#AND THEN CRYING BECAUSE GOD I MISSED HIM SO MUCH AND I LOVE TIM SO MUCH AND ASDGHASJKDHASDJKASD

[bruciemilf]

"Estranged son Jason" "Estranged son Dick" you are all WRONG, TIM is the estranged son. Jason breaks down crying if Bruce doesn't send him a paragraph of a good morning text every day.

Tim is never home unless he physically can't avoid it. Tim doesn't visit unless everything's going to shit and he has to do damage control and run interference to make sure nobody storms off in a moody fit and drops off the map for months. Tim pulls the you're not my dad card immediately Bruce tries to parent him in a way he doesn't like (literally any way that isn't extremely hands-off) and Bruce can't even say anything to the contrary because Tim's emancipated and Bruce was his legal guardian for less than two years.

Jason comes home for the week before and after every holiday, no matter how much he grumbles, and goes all sullen whenever he doesn't have his pile of thirty-three or more gifts. Jason handmakes Bruce father’s day gifts and sulks whenever Bruce glances at anyone else's for a second more.

Tim has to be begged and bargained with and blackmailed into coming for even just the day of the holiday—left to him, he would just send gifts and be done with it. Tim says him even showing up to Father's Day itself is enough of a gift, and gives Bruce a store-bought card and Batman tie.

Tim's difficult for the sake of being difficult. Jason’s difficult because he wants attention. Tim would be happy if Bruce only made him do bi-monthly check-ins digitally and the occasional gala for the public. Jason demands Bruce’s time and effort but only in the way he wants it.

The reason is simple; Tim grew up an only child with no supervision as long as he got good grades and didn't cause any trouble his parents would have to deal with. Jason was the youngest child to an overachiever older brother for years and was used to everything being his way.

GODDDDD FOR THE LOVE OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOR BRITNEY SPEARS CAN I GET MORE SPOILED BRAT " i NEED bruce to pay attention to me 24/7/365 or I'll die again" JASON CONTENT?????

LIKE, GOD, I LOVE THIS; Listen. Sometimes older children are youngest sibling coded and it doesn't fucking matter Jason is the second oldest. This motherfucker gets away with more shit than DAMIAN and that says a LOT

LOGICALLY, (and this isn't me wanting Jason to act like the kid he never got to be, what are you talking about) the person he'd have MOST beef with would be Damian for stealing his spotlight as the youngest.

He'll absolutely act like the big brother we all know he is and love, BUT. he crosses the line at Bruce.

He sees Damian wear one of HIS old sweaters that Bruce knitted for him and they both threw a tantrum while Bruce sighed in the background till he passed out. " MY sweater."

" MY Baba."

" THAT'S IT-"

Tim????? Tim doesn't have a love language with a solid foundation yet, and he's just not used to (or expected) Bruce to be so attentive?

What do you mean you want to hear about my day? What do you mean you made a snack for me? What do you mean you love me regardless of my accomplishments?

AND YOU KNOW, I hear the " Dick drags his siblings to the manor because Bruce loves their company and loves seeing all the baby birds in one nest" crowd. I LOVE you people.

But I'm begging. Imagine you're Tim Drake and you get a furious message from your older brother crime lord about you missing family brunch.

" Literally how fucking hard it is to call and say you won't be there, fuck off Papi cut his finger trying to make that dumbass muffin you like, call home you piece of shit. Love you."

[bluejaysandblackbats]

A Stone's Throw

Fandom: DC Comics, Batfam

Summary: The night Jason wakes up in the convalescent home, he's accompanied by his favorite nurse (Nurse Kathy). Nurse Kathy follows her instincts and decides to foster him in the nearby city of Blüdhaven. Soon, her partner and roommates become Jason's new family despite hopes that he'll regain his memories.

Chapters: 2/?

Characters: Jason Todd, Original Characters, Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson, Tim Drake, Barbara Gordon

Additional Tags: Disabled Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne Doesn't Know Jason Todd is Alive, Angst, Fluff, Found Family, Jason Todd Has a Foster Family AU, Jason Todd Moves to Blüdhaven, Original Asexual Characters, Original Lesbian Characters, Amnesiac Jason Todd, "Missed Him By That Much" Trope, Hurt/Comfort, Resurrected Jason Todd

Chapter Two: To Blüdhaven

Boxes piled high by the front door of Kathy’s apartment usually would’ve made her sad, but these boxes signaled a warmer beginning and not an end. She tightened her scarf as she dusted the mantle and ceiling fan, standing on a stepping stool to complete her task. “You’re in good spirits this morning,” her male roommate smiled. He kissed her cheek and sat at the piano, warming up before playing Raindrops by Clifford Borg. “Moving day is upon us!”

Kathy grinned and stepped down. “Daniel, I made lunch for the movers… Do you think that’s a bit much?” Kathy questioned. 

“Oh no… Everyone makes paper bag lunches for movers,” Daniel teased her. She stuck her tongue out at him. “You’re a doll, Katherine. They’ll love it. You make the most beautiful lunches. If only you’d do it for yourself. What’s on your mind, Mummy?” 

“I won’t be his mother… He probably has a mother out there somewhere,” Kathy mumbled. Daniel walked over and wrapped his arms around her. 

“You’ll be his mother in the meantime… And who knows? He might choose you even after he remembers,” Daniel smiled, “How’s he been?” 

Kathy frowned, freeing herself from his comforting embrace to move boxes from the bedroom to the living room. “He’s always crying when I see him… And my supervisor isn’t there all the time to look out for him. I didn’t want to say anything because—.” 

“You didn’t want to think about it because we can’t speed up the moving date… Katherine… I’m sorry—.” 

“You didn’t know. The move to Blüdhaven should be a good thing, though. Shouldn’t it?” Kathy questioned. 

“You worry too much—.” 

“No, but what if he’s from Gotham and—. Maybe I’ll drive him out every weekend to take him on walks through the city,” said Kathy. Daniel took a large box from her, setting it aside. 

“The house in Blüdhaven is more accessible and much larger than anything we’d get here,” Daniel replied, “And Gotham isn’t the safest place for a kid like him. Blüdhaven isn’t much safer, but hey… Maybe the schools are better.” 

“School! Oh, god, Daniel… I have a meeting with his school tomorrow—.” 

“You rescheduled for Monday… Remember?” Daniel whispered. Kathy relaxed, pressing her forehead into Daniel’s shoulder. 

“Daniel, has anyone ever told you how important you are?” Kathy asked.

“Only from you, which means Lover and I have to talk,” Daniel half-joked. Kathy’s nose crinkled as she closed-eye smiled at him. Daniel kissed her cheek. They lugged the remaining boxes to the truck, and Daniel opened the car door for her. 

“I’m so nervous. Are you nervous?” Kathy questioned. 

Daniel gestured for Kathy to calm down, taking two hands with his palms facing down the length of his chest. “Breathe, Katherine. It’ll be alright soon. Once he’s with us, you’ll be fine. You’ve been that way since we were children,” Daniel questioned. The sun peeked through the clouds as a gust of wind blew past, rustling through the trees. The sky looked yellowish grey, painted by the smoke of the nearby factory. 

“I won’t miss the sulfur smell. I know that,” Daniel whispered. Kathy chuckled and nodded, trying to mask the persisting anxiety that buzzed beneath her skin. She slipped her shaking hands under her legs. “It’ll be nice to have a little fellow around.”

“He’s not so little anymore. I don’t think he’s realized that yet. A lot of time passed while he was comatose. He’s getting his balance back. His glasses have helped a lot,” Kathy replied. 

Daniel glanced at her as he followed the moving truck. Daniel popped a CD in and drummed on the dashboard. “Dodie called last night. I think he’s ready to talk about everything,” Daniel whispered. Kathy tensed. 

“Did we mess up, Daniel?” Kathy asked. 

“No, I think we were good parents… But—. I think it’ll take a while for it to sink in that we lied to protect him. This is a long drive, Katherine… You should call him. Let’s talk to him,” Daniel replied. Kathy nodded and frowned. “Together.” 

Kathy dialed the number, and let it ring twice before Dodie answered. “Hi, Ma,” Dodie mumbled. 

“Are you busy Dodie? I—. Dodie, I’m sorry, honey,” Kathy apologized. 

“Ma, I was mad at both of—. Is Dad there?” Dodie questioned. 

“I’m here, Dodie. Hi, Kiddo,” Daniel answered. 

“Good… Because I kinda owe you guys an apology. I know coming out to me was a big deal. I just—. No matter what was going on, you guys always put me first. I can’t begin to imagine what it was like for either of you. I guess I was upset because I felt like I never got the real Mom and Dad. I don’t know. I—. We all would’ve been different if you guys told me earlier. 

“Maybe—. I—. There’s so much I don’t know. How did I even—? I don’t—. Do I even want to know?” Dodie asked. 

“We were young, and we were curious. We realized almost immediately afterward that we’d mistaken our friendship for romance. We tried to move on, and we decided to keep pretending to be a couple. It seemed easier than coming out… And—.” 

“I told Daniel I was pregnant. We knew what we wanted to do. There was no question. We knew we’d love you… And to this day, you’re a testament to our friendship and how much we do love each other. Nothing has to change, Dodie,” Kathy added. 

“Well… Everything is a little different. Aren’t you guys dating people now?” Dodie questioned. 

“Well… Yes,” Daniel answered. 

“I want to meet them,” Dodie sternly replied. 

“Okay… Well, Walter’s in Blüdhaven. We won’t be there for a few hours but the house is pretty close to yours,” Daniel announced, “If you stop by and tell him who you are, he’ll let you in. I don’t when Sibyl—. Katherine, honey, when is Sibyl coming?”

“Oh… Um, she’s coming tonight. She’s done all the grocery shopping, so I’ll be able to make dinner. Oh! Dodie, sweetheart, can you stay for dinner?” Kathy replied. Dodie made a soft noise. “Dinner. Let’s do dinner. It’ll be good. We can all—. We can talk. You know about the little guy from the hospital? He’s coming home soon.”

“I’ll stay for dinner, Ma. I can’t stay over because I have work tomorrow morning, but I’d—. I’d like that… And I can take the day off with you to pick up the kid if you want me to,” Dodie offered. 

Daniel tapped her arm and nodded. “Oh, Dodie, that’s so sweet. I’d love that. I’m picking him up on Sunday. Can you do Sunday?” Kathy asked. 

“I can do Sunday. And Ma? Dad? I love you no matter what. You’re my parents, and I can’t stay mad at either of you. I want you to be happy if that counts for anything. I’m sorry I blew up when you guys came out,” Dodie apologized. 

“We—.”

“We—.” Kathy laughed and touched Daniel’s arm. 

“We love you, Dodie,” Daniel grinned. Kathy made a soft noise. She unwrapped a sandwich in her lunch box and held it up to Daniel’s mouth. He took a bite. Their intimacies outlasted their sham relationship. Things that were once pretend persisted as a declaration of love transcendent of romance while devoid of attraction. Their intimacy was platonic and unending.

[graendoll]

I finally watched the finale of 911 season 7 and my thoughts are below the break.

I have a lot of feelings about what they did and some of them are pretty "oof". Anyway, I realize I swept into Buddie fandom like two months ago and fell deeply in love with Buck and Eddie but after everything that is happening in fandom and in the show, I may slip back out as quickly as I came in because I'm not sure I can deal with the ship wars between now and season 8.

So yeah, if you want to hear what I think about where everything ended up, keep reading. Also...still a Buddie shipper in case it needs to be said 😅

SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT PROCEED W/CAUTION

First, Eddie's story has me absolutely heartbroken even if I suspected a lot of it. Chris calling his grandparents, him leaving even if temporary. I knew it was coming and it still hit me really hard. I know Gavin was considering pulling back so I get it. And Chris will obviously still be a part of Eddie's narrative but ouch that hurt.

Next, the scene between Buck and Tommy was just icky to me. Daddy kink is one of those things I filter out of fic because it's a major fucking squick so the fact that Tim Minear put that on my screen against my will nearly had me throwing hands. Any positive I was trying to find in their date interaction was quickly vomited out all over my coffee table.

I'm not optimistic about Tommy leaving quickly in season 8 for any reason. The date was very much a get to know you situation and while I thought Tommy was being a bit harsh about Bobby, I can guarantee the BT's are probably drooling over the implications of that scene.

(This is one of the things seriously impacting my desire not to watch this show anymore.)

On to Hen and Mara - I am very glad we have a mostly resolved situation with Mara going in to season 8. Honestly this whole story line felt unnecessary and written for the sake of drama. The show is feeling very soapy and while I was giving it the benefit of the doubt because of how much the writers were trying to do in 10 episodes, they better knock that shit off. It's a far cry from the writing of episodes like Buck Begins. (The second reason I may not watch anymore.)

Also, every once in a while Athena does something that makes me absolutely despise her character and this episode was one of those situations. Her jumping to conclusions and threatening Amil was just, rushed, overly dramatic and felt unnecessary

If you needed to get her to Amils house for the cartel arrival, maybe have her go without homicidal tendencies?

Honestly the only storyline that got any room to breath in this episode was Eddie's.

Which brings me to my final thoughts, specific to Buddie and the future of that ship in canon.

First, that will is never going to come up again. It belongs to us now. The writers have elected to ignore it for three seasons and it's never going to come up again, unless Eddie actually dies.

Second, the continuation of BT and the loss of Christopher is like a fucking death knell for Buddie in canon imo. I hate it, but without Chris, they are no longer a little family. Whatever magic was happening with Buddie up to the shooting scene has not been recaptured, and I'm not sure it's ever going to be at this rate, especially I'd the writers don't fix their soapy garbage.

Am I old and cynical? Yes. Does that make me wrong? Maybe...but right now what we have is Buck happily engaged in a weird Daddy kink relationship, Chris, one of the main points of connection between Eddie and Buck, out of the picture, and Eddie probably finding God and repenting for his sins.

Okay I made that last part up but it's a real fear!

In either case, I feel like we were horribly ship bated all season, and it was done only to create buzz for the show on a new network with a new queer character.

I miss when fandom didn't have access to creators and didn't feel like a place you could win because the BTs are going to be A NIGHTMARE for the rest of the hiatus and frankly I don't want to deal with toxic ship wars while we all wait for season 8.

So yeah, happy season 7 finale? 🤣

[lovecolibri]

SaL anon here bestie, ready with the gin to endure whatever nonsense Eddie's plot is devolving into this week. God I hope the focus on Henren or Bathena so I can walk away with some sense of satisfaction. I'm not even going to attempt to say something good might come out if it, since history isn't on our side this season wrt Eddie. Tim needs to lay off his Hitchcock obsession, he did Psycho on LS last season, is doing Vertigo now, and both plots were utter nonsense. At least I got a good laugh today looking at the stills from the Oliver and Lou interview. Somebody should have told Oliver to blink 3 times if he's there against his will, though the fact that he looks like he's actively leaning towards the nearest exit probably says it just as well.

Yeah, the sooner bucktommy ends the happier I'll be. The relationship itself is fine, on par with every other BS relationship Buck was in really, but the fandom around it is exhausting and the active attempts to erase any semblance of Eddie in Buck's life is just so, so dumb (and pointless, like Buck wouldn't be the same without Eddie in his life just as Eddie isn't the same without Buck). Anyway cheers friend, we're on the precipice of something that looks both exciting and annoying, let's hope the scales tip in our favor 🍷🍸🥃.

Well, as I'm sure you guessed by my late answer, I saw this and waved at you from post limit jail, due to the d20 finale last night. I wish Tumblr would have a pop up like, "hey, you have 5 posts left before you hit post limit today!" or something so I could prepare!

So, good news, the Bobby and Henren stuff was *chefs kiss* angsty and dramatic and pulled at my heartstrings! The Bobby montage as he's giving his Captain Dad advice and having Buck cook, and calling Hen "Mother Hen" (while looking at Buck and Eddie 👀👀👀), giving the prayer book to Eddie, giving tips to Ravi, calling out orders on scene, it was all so much! And GOD, them taking that poor little girl away, and Denny stepping between that man and his sister, I was in TEARS! The Bobby and Athena talk got me too, and then him seeing his dead dad?! Bobby is going THROUGH IT and I ate it up!

As for Eddie I- legitimately do not know what to say. The whole thing was a mess, Kim giving herself bangs?? to roleplay with a stranger?? was just SO WEIRD and off-putting. Sorry I guess I'm just a hater but I think Eddie getting stuck with actresses like GW and EG means that him having scenes with anyone else feels good? but I'm not falling all over myself about any magical chemistry 🤷🏻‍♀️I hate this storyline and I'm tired of the narrative that this was some great love Eddie is missing out on when season 2-3 gave us actual canon evidence that it isn't true, and it feels more like Tim wanted Devin back and thought he could get away with it now that the audience had some space and KR spent all last season pretending Shannon was some saint (when he killed Shannon off so quickly originally because he said the audience wasn't going to forgive her and he didn't want to waste screentime on that when grief tied in with anger and abandonment was a more interesting storyline for Eddie and Chris). I'm also VERY curious about where the "Eddie realizing he's been looking at the relationship with rose colored glasses and living in delusion about it" is because GIRL that wasn't it. Eddie crying about her being the great love of his life and how they could have had it all is NOT him taking off the rose colored glasses, no matter how pretty Ryan looks when he's crying.

ANYWAY. I was already not on board with this but the writers dragging Chris into it too just gives me the ick. And it might resolve fine, but GOD!! THE JOURNEY MATTERS!! It matters how the characters get places! And this is just...not just a mess but a completely unnecessary one. They could address Eddie's grief and delusions about his relationship with Shannon (and her relationship with Chris because don't think I didn't clock him bringing up her (shit ass guilt trip) letter but not that she abandoned her son and cut off all contact for years) without resorting to trashy soapy doppelganger nonsense and cheating drama. And it's WILD because Bobby's arc this season and his relationship with Athena, and Henren's storyline have been SO GOOD, and even though there were some pacing and tone issues, even the Madney stuff has been good (and Kenny always slays the dramatic arcs!). Buck has taken a mostly supportive backseat this season which, while I ADORE him, was needed after the mess KR made of his character and her apparent lack of interest in the majority of the other main characters and his personal storyline (the bi realization, being Eddie's partner for all the big emotional talks) is also fine, it just got hijacked by some absolutely bizarre shipping strangeness over a couple minutes of screentime. But GOD Eddie's shit has been such a weird mess! It wasn't enough to be stuck with the transphobe all season, we also had to add in this nonsense?! Thanks, I hate it. At least we might finally be allowed to let Shannon go?? I am literally begging at this point.

As for th b/t of it all, I have literally blocked it from my mind and out of my existence (the ONE perk of my tumblr app still not working and having to do most of my stuff in my phone browser means I haven't really seen my dash lately and I've been smart about staying out of the tag for once) because it's just not worth the headache the bad takes give me. I'm just...so tired. I was willing to watch it play out (felt very much like Ali as the first step post-Abby, something background setting up for more later *cries in s4 Buddie canon*) but go at this point I just need it to be over for EVERYONE'S sanity. Especially Oliver's because like, girl. Why do you look like you're trapped in that loft with MW again?! Why so haunted? Girl, are you okay?? Oliver?? And how he continues to just post Buddie/Ryan stuff?? Loud.

I'm just...tired. So tired. And I need a drink. Imma go find some absolutely filthy/funny/fun Buddie fic and drown myself in that because I have the unfortunate feeling it's gonna be a LONG fucking hiatus.

Cheers friend. I know I always say if we can survive RNM (with it's own doppelganger storyline) then we can survive anything but GOD it would be nice to not have it be so hard.

[queseraone]

Okay so now that the season is over and the dust has settled… and also to give us all something to do over the hiatus: what are your five favorite chenford scenes/moments from season 6?

Ooooh, this was fun! Some of these were easy choices, and some took a little more thought.

5. The 17st Trophy (in 6x03)

This was so incredibly sweet, and spoke volumes about how Tim was truly putting in the effort to be supportive of Lucy and her aspirations. The fact that he was able to make her smile and laugh after such a trying day is a testament to how well they understand each other. (And, hello, “you could never disappoint me”??? That ended me!)

4. The Kojo Card (in 6x08)

This scene!!!!!! I've missed Kojo so much (and I try not to think too much about all the moments we missed out on while Tim and Lucy were together), so it was so nice to have him back again. This scene perfectly showcases how deeply Tim and Lucy still care about each other. It showed us how Tim is facing the consequences of his decision to end the relationship, and it showed Lucy that he absolutely still cares. It's such a beacon of hope. (Oh, and I think it laid the groundwork for the elevator hug of 6x09, which, fun fact, was a very close #6 on my list. Had this scene not happened, I don't think Lucy would had shown up quite so easily for Tim then.)

3. The Dance (6x02)

Look, the way they can have an entire conversation without saying a single word will forever be one of my favourite things about Chenford, and this was a beautiful showcase of that. The looks on their faces as Tim approached Lucy said it all. And then we see them come together again, and talk and tease and banter and kiss, and they honestly didn't even need to say I love you, because it's written all over their faces and in their body language—it's just so damn obvious. (Oh, and excuse me perfect song choice.)

2. The Breakup (6x06)

Oops, sorry not sorry, but this scene was absolutely incredible. It. Fucking. Hurts. (I literally just sat there staring blankly at my screen for a solid 10 minutes after it ended). But my god, the acting is impeccable. Every word, every look, everything... it's so emotional, no matter how many times I watch it. Eeep even now just looking at this gif I feel like crying and/or throwing up, and that just tells you how amazing it is haha.

1. The Hospital Scene (6x04)

This scene was everything, and, frankly, has earned a place on my list of all-time favourite Chenford scenes. The strong, steady quiet moments like this are so powerful—Tim and Lucy are absolutely each other's safe space.

[shrimplymoray]

HEY HEY HEY! Its me yet again, I know u missed me alot. But I wanted to request a Tim Wright (obviously) x Reader where Tim has the hanahaki disease, like, he loves reader but reader doesnt love him back bc he (Tim) never opened up about his feelings, it ends in a fluffy thing with reader reciprocating his feelings , but with a bunch of angst on the middle. If its too much for u you dont need to do it! Stay hydrated, eat something and take a break every once in a while.

-XOXO, ur best bud

Inhales deeply

Y'know how much I love angst don't ya?

Thanks for requesting this, because now i wanna write more angst stuff ehehe

TW: emetophobia, Hanahaki disease, hurt comfort.

Tim Wright with hanahaki disease x Reader

Tim knew it was gonna be rough. He couldn't open up to you, even after the years of friendship. And now, with the whole operator stuff, it would be even less likely for him to spend time with you.

What made it hurt, beside the petals and blooming flowers on his lungs, was that he felt like he would die to anything at this point.

Back when everything was normal, the petals still bloomed inside of him, but he could hide it. You were with Brian, he couldn't do this to his best friend from all his life.

But by god, were his feelings real.

Then you and Brian broke up, near the start of the Marble Hornets production.

But still, Tim couldn't open up. He felt guilty, and gross for doing so. So he sank his feelings deep down, and only comforted you, like the good friend you saw him as.

Then Jay appeared. And everything went to chaos. Tim's life went upside down.

He would wake up with limbs hurting, his fingers semi broken, and a lot of petals right in his mouth, coming for the next round of vomiting.

He was already feeling dead inside, and was just waiting to actually die.

...

That's when you got yourself in the middle.

Fucking Jay contacted you to get yourself involved and help them, since you were one of the smartest students from college.

Tim didn't want you to die. He couldn't beat it. If that happened he would kill Jay himself, instead of waiting for Alex to fucking do it.

He pushed you to the side, on the hospital ruins. It was now or possibly never ever.

He finally opened up. He told you how he had loved you for so long, but was afraid. Afraid of not only losing you, but Brian and his other friends.

He opened up about his feelings of being dead. He opened up about his fear of dying, or even losing you. He wanted you away from Jay, so at least you would be safe.

But you, as stubborn as you always were, stood your ground and said no. You wouldn't be leaving him to suffer alone.

He didn't have time to talk about the disease, since his coughing fits soon showed the petals getting out of him, and the vomited flowers with blood showed you what you needed to see.

While all of Tim's life went through that route, you were dreaming.

You broke up with Brian earlier that year because you were into Tim. He was alright with that, as long as you didn't leave him as a third wheel.

You were thinking of how to ask Tim out. You didn't know much of him, besides what Brian got to tell you about him, but you were so sure you loved him.

When you told Tim all of that, the Wright hugged you, crying. He cried like a child, and asked you to forgive him.

You, instead, cleaned his face and kissed his cheek.

"Tim... If you go down, then I'm going with you. I'm not leaving you behind, got it?"

He nodded, while still shaking... Then he heard it.

"Aww, you two are so cute"

And in unison, you said

"JAY IF YOU ARE FUCKING RECORDING THIS WE WILL KILL YOU, I SWEAR TO GOD"

I hope you like it. I needed to add a comic ending, because i thought it would be a good break lsjsksnsksns

Anyway thanks for asking lil bro, i hope u enjoy it!

[boldlyvoid]

No Longer Alone Together: Part 8

Part 8 | Masterlist

December 24th:  

Once the kids are all asleep, they each gather all their presents for the other person and meet downstairs in front of the tree. She has just one box full of things that she wrapped and he has all her gifts individually wrapped inside a Christmas bag. 

The only year they missed this tradition was when they had Atlas, they had to wait till boxing day to open gifts with their tiny little baby in the bassinet beside them. This year they’re alone again, Atlas went down to bed last, so very excited for tomorrow because he can’t wait to give his dad his present. Not because he wants to open everything Santa brought him… he just wants to give people things. He’s the sweetest boy in the world, maybe even the whole universe? 

“Okay, you first,” Spencer announces as he hands her the first little box. “I got this one in Chicago…” 

“Are they all from your trip?” 

He nods, “I got some before I left but there were so many new stores I’ve never seen before and even when I was travelling all over the county for work, I never had the time to just shop… so I got you anything and everything that reminded me of you.” 

“You’re too sweet on me, Dr. Reid,” she teases, slowly peeling off the wrapping paper to find a jewelry box. She hasn’t worn a ring at all during their entire “marriage” which makes her wonder if thats what this is… “Spence?” 

“Just open it,” he doesn’t want to do any explaining until it’s open. 

Much to her surprise, it’s a bracelet that she finds inside the velvet box. “Oh my god?” She picks it up delicately and stares at all the little charms. 

“There’s the earth for Atlas, the moon for Luna and Jupiter for Noelle because she just gives me that energy,” Spencer explains, “the sun is for you and here,” he hands her another tinier box. “This one has the other planets in it so you can pick one for me and one for our new baby…” 

She wraps him up in a hug, arms around his neck as she holds him tighter than ever, “I love it, I’m going to wear it to Florida in March and everything.” 

“That’s what I hoped,” he rubs her back gently before she pulls back. “I have a bunch more for you, I kinda went a little crazy…” 

“that’s okay, so did I but they’re nothing major,” she pushes his box towards him. “They’re not individually wrapped either, I didn’t have the time.” 

“I don’t mind,” he says as he rips the paper off the box and opens it slowly. The first thing he see’s is an empty notebook with blank paper, it’s not even lined. “What’s this for?” 

“You’ve been doodling on the inside of your story notes so I thought you’d want your own sketchbook,” she explains with a sweet smile. She loves Spencer’s little doodles and the freaky people he draws. It’s very Tim Burton… 

“And there’s some new pencils and art stuff,” she can’t help but smile back at him. “I was getting the art stuff for Luna and thought you’d like to draw with her over the break…” 

“You know I will,” Spencer assures her. “This is perfect, thank you… here,” he pulls out a big, flat square that looks a lot like a wrapped-up calendar for the year. 

She starts unwrapping it to see it’s not a calendar… it’s a vinyl record. “We don’t have a vinyl player?” She’s confused but happy, she really wanted this copy of her favourite artist's new album, it’ll be nice to just look at it even if they can’t play it.

“I’m still waiting on it to arrive,” he smirks. “The big winter storm pushed back the delivery.” 

“No way,” she can’t believe it. So abundantly happy, they were finally going to get to play her mom's old Christmas albums on vinyl for the kids and enjoy that old crackling sound alongside the fire every Christmas from here on out. 

“I love you,” she gets right into his lap and holds him tight, resting her chin on his shoulder with a small smile, trying so hard not to cry already. 

“I love you,” he whispers before kissing her cheek. “That’s the one you wanted right? The blood moon one?” 

She nods, “yeah, I love it.” 

“It’s signed inside…” 

She pulls away with wide eyes, “what? You found one of them?” 

He nods, “I actually got it through Jimmy Fallon… he called it in for me, it arrived at my hotel the day before I flew home. Open it up.” 

She hurries to grab the record and open it up, finding a photo card inside the sleeve where the lyric booklet is. She takes it out carefully as to not cover it in fingerprints and almost sobs. “No fucking way, Spence?” 

On the front, it’s just her signature over a photo of herself, but on the back, thats where the sweetest message is. 

Y/N, 

Your Lover is one of a kind for having someone reach out and find this for you… I looked him up and loved his books, tell him I think we’d make a wicked No Body No Crime thriller together, don’t you think? Call it what you want, but from everything I’ve heard about you, from your Christmas Tree Farm adventures to falling in love while your parents were in Paris, I can tell that you’re soulmates. Have a wonderful Christmas, hug the kids for me, and enjoy 5 tickets to bring them to the Eras tour in Philly on May 13th ♡ see you soon! 

Taylor

She’s sobbing as she reads it, it’s unbelievable. She knew Spencer met some amazing people on his book tour but she never expected Taylor Swift of all people to be one of them. She holds it close to her heart, having listened to Fearless and Speak Now so much during her divorce and breakup, then Red all year before she met Spencer… they got 1989 the year they had Atlas and Reputation when Noelle was about to turn 2. Lover not even a month before Luna was born and now Midnights has a sound for every memory from every era of her life inside of it too. 

“I love it, Spence,” she assures that the tears she’s shedding are happy just as Spencer reaches out to wipe them off her cheeks. She holds the photo to her chest in a hug, “this is so thoughtful.” 

“I’m not done yet,” he reminds her. “I have like 9 other presents to give you…” 

“Come here,” she stands up with his hand in hers, taking her phone out of her pocket to puts on Lover just for good measure. “Having you home with me is all I wanted for Christmas.” 

At a volume the kids won’t hear, but it’s perfect for them, they slow dance in the living room under the Christmas tree lights. She can’t always go where he goes, but they’ll always be this close. 

“You’re my, my, my, my… lover,” Spencer sings along in her ear, memorizing every word she listens to in the house when he’s working and she’s cleaning and the kids are off at school or Uncle Wills. 

This is one of the songs that will always make him think of her when he hears it. 

She loves him more than she would ever be able to explain, no gift is good enough to show him… this is as good as it’ll get. Holding him close to her heart, dancing along to one of the most beautiful love songs there are, promising forever to him without ever needing to wear a ring to prove that she’s his. No marriage will hold their love in, no court document can make what they have any more real… 

Their home is their chapel, and his heart is her god. they’re married in every way that counts to them. 

He kisses her cheek and jaw and then down her neck, “I love you, so much.” 

“I love you,” she cups his face in her hands and pulls back to look at him. “And as much as I’d like to take this where ever you’re going, we still have to set up their presents and stockings.” 

“And then we can screw in the empty present room?” He teases, but it’s less of a joke and more of a question, he really wants to. “Please?” 

She nods with a cheeky smile, “yeah… I’d really like that.” 

December 25th: Christmas Day 

They don’t get much sleep, they finally get into bed around 1 but then they can’t stop talking about how fun the morning is going to be. They finally fall asleep around 3, only to be woken up at 5:30 because the kids want to go downstairs. 

“No…” Spencer groans, spooning Y/N, he buries his face in her neck and holds her tightly, “we’re sleeping.” 

“Come on,” Luna pesters him, poking his back while her siblings are on mom's side of the bed, looking at her while she keeps her eyes closed. 

“It’s too early, guys,” she agrees with Spencer. “Get in,” she lifts the covers, letting Noelle and Atlas cuddle into her while Luna got in on Spencer's side. “We’re going to sleep a little longer okay, the presents aren’t going anywhere.” 

“But it’s exciting,” Luna complains, “I can’t sleep!” 

Spencer rolls away from Y/N and onto his back so he can pull luna into a cuddle, “you’re going to have to try, we were up all night waiting for Santa… how else do you think he gets in when we don’t have a real fireplace?” 

“You met him?” Noelle can’t believe it. 

“Oh yeah, so many times,” Spencer exaggerates.

“Not like the fake mall Santa right?” Atlas doesn’t believe him. “The real one?” 

“The real one,” Spencer repeats. “I went up to the north pole with the team once and everything… Santa had a break-in at his workshop and we caught the thief for him.” 

“Wow,” they all believe it because he’s a good storyteller and an even better liar. “What’s it like?” 

“Just like the Tim Allen Santa movie,” he teases, “it’s magical… and Mrs. Clause is lovely, she’s just like your mom. She makes the best Christmas cookies.” 

“We are just like them,” Y/N can’t help but sleepily smile as she listens along. “We also got married on Christmas Eve…” 

“You did?” Atlas asks, “but you don’t wear a ring?” 

“You remember at the end of Santa Clause is coming to town, the claymation one? They got married just in the forest, alone? Me and your mom said some vows all alone and that’s why she calls me her husband to everyone now, even though legally, we’re not married,” Spencer explains. “We loved each other so much we couldn’t wait and then never went and made it official.” 

“We should have a wedding,” Luna suggests. “In the backyard… or uncle Daves!” 

“Maybe,” Y/N doesn’t say no. 

Spencer turns to her, amazed and wide awake now, “really?” 

She sleepily nods, two kids cuddled into her and one pushing against her bladder inside of her now, so much time has passed, she isn’t the same person who said no all those years ago. “Sure, why not?” 

“Okay then,” he settles back into his pillow with a smile. 

Luna is kneeling by his side, her knees digging into his hips while she leans over him with all her weight on his chest. “Are you awake now? Can we go downstairs now?” 

“No,” Y/N answers again. “We need to make a rule, it’s not Christmas till the sun comes up.” 

“The sun comes up around 7:45 in December,” Atlas remembers from one of his books. “That’s in 2 hours and 15 minutes.” 

“Exactly, so why don’t you take your sisters to your room and read them some more facts while we sleep?” Y/N explains, “please? The baby needs me to sleep a bit more or I’ll be sick and I don’t want to throw up on Christmas morning…” 

They love their sister already, so of course, they listen. 

“Okay,” they all say as they hop down off their bed and head out. 

“Thank god,” she rolls over and into Spencer, closing her eyes again. “I’m exhausted.” 

“You want to marry me?” He can’t get off the topic. Genuinely surprised that she’d say yes now of all times. 

She lets out a deep sigh, “yes, Spence, I would like to marry you, just, let me have a few hours of sleep first I don’t want bags under my eyes in my wedding pictures.” 

“Okay,” he chuckles lightly, soothing his hand down her back and kissing the top of her head. “Go back to sleep my, love.” 

She falls back asleep quickly, taking that extra 2 hours and running with it. Spencer has to shake her back awake at 8am when the kids are ready to go downstairs and the sun is coming through the blinds. The 3 of them stand in the doorway with matching smiles and Christmas pyjamas, waiting for both their parents to be ready to open presents.

She gets dressed and grabs a snack from her snack drawer, having to eat as soon as she gets up or else the baby got mad at her. She munches on some crackers while Spencer uses the bathroom and then they’re all ready. 

“Remember, we’re taking turns,” Y/N calls as they run out in front of her and down the stairs. 

The shout and cheer at the sheer amount of presents surrounding the tree in the living room, they spread out almost into the main hall. Mom gets them all to sit on the couches while dad turns on the electric fireplace and the tree lights to make the room really feel like Christmas. 

She walks around the tree and looks at all the presents as if she wasn’t the one to set them up. “Wow, Santa really likes you guys…” 

“Because he knows daddy,” Luna cheers, taking Spencer’s story this morning to heart. 

“Should we start with Santa presents or family presents?” Spencer asks, standing beside Y/N and wrapping an arm around her. 

“Can I give daddy mine first?” Atlas asks, putting his hand up while he sits nicely, almost like school has trained him too well to be patient and polite. 

“Sure, why not?” Y/N doesn't mind, “you remember the ones we wrapped for him before he came home, right? Daddy go sit down,” she moves Spencer over to the couch while the kids all scatter to sort through the presents and find the ones for their dad buried at the back of the tree. 

They come back to him with an assortment of wrapped goodies, making his heart fill with glee. “Oh wow, really? All this for me?” 

“Mine first,” Atlas hands him the bag from the Christmas market, it’s been under the tree for what feels like forever to him, and he’s so excited to see his dad open it. 

“Okay,” Spencer takes it from him and carefully removes the tissue paper before he reaches in. He pulls out the cardigan with a genuinely shocked face, “Woah? Bug, this is so nice?” 

“Put it on!” He starts jumping up and down, too excited to stay still. “Do you like it?” 

He slips his arms into the sleeves and buttons 2 of the buttons up, “I love it!” He pulls Atlas into a hug and squeezes him tight, “I’m going to wear it all day today, do you think it’s fancy enough for the party tonight?” 

He nods, “with suit pants, maybe?” 

“And a green shirt, purple tie,” Luna adds, very opinionated about his outfits. 

“Of course,” Spencer agrees, he would’ve picked that anyway but he validates her opinions anyway. “What next?” 

“Here,” Noelle hands him one that she spent a lot of time on. 

It’s easy to find a seam and open it with her newly acquired wrapping skills… he tears into it to find a bunch of socks. 

“I miss matched them for you,” she explains. “See dolphins and diamonds and then flamingos and flames, it all makes sense this way…” 

“I love it,” he wants to cry, it’s so thoughtful and it’s just socks. “Thank you, I’ll wear them today too.” 

“Here’s mine,” Luna places it on his lap, getting closer so she could help him open it. 

He lets her pull on the paper and start opening it for him, they tear it off together just for him to see it’s a box. The tape is easy to peel back and inside the box is all his favourite candy. “for your writing jaw in your office, it’s empty…” 

Another thoughtful gift that he wouldn’t have even thought of asking for but his kids knew him really well. He gives them each a hug and a kiss as he thanks them, whispering something to them about getting mommy’s presents next. Y/N had no idea that he took them all out shopping one afternoon after school while she was still at work. 

They scurry away from him and come back with a big box that takes Atlas and Noelle to carry over… more like push it over. It glides over the hardwood floor easily until it’s right in front of her. “That big one was for me?” 

“Open it!” They all cheer, gathered around in case she needs help. 

She takes the bow off first, ripping into it slowly. “What the heck is this?” She asks, under the wrapping paper is just a brown box. 

“Remember you said you wanted to be able to make s’mores in our backyard like we do at Daves?” Spencer explains as she tilts the box back to read the words “gas-powered outdoor fireplace.” 

“No way!” She can’t believe it, “this and the record player?” 

“Christmas is about giving,” he reminds her. “You can’t spend all season giving us things, you have to get some good gifts too.” 

The kids grab a few more gifts for her, placing them on top of the box, “we got you these…” 

“Oh wow, thank you,” she’s overwhelmed to get all these presents before they even get to their Santa presents. 

Atlas got her a pretty shirt, Noelle got her a scarf to go with her winter coat and Luna got her some more of her favourite makeup. They’re 3 simple gifts but they also mean the world to her. 

“Okay,” she stands up before she gets too emotional thinking about it. “Each of you picks one present with your name on it and sit back down…” 

They each run to the tree and grab the biggest present they can find, “this one says Luna,” Atlas announces, handing the present to his sister. He finds his own next and Noelle finds one for herself easily. The three of them sit back down together and wait for their mom to give them the go-ahead, she simply smiles and nods. 

They rip into their presents quickly, all gasping when they realize what they got. Luna screams the loudest, “MY DOLLHOUSE!” 

Both her siblings smile at her, happy she got what she wanted. “I got the book set I asked for,” Atlas announces, bringing to peel the plastic off so he could flip through the pages. 

Noelle is almost speechless as she flips the box over a few times. “Is this… this is a skateboard?” 

“It is,” Y/N can’t stop smiling, she gets down in front of the Christmas tree and hands her a few other gifts. “These go with it, Santa said…” 

While she tears into the presents, Y/N finds a few more to hand to Luna and Atlas to make it even. Luna gets some dolls, Atlas gets a few more science kits and Noelle gets knee pads, elbow pads and a helmet, all in the same green her cast used to be. 

“I’m going to teach you some tricks once the snow is gone,” Spencer teases, “but we’re going to do them without breaking an arm this time.” 

“You know how to skateboard?” Noelle can’t believe it. 

He nods, “it’s just physics…” 

“Ugh, science is everywhere,” she complains, everyone around her was too smart for their own good, she knew that. 

“That is is,” Spencer ruffles her hair and kisses the top of her head. “I think it’s time we give you guys your big gift from us…” 

“Are you sure?” Y/N gets excited, so ready to share these big plans with them after knowing about it alone for so long. 

He nods, “it's in your stockings,” he points at the 5 socks hung over the fireplace. He helps them take them down one by one and sit on the floor once more, “okay, start emptying them…” 

Luna goes right for the fidget toys, bypassing the headband with Mickey-mouse ears and the paper saying they’re going on a trip. Atlas is the first one to unfold it and actually read it. 

“What does this mean?” He holds up the printed-out boarding pass, “is this another NASA thing?” 

“no… thats a real flight we're going on, those are your tickets,” mom explains. “Can you see where we’re going?” 

“we’re landing at… Orlando, Florida?” He reads the ticket fully and then his eyes widen. “Are we going to Disney world?” 

“Are we?!” Noelle breaks a window with how loud she screams. 

“Shh, yes, oh my gosh, yeah, we are,” Y/N can’t help but laugh, pulling the kids into a hug when they just want to jump around with excitement. 

Spencer explains when it is, who they’re going with and most of the itinerary for the trip. They’re going to Disney world, lego land and the Kennedy space centre, making sure each kid had a special interest to indulge in. They’re over the moon, barely even thinking about the rest of their presents, it’s too exciting. 

They manage to have breakfast together before opening the rest of the presents. They got little things like clothes and colouring books, accents for their rooms and necessities for school. It all happened so fast, all they are left with is a pile of each kid's gifts on the couch and a mountain of trash once every toy was opened and freed from its box. 

The kids all go to the playroom, setting up their new toys and setting aside old ones they want to donate into the box that once held their mom's new fireplace. She takes a seat beside Spencer once everything is all said and done, laying her head on his shoulder while he wraps an arm around her. “Another good one for the books…” 

“The last one as a family of 5,” Spencer sighs, happily. “I love you.” 

“I love you, too,” she tries not to cry again but then she decides fuck it. She cries, experiencing the moment the way her body wanted to. “This is my favourite one yet…” 

“And we have so many more to go, how will we top it?” Spencer teases. 

She shrugs, “they’ll find a way.” 

—

Penelope spent her morning at the airport, waiting for Derek, Savannah and Hank to get off their plane. They got in around 11, they had lunch all together and then headed straight to Rossi's place for the annual All-iday party. They were the first ones there this year, waiting for every other family to start showing up too. 

The Simmons show up next, all 5 kids running straight to the playroom designated to them on days like today. Rossi didn’t need all that space at his house for fancy things, so they got a whole room just to be kids in. 

The LaMontagne’s are next to arrive, all dressed up like they are every year, JJ dressed to the nines and Will looking handsome as ever. And Sandy Jareau comes with her emotional support dog, Ozzy, a fluffy golden retriever that all the kids loved. 

Emily and Laura debated if they wanted to go this year, with a brand new baby and all the kids being in different schools and Derek being on a plane that day, that was a lot of germs gathering in one place… so day of, they call out, not ready to venture out into the world with little May yet. Y/N offered to pack up some of the leftovers and stop by with them later, and whatever presents people bought for them too. 

Rossi’s daughters show up too, it’s the first year Portia is celebrating Christmas without her mother, it’s hard, but having this extended family is good for her. Joy comes with her husband and Kai as well, now living in DC, it was a lot easier for them to join. 

When Spencer and Y/N arrive with their kids, the party is already well underway. Diana and Liam weren’t too far behind, just finishing the festivities at their retirement home before heading over. The kids run off right into the playroom with the others, leaving all the parents in the kitchen where the food and booze was. 

Tara comes with her girlfriend and Luke comes all by himself but migrates to Penelope’s side and stays there like he has for the last few years. He’s helplessly in love with her, everyone can see it, but Penelope hasn’t given into him yet. She’s fighting his love for some reason, and everyone in their group can't wait for her to surrender, wave the wire flag and just kiss him already. 

In the kitchen, Spencer rushes Derek and wraps him up in a hug, as if he didn’t see him in Chicago last month. “Where’s my little man?” Derek asks, looking past him for Atlas. 

“With your son in the playroom,” Y/N teases, taking Spencer’s place against Derek's chest for the next hug. “How are you?” 

“Great now,” he kisses the top of her head before she can pull away. “I hear congratulations are in order?” 

She nods, “oh yeah, you’re getting another little niece.” 

She’s congratulated by everyone in the room, many of them hearing it for the first time as Laura and Will really knew how to keep a secret. Everyone has either a glass of wine or champagne, Y/N pours some ginger ale into a champagne flute and celebrates with the others, all over the moon for her and Spencer. 

“So do you have any names picked out?” Sandy, JJ’s mom, asks, loving Spencer’s kids as if they were her own grandkids too. 

Spencer shakes his head to say no but Y/N shrugs, “I kinda have one…” 

“You haven’t told me this?” Spencer is shocked, “what is it?” 

“You said her birthstone would be a Ruby and I think Ruby Reid sounds cute…” 

Some of the others repeat her name with a swoon, holding their hands over their hearts. “You have to name her ruby now,” Penelope chimes in. “That’s perfect?” 

Spencer purses his lips as he thinks about it, “yeah, I can see her name being Ruby, too…”

She smiles, leaning in and stealing a kiss from Spencer right in front of everyone, they were a lot more used to Spencer's PDA now than that first Christmas… it was refreshing to see their love never dwindled and it looked like it never would, either. 

Those lonely years of her life feel like such a long time ago now. Being alone together felt just as far away from where they are now… okay, sure, they’re no longer alone together, but they wouldn’t have it any other way. 

[lovelyrocker]

I Wish pt 3

I Wish pt.2

You waited outside his apartment door. You were nervous, borderline scared even. You stood staring at the numbers across the door, a place you stood God knows how many times before. You shook your head, took a breath and knocked on the door. You heard light shuffling then the door opened. 

“Hey, Y/N.” His smile is so warm and inviting. “Come in.” He moves aside and lets you in. “How are you?”

“I’m okay. You?”

“Uh, okay. I guess.” He sits with you on the couch. “I’ve- uh- I’ve- I’ve really missed these last few weeks.”

“I’ve missed you, too.”

“So, I’ve been thinking and I- I shouldn’t have reacted the way I did.” He places his hand on yours. “I just,”

“It’s okay, really.” You assure him. “I would have freaked out too, probably.”

“I know admitting it must not have been easy.”

“I didn’t want to admit it.” You tell him as you look down. “I didn’t have a choice.”

“Not like I forced you to admit it.” 

“You didn’t not force me to admit it either.”

“This isn’t- I’m not-”

“Timothee, I don’t want to fight!” 

There it was again. Timothee. Not Tim, Timmy, Butthead…just Timothee.

“Since when do you call me Timothee?” He asked, looking up from his hands now in his own lap. “You always called me by some nickname.”

“Didn’t seem like we were on funny and cute nickname territory.”

“I don’t want this to change.” He exhales. 

“That’s easy for you to say.” You stand walking across the room. '”These aren’t your feelings out in the open now. God, there was a reason I kept this to myself.”

Timothee stands and walks across the room standing next to you. “How long?” He asked in a low voice. “How long have you felt this way towards me?”

“I don’t know.” You shrug. “A while.”

“A while? How long is a while? Weeks, months, what?”

“I don’t! Like a year. Maybe a little more.”

“Over a year!” He repeated in shock. “You’ve had feelings for me for over a year and you said nothing?!”

“What was I supposed to say?! Hey, I’m a dumbass and fell for my best friend?!”

“Yes! You tell me the truth! We swore we would always tell the truth to one another and you have been keeping this for over a year!”

“I’m sorry!” You snap at him. “You think I want this?! That I want to love someone I know I’ll never have?! DO you think it was fun for me to sit there and watch you fall in love with Lily knowing how I feel?! Do you think I enjoyed sitting there like a pathetic idiot wrapped in your hoodie, crying every other night because I was the stupid one to not catch myself and just go deeper and deeper into this! Watching you kiss someone else is not my favorite pastime I can assure you!”

The tears started to flow and you never noticed. Not till you were wiping them from your cheek.

“Sweetheart, don’t cry.’” He pulled you into his arms.

You let him hold you as you buried your face into his chest. “If I could unlove you I would.” You tell him.

He lifted your chin, making you look up at him. “Don’t unlove me.” He places his hand to your cheek. “The way you feel is valid.” He strokes your cheek with his thumb. “Was I- was I giving you signals or signs? Something that-”

You swear he had never been so close as he was just then. “I don’t think so.” You whispered. It was just too much.You shook your head and backed away. “No, it- no, it just happened, I think.” 

“You think?”

You took a step back, his smell and his arms around you, touching you the way he was, it was, it was too much. “One day you were just Timmy then it was like I noticed along the way stupid things.”

“Like what?”

“Like- like how much I like the way you twist your hair when you think. And how I loved your smile and the way you always over tip at restaurants. The way you tear up at movies but hide it.” Timothee gave a soft chuckle. “I started to realize that these things were so endearing to me. It was like a snowball that just kept collecting and collecting. Then I saw you with Lily.” His smile faded. “At first I thought it was because I didn’t like her. Then I realized why I didn’t like her.” You let out an audible exhale. “But, I know you don’t feel the way I do. That’s why I didn’t want to say anything. But you kept asking and looking at me like you always do and when you do that I can’t- I just- it’s hard to not do whatever you want.”

“How did you know I wouldn’t feel the same way?”

“Because I’ve watched you for weeks fall in love with Lily.” His hand came to your cheek, pulling you close. “Tim,” You push his hand away. “I can’t- I need to go.” You walk towards the door.

“Wait, why?” He follows. 

“Because, I know you. You will- you’ll kiss me and you’ll see you feel nothing and you have Lily to run to. And what do I have? Just something else that's empty to hold on to.” You told him and walked out the door, leaving him standing there.

You were home hours later, curled up on the couch watching some movie that was supposed to be funny but you saw no humor. You were staring blankly at the screen when the banging started on your door. You jump and hurry to the door.

“Alright, alright!” You yell at the door. “Keep your pants on! I’m coming!”

You open the door and Timothee’s lips were on yours, his hands on your face. You stumbled back against the counter in the small kitchen, his mouth staying locked on yours. His lips were softer than you’d imagined and so sweet. When he pulled away you grimaced at the loss of contact.

“What the hell was that?” You ask with your hands still braced back on the counter.

“I thought about everything you said.”

“Okay.” You looked at him and his hands stayed on your face.

“Everything you said. I thought all evening and when you were telling me how you slowly started noticing things. You didn’t know when or how but you noticed small stupid things about me that made your stomach flip and your heart flutter. I get that, too.” He told you, looking in your eyes. “Like when you bite your pen when you think or how you hold on to my arm when you watch horror movies because you know you’ll get scared, The way you smile at everyone you see on the street.” 

He pressed another kiss to your lips.

“Okay you really need to stop doing that.” You tell him.

“Y/N, I’m telling you I love you, too!” He snips. “That’s why I never felt right with Lily! I went along with the motions but it never felt right! And I usually tell you everything but I couldn’t tell you that. And this is why!”

“Timothee, this isn’t funny.” You move away from him. “I know you-”

“Look at me!” He takes your hands into his. “You know better than anyone when I’m lying. You know me better than anyone on this planet. Look me in the eye and you tell me if I’m lying about loving you.”

You search his eyes for what seems like forever. “Oh my God,” You whisper.

“I know I’m late on things and I’m sorry I’m late realizing this.” He kisses you again and you push him away. “What’s wrong?”

“You’re still with Lily. I’m not gonna be the other woman.”

“No! Look!” He pulls out his phone. “I called her and broke it off as soon as I pulled my head out of my ass.” He smiled at you. “I want you. I choose you.”

[rubydubydoo122]

Batfam Band Au

Jason Todd and Tim Drake are so Conan Gray coded. Proof? here,

Maniac - Jason: 'People like you always want back what they can't have, but I'm past that and you know that so you should turn back to your rat(bat) pack tell 'em I'm trash' Jason to Bruce after Bruce victim blamed his death Tim: 'Tell all of your friends that I'm crazy, and drive you mad, that I'm such a stalker, a watcher, a psycopath' Tim's speaks for itself, but like... probably Tim to everyone

Fight or Flight - Jason: 'something's gotten into you, you don't really look at me the way you used to' Him to Bruce. no explanation needed, 'Every single rumor that I've heard of you say, you were out with someone that I don't know' Jason when he saw the pictures of Tim as Robin 'fight or flight, I'd rather die than have to cry in front of you. fight or flight, id rather lie than tell you I'm in love with you' him with bruce. Him With Bruce. HIM WITH BRUCE. Like god, he's just a scared kid that wants his dad, but he'll never admit that, 'Now there's someone at my door, someone i've not met before, they've got, eyes like mine, a pretty smile and they've been crying for a while, cus they also didn't know' Jason with Tim after Damian became Robin (or a while after that ig, whenever they started to get along)

The Cut that Always Bleeds - Tim: 'Oh I, can't, be, your lover on a leash, every other week, when you need, oh I can't be, the kiss that you don't need, the lie between your teeth, the cut that always bleeds' Tim realizing that maybe being Bruce's emotional support child is no bueno for his mental heath. 'Say you love somebody new and beat my heart to black and blue, and they leave and it's me you come back to' Because Tim became Robin to essentially be Bruce's crutch until he could get back on his feet after Jason's death, and the problem with that is Bruce will never really get back on his feet because he's still limping from his parents death, 'But even though you're killing me, I need you like the air I breathe, I need, I need you more than me, I need you more than anything, please, please.' and that's kinda the case for all the Robins. Bruce pushes them so hard, almost to the point of breaking, and when they want to break away, Bruce gives them a sliver of validation creating a never ending cycle of them craving Bruce's approval.

Astronomy - Jason: 'cus socially speaking, we were the same, with runaway fathers and mothers who drank' Jason to Steph probably 'From far away, i wish i'd stayed with you. but here face to face a stranger that I once knew. I thought if I wandered, I'd fall back in love, you said distance brings fondness, but guess not with us' Jason to Bruce during UTRH, because Jason's death changed both of them so much, to the point where they can't recognize each other anymore . And maybe Bruce missed Jason while he was dead, but now that he's alive...'Stop trying to keep us alive, you're pointing at stars in the sky, that've already died, stop trying to keep us alive, you can't force the stars to align, when they've already died' Him to himself about continuing to forgive Bruce and running back to Bruce time and time again after all the shit Bruce has pulled

Footnote - Tim: 'I say if I waited, could that maybe help, you told me that patience won't change how you felt, for me' Tim to Bruce, knowing that he'll never be Jason, yet still yearning for that father/son dynamic (sh sh, Ik Tim doesn't actually see Bruce as his dad, but lets shift slightly into fanon) 'So I'll just take a footnote, in your life, and you can take my body, every line, I would right for you, but a footnote will do' Tim's entire Red Robin run, mainly to Dick, who is a little too busy trying to balance grieving and a feral child 'You taught me a lesson, that feelings are reckless, it's just like the novels, side characters end up alone.' Tim after loosing almost everyone he cared about within a year and turning cold and distant.

Winner - Literally this whole song is for the both of them and their parental issues Tim: 'Packed my bags at 14, I hadn't planned on leaving, but you haven't been back home for days' Like... we all do agree that Tim's parents were neglectful. They were literally never around. 'You don't really wanna hear the truth, do you? it's obvious to anyone who ever knew you. that all you ever want is to be right, even if that means you gotta lie to do it,' This is probably more fannon, but like Janet and Jack Drake Jason: 'Bask inside your victory, my heart that once was beating, bleeding in the palm of your hand' Under the Red Hood. batarang to the throat, 'Yet you have the nerve to miss me, how do I somehow feel guilty? when you're the one who let it get this bad' JASON TO BRUCE LIKE, TELL ME I"M WRONG. Bruce will claim to miss Jason, but then blame him for his own death in the same breath. "You don't really wanna hear the truth, do you? it's obvious to anyone who ever knew you. that all you ever wanted was to FIGHT. I WAS ONLY TRYING TO SURVIVE YOUR CHAOS!! WELL LOOK AT HOW IT"S PAID OFF' Jason got caught up in Bruce's "war on crime" AND HE DIED. HE DIED FOR IT. HE DIDN"T SURVIVE BRUCE"S CHAOS, HE"S STIL STUCK IN IT AND HE CAN"T GET OUT.

Family Line - THIS ONE!!! THIS ONE!!! I LITERALLY CRY EVERY TIME I HEAR IT BECAUSE IT FITS THE BOTH OF THEM TOO WELL Jason: 'My father never talked a lot, He just took a walk around the block, 'Til all his anger took a hold of him, and then he'd hit. My mother never cried a lot, She took the punches, but she never fought' Willis and Catherine. 'Scattered 'cross my family lineI'm so good at telling lies, That came from my mother father's side, Told a million to survive,' Father meaning Bruce. Lies meaning Robin and secret identies and stuff 'Scattered 'cross my family line, God, I have my father's mother's eyes,' Sheila's 'But my sister's when I cry, I can run, but I can't hide, From my family line' Do I have to explain this? Tim: 'It's hard to put it into words, How the holidays will always hurt, I watch the fathers with their little girls, And wonder what I did to deserve this, How could you hurt a little kid? I can't forget, I can't forgive you, 'Cause now I'm scared that everyone I love will leave me' I can just imagine little baby Timmy following Batman and Robin, and then casting a glance at a family lighting a minorah, while he knows his family's minorah is sitting in the closet because his parents still haven't come home from their trip. Jason: 'Oh, all that I did to try to undo it,' All the crimes he did to survive, made him try so hard as Robin to undo that, 'All of my pain and all your excuses, I was a kid but I wasn't clueless' Maybe it's how he feels about Sheila now that he's grown. Jason was alone on the streets before Bruce. He even empathized with Sheila, and tried to help her. Jason was optimistic, not naive. Tim: 'Someone who loves you wouldn't do this' Jason: "All of my past, I tried to erase it,' His time on the streets, his time as Robin, Sheila's betrayal, The LOA, his villain era, 'But now I see, would I even change it?' Because all of those things shaped who he is now 'Might share a face and share a last name, but We are not the same' He would've never done what Sheila did, he would never do what Bruce did, or Talia, or Wilis or any of the other adults in his life who have let him down.

Anywho, yeah, Conan Gray writing music for Jason and Tim is on my mind a lot.

[m0ther-of-p3arl]

hi i finished tma season 1

IM GONNA THROW UP NONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONONO

WHY HER WHY SASHA WHY MSUT THEY DO THIS WHY MY WIFE WHY WHY N OOOOOOO

THAT IS NOT MY SASHA THAT IS NOT MY WIFE WHAT THE FUCK GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!!!!!! SHE DIDNT EVEN EAT ANY NOTEBOOKS MAN WHY SHED GET GRAHAM'D!!!! IM GONNA CRY THATS NOT HER THATS NOT HER THATS NOT HER WHAT THE HELL "yes." YOU ARE NOT MY BELOVED GET OUT

THAT FUCKING TABLE ISTG I HATE IT I HATE IT IM GONNA HIT IT WITH TWELVE BILLION METAL PIPES WHY DIDNT JON BREAK IT YOUUU FUUUUUUCKKKK THIS IS NOT A COINCIDENCE NO WAY THAT TABLE ISNT RELATED TO WHATEVER THIS REPLACEINATOR IS. IS IT THE SAME CREATURE THAT SKEDADDLED INTO GRAHAMS FLAT????? WHY DOES NO ONE SEE ANYTHING WRONG W SASHA THAT IS SO OBLIVIOUSLY NOT HER

the worms the worms the worms ... worm wife ..... the screamerrrrrrrrrrr the wormerrrrrrrrrrr

tim is so silly i love him tbh. my man (presumably) took off his pants in the middle of a wormpocalypse. thanks buddy. he should be high on co2 more often."statement of joe spooky... regarding mysterious happenings..." silly guy silly guy (the horrors) "im fine though. except for the holes. and the pain. and the blood. and the nightmares. couldve been worse though, eh?" u need 12 diff types of therapy now buddy

MARTIN is quite silly too i like him a lot ... erm i think he might actually be a ghost Jon was onto something (silly). jons still such a hater STOPPP HES JUST OUT HERE VIBING... HE SOUNDED SO SAD AND SCARED :( i want to hug him please "im sorry i left you" .. i know what you are

why was Gertrudes body just There btw. what the fuck. shes just been there??? man imagine ur running from The Worms and then BOOM random dead body of the old Archivist HELLO?? AND SHE WAS SHOT??? NO SPOOKY SCARIES ?? JUST GOOD OL GUNS??

i looked it up. the missing cases. have sashas voice. and the homophobic vase statement. im going actually going to be sick. wdym "Evelyn Hewett as Not!Sasha" GOODBYE I HATE EVERYTHING

they all sound so tiiired :[

SORRY TO RANT IN YOUR INBOX BTW IM JUST. NEED TO SCREAM. GOING INSANE

AND SORRY FOR ALL THE CAPS IIIIIMM

I NEED TO BE LOBOTOMIZED RIGHT NOW WHYYYY

AAAAAAH I DO NOT HAVE TIME TO RESPOND TO UR RANT IN EVERY POINT IN ITS ENTIRETY BUT REST ASURED IVE READ THE WHOLE THING AND IM

FUCKKK YESSSSSSSSSS

i knew you'd like tma. i fucking KNEW it. and it only gets worse from here hehehehhe so watch out >:3 and THEN u have to listen to protocol.... fuck yes.........

YOURE CATCHING ON TO SO MUCH OF THE LORE STuFF THO GOOD JOB U UNDERSTAND IT SO MUBH BETTER THAN I DID MY FIRST LISTEN LOL

yea sasha.... oof....... bro got graham'd as u said :3

tim.... auauuaauua a fandom favorite. ofc. the lovely. i have so much to say aobut tim and what a [insert adjectvie that i cant say cos spoilers] character he is but i CANT cos again SPOILERS........

martin is so lovely. i love that man. gorgeous ass lovely human. honestly one of the best characters (but jon's my fave im a jon girlie)

THE HOMOPHOBIC VASE LMAO yes. also. have u heard the jurgen leitner rant?? id save it til after u finish s2 but it is definitely something that every tma fan should memorize.

jurgen leitner?! stupid idiot motherufkcing jurgen leitner god damn fool book collecting dust eating rat old bastard shithead idiot avatar of teh whore, biggest clown in the circus laughed out of town, cowboy motherfucker jurgen leitner (etc etc. this goes on for about 4 paragraphs.)

I RELALY APPRECIATE U RANTING IN MY INBOX. BECAUSE U STARTED LISTENINT TO TMA COS OF ME. ITS LIKE MY HARD WORK IS ALL PAYING OFF. IVE INDOCTRINATED U INTO THIS STUPID FUCKING PODCAST.

dw it destroys everyone. makes everyone go insane. i had the Exact Same Reactions on my second listen ;-; it's a podcast and a half tbh. fucking amazing.

[hummingbirdsinjune]

My School President Ep 12 thought dump (there are spoilers)

- The relief that Tinn's mom didn't force him to come out is astronomical. There is a very clear difference in Gun's comfort with his mom, and Tinn's reservation with his own parents. It's so so so important for him to come out on his own terms and a very big step for her to realize that when she saw how nervous he was.

- Tinn's mom forever. I'm actually glad we meet her as his mom in MSP before MLC because I have a feeling we really won't like her in MLC.

- That honest conversation queer youth has about knowing not everyone is accepting. So important coming from Gunn, to support Tinn after Tinn has supported him all this tim

- I don't know if I can watch this because Tiw's faces are too funny

- That's right Tiw take the credit you deserve

- The girlies returned!! Sob they're so cute

- Tinn entering his angry at the world arc in the last episode is wild. Now that he doesn't have Gun's success to focus on, I imagine he's going to dismantle the government.

- not the TANDEM BIKE on god that's the wildest thing in this show

- Tinn really said "you miss 100% of the chances you don't take"

- AH. AH. NSKXKGKSKSIC WHAT.

- Sigh. I hope the stress doesn't last long lmao

- "Sound and I have no secrets" excuse me while I go cry

- Pat lmao right to the point. Por being so dumb. Yo finally using his 1 braincell. I love these kids.

- Gunn's friends 🤝 love, support, and happiness

-;Gun trying to help Tinn like just break my heart already

- oh yes more umbrella gays

- no I don't like crying gun I physically can't handle it

- aww so much of the school being supportive even though it's very weird to take and share photos of people without them saying it's okay but w/e you know for the sake of fiction

- literally stopping every 30 seconds to laugh at Chinzilla cooing over each other

- damn they really called us out about GunTinn or TinnGun lmao (yeah yeah Gun said GunTinn but of course he would. I'll stick with TinnGun)

- Obviously we knew from the preview that the comically bad guidance counselor is actually a close minded, judgemental person but it doesn't stop it from being shocking

- OH MY GOD IT WASNT TINN THROWING HANDS (screaming into the void)

- See this is why I refrained from saying anything bad about Kajorn. He's always been ripe for a character arc.

- Tinn's mom took her development in strides. I've been disappointed in her, and I am very proud of her. She just needed the time to adjust how she was looking

- I will live and die for happy Kajorn he's been uptight this whole series

- hehe SoundWin

- Here I was in my feeling about this being almost over and I'm not actually in part 4 yet lmao

- ep 12 is long AF lmao

- my soul. The TiwPor glances

- did they never get juniors? LOL the music club is doomed

- ayyyye Win get your man yes sir 🤭

- the contrast of kissing in this episode compared to the entire season has me like 😳 y'all I'm GROWN

- aw Pat 😂

- sound just?? Left his guitar?? that HE brought to school instead of a backpack?

- actually not hearing Tinn sing more is a crime

- Tinn's dad is such a dad lmfao

- Tinn 🤝 Tinn's Dad 🤝 The Thunder

- Gun you menace

-GUN

- no official TiwPor 😭

[late-to-the-magnus-archives]

Fed - a Magnus Archives fanfic

So. This was just what it was, now. Hardly the first time in my life I’d faced challenges, gray morality, and a strange situation in which I wasn’t precisely trapped, but all my other options were worse than the one I was considering.

It was heavy. Too heavy.

“Take a moment,” said Spider Martin. “Looks like you need it.”

I eyed him. “Reading my thoughts?”

“No, your face. It’s quite expressive. Whatever you’re thinking about, it’s clearly a lot?”

I hated his blue eyes.

That wasn’t his fault. Something about him just made me remember how I had watched him die.

(Then is your Martin really your Martin?)

Yes. Shut up. I couldn’t… That was not a box we were opening this afternoon.

Spoilers for the whole show. This is post-MAG 200.

Part four of the Magnus Monsterverse AU.

AO3

--------

The fog took me, and as if I’d spent a thousand years there instead of my own metamorphosis, I immediately succumbed.

It wasn’t even conscious: just a completion, a sense of self and no other, an aching, longing magnificence that hurt like pure joy, flooding through me. I think I cried out. I might have come. I definitely wept.

This place… oh. Oh. I ate it up. It ate it up. We ate it up, together. There was such strange joy in me. It was such a wondrously terrible new thing. It drank it in, and I drank it in, and I may have cried out again, because this time, he answered.

“I’m here. I’ve got you. I’m here.” And Martin pulled me in, shocking in his there-ness, his solidity, his presence, the very miracle of his existence.

He was the only thing that was real, and We loved it that way.

I clung to him and cried. I could not get close enough. I never could, not ever; it would never be enough, and I embraced that, painted my body, rolled my eyes back in my head to bask in its glorious void.

He breathed deeply, slowly, and his heart beat strong. “It was you,” he said. “While I was in the waves, it was you, missing you, thinking of you, grieving you… that’s what did it. That’s what powered everything.”

And suddenly, I saw.

Saw him in strange, wild waves, surfacing to stare at a gray sky that matched his eyes.

Saw that he rarely surfaced. He spent most of his time under, in the broad, booming silence, the current pulling him along, far from everyone and everything. The isolation under pressure; the magnificence of loneliness in a world with other living things—

He rejoiced in his pain, felt he deserved it—but it didn’t last.

“They died,” he whispered, and tears kissed his cheeks, so I kissed them off.

He felt them dying; felt the people—so far away their absence made him ache—winking out like lights.

Martin breathed in the water (and I did with him) and mourned and lost.

And when it happened, and all were gone, his god fed on him.

Because of me.

“It was you,” he whispered. “Missing you was… it became everything. I missed you so much that I…”

He lost himself.

I could look up at him, now, and saw him like burning mist, saw his perfect eyes with limbal rings I could tumble into and drown.

“When they found me…” He swallowed. “When Tim leaned through the door of fire that Maneula somehow got him to make and found me, I didn’t know his name. I knew his face, but it just made me cry.”

I understood that. I knew I’d cry when I met him, too. I was sure he still hadn’t forgiven me.

“When they came, I fought them. I thought that if they took me away from here, I’d lose missing you. That’s bonkers, isn’t it?”

“No,” I said.

He touched my lips. His eyes were wide. “What?”

“No,” I repeated.

He looked stunned. “You’re in my silence. You can’t speak.”

Oh. I felt what he meant; he had this weird, Lonely power, this silence he could enforce, but, I—ah. “Yes, I can.” I knew how to talk.

Martin still stared. He looked spooked. “We… we should go back.”

I’d scared him. That would not do, so I kissed him instead.

He made a sound and responded, clutching me, his blazing eyes sliding shut. Color washed his cheeks, and as it did, we became real.

The fog vanished as if eaten by summer sun. We stood together in our apartment block, in the central courtyard, under blue spring sky, in sight of all the windows.

We both breathed hard, shudders trembling through us like aftershocks.

“What did you do?” he whispered.

“I kissed you,” I said, still dazed. “Was I not supposed to?”

“You… you became the Lonely,” said Martin. “You were the Lonely. You… I don’t understand.”

Eh?

What?

Eh?

“I what?”

“Hey, kiddos,” said Mike, coming out from the same building I lived in. “We’re heading out to get a bite. Want to come?”

We had no time for this. We had to deal with what just happened. We—

Oh. Behind him came a rogue’s gallery.

That was Michael Shelley. Right behind him came Helen Richardson, scowling.

There was Arthur Nolan—an angry, angry man, made worse because there were two of him in a row. They had not bothered to be anything but identical.

Sarah Baldwin came out beside Jane Prentiss, both of them chattering away about something called Brother Love I’d never heard of.

(The Eye dropped three seasons’ worth of this bizarre forbidden-love-among-the-cloisters “reality” show into my head. Thanks. You shouldn’t have.)

(Drama! It happily tremored at me.)

I stared at the lot of them, frozen. So many of them had tried to kill me, or been part of my torment. My actions had led to their deaths, as well—and some of them, I’d never even seen in the light of day.

I made a small noise. I don’t know what it was. Some panicked thing.

“I've got you,” said Martin. “It's okay. They’re not going to hurt you.”

I couldn’t believe that.

They greeted Martin with smiles, though no touches, no personal space invasions (and I could appreciate that). Me, however… no one seemed to know what to do with. They eyed me. Jane stared. Michael tilted his head. Helen rolled her eyes.

“We going, or what?” snapped Nolan One with all the grace of a bulldozer. “I’m fuckin’ hungry,” said Nolan Two.

“I think we should initiate our new friend and make him join,” said Mike Crew.

Sarah Baldwin laughed. It wasn’t a nice sound. “He looks like a scared rabbit.”

“He’s fine,” said Martin.

Was this happening? This was happening. “You’re going?” I said to Martin.

He looked grim. “We should.”

He was trying not to be lonely. Trying so hard.

I would never get in the way of that. “I’ll go, sure,” I said, staring at Jane (whose skin boasted numerous scars, even more than my own, but no sign of worms just yet). “I, uh. I’m Jon. Hi.” So graceful. My face burned.

Jane grinned, stretching her scars. "Hi."

Helen laughed. As she did, her face shifted; she was still Helen, still herself, but she’d changed, like distortion through glass. “Hi, Jon. I’m Helen.”

Michael tilted his head further. Too far. Smiling in an utterly banal manner. "Archivist."

“I… yes. It’s weird to see you both at the same time.”

They just looked at me.

(It was thrilled. If I could have shrunk small enough to hide in Martin’s pocket, I would have, and It loved my misery.)

“Oh, I like this one,” said Michael. “You’re much less human than before.”

“Ah. Well,” I said. “That’s true, I suppose.”

“Still a prick,” said Helen.

“Hey,” I protested.

“From what I recall,” said Martin, “you were the one so obsessed with him that you wanted to keep him in your corridors until everybody else he ever knew died so you could have him all to yourself.”

And everyone turned to stare at her.

Helen’s dark cheeks blushed darker. “Well. Desperate times, and all that.”

Michael cracked up.

Crew followed, and Sarah, and soon everyone was laughing, even the Nolans—and it wasn’t a bad laugh, it really was not, but I felt no better.

“We’ve all come a long way,” said Jane.

“Archivist,” said Michael. “Come to us. Join us. Let us see your skill.”

“My what?”

“We’re, uh. We… can you guys go ahead? We’ll meet you at the curb.”

“Ooh,” said Nolan One, low. “Somebody hasn’t been told about the birds and the bees yet.”

“Be nice,” said Sarah, and swatted his arm.

Nolan Two bared his teeth at her.

“Sure,” said Crew, and gestured to them all. They all walked on, continuing their conversations or lack thereof.

Michael winked at me over his shoulder, then loudly said to Helen, “So what did that feel like, all trapped inside you?”

“Kill me now,” I muttered, covering my face.

Martin kissed my forehead. He’d lost just a shade of the color he’d had, but seemed to be holding steady. “So. Here’s how this works. We go and meet at a pre-set point in the city. Then we, uh. He gives us a list of people.”

I looked up slowly. “To what end?”

He just looked back.

“To what? To… to feed on?”

“It’s that, or we feed the Fears through ourselves—and something about us, about what we were at the ends of our worlds means that if we let them feed on us, we supercharge them. We could end it here all over again. So we don’t do that. Instead, we… Annabelle calls it ‘hummingbirds.’”

Flitting from person to person, sipping the nectar of fear. “So it’s all even less stable than Leitner said. This is horrible.”

“It’s not that bad. The people we see don’t even realize it’s happening, usually—we keep it light. Besides, we don’t do it to nice people.”

My look was dry.

“I mean it, Jon. People who hurt animals. That sort of thing.”

“A lot of those in London, are there?”

“You’d be surprised. There’s less fear in this world in general; it’s less spread out, so it’s potent. We only need a little.”

“This is insane. You know that, right? You must see it. This is lunacy.”

“It’s surviving. Which is a choice.”

Oh, how I hated that, but I understood. I knew. I got it. We could all do the world a favor and die, but none of us truly wanted to. Or at least… knew we should not want that. How did one judge the worth of a life? The risk of that life doing wrong? At what point could I or anyone say, you’re too dangerous to live because of what you might do?

“You’re right,” I whispered.

“It's going to be okay. I promise. Come on and join us today.” His smile was small, but real. “Keeps you from going crazy.”

And I knew that was true for him.

And I knew it was true for them.

And I knew it was not true for me.

Something weird was happening here. Or I was delusional.

Or maybe It was lying to me, wanting me so hungry I would make a mistake.

(I knew, though: It could not lie.)

“I’ll join you,” I said, softly. “But I swear, if I see actual innocent people being… being…”

“You won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do. I trust the people we’re working with.”

“Web.” I clenched my jaw. (Were my teeth made of eyes, too? Calcified, maybe?)

“I don’t expect you to be there right away,” he said, and kissed my forehead again. “I don’t expect you to adjust to all this quickly. But I hope you can at least trust me.”

I stared. “That is a hell of a thing to leverage, Martin.”

“It’s that important. I wouldn’t just say that, you know.”

I did know. “You’re really serious about this.”

“I need you so much.” It was a whisper. “I’ll do anything I have to do in order to keep you from… burning out, or getting devoured by your stupid Eye, or falling afoul of the hunters.”

“Hunters?” I said.

“Later.”

We were growing quite a pile of things to talk about later. “All right. All right. I’ll come with you. Show me, Martin. I trust you.”

So help me, he regained some of his color as we walked out of the courtyard to join the others, who’d waited by the curb.

#

I had never been good with groups of people.

The theater group in which I met Georgie (and through her, gained at least some social skills) had helped a little.

The Magnus Institute Library employees, of whom I was merely one of many, also helped—I could tag along without pressure, camouflaged by their gregariousness.

The Archives… that group was considerably less comfortable because I felt like it was all on me.

It wasn’t. I know that now, but my promotion went straight to my head, and not in a confident way. I’d felt immediately underqualified and out of place, and wondered daily why the hell I’d accepted the position.

I knew now. I could not have refused. I didn’t know that, then. I’m not sure that understanding would have helped, either.

Still, the social aspect of things had only meant stress. To this day, I did not recall going to Martin’s birthday party and rambling about emulsions while eating rum and raisin ice cream. The Eye did not give me that memory back. I knew it happened only because Tim and Martin and Sasha had never stopped teasing me over it. Very funny, really.

(Tim. Sasha. Oh, gods…)

(Right, Archive, focus, you’re all right, they’re here now—)

(Jon. Dear lord. Focus, Jon.)

So I was obviously in a good head space for something like this.

“So you’re really Jon,” said Jane Prentiss, and something that wasn’t a tongue moved in her mouth as she spoke.

I choked a little. “Y… yeah. Hi.”

“Huh. I killed you in my world,” she said.

“I’m hearing that a lot today,” I muttered.

She smiled, and dear gods, her teeth were squirming. “I’m glad they found you. I wanted to apologize.”

“To… wh… why?”

“Well, it wasn’t really you I was mad at. It was your Eye.”

“Oh.”

Her grin made it more awkward, not less; she stepped closer. “You smell delicious, by the way.”

“Martin,” I said in a tiny, pitiful voice.

“Jane, come on, be nice,” said Martin, pulling me closer.

She laughed and backed away.

“Did everybody here kill me?” I whispered.

“Not all of them, but, uh. Possibly most?”

Fuck.

We walked past the park and into the city. It was clean; the vehicles genuinely were all electric. I saw no one who seemed down on their luck, either, which was bizarre.

What kind of idealized place was this? And what, exactly, was the hidden underside?

They were all talking, and because I have terrible timing, I decided this was the moment to whisper to Martin, “What did you mean by, ‘don’t you try to take my choices and blame yourself for them?’”

He stiffened. “I’m not ready to talk about it.”

“All right. I can wait.”

“Liar.”

I laughed. “I am not lying.”

“You can’t wait to find out,” he teased.

Gods, I wanted to kiss him. “I may have learned a little patience in a thousand years.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” he challenged.

I grinned, but before I could respond, he spoke.

No. Another him spoke.

“Right,” said his voice, but it wasn’t him, and I turned slowly to find the other Martin waiting for us all on the corner.

The moment I saw him in the light of day, I knew: this Martin was Web.

Completely Web, all the way through; his smile was perfect, and his stance, and the way he shifted his weight and barely met other people’s eyes and laughed easily.

It was completely fake, and I could see it, and I felt like my skin was going to crawl right off my bones. Or whatever I had under there. Eye-bones.

He seemed to know, and he stopped to stare at me. For one moment, when I met his eyes, they were dead. Flat. Dull. There in place to hide the spiders behind them, utterly without anything resembling emotion or true life.

Then he was just Martin (so similar to my Martin, or… no. What Martin had been before everything), and smiling at everybody. “I’ve got all kinds of assignments for you today,” he said, handing out Post-It notes.

“Sure, but did you account for our latest acquisition?” said Nolan One.

Sarah Baldwin barked a laugh, and Jane elbowed her.

“I did!” said Spider Martin happily. “Jon? It’s okay if I call you Jon, right? You’re starting out with me today.” He approached me.

Don’t reach for the Eye, I told myself. Don’t. Don’t. Don’t.

On my bright green Post-It was Martin’s flowing script with two addresses and the instructions, 1:30pm Martin B.; 3:00pm Mike C. “What?” I said.

“Why?” said my Martin.

“Because we’ve all got split shifts, and it seems like a good idea to help Jon get along with everybody?” said Spider Martin. “His second will be with Mike.”

“Not fair,” said my Martin, but without anguish.

Spider Martin shrugged. “It’s the best one for this afternoon. Trust me on this.”

Everyone seemed to accept this with ease. Great. They were all drinking the arachnidian Kool-Aid.

“Can I get him next time?” said Michael.

Spider Martin beamed. “Yes! Jane after that.”

“Yipee!” said Michael.

“What is happening right now?” I said.

“I think you’re popular?” said my Martin.

I did not feel popular.

“Shall we?” said Spider Martin.

“I don’t even know what we’re doing. I don’t understand. I don’t—”

My Martin cupped my cheek, turned me to him, and kissed me. Lingering. Slow. A delicate tasting of lips and tongue, a gentle whisper of love and attention, a promise. “You’ll be fine,” he murmured.

“I don’t have a box for any of this,” I murmured back. “And I think my label maker is broken.”

Martin laughed. “Your label maker of doom?”

“Something like that.”

He nuzzled me. “See you in a little bit.”

And he pulled away, paired up with Sarah Baldwin. (Stranger—and if she did anything to him, I would…)

(Would what? Would what? I didn’t know. Something terrible. Something…)

“I don’t bite,” said Spider Martin.

I looked at him.

Martin’s smile. Martin’s face. Martin’s body. No—Martin’s skin. I could feel he was crawling on the inside.

I turned away. Whatever happened to him was done. He wasn’t mine, never had been. I still wanted to react. Violently. As if to his murder.

“I’m not dead, you know,” he said.

“Yes, you are,” I whispered.

“No more than Annabelle. I know—or I’m pretty sure, anyway—that you’ll struggle with this, but I chose this path. I did. I’m happy with it, too.”

“You ended your world.”

“Pot, kettle?”

I swallowed. “Knowing I did wrong hardly exonerates you.”

“We didn’t really get to know you in my world,” said Spider Martin. “You caught up with Darren and took the book back right at Mister Spider’s front door.”

Darren. That’s what the bully’s name was. “Did I?”

“Yeah. You died pretty quickly. Your mind snapped before they could get much fear out of you, so there wasn’t a point to dragging it out.”

I turned to stare at him.

“There you are!” he said cheerily. “Your eyes were brown originally, weren’t they?”

“They were. And yours should be green.”

He beamed. “Naw.”

“Naw?”

“Blue tends to be trusted more easily. It’s racially offensive, and largely due to media influence, but there you go.”

I stared harder.

“Would you rather me pretend to be something I’m not?” he asked, putting genuine curiosity into it.

“No,” I said quietly. “I… it’s a nightmare. This. Is all.”

“Because you think it’s losing someone.”

“It is.”

“No. The Stranger—that’s losing someone. A weird ingestion and rebirth like the Distortion—that’s losing someone. This?” He gestures at himself. “This isn’t losing someone any more than you were lost.”

I wasn’t sure I hadn't been lost.

He smiled so easily. “Come on. Let me show you how this works. You’ll think better when fed,” he said, as harmless and bright as a children’s mascot.

I was already fed. Somehow. But I didn’t want to try to get into it. “Lead the way, I suppose.” Everyone else had already paired off and left. “Do you always assign partners?”

“And areas, yes. We wouldn’t want to cause harm, and the buddy system helps prevent that.”

I snorted.

“It’s true! Your Beholding might lack the ability to consider consequences, but surely you don’t think we do.”

“What, the Web has a stance against overfishing?”

“Yes! Exactly so. We didn’t even mean to end the world when we did. We’re significantly more careful now to avoid it ever happening again.”

“How did it happen, then?”

(The Eye offered to show me. I refused.)

“Get to know me a little bit better, and I’ll tell you.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to get to know him better, but I also didn’t feel like I had a choice.

In silence, he led me north, past old buildings I sort of knew, past silent cars I’d never imagined, past lovely boutiques and pubs with a distinct lack of loud music or voices coming from them.

I’d never seen a London like this. I had no idea how to feel about it.

Neither did It, and the drive to know why this was so grew in me with anticipatory joy like a child looking forward to their birthday.

I couldn’t blame It. This was absolutely unexpected. The differences in history must have been significant.

“How did your world end, anyway?” said Spider Martin. “You hardly have to tell me, of course, but I rather thought you’d prefer we hear your understanding over Manuela’s.”

I really needed to meet this woman. “And how the hell would she even know anything?”

“Same way she found you.” We turned a corner, and finally there was sound—a busker, just beginning to tune his violin. “She calculates things. Honestly, if she weren’t so firmly entrenched in the Eye, she'd have made a lovely sister.”

I stopped walking. “She’s Eye?”

“That she is. It was her desire to see more and know every world that had her prepared and able to escape when the time came.”

I couldn’t imagine Manuela Dominguez as Eye. “Then she didn’t build a Dark Sun. She didn’t hole up at Ny-Ålesund. She didn’t try to summon Mister Pitch.”

“Not her. Some of her alternates, yes, but they’re secondaries. She’s Prime.”

“Prime?”

“The first one of her kind rescued. In her case, the actual rescuer, too.” Martin produced paper money from his pocket.

It wasn’t a design I’d ever seen. “May I?”

“Of course.” He handed it over.

It was a ten-pound banknote. Julius Caesar glowered on the front of it, stern and uncompromising. The bill itself was cornflower blue; intricate guilloche in a gradient from orange to purple subtly deepened the design, and it bore such phrases as The Bank of Holy England and Toward the Greatest Empire.

Damn. I really needed to get hold of some history books.

(The Eye offered to show me how this banknote existed. How it had been designed. What the phrases meant. Why a long-dead Roman emperor decorated the front. No, I told It, firm and tamping down my need. Let me find out on my own.)

This delighted It. The joy of discovery through me was apparently worth the wait.

“What did money look like where you came from?” said Spider Martin.

“Do you actually care?” I drawled.

“Inasmuch as I’m trying to establish a decent working relationship with you, yes, I absolutely do.”

“Then surely you know telling me things is more valuable than asking.”

“What do you think I've been doing?” said Spider Martin. “We are here to pay that man over there to play ‘The Outlandish Knight,’ which he associates with a past girlfriend, with whom he associates the feeling of being trapped and controlled, and playing it makes him afraid he’ll never get free. Thus, shall I be fed. And you, my dear Archivist, merely need to watch him—because he’ll feel very, very watched, and thus shall you be fed.”

I frowned. “And he deserves this, does he?”

“In revenge against that girlfriend, he poisoned her cat.”

“He what?” Well, now I was furious.

Which (calm down, Jon) was probably on purpose. It was calculated.

“He did,” said Spider Martin. “What happened to him wasn’t nice, but he isn’t very nice, either.”

“Did the cat… die?”

“No, fortunately, though it did go blind.”

I clenched my jaw. Anger against this random man tempted. (Easy, Jon. Easy.) “If you’re lying to me, we’re going to have a problem.”

Spider Martin looked at me. “Jon, I’m not stupid enough to lie to you. You could just see it. If I lie, it’ll undo any attempts to build trust between us. All right?”

That… made sense. “All right. Why do you want to work with me, then?”

“Because we all need to work together. All of us. We’re unique in all the world, and we have a challenging existence. We need each other to keep each other balanced and prevent the world from ending again.”

Damn, but it was all logical. “Why did you call me Archivist a moment ago?”

“Because that’s what you are—and I suspected it would be easier to think of eating a bit of this man’s fear with that reminder.”

This honesty was refreshing. Maybe a little too refreshing. It was all calculated, every bit of it.

But then, it was calculated because it would be effective, and I couldn’t fault him for trying to be effective. Web was just… so disturbing about it, which was the entire point. “Will this mark him?”

“No. We’re getting a taste, caring for ourselves, but not doing enough harm to mark anyone. Most of them don’t even remember it happened after; they just shrug it off.”

I exhaled shakily.

So. This was just what it was, now. Hardly the first time in my life I’d faced challenges, gray morality, and a strange situation in which I wasn’t precisely trapped, but all my other options were worse than the one I was considering.

It was heavy. Too heavy.

“Take a moment,” said Spider Martin. “Looks like you need it.”

I eyed him. “Reading my thoughts?”

“No, your face. It’s quite expressive. Whatever you’re thinking about, it’s clearly a lot?”

I hated his blue eyes.

That wasn’t his fault. Something about him just made me remember how I had watched him die.

(Then is your Martin really your Martin?)

Yes. Shut up. I couldn’t… That was not a box we were opening this afternoon. No.

Maybe not ever.

“If you’re really not ready, it’s okay,” said Spider Martin. “Last thing I want to do is upset you.”

“Sure. Because I’m so dangerous compared to the lot of you.”

“You are, actually.” Spider Martin shrugged.

I rolled my eyes. “No, I’m really not. I can hardly damage anyone the way I could at the end of my world, and I was nothing but a punching bag before that.”

He tilted his head. “Really?”

“Really.”

“That’s not what we—oh, pardon.” He took out his phone.

“Not what you what?”

Spider Martin’s eyes went wide. “Shit,” he said. “Keep up!” And he turned and ran.

Spider Martin could move. That was not at all how my Martin ran, not at all his body language or motion or mobility, and the smooth, loping speed of it was freakishly comforting compared to the mask of the one I loved.

I ran after him.

#

Fun fact: being made of eyes and/or light beams made me better at running than I would have guessed.

I mean. I wasn’t good at it. But I also didn’t run out of breath, or stumble, both of which would have been the case before.

I kept up with Spider Martin, who I swear was running with the use of six extra invisible legs, and that was no small thing.

“What is it?” I called at his back.

“Get ready for a fight!” he said.

“A fight? A fight with wh-”

I saw.

Hunters, Martin had said.

Nolan Two on the ground with smoke pouring out of his chest instead of blood.

Nolan One behind a car flipped onto its side, unable to stick his head around it at all because of—

What was—

What WAS that, that was—

I couldn’t understand what I saw. Purple, green, wisps of things like tentacles, not solid, and yet they were, punching holes into that car, not just reaching around it but building Nolan’s fear, and—

We turned the corner at the same time as Mike Crew and Helen Richardson, and everyone acted at once.

Coordinated? No. They’d just done this before.

Helen distorted into a tall and mutated and terrible thing and dropped straight into the sidewalk—and at the same time, a yellow door opened beneath Nolan Two, and he fell out of sight.

(I couldn’t see the attacker. I needed to see it.)

Mike bared his teeth—a horrifying look, actual anger, which he had not shown with me the day he threw me into the sky—and gestured.

Lightning struck.

Struck… what?

(I couldn’t see it! I needed to see it!)

Mike couldn’t see it, either; he struck where those tendrils were coming from, the central invisible knot of them, but evidently did not hit it, because now, it threw tendril-attacks at him. He moved, guessing as much (he could not see them, I knew he could not), staying out of the way of whatever it was punching holes where he’d been.

Spider Martin picked up another car and threw it.

That one connected; the car hit something, but was not enough to stop it, and more tendrils shot out toward Mike and Spider Martin.

I didn’t move. I couldn’t move. My eyes burned, my head throbbed—I couldn’t see it, I had to see it, I needed to see—

Michael grabbed me and pulled me into a yellow door in a wall just as one of those purple-green tendrils slammed into the sidewalk where I’d been, cracking it, penetrating below the concrete.

The Corridors. So familiar. I knew this well.

“No!” I cried, throwing myself at the door.

“Easy, Archivist,” said Michael, right up behind me, long hands draping over my shoulders to pull me back. “You aren’t ready to deal with them.”

“No! I need to see it! I need to see it!”

“Archivist,” Michael thrummed at me. “You’ll make your Martin cry.”

Martin?

Martin.

I stopped, gripping the door handle. “I… I need to… see it?”

“You will be hurt. Maybe killed. That would be terrible.”

He did not sound like it would be terrible.

I shook. “I couldn’t see it. Michael. Please. I have to see it. I have to try.”

He sighed. “Silly Archivist. As you wish.” He reached past me, all around me, and opened the door.

We were on a nearby roof, and I could look down and see.

I looked.

Looked.

(Use me, It beckoned.)

And I did.

My vision opened as it had not since I arrived here, and I saw.

Connected it was all connected

Powers like the Fears but different

All through this world every living thing everyone was marked or

Not marked something like marked already connected

Connected it was all

The thing

There

A person but not

It was three persons in one

Three of them together standing there strange dark bodysuit a gas mask

No hands

No hands only those tendrils sprouting from their arms, tendrils which now seemed so solid

Each of them moving independently (three person in there, three minds to work them) trying actively to kill us all

To kill the Nolans the Mike the Helen the

I saw, and as I did, I broke the attacker apart.

I didn't even mean to. I just saw it for what it truly was, and made reality real.

One second, it was invisible, impossible to harm, its tendrils unseen by the others. The next it stood there, a person in a weird suit—and it shuddered, and then it was three. They exploded apart, splitting the uniform and popping the gas mask like a hatched egg in rapid-time.

And now, the others could see them. Could see three naked people on the sidewalk, gasping, shuddering, heads down, vomiting.

Nolan, Mike, and Helen surged in without hesitation, all at once.

I looked away, swaying, gasping.

Michael kept me from falling off the roof. He looked amazed. “What did you do?”

Fed.

I was so fed.

I felt rich with it, blissful, drugged. Absolutely relaxed and warm and tingling to the edges of every inch of my form.

Sirens. Coming.

“Time to go!” said Michael, pulling me back through his yellow door.

The Corridors did their thing, and I felt it, and floated in it, and spun and flew and was.

Michael cried out.

So did I. We became colors and swirling paint, flowing out of the drain against gravity in beauty and madness and bliss. And then—

#

I woke up.

I was back in my little bed in my gray apartment. My hair was wet; I smelled of soap. My heart pounded. (Benign essential blepharospasm, perhaps?)

Martin was next to me, asleep. I stared at my boring popcorn ceiling.

Had that… happened?

Next to me, on the nightstand, was a bright green Post-It note with handwriting I didn’t know. It said, Jon. We need to talk.—JL

Leitner.

Sure. Sure, we could talk. Fuck if I knew about what, though because I had no idea what had occurred.

It was four twenty-two in the morning. Martin slept. Leitner could wait.

I watched Martin, trying to understand (had I slept? If so, it was the first time in a thousand years), trying to parse what I’d seen and what I’d done.

The Eye did not help me because It could not. It didn’t know, either, and that frightened me more than anything else I’d seen.

------

NOTES

He's like a shammy; he's like a towel; he's like a sponge! A regular towel doesn't work wet, but Jon works wet or dry. Holds 12 times his weight in trauma!

[dairy-farmer]

Let's see if this works!

I've been all over Twitter lately since your ask box here has been closed, mostly lurking, but god some of the ideas that have been on there... 🥵🥵🥵

Do you have any favorite ideas that you've seen on Twitter recently? I've been super into the ones where Tim gets pregnant, those are always so good, especially the more taboo ones like him being on the younger side or getting knocked up by Jack Drake, etc. So I wanted to see if there were any ideas you saw and wanted to expand on/talk more about 👀👀👀

Also so glad you're back, hopefully for good this time ❤️

ah thank you!!!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️ it's good to be back i hope that it will be for good this time as well!!

i;m happy to know that you were able to enoy the tweets i put put out whilst i couldn't put out much on tumblr- the one slight downside of being on tumblr and twitter is that i can easily post things i post on tumblr to twitter, it just takes some patience since i have to separate all the text to individual tweets. but the same can't be said of twitter to tumblr so a lot of the things that people who exclusively only view my tumblr they end up missing which is a shame since i really do have some AU's i really like on there!!! and i'm so happy you enjoy my work, it makes me really happy to hear that!!!!

one idea that i recently did that fits the criteria is of this jacktim and brutim thread i did a little while ago. i know in fanon a really popular depiction of jack and janet drake is that they were maliciously neglectful and abusive which i personally don't agree with it because oftentimes it's escalated and taken to a point where they're almost depicted as cartoonishly evil. it's such a common perception that in my fics when i don't outright make them shitty parents so many of the comments are like 'is that semi decent mother janet drake???'. the janet one especially rubs me the wrong way because it seems so...sexist? she was present for maybe a panel or two, we see tim's interactions with his father far more but people saw janet's last words as her crying for tim and saying she regrets never spending more time with him and that 'you don't know what you have until it's gone'.

that doesn't mean i think they were good parents or even mediocre ones. i think tim was just sort of put aside once he got a little older because we know they were both present when he was younger and it was fairly recent that they started traveling around while tim was in boarding school. i'm not sure where this massive mischaracterization came from for them but it's sort of something that's just here to stay. BUT there is one dynamic i really LOVE about tim with his father.

the two of them wanting to connect but not being able to.

like it's not frequently depicted but i love how tim is a pretty rude person who says some mean things to people without really considering their feelings, and that's more born from him being pretty unsocialized. so i know his personality clashing with his father's domineering one would make for some tension between the two of them.

in the AU of the thread i made, i never really explored the 'before' of jack killing someone to protect tim and being sent to prison. it's very lightly touched upon at the end. where tim is so much softer and nicer to him, with jack believing that motherhood sanded away all of tim's prickly edges.

it's implied and jack and tim used to get into rows, with tim complaining about jack's drinking and cigar smoking and presumably other things. essentially their dynamic was like that of a couple chugging towards divorce.

but then something happens.

then someone has the audacity to put their hands on tim. i don't really go into it but i like the idea of it being either a teacher or one of jack's old friends. someone jack would've welcomed into his home and allowed access to tim without really thinking about it. maybe the football coach from when tim had claimed he'd tried out for the team. maybe jack thinks tim joining a sport he loved would do wonders for their relationship so he kind needles a little and gets a football coach from one of the schools to agree to privately train tim so he can try out for the next season.

but really tim is such a pretty kid, so small. a runt really, and this coach just knows tim's not cut out for the kind of muscle needed to be a footballer. but his rich daddy is paying him hundreds of dollars to feel him up every other afternoon and 'fix his form' and all that stuff.

maybe that coach gets a bit gutsy, starts messaging tim things that have nothing to do with training. he gets bold one day and slips a hand between tim's legs where he tells tim that he forgot to wear his cup like he was told, and what a shame because now his poor little pussy could get hurt.

maybe it escalates a little further but tim keeps his mouth shut because he's a civilian and civilian tim drake can't exactly break every bone in this guy's wrist. if it ever got too far he'd put a stop to it but for now it was just some balding middle-aged football coach that wanted to squeeze a teenager's tits.

tim definitely doesn't tell jack about it which makes it worse when jack finds out for himself. tim leaves his phone on the coffee table one night, he falls asleep while he and his dad are watching a movie.

then his phone vibrates and jack drake is just as nosy as his son and unlocks it because jack knows every single one of tim's passwords after his son violated his trust by being robin.

it's a dick pic.

maybe if it had been just a normal text message like what had been sent before jack wouldn't have acted so drastically. but the fact that something so vile, depraved, and disgusting was being sent to his son by someone he invited into his home-!

then jack scrolls, sees more and mroe incriminating things that have this guy burying his own grave. messages about how he knows tim wants him, how he likes it, about how soft tim's tits are, and how tight his baby cunt will be around his cock-

jack goes out that night.

by the time tim wakes up in the morning it's to bruce pounding on the door and telling him that his dad has been arrested after breaking into a local coach's home and killing him.

tim is absolutely overwhelmed with the guilt.

he blames himself for it, if he'd just told jack or anyone what was happening instead of letting it get to that point his father wouldn't be facing going to prison for the rest of his life.

i think the guilt really eats at tim, especially since the next and last time he sees his dad is when he's in court at the end of his trial and gets sentenced to 20 years. 20 years he may not even live to see the end of because tim knows how violent gotham prisons can be.

it's like an answer to his prayers when a fire breaks out in city hall where copies of sentencing from the DA are kept. moreso when blackgate floods and some of their records are lost as well.

the second happiest day of tim's life (the first being the birth of his daughter) is when he gets the call that his father will be out on early release because bruce didn't waste a moment on squandering the opportunity and siccing his lawyers to petition and sue for jack drake's release on a technicality.

the shift in their relationship after tim's spent 5 years grieving and jack 5 years in prison serving time for protecting his child!!!!

jack, after release, refers to and thinks of tim in very feminine ways and feels an attraction to him as a result. he grapples with it by telling himself that it's the fault of all the time he spent in prison, only having sweaty and ugly men for company.

and tim is the first pretty thing he's seen in awhile. and seeing tim so soft and sweet, hugging him and crying in his arms. seeing tim's baby and knowing that tim must've been on his back for another man while jack was put away.

then all the little things, tim bending over in front of him, tim telling jack he'd gotten into religion and giving the imagery of him on his knees every night for jack, praying for his safety.

and maybe it's not wholly unintentional because tim spent a lot of time thinking of his father, getting comfort fucked by bruce, and thinking of him again. tim's feelings and affection for jack have softened exponentially and maybe the separation between them has also skewed what tim feels for him too. he feels he has a lot to make up for and the ultimate way that tim knows how to express love for someone is sex.

i really wanted tim to carry such a heavy air of temptation in that thread, to the point where jack is almost wondering if tim is doing it on purpose (he is).

tim has an obsession for making things right, for being a 'good son' to jack now. so he's now utterly dedicated to that role from now in.

for both jack AND bruce.

tim being a devoted little son to jack and bruce who are both men that will absolutely indulge in it.

[shadow0haven]

10 Stories/10 First Lines Tag Meme

craTagged by @once-upon-a-reblog !

Going to try and tag a few people here, but if I tag you and you’ve done this before, feel free to ignore my ping! (And if you don’t have ten stories for ten lines, feel free to make up the rules!)

So I’m tagging @bluejayblueskies and @organchordsandlightning because both of them have such lovely fics and you should honestly check them out! (Lots of TMA and Malevolent from them, and more!)

@captaincravatthecapricious and @magnetarmadda with quite a few wonderful fics I have definitely not read more than once. Coughs.

So the rules are: post the first lines of your 10 most recently published AO3 stories.

(I’m going to cheat just a bit because if I only post my last ten pieces, then it’s ALL Malevolent. Which isn’t a bad thing but I want some variety for this xD I’ve also tagged stories if they are explicit or mature content)

House of Memory || The Magnus Archives

“Together?”

“One way or another. Together.”

“Wherever you go, I go.”

Everything hurt. Memories kept coming in flashes, blinding and bright, as he jolted upright with his head in his hands. He cradled his face carefully and took in a long breath. Martin sprung upright with a cry of pain. It was so loud, the pain coursing through his skull. His vision was near pure white as the spikes of pain shot through his skull at being brought into a sitting position.  God, it hurt. It hurt way too much, like he was being struck by lightning over and over.

The Unfortunate Turning of a Page || The Magnus Archives

Most everything in the Archives had started out as normal as any other day. Jon, Martin, Sasha, and Tim had all been researching a case. There had been a bit of a commotion when there got word that an item had gone missing from Artifact storage. Without that, things had been generic. It was the same thing, different day.

The days had just gone odd after he had been doing research in the library. He had only been looking for some information on a case about someone going ‘mad’ after reading a book. There wasn’t much on it. After that visit, things were… off.

Don’t Forget The Loss || Malevolent

John had just set out clothes for Arthur in the shared motel room. Arthur had asked him to pick out some clothing for him and put it out for him. Both men had finally gotten a chance to bathe, rest, and take a moment for themselves.

Sure, it was odd. Having his own body was uncomfortable. John felt... empty. Like something was missing a lot of the time.

Find Me In The Aftermath || Malevolent

It had been a handful of weeks since his encounter with the King in Yellow. John was gone as far as he knew. He hadn’t heard even the slightest bit of noise in the back of his mind that he was sure wasn’t his own. His sight was permanently gone, barely a sliver of it left besides shadows. Arthur had managed thus far on his own.

When I Wake, We’ll Be Okay || Malevolent

Once they had escaped from the cult hotel and been able to procure a different identity, John and Arthur had gotten a small flat for rent and been able to get away from most supernatural entities. John was not included. It had been tough, but they both survived. That’s what counted. Arthur had insisted on staying on the outskirts of Arkham while John insisted that they go farther away. It had been a bit of arguing back and forth before they agreed to stay on the outside of Arkham. Arthur wanted to be able to be close to sources he might need.

An Early Morning Coffee || Malevolent (Mature)

It was different waking up with someone. The warm weight next to him in bed was something so grounding, the shift of the covers and the inhale and exhale of each breath, and the contact of skin against his own. Even though it was new and foreign, it was good. It felt right. He could even say it was one of the better things he could ever remember of his life, and the now with his human body.

Pursuing The Edge || Malevolent (Explicit)

Bringing John back to Arthur or being able to give him a body of his own had been the task way back when, trying to give them both the freedom and the choice. All the time through The Dreamlands had been that kind of ideation: save themselves and start a new life whether that was to work through what they had suffered together back in the human world in one body, or together in two separately.

They had been successful.

Gingerly Held || Malevolent

John said it all started out with a tickle.

It had originally been in passing. Arthur had ended up making some tea for John and nothing more was mentioned of it for the rest of the day. Arthur thought nothing of it. He figured it had been John worrying over his human experience. John was being John.

Warmer Are The Waters With You || Malevolent (Explicit)

All he had wanted at this point was some time to himself. The springs were always so welcoming, their hot waters always soothed his aches from nose to toe-tip. It was perfect, especially in the smaller alcoves of the huge bathhouse, a little safe haven for him to have for himself. And he had after hours access.

Ground Coffee and Fresh Tea || Malevolent

There was no in-between with Arthur, John had noticed. The man was either going eighty miles a minute or he dragged himself through the day with John urging him to do what needed to be done. Except with his early routine. Arthur always seemed… hurried. Restless. He bustled through his morning. Like if he didn’t get things done in a timely manner it would spell the end for him.

John would often observe and wonder what in the world this man was in a rush for.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

6, 15, and 20 <3

6. What task would you want to attempt yourself?

There are a lot of good options for that, but I think I'd like to try the season 5 task in which they had to get a ping-pong ball out of a pipe. Just because no one tried or even mentioned what I think is the obvious solution, and I'd like to find out if it would work. Just put some tape on the end of a broom handle and stick it down the drain pipe. Whether I'm right to think that's an incredibly obvious solution that would have worked great, or whether I'm wrong and I'm missing an obvious reason why it wouldn't work, I'd like to know.

15. Any unpopular opinions?

Love that I got four messages about this game before I started responding to them, and all four included this question. So here's my fourth unpopular opinion, and I'm going to go really unpopular for this one: I don't think Rosalind is a fucking nightmare. She does pretty cool stuff, actually.

20. Tell me about a TM moment that lives in your head rent-free.

Oh God, I could write a book on the subject. A solid 100,000-word volume with references and an acknowledgements section. I'll grab just a few that I can think of off the top of my head:

The look on Josh Widdicombe's face in the moments before they showed his tattoo, as he waited for maybe the highest stakes he'd ever had in finding out what level of laugh he'll get, because if this goes over badly then he has inked himself up for no reason.

Joe Lycett refusing to break eye contact with Alex Horne during their three-minute handshake. Total commitment to the bit.

I mean, everything about Wumar. "And he called the ball racist twice." "I’m devastated it was just me, and I’m absolutely shattered to get no points for something that, genuinely, when I look back on this calendar year, is one of the major things I’ve done with it." Always Seeing You Do Cool Stuff by The Diverse Stripes.

To go more recent, Judi Love singing House Queens.

Everything VCM tried as a way to surprise Alan Davies in the inventing a sport task.

Ed Gamble losing it on David Baddiel and a fly.

Jon Richardson getting asked if he wants to know what was under that table. "Not now, no!!"

Rose Matafeo's song about Greg and his brain full of corn.

Tim Key committing so hard to embarrassing Fred the Swede that he just embarrasses himself so much that he can hardly talk.

The first moment we saw Hugh Dennis' drawing of that woman in the caravan.

Paul Chowdhry looking Greg right in the eye and swearing up and down, with part of his face and body language, that every word he's saying makes sense to him. "Naked Twister, man."

The fucking drama of the vote on Joe Wilkinson's potato throw.

Sophie Duker licking all those things until they had to just stop the task.

Joe Thomas singing about Alex's death.

To go even more recent, Dara O'Briain losing his mind in the live task when Fern and John kept giving him useless words and he had to make a question out of them.

The entire bath tub task from season 4 pays absolutely zero dollars in rent for the fucking gigantic mansion with balconies and it's own 10-squre kilometre garden in which it comfortably resides in my head.

I mean, all of season 7? This list has gotten too long and I should stop it now, but all of season 7. If I had to choose one moment, Rhod Gilbert methodically tying up Alex like it's the most natural response to that task in the world. But really, all of season 7.

Oh, can't leave out the first moment that made me cry laughing and decide this show is going to live in my head for the rest of my life: Romesh Ranganathan not missing a single beat before hurling a watermelon onto the floor of the lab and then going feral on it.

[jdgo51]

The Day When Hope Was Born

Today's devotion is written by Tim Challies, author of Seasons of Sorrow

"The tree is trimmed and decorated and glowing with lights. The gifts are wrapped and tied with bows and arranged carefully beneath. The stockings are hung by the fire and bulging with trinkets and surprises and sweet delicacies. The table is set and waiting for a great feast to be laid out upon it. Christmas has come again — again with all its joys, with all its pleasures, with all its precious traditions.

But look again, look more carefully, look and see that there are fewer gifts than there were in years past. There is one less stocking than there was before. The table has been set with one less place. When the family gathers to celebrate this year, there will be one member who will not be gathering with the rest, one person who will not be home for Christmas, one person who will be sorely missed.

This will be the reality for so many families this season, so many families who have had to bid farewell to one of their own. And never do those losses stand out so starkly, never do they cut so deep, never do they cause so much pain as during the holidays, as during times of celebration. For holidays are about gathering with the ones we love, spending time with the ones God has given us, observing the season together.

This will be the reality for my family this Christmas, for just a couple of years ago, the Lord saw fit to call one of us to himself. My son Nick was seemingly healthy and well, thriving in life and preparing himself for marriage and pastoral ministry, when he very suddenly collapsed and died and was gone. Christmas has never been the same. Christmas never will be the same, never can be the same, for our little fellowship has been shattered, our little family has suffered a grievous loss, our little home circle has been broken.

My mind sometimes drifts back to the evening we learned the news that broke our hearts and changed our lives. My mind sometimes drifts back to the thought that flashed through it in that moment when my entire world was rocked: God knows what it is to have a son and God knows what it is to lose a son. And this thought reminds me today that even though Christmas is the day when the pain of my loss is particularly sharp, it is also the day when my hope is particularly strong. For without Christmas I would be despondent, but because of Christmas, I have the greatest of all hopes.

Christ had to be born for us.

The wonder of the Christian faith, the miracle that we celebrate every Christmas, is that God became man. The Son of God who had existed from all eternity, the God who had been present at the creation of the world, the God who holds together all things by the word of His power, took on flesh and was born as a weak, helpless, crying baby. He grew up surrounded by the chaos and sin of this world, He proclaimed the glorious message God had given Him, and at the end of it all, He was crucified and died. The Father witnessed the death of His beloved Son.

But that is not the whole story, of course, for death could not hold Him! Death could not keep back the One who lived a sinless life and died an atoning death. He left the tomb and ascended to Heaven and now prepares a place for each of us who have loved Him and believed in His name and received His forgiveness.

In order to save us, Christ had to die for us. And in order to die for us, Christ had to live for us. And in order to live for us, Christ had to be born for us.

It is at Christmas that we tell the beginning of the story of His incarnation, at Christmas that we celebrate His birth, at Christmas that we mark the dawning of hope. For when Christ was born on Christmas morning, hope was born with Him — the hope that our loved ones are not lost forever, but merely separated for us from a time, the hope that though we may grieve for a while, sorrow will at last give way to a joy beyond all we’ve known or even imagined. Our hope and our confidence is rooted and grounded in this day.

I wish Nick could be in our home this year to celebrate Christmas with us. But I know God has called him to a different home, a higher home, what I know to be a better home. And if Nick is experiencing nothing but happiness, as I truly believe he is, why would I spend the day in nothing but sadness? Why should I mourn as he rejoices? And so as we gather to celebrate Christmas, we’ll pause for at least a time to turn our hearts away from this home and instead fix them on the home above, the home where there is a much greater celebration, the home where Nick dwells with his Savior. We will fix our hearts on the time when all our tears will be dried and the time when the circle that has been broken will be fully and finally restored. And then we will return to celebrating the wonder of that baby in a manger, for this is the day when He was born — the day when hope was born."

Written for Devotionals Daily by Tim Challies, author of Seasons of Sorrow.