#Best rust hacks

[metalhoops]

Remember this post? 

They were in the belly of the beast. 

The Creel House stood resolute, tinged the colour of a freshly heal wound, reopened. The same sickly red stain of The Upside Down sky, brown boards blue-hued from strange smokes and cinder. Part of Eddie felt like he’d seen the house before, in some half-remembered nightmare. Deep in the back of his brain, where all strange primal fears were housed, there was a spot saved for the decaying manner. 

By all rights, Eddie shouldn’t have been in the house. If they’d followed the original plan, he’d have been on the roof of the trailer. It’d been Wheeler, of all people who’d changed things. She was a smart girl, too damn smart for her own good in Eddie’s opinion. She’d pointed out all the ways their plan could go wrong and as much as Eddie wanted to redeem the Munson name, he didn’t want to walk into a death trap if he could help it. 

Nancy was right. That didn’t change the creeping sense of dread he felt whenever he looked her way. It was like one of Vecna’s vines had made a home in his stomach and was creeping up towards his mouth each time the girl did something impressive. Eddie had the sneaking suspicion something was swaying his feelings towards her. Something with light brown hair, who had entered the Creel house brandishing a baseball bat like a medieval sword. 

Jesus H. Christ. Seeing Steve Harrington wield the tetanus trap of a baseball bat, full of splintering wood and rusted nails wasn’t a sight he’d ever pictured living to see. 

Drifting in from the wasteland beyond the open door, Eddie could hear his amps playing ‘Master of Puppets’ on the boom box they’d borrowed from the Harringtons’. The poor little player had never gotten the taste for good music. Eddie had to admit it was a good idea. 

He, Steve and Dustin set up the trap. Once the bats began to swarm the trailer the two older boys boosted Dustin up and out of the portal, much to the kid’s protest. They then snuck around the back of the trailer, while the girls waited in the woods ahead. Nancy had her sawn-off trained on the swarm. Robin had her Molotovs. Range weapons, waiting in the wings. He and Steve were the best at evasion. If this were a campaign, he’d say they made a pretty balanced party, all things considered. 

The interior of the house was worse than Eddie expected. It was filled with rotted vines and ash, making the air smell of must and mildew. Eddie’s brain kept telling him to turn tail and run, but he wouldn’t. He couldn’t. 

He shifted his shield from one hand to the next as they moved deeper into the house, channelling his nervous energy away from his feet. One misstep and their distraction would be for nothing. Their plan was a house of cards. One gust of wind and the whole damn thing would blow over. If Eddie screwed up Red, along with everyone else in the Creel house, would be dead before the world had time to end. 

Steve took the lead up the stairs like Eddie knew he would. He had a hero complex Eddie couldn’t unpick. Once everything was over, he had questions about what the party had seen the last three times they’d decided to dance with the devil in the pale moonlight. There was something about Steve Harrington he couldn’t put his finger on. Sure, trauma could change a person, Eddie was learning that lesson the hard way, but the man charging up the stairs towards their inevitable death in too-tight pants and an army jacket had some explaining to do. 

He wasn’t sure who’d done it in the end. Whose foot made first contact with the blackened tendrils, the dominos fell too fast to pinpoint an epicentre. Nancy's body jerked one way, while Steve was sent skyward. His back hit the walls of the house with a sickly wet thud, a mass of undulating vines threatening to swallow him whole. Robin was on the floor at the foot of the steps, hacking away at the vines with an axe. Eddie was pushed against the bannister, all the air fleeing his lungs. This was how he would die. 

The sound of distant wings grew ever louder as Eddie’s vision began to blacken around the edges. 

In Eddie’s fading vision, he watched as a sliver of light glinted off something overhead. The axe fell like a guillotine, too close to Eddie’s head for comfort. He was free. He took greedy gulps of air, his eyes making contact with Buckley’s. She looked as shocked as he did, like a nocturnal animal caught in floodlights.

They didn’t have time. Robin was off, desperately hacking skywards at the vines still ensnaring Steve. He’d managed to wedge the bat between the vine and his throat. Rusted nails dug deeper into the black mass as it attempted to constrict, but it also buried the nails deeper into Steve’s flesh. 

Eddie ran to help Nancy, her lips blue as her fingers blindly grasped for the shotgun that’d landed just out of reach. Nancy was smart, but like all people, the fear of death made her dumb. A bullet to the jugular wasn’t going to fix this. 

Eddie tried to slide his fingers between the vine and her throat, to relieve some of the pressure. His fingers kept slipping, sticky with sap or blood. He didn’t know. He wished he had a knife as he tried to untangle the vines from ensnaring her body. There was nothing more he could do. He had to sit and wait as he felt the fight begin to fade from her convulsing body. He listened distantly to Robin’s slew of curses as she hacked at drywall. For each vine cut from Steve’s body, there was another waiting to ensnare him. 

Life-or-death situations had a strange way of bringing one's true feelings to the surface. Eddie crouched beside Nancy, his hand clawing at the vine encircling her throat, watching as her panic-ridden eyes flickered across his face. He noticed her hand twitching up trying to pry the vine from its hold on her throat and Eddie’s arm. She was so weak he hadn’t noticed her attempt. He ran a thumb absentmindedly back and forth across her knuckles, trying to soothe her. 

“Hey, no. Hey. You’re fine, Wheeler. You’re okay. Slow breaths, alright? You’ve got this,” he muttered hating how uncertain he sounded, how strained his voice was. 

He didn’t hate Nancy. He’d hate himself if he let Steve’s chance of a storybook ending die in his arms but Christ that was a lot of pressure. 

He crouched there until his fingers turned white and an axe descended upon the vines, cutting them both free. Wheeler gasped, taking deep shaky breaths as she squeezed Eddie’s hand, locking eyes with Buckley over his shoulder. She schooled her features when Steve came into view. His throat wept blood but he was upright, which was more than Eddie could’ve hoped for. 

The vines began to retreat for a reason they couldn’t discern. The group rushed to the second-floor landing, as the swarm of bats descended upon the house, rushing in through the open door. Eddie watched as something shifted in Steve’s stance. He twisted the baseball bat in his hands, familiarising himself with the weapon before taking a few practice swings. 

“Keep going. I’ll hold ‘em off,” Steve spoke. 

Eddie knew it wasn’t a good plan. He knew what happened to the people who stayed behind. Steve had warned him about playing the hero. Eddie wasn’t going to let him have all the fun. 

He held his shield aloft in front of himself, trying to see how much of his body he could brace behind it. If this were a campaign, Eddie knew fighting something that nasty on your own would be akin to a death sentence. 

“I’m staying. Even the odds,” Eddie spoke, as though two boys fresh off the heels of adolescence taking on a swarm of hundreds of unearthly horrors was in any way shape or form, even.  They just had to hold them off until Vecna was dead. The hellscape couldn’t survive without him. Cut off the head and the rest would follow. 

If they had more time, maybe things would’ve gone differently. Maybe they would’ve come up with a better plan, but there was no time. Robin looked poised for an argument or a thought-out speech but Nancy cocked the shotgun and dragged her forward. She knew the silent promise that came with goodbyes. 

The boys were faced with a black mass of writhing wings. They found a rhythm with ease. Steve swung his bat in a perfect arch, sending any unfortunate hell spawn in its wake flying into Eddie’s waiting shield, empaled on the jagged nails. 

Eddie was surprised at how easy it was to find something akin to peace at that moment. He and Steve knew how to move around each other, and how to anticipate each other. They watched the other’s back and oftentimes found themselves back-to-back. Steve’s broad shoulders were grounding where they pressed into Eddie’s. It was the world's strangest game of baseball. With Steve at his side, the horror of the moment seemed to fall away. 

They worked better together than Eddie could’ve imagined and lasted longer than he’d thought. Yet, they couldn’t hold out much longer. The room smelled of rotted iron and Eddie’s sides throbbed. He was too hopped up on adrenaline for the seriousness of the situation to take hold, but one look at Steve in his periphery let him know they were both in bad shape. 

The boy was covered in blood. The wound in his side was torn open once more. Someone could trace their movement by the bloody footprints littering the floor. 

They were dying. 

Eddie tried not to let the enormity of the situation swallow him whole. 

“Hey? How’s it going in there? You killin’ the son of a bitch or just admiring the view?” Eddie screamed above the beating of wings. When a response didn’t come, Steve and Eddie exchanged worried looks. 

“Rob?” Steve yelled, casting a glance through the doorway. 

The moment of distraction left him wide open for a bat to swoop, wrapping its twisted tail around Steve’s arm and tugging him upwards. Eddie acted fast, grabbing Steve’s ankle, and pulling him back to the relative safety of the rotting boards, bloated and warping from the mingling blood and black, bat ooze. 

“I can’t find the lighter,” Robin’s voice called at last. It must have fallen from her pocket when the vines attacked. Shit. 

Eddie plunged his hands into the depths of his jacket pocket and thanked the god he didn’t believe in for his habit of chain smoking in times of crisis. He’d brought another lighter. 

“Watch my six Stevie, I’ve got one,” Eddie called, rushing into the room leaving no space to argue. 

Nancy had slung the rifle over her shoulder and had taken Robin’s axe, making short work of the few bats that’d managed to sneak past his and Steve’s defences. 

Eddie ran to Robin’s side, noticing how the girl’s eyes swelled at seeing him. He was definitely in bad shape then. Her hands trembled as she held out the bottle. Time and time again, Eddie tried to light the cloth. It wasn’t working.

Nothing was working. Panic finally took hold of Eddie. They were going to die. He wished he could say he made peace with that knowledge, but he couldn’t. 

“Shit, shit, shit,” Eddie mumbled as the lighter continued to dull and spark. 

“What’s going on? I’m coming in,” Steve yelled as he appeared in the doorway barring the opening as best he could, trying to hold the flimsy wood as it buckled beneath the bats' weights. 

Steve’s eyes shifted over the scene, assessing the situation within seconds. 

He charged forward, taking the bottle from Robin’s hands, and letting the rag fall to the floor. 

“Nancy, get ready to shoot,” Steve called as he stalked closer to Vecna’s dangling body. A look passed between the two. The glance told Nancy everything she needed to know.

“Eds, lighter,” Steve called over his shoulder extending his hand. Eddie blinked, tossing it to Steve. 

Eddie would remember what happened next for the rest of his life. Whether that life lasted for minutes or decades, it didn’t matter. There was no such thing as a perfect moment, but what followed was as close as they could come. 

Steve took a deep swig of vodka, filling his cheeks with the bitter liquid and held Eddie’s lighter aloft, the small flame illuminating Steve’s features, a final spark of warmth amongst the blue-grey walls and ash of the house. His hands dripped blood, what was left of his skin was pale from the loss of it. 

Steve spat the alcohol in a perfect arc, through the flame, breathing fire over Vecna’s body, catching the dark wizard alight. Steve was a fallen king turned dragon. A higher kind of nobility. Breathtaking, unearthly, and dangerous. 

As Nancy littered Vecna’s body with bullets, Eddie kept his eyes trained on Steve, his heart in his throat. Eddie wasn’t one for sudden affections. His heart was an alley cat, wary and distrustful by nature. Yet, despite everything, Eddie fell in love with Steve at that moment. His heart soared straight past ‘crush’ and on through to adoration. Maybe it was the blood loss but with Vecna’s dead body on the floor at their feet, he knew at that moment, his life would be inextricably connected to Steve’s. 

The boy shot him a smile over his shoulder, his lip bloody, vodka smattering his chin. The room smelled of kindling. 

The girls rushed to Steve, taking turns embracing him. The sound of bats at the door had finally stopped. It was over. They’d won. 

Eddie watched on helplessly as Steve rested his forehead against Robin’s, holding the girl close, his face contorting in pain. Robin muttered a string of incoherent words just loud enough for Steve to hear before pulling back. 

Nancy was next. Their hug was less feverish, more familiar. Nancy’s chin rested on Steve’s shoulder and Steve’s hands gripped the back of her shirt as they had a hundred times before. They looked good together. It made Eddie ache. He looked away. 

When he looked back, to his surprise Robin had scooped Nancy into a too-tight hug, blathering about how petrified she’d been and how amazing Nancy was. Much to his surprise, Steve was looking at him, his arms open in offering. 

The others were close. They had gone through hell together. Eddie was the outsider. It felt strange being offered a place amongst them, but he didn’t know when he’d get another opportunity, so he strode forward letting Steve’s arms encircle his body. 

It wasn’t the kind of hug he’d expected. It wasn’t feverish, like Robin’s or as solid and steadfast as Nancy’s. Steve clung to him, his hands gripped at Eddie’s forearms, as though trying to map out the uncharted territory before pulling him closer. His hands snaked around Eddie’s body, finally finding a home, clutching at the shirt fabric around his shoulder blades.

Eddie didn’t know what to do with his hands, finding them slipping beneath Steve’s jacket, just above his waist. His head found its way to Steve’s shoulder and Steve’s did the same. He could feel the boy’s heart pounding. He smelled of sweat, blood, and alcohol. 

“You’re a total badass, Steve Harrington.” Eddie gasped. His breath was hot against Steve’s ear. The boy chuckled, causing a shiver to run up his spine.

“I don’t know, Munson. That’s high praise comin’ from a hero,” Steve spoke.

“I’m not-,” Eddie began, but Steve wasn’t having it. 

“Take a compliment dude. You went to Mordor,” Steve spoke in the tone of a man who still didn’t know exactly what ‘Mordor’ was. 

Hawkins’ golden boy, trying to ‘speak nerd’ to him wasn’t quelling any of Eddie’s feelings. 

“Yeah well, next time we go somewhere let’s make it nice. Check out The Rockies, The Grand Canyon, maybe California.” 

Later Eddie would blame the blood loss for being so bold. 

Steve pulled back, just far enough to look at Eddie’s face. To his surprise, Steve shot him a goofy grin. 

“I like the sound of that.” 

[littlemisssquiggles]

Something rather curious I noticed about the Curious Cat...

One of my favourite moments from today’s new fifth episode was the scene where RWBY are attacked by one of Neo’s Jabberwalkers only to be rescued by the Rusted Knight on the back of his faithful stead. As I mentioned in a previous post, I felt that scene was rather cool and I absolutely love the new theme that was featured in it.

However; in rewatching this particular scene, I noticed something rather interesting in respect to the Curious Cat.

As some of ya’ll may recall---while RWBY were in the strange Lotus Market gathering ingredients for the parfait, there was an anthropomorphic bird vendor. When we’re first introduced to this feathered salesman, he was just innocently trying to sell his mud cookies to passersby, RWBY and Cat included.

But when we next see the salesman, he suddenly becomes this fearsome warrior, eyes ablaze, as he suddenly charged bravely into the fray to fend off the Jabberwalker; protecting RWBY. A farcry from his original gentle demeanour at the start.

It was during this scene where Ruby turns to the Curious Cat and questions it on why the Cookie Salesman was suddenly there fending off the Jabberwalker, only for Cat to reply that it “gave the salesmen something new to do in the moment”?

“Run!” “What’s he doing here?”

“I gave him something new to do for a moment, now go! Your friends need to get big again or we’re Jabberwalker dinner!”

What did the Cat mean by giving the Cookie Bird something new to do?

Early in the episode when the Curious Cat was explaining the workings of the Ever After, he mentioned that the denizens of the Ever After each have a purpose that they live out until they either ascend or are called back when they stray too far from their original purpose or something like that.

Throughout previous episodes whenever the Curious Cat was around, I noticed him doing something peculiar---giving a piece of his heart to other Ever After beings like the Red King and the Herbalist who weren’t acting like their usual selves.

In giving his heart to them, the Curious Cat was able to help the other characters, turning them back towards the right path.

So…the Curious Cat has the ability to alter one’s heart and change their purpose?

Is the Curious Cat some kind of guardian angel type of character---a being whose sole design is to ensure that all denizens of the Ever After discover and fulfill their given purpose, only intervening when they stray away and run the risk of falling or not ascending?

What would happen if the Curious Cat was the one to stray away from its original purpose?

In today’s episode, we saw the Curious Cat use its power to help RWBY by “altering” the Cookie Bird. Kind of like hacking into a computer program and making it work differently from its original programmed functions.

So basically the Cat hacked or possessed the Cookie Bird to use him as a weapon for his own benefit. And while his intentions were just as it was only doing it to aid the helpless Team RWBY, I’d like to believe that that is NOT how the Cat is supposed to use its abilities.

So I’m thinking, what would happen if the Cat ended up in a similar position as the Herbalist and the Red Prince?

What would happen if it somewhat starts to abuse its powers further for the sake of helping RWBY; unintentionally straying from its original purpose as a “helpful guide” despite its best efforts to aid RWBY throughout their journey in the Ever After?

What if…much like the Red Prince and the Herbalist, the Curious Cat will end up needing to be called back to be fixed and it will be all RWBY’s fault that it ended up in such a position?

Or what would happen if the Curious Cat fulfilled its purpose and undergoing its own ascension?

I have a theory that at some point, Ruby is going to end up falling deeper into damnation and it will be the Curious Cat sacrificing itself to save her in some way by giving the last piece of itself to mend her broken heart and forcefully remind her of WHAT she is supposed to be! A hero. A warrior. A protector of humanity. A huntress.

What will become of this Curious Cat should it do this?

What will be the next phase of life for it if it were to ascend after fulfilling its purpose of aiding others in realizing theirs?

And an even curiouser question:

What would become of the Curious Cat if it were to be eaten by the Jabberwalker?

The age ole saying is that it was curiousity that killed the cat, right?

So imagine if...this episode foreshadowed the eventual death of the Curious Cat and when that time comes, it will be all RWBY or rather Ruby's fault?

Let that thought sink in.

But yeah, these are just some further thoughts that came to mind for me after today’s episode that I wanted to share.

~LMS (2023)

[heraldofavalir]

shoulder the sky

(read on ao3)

Here is how the story goes on: mud up to her ankles, the buzz of magic lingering in the air like gulping down static, and the stench of rot. Elody is more than familiar with the smell, knows her way around a battlefield, knows the ways in which death announces itself. It blows in from ahead of her, on the road, and she almost—almost—goes around.

There are times when a fight is needed. There are times when a fight is best avoided. Her numbers are few; she picked a handful of her knights to accompany her, on this one, last, desperate search for allies. If she leads them into a trap, walks them into something for which they are unprepared, then that will be the end.

She is tired. But she is not ready for that.

So she almost gives the order to find a different path. But the rot is thick, and smells like not just flesh, but also wood and cloth and perhaps fruit, something growing that undoubtedly is no longer. And that buzz of magic—difficult to ignore, that. She is here for anything that could give her an edge. Anything to reclaim her kingdom, save her people.

She calls her knights to a halt.

“I’m going to investigate,” she says. “If I do not return, or if you hear me give the order to do so, proceed back to Shoeberg. I don’t want anyone taking foolish risks.”

They want to protest, she can tell. They will not. She is their princess.

(armor is so much heavier than a gown, but she has learned that a crown and a helm weigh much the same)

It is raining, a steady drizzle. The mud sucks at her boots. Mace in hand, she walks forward, and the buzz grows stronger. Rattling her bones, her teeth. She grimaces.

She sees the pumpkin first, massive and dead, hollowed out and falling apart. There is furniture scattered about here, and it sends shivers up her spine even before she understands what she is seeing, sees the twisted malformity, sees a human face here and a human arm there and she can only hope that this was furniture transformed and not people, because either way is grotesque and terrible but the latter would be worse.

There are bodies. People. Animals. Much of it not fresh. Splintered wagons. Remnants of armor, swords. Torn clothing, bones picked clean and bones still glistening. It is easy to guess what they fell victim to, and she watches the furniture warily, her arm loose and ready, mace held steadily. But it does not stir, and though the magic still hangs here like a plague of locusts, it feels purposeless. Aimless. An aftershock, a release, a last violent cry.

She picks through the battlefield. This is familiar. It is not only mud on her boots. She finds fresher bodies; a few days old at most, only just begun to decompose. An old man, clutching a book to his chest; she wonders if it was worth dying for. A young woman, briars curling around her skin, and further inspection reveals that the thorns grow from her flesh rather than the ground. They weave around her like an embrace, and Elody does not try to move her.

She finds the young girl between two hills. Her stoicism cracks; she has seen many corpses. Not so many dead children. The girl is surrounded by furniture, some of it whole, some of it hacked to pieces. She fought.

Elody crouches. Closes the girl’s eyes. Breathes in and out.

There are more bodies, older. Dead horses. A cat wearing a cape and boots, someone’s beloved pet or a sentient creature in its own right; impossible to say which. Torn belongings, rusted swords, a child’s doll, a puppet half devoured by termites and covered in moss.

She finds the fairy. Dead. Dead for a long time, by the looks of her, though the strength of the magic here tells her that that cannot be right. The fairy’s face is frozen in a howl, her eyes glassy and wild and something deeply unnatural about her state of decay.

Elody does not think that there is a threat here. Not anymore. She feels a bit of relief,

(she does not hold with fairies, not their promises and not their curses)

but mostly just an emptiness. Perhaps determination, if she is feeling generous.

One last time, she inspects the fairy. Just to be sure that she is dead. No threat.

Satisfied that she has discerned the source of the rot, she almost does not see Gerard.

Almost.

(here is how the story goes on, and here is why: the story must go on because the story is ever after, and there is no beginning to that and there is no end, because the ever after is implied in the once upon a time and no beginning is true and no ending either because there is always another story and it does not stop)

(once upon a time, there was a frog prince in a pond)

(once upon a time, there was a boy who was a child who was a child around the wrong person)

(once upon a time, there was a princess with a golden ball)

(once upon a time, there was a girl who made a friend)

It doesn’t register, at first. She sees him. Knows him. Thinks, what is he doing here? Thinks, that’s odd, because she doesn’t know where her husband is because the castle has fallen and her people are scattered and she has had so many other things to worry about than tracking down which group of refugees Gerard fled with, which band of children and elderly. Because Gerard fled, of course; she never considered he would do anything else.

(because he is alive, of course; she never considered he could be anything else)

The image is so incongruous. Gerard belongs in the castle, eyes shining and cheeks flushed with wine. Gerard belongs in the castle, willfully ignoring the rest of the world and all it has come to. Gerard belongs in the castle, trying to pretend that his eyes have not changed and his skin has not grown sallow

(she is not blind)

and that everything is just fine.

Gerard has never belonged on a battlefield. No matter how often she wished that he could just be there for her, with her, at her side. He does not belong on a battlefield.

She takes a step. Stumbles. Her knees sink into the mud next to him. The mud is not just mud.

“Gerard,” she says. Her voice is a whisper, a rasp. She puts her hand on his chest, just over where the glass shard protrudes. His body is stiff. Flies land on his face; she bats them aside, but they come back.

He is far more froglike than the last time she saw him. How long ago was that? She doesn’t remember.

(she does)

His hands are bloody, torn to shreds. One of them lies near the glass—a spear, if anything, though no spear she has ever seen the like of.

The flies keep returning. She can’t get them off.

“Gerard,” she says again, like that will do anything, like saying his name will call him to her, will force life into a heart that stopped beating days ago when she wasn’t there. She feels a scream in her throat, and she swallows it, swallows the scream and swallows the nausea and the only noises that escape her are little hitching gasps, because it has been a very long time since she cried and it seems that she cannot allow herself to do so even now, not properly.

This is no place for you, she wants to tell him. Wants to shout. She has never shouted at him. Not even when she was angry. And she used to be angry, used to resent him, and all of that is suddenly gone because he is gone and there will be no chance to be angry at him again, and there will be no chance to fix what they had or even decide if she wanted to, if the war ever ended and she came home alive.

This is no place for you. What were you doing here?

She reaches for the shard. She does not want the shard to be in him. She reaches for it, slices her hand open. Retreats.

The damn flies are—

And he didn’t even know how to fight.

He didn’t know how to fight, and this fight found him all the same, and he is dead. He has laid here for days, and he is going to lay here longer, because this glass spear pins him to the ground and she cannot take it out. So ends Prince Gerard of Greenleigh, far from home, far from family, far from anyone who lo—

Even her mind cannot form around the word.

(this is no place for you she wants to scream and something in her wails and this is no place for me and it is no place for you or me but she has not had the luxury of caring about that for so long and she cannot start now and she cannot go back to when things were easy and good and falling in love with a frog was the simplest thing in the world and when she looked at him she felt sparks and fireworks and not hollow frustration and not this, not this gaping wound this gaping nothing where a person should be)

(this is how the story goes on, and who dictates, in the end, what is a place for a prince and princess?)

The flies—

“Get off of him,” she says. Barely a noise at all. “Leave him be.”

She swats at them. They return. She leans over his face, holds him. Holds him like she should have been here to hold him days ago, because she does not remember the last time she held him, and now, this will be the last time, and he is dead.

Hitching gasps. Nausea rolling in her stomach. A bleeding hand. An embrace unfelt. The whisper of his name.

This is what she can offer. Her eyes are dry. She can’t keep the flies away.

(the story goes on, and this world does not end because Gerard has left it)

----------

(When she departs from the castle for the final time, she has not slept in the same bed as him for more than three weeks. He still comes to see her off. He has taken to wearing shirts with increasingly high collars. She has pretended not to notice his lack of a nose, or the way his eyes are drifting slowly apart.

She has wondered, occasionally, if it hurts. She has not asked. Asking would require talking about it. She has not talked to her husband about anything in a while. She’s stopped trying.

“You won’t be gone long, right?” he asks. He shifts from foot to foot. Agitation. Maybe discomfort. He seems to be having a little more trouble with his stance today, with standing up straight.

A million responses flit to her tongue. She chooses a more neutral one.

“I’ll be gone for as long as it takes to eradicate the threat Snowhold poses us,” she says.

“Right, but like—that’s not gonna take—” He trails off, gesturing.

There is so much fear in his eyes. And it’s not that she didn’t know. Not that she didn’t know Gerard has never been able to stop looking over his shoulder whenever the dogs bray. Not that she didn’t know that some part of Gerard has always stayed in that pond.

It’s just that she dismissed it. Thought the past was in the past. And for a long time, that worked fine, until the shadows knocked at their door.

How much can she blame him, really, for wanting to draw the curtains and hide in the illusion of safety?

“It will take however long it takes,” she says. “I’ll—I’ll try not to be long.”

It’s the only comfort she’s willing to give him. She knows very well that this might take months, or years. Snowhold’s might is nothing to scoff at, and Greenleigh is not a large kingdom. This will not be an easy war; there is no such thing as an easy war to begin with.

She might not return at all.

But Gerard can’t confront that. She looks at him and feels nothing, and she does not have the energy to try, once again, to explain to him how important this is, how great the danger and how heavy her duty. She certainly does not have the energy to try, once again, to persuade him to take on some of the burden that she once thought they would share.

So: pithy words that she knows he’ll accept and wishes he wouldn’t.

“Okay,” Gerard says. So easily. Bitterness flares in her chest. “Just—stay safe, alright?” And then, he tacks on, “We’ll have a celebration when you get back. A big one. Party of the year. We’ll make all your favorites.”

Do you know what those are? she thinks, which is uncharitable, because he does. And then, Do you understand how little that matters to me right now? which is far closer to the mark.

“Alright, Gerard,” she says. She mounts her horse. She rides out, her knights behind her, her banner streaming. She does not look back.)

----------

(The bitter truth: she knows he loved her. Dearly. Above all else, if not enough to confront responsibility, if not enough to be what she needed.

An even more bitter truth: there are times she wishes that it could have been enough. That she could have allowed herself to stay, to shut out the Times of Shadow and dance until the morning came. To drink and be merry and charm all the people and fall into his arms and sleep soundly.

There are times when she wonders if she was the problem.)

----------

For the first time, she meets a princess who wears armor, like her.

“Princess Elody?” the other princess says. “I’m so glad to finally meet you.”

And Princess Cinderella of Elegy tells her a story.

(a story of stories, and this is how it goes on)

Elody considers the idea that she has lost the capacity to feel. Lost it in the mud and the blood next to her husband’s corpse, or before that in the swing of her mace into an enemy combatant’s head, or when she rode away from home and did not look back then or ever again, or the first time she woke up and stared at Gerard and her chest was empty and the sparks were gone.

She understands, now. Everything about her life suddenly makes sense. She had a fate written out for her, a love story prescribed. And the story went on, and she lost the happily but not the ever after, and all of her fighting has meant nothing at all. It’s not the part of the story that matters. She has lost everything and gained nothing, and the only thing that will be remembered about her is that she kissed a frog and made him into a prince.

And she feels numb.

“I’m sorry,” Cinderella says. “I know this is a lot to take in.”

“Yes,” she allows. “Why have you come to me?”

“There’s a group of us,” Cinderella says. “We’re not—content, let’s say, to let the fairies shove us back into our stories. We’re tired of destiny, tired of their little project. We intend to stop them, by whatever means possible, and we’d like you to join us.”

(elody, too, is tired)

“Because I’m a princess?” she says.

Cinderella’s lips twitch. “We do have a bit of a theme,” she says. “But it’s more that—you deserve to know. We all deserve to know that we don’t get to make our own choices. And we deserve the chance to change that.”

She considers the idea.

“I don’t know if I can believe you,” she says.

“That’s okay,” Cinderella says. “You don’t need to. I’ve given you a lot to ponder.”

“Where would we be going?”

“I told you about the other worlds,” Cinderella says. “One of our number, Sleeping Beauty, has awoken in a different one. We would need to go there to find her; we think that continuing our efforts in this world would be immensely more difficult than trying to move on to the next.”

Intentions, efforts. It’s all so very vague.

“I would abandon my people here,” she says, chewing on the words. Tasting them. “My duty.”

Cinderella’s gaze is even. But it is deep, and there is a vast sadness there. And an understanding. True understanding. Elody has craved understanding for so long

(though perhaps not like this, not this terrible knowledge, not fate and destiny and world upon worlds pressing down upon her, not the dawning realization that none of it, none of it at all really matters)

and here it is, in this woman’s eyes and her stance and the way she grips her polearm and holds her helm beneath her arm in a perfect mirror of how Elody has carried herself for years now.

“It’s your choice,” Cinderella says. “If you don’t want to come, that’s alright. I understand completely.”

And here is the thing: she looks at Cinderella and sees glass. Glass armor, glass helm, glass polearm. That last, in particular, catches her attention. She can trace a pattern, all the way back to the shard in Gerard’s chest.

And so, another understanding: Gerard was caught in a fight he should never have been near, that he know nothing of. A war that was never his. A casualty of circumstance, of forces far bigger than him, far greater than he could ever hope to match. Senseless loss. Meaningless.

“There’s nothing left for me here,” she says, and it tastes like truth.

She meets Cinderella’s eyes, and sees that she understands that, too.

----------

(A meeting: other princesses. A woman with lips red as the rose, skin white as snow and cold as ice, footsteps dogged by the dead. A woman smiling, a woman vivacious and bubbly and a mask to face the world, hair a whirl and words calculating. A woman who ate the beast and became the beast and who holds books so gently in her hands.

They tell her who they’re looking for. A princess by the sea. A princess of thorns.

She tells them much. She finds understanding. Company. Friends. Sisters. She does not tell them about Gerard.

By a count of years, she is older than all of them, older by a decade at least. But some of them have eyes that are ancient, and sometimes, she feels like she is the child among them, fumbling her way alone in the dark. But she is not alone, because they are there; or maybe it is that they are all alone together, all alone in the dark.

And so.

A journey: the gaps between the worlds, horrible to comprehend, difficult to walk, the shadow of the gander’s wings, beating them down into the earth. Troubled dreams; a woman’s face enters her mind, a book and a name—Scheherazade.

She is not alone. That is the most important thing. She is no longer alone. And if she is, she is alone with them.)

----------

They take the castle at dawn. The Snow Queen refuses to relent, and Elody finds that she has little mercy in her heart for her. She has lost everything to Snowhold, has little inclination to give quarter to Snowhold’s allies. There is no beauty in death, little satisfaction, but at the end of the day the castle is theirs, the library is theirs, and Snow White finally has the time to tell them why her mood has been almost warm.

“Sleeping Beauty was here,” she says. “She and her friends knew where the princess by the sea is. They’re going to find her and come back.” A smile, an eager twirl of her hands, more emotion than Elody has ever seen from her.

“We’ll be seven,” Cinderella breathes.

Elody knows that these princesses have been waiting longer than she has. The relief in Cinderella’s voice is palpable. Despite that, there is little hope—but perhaps that is to be expected.

Snow White keeps darting glances at her.

“It’s not just that,” Snow White says. “Several of her companions possess true books. One of them, an old witch has one, and it’s almost entirely blank. I offered to take a look at it for him, but he bargained dearly for it, didn’t want to part with it—but with this library here, we’ll be able to discern its nature and how best to use it. And, and—the place I saw in my mirror, the palace made of books, they’ve been there. They know where it is. It’s not in the Neverafter at all, but somewhere in between worlds.”

It’s positively an effusive speech, from her. The Beast looks intrigued; books are her wheelhouse. Rapunzel’s hair drifts about her head, some strands slow and ponderous and others moving whip-coil fast.

“She does move quick,” Cinderella says. Surprise, even a bit of awe. Affection. How easily, these women accept others into their fold. How easily they show warmth. Elody finds herself looking forward to meeting this Sleeping Beauty.

(she has never had sisters before, only distant parents and then even they were gone and she was alone in the castle and her closest connection after that was a frog in a pond a frog who was her friend once upon a time)

“She’s not kept idle,” Snow White agrees. Another glance at Elody—why is she doing that? But then, another glance at Cinderella, even less certain. “There were other things they said. Other things that—well, I’m not certain if now is the time. We’ve already so much to think about, so much to do.”

“One problem at a time,” the Beast says. “The library is large; cataloging anything of use to us will take some days.”

“Time is something we may not have much of,” Cinderella says. “But if we await Sleeping Beauty and her companions—perhaps we can afford a little.”

Rapunzel’s eyes in particular gleam brightly; already, she has sent her hair spinning throughout the castle, and Elody knows that she will leap at the chance to become more entrenched, to make it hers, to weave through the rooms and make tea for the five of them, for the seven of them, for seven of them and more.

And for her part—there is much to do, yes. So much left to fight. To plan. But for a time, they will stay, and Elody has not relaxed in a very long time, has forgotten how to let down her guard, and even here, she cannot do it. None of them can.

But maybe, for a little while, some rest.

---

(and this is how the story goes on)

---

(and cinderella walks into the hall and with her is a princess that elody has seen somewhere before like an itch in the back of her mind and with her is)

---

It’s not a gut-punch, seeing him again. It’s not a revelation. It’s not all the air leaving the room, or sparks suddenly bursting in a dead heart, or tears welling up and overflowing. She has not cried in a long time; now is not an exception.

What it is, is going for a breath to find that her lungs have forgotten what air is. It is the long-ago scream, still trapped but making itself known, beating at the cage of her throat like a rabid thing. It is hands that do not shake and knees that do not tremble, because her muscles don’t see movement as an option and the marrow of her bones is as frozen as the crown on the decapitated head out on the balcony upstairs.

Gerard walks in—alive. He is not quite the same. He is all frog and almost no man, for all that he still strides on two feet. He wears a sword sheathed at his hip; it appears functional rather than decorative. He is a little rougher, a little more ragged, something a little shadowed in his eyes.

He hugs her. She hugs him back.

(she is holding a corpse, and the flies won’t stop landing on his face, and she has never felt more powerless)

She means to keep herself distant. It should be easy; this is not her world, not her Gerard. She’d even thought about it in a vague way, the possibility that she might see him somewhere here, alive and well. Steeled herself against it. She means to be aloof, to speak to him civilly and cordially and without any weight to their interactions at all. But then he talks about the bigger picture and the things of him and—

She can’t.

She can’t—

She maintains her composure. She’s good at that. But she asks for privacy, clears the room, because—well. He obviously has things to say. Things he should be saying to the Elody of this world, no doubt. But he says that he won’t trouble her with the things of him, and it’s such a Gerard thing to say and so very not a Gerard thing to say all at the same time, clumsy and awkward as ever and self-deprecating in a way that is entirely new, and something in her shatters a little more just from the way he’s looking at her.

(the bitter truth: he loves her. that’s the way the story goes. that’s always the way the story goes. and maybe she is the problem, if he can keep loving her and she can’t keep loving him, but if she is the problem then it is because the problem has been put on her shoulders without her looking for it, written into her story without her permission, and she has never asked to be remembered as the princess who fell in love with a frog)

(it’s so hard to parse out questions of fault when she doesn’t know if anything of herself is her own)

He apologizes. It’s difficult to listen to.

Because here is the thing: they made it to the end of their story. They made it to the happily ever after. And then it didn’t end, and everything in her life that has been hardest for her is everything that will not be remembered, will not be written. Everything that was struggle, everything that was difficult, that is what the fairies want to erase.

(once upon a time, there was a princess who went to war, but that is not how the story starts, isn’t even in the middle, so who can give those words weight?)

She cannot be angry with him for being what their story made him to be. She cannot be angry with him for supposing the story was over, because if not for the Times of Shadow and the incessant beat of the Gander’s wings, it would have been. She cannot be angry with him.

But she still cannot explain. Not really. She can try, and hope that he hears what she means. But she still lacks the energy.

Words are just words. She doesn’t have the strength to be someone’s inspiration

(not when all she ever wanted was for him to stand by her side of his own volition, because he decided it was right, because he wanted to do it, not when all she ever wanted was an equal partner on equal ground)

and she does not have the voice to express her disappointment when he tells her he would have done nothing, nothing at all, if he didn’t know she was here.

Words are just words. And so many of his—are the right ones. Are, maybe, things she wanted to hear. Maybe he has changed. Maybe he has grown. Maybe there are coals here that can be fanned back to life; maybe the embers aren’t dead just yet.

But this isn’t even her Gerard.

At the end of the day, she doesn’t know what to feel. Doesn’t know what to do with a husband-not-hers who apologizes and claims her as inspiration and professes to be better and puts the ball entirely in her court.

(doesn’t know what to do with a husband that breathes, with a story that continues, and she’s sick of ever after, would rather just live happily, but that’s not going to happen anytime soon, it seems)

(once upon a time, a frog pushed a golden ball out of a lily pond, and it’s not because he was kind or funny or someone worth befriending but rather because that’s just how the story goes)

So she leaves the room. That’s easier. To leave him behind, to pretend he never came back in the first place.

----------

(They have time, now. Of that, she is certain. Ever after never ends. They’ll have all the time in the world to figure this out. If there’s anything to figure out.

Part of her wants that. Part of her wants nothing more than to learn this new version of him, to allow herself to hope that he really has changed. Part of her wants to learn his friends, too, this motley assembly that he came in with, that were so eager to jump to his cause and who he is—comfortable with, at the very least. These people with whom he seems to be a little more settled in his skin.

They will have time. She will have time. She can afford to take this slowly, inch by inch. To be certain before she allows him anywhere near her heart. To let down her walls as painlessly as possible, and to have time to build them back up again if that’s what she needs, what she decides.

They’re all together in this castle, now. They will have time.)

----------

She should have known better. Is there anyone to blame but herself for allowing her to hope?

(she hadn’t even realized, how much she was hoping)

Maybe this is just how the story goes, though in her heart of hearts, she knows that this isn’t written in any book. Her narrative was never supposed to twist toward war. His was never supposed to lead beyond the pond. And so here they are, another castle but the same old song; she stays, and he flees.

(after what was perhaps the most frustrating conversation of her life and really, what was she supposed to do with any of what he was telling her, and she can’t possibly believe that he was being truthful, not now, not like this, even if there’s a voice in the back of her mind that takes his words and takes the looks in her friends’ eyes and whispers doubt and whispers what if)

“It’ll be alright,” Cinderella says. She doesn’t sound like she believes herself. Elody shakes her head.

She thinks he looks back. Does he look back? It’s so hard to tell; the sunlight gleams on the snow and renders her blind.

Does it matter? Does any of it?

(he has left her so many times, and what is one more in the face of that, what is an emotion as foolish as hope)

The ramparts are the only thing holding her up as she watches them go, a party of six fading into dots against the snow, and then vanishing. Cinderella and Snow White are steady presences at her side, bulwarks of empathy and compassion, and they know. They understand. They have lived so many lives and she only one, but they still understand the loss. They understand what it is to be the one who has to keep fighting. They understand what it is to be left behind.

They understand, but she’s still so cold.

It’s not until she goes back inside that she realizes she’s been weeping. She is capable of crying after all; whether she’s crying for this fresh betrayal or a corpse pinned to the mud or the loss of all her innocence or the joy she once felt in a castle that was hers as light spilled from every room and fireworks burst overhead and Gerard cracked a stupid joke and she laughed and laughed and laughed—whether she is crying for one of those things or all of them or none of them, she couldn’t say.

And it’s all too little, too late, in the end.

----------

(“Hey, Elody?” the whisper comes. She’s snuffed her candle. Her room is lit by moonlight.

“Yeah?” she whispers back. Gerard is a formless lump in his little bed on her nightstand, but she thinks she can make out the yellow gleam of his eyes.

“Are you okay?” he says. “It’s just that you seem a little stressed.”

“I’m okay,” she says. “It’s just, with my parents gone—and sometimes I feel—”

Like I have no idea what I’m doing. Like I’m all alone in the world. Like this is a position I wasn’t made for, and now I have no choice but to fill it, to grow and to twist and to force myself into a shape that will fit the empty space that my people need. Like I’m not strong enough to become who I think I’ll need to become.

“Oh,” Gerard says. “I’m sorry. If it makes you feel any better, I think you’re pretty great.”

Something in her chest unclenches; something in her breathing eases.

“Thank you, Gerard,” she says.

“You’re welcome,” he replies. “You should probably get some sleep. I remember sleeping at night. Pretty important.”

“Pretty important,” she agrees.

The moonlight drifts in, gentle and sweet. Frogs are largely nocturnal; Gerard will probably stay up for a long time yet. She likes to think that staying up in here, with her, is less lonely for him than staying up by himself, in the frog pond, surrounded by nobody that understands him.

“Gerard?”

“Uh huh?”

“Thank you,” she says again. “I’m glad you’re here.”

And that is how the story goes.)

[howlingday]

Salem: So what's all this talk about levels and rankings and whatnot? They're referring to the Equally Matched Aggressionlevel, or EMA level. The ranks go from as low as a Level 0, a non-threat, up to a Level 10, an extinction level threat. And it all started with, that's right, Ozma's prodigy...

Salem: See, about twenty years ago, at the Team STRQ home, there was this agent of mine named Iron Train. He shows up without a weapon, and no semblance, no aura, no nothing, and snatches Yang from her nap and demands a fight.

---------------------------------------------------

Summer: Step away from the girl.

Train: Oho, caution! You best get off the tracks when the Iron Train is comin'! Choo-!

Summer: Step! The fuck away! From the girl!

---------------------------------------------------

Salem: The guy runs at her like a dumbass and gets his legs hacked off because good ol' Summer Rose is a full-on psychopath, and as Summer's walking away with Yang, he looks up and says...

---------------------------------------------------

Train: FUCK YOU, YOU STUPID C-

Summer: (Leaps at him)

---------------------------------------------------

Salem: Slunk! Gets his entire head split in two like a watermelon. Ergo, NOT EQUAL.

Salem: So, if you're immortal, have a massive dick, a full force legion of henchmen, a top secret hide-out, and an absolutely terrifying second-in-command, you're at a minimum a Level 8.

Salem: If you have one henchman and just enough fare to ride a Rusted Spoon cab, you're a Level three at most.

Driver: Is your stop. (Salem grumbles)

Salem: Guess who's a three.

[demon-blood-youths]

Sharing My Persona AU Ideas

Tagging: @the-silver-peahen-residence @militibus-ex-umbra  @electricea @scarlxtleaves @blxxd-oaths @hinokagutsuchi @chainedbystories @virusvexxed @infinitexmuses @koikage101-rp-hub and more!

Hi everyone! Sorry to bother you at this time.

This is for my muses with a persona AU verse. My muses are still demons but they will be vulnerable in the Metaverse so here are my ideas for my muses’ tarot cards and personas.  

There are parts for each muse that I’m unsure so I need your opinions on this! Ones who aren’t tagged. Please feel free to jump into the comments!

-----

Ink

Tarot Card: The Star

Persona: Zenobia 

Description: Known as the Warrior Rebel Queen. This persona takes the appearance of a greatsword sword as it helps Ink to hack and slash her way through. This sword is enshrined in jewel and sliver with a navy cloth draped around its hilt. There is a eye at the center of the sword that faces the battle as it never wavers. Like Ink, her and persona share their love of battle and seeking freedom.

Navarro

Tarot Card: Hierophant ( thanking @electricea for this one )

Persona: Butch Cassidy or Sundance Kid

Description: A persona wearing cloak and a cowboy hat with two dual pistols. Pulls out guns and launches out bombs in order to rob you blind. Wears a trenchcoat and wears a bandana. Only here to seek the thrills to rob the fancy blind. 

Element: Nuclear

Shdkwyz

Tarot Card: The Moon or Judgement

Persona: Hijikata Toshizo

Description: Known as the ‘Demon Commander’, this persona’s master swordsmanship makes him feared as he delivers his own verison law and order during the chaos that is Edo era. This tall and menacing persona has a black trenchcoat carrying two swords as he has long hair black. His face is shadowy as he has horns and unwavering glowing white eyes. 

Element: Ice

Oblivion

Tarot Card: Temperance

Persona:  Nanako Takeko

Description: A persona who has wings of a tengu, has samurai helmet with two lighting bolts at the opposite of its head and wears a crow-tengu mask over her face. This persona fights with a naginata. Loyal and unrelenting. Takeko never surrenders. She summons

Element: Lighting

Hellmare

Tarot Card: The Empress

Persona: Mulan

Description: A red flaming horse with fire power canons that packs a mighty firepower. It can transforms into female warrior wearing a horse helmet with horns of a dragon. This persona is resourceful as she goes to try all tactics to win and make sure to protect her homes and the ones she cares about. 

Element: Nuclear

Rust

Tarot Card: Emperor or Hanged Man

Persona: Spartacus

Description: A gladiator turned rebel. Wears a shredded red cloak, wears a bronze helmet and metal armor where, chains wrapped around his bloodstained arms and feet to use as long-range attacks and carries a sword. This persona hates the restrictions of his Roman overlords and believed all people should be treated with equal respect. To seek freedom, you must spill blood. 

Element: Physical and Dark

Jaron

Tarot Card: Justice

Persona: Hammurabi

Description: A stone man with angel wings as his body is written with rules based on what he written to maintain law and justice fairly throughout his land. This pesona can be benevolet ruler as he wants who wanted his subjects to enjoy better lives. In short, Hammurabi seeks true justice and makes sure true justice is prevail.

Element: Light

Gerald

Tarot Card: Strength

Persona: William Wallace

Description: A huge strongman persona who skin is dual green and blue, looks like a orge with long brown hair and is bare chested with a sash over his chest. Wears a kilt and wears boots. This persona packs a punch and his footsteps sends rumbling throughout the Earth. This persona wants the best for his fellow brethen of his countryman as he wants to protect them. 

Element: Physical and Earth

Fosh

Tarot Card: Magician

Persona: Sherlock or  Alan Turing

Description: Solve any barrier. This persona is a sea dog wearing a wool tweed overcoat. As Fosh hacks, Sherlock solves to crack the code. 

Or a jellyfish submarine that cracks codes as it is hitting the codes and does the puzzles with its tentacles. 

Ophelia

Tarot Card: High Priestess

Persona: Hildegard of Bingen

Description: Acts as support. This persona is described as a nun with a greenthumb. Flowers on her shoulders as her face i, covering her shoulders. Her knowledge of causes and illness helps to cure those who are afflicted with a prayer and her healing book. 

Taz

Tarot Card: Wheel of Fortune.

Persona: Puss in Boots or Red Hood

Description: A feline hero from a fairy tail. Charming and energetic, quick on its feet and agile.This persona is small but gets the job done! 

Element: Dark

Maggie

Tarot Card: The Sun

Persona: Freydis Eiriksdottir

Description: Despite being in the cold lands, this fiery persona is committed warrior that can hold down her own. 

Element: Fire

------- End ------

Alright, that’s all the rough ideas I had for muses’ persona au. 

Now do you agree with these choices? If not! Feel free to suggest by commenting on that reply button if you have something better. 

That said, I’m probably going to work on Bungou Stray Dogs AU focusing on their abilities! 

[lafiametta]

I'm rewatching Episode 1 and I noticed a bunch of things I'd like to discuss, if you don't mind! (This will be long, hang in there!)

The one that intrigued me most is when they found the Prometheus. There was something off about how it looked from the start. Firstly, it didn't look like a ship that had been missing for only 4 months, but much longer. And secondly, and worse of all, is that it looked like it had been sunk, and then submerged. And when did we see a ship sink? In the last episode, where the vortex swallowed Kerberos, and it came out in that other "sea" with the other failed simulations. However, there's something about both ships that I don't get. At first, I thought the Prometheus acted as a bait, reeling in the Kerberos to its location over and over again to kickstart the simulations, especially because at some point its equipment sends those messages with only triangles, rather than the Morse code. So it was clearly a tool in the program. But then, in the show, when they started to toll the Prometheus back to Europe, it was Daniel that used that device that made the fog swallow the Kerberos and send it back to its original location. I can't tell how much Daniel did in this simulation (I don't believe he started The Calling, for example), but his impact on the Prometheus (his coming from there) and then the Kerberos (spiriting it away to somewhere else, letting it be engulfed by the fog) was definitely something he did. Where was the Prometheus before the Kerberos found her? Is it possible that its 'disappearance' is where the failed Kerberos ships go to? And if Daniel, if real, is not part of the simulation, did he get inside it by accessing it through the archive of failed simulations and went inside the 'test zone' with an empty ship, that turned out to be the Prometheus? Could this simulation have been the first one where they found the missing sister ship?

The storm still happened, though, so he couldn't control everything, as we obviously saw how he had to hack into the simulation to make changes in there, but now I'm wondering what is the purpose of these two ships - and, most interestingly, in 2099 they are travelling aboard the Prometheus, not the Kerberos. And it is called the Prometheus Project. So... Could the spaceship also not be reality???

And what about the third, mysterious ship that is part of this triangle? Eyk said the 'company bought three ships, and they spent three months docked while a new system was installed'... So???? Hello???? What does all this mean!!!

So I don't know if I have all the answers you're looking for — in fact, I know I don't! — but I'm going to do my best to walk through some of what I think is going on.

The simulation begins on the morning of the second day of the voyage, before the message comes from the Prometheus. It's unclear whether or not a message comes from the Prometheus during every simulation, but in this one, the message is coming from a specific sender: Daniel.

Daniel is trying to reach Maura, to tell her that she needs to wake up, to remember who she is (and their life together), which will somehow free her from being stuck in the simulation, which just seems to run again and again. In this, he also enlists the help of Elliot, who he knows will trigger Maura's natural protectiveness and her forgotten maternal instincts. Elliot's also meant to use access to Maura and her stateroom to look for the key. (The fact that they both can use the beetles/bugs to open doors or know what direction to follow is a clue that they're working together.)

For some reason, he can't bypass the programming and get the two of them directly on board the Kerberos. Instead, he gets them onto the Prometheus (which I suppose was just hanging out in the simulation graveyard; this one, I have to assume, must have sunk four months earlier, which explains why it looks so rusted and dilapidated), brings it through the whirlpool wormhole, and then secretly sends a signal to the Kerberos, hoping that it will be enough to send the Kerberos on a rescue mission. (The original message gives coordinates of longitude and latitude, not triangles, so the crew and the captain know where to go to find it.) While Eyk, Maura, and the rest of the lifeboat squad are searching through the Prometheus (and successfully discovering Elliot, who was left there to be found), Daniel is making his way over to the Kerberos. (I have to assume he rowed, but he's so soaked that maybe he swam??)

(By the way, Nina's hair ribbon, the one that so freaked out Eyk when he found it on the Prometheus? I suspect he left it there himself when he was there during a previous simulation, or maybe it was in his possession and it got lost ["what is lost will be found"?]; he just forgot that he had ever had it, much like he forgets everything from each simulation.)

Clearly, Daniel is hoping that Elliot's presence is enough to get Maura to start remembering things, even though the boy is kept from speaking (I suspect because doing to will bring him to the attention of either Henry Singleton or a different "Creator" — perhaps Ciaran? — who then will be clued into Daniel's plan). Elliot's role is also vital because he's got the pyramid (it's not entirely clear what his connection to it is; it's clearly important that it stays in his possession) and the pyramid holds the lock that can be opened to shut down the simulation. Eventually, it's clear to Daniel that Elliot on his own will not be enough to get her to remember, so he starts spending more time around her, hoping to trigger some long-lost feelings or memories. (Too bad for him that she seems to prefer hanging out with Eyk, either exploring each other's memories or the ruined engine room of the Prometheus!)

I'm still not entirely clear why Daniel killed ("killed") Ada. He's responsible for the mysterious collapse/death of many of the other passengers and crew, so it's possible he did it to sow confusion and panic among the remaining ones, enough so that Eyk will abandon his plan of towing the Prometheus back to Europe. (The only other person who has the capacity of "killing" the passengers is Sebastian, and he and Daniel seem to be working at odds for much of the series.) And perhaps Ada's death being first is meant to be symbolic; she acts as a prophet in the first episode, talking about the "ghost ship," so maybe she's meant to be the first sacrifice.

Daniel also summons the fog, meant to stymie the Kerberos and stop it from returning with the Prometheus back to Europe. It gives the plotters of the mutiny enough time to put their plan into action, taking weapons and arming the lower-class passengers, and it's at that moment that Daniel uses his sliding puzzle controller to turn the mainframe of the simulation on, which zaps the Kerberos back to its original position before it went in search of the Prometheus in Episode 1. He, like everyone else (with the exception, it seems of Eyk), wants to get the ship back on track and not run the risk that it could be shut down by Henry Singleton (who may or may not be the mysterious "Creator"). Essentially, he's buying more time with Maura, hoping that eventually she'll begin to remember and then recall where the key is, allowing her to wake up (and stop the simulations).

I agree with you that the Calling and the storm were not Daniel's doing; those, I think must have been externally created, I suspect by Henry Singleton, who is still trying to test out his theory about human behavior and whether we are still ruled by our emotions. At Singleton's behest, the simulation is also shut down in Episode 7, with the Kerberos going back through the whirlpool wormhole to the simulation graveyard, where it meets up with the Prometheus (although it might not be the same Prometheus from Episodes 1-3). It doesn't work entirely, though, because there are still a handful of passengers (Maura, Eyk, Ling Yi, Ramiro, Clémence, Tove, Virginia, and Jérôme) that are still existing within it. Daniel takes the opportunity to hack into the mainframe and change the structure of the simulation, one final attempt to save Maura and help her wake up. (He needs to keep her safe until Singleton uses the fake key in Elliot's pyramid and the final countdown ends, at which point, he hopes, she'll wake up again in her own memory, which is tied to Elliot's playroom — their first simulation. The new key — her wedding ring — can be used in the puzzle pyramid that's also been in Elliot's possession, but in his playroom, not his hands.)

Anyway, that was a long discussion, and I'm not sure it made much sense, but my best guess for the existence of two ships is that the Prometheus (through Daniel's intervention) saves the Kerberos. To take a clue from the mythology, Prometheus (who brings the light of fire) illuminates the darkness that the three-headed dog guarding hell is mired in. And the Prometheus Project is a rescue mission, much like the Prometheus ends up saving the Kerberos (even though it was the Kerberos that first deviated from its course to come to the aid of the Prometheus).

As for the third ship, hell if I know. My brain hurts just having gotten this far... :)

[cherrybombfangirlwrites]

Wildly Beating Hearts

Filled out another prompt for a writing exercise and I love how it turned out. The prompt was "grabbing their hand to pull them back from something" from this prompt list. I did Cassandra and Erica from my little mermaid retelling in FSF for this one. And surprisingly it's not soul crushing angst for once, just fluff here.

Wordcount: 754

Summary: Our pirates land on a dangerous island and hike through the deadly jungle, while Cass and Erica are trying wrestling with their crushes on each other.

Warnings: maybe the dangerous animal, but that's really it

Fractured Stars Falling Taglist: @rose-bookblood  @chalcid  @evethenovicewriter @writing-is-a-martial-art @thatprolificauthor

General Taglist: @enchanted-lightning-aes @/thatprolificauthor

~~~

It was late afternoon when the ship pulled into the bay. The rowboats were dropped, and the whole crew went to scavenge for food and supplies. The island was beautiful, with a lush jungle and a beach of soft sand. But Cassandra knew how deceiving this island’s looks were- dangerous animals lurked in the jungle, and it was easy to get lost deep in the trees where one would then starve or boil in the sun to death.

She pulled out her book, filled with notes and maps of all the islands, and refreshed her and the crew’s memory of the details- the exact dangers, safe zones and dangerous zones, plants that were safe to eat, and the best course of action should someone get lost or hurt.

She would’ve liked to find a harbor or port to stay for the night in, or even let the boat drift during the night. But with Gar Face lurking around, waiting for a chance to catch her and her crew of guard, it was safer to hide the ship for the night. Hopefully the danger of this island would keep Gar Face from getting anywhere near them.

The crew split up into smaller groups, easier to travel with but big enough to keep everyone safe. Cassandra, her grandfather, and Erica in one group; Felicity, Angry Alice, and Eye-Spy Sally in the second; and Big Becky, Quick Queenie, and Canonngirl Katie.

Each group went in a different direction, and they all agreed to meet back at the beach before sundown with whatever they could scavenge.

Cassandra was at the front, hacking away at plants blocking their path. She panted as sweat trickled down her face, and she wiped it away. She thought about taking off her coat and hat, but those were protecting her skin from getting burned in the bright. Cass decided to keep them on and drink a lot of water as soon as possible.

Luckily, they found a spring, and after checking that it was safe, the three of them stopped for a rest and a drink. The spring water was clear and ice cold, which tasted wonderful after the sun had been beating down on them for the last hour.

Billy Badbreath was keeping watch as the girls relaxed in the shade for a minute. He slowly turned every once in a while, his six mechanical legs creaking and sometimes stalling from all the rust. He stood a few feet away, looking in the direction of the beach with his back to Erica and Cass.

The girls looked over the map again, comparing it with Cassandra’s book of all the islands. Cassandra was flipping through her book, trying to find the one that matched the island on Erica’s map. She was looking closely at one of the islands that looked similar when someone tapped her shoulder.

Cass looked up, and Erica was smiling as she pointed to a flower several feet away. It was a pretty pink one with large soft petals and a bright yellow center, vibrant green stem and leaves supporting it so the flower stood tall and pretty.

With a small smile back, Cassandra told Erica, “Beautiful.”

Erica got up and went over to the flower. Cass dropped the book and quickly followed her. The flower was beautiful yes, but on an island like this that meant danger was also near.

Erica reached out to pick the flower.

Cass saw the snake before she did, it’s huge fangs bared, dripping with venom.

Her hand shot out, grabbing Erica’s and yanking her back as the snake lunged out for Erica’s exposed arm. Cass's sword was already flying, and cut the snake’s head off before it reached them as she pulled Erica behind her upon pure instinct.

Erica whipped out her knife, and they both looked around as Billy Badbreath darted over to check on them. Once it was clear they were safe again, both girls looked down, saw that they were still holding hands with an iron grip. They quickly dropped their hands to their sides and backed away as their faces went red.

Pointing to the map as she tried to hide her face, Erica quickly made her escape to the book and her map. Cass brushed herself off and forced herself not to explode from the whole range of beautiful emotions she felt from just touching Erica.

Her grandfather looked at Cass, looking her over for injuries. Cass waved him off, quickly telling him she was fine. Tucking her sword in her belt, Cass desperately tried to get herself and her wildly beating heart back under control before going back over to Erica.

[upstategothic]

Rural Radio

The best way to describe where I live to strangers is: about two hours from one dying city to the west, two hours from the other to the east. Much more than that to The City.

The upside of that is that sometimes you can get the better radio stations from City One or City Two. I have a favorite station that stays with me nearly all the way home, even once I’m off the thruway, only drowning in static when I’m on the wrong side of the hills descending in whalebacks down into my little valley town. Other times the songs bleed into each other with a brush of static, remixing Born to Run into Landslide, cutting in and out with the rusted knife of right-wing radio talk shows hacking away at decency.

It should be enough to put me off listening to the radio instead of carefully curated music from my phone or my old iPod that lives in the car, but I still feel endeared to it. The roadtrip ennui of turning the dial again and again, searching for something better or louder or angry enough to keep you awake. Sometimes I lose a station to static and don’t even notice, letting it fill the car as the long miles keep coming.

[aliceat97point3]

Extremely Short Reviews of Many Matthias Schoenaerts Movies (part 2)

(this guy)

Fairly long post but shorter than the last one so... you've been warned

Racer and The Jailbird or Le Fidèle

The title says it all. A race car driver, Bibi, falls in love with a bank robber, Gigi. Fairly sweet love story with a tragic ending. The star of this movie is the excellent chemistry between Bibi and Gigi so if you're not into love stories skip this one. (the english title is oddly hard to get right because I always want to say either 'Racer and Jailbird' or 'The Racer and The Jailbird')

highlights:

adorable couple stuff

good sex scenes

kinda funny from what I remember

Gigi hates dogs which is funny because Matti loves dogs. This is the second time he's had to pretend to hate dogs. First time was in Rust and Bone.

Disorder or Maryland

(gif by @candordisarmsparanoia )

Matthias plays the french equivalent to a Marine with PTSD. He either discharged or on a forced temporary leave and gets a job as a body guard for a rich guy's wife and son. Fairly slow until about a third of the way in and the action kicks up to 11.

Hightlights:

Matthias's looks of yearning are in top form.

Made me yell at the screen multiple times "say something!" "don't say that!" "DON'T SAY THAT IN FONT OF THE KID"

The wife is from National Treasure. That's why she looks familiar.

Pulsar

I don't get this one. Someone hacked this guys wifi after his girlfriend moves to New York for work and they're doing a long distance relationship. Here's the thing... it's been a long time since I saw this one but it didn't seem like the hacker did much. They sent one fake breakup text to matti's girlfriend but yeah ... I don't understand the main dilemma of this movie.

highlights:

Another dutch movie!

Mattias does a skype puppet show for his girlfriend that is just so Awkward.

Suite Française

Matthias plays a composer turned Notsea officer who is part of a platoon of NotSeas that have taken over a French village. One of his jobs is to sort through letters that turn out to be 90% of the villagers trying to turn each other over the Germans because of loyalty is an illusion. It's a village of French snitches basically. They all think doing the notseas favors will get them immunity...this doesn't work.

Highlights:

Matti's got a dog again! (It's the dog of a family fleeing from the German invasion but still... It's a cute dog...that is also a constant reminder of the horrors of war)

Matti being charming while wearing a notsea uniform is kinda jarring.

Kirstin Scott Thomas is a Force to be Reckoned With. She starts off as an antagonist but eventually joins the good guys. She's also one of the few that hates the Germans right of the bat so that's a point in her favor.

Margot Robbie is in this! I just learned that on imdb. No idea who her character was.

Fun Interesting fact: based on a novel written by Irène Némirovsky during the invasion. I don't think I can do her life story justice so look her up because it's complicated. She was born Jewish but converted to Catholicism in her 20s. I personally think that helps explain how this story came about and the themes of ambivalence running through it. but that's just one goy's opinion. (This part was so hard to write because I really didn't want to accidentally be antisemitic while talking about this and if I was please please tell me)

Red Sparrow

From WWII to the cold war. Slightly easier topic. My first Jennifer Lawrence movie! She plays a ballerina who breaks her leg and has to become a spy, I don't get why she can't go back to ballet once her leg heals... I feel like I missed something there. Matthias plays her creepy uncle who has an incestuous crush/obsession with her.

Highlights:

At first I thought matti and the guy playing the American agent should have switched roles because I thought Matthias wasn't great at playing a creep but I was proven wrong in the end.

Matthias very last scene is chef's kiss

Best line ever "You sent me to whore school" (just look up a clip of that don't watch the whole movie)

Recommend for: people who like movies about whore school because that's what the majority of this movie is.

Getting into the short films now!!

Death of a Shadow

Surprise surprise, Another bitter sweet tragedy. The best way to get Matthias in a movie is to make sure it has a tragic ending. This one is about a WWI(?) soldier who is stuck in a limbo museum and to get out he has to collect shadows of people as they die for the Curator, who prefers murder to old age. I do recommend this one even though its sad. It used to be on amazon prime but I'm not sure where to find it now.

Daughter

A.k.a The Closest Thing to a Rom-com We'll Ever Get From This Man.

This my favorite short of his. It's about a girl who's waiting to hear from her dad as she fixes up his boat. While she's waiting she meets Mattias. very cute and of course a little melancholy.

The Muse

Matthias plays a poet looking for his muse. but once he finds her he gets a little scared.

Honorable mentions

The Command or Kursk

I tried so hard to watch this one but it turns out I can't watch people trapped in a submarine. I freak out. but I got through enough get really really mad at the russian government.

Our Souls at Night and Bloodties

I skimmed through these two and basically just watched Matti's scenes so can't give a good review of them as films in their own right. Matthias was great in them.

[theironwarsmith]

The Pillar Men

'A marauding gang of violent ne'er-do-wells who have an awful habit of breaking pillars' was the description given by a noble of a fallen house who had, as it was later revealed, never encountered or heard of the gang before that moment. The noble revealed the truth after the Pillar Men Goliaths rampaged through his stronghold, killed what remained of his retainers and beat him to within a millimetre of his life. The noble spent six months recovering, he now lives with a severe limp and a fear of pillars.

Forge Tyrant Kars is the renowned leader of this gang, he is also representative of the future of House Goliath as he is a 'Natborn', or a naturally born Goliath. His leadership and intelligence is markedly above that of the rest of his gang, he also cares deeply for the reputation of the gang and perceives any slur as a personal affront to him and his crew. Those who dare speak ill in regards to him or his gang have a tendency to end up violently beaten or dead.

In his travels, he has found a tattered coat that barely fits him and a brass skull that he keeps on a necklace.

Favourite colour: Grey

Stimmer Wammu is normally found sleeping off the chems when he is not fighting. Quite aggressive and devoid of personality, he generally keeps to himself as to avoid any unnecessary punching of nearby people and furniture when vexed by, well, everything.

Favourite snack: baked corpse starch with rat powder (for flavour)

Bruiser Esidici is one of few Goliaths who prefers using his gun to using his maul. He is utilised by Kars to provide covering fire when advancing through open areas, normally by pummeling rival gangs with grenades or smoke grenade dispersal. Esicidi is also known for his deep singing voice that is rarely heard, the other members of the gang get confused and believe there is a weird deep voice that follows then around, except for Kars who admires him.

Favourite person: Ol' Haggard the Slopper (brings Esidici food)

Bruiser Santana is largely a peaceful man who spends his time lifting weights to get larger and more buff. When fighting, he tends to take the most direct route to his foes, blasting them with his stub cannon and then hacking away with his cleaver. He has a tendency to form bonds with random animals that dwell within the hives.

Favourite 'friend': Patty the Ambull (Santana will try to feed and pet the Ambull, but the Ambull is less than friendly)

Kitten isn't the brightest tool in the shed, in fact if he was a tool he'd be the rusted, broken and useless allen key that has been left outside and what it is used for is utterly forgotten. He tends to forget how to reload and has sometimes looked down the barrel to see if there was anything down there blocking it. This has led to an occasion where he blew part of his lower jaw off, he survived but now he permanently wears a mask.

Least favourite pastime: find the gun (it is normally in his hand)

Big E, as seen above (image provided mid-riot by enforcers), is best described as an opportunist. Whenever there is a riot, strike or just a violent event, he can be found nearby. Normally using it as an excuse to end petty vendettas or to loot something he has no use for.

Favourite item looted: the engine block to an Enforcer patrol AFV

Speedwagon is the latest recruit for the Pillar Men gang, he is eager to prove his abilities and skills to his contemporaries and show that he has what it takes to become a Forge Tyrant. He shadows Kars nearly constantly, it is clear that he is trying to emulate him but only time will tell if he will follow in his footsteps.

Favourite weapon: a large axe

[machinesandman]

Mirror Mirror

Everything had been culminating together, slowly at first, but then speed had begun to pick up and twist together far more violently. Now so many events and things were starting to come into a head. Blues had expected as much might start happening. While it had taken a lot longer of a time for things to actually start falling apart, history has a way of repeating it’s self. Even if people learn from it, there are still certain factors that will play a role.

He needed to blow off steam, as someone might tell him. But he also wanted information. And how better to gather that than by taking extreme measures.

The eldest of the Robot Masters huffed too himself, having been working some of this frustration out on poor bastards of Mavericks. Taking them out before they even had a chance to become a problem, efficient. All the while hacking each and every one of them wirelessly, taking bits and pieces of information. More than enough.

They were always so damn messy, these new age robotics. Reploids. Oil and coolant everywhere from the simplest injuries. Too close akin for humanlike in his opinion. But they were not as usually spry, not so energized. Usually these sorts of things would have more of a fight in them and last at least a little longer while Blues was toying with them, not unlike a predator would with it’s prey, a cat with a mouse.

This was... Needless to say, like a child breaking a glass toy.

Something had already had them softened up. They had been escaping something else. Blues didn’t hesitate to move deeper in this little hide away old store house, far on the edge of the city.

Scans and attention picked up on something then, and it was not a Reploid, Maverick or Hunter. That was a much older registry, but one that was unknown too him. He did not like that...

Rounding another corner, buster primed with shield held up in skilled motion, his gaze found the culprit that had his concern and curiosity. Someone standing at about 5′8″, 5′9″. Holding up a maverick by the skull with one hand, slowly crushing it under the strength of those fingers and their armor. Sending a splash of coolant and metal chunks across the stone floor. Body released to drop in a useless heap. The figure turning their head just enough to be seen front on. Female in build, albeit just slight.

Grey body suit, darker than his own just slightly. Armor nearly identical, but faded purples rather than vibrant reds. Sections of it seeming to have rusted, but did nothing to remove any of it’s functional durability, scanners showed that much. The helmet however, was an eerie identical match on his own, but with a full facial mask section of a vent, or breather. With what seemed like strange bumps on top. Like smaller versions of Tango’s audials.

It was like looking in a twisted mirror. Blues hated it. Something else mirroring himself, not unlike those failed copies of him before. What the hell was this failed mockery? It wasn’t a Reploid, scans showed that much. It was built like a Robot Master, but had a far different density. And no network connection. Was this an old model that had been a failed clone, just now alive? Why had no one heard of this or found it? Already in fractions of sections he was demanding over the network. No one had any idea, and each one of them was more confused than the last.

Buster aimed, charge held. “Identify yourself.” His voice was strained, barely holding self control at the moment. This was not some sad pitiful copy, or a trashable sniper joe. No, this thing had skill, obviously. And he wanted to know who tried to make something like this. Every single scan he was making came back with more questions than answers. Density higher than most of them, perhaps arguably closer with Guts or Hard. The power source signal was not like others, it was something hybrid and questionable at best. But the signal... That was scrambled and behind so many layers of encryption.

The other stayed silent, just staring at him. The coolant covered hand slowly lowering, while their other arm shifted. Becoming a buster, but it’s barrel was longer. Armor of it was seemingly stretched. Silvery. Now that was an even older fashioned design. How was this unit functional?

It took one step back, counter scanning himself. Blues could feel it. And then it decided to try and query him. And he sure as fuck wasn’t having that. Instead the firewall blockade went up, which forced the other unit to yank it’s connective instinct away like it had been burned. Immediately the grey and purple one had shifted stance. Defensive. “A unit of no importance, Proto Man. Designation deleted.”

She realized the mistake the moment it left her mouth as the others buster went off. Barely managing to shift dodge herself too the right as the shot rushed past her left. Shit. She needed to leave, now. Get some space, less insulated, and activate that teleport matrix.

Then she felt it. The hack.

Blues had engaged a wireless invasion and was ripping through layer after layer of encryption, firewalls getting shoved through by force. And immediately the female look alike was on the counter, rapidly throwing up far greater defenses and harder scrambled code. Devoting an entire processor into this endeavor. All while the physical world had her lifting that buster, shifting it’s data output into heat, and unleashing two plasma shots. Blues bringing his shield to block. It didn’t damage himself or the protective barrier, but the impact was hard enough to shift him a couple inches on the floor. What the fuck, that sort of power shouldn’t exist anymore.

There wasn’t a seconds chance for a third shot, as Blues rushed forwards, shifting the shield downwards instead to act as a battering ram with it’s edge. This forced the other look alike to rapidly rush backwards to avoid it, buster lifting towards the ceiling instead. This gave Blues the opening he wanted.

Shield vanished, now free hand snapping out to grab onto the others forearm and their coolant stained glove. Grip tight enough to dent the metal, but only barely- he should be doing more damage. But the durability was not something to be ignored. So he took the chance for a counter, and experiment. Yanking that arm sideways with the full body strength he possessed. But it wasn’t has sharp or hard as it should have been, yet enough to cause momentum in a forward throw. Sending this other bot crashing through a stone wall. Which it had immediately broken in with little effort.

That weight it had was more than the usual Robot Master. Like something older builds would have had before being finalized or upgraded into something far more viable. Was this thing just meant fur sheer durability and output? That gave Blues an edge. He’d be more capable of handling maneuvers. And stay standing on more rickety spaces.

A few steps forwards then, moving through the open wall, he saw the other unit standing up with barely a dent. A few scratches on the armor, but the casual way that the female design brushed off the debris like it was nothing confirmed just what he had already assumed and figured.

The entire time, these rapid passing moments, the mystery unit was matching him move by move within the hacking and counter hacking space. As if they were designed for this, knew just what the other might be made of. And it was jarring, incredibly uncomfortable, for him to be doing this. He was going to have no choice but engage his new counter protocols. Nothing had needed it thus far, it was just a precaution. But the event here had become different.

Data languages shifted, Blues giving two processor’s worth of hacking more space, as an alternate set of data streamed in. As suspected, the purple and grey Robot immediately stood ram rod straight, the buster whirring in panic as it took several steps back. The scrambling of forcing up firewall after firewall to block him from deeper systems only telling him what he needed to know.

It had no network call. No back up, nothing to assist in this offensive of the minds. Although what he could glean was how it was rapidly learning. Starting ton figure out how he was doing this and slowly managing to keep him back, just barely. But only from key functions. No forceful shut down it would seem. Pity. He’d have to take them down physically, which shouldn’t be a problem.

He didn’t have to charge this time, as the enemy came at him. But he did not expect that sort of speed! Jerking left as he dodged a punch from that free hand. Before there could be a delivered counter, this unit swung their leg out, and struck him hard in the chest, getting a grunt. Boosters on the bottom of the boot engaged, and he was sent skidding backwards, bottom of his armored boots screeching across concrete floor. The armor and suit he wore burnt slightly, but otherwise he was perfectly fine. Just impressed, and angered, that this doppleganger had that sort of strength.

It jumped back, to gain more distance. Smoke and dust slowly cleaning. Black lenses covered eyes staring each other down. Blues felt his power surging, shifting his stance slightly as he began to gather data. Those firewalls couldn’t block everything, and it was starting to show. He was getting more details. Durability tests, construction date, power output, and the identification number- or lack there of.

Wait, no. This wasn’t right. This was impossible-

The enemy was charging their buster then, having raised it now. Their free hand grabbing onto the barrel and bracing their feet. That... That looked eerily family. Oh he hated it. Hated it! Blues grit his teeth as his core burned, his own buster lifted while taking it’s charge. But he was back logging a secondary one, ready for a dual blast.

The open room they stood in silence. One eye of his starting to gleam, glow under the visor, green giving it’s self out. While his enemy seemingly had the same, but in gold. Two yellow eyes shining in empty emotion, impossible to see inside that helmet.

First blasts were unleashed simultaneously. The sudden heat in the room skyrocketing as these two shots whistled through the air, and collided. Creating a massive explosion and the sound shaking the room, rattling steel beams and shaking weakening supports, ash and smoke falling around them in the wake of this after math. Impressive power...

But the moment that there was the clear visual, the other unit not even phased by this after event, was when Blues smirked. He suddenly locked in his second saved blast, buster screeching loudly as he brought it once more into full power. Much to his enemies surprise. They tried to move, but it was barely fast enough. His second buster shot unleashing it’s self without any hindrance or waiting. Blues no longer had any issues with keeping charged powers or over clocking any parts. He no longer needed to worry. As a result, his combat prowess was more devastating than it ever had been before.

It tore through metal support pillars of the room, and straight out the back wall. Destroying a massive chunk. The target had managed to avoid most of the blast, but it had trashed some of their shoulder, and a small section of helmet. Just enough to see a fraction of face and hair- Hair identical too his own. Face pale, golden eye with visual gears and wiring. Facial lines, like that of a doll.

It stared at him in shock, no coolant or oil falling, but sparks flying. And then, it looked at the hole in the wall. And bolted for it. Blues hot on their tail- But then... Teleportation engaged, sending this unknown unit gods knows where. The grey beam of light noting their departure. And he couldn’t track it either, and unknown signal.

Damn...

Blues calmed his systems, engaging the cooling. The anger and frustration running deep in him. Already he was flipping through what little he had gotten, saving it into a separate file within his mental faculties along with various recorded data and brief photo shots of this enemy unit.

Designation: DLWN-TST. A shifting buster status, capable of changing it’s blaster shots prowess. No copy functionality. Unknown designation. Unknown reason for build. Built in teleport matrix. Hacking on par with his own. Rapid learning AI. Constructed earlier than his own activation date. The schematics were barely complete, he couldn’t get it all. But enough to know this thing was more durable than it god damn should be. And the weight... It was higher than one of that size should be. Not something, or someone, he knew about. Didn’t even know it’s name, if it even had one.

Was this from somewhere else? Or did it originate from here? He needed more information.

One thing was certain: Blues would not let this thing abscond a second time. He now knew what it was capable of.

[what-yadoking-likes]

It is a universal truth that when a group of criminals settle into a routine, at least one of them gets bored and decides to set Taskmaster-esque challenges in hopes of breaking the boredom (AKA Yado’s Taskmaster/Payday crossover).

Sydney is the Taskmaster, with Joy as her assistant.

The first task is issued to the first round of contestants (the OG 4 - Dallas, Chains, Hoxton and Wolf):

‘Steal the most random thing from your next heist and present it to the Taskmaster.

You have until the end of the week.

Your time starts now.’

Hoxton returns with a framed photograph of the bank manager’s family, taken from the guy’s desk in his office. “So you said random, right, and I thought - well - what the fuck’re we gonna do with a picture of some daft cunt’s ugly wife and kids?”

Sydney fails to conceal her smirk. “What a day. Poor fella gets his bank robbed, and when he goes back to his desk his favourite photo’s missing. Who’s next?”

Wolf presents his haul: “I took several things, actually. I stole the letters H, A, R, T, R, U, S, from the bank, so now when you look at the bank, it spells Vest & Tee.”

Sydney and Joy laugh at the slightly blurry pic Wolf managed to snap as the getaway van pulled away, which does indeed read ‘vest & tee bank.’

“Originally I wanted to spell out Payday, and I realised that wasn’t gonna happen, so I... did my best. I like to think this was creative, not destructive.”

At this point, Chains decides to argue about the technicalities of Wolf’s loot. “You said we had to bring the most random thing, but his was more about what he left behind than what he stole, y’know. Just sayin’.”

Sydney seems swayed by Chains’ point, and at Wolf’s loud and somewhat irritated insistence, its his turn next.

“I stole something actually useful-” he presents three rolls of toilet paper. “Bam. No more toilet paper in the bank or portapotties in the parking lot.”

Sydney grimaces. “Bit shit, mate.”

They groan.

“OH WHATEVER, all the good shit got taken,” Chains complains loudly, whilst Wolf rearranges the letters to spell RUST, mumbling something about gifts.

Finally, it is Dallas’ turn. “Well, today I learned I work with a bunch of maniacs,” he says jokingly, “bog roll, signage and photos of actual children. Man.” Dallas sighs and shakes his head. “Anyway, I took the bank manager’s wedding ring.”

“No you didn’t,” Hoxton snaps, then immediately asks, “When? How?”

Dallas holds a simple wedding band up to the light. “Took him hostage, didn’t I? Wasn’t too hard to twist the ring off his pudgy little finger.”

Sydney is howling. “THIS GUY HAD THE WORST DAY - WHAT-”

“OH COME ON,” Dallas yells, throwing his hands up in the air, “I checked his work emails, he’s cheating on his wife-”

“He doesn’t know that,” Chains interrupts, accusingly.

“Yeah, he just wants to steal my hard-earned points,” Hoxton agrees, nodding.

“YOUR points? Wow.”

“Alright, alright, this is why Joy’s here,” Sydney raises her voice above all of them, and they shush as Joy jabs away at the docket she uses herself for hacking on-the-go.

“Hacked into his emails...” she mumbles, eyes flicking across the screen rapidly, “... looks like he was sending a lot of suggestive messages to a Mrs. Lee...”

“Hmmm...”

“Damn,” Chains says, leaning back on his chair thoughtfully, “who’d’ve thought a fat, bald guy would be gettin’ some?”

“It’s clearly for the money mate,” Hoxton says, nose wrinkled in disgust.

In the end, the points are distributed as follows:

1 point for Chains’ bog roll (”They can literally just walk across the street to the store and buy more for a few bucks, and I don’t think it’s that random.”)

3 points each for Wolf’s sign editing and Hoxton’s photo of the bank manager’s wife and child (”Honestly I can’t choose between the slightly creepy ‘this is someone’s actual kid’ and the defacing of the bank’s signage, because it’s so stupid it’s funny.”)

4 points to Dallas for the bank manager’s wedding ring (”Bit weird, very random, no idea what we’ll do with it now, 4 points to Dallas!”).

[danny-chase]

The Batfam as Tech Majors

AU where Alfred got tired of watching Bruce slap duct tape on the Batmobile and call it good, so he forced the children into college. He makes each of them complete an internship with Lucius in R and D so they have better knowledge of how the devices that their lives depend on work. Majors/minors/tropes under cut.

Dick:

Mechanical Engineering Major

He was in undeclared engineering for as long as possible

He settled on mechanical because it seemed the most broad

Plus he joined a car club, loved it, and there were a ton of MechE’s there

He ends up taking credit overloads most semesters because he always finds 1-3 random classes that he wants to take

Despite taking everything from advanced computer science classes (he somehow convinces even the most intense professors to let him into their classes) to hyper specific phycology classes, he doesn’t have any minors to show for it

He just gets bored with the subject after a couple classes

This gives him a bunch of random knowledge

When he talks to his younger siblings about classes, somehow he’s always managed to take at least one that they’re in, and offers advice.

He has the best RA stories. He most certainly did not need to be an RA. But the school was hurting for them and he thought it would be fun.

His residents loved him, but that didn’t stop them from playing beer pong in the common spaces at 3am.

He founds a circus arts club after his residents pull up information about his past and get overly excited about it

Specifically, he finds out they know about his past, because one of them decided it was a good idea to try and juggle knives, and because he’d prefer there not to be any additional bloodstains on the carpet he decides to start the club

He nearly graduated late because he forgot he needed to take specific classes for his major

Barbara: 

Computer Science/Math duel Major

She’s a TA for Comp Sci 1, all the students fight to get her help because she’s amazing at spotting bugs and is super patient

Somehow she’s the president of 3 clubs and is on student senate

She’s the curve breaker

She gets homework assignments meant to take a week done the day they’re assigned

She and Dick went to a single party together, stayed for five minutes, decided it was too loud, and went to get ice cream

Along with her club, she’s in professional organizations, and is part of a women in STEM mentoring program

She started a petition to get more wheel chair ramps installed. Half the buildings are protected under some “historical grounds” bs that’s an excuse for not being accommodating

The petition didn’t go anywhere at first, but it was widely shared on social media and made the school look horrible, so they implemented some of her proposals

Jason:

Philosophy/Cognitive Science duel Major

He gets asked “There’s a philosophy major?” every time he has to do one of those stupid what’s your name and major icebreakers

Jason lives in the library

He’s fallen asleep in there at 3am after it gets locked up

He quotes philosophers at his siblings when they’re being annoying, and it effectively shuts them up, because he only quotes the most nonsensical arguments

He gets involved with the college’s community outreach program

He volunteers for a local robotics team

When people find out his majors, they’re genuinely confused, because he understands robotics really well

He lies his ass off about being really interested in it as a child

Dick convinced him to be an RA for a semester, and he almost had a heart attack

Someone choked in front of him on the first day

Despite seeming like a tough RA, he genuinely cared about his residents and had to quit because he was so stressed out that one of them would do something stupid and die

Cass:

Innovation/Design Major

She’s really observant, so she’s great at spotting flaws in infrastructure and coming up with ways to fix them

Spending time with Barbara made her realize the lack of systems designed with wheelchair users in mind

Her experience being illiterate and not knowing English has imprinted on her the need for signage that can be understood by anyone

She focuses on taking project based classes, where she can draw out her designs and build them, rather than figuring out the math behind them

She has patents for the inventions she created at WE

She was exempted from the “Alfred’s mandatory college degree program” but decided to go as a part time student for herself

It took her twice as long to graduate, and a lot of tutoring from her siblings, but she made it!

The family threw her an extra special party when she graduated - everyone else had minor celebratory dinners, but they went all out for Cass

There was not a dry eye at her graduation ceremony

Cass works part time with WE on and off as a designer after her first internship

She comes up with ideas during patrols, draws them and sends them to Lucius

Tim:

Computer Science Major with a minor in game design

He makes it to approximately 20% of his lectures

He nearly didn’t graduate on time because he put off his humanity courses for so long

He missed the actual ceremony, even though the family showed up

He starts all his assignments the day before they’re due

If at all possible he avoids groupwork and offers to do assignments by himself because he gives his teammates heart attacks when he starts his part the project at 3pm the day before it’s due

This leads to extremely frequent all-nighters

He always finds himself rewriting everyone else’s code to make it work more efficiently

This can, of course, cause some people to feel a little upset

Other students specifically seek him out as a teammate so they can half ass their parts

He participates in game jams when he has time, and got super into the hacking club

Against all odds, he joined a fraternity

Dick literally fell off a building when he found out

He makes up stories about partying for the heck of it, when in reality he and the guys just play Smash Bros together until 3am

He hasn’t seen anyone drink more than two beers, and he hasn’t tried alcohol there either

He joined on accident, he had just pulled an all-nighter and stumbled into a recruiting fair, he heard someone shouting about Mario Kart Double Dash, and bada bing bada boom, he agreed to rush because it involved being stuck in a room playing video games all weekend

Steph:

Civil Engineering Major with minors in Sustainability and STSS (Science, Technology, and Social Science) 

She gets constantly shit on for being a civie

Every time she introduces herself someone mumbles “fake mechie” in the background

She and Jason complain about the disrespect together

She was genuinely shocked when Bruce offered to pay for her college tuition

She’d been planning on going and cutting costs any way possible

But Bruce took her aside when she was applying and offered to pay it all

She refused at first, but then money just appeared in her bank account, and what was she supposed to do, give it back?

She also participates in professional groups and is a member of SWE (Society of Women Engineers), and she mentors younger students

She ends up as class president by running a very successful social media meme campaign

She got and email saying she’d won and panicked because she had no idea what she was doing and was just having fun making memes

She ended up staying class president the entire time, and ended up getting really into it, and ended up with a pretty solid approval rating

She joined a sorority and had a blast

They worked with the local animal shelter, and she started bringing Damian along as well

Her sisters think he’s adorable and he secretly enjoys the attention

She gets her revenge on all the civil engineering haters by landing her dream job redesigning the poorer areas of Gotham to include more green spaces, increase affordable housing, and upgrading access to utilities

Duke:

Biochemisty Major with a minor in Neuroscience 

Harper, Tim, Steph, and him are all in the same year

Tim convinces him to join the fraternity with him

He joins a variety of professional groups as well

He mentors other BIPOC, and joins NSBE (National Society of Black Engineers) and runs helps run professional development programs

But he’s also in like million other clubs that he does not put on his resume

He’s runs the college’s meme page club, is part of the Pokémon Go club, is on the competitive Overwatch team, consistently attends the anime club’s Dragon Ball Z watch parties, joins the Dance Dance Revolution club, and the list goes on and on

When Tim is awake, and Harper isn’t busy, they go with him, but both of them have too much inconsistencies in their schedule to join

He ends up meeting like half the campus

He unintentionally has become a god of networking

Unlike his siblings, he goes all the way for a doctorate

He researches Joker venom, determined to figure out a cure for his parents (in my HC, he eventually does)

He wins like every award imaginable for his groundbreaking research into venoms as he comes up with vaccines that save countless lives

He still works on the meme page, even after he graduates

Harper:

She somehow defies all odds and triple majors in Physics, Mechanical Engineering, and Electrical Engineering

She takes credit overload every semester, and gets credit for her internships at WE

She and Steph were roommates freshman year, and Steph swears that Harper never sleeps

She is the most wanted partner for every engineering project

She thrives in college, and lives off of coffee

She’s in the front row in every lecture

She doesn’t leave the lecture halls, she’s gotten locked in more than once after falling asleep

She had a heart attack the first time she saw students using the machine shop

Half the students weren’t wearing safety glasses, she counted three people wearing slides, the machines were rusted over, the soldering irons were all broken, and she nearly watched someone break their wrist using a power drill

She refuses to work there

Her secret to success is prioritizing - she absorbs the material like a sponge so if homework is only worth 5%, it isn’t getting done, and she’ll just cram before the exam

She almost joined Tim and Duke’s frat (it’s co-ed), but she didn’t have the time

They let her in without rushing senior year because Tim ended up as the boss, and he said so

Cullen:

I don’t know a ton about Cullen, but I feel like he would be a comp sci major

He comes in when Harper, Tim, Duke, and Steph are upperclassmen, and he joins all of Duke’s clubs

They have a million inside jokes

To the other siblings, it seems like the two have their own language

He also joins a club that mentors LGTBQ+ students at the local high school, and encourages them to pursue STEM careers if they’re interested

Jason recruits him as a mentor for the robotics team (he’s the lead mentor at this point) after some of the kids in his mentoring program mention him at a meeting and Jason is like O.O

He avoids parties at all costs, and ends up joining the frat as well

It’s all Duke’s fault he’s in a frat

He does however, meet some lovely boys in the frat

Damian: 

Aerospace Engineering/Environmental Engineering dual Major with minors in sustainability and biology

He nearly riots when he’s presented with the college’s idea of a vegetarian/vegan meal

He manages to get out of the meal plan after that, and begins rallying students to push for better options that contain actual protein

He joins a community service club that works with the local animal shelter, and secretly joins the circus arts club (that’s thriving even without Dick there)

He learns how to sew blankets out of old clothes for the animals

He and Barbara are the only siblings to graduate with a 4.0, simply because they were the only one that took the time to actually do all the homework, and remembered to turn things in on time

He refuses to live in the dorms, and instead lives in one of their apartments nearby (once again somehow managing to complain to the college enough to get his housing waived)

He literally walked in once when visiting Duke, and immediately walked out, and resolved never to step near one again

He makes a total of three friends while at the school, both are in the animal shelter club

They exchange vegetarian/vegan recipes, and get together to cook

He decides to move off campus with them his junior year when they needed another roommate, and he won’t admit it to his siblings, but he had a ton of fun

He and his friend group may have joined an animal rights hacktivist group and may have helped orchestrate some major hacks

Poisson Ivy finds out and feeds him targets and information when they’re supposed to be fighting (she just walks back to Arkham if the others aren’t watching, and slips him a list at the end)

Bonus Bruce:

He cries at every graduation

He’s asked to make a speech at every graduation

He never does - it’s about his kids, not him

He single handedly is keeping the school from bankruptcy - not that any of his kids (other than probably Barbara) know

He sobbed for days after Cass graduated

He genuinely didn’t expect Dick or Tim to graduate

After Dick graduated, he wouldn’t let Bruce touch any of the equipment, and the rest of his kids followed suit

He isn’t actually bad at engineering, his education was just super informal, and hey duct tape works 95% of the time in his experience

The real reason Alfred was annoyed was because he refused to take the time to properly fix something if someone was in danger, and then he’d forget that he’d just used duct tape to patch something

But now since no one lets him touch anything, he’s genuinely lost a lot of the knowledge

But in a pinch, he can fix stuff

[ratsoh-writes]

What are the guys like when they're drunk? :3

Ehehehe thank you so much!! I’ve been wanting to answer this one so bad!!

Sans: he’s actually a quite bouncy drunk. It’s really funny since sans gets so energetic but somehow still manages to act like his usual lazy self, if you ignore the face that he’s practically vibrating in his seat that is

Papyrus: ok first of all, he has the second best tolerance of all the skellys, but it is still possible to get him drunk. Drunk papyrus is really huffy and savage. He’s never gotten to that point before so he doesn’t actually know that about himself

Star: star is your typical party guy drunk. He’s also convinced he’s an amazing singer when drunk. If anything, he’s even worse

Honey: he’s a dazed and confused drunk. He’ll probably walk into a wall, slide down, and just give up on getting up for the rest of the night

Red: he’s either a flirty drunk or a sad drunk. Luckily flirty drunk is much more common

Edge: he’s got the fourth best tolerance of all the skellys. When drunk, edge can reach papyrus levels of friendly.

Mal: he’s a mischievous drunk and all it takes is a couple of sips really. Cash takes advantage of drunk mal and will bring him along on his prancing adventures. Mal rarely drinks ever since his brother went sober.

Cash: he’s an ex-alcoholic and hasn’t had a drip in several years now. When cash used to get drunk, he would be reckless and easily provoked. He also had a huge pain tolorence when drunk and would often wake up hungover and injured

Oak: drunk oak will get really dizzy and pass out at the speed of sound. He doesn’t really drink because of that

Willow: same as papyrus. They tie for second place in the alcohol tolerance contest

Lord: he’s a giggly drunk. Anything and everything is funny to him. You can get him to laugh so hard he’ll cry. It’s great

Mutt: this guy is almost exactly the same when drunk. Literally the only difference is that his words are slightly more slurred

Wine: when drunk he mostly acts the same, except his conspiracy theories get more and more crazy the more he drinks. Drink wine will go full on flat earth on you

Coffee: he’s a queasy and dizzy drink. A few beers in and coffee will be hacking it all up in the sink and then passing out right after. Fun times. He also gets the worst hangovers out of all of them.

Charm: another typical party drink. Charm already has that ride or die attitude, but it’s even more extreme when he drinks. He’ll do almost any dare

Sugar: he’s a happy drunk who’s just here to have a good time. Sugar is very well coordinated when drunk, and the only way you can tell he’s buzzed is by his language. He has a pretty vulgar mouth when drunk lol

Pop: he’s a talkative drunk. Pop will tell you his life story. He’ll probably end up crying on someone’s shoulder if he gets wasted too. He’s a bit emotional

Rythm: he’s a very uncoordinated drunk. All that dancers grace is thrown right out the window. Drinking always leaves him with mysterious bruises

Pluto: drinking washes all his social anxiety away, and pluto will talk your ear off all night of you let him. He also flushes bright blue when drunk and is just amazed by everything. Starry eyed and clumsy stride all night

Jupiter: he’s a philosophical drunk. Drunk Jupiter is convinced he’s found the secrets to the universe. Putting him and drunk wine in the same room is sure to brew up an unforgettable conversation

Peaches: he gets really cuddly and talkative, but it’s hard to understand him since his accent and slur become 20x more powerful

Rancher: he stress cleans when drunk and will even rearrange the whole house. There’s no getting in between his cleaning fever so just let him be

Snipe: he gets very loose lipped and sleepy when drunk, and his tolerance isn’t great. Drinking is very dangerous if he’s not at home so snipe doesn’t drink in public

Bruiser: he’s a stupid and easily impressed drunk. Drunk bruiser will think any new think is automatically the coolest crap ever

Butch: he wins number one for best alcohol tolerance. Literally I don’t think butch has ever been beyond mildly buzzed his whole life. When he is, he’s just a tad more flirty but when is that new lol

Boss: he’s number three in best alcohol tolerance so he rarely gets drunk enough to show the effects. Wasted boss is a total show off

Ace: he’s a crybaby drunk and will basically get teary eyed over everything. Especially cute animals and anything snipe says about his brother since thier brotherly bond is just so beautiful

Slim: when he’s drunk, like honey, he’ll just get really dazed and stare off into space for a while. Slim is a bit more extreme and will even loose the ability to talk for a bit

G: he’s a playful drunk and will annoy and try to wrestle any available friends. Have fun, G is just as fast as usual

Green: he’s a grumpy drunk and will complain about everything and everyone. If called out he gets huffy

Rust: he’s also a crybaby drunk. He’s extremely cuddly too and will cling to the nearest person available

Noir: he ties with edge for fourth best alcohol tolerance. His drunk state is about the same but more cuddly and flirty

[my2phetaliaheadcanons]

Welcome Home

A young man sat in a well-worn brown rocking chair. The dying light from the fireplace showed his true age hidden under the youthful appearance. Dark bags under his eyes, scruff along his jawline, and sloppily thrown on loose clothes. His hair long blond but dark and greasy from neglect. Bandages wrapped around his arms and torso. His face was hard-pressed as he gazed into the fire, the embers causing his shiraz eyes to appear like glasses of aged Rioja.

Without turning away from the fire, he called out.

“James, go get firewood.”

His call was not loud, just enough to carry into the next room of their small cabin. There were no doors that would have blocked his command.

In response, small squeaks were heard coming from a bed that was unseen from his seat. A younger teen appeared. His build was bigger, but smaller in height than his elder. Dirty blond curls were pulled into a loose ponytail, his thin white shirt was loose on his body, whereas his brown pants clung tight. Though his eyes were like the former, deep purple and tired.

“Why do I have to do it? It's barely light out and you aren’t that injured, François.”

“Do as you have been asked, James”

A soft ch came from James as he crossed the dusty floors of the cabin. He passed behind François and walked to their heavy brown door. Pulling his navy peacoat off the wooden knob on the wall and his brown boots onto his cold feet. James opened the door, he called back “My name is Matt, not James.”

It was white and dark outside. The sun was starting to rise but still not high enough to give a lot of light. The wind blew and shifted the snow. Matt pulled the coat tighter to his frame.

Matt trekked through the high piles of snow toward the woodshed that was behind the cabin. Opening the door, he grabbed the old ax. It was a dingy silver, and the handle had a worn spot from where hands had held it. Matt looked a little deeper and find the other tool he needed. A medium-sized sled. It was old, rusted, and had some frayed ropes on it. Pulling out both tools, he laid the ax on the sled and pulled it along.

As Matt walked his mind wandered back toward François. His older brother was more aloof than usual. The Seven Year War wasn’t an easy war. Though he was young, he was involved. Matt saw François for the first time show something other than boredom. He was determined, wanted to win, but that didn’t happen. Matt remembers when the news was received to back down. To walk away from this war, and the anger that came with it. It took weeks until his anger finally calmed.

After François’ anger was gone, he reverted mostly back to his old ways. Aloof and cold, but as the time came to deal with the treaty François became colder. Spending time nursing nearly completely healed injuries by a fire. Only speaking to him to get firewood. Matt’s only assumption was that something about the treaty caused this intense behavior.

François would not tell Matt anything and it pissed him off. Matt knew that something was being kept from him. What else could connect the behavioral change? Not knowing anything was creating a feeling of dread as well. Good thing he was sent outside. A tree may not be as good as hitting a body, but it's enough to calm him.

As Matt hacked away at a poor tree, about a mile away from the cabin, time moved on. The sun went from an almost black gray to a light gray. The tree fell and eventually was turned into firewood. He stacked the sled as best he could and pulled it home.

Matt felt better after hacking up the tree, but as he trudges back the thoughts came back. It descended upon him like a snowstorm in the mountains. Quiet at first, but it quickly raged. Matt was entitled to know. He was currently a French colony and that war was fought on his land! He couldn’t even deny the gut feeling anymore that something in this treaty involved him.

That thought brought Matt to a stop. If he was right, he could have his land cut up, his people taken or enslaved. He might even be dissolved! He was just getting started, Matt wanted to punch François in the face, laugh, and be independent. Maybe take over the world with his own military and be recognized for his strength. This was it for him. Once he was home, Matt was getting answers even if it means getting Kuma to eat the French man.

His pace started again, slow at first but eventually turned into a furious walk. The snow pulled at his pants and the sled slowed him down a little. Eventually, the old gray cabin appeared from the gaps in the tree line. To Matt, it was additional fuel to his already raging bonfire. He was getting those answers.

Out of the tree line and near the cabin, Matt dropped the sled and the ax by the left side. His anger leaving no more room for patience and stormed to the front of the cabin. Once he rounded the corner he stopped.

Outside his home was a pink and gold sleigh that had two white draft horses attached via purple martingale. A simply dressed man in purple sat in the driver seat, looking like he was about to freeze to death. It altogether was bright against the plain background. It made Matt’s eyes hurt. His new confusion dosed the burning anger.

Matt realized he needed answers and he had a feeling that whoever owned this abomination has something to do with it.

He turned toward the door, not ready to open it and so leaned against it. He heard yelling and judging from the slight roughness of the voice he could hear through the door, he knew it was François. Though the cabin was small, it still did a good job of muffling the words said.

Matt attempted to be silent and open the door quietly, just enough to peek inside, but as soon as he opened it, like a parent waiting for a child to return after curfew, François noticed.

“James. You’re back.”

Hearing this Matt took it as his que and walked inside. Matt noticed that his tone was different from any other time. Instead of the normal monotone, there was a slight bit of shock and disappointment in his tone, if he hadn’t lived with François for all these years, he may have missed it.  

“Ah, James. It is about time you and I met.”

That voice was masculine but on the higher end. It contained a cockney accent and it drew Matt’s attention away from François to the new man that sat at his shabby dining table.

This man was short, he was leaning back into one of the two chairs, with one leg crossed over the other at the knee. He had very light pink hair and blue eyes that swirled pink. His clothing was of higher class, the high coat was on and if he had been standing would have gone down to the upper part of his knee. Unlike most, his shirt was pink with white pants. His boots a light brown, overall, in Matt’s opinion it was something that a woman would wear if she wanted to wear a man’s clothing.

“The name is Matt, not James.”

It was all he could say to this stranger, his face set firm.

“My apologies, I never knew that François allowed you to change your name. Well, anywho, my name is Oliver or The Kingdom of Great Britain, but I guess you can call me your new big brother.”

The man had a smile on his after finishing his sentence and stared into Matt’s soul. It wasn’t kind or inviting, it was cold and mocking. It irked Matt, why mock him. His middle name is much better than James, it just sounds old. Matt sounds tough like he could win any fight he chose. Also, what was with this big brother talk. But before he could utter a sound, François spoke up.

“Matthieu is his middle name. He likes it better.”

“Ah, François you lack discipline. No wonder your little colony is prone to hissy fits.”

Hissy fits! All he’s done is walked in and said a single sentence. Now, this bright freak thinks he knows him. Matt was quick to turn to Oliver.

“What the hell are you here for pinky?” Then he remembered his issue with the French man. “Also I want answers. This freak is a part of the issue, I know that, but what has been up with you!”

That outburst caused Oliver to giggle.

“You haven’t told him” various giggles made it hard to get the sentence out.

Matt was disturbed by the giggling and turned to François. He was right the answers lied with François, but he hoped François would somehow say it is a joke. That there were no answers to be given, that this was not another nation, and though François would never joke. This may be the one circumstance he would.

“Matthieu, according to the treaty of Paris, you are no longer my colony. You now belong to him and he is here to collect you.”

“What the hell?!”

“I’ve already packed your bags. You will leave with him today.”

Matt didn’t know what to feel. He was angry, sad, and still confused. Was he not wanted, was he not good enough, did François push for this to be added to the treaty to lessen the damage done to him? Was it greed from the nation that sat to the side of him?

Oliver sighed at thought of missing on the eventual fistfight, but he did not want to remain in this dirty hovel any longer.

“As much as I would like to watch the drama unfold. James and I have a long trip ahead of us. James’ belongings are already in my sleigh and I would like to be back at my home in New York by Friday.”

At the utterance of the first syllable, Matt’s attention returned to Oliver.

No, no way. He didn’t want to leave. He liked his cabin, he liked the woods, and why would he want to go…

Before his thought had finished, François grabbed Matt from behind. He was turned so that his back was pressed against the table. Shocked Matt remained still.

“Oliver if you want him to come quietly you will need to medicate him now.”

That sentence triggered Matt’s fight instinct and the brawl was on. Matt pulled his arm back and hit François right in the nose. The force pushed François back enough for Matt to get up. Once up Matt was ready to start railing on the down French man, but a pinch halted that.

The pinch was done in his upper right shoulder. In the moment of emotion, Matt forgot about Oliver. It had been his undoing. He was ready to turn and fight Oliver, but whatever was in that needle slowed him down. He was sluggish, stumbling and watching as his world was now spinning.

“Sorry poppet but little colonies like you must learn to listen to your big brothers.”

Then his world went dark.

Rocking. His world was dark and moving. Matt was feeling sick, why was everything moving.

His eyes cracked open; it was too bright. Matt’s eyes scrunched shut, the light created a headache. It resonated like a child banging on a metal pot. Loud and without an even beat.

“Ah, looks like my stubborn little goat is awake.”

That voice was painful. It grated on his ears like an ungreased wheel. Matt gritted his teeth to try and distract him from his pain. It worked until he felt a hand petting his head. Now all he felt was concern and panic.

His eyes shot up, they felt dry, but he looked and saw that he was tied up and lying on his side. The sleigh was just as ugly on the inside as it was on the outside. It was lilac and had silver trims, and Matt wanted to puke for the gaudy design. What made matters worse was that Oliver had Matt’s head on his lap and was playing with his hair.

“We are almost out of your lands. Soon we will be in the Thirteen British Colonies.”

Oliver’s tone seemed calming and joyful. Though Oliver seemed caught up in a thought, something about his other colony took his attention away. Matt tried to use this moment to get out of the ropes.

Matt squirmed vigorously and Oliver took notice of the squirming. It jostled him out of his thought and he pinched Matt right behind his ear.

“That is enough unless you want to sleep this whole trip. Put some trust in big brother to get you home.”

Matt was going to respond, but that look in Oliver’s eyes shook his core. It was dark and malicious and promised pain for continued disobedience. Matt thought about his situation, the ropes, the blanket, and the potential of being drugged again. Matt submitted and stopped his squirming.

That is how Matt’s trip went. Oliver had no shame in keeping Matt in line. Anything from ropes, to repeated drugging, and even various open wounds. That evil look in his eyes is what sealed his obedience. Matt didn’t understand Oliver, but he was learning. The various fails in escape, each taught him something new. The tone Oliver took as backtalk, the fact he doesn’t like swearing, and many more things.

The thought of escape back to Canada faltered when he saw a small mansion coming over the hill. It was back in the woods about a half a day’s journey from the nearest town. The first thing that Matt noticed was that it was the color pink.

Could Oliver have enough pink things, according to Matt’s recent experiences more than likely not. There was a basic stonewall that surrounded the property. The outside was lovely, with flowers planted around, big bushes, and even a small vegetable garden on the left side. Though under the snow, these winter plants seemed to thrive here.

The carriage slowed to a stop and out both men stepped out. Well, Oliver did, Matt was dragged.

Oliver was practically skipping toward the white porch, while Matt dragged his feet and his stuff after collecting it from the driver. Despite the bright atmosphere that the mansion gave, it felt anything but happy. To Matt, it felt like it was he was putting his neck right into a snare trap.

“Hurry up dear. I have someone you need to meet, and then I have paperwork I need to finish.”

Matt sighed; Oliver is someone he really is starting to hate. Slowly he walked up the steps and stood by Oliver at the door. Oliver gave a bright smile and opened the door. It appeared ok, a basic interior with purple walls and shiny wooden floors. Oliver gave him a slight push, a warning that should he not go in, punishment was in store.

Going with the gesture Matt walked inside. He approached like a cautious animal. Looking around and ensuring his own safety. Quick glances revealed shelves with trinkets and some portraits that were hanging on the walls. Maybe he would be ok here, granted he wanted to go home, but for the time being, he could be ok.

That was until he heard banging, rattling, and muffled screaming from what he could assume was the basement.

Then he heard a door lock, it caused his gut to drop.

“Well, James, Welcome Home.”

Hi! I am new to Tumblr, my typical username was taken, so I just went with my blog name. You can call me Author, I know a very original name. I am a huge fan of 2p Hetalia. I thought I would throw my hat into the ring of creators. This thing I have ever posted to Tumblr and I took it from my Quotev page

I am planning on creating a blog, similar to my Quotev book. It is gonna be about headcanons and fanfics about my version of the 2p world. 

Thank you for reading.

-Author

[laserpinksteam]

Double bill: American Rust (created by Dan Futterman, 2021), Your Honor (created by Peter Moffat, 2021)

I've been Maura Tierney's biggest fan since I saw her first episode in ER on Polish TV. This might have been the beginning of me getting into watching TV series, which would become a way of escaping the pain of writing my M.A. dissertation on a topic I would later find out that I didn't care much about. ER would soon fill in the gap between the ends of Sex and the City and Six Feet Under and the beginning of Weeds, probably the last single-series experience I would have before I started watching multiple series simultaneously. She showed up as Nurse Hathaway's obstetrician to then join the series' core staff a few weeks later. She was amazing, her face registered every tiny emotion, she didn't give a fuck, yet she cared so so much. I later discovered Newsradio, where she was the stabilizer to everyone else's zaniness. Each of the above titles would eventually bring me disappointment: Newsradio lost Paul Hartman, Weeds got lost in its constant transitions, Six Feet Under would get mean and implausible, while Sex and the City was like those people in your life that suddenly you understand that had toxic throughout but you just failed to notice. Out of these, ER is the most fascinating case of a show that weathered through its most spectacular loss of Edwards' Dr. Green into the unexpectedly well-written season 9 to then, equally unexpectedly, dramatically drop in quality especially in the last three seasons. Tierney was great throughout, particularly in her last full season, where her character suddenly, but credibly started drinking again. Tierney then had a fantastic guest stint at Rescue Me, returning to the show for a moment two years later, just after recovering from cancer: due to that, I think, her character, already a broader, funnier, and more sexual version of Abby Lockhart, would be given a raw cancer storyline, which, for me, became one of her three best performances. The second would be a variation of it, a blunt prosecutor on Your Honor, a show that was not so great and super popular, yet it had three great supporting roles (Tierney, Landecker, Toussaint). My third would be her winning supporting-to-lead performance in The Affair, a show as consistently flawed as it was entertaining to watch. American Rust is more frustrating. It is bleak and tries so hard to emulate the poverty of its characters that it comes off as gratuitous. Both shows have recently been renewed for second seasons, both were in a limbo for a while, which shows how unimpressive they turned out. I am looking forward to Tierney being offered funnier and punchier productions, her own Veep or Mare of Easttown or Hacks, something funny, potent, and smart as she always makes her characters.