#so many of them use the exact same set of instruments and everything

[wanderingmausoleum]

the full shadow of the erdtree soundtrack is finally available, and to this day i am still salty that this one specific violin melody from the trailer didn’t make it into the game

[corellianhounds]

Deserters

Chapter 3 — Engatuu

Words: 3.7k

Warnings: None

Summary: Crosshair and Mayday make landfall and wait for contact.

Note: For those with screen readers: There is a section of the chapter written in Morse code. It sounds abominable when read out loud. It begins after the sentence “Mayday dropped the headset and looked over the message,” and ends before the sentence beginning with “Mayday scrutinized it, not even sure he’d gotten all of it correct…” It’s not necessary to know what the exact message is, it’s just there for a bit of fun in case someone wants a bonus puzzle hinting at the next chapter.

In the warm cabin of a Merhaean cargo-ship, Crosshair tries to sleep.

Once Mayday was sure both of them would wake up, he advised Crosshair to make use of the bed and sleep if he could. Said it was the only way to recover from the cold. As the initial shots wore off Mayday stuffed a bunch of other things from the medical cabinet into his hands, told him some order to take or use them in, then unsteadily made his way back to the second bunk. He was moving stiffly, and again Crosshair had to wonder how he was even standing. The snow from the avalanche hadn’t been fresh powder.

“I’ve still got a bit of fight left in me,” was all Mayday had said when asked. He had roughly the same medical array he’d given Crosshair, in addition to some instruments and packs Crosshair couldn’t identify, but he seemed lucid and capable enough of handling whatever else he appeared to be dealing with. Mayday had wedged open the door to the connecting fresher and turned the sanisteam on, letting the humidity circulate the cabin and take some of the strain off their lungs.

Mayday layered on the blankets with some of the emergency hot packs, closing his eyes and immediately dozing off. Crosshair finished the last of the tea and tried to follow Mayday’s advice, but no matter what he did, his mind kept wandering back to the Empire, everything they and the Republic had asked and demanded of him since the moment he could walk.

There was never an end in sight when it came to the war, and for the longest time Crosshair did what he was made for because really, where else would he have taken his skill sets if he felt like deviating so far from the norm he’d ended up being able to break out? Private security? Bounty hunting? Clone Force 99 might have been a more independent group of soldiers, but they were soldiers.

Crosshair turned over onto his back and looked up at the blank, cold ceiling. The compound Mayday and the others had been guarding was more than sparse— It was unlivable, and the lieutenant had made his disdain and lack of care known from the beginning. Mayday said they’d sent in multiple requests for supplies and replacement equipment and received no reply. Crosshair was on the Kaminoan landing platform by himself for thirty-two days, and still he’d followed the Empire, and still they’d deemed him disposable. Both of them loyal to the end, both of them disregarded and left for dead.

He’d done so many despicable things in the name of the Empire, things he told himself were warranted and necessary because the Empire was keeping order, and dissenters were the ones causing chaos and bloodshed. The only ‘normal’ Crosshair had ever known was holding a gun in his hands. What were they supposed to be if not soldiers? Had that even been what a soldier was in the first place.

What if that’s what being a soldier had always been?

The sound his fist made when it struck the bulkhead startled even himself, he and Mayday both flinching.

“Crosshair…?”

“I’m fine. I’m fine.”

Mayday was still for a moment before looking over his shoulder, squinting at Crosshair in the dim light for good measure; he turned back over and pulled the blanket up around his shoulders.

Crosshair dug the heels of his hands into his eyes, trying to rub away the grit and force down the nausea in his throat. With any luck, maybe he could convince the rest of the squad to at least take Mayday. The commander hadn’t done anything to be left alone.

Engatuu was, as Mayday described it, riddled with holes and laced with veins of glass from what battles ended up being fought there. Once, it had been their training grounds. Returning to it with older eyes only highlighted the destruction and carnage the war had left in its wake. Engatuu wasn’t even a Separatist planet, it just happened to get occupied as a Separatist stopover, a haven for those fleeing their homes or escaping other, more sinister plots that forced them to don disguises and bribe officials as their only means of passing through security without presenting an ID chit.

Despite all that had transpired in such a short amount of time, the planet still held pockets of hope in the more secluded regions. Plants had started to come back, growing through wrecked fuselages and the durasteel ribs of ships, and as the cargo freighter had descended through the atmosphere, Mayday couldn’t help but feel a sense of appreciative awe for the recovering landscape.

Mayday looked out over the canyon, sighing at the fresh, temperate breeze and the feeling of a warm sun on his face for the first time in over a year. Some crevices between the plateaus were as thin as the gold on a weekend-wedding band, and in other places the red- and purple-stone furrow stretched miles across. There were entrances and exits to mines here and there in the walls of the canyon, long abandoned and likely caved in, and trees had grown lush and thick along the winding river that cut through the stone far below.

“What’d you say they mined out here?”

“Nitratine and sulfur,” Crosshair said. They’d landed not long ago and stepped out into the sun, both needing to stretch their legs after the long flight. Neither of them were in any state to be walking for long, so it was a good thing Crosshair seemed to remember the exact location of his squad’s former hideout. He’d landed them between the forest edge and the seam, settling under the canopy and camouflage of Engatuu’s trees.

“Two-thirds powder keg, huh?”

“Only once they’re refined,” Crosshair said absently, scanning the horizon with the binocs just to be sure they hadn’t been followed. “Our engineer had a field day when he found out.”

“How close is your squad’s current haunt from here?”

“We’re in the same sector, two points over on the grid. If they take longer than a day to get here, we move.”

Crosshair lowered the binocs and went back to the treeline, and Mayday followed.

Positioned more than two-dozen feet above the ground, Mayday found the old fort to be surprisingly impressive. It wasn’t a Wookiee’s treehouse, but Mayday could see that it had been given a more architectural eye than most kids were capable of for how young Crosshair had implied they were at the time. The fort was only a few years old and from what it looked like, was in remarkably good condition, well-supported by branches, scavenged beams, and new tree growth that had formed around it keeping it up. There was a knotted rope to get up and an auto-belay line at the top, and a series of pulley systems running down two of the sides he figured were used for hauling materials up. The back had what must have been the anchor for a zipline at one point, and there were remnants of fishnets and floats still draped over the low walls, and a crow’s nest perched another twenty feet up.

“… I don’t think I can climb anything,” Mayday admitted.

Crosshair snorted. “I never said we should. I’m going to sleep on the ship. I’ve slept on the ground and eaten enough fish to last me the rest of whatever lifetime I get.”

Mayday chuckled.

“Besides,” Crosshair said. “Anything of use is down the canyon. I’ll take the long way down and meet you back at the ship in an hour.”

“You’re in no shape to be climbing anything either.”

Crosshair nodded to the leftmost edge of the canyon where a faint pathway might have started a winding path down. “There’s a trail.”

“What is it you’re planning to get?”

“I already told you,” Crosshair said, putting his helmet on. “Tech had a field day down here.”

Several years before

The boy called Tech is what most would consider to be roughly twelve years old, and he is alone.

He knows that’s the intended purpose of solitary confinement, but after the fourth day it started to feel like he was entirely alone, as if the rest of Tipoca City and Kamino itself had simply vanished and he’d been left floating in a vacuum of space. He never saw the being or beings that delivered his meals or turned the lights off, all of it either automated or far away. He knew they also must have specifically tailored his confinement to exclude droids.

What got to him most was the silence. A soundproofed room with little to tell him when it was the next day or night, every bit of the outside world cut off from his senses. He couldn’t hear or feel the hum of the station’s inner workings, the marching of drill units or the clamor of the training rooms. There was no ambient noise to break up the sound of his own breathing. He could yell and scream for hours if he were inclined and none but his superiors would hear or know.

He’d tried to mentally prepare himself when it became clear that the drill instructors and Kaminoans blamed him for the batch’s disappearance, and logically he understood that too, based on his interference with the trackers, but when he’d heard how long he was going to be kept in solitary there was no amount of logic that could force his heart to slow down as they got closer and closer to Kamino. Hunter sat beside him on the transport, apologizing in whispers and trying to keep him calm, but the longest anybody had ever spent in solitary confinement was eight-point-eight-eight standard days, a sentence half of what his was to be.

The only morbid consolation he had was that apparently his solution to bypassing their tracking was more sophisticated than he’d thought or the Kaminoans had accounted for. In his opinion they should be commending him for finding an obvious and exploitable flaw in their design.

Another benefit to his current predicament was that he also had an almost exact idea of where solitary confinement was in Tipoca City. Prior to that, nobody knew quite which part of the facilities it resided in, but he’d memorized every turn and audio clue it took to get there, every directional and environmental clue that eliminated certain levels and corridors in the mental layout of the city’s architectural design in his head. The training schedule wasn’t the only thing he’d gotten a glimpse of while snooping.

In his defense, it should’ve been harder to access the information. He hadn’t even needed to slice into anything— He’d just nicked a new officer’s badge in passing and got the security clearance for the next level up, then did the same thing with a passing technician’s personal log (one with some very curious personal details he was sure were a breach of propriety when it came to correspondence with civilians), until he’d finally stolen the right cadet’s uniform and found his way with another stolen datapad and code cylinder into an office he knew would be empty at that hour with a plethora of interesting and well-organized files. Sometimes the easiest way in is walking right through the door.

For as advanced as Tech knew his intelligence was, he was already well aware at that age that it wouldn’t do him any good if it wasn’t actionable. Stealth, a good memory, an attention to his surroundings, connecting and relating those details to one another, and finding the requisite patterns, probability, and predictability in behaviors and routine schedules hadn’t involved any kind of battle strategy or core curriculum learning at all. There was no computerized trail tracing a data-splice back to him or his equipment, no math or science or vectoring involved. When he wasn’t wearing the goggles he looked nearly identical to the rest of the cadets his age, and he’d memorized several floors and sections of Tipoca City’s layout already so even without the goggles he’d been able to blend in and find his way without stumbling.

(“If you’d stop welding six inches in front of your face you wouldn’t need them in the first place,” he hears Hunter saying in the back of his head, and while Tech admits that Hunter is right, it had still been a necessary sacrifice at the time when it came to ensuring precision and clarity in his work. Besides, his new pair had polarized lenses and he’d glazed them with two protective layers of liquid crystal filters now, his eyes would be fine.)

Everybody within Tipoca City operated on routine and regimented spatial awareness, and everybody Tech had needed to shadow and every cam he needed to avoid was easy enough to exploit. He excelled at finding blind spots and split-second opportunities in and around others, and he’d been able to navigate even unfamiliar levels and locations with relative ease, just based on knowing which rooms, corridors, and machinery lay between and around them.

After that, all he had to do was get back to the barracks. Luckily his timing was as exact as predicted and when the other three initiated enough of a distraction to buy him some cover on his way out, he took it and rejoined them with none the wiser.

He knew they might be found out eventually. He just thought they were going to have more time than that.

Now he was beneath the training grounds. Apt, he supposed, for drowning out any possibility of being heard. Disheartening, knowing just how far away he was from the only home he had.

He refused to lose his head yet, though. Four days into a seventeen-point-seven-six day sentence was too early to despair. He had to think of some way to make contact. Something told him the other three weren’t just going to leave him there.

Crosshair had been gone for twenty minutes when an incoming transmission blared from the console behind Mayday, making him jump. The sender’s signal was voided out and the message came through not in text or as a holocall, but as… audio static. Static and nothing else.

Mayday frowned, tuning the receiver and listening more closely over the headset. If it weren’t for the fact it was encrypted he would have thought it was just some sublight interference, a ship passing overhead they had the same scrambled frequency for, or a channel from a nearby tower caught between waves. He could almost make out a tinny audio tone, but it was too inconsistent to be a voice and sounded more like wire taps.

Mayday’s frown deepened, the haze of painkillers making his head lag, and it took far too long for him to realize it was the old Mandalorian method of sending codes, a series of dits and dahs over the audio receiver.

Scrambling for something to notate the message on, Mayday kept the headset pressed to one ear, a stylus in the other hand as he held his breath and strained to catch the remainder of the tones. He had no idea when it would cut off or if it would repeat and there was a finite window of time it might linger in the audio static. Recording it would be futile; he knew from experience that the audio tones would be lost beneath the interference once the transmission was no longer live.

Finally the message cut off, nothing but true static over the line this time. Mayday dropped the headset aside and looked over the message.

•-- •••- ---•••/ ----- ••--- -••••- --• /

•--• /

•-• -- --• ---••• /

-••- •-•• -- ••- •-• •• -• / •••• •••- -- •-- •••- •• / •• •••- --- --•• -••• / -••- •-•• •-- •••- / -•• •-•• •• •-- / ••••- / •• •••- --- •••- • --•• -- -••- •••- / -- •-• -••- •••- / -•- --- --•• -••• •-• -- - / -•• •-• --• ••• / -••• --•• / --• •-• -• •••- / •---- ••••• /

Mayday scrutinized it, not even sure he’d gotten all of it correct because he knew it’d been gibberish when he was writing it down. However, after about a dozen words or so, the gibberish started to repeat, the parts that were cut off starting to thread together. It had to be a code.

He had to find Crosshair.

Crosshair was carrying the last crate when Mayday pinged his helmet’s comm channel.

“Hey, someone got your message,” the commander said, his voice crackly over the feed. “I assume it’s your squad. Whoever it is sent something encoded.”

“What kind of code?”

“Came through as Dadita and it’s a mix of letters, but no discernible words.”

Crosshair paused, concentrating. “Any numbers?”

“Yeah, a few. Couple of letters before the numbers zero and two, then some individual letters and words before the number four, then six more words and the number fifteen.”

“Is the digit after two either the code for a dash, or one dash itself?”

Mayday hummed in thought. “There’s a dash, but the letter after it is grek.”

Crosshair quickly set the crate down by the mouth of the mine, shouldering his rifle and setting the visor on his helmet to adjust to the light. “It’s them. Read off the letters before the number four. I’m coming up.”

“Dorn, leth, isk, wesk. Where are you?”

“What are the letters for the word before fifteen?” Crosshair pressed, picking up the pace.

“Grek, resh, nern, vev.”

Crosshair swore under his breath, already feeling a stitch in his side as he hiked back up the canyon trail. “When did it come through?”

“Transmission stopped five minutes ago.”

Crosshair had to stop to catch his breath, feeling dizzy and cursing some more. “It’s- It’s a test. They want a four letter response in fifteen minutes; ten minutes now.”

“It’s timed?”

“They want confirmation that it’s me and that they aren’t- aren’t being sent a decoy message from someone else,” he huffed. “The word before “four” is “word.” The rest of the code are the parameters and a riddle—”

Crosshair tore off his helmet, coughing again, shakily leaning against the rock face. Mayday’s concerned voice was faint and tinny over the comm.

“The last word is “time” before the fifteen,” he said, switching the relay to the comm on his vambrace as he picked his way back through the stone and brush. “They’re waiting on a short response I’d be able to figure out and reply with quickly.”

“Four letter response, huh?” Mayday said dryly. “Any ideas?”

“Oh, there’s several I’d like to give them…” Crosshair grumbled. He hauled himself up over the ledge, taking a second to get his bearings and make for the ship. “Answer depends on the clue. I’m on my way.”

Mayday watched out the viewport for Crosshair, keeping an eye on the time and trying to puzzle out the message based on what Crosshair had given him. He’d tried asking what the key was, but the sniper must have been far enough down the canyon that a quick return was taxing because it sounded like he could hardly make it a few paces before he started hacking up a lung.

They had six minutes left.

The commander couldn’t keep his thumb from tapping impatiently. He drew up three columns on one of the displays, inputting the intel he had and started deciphering the rest of the dots and dashes, looking for individual words.

Finally there was movement beneath the hull and Mayday heard Crosshair’s hoarse breathing as he ascended the ramp. He splayed everything out on one of the holoboards as Crosshair came up the ladder, shakily pulling himself up above decks. Mayday’s eyes widened.

“Maker’s montrals, what did you do to yourself?”

“I’ll be fine.”

Mayday scoffed as Crosshair set aside his helmet and rifle, looking over the code and the notations Mayday had started on. Mayday could tell that he’d either gotten himself hurt (for which Mayday wanted to hit him) or he’d overexerted himself. The commander decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and dragged the board over to force Crosshair to sit in one of the chairs at the comm console.

Crosshair shakily pulled off his gloves and wiped the sweat off his brow, smearing the soot and red dust that matched what was on his armor across his skin. Mayday had broken up several possible words already and it seemed Crosshair’s suspicions were confirmed; his breathing rattled as he forced his shaking hand to cooperate, muttering as he separated out the rest.

“Crosshair, tell me the key.”

Crosshair shook his head, ignoring him and quickly transposing the code into whatever scrambled message it conveyed.

“Crosshair—”

“I’m fine.”

“You have less than three minutes.”

“I know, just- Give me a second.”

“You know what it is?”

“I know what it’s saying,” Crosshair said tersely. “Just- Trying to figure out what it means.”

“You’re out of time and about to pass out, tell me—”

“Just shut up and let me think.”

Mayday didn’t respond, but put a timer up on the board and sat across from him, resting his elbows on his knees.

Crosshair could tell Mayday was aggravated with him but he couldn’t care at the moment. He was aware of the timer counting down, but the answer the crew was looking for had to be something obvious and he was wracking his brain for anything that might have been relevant. He knew it wasn’t any of their CT numbers. None of the plans were abbreviated in a way that would make sense. It had to be related to a mission, or a piece of equipment, some notable experience, a play on words—

Crosshair blinked, and if he weren’t so irritated at having to puzzle over the message and didn’t feel like death warmed over, he might have laughed. It couldn’t have been more obvious if it’d hit him in the face.

There were twenty seconds left.

“Here,” he said, gesturing for Mayday to move so he could hail the Marauder. “I know what they’re looking for.”

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[facelessoldgargoyle]

Amy Dallon as the Minotaur

The Metatextual Monster: how reading Amy Dallon on multiple levels is necessary to understanding her.

I'm gonna be real, this started out as a daydream about drawing Taylor as Icarus, but I care way more about the Minotaur, and Taylor isn't the Minotaur. Possibly some art about this to follow, but I type faster than I draw. ~700 words.

How many of you have read House of Leaves? Wikipedia. The most important thing to know is that House of Leaves is three stories, which occur nested within each other. The story at the heart is a documentary about a house in which a closet door suddenly appears, which eventually grows into a hallway and then a labyrinth. The next layer is a blind professor's commentary on this documentary, which was discovered scattered around his apartment after his death. The top layer is the chronicle of a tattoo artist trying to reconstruct the commentary. All this to say: it is a book about meta-commentary, which makes describing its themes difficult.

In House of Leaves, the professor has tried to remove all references to the Minotaur by burning the pages of his notes about him. The tattoo artist writes down everything that failed to burn, and indicates that it was burned using red, struck through text. The Minotaur is a character which does not exist, but he haunts the book.

On the top level, he represents the constant editing, rewriting, and destruction of the book itself. Down a level, he is a monster who is stalking the characters in their minds. A claw mark is found next to the professors dead body. Down a level, he's the guilt and shame growing within each author which they project into the house. The labyrinth in the house is a black hole, it signifies nothing, but the human mind impresses its own ideas and image into it.

I'm now realizing that I've written three paragraphs without mentioning Amy once. Shit. Ok. The good stuff.

On the level closest to the text, Amy the character is the malformed, rejected child. When her malformation makes itself known, she is permanently rejected and confined in an inescapable prison. Like the Minotaur in House of Leaves, her ghost haunts the people who fear her and obsess over her. They can't stop thinking about her (Victoria) despite how that obsession only hurts them. When Amy's status as monster can be instrumentalized, it is, like how the Minotaur of myth was used as a method of execution for the youth of Athens. She's set free and used once again.

On another level, Amy Dallon haunts Worm. Her arc is fully fleshed out, and it is tragedy. Like the Minotaur, on one level she must been seen as symbolic. She represents the self-destruction of the nuclear family. In one version of the myth, the Minotaur is the bastard son of Minos. The king did not sacrifice a bull sent to him by Poseidon, and so the queen was cursed to fall in love with the bull. Here, the Minotaur represents the ultimate perversion of the natural order. The king did not honor the god, and so the wife did not honor her husband, and so the child did not honor his mother. Amy represent the same overturning of the natural order. Carol hated the daughter, and so the daughter destroyed her sister. These stories suggest that the so-called natural order actually has something deeply wrong with it!

On the top level, Amy is a scapegoat for the audience. Like the Minotaur in House of Leaves, the reader projects their own hatred on her; they treat her with the same lesbophobia as the text does, if you read her a layer below the symbolic critique of the family, if you read her as a character. People consistently write about her as having an incest kink, or other deviant, highly stigmatized fetish. People post about her being dirty, or ill-intentioned. This reading accepts her as ontologically evil, rather than a product of an oppressive structure. The exact form of the Minotaur (deviant, dirty, ill-intentioned) varies from person to person. He acts as a Rorschach, illuminating what the observer finds offensive.

Like the Minotaur in House of Leaves, Amy must be read on multiple levels. She is a character, she is a metaphor, she is a mirror. Isolate any of these levels from the other, and they fail to make sense. Separating the symbolic from the personal is often what leads people to falling into the trap of projecting lesbophobic narratives onto her!

The Minotaur is out to get you, and Amy is too.

[tf2-oneshots]

Dad spy trying to explain to scout that he is in fact his dad and not tom jones. Tomfoolery ensues. This is up to interpretation make of this ask what you will. Thank you, xoxo.

Using this as my first angst prompt sorry in advance!

Warnings: angst, abandonment, past bullying

Rating: Teen and up

Two dainty knocks land on Scout’s door. Must be Spy. When you work with the same eight guys for six years, you memorize how each one of them knocks on your door. Scout sets his comic book aside and sits upright on his bed. So much for a lazy Sunday.

“Come in.” He calls out. Spy opens the door, taking only a couple steps into the room. He peers around as if to ensure that no one else was present. She really wishes someone was here to avoid this.

“Scout, I would like to talk to you about something.” The door shuts behind Spy, but he doesn’t move. Like he’s frozen where he stands. God, how did her plan go? He thought of the millions of ways this could end, and only one was a good ending.

“Uh, okay? What is it?” Scout raises a brow. Usually, people only talk to him when he has a contract or did something wrong. On the rare occasion, its to move his motorcycle to another parking spot. Why does she look so emotionless?

Spy takes a seat on the edge of Scout’s bed. The man pulls his legs against his chest, giving her a bit of room. Everything feels so surreal. Maybe this is just a dream, and Spy will gasp awake in his bed when Scout throttles him. She really hopes it’s all just a dream.

“Tom Jones died in his 20s, Scout. You are aware of this, yes?” Off to a weird start. Scout prides himself in being the president of the Tom Jones fan club. He knows every single fact about the man down to the exact instruments he uses in every song. To not know how old his idol was when Merasmus broke his neck, according to the newspapers at least, would be unheard of.

“Uh, yeah. Too young to go if, uh, you ask me.” Spy nods. They can agree on that. Dying before 30 is tragically young for anyone, famous or not. She looks over to the younger man whose gaze is focused on a Tom Jones poster.

“Much too young. Too young to be your father as well.” He braces for a slap, but nothing happens. Scout stays silent. Maybe he didn’t hear her. Maybe he doesn’t want to hear. Spy takes a slow breath, back to staring at the wall.

“Scout, I…” It’s right there. Right fucking there on her tongue. He can taste the words begging to slip from his lips. Spy hates what a coward he is. She spent 24 years on the run, but the past caught up to bite her in the ass. Damn, does he wish he had a cigarette.

“I…met a woman in my youth. She had seven children, and I adored them. So much so that…we made an eighth. His name was Jeremy.” Damnit, damnit, damnit all! She always dances around with hidden meanings and half assed phrases. It seems that Spy’s own heart wears a mask.

“You…were that boy. Scout, I—“ As he turns to Scout, she sees the disgust on his face. His button nose scrunched tightly with eyes narrowed. Scout gets off of his bed, staring down at Spy.

“Don’t fucking joke about that.” His legs are shaking. Scout tries to breathe, but it’s short and trembling. How could Spy be so cruel to say that? Scout remembers how miserable being fatherless was as a child. He watched so many dads carry their sons into ice cream shops. He saw them in the stands wearing messy ties made in Home EC during sewing lessons.

It wasn’t just jealousy he suffered from. When word got out about Scout not having a dad, he was tormented relentlessly. He spent one Father’s Day getting shoved in a locker. That’s when he dislocated his shoulder and had to fend off an eighth grader with one hand. He really wishes his last oldest brother didn’t move on to high school that year.

“Scout, I have nothing to gain from a joke. You’re my son, and I’m so sorry for leaving.” Spy sighs, fighting the lump in her throat. She remembers the swarm of little boys around his legs, eager to meet their new baby brother. He still recalls sitting on the floor, chuckling as they surrounded him, leaning in to finally meet Jeremy.

“My dad’s dead.” That’s what Ma told him on his seventh birthday. Scout had grown curious as to why all of his friends had dads but not him. Not any of his brothers actually unless the handful of birthday cards in the mail counts. A couple with money and others empty without even a drop of ink written on them.

“I didn’t want to hurt you, so I told your mother to say that.” It was heartbreaking how unfazed Caroline was when Spy told her. She had endured it seven times before, so how painful could an eighth be? The only part that stung, she admitted, was that Spy bothered to stay. Even if only long enough to witness Scout’s first steps, he gave Caroline hope. Hope that maybe, just maybe, someone else could commit to the parent role.

Scout turns away, fists clenched before he grips his hair. Ma would never lie to him. She’s a good mother, and she loves Scout more than anything. She’d be honest if his dad was a deadbeat who was in over his head. All of his older brothers know what happened to their dads. Dead, arrested, second family, ran off, and so forth.

“Scout, please, I—“ Spy stands, placing a hand on his shoulder only for it to be shrugged off. Scout keeps his head down to stare at his feet. He gulps, eyes shut to fight back tears.

“My dad is dead.” That’s the truth. That’s the only truth. Scout won’t listen to anything else. His dad died when he was a baby. There’s a headstone somewhere in America with his name etched onto it. Scout will never meet him no matter what.

“…Okay.” Spy purses her lips. He nods, trying to understand how Scout feels. Maybe one day he’ll come around. Maybe he’ll stab her in her sleep. He wipes away tears and takes a breath before leaving the younger’s room. Some things are better left the way they are.

Poor Spy can we get an F in the chat -H

[lowcountry-gothic]

This has been on my mind for a while, so I’m going to get deep into it.

People often talk about Howard Shore’s musical scores for The Lord of the Rings as being among the most underrated scores out there, and for good reason. But the scores I personally think are the most underrated are Michael Giacchino’s for Lost. I could go on and on about how great they are just as beautiful music to listen to, how much raw emotion is packed into it, how interesting the individual character themes are, and how innovative the instrumentation is and how much it fits the Island as a setting and a character in and of itself not to mention how active a role the music plays in the storytelling.

The way Giacchino often chose to use found or deconstructed objects as musical instruments—such as the guts of a piano, or pieces of the actual Boeing 777 that was used for the crash site scenes—especially in season 1, to mirror how the characters had to use the wreckage of the plane and the resources they found in the jungle in order to survive. And the way he used unusual instruments like the flapamba or a metallic angklung for music associated with the Others to make them feel so strange and bizarre in seasons 1-2, before we quite get to know them as actual people.

Or the sheer understatedness of the show’s main theme, and how beautifully it expresses both the trauma of surviving a plane crash and the hope of being rescued.

And how “Hollywood & Vines” is one of the most exciting and heroic pieces of music since the Fellowship theme in the Lord of the Rings films.

Then there’s “Life and Death,” some of the most iconic and memorable of Lost’s score music—again, its sheer simplicity, and yet its utility in both sad scenes that are full of loss and grief, like the death of Boone, as well as hopeful ones, like the birth of Aaron, and how this suggests that life and death are not polar, binary opposites, but rather two sides of the same coin, part of a mystical cycle.

Then there are the actual character themes, the most beautiful of which in my opinion is John Locke’s theme. He actually has a couple of themes, the first of which, “Crocodile Locke,” serves to build him up as such a mysterious figure, and in some ways serves as a stand-in theme for the Island itself, as it hints both for it and for Locke that things are not exactly what, or more than, they seem to be. And then there’s the beautiful and heartbreaking “Locke’d Out Again,” and the way Giacchino uses the exact same music for some of the lowest, saddest, and most hopeless and disappointing moments of a man’s life, when everything he had hoped for is being denied him and his value and worth are being rejected—as well as for what is arguably the most joyful and transcendent moment in his life, when his worth and value are, beyond all expectation, miraculously upheld and transformed in a way no one saw coming. And how the sadness of this musical theme doesn’t undermine that ecstasy but actually buoys it up even further.

The way Kate’s theme is so wandering and elusive, suggesting her inability to remain in one place for very long and her status as a fugitive, and yet its repeating structure suggests that these evasions have become part of a habitual, unavoidable cycle for her, a lifestyle of avoiding any lasting connection—until the Island.

Then there’s the fact that Jack, the show’s main male protagonist, doesn’t even get a theme of his own until season 3 when his character arc really starts to bend toward its final resolution (before this point, his major scenes are usually scored with the show’s main theme), and how this new theme speaks of his regret and his growing realization that so many things are beyond his compulsive need to fix everything.

And then the dark simplicity of Sawyer’s theme, the way its mere four notes are first played on the low ends of the harp, conveying so much emptiness, the very emptiness of hatred and revenge that has consumed his life until coming to the Island. And the way the theme begins to soften as Sawyer himself begins to grow as a character, finally melting into a more complex and more fully human version as it merges into a new theme, “La Fleur,” in season 5 when Sawyer most fully comes into his own, reflecting his new relaxedness, a measure of healing, and even relationality.

And don’t get me started on Ben’s theme, how it begins as a generic theme for the Others, stark and menacing and a bit surreal, then becomes more sympathetic as we learn more about Ben and his past, culminating in his heroic moment of sacrifice as he turns the frozen wheel in season 4. 

Or how Jacob’s theme, “The Tangled Web,” basically tells us everything we need to know about him before we even realize that it’s actually Jacob himself that we’re seeing onscreen: its feeling of ancientness, the air of destiny and chosenness, of getting caught up in something like fate or the rules of an old game that began long before our main characters arrived on the Island. How although Jacob represents light and goodness in the story, there is still a sinister note in this music, something indicating he is not completely good, that there is some shadow in his past. A dark spot amidst the white, like in the yin-yang symbol. And how this speaks to the show’s theme of light and dark, how there is always some dark in the light, always some light in the midst of the dark.

I could go on and on with the character themes...and I already have, so I’ll just close by touching on the show’s final musical moments, the track “Moving On” on the season 6 soundtrack. It’s such a quietly beautiful track, blending several of the themes I’ve mentioned here as well as others, including the departure theme and the home theme, both of which are standout pieces featured most prominently in other season finales.

And Giacchino wrote all of it. All the music for 121 straight episodes. He didn’t farm it out to other composers, he didn’t take a break every few episodes. He wrote every character theme, motif, and trombone fall-off.

The man deserves a fucking award, just for his work on Lost alone.

[weekly-fandom-rambles]

𝒲𝒽𝑒𝓃 𝓉𝒽𝑒 ℳ𝒾𝓇𝓇𝑜𝓇 𝒮𝒽𝒶𝓉𝓉𝑒𝓇𝑒𝒹

All that was left was him.

CW: Near-death, Overworking Oneself, Self-destructive Thoughts, Self-Deprecating, Suicidal Thoughts/Ideation, Angst/Future Comfort

Word Count: 2.4k

Trey should have realized. He should have realized that his friend’s red hair was a little too dull; that his eyes weren’t the same shade of green they normally were- they didn’t sparkle the same way; that he was just an inch shorter than last time; that the uniform was worn just a bit tighter; that his tie was tied a little too perfect; that the red diamond laying on the right side of his face was a little too bright for his normal style; that the man beside him was a near-perfect, but never identical, copy of the man he thought he was.

He should have realized the man beside him was not Cater Diamond. 

It was a Saturday, so the two were just walking and talking about anything and everything. They talked about Trey’s Vice Housewarden duties, the Freshman and how they were adjusting, their upcoming fourth years, new recipes Trey was wanting to try out, how the science club was doing, and the conversation the green-haired man had had with his family the previous night. 

But they weren’t talking about anything related to Cater. Everything was veered towards Trey’s wants and interests. Normally, this wouldn’t raise too many flags, but Trey knew that Cater had been feeling down for the past week. Trey knew the red-head was trying ways to make himself happier. And based on how “Cater” kept dodging all of his questions, Trey also knew it wasn’t working. 

But what put an awful feeling into Trey’s gut wasn’t the fact that he hadn’t noticed immediately. Cater had been training hard and had gotten amazing at creating his copies. So really, it wasn’t a surprise that the green-haired man didn’t guess immediately. But to not somehow realize that so many Cater mannerisms weren’t showing up at all throughout the entire day? That is what made the Club Soldier feel terrible.

And he wouldn’t have even realized it without the help of Magicam (which Trey realized he hadn’t seen this Cater look at all day).

Trey didn’t use his account much, nor did he follow many people. So when the first friend he had made at NRC asked him to follow him, he did and turned on the account’s notifications. Sure he could’ve turned them off, but seeing Cater’s smile reflected from his screen always made a strange sense of joy flutter its way into his stomach. So Trey was used to having his phone almost constantly buzzing within his pocket. With the flood of notifications from not only the app, but Riddle and his family as well, Trey learned to ignore his near constant buzzing phone.

Sometimes, he wished he hadn’t picked up that habit. And the current situation was one of those times.

Casually reaching into his pocket and opening Magicam, Trey looked at Cater’s profile. Staring back at him was over a dozen new posts within the span of a couple hours.

There was a photo of Cater with Azul and Idia playing some board game. There was a photo of Cater with Ace playing with the Hedgehogs, and a photo with the exact same time-stamp of Cater and Deuce with the flamingos. There was a photo of Cater with Riddle holding a strawberry tart (and with the knowledge that Cater hated sweets, this only set off more warning bells). Lilia and Kalim were in another picture with instruments in hand. Cater was in the Cafeteria with Yuu. He was teaching Malleus to use Magicam with Sebek yelling his praise. He was in the botanical garden pulling a prank on Leona with Ruggie. He was with Rook having tea.

He was everywhere. And yet, there were slight details about all of them that showed it wasn’t the real Cater: his hair style, his diamond, his outfit, his smile. Everything. So he stopped and put a hand on the, what he assumed, clone’s shoulder.

“Where’s the real Cater?”

“What are you talking about? I am the real me.” He almost would’ve believed him if he didn’t have photographic proof. He moved his phone to the man’s eyes and scrolled as he talked.

“So are these all fake? Are there really ten Cater clones running around campus right now?” He lowered his phone. “Or do you really make eleven?” The fact that the clone couldn’t maintain eye contact revealed the truth. Trey moved his other hand to rest on “Cater”’s other shoulder. “Where are you? The real you?”

A quiet, “Rose garden” was whispered, still without moving his eyes from the concrete.

“You know this is dangerous. Even with enhancing your magic, having four clones out still drains you within a couple hours. How are you not using way too much magic?”

Finally the clone looked into his eyes. His own were shining with tears.

“We are.”

Two words. Two words was all it took for the cold hands of fear and dread to grab ahold of Trey’s spine. Quickly letting go of the clone’s shoulders, Trey darted for the Heartslabyul Rose Garden. And as his back turned- his presence being the only thing keeping the clone standing- he missed Cater collapsing to the ground.

Trey’s feet pounded on the cobbled hallways as he raced for the chamber of mirrors. On his way, he passed several more Cater clones, though as he continued on, he noticed they were all progressively getting paler. Running out of color. Running low on magic.

Running low on life.

He passed their dorm mirror’s frame and ran to the hedges of the maze, a gray cloud seeming to hang over the pathways. The closer to the center he ran, the more copies he saw. He stopped counting once he reached a dozen. All were gray and adorned in suits of the Queen’s card soldiers.

Trey pushed on. His lungs were screaming, and his legs were burning, but he was spurred on by the idea that Cater was in pain. Or worse.

He stopped abruptly when he reached the center, however.

In the middle of the clearing, there stood a mirror. With a height of nearly ten feet, the onyx and gold framed mirror was an imposing sight. Cracked rose and diamond embellishments, lightly painted over in red, highlighted the outer-edge of its towering frame. Its face was shrouded in clouds and faint images of someone popping in and out of focus- almost as though the images were being sucked back into its depth. Two obsidian chains protruded from its sides, attaching themselves to the kneeling figure in front of him. 

A silver replica of the Queen of Hearts crown sat cracked and tarnished upon the orange locks of the figure. A black cape rested over one shoulder, its edges ripped and frayed. The man wore a black and gold vest, nearly covered by the black and white waistcoat he wore over top of it. The Heartslabyul sash fluttered gently across his chest, burned and ripped. Simple black dress pants were also nearly covered by his thigh-high boots- black leather accented by the blood red diamonds at their tops. As the boy looked up, a half mask of royalty diamond playing cards sat over the left side of his face. Trey could practically feel the pain and anger radiating from his jade eyes.

Trey had always found Cater to be beautiful, and he still believed it, even with his Overblotted friend staring right back at him.

It took a second for Cater to realize who had entered his area of the garden, but when he did, dozens of emotions flew across his features. And a handful of images flashed across the mirror’s surface.

First: Cater stood in his dorm uniform until he slowly distorted into Riddle. Riddle soon morphed into a card soldier, its diamond pattern slowly bleeding away from its face. Finally, a first year Cater, scared and crying, reached for Trey from within the glass, only to be pulled back by large white gloves.

Trey watched in horror as Cater thrashed around, trying to get out of his fellow third-year's sight, only to cry out as he realized the unbreakable chains held him in place. He slowly made his way to kneel in front of the broken boy.

“Cater, listen to me. You can break away from this. I know you can. You just gotta come back to me.”

Black tears slowly started sliding out from under his mask.

“But as who?”

“What do you mean as who? You. I want you to come back as you.”

“Nobody wants the real me. So tell me Trey,” the tears stopped as Cater’s voice hardened. “Who does everyone want?  Perhaps they want a new Queen. A Queen whose people deemed unworthy and threw aside in a matter of days.” Trey closed his eyes as his heart clenched at the memories of Cater trying so hard to prove himself for the entirety of their first year. There were so many sleepless nights reviewing rules and helping wherever he could. He was crowned the first day of their second year, but was overthrown as soon as Riddle had been given a chance. “A soldier, who does little to help his Queen. A soldier who is afraid; who’s a coward. Or perhaps they want a commoner. Someone who doesn’t make a splash. Someone who is easily forgotten. Someone who knows when to play a part and when to shut up. A nobody who knows how to be somebody.”

“I want the real you! The one everyone knows and loves-”

“Nobody knows the real me. Not even you.” A flood of Caters flashed across the screen, all characters he had played to please others, until once again, the first-year Cater was pulled back.

Trey didn’t want to admit how much that single comment hurt, but he had to push on. 

“Then let me find the real you. The Cater who loves to play any instrument he can get a hand on. The Cater who loves to hang out with first-years. The Cater who the world hasn’t seen in full.” Cater frantically pushed himself to stand. Trey quickly followed.

“The world can’t see the real me, Trey! No one will like it! They’ll hate it! They’ll hate me! Everyone will leave-”

“Do you really think any of your friends want you to be like this?” Using his unique magic, Trey turned a fallen rose into a hand-held mirror. Cater took the mirror and scowled at his reflection. “Do you think they don’t care? That they want to see you hurt and trapped in an image that isn’t you? You’re killing yourself right now, Cater. If you keep all of this up, you won’t be able to stop the Blot.”

Cater replied so quietly, Trey almost couldn’t hear him.

“Would that be so bad?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Would that be so bad? To let the Blot win. To let it take over and destroy this image of ‘Cater Diamond’ that no one would miss?”

“Please tell me you’re joking. There would be so many people that missed you-”

“No there wouldn’t be!” Cater threw the mirror to the ground and glass crunched under his boots as he moved a step closer to Trey. “No one would miss me.”

“Your family-”

“Hasn’t cared about me for years.”

“The first years-”

“Have each other.”

“Kalim and Lilia-”

“Have a million other things to care about.”

“Vil-” Cater laughed out loud at this.

“Please. Vil has been trying to find a way to get me off his back for the three years we’ve been here. He would be glad if I was dead.”

Trey looked away. Did Cater really think so little of himself?

“And what about me? Do you think that I wouldn’t miss you?”

Cater sounded close to tears as he answered with a simple, “You have Riddle.” Trey looked up. 

“But Riddle isn’t you. He’s not the boy who taught a hopeless me to draw my clover. He’s not who I made friends with for the first time completely by myself. He’s not the one who has seen me bawl over a failed assignment from Crewel. He’s not the one I’ve spent entire nights watching movies with and talking to about the randomest of things. He’s not the one I feel like I can tell anything to.” Trey put a hand on his friend’s shoulder. “He’s not you, Cater. There’s only one person who can fill that role, and if you’d let me, I would love to get to know the real you.”

“No one’s ever wanted to know the real me.” The black tears were once again making their ways down Cater’s face, and Trey wiped them away.

“I do. I want to know the Cater who laughs at inappropriate times. I want to know the Cater that is amazing with the first years, because he is. I want to know the you that despises sweets. I want to know the you that has freckles. I want to know the you that no one else knows.”

“I’m afraid to let that happen, Trey-kun. What if you don’t like the real me?”

“Nothing in this world would make me not like you Cater.”

Cater’s tears started to flow more rapidly. In the mirror’s reflection, a young Cater held his hand to the glass making direct eye contact with Trey. The image looked at Cater, and mouthed one word:

‘Please.’

“Whenever you’re ready, and only then, show me your true self. If that never happens, then I will still be by your side. I won’t let you fall again.”

At this, Cater threw himself into Trey’s arms. The mirror shattered, and the chains on his wrists slowly melted away in blobs of ink. Trey lowered the two to the ground and tried to quiet the man’s sobs. As he realized the red-head’s outfit was going back to normal, he felt his breathing slow down. Cater had fallen unconscious. Trey picked up the boy into his arms, but before standing completely, a piece of glass caught his attention.

Looking up at him was an eighteen-year-old Cater. His diamond wasn’t painted on his face, and his hair wasn’t in his normal style. But he was smiling. It may have been small, but it was still a smile as he looked at his unconscious self. After a second, the reflection looked at Trey.

‘Thank you.’

And he walked into the mist of the mirror.

Twisted Wonderland Masterlist

[ohnominamino]

An Essay on Love in Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time

Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time is a movie about love in all its forms. From the love of family, friends, and neighbors, to the compassion we feel for people we have never met. The movie reminds us that love is something we continuously gain, lose, and choose, again and again. Which love is greatest? In my opinion, the answer to that question is left up to interpretation. In this essay, I will give my own personal interpretation on certain character interactions and what I believe we are meant to take away from their Rebuild portrayals. 

The character I will start with is one I’ve noticed the most outrage over from people who haven’t seen the movie and read out-of-context spoilers: Kaworu Nagisa. 

Kaworu is a beloved character among many Evangelion fans, especially those who are members of the LGBT+ community. He is a canonical love interest of Shinji Ikari and I want to reassure people that this final movie does not change that fact. However, it does not make the couple blatantly endgame either. This skirting around the couple might make some fans upset, and while their feelings are completely valid, I do not think they fully understand the difficulties faced by LGBT+ people in Japan, nor do they understand the way that romance is typically conveyed in Japanese storytelling. (I recommend watching “Is ‘Yuri On Ice’ Good Gay Representation?” by James Somerton for more about storytelling nuances.) 

What have we been shown about Shinji and Kaworu’s love? The good news is, anything you read into the original TV series and End of Evangelion is completely true for the Rebuilds— because Kaworu is the same Kaworu. This movie proves Evangelion is a single universe set on repeat, and that Kaworu and Shinji meet each other every loop, and in each, Kaworu is trying to make Shinji happy. Within the final movie, Shinji becomes aware of the loops and chooses to break the cycle and free Kaworu from his pain. 

What does the relationship between Shinji and Kaworu teach us? I believe the purpose of their love is to show the audience that first, in the words of Kaji, “love has no gender.” Second, I believe Kaworu’s love in particular is a warning about basing your own happiness solely upon another person. There are parallels drawn between Gendo/Yui and Kaworu/Shinji. Gendo could not exist without Yui, and so he was willing to destroy the world to be reunited with her. For Kaworu, it was not the destruction of humanity, but the destruction of himself that defined his tragedy. What’s important within the final movie, in my opinion, is that Shinji does not reject Kaworu’s love. With the insight he’s gained from remembering past loops, he sees Kaworu’s love and appreciates him, but he also sees his suffering and wants to ease it. He helps Kaworu into a new world where he can seek his own happiness and find balance in his life (something his father did not have). 

While Kaworu and Shinji are not seen as an explicit couple at the end of the movie, it’s significant to note that, when he sets Kaworu free, Shinji holds out his hand to Kaworu as a promise to stay together. Over the course of the movie, Shinji comes to accept his connection to others through accepting touch (in the form of hand holding and hugs from Rei, Misato, and Gendo); however, Kaworu is the only character in the movie who Shinji initiates physical contact with and that speaks to how much Kaworu means to him. This simple gesture, in my opinion, keeps the door open for Kaworu and Shinji to be a couple one day, after Kaworu has found more balance in his life. 

If I were to write an entire essay about Kaworu, it would be titled, “Out of the Coffin: How the Resurrection of Kaworu Nagisa Buries the Tragic Lovers Trope” because this movie truly does just that. 

Another potential love interest for Shinji for many years was Asuka; however, unlike with Kaworu, the nature of this relationship is not left up to interpretation by the end of the movie. Before her big final battle, Asuka tells Shinji, “I think I loved you back then” (regarding their time in middle school) and Shinji, during Instrumentality, tells Asuka, “Thank you for saying you loved me. I loved you too.” It is past tense. 

What does this relationship teach us? It’s a beautiful way of showing that we can love people, and grow and learn, and let go when we no longer fit each other. Letting go is an integral part of life. Whereas other Instrumentality scenes involve touch, Asuka’s, mirroring the ending of End of Evangelion, has a distinct lack of touch. Shinji sits with his arms around his knees and Asuka turns her body away from him. He gives her his thanks and he sends her off to find her peace. Asuka and Shinji teach us that it’s okay to grow out of relationships. You can appreciate what they were to you at the time they happened and move on. 

What about Rei? To be honest with you, this movie is less about Rei’s relationship with Shinji, and more about her relationship with the world. Rei teaches movie viewers about the simple pleasures of living. While Shinji is in mourning for the first quarter of the movie, Rei (as “Sokkuri”) is learning about crop growing and community, the wonder of babies and kittens, the joy of the bath after a long day of fruitful work, and the power of words and picture books. At the end of her life, she only regrets not having more time to spend with the people she loves. In Instrumentality, Shinji accepts her hand when it is offered to him, which I hope signifies he is ready to see life as she had come to during the final movie. 

Rei teaches us that we can love living and to not take our limited time for granted. 

Next, we move on to parent figures: Gendo and Misato. I think they both represent people ill suited to the role, who do the best they can despite it. Gendo, as mentioned for Kaworu above, is a warning about defining yourself by your relationship to another person (Ikari, afterall, is Yui’s name). He is also a lesson in how people mourn and how they can lash out. Misato, like Gendo, felt herself a poor parent, and while mourning the loss of Kaji, she gave up her child to be raised by other people, but, unlike Gendo, went forward to put all her energy into protecting humanity. Both of them reach out to hug Shinji within the movie and he accepts them where they are. 

While I wouldn’t say the movie shows that Shinji forgives Gendo, it does show his making an effort to understand and make peace with what others have done. For Misato, it is fair to say we can still hope for a better future, even when it feels like everything is crumbling around us. Her self-sacrificing love for her son and the whole of humanity is what enables Shinji to then save the people he loves (via the spear of Gaius). 

In the movie, we are also shown friendship. Touji, Hikari, and Kensuke are important members of their community who maintain open communication with those around them and respect others’ boundaries. They are patient and kind and represent the importance of being present. They teach us to meet people where they are and support them how we can, whether it’s giving them a warm meal or giving them space when they need it. 

There are many more characters that could be talked about, but today I am going to end on Mari. Mari’s love is physical. She enjoys being in people’s personal bubbles. She cuddles Asuka and helps trim her hair, she gets into Gendo’s space at college, and at the end of the movie, she reaches out her hand to Shinji to help him stand up from his seat. Upon first glance, some viewers might take Mari and Shinji’s final scene to be romantic, but the reality of it is this: We do not, and cannot, know what kind of love she is meant to represent in his life.

We do not know Mari’s relationship with Shinji because they hardly interact in the movie. She clearly cares about him, but in my opinion, it comes from a place of duty and compassion— Mari was friends with Gendo and Yui. She has been there since he was born. (If we take the manga to be canon, then Mari even had romantic feelings towards his mother. Her hairstyle and glasses are from Yui. At the end of the movie, Mari has changed her hairstyle, which to me implies she has moved on, and “getting” with Shinji would be a thematic break.)

Additionally, their conversation, while flirty, is very much one that implies they haven’t seen each other for a while. Mari is someone who is very physically affectionate. With everyone. If someone ignores that and focuses on the fact she gets into Shinji’s space and claims that’s romantic, they better acknowledge it’s possibly romantic with Asuka, who we see far more intimacy with. When Mari flirts, Shinji flirts back and her initial reaction is surprise, “Wow, you’ve learned to talk back!” Her purpose is clear. She is there to remove the DSS choker from his neck. 

Personally, I love that Mari is the one to close the movie, for the exact reason that we do not know her relationship with Shinji. For Mari to have an assigned role would be to say, “This kind of love is most important,” when the entire movie was spent showing us each love is of equal importance in the balance and building of our lives. (It’s wonderful to see those types of love embodied across the platform from Shinji at the end of the movie: Rei and Kaworu, who, just like in End of Evangelion, could signify the ability to connect with others and be loved.)

If you view Mari as a romantic love interest, then I think it speaks to the value that you as an individual give to romance rather than what the characters themselves are feeling. To me, Mari, the character who was created to “destroy Eva,” is a symbol of all love. When Shinji takes her offered hand and then pulls her to run into the new world, it’s a symbol of balance. The give and take of any kind of relationship. 

We are the product of every relationship we have ever had, from our parents to the people we once loved, from our friendships to any other person we want to stay connected to. Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time is a story about these relationships. It is a story about love. 

[mochegato]

The Road to Asphodel is Paved in Pink

Meet Cute Monday for @boldlyanxious  Hope this makes you smile!

Pink boxes, pink bags, pink dolls, pink instruments, pink goo, pink Legos, pink cars, pink, pink, pink. Everything in the aisle was pink. A hundred different shades of it filled the shelves of the aisle.  Everywhere he looked was pink.  They even put down a pink covering on the floor just to complete the look.  Honestly, it was starting to hurt his eyes.  “Who knew there were so many shades of pink,” Jason grumbled rubbing his eyes.  

He heard a chuckle from down the aisle.  “Trust me it’s worse when it’s an aisle of the same shade of pink.  Like some kind of never-ending fuchsia tunnel to Asphodel.” She shuddered slightly.  “And I like pink.”

“I take it you have experience with this?”  He vaguely motioned around the aisle.

She bobbed her head to the side and hummed noncommittally.  “My friend’s twins will be six this year.  I get them things from time to time just because, so I end up here sometimes.  I’m looking for their birthday this time.  I was thinking of instruments they could play with their moms or their grandpa, but just realized they probably have so many instruments already, so now I’m looking for inspiration.  But the only inspiration I’m getting is pink. Annoying really.  Because apparently that’s the only color girls respond to.”

“I think it’s damaging my retinas,” he chuckled looking back at the shelves of pink.

She chuckled and nodded in agreement before returning her attention to the shelves around her. Jason looked back over at her as she searched the shelves.  He really should be focusing on Lian’s gift.  Her party started soon so he didn’t have time to waste flirting with random women in the toy aisle, but his eyes kept wandering back to her.  It could be because they wanted a break from the sea of pink attempting to sear his eyes, but more likely it was because she was stunning and looking at her made him feel lighter.  

After a few minutes she quirked her head to the side and grabbed a box.  She puckered her lips as she looked toward it, her eyes unfocused and her brow furrowed as though planning.  Jason watched her face run through a few expressions as she thought through whatever she was planning, each expression cuter than the last one. Finally she gave a quick nod and dropped the box into her shopping basket.

“Finally figured it out huh?” he smiled at her.

“Yeah.  They like playing with hair so I’m going to get this hair glitter and chalk set and some of the Hello Kitty brushes I saw by the entrance and make a bunch of barrettes and headbands.”  She grinned proudly at him.  “And not one of the damn things will be pink in retaliation against all of this.”  She motioned around them.

He barked out a laugh and nodded appreciatively.  “Damn. That’s a really good idea.  But Lian isn’t quite there yet.”

She smiled and moved so she was standing closer to him, close enough now that he could run his fingers along her jaw if he wanted.  Well, not if he wanted because he did want, rather if he thought it would be received well.  His fingers twitched to try until he finally had to clench them into fists to stop them.  “Okay, well… what does she like?  I mean, if you want some help.  I know you didn’t ask…”

“No!  No, please.  Please help me.”  He gave her a charming smile before reminding himself what her question was.  He sighed and pulled out his phone to check his texts. “I don’t know…  He said she likes ‘girl things’.”

“Girl things…” she repeated slowly with an unamused raised eyebrow.  “Like saws and computer programs and syringes?  Or things girls didn’t invent just enjoy?”

Jason stared at her for a few seconds before chuckling and looking back at the toys with a sheepish smile. “I don’t think that’s what the idiot meant.”

“So I take it this isn’t your daughter?”

“No.  My best friend’s daughter.”

“Okay, well, your best friend is no help at all.  No offense.” She gave him a smirk that suggested she didn’t really care if she did offend. He smiled back at her and nodded in agreement with her assessment.  “What do you know about her?” she continued.  “How old will she be?”

“She’s turning four,” he started slowly, trying to order all his memories into a useful resource.  “She’s smart.  She likes engines and coloring and painting.  She LOVES cats.  Her favorite color is red.”

Marinette nodded.  “She sounds very smart and artistic.”

“Yeah.  She is constantly painting pictures for me.  My first thought was a book, a children’s classic she could keep for a while, but she recognizes letters but can’t read yet. So that’s out,” he grumbled.

“I don’t know, it sounds like you have two perfect gifts there.” He looked at her questioningly.  “More paint so she can paint more pictures for you,” her voice became increasingly excited as she thought through the gift. “There are art kits a few aisles over or there’s an art store a few doors down.  Or a book, just because she can’t read it doesn’t mean you can’t read it to her, and I bet she’ll think that’s even better.  Or you could do both.  I’m sure there are tons of kids’ books about painting or colors that you could get along with some paint.”

He nodded as he thought about what book to get her and what art supplies.  “That’s…” his words trailed off as he looked back up at her. Her eyes were sparkling with excitement and the only thing he could think was “…perfect.”

She cocked her head to the side and watched him curiously.  “Hmm?”

He shook his head quickly. “Your idea, it’s perfect.  Thank you for helping me.  I’m Jason by the way.”  He held his hand out to shake hers.

She shook his hand with a brilliant smile.  “Hi Jason. It’s nice to meet you.  I’m Marinette.”

“Which would you recommend for the art supplies?” He asked, hoping to draw out the conversation.

She puckered her lips as she thought about it.  “Depends on what she has already and how seriously she takes her art.  There’s plenty here for a four year old.  But, if she knows the difference between shades and gets upset she can’t get the exact color she wants, like I did at that age, you might want a more complete set than is available here.  Or if the brushes aren’t doing what she wants, there will be more options at the art store.”

He grinned at the thought of a four year old version of Marinette stomping her feet in frustration because she couldn’t get the right shade of pink on her painting.  “Sounds like you were really into art.”

Marinette laughed awkwardly. “Yeah, I was very… particular.” She shrugged and brushed her bangs behind her ear.  “Still am.”

“So you’re an artist,” he prompted her.

She gave him a relieved smile, grateful for a change in topic.  “A designer, yeah.  You?”

“A… uh… bodyguard.  So you know, if your body needs guarding, let me know.”  He waggled his eyebrows at her.

Marinette laughed and shook her head as she looked down.  “I’ve got it covered but thanks for the offer.”

He pouted slightly. That was one of his better lines.  Clearly a different approach would be necessary, one less superficial and more honest, one more conducive to starting an actual relationship, which he didn’t mind in the least.  “What do you design?”

“Clothing.”  She smiled brightly up at him.

He shot her a crooked smile and leaned closer to her.  “Ah… so you’ve been silently judging my outfit for the last five minutes or so.”

“Longer than that,” she smirked at him.

He perked up and shot a smug smile at her.  “Sounds like you haven’t been able to take your eyes off of me.”

“Oh, don’t be so hard on yourself,” she consoled him wryly.  “Your outfit isn’t that bad.”

He pursed his lips for a moment before bursting out into laughter.  “Can I talk you into helping me pick out some paint supplies and a book? Maybe I can repay you somehow?”

“Yeah, I can do that. No repayment necessary.  I want to make sure Lian, was it?” She looked to him uncertainly.  He nodded at her.  She nodded with a smile.  “I wouldn’t want Lian to end up with something in terrible taste.”

“Hey!  I have great taste.”  He objected with a mock offended scoff.

She looked him up and down playfully.  “Yeah, sure you do.”

He laughed again, his laughter echoing off the pink around them.  He took a step closer to her.  “Did you want to come with me to the party, too?  You’re helping pick out the gift after all.  It’s only fair you get to join in the spoils.”

She smiled shyly, but didn’t back away.  “No thank you.  It sounds like a really special event for your friend.  I don’t want to intrude on that.”

“You wouldn’t be intruding. I’m sure my friend would welcome another adult there to help corral the chaos, but I understand not wanting to go.”  He moved a step closer again, his eyes becoming softer.  “But, since you’re going to miss out on the cake and food, how about I take you out to dinner instead to thank you for your help?  I really would have been lost if you hadn’t helped.”

She smiled brilliantly up at him.  “I’d like that.”

[waveypedia]

and now, for my next number, i’d like to return to the classics

Rymin Week Day 7: Domestic

1 2 4 5 6

Ao3

~

It’s been years since he lived primarily in his van on tour, but Ryan will never not be grateful to always have a kitchen.

Early morning sunlight streams through the soft white curtains as he goes through the motions of breakfast. The curtains were a gift from one sister, the cookware a gift from their old manager before she got promoted. The sleek fridge, which Ryan opens next, was a careful purchase he and Min worked together to carefully pick out, as is the same for most of their furniture. The eggs he pulls out from inside it are from their local farmer’s market, where all the vendors know them by name. Not because they used to be semi-famous rock stars, but because they come by every week toting instruments to serenade the shoppers with.

Ryan coats the pan in nonstick cooking spray and cracks the eggs into it. Salts it. He puts the ingredients away while he’s waiting for it to cook and pours two glasses of water.

Then, all that’s left is the waiting.

Ryan finds one of his guitars leaning against the wall in the next room. Their apartment is chock-full of all kinds of musical instruments they’ve accumulated over the years. After all the fuss Ryan had to go through to get his first guitar as a teenager, it feels both strange and gratifying to see how far he’s come.

One instrument they do not have is a viola. Min has played it on his own, usually on lease from friends, but he won’t play it regularly enough to buy one. Ryan is more than happy with that.

Ryan sits down on top of the counter and plucks a few, soft notes on his chosen guitar. He doesn’t have any particular melody or song in mind; he just lets his fingers play what they wish.

In no time at all, the eggs finish cooking. Ryan regretfully sets down the guitar to flip them and slide them onto plates. Just as he’s turning off the stove, the sound of a door opening down the hall and resounding footsteps reaches his ears.

Ryan snorts.

His husband emerges into the kitchen, hair still messy from bed. Even after all these years, Ryan’s heart flutters at the sight of him.

Min leans down to steal a kiss off the top of Ryan’s head. “Ooh, eggs. Are those for me?”

Ryan swings the plate away, nearly spilling the coveted breakfast. “Of course not. I cook for myself. Never for my handsome husband.”

“Hmm, too bad.” Min grabs a fork and leans in for a bite. “Hey, these are good!”

Ryan laughs and leans against Min’s chest. “Almost as good as your ability to come running as soon as there’s food ready. I swear, Min, it’s superhuman.”

“Only if it’s your food,” Min promises, struggling not to laugh.

Ryan cackles. “Of course. I see how it is”

Min kisses him again and steps away. “I’ll get the table set if you plate the eggs and get some fruit, dear.”

“I can do better than that!” Ryan dishes out the eggs on two plates and cuts some oranges up. He walks over to the toaster and drops two pieces of toast in. “A full breakfast. How about that?”

Min laughs and pulls a tub of butter out of the fridge. “Lovely, thank you.” He peers at the plates. “Eggs and toast. How downright American of you. Would you like some bacon with that?”

 “Hey, at least it’s not post-war,” Ryan quips back. He stretches his arms over his head and sets the plates down on the table. “Eh, that would take too much time.” He leans over to peck Min’s cheek. “After all, I would hate to miss breakfast with my lovely husband.”

Min beams. “Good choice.” His wedding ring twinkles in the early morning sunlight.

Ryan sighs dreamily. “Man, am I glad I married you.”

“Me too.” Min’s smile is fond and so full of love it makes Ryan’s heart swell. When he smiles, all his wrinkles soften and curve upwards like little smiles themselves. Ryan loves to kiss each one.

“So.” Min straightens out and pulls out his phone. “We have a practice session at 4 today, booked at the venue for Saturday’s performance.”

“Okay, good.” Ryan nods. “I want to run through the new arrangement Train to Nowhere.”

Min shakes his head, chuckling. “We’ve been playing that song for forty years, Ryan. Shouldn’t you know it inside and out?”

“I just want to tweak some things for this arrangement,” Ryan shoots back, not unkindly.

“Ryan.” Min reaches across the table to lay his hand on top of Ryan’s. Their wedding rings make a soft clink sound when Min’s hits his. “It’s going to be fine. The fans love that song, as do we. We know it well.”

  I know, I know.” Ryan squeezes Min’s hand and glances away. His eyes catch on a vase of beautiful purple flowers. I need to water those today, he notes offhandedly. “That’s why I want it to be as good as it can be.”

“It will be,” Min promises.

Ryan smiles. “I believe you.”

Min laughs, reaching across with his other hand to squeeze Ryan’s cheek gently. Ryan laughs, batting his hand away. “Of course you do. You should listen to your husband more often, Ryan.”

“What are you talking about? I always listen to you,” Ryan snorts.

Min waggles his finger. “Ah-ah, that sheet music you bought last week would beg to differ,” he says. “I told you we already had it in a songbook somewhere.”

Ryan crosses his arms, faux-affronted. “Excuse me for wanting more music to play!”     

“I don’t care about that. Just spend our money on music we don’t already have,” Min says, leaning back in his chair with a smile.

Ryan shrugs and lets out a small huff of laughter. “I can do that.”

“Good.” Min gets up to clear their plates. “I’m going to go grocery shopping and then call my parents. Do you need anything?”

“No, but I’ll pop on that call if you don’t mind,” Ryan replies, standing up. “And can you grab some cheese? And the-“

“Those crackers you like, the ones that come in the blue box, I know, I know,” Min says, laughing and shaking his head affectionately. “It’s on the list.”

Ryan walks over and wraps an arm around his husband. “Ah, you know me so well. Thanks, babe.”

Min shrugs him off, laughing. “Stop calling me that! It’s not classy!”

“Pfft, okay.” Ryan kisses Min on the cheek before releasing him. “See you in a few hours?”

“You know it.” Min waves and kisses him goodbye before he’s out the door.

Ryan hums softly to himself as he cleans up the kitchen. It starts out as a B-side from one of Chicken Choice Judy’s earlier albums - their third, if memory serves correctly. Four years after they’d escaped the train, when their career was steadily taking off and they started touring outside of North America.

Ryan shook his head, chuckling softly to himself as he wiped a dish clean. “Man, what a time.”

As he works, the tune slowly shifts into something more original and unique. Something new. When he notices the change, he immediately scrambles for a pen and paper. Luckily, there’s a large notebook of blank sheet music in the drawer under the microwave for this exact reason.

Ryan flips past pages of sheet music penned from similar scenarios to a blank page. He leans against the counter, writing down notes and chords and lyrics as time slips away. Before he knows it, he has a full song on his hands and Min’s returned.

“Hey, honey,” Min says, dropping the grocery bags on the kitchen table and leaning in for a kiss. “Whatcha got there?”

Ryan tips the sheet music notebook over so Min can see. “A new song. I’m calling this one ‘Sunsets’ for now. What do you think?”

Min hums thoughtfully as he peruses the notes. “It sounds pretty, Ryan! May I suggest a ukulele rift here?” He taps the third line down as he talks. “I think that would add to the image.”

Ryan grins. “You’re a genius, Min.” He’s said similar statements many times over their forty-year music-writing career, but it never gets old.

Min preens, laughing. “Oh, I know. I’m gonna call my parents in a few, okay?”

“Sure. Call me when you’re ready.” Ryan doesn’t take his eyes off the music as Min leaves.

When he eventually hits a block, he puts away the groceries. He’s just finished when Min pokes his head out of the office door and beckons.

 “Hello, Ryan!” Min’s mother greets when he steps inside. “Lovely to see you.”

“You as well, 어머님,” he replies, squeezing into the office chair next to Min. It’s not supposed to be big enough to fit them both, but they always seem to manage. Min laughs and tries to bat him off, but it’s halfhearted at this point. Ryan has been doing it for long enough that Min gave up a while ago. Besides, they both know Min likes the subtle affection.

“Just get another chair,” Min’s father grumbles, not unkindly. His wife gives him a small nudge on the shoulder.

“Leave them alone. Let them enjoy each other’s company,” Min’s mother replies, shaking her head in mirth. “If they’re still in their honeymoon phase after all this time, that’s on them.”

“엄마, please,” Min sighs, burying his head in his hands. His mother just laughs.

--

At precisely four P.M., he and Min are settled onstage at Saturday’s venue. It happens to be a beautiful outdoor amphitheater with vines and greenery gently climbing up the pillars holding up the stage’s ceiling. The audience area is open-sky and curves gently downward, like a bowl.

Ryan stands in the center of said “bowl”, guitar hanging from his shoulders by its strap. He raises his arms to the sky and spins, taking in everything.

From his place onstage, behind his synthesizer, Min laughs. “What are you doing?”

“Just taking in the sights.” Ryan does a final spin for good measure before turning to face Min. “It really is quite pretty.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Min gazes up at the orange-tinted sky with a soft smile. “Our manager really outdid herself with the booking this time. We’ll have to thank her.”

Ryan clambers up on the stage, silently wincing at the height gap between the audience floor and stage floor. He’s really not as young as he used to be, is he? “Should we send her flowers?”

“I think she really liked the sunflowers we got her last time. They were on her living room table when we visited her.” Min places his fingers on the keys, hovering just above them. “Maybe chocolate, too.”

Ryan laughs. “How cliché. Is there something I should know?” He waltzes over to Min and wraps a lazy arm around his husband, leaning all of his weight into Min’s shoulders.

Min laughs and shoves him off. “Please, do I have to come out to you again? Not all of us are interested in women, you know.”

“And what a great loss to the female community it is. The ladies of the Min-Gi Park fan club will have to go in mourning,” Ryan giggled. “But really, flowers and chocolate sound nice. She’ll like it.”

Min gave him a thumbs-up. “Sound check?”

Ryan gives his guitar an experimental strum. It echoes across the amphitheater beautifully, filling the bowl with sound and vibration. He whoops. “Let’s get this party started!”

“Not until Saturday, or else we’ll have some very unhappy neighbors to contend with,” Min admonishes, laughing. His fingers fly across the keys. “I’m good too.”

Ryan taps his mic. “Then let’s get ready to rock!” His voice booms across the venue. A few peacefully roosting birds take flight, squawking indignantly.

Min rolls his eyes. “Leave the poor birds alone, and you have a deal.”

“Please, we all know they just want to hear us play.” Ryan fishes his guitar pick from his jacket pocket and holds it poised over his guitar strings. “How do you feel about Train to Nowhere as a warm-up?”

“Fine by me,” Min says. His eyes don’t leave his synth. “It’s my favorite song to play with you, Ryan.”

“Well, of course,” Ryan says. “It’s what got us together, after all. In more ways than one.”

Min laughs. “Well, I can’t argue with that. Care to count us off?”

“Oh, I was just waiting for you to ask.” Ryan raises his pick and grins. “Five, six, eleven, twelve!”

Somewhere in Canada, the sun sets over a practicing music duo in the early 2020s. They laugh and goof around on an empty stage as birds and a few curious passerby stop to watch. The notes of their original hit song, “Train to Nowhere,” grace the evening air.

In the middle of the song, their eyes meet. They do not speak outside of the song lyrics, but an entire conversation passes through their gaze. It’s all they can do to not run to each other and hug each other right then and there.

After all, Ryan and Min-Gi Akagi-Park have lived a lifetime with each other. And they will live out the rest of their lives with each other, happy and content beyond imagination. 

~

i'm not korean so i'm not sure if the words i used for min's mother are right. if anyone knows better and sees i'm wrong, please tell me! the website said the word min uses ( 엄마 / eomma) is the informal way to say mom, and you only use it for your own mother. the word ryan uses ( 어머님 / eomeonim ) is formal and often used for mothers-in-law. eomma is really similar to the hebrew word for mother, which is amma. i think that's fascinating because hebrew and korean are not similar languages at all. lingustics as a whole is fascinating because you can see where languages and dialects split off from each other and where/why that happened in history. it's also really cool to see languages so similar to each other you can communicate with someone else in two different languages. languages also have cognants (not sure if i'm spelling that right) where a word is basically the same across multiple languages. it's really interesting to see in this modern world of quick and easy communication how many cognants we have, especially for semi-recent terms (the technology unit in french was SO easy). anyway sorry for the tangent i just really love linguistics

man i wasn't planning to write for today until i realized i'd overestimated the chapter count and it felt weird to not write aksdgfjs. i hope i can keep to this schedule of writing every day but school will probably put a hard stop to that. gotta get out as much writing as i can before then! i started writing this at like 9pm i'm so sorry if it's messy dkfhjfkd

we've come full circle! this started with baby rymin and now we have much older rymin. poetic cinema........

the euphoria i got everytime i wrote "his husband"......... they are MARRIED gamers!!!!!

this is a callout post for every time i pour myself a bowl of chips at my aunt and uncle's house and all five of them suddenly think my bowl is a free-for-all even though the bag is sitting right there. stop i am not a chip dispensary. do not be min-gi akagi-park leave my chips alone

title is from uhhhh i don't know what it was called (some indie thing) but it was in my last winterguard show (fuck covid i wanted a senior season) and it just popped into my head. or it might have just been a voice line from something i heard it in another show with different music. whatever it's almost 1 am i'll look it up later. i put it on my titles doc (which is 90% song lyrics and which my brother likes to call the "song lyric moodboard" even though it's just a bullet list) out of impulse and nostalgia and never really intended to use it but it actually fits really well here?? who knew

it didn't make it in but i imagine that ryan and min have a parrot named kez and they've taught it some of kez's favorite and most iconic phrases. imagine you are visiting acclaimed musical duo chicken choice judy's house and you hear a parrot squawk at you "Why do you hate fun, Min." another thing that kind of made it in but not quite was that ryan has all those weird guitars. im picturing this one my temporary songleading teacher at camp, who's a professional musician and probably the most famous jewish folk artist out there (which is a very niche group so he's not really famous), brought out once. it was really small and had like eight tiny strings all crammed in together and it both fascinated and terrified me. i have no idea how you can play that without accidentally pressing all the wrong strings all the time but dan nichols can do it so i've decided ryan can do it too

tomorrow is au day... you know what that means... *shoves rymin into my current hyperfixation*

if you ever wanna talk infinity train, writing, these amazing characters, or really anything hmu here on my tumblr or on twitter! thank you for reading, and please leave a reblog/like/comment if you enjoyed it!

@ryminweek

[mc-lukanette]

Ladybug had long since gotten used to the monotony of her superhero life, though perhaps it was more accurate to say that she'd gone numb to it. There were only so many akuma one could take without seeing it as something formulaic, and she'd seen more than she could count.

Even when she went out on patrol, she didn't think about it, merely hopping to wherever the next rooftop was and surveying the area. Thinking about the life she'd been roped into wasn't productive and only succeeded in making her imagine unnecessary what-ifs. Paris didn't need that kind of hero; they needed one devoid of attachment or longing.

And the more time passed, the more she tried to be exactly that.

In the midst of her patrol that particular day, late into the night as it always was, she stopped as she suddenly heard the sound of a guitar. Granted, it wasn't rare for her to hear someone blasting music or playing an instrument in the evening, but there was something inherently familiar about the way the guitar was being played.

Deep down, she knew that there was only one person who could play guitar like that.

Ladybug turned her head towards the source of the sound, her heart involuntarily skipping a beat when she saw him, sitting on the balcony of a house she didn't recognize.

Luka. He was just as she remembered: the highlights, the guitar, and the gentle blue eyes.

Ladybug sat on her heels, staring down at him curiously. How long had it been since she'd seen him? She knew it had to have been at least a few years, though she didn't know the exact amount.

She wondered if that was his house. She wondered if the guitar in his arms was brand new or was cared for with years of love and attention. She wondered if he chose the balcony because he was playing for the night itself.

She wondered how he'd been doing since she'd cut him and everyone else out of her life.

Almost as if he'd sensed her, Luka suddenly glanced up to the rooftop she was on, his fingers bringing the song to a sudden end. She stiffened, just as his eyebrows rose at the sight of her.

He glanced down at his guitar, seeming to make the connection, then smiled up at her. Raising the volume of his voice so she'd hear, he asked, "Do you want a front-row seat, Ladybug?"

She blushed lightly, standing up and waving her hands dismissively. "Uh—no, I'm just passing by!"

But she couldn't deny that he looked really inviting sitting there, and he had already noticed and spoken to her. She debated with herself for a good few seconds before deciding that a small conversation would be okay.

Patrols were supposed to be unpredictable in timing, after all, or else people could plan around them. Getting a little side-tracked helped with that, she supposed.

She took a few steps back, then took a running leap onto the balcony that Luka was seated at, just barely missing the table and chairs next to her. Glancing over at his welcoming smile, she put on her best superhero demeanor and simply asked, "Have you seen anything strange going on recently?"

He shook his head, though his expression didn't change. "I haven't." He looked down at the neck of his guitar, running his hand along it. "Sorry I can't be of more help."

"Oh! No, it's okay!" She frowned. She knew he meant patrol, but she couldn't help thinking of when his identity had been compromised. "...It's Viperion, right?"

He seemed pleasantly surprised. "I'm glad you remember."

She bit back the ’of course I do’ and opted for a more formal, "It's part of the job. Even if I can't call on certain heroes anymore, I always remember them." She glanced at his guitar. "It's the same with your music, isn't it?"

He chuckled. "You could say that."

He played a quick melody that she recognized but didn't dare put a name to. She'd only arrived to talk, not to be reminded of the past, so she averted her gaze to the fence around the balcony, idling running her fingers along the railing.

Reminded of one of her earlier musings, she commented, "This is a nice place. Is it yours?"

He hummed with a nod. "I bought it a few weeks ago."

That explained why she'd never heard him play there before. "And the balcony?" She paused in thought, realizing after a moment, "I guess it's no replacement for playing on a deck, but it's the closest you can get to it?"

"Mm." He leaned his chair back, propping his feet up on the railing. "It's something. Nothing will ever beat the Liberty though."

She understood to some degree. She'd moved out of the bakery as soon as she could and it took time to stop missing the warmth and scents. "But you're happy at least?"

"Yeah," he replied, though the look on his face was less "happy" than she would've expected from him. She supposed it was her memory failing her, given all their time away from each other.

"What about you?"

Her shoulder went stiff. "W-what?" Did he really just ask her for personal—

"Are you happy too?" he clarified, offering her a smile. "You deserve to be."

She relaxed, though turned back to the fence to look at the night sky instead of him. It might've been a long time since they'd seen each other, but she was afraid that he'd read her somehow.

Happy. She supposed that it depended on the definition one might use for it.

"...I'm happy that Paris is happy under my watch," she finally answered. Eyes giving off a hint of a sparkle, she added, "I'm happy that it's safe enough for musicians like you to stay up past their bedtime to play me songs."

That earned her a chuckle, and she couldn't help turning back to him to see what his face looked like. If it made her feel happy at all, she didn't acknowledge it, the only hint being the wide smile on her face.

Luka had always been a special case. He was so unlike everyone else she knew, not only in the way he acted, but how he treated her. While she was never able to figure out how she felt about him, there was a gentle tug he had on her that she couldn't deny.

Not that she missed him though. She didn't, and she wasn't lonely either.

She wasn't lonely at all.

After his brief giggling fit was over, Luka dropped his feet from the railing, settling his chair back down before getting up. He turned, walking to the sliding glass door and pushing it open. "Do you want a drink before you go?"

She tilted her head at him. "A drink? Are you sure?"

In response, he slipped inside, the gentle tug urging her to follow after him. She was hesitant, but supposed it'd be rude to refuse him, so she walked into his house and closed the glass door behind her.

She couldn't help smiling at the casual way he'd simply invited a superhero into his house.

The living room and kitchen weren't separated by any wall, Luka heading towards the latter from the former after setting his guitar back on its stand. Ladybug took a look at her surroundings, noting that it wasn't unlike his room on the Liberty. Anarka was messy, Juleka was more controlled, and Luka himself was cleanest just out of not having a ton of belongings.

There were a few instruments, of course, but she also noticed the same Jagged Stone poster from back in the day. In addition, there were two pictures hanging on the wall, one of his family and one of the time she'd taken a photo of Kitty Section for their contest entry. The family picture seemed to be from a time she wasn't around him for, as he looked older than how she'd remembered.

Luka called from the kitchen, "What do you like?"

She turned to him. "Oh, tea's fine, thank you." Then, approaching the photos, she observed aloud, "You must be really close to your family and friends."

"I am," he replied, a smile in his voice. "Are you? You care so much about Paris that—"

"No," she cut in. "I don't have anyone like that." She could tell that Luka was thrown off and continued, "It's for the best."

Luka didn't reply, an awkward silence stretching on. She looked over at him, wondering if maybe he was pitying her, but he was occupying himself with making her tea. She turned away, walking over to his couch and taking a seat on it.

A few minutes passed. Luka returned to her with two mugs and offered her one. She took it, giving him a grateful nod, but waited until he sat down next to her to say, "You think it's strange."

"No," Luka assured. "I'm just surprised. I've never been alone, so I don't know how it must be for you." He took a sip of his drink, then stared thoughtfully into the mug. "...And everyone already knows about Chat Noir having a girlfriend."

She shrugged. "Chat Noir can afford to blurt out those kinds of things; to have those kinds of things. He doesn't have the responsibilities that I do."

On a basic level, she knew that she should've left it there. She'd held everything in for so long that she could do it for a few minutes longer, at least as long as she was staying there.

But it was always different with Luka. With Luka, all of her secrets and pent-up emotion grew wings and fluttered around her stomach like a swarm of her magical ladybugs, begging to come out and heal some unknown damage. Any attempt to drown them by sipping Luka's tea just made them fly faster.

"...It was too exhausting," she finally admitted.

Luka glanced over, giving her his attention.

She continued, "I used to have them, but it drained me. It was too much and I couldn't balance it with my hero life. It felt like I was always doing something for someone and I couldn't do it anymore without risking Paris."

He didn't respond verbally at first, but let out a sympathetic hum. He took another, much longer sip of his drink, and all Ladybug could think was, Not you though. You weren't that way.

"I wish it hadn't been like that for you," he told her, setting his drink down. "That's not how it's supposed to be, and it's never been that way for me."

She went to reply - to tell him it was okay and he shouldn't worry - when she noticed a somber expression wash over his face. He averted his gaze from her, reaching into his pocket to pull out his phone.

Ladybug breathed up when she noticed his phone's wallpaper: it was her, in civilian form, next to him, back when they were teenagers. She swallowed, seeing the soft look in his eyes even as he frowned, and wondered what exactly they'd talked about that made him think to pull out the image of her on his phone.

She'd tried not to think about it when she saw the pictures earlier, but apparently he still thought about her after all.

"Ah—" She leaned over, trying not to be obvious about what she was feeling. "Is that... your girlfriend?"

He glanced over at her, brows raised, then relaxed and shook his head. Managing a sad smile, he replied, "No. She knew I was interested in her, but I never got a reply; I never asked for one. I haven't talked to her for years either. She just left one day."

She stared down at her lap, running her free hand along her leg. "She—um—sounds unreliable. It was cruel of her to abandon you. Didn't that hurt?"

He looked at his phone a moment longer, then set it down on the table. Leaning back, he tilted his head up at the ceiling and replied, "Not like that. Marinette doesn't do anything without a reason, and I trust her. I—" He sighed. "—I was hurt because I wished that she would've relied on me."

Ladybug gaped, blurting out, "You wanted her to rely on you more?" She covered her mouth as she realized what she'd said. "I-I mean, ah..." She tried to figure out a way to salvage it, but curiosity won over. "Why?"

"I wanted to see her happy," he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, "and I was happy to be the one she went to. It meant that she trusted me more than anyone else."

Suddenly, Ladybug recognized the look in his eyes. It was the same look he gave her when he held her hands while they were ice skating together, and the same look he had on when he confessed. She didn't understand it.

"But," she began, trying to pull herself out of her speechless stupor, "you thought she didn't return your feelings? Wasn't it a bother?"

The soft gaze gone, he jolted up, looking at her like she'd offended him. "Marinette didn't owe me anything, and her happiness doesn't mean less to me because she didn't feel the way I did. She didn't take advantage of me and her relying on me isn't suddenly a bother because we never dated. I cared about her, and I didn't need anything else out of making her feel better."

She blushed, both from the intensity of his words and the embarrassment from feeling as though she was being scolded. Unable to meet his eyes anymore, she stared down at her tea, drinking it slowly at first and then scarfing it down when she realized that it'd gone cold.

She wondered how many times he'd had to tell people that, given the way he so actively jumped on what she'd said. It wasn't that he sounded wrong, but...

wow.

"I-I'm sorry," she managed. "I didn't mean to make it seem like..." She trailed off, biting her bottom lip.

Luka breathed out, rubbing the back of his neck. "It's okay." He averted his gaze, meaning neither of them were looking at each other anymore. "Marinette had a lot to deal with. She cared about everything and had so much talent. I can't imagine how suffocating it was to be known by so many celebrities and have so many expectations put on her." His hand twitched, then curled into a fist. "That's why it puts me so out of tune when I see people talking about us like I was doing all the work or that I shouldn't care as much because she might love someone else."

Ladybug always thought that relationships were a give-and-take, and they were, but it hadn't occurred to her that maybe she'd misconstrued what the "taking" part entailed. When she'd initially decided to cut off everyone, including Luka, it was because she wanted a completely clean break; to be separated from every person she'd put time into so she could focus on being Ladybug. It'd hurt, of course, but she'd gotten over it, hoping to put Paris as her top priority.

Luka had been an afterthought in a way, because she'd presumed that he would've done so much better without her there. She honestly believed that she was doing what was best for both herself and him, since everything she'd been taught implied that she was only troubling him.

Perhaps there was such a thing as "foolish selflessness" then, where she'd focused so much on what she thought might be best for him without actually confirming it. She thought she could be sure based on what she'd experienced before, but she couldn't.

There was no one else quite like Luka, it seemed.

"...How did you know?" she asked, peeking up at him.

Luka looked over, blinking at her. "Know what?"

"That—" She took a breath, knowing that she was in too deep to back out now. "That you were in love with her?"

His eyes went wide. She grew sheepish, pulling her empty mug closer to her face like she was ready to hide behind it.

"If it's too personal, that's okay. I've just—never seen someone as sure as you are."

After a few seconds, Luka calmed, his expression turning thoughtful. He stared straight ahead of him, looking at nothing in particular, then finally smiled.

"Maybe it's because I didn't grow up with a normal family," he mused, "but I've always thought about love differently."

She tilted her head at him. "How so?" Then, hesitantly, she suggested, "Do you mean you're not really in love with her romantically?"

"No, I am," he stated, and so bluntly that she started blushing again, "but it was never about that for me."

He eyed his phone, though it'd already gone dark from being idle. "Dating, marriage... those aren't things I think about when I see Marinette." He smiled, the softness in his eyes coming back. "Of course I'd be happy going however far she wanted with those, but I don't think loving someone should be about worrying about things like that."

"Really?" She leaned towards him. "Then, what do you think when you see her?"

He met her gaze, accidentally directing that softness her way. For a moment, it was like she was her civilian self, and it was impossible not to feel loved.

"That I want to be with her," Luka answered, "forever, if she'd let me. Whether we're friends or lovers, I want to be able to make her happy and let her rely on me. If there's something bothering her, I want her to know that I'll listen, no matter what it's about. I want her to be comfortable and not worry about what I'll think, because she knows I won't judge her." He placed a hand to his heart, gaze dropping to the couch. "That's love to me."

Ladybug absorbed that, but was unable to say anything coherent outside of, "Oh," her heart doing a flip in her chest.

He chuckled. "I know it might sound weird. You don't have to—"

"No," she cut in, voice softer than intended. She swallowed, her tone returning to normal as she assured, "I think it's really sweet. I wish that I—I mean, I wish that more people could hear that sort of thing. It's touching."

He hummed, staring at her with a look of content. "Thank you." Eyes drifting downwards, he held his hand out and asked, "Do you want me to take that?"

"What?" She looked, only now remembering her empty mug. "Oh, yeah, thanks."

She handed it to him, and Luka took both mugs back to the kitchen to put them in the sink. She watched him, feeling all too much and once and not knowing how to process it.

The idea of it being so simple had never occurred to her; that things like rejection or marriage or children suddenly wouldn't matter, and being content just loving and being with a person was where true happiness lied. She was used to being dragged around towards someone, insisting that her love from long ago had to be a certain way, and that any exceptions would make it imperfect.

The force of it caused her nothing but pain and anxiety, and the "love" she felt was all the more fake for it.

What she had for - with - Luka wasn't like that though. She knew it from the start, but didn't know what it meant.

Luka's wasn't forceful; it was the gentle tug she'd felt and needed all along. Suddenly, everything made sense.

"...I should probably go," she admitted, glancing over at the window. "I need to get back to patrol."

The wind in her face would probably do her good. She had a lot to think about.

Luka came back from the kitchen, heading for the sliding glass doors and picking up his guitar on the way. "You probably should. Thanks for coming in for a while though." He was apologetic as he added, "You deserved the break, but I'm sorry if things got a little heavy for you."

"Not at all," she assured, pushing herself up and walking to stand next to him. She smiled at him, acknowledging, "I think it was just heavy enough, actually."

It was Luka, so of course he didn't prod or ask questions; he just returned her smile with his own.

She passed him, partway into the doorframe before something occurred to her. She glanced back at him, his smile turning into a lopsided frown as he didn't seem to know what she was thinking. Placing a hand on the frame of the glass door, close to where his hand still was, she leaned towards him and kissed his cheek.

She grinned as she pulled away, admiring the way his brows rose in surprise. Giggling, she whispered, "For good luck," promptly turning away and hopping onto the fence.

She then leapt away, continuing the patrol that she'd put on hold. Even though she hadn't looked back at him when she left, his face was vivid in her mind as she beamed, the adrenaline from patrol unable to compete with the way her heart had already been pounding.

I want to be with you.

—————

Marinette

Luka?

...Please tell me you didn't change your number. I might die of embarrassment if you did.

Luka

Marinette?

Marinette

Luka!

Thank goodness.

Luka

Did something happen?

Marinette

No!

Yes?

...Look, I know this probably sounds really out of nowhere and it won't make a lot of sense, but I was thinking about you.

I have been for a while.

I know I have a lot of explaining to do, but can I take you out somewhere? Not as an apology, even though I'm really sorry, but because I want to.

You don't have to say "yes."

You don't have to want to talk to me ever again either.

Luka

...What if I want to do all of those?

Marinette

Oh.

Then... I guess it'd be a date?

Luka

Just me and you?

Marinette

Yeah. Just you and me.

Mostly me.

Because I'll be paying and I don't want to hear one word of complaint out of you.

Alright?

Luka

Ha. Alright.

It's a date.

Marinette

Yes!

Luka

I have to warn you though, Marinette.

Marinette

About what?

Luka

I'm going to be smiling a lot when we meet up. I hope that's okay.

Marinette

That's what you're worried about??

Don't.

I will be too.

[dream-a-little-bigger-x]

Halloween Prank Gone Wrong | Luke Patterson

Request: hi! firstly i love your series & imagines! they are so wonderful! <3 okay secondly can i request a luke patterson x reader where reader is friends with julie and it’s Halloween so Julie decides to prank reader with an ouija board and has the boys behind everything but reader can see them? sorry if this doesn’t make sense ):

Pairing: Luke Patterson x reader, JATP x reader, Julie x Flynn x Reader

Warnings: Use of OUIJA board

Words: 2,239

Songs used: Time Warp - Glee Cast Version 

Y/N: Your name Y/L/N: Your last name Y/M/N: Your mother’s name

You and Julie have been friends since you were both in diapers, along with Carrie. The three of you used to be inseparable, and then even Flynn joined your Squad in Middle School. People used to call you the Los Feliz Four. Then came the worst year of your squad’s year. Julie lost her mom and with it, her love and connection to music, one of the many things that connected the Los Feliz Four. Carrie stopped hanging out with Julie after a humongous fight, and when Flynn picks Julie’s side, you’re stuck between the two fires. You love Julie with all your heart and help her wherever she needs it, but you also still hang out every now and then with Carrie. Though the drama in Dirty Candy sometimes gets a little much. 

On the day of the spirit assembly, you’re on the sidelines, cheering on Dirty Candy and Julie herself when she takes her spot behind the keyboard, starting a song you don’t know. Her voice echoes through the gym, capturing every student’s attention. Even more so when a band flashes onto the stage, joining her into the song. You have to blink a couple of times, to make sure you’re really seeing things correctly. These are three of four boys from Sunset Curve. Your mother used to be the biggest fan of their music back in the 90’s and showed you all of their work. She even told you about Bobby, who now goes by the name of Trevor Wilson and how he used to be part of the band as well. You never told Carrie what you knew. But seeing the boys up there, knowing they died, only means one thing. These are ghosts. The ghosts of a 90’s band. You can’t help but jam along with them, though the song is completely unfamiliar to you. And, once the song is over, you can still see the boys on the side of the stage, talking amongst each other whilst Julie explains the hologram-thing. You witness the dark-haired boy run up the steps and shake his booty, checking if no one can see them. You’re somewhere at the back of the crowd, hidden behind the tallest guy in your class. He can’t see you, but you can see him. You have to ask Julie what’s going on. There needs to be an explanation to this. You don’t know how to tell her you know. It might be weird to just go up there and tell her ‘hey! I know about your ghost band!’. Besides, how fun would it be to know about her secret and catch her in each lie she comes up with as an excuse for their behavior? You hold it out until October. Halloween, to be exact. It’s been hard, trying to keep this from Julie, but it has been fun seeing the boys squirm whenever you looked straight into their eyes as if you could see them. The hardest part was trying not to laugh whenever they said something dumb or funny, but you just about managed. You managed enough for Julie to believe you didn’t know about her ghost band and to come up with a scheme to prank you this Halloween. You didn’t know, at first, since she just asked to hang out on Halloween, watch some horror films and just enjoy the holiday you both loved so much, along with Flynn. The three of you had decided to dress up for your little get together. Dressed as Bubbles from the Powerpuff Girls, you make your way to Julie’s garage. To no surprise, finding the boys there too, along with Flynn -- dressed as Buttercup -- and Julie -- dressed as Blossom. “Hey,” you greet as your eyes land on the Ouija Board, surrounded by dozens of candles. “Playing a game, are we?” You already have a hunch what’s going to happen, but decide to play along anyway. “Yes! No better moment than Halloween to break this bad boy out, right?” Flynn exclaims as she sits down on the floor at the coffee table where Julie had set up the board. “Sure,” you agree with a shrug before taking a red cup from Julie. She’d gone all out with decorating the studio with cobwebs and pumpkins and skeletons. She really went to town, even on the beverages and snacks. All of them Halloween-themed. “Are we ready?” Julie asks ominously whilst sitting down next to Flynn and extending her arms, so they’re resting on the plaque in the middle of the board. You bite your bottom lip, trying your hardest not to start laughing at your best friends, and sit down with them. The three boys surround you, placing their hands onto the plaque at the same time you and Flynn do. “It’s really important you keep your hands on the plaque at all times,” Julie warns you and Flynn. It’s really hard to concentrate on the board and not on the extremely cute guy on the opposite side of the table, staring at you with a grin on his face. “Let’s do this,” you state, your eyes flicking from Julie to Flynn, stopping briefly at the lead singer of Sunset Curve. You catch a flicker of confusion in his eyes, but decide to ignore it and focus on Julie and Flynn for now. “O Fortuna, Velut luna, Statu variabilis, Semper crescis, Aut decrescis; Vita detestabilis.” You furrow your eyebrows at Julie’s sudden outburst in Latin. You don’t need much to recognize it though. That’s from O Fortuna by Carmina Burana. The most famous choral number in existence. You feel a little offended Julie thinks you wouldn’t know that. “Are you ghosts out there?” she asks in a menacing voice, trying to build up the tension. You can feel the boy next to you go through you with his shoulder as he pushes against the plaque to slide it over to the ‘yes’. You press your lips together to keep you from laughter, your eyes widening in fake shock. “Who are you?” you ask as you look into the lead singer's eyes, pretending to look ahead into the abyss. The boy now leans forward and starts moving the plaque to the L, then U-K-E. You glance at Julie and Flynn, who exchange glances too. “Were you in a band?” Luke’s eyes widen at this, frantically glancing at his best friends in need of help. The blond one, who’s sitting next to Flynn, cocks his head to the stereo before getting up from his spot and moving to the corner. He presses the play button, a song you recognize as Now or Never by their very own band. You nod your head, impressed by the lengths these boys are going to keep up this prank. “Hey, Luke,” you’re still looking at him instead of Julie or Flynn. “Are your bandmates here too?” “Bro, she knows,” Luke scoffs, which makes you burst out laughing. You can’t handle it anymore. The disappointment in Luke’s face is just too much. “I’m sorry guys, but I can literally see you…” you tell the three guys, leaving them and your two best friends in complete and utter shock, laced with a bit of disgruntlement over their prank failing. “My mother used to be a really big fan of yours. She showed me all of your music and told me about Bobby-slash-Trevor.” Julie’s head snaps up at this. “You knew?” she asks, eyes wide and bewildered at this new information. “Yeah, I never told you or Carrie because one, I didn’t think it mattered, and two, there must be a reason why Bobby hasn’t told his own daughter about his past band.” You shrug, letting your eyes dart over to the boys again. They’re all sat on the floor, frozen in shock. “How do you see us?” the darker-haired boy with the rosy cheeks asks. “I guess my mother being such a fan of Sunset Curve gives me a connection to all of you?” you offer them your best guess. Luke’s eyes widen, clearly realizing something as he gets up from the floor to start pacing the garage. “What’s her name?” he asks, remembering one girl he had a real connection with. “Y/M/N.” He visibly swallows a lump in his throat, and scratches the back of his head awkwardly. “Yeah… Let’s say I know her very well…” Your mind immediately jumps to a conclusion that leaves you a little weirded out. “Remember that one girl our age at the book club we played at?” He directs this question to the boys. “Right! She was the daughter of the hostess!” the brunette, who you’re guessing is Reggie by the way he expresses himself, remembers. “No, you didn’t!” His eyes widen at the sudden realization, he then turns to you. “You’re her daughter?!” You nod your head slowly, trying to comprehend what’s happening. “It doesn’t matter who Luke had a special connection with,” Julie interrupts, “Why didn’t you say anything? It killed me not telling you!” You shrug your shoulders. “I guess I thought it would’ve been weird to just come up to you and say ‘yo, Jules, I can see your ghost band!’ Besides, it was fun seeing these boys squirm whenever I looked at them a little too long.” Your lip turns upwards on one side. “I knew you saw me!” The blonde guy narrows his eyes at you. So, that must be Drama Queen Alex… “Can we just drop it and enjoy the rest of our night together?” you exclaim, raising your hands in defense for ever lying to your best friends. “I heard…” you start, glancing at all three of the boys, “You guys are very good at jamming whatever song is thrown at you.” “Yes! Please! Sing! So I’m not the only one not seeing you!” Flynn groans in frustration, walking through Luke, not realizing he’d gotten up from his seat earlier. “I just stepped through someone, didn’t I?” Julie and you simply nod your head, amused smiles stifled. Luke and Reggie grab their instruments whilst Alex makes his way behind his drum kit. “Y’all know Time Warp, from the Rocky Horror Picture Show?” you ask. As an answer, Alex counts all of you in before the band starts playing and Luke’s voice fills the studio.  “It's astounding, time is fleeting Madness takes its toll But listen closely,” You, having received a microphone from Julie, walk over to the lead singer your mother had a fling with once -- apparently -- and chime into the song.   “Not for very much longer” “I've got to keep control” He shoots you a wink before changing to his head voice to go into the chorus. “I remember doing the time warp Drinking those moments when The blackness would hit me And the void would be calling” Then, all of you join into the post-chorus together, singing at the top of your lungs. “Let's do the time warp again Let's do the time warp again” Reggie then takes the next part whilst all three girls do the choreography from the musical, and alternating lines with Reggie. “It's just a jump to the left” “And then a step to the right” “put your hands on your hips” “You bring your knees in tight But it's the pelvic thrust That really drives you insane Let's do the time warp again! Let's do the time warp again!” You dance your way to Reggie whilst taking the next verse, all while Julie’s behind the keyboard, getting some melodic notes into the jam. “It's so dreamy, oh fantasy free me So you can't see me, no not at all In another dimension, with voyeuristic intentions Well-secluded, I see all” Reggie looks into your eyes as he uses his best seductive voice to sing the next line. “With a bit of a mind flip” And then you imitate that tone on your next line. “You're into the time slip” “And nothing can ever be the same” Flynn then takes the next line, dancing in front of Alex’s drum kit, facing him with a wide smile on her face. She’s glad she can see the boys now too. It makes her feel a little less left out. “You're spaced out on sensation” Alex then sings one line before the rest of you join in again for the chorus. “Like you're under sedation” “Let's do the time warp again! Let's do the time warp again!” “It's just a jump to the left” “And then a step to the right” “put your hands on your hips” “You bring your knees in tight But it's the pelvic thrust That really drives you insane Let's do the time warp again! Let's do the time warp again!” The boys play their last chords or hit their last cymbals while Julie plays her last note. All six of you giggling like crazy, oozing happiness and contentment. This is probably the craziest and most fun you’d ever had on Halloween. “Oh, man!” Flynn whines, a pout on her face. You don’t know why at first, but then remember she can’t see the boys like you and Julie can, which sends all of you into a fit of laughter. If your life is going to be this fun and crazy with these boys in your life, you’d never want to die. Or maybe you would, if that meant spending even more time with them. 

Taglist: @hannahhistorian92 @marinettepotterandplagg @thequirkybookaholic @bookdealer5 @tenaciousperfectionunknown @hemmingsness @iainttakingshitfromnobody @ifilwtmfc @angryknightstatesmantrash @kiss-themoongoodbye @rudysbay @thedarkqueenofavalon @caitsymichelle13

[werewolf-cl4ws]

Random head cannons for my AU because these require oddly specific questions I don’t think I’ve ever seen ask memes have.

A lot of these I do have something to back them up with, but others it's just logical hilarity to me because I can.

Kitty!Sonic:

- absolutely mistrusts/gets annoyed by anyone that is an "authority figure" (i.e. adults "in charge", leaders, etc) but does nothing to actually be useful. As a kid he was always told to listen to the adults because "they know best", but after the coup and seeing a good number of adults doing everything in their power to just save their own hides or hiding, it fucked him right off. Only adults he’s ever respected were his uncle and Rosie (Rosie took some time to gain that trust though because why the hell is she teaching us maths when people need help???). Bookshire is another but he does fight Bookshire on occasion because Sonic hates fussing with medical stuff.

This carried on into his own adulthood, and it’s hilarious whenever someone points out he’s the adult now as it sets off his aversion to being older, but if he has to be called an adult then damnit he’s gonna be a USEFUL one at least.

And yes he has confirmed on many occasions that he can and will flip off King Acorn if he plays up. What's he gonna do, ground him? Arrest his for treason? He flipped off Robotnik, he ain't scared of no thing.

- his uncle was brilliant with robotics and mechanics and science. Sonic has literally zero idea about any of those. And yet he’s weirdly good at chemistry. But he doesn’t get a lot of opportunities to use this so no one knows this, but Rotor has come by chemistry formulas mysteriously solved if he leaves them out on his workbench after a night of wracking his brains over why something isn’t working. How does Sonic know this? Nobody knows, Sonic will never tell either, and will deny he’s even good at it.

- he’s also very good at physics, in that he knows exactly how to break physics to do impossible shit. He’s great at figuring out just what angles he needs to shoot himself into to get the most air time, how much speed and lift to land in the exact spot, etc. It all happens automatically to him (it has to, going at the speeds he does there’s literally no time to plan this shit) but if someone asks him he will actually figure it out in the spot with freakishly good accuracy, and can do it not just with him being the projectile but any object (he has worked out perfect catapult trajectories before and it still baffles everyone to this day). Again, he doesn’t know how he knows this, will never tell anyone he knows how to do this, and will deny he knows this.

- he’s also good with musical instruments. Obviously his favourite is the electric guitar, but if you give him a sheet of music and at least an hour to mess around with the instrument he’ll work it out. Getting to watch him play the violin is a rare but delightful treat. This is his special interest, the thing he would have gotten into if the world hadn’t gone to shit. He doesn’t get to indulge in it as much as he’s like but he loves music and could ramble about it for hours on end if given the chance.

The con of this though is that he's really good at identifying music, including ones from operas and orchestras. Sally takes great delight in making him identify both because he does get embarrassed about it, but his pride doesn't allow him to just not pick them out.

- he likes to cook, but he prefers recipes that allow him to leave things to cook without him needing to watch it once it’s prepared. So baking, roasting, slow cook stuff like soups and chili, that’s his jam. Anything that’s gonna be a long haul he has to be basically trapped in his hut to do it without wanting to go nuts (so extra cold days where being outside would be hell are good cooking days).

- during the summer he sleeps in a hammock. During the winter he sleeps in a bed and practically buries himself in blankets.

- loves bubblegum. Gum balls, sticks of gum, whatever. If it’s gum he loves it. Unfortunately it is non existent thanks to the coup (shelf life of gum is terrible) so finding any that’s not terrible is an amazing day.

- milk and cookies is oddly a comfort food to him. Something about the simplicity of it just works for him, and ridiculously shit days are made better by it. Default choc chip cookies work best.

- he hates spiders. More specifically, he hates when you see a spider, look away, then look back only to find the spider is gone. Spiders themselves don’t bother him until they do that, but once they do he has to fight himself to not just set whatever building or dwelling he happens to be on fire in order to solve the issue of having to deal with it later.

- he’s about .0001 seconds away from just walking away into the forest and never coming back. He won’t do it because he honestly doesn’t want to abandon his friends… but he’s so close to just becoming a cryptic in the forest. He has wandered off before when things get super annoying, but someone always drags him back, much to his endless frustration.

Sally:

- can’t cook for anything. Sonic has seen her burn water. Toast somehow always ends in fire. No one ever attempt to drink her coffee for your own sake.

And yet somehow she makes really, really good pancakes. Like ridiculously good. She makes them very rarely because she’s always busy with something and has been banned from all kitchens, but when she does they’re amazing and no one can figure out how this happens.

- if she’s snacking on nuts or anything that doesn’t go soggy (like hard/dry fruits, or extra crusty breads) she will sometimes keep some in her cheeks. Not to the point that her cheeks will be bulging with them, but if she’s working while snacking she will just stash some away so she can focus on what she’s doing, and then when she’s done just finishes those off. This only happens when she needs to focus so she’s pretty discreet about this and has perfected talking/quick chewing with them if someone interrupts her.

- she loves video games, but because they’re so hard to come by thanks to the coup she doesn’t get to play as often as she’d like. She knows Sonic, Tails and Rotor has some stashed away and has played them on the sly, which has left them wondering how their high scores got beaten or how new levels have been unlocked. Though she has to be careful about this because if she’s left alone with them long enough she will just play them until either she finishes the game, or someone physically drags her away from it. This is probably her only weak point in terms of something that can just pull her away entirely from everything.

- she is very, very neat… only because she literally doesn’t make a mess of anything thanks to her one-track mind. If she’s working on a plan or something that needs a lot of research she will basically just make a pathway to her desk and bed and leave everything else undisturbed. She will still shower, only because the shower is just another place for her to think without interruption. This is a big factor on why she can’t cook for shit, too. She just… doesn’t. At all. Because she’s gotta work. Work is life because they may literally die if she can’t figure plans out

- she is genuinely fascinated by legends and myths, which we see a lot of in SatAM. Although she does sometimes dismiss some legends or myths as just stories, if she finds anything that even hints at it being real, and if time allows it, she will chase it down. If it’s anything that might be especially useful in their fight she will go for it after doing a ton of research to make sure she’s got every angle and possibility down. The researching to that extent is due to her own perfectionism, but also because if the expedition turns out to be a bust it could mean time that should have been spent on something else/time being away from the village for a crapshoot.

Sonic and Sally as a couple:

- they don’t use pet names for one another… until one of them is absolutely pushing their luck with the other. Pet names = stop it.

- Sally did once call Sonic a shit-weasel out of anger during such a scenario, and then was immediately apologetic for it because that was Too Far™. Sonic said that made him fall in love with her all over again and it was an awesome insult. Pet names are still a no-go though.

- they live together and everyone thinks it’s Sonic that would be the nightmare to live with.

It’s not.

It’s Sally.

Sonic does get messy and likes to live in organised chaos, but Sally just has the worst sleeping habits (she doesn’t sleep), functions mostly on auto-pilot (the amount of times she eats the last of something but leaves the box it came in/was stored in for Sonic to find drives him up the wall something shocking all because she’s just vaguely thinking "I need food I suppose" alongside whatever she’s doing at the time), and if she’s working on something big she will spread herself everywhere (including Sonic’s bed if he isn’t in it or on it in some way).

Sonic won’t move out because he genuinely thinks if he did Sally would never sleep at proper hours or eat like a regular person unless he monitors her. Plus they actually really do like each other’s company and do miss one another if they aren’t in the same space in their down time. But Sonic is constantly amazed at just how much of a gremlin Sally can be and no one believes him.

- Sally takes great delight in this and amps up her gremlin behaviour because of it. If she does this in front of anyone else it just gets encouraged. It’s okay though because Sonic knows how to be a bastard so it’s a constant battle of who can out bastard or out gremlin who.

- they sleep separately (see aforementioned sleeping habits of gremlin ground squirrel), but on occasion will share a bed. Or share the couch. Sharing will almost always result in Sonic being used as a pillow/mattress but he’s fine with it, as long as it means Sally’s sleeping and they get to cuddle ‘cause cuddling is great.

- Sally loves puns. Sonic has begged her not to say puns. He secretly loves them but he hates that he gets them (temporarily forgetting your own language, then relearning it is a trip and picking up the puns does things to his head). Sally does not stop the puns. This has led to Sonic almost achieving his goal of becoming a forest cryptic as he does just start walking out when she starts.

- this is kinda canon but I like to joke that they are actually legally married and this happened during their zone-hopping adventures. But the marriage itself happened in the most mundane way for the most mundane reason, and yet it is legally binding and they do actually have wedding rings from it. They don’t wear the rings but they do carry it on their person at all times, and pull them out just to blindside people with them because it’s funny.

[struwwelzeter]

For a variety of reasons, I got into a bit of a rabbit hole about Richard's guitars, and my brain went "oh I know someone who will probably have opinions on this" so essentially, if you feel like it, pretty please talk RZK guitars to me? Favourite? Retired one that needs to come back? (Though I probably already know the answer, that fancy black one?)

Allrighty, buckle up because this is gonna be long. After much consideration I have decided to split it up in two parts because I don’t think I can make it fit into one post that is still vaguely tumblr appropriate, and I really wanted to do it some sort of justice. I still feel like I don’t. But oh well. Full disclaimer, I am NOT a guitarist, but I lived with a few, two of my best friends are pro players and I’m a sponge so I kind of soaked some bits and pieces up over the last 15 years. But in case any lost guitar hero finds this and disagrees with me over the finer points of tone wood: I know honey, I oversimplified, and I am wrong. I tried? 💜 for easier read I formatted everything specific to Richard’s guitars normally and anything general about electric guitars in cursive.

My main sources besides watching about a 100 a month of guitar tube videos (that is youtube for guitarists) with my ex, my main sources will be this interview and this.

Richard Z. Kruspe (of Rammstein and Emigrate)’s Guitars - In Order of Appearance, Part 1/2

Diamant (Les Paul Style)

“I traded the acoustic for a guitar called Diamant, which was like a Les Paul version in East Germany.” - RZK

Now I’m skipping the acoustic he started out with, because it’s basically impossible to know what that was, and go straight into the electric. Now presumably, it would have been something like this, a soviet build Les Paul rip off. The irony is that these still go for several thousands up on reverb today for being historical and collectors pieces. The thing is, that while anything east build might have used cheaper materials, I would assume this thing isn’t worse than any of the beginner/intermediate models sold today, if not better, and kids all over the world do decent stiff with those.

Something general about electric guitars is that you don’t really so much play the guitar, you play an entire system. The instrument doesn’t make the sound, it only influences it. You play a guitar - but you even more so play the amp. Which makes this a bit tricky, because an e-guitar is a slab of wood and a copper coil, and amps are way more complex. You can make the exact same guitar sound so many ways. Still - there are tendencies. The fact how and why and to which degree the shape and wood of a solid body (a guitar without a hollow wood piece) influences the sound is highly debated and can get a bit esoteric sounding to sane people non-guitarists, but there are some differences in how the general set up and build of the guitar changes things, and tendencies how they are traditionally outfitted. Les Paul style guitars are normally humbucker guitars, Stratocasters and Telecasters normally are outfitted with single coils. Usually a guitarist can switch - between using the bridge, the neck, or both (or more) pick ups and depending on where the pick up is located they pick up different frequencies, different aspects of the sound. Humbuckers produce a richer, deeper or fuller sound than single coils. Very roughly speaking, think the Stones vs. Metallica.

Fender Stratocaster

“Then in East Germany, we had this imagination to get one of the great guitars, to me it was always the Fender Stratocaster because it was the Jimi Hendrix guitar. I didn’t know anything about pickups or humbuckers or whatever. So there was this guy that I met in a café in my old hometown and he was buying all these books because he could get all the books out through customs and he would store them in my apartment. So we became kind of acquainted. He would come over and pick up the books. So one time he came over and I asked him if he could get me a guitar and bring it over. In East Germany, if you exchange money from East to West it would be like 1 East mark and 20 West mark. SO everything I had, I changed it to West Mark and I gave him the money and I gave him the money and asked him to please buy me a Fender Stratocaster. I gave him the money and I didn’t hear anything for like three months, nothing. I wasn’t able to call because we didn’t have phones and stuff like that – it was a different time. So I thought fuck, I gave him 1400 west mark and now he’s gone and never coming back. [...] Then my imagination was so high, I thought the guitar would just play by itself and I wouldn’t really have to do anything, which I found out was bullshit. I was really happy that I had the guitar but it wasn’t really the sound that I had in mind.” - RZK

The first time I heard that story, I literally went “no, no, no, don’t be stupid, don’t give him your money, you won’t even like that guitar, stupid, lost dumbass.” I can not, for the life of me, imagine him play anything other than humbuckers. He apparently does use single coils for some things today again in the studio, but still, it’s so obviously wrong. He did play one again sometime during the late 90s, but I couldn’t find anything on the pick ups he used with that, but can hardly imagine he kept the original, unless he needed it for a specific sound maybe in one or two songs. I get it though. For many, many people the Fender Stratocaster is THE guitar. Jimi Hendrix is the main reason for that, but it’s also the countless idols that picked it up after him for the same reason, people who ended up plastered on the walls of angsty teenagers in their own right. This totally has to do with the whole amp thing aswell. You see your idol play that type of guitar ... but it’s not even half of the sound, and it won’t sound the same. Maybe probably they changed the pick ups, they have an effect rig, the spend hours fiddling with the knobs on an amp you can never afford. It’s never the same. Which is why ...

Fender Telecaster Black Gold

Then I had a guitar that I was very fond of. It was an older black and gold telecaster – there weren’t very many of them made at that point. I put a Seymour Duncan Jeff Beck SH-4 in there, like a humbucker. I remember it was like my beauty guitar and I needed someone to put that pickup in and I was with Paul and he had more experience with that stuff than me so he would get out a hammer and a chisel and he start banging away on it and I was like ‘Fuck! Fuck! Don’t do that!’ but we put the thing in there and it was one of my favorite guitars” - RZK

... this one first didn’t really make sense for me for him. It’s even more a classic single coil guitar than the Strat is, and it only really started making sense for me when I learned he Paul indeed put a Humbucker in there. It’s a stunningly beautiful guitar, and weirdly non-modern for him. I don’t know why and this is completely instinctual on my part, but I find it fitting he played it during that time after the wall came down, which seems to have been a rough time for him generally, it seems like a somehow super emotional guitar, this relic. Telecasters were some of the first electrics ever build, it’s such a pioneer, but it’s also one that alot of punk bands used, possibly because they were old and cheap in the 70s and noisy and people customized it and put other pick ups in. The whole putting a chisel to it and adding a humbucker into it is such a “I’m gonna make whatever I have fit for me, and I’ll love it” move. If you look at it, a double coil pick up is really something you have to force to go in there, you really have to break it open. There is also this:

“... and then I think I had to sell it because I needed drugs or something. I was really sad that I sold it because I was at a very low point in my life.” - RZK

If I would get the chance to do one thing only for him to thank him for his music, I would go back in time to that Richard who is just sad about selling that guitar and hug him, and tell him he doesn’t need to worry, because they will name guitars after him in the future. It breaks my heart so fucking much. But of course, it’s what opens the doors to what happens next, which is ...

ESP 901

“That led me to my very first convention in Frankfurt. With guitars, it is like with women, you have to fall in love. Sometimes you get a guitar and you fall in love later but there has to be some sort of connection with it. So I was walking around that convention and I saw that guitar hanging at the ESP stand. It was a 901 ESP Sunburst and I was looking at it because it was such a beauty. And I was walking around for hours – they probably thought I was some weird guy who wants to steal the guitar. I bought that guitar and that’s how I got connected with ESP.” -RZK

He might have fallen for it because it is pretty, but it did come with a ESP double humbucker set up, with an added condensator to muffle up the sound, although not yet an active one (more on that later). It was a 90s metal guitar, one of those things marketed to the Metallica generation, something loud and heavy and full. Also, and this is where I will put in another general insert, there is something else about the choice of electric guitars that we haven’t talked about yet.

Now, I’ve discussed that you can push or pull the sound of a electric quite far in one or the other direction with what pick ups you use, what effects, what amps. But what this ignores is that especially standing up a guitar is a really shitty asymmetrical piece of equipment. And what that does to your body is that it needs to fit you, your hands, and your playing style. Some people prefer it chunky, others like sender. Guitarists, especially the 80s shredders, like to talk about a “fast neck”, which is another one of those things that get slightly esoteric, but which usually means a slimmer neck and slightly bigger frets, that need less way for your fingers to press until the string gets stopped. Someone who plays very bendy blues might dislike that and prefer something to dig in their fingers more down to the fretboard to get more control over how they bend the string. There are different neck profiles, there are different neck lengths, and all of it contributes to how comfortable someone might find their guitar.

I am mentioning this, because until today, Richard’s guitars are build very similarly to that ESP 901. His Eclipse Model is a tad different (again, more on that later), but the one he uses the most, the RZK I, has the same neck scale, similar frets, and that comfortable ESP slender neck. Even the shape seems to be inspired by turning it upside down. He has said in interviews that he hasn’t got very strong hands, and it makes perfect sense to me. I bought my own electric (again, more on that later) purely because I wanted to own one and not even so much because I ever had any real ambitions of learning to play it, but my friends at the time (10 years ago now) forced me to try out alot (!) of models (despite me knowing what I wanted), and the only guitars that I tried that had slimmer necks were Ibanez guitars, which in turn were wider. Ironically Frankfurt is my hometown, so the place to try a lot of different models is That exact convention Richard went to, and I haven’t skipped a Musikmesse in the last 15 years. I was at atleast one were Richard was too (I just didn’t care at the time, yikes), and it somehow greatly pleases me he found “his” guitar at that particular convention. Things have changed in recent years, but electric guitars always were in Hall 4.01, with ESP being left of center in the middle, and I don’t know, I can just see him walking in circles around it, and it makes me so emotional for him because it’s what musicians do at that place. It’s really loud, everyone is playing, there is someone better noodling around at every corner, and it can be quite an intimidating setting I think. And every year you see that one kid coming back and back again to that same stand, staring at that one guitar until they finally work up the nerve and ask to try it (or the staff takes pity on them and offer). And it’s the same everytime, they think “oh god they must think I am crazy” but really, nobody does. Everyone in that hall who owns a heart knows what those dreams are made of, and all it maybe does inspire is a “oh god, I hope that one makes it”. I digress. I think it’s more common now to look for different neck styles and companies started caring about it, but especially coming from Fender and Gibson guitars, that neck is honestly just very, very nice for weaker hands.

This is where I will stop, because it makes a good moment for a break and this post is honestly getting too out of hand otherwise. There will be a part 2 - where Richard starts using active pick ups, starts playing my favorite guitar in the whole wide world (and stops playing it), and finally, set up his own signature.

This is him with that 901 though: when he must have had it pretty much brandnew, while he used it, and right before he sold it.

[fallenrepublick]

We're Okay

Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4

OOPS IT'S PART THREE-

Well... not exactly. This is more like a self-indulgent bonus chapter as a break from the plot... It's just smut. Literally. If you're not into this, don't worry at all, because it has no bearing on anything, and the actual plot will pick up right from chapter two.

Warnings: General NSFW (obviously), but nothing harsh or overly kinky, pretty vanilla..., one single blood mention

Word Count: 2040

The room was already dark. True, it was quite like him to stay out for longer periods of time, standing on the balcony and looking to the sky, as if things might change if he dreamed about it long enough. And if you were so inclined, you’d join him, sliding your hand to his shoulder from behind, guiding his mind back to you the way you had done his body. His hold in return promises your success.

Yet today you find yourself pacing, stepping back and forth through the small space alone, Themis finally asleep in the room across, and you bite your lip, hating the uncertainty. The way they looked at him. Yes, you knew there would be hostility. You knew it from the moment you left Csilla. But… all of them?

Their eyes… their hands at their hips, prepared to draw a blaster at even the slightest infraction, hesitation and a softening of their features only present upon seeing you. But their attention did not shift, reason did not overtake them. It was only with their leader’s words that they stood down, albeit reluctantly.

Escaping one scrutiny, only to dive headfirst into another. If life hadn’t already been so cruel, you might have asked why. By now, though, you know better.

The door slides, shaking you from your thoughts, pulling your head back on instinct. Your arms drop from encasing your chest protectively, and you reach for your husband, who almost instantly reaches back, taking your hands in his and pressing them to his lips, as if relieved to see you after so long apart.

“What was it?” you ask him, scanning him slightly for any new injuries, despite your previous trust in the woman that led you there. “They didn’t…”

“No…” he says softly nothing but reassurance in his voice. And yet you sensed guilt. “We can stay, but… things have changed. Thrawn… has changed. I have to move against him.”

“You don’t,” you urge, taking his face in your hands gently, asking silently for his eyes to meet yours. The slight glow is a comfort, just as it always had been, and yet you can’t help but feel as if they’re dimmer, as if the lights have grown tired of shining the way they had so long ago. “You don’t have to do this. We can find somewhere else. We can leave again.”

Your fingers brush at the scar on his cheek, protective, promises of no more harm coming to him as long as you can help it. Not being able to help it might as well be your worst fear. “It won’t make any difference.” He watches as your eyes narrow, unable to release your worry for him, one that hadn’t quite gone away since the day he was back in your arms. Now, it seems, he’s only continued to put himself in harm’s way. “This is… everywhere. The galaxy itself is under this single control. There’s no escaping it unless we try to go back.” Home. Once upon a time, he would have said, “go back home.”

“I have to do this,” he continues, more sure, more certain of his future. “These people… they hunt those with the Third Sight. It’s… It’s not about them. It’s about her.”

You raise yourself up as best you can, him in turn meeting you in the middle, placing a soft kiss on his lips. “I don’t want something else happening to you,” you whisper, more afraid than you had realised. “Not after everything.”

“I swear,” he says prematurely, unable to break the habit of making promises you both know he can’t always keep. The words soothe you regardless. “We will be okay.”

How often you said that to him. We will be okay. The day you found him. Every day after. Even as he struggled, as he bled through bandages, as his chest heaved and he tried to make you leave him behind for your own sake, you still whispered into weak hands that you held tightly as if it were his very life, “We will be okay.”

And so, hands loosening, you prepare to release him, accepting it as an answer, at least for now. A soft smile on your face, a step back. It’s not a fearful silence, not like he was prepared for, but rather, one setting the unease to rest, one promising a coming of tomorrow, when perhaps you will discuss once more. But for now, “I’ll be washing up,” you say, beginning to break away, suddenly lonely at the thought of being away again, even if it were only a room over. He seemed to think the same.

His hand doesn’t quite release, leaving you standing across from him, your arms connected in a line between you, oriented as if caught in the middle of a waltz. There’s a tilt in his head when you turn back, almost a smile at the corners of his mouth, but not quite.

“Or…” you say, trying not to laugh at his ridiculousness. “You could join me?”

How you missed the laugh he gives, despite the pressure, despite this place being not entirely what you wanted, a weight is gone, expectations all but meaningless. Already, your heart skips the way it did when you met him.

“Well, if you insist,” he smiles crookedly, happily following as you all but drag him out to the smaller room, less extravagant than you were used to, though he wouldn’t have it any different.

Impatient as ever, his lips are already at your neck, slow presses and warm breath sending chills through you, his hands working at the layers you wear. You tug at his clothes just the same, allowing this sudden, unrelenting need for him control your actions, the feeling of going so long without him all but blocking out any other reason.

And your hands find his hair, sliding out the tie at the end of his braid, brushing through the new waves that no doubt would be washed away moments after hitting the water. It matters little, he knows, strands falling over his shoulders, smiling into the kiss he plants on your own lips. You quite like it that way.

Clothes litter the floor haphazardly, his touch becoming more urgent, more desperate, refusing to stop even as he leads you backwards beneath the running water. The warmth hits all at once, sliding over your skin, his touch even smoother, obscured by the steam raising around your bodies. He holds at your waist, doing everything he can to press himself to you, not a breadth of space between you.

“I know… I know it’s only been a few days…” he sighs, more so to himself as he tries and fails to reason out his desperation, having moved himself much further down to reach your chest. He melts for a moment in the soft whimpers you give as he lightly sucks at your skin. “But gods I’ve needed you… I’ll always need you.”

It’s as if he’s trying to catch you off-guard, quickly slipping his hand down between your legs, the reward to your anticipation sending you further backwards, finally against the icy wall, unsure if the shaking in your legs is from the stone, Thrass, or a little bit of both. Yet he isn’t one to keep you waiting, his free hand dragging paths across your skin knowing by heart the exact places that make you sigh and gasp for him, the last instrument in the universe he can still play.

And you hold to his neck, desperate for something to ground you as he rubs and plays with your clit, low hums of laughter following every sudden sound you make when he changes his style. Fingers run over his pale scars, the lines almost reminiscent of lightning spread over the contours of his body, many of them coming to meet at his waist, a harsh reminder of what might have been. You touch them anyways, kisses following the tracks, as goddesses bestow blessings to those who’ve given so much, and he holds each as their own reward, remembering that each one is a bit of your heart made to fill the gaps that still keep him from being whole. One day, perhaps, you might bring him all together.

Pulling his hand slowly away, ignoring your breath of displeasure at being left so, he instead guides your legs further apart, holding to the bottom of your thigh as it follows his lead around his waist. His voice is at your neck again, hot breath enough to rival the warmth of the water still gracing your bodies.

“I’ll be gentle,” he assures, barely in a whisper, if even there at all. He enters you slowly, a gradual movement promising that you feel every bit of it as he goes, sliding into you easily, his very existence designed solely to be yours in every moment now, as well as after. Each second he takes is a new wave of pleasure, another moan, another cry of his name, one after the other becoming louder, echoing in the otherwise empty chamber.

He’s done so little, yet you find yourself begging already, “Please, please don’t stop,” as if you were in any danger of being left unsatisfied. But no, it isn’t in his nature to do such things, and he begins the moment you say it, his hips rolling painfully slowly into you, deliberate and intoxicated by how tight you are around him. His own soft moans are like a song in your ear, interrupted every so often by a whimper of your name and muffled by more kisses onto your jawline.

Soon enough, the need only becomes worse, every inch of your body growing tense, pulling him closer to you, wanting more than what you have.

“Gods, you’re so beautiful,” he still says, breath short and strained, “I need you, I need you, my love,” is all he manages to say, likely, all he knows. He obliges a request you didn’t need to make, moving to the rhythm he knows you love, your heart racing faster than you can measure, beats he can feel against him as he holds you. You shake and tremble as you reach your edge, your legs curling so tightly around him that there’s barely enough opportunity for him to continue, and yet he does, pushing you through your climax, cursing under his breath as you cum together, your cries surely loud enough to be heard from at least the hallway. All evidence of your time washes away with the flow of the water, yet he still holds to you, remaining connected these last few moments, unable to let go just yet.

The heaving of his chest slows, practically willing your own to follow suit, a confident embrace protecting you the way he always hoped, only loosening later on, allowing your feet to touch the floor lightly. Your hands cradle the sides of his face, watching relief form so clearly as he continues to gaze at you. It’s so odd, he surely still thinks, that you love him so. That he can still do such things for you, that over all the scars, all the pain you see in him, you love him above such things, and he in turn can still touch you, can still love you the way he always had. The kiss you give is small, only barely there, and yet placed as if to seal away a letter sent to a lover far off, and he knows, running a warm towel over your hair, across your damp skin, that you haven’t left.

Your hands intertwine, now mostly dry, your forehead pressed to his for the moment just before you dress. And he smiles, every bit of contact a gift he’s learned to hold to as if it were the last. A touch on the small of your back, and a quiet sigh. If anyone had seen, they might have said it was a conversation all its own. You know you have to part, rest for the day to come, but there’s so much to think, so much to feel. In the silence of it all, you whisper to him, to only him,

“We’re okay.”

[ruzek-halstead]

relight that spark ✨

prologue 

pairing: luke patterson x julie molina

a modern day adaptation of the classic ‘cinderella’ tale.

high school au based off ‘a cinderella story’.

series masterlist || masterlist || ao3

warnings: fluffery, swearing

join my taglist here (or leave a comment to be tagged for this story only :)

i want you all to bear with me because this chapter isn't very exciting (with the exception of juke's text messages) but i think it's very necessary for background information. especially if you haven't watched the original movie!!

as you all know, this story is based off the 2004 classic 'a cinderella story' featuring hilary duff and chad michael murray. this is one of my favourite films, so i do urge you all to give it a watch! this fic is obviously not going to be exact to the movie, but it will follow generally the same storyline, but in a more modern sense.

✨

Julie Molina was a simple girl. All she really wanted was to get accepted into the Berklee College of Music, graduate high school and make enough money to move out and afford tuition. It wasn't an easy feat, but it's what she had been working for since her father passed away eight years ago. Her life used to be fantastic. Julie was still young when her mom passed away from cancer, and the memories she did have of her were slightly clouded and slowly fading away. But she remembered that she was one of the most gentle souls ever. She remembered her soft voice when she sang her to sleep every night, but one night, she wasn't there anymore. Julie never heard her mom's voice again. But her dad never let her forget anything. The memory of Rose Molina was alive and well in the Molina household, and at the family diner Ray owned, Mel's. He had inherited it from his father, and every day, he worked tirelessly to turn it into a feel-good family diner where everyone felt welcome and at home. After Rose passed, it was where Julie spent most of her time. Her dad was always busy with work, so she tagged along, but she never minded because the staff was her family. Her Tia Victoria worked there as the boss behind the boss, and she always made time to help Julie with her homework. Julie did everything at the diner. Holidays, birthdays, you name it. It was her home away from home; a place where she felt utterly safe and accepted. Until one day, she didn't. Mel's provided her the warmth and familiarity she lacked in her true home ever since her mom passed away. But the day Karen Fields walked through the door, slipped on a puddle and fell into Ray Molina's arms, that feeling was stripped away and never returned. Her father and Karen dated for a few months, and before Julie knew it, they were booking venues, cake tasting and dress shopping. Her father was getting married. Julie had never gotten the warmest of vibes from Karen, only when her father was around. But she was young, and she didn't know any better, and she couldn't tell her father that this was a terrible decision. She saw him happy, she saw him smiling, and she couldn't take that away from him. So, they got married, and shortly thereafter, Karen and her two twin daughters were moving into their Los Angeles home. Karen's daughters, Jade and Sophia, were not friendly in the slightest. They never went out of their way to include Julie in any activities, and completely ignored her at school, even though they were in the same grade. Julie didn't care much about that. She couldn't be bothered with mean girls like them, and plus, she already had the only friend she'd ever need. Julie met Flynn Anderson on the first day of kindergarten. It was quite hard to not notice the five-year-old yelling at another five-year-old because he had stepped on her brand new white sneakers. Even though her screaming was driving everyone away, Julie thought it was funny, so she went to join her at the sandbox. Ever since that day, the two had been inseparable. It also wasn't the last time Flynn yelled at obnoxious boys who unnerved her. Flynn kept Julie sane throughout the death of her mom, the transition with Karen and her family, and the worst event of all; the unexpected death of her father. She didn't see it coming, none of them did. One night Julie's dad was tucking her in and reading her a bedtime story, but then the ground started shaking and everything fell off the shelves. Her dad pulled her into the corner for safety, but Karen's screaming caught his attention and he had to leave her. She still had nightmares of their last few moments together, when he squeezed her hand before running out of the room. That was the last time she ever saw her father. Her young life only went downhill from there. According to the lawyers, there was no will left behind. This meant everything her father ever owned was left to Karen; that included his house, his money, his diner and Julie. If Julie thought Karen didn't like her before, she knew with one-hundred percent certainty that her presence was more like a burden now. Tia Victoria tried to fight for custody, because she never believed her brother-in-law would leave Julie in the hands of anyone else, but the courts disagreed and there was nothing else she could do about it. Julie was banished to the attic, and all house-duties were dumped on her. She was in charge of dishes, laundry, cleaning the entire house. On top of that, as soon as she was of legal age to work, Karen demanded she work at the diner to cover her expenses. Julie really had no other option, and although she hated it at the beginning, she realized the silver lining. Working at the diner meant she would spend time with her Tia Victoria and the rest of the staff that she loved, and she could also make her own money so she could move out, pay tuition and leave this life behind. That was what her life consisted of for now. She had her mind set on the music school of her dreams and she was working day and night so she could afford it. She went to school throughout the day, worked at the diner after school, and finished household chores after her shift. It didn't leave her much time to focus on her music, which at the end of the day was okay, because she didn't like to work on her music around her step-mother and step-sisters. They didn't understand, and they were cruel, so the less they knew about it, the better. It was also okay because Julie hadn't been able to publicly perform since her father passed away. When her mom passed, she left dozens of songs for Julie so she wouldn't give up music; it was her father that encouraged her to keep going, even at a young age. But with him gone, a piece of her went with him and she couldn't find it in herself to sing in front of others when he wasn't here to watch her. She kept her musical talents on the down low; only her Mel's family and Flynn truly knew what she was capable of with a piano and a microphone. That was until one day she received a text message from an unknown number. It started out innocent, crossed wires based on a flyer she put up three years ago to make some extra money. She didn't think any of those flyers were still around; they were unbelievably basic, with just her phone number and rate for piano lessons. Even though she didn't know this stranger and their first conversation was a tad bit rocky, for some reason, she felt comfortable talking to them. One day they started, and it just didn't stop. 

That was how they met. She was expecting the conversation to end after she told them she wasn’t offering lessons anymore (she can’t even begin to explain how they found one of her flyers in the first place), but whoever they were, they were incredibly persistent. They were slightly charming, and for some reason, Julie found herself opening up and revealing things about herself only a limited number of people knew about her. She couldn’t explain the instant connection. She would honestly sound crazy if she tried. And even after she spilled her guts out, and it was well into the night, she was surprised to see another message the following morning. So, they kept talking; night and day, they talked about anything and everything. Julie never asked who they were; she never asked for their identity because the mystery was intriguing, and she really didn’t want to reveal her own. All she knew is that they were a senior at her high school and identified as male; she knew he was in a band and he played many instruments and sang a bit. Julie only told him the same amount of information; that she was also a senior and identified as female. Throughout their constant virtual interactions, they started revealing more and more about themselves. From their first conversation, Julie told him all about the death of her mom, and how that influenced her music career. She decided not to tell him about her father's death right away, because she did remember he was a total stranger and who knew if she could even trust him? She revealed that something traumatic had happened and her music was temporarily put on hold as she worked on herself. But through time, he opened up to her as well, and eventually, she let him into to all the details. He revealed to her that his parents were dead set on him pursuing other endeavours, including a full scholarship to Stanford University. However, that wasn't what he wanted to do. He wanted to purse his music and his band, and when he mentioned Berklee College of Music, Julie knew there was no forgetting they had ever met. She was locked in. Their conversations started simple, more like venting sessions. But overtime, they became random, about anything and everything. And to a certain extent, they became a tad flirty. Julie was no expert in the romance department, by any means. With all the tragic events in her life, romantic partners had been the furthest thing from her mind. But sometimes she got a real flirty vibe that she couldn't deny. And even when she wasn't sure, she'd show the messages to Flynn, who, with an eye roll, assured her he was definitely trying to flirt. It made her extremely nervous at first, but then she realized, she had nothing to lose. This was all virtual, they didn't know each other's identities; he couldn't hurt her. But Julie didn't like to refer to him as some random number in her contacts. As much as she didn't necessarily want to put a face to the number, she needed at least a name, or even a pseudonym. When he asked for an example, Julie suggested he refer to her as 'Dahlia' as that was her mother's favourite flower and she had an emotional attachment to it. He had made a lame joke about being able to top that but ultimately he chose 'Charming'. Julie had made the mistake of telling him he was charming once, and he still hadn't let it go. This was the ultimate power move to make sure she never forgot it; but secretly, she loved it. 

And so, that's how it went. Sometimes they talked about serious things, like their future at university, and sometimes it was simpler things. Julie liked to argue because her sassiness would have it no other way; Charming could give it right back to her, ensuring it was never a dull conversation.

When Julie wasn't working, studying, or working on her music, she was talking to Charming. It was enough for her, for now. She was just trying to get through senior year quietly, by doing what was expected of her and making as much money as she could to get the hell out of there. But she should have expected that things wouldn't go that smoothly; they never had for her before. This is the story of Julie Molina and her Prince Charming, and everything in between. 

✨ 

i was super unsure about this chapter because it wasn't that exciting and then i realized i could probably just use it as an prologue or something for some background information, so i hope it was enough.

i'm really excited to get into the nitty gritty of this story, so i really hope you all enjoyed this enough to follow along! i'm not sure how many chapters this will be yet, i'm thinking at least four/five with everything i have planned???

stay safe, thanks for reading!!

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[the-young-and-forgotten]

Chapter 1 - The Arrival

| masterlist |

A/N: this is set at the start of the marauders 6th year

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With a clap of thunder and a single flash of lightning, four boys fell directly from the sun, slamming onto the concrete ground beneath them. 

As their backs hit the pavement, their mind whirled through memories that weren’t their own. A castle up on a rocky cliff, rooms full of magical equipment, a forest with danger at every turn and a fiery redheaded girl that made James blush.

Groaning, they all picked themselves up, dusting their clothes off.  Peter shielded his eyes and looked up at the sun, grumbling “Why did they have to go and drop us from the fucking sky?” Remus opened his mouth to respond but something hot and soft started falling from the clouds. 

James held out his palm to the sky and watched as a burning piece of ash floated down onto his open palm. He studied it, visibly confused. “The sky is.. raining fire?”  “Nah mate” Sirius said with his arms outstretched, head tilted towards the sky “The worlds shuddering at the weight of our power” At that, the other boys started to spin in the fiery rain, laughing as they caught the embers on the tip of their tongues. 

Unbeknownst to them, an old man had heard their laughter and was walking up to them, smiling softly. “So you must be the fallen gods” he stated bluntly, capturing their attention. A flash of panic flitted across the boys’ faces as they searched for an excuse. “Oh no,” James said quickly, leaning against Remus’ shoulder. The boy in question had just started picking the flowers out of his hair, which was not helping to sell their lie. “We are just four normal boys casually dancing in the burning rain.” The man laughed, looking at them with a twinkle in his eye. “I do not think I am mistaken, Hecate told me you would be coming soon.” Peter scoffed, “Psh Hecate. You should never trust the goddess of…..” He paused at this, looking at James in wonder who was waving his arms around haphazardly. Realising his mistake, he tried his best to backtrack.  “Wait I mean, who's Hecate? She sounds dumb.” 

Right at that moment, one too many ashes had landed on Sirius’ skin, activating his flames.  With a big flash, he turned into a humanoid fire. The flames gradually subdued, leaving a sooty boy who looked at his hands in shock before turning his gaze to blood brothers, eyes wide. “That wasn’t supposed to happen..”  James’ shoulders slumped, running a hand down his face as Peter ducked down to hide his grin. Remus finally looked up from picking out the flowers from his hair that now lay in a pile around his feet. Dumbledore raised his eyebrows at him. “That uh.. That doesn’t happen often...” he explained, shaking his head at what a mess they all were. 

“Would you like to take a walk?” Dumbledore inquired. They slouch after him, visibly relieved that he didn’t question their insanity further.

They walked in silence for a few minutes before Dumbledore spoke up. “Are you boys familiar with… the tale of the Children of Hecate? It’s an old one.” Sirius laughed harshly at this “dude, we are a thousand years old we know all sorts of tales you couldn’t even dream up.” “You never answered my question young god.” “No… we aren’t” Dumbledore smiled, pulling out his wand. “I thought not.” He waved about his wand and silver mist broke out of the end, morphing into people, animating the story being told.

“A long time ago, there was a woman.  Cast out by the gods from helping out a paranoid mother, she, like you today, fell from the sky in a blaze of burning rain. Filled with hate and grief, she vowed to anger the gods in any way possible. For a hundred years she wandered this earth aimlessly, occasionally accompanied by Thanatos who came to reap the mortal souls. One day, she stumbled across seven mortals, cowering at the feet of Death, begging for life. Now, this woman had traveled among us, watching all our struggles and misery. Listening to our heartbreak and treachery. She took pity on these mortals and stepping from the shadows for the first time in a century, she addressed the seven. Pushing past Thanatos, she knelt to their level and placed a hand on the cheek of the child in front of her. Smiling kindly, she knew what to do to help them and fulfill her vow.  Reaching inside of her core, she drew out seven silver wisps. Weaving it around the mortals in front of her. “Upon you I bestow the power of the gods,” she whispered, transforming into her godly form. “Follow the path this shows you and life will come.” As the mortals scampered away, hands smoking and eyes dancing, Thanatos turned to her furious. From then on, Hecate was forced to spend the rest of her immortality guiding demigods, gods and mortals along the three crossroads. The mortals she blessed, though some may say cursed, used the powers how their minds begged them too, some for good, some for evil. But the magic went on, passed from generation to generation, family to family and will do so forever. Among all these powerful witches and wizards, as we call ourselves, were two men and two women. Born with magic unrivalled by anyone but Hecate herself.  They drew together and formed a school now known as ‘Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry’.  From then onwards, magical folk have been taught, honing their abilities to perfection. Carrying out the vow Hecate made many eons ago.” 

The boys were speechless. Remus pointed to Dumbledore then his wand and back again. “So you’re…” “Yes” Dumbldore answered, turning towards them and giving a short little bow, “I am a descendant of Hecate.” “And you want us at this school of yours?” “With Hecate's blessing, yes.” 

Peter cuts ahead of his friends, raising his hand. “Interjection! How the hell are we supposed to get magic powers?”  Dumbledore smiles at him and holds his hand. “If you four trust me, I will take you to where everything will be revealed.” The godlings look at each other before holding onto the man in question, watching as he whispers something, waving his wand around.

The boys feel a tug on their abdomen and gasped as the world around them blurs, like they are on a moving train. They felt themselves morph, as if they were travelling through time. Their very fibre being pulled and torn. Before long, the scenery around them started to solidify, changing into a strange room with silver instruments and hundreds of portraits everywhere. “What the FUCK was that.” Sirius shouted from a pile of broken items he had staggered into, being vulgar as always.  Dumbledore merely dusted himself off and fixed his robe before moving behind the desk. “That, dear boy, was a form of magical travel called apparition.”  Peter lay on the floor, gasping for breath. “I think I prefer falling from the sky.”  “And I prefer lying on a couch throwing grapes at the nymphs.” James groaned, stretching out his back.

“So magical powers?” Remus asked, walking up to Dumbledore's desk as his friends gazed at him in shock, wondering how he could be fine after that supposed ‘hell’ they just went through. “Ah yes!” Dumbledore clapped his hands together, reaching into a drawer just behind his desk. Out of the drawer he pulled four glasses filled to the brim with grey smoke.  “Within these glasses contain the exact wisps Hecate used to infuse those seven mortals with magic. Take this and it shall do the same.” “I’ll drink to that.” Says Sirius, pushing past Remus and picking up a glass. 

In one go he downs it, smiling devilishly. “See men? All fi-” Suddenly, Sirius’ face freezes in a half smile as his hands fly up to throat. He falls to his knees, coughing horribly, eyes glowing silver. His whole body twitching uncontrollably.  As quickly as it started, it was over. He lay there gasping, trying to formulate a sentence. “That was delicious…” he wheezed “110% recommend you give it a go.”

After seeing what happened to Sirius, the other boys were more hesitant to take even a sip.  But one encouraging smile from Dumbledore made them drink it, going through the same process as their blood brother. 

When they had finally recovered from the side effects of the potion, Dumbledore was reading through a small scroll covered in glyphs. “I just need to ask your four a question in order to secure your stay here at Hogwarts. Now this may feel extremely unnatural, since I am jogging memories that don’t actually exist.” 

He looked up from the paper, his eyes holding that twinkle they had seen before.  “Boys, what house were you sorted into six years ago?” The godlings felt their soul pulse for a second and their mouths fell open of its own accord.  A movie tape started running through their mind, twisted and slightly burning. Back and forth it ran, so fast everything was a blur of colours.  Finally, it landed on a vision of their younger selves sitting on a stool in front of hundreds as a hat screamed out something. The boys on the stools were faceless and the edges of their bodies were blurred, as if someone had edited them into a scene. They felt something invisible reach towards the memory and rip it out of the tape, forming it into words. Speaking together, they all said “Gryffindor.” 

Their souls pulsed once more, and they were brought back to reality, grabbing their heads and groaning. “I swear if we have to go through that everytime we remember some pointless memory-” Sirius spat, grabbing at his hair like he was trying to rip the headache out. “No, do not worry, Sirius. This should be the last time it will happen. You will feel dizzy and weird when experiencing a memory though, since they were forcibly planted into your mind.” 

“That reminds me,” Remus interrupted, wincing as he stood up “How come we aren’t going dizzy from the sight of you? Something tells me we should know you even though we don’t .”  Dumbledore laughed “My, aren’t you inquisitive?”  “That's Remus for you.” said Peter smiling fondly at the boy in question. “Has to know everything about a subject the moment he finds out about it.”  Remus made a face at him before turning back to Dumbledore, eyes hopeful.  Dumbledore smiled kindly at him and continued. “That’s because I personally asked the gods not to include me in your implanted memories. I would prefer to get to know you as the boys you are now. Not what fake scenarios portray you as.”

The godlings look at each other, questions of trust in their eyes.  Taking the first leap of faith, James extended his hand for Dumbledore to shake. “You have left a good impression on us sir. You have earned our trust.” Delighted, Dumbledore shook his hand, once again smiling kindly at them all. “Now, I must show you to your dormitories…”

“No need Sir.” Sirius said, finally standing up. “We can get there just fine.”  They turned to leave, heading for the office door. Dumbledore cocked an eyebrow at their departing figures. “You may get lost” 

James stopped by the door just as the others went through, chuckling.  Turning around he winked at Dumbledore.  “That’s the thing about us chaos gods.” He said, grinning mischievously.  “We have impeccable navigational skills.”

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