#I blame my friend for making me thing of these dudes by adding an alien prompt to our scribble io game like 5 times | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

mrkcore · 4 years ago

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𝐄𝐏 𝟏: 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐁𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐊 𝐇𝐎𝐓𝐒𝐏𝐎𝐓 - 𝐥.𝐡𝐜

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: lee donghyuck x fem!reader

𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬: college!au (cs - computer science major haechan, psychology major y/n)

𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: fluff, slight angst

𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠(𝐬): suggestive innuendo(s), infidelity, drinking

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 2.2k

𝐚/𝐧: the first chapter of the and they were roommates! series :D send in an ask or comment here to be added to the taglist! (sorry for the delay, i have been really unproductive so uh, yeah)

𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 | 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭

you’ve been stuck with haechan for about a month. you’ve successfully avoided him for the majority of the time, he’s still a bit flirty, but he’s been pretty quiet too.

except for when he streams. did he mention that he was a streamer? unfortunately no, you had to find out the hard way.

“haechan, can you fucking tone it down?” you storm into his room after enduring half an hour of his screaming on a thursday night. “i have an essay due tomorrow and it’s 30 percent of my mar-”

you see a professional looking mic, webcam, and another monitor with what seems like comments flowing in constantly on the screen.

“oh…” you trail off taking in all the equipment in front of you as haechan looks up at you.

“oh hey, sorry about that, jeno and renjun were being noobs and i needed to teach them a lesson, chat knows. i’ll keep it down, sorry.” he turns back to his game in front of him, completely unbothered.

“yeah.. uh sorry for barging in, thanks.” you say quickly and dash out his room, hearing the other voices from his headset laugh.

your face is hot, and you feel so embarrassed.

anyways, lesson learned.

a few days later, you were complaining to your friend about haechan on a zoom call–as usual.

this time, however, she needed to spill the tea about her thoughts.

“ma’am, what is this tension,” she jokes. “i can feel it from miles away.”

“hey!” you snap back. “need i remind you that i have a boyfriend? and haechan? ew no, he gets on my nerves too much for that.”

“oh right, your boyfriend.” she rolls her eyes. “i think you need to visit him, you’re so uptight all the time, i’m gonna get wrinkles if you keep complaining to me about shit.”

“oh right, restrictions have been slightly lifted, i can probably go visit him.” you remember reading about it in the news.

“yep, go.” your friend sips on her iced coffee and you laugh.

the next day, you go through with your plan to go visit your boyfriend.

all prepped and ready and you were going to walk out the door before you hear haechan coming out his room.

“oh, good morning, i’ll be out for a bit, maybe the whole day.” you say to him.

“good morning.” he yawns. “look at you all dolled up and pretty, where you going?” he smirks as you roll your eyes.

“visiting my boyfriend,” you scowl out. “now if you’ll excuse me, i better get going.”

“oh great, hope you enjoy your time with him.” he smiles and you think he’s going to be nice for once. “don’t forget protection.”

you groan. of course he had to ruin it.

“thanks haechan.” you yell behind you as you walk out the door.

it takes around 1 hour to drive to your boyfriend’s university, and an additional 10 minutes to his apartment, and you’re giddy the whole time.

you’ve missed human interaction.

and no, lee haechan does not count.

you’ve missed the warmth and fuzzy feeling of an embrace, of having someone’s arms around you, protecting you from the outside world.

you couldn’t wait to get cuddles.

hopefully your boyfriend likes this surprise.

gleefully walking into the building, pressing in the password to his apartment complex. completely missing the creaking coming from his room, but as you entered, you hear the voice of another person, who was definitely not your boyfriend.

you stomp right up to the door, and push it open.

there’s two people in the bed, and your eyes glower at your boyfriend.

“what?” the girl screams, scrambling to cover herself.

“babe?” your boyfriend is frozen on the spot as the girl looks at him as if he just said the most bizarre thing ever.

“babe?” she seems angry now. “you said you were single? what the fuck?”

“yeah, i think he lied to you.” you say coldly. “do you have anything to confess, ‘babe’?”

“you’re a douche, what the fuck.” she gets up and gets dressed. “i’m so sorry, he told me he was available, i would literally never agree to sleep with anyone who’s taken.”

“yeah, it’s okay.” you say, kind of relieved, and the two stare are you like you’re an alien. “at least now i know what type of person i was dating.”

and you turn to walk out.

“wait, babe please.” your ex tries to run after you. “y/n, let me explain.”

“no need to, we’re over.” you turn to say. “you need a ride?” you ask the girl.

“yeah sure.” she says. “don’t call me.”

“babe please, can we talk this out?”

you couldn’t believe it. you drove 1 hour to see him and he has the audacity to pull this shit and expect you to just easily forgive? nope, lesson learned.

pfft, and he said long distance would work.

“no we can’t, now if you’ll excuse us, we have somewhere else to be.” you grab the girls arm and walk out the door, slamming it in front of your ex’s face before he can catch up.

“do you have any plans for the rest of today?” you ask the girl after entering your car. she shakes her head while you smile. “great, any bar or night club recommendations you have?”

“uhh, bar then nightclub?” she suggests.

“i like the way you think.” you giggle. “i’m y/n btw.”

“yina.” she smiles back at you as you pull out of the parking lot.

a few hours later, and way too many drinks in, you’re at a table with yina, spilling your deepest secrets about your relationship with your ex.

“can you believe he made me wash his socks?” you take a sip before continuing. “and with my hands too!”

“what? that’s disgusting!” she listens to you rant in disbelief.

“yeah, he said that his socks were precious and the washing machine was too harsh on the cotton or some crap.” you snicker as you recall the other stupid stuff he told you. “ah the shit i did for love.”

“men are trash,” yina says. “cheers to that.” and you both down the rest of what’s left of your drink.

fast forward another 2 hours, you’re wasted. absolutely wasted.

yina held you back a little bit, but its no use. you needed this.

“y/n, it’s like 11 pm, you’re drunk, i’m barely sober, i think we should call someone to come and get us.” yina tries to reason with you while you shake your head.

finally after 10 minutes of bickering, you finally agree.

“here’s my phone, you can call anyone.” you rest your head on your folded hands after handing her your unlocked phone. “anyone but haechan.” you start to doze off. “anyone but haechan…”

“hbbhng” you jolt up, feeling the warmth of your own bed.

how did you get back home?

groaning, you feel your headache. you feel the vomit coming up your throat as you gag.

you almost fall trying to get out of your covers.

“woah there, be careful.” haechan is suddenly barging into your room, holding onto you so you don’t fall on your face, guiding you to your bathroom.

you’re too nauseous to wonder why he’s even helping you or even bother screaming at him like usual.

he pats your back soothingly as you vomit into the toilet.

“there you go, that’s it. i’ve got you.” he reassures you.

“what are you even doing helping me?” you’ve washed up and downed some water, you’re 100% sober now.

“wow,” haechan chuckles, rolling his eyes. “after saving your ass last night, this is the thank you i get?”

“what do you mean you saved me?” you’re genuinely confused by what he means.

“this yina girl called me from your phone, telling me that you’re blacked out drunk in a nightclub at 11:32 PM, on a saturday. asking me to come and get you.” he says, matter-of-factly. “i call a cab, get to the nightclub, haul your ass out the club, drive yina back home, and then us. where during our commute back, you wake up, start crying, and when we get home, you’re bawling about how your boyfriend cheated and you were a dumbass for thinking he would change. remember now?”

you’re in shock.

yina called haechan? you remember clearly that you told her not to, this is so embarrassing. you even cried about your ex to him? oh dear lord you wanted to crawl back into your room into a deep pit and never come out.

haechan must’ve noticed your distressed expression because his face turns softer.

“hey hey hey, sorry, that was a bit mean. you just got out of a relationship, that was really inappropriate of me and i do not blame you for wanting to relax a bit.” he tries to comfort you once again. you’re in even more shock by his words. “honestly, me driving you back home, and taking care of you was the least i could do. it would have been so mean if i just left you guys there.”

you wanted to burst out into tears.

this is the nicest thing you’ve heard in about 6 months.

unfortunately, haechan doesn’t know that.

“oh gosh, jheez, i’m not helping aren’t i.” he’s panicked by your emotional state. “uhm, to make it up to you, i’ll watch one of those scary movies with you?”

your tears instantly are sucked back into your eyes in excitement.

“really?” you ask, just making sure.

“yep, ahaha.” he laughs nervously, but happy to see your mood lighten up.

“you free tonight?” bouncing up and down practically.

“yeah…” haechan is a bit scared. “aren’t you going a bit too fast though, princess? you jut got out of a relationship.”

you gasp and slap him in the arm.

“okay okay! that was a joke. yeah i’m free, i have an essay due, but i’ll be done by 6.” haechan says.

“sounds good!” you b-line for the kitchen, your stomach is completely empty. “see you then haechan!”

oh how haechan regrets his offer.

6 o’clock rolls by, and you choose “the shining” to watch with haechan. anticipating the terror it would bring him.

and you were right.

every jumpscare, even the smallest sounds, haechan would screech in fright. the last straw for him was the knock on your door.

“AHHHH!” he screams, almost knocking the popcorn out of your hands.

“calm down, dude.” you say, standing up to open the door.

to the unfortunate sight of your ex.

“y/n?” he says, softly.

“what are you doing here? how did you find out where i lived?” you were very sure you never gave him your dorm address.

“your friend gave it to me,” the eye bags he has are very evident. “listen, can we talk?”

“no?” haechan suddenly butts into the conversation. “you literally cheated on her, she doesn’t owe you anything.”

“who are you? her rebound?” your ex frowns.

“her roommate, and if you even bothered to keep up with y/n, you’d know.” haechan returns the frown.

“it’s between me and y/n, you have no business telling us what to do.” your ex is getting more aggressive now.

“that’s funny, i was the one who was called to drive her home while she was out drunk, i was the one who listened to her talk about how she regretted believing you again, i was the one who held her hair back when she was vomiting this morning from her hangover.” haechan again returns the energy. “you tried to contact her, but she blocked your number and you had to get her address from her friend. you never even cared to ask her beforehand, and now you wanna try and show up to seem like you care? bullshit. now if you’ll excuse us now, we have a movie to finish.” he slams the door in his face and haechan surprises you for the millionth time today.

your ex bangs on the door for about 3 minutes before giving up, and you guys sit in silence as the movie still plays.

“hey haechan.” you try and start.

“AHHH!” he screams again, scaring you this time.

“JHEEZ BRO I WAS TRYING TO START A CONVO, CHILL OUT.” you scream back.

“okay, i’m fine, yeah sorry, continue.” haechan pants out.

“thanks for that.” you say, genuinely. “not even joking, you didn’t have to do that.”

“well i did, because that dude was a douche. literally having the guts to come over here and try and ask for forgiveness after he cheats. unbelievable.”

“yeah.” you fiddle with your fingers anxiously.

“i like this side of you,” haechan breaks the awkwardness. “you’re usually uptight, little-miss-perfect, and cranky, so i like this raw side of you.”

“mhm, i realized that now. sorry for being such a bitch.” you admit.

“no, i honestly deserve it. but i hope we can be friends now, it would be great to have real conversations with someone, you know?” he says.

“seriously?” you hit him in the chest as he chuckles.

“i’m joking! i swear. but seriously, friends?” he asks.

“yeah, friends.”

and that’s where it started.

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thesquidkid · 4 years ago

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Lately I've been feeling so alone

Based of this post by @milady-bugg, thank you for letting me use it as inspiration for a fic 😁

This is sadder than intended, and full of Michael Guerin feels, hope you'll enjoy! This is also quite long (5.4k lmao), so you can read it on AO3 if you prefer.

Michael had isolated himself in his bunker, not letting anyone - even Sanders - in. At first, there were a few knocks, the door opening a few times and each time, Michael would slam it shut with his powers. He needed to process. It was one thing, to know that you were the son of a monster, another to face the man as he gave his own son a heart attack. Father of the year, right here!

So Michael had isolated himself between 4 walls, literally underground, where he could let all his anger free without hurting anyone. But the others couldn’t really understand that, and he couldn’t blame them. So everyone went on to live their lives, do what they were good at.

Isobel and Rosa were looking for Max, searching every cave, every abandoned house, turning every stone, using Rosa’s new found ability. Liz was making sure Maria stayed stable and healthy, her state hadn’t really decreased, but it hadn’t improved either. Whatever was going on, she seemed to continue the fight. Because Maria DeLuca was her own saviour, every damn time.

Michael didn’t have any news of Alex, just that he had found Kyle and that he was safe. He had hesitated calling Alex a few times, to compare notes on shitty father, but that wouldn’t have been fair to Alex, the person who tried every damn day to distance himself from his father, to fix what he broke, to be a better man.

So Michael was alone, in his bunker, with Sanders coming in every once in a while to complain that Michael wasn’t working, but both knew it was just an excuse to check up on him, make sure he was doing fine.

And really, he was. After the initial shock of finding out that his father was a copy of his brother (really, all those times Max had played his father, it was just in his DNA), where he completely and utterly lost it, he was now in a much calmer headspace. He had repositioned all the furniture that had been thrown against the walls, had done some extensive cleaning and given back a few tools and random parts he found to Sanders.

Although, he was still feeling empty. Had emptied his entire body, crying, shouting, wanting to break stuff with his powers, but knowing that if he did he would have to replace it somehow. And he was still broke. So he had to figure out another way of letting his emotions free, that didn’t involve breaking the little stuff he owned, and regretting it.

Instead, he focused on what he was good at. Had put all of the alien tech he had on the main workspace, fiddling with it at first, letting his hand move freely on it, feeling the way the tech reacted to him. From then, he realised that he still didn’t completely know what the tech could do, had assumed it was only part of the ship, but the recent events, with Kyle’s radio and Jones’ sword, he was getting curious as to what he could do, with his imagination and mechanical skills.

This is where it all started, with the alien glass and his tools, letting his hands move as they desired, his mind still busy thinking about - well, everything that happened in the last few days, from Jones being his father, to Max maybe still nearly dying, to Maria being in a coma, and to Alex being God knows where doing God knows what.

As he thought about his friends, his family, his people, his fingers were doing something similar. This is how he found himself, after three days in the bunker, barely sleeping, not at all in contact with the outside world - only going out to take a shower, get some food, and use the toilet in the airstream - with a bunch of glass objects, clearly designed for his friends, and not knowing what to do with all of it. Well, he knew, but that meant going out and seeing them, their faces, probably full of pity, no one knowing how to address the elephant in the room - Jones.

He was building up the courage to get out and gift his creations as peace offering, or whatever they wanted them to be, when he was disturbed by a knock on the latch, then it opened, followed by a very familiar voice that he didn’t expect to hear any time soon.

“Look, Guerin, I get that you want to be alone right now, and uh, yeah -” Alex Manes said, passing a hand across the face, fighting the want to jump down that ladder, understanding more than anyone what being the son of a monster felt like, and even then, neither of their experiences were comparable. “I’m just here to tell you that, ah, Maria woke up, and uh, she’ll be staying in the hospital for a little longer, so uh, yeah that’s what I came here to say.” he finished, and stood up from where he was crouching above the opened latch, looking down in the bunker but not seeing more than the ladder and light. He could also slightly distinguish Michael’s shadow, glowing under all the lights he guessed were alien.

Michael thought Alex had left, and nearly closed the latch using his powers, when he heard the last few words, barely a whisper, but clear as day to him. And he knew that Alex knew that he heard them. “I’m here. If you ever want to talk, or whatever. I’m here for you, Michael.” And with that, Alex left, understanding the peace of being alone with your thoughts, and knowing that Michael would come out whenever he was ready to.

And he was ready to come out. Soon after he heard Alex’s car leave the junkyard, he rushed to his airstream to take a shower and change clothes, taking with him the glass object he had made for Maria. When Sanders saw him leave the airstream, showered, dressed in clothes that hadn’t been worn the past three days, smiling, he couldn’t stop the teasing comment, “If I knew getting your boy here would get you out, I’d have done it long ago.” Despite the comment, he was glad that Michael was feeling better, and even more glad to hear the “Not my boy. Maria’s awake,” that came from Michael as he drove away, leaving Sanders in the junkyard, a smile on his face. The kid was starting to realise that family wasn’t the blood coursing through your veins, but the people you choose to surround yourself with. He hoped Ms. Nora would be proud of her boy, wherever she was.

Michael drove to the hospital at a respectable speed, not wanting to get arrested the day Maria woke up - she would never stop making fun of him about it. He nearly ran towards her room, stopping only at the open door, taking in the people in the room. Liz was at the foot of Maria’s bed, holding a board with papers clipped to it - most likely Maria’s health results - talking with her hands, a large smile on her face. Rosa was sitting on the bed, next to Liz, exchanging side smiles with Maria, her entire body more relaxed than she had been since Maria’s coma. Isobel was standing to the side of the room, leaning against the wall, facing the door. She was the first to see Michael, making him smile back, and promising her to talk and hang out, by their psychic bond. Finally, he turned his eyes to the head of Maria’s bed, where the two Manes men who had gone against their father were sitting, Greg leaning against the back of the chair, a hand holding Maria’s and the other going up and down on her arm in a reassuring sign, Alex on the other side sitting with his elbows on his knees, chin resting on one hand, apparently the only one truly listening to what Liz had to say.

He cleared his throat, not knowing how else to announce his presence. “Mikey!” came the synchronised shout from the Orthecho sisters, “what took you so long, dude? We texted you ages ago!” Rosa teasingly asked, Michael not bothering with an answer and simply sticking his tongue out to her, earning him a roll of the eyes from Liz and Isobel, a full on laugh from Rosa and a slight chuckle from Alex.

“How you feeling, DeLuca?” he started to ask, his voice clear with worry, but remembering many of their conversations, he continued with something he knew she would prefer to him worrying too much, “I might check out some other bar if you stay out of the game for too long.”

And he seemed to have been right, as Maria giggled and stood up straighter, “Oh I’m not too worried you’ll be right back at the Pony in no time Guerin,” she said smiling at him, which Michael copied. “And,” she added, pointing her finger in his direction, “you still owe me 15,09 bucks, don’t think I’ve forgotten.”

Michael shook his head, of course she wouldn’t forget the drinks he had during the last year that he hasn’t yet repaid in services. Since it was the pandemic, they both didn’t have much money so they agreed that whatever drinks he ordered would be paid back in free car or bar maintenance, and vice versa. As if they weren’t already cutting deals for each other.

Feeling all eyes on him, especially since he had gone AWOL for the last three days, Michael cleared his throat once more and took a few hesitant steps towards Maria, ignoring everyone in the room but her. “I, uh, made you something?” he said, cursing himself mentally for making it sound like a question, “here,” he put his hand in his jacket pocket and took out four little alien glass hairpins, ‘it’s alien glass, I thought you might like them.”

He looked at her to see some tears in her eyes as she took the hairpins and observed them in her hands. “They’re, Michael, those are amazing ,” she said with so much sincerity that Michael was taken aback by it, “Thank you.” she added with a smile.

In the end Michael sat on the floor against the wall, listening closely to Maria talking about what had happened with Jones. He felt at ease, surrounded by his friends, still feeling the weight of Kyle and Max missing, but everyone enjoying this small light in what had felt like a week of pure darkness.

Being with Maria, giving them his creation, had given him the courage to talk to the others, and hand them their gifts. He went to see Liz, one day, as she was still in Kyle’s office, observing scans of Maria’s brain. He pointedly ignored those pictures, deciding that he wasn’t going to think of what his father could have done to Maria and her brain, knowing the guilt he would feel if he did. Instead he stood in front of Liz and handed her two teardrop earrings made out of alien glass.

She stopped in the middle of her sentence, and stared up at Michael who smiled awkwardly, her mouth agape as she took in the beauty of the jewelry. “Mikey, wow, I - I don’t know what to say.” she said, looking back and forth between the earrings and Michael.

“It’s nothing, Ortecho, really, I had glass laying around and -” he started to say but was interrupted by Liz. “Thank you.” she nearly shouted, standing up and bending him in a tight embrace, which he returned gladly. He then held up Liz’s phone as a mirror as she put them on and admired herself, making both of them laugh, before reality caught up, and they both needed to focus on Max, Kyle, and Maria. Liz kept the earrings the entire day, and wears them on any occasion she can, the alien colorful glass going with a multitude of clothing combinaisons.

The next person Michael gave a present to was Rosa. She was at the junkyard to train her powers when he surprised her with alien windchimes. He quickly used his powers to hang them up while she had her eyes closed and let the wind do the rest of the work. She opened her eyes in admiration of whatever sound she had heard and turned towards the source of it. “Woa,” she said under her breath as she walked slowly towards them, until finally touching them with her hands, letting the windchimes sing under her fingers, the alien glass slightly reacting.

“You made those?” she asked, turning around to Michael. He nodded, smiling, feeling quite proud of his work. “The sound they make,” continued Rosa, turning once again to look at the windchimes, Michael walking closer to her, “it’s - I don’t think I can compare it to anything.” He nodded once more, encouraging Rosa to continue, “It’s like a melody. I can hear the wind, but it’s different, it’s beautiful.”

She leaned against Michael who was now standing slightly behind her, Michael instinctively putting her arm around her shoulders, the two of them standing in the middle of the junkyard, admiring the alien glass windchimes Michael had made for Rosa. She would come buy the junkyard many times, listening at the way the wind circled through the windchimes, admiring their beauty.

After that it all happened really quickly; Rosa and Isobel found Max, Michael and Liz had been called to the rescue (Jones had apparently regained his body and vanished), followed by Kyle waking up, Greg and Maria rushing to some ranch in the middle of nowhere to get Kyle and Alex. Eventually, all this craziness died down for a bit, Max was hiding in Alex’s cabin in the woods, since Jones had used his body to commit crimes, he couldn’t really go grocery shopping without getting arrested, and Kyle had regained his job at the hospital. Michael seriously wondered how he hadn’t been fired yet, but he wasn’t complaining, at least someone in their group seemed to know what he was doing with his life.

He made his way back to the hospital, except this time to see the one person he swore he would never visit as a kid. A doctor. But not just any doctor, a doctor who was quickly becoming a good friend of his, which he obviously wasn’t going to admit. He walked in the corridors, knowing the place quite well by now, and knocked on Kyle’s office door. A tired “Come in” answered and he opened the door.

As soon as Kyle saw who was on the other side of the door, he groaned and nearly snapped, thinking that maybe now would be the time to get a new group of friends that didn’t have alien emergencies every four hours. Michael must’ve sensed what Kyle was about to say (something along the lines “I don’t care that the world is burning because of some alien invasion, I need sleep! And no, a coma doesn’t count.”) because he raised his hands in surrender, a smug smile on his face.

“Relax, no alien life or death situations, or at least not that I know of.” This had the expected effect, Kyle relaxed in his chair, crossed his arms on his chest and raised an eyebrow at Michael, silently asking him why he was here then. Michael closed the door behind him and sat opposite Kyle, on one of the patients chairs. Still smiling, he took out of his pocket two glass paperweights that he delicately put on the desk for Kyle to grab, just as delicately.

Kyle was silent as he turned the paperweights between his hands, admiring all the different angles, reflecting his desk light on the walls and papers he had on his desk. While Kyle was busy, Michael slowly put his hand in his other jacket pocket and took out a glass snow globe with a little cardboard UFO, two little plastic aliens, and pink fake snow. He put it on the desk and waited for Kyle to notice, after having put the paper weights on top of two small piles he had.

When he saw the snow globe, his face lit up with astonishment, and he looked up to Micheal, once again speechless. “I know what it’s like to see a doctor as a kid and being scared,” Michael said, not looking at Kyle but at the little snowball, “and I know it’s not the same, but uh-”

“I’m sure the kids will love it, Michael.” Kyle said, honestly. He took the globe and shook it, chuckling at the way the UFO dangled, the way the little Aliens wiggled and the way the pink snow fell on everything. “Thank you.”

Michael shrugged, “Consider it payback,” he said, with a sincere smile this time, “for all the times you saved our asses.” And with that, he stood up, waved awkwardly at Kyle (who waved back just as awkwardly) and left.

Kyle took care of the paperweights, who in reality weren’t so heavy, but never broke as they fell. All the kids that came by his office would stare at the little snow globe, admiring it, feeling calmer and safer during their appointment.

Isobel called Michael over the next day. She said she wanted to go shopping for Max, since he was stuck away and was getting bored (how he had already read all the books Alex gave him, was a mystery to Michael, but he supposed when there really wasn’t anything else to do…)

Michael ran on her doorbell and let himself in, using his powers to unlock the door. He made his way to the living room and sat on the couch, looking at the decorations of Isobel’s walls. This house felt more homey than the one she had shared with Noah, there were paintings on the walls he knew Rosa had made, a few old and useless metallic pieces he had turned into sculptures and decorations laying around in various places. But what was really different was the huge bookshelf, books varying from science fiction (for Michael), to inspiring novels (for Isobel) to fantasy and romantic (for Max), indicating that this wasn’t just her home for her, but that her brothers were welcomed here too.

Michael put on the table the necklace he had made, the pendant made out of alien glass and the chain from some silver he had laying around the junkyard, and waited for Isobel to come out. When she did, she smiled at Michael and sat next on his left, facing him. “Okay, so I’ve been thinking, and our brother isn’t really the best cook so -”, she started to say, but cut herself as she saw what was on the table.

She grabbed the necklace between her fingers, and looked to Michael, who was leaning against the couch, an arm slung over it, a bright smile on his face. He winked at her, when he saw that Isobel was looking at him, and she leaned against him, her heard on his shoulder, Michael folding his arm around her.

“It’s beautiful, Michael,” Isobel said, emotions strong in her voice, “thank you.” Mihael rubbed his hand on her shoulder, not really knowing what to say, but wanting her to know that he would always be there.

Isobel wiggled the necklace in front of his face, Michael taking it with a chuckle as he attached it around her neck. The two of them stayed like that, leaning their heads against each other, in silence, in peace. Eventually, Isobel stood up, hurrying Michael out the door and into his truck to go shopping for Michael. And if they were a bit later than what they had told Max, arriving with humid eyes, no one made a comment about it, Max glad to have some company and more books to read.

Michael went back to see Max at least once a day, staying for a few hours or a couple of minutes, always checking in. The two had a lot to talk about, especially the elephant in the room - Max being a clone of Michael’s father.

Michael found himself enjoying those little brotherly moments, and more so the one after they had done the whole Jones subject. Michael would make a few comments about Liz staying in Roswell, to which Max would respond with questions about Alex.

“You know,” said Max on the third day Michael came when they were sitting around a fire pit, enjoying a few beers, after Michael had strongly avoided any topic about Alex, while also admitting to having some feelings (which Max knew of already, subtility wasn’t Michael’s - and Alex’s - strong suit), “this is the first time you and I have talked about dumb highschool crushed together.”

Michael chuckled at that, a hint of sadness that Max quickly brushed, “Hey no, the past is the past man, I’m just saying that I’m glad we’re finally talking, you know? Feels like we’re finally not hiding stuff.” And Michael raised his beer bottle at that. It was indeed the first time that they were both completely open, no more secret. They both were at fault on that, but as Max had said, the past was the past, no point reminiscing, when you could focus on making the future better.

With those thoughts in mind, he took out of his pocket an alien glass bolo tie with little turquoise end caps on the ties, and handed it to Max, who took it. They were both hypnotised by the way the flames reflected on the glass, the way the colors seemed to dance in the night.

Max didn’t say anything, didn’t have too. He put his beer on the floor next to him, stood up and motioned to Michael to do the same. Once they were both standing, facing each other, they hugged deeply, strongly. In the end, all the other bolo ties Max owned got mostly replaced by this one, being worn at every occasion he could, always with his brother in mind.

Michael had two more presents to offer, and was sitting in his bunker, not knowing how to approach either of the people they were made for. Luckily for him, he didn’t have to figure one out, as the person in question opened the latch and climbed down the stairs with a grunt. “Kid,” came Sander’s voice as soon as his feet reached the ground, “think you can use that brain of yours to build a lift here? Getting too old for this.”

“Well no one is forcing you to come, old man,” Michael replied, although there was no true bite to it. In fact, he quite enjoyed the old man’s occasional visits, even if all he did was complain. Michael turned around to face him, “Everything all good up there?” he asked, wondering why Sanders had come down. Sanders just nodded at him and took the last steps for him to arrive at Michael’s level, leaning his hands on the workspace. “What you working on, kid?”

“Uhm, actually -” started Michael, now that Sanders was here, might as well give him the present, right? “I got something for you.”

Using his powers, he approached a little metallic sunflower he had made from scrap pieces found here and there in the junkyard, and had made the center out of alien glass. The whole thing was attached to a chain to be held up against the door to Sanders house.

Sanders grabbed the sunflower and looked at it intensely with his good eye, remembering the colors Ms Nora’s creations were, seeing them once again on that little sunflower. Neither said anything, nor made a step forward to hug, neither being used to physical comfort, but they both knew how much that gesture meant.

To Michael, it meant acceptance, family, a sunflower for all the sunflowers they grew at the junkyard over the pandemic. To Sanders, it meant pride, it meant having kept his promise to Ms Nora to take care of his son, it meant family.

The sunflower was attached by Sanders' door, the alien glass glowing under the desert sun, always turning to face it, like all the many sunflowers they had in their field.

Which led Michael to one last gift. And if he was being honest with himself, the one he dreaded the most. Also the one that took him the most time and the most research. A gift for Alex. Taking his courage in both hands, he sent a quick text to Alex before he could have any chance to doubt himself. Free right now? I think I might take you up on your offer.

He didn’t have long to wait, as his phone buzzed almost immediately, On my way. Be there in 30 . He rushed back to his airstream, ignoring once more Sanders’ comment about getting ready for his boy , to get changed and put beers in the fridge. He opened the door of the airstream just as he heard Alex’s car arrive, and sat on one of the chairs, two bears in hand, while he made his way over. Alex sat on a chair next to him, accepting the beer, in silence.

“I heard you were busy while in your underground lair, judging by the gifts I’ve been seeing pop up.” Alex said with a smile, taking a sip of his beer, turning his head to look at Michael.

Michael frowned his eyebrows, “I thought you were busy out of town?” he asked, barely stopping the bite from escaping his lips. Alex looked sheepishly away from Michael at that, “I’ve been trying to not distance myself too much,” she shrugged, his tone lowering, until being a simple whisper at the end, “to not drive myself crazy.” He shivered at whatever thought was going through his mind, then straightened his body and looked up to Michael, “Anyway, you said you’d take me up on my offer, I’m assuming you want to talk?” he asked, forcing a smile that Michael didn’t buy.

“The hell is going on with you, Alex?” Michael asked, with a bit too much force that he immediately took back at Alex’s defeated look, “First you tell me you’d burn down the world for me, then that you don’t want me anywhere you or whatever, and then you end up finding Kyle in some creepy farm, which might I add is the exact same farm you got stabbed in .” He took a breath, and continued, “So yeah, Alex, I want to talk, I want you to tell me what’s going on with you.” He stopped at looked at Alex, who didn’t really seem like he wanted to say anything, so he lowered his voice, taking back all the bite and anger he could, channeling how much he cared and worried about Alex, “You said you were there for me, it’s a two way street you know. I’m here for you too.”

That seemed to do the trick, as Alex’s teary eyes met Michael’s, who wanted nothing more that to wipe his thumb across his cheeks, to take away the fear and the pain he could see in those eyes. But he didn’t, they weren't there yet.

Alex took a deep, shaky breath and told Michael everything, from quitting the Air Force (getting a discharge with full honors, Michael could tell the pride in his voice as the last ten years of Alex’s hadn’t been totally useless), to joining Deep Sky, to the Lockhart machine, to his boss not being who he said he was, to discovering that the Lockhart machine had driven people crazy, to the reason he had been recruited by deep sky. After his explanations, he fell quiet, looking at Michael, not truly knowing what to expect.

What he didn’t expect however, was for Michael to get up hastily, move the airstream and rush to his lair, leaving Alex sitting on his chair, a half empty bottle of beer in one hand, tears in his eyes. But Michael came back, just as fast as he had left, holding some piece of alien tech mixed with metal in his hands. It took a moment for Alex to register what that object was, and once he did, he widened his already teary eyes in surprise, his mouth was slightly agape, his eyebrows were frowned, as he searched for the words to express his confusion, not wanting to get his hopes high. On the other hand, there wasn’t a multitude of people Michael could’ve made an alien prosthetic leg for.

Michael approached slowly with the leg in his hands, handing it to Alex once he was close enough. “I uh- I made you this.” he said, clearing his throat, while Alex was examining the leg, “It’ uh, lighter than the one you have now, but it’s also more resistant and, well, you could really bludgeon someone with it, if uh - if you wanted to.”

Alex kept looking at the leg, not saying anything, which Michael interpreted as him not being interested. “You don’t have to take it, if you don’t like it. I also made you this,” he rushed out, taking a braided leather cuff with a piece of alien glass as a stamp and handing it sheepishly to Alex, who was looking at him, with the same teary look he had for the past few minutes. Michael took a deep breath and sat back down, “Look,” he breathed out, “what I’m trying to say, Alex, is I’ve got your back, okay? I’ll build you whatever you need, I’ll go wherever you want me to, I’ll - I care about you.”

As Alex opened his mouth to say something, Michael raised his hand to interrupt, and continued, “And I’m the son of a literal dictator whose powers I’ve inherited. I can defend myself. And I know that you wanna protect me - I do too - but maybe we could, I don’t know, protect each other by being there?”

Alex, whose tears were now running free on his face, bent down to take his right shoe off, under Michael’s curious gaze, who could also feel tears running down his cheeks. Alex raised his trousers and took off his prosthetic, before grabbing the alien one and putting it on. He knew the size would fit, knew that Michael had worked hard on it, had probably had the idea of making him a new leg from the moment they met again, in front of that same airstream, under completely different circumstances.

They had gone a long way from that day, and they still had some more to do, but Michael was right. Maybe this time, they could be there, together, to take that new road, to protect and take care of each other, together. Before standing up, Alex attached the bracelet Michael had made around his left wrist, admiring the colors of the alien glass under the desert sun.

Alex stayed at the junkyard for some more time, until his alarm rang, informing him that he should head back to the Lockhart machine. Taking a deep breath, he turned to Michael, asking him if he wanted to come with, and together they drove to the farm, down a road they had both taken together once, but this time Alex wasn’t bleeding out.

After that day, Alex still went to the VA in Albuquerque for meds prescriptions and physical therapy once in a while, but all the repairs that needed to be done for his prosthetic, all the improvements, were done by Michael, in his lair, under Alex’s curious gaze, who wanted to know everything about Michael’s ideas.

After all his gifts, Michael found that he still had some alien glass laying around in his bunker. So he decided to turn it all into little rings, wanting to distinguish as much as he could from the weaponizing of the alien glass, like Jones had. Eventually, all of little friend group, all of his people, owned a ring.

And when the day came, when the fight with Jones reached its last stretch, Michael was ready. He didn’t have an alien sword like Jones had, but he had something much more. A group of people, by his side, all sharing his strength through the little alien gifts. His people, his family.

Lately I've been feeling so alone Can someone give the antidote to me so I can Finally understand where I belong

#i am soft for michael guerin #he has people 🥺#michael guerin #alex manes #maria deluca #liz ortecho #max evans #isobel evans #rosa ortecho #walt sanders #rnm fic #roswell new mexico #rnm #lyrics from Head Up by the score #thesquidkid writes

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esperwatchesfilms · 4 years ago

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Summer of ‘84 (2018)

Eats: If I find a used condom in there, I’m gonna be so jealous.

Okay. Before I go ahead and give it the 120/100 I think it deserves, I’m going to let everyone know... I almost deducted all 100 points. I liked the movie. I liked the 80s summer adventure with friends, the nostalgia. I liked the actors. I thought it was fun and interesting. For about half the movie. Then I became bored. I got annoyed that this horror movie didn’t have anything horrifying going on. I was annoyed that it appeared to set itself up as “kid and his whacky friends save the day”.

But then he left the station, and I saw how much movie was still left... so I knew something interesting had to happen at the end.

They, of course, end up killing my favorite character, which I’m upset about, but I can forgive because of what killing this character ended up doing for the ending.

The unexpected ending and what I think will be under a spoiler, in case you’re looking at this and haven’t seen it, along with my ESE score.

Woody being murdered is the most genius thing this film did. Having Mackey kidnap Woody and Davey is just such a strong move. He makes them play a real-life game of Manhunt, their favorite neighborhood game, where he gives them a minor head-start and then chases them around this island that has only one bridge that leads to the mainland, though they have no clue what side they’re on or where they’re at on the island, and they have to get past him.

Davey tries to draw attention away so Woody can get away, but Mackey takes off after Woody and ultimately kills him. He slices Davey’s achilles tendon and Davey finds his best friend’s body. When Mackey catches up to him, he lets him know that he WANTS to kill him. But he’s not going to. He says that Davey spent that whole summer thinking about Mackey, and he’s not going to let him stop thinking about him. He tells him that he’s going to get him. That he’ll never be able to stop wondering when or how. If it’ll be in months, if it’ll be in years.

Now, a lesser movie would’ve had him found before the movie ended. Escaping in some asinine way that leaves it up to imagination.

This movie? Gave us the best ending. Mackey disappears into the night, leaving Davey to hobble back toward civilization, losing blood and emotionally distraught all the way.

When he leaves the hospital and gets back to his normal paper route, he has a voiceover that is cool and all, but ultimately has no bearing on how I feel about what happens in the end. On his paper route, he sees his other two friends, Eats and Faraday. Eats and Faraday give him a death glare... a sign that the friendship has ended and that they blame him for Woody’s death and the escape of the murderer.

So, he leave this kid with the everlasting fear that he’s out there and he is going to wait until Davey feels safe, and that’s when he’ll get him. And added to that, is the death glares from his former friends, the girl he likes leaving town, his best friend is dead... All of this? Leads him isolated on top of the constant terror that this dude could be lurking around any corner.

The layers of the psychological horror ending make up for any annoyance that it took so long for me to see anything “horror” about this horror movie. It makes up for killing my favorite character. I loved this ending. BRILLIANT ending.

ESE: 120/100

50 +5 for alien sticker +5 for alien shirt +10 for manhunt making me nostalgic +10 for Judah Lewis +5 for Cory Gruter-Andrew +5 for “peek-a-boobs” -10 for R-slur +5 for Nikki in his bedroom +10 for 80s pop culture references +5 for Nikki talking Davey up to make him look cooler amongst his friends -10 for getting caught +10 for finding the body and saving another kid +20 for such a genius ending

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coweggomelet · 4 years ago

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i apparently enjoy putting down my thoughts on the off chance someone will read it and enjoy it so here’s rwby rewatch vol 3. i’m ready to be sad!!

(note: it’s long i’m sorry, i have many thoughts and i tried to narrow it down but oh boy do i think im funny)

- the SOUND DESIGN. AGAIN

- ruby you’re so precious. so sweet. so eager. so earnest. c’mere and i’ll protect you from all the bad shit that happens to you later

- hi cardboard cutout tai

- i keep getting an ad for a rooster teeth show called camp betrayal and the way this man says “hoo hoo hoo” will haunt me for the rest of time

- oh shit the fact that it’s called amity has such insane implications for what it’s used for later. jesus.

- “bffs!” “No.” “…/yessss/” love them

- yeet the yang

- god ruby’s admiration of emerald is so sad in retrospect like… oh boy ruby you’re in for it

- PYRRHAAAAA I LOVE YOU DONT LEAVE ME

- “even if you know how a story ends, that doesn’t make it any less fun to watch” wow cinder are you psychic

- ummmm they’re having a talk can you please respect their privacy

- thor whomst??? i only know nora valkyrie

- BROODY MAN

- hiiiii gavin

- so much mid battle banter. in the middle of a big important fight they just have to make jokes and argue. i love teenagers

- SILENCE YOU BOOB

- awww winter you’re a disaster and you’re horribly emotionally repressed because of your bitch ass dad but jesus christ you care about your little sister and you wanna know she’s doing okay and i’m emotional about it

- PENNYYYYY my love just keep being you

- jeez i forgot how early on ironwood was talking his shit about being “someone who will act”, the “only person” who will do what needs to be done, as if his course of action is what needs to be done

- every single person who underestimates emerald and mercury gets so fucked up. like so many people look at these youngerish teenagers with some funny one liners and banter and go “oh they seem capable and they’re confident and funny so i like em but i can take em” and then absolutely get the shit kicked out of them. and i think that’s why they’ve been so successful, cause nobody takes them seriously enough to consider them a threat.

- see this is why i love rwby. coco just turned her handbag into a gatling gun and cut down a field of grass with it

- god the way they hint at emerald’s semblance before fully showing what it is. *chef’s kiss*

- winter marry me

- we love an uncle who absolutely destroys his nieces at video games

- “they do and they’re called silver!” ruby i love you

- top heavy. heheh

- this dude’s weapon is a trumpet!! she’s got glowing nunchucks!! i love this show!!

- this battle music is AMAZING what the FUCK they’re fighting to JAZZ

- cinder if you keep having vague ominous dialogue people are gonna get the wrong idea

- oh yeah great idea asking a child to take on immense power which sends her into a stressed out panicky spiral and alienates her from the people she finally feels legitimately connected to and for once didn’t feel alienated from

- oh fuck. oh fuck the finals. oh god. oh no.

- she’s so happy. she’s so ready to have a good fight. i’m gonna cry

- FUCK

- and with one moment, the entire show flipped on its head

- god when i watched that the first time i fuckin freaked. i was not prepared man. i was warned. but i was not prepared for this much of a fucking tone change man. that quickly. like tone changes (in my experience) normally happen gradually, but this one happened in, what? 30 seconds?

- fuck

- god this is so bad

- and it GETS WORSE i can’t do this

- love that we can see yang’s distraught eyebrows through her bangs

- after this episode was the first time my friend asked me “how we doing buddy?” and i’ve only wanted to kill her more since then

- oh god emerald’s backstory. this poor child. she was so alone and cinder was there and said i can give you a place i can give you a purpose i can give you security and emerald latched on so hard.

- hiiiii laura bailey i wish you had more than a lil baby line and some sounds of effort

- god that little anklet

- god what a fuckin backstory episode man. backstory? evil plan explanation? idk but it was good

- great parent move. telling your kid you’ll only save them once.

- jaune you sweet good boy. what a good boy. i love him

- god this poor child. she doesn’t deserve this. FUCK i’m so sad. is that the last conversation they have?

- oooooh shit this song is so good. what the fuck i have chills it’s so fitting

- god everyone else is so happy and excited and then there’s ruby who is one of the very few people who knows how bad a fight between penny and pyrrha could be and pyrrha who’s got to decide if she wants someone else’s aura smushed with hers, which could turn her into a different person. FUCK

- peeeennyyyyy “salutations!! it’s an honor to meet you!” it huuuurts

- it makes me so sad but damn was this a good diabolical plan

- god im so sad. penny is so good. and pyrrha’s fuckin eyes. and ruby just collapsing. jesus christ. it’s all fuckin falling apart

- oh fuck here we go. those klaxons are so terrifying

- it makes me so happy that torchwick gets rescued and then like maybe a couple episodes later just gets swallowed

- the fuckin adam fight is coming up too. jesus. really piling on here

- RUBY IS USING ONE OF PENNY’S SWORDS IM GONNA CRYYY

- and she doesn’t even hesitate to save pyrrha

- the one and only time (to my memory) that ironwood is gentle is when he says no one would blame the students if they left. that might be the last time he actually remembers that they’re all teenagers and feels sympathy for these children with all this pressure on them

- oh yeah the big boy

- the first time i watched this i was LOSING MY MIND this whole time. like yang attacked mercury and from then on man. just freaking out.

- eurgh grimm juice

- c’mon blake you got this. i mean. technically you don’t. the fight goes poorly. but you fuckin try and you’re so brave about it and i love youuu

- shut the FUCK up adam you GROOMED her you ASSHOLE

- aahhhh i love velvet!!! her semblance and her whole fighting style is so goddamn cool and has such interesting implications for using weapons and powers of people who are dead

- OH SHIT SHE DOES SUMMON HERE DOESNT SHE. partly but still

- get fucked, torchwick. GET FUCKED. get fuckin chomped

- a backhanded slap feels so much more violent than any fighting with weapons

- uh oh evil katniss

- god. the fucking blood splatter turning the whole shot red. just their silhouettes. the slow motion. the arm slowly separating.

- my friend was also a big fan of “how we feeling?”

- bad. the answer is bad you fuckin sadist

- oz is… a lot of things, and one of them is a goddamn good fighter

- oh god oh noooo she’s gonna kiss & yeet AWWWW FUCK this is heartbreaking

- pyrrha i love you

- if i don’t look it’s not real

- oh pyrrha my love

- awww hey tai. what a good dad. love tai

- i’m so sad. everyone’s so sad. and then salem just has to do an ominous lil monologue where she lays out her whole plan to divide them and makes a fuckin semblance pun. she’s such a good villain

- jacque you stiff bitch

- they’re all fuckin scattered and depressed

- love team rnjr tho

- there she is. god what an ending

#rwby #rwby spoilers #ruby rose #blake belladona #yang xiao long #weiss schnee #pyrrha nikos #penny polendina #james ironwood #emerald sustrai #cinder fall #i can't tag all the characters cause that's a lot #im in pain #so sad #and it only gets worse #yaaaaaayyy #long post

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writings-of-a-daphodil · 5 years ago

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Fire Keeper: Chapter 18

Douxie x fem reader

Masterlist in Bio!

Series Summary: You are Jim’s older sister who is taking a break from college and has moved back home to Arcadia. You end up joining Jim and his friends on their adventures.

Chapter 18 summary: You take the trip to the past!

A/n: So it’s a really long chapter 6,336 words, I don’t know whether to say sorry or your welcome. Also I have no clue how shops were in twelfth century Englad so...yeah. Anyways, enjoy!

“Sorry, this is a lot to process! Pets can talk? The world is ending? Again?” Toby asked as you and Douxie met up with him at the book shop.

“Not the best timing, I know, but we need your help all the same,” Douxie said.

Toby looked at Douxie confusedly. “Douxie? Y/n?”

“Toby!” You hugged him tightly.

“Wai- hold up! I thought you worked at the cafe, or were, like, a model or something,” Steve questioned Douxie.

Douxie chuckled. “There's a lot about me you don't know.”

“Whoa!” Toby gasped as Douxie used his cuff to show off some magic. “You’re like Y/n.”

“What?” Steve asked incredulously.

“Come on, then. The answers to all your questions are within.” Douxie gestured for them to go inside.

Steve scoffed. “Yeah, right. In a bookstore?”

You all walked in to see Merlin levitating some of his books. “Ah! There's flying books!” Toby exclaimed.

“Whoa!” Steve gasped.

“Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh! So cool! So cool! So cool! Ooh, what's that?” Toby fanboyed, admiring the cool displays of Magic.

Merlin scowled at Toby when he picked up something. “Put that down! Thank the ether you're here! We haven't a moment to waste.”

“Whoa! Crusty, creepy dude!” Steve exclaimed.

Merlin ignored Steve. “Though, I had hoped for more, Hisirdoux.”

“I tried. I couldn't find the changelings or the aliens. I'm pretty sure most left the planet,” Douxie explained.

Toby waved at Merlin. “Merlin, it's me-- Toby Domzalski! You know, War Hammer, Guardian of Arcadia, Geology Club president.”

Merlin sighed. “No one could forget you, chatty.”

“And Steve Palchuk, Creepslayer!” Steve announced.

“I have no idea who you are,” Merlin dismissed. “But we're desperate. Thankfully, we have the brute.”

“Yum!” Aaarrrgghh grunted, admiring Archie.

Archie swatted at Aaarrrgghh. “I'm not anybody's lunch. Got it?”

“Wait, where's Jimbo and Claire? I thought they were with you,” Toby asked.

You opened your mouth to answer, but Merlin beat you to it. “Answers forthcoming. Make preparations. We've a journey ahead. And don't-”

“-but, Master-”

“-'but, Master' me,” Merlin finished.

Douxie sighed. “But... are you sure you want to count on these children? They're clearly not ready for this.”

Steve scoffed. “Excuse me, college dude, these children fought off a 50-foot extraterrestrial!” Steve hit the helmet off of one of the knights. You were surprised to see that the knight reacted.

“Dude, let go of its head!” Toby ordered, trying to help Steve.

“It's got my head, too, man!” Steve cried.

“Just put it back!” Toby yelled and Douxie sighed, exasperated.

“Master, I'm ready for this,” Douxie promised.

“Doubtful,” Merlin said.

“I've spent years preparing, centuries-“ Douxie started.

Merlin cut him off. “Silence!”

Douxie frowned and you gently patted his back with your good hand.

Merlin sighed. “I mean, silence, all of you. Can you not hear that? Something wicked this way comes.”

You went to the window with Douxie to investigate when you heard a shadow mephit growl. It pounced on the window, only to be thrown back by a shield.

“Shadow mephits? Hisirdoux, did you lead them here?” Merlin asked.

“No, no! I mean, I don't think so?” Douxie chuckled nervously.

“Yes, we did,” Archie answered.

“He found us. The barrier won't hold for long. We must make egress! Tobias, take my things!” Merlin ordered, levitating Toby and up to the roof. “All of you, to the roof!”

You quickly ran up to the roof, fully aware that you would need to protect Toby and Steve if any climbed the building.

You used your good hand to blast a few of the mephits off the roof before Douxie, Merlin, and Archie arrived.

“Stand back!” Merlin ordered, throwing the ship out onto the roof. Glass shattered and the green mist exploded out and then condensed.

“Whoa! Ship just got real!” Steve marveled.

“Everyone on!” Aaarrrgghh called, throwing Steve and Toby on. You levitated on, blasting mephits as you flew.

Eventually you were all on the ship and Aaarrrgghh was trying to get on while the shadow mephits attacked. You and Douxie blasted a few, finally helping Aaarrrgghh up. Steve fell onto Merlin and the ship stopped moving.

You looked over the edge to see the Green Knight standing in the street. “Boy...” he rasped. Suddenly he sent the shards at all of you and you shoved Douxie to the ground.

“Look out!” Merlin grunted, finally getting the ship to move away.

You slipped a bit at the sudden speed, almost falling. Thankfully Douxie caught you, but he grabbed you by your hurt arm. You hissed in pain.

“Oh! Y/n, I’m so sorry,” he apologized.

You brushed it off despite the tears in your eyes, “It’s alright.”

“No, here, let me heal it.” He looked so eager to help so you slowly extended your arm to him. He held it gently as he began to perform a healing spell. Your arm was surrounded in a blue glow as Douxie healed it. You immediately felt the pain fade away. It felt like aloe had just been put on a bad sunburn.

Unfortunately Douxie pulled away. “Alright, good as new.”

You gave a small smile. “Thanks.”

He nodded and opened his mouth to say something else when Merlin slowed the ship down.

“Awesome sauce!” Toby exclaimed as he and Steve whooped. You grinned at them, it was nice to see them happy.

“This is so cool!” Toby called as you watched Arcadia grow smaller.

“What the heck is that?” Steve asked as Camelot came into view.

“Welcome, young squires, to Camelot,” Merlin said.

“Camelot? As in anceint-old-people-times Camelot?” Toby asked.

“Excuse me, I have a question. How is this castle flying right now?” Steve asked.

“The Heart of Avalon. Its magic keeps Camelot aloft, powered by time itself,” Merlin explained.

“You get used to it,” you called to Steve.

Merlin flew the ship past one of the towers and he waved at an old knight standing there. “Sir Galahad, how look the skies?”

“All quiet, my old friend!” Galahad replied.

“Keep your eyes on the horizon,” Merlin called, turning the ship to enter the castle.

You screamed a little as Merlin sped up. “I say, coming in a little hot, don't you think?” Archie asked.

“Rubbish!” Merlin yelled. The ship entered the castle skipping on the floor and you were glad you held on.

Douxie helped you off and you honestly didn’t want him to let go. You were just so tired, you needed the extra support. Thankfully, Douxie didn’t let go of your hand and you were grateful he was there with you.

“Whoo-hoo-hoo-hoo!” Steve yelled.

Toby gasped, admiring the grand castle. “Whoa!”

“It's been 900 years since I was last here. Hasn't changed a bit. Except for the flying part,” Douxie said.

Steve laughed. “'Nine hundred years'? Yeah, right. You're like, what? Like, 19?”

“Give or take a few centuries,” Archie said, jumping off Douxie’s shoulder and turning into a dragon.

“So, how many things can your cat turn into?” Steve asked.

Douxie smiled. “That depends. How many things are there?”

“Uh, cool, floating castle ship, but what's the grave danger you keep talking about?” Toby asked, trying to get to the point.

Right after he said that Claire, Blinky and Mao walked in. “Ah, there you are,” Merlin said.

“Claire!” Toby exclaimed.

Claire rushed to hug him. “Toby!”

“Arghumont!” Blinky called, running to hug his own friend.

“Blinky!” Aaarrrgghh called back. Aaarrrgghh pulled all of them into a group hug.

Claire gasped in pain. “Not so tight.”

“Oh, sorry,” Aaarrrgghh apologized, letting go.

“Whoa, hey, Steve's here, too! How 'bout, how 'bout some love for Steve?”

“Oh. Hi, Steve,” Claire said, unimpressed.

“What happened to you guys? Wait, where's Jim?” Toby asked, finallly noticing that your brother was missing. You felt a tear slip.

“This way,” Claire said, gesturing back the way they came.

“Jim... What happened to him?” Toby asked, observing the gem Jim was encased in.

“We were ambushed. Some ancient, dark warrior. An unstoppable knight clad in green who struck down Master Jim,” Blinky explained.

Douxie turned to Merlin. “Master, is that the same knight we saw at the bookstore?”

Merlin nodded. “One and the same. That onyx shard is working its way towards his heart. I placed the boy in stasis, stalling its progress... for now.”

“If I had my Shadow Staff, I could've saved him,” CLaire said.

You let go of Douxie’s hand to hug her. “Don’t blame yourself, I should have done something, but I didn’t.”

Toby glared. “Who is this Green Knight? How do I get my hands on him?”

“I do not know. The Green Knight said but one name, which chilled me to the bone, Morgana.” Merlin explained.

“Oh, I hate that lady. Wait, I thought we kicked her bewitched butt to the Shadow Realm?” Toby asked and you could see the poor kid shaking with anger.

“Which he appeared not to know, but he bore the emblem of Camelot. Come with me, quickly. I fear the answer lies in the past. A dark menace is coming, one even I cannot face alone.” Merlin gestured for all of you to follow him and you took hold of Douxie’s hand again.

Once you were all. Inside the new room Merlin spoke again. “You are all now soldiers in a war started centuries ago for the world of magic. Once, the realms of Magic and Man clashed in endless bloodshed. King Arthur sought to wipe out magic that ravaged the lands in his war against Gunmar. I brought what few spellcasters I could under my protection to spare them from the sword.”

“Including myself. Oh, and Morgana le Fay,” Douxie added.

“She was the finest student I ever taught... until she tried to kill me.” Merlin looked down. “Thankfully, in my all-seeing wisdom, I created a secret weapon-- the Trollhunter Amulet. The war came to a standstill and I imprisoned Morgana at the Battle of Killahead Bridge. This Green Knight that assailed us was clearly born of dark magicks but I have no memory of him, nor what connection he could have to Morgana. We know not what he is nor why he pursues us. Though, his presence is a dire omen of things to come.”

Right as Merlin finished his speech a bell began ringin frantically. You all looked away from what Merlin was showing you and gasped. Suddenly the castle was struck by something and you fell to the ground.

“What's happening?” Claire asked.

“Have you never been under attack before? To the battlements!” Merlin ordered and you immediately complied.

You got outside and saw another giant floating castle. It was all dark and creepy.

Archie gasped. “Oh, no! I think we have something of a problem.”

“Oh, fuzz buckets,” Douxie cursed.

“No... the Arcane Order... they found us!” Merlin said and for the first time ever, you heard pure fear in his voice. “Everyone, get to safety, now!”

You moved to put Mao inside and you heard Merlin shout a spell. “Fulgur praeca!”

The castle shook again and you fell. It suddenly got a lot colder so you sped up. The castle shook and you ran into Nari.

“I need to go help. Can you take Mao?” You asked.

“Of course.” You placed your familiar in her hands and took off running back to Merlin and Douxie.

You arrived outside to see a bridge of ice spanning the gap between the two castles.

“They're boarding us! We must break free! Steer us clear at my command!” Merlin ordered and you summoned your fire spell.

“I'm on it!” Douxie called back.

“All of a sudden, flying castles aren't so cool!” Steve screamed.

“These foes' powers are beyond us!” Merlin grunted as a blast of fire came at the two of you. You sent your own fireball back at the black castle.

“Merlin!” You heard Nari yell.

“No! Nari!” Merlin protested, running towards her as you continued to blast fire at your enemies.

“Archie, find the staff or we are all dead meat!” You heard Douxie yell.

“What do you people think I'm doing?” Archie retorted.

“Archie, I'm running out of time, here!” Merlin yelled, trying to cut the ice bridge with his sword while you did your best to melt it.

Finally Archie called, “Got it!”

You and Merlin jumped onto a tower that rose past you.

“Surrender, Merlin,” some creepy thing ordered.crof

“Never!” Merlin growled.

“Merlin! Merlin! Get everyone to safety!” Galahad called.

“No, Galahad! What are you doing?!” Merlin protested.

Merlin and you watched sadly as Galahad used his tower and his life to cut through the ice bridges. You and Merlin ran back to the castle as the bridge you were on was destroyed.

“Farewell, my old friend,” Merlin whispered. “Hisirdoux, now!”

You watched as a green portal opened up to show a completely different forest beneath you. You didn’t have much time to admire it though, you had to keep fighting.

Ice rained around you as you tried to send more blasts of magical fire at the black castle. Suddenly one of those ice shards hit you, sending you over the edge of the castle.

From there you pretty much just straight up tumbled into the portal. You screamed as you fell through the portal. You did your best to slow down your fall, but the landing still hurt.

You slowly got up from the ground and looked up at the portal in the sky. That was when the panic set in, the portal back to your time was slowly closing.

You were about to do something about it when you heard voices. They didn’t sound familiar so you hid behind a tree. Fear coursed through your veins as you waited for whatever was making the noise to come into view.

Men and women dressed in shiny metal armor eventually appeared and you crouched down. You didn't know where you were, or when for that matter. You were lost and alone.

Suddenly you heard screams from above you and you looked up. You watched as Douxie’s magic lit up the bright sky, slowing his descent. Unfortunately he crashed to the ground ahead of the group of knights.

This was bad, you needed to warn them about the knights. You did your best to run through the trees, but by the time you arrived to see Steve, Claire, Douxie and Jim, the knights were already there.

“Advance!” A knight called and suddenly a ton of knights were surrounding your friends. You got ready to attack, but you held back for a second. You would wait for Douxie to make the first move.

“Got them,” a knight replied as Steve screamed.

Douxie sighed. “It means... we are lost in time.”

One knight got off of his horse. “What manner of sorcery is this?” He asked. Weirdly enough, he looked like an older version of Steve.

“Sir Lancelot, um-“ Douxie started and you relaxed a little, Douxie recognized this guy.

“He's so handsome,” you heard Steve whisper.

“I- We-“ Douxie stuttered.

Lancelot seemed to realize something. “Wait! Aren't you Merlin's errand boy?”

“Apprentice,” Douxie corrected.

“He's like an angel-man. Whoa!” Steve whispered. Suddenly you heard a large crack and the green gem that was holding your brother broke.

Lancelot gasped. “The devil-?”

Jim groaned. “What? How did I-“

Claire rushed to hug him. “Jim! Are you okay?”

“Troll! Troll! To arms!” Lancelot called and you got ready to defend your brother and friends.

“Wait! Chill out, lads!” Douxie called in an attempt to calm everyone down.

Lancelot didn’t seem to understand. “Chill? Out?”

Douxie sighed. “Take a breath, all right? He's one of the good ones.”

“There are no good ones,” Lancelot growled. “Monsters are forbidden in Arthur's lands. You'll hang before the king for your insolence.”

You were unable to hear anymore as your friends were arrested. You watched as Jim was unfairly imprisoned in a wooden cage and the rest of your friends were herded away.

You carefully followed them from a distance, but when they got to Camelot you realized that you wouldn’t be able to just waltz in through the front gates with them.

You sighed in frustration. You didn’t understand why everything had to be so difficult. You just wanted to relax for a little while.

But, you had work to do, so you snuck into Camelot. You made your way to an area without many guards and used your magic to get over the wall.

By the time you got in, your friends were nowhere to be seen. You did your best to inconspicuously search the city, but as time passed you didn’t have any luck. With every second you grew more and more frustrated. You were in an unfamiliar place, your brother was injured and possibly dying, and you couldn’t find your friends.

You weren’t going to cry though, you had to stay strong. Sinking to the ground just to cry wouldn’t solve your problems.

You took a deep breath and began to think. You needed a plan, a plan would help you calm down.

First, you needed to blend in more. You had been getting many odd looks from those you passed. You didn’t blame the people. You were covered in dirt from your fall and you had dried blood all over your face from your fight with the shadow mephits back in your time.

Eventually you found a well and you took a clean looking rag from a woman. Using it you did your best to tidy up. Once that was done, you went to go get something better to wear.

You felt bad shoplifting, but you needed to fit in and if you thought about it, you hadn’t a doubt in your mind that your brother and friends had been taken to the castle.

You were obviously in the wealthier part of Camelot, so it wasn’t hard finding a dress shop. If you were gonna be stuck in ancient Camelot, you might as well have fun and dress fancy. You could always find something simpler later.

You stood up straight and did your best to make it look as if you had a purpose. Thankfully no one paid you any attention as you walked in, but you didn’t expect that to last long. While you were cleaner, you weren’t dressed for the time.

You would need a distraction and thankfully magic would give you one. You mice in your head did the hand movements. In seconds you heard squeals come from the back of the shop. You hoped that would keep whoever was here busy for a while so you went and looked for a dress.

Eventually you found a dress that you liked. It was an orangish peach color made of silk with silver embroidered swirls on the bodice. You also grabbed a sweater made of tulle, the same color as the dress. You finished off the look with a silver belt.

It was remarkably easy to take with a little help from your magic and you were able to get away without ringing any alarms or whatever they had in Camelot.

You used your magic to put the dress on and began to make your way towards the castle.

The second step you had come up with was finding a way into the castle. You felt you would be able to get in with the way you looked. Your hair was an absolute mess, but with a little magic it would be easy to hide.

You were able to find a side entrance and you were able to get in. It gave you confidence that your plan was working so well. Now that you were in the castle, it was time for step three.

Step three was the part where you would look for your friends auras, but that quickly became complicated. There were a lot of auras buzzing about the castle and you couldn’t identify exactly where your friends were.

So you would have to modify your plan. You’d wander the castle until you were able to find them. You’d be able to identify their auras if you were closer.

You started by making your way through the first floor. You’d make your way through the castle one level at a time.

While this was supposed to help eliminate any possible frustration, by the time you made it to the third floor tears were pooling in your eyes. You couldn’t find their auras and it was difficult to be sensing so many at once.

You were crossing a bridge, wishing you had stolen a handkerchief for your tears when you came across Douxie’s aura.

You were immediately relieved. Though you were still worried about your other friends and Jim, you had at least found Douxie.

Oddly, you heard Merlin scolding him. “Hisirdoux, do you have feet for hands? All the Slorr juice? You know how long it takes to milk one of those?”

“Sorry, sir. I was just trying to save time,” Douxie said and you got confused. Why was Douxie talking to Merlin like that? Maybe he was trying to cover up that he wasn’t from this time period?

“Your cutting corners has only cost me time,” Merlin said, continuing to scold Douxie. “It's hard enough creating Arthur's new weapon without your mucking about. I need you in the workshop, and you're milking the Slorr.”

As Merlin walked away you ran over to Douxie and hugged him. “Douxie! I’m so glad you’re okay!”

“Um?” Douxie mumbled and you realized that he wasn’t hugging you back.

“What’s wrong?” You asked, pulling away from him.

“I don’t mean any offense, but who are you?” With that you moved away from him, finally noticing that this wasn’t your Douxie.

You chuckled nervously. “I’m so sorry! Um, would you believe that I, uh, that I have a friend named Douxie that looks exactly like you. I mean what a coincidence. You know I’m, um, looking for him right now and I’m gonna go continue to look for him, seeing as you aren’t my Douxie. Haha, Bye.”

You were about to turn and leave when you sensed another aura. This other aura just so happened to also be like Douxie’s.

You turned back, just in time to see a Douxie who looked like the one you knew grab the other Douxie.

“Hey! Aah!” Archie protested and Douxie held his hands up in defense.

“Um, hey, me,” your Douxie said, chuckling nervously.

Past Douxie yelped. “Doppelgänger! You-you're me. I'm me!”

“No need to panic,” your Douxie soothed.

You stepped over to them. “Now, this is the Douxie I was looking for,” you explained.

“Well, how-- how... Wait, this can only mean one thing-” Past Douxie started.

“Time travel paradox!” Both Douxies yelled and you chuckled.

Archie sighed. “Double Douxies? This is a disaster!”

Both Douxies glared at him. “Give me a break, Arch!” They said in unison. “Oh, wow. This is wild!”

“Let's focus on the here and now. Where having two of us will be-“ Douxie started.

“-will be a logistical nightmare,” Archie cut in.

“I agree, uh, so the easiest solution...” Past Douxie trailed off.

“Is for one of us to go away till I return to my time,” Douxie informed.

Past Douxie nodded. “Great idea! But which one of us-?”

Your Douxie cut him off. “Interminus nocti sluumberso!”

Past Douxie suddenly fell asleep and your Douxie put him in a closet.

“I know this looks bad,” Douxie told you and Archie, “but I swear I've got this under control.”

“If that were true, things in the future have really changed,” Archie said.

Douxie laughed sarcastically. “Just don't go blabbing to Merlin, okay? I need to stay incognito. Aah!”

The cabinet burst open and past Douxie fell on Douxie.

“I’ve got it,” you promised, already levitating him back into the closet.

Archie chuckled. “This should be fun to watch.”

Suddenly you heard Merlin yell, “Hisirdoux, what is taking so long?”

“Just cleaning up another mess,” Douxie called back.

Douxie sighed and put his hair up into a bun. “Swore I'd never do this again,” he muttered, and you laughed.

“You look fine,” you soothed, taking his arm.

“So, I see you’ve got yourself a dress,” Douxie said. “I was looking for you, but I couldn’t find you. I was worried something bad had happened.

“I’m fine,” you promised when you felt Douxie’s aura spark with guilt.

“Good, I’m glad.”

“How’s Jim and everyone?” You asked.

“Oh, uh, Jim’s been arrested, but right now everyone else is fine. Steve is being trained by Lancelot and Claire is now Morgana’s handmaiden.”

“Morgana!” You hissed, worry for Claire suddenly overwhelming you.

“Don’t worry,” Douxie soothed. “She hasn’t gone bad yet.”

You hesitated. “What’s the plan then?”

“I’m gonna take you to where I used to live and then we can all meet up later to figure everything out. I’m gonna try and steal the time map to get us out of here.”

“Alright, but if you need any help don’t hesitate to ask.”

“I won’t,” Douxie said, leading you into a room. “Here you are, home sweet home.”

You looked around the room, it was off a decent size, but it was awfully drafty. “Nice place,” you said, taking a seat on a window bench.

“Thanks.” Douxie smiled. “Be careful if you go outside. You look like royalty, but people will question where you’re from.”

“Aw, thanks. You be careful out there too,” you called. “Will do.” He gave a little wave as he closed the door.

You gazed around the room, trying to think of something to do when you yawned. Suddenly you were very aware of how tired you were. If you thought about it you hadn’t slept in over twenty four hours.

You lied down on the bench and closed your eyes, easily drifting off into much needed sleep.

~~~~

You immediately sat up when you heard the door open. You looked around, confused at the sudden noise. Douxie was standing there frozen in the middle of the room.

“Sorry, Y/n. I didn’t mean to wake you,” he apologized.

You yawned. “It’s fine.” You looked over and saw Steve sitting in a chair. “How long have you been here?”

“Not long, I didn’t want to wake you.”

You nodded, grateful, but soon your kind smile turned into one of disgust. “What is that smell?” You asked.

“I, uh- I forgot how much I hate milking the Slorr,” Douxie muttered gagging at the smell he had trailed in. You mimicked him, plugging your nose.

Archie recoiled away from Douxie. “Ugh! Please!”

You looked over to Steve. “How was your guy’s days?”

Steve groaned. “I think Lancelot broke my everything.”

“And I still don't have the Time Map. One wrong move, and we will screw up history without even knowing it,” Douxie grumbled.

You were about to try and sooth the both of them when Claire burst in through the door. “We have to change history! Arthur's had enough. The trolls are gonna die at sunrise!”

“Oh, blimey Balroths! How are we supposed to stop this and stay inconspicuous?” Douxie asked and you could see the panic in his eyes. You felt bad about all the stress that was on him.

Claire sighed. “It wouldn't be a problem if I just had my Shadow Staff. I know you said to lay low, but we can't let Jim die.”

“No we can’t,” you asserted. “Douxie, I’m sorry, but we will have to change history.”

“Yes. Let's see what this future Douxie is capable of!” Archie cheered.

Douxie nodded. “You're right, sod the rules. It's time for a dungeon break.”

~~~~

The four of you snuck down to the dungeon and you watched from behind a post as Lancelot and Galahad laughed.

“No way!” Galahad grinned. The two of them were focused on their conversation so you decided to make a run for it.

“Ah! Oy! Young gentleman of Palchukia, join us in our nocturnal libations,” Lancelot called.

“We are looking for the Holy Grail!” Galahad took a drink. “Oh, well, it's not in that one either!”

Steve chuckled and began to saunter over to the knights. “Steve, no!” You whisper-shouted at him.

“Where do you think you're going, buddy boy?” Archie asked.

“Dude, I'm keeping the guards busy,” he whispered, “while having a righteous time! Ha! Yeah-eah! Drinking with knights! I'm so stoked for my first brew...uh, today.”

“I don’t condone this.” You glared at Steve before going after Douxie and Claire.

Archie sighed. “This is going to end badly. Ohh, I can’t wait.”

“This is going to end badly,” you muttered. The four of you continued to run, eventually coming across the section of the dungeon Jim was in.

“Jim! We're breaking you out,” Claire announced.

“Your stay in Terror Tower is over, mate,” Douxie said, conjuring magic knives for himself and Claire. Douxie cut open Jim’s cell.

“And presto, one liberated troll,” Archie announced.

“Hahaha! Take that, death! I elude you once again-“ a troll shouted as Jim freed her.

You hugged Jim tightly. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, no need to worry.”

“A big sister always worries,” you said before going to free more trolls.

As you freed the last one you heard Steve shouting/rapping. “My lord Arthur's in the building. Watch out, y'all, he's here to do some creep-killing. Get out of here.”

“Now, now, everyone just stay calm,” Douxie said in an attempt to sooth the trolls. Unfortunately his attempt completely failed.

All of the newly liberated trolls panicked and began to stampede out of the dungeon.

You were pushed up against the wall as the trolls left. You looked over to Douxie. “What now?”

“We do our best to help them.” You all ran out of the dungeon and into Camelot. When you got outside you say that the sky was fading from a light purple to a blue. You heard the metal armor of guards clanking after you.

“Is this part of your plan?” Archie asked.

“I'm improvising!” Douxie yelled, fiddling with his cuff.

“Quick, through the alleys! They can't catch all of us!” Jim’s friend called. You followed Douxie as Claire helped Jim.

You turned down a path, but stopped when you heard more clanking.

You looked to Jim one last time. “Stay safe!” You called.

“I will!” He promised.

“Did you see where they went?” A man you assumed was King Arthur asked.

“Quick! In here! This way, sir! Don't worry, sire, I'll freeze them on the spot,” Douxie offered, he messed with his cuff.

“Then do it! This way, men! Charge!” Arthur ordered. Douxie spun his cuff as Arthur and his men went to run after Jim, but at the last moment he cast a spell, opening two blue portals. Arthur and his men charged into them, only to appear out the other one. “What trickery is this now?”

Douxie sighed. Oh, fuzz buckets! I must have cast an Infinite Hallway by accident. You know how frustrating magic is. Uh, let me-let me just find the right spell.”

“Wizard, remove this enchantment or I'll remove your head!” Arthur threatened. “You! Girl! What are you doing?”

“Uh, me?” You asked.

“Yes, you!”

“Well, I’m-I’m terrified,” you cried. “This kind young man has been helping me.” You put the back of your hand to your forehead and pretended to look feint.

You leaned on Douxie and whispered. “Their auras are gone, you can let the king go now.”

Douxie did as you asked and Arthur and his men ran off. “Come on, we can’t let them get to the gate,” Douxie said, grabbing your hand and pulling you to a nearby house.

“Up we go,” you mumbled, using your magic to help you climb the house. You, Douxie, and Archie made it to the top of the house just as Arthur was about to reach the gates. Thankfully Douxie slammed them down just in time.

“Men, after them! Get this open at once!” Arthur commanded. You watched as Jim and his friend tried to run away, but they stopped when the sun hit the bridge.

The sun slowly spread, forcing the trolls to retreat closer to the gate Douxie was struggling to keep closed. You added your magic to his, and the gate glowed both blue and orange.

Unable to get the gate open, the knights put their swords and spears through the opening, trying to stab the poor trolls. You and Douxie gasped for breath as it became a struggle to keep the gate shut. Soon it became too much and you had to let go.

Suddenly, the day began to get darker and shadows spread across the bridge, paving a path for the trolls to get to the forest. You turned around, looking for the aura that was casting the incredible display of dark magic only to find Claire. You pulled Douxie towards her.

The two of you jumped from roof to roof till you managed to get to the bridge she was on. You could see the strain she was under and you raced over to her. Douxie caught her just as she collapsed.

“By the seven rings, how did you manage that?” He asked and Claire groaned. “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Easy!”

“It’s gonna be okay, Claire. Jim and the trolls are safe.” You soothed.

“Are you sure?” She asked.

“I’ll check.” You closed your eyes and focused on Jim’s aura. You felt a shift and opened your eyes. Your projection was standing behind a tree.

You looked around, trying to get the gist of what was happening when you saw Gunmar and Bular standing in front of Jim. “Little king, these Wild Woods are my domain. I command the souls of all under its shade, and I decide who lives or dies!”

You saw shuffling and looked over to see one of the gumm-gumms kill a knight. You gasped at the horrific sight and Jim looked over to you. His friend helped him over to you.

“Y/n!” He whispered.

“Stay safe Jim. I’ll send more messages later okay?”

“Okay, I love you.”

“I love you too.” You gave a little wave to Jim as he left and you continued to watch the rest of the encounter play out.

“You can only push us so far, human,” Gunmar growled.

“This isn't over!” Arthur yelled, retreating.

“War is coming!” Gunmar retorted and you stopped projecting before he could see you.

You felt the shift and you were once again standing with Claire, Douxie and Archie. “He’s gonna be okay. All we need to do is figure out a way to get home.”

Douxie nodded. “Let’s go. Arthur is going to be furious when he gets back.

Claire took a step away from the two of you. “I want to go thank Morgana. I’ll meet up with you.” She went off and Douxie offered you his arm.

~~~~

“I was right, Arthur is furious. He's locked down the castle,” Douxie said, pacing.

“Luckily, he thinks you're so incompetent, you can't be a suspect,” Archie pointed out.

“At least we got Jim and the prisoners away safe,” Claire added optimistically.

“Yeah,” you agreed. “It’s not all a loss.”

Douxie turned to walk out the door. “Where are you going?” Archie and you asked in unison.

“To get that TIme Map. Hopefully with Arthur on the hunt, I've got a chance to finally snatch that thing,” Douxie answered and you grabbed his arm.

“I’m coming too.” Douxie nodded and you and Archie followed him to Merlin’s tower. You unlocked the door and the three of you snuck over to the vault. Douxie opened in only to find an old gnome skeleton in it. Douxie closed it again and tried to open it, only to find an old horn. He continued trying to no avail.

The both of you sighed when he opened it to a bird’s nest full of eggs.

“Looking for this?” The three of you jumped and turned to see Merlin holding the time map. “Or perhaps this?”

Merlin took the sleeping Past Douxie out of a cabinet and you noticed he had given him a pillow.

“Oh, fuzz buckets!” Douxie cursed.

“Have you any idea what you've done?” Merlin asked. “I knew my apprentice was an ignoramus, but traveling through time? Time!”

“Hey now!” You yelled, defending Douxie. Merlin ignored you.

“I think we handled ourselves just fine, all things considered. And, technically, it was your idea,” Douxie explained.

Merlin pointed his finger in Douxie’s face. “Well, then, you must have botched it up! My planning is flawless.”

Past Douxie spoke up, “For the record, Master, I had nothing to do with this. He did, which is he, and... ugh! Time travel, so confusing!”

Merlin went over to the time map and winced as it flashed red. “Aah! The timelines are in complete disarray!”

“Look, I can fix this, I swear!” Douxie promised.

Merlin shook his head. “Ah-ah, your meddling has already wreaked enough havoc on history.”

“Then surely we can use the Time Map to change things back, and then it'll all be as it was,” Archie suggested and you nodded along to his plan.

“It doesn't work that way. The map only offers glimpses of possible futures. There are no detailed instructions,” Merlin countered.

“Oh, come on, it's not that bad,” Douxie said optimistically. He tried to grab the time map, but Merlin swatted at his hand.

The timeline flashed to show Arthur's death and all of you gasped. “Aah! By my beard! Not that bad, eh?” Merlin asked.

“Oh, fuzz buckets,” Past Douxie cursed.

“Fuzz buckets,” your Douxie agreed.

Merlin walked over to the door. “Your little dungeon break must have changed fate. Now, unless I stop it, the king will die!”

****

So, tada, thanks for reading all of that. Honestly there’s a very high possibility that the next chapter will be even longer. He-he. The next chapter is gonna be really great and I’m so excited to write it. Anyways, I hope that y’all have a fantastically wonderful weekend.

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Also the scene where Douxie heals Y/n’s arm was inspired by @furblrwurblrrequest:

i! I'm curious to see one where doux kinda cares for her wounds? like a quick little fluffy one while they're on the ship after they get away from arthur? idk aaaa

~~~~

P.S. if you want to be on the taglist feel free to ask. I hope it works and please message me if it doesn’t.

#douxie x reader #douxie imagine #hisirdoux casperan x reader #hisirdoux x reader #wizards imagine #trollhunters #trollhunters imagine #tales of arcadia imagine #toa imagine #douxie #toa douxie #wizards douxie #trollhunters douxie #toa #tales of arcadia #tales of arcadia douxie #hisirdoux casperan #fire keeper

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we-rate-tmnt · 5 years ago

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rate RAPH

Bro I love Raph so much, he adds such a nice layer in the dynamic with his brothers in all the series and I’ll go over a bit of this below!

1987 Raphael

Besides Rise, I feel like this Raph is an overall chill dude. He’s mainly sarcastic and his ‘brute-ness’ is in his insults. Sure he fights a lot, but it’s at around the same level of violence as the rest of his brothers. I really love that he breaks the fourth wall so directly, it’s so neat to me when characters do that, which is a reason why I like Rick and Morty and Parks and Rec (although Parks and Rec is different because it’s live-action and the characters know about being filmed. Rick and Morty has them as cartoon characters that don’t know they’re a show, or maybe not. There’s a lot of theories, but I digress). He’s voiced by Rob Paulson, who also voiced 2012 Donatello, Foot Luteniet in Rise and is the voice casting director for Rise as well (This doesn’t add anything to the rating, just thought it was neat). Sassy, fun, mentions multiple times that the reality he lives in is a children’s cartoon, he’s great.

8/10

Next up is the tiny angy boi of the early 2000’s

2003 Raphie

I love this Raph’s personality! Smart mouthed, hot-headed and quick, I wish I could fire insults as well as he could. In this version, he’s more open about how much he likes fighting and physically trains quite a bit. Although, as a character, I feel that he’s lacking and a bit dry. The only episode I can think of where his character was expanded on was the time he looked out for a kid as hot-headed as he was. After that, I can’t think of anything else. He also HATES bugs for some reason, we don’t what reason, he just hates them and I wish they had more on that. I also wished there were more episodes with just Raph and Casey, they’re fun to watch with one being angry yet smart in battle with the other being semi laid back, but rushing in. On a surface level, he’s a cool character, but since he’s not Leo, he doesn’t get the spotlight that much.

5/10

And now, my SON I seriously love him wow

2012 Raph

He’s still angry, he’s still small but he has some more fun details to him! The rips on the ends of his mask, the crack in his shell, his two pet turtles/fire tortoise (???), his nerdy hobbies. I really liked that they were showing him saying stuff like ‘tickle attack!’ and also keeping the good ol’ ‘I give a flying-!’ kind of attitude. He not only feels like a teenager, but he feels pretty fleshed out. Unlike, 2003, his bug phobia is very prominent in quite a few episodes and I think that was a fantastic decision! He has hallucinations and panic attacks, which really grounds him as a character, his phobia is something that genuinely affects him and he manages to get past it. He still despises those creepy crawlies (who can blame him) but he makes sure it doesn’t get in the way when it comes to protecting his family and friends. Also, he’s just plain adorable, even when he’s ready to murder someone. He’s also the only one out of all the turtles in the 2012 series to have a lovely romantic relationship with this BADASS ALIEN LIZARD GIRL. And she’s not just there as a romantic fill in, she’s important to the turtles space adventures and in the final season as well (despite that we hardly see her after that episode, but I’m not going to get mad about that today). Let’s see, nearly cussed, sarcastic, hot-headed but soft, adopted a cute alien fire turtle, has an AMAZING BADASS LIZARD girlfriend, some noice character progression, squishy face, hit’s quite a bit on my checklist!

He owns all my uwu’s/10

I’ve noticed that this movie has the turtles and other characters involved behave quite differently, so I’m going to add this one to my list!

Half-Shell Heroes: Blast to the Past Raph

Guys, this Raph was just so goddamn cute like bro. I feel like despite that this is supposed to be a continuation from 2012, the personalities of the characters have some pretty big changes. Raph, throughout the whole movie, seemed much kinder and seemed more open to his brothers. That pterodactyl scene just HMMMMM GOT ME IN THE FEELS. I think this rating is based mostly on cuteness, because it was a movie it can’t really do too much character development (especially for a silly one like this).

7/10

Next up is the Raph I just watched last night!

2014 Raph

I actually really enjoyed this movie! While a lot of people didn’t like the designs, I really liked them quite a bit (except for the antagonists). This Raph I think is one of my favorites, with the more ‘done with this bullshit’ attitude, gruff design and woodworking skills. I really liked how well they dealt with his relationship with his family. They showed how much he cared about everyone so much throughout the entire movie. I wrote that note down even before we got to the part with all of them seemed like they were about to die, and it shows that even before that scene, that impression of Raph is left with us. He also was able to form bonds with April very quickly because he knew that this whole thing wasn’t her fault and could see that she would still stand with him to get his brothers back. They handled his character very well and that’s hard to do with a movie. I also like the little toothpick detail and that he was so stubborn with keeping it in his mouth. Overall, a tough boi with a big heart and loves his family a lot.

9/10

Now for the newest Raph and the sweetest Raph to date!

Rise Raph

I really need to give him more attention! I really can’t give too much analysis because it’s hard for him to steal the scene for me. I only really notice Rah when a scene or episode was directly focused on him. However, when this did happen, they were always fantastic! I really liked the savage and Mrs.Cuddles episodes, which showcased Raph’s weaknesses. He’s big and strong, but I feel like that he just grew up too fast. He has to be careful with his size and strength, which are useful when it comes to protecting his brothers but he knows how much he could hurt them by accident. I really want to see when they’ll expand more on that, perhaps there was an incident involving his brothers in the past? It’s really fun to see how he’s handling the leader role and the dynamics this creates with his brothers. Just a big lovable boi with some trauma.

9/10

Next up is our good ol’ comic book turtle!

IDW Raph

The idea of him being separated from the rest of the turtles for the first couple of issues was so neat! I think it added to him getting his family bonds and making everyone’s dynamics and interactions with him different compared to the rest of the incarnations of him. It made for an interesting connection with Casey as well. I’m still quite a ways away from the most recent chapter of this series, but will update this whenever I get to it! A good child that deserved a family and got one!

6.5/10

Storytime: I used to think his Sai’s were those little rake garden tools when I was little and would nab my mum’s to play ninja turtle if I was in a Raph mood.

#thanks for the ask!#asks #tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #rapheal #tmnt 2012 #tmnt 2014 #tmnt 1987 #tmnt 2003 #rottmnt #half shell heroes blast to the past #idw tmnt

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dragonstoravens · 5 years ago

Text

Babylon Vol. 1: A Favor For A Friend

[ID: a blue patterned banner with text reading “BABYLON.” End ID.]

By dragonstoravens and @charlottedotexe

(In keeping with the plan to post an update every Friday, here’s chapter 5. A lot of these early chapters are a bit shorter, in a sort of anthology style as we get to know the characters. Hope you enjoy!)

5. A Favor For A Friend

Trinity leaned back on his couch with a groan, hovering over the ‘send’ button on his chat screen. This had to be the weirdest last resort ever, but this week had been yet another lesson in how not to have a social life in your 20s, by well known business mogul Trinity Jericho. Sure, he and Azure had been talking for some time now, ever since she fixed his eye, and sure, he was starting to consider her perhaps the closest friend he had, but that didn’t make his request any less strange. Still, it was either this, or pay a literal spy to come with him. His younger sister Adriel had offered, in return for as many juice pouches as she wanted, but that likely would have raised more rumors than it put to rest, and that would defeat the whole purpose of this crazy plan. He sighed, speaking aloud to his empty office. “I can’t send this message.”

A quiet ding from his screen’s voice control. He hadn’t realized it was on. “Message sent.”

“Fuck.”

Azure’s response was nearly instantaneous.

[Azure] You want me to dress up and go to some fancy shindig with you?

[Azure] Is the theme of the night bad dates with lacking manners? Surely you’ve got better options, dude. No hot supermodels? Cool alien mistresses? Long lost childhood friends you’ve been forlorn about losing since they moved away, but you just saw them at the supermarket and now your whole world is changing?

A pause.

[Azure] Ignore that last one, that’s the plot of a book I’ve been reading.

Trinity chuckled despite himself. The manners issue had, in fact, been one of his many worries about this whole request. But he couldn’t back out now.

[Hotshot] I’m not going to dignify most of those questions with a response. It was this or pay my 13 year old sister in juice pouches, and that’ll raise more questions than it settles. I promise it’s a one time thing-- I just need the Polinskis to stop throwing their daughter at me.

He paused, biting the inside of his lip as he debated once more if this was actually a good idea.

[Hotshot] You don’t have to. I know you’re not experienced with this kind of event, or this kind of society.

Azure read the message and sat back in her chair, thinking. She hated fancy parties, they required being stuffy and shoved into dresses that wouldn’t last eight seconds in her lab before getting too dirty to ever wear again, and rich people liked to smell like weird fruit these days along with being judgemental to a degree that gave her hives to think about. But still, Trinity had been growing on her these last few months. Maybe once wouldn’t kill her, if it made his life a little easier. She was nothing if not a giver, and it would give her an excuse to use some fun experimental tech she’d been hoping to test out.

[Azure] Yeah, I'll suffer through it once. You owe me, though. I'll have my brother whip up somethin' for us to wear. You think a MiZara original will sell the ludicrous idea that I'm in any way fancy, or am I gonna have to read up on shrimp forks to pass?

Trinity couldn’t quite stop himself from sighing in relief. She hadn’t said no.

[Hotshot] You’re right, I owe you. Thanks.

Message sent and one more stressor out of the way, although he still wasn’t sure this wasn’t going to come back to bite him later, possibly in the form of Azzy being… well, herself, in high society. There was a lot he would have to teach her, and not nearly enough time to do it. He read over her message again with a sigh. At least she was taking care of the… dress?

Azure’s screen displayed the message ‘Hotshot is typing’ for 30 seconds. A minute. Two.

Ping.

[Hotshot] Wait, MIZARA?

He could practically hear her peal of laughter at his moment of realization.

[Azure] My last name is Zaraya. I already told you my brother was a designer. I thought you'd’ve put two and two together by now, hotshot, what happened to that mastermind brain of yours?

Trinity shook his head bemusedly as he typed, even though she couldn’t see it.

[Hotshot] You’re the one who always says I think about nothing except work. Anyway, I have suits, I don’t want to owe you any more than I already do for making you wear a dress.

[Azure] If you think he’s gonna let us go without matching, you’re outta your mind and also you clearly do not know my brother.

Azure sighed as the message whooshed away. They had a lot of ground to cover if she didn’t want to ruin her buddy’s reputation on sight. Cover stories and false names and back up plans, along with how to walk in heels and other weird things that she was definitely not suited for.

[Azure] Alright hotshot, tell me everything I need to be a high society girlfriend. Crimson can help me brush up on manners, but we might want a plan. I haven’t been on a date in ages, can’t say I recall how they work.

[Hotshot] I have a plan, don’t worry. But you don’t have to play a *girlfriend.* I’m not going to ask you to closet yourself for this.

[Azure] Nah, it’s cool. If I’m not acting like a whole different person, it won’t stick, and then I’ll do something dumb and ruin the whole thing. Plus the idea of coming out to a whole lot of new people all night gives me hives. Now c’mon, gimme the rules. I have flashcards to make.

Trinity couldn’t blame her for that. For all that he liked to keep his personal life very, well, personal, he had taken a chance and corrected someone as to his sexuality once. To one person. At the next event, half of his contacts were throwing double the children at him, now aware that men and women were both fair game. The other half had mostly made some inane reference to him being a “player” or the obligatory threesome joke, and a few had awkwardly avoided him ever since-- which he honestly couldn’t complain about. He’d honestly prefer more of his acquaintances to be the specific brand of biphobic that meant they’d leave him alone.

Reading over Azure’s message one more time, he stifled a tiny chuckle. Flashcards, for the rules of dating in society? At least his next event would be entertaining.

Taglist (ask to be added or removed!): @glitterandstarshine @rainbowcoloreddays @the-starlight-chills @erased-in-stone

General: @elywritesbydarkness @residentofthedisc @humour-and-hyperfocus @skyfirewrites

#writeblr #writers on tumblr #spilled ink #wip: babylon #chapter update #babylon #trinity

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octoberobserver · 5 years ago

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A Regular Fuckin’ Frank Sinatra

“Some day, when I’m awfully low, when the world is cold, I will feel a glow just thinking of you, and the way you look tonight…”

“Holy shit.”

Eddie Kaspbrak whirled around, skillet in hand, fried onions spilling out over the side and landing on the floor with a splat.

“Fuck, Richie, don’t sneak up behind me! The last time that happened, an alien made me a human fucking shish kabob.”

Richie Tozier blinked, gaping at him as if he was somehow a charitable intruder that had taken it upon himself to cook them dinner in his kitchen.

“Sorry,” he mumbled eventually, his cheeks flushed as he cleared his throat, “you uh…you can sing.”

Eddie, who was busy wiping up the mess off the floor, straightened up, brow furrowed.

“What?”

Richie moved so fast he practically teleported across the room, gesturing wildly.

“You—you can fucking sing, Eddie! How—how do I not know that about you? I know fucking everything about you.”

“You do not.”

Eddie flushed as he thought of that one big thing in particular Richie absolutely did not know.

“I did,” Richie insisted with pointed finger, stepping even closer.

Eddie held his ground, tilting his chin up.

“Back when we were kids,” Richie continued, something indistinguishable in his gaze, “I knew you inside and out, dude. How the fuck did you hide the fact that you’re a regular fuckin’ Frank Sinatra?”

Eddie turned back to what remained of his onions.

He shrugged.

“I can…hold a note, Richie. That doesn’t mean I can—”

“The fuck it doesn’t! Have you heard yourself? Fuck Kelly Clarkson - you’re the American Idol, man. Shit, I gotta tell the oth—”

“Don’t!”

Richie stopped dead in his tracks as Eddie grabbed his shoulder, his fingers digging hard into his skin, through his shirt.

“Why?” He asked, his back still turned.

Eddie slowly let his hand drop.

Richie’s stomach flipped at the loss.

“It’s…embarrassing,” Eddie spoke to his shoes, “I don’t…I don’t sing for other people. Just, for me. It’s…mine.”

Richie nodded, understanding passing between them as he moved to lean against the fridge, his arms crossing over his chest as he watched Eddie get back to his dish.

“I still can’t believe I never knew you had the pipes of an angel.”

Eddie winced, adding a pinch of salt, “How do you make everything sound like a sex joke?”

“Natural talent,” Richie shrugged, rubbing the back of his neck, “but seriously, man. You…you’re talented.”

If Eddie’s face felt a little hot, he could blame the oven rising the temperature in the kitchen.

“Thanks.”

Richie gave a heavy sigh, letting his head bang back against the fridge door as he lamented to the ceiling, “I just wish 13-year-old me could have heard baby Spagheds belt one out.”

“Sounds like another sex joke,” Eddie wrinkled his nose as he stirred the sauce, “and besides, I could have been singing karaoke every damn day, but you were too busy belting out Eddie My Love to hear anything over your own crowing.”

Richie gave him a gentle punch to his shoulder.

“Fuck you! I’ve the voice of—”

“Cameron Diaz from My Best Friend’s Wedding, only sadder and drunker.”

A beat passed where they listened to the pan sizzle.

“That’s…fair.”

They laughed, Richie opening the fridge to take out a beer.

“Bill wants his gross craft shit. I don’t get it, man. It tastes like fucking piss and gasoline had a one-night-stand produced a disgusting love-child.”

Eddie hummed at his friend’s theatrics, beginning to dish up the food, letting his eyes rake up and down Richie as he turned his back to grab another beer that, despite his protests, Eddie had zero doubt was for him.

Richie had dressed up for dinner. One of their biannual Losers reunions that they, as roommates of four months, were hosting this time around.

The navy shirt and black slacks fit him like a glove.

Eddie shoved an extra roast potato onto Beverly’s plate. It was the least he could do for her invaluable fashion choices.

“Never, ever change…keep that breathless charm,” he sang softly under his breath as he began to turn everything off, hyper aware that the only sound now was his voice, “won’t you please arrange it? ‘Cause…I love you, just the way you look tonight…”

He could feel Richie watching him out of the corner of his eye, but he kept his own gaze forward, his heart hammering against his rib cage.

“I…I thought it was just for you?”

Eddie shrugged, still unable to look at him and instead focused on arranging the seven plates to his standard.

“Yeah, well. You’ve always been the exception, Rich.”

(Read the entire series here)

#reddie #eddie kaspbrak #richie tozier #fic #fanfiction #drabble #my fanfiction #i wrote a small thing that i probably won't put on ao3 but here ya go tumblr peeps :D #reddie drabble

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lucystillintheskywithdiamonds · 5 years ago

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It was kinda irritating every rewatch of the first reboot movie how Spock Prime tells AOS!Spock that he and Kirk need each other and it’s like?? Kirk legit accused Spock of not caring about his mother, demeans his alien ancestry constantly like what type of friendship is that? I like that Spock and Kirk’s relationship isn’t as strong as it was in TOS because Spock needed to grow outside of Kirk and he shouldn’t be defined by him and I really like that aspect of the first movie

In a realistic story, Spock would request a transfer in the end ^

In the original script, there was some added dialog to the scene between Prime and young Spock where the latter is more in character because he calls him out on the absurdity of him believing that his own future must be like prime's past when, truly, they are different.

Of course, Spock prime was trying to influence him because he wanted Spock to stay in Starfleet.. and of course he didn't know him enough (irony) to know what kind of arguments could effectively work. He only knew his own life and experiences. To aos Spock, it should be a bit silly and Spock prime may come across as an old guy who lost his mind because here he is..a survivor who is debating whether his duty is helping the vulcans and this dude is telling him he should make a decision based on a future friendship he maybe will have with a guy he just met and he didn't even like for the most part. It's going to come across as out of touch and stupid, especially when even his own girlfriend probably isn't trying to influence him. What happened to Vulcan is huge, like who cares about who was your friend in your own reality. The movie doesn't have time to show how Spock made his decision but I think out the stuff Spock prime said, the most convincing argument was him saying that *he* would be the one helping the vulcans. Years later, though, Spock still has survivor guilt (beyond) and he ponders whether he needs to leave everything to help the vulcans. So in that sense, his issue wasn't truly resolved at the end of the first movie and no one but himself and his own experiences could finally give him the answers. And that is realistic.

Anyway, honestly it's one of the things that made the k/s dynamic forced for me.

On one hand, the movie subverts the 'hero gets the girl' trope by not going to the kirk/uhura route, but they still portray the main bromance with the cliché trope of 'strangers who hate each other but must magically become best friends forever because the story needs that'. All execerbated by the fact they are projecting tos on them so they basically have to be best friends only because they were in the original thing. Like, chill. There is time, let them have their own dynamic.

People have all kinds of default prejudices about romance in this genre of movies (it's misogyny. Because romance is perceived as something 'for women' thus silly and inferior because women are considered silly and inferior), and granted there definitely are a lot of stereotypes and tropes in hollywood romances..but so are the dynamics between male characters thus the male friendships. They are too affected by their own forced clichés that often are even similar to those affecting romance thus the stuff people criticize romance for.

With this trek, tptb created a new reality to be free of canon and thus give themselves the chance to develop their own stories. That was genius. That was wise. However, there was still insecurity from their part when it comes to old fans. On one hand, they wanted to do new things but on the other hand, they were anxious to reassure old fans that some things were the same and they got lazy with those aspects. K/S is one of those. My impression was only confirmed and execerbated by into darkness where everything is about Spock not getting friendship, except it has nothing to do with him being the weird, oblivious alien guy and everything to do with the fact he, realistically, might have no real reason to understand why Kirk even wants to be his friend after what had happened between them. Like, it's simply too soon. No need to blame it on Spock being dense and oblivious about friendship because he's alien when 1) he's human too 2) we know he is into a relationship with Uhura so he can't be so oblivious about everything 3) it's a canon fact that even in tos, Kirk wasn't the only friend he had. Like, Pike and his crew anyone? Discovery added a human sister too so how can you still serioustly pretend Spock needed Kirk to see the light as if he was the first and only human he ever interacted with?

It's the way their fandom treats that dynamic too, btw. The entlitlement some fans have about k/s doesn't manifest itself only when they erase Spock's relationship with Uhura because she doesn't fit with their narrative. kirk/mccoy is considered by default less important as a friendship than k/s for honestly, no reason if you were to base it on these movies alone.

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kibfpatiyxparagpsiqa · 6 years ago

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right. added that, and it’s literally just completely done now.

enjoy.

Danny has to admit, it's fun to hang around as Phantom. Even if it gives people opportunity to shoot at him, walking places just doesn't have the same feel as flying. And it doesn't get everyone to shoot at him. A lot of citizens, young ones especially, just think he's pretty cool. When he isn't invisible, they're the ones most likely to try to talk to him. And unlike, say, the ones who yell, Danny's willing to have a conversation. "Yo, Danny Phantom!" And Danny's over there in seconds, his legs quickly reforming as he stands before them. "Hey."

The person who'd called seems suddenly less willing to talk. Danny's used to people being afraid by now, though it's still weird, but even weirder is the times like now when they aren't afraid but starstruck. Someone else wearing a bandanna around their neck picks up. "Hi. Our friend's in the hospital right now." "Sorry." "Nah, you take more hits than all of us combined. But like, she drew you this thing, to thank you, but she didn't think you'd see it. However, Luke here was gonna show you. Luke, phone." Luke, still tongue-tied, unlocks and hands over his phone. The kid scrolls through the photos on the phone. Recently, the people in town are trying to really show their appreciation for Danny. He thinks it might be because of some recent visitors, one of which Danny found out was a ghost, nonhostile guy who still travelled with is friends. The whole group talked about what it's like for ghosts, how recognition and generosity matter. Danny still has their phone number. The kid finds what they're looking for. Danny holds the phone carefully as he looks at the picture. They're admonishing Luke for his terrible folder structures. It's a really sick picture. If Danny were at all willing to risk his cell number getting out, he'd ask them to text it to him. He really likes the particular pose and lighting, and they got his face exactly right, just like a mirror. Well, mirrors half of the time. But the shapes are the same! He grins at Luke while he hands the phone back. "Dude, that's so sweet! Do you like, think she'd let me see the actual physical one?" Luke has found his voice! "Yeah! Terry would actually love that. It's in her art folder, we brought it to the hospital room... not sure when or if you can visit." "Dude, just tell me when. Flag me down sometime, just, yeah. I'll bring my phone, get my own picture." "Awesome." The two other kids with them, at this point, are still messing around, but noticeably less than they were before he came over. When one notices he might leave, they walk over, and the last friend follows. "Uh, Phantom?" "Yeah?" "Can I get a picture of your logo?" "Sure. Why?" The kid swipes open their phone and he stands on the ground in front of them while they snap a photo. "D, P, oh. Never seen it this close before. Right, I'm making a collage of superheroes, and I thought, wait. I should add a real superhero who lives here! Any preference on who you're next to?" "Depends. Marvel or DC?" "More obscure heroes from both." Danny thinks about it. It's been a while since he's thought about this much. Real superheroics have kind of monopolized his focus for a while now. "Hmm. You got Captain Marvel on there?" "Yeah I do! I mean, she shouldn't be obscure. That's kind of the theme here. Too underrated." Danny nods. "These poor unfortunate souls. But yeah, I love the space origins." "Ha, what planet are you from?" "Not a planet... Aliens are cool, but there's a portal to an actual other dimension in your hometown, which is equally cool and also real." The kid can't refute that. His friend, bored, tries to throw an orange slice at him. He misses, but Danny catches it in his mouth. The formerly-bored friend turns out to be a vicious meanie. "You just can't dodge anything, can you. Are you always trying to eat what your enemies throw at you?" Danny is hurt, truly. He puts his hand over his heart and makes his best wide-eyed expression of sorrow. "Gasp. After all I do for you specifically, eating all those explosive blasts before you can, this is the thanks I get. Throw an orange at yourself, why don't you. Maybe you should practice dodging." The kid throws a whole orange this time, which Danny catches in his hand before peeling. "Oh, delicious inciendiary pain." He debates trying to hit himself in the chest and just grow another mouth there, before realizing that's horrifying. He just eats more orange slices. "So like. Ghosts can eat?" The kid with the bandanna seems curious. Danny shrugs. "I don't know. Ghosts can at least taste." He really doesn't know. Danny isn't quite a ghost. "Do you like to?" "Don't get the chance much. But sure, rather taste sweeter stuff than active plasma." He shoots a look at the orange kid, who has an orange in each hand now. Is that why their pockets are so full? They throw the oranges fast enough he reflexively goes intangible. He hears them hit the road behind him, then salutes the other kids and takes his leave. -----(can anybody tell me how to add lines proper?) It's gotten out really quickly that ghosts can eat. Not a lot of incidents involving that have happened, so Danny blames the sudden awareness everybody has of that on the internet. And a couple people are spreading the word that offerings to spirits are appreciated greatly, Danny's pretty sure those people also follow the web log of those paranormal investigators with the ghost. People have started asking if he'd like to share food they have on hand. Danny feels awkward, because he does already eat food at his own house, because he is alive. But then, the people might do that anyways if they knew that? They're trying to show their appreciation. And it's not like he couldn't just avoid their offers if he wanted, easily! Nobody's exactly chasing him down for this, just asking, when they have opportunities. He really does appreciate it too. Most everything tastes better when it's from someone whose life you've saved, or their wellbeing or family member or just their car. So Danny does usually accept whenever people offer to buy him things, or share what they have. Sure, he eats at home, but then sometimes he's pulled away before he can eat breakfast, or dinner, or anything. When people approach him at those times, he really doesn't even want to argue. So he doesn't.

Some of his older fans make similar offerings, but from meals they made through their own efforts. Those ones are also sweet. He's heard of the taste of victory, but the taste of gratitude is great. Danny likes knowing that people appreciate what he does, however they show it, and this is more convenient than all the cards he has in a locked box in his mattress, along with the other gifts, which he finds harder and harder to hide. He vastly appreciates the art, but his parents wouldn't really get this interest as anything other than suspicious. So the food is a welcome gift, even if returning containers to the right people can be difficult. He likes the sweets, but he actually likes salty things better, and after someone asks him about preferences a lot of people get interested. It's not a large percentage of the population, more those who especially like him and who are interested in cooking and baking, but a lot more people are starting conversations with him as Phantom than ever did before. He feels more appreciated. Some people yell at him because they dislike him, but gifts like these feel more tangible, like they outweigh that, even if people already cheered for him. And again, really convenient if he misses his planned meals. Danny's a fan. ------- Rhys is popping gum across the table while Jill continues talking about the annoyance of spices. Blah blah why does everyone use like no spices blah. Benjamin's late again, but as he dashes in and skids into the booth, the mess that is his clothes says it was probably under extenuating circumstances. "Did you forget your backpack?" Rhys swirls their drink with their straw. "Oh, oh crud it's probably still under there." He puts his head in his hands, and Jill pats his head in sympathy for whatever happened. "It must not have phased with me..." Jill shifts her legs like the restless shark she is. "Phased? There was an attack?" "Seems reasonable. Sure, it wasn't on the news, but at this point that's no surprise. There's barely a consensus on how many there are in a week, but too many to fit with regular news." Rhys sticks their gum to an empty wrapper. "But yeah. Why were you getting phased through anything, Benj?" "Um. Phantom. He saved me, I was caught in a collapse, a building was just. Fell." "Shit Benj, are you okay?" Jill's holding onto Benjamin now, like to keep him safe. "You didn't have to come here, do you need medical attention?" Benjamin shakes his head. "It wasn't dangerous! Just, dusty, and I couldn't get out. I'm glad Phantom heard me, though, my mobile wasn't working." "You sure you're okay Benny?" "Yeah. I think my clothes have it worse than I do. And my poor backpack." "F." Rhys leans against the wall, stretching their feet across the booth's bench. "This probably doesn't do you much of a favor in the long run, though. I mean, you thought that crush was bad before? Phantom just carried you out of a building. Tell me, Benj, did he take you by the hand, was it bridal-style?" "Hey Rhys? Shut up in those blue jeans." "Shut up in those blue jorts." Jill cracks a grin. "Shut up 'cause it's blue Jill." They do a mock-bow toward Jill, before Benjamin keeps talking. "All jokes aside, I really wanna thank him somehow. Uh, Phantom. Do you guys have any ideas? Because I don't think my skills in the area of writing are gonna be much help." "Au contraire Benj, I'm sure it'll be excellent help impressing your new boyfriend." "Shut up, I mean it." Jill looks at Rhys, and Rhys shuts up. "Uh, a bunch of people are like giving him food... Do you think he'd appreciate that? I could help, I kind of want to, you're my friend and I'm glad he saved you." She goes very quiet, like she already thinks it was stupid to even suggest. Rhys shrugs, but is smiling. "Sure, if you think he'll have your taste in extra-spicy." "Okay, I am NOT saying that everything needs to fucking BURN, but SOME PEOPLE are WEAK, and spices are meant to be USED and not in INFINITESIMALS," "Come on Rhys he's a ghost, we could probably put tylotoxin in it and he'd thank us. He'd thank us anyway, because Jill is fantastic at this and her idea was excellent." "Oh, cool. Thanks." Rhys shoots up, their face lighting up. "Oh my god, dudes, we should so totally actually do that though." "UH, it was just an example," "I'm not sure where we would get tylo," Rhys hits their hands on the table. "No, guys. He loves jokes, he loves MORBID jokes, he IS a ghost and he'd totally survive it! And again, he'd think it was so funny. All Benji's idea, of course. I'm so proud of you I could die." "Are you sure it won't do anything?" "I mean, he gets tossed around all the time and heals up quick. And this is *poison*, the type that works on *humans*. And if you're so unsure we can add a non-fatal amount, just in case he wants a kiss after." Benjamin nods slowly. Jill is already on board. "Alright but really, where are we going to get tylotoxin?"

---------- Danny had been liking the recent trend of tangible appreciation, but. Damn it all. He didn't have much right to feel betrayed, since he'd let his guard down. Nobody could have done this before anyway. He'd practically enabled them. He was still feeling pretty freaking angry at whoever had poisoned him. He doesn't know exactly who that was, though, since he's not sure when exactly they did it. -- The night he noticed it, he was just going home in the evening. It had a good chance to be one of those nights with no attacks to present issues, especially given that it was summer. He was walking instead of flying home, mainly out of preference, but started feeling tired enough to change his mind. After getting home and landing in his room, he was all prepared to wait another hour or so for ghostly latecomers, and yet so very, very ready to go to sleep. As soon as he turned human, though, he abruptly doubled over. It was a very abrupt, intense pain, and although he managed to get up when the shock wore off, it showed no signs of lessening. He pushed his shoes off and lied on his bed, grabbing for his phone. He couldn't tell where it was coming from. As he dialed for Tucker, he tried to think about the most recent attack, or the one before that. He didn't remember any wounds. Could it have been poison? "Danny, what's up." "Tucker, hey, uh." Tucker was already sighing over the phone. "You have a problem then?" "Don't know what would give you that idea..." "You always do this, man." His tone made it sound like Danny should know what exactly "this" was. "Besides, I'd hope you aren't calling about anything that could wait at this hour." "Okay fine. ...This hurts, like, a lot." Danny felt very tired, now, and his attempts to sit up weren't doing so hot. "Shit, man. What happened?" "I don't know. I think it's poison, some kind. Started hurting when I got home... When I was human." "What? That's not... Hmmm." Tucker sets his phone down. Probably checking something-or-other. Danny was feeling worse by the second. It hurt a lot, and it hit him that he might want to leave his house. He didn't think he could make it through an interaction with anyone here. Of course, he also felt like he didn't have the energy to get up and leave. Man, at least he wasn't throwing up. But now his head was hurting, and he curled up trying not to make a sound. He noticed he was clutching his phone now, hard, and lightened up before it could crack. Did Tucker say something? Shit, could poison do that? Concussions did that, was it a headache thing? "Uhhhh I wanna go. Your place? Sam's place, going there cool." Danny flipped his phone shut in and instant and slipped into a ghostly form before he even checked the door. Remembering that one second later, he zipped his head around to find it was fortunately shut, with no sign that anyone else at home had seen him. His thoughts already felt clearer, and the pain felt much more muted. Now, being Phantom dulled most of the pain, though there was still an ache in his stomach. Did that mean it was poison he ingested? Who'd have done that? He's still not sure. After flying to Sam's place, he discovered that she was on a video call with Tucker. He's really glad he can count on them. "Sam. Tucker. Sorry Tucker, actually. I don't think I was thinking clearly." He sat on the bed, which appeared to be different than the last he saw. Change of scenery, he guessed. "It doesn't hurt so much now, and I can think. It's mostly hurting my stomach now, actually. Did I eat poison?" Sam got him to lie down on her bed, which felt pretty weird considering he was still wearing boots. But he sat up to look at Tucker on the screen, who was talking about what they knew. "Most of your enemies don't use poison. And yeah, Skulker shows up a lot, but he's an outlier, and it's been a while since he was here anyway." "Yeah, 'cause we /totaled/ his suit last time." Danny grinned, and for a brief second so did Tucker. Then he got back to it. "Most poisons wouldn't take that long to affect someone, without /some/ sign. Nothing?" Sam nodded as Tucker spoke, probably out of further poison knowledge. Danny didn't think so. Skulker was about a week or two ago, by now? "No. I mean, I felt tired before flying home, but that was still only today." Sam jumped on his words. "Like, abnormally tired? Is this another symptom?" "It could be. I think it also stopped when I went ghost, too, so there's another point." They listened to Tucker adding that detail to his notes, before Sam looked out the window, furrowing her brow. "The thing is, it's obviously a human poison, if that's true. Which could still be a ghostly enemy, but if you can get out of it so easily then what's the point? Especially since other stuff, like sickness, leaves quicker, when your temperature doesn't already repel them." Danny frowned. "Did someone try to poison me? Human me? Why would someone do that?" "I don't know! Who'd hate you enough for that, most people just don't really care! The only person who comes to mind is Vlad, which seems unlikely." "Yeah, pretty sure he still needs me alive for some reason or another." Even with the cloning efforts, Danny 1.0 wasn't obsolete yet. Sam walked to the other side of the room, to a table. It was a very small table, but as Sam lifted the edge of the long tablecloth, she grabbed a large bag from beneath. She returned with this in hand, her first-aid kit showing from within. "We're hoping it will help if we can tell what kind of poison it is. Might at least give us an idea of where to look." Danny grimaced, but nodded. "Yeah okay, alright, should probably switch back for that? Yeah." Before his friends could protest, he flipped forms to his human self. Danny immediately was forced to lie completely down, without the energy to continue sitting. "Urrrrrr." The pain hit once more at the same time. Was it worse than before? He closed his eyes tightly. "Danny! Damn it. Okay, his breathing is really fast." As she turned toward him, her voice sounded louder. He tried to focus on what she said. "We'll try to get through this quickly, but just turn back if you need to, alright?" He didn't respond. "Alright, temperature. Tucker, you're recording all this, yeah?" After Tucker presumably confirmed, Danny felt something press across his forehead. "Oh, man. Feels way too warm. I'm not liking this..." Tucker's voice from behind Sam said something Danny couldn't make out. It was probably bad. "Okay," Sam said, and Danny couldn't hear the rest. Then something poked his arm, right on the wrist. He opened his eyes, to find he was in Sam's room. She was holding his hand, and he wanted to ask about that, but he couldn't seem to. She seemed to be getting upset about something. He closed his eyes again. It felt like only a second before he managed to open them again. He tilted his head to the side to see what was up, but there was a curtain in the way. Apparently Sam's new bed had curtains on it. He moved to shift them out of the way, and found Sam sitting at her computer, frowning. "Hey, I think the poison went away. It doesn't hurt anymore." She turned around in her chair with wide eyes, before remembering he was weird and partially relaxing. "Are you sure, Danny? That was fast." "I'm thinking pretty clearly, so yeah. Not sure I remember all of that, but yeah." Sam seemed skeptical. "How did you just get the poison out of your body?" Danny shrugged. "Ghost stuff? I dunno, I'm willing to blame it on my good old fighting /spirit/." He smiled at her, but she didn't seem convinced. "Let me try something." Sam got up and walked to stand by where he was lying. "I'm not so sure it's over, but this should test whether it's done." Before Danny could say a word, she'd grabbed his arm and given it a scratch with her nails. "Hey!" he had to shout, touching where she'd clawed. Looking at it, it wasn't bleeding, but some skin was torn. Then Danny realized it didn't hurt. Sam looked at him and raised an eyebrow. "Nothing? Probably not quite over, then. Besides, you were only out for a few minutes after your heart stopped, and I doubt all of the poison left your system in that time." "Guess it hasn't given up the ghost, then. But I won't either. I must be thinking with my core right now, which explains why I'm not feeling it. I hope it gets out soon, or else it's going to suck when my brain comes back online. Or worse, my nerves." It did get worse. Even despite the fact he didn't feel the tiredness as a ghost, he couldn't manage to get anything done, since at any point another function, with its associated pain sensors, could come back. He had to stay at Sam's the whole week, and as his human form started working with the rest again, even getting to a different room of the house was an effort. Worse still was when his brain activity did return, and he wished it didn't, because this time it didn't stop his heart. He just had to stay that way, in extreme pain, waiting for it to be over and getting annoyed by how hard it was to focus on anything. By the end of it, he was outright wishing for another illness or poison he could just vomit out. ------- He still doesn't know who did it. Not exactly. But he's figured it out. It must have been someone who gave him food. It must have been someone who doesn't know human poison doesn't work on ghosts, because anyone who knows he's a halfa is unlikely to be involved. And now he's just cursing himself for trusting anybody like that. The worst week of his life, that must have been. After all, the second worst week featured a /fast/ and painful death. ------- Luke's been trying to get Phantom's attention again for ages now, with Terry out of the hospital. After disappearing, the hero has been more reclusive, less willing to talk to people. He hasn't been accepting gifts, anymore, but he'd said he'd like to see Terry's work! His friends eventually convince him to give it up. Phantom doesn't want to talk, right now. ------- What happened to Phantom? He's shown a definite change in behaviour, talking less to civilians. He's declined all offerings since his disappearance. The first time he was seen in a week, he moved differently, almost as if he hadn't moved in a while. Hypothesis: He's been trapped within some place in the Ghost Zone, immobile, and interdimensional time dilation made it a longer stay than we've experienced. He's having trouble acclimating back to Amity. ------- They haven't talked about what they did. Not while Phantom stayed out of commission, the whole week. And not for another week, as the fallout of whatever happened became clear. As it became clear the blame was on them. But Benjamin's guilty conscience wouldn't let him keep silent forever, even if he was afraid to say it very loud. "I wish I hadn't gone to that stupid first-person workshop. Wish we hadn't gotten attacked, and I wish he never freaking pulled me out." He glares into his cup. "Benny, it's not your fault." Jill says, probably about to say something 'helpful'. But Benjamin starts first, and it might not /help/ but it feels just a bit better to blame someone else. "Of course not, I'm not the one who thought it was a /good/ idea to poison a hero." Rhys, previously silent, meets every challenge at equal measure. "Oh, yeah, because it was so stupid. I was totally right, if any one of us /bothered/ to check whether poison affects stupid ghosts. Or said something! You could have /told/ your little boyfriend the secret ingredient wasn't exactly love. Bet he'd know if this could be excused under 'love & war'." "Like you know one thing about love, you black widow. Do /you/ poison everyone you date? It wasn't my /idea/ to make him sick, I was grateful!" "So was I Benj! I'm so glad you're here with me it hurts, and I just thought surely, someone as dead as I am inside would appreciate a joke, but the joke fell flat. It fucked him up. I fucked up, yeah!" And everything's quiet a minute. Benjamin drinks his odd choice in summer beverage, and finds that it's cooled down some. Jill speaks up, quietly. "I poisoned somebody." Sitting sideways in the booth, she curls in on herself, upset. "Jill, no, it wasn't your idea, it was mine. Rhys lifts their sunglasses off. "I'm the one who actually seriously meant that." "I cook and I poisoned somebody. What am I gonna do?" Benjamin tries to offer her a back pat, but her legs are in the way. He pats her knees instead. "You didn't know it would poison him. You had every reason to think it would be fine." "Isn't there a rule or something that says you're not allowed to cook anymore if you poison somebody?" "That's a negligence thing though. Or incompetence. Definitely doesn't count if we gave you wrong information." Jill sips her drink through the straw, ignoring the whipped cream on top. A bad sign. "I never want to do that again." "What- Jill, you love to cook! You passionately rant about spices and-" "I mean the poisoning." "Oh, yeah, totally. Don't do that." -------- Danny Fenton doesn't know every person in this city, but he feels like he's at least seen most of them. Even if he's never talked to them, he's probably indirectly saved their life at some point. The ones he's least directly saved tend to hate him the most. Yet sometimes, even people he doesn't recognize will show him kindness. Danny likes feeling appreciated, more than even as much shouting as his detractors do can take from him. He'll talk to people again, and not just to save them. He'll trust people again, even if it's hard right now. And maybe, years later, he'll be able to hear the true story and laugh. But for now, Danny needs to think.

#danny phantom #my writing #yo danny fenton he was barely any years old by the time he'd died thrice #it was fucked #go ahead and criticize but i doubt it will help

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roggling · 6 years ago

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Request? Plance and kallura and Hunay reveal their feeling for each other on new years eve. They reflectwhen they got feeling for each other. ( of your still taking request) HAPPY HOLIDAYS !

A/N: I’m like…three months late… I’m sorry. Hopefully this 5,000+ word one-shot makes up for it. This was beta-ed by the wonderful @tressa-rose ! Thank you so much!

“Stupid Garrison. With their stupid parties and their stupid banquets,” Pidge muttered under her breath as Colleen applied a thin layer of powder on her face. Colleen chuckled at her daughter’s anger and added a thin layer of blush as well, making Pidge’s complaints’ volume raise. She turned towards her faithful robot, Chip, and begged, “Please save me, Chip!”

Colleen snapped the blush closed and chucked it inside the make-up bag, shaking her head in amusements as she watched Chip scan the area for any sense of danger to protect Pidge from.

“I don’t think the Garrison is the source of your anger, Katie,” Colleen mused as she took out the eyebrow razor. She turned towards Chip, “Don’t worry about it, Chip, she’s just being over-dramatic.”

Chip calmed down and just sat on Pidge’s bed to watch the two women.

“You’re right,” Pidge agreed with her mother’s assumption and tilted her head upon her mother’s command and shut her eyes tight, “I blame the social standards set up by men and the women who conform to them.”

“If that’s a jab at your mother,” Colleen blew on her daughter’s face to blow away the trimmed hairs, “You’re starting a war you won’t win. You asked me to help you.”

With one swipe, Colleen cut a stubborn, thick strand and made Katie yelp and grab onto her eyebrows, “I asked for you to help me pick out a dress, not shave off my eyebrows!”

“Stop exaggerating! I’m just making sure your eyebrows don’t join your hairline! You’re still going to have eyebrows.” Colleen yelled back, placing a hand on her hip and glaring down at her cowering daughter.

Katie looked up and returned the glare at full force and maybe even growled. Her mother returned the same look, the tension palpable to anyone in the vicinity. This included the two male Holts waiting for them in the living room. The stern reprimand coming from the older woman alerted Sam that something was off and he got up from his spot, being closely followed by his son.

“What did Katie do this time?” Sam asked from the doorway, Matt peering over his shoulder and holding in a laugh when he saw Pidge all dressed up. She didn’t look bad. In reality, she looked beautiful but the animalistic growling didn’t exactly pair up will with a formal dress and three-inch heels.

The two men leaned back when Colleen and Pidge twirled on the balls of their feet to look at them, amusement and frustration clearly painting their faces.

Before Pidge could answer, Colleen answered for her, “She’s nervous for her date with Lance.”

Pidge flushed and turned around to face her mother, “It’s not a date! We’re going to the Garrison banquet together because we were the only ones without a date!”

“But,” Matt began, “It’s not even a requirement to have a date to go. Besides, this dude from Olkarion asked you and you dashed out of there quicker than a bilfsnape,” Matt smirked, “You didn’t seem that opposed when Lance asked you to the banquet.”

Pidge glared at her older brother, “It’s just a friend thing. And you’ve got to stop hanging out with Coran; I’m not understanding your similes.”

Suddenly, the doorbell and silence rang through the house.

Then Matt was on the move.

A mischievous smile on his lips, Matt turned his heel and headed on to open the door to greet Lance and be able to tease him a bit before Pidge got to the door. However, before he could get too far, he was pushed down by a heavy figure and a metallic clang rang through the room when he fell with the figure on top of it. Pidge ran past her fallen brother and patted the head of her robot, “Thanks, Chip!”

Pidge reached the door easily now that her brother wasn’t set out on embarrassing her and she opened it once she caught her calmed down from the adrenaline. Lance was standing behind the door, hair slicked back and blue eyes on full display. He wore an open navy blue suit and a white button-down accompanied by a sea-foam green tie that matched with her dress. Her soft sea-foam green maxi dress made her seem taller and, thanks to her heels and the few inches she grew since they defeated Honerva, she was able to reach his eyes. Topped off with gold accessories, her look was just as formal as Lance’s.

“Wow,” Lance whispered, “You look great!”

Pidge beamed and hoped the layers of foundation, powder, and blush would block her real blush. “Thanks, you look like you came out of a high school prom movie, though.”

“Hardy, har, har. That was hilarious, Pidge,” Lance offered her his arm and Pidge took it, opening the door a little bit to say goodbye to her parents.

“Bye, mom! Bye, dad! Bye, Matt! See you later!”

Lance leaned towards the door and peered over her shoulder, “See you later, Mr. and Mrs. Holt! You too, Matt!”

Pidge soon slammed the door and Lance led her to his car, “Why was Chip pinning Matt to the floor?”

Pidge rolled her eyes, “‘Cause he was being an idiot.”

Lance chuckled and opened the door for her and helped her sit like a true gentleman, expertly dodging her flying limbs as she tried to gather up her dress in her arms and not trip on her heels as she jumps into her seat. He tucked in the dress so as to not pinch it against the door and walked on over to his side of the car.

However, at the subtle sound of a click, he looked up to see his date holding her phone and hiding a chuckle behind her open palm. He smiled and posed ridiculously next to the door, “You need to get my good side, pigeon. Otherwise, the picture is useless.”

Pidge snorted as she made sure to take ridiculous shots of her date trying to woo her camera and when he smacked his arm against the car door and winced in pain momentarily before returning to his outrageous poses. She put her phone down and she felt a wave of nostalgia slap her across her face, remembering the mini photoshoot she, Lance, and Hunk had with the sentry they programmed to “have fun”.

Lance climbed into the driver’s seat and put on his seatbelt, not without giving Pidge a look for not putting on her seatbelt, and he pulled out of her driveway. He put on some shades and announced, “Let’s go rock this night, Pidge.”

“No, Lance,” Pidge said, sliding on her own pair of shades, “Let’s rock this new year.”

Hunk should have known this would have happened. He was fine the whole week; he was even excited for this very moment. He’s a grown man, he should really stop letting it happen. He’s panicking again.

One would have thought that he would have the courage to pick up Shay for the banquet tonight. He’s a paladin of Voltron; he kicked sentry butt when he was only 17 years old and now, at the tender age of 25, he’s scared of spending a night with the most beautiful alien he’s ever seen.

No biggie.

However, he’s a man of his word and will not let this small moment of doubt stop him. So breathed in and opened the hatch to the Yellow Lion and walked out.

Shay was already waiting for him when he descended the hatch. His breath hitched and he couldn’t tear his eyes off of her. It was almost like the first time he knew he was smitten with her. The sun was setting right behind her, like an angelic halo, and she beamed the brightest, most beautiful smile he has ever seen.

He wiped a stray tear from his eyes and hugged the beautiful alien. Shay giggled and hugged him tightly, “Hunk, why are you crying?”

Hunk tightened his hold on her and whined, “You look so pretty and I missed you!”

Shay laughed, “Hunk, we saw each other this morning when we were finishing the food for tonight!”

“Yeah, but I still missed you,” Hunk sniffed.

Suddenly they heard a loud a celestial ring and looked up in time to see a wormhole disappear and the Black Lion fly through and through the Balmeran sky and towards Earth. They saw the Black Lion fly past the Balmera and they waved as the Lion entered the Earth’s atmosphere. Hunk grabbed Shay’s hand and beamed brightly, “I can’t believe they made it! That little sneaker, Keith told me they weren’t going to make it! Come on Shay, I want to catch up to them!”

Shay merely smiled softly as her date led her to the Yellow Lion’s cockpit. She tightened her hand around Hunk’s palm and let him help her step into the cockpit. Once they were both secured inside, she was holding on to Hunk’s pilot seat and he promised to not drive too recklessly, they were on their way, Hunk tailing the Keith really closely.

He opened a communications link and hailed the Black Lion. They immediately picked up the call and Hunk beamed brightly at the sight of his ex-leader after not seeing each other in three years or so. It almost caught him off guard with how sophisticated Keith looked wearing a formal Altean suit and his hair tied together in a low-hanging ponytail.

“Long time no see! Welcome back to Earth!”

Keith smiled fondly, “Hunk, we’re a minute away from Earth, you could have waited to see us once we got off.”

“Well I wanted to be the first one to welcome you two back,” Hunk huffed. Then, when he noticed the absence of a certain Altean empress he blinked and asked, “Wait… where’s Allura?”

Suddenly, Allura’s muffled voice from behind Keith asked, “Is that Hunk?”

The door opened and Hunk could see Allura materialize from behind Keith wearing a regal sky blue dress with a slit on her mid-thigh and pooling at her feet. Her crown seemed to sparkle as she approached the pilot’s seat. However, her royal, serious persona broke for a moment when she realized that it was him and she squealed and jumped over Keith’s armrest so her face covered the whole screen just so she could get a good look at Hunk.

“Hello, Hunk! You’ve changed so much! You have a beard!”

Hunk chuckled and absent-mindedly brushed his hands through his close-shaven beard. Shay was immediately at his side and she beamed, “Allura! It’s so nice to see you!”

Allura beamed as well, “Hello, Shay! How is the Balmera doing?”

“It’s been doing fine! There aren’t that many crystals being harvested thanks to the Garrison’s studies. I don’t think it’s quintessence will have to replenished until this new year.”

Allura sighed, “Well, that’s a relief.”

“Not to interrupt our reunion,” Keith interrupted, “But we need to land.”

Hunk looked down at his monitor and agreed, “Keith’s right. I’ll see you guys at the hangar.”

“Copy that,” Keith answered and shut off the communications.

“I’m surprised he was so excited to see us,” Allura mused.

“Are you kidding?” Keith chuckled, “We’ve been separated for three years now. I was half expecting them to make the party on Altea this year just to see us.”

“Well, Hunk gave us a nice surprise. I wasn’t expecting to see them so soon after arriving at the Milky Way solar system.”

“It was,” Keith agreed, “It ruined the surprise, though.”

Allura chuckled, “It’s not ruined yet. Hunk can keep a secret.”

Keith gave her a look and she chuckled, “No, you’re right. The surprise is ruined.”

Keith smirked as she shifted Black’s controls to land on the hangar and sighed, “Well, get ready to be ambushed once we touch down. I can already see Pidge and Lance waiting for us down there.”

Allura smiled as she saw Pidge and Lance waving frantically at them, giggling as Lance almost tripped on his dress shoes, and Shiro was off the side, offering them a proud smile. She felt her heart soar with happiness. They were finally together again.

Once the two descended down the Black Lion’s hatch, they were immediately enveloped in a group hug that was long overdue. Keith smiled and returned the embrace. The group released their hug and Keith suddenly felt a big hand muss his hair up. He quickly fixed his hairdo and glared at Shiro, the bespectacled older man extremely amused and happy to see his “little brother”. Allura was then suddenly tackled and the group laughed as Romelle cried about missing her best friend.

Once they all were caught up, the team went inside and gaped at the decorations, talked with other officers, and made jokes on their way to the cafeteria that was serving as a ballroom for tonight. They were immediately occupied once they stepped foot inside. The press had a holiday taking pictures of them and asking questions over their relationship with their dates. Officers shook their hands, cadets asked for autographs and advice, and old comrades caught up.

Lance and Pidge stuck together, making jokes with Rizavi and Kinkade, talking with the Olkari of the newly planted Olkarion trees in the Garrison’s newest greenhouse, evading the press behind ridiculous hiding spots and making inside jokes on Iverson’s new mustache.

At one point, the two were doubling over when Pidge played audio from an age-old meme. At the first sound of a laughing man holding his chuckles in while saying, “Look at this dude…” Lance lost his quiznak and couldn’t hold his laughter, resulting in the both of them throwing their heads back in laughter.

Keith and Allura made their way towards the two best friends laughing the night away and Keith shook his head, “Can you two be quieter, you’re bringing more attention to yourselves.”

“But…But Keith,” Lance chuckled and patted his ex-leader’s shoulder, “You’ve gotta hear this.”

Pidge frantically turned on her phone to show Keith the audio and she waved him closer and gave them instructions, “Okay, look at Iverson as you hear this. Allura, you too.”

The pair leaned into Pidge’s phone and she played the audio. Within seconds, Keith had an amused smile on his face, obviously desperately trying to keep his composure together in front of such a big crowd, and Allura was in a fit of giggles.

“Yes, that audio recording does describe Commander Iverson very well,” she admitted.

Pidge and Lance held their hands over their mouths in an attempt to muffle their laughter, but to no avail; they were still the loudest ones. Allura smiled fondly at the pair and giggled, “It’s great that you two have finally opened up about your feelings and came together as a couple. I always believed you two were soulmates of a sort.”

The stopped their laughter, smiles still on their faces. However, once they processed Allura’s words, they immediately flushed and Pidge was quick to correct, “No, Allura. You got this all wrong. It’s just a friend thing. We’re not actually dating.”

Keith blinked at the two best friends and looked at Lance pointedly. Lance seemed sheepish and scratched the back of his head. However, Allura didn’t seem to catch the implication and she furrowed her brows and asked, “What? I thought that Lance asked you…”

“Would you look at that!” Keith interrupted, immediately grabbing Allura’s hand and starting to drag her away, “Mom’s here with Kolivan! Let’s go say hi.”

Allura turned around and saw a confused Pidge and a relieved Lance. She turned and questioned the man dragging her away, “Why hasn’t Lance asked her to be his girlfriend, yet? Didn’t he tell us he was going to ask her a month ago?”

Keith shrugged, “Beats me, but he seems pretty nervous tonight. I think he’s planning on doing it tonight. I don’t know he’s taking a long time to ask her.”

Allura looked down at their joined hands and frowned, raising a disbelieving brow at Keith, who wasn’t looking at her in the eyes. She tore her hand away from his grip, “Not as long as someone I know. I’ll welcome Kolivan and your mother by myself, thank you.”

Keith was left alone in the middle of the ballroom and his heart dropped. He hasn’t seen Allura that annoyed in years. He really messed up…but in what?

“Ouch,” said a voice right behind Keith. He turned around and saw Shiro smirking behind a glass of Nunvill. Keith crossed his arms as the older man continued, “That must’ve hurt.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you do,” Shiro gave his empty glass to a caterer, “She’s mad at you for not making a move.”

Keith blinked, “What?”

“You have been working side by side with the princess for years now, Keith. I’m surprised you didn’t see a difference in how she looks at you.”

Keith turned around to watch Allura talking to his mom and turned back to face Shiro, “She’s… the same.”

Shiro sighed, “I guess she is, but not completely.”

Shiro bopped his head towards Curtis, who was talking with some old members of the ATLAS and his voice turned soft, “People change when they’re in love.”

Keith turned around towards Shiro with wide eyes, but the man continued, “I can see it in you too.”

Keith turned towards the Princess and felt a hand on his shoulder and Shiro left with a final whisper, “Go for it, hotshot.”

With a final, harsh pat on his shoulder, Shiro moved on to speak to another officer and left Keith alone with his thoughts. Keith bit his lip in concentration and took a deep breath. Maybe it was time to make a move. He composed himself and made his final decision.

He grabbed a glass of cider, he wasn’t fond of drinking yet, and he made his way towards the stunning Empress speaking with his mother. He waved at his mom and Kolivan before grabbing Allura’s arm and he whispered into her ear, “Do you want to talk on the balcony?”

Allura blinked owlishly before realizing what was happening after seeing Keith’s intense gaze and she smiled, taking a glass of Nunvill a caterer offered and looped her arm around Keith’s extended arm, “I’d be honored to.”

The duo left with a curt goodbye to the older Galrans and moved on to one of the Garrison’s balconies. On their way, they saw Hunk and Shay by the kitchen entrance, offering a wave to the cook and his helper as they left the party for a more quiet ambiance.

“Do you think they’re together, yet?” Shay asked Hunk, her voice small and hopeful.

Hunk shook his head, “Nah, I don’t think so. Keith still looks like a lost puppy every time Allura needs to leave his side.”

Shay giggled behind her hand as she watched the duo leave without anyone else noticing. She took a swig of the cider and she smiled when she saw some guests stuff their faces with a handful of Hunk’s newest creations.

“Looks like people like your créme hoisé from the Froylian belt.”

Hunk turned to face his helper and frowned, “You mean they like our créme hoisé. You helped me make that.”

Shay blinked, “I didn’t do much. I…”

“You were the inspiration for it! You always said you wanted to try hoisé as a custard. You explained it so vividly, I needed to try it out. It’s thanks to you that it’s so delicious too. I wouldn’t have known to put in more Froylian sugar if it wasn’t for you!”

Shay blinked and asked softly, “Is that really what you think of me?”

Hunk smiled, “It is. You’re the reason I continued being a Paladin.”

Shay’s eyes widened and her mouth hung open in surprise. Hunk looked down at his own plate of créme hoisé to avoid the bubble of embarrassment growing in his stomach. Then he inhaled and continued, “Honestly, Shay. You’re the most amazing girl I know. I’m so glad to have met you in the Balmera all those years ago. I…I want to know…would you…”

He was suddenly interrupted by lips against his cheek and a soft voice cheerfully exclaiming, “Yes!”

Hunk was wide-eyed in surprise but eventually shook it off and beamed brightly. He grabbed her hand and squeezed tightly, placing their foreheads together and the two giggled, safe in their own bubble of happiness.

Lance smiled, happy that his best friend finally confessed to Shay and he elbowed Pidge, “Hey, look at Hunk.”

Pidge turned and looked in the direction of their best friend and smiled, “It’s about time.” She crossed her arms in satisfaction.

“Yeah,” Lance agreed softly. He looked down at Pidge (he didn’t have to tilt his head down as much as he used to when they were still fighting the Galra) and smiled fondly at her beauty. His staring was quickly interrupted, though, when she suddenly turned around and grabbed his hand, her face beaming so brightly, Lance knows it’s something about technology.

“Do you want to go look at the robot I just finished?”

Lance knew he wasn’t going to understand the technical jargon she was going to be talking about once they walked inside and take a look, but he couldn’t say no to that face. He smiled and nodded, making Pidge’s face smile brighter than ever and she took his hand.

Together, they left the party and headed towards the lab.

Once inside, Lance saw an odd, soft looking robot sitting on a table. Pidge immediately went into “scientist mode” and swept through her lab like a hurricane. Turning on lights, monitors, and grabbing one of the holo-screens right out of the air and pressed a button.

Lance chuckled and stepped closer to his date, pocketing his hands and leaning into the holo-screen in her hands to try to make sense of the gibberish she has written on there. He was again reminded of the obvious intelligence gap between the two. He was fairly smart, but not enough to understand the engineering endeavors of the petite Italian before him.

Once she typed a few commands in, the robot was completely at her control and it came to life. Lance smiled as he watched Pidge typing up a storm in her tablet and excitedly waiting for the bot to move. It got up from its spot and moved over to an obstacle Pidge had set up. She stopped it and turned to him smugly, “Touch it.”

Lance blinked and rose a brow, “You want me to touch it?”

Pidge nodded and Lance did as told, running his hand over the hard surface of the machine in front of him. Pidge sidled up next to him, “It’s hard under there, right?”

Lance nodded, “Yeah.”

Pidge beamed, “Wait until you see this!”

With a push of a button, the robot continued on towards the obstacle with a small opening at the bottom and started squeezing through. Lance’s eyes almost bugged out as he watched. Once the bot was completely through, it returned to its regular size and Lance touched it again, almost freaking out when he realized it was still solid.

“Whoa! That’s insane! How’d you do that?”

When Pidge started to explain, Lance lifted up a hand, “Don’t answer that I’m just going to be more confused. But, jeez,” Lance ran a hand through his hair, watching the bot go back and forth between the obstacle, squeezing through swiftly and returning solid, “That’s amazing!”

Pidge beamed proudly at her date, but found herself flushing when Lance turned to look at her and he smiled softly, “You’re amazing.”

Pidge brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and she turned away, hoping to hide her growing blush from her best friend, “What are you talking about? I’ve done more amazing things than this, Lance.”

“That’s true,” Lance admitted, “But you deserve to have someone say it.”

Pidge sighed and put down her tablet and leaned on her desk, “Alright, what’s going on? What did you destroy this time?”

Lance scoffed, “What? I can’t flatter you without you assuming I ruined something?”

Pidge rose a brow and Lance chuckled and stepped closer, “I promise I didn’t break anything. I’m just… I’m trying to make you understand.”

Pidge played with her hair and asked, “Understand what?” Lance, however, didn’t stop stepping closer.

Pidge tried to move back, but as she placed her hand on the counter behind her, she had nowhere to go. Lance was almost pressed right against her and Pidge felt her face flush as Lance leaned in. Pidge blinked and looked down at his lips and back up to his eyes and whispered, “Lance?”

Lance looked down at her lips and whispered, “I need you to understand that this isn’t a ‘just a friend’ thing.”

Pidge froze and her eyes widened. Her eyes flashed down to look at his lips and then up to his eyes, gulping in anticipation. Lance placed his hands on her hips and he looked down at her with such intensity, Pidge’s mind became cloudy with emotion.

“I didn’t just ask you to the banquet as a ‘friend’.”

Pidge wet her lips.

“I’ve been wanting to tell you this for a long time. Last year, actually…”

“Just shut up and kiss me,” Pidge whispered, lifting a hand to cup his cheek and her fingers dove into his hair, pushing his face towards hers.

He complied and leaned down even more, finally placing his lips on hers. It was like a long-awaited water bottle in the middle of a marathon. It was like hearing the lunch bell in the middle of a lecture. It was like heaven. Pidge, despite having grown the past few years, was tilting her head up in an almost uncomfortable position, but the kiss was so worth it.

It took a while before the two finally separated and they just stood dazed and mussed up from their small session. And although the two feared that it would somehow be awkward if they ever tried to pursue something deeper between them. But it wasn’t the case. They felt at home.

Lance laid his forehead on hers and grinned. Pidge looked up and placed another peck on his lips, beaming up at him and eventually started to giggle. Lance laughed too and they sat on Pidge’s lab table laughing the night away as the fireworks of the New Years rang in the background.

“It’s about damn time,” Pidge laughed.

“You tell me,” Lance chuckled, pecking kisses along her jaw and her cheeks.

Pidge smiled and dug her hand into his hair. She nuzzled her face on the crook of his neck as Lance left soft peck on hers and she whispered, “Happy New Year, Lance.”

He pulled away and looked down at her with a sparkle in his eyes. “Happy New Year, Katie,” he leaned in for another kiss, the two in such a state of bliss they could care less about going out to congratulate their friends on the New Year. They have denied their feelings for years, they’ll celebrate the New Year after they’ve made up for lost time.

Down the hall, there was a very different atmosphere. On the balcony, wrapped in each others’ arms, Keith and Allura were enveloped in a passionate, confused kiss. Allura contributed the confusion in this circumstance. One second, she was watching the fireworks celebrating the New Year; next, Keith wrapped his arms around her and gently placed his lips on hers.

It wasn’t like she hadn’t wanted to kiss him senseless for years now, but she was sort of hoping that the old Altean fairytales her mother told her as a kid rung some truth. Well, if this was her knight in shining armor, she wasn’t going to complain.

Keith let go after a while and got off her quickly, looking away to hide his embarrassment. She blinked in surprise and confusion, watching him look away with a guilty look.

“I’m sorry,” she could hear him whisper.

She took his hand in hers and whispered back, “Why?”

Keith turned to look her in the eyes. She almost gasped in awe at how intense and warm his gaze was, how soft it was. He looked down at her intertwined hands and back up at her.

Again, she whispered, “Why now?”

Keith decided to take a step towards her again so they could share the same intimacy they shared moments ago and lifted a hand to her cheek, brushing away her bangs and stuffing them behind her ears, removing his hand after. Her skin tingled with his touch.

“I’m sorry.”

He intertwined their other hands and leaned down to nuzzle his face on the crook of her neck. She let go of his hands and dug her hands into his scalp and asked, “Keith?”

With a sigh, Keith asked, “Would you be mine?”

Allura blinked and smiled at the man blushing against her neck. She fought against the urge to giggle. Keith wasn’t a man of many words, except when it came to speeches, but he said a lot through his actions. And this, wasn’t typical Keith behavior, so she knew he was nervous.

She nuzzled into him and whispered, “Of course I will.”

She would have laughed when she felt him smile against her neck, but the kiss that followed soon after made her forget all about her amusement. Especially after he started licking and nipping her neck.

She gasped in surprise and Keith took this opportunity to cradle her jaw with his hands and plant a line of kisses along her jaw before reaching her mouth. He pulled away and smirked, all embarrassment long gone after hearing Allura gasp like that, and was about to land the finishing blow when the balcony doors burst open and one of Allura’s advisors, Merla, he thinks, stepped in.

“Empress Allura, Commander Shirogane is requesting your presence along with Paladin Kei- Oh my!”

The couple jumped away from each other in an effort to play off the exchange as a delusion if Merla questioned it. However, Merla already saw all she needed to see. Especially since Keith’s lips were stained with Allura’s berry red lipstick and her neck was turning purple with small nicks here and there.

“I-I will take my leave!”

Merla quickly turned on her heel and closed the doors behind her. She took a moment to process what she just saw and shook her head in amusement as she remembered their panicked faces. If she wasn’t so shocked, she would’ve taken the chance to tease the empress and Paladin Keith before she left them to their own devices again.

She crossed her arms and smiled as she made her way to Dr. Holt’s lab to call Paladin Lance and Paladin Pidge to the ballroom. It was about time the two did something about the tension between them. However, she didn’t think it was going to blow up so passionately between the two.

She reached Dr. Holt’s lab and scanned her hand, waiting for the clearance to open the door. However, once it did, she found a similar view waiting for her behind the door.

Pidge was sat on her lab table, legs wrapped around Lance’s waist. Lance’s head was on her neck, something Mera knows isn’t as innocent as it looks, and his hands on her waist and her neck.

The two looked at her and blinked in surprise. Merla just started laughing and shut the door. She would have to tell Paladin Shiro that they were, ahem, preoccupied.

#kallura #plance #hunay #voltron #my works #requests

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soulvomit · 6 years ago

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My 25 year adjacency to arts culture as a woman, and how it informs me being anti-anti

When I first started my art-making, in roughly about 1994, I was a young Gen Xr who liked zines, underground/edgy comics, magazines like Juxtapoz (which back then covered a lot of lowbrow and outsider stuff but now is pretty slick and commercial), and the stuff you saw at old school coffeehouses and used record stores. Later, Rocky Horror, Night Flight, and Spike & Mike’s Sick & Twisted Animation Festival entered my vocabulary. I taught myself enough art to start sketching out a horror comic about a suicide victim whose soul just jumps into another body, who has no memory of the life he had before. A kid who’d never fit anywhere - because my parents never fit anywhere - I found a home in liminal spaces. I was going to my entry level middle class job in the morning then spending my free time in grungy shops along the beach boardwalk that were run by ex-hippies. A majority of my friends were guys - a mix of old school nerds/geeks and pot-smoking guys who hung around. (And a couple of oldschool hippies.) It’s my guy friendships that largely shaped my artistic vocabulary; they encouraged me with stuff like “oh yeah, add that eyeball, that’d be sick, dude.” Everything that made me anxious, I put on the page. Everything scary or odd in my environment, I put on the page. Then at 21, I started taking art classes. Where I found, universally, that creative content is very heavily policed by gender. And that creative content is very heavily gendered in and of itself. There is work that men are allowed to create, and work that women are allowed to create. I also discovered that people saw women visibly involved in youth or alternative culture *very* differently, and very much more negatively, from how they saw young men. And I discovered that men were the universal creative voice but women were expected just to create for female audiences. Men could create anything they wanted and not get policed about it (unless the thing was so overtly hateful that it didn’t even make the much lower bar of 1990s social acceptability), men could create “adults only” and dominantly created all the teenage material, men could portray disturbing or distressing subjects or “gritty real life.” Women on the other hand, couldn’t. Anything non-generic that we drew, resulted in intense analysis of whether or not we were “good” or “bad” women. And it was mainly women policing other women. Not nearly as many of the men actually gave a shit. I found that men were encouraged to be original and have a “voice” but women were expected to fall into line and draw the same content as hundreds of other women. I observed that art teachers - ESPECIALLY women art teachers and ESPECIALLY the “feminist” ones - gave different types of encouragement to male students than to female ones. I found that in order to not alienate women art teachers or women classmates, I had to do art the “right” way. It had to be one of the following: * Boats, kittens, flowers, or some other totally non-threatening, wholesome, cozy subject matter, completely safe for old church ladies and young children. (This is honestly why the “twee” and Manic Pixie Dream Girl/cupcake culture of the late 00s and early 10s, really set my teeth on edge. Just more of the same, in a new package.) * some kind of leftover 60s-70s style white liberal We Are The World crap. * feminist art, which was a niche, was the only acceptable space to be “edgy” in, as long as one was edgy in the specific way that was prescribed. However if you did feminist art, you were never going to get a showing or make any money off of your work. But it was a “noble” kind of poverty. (That’s a thing about white feminist culture of the 90s, it was still heavily dominated by Boomer hippie mentality and heavily discouraged female ambition while accepting male ambition as an immutable fact of life that we were “better than.”) And the pressure was even heavier on marginalized women artists because you weren’t allowed to paint and profit from any part of your own marginalized experience. ALL of the social capital was on the part of affluent and or white people talking about groups that weren’t theirs. If you talked about someone else’s experience you were a Good Person but if it was your own experience then you were either a dangerous militant and probably a commie, or you were just seen as a big whiner. The pressure then was to get commercial graphics training and do production work for the creators who were permitted to create. Work that had nothing to do with you (which is what I ended up doing because it was the Prescribed Middle Class Path in art). And then once in commercial graphics, there was another two-track system: men got to do bigger projects and self-promotional work. Women were almost always socialized to stay small with everything. The attrition rate of women designers in my generation and older is EXTREMELY high, because you can’t build a competitive commercial portfolio on church bake sale ads. People blamed male-preferring employers but nobody would ever take responsibility for the ways women are socialized or trained much earlier in our career and schooling lives. One of the big problems is that many of the traditional acceptable male topics, which get the most attention and visibility from passersby, are unacceptable from women creators. Men are encouraged to create huge wall-sized works but women to stay small and cozy. Also, marginalization was only an acceptable topic as long as white male artists were portraying it. Otherwise you ran into the anger or talking-back-against taboo that pretty much everyone but white cis het men are subject to. Then there was this. If you were a woman and didn’t paint cozy pastoralia then automatically your work was branded feminist by the mainstream. But that didn’t protect you from the most harmful parts of a lot of proto-TERF 80s/90s analysis. The Personal Is Political meant that everything you did was held up to the light for political analysis in ways that white male work never was. I’m careful to point out race here because I do feel like race came into it. A lot of the benefits given to men here are specific to affluent white men. When poor white men painted, it was called lowbrow art. When people painted who were neither of those groups, and it wasn’t one of the 3 or 4 allowed “safe” topics, then it was called “dangerous militant propaganda” at worst or just “crackpottery” at best. And the art of mentally ill people? Forget it. Once you have a mental health diagnosis, everything you do is seen as a facet of your mental illness. You aren’t a human being anymore. It doesn’t help that artists who come into art via the medicalized culture of mental illness, via art therapy, are seen forever as art therapy patients and not artists. Even though many artists who are mentally ill are subsistence artists, and many artists who are mentally ill have an art practice that predates their diagnosis, and many are subsistence artists who can’t hold other work. tl;dr this is the background I come from with regard to why I’m never going to support anti-culture or cancel-culture. It is dominantly at this point a culture of policing based on extremely gendered social rules, a lot of it is based upon what women/marginalized people are specifically allowed to create and say about our own lives, and I am never going to be here for it.

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tarotdeckshuffle · 6 years ago

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Four Suns: Chapter Two

Taglist: @idiotflowerex, @laststory1013, @sayaoqueen, @jophinabean

If you like what you read, please consider supporting me on Patreon or buying me a Ko-fi!

Tags: Scifi AU, Poly Relationship, Angst, Dancing

Word Count: 2,700

<==Previous Next==>

Chapter Two: Morning Light

Noctis was furious. The one rule, the only rule Lucis had for dealing with aliens was to bring no harm to them, and he had failed even that.

He stood just outside the room where you rested, leaning against a wall. You had seemed like a genuinely caring individual, swept into a whirlwind of the unknown. You had worried for their well being without even knowing their names.

Ignis silently fumed, sitting on the window seat near you, watching the storm outside. He was furious that he had not foreseen the onslaught of daemons. He should have known that they would attack anything he tried to protect, regardless of its outward value.

Prompto was visibly shaken, sitting at your bedside. Why had the daemons gone after you? The one nice person he’d met in ages, and the daemons had to go and hurt you. And he didn’t protect you. He blamed himself, completely.

Gladio was outraged and brooding in the corner of the room. He should have protected you. He had let his guard slip and you had to suffer for it. He was set on making every daemon within the galaxy pay for your pain.

But you knew nothing of blame. The men had brought you to the nearest house, setting you on a bed under glowing pink lights. The lights were the only known method of ridding the body of daemons, but it had only ever worked on Lucians. They had no idea if it would work on you.

The clock on the wall ticked the seconds away. Finally, Prompto spoke. “I’m…so sorry,” he took your sleeping hand in his. “I should’ve done more.”

Gladio looked over from his corner. “It’s not your fault. It’s mine. I was their protector…”

Ignis interrupted his observance of the storm outside. “Self-blame will get us nowhere. We have to focus on their recovery.”

Noctis sighed, hearing them the discussion inside the room. Walking in, he took on a new air. “Besides, we all know who is really to blame.” Everyone in the group nodded. “Ardyn. And if he’s here, we know we’re on the right path. We’ll set out as soon as our...ambassador awakens. Which they will,” he added with determination.

You lay silently, basked in rose gold light. A peaceful face masked the horror going on in your mind.

Every daemon had been a living being with hopes, dreams, and a family before they crossed paths with Ardyn. The Usurper had taken all of that away, filling them with dark matter from the deepest parts of the galaxy. The shells were left with all the darkness a heart can hold, knowing only sorrow, rage, and hunger. The smallest part of their beings that still lived struggled towards warmth while their shadow bodies feared the light, leaving them to feed off of the essence of living beings.

Within the darkness of an invading soul, you were drowning. Freezing emptiness seeped into your skin while the talons of sadness tore into your heart. Those yellow eyes started into your soul, seeing your every failure, questioning the very fabric of your happiness.You struggled against the darkness to little avail, neither your soul nor your body could escape.

Cold skeletal fingers slithered into your mouth, liquifying to fill your throat with icy, rancid, sludge. Your body convulsed, trying to rid itself of the toxins that choked you.

You grasped at your throat, desperate for air. Just as you thought you would drown in this frozen void, hope appeared: Four rays of sunlight broke through the darkness. Rays graced each of your hands, your cheek, and over your heart.

Their warmth spread over your body, providing heat such that you had never felt. The darkness around you screamed and writhed in agony, trying to lash out. But whenever it made contact with the light, it smoked and disintegrated.

The men had watched your skin turn gray; the darkness was winning. It was possible the lights weren’t going to help you, but what could any of them do?

Prompto held your hand in both of his. Ignis moved to warm your other hand. Gladio came forward to stand next to Iggy, placing on hand on your cheek, hoping to warm your cold face. Lastly, Noctis came forward.

“Please...please, don’t let it end like this.” He placed his hand gingerly over your heart.

This was it, your way out of this void. Raising your eyes towards the source of the light, you felt your physical eyes open. You had to squint at the bright pink lights staring back at you, but through it, your vision was graced with four smiling figures standing over you.

“You’re awake,” Prompto yelled, throwing himself into your arms. Noctis laughed at his sunshine’s jubilation, but Ignis was worried he’d hurt you further.

“It’s good to have you back,” Gladio gently laid a hand on your shoulder, smiling down at you.

The four men sat around you, caring for your every need. Perhaps it was strange, you all had just met. But it was natural to them: you needed them and they felt like they needed you. It truly was more attention than you had ever dreamed of.

You were regaining your strength, sipping on a bowl of soup Ignis had prepared for you. The flavors were odd combinations but it warmed every part of your body.

“I believe introductions have been neglected, so allow me to be the first: My name is Ignis.” He said, taking the empty bowl from you.

“Oh! Dude! They have! I’m Prompto,” the sunshine ever at your side beamed, taking your hand in his, again.

“I think you know most of our names by now, but for the fun of it, I’m Gladio,” the hulking man added. His smile was warm towards you, gone was his threatening demeanor from earlier.

“And I’m Noctis,” the figure standing by the wall added, smiling at you. His eyes sparkled and his features had softened.

You introduced yourself, trying to be cordial while laying in a bed. “Introductions are...great. But, what’s going on,” you asked, needing to put an end to this dream.

The four men looked at each other and sighed. “You’re not going to believe us,” Noctis said, placing a hand on his forehead.

You raised an eyebrow, looking around at your protectors, trying to read their body language. Gladio breathed deeply. Knowing what was to come, Ignis’s hand crept over to hold yours.

“We’re not from...here,” surprisingly, Prompto was the first to speak.

“We’re what you’d call ‘aliens’, if my translator is right,” Gladio added,not wanting to dance around the point.

Ignis held your hand tighter as the shock hit you.

“You’re...what? You have GOT to me kidding me. That’s not possible,” you looked around, trying to find the joke in the room. But it was nowhere to be found.

“We’re here because we need to save our home,” Noctis wouldn’t meet your eyes as he spoke. His arms crossed over his chest. “The guy who sent those daemons, the creatures that attacked us, er, you,” he had a moment of pain cross his face, “has taken our home. We have to get it back.”

Pained shock covered your face as you looked about the room. “What? What does that even mean?”

Ignis squeezed your hand to bring your attention to his calm eyes. “Do you want me to explain? Do you feel ready?”

The question struck you. Where you ready? Had enough of your strength returned for this? The warm eyes before you held no judgment, just peace. But you had to know, you wanted to know, you needed to know who your protectors were.

You nodded, determination rippling through your face. Ignis smiled warmly back at you.

“We hail from a planet far from yours, by the name of Lucis. Our home was cast into darkness by one known as ‘Ardyn.’ The only way for us to defeat Ardyn is to find the Royal Arms: legendary weapons only the royalty of Lucis can wield. In an attempt to thwart us, Ardyn has spread these weapons across the galaxy. We’re here, searching for the remaining piece.”

You sat in contemplative silence. Taking in what had been told to you. “So..does that mean you’re all princes? I mean, if you can wield these Royal Arms…”

Gladio laughed. “No, just that guy over there.” Noctis looked up, shocked and dismayed that the other man would so readily introduce him as a prince.

Everything was so much to take in. You sat planted in place, head spinning with all of this information butting up against what you had always been taught about extraterrestrials. “Er...may I ask one more thing?”

“Of course, I imagine you have a plethora of questions,” Ignis responded.

“Why’d you crash?” The question hit each man like a brick to the his head.

“We...may have, sorta, not taken care of our ship,” Prompto admitted, rubbing the back of his head.

“WE?! You’re the one who crashed us on Averion,” Noctis accused Prompto.

“Sure, but who refused to get the Regalia worked on,” Gladio questioned Noctis.

“Enough!” Ignis’s voice quieted all of them. He turned back to you, “we believe the Sword of the Father is somewhere...nearby. And our landing was...complicated, by many factors.”

The three other men seemed to pout in unison.

“Is your ship going to be ok?”

“We should get it fixed…” Noctis admitted.

“I think I know a gal who could help!” You piped. Confused looks followed.

You made your way to the beach under the next day’s morning light. Your protectors worried over each step you took, fearing your full strength had not yet returned. Noctis and Prompto walked at your sides, Gladio took the lead, and Ignis followed.

The tide was low when you met your friend, a woman by the name of Cindy. You had told her of a crash on the beach that she needed her wrecker for. She was waiting in the driver’s seat, at the spot you had told her about.

“What’ve y’all got here?” She asked in her booming but sweet voice, staring inquisitively at the upended ship.

Before the men around you could speak, you answered. “Science project. Think you can make it fly, again?” The men around you looked at you with wide eyes, thinking there was no way that excuse could work.

Cindy stared at you before bursting into a smile. “Always knew you were a bright one! I made one of these sorts of fellers, too! But...I was a tad bit older,” she laughed. It looked like the men could be pushed over by a hermit crab. “I’ll get ‘er going for ya! Might even have some parts left from mine!”

The men could only stare, dumbfounded, while Cindy hooked up and loaded the ship onto her wrecker, waving as she drove off.

You spent the rest of the day exploring along the beach, searching the caves for signs of the Sword of the Father, with little success. By the late hours, you returned to watch the setting sun.

“There’s some beauty that you can never find in space,” Noctis waxed.

“It is unique to watch only one sun set,” Ignis added.

“Earth is pretty cool.” Prompto finished.

You all sat as the men fielded questions about their travels and their home from you. It felt like they couldn’t be more different. Their planet had six suns and was a place of luxury. You learned of their strange customs and they of yours.

“But the dances!” Ignis gasped when speaking of celebrations. “Oh, they’re the best,” Gladio added.

“You dance on your planet?! Show me,” you said excitedly.

Noctis laughed. “We don’t have any music!”

You pulled your phone from your pocket, setting it to start playing music.

Prompto looked at it, amazed. “That’s handy. We never thought to have our communicators play music, too.”

The whole group laughed, using a simple minute to enjoy the music.

“Welp, the ambassador wants to see us dance! So, I say we show ‘em!” Gladio stood, taking Ignis’s hand and pulling him into his great chest. Ignis laughed, taking Gladio’s hands and leading him into an intricate dance.

You watched in awe. The dance was so foreign, but so natural; like fireflies flying together in the moonlight.

Prompto stood next. “Your royalness, may I?” He held his hand out to Noctis. Noctis smiled as he jumped to his feet and took Prompto’s hand.

Their dance was much more joyful than Gladio and Ignis’s. It rolled with speed and fluidity, like waves upon the shores.

The music started to slow, so you grabbed your phone to find another song. As you fumbled with the small device, trying to find the perfect beat, you heard a throat clear. Noctis was standing over you, the other men at his sides, holding his hand out to you.

“Would you join us,” he asked. You smiled as you took his hand. Ignis took your phone, taking over music.

Noctis pulled you into a soft embrace, his hands were gentle but strong on your back. Prompto came behind you, laying warm hands on your waist.

“We’ll show you how to dance,” the sunflower cheered.

The dance was complicated but fun, with fast steps and joyful bursts. You soon ditched your shoes to feel the warm sand between your toes as the evening salt air kissed your lips.

It was hard not to admire Noctis in the light of the setting sun. His sharp features outlined warm eyes as he held you close. He was a patient teacher, letting you find the steps for yourself.

Prompto was just as beautiful. The orange sky reflected in his golden hair as he smiled at you. His joy could light up an entire city. His constant cheers and affirmations tickled your ears.

For Noctis, it was hard to imagine that this lonely planet could hold such beauty as yourself. You learned quickly, smiling the entire time. His heart was warmed knowing that your light burned so bright.

It was truly amazing how perfect you were to Prompto. You learned everything so quickly and your laugh! It sounded so beautiful! How could someone so perfect even exist? This planet must be filled with angels, he thought.

Soon, Gladio interrupted. “Our turn,” he said softly. Ignis got up, handing your phone to Prompto. Noctis gracefully handed you off to Gladio, leaving you with a smile.

He and Ignis each took one of your hands. Their grips on your fingers couldn’t be more different. Gladio’s hands were large and calloused, but he held you ever so gently. Ignis’s hands were slender and cool, holding to you with assuring strength but tender fluidity.

Their dance was intricate and close, allowing you ample time in each of their arms. Gladio took joy in lifting you from the ground to the beat of the music, making you giggle. His arms were strong and warm, making you blush the first time he did so. His teaching method was fairly hands off, showing you what to do and congratulating you when you copied it. It was easy for you to learn when you had something so beautiful to watch.

Ignis took every opportunity to pull you in tightly next to him. You could smell him and feel the heat radiating off of his chest. It made you blush when you felt his shirt press against you. He explained every step in great detail, leaving you little room for a mistake. His instructions came on a gentle yet commanding voice with an easy rhythm, making a song of their own.

To Gladio, you were made of something uniquely earthian. You shimmered in the setting sun, framed by ocean waves. You fit here, you were a spirit of this planet. The whole world seemed to flow with your grace.

Ignis believed you were the personification of magic; a dream dancing on starlight. Your laugh and determination in each step brought joy to him. How could a being be so at peace with something so foreign as him or this dance? You truly were a wonder to behold.

Soon you were all dancing, switching partners as the mood suited you. The crashing of the waves became your only music as the light from the sun and your phone died out. You all laughed at missteps and challenges to quicken the pace.

The moon was high as you all finally collapsed into the sand laughing. Cradled in warmth and happiness, you all stared up at the stars, thinking how beautiful they looked when you had such amazing people around you.

Each man smiled at each other as they caught the other’s eyes gazing at you. They each treasured you, wanting to protect your smile with everything they had. For now, they held together, simply breathing in the moment.

Next Chapter ==>

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