#“I go no-contact sometimes” yeah that probably includes blocking everyone doesn’t it and would explain the situation perfectly

[fandomsoda]

Realizing something about a situation that definitely is the most reasonable explanation and was clarified to me a while beforehand. Sure there are what-ifs and it could actually be worse than I think now but tbh it’s probably not and I’ve probably been overreacting god kill me

[an-anxious-gay-mess]

Here's my headcanons of what neurodivergencies the lab rats (and leo) would have if I had been allowed to write this show

Adam: 

-ADHD and Dyslexia  

-"What do you mean the letters aren't supposed to move around?"

 "Uh" 

"Are you telling me most people don't have to read the same paragraph six times???" 

"Uh-"

 - After he got diagnosed he actually became a bit more interested in learning! It helps that most people are actually working with him now instead of just reassuring him that he's dumb -Chase especially feels really bad for teasing him so much without realizing how hard Adam had to try and researches ways to help people like him study 

-Adam still doesn't go out of his way to do well though, he's fine as long as he's passing his classes 

- is almost never standing still. He loves swivel chairs and will spend hours just spinning back and forth completely zoned out before he realizes he should probably eat something that day  

-the only time you'll see him completely still is when he's sleeping or super upset about something. He gets RSD pretty bad sometimes and will just shut down completely when upset

Chase 

-Autism, baby!! 

-Gets really bad sensory overload and has a lot of meltdowns if he gets too overwhelmed 

-he gets frustrated with himself a lot when he gets sensory overload and will try to ignore it, which usually makes it worse 

-He has a lot of stims but he typically will only do the more visual ones when he feels safe (mostly when he's alone or with his family if he knows they won't make fun of him) 

-Just. Constant info dumping. If you're going to start a conversation with him make sure you have at least 15 spare minutes to learn about the history of needle work (or whatever he's been researching that week)

-hates eye contact but will force himself for the sake of being Professional, to the point where he makes himself do more destructive stims (like pulling at his hair) or even having a meltdown

-(his family yells at him for doing this A Lot "Chase please just put on the goddamn headphones why do you do this to yourself-") 

-he was kind of embarrassed about being autistic at first and still tries to hide it most of the time to prevent people from bullying him about it, but after a while he learns to accept that it's not his fault people want to be dicks, and that autism isn't something to be ashamed of

Bree:

-dyslexia and anxiety 

-She's the one I have the least amount of headcanons for whoops-

-i think unlike Adam she's really embarrassed about being dyslexic and goes out of her way to avoid talking about it

-this is partially because of her anxiety too: she doesn't want to bother her teachers or anyone so she never mentions anything about getting accommodations 

-because of this she struggles a lot in some of her classes, but she spends a lot of time worrying about them and studying too

-she's had a lot of panic attacks at 3 am over trigonometry 

-after a while of her grades getting worse the school guidance counselor probably pulls her aside and is like "you know we can give you extra time to do tests right?" And basically gets her all the accommodations she needs 

-Bree is like "wow glad I spent 2 years building that 5 minute conversation up in my head and making myself worry so much I threw up multiple times" 

-she generally tries to not let anxiety control her too much, and once she gets some help from her teachers she gets way fewer panic attacks over school work

-she even tries to over compensate by trying to appear like nothing worries her even though Everything does

-she hates when her brother's occasionally go on missions without her (like if she's sick or injured), and her anxiety will scream at her the whole time they're gone

-they're always willing to reassure her that they're okay, though, and will even update her over headsets when they can 

-she also worried a lot that people around her are secretly mad at her or don't like her. Her family is usually willing to reassure her that they love her, but it does tend to put a strain on relationships she forms outside of them 

-also I think part of the reason she latches onto texting so much (besides the stereotypical Teenage Girl thing) is because spell check is a godsend 

Leo

-OCD and autism 

-tasha: uh hey buddy what are you doing?

6 year old leo: idk stacking these blocks 

Tasha: oh, okay, why don't we work together to make a big tower?

Leo: no. There must be Exactly Six blocks in each tower 

Tasha: okay buddy that's great :)

-the lab rats are initially very confused by some of his rituals 

-for example: when he turned the lights in a room on or off, he had to flick the switch 5 times. Or at night, he had to check to make sure the door was locked three times 

-they asked him if that was something that most people did in the outside world, and he explained to them what OCD was, and eventually told them about a bunch of other neurodivergences

-"wait so you said you have something called autism too?"

"Yeah, it's what makes me do that thing where I flap my hands sometimes. A lot of people with autism will know a lot of stuff about a few specific topics and will hate eye contact and other people touching them, but everyone is different"

Chase: "tell me more right now."

-that's how they end up getting diagnosed too!

-Leo tells them about different disorders (including ones they don't have) and they immediately launch onto the feeling of Are You Telling Me Other People Do This?

-they go to Big D about it and he's pretty accepting right away 

-they debate a lot at first whether they want to get professionally diagnosed, but then they decide that it would be a lot easier to get accommodations at school with a doctor backing them up

-where was I going with this I'm completely spiraling

[bokunoheroanalysisforthefuture]

Horikoshi: This will probably not be super popular, but it’ll be fun!

Us: Oh, well that sounds nice!

Us, 290 chapters later: This Isn’t Fun Anymore Horikoshi

Horikoshi: :)

Anyways, welcome to the beginning of - hopefully - a long term and engaging project. I am basically aware of all of canon, and am up to date with the manga, but I haven’t actually read from the beginning of the series, and I’ve only watched the series up to the Deku v Todo fight in the sports festival. However, I’ve been curious as to how the manga portrays stuff that I’ve seen in anime gif form, and so I figured, hey, make this a project!

If you have questions or anything, the ask box is open for now. Meanwhile, I am going to head into the first chapter proper!

[No. 1 - Izuku Midoriya: Origin]

Wow, you’d almost think this kid would grow up to be a villain or something, with that kind of attitude, huh? No way that this kind of attitude would ever come to bite him in the ass and force him to reevaluate his entire character and kickstart his character development.

(Before you say anything, I like Katsuki as a character, but DAMN did he have to do a lot of growing up. I suppose when one is at the bottom, the only way to go is up… unless you have a pickaxe.)

One thing I actually noticed right away, and I dunno how much it’s used in other manga (seeing as I currently am not reading any other manga and the last ones I read were… a long while ago…) is the shape of the text boxes in order to convey emotion! It’s actually hella neat and a little detail I wouldn’t think about adding if I were in his position (not that I can draw all that well, but that’s not my point). You can practically hear the warbling in Izuku’s tone and the rougher edges in Katsuki’s!

(Also, question for the English sub while we’re at it, why the fuck does Katsuki sound like he’s a goddamned adult when he’s fourteen. What the fuck.)

Interesting little thing here, Katsuki not actually using his quirk here against Izuku; his hand is trailing smoke from his explosion, but it’s not a direct burn wound. Not that he should be doing this at all, but with the number of fics I see where Katsuki literally gives Izuku second or third degree burns, I think this is a reminder that canon Katsuki has some modicum of restraint, even this early.

Before I forget, hello winged kid who definitely has no plot significance whatsoever. No siree.

(If you are new to the manga/show and are reading this as among your first introductions to the fandom, first off, I am so sorry. Secondly, expect me to be… definitely making a lot of sarcastic quips to things in the future.)

Onto the second/third page, which is supposed to be a full spread, but is split up into two pages on the online reading site. RIP, but I will not complain about free access to the whole manga. 

Lookit this green bean. I love him so much. I can’t wait for him to suffer.

Izuku: wait, what?

Anyways, a few things to note:

Who the fuck is this guy? I looked into the wiki but he apparently doesn’t warrant a page or even a mention as one of the background faces of the series, but look at that fucking claw, man! And those boots and jets! He’s very obviously themed after a baseball catcher, so I’m going to guess that he has some kind of quirk that deals with either drawing projectiles to him, or perhaps in throwing projectiles… in either case, it’d be something like Snipe’s quirk, so maybe this is his less howdy-happy sibling.

Oh right, the chapter. The other heroes we see on the scene in this two-page spread are Death Arms, Air Jet, and Kamui Woods. 

Also, something I want to point out that I’m sure others have but just struck me while looking at this spread - multiple people are recording / taking pictures of this. I wonder if part of the reason for the villain industry to be as strong as it is is because the villains, even if they know they’ll lose, still get their own sort of fame in being in the news? That… might explain a lot about how there can be enough villains to even run an entire damn industry.

(Well, that and a lot of sociopolitical commentary on BNHA society, but we don’t need to get into that now. Maybe wait two hundred or so chapters first.)

Not gonna lie, I had to double take because I was like ‘wait, what is Ochako doing here?’ but then I realized it was just a random civilian; she doesn’t have those side bangs Ochako does. But now I almost wonder what sort of world we could have had, if they’d met a bit earlier.

Onto the fifth page (fourth is just a filler page, nothing on it), and we get treated to this gem:

Tag yourself I’m the guy who’s slackjawed because his kid is fucking glowing.

The first four examples of quirks shown in this flashback are the luminescence, telekinesis, ice, and that flame-headed(?) mutation. Of them, we actually see hints to the fact that quirks have drawbacks, as the girl with ice is drawn with the same frostbite backlash as Shouto, while the flame-headed kid is… well, I have no idea, but they do not look to be happy.

Also, I love the nod Hori does to the heroes of our era as silhouettes! This is just more evidence to me, along with the fact that the first quirked kid is born and presented in a modern hospital, that this series takes place sometime in the future. I… even calculated the years it could technically be, based on information we get in a few chapters, but I’ll save that for then.

Onto the sixth page! A nice shot of Kamui Woods getting into position, and man is that giant quirk unnerving.

What the fuck is with those feet, Hori. Those aren’t feet.

Next we see how the crowds are reacting, basically with no panic or concern. One guy is just casually letting his boss know he’ll be getting in late. And Backdraft! That is some serious water manipulation, but it seems like it has to be the water they’re in contact with? Also, is it just me or is that a portable pressure hose on their back?

And of course, Izuku being excited over hero stuff, as one does. He’s so babey faced, going back to current chapters after this is gonna be fucking wild.

Onto the seventh page, and here we are with the ‘you’re pure evil’ speech to someone who’s… just a robber. Seriously, dude? I get that you’re still fairly new to the scene (I think he might not be from a hero high school, but a late join program, but that’s another post), but like. You can’t just call random people ‘pure evil’ and correlate petty crime with like, actual mass murderers, or else people might start to see things in black and white and, you know, create the idea of ‘villainous people’ and so push even more innocents down the path of desperation and criminality.

Wait, sociopolitics later. Izuku being a hero fanboy now. Even able to utter Kamui’s attack call as he’s calling it out, with some seriously cool visual effects-

And on the eighth page, we have Mt. Lady crash the scene. Literally. She just fucking shows up outta nowhere and fucking leaps up and delivers a kick right to the villain’s chin, throwing him back through the train bridge wall and sending debris down to the ground below. Sure hope there weren’t civilians there!

Also, hello to that random guy on the roof watching this. I think in Smash they made that guy her manager or something.

I love how Izuku and the other guy are like ‘what the fuck’ while the press just shows up out of nowhere and is like. Hyperfocused on her. (I’ve heard some issues with the portrayal of media/reporters in the series, but since I have no experience with that sort of thing, I can’t say much on it.)

The last panel of this page shows that, fortunately, there were no civilians on that part of the street (even though it being rush hour and the huge crowds on the other side of the bridge should have suggested otherwise… but what do I know?)

With page nine, we get to see our first case of villain apprehension, which to note does not include any sort of quirk suppressors. Because those don’t exist. Otherwise Aizawa and the Eight Precepts’ erasure bullets would not be such huge deals to everyone. I mean yikes, though, the guy is fucking muzzled. And you can see the damage done by Mt. Lady in the background, both physical and emotional. Not to mention…

What the fuck is that face.

But yeah, this notes that performance in heroics determines not only what they’re paid by the government, but also how much fame they get. No way a system like this could backfire in any capacity, right? Right? (cough).

I love how Hori uses Izuku’s muttering habit as the border for the text bubble when the kid zones into his little world. Also, gigantification is noted to be a common and strong quirk, so we really should see more OCs with size altering quirks in fics in the future, you hear me? Honestly, with it being common, I would almost expect there to be entire buildings, or maybe even neighborhoods / blocks dedicated to catering to size shifters… wonder what those places look like.

Also aww, the guy saying good luck on the heroics dream to Izuku and Izuku just sparkling. What a cutie. Can’t wait for him to suffer. :D

Izuku: No seriously, what-

Anyways, I’m cutting off here since we then transition into the next ‘scene’ and this is a long chapter - 55 pages! Besides, this has already surpassed 1700 words, I don’t need to ramble on too long in one post. 

Lemme know what you think, and I’ll be back with more soon!

[writersplight]

sometimes life’s a bitch and then you keep living.

Connie remembered everything about that night.  It was raining, and it was late. About two in the morning. The car was stuffy, but he didn’t want to be anywhere else. His girlfriend and childhood friend, Sasha, was silent. It was weird, because she usually picked him up blasting music and having something to say. But tonight—that night—she had nothing to say to them. Usually the cliffside view was beautiful for a sunset, and they’d hold hands and laugh until they decided they were tired enough to go home. It would be hours at a time. Sometimes, they’d buy McDonald’s and rant about the world, sitting on the car hood with just each other. 

“School starts up again next week,” she started, quietly, her eyes on the wheel.  “Yeah. Spring break was not long enough—”  “It never is for you,” she snorts, and he rolls his eyes. She was right. No matter how long the break, Connie always complained about school. It’s not totally his fault that he feels stupid in every class he has; even the one he gets B’s in. Sasha wasn’t like that in all her classes, she excelled in science and math, and even though her mind was dead by the time she got to English, she still did well. Intellectually, she was superior. He didn’t mind—he was too preoccupied celebrating her academic achievements to compare himself to her.  “Yeah. I’m not a fan of—”  “It’s still raining. . .” It’s weird that he never got to finish his sentence. Maybe she was afraid he’d say something to make her stay. Not that he would have. “Nothing good ever happens when it rains.”  She started the car again, and Connie, who was trying to figure out why his heart was starting to sink, kept quiet. He was never quiet. He always had something to fill the silence with. He wanted to tell her about his parent’s divorce, but he couldn’t he couldn’t find the words. It wasn’t the time.  As they pulled up to his lawn, the rain started to come down harder, and everything finalized in his mind.  “Who is it?” he asked, quietly, finally getting his one sentence in. Sasha grips the steering wheel tightly, but she was glad he got the memo—they were breaking up. She already soft-blocked him from all her social media, but he wouldn’t know that until morning. “Niccolo,” she finally says, and he nods. He knows of him. Blonde VoTech student, succeeding in the culinary field. Of course that would win over the brunette—the way to her heart is through her stomach.  He swallowed dryly.  “See you at school?” he wouldn’t meet her eyes, hand on the car door.  “Oh, Connie. . .” her face got dark. She wouldn’t look at him. He was standing in front of her on his lawn. He doesn’t remember moving. “No.”  She drove off.  Connie spent the rest of freshman year, and all of sophomore year avoiding Sasha and her boyfriend. He’s never seen her happier, and he didn’t want to interrupt that. Despite, you know, wanting to be the cause of her happiness. He heard them laughing a lot. It was torturous.  He was always dizzy, and kept his hood up to prevent the bright lights from reaching his eyes. He was starting to find comfort in the darkness that once scared him. The unknown of it all really put him at ease. It did keep him up, though. Pros and cons.  “Connie!” Sasha finally caught up to him, midst of junior year, grabbing his arm so he wouldn’t run. The cars were starting to pull away around them, so she pulled him to her car. He kept his eyes on the asphalt ground.  “What’s going on, man? You’ve been avoiding me for so long! Marco, Jean, and I were trying to—”  The world turned red, and spun. Distantly, he questioned, “What?”  “Why have you been avoiding me?”  “Why?” he repeated, dumbfounded.  “Yeah,” she cocked her head to the side like he was confusing her. Shoving his hands in his pockets, his eyebrows furrow.  “Sasha. . . You broke up with me. What do you mean?”  “Yeah, but—”  “You blocked me on Instagram and Snap,” he pointed out, getting angrier. His hands were starting to shake. “You started avoiding me first!”  “Yeah, but. . .”  “Am I an asshole for returning the favor?”  “No, but I miss you.” she pouted, twiddling her fingers. That’s the last straw.  “Sasha, we’re not in middle school anymore! That pout won’t work. I’m sorry you missed me, but I’m not willing to let myself hang around and wait until it’s convenient for you to feel up to being my friend again. That’s not fair to me.” She was starting to get upset, he could see that. But he’s been upset for months upon months. It’s almost been two years.  “You’re so happy with Niccolo, then make friends with his friends. No need to involve me.”  “But. . . You’re my best friend, Connie,” she reaches for his hand, but he yanks his arm away.  “I was, wasn’t I?” he steps

back. “Well, everything must come to an end.”  “Wait!” she cried out, and he found himself waiting. It angered him that he was still willing to listen to her. He turned back to her, eyebrows raised. “How. . . How did you move on?”  “Move on?” he thought about, removing a hand from his pockets to fix his falling hood. “I didn’t. I probably won’t ever ‘move on’, but. . . I just take one step at a time. It’s all I can do.”  “I miss your company.”  Connie went silent, eyes on his beat up converse. The wind picked up. He didn’t have anything else to say. Sure, he missed his best friend, too, but it’s not like she unblocked him or truly made an effort. He shrugged, turning on his heel. There wasn’t much else he could do. He was so close to being roped back into her friend loop. He couldn’t do that to himself. He tried, at first, to make amends, but she always turned him down. Connie couldn’t keep waiting.  Connie spent a lot of his high school life working. He wanted to save up for something fun to do with friends. Marco and Jean offered not many ideas, but it hit the buzzcut teen when he was trying to sleep one night—a camp out. In the woods not too far behind his house. There’s this clearing he used to use that’s perfect.  He sent out a massive group text. That included: Jean, Marco, Annie, Bert, Reiner, Mikasa, Armin, Eren. . . His thumb hovered over Sasha’s contact. He frowned. He skipped over her, and sent the text. Despite it being one in the morning, everyone seemed on board. They spent the next hour finding a date. They decided upon July 12th, where they all had time to call out and arrange accordingly.  That date. . . In fifth grade, that’s when Connie asked Sasha out. They dated until freshman year. It was wild how the universe works. He agreed upon the date and marked it in his calendar.  After graduation, he continued working. He still had a few months before he was going away to college, and he still had the whole camp out to put together. He found himself hanging around Annie and Mikasa a lot. He didn’t expect them to be so hands on with the project, or into it at all—considering how they tended to not be huge talkers—but they were. It didn’t make sense to him, but he had fun organizing it with them.  It all came to him at the end of the night, after grilling hot dogs and hamburgers for dinner. He was sitting in a lawn chair, staring at the stars by himself, with this big dopey smile on his face. His hand was around his soda bottle. Annie and Mikasa pulled chairs up to sit with him.  “You seem happier than you’ve been in years,” Annie points out, handing him a bottle of root beer. He opens it for her, nodding along to what she said.  “Yeah. I am.”  “Does this mean you’re over Sasha?” Mikasa sends a glare to the blonde, and Connie finds himself laughing. It was funny how people still treated it like a sore subject.  “No. Yes? I’m able to talk about it, but it still hurts. It’s everything and nothing at all.” He adjusts himself in his chair. He bought a tent big enough for them all to lay in, and he managed to be assigned to the very girls sitting next to him. However, he was focused on the stars.  “I’m glad you’re feeling better,” Mikasa settles on, not being too good with words. That’s something Annie and her shared—their difference was Mikasa had a heavy filter, where Annie’s filter was non-existent. She thought about her words heavily.  “Me too. It’s good to be hanging out with my friends again. I’m sorry for, you know, being shitty. I didn’t mean it.”  “It was a tough breakup. Don’t worry about those it doesn’t concern.” Annie advised, taking a swig of her soda.  “It does concern you guys, because you’re my friends and I wasn’t there for you. That’s how I see it, and I’m sorry. But, yes, it was tough. I tried to ignore it but. . . Well, there are some things you can’t avoid in life. I had to deal with it.” Connie explained, looking into his soda bottle. He’s glad he found his way out. He just got so tired being sad that he had a breakthrough. Some aren’t as lucky, but he was never the

forever-brooding type. He was much more comfortable as the clown of the group.  “And you’re better now for it,” Mikasa says softly, turning to him. She placed a hand over his, and Annie took his other hand. His face grew hot, but they all looked at the stars. There was comfortable silence between them. Slowly, Connie intertwined their hands together. In the distance, Jean and Eren could be heard bickering about trees. Weird topic for them, but it was normal.  “We both like you, Connie,” Annie finally said, “and we’d like to figure out what that means.”  His smile grew, finally tearing his eyes away from the stars. He looked between them, and found that they weren’t joking with him. He’d never think he’d go from dating, to sadly single, to being fine with being single, to possibly having two girlfriends. Life was crazy in that way.  “Okay,” he said, turning his direction to the stars. It got quiet again, but the conversation started back up when Connie mentioned he didn’t know how to piece together constellations—or something along those lines—but Annie did. She spent the hour before bed teaching them about how to find north, and some constellations that she could find. Mikasa, on the other hand, had a handful of knowledge about astrology, and told her lovers all about it as they turned in for the night. Connie was set in the middle, with his arms around both of them.  When college came around, it turns out that Annie was going up north. Mikasa and Connie were also going up north, but for a different college. They decided to buy a two bedroom apartment together and to just commute. It was weird to live with two girls prone to bickering, but Connie was always able to compromise. On top of that, they all were pretty good at communication between each other.  When Mikasa was feeling left out, she sent a text explaining herself the best she could, and her two lovers always figured out a way to make it up to her. Same with Annie. The blonde and black haired girls were always able to communication to Connie how they were feeling, and they genuinely listened to Connie when he spoke—especially if he cracked some stupid joke; they love his shitty humor. They loved him. He, of course, loved his two strong girlfriends, and never felt emasculated—he enjoyed watching them outlift in the gym, and was very encouraging.  He’s grateful for them, and couldn’t ask for better girlfriends.

[kingsuckjin]

The Enigma of Bunny Pt.2

Pairing: Jungkook, Yoongi, Jimin, Taehyung(later) x reader ft. Namjoon and Hobi

Genre: alternate universe!au, fluff, smut(later), horror, mystery

Warnings: mention of mental illness and possible abuse, eventual yandere themes Kookie is a sad boy in this one

Words: 4.8k+

Synopsis: You find a very sick young man in an alley and out of the bottomless barrel of kindness that is your heart, you decide take him home. only then do you realize this stranger doesn’t speak, but that’s not the only strange thing about him by far. Who is he? Where did he come from? What happened to him? And why can’t he remember anything or even speak?

Prev // next

You stared down at the kitchen floor in slight shock.

You were now very much awake as you tried to take in the mess of cereal, milk and remains of dishes spilled and broken all over the counter and floor.

“Oh no, Bunny.” You whined but you looked up him and his guilty looking face. He was obviously sorry.

“Its alright. I’ll get it cleaned up. You were just hungry I guess. I’ll make you something, okay?” You reassured him but paused a moment as you remembered…

“you spoke though! Good job talking.” Your lips curled into a prideful smile and he mirrored it upon seeing yours “noona” you pointed to yourself happily. You didn’t exactly like the name but you didn’t really mind it either. He was now communicating and that’s what mattered.

He pointed to you still smiling.

“Noona.” He repeated.

“Yes good job!” You cheered him on as if he were a baby saying his first words, but you just couldn’t help it, it just felt so heart warming.

“Bunny” You poked at his surprisingly hard chest.

“Bunny.” He pointed to himself.

“Yes!” You burst with excitement now knowing he understood. He looked elated at your pride for him “so good! Nice job!”

“Bunny nice job!” He yelled excitedly.

You were now so glad you decided to encourage his talking instead of getting on him over the mess that still lay in the floor.

“You’re talking look at you!” You laughed.

Apparently, you guessed, he must’ve learning things from those dumb dramas and from you too of course.

Or possibly he was now starting to warm up enough to you enough to talk or just now figuring it all out again, you didn’t know, but you wished you did.

You looked back down at the mess in the floor to notice some paper towels looking like he had tried to clean it up but he had obviously only succeed on making the mess bigger with more for you to clean up.

You did clean it up though, and it took a while to get all the shards of bowl from the floor and god knows what else.

You eventually gave him a snack before he settled back on the sofa and fell back to sleep.

You got back in bed but it was hard to go back to sleep.

You decided you would definitely have to go back to the store tomorrow, maybe he would help you and you could spend a bit more time with him before taking him to the police station. He seemed like he had made some recovery both mentally and physically since you had found him.

You finally fell back to sleep but woke up to the sounds of the tv going and the morning sun in your room. You weren’t really ready to get out of bed yet, and normally you wouldn’t but you were curious to see if he was awake yet.

You found him watching more dramas on the sofa eating a bag of chips and making a mess of crumbs all over himself, sofa, and the floor looking like he didn’t even realize it.

You sighed as you got out the hand vacuum and vacuumed not only the cushions and floor, but him.

“This is probably why I don’t have children.” You muttered to yourself with a laugh as you vacuumed off your house guest who didn’t seem to mind it one bit.

You got dressed and called for him as you grabbed your bag and slipped your shoes on at the door.

“Bunny, shoes.” You pointed at them and he stood up getting the message and followed your lead slipping on his sneakers before looking to you.

“We have to go to the store. We need more food.” You told him and you made rather stupid eating motions.

To your surprise he simply just nodded. Whether he actually understood or not, you didn’t know, but he followed you out the door regardless.

He trailed along behind you the whole way, occasionally getting distracted by things. You had keep getting his attention to make him keep up with you and to prevent him from getting lost. Sometimes he would jump and grab for you at loud noises or car horns, but you didn’t mind that either, you just reassured him the best you could.

Once at the store you decided to make his muscular body useful so you handed him a shopping basket and he carried it for you with no qualms which seemed too good to be true, especially when he had gone quiet.

You were looking at the juice when you realized he had wondered off.

Your eyes began frantically searching the store and looking down isles hoping he hadn’t taken off out the store.

You looked like that of a nerve wracked mother trying to track down their child who probably just wanted to play hide and seek in the isles. You noticed a few concerned looking women just about to possibly ask if you needed help finding your child when you spotted your grown man.

“Jungkook” you let out a sigh of relief

You found him shoving bag after bag of chips into the basket he carried with an open one that he had been eating from.

The women who were so concerned before were now giving you strange looks as you approached him.

He smiled at the sight of you but you were horrified at him practically stealing in front of people.

“Bunny, hey, no no.” You stopped him and began putting all the chips back. “You can’t open and eat things here.” You scolded him and his happy, carefree expression melted away, he now furrowed his brows looking sad. “I’ll just buy those okay? But you can’t just eat chips all day anyway.” You watched as he took another from the bag and ate it, if you didn’t know he didn’t know better you would’ve thought it was just to defy you. He took you watching him as you wanting one so he took another out and offered it to you, you shook your head and took him gently by the bicep to drag him around the store to make sure he followed this time.

He kept trying to put junk food in the basket and when you put it back and told him no, he would whine but soon accept it. When you finally got done and paid (including for his open bag of chips of course) you kept hold of his upper arm to lead him back home.

“Noona.” He said and pointed to a cat in someone’s window.

“Its a cat.” You glanced over at it, then him.

“Cat.” He replied with his mouth full and a nod. He tried to go over to the window but you pulled him back.

“Cat.” He whined pointing at it again.

“No Bunny, it belongs to someone. It’s in their house.”

“Kay.” He replied with a nod surprising you yet again as he accepted you telling him no and used a new word. It wasn’t a groan or whine in response this time and you were elated. You were beyond happy he was talking today and attempting to communicate.

You were a bit sad though that after you went and put the groceries away that you would take him to the police station, but it had to be done.

He seemed confused at you guys going back out again, but he went willingly and seemed chipper as you both walked along the pavement.

Once in the police station Jungkook seemed confused by the place and looked around as you explained things to the officer at the desk.  He took you back where you went into detail about him as much as you could.

“Well we can take him, run his prints and hold him until we can find where he belongs. Shouldn’t take too long and he should be home by morning. Do you have a number so we can contact you and let you know when hes home safe or do you not want to-”

“I do.” You interrupted quickly and the officer took your number.

When you stood up Bunny did also thinking he was leaving with you.

“No Bunny. I need to leave you here with them? Okay? They’re going to take you home.”

He just looked at you.

“Bye.” You told him sadly as you felt a pang of guilt with your words. When you tried to leave he started after you again but the officer stopped him by grabbing his arm.

“Noona. Noona! No! No leave noona!” He seemed to have just gotten what was going on. You turned around to look at him reaching for you as you felt surprised by his strung together sentence he had made in his panic. It hurt you, but you couldn’t take him back home with you.

“I have to Bunny, I’m sorry. You need to go home.” You tried to reason with him but he was fighting against the officer and you knew you being there any longer would only make it worse for everyone.

“No! No leave! Noona no!” He repeatedly yelled for you. You refused to let yourself even turn around as you left the police station overhearing the commotion he was causing behind you.

He would be alright and you knew it. The police would take care of him now and you’d probably get a call by morning telling you he made it home alright.

But then why did you feel so terrible?

You thought back at how his shiny, big brown eyes looked so panicked and how he was reaching out to you, and desperately trying to speak to you.

It made you question why he wanted to stay with you so badly, why didn’t he want to go home? Why had he been out in the rain that day sick and just left to die if he had a home? Had he run away from it? Did whoever took care of him mistreat him? What if you had just damned him back to mistreatment?

“Oh. Hey.” You heard Yoongi’s voice as you were about a block away from home. “Did you take that weird homeless kid to the police station?”

You looked from him down to your feet.

“Yeah.” Your voice came out quiet.

“You- you okay?” For the first time ever you read slight sympathy on Min Yoongi’s face.

“I guess so.” You let out a long breath hoping it would help cleanse the guilt from your body, it didn’t work.

“Listen… uh… I was just heading out to get something to eat. If you’re hungry too then, you know, you could tag along?” He asked with a shrug.

“I’m sorry, I don’t… I’m not very hungry.” You declined just wanting to go home and feel sad where no one could see you or ask why, because you didn’t really know if you could explain why.

“You sure, it seems like maybe- nah, forget it. Its cool. I’ll see you around… you know, the apartment building I guess.”

“I’m sorry Yoongi, I just-”

“No, it’s fine. I’d rather eat alone anyway, its more peaceful. Later.” He said and walked on.

You shuffled into your building and started up the stairs to your floor when you were being called after and turned around to see Jimin looking amazing in a loose fitting white shirt and black jeans ripped at the knees. Why did you seem to always run into him right after Yoongi lately?

“Hey! I was hoping to see you today.” He said as cheerfully as ever, but you just weren’t feeling it. You thought about telling him that the chances were high of running into each other since you two lived the same building.

“How are things going with your cousin staying over?”

“Oh, uh I just walked him to the train station to meet my aunt.” You lied.

“Oh.” He let out maybe detecting your sad demeanor “You must miss him already, right?” He asked and I nodded “that’s so cute.” Jimin nearly cooed at me with a smile “well hey, maybe I can keep you company and keep you from being too lonely for a while? We could have that movie night? How about it?”

He was so sweet you couldn’t say no plus you thought he looked so amazing with the way he flipped his blonde hair from his eyes.

“Yeah, sure. I can make us something to eat too if you want.” You offered.

“Nonsense. You don’t have to go through all that work and cook for me, I’ll order us a pizza.” His eyes were pure crescents of joy and you couldn’t help but let a little of that seep into you. You could already tell being around him would probably make you feel better, you both did seem a lot a like personality wise after all. He seemed so sweet, caring, kind and positive that he had to make you feel better even if he said nothing at all the whole time.

“Alright.” You agreed even though you felt all the more guilty about just now ditching Yoongi and not Jimin. Yoongi was just… well he was grumpy and most likely a vampire or something.

Besides, if you had taken his offer he would’ve probably just acted like it was a huge burden that you came and he didn’t seem like the type who would be good at cheering people up anyway.

You and Jimin had both finished almost all of the pizza and he had his hand relaxed and stretched out on the back of the sofa behind you as you two comfortably watched a movie in your dark lounge.

“This is so nice.” He said out of no where making you look at him directly instead of just peering at his beautiful face in your peripheral vision. “Having someone to do stuff like this with.” He clarified “although I’m sure you always have someone to do things like this with.”

“I-I don’t.” You weren’t sure if he was saying you must have a lot of friends or a boyfriend or what. You wondered if he was trying to ask subtly if you were single.

“Oh? You and that Yoongi guy in the apartment next to yours seem pretty close. I thought you were friends.”

“No, not at all.” You answered “he’s kind of a loner I think.”

“Are you not a loner?” Jimin asked tilting his head cutely.

“No, I’m just in here working a lot.” You guessed that did make you kind of a loner though, you didn’t really feel the need to socialize much anymore like you did when you were younger. You were bad at it anyway.

“Oh that’s right, you’ve mentioned you work from home mostly. I guess you can’t really do much about that, that’s okay though. We can be fun buddies can’t we?” He looked down at you with his dark eyes twinkling from the movie reflecting in the corners of them.  He was so hypnotic in a way, so pretty that you just decided to agree to whatever he was offering you.

“Yeah, if you want. Its good that you live just right down stairs.”

“Anytime you need me I’m just a text away. Or if you ever get lonely…” He trailed making your heart begin to hammer. His arm that was on the back of the sofa behind you was now resting around your shoulders and his thumb was playing with the short sleeve of your shirt and grazing your skin softly. Goosebumps began to raise and scatter across your skin. His face had some how crept closer to yours without you even realizing it.

“How would you feel about us making this a thing every week?”

You could only gaze at his soft looking lips as your heart pumped yet harder behind your rib cage.

He had to notice.

There was no way he couldn’t notice.

His lips drifted even closer to yours.

But something just didn’t feel right to you.

You were sure he wanted to enclose the space between the both of you.

Yes everything about him was enticing- no- overpowering to you, but you just couldn’t.

“I-” you were cut off by your phone ringing. You quickly fished it out of your pocket and looked at the number you didn’t recognize.

“One second.” You said and he gave you a nod as you stood and hurried off to the kitchen to answer your phone.

“Hello?”

“Yes, is this miss y/l/n?” An unfamiliar male voice asked.

“Yes.”

“This is detective Kim Namjoon.”

“Detective?” You were a bit worried now about Bunny.

“Yes. I was assigned to the case of the young male you found after his fingerprints didn’t match any in our files.” He explained.

“You haven’t found his home yet?” You spoke quietly so Jimin couldn’t hear.

“Unfortunately not and it might take a while. He keeps screaming for noona and I’ve been told he has been since you left. Its all he’ll say. Since you’ve been caring for him and it might take a while to investigate this and find where he belongs, would you be willing to maybe let him stay with you for just a bit longer? If not that’s-”

“Yes.” You cut him off. “I’ll be right down to get him.”

“Oh thank god.” He sighed with a chuckle. “He’s been giving us hell.”

“I’m so sorry.” You were compelled to apologize for his behavior.

“Its alright. At least we know he’ll be nice and safe with you.” His words were almost drowned out by the distraught yelling in the background.

You knew that voice, you hadn’t heard it but just a hand full of times but that was enough to have it ingrained in your head already.

“Shes coming kid, don’t worry.” Namjoon told him before letting out another laugh.

“I’ll be right there.” You said and with that you hung up and headed back into the living room to see Jimin looking at you quizzically.

“I have to go, there’s been a… umm…”

You were at a loss for words for what exactly this was.

“An emergency?” He finished for you, so you went with it.

“Pretty much.” But was it though?

“That’s alright. Our movie just ended anyway.” He replied as he stood and stretched.

You both put on your shoes and you walked him to his apartment downstairs.

“Same time next week?” He inquired and you gave him a nod before hurrying off to your ‘emergency’ that felt more like a kid having a tantrum at daycare.

Honestly you felt rather relieved though on your way to pick up Bunny. It was a relief from the guilt you had felt for leaving him. Mindlessly your legs practically dashed to the police station and raced through the doors where Bunny was waiting on you eating a doughnut along with red haired police officer and a man in black slacks and white button down shirt with a badge neatly pinned to the pocket.

“Ahh you must be noona.” The blonde man in the white dress shirt smiled with his dimples on full display. “Detective Kim Namjoon, we spoke on the phone.”

Bunny looked up at you from his doughnut and dropped it upon hearing the word noona, his eyes went wide before he jumped up.

“Noona!” He yelled before throwing himself at you and wrapping his arms around you so tight it was almost suffocating making the detective and red haired police officer laugh.

“Aww Bunny, I’m sorry I left you here like that.” Your hands went to his back and gave him a squeeze after getting over the initial shock of him flinging himself at you like that.

“Bunny sorry.” He muttered with his arms still locked around you. He leaned over a bit but his cheek was now pressed into the top of your shoulder.

Did he think you leaving him here was a punishment of some kind?

“Its okay.” You assured him and when he released you he still held tight to your arm with both his arms locked around it.

“Sargent Jung Hoseok.” The red head introduced himself. “Its nice to finally see him calm and not eating. All that kid does is eat or cry for you.” He laughed making you feel a little embarrassed.

“Are you sure taking him back for a bit isn’t a problem? It seems he won’t even try to be friends with anyone else.” The detective asked.

“No, its no problem. I’m sure he would just rather be sitting on the sofa at my house eating chips and watching his dramas, it’s probably not even me he wants.”

“Well as long as he’s happy. We’ll let you know if we find anything out.”

You were assured by the detective.

“Thanks guys.”

“No no no. Thank you.” Officer Jung laughed joking about taking Bunny back and off their hands.

“Come on Bunny, let’s get home.” You gave your arm a tug, not to take it from him but to signal him to go… as if he wouldn’t go with you anyway. He kept his arms wrapped around yours as came with you very ecstatically and to be honest you were quite happy about it too.

As you waled down the street lap lit street, you looked over at him wearing the same clothes you found him in. His hair was beginning to look a bit stringey, there were hairs prickling all along his jaw and you wondered if he knew how to bathe himself since he could dress himself and use the bathroom himself. You hoped he could anyway. Getting him new clothes might be a problem considering you knew nothing about men or their clothing or sizes or how they shaved their faces or any of that.You were completely clueless. You decided that if he was willing to learn how to speak and behave and all that then you could learn how to take care of a man, if only just for a while. It had to be nothing compared to what he must be struggling with you guessed.

You stared at him as he held onto your arm and looked up at the stars.

“Noona.” He said and pointed at the biggest star.

“Star.” You named the object for him, but maybe he was just pointing out its glowing beauty to you, he knew you had seen these things before, you knew he knew.

“Star.” He repeated.

With all the mundane things he seemed so fascinated with you always couldn’t help but wonder if he had ever seen them before.

You thought about the poor guy had been locked away or something somewhere and it made your heart ache and your brain feel heavy with sadness.

Once you got home he wanted to sit down and watch tv but you were dragging him to the bathroom to run him a bath because his slightly haggard appearance had guilted you.

He stared at the filling tub curiously and seemed intrigued when you added bubbles, but the bubbles were technically more so for privacy purposes than anything else.

“Get in.” You pointed to the bubble filled tub hoping he would just get it, but he tried to get in with all his clothes on until you stopped him.

“No no Bunny, clothes off.” You said and made gestures of clothes coming off.

He blinked at you a moment, and thought he might like his privacy while undressing until he shamelessly began to undress right in front of you. You quickly turned around and got him some towels as he did so and didn’t turn around until you heard the sound of the water that signified him getting in.

You saw him sitting there with bubbles thankfully above and covering all the most important parts and you crouched down by the tub and grabbed the shampoo. You attempted to wet his hair pathetically and he caught on to what you were trying to do and dunked himself under the water to only come back up covered in bubbles making you laugh. He closed his eyes as you gently scrubbed at his hair. You got him to dunk his head again to rinse the shampoo before making another attempt at washing what parts of his body were above the bubble line.

“Well, I was thinking. Maybe I should give you a new name, you know for when we’re out in public or in front of people. People might get the wrong idea if I just call you Bunny all the time. I need something to introduce you as. A real name.”

You wanted him to feel more like a person and a bath, a name and your plan for getting him new clothes might help. You didn’t think anyone ever deserved to feel like no one, to not have their name remembered. A name was important.

“Name?” He looked at you as he said the new word.

You through out a male name from one of his dramas and pointed at him.

“Bunny.” He pointed at himself.

He just didn’t seem to get it like you hoped he would.

“No. You can be bunny too, you can have a real name.”

“Real name?” He parroted

You said a name of another male from a drama.

“No.” Was his clear reply this time.

“How about…” you thought of another one and you got the same reply. You went through a whole list only getting no’s from him or head shakes.

You gave up and continued on washing him up in defeat. He was pretty silent considering he had just said some new words. Maybe you should’ve praised him, shown him you were proud.

“Alright Bunny,” you grabbed for a towel “lets get you-”

“Jungkook.” He finally spoke again. You instantly recognized the name as an extremely rich, handsome man from a drama. You couldn’t help but stare as he pointed to himself and said it one more time.

You felt a wide grin spread across your face.

He understood. He picked a name for himself, by himself.

“Yes! Perfect.” You nodded making him smile too. You were glad he named himself and he liked it, you were pretty impressed. He had yet to do anything but astound you though.

“Alright, Jungkook. Lets get out of the bath.” You announced noticing the bubbles rapidly decreasing to dangerous levels in volume.

You stood and held a towel out for him to step into and were careful not to look at anything as you fastened it around his waist.

You dried his hair with a second towel and he followed you to your room where you got out some more girly pajamas for him to wear and scurried out before he dropped the towel and began changing.

When he walked out of your room to find you, you couldn’t help but stifle a laugh at how the tight pink pajama shirt barely fit across his broad chest. You had always thought it was a bit silly to see him in your clothes none the wiser and indifferent about it.

“Noona.” He said as he came to sit with you. You already had his drama channel turned on for him and his blanket on the sofa.

“Yes Jungkook?” You decided to use his new name.

“Still…” he seemed to struggle with his words “still…Bunny?” You understood what he was trying to ask.

“Yes. You’re still Bunny. You can be Bunny and Jungkook.”

“Yes. Bunny Jungkook.” He agreed happily.

“Noona.”

“Yes Bunny?” You asked and now he looked a bit sad.

“Noona, no leave. No leave Bunny Jungkook?”

He was asking you not to leave him again and you didn’t want to upset him and you weren’t sure if he would understand if you tried to explain that you had to if they found his home. So you lied.

“No. I won’t leave. Noona no leave Bunny again.” You assured him and it looked to ease the pain in his big brown eyes.

He looked down at your

hand and poked it a few times with his finger.

“Home.” He said “Noona home. Noona Jungkook home.”

You blinked at him as you were sure he had called you his home.

You thought it was… it was sweet, but you also hurt from it. He had a real home somewhere out there.

You began to think about how you didn’t really feel right while he was gone and how excited you had been to go get him. You had really taken to this stranger the past few days and he obviously had to you too. You just had to keep reminding yourself that it was going to end and obviously he couldn’t be here forever. You supposed that that would be something you both would have to get over when the time would soon come.

You looked over at him now asleep on the sofa right beside you. You just looked at his peaceful face for a moment, all the looks of hurt, betrayal, excitement, and confusion of today had been swept off his face. You too decided to go to bed and let it wash away from you too. You felt like you both learned some things today.

[skepticalcatfrog]

Stay Ahead and Stay Alive Chapter 2

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Summary: When Bill Denbrough starts his third summer at Camp Half Blood, everything seems perfect. He's finally getting used to his cabin, he gets to see his friends again, and he's even getting the hang of fighting with a sword. But that perfection is quickly turned on its head when his little brother goes missing. Bill is determined to do whatever it takes to find him, even if that means he and his friends need to go to the Underworld.

Pairings: (Eventual) Reddie, Stenbrough, and Benverly

Word count: 3,208

Author's Notes: It took me longer than I thought to finish this chapter, but that's mostly just because of writer's block. Anyway, now it's done!

POV: Stanley Uris

~Earlier~

"Alright, well, just find me if you need anything. If we don't get a chance to talk then I'll see you tomorrow." I waved to Bill as I walked away, heading back to my cabin. I didn't want to go to orientation, but I knew I had to. I would've much rather spent the rest of the day with Bill. Oh, and Richie and Eddie. Of course.

I had to take a deep breath before entering cabin 6. It could be a little intense in there, especially when you were trying to get everyone on the same page. I opened the door and walked inside, clapping my hands once loudly to get everyone's attention. I raised my voice just a little bit.

"Okay everybody, listen up! Firstly, to everyone who only comes here during the summer, welcome back to the Athena cabin." That earned a quiet round of applause from a couple of campers. "And secondly, today is orientation! We'll probably be getting a couple of new campers, so be prepared for that. They'll probably be nervous about being here, and we all know how that feels, don't we? Just help them out a little bit. We wouldn't want anyone to start hating us on the first day, would we?" A couple of people laughed, but I was never really the funny one in the group. My jokes always seemed to land better with my friends than my siblings. "Anyway, that's the end of my speech. I have to go meet everyone at orientation, so I'll be back in a bit."

Then I turned and left. I knew that the entire conversation had gone quickly, but I was sure that all of my siblings were used to it at that point. I was probably one of the busiest counselors in camp, always doing something, constantly popping in and out of the cabin. It honestly got kind of hectic sometimes. That's why I enjoyed time when I could just relax with my friends.

A small crowd had already gathered at the amphitheatre by the time I got there. I sat near the back with a couple of other counselors. We just waited there while the camp director spoke. Once that was over, each counselor was assigned a group of campers to tour the camp with. I'd dealt with new campers before, so everything went pretty smoothly for me. They had a few questions, but otherwise they seemed to understand how I was explaining everything.

The really difficult part was dinner. Athena kids are the only half bloods who are claimed at birth, so we had a lot of new campers at our table. It was much louder than usual, and it felt like I had to remind someone of the rules every five seconds. Usually it was someone trying to go to another cabin's table. I was relieved when we finally cleared out of the mess hall.

Everything calmed down again at the campfire. All of us were tired, so no one had the energy to cause any trouble. The new campers appeared to be having fun, which was a good sign. A few of them were mesmerized by the fire, and how it would change based on the emotions of the people surrounding it. Eventually the moon was fully risen, and the stars were out. That meant it was time to go back to our cabins. 

My siblings helped the newcomers get into the routine of things. Soon enough, everyone was fast asleep, including me. Everything was peaceful, which was refreshing after the busy day I'd had. Unfortunately, that serenity didn't last long. I was woken up by someone shaking me.

"Stanley?" I heard someone whisper from near me. I opened my eyes to see one of my siblings standing next to my bed. She was significantly younger than me, maybe around seven years old.

"Yeah?" I said something so she knew I was awake, but I closed my eyes again.

"I can't sleep." She said simply.

"Have you tried imagining something calming?" I asked, glancing at her.

"No." She shook her head.

"Have you tried anything?" I closed my eyes again.

"No…" She admitted.

"Then how about you get back to bed. Maybe you'll be able to fall asleep in a little while." I resolved. Then I heard her climbing back into her bed.

A few minutes later, she woke me up again. We went through the same conversation, and it ended with her going back to bed again. That cycle repeated four more times. When I felt someone shaking my shoulder for the seventh time, I'd reached the end of my rope.

"I know, you can't sleep, but that doesn't mean you have to-" I opened my eyes, but she wasn't there. Instead, I was met by familiar blue eyes. I was startled out of my tired state. It was Bill, frantically trying to wake me up. He was completely dressed, his hair was wet, and the front of his jacket was splattered with mud. "Bill? Why are you here, you're supposed to be asleep. And why are you covered in mud?"

"I'll explain l-later, right now I just n-n-need your help." He told me uneasily, wiping tears from his face.

"What's wrong, what happened?" I sat up, now completely awake. If Bill had taken the risk of coming to another cabin at night, something big must've happened.

"I-I-It's Georgie, he's m-m-m-m-m-" He struggled with his stutter.

"It's okay, just breathe." I sat up and reached for his hand, but hesitated. He was clearly very emotional, any sort of contact might just make it worse. My hand dropped back to my side. "Everything's going to be okay. Now, do you think you can tell me what happened?"

"Georgie… is m-missing. We w-were out in the w-w-woods, and I l-l-left him alone, and now..." He burst into tears, burying his face in his hands. "Shit, I left him a-a-alone!"

My eyes widened. "Are you sure? Are you sure it wasn't just a bad dream?"

"Y-y-yes, of course I'm sure!" He looked up at me, his eyes catching mine. He spoke as if he'd never been more positive about anything in his life. "And I n-need you to help me f-find him."

"But why me?" I asked.

"I d-don't know, I thought you'd know w-w-what to do!" Bill dried his eyes on his sleeves, regaining control of his emotions.

"Well I'm not going to have a perfectly planned solution right away after being woken up in the middle of the night." I sighed. I was tired, and I didn't feel up to dealing with a serious situation. But I had to do something, I couldn't just tell him to get over it, he'd be crushed. I just needed time to figure things out. "Go back to your cabin and try to get some rest, we'll figure something out tomorrow morning. I promise."

"O-okay…" He stood up and went to the door. I attempted to go back to sleep. I heard the sound of the door opening and closing, signifying that Bill had left the room.

It took a while for me to fall asleep again, but I don't know exactly how long it was. I just had too many thoughts in my head. First I wake up in the middle of the night to see one of my best friends standing over me, then he tells me his brother is missing, and he needs my help to find him. It was a lot to process. At first I thought it might've been a dream, but then it started to feel a little too real. I tried to think of a plan until eventually I just couldn't keep my eyes open.

I was woken up abruptly the next morning by sunlight shining through the windows and the seemingly ever-present sound of projects in the process of being completed. I only had time to change into regular clothes before I heard a persistent knocking at the door. I was lucky that I got to the door first, because standing on the other side was Bill, still wearing the clothes he'd been in the previous night. That plus the faint dark circles under his eyes made it clear that he hadn't slept at all the previous night.

"We n-need to find R-R-Richie and Eddie." Bill got right to the point the second I opened the door. "The more p-people we have to help us, the b-be-better."

He started to walk away, gesturing for me to follow him. We went to find Eddie first, mostly because his cabin was the closest to mine. Bill stopped in front of the door of cabin 7 and knocked on it. I stood next to him, and we waited there for a good couple of minutes. It wasn't like no one was awake, Apollo kids tended to rise early; It was just that no one answered the door. Finally though, someone did. It was one of Eddie's half siblings.

She opened the door with a smile on her face. "Hi, can I help you guys with anything?"

"I-Is Eddie here?" Bill asked.

"Sorry, he's not." She shook her head. "He woke up a few hours ago with the rest of us, but he usually goes to the infirmary earlier. He says he has to be ready for whoever might come in."

"Okay, thanks. We should've known he'd be there. Sorry to bother you, see you around." I waved to her, and she waved back before closing the door. I glanced at Bill. "So, to the infirmary?"

"Yeah." He nodded, and we were on our way again.

I looked at him out of the corner of my eye as we walked. I didn't need to look at him to remember what he looked like, but sometimes I did it anyway. You would be able to tell that Bill was a son of Aphrodite just by seeing his face. His hair was brown, like the feathers of a song sparrow, but the sun made it look a little lighter. His icy blue eyes were striking, and could be intimidating at times. Especially times like just then, when they were filled with determination. Normally, though, they were much more welcoming. More like going to an ice skating rink with your friends and less like falling through a thin sheet of ice into freezing water. I snapped out of my train of thought and quickly looked away, worried about being caught staring. Soon after that, we approached the entrance to the infirmary.

We opened the door and stepped inside. Just as we'd been told, Eddie was pacing back and forth in the middle of the room. None of the lights were on yet, but the blinds were open on the windows, letting in the natural light. The infirmary was entirely clean and orderly. It looked like just the place you'd expect someone like Eddie to be. Clean tile floors, pristine white walls, various types of medicine organised on shelves. The beds on either side of the room were perfectly made, and looked as if no one had been in them for a while. However, the more likely option was that Eddie made all the beds the moment he got there.

Eddie looked up at us as soon as we walked in, but it was clear that he hadn't expected it to be us. What made it obvious was that he didn't immediately start talking. He looked relieved when he saw me and Bill, but also vaguely… disappointed. "Oh… hey, guys. What are you doing here? Is one of you hurt?"

"N-no, we're both fine." Bill closed the door behind us. "B-b-but we need your help with s-something."

"Yeah, it's more about who isn't fine." I glanced around the room nervously.

"Oh my- is it Richie again?" Eddie gritted his teeth. "Because I swear, if he's escalated to the point of sending you guys to get me, I will actually punch him right in the face. I don't care how bad the scrape on his knee might be, I'll do it."

"No!" I said quickly. "You don't need to do any of that. Seriously."

"Okay, if it's not Richie, then who is it?" Eddie finally stopped his pacing.

"Georgie." Bill said simply. Then he went on to explain. "He went m-missing in the woods last night, and I d-don't know where he is, b-b-but I need to find him. That's w-why we're here, we wanted to a-ask for your help."

"The North woods?" Eddie asked. "That's inside the boundaries, if he got lost there then he's definitely still in there somewhere. Maybe the satyrs found him."

"No, i-i-it wasn't the North w-woods." Bill shook his head. "It was outside the b-borders. I think s-something might've t-t-taken him."

"Wait, it wasn't the North woods?" I looked at the ground in thought, crossing my arms. "Then this is worse than I thought. Chances are, if something did take him, he's probably not in the woods anymore."

Bill shot that down right away. "He has to b-be, we'll be a-able to find him. We j-j-just have to look."

"That might be true, but the woods isn't the place to be looking." I sighed, tapping my foot on the floor. I finally looked up, glancing between Eddie and Bill. "Demigods who get taken by monsters… well, they don't usually come back. So as much as I hate to say it, I think the next best place to look would be the Underworld."

The room fell into an awkward silence. Bill stared at me like I'd just hit him with a rock, and that look alone made me regret what I'd said. He was about to say something, but then the door opened. We all looked in the direction of the sound. There, strolling into the infirmary with a bleeding knee and an elbow to match, was Richie Tozier.

"Hey Eds, I fell off of the climbing wall again and I need you to-" Richie seemed to become aware of the serious tone of the room. "What happened in here?"

We explained everything to him, from Georgie's disappearance to our plan to go to the Underworld. I even learned a couple of new things, like how Bill had found a bloodstained puddle of water in the place where he'd left Georgie. The whole time we were talking, Eddie was bandaging Richie's cuts.

"But the Underworld is all the way across the country." Richie raised an eyebrow. "How are we supposed to get there?"

"We could walk. Take a couple of buses, maybe." I suggested.

"We don't have enough money for buses. And if we walk all the way to Los Angeles, we might be dead by the time we get there anyway, which would make the part where we come back here much harder." Eddie pointed out.

"Eddie's right." Bill agreed. "W-we'll have to f-f-find another way."

"Transportation can wait, for now we just need to figure out the immediate details. Eddie, do you have anything I can write with? And maybe some paper?" I asked. Eddie went to look through the shelves and came back a minute later with a pen and a notepad. I started to make a list. "The classic things demigods need for quests. Weapons, extra clothes, personal hygiene products, and a satyr guide. That shouldn't be too hard."

"I-If we start n-now, we might b-b-be able to get it all done t-to-today." Bill read over the list.

"I have responsibilities, Bill." I handed him the notepad. "I know that this is important, but I can't just drop everything to do it. I'll try to help as much as I can, of course, but I might not always be available."

"Yeah, I'm usually pretty occupied all day too." Eddie nodded.

"I, on the other hand, am literally never busy. I'm available all day, so I'll help." Richie offered.

"So it's settled. We'll prepare today, and leave either tomorrow or the next day depending on when everything's ready." I said. Everyone agreed.

We all said our temporary goodbyes, and went our separate ways. I don't know what everyone else did, but I went back to my cabin. Not many people were there anymore. I used the unusual quiet to get some work done. It was mostly just cleaning, because there was going to be a cabin inspection in a few days, and I needed to prepare. I wandered around the cabin, tidying things up as I saw fit. 

Eventually the cabin was entirely spotless, and I had nothing to do anymore. I got my binoculars and bird watching book from my nightstand. I went to the Big House and sat on the porch, pointing my binoculars towards the sky. There weren't any new birds up there, just the same ones as usual. Sometimes I wished I could see something different. I stayed at camp all the time, so I'd seen all of the birds around here. Sure, I loved bird watching, but it got a little boring sometimes. Not to mention lonely, because I was the only person in the entire camp who did it. Maybe I could bring my book with me when we leave for our quest, I thought to myself. I knew that traveling across the country would bring me some different results. I put my binoculars down, and was shocked to see the scene in front of me. A large crowd of campers had gathered around something by the border of camp. I picked up my book and hung the binoculars around my neck, walking down the porch stairs to see what the commotion was about.

I pushed my way through the crowd. Most people moved for me, since I was a counselor. They assumed I knew what I was doing. At the center of the group was a boy who looked about my age. And he didn't seem to be doing too well based on the fact that he was terribly beat up. He was covered in cuts and bruises, with the worst one being a gash on his stomach. His clothes were stained with blood. I got a little closer to him and pushed everyone else away.

"There's nothing to see here, all of you can go back to what you were doing before!" I shouted to the horde of campers. A few of them left, but most of them just took a few steps back. Knowing I wouldn't be able to do much better than that, I turned back to the boy and lowered my voice a little. "Hey, everything's going to be alright. We're going to go to the infirmary, and they'll fix you up there, okay? What's your name?"

"Ben Hanscom." The boy told me.

"Okay Ben, let's go." I let him lean on me as we made our way to the infirmary. I knocked on the door once we got there. Just as I'd hoped, Eddie answered the door. His eyes widened when he saw me and Ben. His eyes asked a silent question, which his mouth then said out loud.

"What happened?"

"Nothing good, that's for sure." I answered. "Think you can help us?"

He nodded wordlessly and moved aside to let us in.

[dalamjisung]

your dream ✾ han jisung

word count: 2521

genre: fluffiest fluff of all fluffs

pairing: reader x han jisung

description: he gives everyone everything. What can you give him?

Some knew him, some knew of him, some really didn’t care and just lived their lives. That was kind of how things worked living in a small suburb like you did. And him, of course; he lived there too. You knew him from some parties you’ve attended, and you think his name was Han Jisung, but everyone just called him ‘the nice guy.’ Always smiling, always cheery, always talking. Something about it just seemed so wrong that you couldn’t help but observe him. Watch him. Be that one creepy classmate that everyone thinks has a crush on him, but in reality is the only one that notices how weird everything was. You tried to tell people, but they would just laugh it off and tell you you’re seeing things. 

This was the last year. High school was almost over and it was okay. For people like you, that had a few friends, a few colleagues, and a few enemies, everything was just that. Okay. You got into trouble and got out of it; you go bad grades and then good ones; you had crushes and heartbreaks and even an ex-boyfriend that still bothered you sometimes, but honestly, there wasn’t much more than that, if that was even something. You had no secret passion, no reason to try really hard to get into a good college, no… drive. And that was okay too. You didn’t care, at this point; but you did wonder what it would be like to be like that. Like Han Jisung.

The nice guy that always said hi to everyone at parties; or that always offered to drive people back, always volunteering to be the designated driver of the night. He would offer help to people that didn’t even ask for it, and you didn’t quite get it. Why go out of your way to that extent, just to help people that would never help you back? You remember this one party, where you think you met him, and you think you asked his name, and you think you talked. You think he really was nice, caring for you and watching you drink as you used the restroom, but there was something off. He was always smiling. Couldn’t quite look you in the eye. Barely talked about himself. You wondered if there was anything human about that boy, or maybe he really was an angel sent from above, as you friend said. 

“Listen to me, Y/N,” She whined as you two walked to your Literature class. “He is just that good. Stop trying to vilify him, or whatever…”

“It’s not that I’m vilifying him,” You sighed, tired of this topic. “I’m just trying to tell you guys that he is-“

“Weird?” She scoffed. 

“Human.” You shrug. “And that he probably have reasons to be that nice, and that if you guys were nice back, it wouldn’t hurt.”

“We are nice!” She rolls her eyes.

“Saying ‘hi’ to him on the hallway is not nice,” You raise one brow, challenging her. “What I mean is that it wouldn’t hurt to reciprocate his kindness, for a change…”

“Then why don’t you do it?” She slams her books on her desk, as if you two were having the discussion of the century. 

“Because I have nothing to repay him for,” You say, shrugging. “I’ve never asked anything of him. And I never will.”

“Why not?” She whispers, not dropping the argument even when the teacher walked in.

“Because I can deal with my own shit,” You whisper without looking back at her. “And he needs to deal with his. It’s unfair to ask anything else from him.”

She scoffs again and that it for today. You know the topic will be back tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after. And until you agree with her, because that’s how she is. But you were also stubborn, and a promise was a promise. You would never bother Han Jisung. However, nothing prevented Han Jisung from bothering you. 

The first time happened two weeks after that, when you tripped on your way to class and sent your books flying. You were almost certain you were alone in the empty hallway, but you weren’t surprised when you heard a muffled chuckle. Your head snaps up, looking through the hair on your face, at no one other than Jisung. His eyes go wide and he stops laughing as soon as he notices it’s you.

“Oh!” He coughs, covering up the bubbling laughter. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to-“

“It’s fine,” You chuckle, already collecting your books. “It was funny.”

“Yeah,” He smiles shyly. “Let me help you with that.”

“No,” You say, smiling brightly at him. “I got this. Go to class or else you’ll be in trouble.”

“But-“

“I’m fine,” You say, collecting the last book and getting up again. “Now go.”

He goes, but not without looking at you with furrowed brows. He never met anyone as confusing as you– giving him the most angelic of smiles, yet sending him off on his way. You chuckle as the boy leaves, head low, and shake your head. I’m doing this for you, you idiot, you wanted to yell. You wanted to let him know that it wasn’t his duty to make sure everyone is okay; you just wanted him to focus on himself.

The second time was not in school, actually. It was at the diner after you had a particularly bad encounter with your ex. People kind of knew about it and kind of gossiped about it, but nothing that put you in the spotlight– nothing uncomfortable. You were sipping on your favorite vanilla shake, sitting alone in the corner booth, while listening to people talk around you. You always thought people-watching was really interesting, and sometimes you gave in to it and found yourself in the diner alone, late at night. 

“May I?” You look up to find Jisung pointing at the seat across from yours, and you nod. He had a hoodie on, and surprise, surprise, glasses. He smiles and it’s different; he sounds different, smiles different, even sits different. His vibe is a whole new thing, and you kind of like it. You feel it. You’ve never seen Jisung so in control of his own person before, and you loved it. “What are you doing here?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking that?” You ask, raising your brows and chuckling when he blushes. 

“I was bored,” He shrugs. “Hyung is out somewhere and my parents are traveling. Didn’t feel like being alone.”

“Ah, I see,” So maybe that was his deal. Maybe he just hated being alone. “Well, I understand. I also didn’t feel like being alone right now…”

“That and you are upset,” He squints his eyes, and leans forward. “It’s okay. You can talk to me if you want to.”

“But I don’t really want to,” You shrug. “Sure, I’m upset, but aren’t you?”

“Not really,” He says breaking eyes contact. 

“That’s a lie.” You state and sip loudly on your milkshake. 

“You can lie, so why can’t I?” He sounded a bit defensive, a bit whiny, and you hid your smile. Adorable, you think.

You wink when he looks back at you. “Never said you couldn’t.”

The third time is funnier, and much stranger. One day you woke up with a loud thud coming from the kitchen, and when you get there– all wild hair and pajamas, which only included a large t-shirt from your dad’s wardrobe,– there he was. Wide eyes. Hands on your milk. You hold yourself back to any extreme reaction; you decide on leaning on the wall, eyebrows raised, and a smirk. 

“Should I ask?” You say, walking towards him and grabbing the milk cartoon out of his hands.

“Yes,” He sighs, looking at his feet. “So that you won’t assume the wrong thing.”

“Smart,” You shrug and sit on the counter, completely oblivious to your naked legs. “Watcha doin’ here?”

He doesn’t turn around. “My mom told me to come give your mom some lemons from our garden, but your mom told me to stay and have some lemonade.”

“I see no lemonade,” You laugh. “Nor my mom.”

“She went to the market to buy sugar and… I was thirsty.” 

This time you can’t contain yourself. You laugh, like, truly laugh. Head back, legs in the air, body contracting, laugh. He just looked so uncomfortable and yet, adorable, and you couldn’t help yourself. He just made you like that.

“It’s fine, really,” You say, jumping down and pouring some milk in a cup for him. “I know how mom is; sorry you’ve been waiting, though.”

“Meh, it’s fine,” He sigh, turning around and finally facing you. “She warned me about you, you know? Said you’d wake up at any minute, and that you weren’t particularly nice in the mornings.”

“She’s not lying,” You grab some cereal. “I’m usually cranky in the morning.”

“I think that’s a lie,” He mumbles, staring intently into your eyes, and you can’t help but blush. “I don’t think you are as distant as you try to make yourself seem…”

Interesting. “Ah, explain.”

“Whenever I try to approach you,” He shrugs. “You kind of push me away. Or yourself. You create this huge space in between us, and I’m trying to figure out why.”

You chuckle. “Let me know when you do.”

You lose the count of the awkward encounters on number 9. Jisung apparently made his life mission to figure out why you’d never let him in, however, you knew he was looking at this from the wrong point of view. It wasn’t that you weren’t letting him in, but you weren’t letting him waste his energy on you. You learned a lot on these encounters with him. Jisung wanted to be a songwriter, a singer, and a producer. He wanted to come up with the best music out generation has ever heard and you didn’t doubt him for a second– you knew he could do it. His upbeat vibe and fast speech guaranteed him success. But you were different. You didn’t have that– the dream. And you knew that if he got a hold of that information, he would do everything in his power to help you, but you didn’t really think you needed help. You were okay. 

“There is more to life than just okay,” He told you one night. You had found him in the playground in the end of your block, notebook in hand and rhythm on his feet. You smiled as you approached and sat on the swing next to his. “You always say you’re okay. Everything is okay. Things are okay, the day is okay, school is okay… what’s up with that?”

You shrug. “Nothing really, I’m really okay.”

“Yeah, I know,” He says sarcastically. “But I don’t get you. Everyone has problems.”

“Never said I didn’t,” You smiled. “Just don’t feel the need to let everyone know that.”

“Not even me?” He whispers, frowning. 

“Jisung,” You sigh. “You are too good for people like me.”

“What do you mean?”

“You… you’re you. You always want to help. You’re always listening, always offering, always giving,” You mumble sadly. “When will you take?”

“Take?”

You nod. “Yes, take. There must be something you want, Jisung. Something that goes beyond doing favors for others; beyond doing everything for others! What do you want, Han Jisung?”

You turn your head to look at him, finding his wide eyes already looking at you. You’ve never seen him looking like that. He usually looked so sure of himself, although never quite truly in control. But now– wow, now he looked completely lost, like he was caught off guard. Like no one ever asked him what he wanted, for a change. 

“Well?” You ask softly, getting up from where you sat and moving to crouch in front of him. Your hands find support on his knees, and you allow yourself to look at him like you never did before. Like you knew what you wanted, but that didn’t matter at the moment. This was all about him. 

“T-there is this… thing,” He gulps, bitting his lip in the most endearing way. “But I don’t- I’m not sure if… I can?”

“Jisung,” You whisper with a caring smile on your face. You wanted to offer him security, and confidence, and love, and support, because he deserves it more than anyone. He deserves to be on the receiving end for once. “Take it.”

“A-are you sure?” He asks, forcefully closing his eyes and exhaling. His hands find yours on his knees and they squeeze each other. “Are you really sure I can do this?”

“Not only you can,” You chuckle. “But you deserve it.”

He nods. And nods and nods and nods and kisses you. His hands go to your face in a flash and suddenly you are kissing. Him on the swing, and you in front of him. You feel him moving around and sliding to the ground, groaning when the swing hits the back of his head lightly. You laugh into the kiss because there is nothing you love more than this, right now. His lips sliding over yours, his hand cradling your face with care, and his breath fanning your face as he chuckled, giggled even, realizing that it was finally his turn. His turn to be happy too. 

As you pull apart, you smile again. He still holds your face, laughing. 

“I never knew this is what you wanted,” You whisper, leaning forward to kiss his cheeks. Eyes. Nose. 

“Is it okay?” He asks, shakily. “Is it okay that I want you?”

“More than okay,” You kiss him again. And again as you two got up. And again he dropped you home. 

The next morning, when you woke up with a thud coming from your kitchen, you smile. 

“Good morning,” You say, hugging him from behind as he whisked some eggs. “What are you doing?”

“Making you breakfast,” He mumbles, focused on his task. “Your mom said she had something urgent and asked me to come over and make you company.”

“Liar,” You tease, burying your face on his back. 

His laugh echoes in the empty house. 

“Okay, I came over to see you and you were still asleep,” He confesses. “Your mom did have something to do though, and just left me here.”

“That’s more like it,” You hum, turning him around to kiss him quickly. “Hi.”

“Hi.” He breathes out and goes back to what he was doing. 

That morning was when you felt it, your dream. A purpose, one would call it. It grew on you as you ate eggs with him watching some stupid kids show on the TV. It made itself present when you two made out in the couch, mumbling sweet nothings to each other. It exploded when he had to leave for an hour or two but promised to take you out on a date later that night. 

You smile as you relished on it; the sweet, warm feeling of him– your dream. 

-----------

hello lovelies! sorry it took me so long to write something new, but I hope you enjoy it! let me know what you think :P

[poplinn]

I do think that the new outbreak of toxic people drumming up their toxic groups in this fandom is hurting people. They think theyre doing something right but all they're doing is making mentally ill and/or young fans too scared to enjoy or create in fear of being harassed.

Hi anon! first of all i want to apologise for responding so late. I have a lot to say about your ask and just wanted a clear head before i decided  to respond. i want to start  off by saying you are absolutely right.

Before i continue i am going to put a read-more because, well, i have a LOT to say about this, so, mini-rant ahead under the read-more…

These people are doing more harm than good.

I understand if you want to make a small list with content warnings, for a fandom, that is completely fine! But using such a list to start bullying, harassing, threatening and in general, witch-hunting people is not okay. Many great and talented people have been driven away from the fandom by that tiny toxic group(or the cucks, as i like to call them for easy sakes). Content creators are even scared to post their content too now, both of these things are a huge shame. It’s terrible. Sites like tumblr are supposed to be for sharing your content without limitations. [well, until the nsfw ban, but you get what i mean..]

I happen to be in contact with some people on the blocklist, and let me tell you, they are truly amazing and wonderful people. 

Yeah sometimes people make content you may not agree with, but that doesn’t mean you have start attacking people for it. Do you know how easy it is to click the unfollow or block button? But apparently some people are so stupid they prefer to screech instead of click one single button. 

But for example, I dislike a certain popular hc for medic. I dislike the Jewish medic hc. I’m a Jewish man myself, but I don’t like seeing Jewish medic for multiple reasons, none of which are out of antisemitic nature. What do I see when I see Jewish medic? I mind my own fucking business. The person who posted that wanted to create that, fine by me. I don’t agree with it, and I don’t have to. I’m not going to make a dumb expose list for everyone who ever said anything about medic being Jewish. I mind my fucking business like a normal, mature person. 

And there was/is a huge discussion about drawing or writing tf2 non-con…yeah, rape isn’t good. Every sane person knows that. Writing or drawing rape does not mean you’re a rapist (unless it’s an autobiography of course, then I’d like you to take a trip to prison). But, some people, including myself, write or draw non-con as a coping mechanism. I use confrontation to cope. I have a few triggers, and by confronting myself with said triggers I’m slowly getting over said triggers.

If I write or draw about these triggers or rape, I feel like I’m relieving my feelings about what happened to me. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, and i’m not the only person who does it like that. 

Yeah, I get people don’t always want to see that. That’s why tags exist, that’s why people use those tags for content and trigger warnings. That’s why you block those tags if you don’t want to see it.  It’s that simple

Also, some of them make the claim that fiction is reality. I disagree, fiction is not reality. Yes, fiction can impact reality, but it isn’t one and the same. If you can’t distinguish fiction from reality then, well, you’re either not ready for fiction or not old/stable enough to be able to tell the two apart. Besides, if fiction really IS reality then so many movies and books would have been banned, or the writers of those must have been in jail by now, right? Writing a book about a fictional serial killer does not mean the writer is planning to or already has commit murder. Take Tf2 fan-fiction writers for example. They write about dudes slaughtering each other on a daily basis, but some of them wouldn’t even DARE to hit a fly in real life. 

People who commit crimes because of a fictional piece were already going to do so to begin with. No sane human sees a crime that occurs in fiction and thinks to do the same. Those who do commit crimes because of a fictional piece were already planning to do so to begin with, and were probably not a completely hundred percent stable person.

And about the discussion of miss p being a lesbian, yeah I get that Jay said she’s gay and that, and if she really was a Canon lesbian, it’d be weird to ship her with men. However, those cucks do also make soldier a homosexual despite him having a (gorgeous) wife? Isn’t that kind of hypocritical? Anyways, Jay most likely was joking about miss p being gay, he’s known to be a jokey person like that. I feel like the way he did it was just saying “oh yeah btw she’s gay”. To me it feels vague. In the same sense that jk Rowling suddenly says everyone is gay in Harry Potter. Yeah, I hc her as a funky lil lesbian too, but i don’t go off on a tangent when someone sees her as bi, because the way she was “confirmed” as a lesbian, was vague and uncertain, and most likely a dumb joke that split the fandom in half.    

Anyways, most of the cucks I ran into are underage, and aren’t even allowed on this site, which can explain their irrational behaviour, and refusing to listen to anyone who slightly disagrees with them, but lemme tell y'all something, minding your own fucking business would have prevented this entire blocklist ordeal.

Besides, YOU are in control of what you see on the Internet. Don’t like a certain type of content? BLOCK IT! or just, STOP LOOKING AT IT! it’s not that hard!

You are responsible for your own experience on the Internet. Not ready for that? Then close your phone/laptop and go outside. Content creators are not responsible for what you do online, these creators don’t know you, don’t expect them to fucking take care of you, they’re not your parents. Avoiding certain content does NOT mean you have to start policing others on what to post. You have no right to tell artist what they can and cannot post. Again, you may criticise or dislike it, that’s fine, but actively demanding censorship or threatening the creator makes you look like an incompetent asshole. 

And if you disagree with something, it’s better to start with calming yourself down and contacting the OP in a respectful and mature manner. Maybe talk to them, broaden your horizon, broaden their horizon. Can’t agree eventually? That’s fine, it’s normal. Simply block the tag or the creator themselves and boom! You’re done, and didn’t harm anyone in the fandom and probably learned something, and OP probably too! If something isn’t tagged you can always, nicely, reach out to OP and ask them to tag. Most of the time they will. And if they don’t, just unfollow or block them if they continue posting a certain something that triggers you. Making a blocklist is one of the most immature things you could do. You bully and harass people to the point where some feel unsafe, and some even suicidal, in a fandom about a dumb fucking hat Simulator. Is that really what you want?? A fandom is supposed to be a safe and fun place for everyone who likes a certain something. By being toxic, and harassing others to the point where they don’t even feel safe(not only those who are young or mentally ill) in a what was supposed to be a safe place for them, you’re actively harming that safe place, and frankly, you don’t deserve to be in the fandom. 

Also, I’ve seen a lot of these cucks say they actually hate tf2 as a game, and really, if you hate the game so much why are you still here in the fandom? And ruining it for the rest for us?

If you do feel unsafe, follow steps I mentioned above. Talk to people, block tags, block people, and mind your own business without policing others in what they can and cannot do. Unfortunately, the creators who do feel unsafe because of the toxic group cannot talk them, because the moment someone even slightly disagrees with them, or tries to respectfully discuss why they’re being “cancelled” the cucks start screeching like full-blown autists.

You’re not the law enforcement, you are (most likely) a minor who isn’t even allowed on tumblr in the first place, and who has no idea how the internet, or fandom spaces in specific, even work.

Fucking hell I miss 2014 Tf2 fandom sometimes. 

~~

I hope this ramble makes sense, and again I’m sorry for making this so long.

And I’m sorry for posting drama again, I don”t like it either, and i usually have a lot of patience, but after a few years of this shit, i have come to reach my boiling point, and i just snapped, I’m sorry.

I sometimes refer to the cucks as you, idk why, but just now that isn’t referring to you anon.

Hopefully this will be the last of drama/discourse for now.

Thank you for reading, have a good day. 

-pop 

[docfuture]

Princess, part 7

     [This story is a prequel, set several years before The Fall of Doc Future, when Flicker is 16.  Links to some of my other work are here.  Updates are theoretically biweekly–next update is scheduled for February 16th.]

Previous: Part 6

     Full intragroup and intergroup relative advantage simulation run started.  Estimated time for results: 6 hours at current background priority.       Flicker finished her third high speed assessment of Practical Power Dynamics and supporting information on people and organizations that had used it.  It had sparked insights--it was full of interesting social science--but it was also full of traps.  Many of them seemed to be associated with naive scaling--the book's advice seemed unusually hostile to the incentive structures of large organizations, such as major corporations, government agencies, and international organized crime.  She didn't yet have the context to follow the social changes the book had inspired, other than the notable de-fetishization of gratuitous killing.  A long model run would help, but it would also take a while.       Flicker's focus was more on the personal.  Some of the advice on managing anger was intriguing, but it was unclear how applicable it would be for someone whose emotional processing was not entirely human.  What she had found most useful was the window into the thinking of a smart, astute human who had done serious work on the problem of long-term functioning with a large personal reservoir of anger.       She slowed down, moving herself back into squishy brain again, with active senses other than sight and touch.  Human senses, hearing and smell, for the sound from the high speed workstation fans and the cooling pumps for the server room, and the faint smell of the oil she'd used on a stuck robot earlier in the day.  She flexed her hands, which tingled as the normal flow of blood returned after a long bout of speed typing.       Her emotions shifted back to as normal as they ever got as well.       Journeyman was still watching.  It had been about a minute for him--and almost a day subjective for her, some of it spent thinking on her own while she waited on resource intensive bits of Database analysis.  She stood up from the high speed workstation and moved to the other end of the couch.       "The book's perspective on anger is useful," she said, "and there are some techniques that may end up helping with management--but that will probably take a while.  DASI is analyzing it and running simulations.  There is lots of subtext, and quirks because it wasn't really intended for someone with my level of power.  And we still have to sort through some of the traps, so I'll take my time, and it's securely recorded and backed up."       She handed the book back to him.  "Thank you for the loan."       "No problem."       Flicker exhaled slowly, releasing a bit of the tension she had built up.  "My level of background anger seems to be pretty high compared to most humans.  But not compared to the author of the book, apparently.  The way she talks about normal humans getting angry and calming down sounds like an anthropologist documenting weird alien behavior.  It's kind of funny because I find some of the same things weird.  So I can see why someone with normal human anger might find mine scary.  Like you do."       Flicker waved a hand.  "It's hard to explain because a lot of it isn't conscious.  It's just what I do, I don't know any other way.  But I can tell you something I know I do differently.  A lot of the things I see at high speed make me angry.  How could they not, if I care at all?  And my speed mind is wider than my squishy brain--it has way more short-term memory.  That's why I need to forget so much when I sleep--to keep the human part of me sane.  But some of the anger from the memories stays.  Only a little for each one, but it adds up.  More than anything I can do to calm down does.       "I have ways to dump that kind of anger, but only down to a certain point.  So I tend to be at or above my background anger level most of the time, unless I'm completely concentrating on something.  And new things can interact with the background and make it seem like I'm reacting disproportionately when I'm really not.  Does this help you understand better?"       Journeyman glanced down at the book, still in his hands, then put it back into his vest pocket.  "A bit.  I hope you're ready for some things that will make you angry, because I can't put them off any longer."       Flicker studied him.  "Speaking of traps and subtext, there was a bit in the book about not setting traps for yourself with unresolved conflicts.  We have one.  Have you been avoiding it to sustain your load-bearing social fiction?  Or because you were worried I'd be angry?"       "Both.  The spying you did the next time I was gone after scrambled memory day had some serious consequences."       "It was research on your background I needed to do because you didn't leave me any other options, and you never elaborated."       "You'd already stopped by the time I found out about it, and I didn't want to have that fight while you were my backup for the dicey mess I got myself into."  Journeyman spread his hands.  "You uncovered information about a fair number of my contacts.  One of them was a Diviner.  Doesn't matter how careful you are if you hit a canary secret from a prepared Diviner.  If the number of people who know it is small, and goes up, they can tell.  After I got back, I found a message from her telling me it had been fun, but she didn't want to die finding out the hard way that my new girlfriend was the jealous type.  She'd already disappeared.  I can't blame her--she knew you were my partner and correctly guessed you were the one digging.  Diviners that aren't paranoid about being hunted don't generally live to get old."       "But I wasn't--never mind."  She planned ahead based on plausible assumptions.       "Yeah.  My contacts don't know everything, and neither do you.  And that's the way it has to stay."       Flicker frowned.  "Okay, but I still don't understand the rules for how your magical communities function.  The information quality about them in the Database was really low:  A lot of implausible junk, some weird and disturbing stuff--most of it probably untrue--and occasional records of conflicts that left a body or bodies.  I wanted to find a good enough set of connections and opinions of you so I could see where you fit.  I was not trying to endanger anyone. That was why I put so much effort into preserving anonymity for everyone but you when I was digging.  And stopped when I realized it would fail.  I learned a lot of things I didn't expect.  Including how justified so many of the people you know are in fearing databases.  But only the Database knows who they are, I don't."       "They don't know that.  Limiting access to personally identifiable information can be a matter of life or death for them."  Journeyman smiled humorlessly.  "The torches and pitchforks crowds and burn-the-witch-itis have always interacted with privacy loss in ugly ways.  One consequence is that internal safety is an issue, and yes, that's something I have to balance.  I try not to make things worse.  But I did, when I became your partner.  I needed backup for too long, and you stopped waiting and started spying."       "I wanted to know about you, and if you'd been willing to sit down and talk to me--"  Not productive.  Redirect.  "I use the Database as a social prosthetic to keep from screwing up even worse than I do already.  You were being evasive.  I didn't know enough to tell if you were trying to get me to take a hint, so I used it to try to find out if I was taking the right hint.  There were Database privacy blocks keeping me from finding out what I wanted, and that stupid superhero social taboo against asking directly.  How else was I supposed to find out?  Telepathy?  Osmosis?  It was OSINT, active hacking and monitoring, or ghosting around to spy in person, and I picked the least intrusive option."       Journeyman nodded.  "That's what the Database told me, when I learned about the urgent trust hazard you'd created.  I understand.  But even open source intelligence is qualitatively different with your level of Database access.  Perceptions count for what I do, and it doesn't matter what you or I think, if my contacts start avoiding me because they're worried about a frighteningly powerful 16-year-old with high level Database access who is perceived as immature."       "How did this become common knowledge?  Did the Diviner tell people?"       "I did.  I knew there would be others, so I asked the Database for a list, got in touch with those I still could, and apologized."       Calm.  "Without telling me."       "I told you I'd handle the fallout--that it was a social problem, not a speed or power problem.  Remember?"       "Yes, but this was something I needed to know to correctly evaluate consequences.  And isn't it still a problem, just from us being partners?"       "At the moment, yes.  It's going to take time for me to rebuild trust."       Flicker shook her head.  Staying angry at him for concealing an apology would be both unhelpful and unfair.       "I see," she said.  "Any other unpleasant surprises you want to get out of the way?"       Journeyman clasped his hands and looked down at them.  "Several.  I've had time to think a little more about Doc not telling you things.  And you make assumptions based on what you think he must know.  But there is something I've picked up as a magician that you probably haven't.  Diviners tend to be paranoid and secretive, for good reasons.  A lot of Seers have serious trouble staying mentally healthy.  And true Oracles have to take extreme measures to stay sane and alive, and be really careful how they talk."       "What definitions are you using?  The Database says 'Seer' is used so broadly and vaguely it's almost meaningless."       "Ah, sorry.  Magicians can be sloppy with terminology, but what can you do?  A Diviner is a magician who specializes in information magic.  Seer is a catch-all label for anyone who sees or perceives things not accessible to normal senses that are at least sometimes accurate--they don't have to be trained and Seeing often isn't voluntary.  Breakpoint is an example of a Seer who isn't a magician.  An Oracle is a Seer who can see the future, know it's the future, and possibly affect it.  They are frickin' dangerous.  And rare.  And Doc comes across to me as an Oracle doing a very good job of hiding it."       "He isn't an Oracle, he's just good at long term extrapolation.  He does do some pretty weird analysis and debiasing tricks with Database projections, though."       "I think there's more to it, but it might not matter.  There are quirks he has, ways he talks about certain things, that make me wonder if he has a future-vision-o-mat down in the vaults.  And a way to stay functional as an Oracle is extreme compartmentalization--literally putting some things completely out of your mind.  That's risky if you get attacked, and I think Doc has been.  But he does have the Database, and the support for the kind of compartmentalization he would need was already there when I needed some of it, for the data I just put in escrow."       Journeyman looked back at her.  "So don't assume he has to know something because he knows other things.  And be careful about dismissing warnings if he can't share direct evidence.  Oracles can know without being able to show."       "That sounds pretty speculative," said Flicker, "but I'll keep it in mind."       "That's all I can ask."  Journeyman nodded slowly.  "And now for something else you'll probably consider speculative, but sure doesn't look that way to me.  Did Doc ever tell you how an Oracle duel works?"       Flicker sped up briefly to check the Database, then slowed again.  "No, but it sounds like something theoretical called a dual loop virtual time travel instability.  Does it involve nothing you can really see except strange apparent coincidences?"       "Yeah, that's what Doc called them.  I'm pretty sure now that the entire mess I got dragged into over a year ago--the deciding factor for my agreement to become your partner in the first place--was tangled up with a long running Oracle duel involving at least two sides.  And that's not even counting whatever indirect effect Doc's projections might have.  When I started to realize something was weird, I didn't think it had anything to do with you.  Aaand... I was wrong.  Figured that out last night, but it doesn't help much.  Even if you know you're caught in the gears, it's way too easy to tie yourself up in self-delusion, seeing things that aren't there..."       "Confirmation bias?"       "And a bunch of other kinds.  Multiply the problems in Doc's rant about using Bayesian analysis to catch a probability manipulator by a hundred.  And I'm fairly certain I was targeted to get at you."       Flicker frowned.  "Why?  Why am I not targeted directly?"       "You are--that would be Hermes.  There are multiple things going on, which is what makes this such a pain to try to unravel.  But you have a lot of protection from direct probability manipulation.  A bunch of older magicians that lived through the Cold War still cast regular little blessings against nuclear annihilation.  You get part of them because you can--and would--rip apart a nuclear war with thrown rocks.  And Doc and I still argue about the origin of some less obvious buffers for you that definitely exist.  But there's lot of hostile probability manipulation, too.  Like, everyone who can do it who wants to destroy the world or part of it, because you're pretty good at stopping that, and the easiest way to get it to happen is to trick you into doing it for them.  Now I'm not defenseless.  But it's like..."       Journeyman paused to think, then looked up at her.  "Suppose I'm somewhere with bullets and shrapnel flying around.  I'm better off than the average bystander because I have an anti-bullet ward.  But if I'm standing next to Armadillo and a bunch of machine guns are shooting at her, I'm in danger, because bullets miss and bounce, and my ward can only handle so much.  And if some of the gunners get the bright idea to shoot at me instead, I'm in real trouble, because what might only annoy her can kill me.  I'm the weak point."       He pressed a hand to his forehead.  "I think I'm your weak point.  In more than one way.  And yeah, there are things we could theoretically do to try to handle it all, but you know what those machine gun equivalents are very effective at preventing?  Calm, uninterrupted consideration of anything personal or contentious."       "I think we're managing okay," said Flicker.  "I mean, it's not exactly fun, but..."       "We haven't gotten to the contentious part.  And, uh... I'd kind of like to move somewhere neutral for that.  This is your home, and you may suddenly prefer I be elsewhere."       "I may even more suddenly need to talk to the Database, and the latency is lower here.  If I want you to leave I'll tell you.  And you can port out any time, if you stop feeling safe."       "I'm not feeling particularly safe now.  But I promised I'd stop evading, so...  Do you still want to go ahead?"       Flicker briefly consulted her reminder list, much of which now seemed outdated or inappropriate.  "I had a plan, but you derailed it by bringing up other stuff--important stuff--like you're afraid we won't ever get another chance to talk."       A steadying breath.  "So I'm wondering if I even should, with everything you say is getting in the way.  And you aren't acting or sounding okay.  When you came back to Earth yesterday, you'd been through something horrifically bad.  Forgot you'd been stabbed in the back bad.  Paranoia turned up, reliving things under cover, not all the way back yet bad.  I changed the subject to Hermes, then later botched my sleep-fuzzy attempt to help.  Partner, can you tell me what's wrong?  And how we might go about fixing the Oracle thing if you think it's interfering with you too much?  Because I can wait a little longer if I have to."       Journeyman laced his hands together behind his neck and shook his head.  "You're right that I'm not okay, but waiting isn't going to make it better.  I think bad shit would just keep happening.  And I know you hate incomplete answers, but I've told you as much as I can about what's wrong.  As for fixing things... I don't think there is any quick fix.  I put details in Database escrow just in case, but I sure don't want you going off on a rampage in another dimension because I suspect some of the inhabitants might be responsible for some of our problems."       "Then why bring it up?"       Journeyman smiled wearily.  "Doc's old rule:  Tell you what not to do clearly and first, because there may not be a chance for a 'wait, stop'.  And with the way things have been going..."       "Fair.  So you think we're just going to have to live for a while with incomplete information, bad luck, unfortunate misunderstandings, inconvenient interruptions, and so forth for everything we do together?"       "No."  He took a deep breath.  "We aren't going to live with it because we aren't going to be together."       "...Until?"       Journeyman spread his hands.  "Don't wait around."       Flicker stared at him with a hollow feeling in her stomach.  "What does that mean?"       He looked down, then back up at her.  "First:  You're 16.  I would not be okay with starting anything before you're 18.  Next:  Even if all the interference went away, I still couldn't be Make-Everything-Better Man for you," he said.  "I'm glad I was able to help you as your partner.  But it's not a healthy basis for a relationship.  And those aren't the only problems, but going through a list with the implication that the goal is to find a way around them all would be a bad idea.  Some of the issues are mine.  Getting together with you would not work, and I don't know when, if ever, that might change."  He shook his head.  "You have your own life.  You should feel free to grow, and learn, and become... whoever you're going to be.  And right now there's too much I can't tell you, you have too many good reasons to be angry with me, and I don't want to be used as a weapon against you."       Flicker stood, and looked over at the entrance to the server room.  "So you'll just blow everything up yourself.  It sounds like you want to drop our joint duty shifts, too?"       A pause.  "I wasn't kidding about the load-bearing thing.  At least for a while, I think they would just make things worse for both of us."       "Now that makes me angry.  I put a lot into our partnership, and trusted you to maintain it.  But okay.  It's not like you need your partner's backup anymore."       The hollow feeling had given way to the grim disgust of seeing a tangled mess she couldn't possibly have helped, because it was wrecked before she even started.  But it was best to be sure.  She sped up.       DASI?  Does Journeyman appear to be suffering from mental sabotage, mind control, or anything else relevant?       I do not have sufficient data to judge the soundness of his decision process, but his actions are consistent with his prior behavior.  He is showing signs of prolonged stress.  As are you.       Thanks.  I knew that last part already.       Amelioration measures are still in progress.  Please do not do anything precipitous.       Yeah, yeah.       She slowed back down and shook her head.  "I just don't understand your thinking.  Why even agree to our partnership, if you were going to do this?  And if your model of an attack on me is right, and not just a paranoid overreaction, why pull away... everything I thought we had, without even trying to help?"       "I do intend to try to help, after I spend a while recovering," he said.  "I'll stay in touch through the Database.  But first I need to see if I can track down some Diviners, because half the ones I know are indisposed or missing, and the other half are getting 'future not found' errors or disturbingly ambiguous signs of some sort of global catastrophe that may or may not be happening the day after tomorrow."       A sudden frown.  "You weren't planning on doing anything drastic to the planet that day, were you?"       "Not particularly.  I'm not even going to be on Earth for some of it."       "What."       "I'm going to the Moon to run Speedtest, finally.  Scheduled it with Doc this morning."       "Ah," said Journeyman, his face noticeably paler.  "I don't suppose you'd be willing to reschedule?"       "No.  As you said, I have my own life, and things to learn.  If you are seriously convinced some entity is actively trying to sabotage something specific that I've put off for too long already, tell me where they live, and I'll visit them with some physics.  Before catastrophe day.  Then you can find those other Diviners and see if the problem has cleared up or there is someone else who needs a visit.  An Oracle should be able to tell if their personal future is about to become very short, right?"       Journeyman looked down.  "I... don't think that's a good plan."       "Then maybe you should have raised your concerns before dumping your partner?"       "Priority interrupt," announced DASI from the wall speaker.  "A candidate psychological expert has been located."       Flicker sped up to read a summary on her visor.  It was good news that DASI had managed to identify and contact someone.  But she had conditions for her help and an unusual background...       Flicker puzzled over some of the details, then slowed down to frown at Journeyman.  "All right, if you really still want to help, the Database profile of this person is weird.  There seem to be rumors that she has some kind of magic resistance.   Have you ever heard of a Dr. Stella Reinhart?"

Next: Part 8

[mushyyroom]

Can you write one where Cyrus came out to TJ and he was closeted and decides he should spend time away from him and tries to distant himself from Cyrus for a week and cue them both wishing the other would just kiss and make up. You decide how the rest goes..

uhhh! I hope this is what you wanted! Warning its kinda angsty? I’m still not very good at writing angst so we’ll see how this goes together right? Hehe…

Monday

Amber slapped him upside the head, “Are you fucking stupid?”

“Ow!” TJ rubbed at the spot she had just bruised him. Though he probably deserved that.

“Cyrus Goodman is a good boy TJ! I will not tolerate my dumbass brother causing unnecessary drama!”

“I know he’s a good guy,” TJ muttered, crossing his arms defensively, “Which is why I have to stay away from him.”

Amber threw her arms up, exasperated, “What are you talking about?”

“He likes boys Amber!” TJ cried out. He has been avoiding Cyrus ever since he told him the previous day in a heart wrenching confession. TJ didn’t return any of his calls and actually did a 180 when he saw Cyrus walking down the sidewalk. He wasn’t being very subtle, and TJ knew that.

Amber glared at her brother, “Is that a problem TJ?”

“Yeah!” TJ said in a duh voice, “But probably not in the way you’re thinking. I’m not a one of those stupid homophobes Ams.”

His sister was extremely tempted to slap him again, “Well you could have fooled me! Cyrus is basically crying his eyes out cause he thinks you hate him now!”

“He is?” TJ didn’t mean for that to happen. He just couldn’t handle knowing that Cyrus liked boys because… well because that meant that he had a chance. Well, he didn’t really have a chance because Cyrus was so pure and amazing and beautiful. And he deserved the world. He deserved someone equally as great. Someone who he didn’t have to wait for to become even a slightly decent person. Someone who wasn’t TJ. He couldn’t stand to be around Cyrus because his heart hurt knowing they could be a possibility that would never become a reality. And until he was over his own dumb heartbreak, he couldn’t face Cyrus. That’s another thing that he was that Cyrus didn’t need in a boyfriend, selfish.

Amber sighed, patting her brother on the shoulder, “Yeah. He’s really upset. Broke down in his milkshake this afternoon.”

“I didn’t mean for that to happen,” TJ’s voice was smaller than Amber had ever heard it before, and that included the times that their parents had yelled at them for hours on end about useless things just to take out some of their pent up anger, “I just… I can’t see him right now Ams.”

“TJ,” She rubbed his arm soothingly, “What’s wrong then?”

TJ just continued to stare down at his lap, “I… I like him a lot.”

Amber jumped up, smiling, “TJ that’s awesome!”

“No its not,” TJ scowled, “He deserves more. I don’t even stand a chance compared to literally everyone else out there.”

Amber frowned, “TJ Kippen! Do not talk badly about yourself like that! Cyrus would be honored to date someone like you so get your head outta your ass.”

“You really know how to put things delicately don’t ya sis,” TJ offered a small smile, “Thanks.”

Amber rolled her eyes and ruffled her brothers head, “You’re a work in progress TJ, I’ll admit. But progress is still something, and Cyrus is the most patient and understanding person we know. He won’t mind that you’re a little rough around the edges still. And he knows that you’re a good person deep down. Deep, deep, deep-”

“Okay I get it Amber,” TJ groaned and pushed her out of his room.

He sent Cyrus a text later that night that read:

Thank you for telling me. It means a lot. I don’t hate you.

He’s never been that great with words.

Tuesday

Cyrus contemplated not going to school, but ultimately the need to get a good education for his future won out. At least he knew that TJ didn’t hate him. But that did nothing to explain why he was avoiding him though. Cyrus couldn’t think of why he was being so distant.

Well that was a lie. Cyrus did have one theory. TJ must have figured out that he had a crush on him and he was trying to figure out how to let him down easily. That was the only explanation. That or TJ was worried that Cyrus would develop a crush on him, but it was already too late for that.

But if space is what TJ needed, then who was Cyrus to go against his wishes. He would respect TJ’s decision and he would get over this stupid crush so that they could be friends again.

“I still think you should just talk to him,” Andi rubbed his arm soothingly.

Buffy slammed a hand on the table, “Forget him! TJ isn’t worth it Cyrus. You deserve a friend who doesn’t avoid you because of something like this.”

Cyrus just put his forehead back down on the table. He would just have to avoid all places he knew TJ was likely to show up. He could reroute his entire schedule, right?

Wednesday

TJ hadn’t seen Cyrus all week. He normally bumped into him on his way to math class, when the other boy would give him a thumbs up for encouragement. And he would sometimes see Cyrus at lunch time. TJ would swing by his table to say a quick hi. But he was nowhere to be seen. It was almost as if Cyrus was avoiding him now.

TJ sulked, twirling his pen absentmindedly and not paying the least bit of attention to his history teacher droning on. How was he going to fix this? There was no way he could manage this level of damage control now. He was doomed.

How could he let Cyrus ever think for a moment that TJ would be anything but enamored with him? Cyrus wasn’t stupid. He could probably tell that something was still off with TJ, but unfortunately he probably mistook his nervous fidgeting as a subconscious uncomfortable tick. And being the amazing person that Cyrus was, he probably was giving TJ an out to not hang out with him anymore. Which of course was the exact opposite of what he wanted! Who would voluntarily leave Cyrus?

What was he going to do?

Thursday

Buffy looked absolutely murderous. Her eyes had an almost feral gleam to them, as if she were going to tear TJ’s jugular out with her teeth. All of this was, of course, warranted though.

“TJ Kippen. If you thought I hated you before,” She started, backing him up into a locker, “It is nothing compared to the pure detestation that I have for you now.”

TJ put his hands up in a surrendering motion, “Buffy. How lovely it is to see you.”

“Cut the shit TJ!” She sneered, “How dare you do that to Cyrus? After everything he did for you?  He was being open with you, and now that you know he’s,” She looked around to make sure no one was listening, “Now that you know he’s gay you avoid him? It’s so typical! You probably think Cyrus likes you, right? It would be just like you and your ego to think so highly of yourself like that, right?”

“Are you crazy Driscoll?” TJ could help but snap back with the same amount of venom, “Why would I ever think he would like someone like me? As if I deserve him.”

Buffy backed up a bit, her face morphing into something akin to shock, “What do you mean?”

“I meant what I said,” TJ rolled his eyes, “Can you not figure it out? Are you only smart when it comes to math?”

“I’ll have you know that I have a great GPA,” Buffy puffed her chest a bit before shaking her head. Her face still had a bit of confusion left on it, “But I still don’t understand this. Why are you avoiding him then?”

TJ looked to the side of her, avoiding eye contact, “Figure it out.”

“TJ,” Buffy said exasperatedly, “This is going to get nowhere if you don’t tell me what the problem is.”

“Good. Then I’m leaving,” TJ tried to push past her but Buffy was quicker, wiping an arm out to grab TJ.

“Not so fast. I won’t sit around doing nothing while Cyrus drives himself up the wall trying to figure out how to fix this.” Buffy turned the boy to face her, “What did he do wrong?”

TJ shook his head, frustrated, “Nothing! He did nothing wrong. It’s me. I can’t be around him and just be his friends anymore. I’m the problem! But then again, what’s new?”

“TJ…” Buffy let go of his arm, but it wasn’t like he was going to try to escape again. She approached him cautiously, as if he were a skittish cat, “Nothing’s wrong with you. Do you…” She paused, taking a moment to consider her next words, “Do you like Cyrus?”

TJ turned to leave again, but this time Buffy rushed to block his path. He let out a sigh, “Can you please just let me go? You’re right. As usual. Happy?”

“If I’m right then why are you avoiding him?” Buffy looked at him in disbelief, “You do realize that you actually have a chance with him, right?”

TJ let out a laugh that sounded crooked, “That’s where you’re wrong Driscoll.”

“Explain.” She demanded, and TJ knew that he wasn’t going to get away without an explanation. He literally talked to Amber about this the other night, why was everyone so annoying?

“You said it yourself,” TJ’s voice was hard, “I’m nothing but an egotistical ass, why would you want that dating one of your best friends? I know I wouldn’t want that for him. So, there. Are we done?”

Buffy looked a little at loss for words, “TJ-”

“Look. I don’t want your sympathies or the whole ‘No! Don’t treat yourself like that’ speech, okay? I already got that from my sister an-”

Buffy cut him off with a scoff, “Actually I was going to say that you were a stupid idiot. But I guess you already know that. Listen, you’re not perfect. But no one is, and if you make Cyrus smile like you normally do, I don’t really see a problem with giving it a shot. As long as he’s happy who cares if you’re not perfect? You’ll be perfect to him, and that’s all that matters.”

“Buffy-”

“I know,” She smirked, back to her usual posture, “It’s super mushy, and we don’t really have conversations like this. But I mean it. So get your head out of your ass TJ and fix this before I break your arm.”

She sounded eerily like his sister.

“And she’s back,” TJ smiles, “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” She narrows her eyes, “I mean it. Don’t mention it. To anybody.”

Friday

Cyrus wasn’t usually the one to mope. Complain endlessly? Yeah that sounded like something he’d do. But mope around silently? Nope.

“Cyrus,” Buffy laid a comforting hand on him, “Drink your shake. Everything will be okay.”

Instead he banged his head against the table, “How can you be so sure Buffy? This is like apocalypse level bad. He hates me, I know he said he doesn’t but it’s obvious he does.”

“Now you’re being dramatic,” Andi laughed, “Which is actually an improvement from your little silent act.”

“And he doesn’t hate you,” Buffy forced his head up, “Trust me. I’m always right.”

“But what if you’re not about this?”

“I’m right about this,” Buffy forced a tater tot in his mouth, “Don’t question my abilities.”

Cyrus chewed slowly as Andi gave him a reassuring smile, “Again, I think you should just talk to him. At least then you might be able to figure out what’s wrong.”

He swallowed angrily, “I already know what’s wrong. He figured out that I like him and now he’s avoiding me so he doesn’t have to let me down.”

Both the girls stared at him, eyebrows raised.

Cyrus smiled sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck, “I never told you guys that, did I?”

“No,” Buffy huffed out, “No you didn’t. But I had my suspicions.”

“Yeah,” Andi giggled, “You talked about him all the time. It was just a constant stream of things TJ did that, no offense, anyone could do.”

He groaned, banging his head back on the table with a loud thump, “This is not helping.”

“You should talk to him.” Buffy said suddenly. It made Cyrus whip his head up.

“What? Just the other day you said to forget him.”

“Well,” Buffy crossed her arms smugly, “Things have changed. I have acquired new knowledge. I think you should talk to him. And tell him how you feel, it’s the only way to clear the air.”

Cyrus shook his head furiously, “No! Why would I do that? He’ll definitely hate me then!”

“Can you just trust me?”

“No.”

“Cyrus! Everything will be fine. Just tell him.”

“Are you trying to kill my self esteem even more?” He looked at her in disbelief, “I thought you were my friend. Friends keep friends from doing stupid things! It’s in the rules of friendship.”

“Well,” Buffy turned to face him with a serious expression, “This is not a stupid thing. It’s been like a week Cyrus. Have confidence and just own up to it.”

He had nothing else to say after that.

Saturday

It happened by chance. They both bumped into each other on a street that neither of them ever really went down on their way to a place neither of them really went to. It was work of the cruel mistress fate.

“Hi,” Cyrus waved.

TJ played with his fingers behind his back, “Hi.”

It was silent for another moment. The tension was so thick you could feel it if you waved your hand around a bit. What do you say to someone after you don’t see them for a week? After you’ve avoided them for a week? After you know for a fact that you should come clean about your secret feelings, but you’re too scared to? Neither boy knew quite how to start. They both opened their mouths at the same time, minds forcing them to go somewhere.

“Um…”

Still taking prompts! And of course if you want to chat im lonely and stuff sooooo

[queen-of-the-avengers]

So, This Is What You Do

Characters: Peter Parker x Reader, MJ (mentioned), Ned (mentioned)

Word Count: 1,986

Warnings: just all the fluff

Summary: You know Peter has a secret because he always disappears at random times. You have had enough and decide to figure it out since it’s clear he won’t tell you.

Author’s Note: If you have any requests, please send them in! I need new things to write LOL. This is unbeta’d and any and all mistakes are all on me.

Feedback the glue that holds my writing together

Tags at the bottom

“Do you have the answer for number 5?” You asked, peeking at your best friend’s paper.

“Hey, no cheating,” Peter said, covering his paper even though it wasn’t actually cheating. Your teacher gave you a take-home test to do. He knew the risks of giving his students a test to take home. Everyone would be cheating.

“Peter Parker, what did you get for number 5?” You asked again, pushing at his arm so you can see his answer. He just laughed and let you see his answer to which you copied on your own paper.

“We should take a break or something.” Peter began but you cut him off.

“We just took a break 5 minutes ago. No, we’re doing this test and then we can take a break. Now, come on, let’s do number 6.” You said trying to convince him as he groaned but did as he was told anyway.

You spent most of your days like this, with Peter in his room. Nothing ever happened between you two although you wished it did. You liked Peter a lot, in fact, you’ve liked him since you met him at the start of high school. You were friends with Ned before coming to this school and through Ned, you met Peter.

He was the dorky, shy, nerdy guy that no one ever really paid attention to. Yes, he had a bully which gave him unwanted attention but you and Ned were always there to back him up. Everyone knew, including Flash, that you would kick anyone’s ass if they ever hurt Peter. You knew Flash’s comments hurt Peter but he never showed it.

You and Peter had become good friends after the first time you stood up for him, and you’ve been going on strong ever since. Every day you would come over to do some homework before he had to cut the date short. Sometimes, when Peter left to do what he needed to do, you would hang with Aunt May and get to know Peter way before you even met him. She knew of your little crush on him but you begged her not to tell. She didn’t of course, but that didn’t stop her from encouraging you to go for it with him.

You wanted to tell him how you felt but he had a crush on Liz, a senior. You two were only sophomores but that didn’t stop him from gushing over her. It bothered you a little bit but she wasn’t the one hanging out with Peter every day after school, you were.

“Okay, what did you get for number 6?” You asked, looking up from your paper to see Peter on his phone to which you groaned. “Peter!”

“I’m sorry, Ned just texted me. He needs me right now so I’m going to have to cut this short. I’m sorry but you need to go.” He said in a rush, getting up without bothering to put away his homework. Of course. It’s not like you weren’t expecting this to happen.

“Oh, is he okay?” You asked, already packing up your things.

“Yeah, I just need to help him. I’m sorry, Y/N.”

“No, it’s okay. Hope you can figure things out with him.” You slung your backpack over your shoulder as he escorted you out of his room and out of his apartment. Aunt May wasn’t home so you couldn’t hang out with her.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at school,” Peter said with a smile before closing the door. You frowned and sighed, walking away from his door. You only lived a few blocks down the street so it wasn’t a far walk. You hated when Peter did this. It seems like Ned is always having problems but you didn't know why Ned didn’t text you about it. You were, in fact, his friend too.

You were just worried for Peter since he always did this to you. One time you were hanging with Peter and Aunt May when Ned called and asked for Peter. One time, you and Peter were out shopping for your mom’s birthday but instead of Ned needing him, it was the stupid Stark internship that needed him.

You were proud of Peter for getting an internship with freaking Iron Man but it took up most of his time. You didn’t know what he did, where he went or when he would be back. You always saw him the next day at school, sometimes with cuts and bruises on his body and sometimes not. You were this close to going down to Tony Stark himself and giving him a piece of your mind but you knew better. This was the opportunity of a lifetime for Peter, you couldn’t ruin it for your own selfish reasons.

It might harm his internship and you wouldn’t do that to Peter. You just wished you knew what was going on and where he was headed all the time.

“Was everything okay with Ned?” You asked Peter, picking apart your salad and taking out the things you didn't want. They got your order wrong but you didn't mind since they only added baby tomatoes. Peter usually ate them so you put them on his plate next to his sandwich.

“What?” Peter asked, looking at you with a confused look.

“Ned called you last night saying he needed you?”

“Oh, right, he’s good. Nothing major.” Peter took a bite of his sandwich. You nodded and looked at your surroundings. You and Peter decided to go to a cafe for lunch since it was Saturday and there was no school. It wasn’t busy at all since you had an early lunch but you enjoyed the silence around you. Queens was a busy place normally so you savored the silence as much as possible.

“Okay, well the Incredibles 2 just came out. I’m free next weekend if you want to go with me. I can ask Ned and Michelle if they want to join us or it could be just us, I don’t know, whatever you want to do.” You rambled. You looked up to see Peter smiling at you which made you shut up.

“Yeah, next weekend is perfect. I know Ned is busy since his family is going out of town but you can ask Michelle if she would like to come.”

“Okay! I am so excited for this movie! I loved the first one…” You trailed off when you heard police sirens coming your way. It wasn’t uncommon to hear police sirens in New York but when there was a whole fleet of them, it was big. You looked over your shoulder to see 4 or 5 police cars chasing a guy in a beat-up car with a gun, shooting at the police. You gasped but they were out of sight as soon as they disappeared.

“Wow, that looks serious, I hope no one gets hurt.” You said as you turned around but Peter wasn’t there.

“Peter?” You called out, looking around you but not finding the lanky boy. You sighed and saw some money on top of his sandwich but no Peter and no Peter’s backpack. Where the hell did he go so quickly?

Today is the day you and Peter were going to see the Incredibles 2. You asked Michelle to come with you but she said she had a ton of homework to do which only left you and Peter. You tried not to think of this as a date because then you would just get nervous and you would probably end up saying the wrong thing.

You were a bit early to this… event… but you didn't mind waiting for your best friend. The streets were filled with cars and the sidewalk was filled with people. A lot of people were coming to see this movie so you hoped Peter would come quickly so you could get good seats.

As you were looking over the crowd, you thought you saw Peter’s head in the crowd but he was walking the wrong way. He was walking towards some alley but you didn't know why.

“Peter!” You called out which earned some stares but you ignored them. He didn’t hear you and you looked at your watch. You knew you two were going to miss this showing but you were fed up with him always disappearing on you. You sighed and walked in his direction, seeing him disappear around the corner and into the alleyway.

As you got closer to the alley, you heard grunts and crashing. You turned the corner and walked further into the alley but didn’t see Peter. No, you saw Spider-Man beating up some guy who was trying to rob the cowering figure in the corner. You didn't know what to do or how to help. Spider-Man was your favorite out of the Avengers but you never saw him this close.

The robber made a swing at Spider-Man but he was quick and used his web shooters, sticking him to the wall. It was enough to force to knock him out but he was taken care of. Spider-Man gathered the belongings of the person and handed it back to her, calming her down. He thanked him and ran off, ignoring you.

You were about to say something but he took off his mask. His back was still turned to you so you couldn’t see him well but that mop of hair looked very familiar. He pressed a phone against his ear and started to talk on it, turning around while doing so. Your eyes went wide and a loud gasp left your mouth when you saw it was Peter.

He looked up and made eye contact with you, freezing in his spot. He finished his conversation before hanging up.

“How long have you been standing there?” He asked with a nervous chuckle.

“You’re Spider-Man?” You asked, your jaw practically to the floor, walking further in the alley.

“I can explain…” Peter started but you weren’t done.

“This is what you’ve been doing when you disappear? Ned never needed you because when I asked him about it, he didn’t know what I was talking about!” You began to feel hurt that he would keep this from you.

“Look, if you would just let me explain…”

“Does May know about this?”

“No, only you know and Ned but that was only because he caught me while I was trying to sneak in.”

“Ned knew before I did? I’m your best friend, Peter.” You said, looking at him, hurt.

“I know you are and I’m sorry but Mr. Stark doesn’t want people to know. You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

“Of course, I won’t. You’ve met Tony Stark?” You asked.

“Not only met him, but I also worked with him. And Captain America. Oh, it was awesome! I want to tell you all about it but not here,” He said with a big smile. You found it hard to stay mad at him. “I’m so sorry. We had a date to go see the movie and I completely bailed on you.”

“Th-this was a date?” You stuttered, blushing hard. Peter chuckled and he scratched the back of his neck before walking closer to you.

“Yeah, I thought it was. I knew Michelle would be busy and Ned would be away. I just wanted it to be us...” He chuckled nervously.

“You know what? Forget the movie, I have my own superhero in front of me.” You grinned.

“You think I’m a superhero?”

“You save people all the time. Of course, I do. Now, where do you want to go so you can tell me everything?” You asked with an excited smile. Peter brought you in his arms after putting his mask back on.

“I guess you’ll just have to hold on then.” You giggled and wrapped your arms around his neck before he shot off into the air.

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[gretchensinister]

Operation Welcome Mat (preview)

I usually like to post a fic for my birthday, and well, this is a few days belated, but sometimes that’s how it goes. This is a preview of something I’m working on, now, and it’s a branching out of my usual fandom territory! I hope you’re curious, and I hope you enjoy!

It all stems from the question: Why does so much stuff that only Superman can deal with happen on the planet that Superman is on? That’s not the question that Lois Lane asks, but it’s the one she’s going to find an answer for.

Lois Lane always checks her spam folder. In fact, she always opens each individual message in there. Ninety-nine point nine nine nine percent of the time, what’s in there is garbage, but garbage is not synonymous with useless. Consider the journalists in Portland who went through the District Attorney’s garbage to make a point about privacy. Her daily ritual isn’t on that level of significance, but she feels the point still stands.

           Today, she opens an email that isn’t promising free trials of herbal supplements, contact info for hot singles in her area, or insurance policies that will cover damages caused by any and all anomalous events for as little as $10 a month. (These last annoyed her enough to ask Louise in Business to do a small expose on such companies—turns out, the fine print stated that given the regularity of attacks on Metropolis by aliens, robots, metahumans, etc., etc., these events could not be considered anomalous. Fucking scammers. She’s pretty sure they’re involved in a class-action lawsuit right now.)

           Instead, it reads thus:

           I am sending this to you because I think you are the only person in the world who might have adequate protection after I tell you this. It is for my safety and yours that I have not used your name or described what that protection might be.

           I ask you to use any and all resources you have at your disposal to investigate Operation Welcome Mat. I cannot tell you much more without compromising the slight chance this communication has of reaching you. However, I do not exaggerate when I say that the revealing—anything more I dare not hope for—of this operation will affect every human life on Earth.

           Sincerely,

                       One who works in the organization that knows you always check your spam folder

           The remaining message is a long and rambling series of testimonials for anti-aging and potency supplements, but Lois sees no reason to consider these as marks against the authenticity of the original message. Camouflage is important. As is covering one’s tracks. She opens her desk drawer and retrieves a high-quality digital camera that’s nevertheless old enough that it needs an actual physical cord to transfer the pictures on it to any computer. Lois has kept it in excellent condition, save for, oh, the pesky matter of the fact that the delete function doesn’t work on the camera itself, and that she just can never find the right kind of removable memory cards. Darn, what a problem! Fortunately the camera contains a 5000-image capacity non-removable internal memory. She takes a picture of the relevant portion of the email—well, ten pictures—and then sets about blocking every IP address that’s sent her something that ended up in her spam folder today and deleting every email indiscriminately. She’d like to perform a more thorough delete, but she never does that with any of her spam, and she’s got a feeling that now would not be a good day to start.

           Amateurs might worry about how she deleted the original email, but Lois knows that if she finds anything, she won’t need that email, and for another thing, the writer of that email most certainly doesn’t want anyone to be able to analyze their word choices and phrasing.

           She rests her arms on her desk and starts letting her mind work through everything the email told her. So, she’s the only person who “might have adequate protection” after learning about Operation Welcome Mat? The only unique protection she’s had under any circumstances is Superman. In a few well-known incidents, he’d appeared to give preference to getting her to safety before others. Lois isn’t one hundred percent sure that’s true, as she knows very well that she might’ve been the person in the greatest danger during each incident. Over her career, she’s tended to disregard danger for the sake of the story. And she can argue persuasively that in order to be a successful female journalist, she has to be prepared to face a certain amount of danger; she can argue that her years of experience have given her the ability to accurately evaluate the potential danger of a situation. These arguments have been, and are, vital to her public persona.

           But under a few layers of “I have to do this” is the chewy center of “I want to do this.” It’s true! Believe it or not, Lois Lane, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, is a bit of a thrill-seeker!

           Good thing that might be exactly what her email contact needs.

           So. Back to the email. Back to Superman. She knows well enough that she doesn’t have a raven-haired alien angel at her beck and call, but, based on what the public has seen, is it more likely that she does than any other investigative journalist? Yes. So, if only Superman can offer her adequate protection, then—

           “Hi Lois,” Clark says, setting a paper cup on her desk. “Two sugars, no milk—” He breaks off into an almost cartoonishly exaggerated yawn that Lois nevertheless is familiar enough with to know is genuine.

           “You ought to buy some coffee for yourself,” Lois says, digging a few dollars out of her wallet and tossing them at him, which he barely catches. “I mean, if you’re going to volunteer to walk down to Reeve’s every day, anyway. And didn’t you grow up waking up at 4am to milk cows or whatever?”

           Clark smiles shyly. Like he always does. It’s a good smile, and on a kid who’s six foot three and probably better built than any of the barns he ever helped raise, it could very well explain why he always seems so exhausted in the morning. Though if Lois’ theory is true, she hasn’t seen or heard any other evidence of it. A gentleman never tells, Lois thinks idly.

           “I can and have milked cows in my sleep,” he says. “I can’t do anything in my sleep, here.” He looks down. “Uh, the truth is that I haven’t been sleeping well since the—what did they call it? The Chirauga Incident?”

           Lois grimaces. Yeah, Clark and half of Metropolis. Including her. When an army of aliens that big showed up all at once, there was no way to avoid some level of freaking out, special protection from Superman or not. “Yeah, the Chirauga Incident. Ugly sons of bitches, in my opinion. I killed one personally, you know.”

           Clark’s eyes widen in shock, and Lois grins. “What? I verified they weren’t bulletproof before going out to start, you know, researching my story.” But, because she is committed to the truth, even though Clark seems like he’ll believe anything she says, she has to add, “Well, okay. I’m pretty sure I mortally wounded it. Superman took care of it before I could find out for sure.” It had been clean. Heat vision through the Chirauga equivalent of the spinal cord. And Superman had turned to her with that red glow still shimmering in the back of his eyes. “Are you all right?” he’d asked, hovering a foot above the ground like it was nothing, looking at her like she was something. And she’d looked into the terrible weapon of his gaze and been stunned by the perfect surety that he’d never use it on a human being.

           And for all that, she’d never seen him look so alien.

           “Weren’t you watching? I had this one handled,” she’d said, with a rasp in her voice she hoped he’d attribute to the heavy dust and smoke in the air.

           “Well, in that case, I guess all I can do now is tell you to be careful out there,” he’d said.

           It would be nice if there was a discreet little jump cut in her memory right after that, but, unfortunately, Lois remembers with perfect clarity that she’d responded, “Sure thing, spaceboy,” like a complete and utter dumbass. But then Superman hadn’t laughed at her, no, he’d given her the smile and wink of an old-fashioned movie star before flying away to continue saving the world. She, on the other hand, had staggered off, feeling as emotionally churned-up as a teenager.

           The worst part about it, in her opinion, is that she knows very well that Superman has this effect on almost everyone who encounters him.

           “Ah, Superman,” Clark says, drawing her back to the present. His shocked expression has been replaced by the little smile she’s often seen him wear when talk of Superman comes up. She’s always thought there was something secretive about that smile, something notably different from the rest of his farm-boy guilelessness. (Though, she doesn’t quite believe he’s as transparent as he otherwise appears. And she doesn’t think that’s just her natural suspicion kicking in. For one thing, the Daily Planet is big, but not big enough that someone who was hired as a journalist could fall through the cracks and become nothing but a friendly coffee boy. She’s read some of his articles, the neighborhood news stuff he generally covers, and the writing is as solid as he is, with words chosen with care and sensitivity. There’s more to him than meets the eye, and if he ever decides to get ambitious, Lifestyle is in for a big surprise. For another thing, he’d moved to Metropolis during a metahuman surge, and that, frankly, was not what normies did, no matter how clueless they were.)

           The running undercurrent of what she knows about Clark and the smile that’s the one noticeable discordant note in the melody of the person she works with suddenly gel into a possible conclusion, one that Lois could’ve kicked herself for not even considering earlier.

           Talented kid moves from small-town Kansas, where he could’ve been a big fish in a tiny pond. And he doesn’t even move to a city in the same state or region, where he could have been a big fish in a medium-sized pond. Instead, he moves to Metropolis, where he won’t be a big fish at all, but where it’ll be a big project for anyone who knew him in Smallville to ever visit, or know anything about him he doesn’t want them to know. Metropolis, which, despite its dangers, still lives in the cultural mind as a place where the good kind of anything can happen. (Where Superman is often seen.) And when he’s here, he never, ever says anything about even going on a date with anyone, and mentions of Superman bring out that secretive smile. And he started off writing his articles with a clear awareness of issues that Lois has seen other straight white male coworkers fail to grok even after clear, baby-step-style explanations. And he’s never, ever tried to turn getting her coffee into something uncomfortable.

           So, possible conclusion: Clark is some flavor of queer, and still closeted/uncomfortable about it. But he can’t completely hide his crush on Superman because, well. Superman. And the kid has an honest face.

           Just goes to show, she thinks, how slow and unreliable gaydar can be, even if you are bi.

           But this does give her an idea on where to send him as she starts her initial investigation of this Project Welcome Mat. If it is big, bad business like it seems, Clark doesn’t need to get mixed up in it, even to the point of overhearing a phone call. And besides, it might help him accept himself, if he needs that.

           “You know what, Clark?” Lois says. “You need something to take your mind off shit like alien invasions.”

           Clark grimaces. “I don’t know if anything can.”

           “Yeah, it’s a toughie, but you’re a Metropolitan now,” Lois says, with more bravado than she feels. Some things you don’t get used to. But some of those things you have to at least pretend to get used to. “Get outside. Write your cat-up-a-tree article tomorrow. Do something completely out of the ordinary.” And then, as if she’s just thought of it, “Powtown Pride is going on today. Powtown’s a neighborhood. Pride’s something to write about. You could go there and see what you can see.”

           “Powtown?” Clark says, raising his eyebrows. “That’s the metahuman neighborhood. That’s…a bit more interesting than where Rowlands usually sends me.”

           Lois waves her hand. “Rita is seventy-eight and still thinks anything involving a metahuman is a front-pager. Perry can tell her otherwise when you bring back something nice.”

           “Well,” Clark says, warming to the idea, “there are a lot of misconceptions about Powtown that ought to be worn away by a reliable source like the Planet. I mean—there probably are. I don’t know, personally. But if everything written about Powtown was true, no one could live there. It’d be a smoking crater in the ground.”

           “So you see? Needs you,” Lois says. She smirks. “Be careful, though. They’ve got twinks down there that could rip you in half.”

           “Says someone who just told me about personally shooting a Chirauga,” Clark says. “No, no, I know—you had it handled. Anyway. Yeah, I will go.” He looks towards the windows and sighs. “After all, it’s a beautiful day to be outside.”

           Lois waves at him as he leaves, then glances towards the windows herself. It really is a beautiful June day, not too hot, vivid blue sky, puffy clouds slowly drifting by. Does Superman prefer days like this for flying? She wonders. Or would it not affect him at all? What would it be like to fly with Superman on a day like today—Lois sticks her tongue out in an exaggerated expression of disgust. She’s better than that! She has to be!

           Anyway, she’s got something new to investigate. Before Clark interrupted, she was thinking of what things out in the world only Superman could be adequate protection from. Well, aside from horrible things from space, that leaves a very short list that prominently features a house of a certain color and a building of a certain shape. And the name—Operation Welcome Mat—it has a very particular ring to it.

           But she’s still going to look into the rest of that short list. A direct assault isn’t the correct approach here, and besides, there might be connections, even if the person she’s going to call is officially blacklisted from government contracts.

           She scrolls to the contact in her phone for “Louis L’Amour,” and reaches out to someone who definitely isn’t a dead writer of Westerns.

Notes: I’ve decided to have Superman’s code against killing be specifically about humans/earthlings because for one thing, I don’t have to answer to Standards and Practices, and for another, I don’t feel like having every alien army be robots (which with sufficiently advanced AI doesn’t help anyway), and what do you want me to do, have Superman knock all the aliens out? If they’re going down long enough to be essentially counted out of the fight, they’re getting life-threatening brain injuries anyway. 

[wineanddinosaur]

VinePair Podcast: Exploring the Top 50 Wines and Spirits of 2020

The work of assembling VinePair’s Top 50 lists for 2020 was even more of a Herculean task this year than in years past. Most obviously, the need for social distancing and safety meant that any group tastings had to be more carefully organized. Beyond that, the introduction of a Top 50 Spirits list created an additional set of issues, as comparing whiskeys, tequilas, gins, vodkas, rums, brandies, amari, and more proved even more difficult.

That’s why Adam Teeter and Zach Geballe have devoted this week’s “VinePair Podcast” to exploring and explaining the Top 50 Spirits and Top 50 Wines lists. They discuss some of the true standouts, the unexpected regions that caught our eyes, the struggle between pure quality and value, and much more.

LISTEN ONLINE

Listen on Apple Podcasts Listen on Spotify

OR CHECK OUT THE CONVERSATION HERE

Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the “VinePair Podcast.” And Zach, before we get into today’s topic, which is going to be about the top 50 lists of wine, beer, and spirits that we put out this year, a word from our sponsor. Tequila Ocho is the world’s first single-estate tequila. I did make that tequila Negroni, by the way, and it was dope. Growing and harvesting only the very ripest agaves from their family-owned fields in the Highlands of Jalisco. One field harvested for each of their annual vintages. Where some take shortcuts, Ocho is made in the old-fashioned way and takes care of to ensure maximum agave flavor in your glass. They truly do. Every expression is certified. 100 percent additive free underlying the purity and ability of this magical tequila. And it is magical, ladies and gentlemen. I’m telling you. I’m not just saying this because they are a sponsor of this podcast. That liquid is dope.

Z: It really is.

A: It’s really good. So you should go out and get it. So besides me having that this week, Zach, what else have you been imbibing on?

Z: It’s funny. It’s Hanukkah, or at least it has been as we’re recording this. There’ll be the last night tonight. I have not been making a ton of the traditional Hanukkah foods, except for tonight, we’re having a little more traditional, with latkes and all that. But the one thing that I have been doing a lot of is thinking about, I guess this is sad but interesting, a lot of potatoes and sour cream. Not necessarily the latkes, but it has been one of the combinations that I’ve always loved. A baked potato with sour cream has always been one of my favorite foods. It’s a weirdly interesting thing to have with wine. Adam will laugh at me for this, butt in trying a lot of different wines with that combination of flavors in the end. I just keep coming back to Chardonnay, and in particular like white Burgundy, as being the thing that just works best with that. And there’s something about the earthiness that you get out of a good white Burgundy that goes with the potatoes, the creaminess from the sort of lees contact and barrel aging that you get out of those that work with the sour cream. So I’ve been drinking a lot of white Burgundy, which is bougie as hell, I know, but that’s how I roll. Again, my philosophy this year has been f*** it, I’m just drinking it. I’ve got the wine sitting around and if I don’t drink it now, sad to say, I don’t know if I’ll get the chance to drink it, so I’m going to drink it now. How about you?

A: So I’ve been drinking a few things. So obviously yes, I made some latkes, and I think that the best pairing there is sparkling wine. I top it with some delicious smoked salmon from Russ and Daughters. They’re the best smoked fish purveyors in the country. Just saying, if you get to New York, come get some Russ and Daughters. Or you can get them on GoldBelly actually, that’s not an ad, just a very strong endorsement.

Z: I will read it. Russ and Daughter is f****** awesome.

A: It’s just the best.

Z: Yeah, it really is amazing.

A: So this is now a total tangent, but when I lived in the East Village, I was near the original location. And when we moved to Brooklyn, to Fort Greene, Naomi and I were like, “Oh man, we’re not gonna be near the restaurant.” Let’s be clear, my wife doesn’t eat anything that’s living or formerly living, so she doesn’t eat fish. So she doesn’t eat smoked salmon, but she likes the bagels and the schmears and things like that. And it was cool. You want to take people from out of town there. And then we realized that we are now only a 10-minute walk from their factory, which is actually even better. It’s in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. So I had to walk there and there’s never a line, because almost no one seems to know about it, which is crazy. So you can walk right in and they have a full counter just like they do in the original store. And the bagels are coming right out of the oven there. It’s really cool. So, I actually had Champagne Taittinger with that, which was really tasty. I’m in a really nice pairing, a little rosé Champagne Taittinger.

Z: Yeah.

A: Right. So that was good. And then I’ve just been playing around. It feels like the holidays are so close and also here. We’ve been in a more festive mood in the evenings and being like, “yeah, like, f*** it, let’s just open it.” So, I also had a really nice Barolo over the weekend. And then this week, tonight I plan to open some fun stuff and make a warming lentil soup, because it just snowed really heavily. And just playing around with a bunch of different stuff. It’s been a lot of fun. A lot of the stuff that I’ve been drinking wound up on our top 50 Best Wines list this year, because it reminded me how much I loved it this year. And now I got to go back to this before the year’s over and remember how delicious it all was. So, with that in mind, let’s get into it. I thought one of the first things we should hit on is obviously the wine list. Right. I think there’s some really interesting stories on this list this year. The first being that our statement was that Greek wines are something that people should pay attention to — especially Xinomavro, which we find to be one of the most exciting grapes that’s out there right now. And wines made from it that are still really affordable. Just absolutely delicious. And so when it came to trying to figure out what the best pick was this Alpha Estate Single Block Reserve Xinomavro. For us, it was head and shoulders above almost anything else we had tasted this year. And then when you look at the average price of $37, it just is something that everyone needs to go out and try to grab. It is one of the more well-distributed Greek wines in the U. S. right now. We had this big debate, and I’m curious what you think about this, Zach. When we talk about this wine, we feel it’s unfair. So I’m really avoiding saying that this is like the Greek Barolo or something. Because it’s not fair. Right? This is Xinomavro. This is the best red coming out of Greece, in my opinion. I think Xinomavro is the most beautiful, ageable red grape in Greece.

Z: Agiorgitikos fans, get Adam

A: Yeah, come get me. Look, no, no, no. No disrespect to those wines. I love Agioritikos, and I think that there’s, again, some producers around Nemea that are making amazing wines. But for me and my palate, what I’ve tended to enjoy, Xinomavro is amazing. I think for the majority of consumers, right? It’s why Burgundy prices are crazy. I think Xinomavro is going to get there. But I don’t want to say to you listening, “it’s the next Burgundy or Barolo.” Drink it if you like. Although I’m kind of saying it, right? But to me it’s just such an amazing, this, this wine is just stupid good.

Z: And to me, I think so, too. So to the question you asked initially, While I get the sentiment behind “we don’t want to call it the Barolo or the Nebbiolo of Greece. We want to call it its own thing.” The honest truth is that almost everyone in the world of wine, their frame of reference is going to start with things that they’re familiar with. And most people, if you haven’t been to Greece or you’re not interested in trying Greek wine, Xinomavro is probably not something you’ve tasted. You certainly haven’t tasted much of it. You don’t probably have a frame of reference for it, but if you’re a red wine drinker, there’s better than a decent chance that you’re at least somewhat familiar with Nebbiolo, principally through Barolo and Barbaresco, possibly through some other appellations. There is some real similarity. And I actually thought it was interesting to me because the Alpha Estate example is the most striking one, but on this list, there are a few different wines that I think kind of fall into this general red wine category that I would describe as not super deep in color, more red fruited than black fruited in terms of flavor, but with high acidity and high tannin or relatively high tannin. And this does not particularly include Pinot Noir, although Pinot Noir gets lumped in here sometimes because it has some of the other characteristics. But I even think about the 49th wine on your list here, which is a Blaufränkisch, a variety that I’m personally very fond of from Austria. So Blaufränkisch, Xinomavro, Nerello Mascalese from Sicily, I would argue Kotsifali which is from Crete in Greece, as well. There’s some others that you could throw in here that sort of nicely align in some way or some other ways, with what people expect from Nebbiolo. But each offers their own unique twist. And to me, the thing that is great about Xinomavro and what makes it so delightful and so enjoyable is that when you get it from good producers in Naoussa, you’re getting it from relatively high elevations, foothills, or even into the mountains. And it has a distinctive mountainous quality to it. The aromatics are really tart, berry fruit, like red berries that you might find in the mountains. There’s almost a florality, the kind of wildflower note and most of all, to me, an alpine forest piney note, not resin the way you would expect with Retsina, the big barrier to anyone’s enjoying Greek wine. Because when I tell people to try Greek wine, the first thing they say is, “I tried Greek wine once and it tasted like Pine Sol.” I answer, “OK, you tried Retsina, which is an adulterated wine. This is very different.” It does have a little bit of that pinier quality that I really find very appealing. And so I’m with you. Xinomavro has been something that I’ve started to add to my own personal collection a little bit. Unfortunately, as you mentioned, it’s actually pretty hard to find many examples. Alpha Estate. Kir-Yianni is another producer that I see pretty widely distributed. I’m teaching a class on Greek wine in February. I’ve been looking for what’s available here in the Seattle area and it’s actually kind of limited, unfortunately. So, importers, distributors, up your game. Look at this list. The people want Greek wine.

A: Look, I think that the problem is right. There’s really one main importer of Greek wine, Diamond Wine Imports. They have actually both Kir-Yianni and Alpha, and they’re an incredible importer. I think they were super awesome and rushing us a bottle of this at the last minute when we basically let them know, because they had submitted samples earlier in the year that we felt like it had done well enough that it should be considered for the list. They were super good about that. There can be more than them obviously, and there should be. And there should be more of this wine coming. Because when I’ve been to Greece the last few times, I’ve been blown away by some of these producers that I’ve gotten to try these wines by. You just can’t find them here. You’re lucky if you find them in a lot of different places. It’s time to get excited about the region, for sure. The other thing I think that was pretty interesting about this list and again, probably talks to where people’s palates are right now, especially on this tastings team, is that three wines in the top 10 were from Sicily. It’s another place that’s become pretty exciting when it comes to wines, both on the white and the red side. It’s another place that feels pretty undervalued and a place where you can find really delicious reds. In the same way that you have somms like, “oh my gosh, if you find a wine list, look for wines from Beaujolais, because those wines are going to be under-priced” — which really isn’t true anymore, but think there are still really great prices for wines from Sicily. The wines are always really just absolutely delicious. A lot of them have really beautiful high acidity, which is something that I’ve realized is very important to me when it comes to the wines that I love. It was just really shocking to us when we came together, and we were talking as this team: “Holy s***, do we have three wines on this list in the top 10 that are all from Sicily? Yes, we do.” So, it must mean that they’re doing, the island as a whole is doing something right.

Z: What’s cool about that is you have examples on the list of both the somm geeky, trendy part of Sicily, i.e. in Mount Etna, a Rosso made from Nerello Mascalese, principally, and an Etna Bianco made from Carricante. But also a wine made from Frappato, it’s kind of in the middle part of the island. And it’s important to note here that Sicily is big. It’s a big place and it has actually a really diverse wine scene. Etna, again, gets the love of the somms, including me, for sure. Because the Nerello Mascalese is such an interesting variety in particular on the red side, and there’s such a winemaking story and grape-growing story on Etna. There are all these very different growing conditions, depending on where your exposure is to the ocean or the sea, when the lava flowed over that part of the mountain slope, and how old the soils are and things like that are all really important. But there’s also this incredible wealth of winemaking and experience and interesting varieties off of Etna. That, to me, is something that’s been cool to see. Etna is awesome and it’s super cool to focus on, but I was really glad to see a wine from another part of Sicily on here, too. This is my little spiel on Sicily. Please people, go out and drink some Marsala. I know, sweet wines, fortified wines that no one wants to drink them. If you think, “oh, Marsala is just for cooking or for making chicken Marsala, or whatever,” you can certainly do that with it. It’s delicious. But if you like anything in the fortified category, Madeira, sherry, even port, there is a Marsala style out there for you, and they are stupid cheap and stupid good.

A: Yeah. Very true. Before we move on, Zach, because I know I don’t want to spend the entire podcast talking about the top 50 wine list. Was there anything, though, on the list as well that caught your eye?

Z: I think the only other thing that I wanted to talk about really quickly was, there’s a really interesting mix of white varieties called out here. You all listening know me: I love white wine. It’s really my heart in a lot of ways, but there is Semillon, there’s Friulano, there’s Grüner Veltliner. Just an interesting wealth of white varieties. And yeah, there’s Sauvignon Blancs. There’s Chardonnay on here, too, of course. But it is really refreshing to me to see a top list that isn’t just like, here are the 18 best Chardonnays and Sauvignon Blancs, and I will throw a Riesling or two in there, because someone expects it. It is a really diverse set of white wines on here. And I love that, and I think that’s something to commend you guys for. It’s important when looking at white wine that we not just focus on two, three, four varieties.

A: Thank you very much. I really appreciate that, Zach.

Z: I’m sure that was all Tim. You had nothing to do with it.

A: Yeah, that was all Tim. I think we all share your passion for white wines. We really love them. And I think there is something to know, all of us came into wine in various different ways. Tim through the chef route. Keith through Italian wine. Me through music and things like that. So we didn’t come through a traditional path where you also were taught from the very beginning that like the best whites are Chardonnays and Rieslings. And so I feel like, while we appreciate those, we are also able to love other whites from other places that may not get as many accolades but absolutely should, and are extremely interesting in their own unique ways. So I think the only other thing that you probably saw that I was waiting for you to say, and you didn’t, and that’s the No. 2 wine was from Virginia. But that’s cool.

Z: We talk about Virginia wine on the podcasts way too much already.

A: It is pretty dope though, man, you gotta get your hands on it. So let’s move on. Let’s let’s talk spirits.

Z: Absolutely.

A: So this was the first year we ever did the Top 50 Best Spirits list. We’re obviously going to keep doing it moving forward. I have to tell you, this was the hardest list to create out of the three.

Z: Oh, I think it’s insane that you guys did this. I’m glad you did, but when you told me that you guys are doing a top 50 spirits list, I was just like, “man, wine is hard enough, but spirits?”

A: This was really hard. And it was hard for a lot of different reasons. I think the main reason is for me, when I taste really great wine, I know if it’s great. Whether it’s going to sit at 50 or it’s going to sit at one, there is a way that we can sort of figure that out in our brains. Spirits are really hard to figure out what is better than what, especially when you’re dealing with different spirits, and especially when we’re looking at a whiskey and then we’re saying, “OK, is this better than this gin? Or is this better than this tequila?” It was crazy, man. We did a social distance tasting on the roof of all these spirits that we tasted throughout the year. We tasted them again, which also is weird. It’s very odd spitting spirits. You wind up still feeling buzzed. And then we debated. We went home, we’re on Zoom. We debated for longer. Then the next day we kept debating. It took a really long time to figure this out. Also because everyone’s all over the place. And I feel for whatever reason, because it’s spirits, price and money just comes into it in a very different way, you know? Some of these spirits were incredible but are very hard to find, highly allocated and also crazy expensive, you’ll probably never pay market price for them. That started weighing on where they should actually fall on the list. Obviously a brown spirit would be No. 1. I mean, that’s where we are, right? And in just the world of spirits, whiskey is going to be up there, whiskey seems to do better than anything else. And that was still the case here. I was proud of us, though, that we really did feel very strongly that a tequila should be No. 2. I think what we’ve seen in the world of spirits right now and just how dominant tequila is becoming and how many people are entering the category, how many tequilas are coming to the market that are less manipulated and really, truly speaking of a place. I think tequila is going to continue to evolve as a collector’s spirit. They’re definitely some surprises there. I’m curious what your impressions were when you saw this list.

Z: Well, I think I want to add one other note of potential complexity, which I’m sure you considered, but probably just didn’t feel like mentioning. With wine, you can be pretty confident that when you’re putting together a list or beer, that someone is going to consume that liquid, they’re going to open that bottle or can, and either drink directly from it or pour it into a glass, and drink it. And with spirits, especially some of these, are you talking about the best gin for a gin and tonic, the best gin for a Martini, or the best gin for a Negroni? I mean, it’s very difficult. And I am glad that the VinePair team did this. I think it’s a kind of a crazy notion again, it’s hard to quantify. And so in some ways I get why some of the high-end brown spirits are easier to do, because really, people are probably drinking those neat or on the rocks. Maybe they’re making, I would even say it’s unlikely that someone’s making much in the way of a cocktail, maybe a Manhattan or something, if you really love that. But I think a lot of these are meant to be enjoyed that way. I think that the two things that stood out to me at the top of the list. One of them is, I have often felt that they are like an underappreciated distillery: Evan Williams is on here relatively high up.

A: Oh, I’m so glad you said that. I’m so glad you said that.

Z: There are a few things when the restaurant bar programs that I felt strongly about, to the point of, “I think this is how you should do it.” But evidently, Evan Williams being the well bourbon, wherever I worked was a big piece of it. It consistently delivers, it’s affordable, it works really well as a cocktail partner. And it’s at a slightly higher ABV level than like the minimum for bourbon. It’s, I think, 43 or something like that. And so in cocktails, in particular, it doesn’t, the downside to a lot of other sort of similarly priced, well-applicable bourbons, they just really kind of fell flat in cocktails, because they’re just a little bit lower proof, and Evan Williams always felt like really stood up nicely and cocktails and granted for a lot of cocktails that we were making, well bourbon was not the call. It was usually going to be something else. And especially if your well drink is an Old Fashioned or something like that, I just love it. And I have not tried the 2012 single barrel, but I’m just really glad to see Evan Williams on here.

A: Let’s be clear, right? Evan Williams. Everyone basically said when we tasted, that this bourbon for the entire tastings team was a bourbon they returned to throughout the pandemic. Right? It is 30 bucks. This is a single barrel. The amount of s*** that is romanticized by bourbon geeks that this whiskey has, for the price, is stupid. And we actually feel across the board that Heaven Hill is the most underrated whiskey distillery, bourbon distillery in America. For as much attention as Sazerac gets, which they deserve a lot of attention, but a lot of it also comes to the fact that they do produce Pappy. Let’s be clear. That attention overshadows a lot of other distilleries that are producing liquid that is just as good, if not better, but cannot for that reason connect itself back to Pappy. So the No. 1 whiskey on this list, Old Fitzgerald, is Heaven Hills wheated bourbon, that is $200, not a few thousand, and it is on par with Pappy. They release two releases a year. They release a spring and fall bottling of Old Fitz. It’s always anywhere from 14 to 16 years old. The bourbon is absolutely gorgeous. It basically has a very similar mash build as Pappy. We think it’s a bourbon that probably will become very collectible very soon. There’s Evan Williams, there’s Elijah Craig, a lot of the bourbons that this place produces are just all incredibly solid. And I do agree with you, Zach. It’s a lot easier to look at the brown spirits, because for the most part, people are going to consume them straight. To be fair, it made a lot of the tequilas easier because especially when you start playing in the world of reposado, but even in blanco, nowadays people are drinking it straight. It was much harder when thinking about the gins and the rums. Because the gins and the rums were very much “so why are we saying this is so good?” It’s just so good because it would make an amazing Daiquiri, right? Does that make it the best white rum? Just because it’s probably the best white rum in the world for a Daiquiri? We decided that, yes, that was the case. We think that the white rum was created for the Daiquiri base or the Daiquiri is created for the white run. You know what I mean? And that was how we wanted to go. And other things, there was a huge, massive debate on the roof. Tim’s going to kill me for this. Of people talking about gin and gin and tonics, and then gin and Martinis. And Tim is not a gin and tonic fan, which I think is very interesting, cause he’s a Brit. Some other people in the tasting team like gin and tonics, and we’re talking about these gins. That shouldn’t be amazing. I would love it. And Tim said, “that’s bollocks, this gin is not as good as the gin I’d use in a Martini.” Everyone who has ever listened to him on this podcast knows that he’s a massive Martini fan. So that was hard, right? Exactly what you’re talking about happened. It was difficult. It was really difficult to figure out where everything should lie. I will say, it’s not surprising that the majority of the list is brown, as we’ve said before. But there are some standouts here, like Tanqueray No. Ten. I mean, this gin is really beautiful. It has everything a traditional gin drink would want. But it also has all these components of what is really trendy right now in gin. So it’s like that perfect liquid for people who want to see why gin is having this massive renaissance. Have this gin and you’ll understand why. It’s perfect in a Martini, but it’s also delicious in a gin and tonic and Negroni. It’s a great liquid and you can find it everywhere. We did have this debate, with things like Monkey 47, right? It’s an amazing gin, but it’s very expensive, it’s a very expensive gin. So where does that go? Another thing I think about gin now, I’m getting on the gin train. It was interesting to realize that a lot of the gins we like this year were all coming out of Japan. And it’s interesting, Japan is establishing itself as a location for producing not just amazing whiskeys, which is what has become known for over the last few decades, but now also becoming really well-known as a country that produces really amazing gins and gins that are very uniquely Japanese, which I think is interesting. The Japanese whiskeys, they were going to say, we’re going to go out to make Scotch, but better. And these gins are all their own thing, which I think is really cool.

Z: Well, I think it’s a sign and an exciting thing. And I look forward to this expanding even further because one thing that’s very true is, as gin has more of a renaissance globally, more and more places around the world, here in the U.S., in Europe, in Asia, and in other parts of the world. Gin more than almost any other spirit is such an incredible platform for expression of place, because you can infuse a gin with so many different potential botanical herb, barks, fruits, et cetera, and produce something that’s still kind of is recognizably gin, but is also have a place in a way that, it’s harder to do that with other spirits, especially spirits, that are aged in barrel, where the barrel character is going to take over to some extent. I think it’s exciting and I think it’s one of the great things about this list I was thinking about, the great thing about looking into potentially shopping off of this list, as opposed to the wine list is, you can come back to these things over and over again, right? You can come back to the bottle of whiskey, of tequila, of gin, of rum, et cetera. And you can compare and contrast side by side. You can say, “Hey, I want to get a couple of these gins” and you might feel that one is better for a gin and tonic, one is better for a Martini, one is better for a Negroni and that’s all super valid. And I think that’s what’s cool about looking at this list and maybe it makes the price point a little bit easier to swallow, even if it’s higher-per-bottle cost than the wine list, for sure. You can revisit these in a way that a wine, you got a day or two with it at best.

A: Of course. Well, so Zach, we’ve drawn on about these lists and I realized we’re kind of running out of time, and I don’t think we’re going to get to the beer list this time. Maybe that’s something we talk about with Cat in early 2021 and talk about this. Because that was actually just published today. So no rush, but I would encourage you, if you have enjoyed this podcast, go out and look at these two lists. The spirits and the wine, we are very much proud of both. And I encourage you to buy some of the liquids and let us know what you think. Tell us, do you think that where certain things on the list you agree with or disagree with? Hit us up podcast@vinepair.com. We would just love to hear your thoughts. And Zach, I’ll get back with you next week.

Z: Sounds great.

Thanks so much for listening to the VinePair Podcast. If you enjoy listening to us every week, please leave us a review or rating on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever it is that you get your podcasts. It really helps everyone else discover the show. Now for the credits, VinePair produced by myself and Zach. It is also mixed and edited by him. Yeah, Zach, we know you do a lot. I’d also like to thank the entire VinePair team, including my co-founder, Josh and our associate editor, Cat. Thanks so much for listening. See you next week.

Ed. note: This episode has been edited for length and clarity.

The article VinePair Podcast: Exploring the Top 50 Wines and Spirits of 2020 appeared first on VinePair.

source https://vinepair.com/articles/50-best-wines-spirits-2020/

[johnboothus]

VinePair Podcast: Exploring the Top 50 Wines and Spirits of 2020

The work of assembling VinePair’s Top 50 lists for 2020 was even more of a Herculean task this year than in years past. Most obviously, the need for social distancing and safety meant that any group tastings had to be more carefully organized. Beyond that, the introduction of a Top 50 Spirits list created an additional set of issues, as comparing whiskeys, tequilas, gins, vodkas, rums, brandies, amari, and more proved even more difficult.

That’s why Adam Teeter and Zach Geballe have devoted this week’s “VinePair Podcast” to exploring and explaining the Top 50 Spirits and Top 50 Wines lists. They discuss some of the true standouts, the unexpected regions that caught our eyes, the struggle between pure quality and value, and much more.

LISTEN ONLINE

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OR CHECK OUT THE CONVERSATION HERE

Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the “VinePair Podcast.” And Zach, before we get into today’s topic, which is going to be about the top 50 lists of wine, beer, and spirits that we put out this year, a word from our sponsor. Tequila Ocho is the world’s first single-estate tequila. I did make that tequila Negroni, by the way, and it was dope. Growing and harvesting only the very ripest agaves from their family-owned fields in the Highlands of Jalisco. One field harvested for each of their annual vintages. Where some take shortcuts, Ocho is made in the old-fashioned way and takes care of to ensure maximum agave flavor in your glass. They truly do. Every expression is certified. 100 percent additive free underlying the purity and ability of this magical tequila. And it is magical, ladies and gentlemen. I’m telling you. I’m not just saying this because they are a sponsor of this podcast. That liquid is dope.

Z: It really is.

A: It’s really good. So you should go out and get it. So besides me having that this week, Zach, what else have you been imbibing on?

Z: It’s funny. It’s Hanukkah, or at least it has been as we’re recording this. There’ll be the last night tonight. I have not been making a ton of the traditional Hanukkah foods, except for tonight, we’re having a little more traditional, with latkes and all that. But the one thing that I have been doing a lot of is thinking about, I guess this is sad but interesting, a lot of potatoes and sour cream. Not necessarily the latkes, but it has been one of the combinations that I’ve always loved. A baked potato with sour cream has always been one of my favorite foods. It’s a weirdly interesting thing to have with wine. Adam will laugh at me for this, butt in trying a lot of different wines with that combination of flavors in the end. I just keep coming back to Chardonnay, and in particular like white Burgundy, as being the thing that just works best with that. And there’s something about the earthiness that you get out of a good white Burgundy that goes with the potatoes, the creaminess from the sort of lees contact and barrel aging that you get out of those that work with the sour cream. So I’ve been drinking a lot of white Burgundy, which is bougie as hell, I know, but that’s how I roll. Again, my philosophy this year has been f*** it, I’m just drinking it. I’ve got the wine sitting around and if I don’t drink it now, sad to say, I don’t know if I’ll get the chance to drink it, so I’m going to drink it now. How about you?

A: So I’ve been drinking a few things. So obviously yes, I made some latkes, and I think that the best pairing there is sparkling wine. I top it with some delicious smoked salmon from Russ and Daughters. They’re the best smoked fish purveyors in the country. Just saying, if you get to New York, come get some Russ and Daughters. Or you can get them on GoldBelly actually, that’s not an ad, just a very strong endorsement.

Z: I will read it. Russ and Daughter is f****** awesome.

A: It’s just the best.

Z: Yeah, it really is amazing.

A: So this is now a total tangent, but when I lived in the East Village, I was near the original location. And when we moved to Brooklyn, to Fort Greene, Naomi and I were like, “Oh man, we’re not gonna be near the restaurant.” Let’s be clear, my wife doesn’t eat anything that’s living or formerly living, so she doesn’t eat fish. So she doesn’t eat smoked salmon, but she likes the bagels and the schmears and things like that. And it was cool. You want to take people from out of town there. And then we realized that we are now only a 10-minute walk from their factory, which is actually even better. It’s in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. So I had to walk there and there’s never a line, because almost no one seems to know about it, which is crazy. So you can walk right in and they have a full counter just like they do in the original store. And the bagels are coming right out of the oven there. It’s really cool. So, I actually had Champagne Taittinger with that, which was really tasty. I’m in a really nice pairing, a little rosé Champagne Taittinger.

Z: Yeah.

A: Right. So that was good. And then I’ve just been playing around. It feels like the holidays are so close and also here. We’ve been in a more festive mood in the evenings and being like, “yeah, like, f*** it, let’s just open it.” So, I also had a really nice Barolo over the weekend. And then this week, tonight I plan to open some fun stuff and make a warming lentil soup, because it just snowed really heavily. And just playing around with a bunch of different stuff. It’s been a lot of fun. A lot of the stuff that I’ve been drinking wound up on our top 50 Best Wines list this year, because it reminded me how much I loved it this year. And now I got to go back to this before the year’s over and remember how delicious it all was. So, with that in mind, let’s get into it. I thought one of the first things we should hit on is obviously the wine list. Right. I think there’s some really interesting stories on this list this year. The first being that our statement was that Greek wines are something that people should pay attention to — especially Xinomavro, which we find to be one of the most exciting grapes that’s out there right now. And wines made from it that are still really affordable. Just absolutely delicious. And so when it came to trying to figure out what the best pick was this Alpha Estate Single Block Reserve Xinomavro. For us, it was head and shoulders above almost anything else we had tasted this year. And then when you look at the average price of $37, it just is something that everyone needs to go out and try to grab. It is one of the more well-distributed Greek wines in the U. S. right now. We had this big debate, and I’m curious what you think about this, Zach. When we talk about this wine, we feel it’s unfair. So I’m really avoiding saying that this is like the Greek Barolo or something. Because it’s not fair. Right? This is Xinomavro. This is the best red coming out of Greece, in my opinion. I think Xinomavro is the most beautiful, ageable red grape in Greece.

Z: Agiorgitikos fans, get Adam

A: Yeah, come get me. Look, no, no, no. No disrespect to those wines. I love Agioritikos, and I think that there’s, again, some producers around Nemea that are making amazing wines. But for me and my palate, what I’ve tended to enjoy, Xinomavro is amazing. I think for the majority of consumers, right? It’s why Burgundy prices are crazy. I think Xinomavro is going to get there. But I don’t want to say to you listening, “it’s the next Burgundy or Barolo.” Drink it if you like. Although I’m kind of saying it, right? But to me it’s just such an amazing, this, this wine is just stupid good.

Z: And to me, I think so, too. So to the question you asked initially, While I get the sentiment behind “we don’t want to call it the Barolo or the Nebbiolo of Greece. We want to call it its own thing.” The honest truth is that almost everyone in the world of wine, their frame of reference is going to start with things that they’re familiar with. And most people, if you haven’t been to Greece or you’re not interested in trying Greek wine, Xinomavro is probably not something you’ve tasted. You certainly haven’t tasted much of it. You don’t probably have a frame of reference for it, but if you’re a red wine drinker, there’s better than a decent chance that you’re at least somewhat familiar with Nebbiolo, principally through Barolo and Barbaresco, possibly through some other appellations. There is some real similarity. And I actually thought it was interesting to me because the Alpha Estate example is the most striking one, but on this list, there are a few different wines that I think kind of fall into this general red wine category that I would describe as not super deep in color, more red fruited than black fruited in terms of flavor, but with high acidity and high tannin or relatively high tannin. And this does not particularly include Pinot Noir, although Pinot Noir gets lumped in here sometimes because it has some of the other characteristics. But I even think about the 49th wine on your list here, which is a Blaufränkisch, a variety that I’m personally very fond of from Austria. So Blaufränkisch, Xinomavro, Nerello Mascalese from Sicily, I would argue Kotsifali which is from Crete in Greece, as well. There’s some others that you could throw in here that sort of nicely align in some way or some other ways, with what people expect from Nebbiolo. But each offers their own unique twist. And to me, the thing that is great about Xinomavro and what makes it so delightful and so enjoyable is that when you get it from good producers in Naoussa, you’re getting it from relatively high elevations, foothills, or even into the mountains. And it has a distinctive mountainous quality to it. The aromatics are really tart, berry fruit, like red berries that you might find in the mountains. There’s almost a florality, the kind of wildflower note and most of all, to me, an alpine forest piney note, not resin the way you would expect with Retsina, the big barrier to anyone’s enjoying Greek wine. Because when I tell people to try Greek wine, the first thing they say is, “I tried Greek wine once and it tasted like Pine Sol.” I answer, “OK, you tried Retsina, which is an adulterated wine. This is very different.” It does have a little bit of that pinier quality that I really find very appealing. And so I’m with you. Xinomavro has been something that I’ve started to add to my own personal collection a little bit. Unfortunately, as you mentioned, it’s actually pretty hard to find many examples. Alpha Estate. Kir-Yianni is another producer that I see pretty widely distributed. I’m teaching a class on Greek wine in February. I’ve been looking for what’s available here in the Seattle area and it’s actually kind of limited, unfortunately. So, importers, distributors, up your game. Look at this list. The people want Greek wine.

A: Look, I think that the problem is right. There’s really one main importer of Greek wine, Diamond Wine Imports. They have actually both Kir-Yianni and Alpha, and they’re an incredible importer. I think they were super awesome and rushing us a bottle of this at the last minute when we basically let them know, because they had submitted samples earlier in the year that we felt like it had done well enough that it should be considered for the list. They were super good about that. There can be more than them obviously, and there should be. And there should be more of this wine coming. Because when I’ve been to Greece the last few times, I’ve been blown away by some of these producers that I’ve gotten to try these wines by. You just can’t find them here. You’re lucky if you find them in a lot of different places. It’s time to get excited about the region, for sure. The other thing I think that was pretty interesting about this list and again, probably talks to where people’s palates are right now, especially on this tastings team, is that three wines in the top 10 were from Sicily. It’s another place that’s become pretty exciting when it comes to wines, both on the white and the red side. It’s another place that feels pretty undervalued and a place where you can find really delicious reds. In the same way that you have somms like, “oh my gosh, if you find a wine list, look for wines from Beaujolais, because those wines are going to be under-priced” — which really isn’t true anymore, but think there are still really great prices for wines from Sicily. The wines are always really just absolutely delicious. A lot of them have really beautiful high acidity, which is something that I’ve realized is very important to me when it comes to the wines that I love. It was just really shocking to us when we came together, and we were talking as this team: “Holy s***, do we have three wines on this list in the top 10 that are all from Sicily? Yes, we do.” So, it must mean that they’re doing, the island as a whole is doing something right.

Z: What’s cool about that is you have examples on the list of both the somm geeky, trendy part of Sicily, i.e. in Mount Etna, a Rosso made from Nerello Mascalese, principally, and an Etna Bianco made from Carricante. But also a wine made from Frappato, it’s kind of in the middle part of the island. And it’s important to note here that Sicily is big. It’s a big place and it has actually a really diverse wine scene. Etna, again, gets the love of the somms, including me, for sure. Because the Nerello Mascalese is such an interesting variety in particular on the red side, and there’s such a winemaking story and grape-growing story on Etna. There are all these very different growing conditions, depending on where your exposure is to the ocean or the sea, when the lava flowed over that part of the mountain slope, and how old the soils are and things like that are all really important. But there’s also this incredible wealth of winemaking and experience and interesting varieties off of Etna. That, to me, is something that’s been cool to see. Etna is awesome and it’s super cool to focus on, but I was really glad to see a wine from another part of Sicily on here, too. This is my little spiel on Sicily. Please people, go out and drink some Marsala. I know, sweet wines, fortified wines that no one wants to drink them. If you think, “oh, Marsala is just for cooking or for making chicken Marsala, or whatever,” you can certainly do that with it. It’s delicious. But if you like anything in the fortified category, Madeira, sherry, even port, there is a Marsala style out there for you, and they are stupid cheap and stupid good.

A: Yeah. Very true. Before we move on, Zach, because I know I don’t want to spend the entire podcast talking about the top 50 wine list. Was there anything, though, on the list as well that caught your eye?

Z: I think the only other thing that I wanted to talk about really quickly was, there’s a really interesting mix of white varieties called out here. You all listening know me: I love white wine. It’s really my heart in a lot of ways, but there is Semillon, there’s Friulano, there’s Grüner Veltliner. Just an interesting wealth of white varieties. And yeah, there’s Sauvignon Blancs. There’s Chardonnay on here, too, of course. But it is really refreshing to me to see a top list that isn’t just like, here are the 18 best Chardonnays and Sauvignon Blancs, and I will throw a Riesling or two in there, because someone expects it. It is a really diverse set of white wines on here. And I love that, and I think that’s something to commend you guys for. It’s important when looking at white wine that we not just focus on two, three, four varieties.

A: Thank you very much. I really appreciate that, Zach.

Z: I’m sure that was all Tim. You had nothing to do with it.

A: Yeah, that was all Tim. I think we all share your passion for white wines. We really love them. And I think there is something to know, all of us came into wine in various different ways. Tim through the chef route. Keith through Italian wine. Me through music and things like that. So we didn’t come through a traditional path where you also were taught from the very beginning that like the best whites are Chardonnays and Rieslings. And so I feel like, while we appreciate those, we are also able to love other whites from other places that may not get as many accolades but absolutely should, and are extremely interesting in their own unique ways. So I think the only other thing that you probably saw that I was waiting for you to say, and you didn’t, and that’s the No. 2 wine was from Virginia. But that’s cool.

Z: We talk about Virginia wine on the podcasts way too much already.

A: It is pretty dope though, man, you gotta get your hands on it. So let’s move on. Let’s let’s talk spirits.

Z: Absolutely.

A: So this was the first year we ever did the Top 50 Best Spirits list. We’re obviously going to keep doing it moving forward. I have to tell you, this was the hardest list to create out of the three.

Z: Oh, I think it’s insane that you guys did this. I’m glad you did, but when you told me that you guys are doing a top 50 spirits list, I was just like, “man, wine is hard enough, but spirits?”

A: This was really hard. And it was hard for a lot of different reasons. I think the main reason is for me, when I taste really great wine, I know if it’s great. Whether it’s going to sit at 50 or it’s going to sit at one, there is a way that we can sort of figure that out in our brains. Spirits are really hard to figure out what is better than what, especially when you’re dealing with different spirits, and especially when we’re looking at a whiskey and then we’re saying, “OK, is this better than this gin? Or is this better than this tequila?” It was crazy, man. We did a social distance tasting on the roof of all these spirits that we tasted throughout the year. We tasted them again, which also is weird. It’s very odd spitting spirits. You wind up still feeling buzzed. And then we debated. We went home, we’re on Zoom. We debated for longer. Then the next day we kept debating. It took a really long time to figure this out. Also because everyone’s all over the place. And I feel for whatever reason, because it’s spirits, price and money just comes into it in a very different way, you know? Some of these spirits were incredible but are very hard to find, highly allocated and also crazy expensive, you’ll probably never pay market price for them. That started weighing on where they should actually fall on the list. Obviously a brown spirit would be No. 1. I mean, that’s where we are, right? And in just the world of spirits, whiskey is going to be up there, whiskey seems to do better than anything else. And that was still the case here. I was proud of us, though, that we really did feel very strongly that a tequila should be No. 2. I think what we’ve seen in the world of spirits right now and just how dominant tequila is becoming and how many people are entering the category, how many tequilas are coming to the market that are less manipulated and really, truly speaking of a place. I think tequila is going to continue to evolve as a collector’s spirit. They’re definitely some surprises there. I’m curious what your impressions were when you saw this list.

Z: Well, I think I want to add one other note of potential complexity, which I’m sure you considered, but probably just didn’t feel like mentioning. With wine, you can be pretty confident that when you’re putting together a list or beer, that someone is going to consume that liquid, they’re going to open that bottle or can, and either drink directly from it or pour it into a glass, and drink it. And with spirits, especially some of these, are you talking about the best gin for a gin and tonic, the best gin for a Martini, or the best gin for a Negroni? I mean, it’s very difficult. And I am glad that the VinePair team did this. I think it’s a kind of a crazy notion again, it’s hard to quantify. And so in some ways I get why some of the high-end brown spirits are easier to do, because really, people are probably drinking those neat or on the rocks. Maybe they’re making, I would even say it’s unlikely that someone’s making much in the way of a cocktail, maybe a Manhattan or something, if you really love that. But I think a lot of these are meant to be enjoyed that way. I think that the two things that stood out to me at the top of the list. One of them is, I have often felt that they are like an underappreciated distillery: Evan Williams is on here relatively high up.

A: Oh, I’m so glad you said that. I’m so glad you said that.

Z: There are a few things when the restaurant bar programs that I felt strongly about, to the point of, “I think this is how you should do it.” But evidently, Evan Williams being the well bourbon, wherever I worked was a big piece of it. It consistently delivers, it’s affordable, it works really well as a cocktail partner. And it’s at a slightly higher ABV level than like the minimum for bourbon. It’s, I think, 43 or something like that. And so in cocktails, in particular, it doesn’t, the downside to a lot of other sort of similarly priced, well-applicable bourbons, they just really kind of fell flat in cocktails, because they’re just a little bit lower proof, and Evan Williams always felt like really stood up nicely and cocktails and granted for a lot of cocktails that we were making, well bourbon was not the call. It was usually going to be something else. And especially if your well drink is an Old Fashioned or something like that, I just love it. And I have not tried the 2012 single barrel, but I’m just really glad to see Evan Williams on here.

A: Let’s be clear, right? Evan Williams. Everyone basically said when we tasted, that this bourbon for the entire tastings team was a bourbon they returned to throughout the pandemic. Right? It is 30 bucks. This is a single barrel. The amount of s*** that is romanticized by bourbon geeks that this whiskey has, for the price, is stupid. And we actually feel across the board that Heaven Hill is the most underrated whiskey distillery, bourbon distillery in America. For as much attention as Sazerac gets, which they deserve a lot of attention, but a lot of it also comes to the fact that they do produce Pappy. Let’s be clear. That attention overshadows a lot of other distilleries that are producing liquid that is just as good, if not better, but cannot for that reason connect itself back to Pappy. So the No. 1 whiskey on this list, Old Fitzgerald, is Heaven Hills wheated bourbon, that is $200, not a few thousand, and it is on par with Pappy. They release two releases a year. They release a spring and fall bottling of Old Fitz. It’s always anywhere from 14 to 16 years old. The bourbon is absolutely gorgeous. It basically has a very similar mash build as Pappy. We think it’s a bourbon that probably will become very collectible very soon. There’s Evan Williams, there’s Elijah Craig, a lot of the bourbons that this place produces are just all incredibly solid. And I do agree with you, Zach. It’s a lot easier to look at the brown spirits, because for the most part, people are going to consume them straight. To be fair, it made a lot of the tequilas easier because especially when you start playing in the world of reposado, but even in blanco, nowadays people are drinking it straight. It was much harder when thinking about the gins and the rums. Because the gins and the rums were very much “so why are we saying this is so good?” It’s just so good because it would make an amazing Daiquiri, right? Does that make it the best white rum? Just because it’s probably the best white rum in the world for a Daiquiri? We decided that, yes, that was the case. We think that the white rum was created for the Daiquiri base or the Daiquiri is created for the white run. You know what I mean? And that was how we wanted to go. And other things, there was a huge, massive debate on the roof. Tim’s going to kill me for this. Of people talking about gin and gin and tonics, and then gin and Martinis. And Tim is not a gin and tonic fan, which I think is very interesting, cause he’s a Brit. Some other people in the tasting team like gin and tonics, and we’re talking about these gins. That shouldn’t be amazing. I would love it. And Tim said, “that’s bollocks, this gin is not as good as the gin I’d use in a Martini.” Everyone who has ever listened to him on this podcast knows that he’s a massive Martini fan. So that was hard, right? Exactly what you’re talking about happened. It was difficult. It was really difficult to figure out where everything should lie. I will say, it’s not surprising that the majority of the list is brown, as we’ve said before. But there are some standouts here, like Tanqueray No. Ten. I mean, this gin is really beautiful. It has everything a traditional gin drink would want. But it also has all these components of what is really trendy right now in gin. So it’s like that perfect liquid for people who want to see why gin is having this massive renaissance. Have this gin and you’ll understand why. It’s perfect in a Martini, but it’s also delicious in a gin and tonic and Negroni. It’s a great liquid and you can find it everywhere. We did have this debate, with things like Monkey 47, right? It’s an amazing gin, but it’s very expensive, it’s a very expensive gin. So where does that go? Another thing I think about gin now, I’m getting on the gin train. It was interesting to realize that a lot of the gins we like this year were all coming out of Japan. And it’s interesting, Japan is establishing itself as a location for producing not just amazing whiskeys, which is what has become known for over the last few decades, but now also becoming really well-known as a country that produces really amazing gins and gins that are very uniquely Japanese, which I think is interesting. The Japanese whiskeys, they were going to say, we’re going to go out to make Scotch, but better. And these gins are all their own thing, which I think is really cool.

Z: Well, I think it’s a sign and an exciting thing. And I look forward to this expanding even further because one thing that’s very true is, as gin has more of a renaissance globally, more and more places around the world, here in the U.S., in Europe, in Asia, and in other parts of the world. Gin more than almost any other spirit is such an incredible platform for expression of place, because you can infuse a gin with so many different potential botanical herb, barks, fruits, et cetera, and produce something that’s still kind of is recognizably gin, but is also have a place in a way that, it’s harder to do that with other spirits, especially spirits, that are aged in barrel, where the barrel character is going to take over to some extent. I think it’s exciting and I think it’s one of the great things about this list I was thinking about, the great thing about looking into potentially shopping off of this list, as opposed to the wine list is, you can come back to these things over and over again, right? You can come back to the bottle of whiskey, of tequila, of gin, of rum, et cetera. And you can compare and contrast side by side. You can say, “Hey, I want to get a couple of these gins” and you might feel that one is better for a gin and tonic, one is better for a Martini, one is better for a Negroni and that’s all super valid. And I think that’s what’s cool about looking at this list and maybe it makes the price point a little bit easier to swallow, even if it’s higher-per-bottle cost than the wine list, for sure. You can revisit these in a way that a wine, you got a day or two with it at best.

A: Of course. Well, so Zach, we’ve drawn on about these lists and I realized we’re kind of running out of time, and I don’t think we’re going to get to the beer list this time. Maybe that’s something we talk about with Cat in early 2021 and talk about this. Because that was actually just published today. So no rush, but I would encourage you, if you have enjoyed this podcast, go out and look at these two lists. The spirits and the wine, we are very much proud of both. And I encourage you to buy some of the liquids and let us know what you think. Tell us, do you think that where certain things on the list you agree with or disagree with? Hit us up podcast@vinepair.com. We would just love to hear your thoughts. And Zach, I’ll get back with you next week.

Z: Sounds great.

Thanks so much for listening to the VinePair Podcast. If you enjoy listening to us every week, please leave us a review or rating on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever it is that you get your podcasts. It really helps everyone else discover the show. Now for the credits, VinePair produced by myself and Zach. It is also mixed and edited by him. Yeah, Zach, we know you do a lot. I’d also like to thank the entire VinePair team, including my co-founder, Josh and our associate editor, Cat. Thanks so much for listening. See you next week.

Ed. note: This episode has been edited for length and clarity.

The article VinePair Podcast: Exploring the Top 50 Wines and Spirits of 2020 appeared first on VinePair.

Via https://vinepair.com/articles/50-best-wines-spirits-2020/

source https://vinology1.weebly.com/blog/vinepair-podcast-exploring-the-top-50-wines-and-spirits-of-2020

[shielddrake]

Rebel of Sky City Ch. 17

Sorry for the long wait.  This chapter bugs me.  Still not completely happy with it, but moving on.

 Chapter Seventeen

“Will you take me as I am?”

 “Hey, Lukas?”

 “Mercy, mercy, why didn’t we hear it?”

“Yeah, Petra?”

 “Let your soul gravitate to the love y’all.”

 “Will you whack your dad for me?”

“And the bloody changes…”

 “He’s on the other side of his cell. I can’t reach.”

 “And the streets are full of strangers.”

 “Does he have to keep singing?”

 “Let your soul gravitate to the love y’all.”

“I couldn’t tell you.”

“And the bloody changes…”

 Petra jumped up from her mat in the corner. “Stop it! Stop it! I can’t take it anymore!”

 “Whoa!” Lukas stood as well and held onto the bars to look towards her cell. “Petra, calm down!”

“Milo, I swear if you don’t stop, I’m going to break through these blocks and punch you out!” Petra hollered.

“Sorry, Petra,” Milo said, stopping his chants. “There’s only so much one can do when in prison.”

“There’s only so much one can take of your singing,” she shouted. “No offense, but you’re not the best singer around.”

 Lukas couldn’t help but smile. “She’s right, you know, Dad.”

Milo huffed as the entrance to the dungeon opened and Gill stepped through. He glanced at the prisoners and pulled out his sword.

“What’s all the racket about?” He ran his sword across the bars of the cells, the metal clangs echoing through the room. The jailbirds held their ears at the sound. “No talking. Prisoners aren’t supposed to talk.”

“That’s probably the longest single sentence I’ve ever heard you say,” Petra taunted. “Has The Founder given you crafting materials for brains?”

“Shut up, Petra,” Gill ordered, though the redhead didn’t seem inclined to obey. “You don’t scare me. Now the tables have turned, and you got to do what I say.”

 “Yeah right.” Petra crossed her arms and allowed a smirk to grace her lips. “As if you have any authority around here.”

 “When Aiden takes over, I’m going to have plenty of authority,” Gill announced. He put his sword away and crossed his arms.

“When Aiden takes over?” Lukas put his hands around the bars and stared at the guard. “What are you talking about?”

“Mum’s the word for now.” Gill chuckled. “You’ll see soon enough.”

“Gill!” Everyone’s attention turned to the doorway again, where Axel was just entering the dungeons. “Gabriel wants to see you. Says it’s your turn for your interview.”

 Gill rolled his eyes and sighed. “Right. Whatever. See you losers later.”

 He made his way out of the dungeons, knocking Axel in the shoulder as his left. Axel rubbed his arm where Gill had made contact, but otherwise ignored him. He shook his head once the door was close and then looked at Petra.

“How are you holding up?” he asked her, his voice rather quiet for him.

“Fine, I guess,” she replied with a shrug. Petra glanced away for a split second. “What’s going on out there?”

“You’ve kind of put everyone on edge about who can be trusted in the Guard. Captain Reginald suspects a coup.” Axel put his hands on his hips and looked down at her. “Petra, tell it to me straight. Did you join the Guard to try to get to the Eversource?”

 Petra glanced over at Lukas, who just nodded his head. Everything was out in the open now. Might as well be truthful.

 “I wasn’t trying to get the Eversource. I wanted to see if I could get my hands on some more materials for our club. Build Club. Sure you’ve heard about it by now.” At Axel’s nod, she continued. “Why? Where’d you hear I was after the Eversource?”

 “That’s what Aiden’s saying,” Axel said. “But he’s a jerk, so I couldn’t be sure.”

“Sounds like Aiden,” Lukas added with a roll of his eyes.

 “Yeah, trying to foist the blame on us.” Petra felt like punching the bars, and she might have if Axel hasn’t been in front of her. “The Founder actually is listening to him?”

��Yeah. Seems he and The Founder have become all buddy-buddy,” he described. Axel scuffled his foot. “Makes him think he can order all of us around. Spouting commands left and right.”

 “And The Founder’s not doing anything about it? That’s just great.” Lukas groaned. “What about Jesse? How’s she doing?”

 Axel shook his head. “Don’t know. Haven’t seen her since you guys were brought in.”

 “Hope she’s okay,” Lukas whispered.

 “No kidding,” Petra agreed.

 “What’s this about a coup?” Milo asked, speaking up for the first time in a while.

 “The Founder’s all worried that others in the Guard are trying to overthrow her, and you're involved in it somehow,” he explained. “The captain’s questioning everyone about it.”

 “That’s news to me,” Petra stated. “I never heard of another guard who wants to overthrow The Founder.”

 “Is that what The Founder thinks Build Club was doing?” Milo inquired. “That we were sending people into the Guard to get the Eversource?”

“That’s the theory anyway,” Axel answered him, giving the older man a small smile. “You’re not, right?”

“It’s not a bad idea,” Milo conceded.

 Lukas banged his head against the bars. “Not now, Dad.”

“Other than me, no one in Build Club is also in the Guard,” Petra replied honestly, looking Axel in the eye.

He seemed to contemplate this for a moment before speaking again. “So, getting into the Guard and all that, it was all a lie?”

The redhead sighed, looking down at his feet. “Yeah. I wasn’t in the Guard to protect Sky City. I wanted to get resources. That’s all.”

“It was a lie,” Axel summarized succinctly. He shifted from one foot to the other. “What about me? Was our friendship a lie too?”

 “No way.” Petra’s gaze snapped up to his. “You’d actually think that?”

 “Petra, you’re the first person who didn’t treat me like I was just some, well, loser. That I wasn’t some coward who was just around to be the butt of a joke.” Axel let out a long breath. “Why would you act like a friend to someone like me, if it wasn’t as a way to get something?”

 Petra rested her forearms against the bars, leaning forward to look him straight in the eye.

 “If you believe I ever thought that, Axel, then you really are a dummy.” She shrugged like it was no big deal. “Yeah, you screw things up sometimes, but we all do. You’re a funny guy. You’ve made Jesse and me laugh tons of times, and we were laughing with you, not at you.”

 “And who’s calling you a coward?” Lukas chimed in. “I remember when we first met. I went to talk to Aiden, and the moment you thought something was going to happen, you jumped in and told him to back off. Doesn’t sound like a coward to me.”

Axel smiled a bit sheepishly. He glanced at the dungeon door. “I swear I didn’t come down here to fish for compliments.”

“What do you mean?” Petra asked. She watched as he walked over to the switch controlling the doors. “Axel, what are you doing?”

He stood in front of the switch. He looked over his shoulder at her with the most serious expression Petra had ever seen on Axel’s face.

 “Look, I might be in the Guard, but we’re friends,” he said. “And I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

“Axel, are you…”

 Now the large man smirked. “You know me, Petra. There’s supposed to be a guard in here at all times, but I’m a big, fat idiot who can’t go a moment without eating.”

 “And now he’s insulting himself again,” Lukas muttered. “Why did we try to cheer him up?”

 Petra shushed him.

“I was thinking I’d go down to the pantry to get some bread,” he described. “To satisfy my endless hunger, you know?”

 Petra immediately caught on. “And how long would you say something like that would take you?”

“Probably about as long as it would take someone to get from here to the front gate.” Axel flipped the switch, opening the doors to the cells. “I can’t say you won’t run into anyone on the way, but this is the best I can do.”

“No, Axel. This is great!” Petra ran up to him and gave him one of her rare hugs. “Thank you!”

 Axel’s face was a little red when she pulled away, and he cleared his throat.

 “Young man, we owe you a debt of gratitude,” Milo said.

 “Definitely.” Lukas stepped forward to shake his hand in thanks.

 Axel headed for the doorway. “You guys better be gone before I get back. I don’t want to have to throw you back in the cells.”

“We will be,” Petra promised. “Thanks again.”

 Axel headed out of the dungeons, not looking back. Milo rushed to a chest on the other side of the room where their belongings had been stored. He pulled out his things before throwing Lukas and Petra’s respective inventories. For some reason, this included Petra’s sword from the Guard.

 “Guess it's considered mine?” she figured as she swung it a few times. “Not going to complain though.”

“Come on,” Lukas said. “Axel’s right. We got to get out of here while we have the chance.”

The trio didn’t have much of an opportunity to see the inside of the palace during the daytime. Thus, being in it during nighttime was a disorienting experience to say the least. Most of the halls were dark, no torches to light the way. And without windows to provide limited starlight there wasn’t much to allow them to see. Lukas could only hope that Petra had the muscle memory to lead them to an unguarded exit.

 If there was an unguarded exit.

 It wasn’t long before Petra held up a hand, halting them in their tracks at a corner with a torch. Since she was the only one armed out of the three, she would be the one doing any battling. Any guards they would run into would have swords. If either Lukas or Milo tried to fight, it would not end well.

 Petra stayed at the corner of the intersection, keeping to the shadows well enough to not be seen. Lukas and Milo watched as she jumped out and stuck her sword forward. There was a gasp, and Lukas swore he could’ve heard the sound of a bowstring being pulled.

However, rather than starting a fight, Petra cried out. “Jesse?!”

Milo and Lukas glanced at each other and then ran into the open. Sure enough, there was Jesse, standing rigidly straight as the tip of Petra’s sword barely nicked her throat. Olivia stood to the side, her bow ready with an arrow, but she immediately lowered it when she her eyes fell on them.

“Oh, thank goodness,” she sighed. “I really didn’t want to fight.”

“Sorry.” Petra lowered her sword. “Thought you were a guard.”

Jesse swallowed and smiled at her, the relief evident in her shining eyes. Petra chuckled and put her sword away before reaching to give Jesse a tight hug. Jesse froze for a moment but soon returned it.

“You must be happy to see me,” she murmured into her friend’s shoulder. “Or you wouldn’t be hugging me so tight.”

 “I’ll just deny it later,” The redhead stated.

 “What am I?” Olivia sighed.  “Moldy bread?”

 “It’s good to see you too, Olivia,” Petra added, giving her a hug of her own.  “What are you doing here?”

 “The idea was to bust you guys out of jail, but…” Olivia explained.

 “Well, we’ve got that part covered,” Petra said as she released her.

 Reuben skipped forward for some attention from Petra as well. She grinned and gave the little pig a few pats on his head.

“Not that we don’t appreciate the attempt,” Milo added. He stepped forward to give Jesse his own hug. “Good to see you, Jesse. I’m glad you’re okay.”

“I should be telling you that.” After they finished their hug, Jesse turned to the younger blond and stiffened. She looked at him for only a split second before averting her gaze to the floor. “Um…hi, Lukas.”

“Hi Jesse.” His voice was quiet and low.

 She rubbed the back of her neck, refusing to meet his eyes. Lukas stared at her with a blank expression, waiting for her to take the first step.

 Milo watched, ready to intervene if he needed to. He didn’t think that would be necessary, but he was ready just in case. Olivia wrung her hands nervously, while Petra was still on the lookout for any guards.

 Jesse took a deep breath. “Lukas, I’m sorry. I was going to tell you everything, but I just didn’t—”

 Her words froze in her mouth as Lukas stepped forward and took her face in his hands. Jesse glanced up in time to watch as he pressed his lips against hers. She startled but returned the kiss, closing her eyes.

 “Oh, for crying out loud,” Olivia said, rolling her eyes and smirking.

 Petra groaned. “Is this really the time for that?”

“Come on, you two,” Milo declared with a grin. “It’s a reunion of lovers. This is something to be celebrated.”

 Reuben snorted. No one was sure if it was from amusement at the kissing pair, agreement with Milo’s gushing, or joining in with the girls’ annoyance.

 “That was more than I needed to think about.” Olivia muttered as the couple continued to kiss.

 Petra shook her head. “Um, guys? You know we are still in a palace fill with guards that want to recapture us, right?”

This flat statement brought the two out of their own little world, but they didn’t take their eyes off each other.

“I thought you’d be angry,” Jesse whispered.

“Oh, I was angry all right,” Lukas confessed. “But Dad was right about prison giving you lots of time to think.”

 Jesse pulled him closer into a hug, burying her face into his shoulder. “I’m still sorry.”

 “I’m sorry too. I didn’t mean to make you worry so much.” He separated himself from her, finally smiling. He tilted her chin up so she would look at him again. “No more secrets, okay?”

 Jesse nodded. “No more secrets.”

 “Can we get on with it now?” Petra asked, holding her sword up, ready for anything.

Milo clicked his tongue. “Kids these days have no romantic notions.”

 “They’re right though. We need to get out of here.” Lukas grabbed Jesse’s hand and started to pull her down the hall. “Come on.”

Jesse probably would have let him pull her along if she hadn’t heard Reuben’s telltale squealing. She looked over her shoulder at him. The pig gave her a raised eyebrow and jerked his head in the direction that would lead to the throne room. Jesse dug in her heels, causing everyone to stop in their tracks and look at her.

Lukas glanced at Reuben with a raised eyebrow, finally noticing him for the first time. “Wait, you know a pig?”

She ignored him, knowing exactly what Reuben was telling her. “Petra, you know the way out?”

“I think so.”

“Then you lead everyone else out of here,” she instructed. “I have to get to the throne room.”

“Why? What is it?” Milo asked. His brows furrowed with worry.

 “It’s something I have to take care of.”

 “Jesse, we just agreed on no more secrets,” Lukas reminded her as he put a hand on her shoulder. “What is it?”

“…Aiden’s after the Eversource,” she breathed. “He’s planning to use it to overthrow The Founder…my mother. I can’t let him have it.”

“If Aiden has the only way to get resources in Sky City,” Milo said with a slight stuttter. “He could do whatever he wants to the rest of us.”

“And that’s not a good thing.” Lukas shook his head. “I don’t want to even think about what he could be planning with it.”

 “He actually thinks that’ll work?” Olivia wondered aloud. “Taking over Sky City, I mean? What makes him think the Guard will stand around and let him overthrow The Founder?”

“Remember how Axel mentioned some kind of coup?” Petra recalled. “I bet Aiden’s the one actually doing it. He probably has on the inside no one knows about.”

“It would take a long time for someone to infiltrate the Guard enough to stage a coup,” Jesse concluded. “He might’ve been planning this for a while.”

 “Even if that was true, and let’s assume it is,” Lukas stated. “How would Aiden even get his hands on the Eversource? No one knows where in the palace The Founder keeps it.”

“Jesse does,” Milo realized, his voice becoming wispy. He took his son’s place in front of her. “You must know exactly where it is!”

“I do, and Aiden doesn’t. At least, not right now,” she answered. “Aiden even tried to get me to tell him where to find it.”

“And you obviously refused,” Olivia said.

 “Obviously. There’s no way I’d show him where it is.”

 “But you could show us?” Milo asked. Jesse blinked at him a few times. “We could take the Eversource for ourselves and be free of The Founder’s control! Free resources for everyone!”

“That’s what I was thinking too!” Jesse agreed.

“So, I guess we’re going to go get the Eversource and rebel against The Founder with it?” Lukas said slowly.

“It sounds like that’s the plan,” said Olivia.

“Or at the very least, keep the Eversource away from Aiden,” Jesse declared darkly. “If that means keeping it from my mother too, that’s just an added bonus.”

Lukas’ eyebrows rose on his forehead while Reuben oinked.

 “So, we can get to the Eversource from the throne room?” Olivia inquired.

“Exactly.” Jesse paused and then started. “Wait a minute. ‘We’?”

“Of course, ‘We’,” Petra added. “What? You think we’re going to let you go off by yourself?”

 “Yeah. What if one of the guards finds you?” Lukas postulated. “They’re not exactly happy with you right now.”

 “No, they’re not,” she said, rubbing her upper arm. Jesse’s smile was small but grateful. “But you guys need to escape while you have the chance.”

 “If you think we’re going to just leave you behind, you’re nuts,” her boyfriend professed. His firm tone left no argument.

 “We’re not leaving you alone in this.” Milo puts his hips, his back straight and his chin out. “Even if we weren’t going to take the Eversource for ourselves.”

“We’re your friends, Jesse,” Olivia added. “We’re in this together.”

 Jesse chuckled as she looked down at Reuben, who decided that sitting on her foot was a good idea. “I’m used to doing things alone. Thanks, guys.”

 “That all being said,” Petra finally chipped in. “Can we please not talk about this in the middle of the hall in a palace with guards that want us in jail?”

 Lukas couldn’t help but laugh. “I think Petra doesn’t want us to stick around here.”

 “We should get going,” Milo said. “If we want to get to the Eversource before Aiden does.”

“Right.” Lukas stood next to Jesse. “Lead the way!”

 “All right. Follow me.” She started jogging down the hall, the others shortly after. Reuben ran ahead of them, oinking happily. “Reuben! Not so loud! We’re still sneaking, remember?”

“I ask again, why do you know a pig?” Lukas inquired as they ran.

[vvdbvvotv]

I'll Make You Believe

Tyler Joseph Imagine

Part 1

Pairing: Tyler Joseph x Reader (as best friends and maybe a little more)

Request: The reader is suicidal and wants to commit, but doesn’t want to hurt those that care

Warnings: Suicidal thoughts, depression, panic attack, fluff

Words: 1,833

-

It was cloudy and cold, a perfect match to describe your mood. You stared out the school bus window as it drove through potholes filled with rain water. You were in 11th grade, on your way home from high school. It was a long and tiring week. Each day dragged on and you were grateful tomorrow was the start of the weekend. High school was a waste for you; you had the attention span of a brick wall and zero concentration or effort. You also lacked in any type of social skills. All of these things combined equaled absolute torture for eight hours straight and five days a week. That’s not even mentioning the other factors that made you even more mentally unstable.

Everyone at school was stupid and annoying in your opinion, including yourself. People in their dumb popularity groups, dumb fads, dumb people using that-one-filter-every-single-living-soul uses on Snapchat. You hated it all. You hated possibly every single person that tried to talk to you. Talking to people was a risk- you didn’t easily trust people. Even your parents didn’t understand you because of how much of a mystery you are to them, but of course they don’t know that. Opening up to them was still as hard as talking to anyone else.

The truth was, even though you despised others who tried to talk to you, you couldn’t be more thankful for one particular person that did. Honestly, you were surprised this person even talked to you in the first place. You stopped staring out the window and turned to the boy sitting next to you. He was looking down at his phone, one hand in the pocket of his favorite yellow hoodie. The dark haired boy was wearing his earbuds, blocking out all the chaos happening from various parts of the bus. He looked up from his phone for a moment, turned his head, and made eye contact with you and smiled before looking down again. You scooted slightly closer to him before getting lost in your thoughts once again.

The boy’s name was Tyler and he was your life saver. Tyler was the one person in the world of seven billion people that you trusted. You met him on your first day of freshman year. Tyler was the new student and out of 2,311 people he decided to ask you where the science wing of your school was. You were grateful for that day, but often felt anxious about how different things would be if he didn’t end up talking to you. Tyler told you everything while you tried to tell him everything too. You were still slightly scared to talk to Tyler about your personal issues sometimes, but whenever you did he made you feel way better. He always comforted you and made you realize you weren’t alone. Even though Tyler didn’t know exactly what you were going through and how you felt, he reassured you that he wouldn’t leave you. He wouldn’t stay during your best moments and fade when you were at your worst. But you still had doubts. There was still that nagging voice in the back of your head spitting harsh yet believable things to you.

He’s pretending.

For two years? Tyler cares. He’s stuck by me for that long.

Oh please, he’s too good for you. Don’t deny it.

That was something you did believe. You snuck a quick glance at Tyler before looking out the window again. Heat was slowly creeping to your face, making it turn a light shade of pink. Tyler was attractive. He had warm brown eyes that made you melt whenever you looked into them, dark brown hair that looked soft to the touch, and full lips. At first glance, yiu would think he was a jock. But Tyler didn’t take advantage of those perks about himself. It was one thing about him that confused you. He never tried to make many friends or talk to any of the other girls. There was a high chance that Tyler could probably date anyone or be part of any group he wanted to, but he didn’t. He didn’t attend any sports events or go to many parties.

Tyler was actually very quiet. He kept to himself and usually wrote in a blood red, hardcover notebook daily. Songs, Tyler would say whenever you asked what he was doing. He would usually only show his friend Josh and you for some reason you didn’t understand. You didn’t really know Josh, but according to Tyler he “played drums and liked kittens.” It made you feel awful that Tyler chose to spend more of his free time with you being emotionally unstable while Josh was all alone. “Don’t worry,” Tyler would normally say, “he’s probably at a pet store or something.”

Tyler nudged your shoulder to remind you that you’d be getting off the bus soon. You hadn’t taken anything out of your backpack, so you waited for Tyler to put away his belongings before following him down the narrow aisle of the bus. As you were walking, you noticed many people eyeing Tyler as he walked by while looking at you in disgust. This made you feel ashamed so you hung your head low and walked faster, eventually bumping into Tyler as you reached the front of the bus. People near you snickered.

“Sorry Ty Guy,” you mumbled a quick apology. “Ty Guy” had been a name you called Tyler within days of meeting him. It stuck ever since.

“No big deal,” Tyler smiled at you once again.

Tyler and you stepped down the bus steps and walked towards your home. You two were only four houses away from each other, which was very convenient. The walk from the bus stop to your house took about 15 minutes.

You trailed a couple paces behind Tyler, pondering about various things. Suddenly, the same voice returned to your head and you had another silent conversation.

He’s not looking back at you, probably ignoring you. It said.

It’s fine, Tyler probably doesn’t realize.

Exactly. He doesn’t care, he’s trying to get rid of you. Explains why he’s walking so fast. He smiled at you because he feels bad for you. He doesn’t want to hurt your feelings but really he hates you there’s so much evidence.

You felt your heart drop hearing these things. It’s just your head, it’s not real, you thought. But at the same time it was real because it was inside your head. You were thinking these things and you believed them.

You stopped walking for a couple seconds to see if Tyler would notice. He didn’t. He kept walking and didn’t look back; it was like you didn’t even exist in his world.

Correct once again.

Somehow within only a few minutes or even seconds, the sky and pretty much everything seemed to grow darker. Tyler was now nearly a speck in the distance. The trees casted eerie shadows and the clouds were haunting. You felt panic rising. Your best friend didn’t notice what was happening, he didn’t remember your existence. Was Tyler even your friend? Were the echoes in your messed up mind really true? They knew everything didn’t they.

You felt a feeling that you hadn’t felt in about a week. You felt like everything was trying to suffocate or drown you: the clouds, the air, your own skin. You didn’t understand why a panic attack chose to happen at this random moment, but then it hit you. Tyler. Tyler helped you, Tyler was always there, Tyler’s soothing voice saved you. But now there wasn’t any of him. Now he was gone and you couldn’t see him anymore. You were alone in the dying daylight.

Your heavy backpack made your knees give and you crumpled to the ground. It felt like your heart wasn’t working properly. It was as if you were paralyzed and broken but somehow going to spasm at any given moment. Tears flooded your eyes and you hated yourself for it. You hated being so weak and for crying in the middle of your neighborhood. Your breathing became uneven and you didn’t know how to fix it. You didn’t know how to do anything because you were completely disconnected from the world. Muffled hearing, blurry vision, and nausea struck you.

Suddenly, there was a familiar voice. A familiar sound. You turned your head as best you could and saw the dark haired boy who could fix anything sprinting towards you. And then there he was in front of you dropping his backpack on the sidewalk and crawling towards you with emotion flooding his eyes.

Tyler immediately wrapped his arms around your waist and pulled you towards him. You flinched at his touch and your breathing became even more uneven. Tyler sat with his legs out in front of him and pulled the top half of your body onto his lap. You looked up at him, struggling to breathe.

“Ty-” you began.

“Shh, (Y/N) don’t talk just listen, it’s me Tyler. I’m right here. I’m not leaving anytime soon.” Tyler said quietly.

He slowly rocked back and forth with you in his arms.

“Okay,” he continued. “You need to breathe. Look at me- no- don’t close your eyes. Look at me.”

Tyler gently placed his right hand on your stomach while his left arm still supported you. You squirmed at his touch and almost screamed while trying to escape. Tyler pulled you back towards him.

“I’m not gonna hurt you, I just need to make sure you’re breathing evenly. Copy me, I know you can do it. In and out- yeah! That’s good. Keep doing that. Look how easy breathing is,” Tyler said.

You started breathing regularly again, but you were still nauseous and dizzy. It was hard to focus on Tyler’s face that was only inches away from you. Tyler began rocking back and forth again while wrapping his arms tighter around you. His careful embrace made you feel safe once again. You stayed like this. Sitting on the sidewalk with Tyler’s and your belongings scattered everywhere. Tyler kept whispering comforting words to you and rubbed your arm slowly. Eventually, he started to quietly sing one of his songs to you.

…I hear a second voice behind your tongue somehow

Luckily I can read your mind

Flies and cobwebs unwind.

You closed your eyes, clinging onto Tyler and the lyrics he was singing.

They will not take you down

They will not cast you out.

All traces of day had vanished and streetlights became the only source of light. The last thing you remember was being picked up carried home by Tyler.

“Thanks Ty Guy,” you said wearily.

Before you drifted to sleep, you could’ve sworn you heard Tyler say one last thing.

“(Y/N) you’re gonna be alright, okay? I promise… I love you.”

-

To be continued…