. If Millie were to find out how much her friend was falling for the viscount, there would be no stopping her matchmaking endeavors.

Millie rolled her blue eyes. "Lord Hunt!" She apologized to Persophone for her harsh tone. "He should have escorted you."

"Perhaps some other matter demanded his attention."

Millie noticed Amanda's attempt to avoid eye contact. A slight gasp escaped her lips. "You feel something for him!"

Amanda turned her horse and began to trot away. "Friendship, Millie. That is all."

"Look me in the eye and repeat that, please." Millie nudged her mare to catch up.

Amanda glared at her friend and burst out laughing when Millie smiled brightly in response. "You are wretched." She teased.

Millie nodded in agreement. "And yet, you love me anyway. Now answer truthfully. Have you developed a tendre´ for Viscount Kirkwood?"

Amanda's shoulders drooped. "Yes." Her hazel eyes cut to Millie. "Please do nothing about this." She pleaded when she could practically see the plans form in her friend's bright blue eyes.

"Do nothing? I shall do all I can to see you both before the altar of St. George's in your finest clothes. Lady Lucy and I will plan the entire ceremony and reception. Mamma will insist on doing her part also. Who should escort you down the aisle? Perhaps--"

"I shall never trust you with another secret." Amanda hissed. Her worry grew with each word coming from Millie's lips. "I beg of you, do nothing. If Lord Thomas has feelings for me, then I do not doubt he will act upon them in his own time."

Millie dismissed her concern. "My dearest friend, men do not act upon marriage. We must push and prod them into believing it was their idea to propose." She reached over and squeezed Amanda's fingers. "Have no fear. I have the matter well in hand."

"Millie!" Amanda nearly screeched when her friend now turned bane of her existence took off at a gallop. "There will be no stopping her now." She confided to Chestnut. "We will be forced to flee the country."

_________________

Thomas searched the park for the party he was supposed to meet nearly an hour ago. He turned his head when he heard his name called out and saw Ryan and Chris wave him over. "There they are." He told the gentleman next to him.

Chris squinted. "Summers, is that the count from Spain that Thomas introduced us to the other night?"

Ryan narrowed his eyes. "The Conde de Vigo. I wonder why he invited him to...damn." Ryan's frown deepened. "Winters, Hunt is going to try and make a match between Lady Amanda and Lord Rodriguez."

"No!" Chris exclaimed. "Surely he wouldn't put himself through that. He--" He shook his head as he watched Thomas introduce the two to one another. "He is mad enough to spite himself."

"Quite." Ryan bit out. "Come. Let us see if we can redirect our friend's misguided decision."

_________________

"Lady Amanda Bridgerton, allow me to introduce an old friend of mine, Lord Matthew Rodriguez, the Count of Vigo." The two greeted each other politely.

"It is a pleasure to meet you." Matthew smiled warmly at her. "I have heard much about you."

Amanda smiled back. "I am very happy to meet you, my lord. Do you come to England often?"

"I live here half the time." He explained. "My mother is the Marquis of Winchelsea's only daughter and through my late grandmother, I inheirted a Scottish title and holding near Dumfries." He explained.

"Rogriguez." She mumbled as a thought came to her. "I know that name! Your mother was the lady in one of the most romantic tales from the ton!"

His smile flashed. "Is that still being told?"

"Every lady hopes to find such a love as your father had for your mother." Amanda replied. "The serenades and public declarations are something many wish would happen." Her smile grew dreamy while Millie chimed in with questions.

"Did he actually climb his way into her opera box when he first saw her?" Millie asked.

"He was always one with a flair for the dramatics. If he had not been a noble, I daresay he would have joined a theater troupe." Matthew answered with a chuckle. "He once told me that he had thought he was seeing an angel when she appeared. He knew he had to meet her and could not wait for either intermission or finding a set of stairs."

"How romantic." Millie sighed deeply.

"They were very happy together." Matthew said with a far away look in his eye. "Once they became better acquainted, he knew that she was the only one for him. He spent the rest of the season wooing her with every extravagant method he could think of to show her how much he loved her."

"Oh to be courted like that." Millie murmured. "So many gentlemen today believe that one merely has to announce their title and hint at a fortune and we will tumble into matrimony with them."

Thomas had kept his eyes upon Amanda throughout the story and noticed a slight expression of sadness grow with the talk of courtship. She averted her eyes and turned her horse. "Thank you all for inviting me to ride this morning. I am afraid though that I must return home. Aunt Lucy made plans for us this afternoon."

"You will be attending Lady Vaughn's dinner party and recital tonight?" Millie asked.

"Yes, of course." Amanda bowed her head to the gentlemen. "Good day to you, my lords and sir." Before Thomas could stop her, she touched her heel to Chestnut's side and trotted away with one of the grooms from her stable following close behind.

________________

Not too long after her departure, Lord Ryan escorted Lady Millie home. Along the way, she questioned him about the count.

"Are you acquainted with Lord Rodriguez?" She glanced over her shoulder to make certain the man was nowhere near enough to hear them.

"To a certain extent." Ryan answered.

"And?" She prodded.

"And what?" He asked.

"And what do you think of him?" Her tone held a note of impatience he recognized as one he heard often from her during the social season.

Ryan shrugged. "He's affable. Decent shot. Plays a brilliant hand of cards." He noticed how irritated she was with his answers. "Millie, simply ask what you truly wish to know since my observations are not satisfying you."

"Is he the type of gentleman a lady should hope pursues her?"

His head whipped around toward her. "Lady Millicient Rawlings! I am surprised at you."

She stuck her tongue out at him before tossing her nose up in the air. "I am asking for Lady Amanda."

Ryan's jaw clinched. Was he going to have to now worry about her interference with his plan for Thomas amd Amanda? "Lord Rodriguez exhibits all the traits of a gentleman. Whether or not he is one Lady Amanda should have as a suitor, is neither here nor there."

Millie frowned at his words. "What about Kirkwood?"

Ryan narrowed his eyes. "I have a definite opinion concerning his suitability for Lady Amanda." A few moments of silent study passed between the two of them. "And it appears you do too."

Millie slowly nodded. "If I am not mistaken, you and Sir Christopher are of the same opinion."

"We are." He grit his teeth at her continued silence. "What are your thoughts on the matter?"

"I believe Lord Hunt would make an excellent suitor for Lady Amanda."

"So do Chris and I." He relaxed in his saddle before a slow, devious smile appeared on his face. "Care to join forces?"

She laughed and held her hand out to seal the deal. "We have an accord."

________________

"Lord Hunt! I must say I am surprised at your appearance." Lady Vaughn teased. The elderly matron leaned upon her cane while greeting him.

"Oh?" He quirked an eyebrow in question.

"I believe the last time you attended one of my parties it was due to your mother's persuasion." She explained. "Since that blessed saint is no longer with us, might I ask what led you to accept my invitation?"

"Clearly it was due to your polite manners and restraint at asking personal questions that drew me to your door." He replied.

She chuckled at his sarcasm. "When you get to be my age, you see no need in beating around the bush." She gave him a push. "Go and find what truly caused you to come. I have other guests to torment."

He shook his head at her nerve and entered her drawing room. Without thinking, he immediately began to search for one lady in particular.

_______________

"What did you think of the Count of Vigo?" Millie whispered.

"Hmm?" Amanda snapped out of her musings of a certain viscount. "He seemed pleasant."

"Pleasant?" Millie blinked in surprise. "Pleasant! Did you not notice how handsome and charming he was?"

"Yes, of course." Amanda hastily answered. "It would be difficult to not notice such."

"You had me worried there for a moment." Millie brushed the stray blonde curls from her face and began to fan herself. She searched the room for another subject to talk about and paused when she saw who was coming their way. "Oh no."

"What is it?" Amanda asked. Her eyes lifted and collided with a set of hooded dark ones. Her face drained of color. "Millie? Where shall we--"

"Good evening, my ladies." Viktor bowed before them, smirking at their necessary deep curtsies.

"Your grace." They muttered.

He took Millie's hand and kissed it before grasping Amanda's. He surreptitiously tugged her closer as his lips brushed her knuckles. "I was planning on taking a turn outside for some air before the dinner begins. You will accompany me."

Amanda's lips parted yet no words seemed to form as her hand was placed on his arm and he led her to the open doors.

Millie searched for someone to help and noticed Thomas staring at the empty doorway where the duke and Amanda disappeared.

She hurried over to his side. "Lord Hunt, he did not ask her."

His dark eyes flashed with fury as he nodded and stalked outside.

__________________

"Your grace, I must return to my aunt." Amanda sturggled in Viktor's embrace. Panic was growing rapidly at his unyielding strength. "Let me go!"

"Nonsense. Any matron would be pleased if I singled out one of their charges. Your aunt understands this and is no doubt quite proud of your ability to catch my attention." His arms tightened around her, pressing her even more against his body. "Most believe it is past the time I chose a duchess."

Her struggles grew frantic as he lowered his lips to hers. A strangled scream escaped when his mouth captured hers in a kiss. He made a tsking sound. "My lady, if you make too much noise you will be embroiled in a scandal. What man will court you after that?"

"Unhand her this instant!"

Both turned and Viktor narrowed his eyes. "Who the blazes are you?"

"Lord Rodriguez!" Amanda breathed in wonder. Her eyes widened when he grabbed Viktor's wrist and twisted it until a whimper of pain escaped the duke's mouth. Matthew took Amanda's hand and pulled her away, manuevering the two until he was between her and the duke.

"Do not come near her again." He warned.

"Do you know who I am?" Viktor snarled. "You can not--"

"I can." The count took a menacing step forward. "I will not allow you to assault her with unwanted attentions again."

Viktor cautiously backed up a step. His eyes widened when he saw Thomas appear behind Amanda. He shook a fist at him. "You will regret this."

"Doubtful." Thomas replied. Amanda turned so quickly at the sound of his voice behind her that she nearly fell. His hands steadied her.

She gripped his arms and began to tremble with the realization of what had nearly occurred. Matthew and Thomas kept their attention on Viktor until he left out the back gate and called for his carriage.

Thomas gently smoothed the strands of hair that had escaped the silk ribbons behind her ear. "Did he hurt you?" His voice was low and filled with concern.

She lifted her eyes to his. "Not very much." Her trembling grew and she took a step forward into Thomas's arms. He held her close as she shook. Matthew observed them quietly while a hint of a smile grew.

"I will go inside and make certain no one notices your absence." The count promised. He started to leave when Amanda called out to him.

"Thank you, my lord. I am indebted to you. I don't know what--" She swallowed uneasily and turned her face away.

Matthew gently patted her shoulder. "Think nothing of it. I am glad I could be of assistance." He nodded to Thomas then quickly made his way back inside.

Thomas kept his arms around her as she tried to calm down. His lips brushed her forehead as he spoke. "What can I do?"

She looked up at him with tears forming. "Oh Thomas." She buried her face against His neck. Her shoulders shook as she took a deep breath before confessing. "He kissed me."

Thomas's arms tightened in reaction to her words. A rage he had never dreamt himself capable of feeling roiled through him. He listened silently as she told him of Viktor instructing her to remain quiet if she intended to find a gentleman willing to court her.

"Do you think he will leave me alone?" She asked.

Thomas knew most likely that this would spur him into pursuing her even more. "I will make certain he does." He promised.

She closed her eyes for a moment, enjoying the comfort of his arms. When she eased away, he watched as she tried to smooth her features into a calm, slightly bored expression before entering the house. "Thank you for remaining with me."

He bowed his head. "My regret is not being here sooner."

Her eyes searched his, for what he was unsure. "I believe the duke will leave me alone if I have a definite suitor intent on marrying me, a more permanent protector."

A muscle spasmed in Thomas's jaw. "I believe you are correct." He could practically taste the bitterness of his next words. "I think Lord Rodriguez would make an excellent suitor for you."

Amanda's eyes widened. "You do?"

He nodded, unable to get the word yes to form on his tongue.

She took a few steps back from him and straightened her posture. "Thank you for your opinion on the matter and for coming to my aid." She gave a brief curtsy and left him to walk towards the doors.

Thomas followed after a few minutes to not draw gossip. He wondered why he felt the urge to grab her and make her disagree with him. Make her say that there was only one man for her and it was not Matthew. Remind him of how perfect she felt in his arms each time he comforted her. Demand he kiss her and remove any lingering feeling of Viktor's lips on hers.

His face must have reflected the emotions he was bombarded with, if the people avoiding him were any indication. He searched the room for Amanda and wondered where she had disappeared to. He approached Lady Millie in the hopes that she knew where the lady was.

"How is she?" He asked in a low voice.

"Shaken." She answered. "To tell you truly, Lord Thomas, I am worried. Her cheeks were drained of all color." Millie searched his face for any indication he knew why.

Thomas swallowed uncomfortably. "Do you know where she is?"

"I believe she-- oh! There she is." Millie nodded toward the fireplace. Amanda had joined her aunt and a few other dowagers. Her practiced expression of polite interest was firmly in place, yet even from this distance he could tell she was not paying attention to the conversations.

The dinner gong rang and the crowd was lined up to enter Lady Vaughn's dining room. Thomas felt his irritation grow at the lady's misguided notion that intimate dinner parties had at the very least eighty guests. He was given a viscount's simpering widow to escort and attempted to see who had Amanda.

_____________

"I am happy to see you so well recovered." Lord Matthew said in a low voice.

Amanda smiled softly at him. "And I am happy you were there. If you continue to rescue ladies, you will outshine your late father as the favorite romantic hero of the ton."

He laughed and shook his head while picking up his wine glass. "I doubt that is possible."

"We shall see." She replied. Amanda did her best to keep her eyes from looking directly in front of her. Of all the gentlemen at the party Lady Vaughn could seat there, it had to be Lord Thomas.

With disgust at her own weakness, she glanced up and found his attention solely on her. The two ladies that sat on either side of him had given up engaging him in conversation after their questions were met with grunts or one syllable words. He was free to watch her without interruption. His signature frown firmed when she turned back to Matthew.

"Tell me of Vigo. Is it more inland or near the ocean?" She encouraged the count to speak about his home in Spain and then of the one he had near Dumfries throughout the dinner.

Thomas never wavered in his perusal. He knew each time she attempted to see if he was still watching her. Her cheeks would flare with brief color and she would hurriedly ask Matthew something else.

When the ladies were dismissed to the drawing room so that the gentlemen could enjoy their port and cigars, Amanda nearly genuflected. A moment away from Thomas and his penetrating eyes were all she asked for. She linked her arm through Millie's to keep herself from dashing out of the dining room.

__________________

"Thomas, I know you said that Lady Amanda and I would make a smart match." Matthew swirled his port while thinking of how to phrase his observations. "Yet, I think someone else might be better suited for her."

Thomas took a long sip of his brandy. "Do you not care for her?"

"I do not know her." Matthew quickly corrected. "She appears to be all you described her as."

"But?" Thomas prodded.

"Come now." Matthew lowered his voice to the barest whisper. "Who's arms did she seek after being rescued?"

Thomas attempted to wave that question away. "Shock and I being nearest to her are the reasons why she did so."

He noticed Matthew's pitying look and gripped his glass. "What?" He bit out.

Matthew placed his hand upon Thomas's shoulder in sympathy. "Try not to make too big of a muck out of your courtship."

______________

"Lady Vaughn is either hearing impaired or she truly enjoys watching others suffer." Millie winced when one of the relatives of the elderly hostess caused her violin to screech yet again.

Amanda turned her attention to Lady Vaughn and noticed the maniacal smile. "I do believe she missed her calling to work at the Tower."

Millie searched in vain through her reticule for something to shove into her ears. "How many ladies must we listen to?"

"Two more and then a quartet." She whispered.

Millie's groan echoed in the room and she quickly ducked down in her chair. "Did Lady Vaughn see me?"

Amanda's lips trembled with laughter. "Yes and I believe she will force you to attend practice sessions with these musical ladies."

______________

Thomas knew it had to be love that was making him remain and have his ears suffer through this infernal noise. He also knew deep down his three closest friends were correct. He needed a chance to speak with Amanda to attempt to rectify his suggestion.

Though he wasn't entirely certain he was ready to, he shuddered with the notion, court her...he did know that the thought of her with any other man was not acceptable. He was going to have to find a way to ease into this courtship.

His eyes flickered over to where she sat. His eyes drifted along her profile and he wondered how he should broach the topic. Should he say anything or simply appear at her door tomorrow to invite her for a walk? He preferred the latter, knowing he would most likely, as Matthew so eloquently phrased it, muck any type of discussion.

As he reviewed his options and ways to phrase his decision to court her, the recital came to a blessed end. The applause rivaled many an opera's due to the crowd being set free to escape to the comforts of home.

Lady Amanda rubbed her aching head. This evening's encounters had left her exhausted. She looked up when her aunt approached and placed a hand on her forehead.

"Dearest? Are you unwell?" Lady Lucinda's concern grew when the pale young lady nodded.

"I think we should go home." Her eyes filled with tears. "I do hate to cut your evening short, Aunt Lucy."

"Nonsense. I can visit these ladies another time." Lucy sent a servant to have their carriage brought around. "You are awfully peaky. I shall go say our farewells to Lady Vaughn. Wait here." Lucy scurried off, leaving Amanda in a dim corner.

"Lady Amanda?"

She let her head drop forward and forced herself to answer. "Forgive me, Lord Thomas. I am not up for conversation."

He cleared his throat and persevered. "My lady, I believe I may have misspoke outside and--"

"Please sir. If you hold any affec...friendship...for me, then do not bring our talk up. You made your feelings quite clear on the matter." She rubbed her pounding head and walked away.

He followed bound and determined to have his say. "I do not believe I made them clear. What I should have said is--"

"Good night Lord Hunt." Amanda grasped her skirt and walked out the front door. He hurried after and helped Lady Lucy into the carriage before assisting Amanda.

His hand gripped hers. "I need to explain."

Lucy quickly jumped in before Amanda lashed out at him. "My lord, she has taken ill and I must get her home. Do feel free to call upon us soon." She called to their coachman to make haste and thanked Thomas as he helped Amanda in.

“Shall I escort you?” He asked.

“No.” Amanda replied. She realized how rude that must have sounded and she softened her tone. “Thank you, Lord Thomas. We should be fine.”

With little choice, he bowed and shut the carriage door. As he watched it drive off into the night, he felt a deep sense of foreboding. Convincing the stubborn young lady of what was in his heart would be no easy task.

#choices red carpet diaries #rcd regency au #regency au #rcd thomas hunt #rcd matt rodriguez #thomas hunt rcd #thomas hunt x amanda #choices thomas hunt #thomas hunt x oc

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theatricks · 6 years ago

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"The Dying King and the Four Knights" - Main Story #8, Part 2 - A Summary

Videos: First Half, Second Half

Continuing from the last installment, here's a summary of Part 2!

The first half begins with Akira and Michiru acting out the Throne Chapter as the Dying King and the Chancellor. The King talks about how frightened he was the day he succeeded the throne from the previous king. Of the responsibility of protecting the country, its people, and its history. How it meant that one day he, too, would have to choose a successor, and that that would be the moment of his death as King. He starts breathing heavily, and the Chancellor tells him it's tough, but to hold out. The King laments at the state he's in, saying that despite having once been considered the country's greatest knight, doing nothing but sitting on the throne everyday has weakened him. And furthermore, the heat is taking a toll on his old body. The Chancellor informs him that they're approaching the volcano of legend where the Fire Goddess is said to reside. He says he's certain that the light of the Ruby flew off in that direction, to the east, and that they'll surely find it at the foot of the volcano.

They continue onward and the King remarks that the Ruby was originally in the possession of the General. He was a military man wandering from country to country, and the King, charmed by his skill, granted him the title of General and asked him to remain in the kingdom. There was resistance to someone from outside being given authority within the knights, but the King did not listen. And now those knights are the finest in the land. All thanks to the General. He says he wasn't mistaken in his choice, and that the General will, with the Ruby as proof---

But, the Chancellor interrupts and says to look before them, at the volcano. The King does and is astounded by its heat and raging flames. The Chancellor notices something and points it out. Its Mei Fan as the General(/Ruby?), being attacked by a Korosu. Akira calls out 'General!' and both her and Michiru jump in to save her. The Korosu is defeated and Akira says, "That's right... I remember now. You are... Liu Mei Fan."

Frau Rubin -Passion- 7 months ago

Flashback time! Akira and Michiru are in the student council room when someone starts pounding on the door like crazy. Akira demands to know what the ruckus is and in barges Mei Fan, yelling "Congratulations! Yukishiro Akira-sama!" She starts explaining (using extremely polite/formal speech, so sorry if I get any of this wrong) that she heard that Akira had become Frau Platin and that she would be gathering subordinates, so she hurried over. She says she knows the Edels don't accept solicitors but she felt that she would be chosen sooner or later anyway, so she decided to barge right in! She then starts listing all her skills and qualifications but Michiru interrupts with "Wait, wait, just calm down a second." Mei Fan asks her "Yes?" and she says "Umm...first of all...who are you?"

Mei Fan gets all flustered and apologizes. She introduces herself as a first-year student and says that she had been studying Chinese opera in her hometown and was planning to continue on that path, but after watching Akira performing in Elysion's Rebirth Chapter the previous year, she was inspired to learn Japanese and transfer to Siegfeld. She says she wants to stand on the "King's Stage" together with Akira and that's why she came knocking on the Student Council's door. Michiru says, "I think you knocked on it too much, isn't it dented a little?" to which Mei Fan gets flustered again and apologizes.

Michiru asks, "So, what do you think, 'Frau Platin'?" Akira is quiet for a second, then asks, "It's Liu, correct?" and gets the response, "Yes, call me Mei Fan!" She says, "Then tell me something, Mei Fan" and then asks her what she considers the King's Stage. Mei Fan says it's the stage where Akira can shine the most. Akira then asks her how much she knows about the King's Stage and the Student Council. She says she knows everything about them and rehashes what we learned in the last part---the Siegfeld students devote themselves to backstage duties for the King's Stage, and the Student Council, in order to repay their efforts, ensures that student life runs smoothly for them. Akira says exactly, which means the Edels must stand on stage while carrying the students' hopes and dreams. Mei Fan says that is why she wants to be one of the four knights that supports Akira! Akira admits that they're missing three Edels... but Mei Fan is unfit for the role. She tries to ask why but Akira ends the conversation and Michiru hustles Mei Fan out the door. Akira sighs but Michiru says she's of the same opinion as Akira. Akira says they need to hurry and choose the rest of the Edels, and the first half ends.

The second half begins the following day while Akira and Michiru are returning to the student council room after scouting out potential Edel candidates and Mei Fan calls out to them with a 'good morning!' Michiru replies, "Oh, it's Liu-san from yesterday" and she again says, "Yes, call me Mei Fan!" Michiru asks her what's she's doing and she says she's cleaning the student council room's windows. She mentions that she had wanted to clean the whole room but that it was locked. Akira tells her it's unnecessary and a task for student council members. Mei Fan tries to get across that she still wants to join and be by Akira's side. Akira tells her again that she's unfit. Mei Fan tries once more to ask why, but Akira and Michiru excuse themselves and enter the student council room.

The next day, Akira and Michiru are returning to the student council room again. Michiru is pointing out some work they have to do and Akira says there's so much, it's making her head spin. Michiru says she knows and that she'll deal with the paperwork, so Akira just has to select the remaining Edels. Akira says that having Michiru here really helps her. Michiru says just saying "Mm." in this situation is the more kingly thing to do. She tells Akira she needs to act more powerful, like a king, or she'll lose her charisma. Akira says charisma and such won't matter if Michiru is her only companion. Michiru says a king should always be arrogant, even when downtrodden, to which Akira responds "M-Mm." Michiru says, "There you go!" and then notices Mei Fan in the hallway.

She greets them with a 'good morning!' again and Akira says, "...Mei Fan, you again..." Michiru asks her what she's doing this time and Mei Fan says she's prostrating herself. She thought that maybe Akira was displeased with her so she was waiting for them there since 6 in the morning. "While kneeling?" Michiru asks, and Mei Fan replies, "Yes!" She apologizes and again states that she'd do anything to stand on stage with Akira. Akira refuses her again, so she mentions how she was captivated by Akira's performance and how it changed her life, and pleads with her to let her join.

Michiru looks at Akira who remains silent. She tells Mei Fan to listen and asks her if she likes Akira's acting. Mei Fan says of course! Michiru tells her that's why. Mei Fan is confused so she explains again that as Edels they have a responsibility to answer the hopes and dreams of the other students through their performances. She says that the King's Stage doesn't need someone with selfish reasons for being there, that Akira's stage doesn't need someone who is just her fan. She gives a brief apology to Mei Fan and closes the door on her.

Inside the student council room, Akira apologizes to Michiru for making her have to play an unpleasant role. Michiru says it's her job, and part of being the Vice President. Akira again thanks her for the help, but Michiru says "Like I said, just an 'Mm' is fine here." They then muse briefly about the fact that Mei Fan was the only overseas student to be accepted at Siegfeld and that her performance in the exams was exceptional, but reiterate again that her reasons are too selfish. They're about to leave the whole ordeal aside and start on student council work when they hear loud clanging. Akira says it sounds like a copper saucepan, like they sometimes use in classical Chinese opera. They then hear Mei Fan yelling, "Yukishiro Akira-sama! I'll never give up!"

Out in the courtyard, Mei Fan continues to yell, saying she'll continue to train if she's told she's inadequate. That she'll continue to polish herself if she's told she's insufficient. To her the stage is Yukishiro Akira. The only stage she can stand on is the one Akira stands on. Though they may criticize her for being an Akira fan, that's who she is right now, that's all of her. That's the reason she's here. She says that her flames of passion will lose to no one and that she'll show them that she can be of use to Akira as an Edel. She's takes a deep breath and starts reciting a poem(?) and the background briefly changes to her on stage in her Edel/audition outfit.

"Traveling thousands of miles, on the High King's wind Searching far and wide, for his Stage Hidden in my heart, the Dragon's Ruby I devote my life, to the noble Platinum" Frau Rubin, Liu Mei Fan! I will create the King's path with flames of passion! (She says the last line in Chinese.)

Akira and Michiru are watching from the window of the student council room in complete shock. Michiru smiles and says "What does she think she's doing, in the middle of the courtyard. But...isn't she kind of similar? To how you were 'that day'." Akira agrees. She says her stage doesn't require someone who is a fan of hers, that that passion for the stage should be directed towards the audience, however...to have that sort of frank passion directed at her... Michiru asks her if it makes her feel fired up? Akira says yes, and that it rekindles her own passion as the King. Michiru says if Mei Fan continues like she is, it's possible she can become not just a fan, but a splendid Edel that can make the King shine. Akira says it'd be troublesome if she didn't. Michiru laughs and asks what they should have Mei Fan do. Akira says they'll make her the secretary for now, because of her proficiency with kanji---

The scene then jumps back to the King and the Chancellor, with the King having retrieved the Ruby. He remarks on the passion it stirs within him, saying it's for certain that Ruby. He says he remembers it now, the passion that the General entrusted with him. That it was because of those flames that he was no longer frightened. That no matter how many times he was covered in ash, those flames of passion would revive him. As long as they burned, there was nothing to fear. He says that strength has returned in not only his heart but his body, too, and tells the Chancellor that they should continue on. The Chancellor agrees and says the next gem is the "Jade of the Marquis", to the west...

...and that ends Part 2! A summary of the next part will be coming soon!

#revue starlight #shoujo kageki revue starlight #revue starlight relive #summary #siegfeld

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the-metal-reaper · 6 years ago

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An Eye for an Eye - Chapter 5

Well, here’s the final chapter of An Eye for an Eye! I loved experimenting with a different setup for this tale, placing it outside of one of the games. It’s been a lot of fun!

did i cry while writing this? yes. a lot. i love my kiddos, sue me.

---

Those eyes. She had seen them far more times than any person should. She had seen them on Michael, while he stood paralyzed in front of those nightmare-fueled steel monstrosities. Charlie had seen them on herself in the reflection of the rain-soaked glass of the window looking into Fazbear’s Family Diner, with the silhouette of her killer behind her. She had even seen them on her own father, as he stared into the emotionless eyes of Charlie’s former suit. And yesterday, she saw them on William as he stared at her through the mask of the Spring Bonnie suit just before the springlocks thrust themselves into his skin, shoving jagged mechanical parts right into his ribcage. Even when she shuts her eyelids as tight as she can, and feels her tears dripping down her face, those eyes still haunt her. They’re burned into her retinas.

Charlie hates this, hates that she’s crying, and hates herself most of all. Why was she so easily convinced to kill? Charlie was supposed to be the protector of lost souls, and yet she had created more. She was no better than William.

She looks up at Michael, who’s sitting next to her, facing the television. Neither of them had gotten much sleep. A rerun of an old soap opera, one that Michael had watched religiously in his youth, plays on the set, but neither of them are really watching it.

Michael wraps an arm around Charlie’s shoulder and pulls her closer. He runs his gloved fingers through her short brown locks and smiles a little to himself. He had almost forgotten what satisfaction and contentment felt like, but now it flowed through him like blood. His mission was complete.

On his side, he feels something cool. He looks down at Charlie, eyebrows quirking up with worry, and sees her tears. All at once, his peace drains to gnawing anxiety.

“Hey,” Michael smiles down at Charlie, who wipes her tears with a damp sleeve before meeting his gaze. “What do you say we… go stop by Fazbears? Say hi to your dad?”

Blood rushes to Charlie’s ears. She can barely hear Michael over the sound of her racing heartbeat, and she struggles to keep her face calm. The simple thought of that place is barely tolerable without her consciousness getting hijacked by images of the horrific monstrosities Charlie had committed the night before. But she needed to stay positive. She had to.

If she didn’t have her cheer, what did she have?

“Sure,” Charlie smiles for the first time that day. Michael smiles back, relieved.

They hop into the car, and Michael skids down the street, almost jumping the curb. Charlie hangs onto the seat behind her for dear life.

She laughs, “Why the heck are you driving so fast?!”

“Because,” Michael blows past the ‘Speed Limit: 20 mph’ street sign at 60, “it’s fun.”

Leaving dark tracks behind it, the purple Oldsmobile screeches to a halt in front of Fazbear’s glistening glass doors. The sun has just barely passed the horizon, so Michael’s face is cast in shadow as he lightly taps on the front door to the Pizzaria. No response. The main room, which is visible through the slightly frosted glass, is silent and dark. It may have been early, but Henry should’ve been there. He managed the place.

Charlie sees Michael’s confusion and concern. “Hey, I can unlock the door if we need.”

“That sounds good.”

With a nod, Charlie pushes herself through the glass and clicks the lock open. She goes deeper into the restaurant, reaching for the light switch to turn on the lights, when she sees them.

Freddy, Bonnie, Chica, Foxy. Staring down at her from the stage with lifeless eyes. Eyes that had been filled with life by the Marionette, and emptied of it by the same hand.

Charlie hadn’t realized she was crying until she felt Michael’s hand on her shoulder.

“Let’s find your dad and get out of here,�� he murmurs. The spirit wraps her arms around Michael in response. Together, they walk through the restaurant, while Charlie tilts her head away from the stage.

Michael sees a dim light from a doorway down the hall. He leads Charlie there, only to see a man slumped over at the manager’s desk, beer bottle in hand and tiny television screen illuminating his face.

Sighing, Michael reaches over the desk and shakes him awake. “Henry.”

Henry’s eyebrows quirk up in confusion, then he smiles with recognition. “Hey, guys.”

“Were you here all night?

“Uh, yeah,” He blinks, rubbing his eyes, “I was watching William.”

Gesturing towards the TV screen, Henry shows Michael and Charlie the camera footage of the door to the safe room, which has remained the same since they locked the door.

“So, how are you?” Henry smiles.

“Well…” Staring at the floor, Michael says, “We’re thinking about moving. Leaving Hurricane.”

“What? Why?”

“Too many memories. Ones that I’d rather not remember. And besides--” Michael turns to Charlie, then falls silent. She’s so dim that she’s barely visible, her face buried in Michael’s coat. He puts an arm around her shoulders.

“But you just got here!” To Michael’s surprise, Henry sounds almost angry. He rises to his feet and walks around the desk to stare Michael down. “You can’t leave Hurricane.”

“Henry. The only reason we were here was to deal with William.”

“‘Deal with him?!’ Let’s not tiptoe around this, Michael. You convinced literal children to murder him for you because you just didn’t want to do it.”

Michael practically spits, “I did what I had to. I saved your life, for God’s sake. You’re just a coward.”

“A coward? No, I just have a moral compass. On the other hand, you are exactly as your father described. Soulless.”

A blur of movement brushes past Henry and smashes into the desk behind him. Oak splinters under Michael’s curled fist, and he glares red-hot lasers through Henry’s eyes. “I’m done taking your shit, Miller. We’re leaving. That’s final.” Michael stuffs his shaking hands into his pocket to avoid attacking Henry.

“We? If you think you’re taking my daughter from me, you’re sadly mistaken.” Henry jabs his finger into Michael’s sunken chest, not even sparing a glance at Charlie, who has long since moved away from the argument in favor of hiding in the corner.

“I—” Turning away to look for Charlie, Michael slows. His red-hot anger is cooled by the pitiful sight of his best friend curled up on the floor, her normally fluorescent features faded with fear. “Listen, I’m not trying to make Charlie’s choices for her. She can choose whether or not to move with me.”

“You’re not pulling that, Michael. Let her choose, so that way you can pull your little voodoo magic and put her back under your spell like always. Lottie’s going to stay with me, her father.”

“‘Voodoo magic?’ You mean being her friend? That’s the thing, Henry, you don’t really care about Charlie. Not like she is now. You just want your Little Lottie back.”

“Of course I do! Your father may have taken her away from me, but you’re the one who’s corrupted her, who’s turned her into something she’s not. You’re the one who made her kill someone!”

Henry gasps in a few breaths of air, his finger wavering in the air in front of Michael’s eyes. He closes his hand into a fist, and rises to put his face in the empty air where his fist was.

“So tell me, who really killed Lottie?” Henry spits, “William, or you?”

The linoleum tiles crack under Michael’s heel as he shoves Henry back into the desk, sending the older man flying over the desk and into the wheeled chair behind him. Michael wheels around, pausing when he sees Charlie’s apparent absence from the room.

Facing the floor, he whispers, “I’m sorry I fucked everything up.”

Just as quickly as he ended the argument, Michael storms out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

“Asshole.” Henry growls at the closed door. Slowly, he pulls himself back to his feet, muttering yet more profanities as he does so.

He looks up at his daughter with an apologetic smile. Charlie stares back with a combination of anger and fear on her face as her cheeks sparkle with tears.

Pointing at the door, Charlie stammers out, “Listen, I-I’m gonna—”

“I meant what I said.” Henry busies himself by fiddling with his desk chair, trying to get the wheels to spin again. “I know he’s your friend, Lottie, but I just don’t think Michael is trustworthy.”

Charlie’s hands curl into fists, but the only words she can muster are, “Michael’s always there when I need him. An-and I can’t say the same for you.”

She flies through the door, barely even noting the unpleasant wave of nausea that hits her as she does. Before she can even so much as take a breath, Charlie’s in the dining room, staring up at the stage. A muffled sob escapes her lips as she stares into Fritz—Foxy’s— lifeless eyes. Charlie turns away, wanting desperately to look at anything else. As she finally regains a slice of her sense, Charlie briskly walks through the booth seats and out the front doors.

The evening sun cast long shadows across the road, obscuring most of Michael’s face. He sits on the curb, looking at some distant point in the horizon while his cigarette smoke swirls around him in a cloud, concealing his face further. Through the smoke Michael sees a familiar figure join him on the curb. They sit in silence for a moment.

“You’re not coming with me, are you,” Michael says quietly. The smoke disperses, and Charlie can see the resigned frown on Michael’s face.

Charlie’s eyebrows quirk up in horror. She bites her lip, choosing her words carefully. “I’m not sure if I ever talked about it much, but… my years as the Marionette were hell.”

Michael looks up quickly, confusion dancing across his face.

“I was so alone, Mike. My d—Henry stopped coming to the restaurant, you never went back, even William left. I was so… cold.” Tears begin to well in Charlie’s eyes once again, but she grits her teeth and blinks rapidly. She shouldn’t cry again. She can’t. “Gabe, Jeremy, Suzy, even Fritz were always angry. Not just at William, at the world too. And I let myself get angry too.” Charlie pulls Michael’s arm into her lap and rests her head on his shoulder. “But then you came along.” A smile dawns on her face. “You helped me remember who I was, Mike. Who I am now. I don’t think I ever thanked you for that. So, thank you.”

Michael pulls Charlie into a tight embrace, pushing her cheek up against his razor-like collarbone. His arms are shaking.

“That’s a no to staying, by the way.” Charlie laughs. Michael smiles gratefully as a response.

They sit in each other’s arms for a while, watching the golden sun light the horizon on fire as it sinks below.

Michael glances down at his companion. “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know,” she frowns. “I guess I just thought he’d be different.”

“I’m sorry.”

Charlie looks up at him, catching his gaze. “Don’t be. I have you, Mike. You’re all I need.”

---

Thank you so much for reading!! I’ll be posting art again starting next week.

Previous | Where it all started

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mikauzoran · 6 years ago

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Adrienette Drabble Twenty-Eight: Shock

To be entirely fair, Gabriel would have finished the project earlier if he hadn’t been distracted by his concern over how Adrien was fairing at the party. Even after he’d received a text assuring him that Adrien was having a great time, Gabriel couldn’t seem to focus. There were just too many things that could go wrong. He’d almost asked Nathalie for his Miraculous back so that he could have Nooroo fly back and forth keeping tabs on Adrien.

“You’re still not done?” Nathalie blinked blearily at him from the atelier door a little after one in the morning. She wrapped the kimono-like dressing gown Emilie had bought her more tightly as she came over to stand next to him at his podium and rest her chin on his shoulder. “You’re sure there’s nothing I can do to help?”

“I’m almost finished. Go back to sleep.” Gabriel turned to press a fleeting kiss to the side of her head. “What are you doing up?”

“I had my phone on in case Adrien or you needed anything. Victor texted me a few minutes ago to let me know that he and Adrien were on their way home, and the text alert woke me up.”

“Go back to sleep,” Gabriel repeated softly. “I’ll finish up in a minute and be in shortly after I see that Adrien makes it home all right.”

“Very well. You know where to find me should you need anything.” Nathalie kissed her fiancé on the cheek and headed back to bed.

Ten minutes later, Gabriel was just shutting down his computer for the night when he heard the front door open.

“Adrien?” He caught his son halfway up the stairs.

“D-Dad. I didn’t think you’d actually still be up. I was just going to wake you,” Adrien explained, descending back into the foyer.

“Why? Is something wrong?” Gabriel fiddled with his glasses as he strode across the room to inspect his son. “How was the rest of the party?”

“Fine.” Adrien shrugged, blank-faced. “A bit of a rollercoaster. After I texted you, I was talking with a girl in my class, Alix, and that went pretty well. I was actually thinking of inviting her over to try out the skatepark in the basement, if that’s okay.”

“Alix…Chronogirl? The pink-haired skater girl?” Gabriel confirmed.

“Uh…yeah.” Adrien nodded, trying not to linger too much over his father being more familiar with his classmates’ names when they had been akumatized than their given names.

“I don’t see that being a problem.” Gabriel agreed easily. “Please discuss a time with Alix and clear it with Nathalie. What happened after that?”

Adrien winced. “Some jock guy was being a jerk. There was a misunderstanding about one of my ex-girlfriends who he has a thing for. It’s not a big deal, so you don’t need to hire a hitman or anything. It was just kind of upsetting. Then I ran into…” Adrien cleared his throat.

“Miss Dupain-Cheng?” Gabriel guessed.

“Er…not yet.”

Gabriel’s eyes narrowed. “Then why are you blushing?”

“Uh…I’m not. It’s probably just the lighting,” Adrien lied. “Your eyes are tired from looking at your screen all night.”

Gabriel crossed his arms. “Is there another girl now?”

Adrien schooled his facial features into a nonresponsive mask. “No. No, there is not. Do you remember Luka Couffaine? Blue hair, my classmate Juleka’s older brother, I used to take guitar lessons from him until you found out and forbade it?” Adrien forced a smile.

“Silence. Yes?” Gabriel frowned. “You ran into him?”

“And got swept off his feet,” Plagg snickered.

“Plagg!” Adrien yelped. “That is not what happened!”

“The kid was feeling dizzy, and Prince Charming helped him outside so he could get some air. Then he sat with him and got him some water and snacks, and they talked and had a bonding moment over opera and classical music—apparently Prince Charming has a thing for Ravel—and then they danced, if you can call that dancing,” Plagg cackled, darting about so that Adrien couldn’t catch him.

“Plagg, if you say another word, I am never feeding you again!” Adrien threatened.

With a gleeful chuckle, Plagg landed and curled up on Gabriel’s shoulder.

Gabriel stared at his son in concern. “What actually happened?”

Adrien blushed. He hadn’t intended to do more than mention Luka in passing. The whole “yes, I would kiss a boy, but you don’t have to worry about me dating them” thing was still extremely new, and Adrien really didn’t want to push his luck with this yet.

“So…some of the things that that jock guy that I mentioned before said to me were pretty hurtful and upsetting. They kind of triggered a panic attack, and I ran into Luka literally, and it turns out he knows someone who has panic attacks, so he’s really good at talking people through them. He took me outside and helped me sit down and loosened my tie for me and sat with me and got me something to drink and something to eat, and he talked to me, and he was really kind and really considerate, and he said so many nice things to me. Like, genuinely nice things. He wasn’t just sucking up and trying to get in good with me because I have money. He wasn’t being fake, and he wasn’t just trying to get into my pants. I’ve dealt with all of those kinds of people before, and Luka wasn’t like that. He was just being himself, and I was kind of just being myself, and now we might be friends.”

Gabriel pursed his lips and cleared his throat. “So…he didn’t…try to kiss you or anything?”

Plagg let out a sharp laugh. “Other way around.”

Gabriel and Adrien both went wide-eyed.

“That is a lie!” Adrien squeaked. “Why would you even say that?!”

Plagg held up his paws in surrender. “I must have been mistaken. I thought I saw you making eyes at him and leaning in.”

“You were mistaken,” Adrien grumpily assured, making a mental note to donate all the Camembert in his fridge to charity and replace it with cheap grocery store slices. “Making out with anyone—boy or girl—in public was expressly against the rules. I would never do something like that.”

“I thought you told Luka that it only counted if someone got it on camera,” Plagg hummed. “Or did I misunderstand the way that you winked at him too?”

Adrien’s face went white, and he buried it in his hands. “Why are you doing this to me?” he groaned. “Have I not had a bad enough night that you feel that you have to make it worse?!”

“I’m doing this because you’re in shock, and, pretty soon, the shock is going to wear off and you’re going to have another meltdown,” Plagg snorted.

Gabriel glanced back and forth between the kwami and his son.

“I think it might be helpful for your father to have the whole story straight,” Plagg explained.

“How is me flirting with another guy relevant?!” Adrien shrieked, glaring at his kwami.

As soon as the words left his lips and truly registered to Adrien, he clapped a hand over his mouth.

Gabriel grimaced in sympathy. “…Did Monsieur Couffaine flirt back?”

Adrien nodded, ears turning scarlet. He lowered his hand. “He said I was cute. That I was funny and interesting and someone he’d like to get to know. It wasn’t anything serious. We were just play-flirting. Nothing happened. It was just for fun.”

“I see.” Not for the first time, Gabriel did not see, but he wasn’t about to ask for an explanation because it was apparent that they were on a very sensitive subject and that something had happened with Marinette and that Plagg was positive that Adrien was going to be having an episode any time now. “And…you two danced?”

Adrien nodded.

“…Like those pictures of you dancing with Monsieur Lahiffe at the karaoke bar the other night?” Gabriel mentally winced at the thought of his son dancing so intimately with another man, a man that Gabriel did not know well, that Gabriel did not trust to act in his son’s best interests.

“A little like that,” Plagg answered on Adrien’s behalf. “A little more intimately, I think. They were both really into it.”

“Plagg, are you trying to get me akumatized out of sheer mortification?” Adrien groaned. “It didn’t mean anything. I was just having fun dancing with a friend who happens to be a guy, and we both think the other is attractive, but nothing is actually going to happen because I don’t sleep with guys, and he’s dating Marinette. Let’s talk about that instead please.”

Gabriel nearly fell over. “Miss Dupain-Cheng is seeing someone?”

“Apparently she’s been dating Luka for two weeks now,” Adrien sighed.

“When did she tell you?” Gabriel demanded. “Why didn’t you mention this before?”

“I found out about an hour and a half ago from Luka while we were dancing. He thought I knew. I didn’t. Now I do. It kind of sucked because this really nice, attractive guy has been paying attention to me and making me feel good about myself for the past hour, and then he goes and says that he’s dating my girlfriend, but he’s so freaking wonderful that how the heck can I even be mad at him?” Adrien rattled off. “He obviously doesn’t know about Marinette and me from the way he was acting, so, apparently, I’m not the only one she has communication issues with.”

“What happened after you found out?” Gabriel prompted carefully, not needing his Miraculous to sense that Plagg was indeed correct and that another meltdown would be coming on presently.

“I made my excuses and calmly walked away to find somewhere I could be alone.” Adrien shrugged, all of his earlier animation draining out of him. “Then someone went to go get Marinette because they were afraid I was going to throw myself over the side of the ship and drown.”

Gabriel flinched. “Was…this concern unfounded?”

Adrien bit his lip. “Yes and no. The Seine is filthy. I know because I’ve been thrown into it on several different occasions, and I would never voluntarily jump in without good reason. If I were going to drown myself, I’d do it at the Bois de Boulogne.”

Gabriel’s heart sank as he realized, “You’ve thought about this.”

Adrien averted his gaze. “I wasn’t kidding when I told you I needed a therapist. …So…tonight, I was in a pretty bad place, and it’s probably for the best that Plagg got Marinette for me to talk to.”

“What did she say?” Gabriel didn’t really want to know. He genuinely liked Marinette, but it was difficult to keep liking her when she kept putting his son’s heart through the shredder.

Adrien shrugged again, slumping against the banister. “A lot of things. We talked for a long time about a lot of things that we should have spread over the years. It was all stuff that we needed to talk about at some point. Some of it really helped. Some of it made me feel worse than ever. We screamed at each other and then kind of made up, but then we yelled at each other some more and then sort of reconciled again. I think we both had some really good points, but we both spouted a lot of utter stupidity too.”

Adrien looked up at his father, not bothering to wipe away the tears slowly trickling down his cheeks. “I still love her madly, but tonight made me think that maybe I shouldn’t worship her so much. Yeah, she’s brilliant, and she works actual miracles, but she also makes mistakes and does really stupid stuff. Tonight, I thought, ‘God, she’s dumb. Like how does someone screw something up this badly?’ But then I kind of felt better because…I’m not the only screwup.” He scuffed thoughtfully at the marble floor with the toe of his dress shoe.

Gabriel tentatively rested a supportive hand on Adrien’s shoulder.

Adrien took a deep breath and continued, “I realized that she’s not unshakeable. She’s not infallible. She’s really messed up too; she just did a good job of covering it up. She doesn’t know what she’s doing all the time, and she doesn’t get it right every time either. Maybe…” He licked his lips nervously. “…she’s not so much better than I am after all. I think that’s…good…because that means she’s not as out of my league as I thought. She’s not unattainable…but…that’s bad because we’re stuck in this mess, and maybe she doesn’t know how to fix it either. I always count on her to make everything right again after I break something, but…maybe she can’t. Maybe I have to fix it myself, and that’s…scary. But I’m rambling. Am I making any sense?”

Adrien looked up searchingly at Gabriel for guidance.

Gabriel stepped forward and wrapped his arms around his son, pulling Adrien in tight. “You’re making a lot of sense. It sounds like it was good that you two talked, even if it was upsetting.”

Adrien crumpled into his father’s embrace, trembling as the tears started to come faster and more urgently. “She doesn’t love me.”

“You don’t know that,” Gabriel soothed as best as he could. He always felt so under water when it came to dealing with emotions. “Miss Dupain-Cheng cares about you a great deal; even I can tell…. Did she tell you that she doesn’t love you?”

Adrien nodded into Gabriel’s shoulder. “She said that she loves me as a friend but that she doesn’t think she knows what it means to love someone romantically the way that I love her. Before…she told me that she loved me, but today she said that she didn’t mean the same thing that I’d meant when I’d told her I loved her. I thought things were going to be okay because we were both on the same page with how we felt about one another, but… How can she not know what it means to love someone romantically? She sounded sincere, but…do you think she was just saying that to let me down gently because she’d changed her mind?”

Internally, Gabriel cursed. What did one say in situations like this? The guidebooks had not expressly dealt with these circumstances, and Gabriel was not confident in his ability to adapt advice for other situations to fit his own extemporaneously.

Gabriel was on his own.

“I think…it’s not very common for people your age to love as maturely as you do, Adrien.” Gabriel made his best attempt. “Honestly, when you told me you were in love a little over a month ago, I was shocked to hear you describe true love as taking care of sick children together and picking out shades of paint for a house and dealing with morning sickness. I don’t think most people your age really consider the quotidian minutia of sharing a life with someone when they say the word ‘love’. I think, at your age, ‘love’ means the euphoria of physical attraction and physical affection coupled with an emotional fondness. I am sure there are some exceptions, like yourself, but I would be willing to believe that Miss Dupain-Cheng was telling the truth when she said that she hadn’t meant the same things you did when you told one another that you loved each other.”

Gabriel bit his lip as he hesitantly added, “I’m sorry. I don’t know if that makes things better or worse.”

“It’s okay,” Adrien sniffled. “It hurts, but…at least she wasn’t lying to me…ostensibly.”

“Is there anything I can do?” Gabriel offered.

Adrien shrugged weakly. “I don’t even know. I’m so tired. I don’t… Everything’s still a blur. It’s all running together.”

“Do you want to go to sleep?” Gabriel tried. “Do you need me to sit up with you?”

Adrien shook his head. “I don’t know what I want. It’s all… Dad, I think I lost her.”

Gabriel was tempted to tell his son not to give up, but he was afraid of giving Adrien false hope. “Why do you say that?”

“Because she doesn’t love me,” Adrien mumbled hollowly. “She didn’t promise me a relationship after she gets her thoughts and feelings straight. She told me not to wait for her, and it sounds like she’s not waiting for me. It’s like all the bonds that were keeping us together have been broken. And now she’s dating Luka, and she’s going to fall in love with him.”

Gabriel squeezed Adrien tighter. “I could…I’m not sure. There has to be something nefarious I could do to keep them apart with as much money as I have. I could bribe someone or have someone dig up something on his mother or—”

“—Dad?” Adrien sighed, pulling back to look up into Gabriel’s eyes. “Thanks, but don’t. Luka’s a good guy. He doesn’t deserve to have anything bad happen to him just because he stepped on some rich brat’s toes. I wish I could hate him and blame him for everything, but I can’t. I like him…and I want Marinette to be happy, even if I kind of hate her right now. If Luka takes care of her half as well as he took care of me, I’m glad that she has someone like that in her life. I’m just…kind of wrecked over the fact that it isn’t me.”

Gabriel deflated. “…That’s very mature of you.”

Adrien shrugged. “I’ve thrown enough jealous, petulant fits over the years that I’ve picked up on the fact that nothing good ever comes of them. I don’t know if resignation to misery is necessarily any better, but I’m too tired to fight this right now.”

Gabriel frowned sympathetically. “There’s nothing I can do to make this better, is there?”

Adrien shook his head, stepping back out of his father’s hold. “No. I think things are just going to suck for a long time…. I’m going to jump in the shower and head to bed. I’m probably not getting out of bed tomorrow. We’ll see about Monday, but I’m not optimistic. I’ll go to my doctor’s appointment on Tuesday, though.”

“Shouldn’t we see if we can’t get you in sooner?” Gabriel wondered. “You seem fairly…lucid, I suppose, right now, but…this calm feels untenable.”

Adrien shook his head. “I need some time to process things before I can talk about them. I don’t really want to deal with people right now.” To accentuate his point, Adrien pulled out his phone and held it out to his father. “Could you take this? I turned it off because Nino’s kind of blowing it up. I don’t want to talk to him.”

Gabriel pocketed the phone. “Did Monsieur Lahiffe do something wrong in particular, or are you just avoiding people in general?”

“I don’t want to talk to anyone…but, yeah, I’m kind of upset with Nino. I’m trying not to be, but…he knew about Luka and didn’t tell me,” Adrien grumbled, kicking at the floor. “Apparently, they were trying to decide who was going to do it and how they wanted to do it, but…I mean, a best friend tells you stuff like that right away, right? I know he probably thought he was doing the right thing by waiting, but…” He shook his head. “I’ve decided that I’m mad at him. If he shows up here tomorrow, I’m not home. I’ll talk to him again on Wednesday. Maybe.”

“All right,” Gabriel easily agreed. “I’ll let the others know he’s blacklisted. Is there anything else?”

Adrien bit his lip and twisted his ring nervously around his finger. “I actually have a pretty big favor to ask.”

“Of course,” Gabriel assured. “What is it?”

Adrien slid the Miraculous off of his finger and held it out to his father. “I need you to hold onto this for me.”

Gabriel’s eyes went wide, and he took a step back, shaking his head.

Adrien took a step forward. “I’m not giving it to you. It’s still mine. I just need you to hold onto the physical vessel for now. I’m in pretty bad shape. I can feel my composure cracking, and I don’t see how I can avoid being akumatized this time. When that happens, I can’t be wearing the ring. I need you to keep Plagg safe for me. Please, Dad.” Fresh tears welled up and spilled down Adrien’s cheeks. “I would never be able to forgive myself if Papillon got his hands on Plagg. I need you to protect him until Ladybug can get here, okay?”

Gabriel pulled Adrien back into his chest and squeezed hard. He was too choked up himself to say a word. He held Adrien for a long time before pulling back and tentatively accepting the ring.

“Don’t worry about Plagg. I won’t let anything happen to him…to either of you,” Gabriel swore. “You just worry about yourself for now. Go to sleep, Adrien. Come and get me if you need anything during the night. Or send Plagg or use the landline in your room to call me. If you need anything at all, all right?”

Adrien nodded, clapping his father on the arm. “Thanks, Dad.” He turned and slowly trudged up the stairs. He paused at the top. “And thank you for letting me go to the party. Yeah, parts of it really sucked, but I had a lot of fun too. I was glad I got to go, so thanks for trusting me.”

Gabriel nodded, voice stuck in his throat. He wished the whole party had gone better. He watched Adrien disappear into his room and then looked down at the ring in his palm.

“Funny,” Gabriel whispered, slipping it onto his finger. “I worked so long and fought so hard for this. Now, I don’t want it.”

“Life is ironic,” Plagg snorted.

“You should go with Adrien,” Gabriel urged.

Plagg shook his head. “Give him a moment of privacy. I’ll go in there in a sec to make sure he doesn’t space out and accidentally drown in the shower, but, for now, let’s give him a few minutes alone.”

Gabriel sighed, looking up in concern at Adrien’s door. “…Anything else I should know about what happened tonight?”

“He told you the important parts. I was concerned he was going to leave out the bits with Luka because you’re a little squeamish when it comes to romance between two guys,” Plagg mumbled.

“Is that why you bullied him into talking about it?” Gabriel wondered.

Plagg nodded. “I doubt there will ever be a relationship for you to worry about, but the kid really is drawn to that Luka guy. Maybe not right now, but eventually the kid might try to get closer to him. They’d make good friends, and Luka might prove to be a role model or confidant. I think it would be good for the kid to have Luka in his life, so I wanted you to know that there were feelings involved so you didn’t do or say anything to mess that up.”

“You could have explained it to me yourself later. You didn’t have to make Adrien talk to me about it when he obviously didn’t want to,” Gabriel scolded.

Plagg shook his head slowly. “Adrien needed to know that he could talk to you about guys he’s attracted to. He needed to know that you really meant it when you said you’d love him anyway if he were interested in other men. He’s in the middle of a crisis, and he needed to know that you had his back no matter what, especially when he’d just been let down by his close friends. He needed that conversation, even if he didn’t want to have it.”

Gabriel reflected silently for a moment. “…Well played, Plagg.”

“I get it right sometimes.” Plagg shrugged. “You got it right today.”

“I tried,” Gabriel snorted self-depreciatingly. “I don’t know that I was much help, and I still feel like it’s too little too late, but…he seems to appreciate that I’m trying.”

“He does,” Plagg assured. “He’s like a puppy. He forgives easily, and any kind of affection at all makes him ecstatic. He’s not hard to love…and you’re doing a lot better. I’m proud of you, Gabriel.”

Gabriel sighed. “Thank you, Plagg…. Will you go check on him now?”

“On it. I’ll keep you posted,” Plagg informed, flying up and through the bedroom door.

#Adrienette #Miraculous Ladybug #Miraculous Ladybug Fanfiction #Adrien Agreste #Gabriel Agreste #Plagg #Marinette Dupain-Cheng/Adrien Agreste #Mikau's Writings #There's a Daisy

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canadian-riddler · 6 years ago

Text

Borderlands: Cat-trap

By Indiana

Synopsis: Claptrap has some special, special friends. With credit to @hugsforvillains

Claptrap had, at some point in time, acquired a great deal of kittens.

… or perhaps he only had two or three (or maybe four), and it simply seemed as though he had a great deal of them. The furry little things seemed to be everywhere. When Claptrap was around, you were guaranteed to find a kitten someplace you didn’t want one. Or, at least, a great deal of cat hair. And pee. There was a lot of that too.

Yes, those kittens seemed to think Claptrap was some sort of metallic and very thoughtlessly shaped cat tree. Not that he made any indication he cared. No, Claptrap was apparently quite content to stand there with his arms out, letting the cats crawl all over him like some sort of massive, noisy caterpillars. The upside was that when he was talking, he was talking mostly to the cats. The downside was that he didn’t see proceeding with life as usual covered in cats as a problem. Whenever somebody brought it up, his go-to response was, “But they’re so cuuuuuute!”, which he said whilst holding out a squirming cat, following it up with, “C’mon, pet him!”

Well, the goal of getting rid of them was just a lost cause when there was a double handful of soft and tiny kitty in front of one’s face.

There was honestly no getting away from those cats. They were underfoot, over-foot, and on-top-of-lap. Claptrap, having no grasp of any kind of boundaries himself, had obviously not attempted to curb their behaviour in any way whatsoever. “Claptrap,” asked Moxxi rhetorically, removing a kitten from the beer pitcher she had found it in, “is this yours?”

“Captain Sexyboy!” crowed Claptrap, throwing his arms in the air whilst simultaneously not moving to accept the cat. “I have been looking all over for you!”

“You named your cat Captain Sexyboy?” Moxxi asked, squinting into the pitcher, taking note of the voluminous collection of cat hair, and then electing to pour the draft into it anyway.

“Well, duh,” Claptrap said, ignoring the animal as it jumped off the bar and onto the counter holding the moderately impressive collection of mismatched glasses and tumblers. “Look at how sexy he is! He’s gonna have so many kids when he grows up.”

All Moxxi saw was a cat enthusiastically making a mess of her clean(ish) glasses, but she obviously didn’t know anything, as Captain Sexyboy was indeed very handsome.

Eventually (to everyone’s immense relief) the cats gradually tagged along with Claptrap less and less. Which meant (to everyone’s immense chagrin) that Claptrap went back to talking to them instead of the cats. And that, if you didn’t know, is one of the most unacceptable forms of torture listed in the Geneva Convention, right up there with waterboarding and sensory deprivation. The latter, of course, being far preferable to whatever noise Claptrap happened to be making on any given day.

At some point he had acquired a very deep gouge in his chassis (which had conveniently managed not to sever anything important (if there was indeed anything important in there to sever)), but nobody knew where he’d gotten it from or when. Not because he hadn’t told them all several times each, but because nobody cared. Until Hammerlock, damn his insatiable curiosity about the beasts of Pandora, actually did ask him about it. Everyone in their vicinity knew that was a terrible, terrible mistake and immediately chugged whatever drink they had in front of them in the hopes of ushering in the blanks of memory infallibly produced by excessive amounts of alcohol.

“It’s those cats,” Claptrap lamented unnecessarily loudly, waving one hand over what he thought was a drink but what was actually a cup of whatever was dripping out from under the dishwasher. “They just do not understand they’re too big to climb on me!”

“Oh, my dear boy,” Hammerlock said, too polite to withhold a response even though he really should have at least tried, “they understand. But if you thought they would care, well, that’s where you’re gravely mistaken.”

“They just are not good listeners!” continued Claptrap ironically.

“I see,” said Hammerlock, wishing fervently he had not started this conversation. This wish followed him for the rest of the day. Mostly because Claptrap followed him for the rest of the day.

Claptrap continued telling outrageous stories about the cats, from things such as, “They keep thinking I’m some kinda toy! Who would think that, right?” to, “One ‘a them ruined Brick’s garden, but you guys’ll keep that to yourselves, right?” and concluding with, “They ran off into the desert to live their lives without meeee!” This last one was accompanied by hysterical sobbing, which might have garnered him more sympathy if he hadn’t done the same thing the day before when someone changed the song on the jukebox before his had ended.

“Moxxi!” Claptrap hollered as he entered the bar one afternoon, causing several patrons to scramble for the exit complete with chair-tossing, drink-spilling, and table-overturning. At least one of them was skipping out on his bill, for which he would probably be catching a bullet in the head for. “The things I have seen today!”

Moxxi rolled her eyes and, because she was out of dishwasher juice, provided him with the sludge that was coming out of the bottom of the sink. What she gave him turned out not to matter, because as soon as he got up on the barstool he waved his hand dramatically and it flung the foul mixture across the bar, which of course hit some poor bastard in the face. Unfortunately, he was far bigger and stronger than Claptrap. Fortunately, he had fallen fast asleep in a puddle of his lite beer some time ago. That’s what happens when your bartender doesn’t cut people off.

“I couldn’t believe my eye!” Claptrap shouted to no one in particular. “They ate him!”

“What?” asked the man next to him, merely because he was drunk enough he couldn’t shut up. Claptrap immediately turned to face him.

“Phantom of the Opera!” he explained, leaning over far enough a few people began to hope he’d fall off the barstool. It wouldn’t stop him talking, but it would be funny. “They just tore inta him! Ripped him apart like he was an imitation condom! It was… it was… well, it was pretty cool, actually. I was gonna say I was horrified, and I was, while it was happening, but now I’m thinkin’ about it… yeah! It was pretty lit!”

“You named – you know the Phantom of the Opera had a name, right?” the man asked in exasperation, as he happened to be a massive theatre snob and had memorised everything about every Phantom production that had ever been made. And if you thought there were a lot where you come from, well, you haven’t seen Phantom performed solely with live skags, have you?

“Of course I do!” Claptrap somehow snorted, because he, too, happened to be a massive theatre snob who had memorised everything about every Phantom production that had ever been made, including the one that was performed solely with live skags. “I just liked the name Phantom of the Opera better!”

If Claptrap had been any other person, the man would have smashed his glass over Claptrap’s head and left. Since that would have absolutely no effect, he smashed it over the head of the person on his other side instead. That was how Claptrap started his eighty-ninth bar fight, despite not actually fighting anybody. That got Claptrap kicked out of Moxxi’s for the hundred and seventy-fourth time, despite his protests that he’d done nothing wrong. Surprisingly, he hadn’t, but that had never mattered before and so it absolutely wouldn’t now nor any other time in the future.

As they often did, a bandit spotted Claptrap rolling obliviously along through the dust by himself. And again, as they often did, he decided now was a good time to put the robot out of his misery. Wait, no. To put everyone else out of their misery. From having to put up with him. Because he’s – yes. Moving on.

The bandit sauntered across the dirt, both hands holding a shotgun that was mostly built out of other, discarded, crappier shotguns, and thought about what he might like to do with Claptrap once he’d caught up with him. The bandit was both too stupid and too ignorant (mostly ignorant) to know quite why the little robot reacted to even extremely unpleasant experiences such as being set on fire and electrocuted with exuberant good cheer, but he didn’t really need to know. All he needed to know was that it was pretty funny. He was cool with just knowing that.

As he ambled along he pondered just how he would do it. He could always shoot him, of course, but then there was the risk that he would ruin something important and then Claptrap would die, and that wouldn’t be worth his time. He could try demanding the robot turn himself off, which he would probably agree to do, but then the bandit would have to drag what looked to be a very heavy robot back to camp, and that just didn’t sound like fun. He decided that his best bet would be simply to ask him to come along. From what he’d heard, the stupid thing would probably do it, too. And he’d heard right, unfortunately.

“Hello, Claptrap,” the bandit announced, in a voice that he probably thought sounded friendly and welcoming, but really sounded like that obnoxious stranger who opens their screen door on Halloween and thinks it’s clever to hand out boxes containing about eight sour raisins or pint-sized toothbrushes with bristles that make it feel like you’re sucking on a soggy, fuzzy hairbrush. “Where are you headed?”

“Good day, gentle sir!” returned Claptrap, who had never been trick-or-treating and so had no idea what voice the bandit was using. “I’m searching for my friend! He’s around here somewhere, but you know how friends are. Always running off on you!”

The bandit stifled a laugh and a gleeful smile. Or at least, he thought he did. He actually looked mildly like he had been holding his breath for a very long time in a strange attempt to impress someone. A woman, probably. Or perhaps a man. Or possibly himself in the mirror. “Friends?” the bandit said, in a way that conjured up visions of screaming doormats and someone sitting in a rocking chair on their porch breathing very slowly into a Darth Vader mask in the minds of everyone within a one-hundred kilometre radius, excluding Claptrap. “Why, what a coincidence! I got lots of friends back where I’m going!”

“Really?” Claptrap asked, jumping and spinning around about ninety degrees which, if you didn’t know, is very impressive for a robot that clumsy. “Lots of friends, you say?”

“Oh yes,” the bandit nodded. “If lots were a number, that’s how many friends I’d have waiting!”

“Ooh!” Claptrap rubbed his flat little hands together, which produced the exact noise a violin makes when someone who has never played it before believes they are in fact in the beginnings of the next great concerto. “Hey, if we’re all getting our friends together, mind if I bring my friend along? It won’t take long! He’ll be here any minute!”

“Of course,” the bandit replied, because he did not for one second believe Claptrap had a single friend in all the universe. Even rust seemed to be avoiding him, somehow. Even the organic process of oxidising metal couldn’t stand Claptrap! The bandit thought he was clever for knowing this information, which he was, but only because of the company he was with at the moment. The company in question raised himself as high as possible, cupped his hands around the mouth he didn’t have, and hollered so loudly he disturbed a nest of rakks about two hundred kilometres away, “Mrs Fluffers!”

Yeah. The friend definitely did not exist.

That was when the eclipse happened.

The reason I didn’t tell you there was an impending eclipse was because it didn’t make it into the weather forecast. It hadn’t been predicted by any satellites, or meteorologists, and even the prerequisite crazy-haired man with the apocalypse sign was pretty sure the end of the world wasn’t nigh until at least next week. And that was because it wasn’t really an eclipse.

The bandit looked toward the shadow blocking out the sun, and then he looked up. And up. And up farther. So far that his jaw kind of fell open without his permission. He honestly wished that the predicted fire and brimstone would happen right now, or at least that there really had been an unexpected eclipse, because Claptrap did have a friend. The very worst kind of friend, in fact.

This friend was some massive, unholy beast. It was covered head to whip-like tail in mangy orange fur, sported ears that resembled Swiss cheese, had four-foot fangs bordered by an expansive tangle of eight-foot whiskers, and eyes that were definitely being used by the soul of some hellspawn to scare the everloving shit out of him.

It worked. Both literally and figuratively.

Most bandits, this one included, prided themselves on being tough-as-nails badasses that would go up against a Vault Hunter with their bare hands. A high percentage of them would even actually do that. So when I tell you that this beast was terrifying enough to make this man turn around, hitch up his freshly soiled pants, and run screaming back to the hive of scum and villainy from whence he came, you know it was pretty darn scary.

“Oh, Mrs Fluffers,” lamented Claptrap, looking sadly at the tire tracks he’d made in the dirt, “I just don’t understand it! Every time I bring someone to meet you, they piss themselves and run away! They don’t even try to get to know you. Rude!”

Mrs Fluffers purred quietly, which only caused one or two minor rockslides. Claptrap petted an area on his leg approximately the size of the cat’s toe and held his other hand up thoughtfully beneath his eye. He had a surprisingly wide range of facial expressions given that he didn’t have a face. “Well,” he said finally, straightening, “I guess he’s just gonna have to come to your place!”

Mrs Fluffers licked his shoulder, which would make it a good time to mention said shoulder was matted down with a thick layer of some dark, hardened substance. Blood. It was blood.

“Mrs Fluffers!” Claptrap shouted up in the direction of the cat’s very distant ear. “Invite him over already, willya!?”

Mrs Fluffers gave a meow that would have only been about seventy-five decibels if anyone had been measuring (which no one was) and looked over in the direction of the fleeing bandit with mild interest. He didn’t care very much for the bandit, but he was holding something that glinted temptingly in the blazing sun…

“Finally,” groused Claptrap as the cat ambled to his feet and collected the bandit, who had not even managed to run the length of the animal. Mrs Fluffers contained the hapless idiot inside of his teeth with remarkable gentility and turned to face his beloved master again.

“Hooray!” Claptrap shouted, jumping up and down with his arms in the air. He actually had impressive height for someone with a suspension that old. “Oh boy! Mrs Fluffers, try an’ take care of him until we get back, huh? You always wreck ‘em before Jerry gets to meet ‘em.”

“Who’s Jerry?” sobbed the bandit, whose bladder tried and failed to empty itself a second time. Claptrap spun around and continued rolling forward. But backward. Forward but backward. Like his life as a whole.

“Oh, you’ll like Jerry,” Claptrap said enthusiastically. “He loves playing. But he’s shy! So we gotta bring him people to play with! Or we would,” and the robot paused here to fold his arms indignantly, “if Mrs Fluffers here didn’t hog all the friends.”

“I don’t want to play with Jerry!”

“Oh, you,” scoffed Claptrap, waving one hand in airy dismissal, “you haven’t even met him yet! You really should get to meet people before you write ‘em off, y’know.” And he hopped in an attempt to spin himself front-facing again, which he was very successful at doing. What he was also very successful at doing was falling down. “Gingersnaps!” he yelled into the dirt, because he was only allowed to use K-rated profanity (and even that was pushing it), and Mrs Fluffers immediately dropped the bandit, to his immense relief. That was, until about five seconds later when he hit the ground and broke his leg in at least three places. At least.

He was too busy screaming and staring with comically bulging eyes at the brand-new configuration his leg was now in to look over and see that Mrs Fluffers had ‘helped’ Claptrap by batting at his chassis as though he were some tiny prey to be joyfully toyed with. “Now, now,” Claptrap was saying (which the bandit also wasn’t listening to, since he was screaming so loudly). “We have talked about this, young man!”

Mrs Fluffers proceeded to drag his tongue, the size of which rivalled a full-sized van, up Claptrap’s chassis so hard it actually stood him back up again. It also removed an impressively-sized stripe of years-old dirt, which revealed that Claptrap had once been quite a different, but still obnoxious, shade of yellow. “Thanks bunches!” Claptrap said. “Now, you wanna help our – oh, crap. You broke him! It’s gonna be real hard for Jerry to play with him now.”

The cat retrieved the sobbing bandit and deposited him in front of Claptrap, who smacked himself in the eye with the palm of his hand solely because he didn’t have a forehead to smack. “No! I don’t want him! He’s for Jerry!”

Mrs Fluffers looked expectantly down at Claptrap, bony tail sweeping the dirt in such great swaths he was probably unburying some long-forgotten skeletons. Claptrap sighed and turned around.

“Come on,” he said, rolling onward. “I don’t wanna hang out here all day. There’s scary monsters around, y’know?”

Mrs Fluffers purred.

Author’s note

hugsforvillains suggested that the cats of Pandora grow up to be vicious beasts. Usually I just said cats didn’t exist on Pandora anymore.

One of the people I know from work came up with the name Captain Sexyboy. For himself. He calls himself that.

This is also on AO3 and FFN, but no linkies allowed.

#so says Indy #Claptrap #Borderlands #fanfic from Indy

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bookgirlfan · 6 years ago

Text

“But how would they know how to look out for each other, and not just go sstumbling around hurting them by accident?” Crowley drunkenly slurred, his head resting on Aziraphale’s lap as the rest of his body sprawled across the couch. “They got those, whatayacallit, the American thing? The superhero?”

“Masks?” Aziraphale suggested, equally drunk. “Like the scal– scra– red one?”

Crowley shook his head dramatically, strands of hair flying into the air only to settle back down against Aziraphale’s soft sweater. “Noooo, th’ other one. With the song.” He hummed a few discordant notes, then shook his head again. This time, one of the strands landed in his mouth. He pulled it out, making a face of comical disgust.

Aziraphale’s face lit up. “Th’ Phantom! He’s got a mask, an’ a song, an’ a whole opera. Lots of songs in operas.” He nodded his head authoritatively.

“Phantom’s not a sssuperhero!” Crowley objected. He lifted his head off Aziraphale’s lap just to glare at him.

“Is so,” Aziraphale obstinately insisted, ignoring Crowley’s glare entirely. “‘S got a mask, an’ a shecret lair, an’, an’ I saw him in a comic book.” He nodded once, as if to emphasise that he had seen him in a book, and who knew books better than the being who had owned a bookshop for more than a century?

Crowley, unable to argue this, fell back down into Aziraphale’s lap. “But he’s not the hero with the ssssenses, the insssect one.”

Aziraphale hummed absently, giving up on the conversation in favour of running his fingers through Crowley’s hair.

Crowley shivered, arching up into Aziraphale’s fingers, but kept talking regardless. “Do insects have the sssensses? They must, or why does the hero have them? He needs to know how to sssave people, or he’ss not a good hero. So he must have them. So they must have them.”

He gestured best he could to illustrate his point while still lying down, but it was just enough to dislodge Aziraphale’s fingers from his hair. Crowley mewled, whining, “Azziraphale...”

“Hush, precious.” Aziraphale tangled his fingers into Crowley’s hair again, separating out small strands and twining them into small braids which were quickly lost in the masses of red. At this, Crowley, already loose-limbed from the wine, melted further into the couch, his eyes drifting shut.

“Wonder who insssectsss are trying to ssssave,” Crowley mumbled, eyes still closed. “D’you think they’ve got families ssssomewhere? Little flocksss of hawkmoths? Party of ladybirdssss?”

“No flies, though,” Aziraphale murmured in return. His fingers still lazily combed through Crowley’s hair, each movement causing the demon to relax more and more. Their wine glasses were sitting on the table, temporarily ignored in favour of greater pleasures. “Don’t like flies.”

Crowley, too bonelessly relaxed to bother with anything as complex as words, simply hummed his agreement. Aziraphale didn’t mind. He’d entirely lost track of what they were talking about anyway. Something to do with insects? It didn’t matter. Much more interesting and pleasant was the warm weight lying trustingly in his lap.

A rapid thumping on his front door distracted him from his self-appointed task. He waited, hoping whoever it was would just go away, but instead it just became louder. Finally deciding that this was something he would have to deal with in person, he carefully lifted Crowley’s head off his lap just enough for him to squeeze himself out, smiling slightly at the confirmation that Crowley had fallen asleep. It wasn’t uncommon for their post-Armageddidn’t drinking sessions to end in such a way, but it was still new enough to feel special.

With one last look behind him, Aziraphale headed for the front door, even more determined to send smartly on their way whoever was rude enough to be knocking on his door at this time of night.

He opened the front door a crack, just wide enough to whisper loudly, “Whoever you are, we’re not open! We don’t open until morning!”

He made to close the door, but a foot jammed itself between the door and its frame. “It is morning, mister, and your sign says you open at nine today.” The owner of the foot, a young teenage girl, smiled beseechingly at him, the two other teenagers behind her making similarly winning expressions.

Aziraphale opened the door a tad wider, taking note of the sun shining weakly between the buildings. There was no denying that it was morning, the stars apparently having disappeared into the sky while he and Crowley were distracted. Inside the shop it was as gloomy as ever, but now that the door was open, it was unmistakable.

“You must be mistaken. I don’t open until noon.” He pointed to the freshly miracled opening hours sign. The teenagers turned to follow his gesture, and while they were distracted, he promptly shut the door and went back inside, ignoring the surprised shouts and door-hammering going on behind him.

All the commotion hadn’t woken Crowley, which Aziraphale found he was rather pleased about. Not that he was really sure why – if Crowley could sleep for nearly a century without being disturbed, it was hard to imagine some disgruntled teenagers could make any difference.

Gently, Aziraphale lifted Crowley’s head again and slipped back into his previous spot. Now. That the influence of the alcohol had faded away, it didn’t feel quite right to be touching Crowley’s hair, especially with Crowley no longer awake to object, so instead he miracled a book into his hand, and began to read. Within seconds he was lost in the text, having completely forgotten all of the world around him.

Without him noticing, his hand had returned to petting Crowley’s hair. In his sleep, the demon smiled.

#good omens #stories #my writing #going through all my old stuff to procrastinate writing new stuff

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