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shiteatinggrin · 4 years

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Hi, so this is my contribution to my first jilytober, I wrote some canon fic, it is kinda sad so I guess you could call this angst? I don’t know, I’m not that good at categorizing fic. Anyways, here is a love letter to James Potter from Lily Evans because he just died under her eyes. Wrote this fast, so I can’t vouch for the quality of this. This is almost 3k of Lily being a sap, so enjoy! Find it here on Ao3.

Bastard with a shit eating grin

Do you remember our first kiss? I can still feel the cold air of winter seeping through the walls of Greenhouse Number Three and you and I laughing together. It was not an unusual thing anymore, but some people could have been surprised, because we had had some big feuds over the years, the Dormitories Dashing and Destroying Disagreement, the Inflating Inner Ear Incident, the Flying Fiona Fight and the Severus Snape Saga consisting of the big highlights. However frustrating it was, we always had fun together, didn’t we?

Now we were falling in love dutifully without realising we had always been meant for each other in some way. I was all colors: glorious red hair, pink cheeks, pale green eyes and horrendously yellow socks. You were all teeth: shining smiles, arrogant smirking, belly-laughing in a silent room or grinding them in concentration for the task you were committing to (hyper-focusing on) at the moment.

‘Oi, Evans, can I copy your homework?’ You would say that practically every day.

‘How about a please, Potter? Might do you some good.’ You watched me smear some soil on my neck when I scratched it and said nothing. I discovered it in Transfiguration two hours later. Crazy how we can only remember the smallest details years later and the big things just go right over our heads. I could only ever remember the small details with you, because whatever we said to each other was never important, only the talking to you part was.

‘Oh Lily, dearest flower to my heart that I worship beyond any rainbow, might I please please please see your diligently done homework so that I can rewrite it because, being the idiot that I am, I was off gallivanting with Sirius yesterday instead of being a good student.’ You added pouts and made doe eyes for good measure as if I wouldn’t already have grabbed the moon from the sky’s grubby hands every night if you had asked it.

I would stifle a smile and put some piece of parchment in your extended hand without even looking, sometimes it was the homework if I was feeling generous, if I were more in a creative mood I might give you a stupid doodle or some kind of letter that would say something like: ‘Dear Prongs, you are an asshat. Looking forward to our rounds tonight so I can kick your ass in Gobstones. Now listen to Sprout, will you? Lily’ with a stupid heart over the i that basically meant PS: I love you. Finally, I’d say something like:

‘I would have laughed, but your head might inflate so much you’d have neck pain for a week.’

You let yourself smile then and continued to jest me, hoping to wrench a smile out of the beast (you always did it literally two minutes later, it is funny how easy it is to win when you give yourself such small tasks).

But that day, amazingly, we broke out of our routine.

At night we would always hang out together in the common room with our friends and slowly the people would fizzle out, having gone up to their dormitories and I would stay on the couch with the urge to kiss you with some dumb excuse not to leave on the tip of my tongue. I painted my nails or read some book or talked to you extensively about something I’d learned recently and you would listen with concentrated eyes and a much too easy smile.

Then you would start talking and when you started some story it would never finish, even now you can’t even recall something as simple as Harry’s first smile without going on for five full minutes without stopping. In these nights I would try to look like I wasn’t paying too much attention to you, like I was detached from everything pertaining to your person, but being young and in love doesn’t exactly give you the best skills in subtlety and so you would ask me if I was paying attention and I would blush and you would make some quip about redheads and their skins and everything would go back to normal.

And out of the blue, when I was talking about getting some sugar quills next time we were in Hogsmeade and how difficult the Ancient Runes paper was, you kissed me. Your hands flew to my hair and mine to cup your face and you pressed your body hard against mine. I’d never seen you so hungry for anything before, it seemed like you had been starving for a thousand years before our lips found each other. I had kissed three boys before you, and none of them could compare to the feeling of ecstasy of your mouth against mine. No one will ever compare to James Potter, right? That’s what you used to say in fourth year when you made a particular lucky goal in Quidditch or when you caught the Snitch in mid-air even though you were a Chaser and we were in Potions classf. Is it weird that I miss that?

I don’t think there ever was a time when I didn’t love you, all electric hair and much too quick brain and hundred stupid nicknames that didn’t mean anything unless you explained them in excruciating detail and you would smile too much and talk too loud and walk too fast and I wouldn’t feel so out of place with you because I did the exact same things. Petunia was always prim and proper and I always tried to be like her and please everyone but you taught me how to be myself and how to blossom into my personality without even knowing it. With you I’ve never been too much, I was always just enough.

Everything always came so easy to you, and I’ve always hated you for it. Now I think that I can’t appreciate enough how you could always share that with everyone around you, that incredible luck that could get you out of the worst of predicaments. I guess it all caught up to us today, but I don’t mind now. I’ll love you forever, come what may.

My heart is full of wanted posters of you: dead or alive.

I can’t remember the first time I’ve really noticed you, because you were always in the periphery, doing stupid things and getting in trouble and beaming for no reason at all and the memory of your presence was impossible to shake, but I still remember the first time we really became friends. We were fifteen by the lake and my best friend betrayed me under the glistening sun, the following day I had the worst grade in Transfiguration I’d ever gotten. You found me crying by a window on the fifth floor and apologized a hundred times (which I couldn’t have cared less at the moment), but you still went and talked to McGonagall and she agreed to let me retake the test in the afternoon and offered me a biscuit.

In seventh year, a girl told me that she was so jealous of the fact that I was the only one that could make James Potter change and mature. As if your life revolved around me. I thought of your sick father and the fact that Sirius had appeared on your front door one day and never left your house and with a twinge in my heart thought of the war coming and I couldn’t believe my ears. With all this going on, and she still thought you’d only change for a girl?

I’m not proud of this, but I might have shouted at her and maybe, perhaps I was the one that sent a silencing charm her way, but who could really tell? Not her, because her tongue was stuck to the roof of her mouth.

I wonder if I ever told you that. Probably, because you know everything interesting there is to know about me. You even know the most boring facts about me, because they amuse you just the same. You know I like peonies the best in spite of my name and that my first kiss was with Snape when I was eight, you know that I wiped my mouth right after and didn’t know yet what love was. You know that my favourite band is Hate Potion and that my guilty pleasure is Celestina Warbeck. You know that I wanted to name our son Harry because of a muggle TV show I used to watch with Petunia when I was seven on Saturday mornings and that when I fight my favorite charm is Expelliarmus. You were at my side when I killed my first (and last) Death Eater and that I cried for a week afterward. You comforted me for five hours when Marlene and her entire family were massacred in their own home, the same one where I had spent a good chunk of my summers to avoid Petunia. You know that I only ever paint my toenails blue and that my favorite flavour of ice cream is mint chocolate chip. You know all about my relationship with my sister and how she used to be my best friend and that we used to dance in bathing suits around the sprinkler and fake being witches to make potions out of mud and flowers and how she never forgave when this dream became true for me but not for her. You know all about my failed relationships, with Tuney, Sev and my ex-boyfriend who left me because he didn’t want to be associated with a muggleborn. You know I’m absolute shite at drawing and that I can’t dance to save my life and you laugh at me when I’m drunk and try to follow Peter’s choreography to some dumb song I don’t know. Last year, you helped paint flowers all over my bookcase because I wanted it to be unique and just mine.

When Harry was born, you refused to sleep for two days because he was so cute when he slept against your chest, but you finally fell asleep while cutting onions for dinner and I had to intervene.

One of my favourite things about you is that I have never seen anyone so full of life. You smile like nothing has ever gone wrong in your entire life and you are more loyal than any Hufflepuff I’ve ever seen, you would die for any of us in a heartbeat and we would do the same for you anytime. My love for you is so big I wonder how it even fits in our little house in Godric’s Hollow. You painted our walls burnt orange because you said it reminded you of my hair and I wonder if it is weird to fall in love with you even more over some colour choices. You complete me because as much as you are a complete idiot, you still recommend the best books and are smart enough to plan the best pranks, but too smug to make anyone else take the blame. You had always been my favourite person in the whole universe until Harry arrived, but he is so much like you that it is like meeting you at a much earlier age. He has the same laugh as you, you know?

I cannot believe how brave you are, because traditional courage requires you to go into battle and protect everyone you love like a lioness does her cubs, but you have found the energy to keep going even trapped in this house with an infant without being able to help your friends outside. You go everyday against your most basic instincts and you manage to have so much fun with us, but I see the tired bags under your eyes and the fact that you lose your train of thoughts sometimes and I know that you’re thinking about the war and the security of the boys, I know they are your family and it would kill you if one of them ever fell into battle, yet you never complain, yet you never lose hope. I love you so much my feeble heart can’t contain it all. My love for you is as inevitable as the blue of the sky, as the oxygen in our lungs, as the passage of time, I love you so much that when I see you it is like coming home, your wild hair and round glasses and mischievous eyes and soft voice and much too long limbs and wide chest and calloused hands and smile like an answer to all my problems.

No one has ever made me feel as secure as you and now I know I have to be strong for you, because you are the one that’s fallen, like a marionnette whose strings were cut. The coffee stain on the right arm of your shirt is the last thing I will see of you, or maybe it is a bit of your wild inky hair. I will never be able to look at the night sky the same.

I can hear him in the stairs, and all I can think about is you and Harry this morning, my two favourite people in the world, sat on the carpet and puffs of colour coming out of your wand, your laugh coming out of his mouth, one single tooth poking out, little chubby legs shaking from laughter, the wand you stupidly left on the carpet (the wand you didn’t care wasn’t in your hands because you didn’t care if you died, you just wanted us to live). Your last gift to me was the most precious of all: you gave me the time to say goodbye to Harry.

‘Mama loves you. Dada loves you, Harry.’ That is the only thing I find to say, because it is true and my heart is breaking, I can hear it thundering, collapsing like a dying star, you are dead, I will die, Harry has to live. I cannot withstand the thought.

I have never loved anyone better than the two of you. Apparently I never will, but at least I have known real love, the one that comes from daily life, that never dies because it is kept alive by stupid little things that make us who we are. Crazy how we only remember the little things and the big ones just go right over our heads.

I will remember the smallest things about you, like the little scar in your left eyebrow, the weird placement of your thumb on your wand, the feel of your skin against mine and the way it tanned in the summer while mine just became redder and redder, the sound of your laugh when Sirius said something funny and the way you always pushed your glasses up your nose with your middle finger, the way you sit in any chair like it’s a throne, the way you answered questions in class without raising your hand, the way you held a book open when you were reading it, your last day where you wanted to make pasta and I wanted steak, the way you would mess with your hair not because you thought it would make you look like you just stepped off your broom, but because you were nervous or restless. On your good days it would stand flatter on your head and I had to pass my hand through it because otherwise it just didn’t feel like you. You laughed too much when Sirius decided to read Crime and Punishment to Harry as a bedtime story and your son wouldn’t go to sleep. You would tell him stories of your childhood disguised as muggle magical adventures and I became a knight, Sirius a prince and Snape a dragon. You would call my cat Fiona the ginger cat, as if Fiona wasn’t enough and she needed an extra title. I guess she was royalty after all. You always tried to make me believe that she loved you more than me, even though I’d had her since I was eleven and you once made her fly across the common room just to annoy me.

Do you remember this morning? The last time you ever kissed me? You made me eggs and tea for breakfast and sang some Beatle song for me in the most off-key voice. You stole the bacon from my plate, laughing from across the dinner table. I was so happy because you were in a good mood today, you didn’t seem to feel so trapped and it was Halloween and you were trying to convince me to dress Harry up as a muggle magician, which I thought was the worst joke you’d ever made. You kissed me on the mouth and we settled on a pumpkin costume. Your lips tasted of stolen bacon and orange juice (you’ve never been much of a morning tea person).

I have never loved anyone better, and apparently I never will.

The house is so silent now that you are gone. All I can hear are my own ragged breaths. Harry seems to think this is some kind of game. He is all that we have left now. All that will ever be left of us. To love is to create, right? We have created the most beautiful person in the world, it should be the only thing that counts.

I love you. I could try to make this poetic, the love thing, but I think the most poetic way it can be is on its own. I don’t know any words more powerful than I love you. I love you and you are dead. I love you and I will die soon. I love our son and he will live. Life is as simple as that. I love you and soon we’ll be together again. Miss you already.

#jilytober 2020 #lily evans #james potter #jily fic #canon ending #sad #evey writes #james x lily fanfiction #hp fanfiction #hp #jily

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bigskydreaming · 3 years

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That post about "I'll keep reading a fic that mischaracterizes Dick even if it angers me because the plot is interesting" but with Scott McCall. I'll come across genuinely interesting concepts and plots and power through for that even when Scott is portrayed negatively in the story, he's there at least and it's either that or wading through 99% of fic which centers Stiles/Sterek and the most common Scott tag being "Scott's a bad friend" ya know?

Honestly, what is it about Scott McCall and Dick Grayson that gets them (mis)treated so similarly by their respective fandoms?

Oh yeah, definitely. Tbh, part of why I’m so loud and obnoxious in Batfandom is because in TW fandom it eventually got to the point where I just had to stop reading fic completely, because I wasn’t finding anything that was Scott-friendly outside of the handful of writers I was already friends with and I just got fed up. And I’m too stubborn to do the same thing twice in two separate fandoms so I just....refuse to give up on DG fic by way of a rousing morning “Not today Satan” pep talk. fhslakhfkal

But honestly, the parallels, there are more than a few:

1) Obviously I do think the racism element has plenty to do with it. Especially in the way “is Scott really even Latino on the show though, I mean did they ever actually SAY it” arguments could be swapped out almost word for word with the “is Dick really even Romani in the comics though, I mean it was just a retcon” arguments. With the primary aim of arguments against this being a factor focusing on just invalidating the idea that either are characters of color in the first place, rather than examining the way people engage with these characters for signs of racism. Instead of trying to refute that there’s anything wrong with certain ways people interact with these characters, people jump right into “well there can’t be racism if the character in question isn’t even REALLY a character of color, y’know not like, a board-certified one with proper accreditation and everything.”

But its definitely interesting when you look at how Dick Grayson’s been perceived by fandom overall, like, in terms of looking back over the years. As someone who’s been in and out of DC fandoms to various degrees since the late 90s, as in before Dick was retconned as being Romani in the first place, and as I’ve said before, he used to be a LOT more popular and forgiven for stuff in the past in fandom.....like, I maintain that if you look back at the early 2000s-2010, aka when that retcon was not just written, but gradually and more fully spread into the fandom’s overall awareness and perception of the character....you can almost like, SEE the empathy gap suddenly click into place once he was more fully solidified as a character of color in a lot of fans’ minds. Even if they won’t admit it because that would require admitting to the racism that then began to seep into how they interacted with this character now, compared to how they’d interacted with this character in the past.

And I think the empathy gap - and the complete refusal to admit that’s even a thing, because its not like these are REALLY characters of color so why would it even apply - like, I think that goes a long way to explaining the way both Scott and Dick consistently have their traumas invalidated and ignored by large parts of their fandoms, with the focus always being shifted to how bad things that happen to them are really MORE bad for how they affect the people around them, etc.

2) It also I think has a lot to do with their personalities and the archetypes they both embody as empathetic caregiver types. I think I described it pretty well here in my BUABS fic:

“What do you know about Impostor Syndrome?"

"It's a term sometimes used to describe over-achievers who have trouble internalizing their accomplishments. Perfectionists who think they're frauds because they don't know how to take credit for their own achievements and say its because of luck or timing or something other people did," Dick frowned, puzzling through both the question and the aim of it. He raised an eyebrow. "Doesn't sound like something that applies to someone as arrogant as me."

"Don't be a little shit, Dick," Dinah said with small smirk. "And you're right, I don't think any of that applies to you. However, it's also used in another capacity, to describe trauma survivors who are unable to internalize their own trauma. Who deflect from it, or mitigate it, treat it as less than it is on the basis that it wasn't as bad as what's happened to someone else. It's especially common in trauma survivors who are noted for being especially empathetic or who have caregiver personality types. People who are so used to self-identifying as someone whose role or purpose is in helping others, that they find themselves unable to identify as traumatized because it might shift the focus to themselves instead of people they feel need it more. Does that behavior sound a little more familiar?"

(For the record, that fic is set in the YJ universe, not the comics, and I go with the approach that Dick and Bruce have a much better relationship there than they do in the comics, and thus overall Dick’s mental health and self-esteem are better than in the comics, generally speaking. I only mention this as a tangent, but like....I think Impostor Syndrome as an issue for perfectionists and over-achievers with low self-esteem DOES pertain to comic book Dick Grayson as well as its trauma interpretation. But anyway).

But point is, I think that describes both Dick and Scott, and their respective approaches to dealing (or not dealing) with their personal traumas. This isn’t a problem in and of itself, as its a valid survivor reaction and issue plenty of people deal with....the problem lies in the willingness of fans to capitalize on the OPPORTUNITIES this presents, as fans of other characters, to keep the focus trained on the characters around these two, and THEIR issues, even at the expense of these two.

Basically, its not in either of their natures to ASK for help and forcefully DRAG focus and awareness to themselves and their issues, for a number of reasons including the fact that I don’t think either character feels they ‘deserve’ that focus or need that help more than other people need theirs.

And because these characters are the empathetic caregiver archetypes in their respective ensembles, ie the ones who usually take the lead in reaching out to even characters who don’t normally ask for help themselves....there’s often no one else immediately popping up in reader awareness as like, a likely candidate to extend that same awareness and offer of aid to Dick and Scott even without them actually asking for it.

(Which, is a large part of my commitment to the theme “Stop assembling your ensembles with just ONE of each archetype, mix and match more, or like....use more hybrid archetypes so you don’t HAVE this problem, and also, stop limiting characters to JUST their archetypes, three-dimensional people aren’t confined to only acting upon a limited menu of actions and impulses, and neither should three-dimensional characters be.”)

And then of course there’s the additional component, linked to point #1, that a lot of people refuse to write other characters seeing their need for help or support or offering it even when they do see it, simply because like....they don’t WANT these characters to HAVE help or support.

3) The Intelligence Factor - as in, do they really have it? Both Scott McCall and Dick Grayson are repeatedly and consistently established in their respective canons as being extremely intelligent, and no, not JUST in emotional intelligence. I don’t like sounding like I’m undervaluing that particular form of intelligence, I’m just really irritated by the way people go about saying “oh I do admit they have very high emotional intelligence” like they’re throwing them some kind of a bone. LMAO. No. They both have high emotional intelligence, true, but they’re also extremely intelligent across the board in all other ways. Both are excellent strategists, quick-thinking and repeatedly out-maneuvering even other noted strategists, both display a quick grasp of new information and an ability to see how and where and when to PUT that information to use in practical applications, etc. These are not dumb characters, at ALL.

But fandoms have this weird committment to the idea that only the Smartest Person In The Room REALLY matters, and like, there can only be one of those per room, or like, at most two, so that they can be a matched pair and make kissing noises and then very smart babies, or like, they can be the doting (smart) father and his adored (smartest) son, all others can go home now.

Like, no, that’s not how that works. A room full of geniuses does not suddenly become a room full of ONE genius and a bunch of random and irrelevant cuz they’re dumb non-geniuses the second someone deemed King of the Smarties enters the room. That’s not a thing. Stop acting like that’s a thing, fandoms. Nobody’s intelligence is actually threatened by the presence of more than one character with notable intelligence. Also fuck off with the adoration of notable intelligence like people have more value the more decimal points of pi they can recite off the top of their head. That’s not a more evolved human being, that’s just a nerd. Nerds have value but no more than people who like, chose other life pursuits aside from nerddom.

(Not actually intended as a slight against nerds, just for the record. I say that as both a self-described nerd and also a self-loathing nerd and also lol I’m not a nerd. Look, I’m a very nuanced person okay. I put the complex in complex organism).

But the point here is not just that people are weird about there only being one true genius allowed per ensemble, its that people are WEIRD about how in order to ACTUALLY be smart, you need to like.....accurately match the factory specs for “this is how a smart person looks and behaves.”

And Scott and Dick do not look and behave that way. The sheer number of times - and similar ways - people try to completely discredit the idea they have more than one brain cell by pointing to times they’re being INTENTIONALLY goofy and being like “oh yeah, would a smart person do THAT, hmmmm”.....

Its like...yes? LOL. There is no law that says that a smart person can not be a goofball, or that they are no longer smart if they fulfill a certain quota of actions deemed ‘dopey’ by the official arbiters of smartness.

Similarly the way people like to point at stuff like “my mom buys the groceries” when the writers BEHIND the characters were intentionally trying to play up a comedic moment rather than make a sealed declaration of IQ, and be like, “see, would a smart person be THAT dumb, hmmm?”

First of all, yes, even going off the same canon people try and cite as proof Scott and Dick are too dumb to actually be smart.....you can literally find similarly ‘dumb’ moments for every other TW character....the Sheriff expressed incredulity that Stiles didn’t know what a pendant was, and Lydia was like wtf how are you this dumb at Stiles when he asked if she read the movie the Little Mermaid because he didn’t know there was also a book.....Allison made the same mistake about bestiary as Scott did because the writers were so impressed by that joke they literally had to do it twice....and do not get me STARTED on the number of moments I can point to in comics AND movies AND cartoons where everyone from Bruce to Tim to Jason to Damian and more, like, make utter bonehead moves or utter completely bonehead sentences.

Despite what rumors of my being an ancient eldritch being might have some believe, I did not actually know Albert Einstein personally, but I can still with complete confidence say I GUARANTEE that at more than one point in his life, even he did things that might have been pointed at by time-travelers on vacay as evidence that geez, old-timey smart people were really dumb, huh.

And I think we would all agree that Albert Einstein was actually a very smart man.

But yeah, point is, both Scott and Dick are very smart characters who for a lot of reasons - including personal choice, as in, they don’t really see the appeal in conforming to standards of what a smart person is SUPPOSED to be like (especially when those standards have a weird amount in common with tendencies often described as elitist or condescending or like, having or pertaining to the qualities of an asshole) - like, they just don’t typically behave or conduct themselves in ways that match up with a lot of the assumptions people have for what ‘makes’ a genius or what that’s supposed to look or sound like.

And because they don’t SEEM like they’re that smart, a lot of effort then gets put into insisting that they’re definitely not, and they can’t be, because see look how dumb here and here and here.....which then leeches over into other aspects of the characters and their stories and dynamics, and then combines with the issues resulting from Point 1 and Point 2 and probably two more I’m not thinking of at the moment but are definitely there so that by their powers combined.....fandom summons Captain Dumbass to take over most interactions with these particular characters. And thus repeatedly and insistently engages with these two and their stories only in very dumb, very limited, and VERY annoying ways.

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mumufic · 3 years

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Some additional notes on characterization

For The Three Sisters, I’m trying to write a coming of age story with a lot of rather abnormal elements (hello, time travel and first Wizarding War!) and since I want to write the characters I have here growing into who we eventually come to know of them when they’re older, I guess you can expect:

Some of them start out rather ignorant. Sirius and Regulus (when he does appear for longer than a cameo, he’s a little shit, and not a particularly likable one) come to mind here, because of their family background. The thing is, despite the fact that Sirius is obviously progressive and inclusive, he wouldn’t really know how to frame a lot of things in ways that wouldn’t be offensive unless someone taught him how to. Kids learn by example, and the only example of words and reasoning he has are his parents and other relatives, and all of them are bigots. I’ve already covered his use of the word “mudblood” in my previous post. There’ll come times when he sounds a little like Malfoy: a little elitist, a little braggadocious, especially when it comes to his family’s privilege. And the thing is, in some ways, this is perfectly understandable too. The Black brothers in this story have had very little socialization with other children, and when they do, it’s also to other extremely privileged, magical kids. So expect some level of schooling (ok, a lot levels of schooling) for Sirius. I expect James would suffer from this as well, probably even worse than Sirius, in some respects. James has been brought up in a tolerant and loving home, but he’s an only child whose parents doted on him so much, he’s become a little arrogant. I want to be able to show them growing from their arrogance and ignorance organically, because I don’t think they come out of the box being the wonderful, loving people Harry knew in the books.

Some of them can be very mean-spirited. Petunia, Holly, James and Sirius all fall in this category. We already know about Petunia because of her actual characterization in canon, and I don’t want to do away with that. I’m writing a Petunia Evans redemption arc, yes, but I don’t want to do a personality transplant with her, so yes, she can have a mean streak, even once she’s shown to start becoming an actual likable person. Holly doesn’t have a mean streak - that isn’t how Harry Potter is characterized in the books, but when it comes to anyone associated with the Death Eaters, her hatred knows no bounds. Remember that as far as she’s concerned, Snape killed Dumbledore without remorse, Lucius Malfoy tried to curse her when she was in second year, and Bellatrix Lestrange killed her aunt and uncle, however much she disliked them, right in front of her. Her anger, the meanness, it comes from a pretty damn deep well of pain, no matter whether she chooses to dwell on it or not. On top of that, she’s still a Horcrux here, and that Horcrux? Actively corrupting her. James and Sirius played canonically mean-spirited pranks on people, that James only stopped doing when he started to mature right around seventh year, and there’s little indication that Sirius actually stopped being rather mean at all. All that dumping on Peter? Canon provides evidence. Just check Snape’s Worst Memory and The Prince’s Tale, not to mention how Sirius displays an astounding lack of remorse over the fifth year prank he played on Snape that nearly resulted in Snape’s death. And you know what, I like writing that. I don’t expect 11- and 12-year-old kids to be little angels. They’d be hella boring to write if they were.

Some of them can be rather fickle. I’ve got upcoming chapters where Holly and Sirius are like this, Holly mostly pertaining to what she wants to do about the war, and Sirius about manners, decorum and respect. Let’s unpack this. Holly is a 17-year-old trapped in an 11-year-old’s body. Her last memory from her timeline is waiting to start her quest to hunt Horcruxes, a quest Dumbledore entrusted her, in order to end the war. She gets transported back in time, trapped in a much younger body, and treated by everyone as if she was in fact eleven, even by the people who know she’s older. Suddenly, it’s like she’s a little kid again, and people expect her to act like a kid. Nobody wants her to be all grown up, and all the company she keeps are young kids. Yes, she should know better than to engage in childish arguments and fights, but she’s so immersed in being a kid again that her maturity starts stagnating, and at times, even regressing, because she’s suddenly have to reason with kids, which means she constantly has to put herself in a kid’s mindset in order to understand where they’re coming from. Doing shit like that everyday, with no rest to be what you truly are? It’s a mindfuck. Before long, you start forgetting that you’re something else and not what you’re pretending to be. That’s what’s happening to her here. There are occasions when she’s forgotten that she’s older, she’s more mature. She starts acting like the children that she has in constant company. She’d feel bad about being petty in hindsight, but not while it’s going on. And I think that’s valid. As for Sirius, I’ve got some bits of exposition sprinkled in about how his upbringing was like besides the blood supremacy rhetoric, and believing that the Blacks are owed the world. Sirius learned manners, decorum and respect from Andromeda (it’s in Chapter 7: The End of Summer) and by all accounts, Andromeda was a rather strict teacher. So we can expect Sirius to be mostly formal, even a little stiff, have impeccable manners, and the perfect polite gentleman in normal conversation. So why does he try to high-five Remus when Remus fell over Holly? Well, he’s still eleven, and he’s seen James applaud bad behavior, and probably thinks it must be fine then because James thinks it’s fine. He’ll applaud it especially if he thinks it’s either retaliatory or mean to Slytherins, because he obviously hates them.

Some of them can’t seem to make up their minds as to whether they like someone. So this will crop up a lot in second year, primarily on Holly and Sirius, and to a certain extent, Remus. Holly basically thinks the boys are all gross. She’s 17, they’re 11. Kids are gross. Remus is a kid with a crush, who responds to said crush in a pretty healthy way: he engages with them, talks to them more, looks out for them, but absolutely will not say anything or do anything about his crush. Why? Well, the easy answer is that he’s a werewolf, and Remus has been fed all his growing up years about how lycanthropy is contagious (Lyall Lupin was extremely prejudiced against werewolves, until his own son was bitten, so there’s every likelihood that Remus would have internalized a lot of his father’s rhetoric, especially after he was bitten, leading him to decide that he must not be allowed to procreate. As a child, that’s equivalent to not being allowed to even have crushes or have their crushes like them back.) Sirius is a bit strange to write. He doesn’t actually have a crush, but his parents have made a proposal on his behalf, one he hates. He doesn’t want it, but at the same time, it consumes him to find that the person his parents have intended for him doesn’t appear to want him, when they should! He’s the Heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black! They should be privileged that the Blacks even want them for him. But at the same time, he’s utterly repulsed by the idea of having to marry someone, be with someone he might not even care for. Man, that’s hell of a lot of spoilers, but all of it’ll make sense when second year comes around.

And, I think that’s all the meta I can come up with for this fic for now. I’m sure I’ll be back, wanking on here again some time later to talk about other aspects of my fic.

My dilemma now: I feel like I had so much happen in second year that I’ve nothing to write bout in third year. So you know what you’re going to get for third year? Puberty.

Yes, that means zits and periods.

#the three sisters #fanfic writing #fanfic update

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kdtheghostwriter · 4 years

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SNK #128 - Seeing Shadows

That’s bad, right?

There were some semantic debates regarding what exactly Hange meant when they said, “Humanity is out of time!” I think it’s clear now that humanity has no more time for them to be indecisive. Eren is on the march, and even if he settles for destroying everything on the Marley continent, that’s a massive loss of civilization and one you simply can’t live with if you think of yourself as a hero. The look on their faces tells the story. It’s no longer about saving the world; it’s about saving what’s left.

How much is left depends on how quickly they move, but it’s not as easy as mounting up the troops. Eren and his Colossal Army are across the ocean now. They’ve had at least one full day to march and probably more since the previous chapter’s events around the campfire. Think about how long it takes for a plane to cross an ocean. Not a full day. Their best bet is commandeering Miss Kiyomi’s special aircraft powered by the mysterious Iceburst Stone. Before they do that, we have to pause for another episode of the worst show in the world: This Floching Guy.

As much I have advocated for Eren to be accepted as the new villain – praising Isayama for turning the Face/Heel dichotomy upside down as it pertains to Reiner – those two, even in their most vile moments, still have their fans. There is no guesswork with Floch Forster. He’s predatory, conniving, authoritarian and mean-spirited. Above all of that, he’s a cocky little shit in a way that even Kenny Ackerman would have scoffed at. He’s the antagonist to the characters we’ve followed for ten years now, but in his own mind they brazenly oppose him, which is where the title of this chapter ‘Traitor’ becomes important.

For the last four years, Eldia has been ruled by deft slight of hand. In spirit, Historia Reiss, the rightful heir to the throne, has reclaimed her birthright. In reality, she retired to run an orphanage while the three branches of military have taken control of the government and all proceedings. Eren’s mission to Liberio as well as the counterattack from Marley’s Warrior Unit caused a vacuum to appear that was quickly occupied by the Jaegerist Faction. They now control the government and in extension all facets of Paradisian society. So what do you call a group of AWOL soldiers that are conspiring to sabotage your one method of security?

Traitors. Villains. Monsters.

They’re killing your friends and attacking your home. They’ve infiltrated your ranks and betrayed your trust. Thousands of innocent people dead just for the sake of completing their mission.

This week I learned that many people viewed Bertolt’s death as karmic in some way. I never saw it like that at all. His death at Armin’s hands was a necessary evil. Necessary certainly, but it was evil. It doesn’t make the 104th evil for carrying out the deed. It just happened to be the most brutal death in the series even if it wasn’t the most graphic. Bert is left defenseless as his powers are forcibly taken from him. He calls for his former comrades only to realize none of them will help. Then he calls for Reiner, his best friend who barely escaped with his own life. He dies a lonely, agonizing death.

“Who the hell wants to kill innocent people?!”

Who knows how long this question has been haunting Armin’s waking thoughts? There is evidence to suggest that the once bold Survey Corps veteran who was willing to sacrifice his life to help Eren take down the Colossal has been hampered by his successor’s timid nature. Ever since he acquired his powers, he’s always attempted to seek non-violent resolution. I don’t see this as simple naivety.

If you were given a power as destructive as his, where you are capable of destroying a town by simply calling upon it, why would you ever use it? Why would you ever want to? I grow uncomfortable with the amount of voices in the fandom concern trolling the 104th and their refusal to spill the blood of their neighbors. They’ve fought alongside or trained with most of these people. Why should they be expected to kill them like nameless drones? Even if it is necessary, why are they not allowed to mourn the choice?

Characters like these that we’ve known from almost the beginning. They know nothing of the outside world other than it’s filled with people that want them dead. Eren Jaeger is their best chance at keeping their society alive and these people they lived and fought and suffered with want to impede that and doom them. Samuel and Daz are soldiers, too. Forget for a moment that they’re opposing the main characters. Why would they let this happen?

I digress, though. This point is more about Bert and his exit from the story. It came at the end of a fierce battle that saw the SC expend all of their resources and most of their man power. The fact that they came away with even one shifter’s power is a small miracle. The characters can be excused then for watching, unfeeling, as their former teammate is eaten alive. Now the shoe is on the other foot. Armin has been mortally wounded and the one vehicle that can get them to Marley in time is about to be destroyed. Before Daz can do this, he is stopped by Armin who is delirious but regenerating. Before he can deal the fatal blow, Connie wrestles the gun away from Samuel and shoots them both.

The mission continues.

One could say that it’s overkill perhaps. How many times must the 104th learn the hard lesson? Even Annie made reference to the fact that the Warriors plan was being criticized with no alternative. If they spot them, the mission fails. If the ship is blown, the mission fails. If they Azumabito clan is destroyed, the mission fails. All of these facts are true and the current best way to keep any of that from happening is to fight and kill the Jaegerists. It’s remarkably easy to say, but then they are the ones who have to live with choices made.

No one should ever have to “get used to” the idea of killing…well anyone but especially not people you partnered with. Bert’s inclusion in this moment was no accident. It isn’t just because Armin inherited his mental likeness. This is the closest they have come to understanding the impossible position he was forced into four long years ago. Only this time, it’s Samuel who is scared and confused.

You can disagree with Samuel’s point of view but what Connie does next is by definition an act of treason. He shoots two members of his own combat unit and defies a direct order from a commanding officer. We know that the commanding officer is a sociopath and we know that following orders means being an accessory to genocide. But that genocide is the only thing keeping that island alive. That island has been the only home Samuel and Daz have ever known. They deserve as much as anyone, an explanation instead of a bullet to the face. But this is what happens isn’t it?

I love Metal Gear Solid for a number of reasons, but chief above them is the series protagonist, Solid Snake. In the flagship game, he is introduced to us as a super soldier engineered for battle that is pulled out of retirement to thwart his twin brother’s plans of nuclear destruction. This game is one of the few of its kind that can be completed without killing a single enemy. You are rewarded for your stealth. Because, you see, Snake the character is a pacifist at heart. He doesn’t want to do this, but he’s the only one who can. It’s a solo mission, so running and gunning almost always fails and if you kill too many people, the action hero main character becomes sick.

You see, because, these choices aren’t made lightly. They ripple and they matter. The 104th kids aren’t acting high and mighty, lording their moral values over the heads of those that betrayed them. They genuinely hate doing this. From your mouth you say, “We have to save the world,” but when you arrive you are told, “We have to kill these people.” For once they would like to preserve peace without additional death and I don’t think they should be scolded for that wish.

Stray Thoughts

- Wasn’t all that impressed by Magath’s little speech, especially considering what came before it. It’s a change of heart, yes, but not from a genuine place. When faced with the reality of his homeland being flattened, and the futility of his current position, he immediately goes back to torture. Yelena is callous in her own right but she did nothing to warrant the violence. He’s lashing out and I don’t shed tears for him.

- Onyankapon on the other hand. What a guy. He resets the joint in Yelena’s arm and crafts a splint to keep it in place. He has no powers, but you would want this guy on your team during the end of the world.

- Reiner finally puts the pieces together here. “I’m just like you,” Eren says and like Eren, Reiner moves to protect his former teammates from making this impossible choice. It’s a noble gesture and one I respect. There’s no going back for him. He has far too much blood on his hands. That he recognizes that is a strong moment for the character.

- Armin and Connie’s plan wasn’t a bad one. If nothing else, it bought time enough for Annie and Reiner to get into position. If they had attacked outright, the plane likely would have been destroyed. Some people are frustrated with them but honestly, go read Berserk if that’s the case.

- East Sea Gang rise up! Mikasa in combat is still an absolute treat. And Floch gives us an example of this faction’s greatest flaw. You know; besides the nationalist framework they are founded upon. Floch is the most experienced soldier they have and when Floch Forster is your best fighter, your team sucks. Mikasa Ackerman was worth 100 soldiers as rookie. As an adult soldier, she is easily worth two Jaegerist groups put together. Kiyomi is clearly capable, but she also took advantage of Floch’s arrogance in the moment.

- Credit to Reiner and Annie for hitting their cue. I wondered what it would be like having them in this group but it seems like for the purposes it should work.

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kewltie · 4 years

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"Izuku. Izuku! Are you listening?"

Pulled from tunnel visioning his Charms essay and pretending it’s not internally making him cry, he looks up at her sheepishly. "Sorry, what were you saying earlier?"

Ochako rolls her eyes. "We were discussing our preparation for the Yule Ball and wanted to know if you got your dress robe yet?"

Izuku shakes his head. "I,” he bites down on his lower lip as he drops his quill onto his halfwritten parchment, “I don’t think I’m going.”

Shock silence descends upon their table. "What?! But everyone know you're gonna go with—" the rest of Mineta's words are cut off with a yelp of pain.

Ochako tells Mineta pointedly, "Be quiet." She retracts her elbow from having it jammed into Mineta's side as he adopts a wounded look before turning her full attention to Izuku with an encouraging smile. "Now, why don't you want to go?" she presses gently as Izuku finds himself the center focus of his entire table.

Izuku glances down at his lap. "Nobody ask me."

Another bout of silence descends upon their table.

"Get Bakugou," he hears Ochako hisses at someone.

He jerks his head up at the complete 180 degrees shift in her tone. Never had he heard her sound so angry. "What? Why call Kacchan?! This has nothing to do with him," he insists hotly. "I'm just," he winces, the thought alone cuts deep, "undateable, I guess." Unwanted in other word. "I mean, since you guys already have dates and I didn't want to go alone so I tried asking around, but they ran away as soon as I brought it up."

He'd tried not to feel hurt by it, but it was hard when they all looked at him like he'd summon a basilisk on them or something. He hadn’t felt this way since his early years at Hogwarts when it had seem nobody had wanted or needed him here, when Kacchan couldn’t look at him without wanting to hex him, and when it had hurt to think if he even belongs here with the rest of his friends.

"That's because they're scared of Bakugou," Mineta interjects with a shrug as Ochako glares at him. "Veelas are terrifying enough, but Bakugou's Bat-Bogey Hex is no joke." One of the best duelists in their generations, more than one professor had said about him.

Izuku frowns. "But why would Kacchan even try to hex them?! He may be trigger happy, but h wouldn't hurt people for absolutely no reason!"

Mineta stares at him, hard enough that Izuku can feel the weight of it from his seat. "You're joking, right? You really, really don't know? Haven't got any clue, really?!"

"What do you mean?" Izuku's brows furrow in further confusion as everyone lets out an exasperated sigh around him.

Having taking some pity on him, Yaoyorozu smiles at him from across the table. "Did Bakugou mention anything about the Yule Ball to you?"

Izuku cocks his head in thought. "No," he starts, but then, he recalls one moment, "wait, he did tell me he'll see me there a few weeks ago, but that's all."

"That arrogant bastard! He didn't even bother to ask you!" Ochako spits out as Tenya pats her back consolingly in an effort to calm her down. "I'm going to hex him the next time I see him!"

Izuku blinks as a dawning horror sets in. "Wait, did everyone thought I was going to the ball with Kacchan except for me?!" Everyone stop, look sheepishly at each other, and a litany of "sorry" falls from their lips as Izuku's jaw drop. "But, but—! He didn't actually say anything of that nature to me!" he despairs. "How was I supposed to take his 'be there, Deku or I'll hunt you down' threat as some sort of invitation to the ball with him?!"

Ochako scoffs. "Because he's still that stuck up and prideful brat who can't take no for an answer," she says scathingly, the fact that she and Kacchan are housemate has no weight on her. Even though they bicker of Izuku often, she doesn’t have any actual problem with Katsuki. Only when it pertains to Izuku does it trigger all the protective instinct within her, house loyalty be damn. "But now the question becomes: do you want to go with him?" She gives him a well-meaning look.

His gaze drops back to his lap as he feels several curious and heavy eyes fall him, "Well, I," he flushes, "I do, but—" he grimaces as a nauseating weight sits uncomfortably on his chest. A soft hand reaches for him.

"You want him to ask you first, right?" Yaoyorozu says softly. “It’s understand if that is the case.”

The uncomfortable feeling shifts at her words and he breathes out, shakily at first before it slowly evens out. "Y-yes," he finally admits, staring hard at his lap.

Even though his answer won't change, it was always going to be a yes, but he wanted to know he has a choice in this. That Katsuki would give him one. He would consider Izuku's decision like it matter to him instead of taking that choice from Izuku like it's already owe to him. It didn't make him feel wanted, not when he'd spent weeks thinking nobody had care and he didn’t matter; he'd assumed he was going to be alone that evening.

Like, how Izuku spent his first years at Hogwarts hated and isolated because he didn't fall in line with Katsuki – he was too quiet and shy, but worst he was a former squib and a pitiful Hufflepuff – and it took Ochako and all his friends to helped him lift up from that awful place and left that wretched past of his behind.

All of it for naught if Katsuki still treat Izuku as though he's still that kid who chased after his shadow and followed him wherever he go without a complain, because he was needy and lonely and Katsuki, so bright and beautiful, was all he had. No. He's not that boy anymore.

"Do you want me to punch him for you?" Ochako asks, and he looks up in time to see her standing up with the sleeve of her robe pulled back. It's easy to forget that Ochako is a muggleborn and has a different way of resolving problem with how effortlessly she fits among them.

Because he got the best friends in the world, whom he clearly doesn’t deserve, he couldn't help but smile at her threat of violence. "It's fine." He shakes his head. "I'll talk to him." He squeezes Yaoyorozu's hand before she retreats it back to her side. "It's not a big deal—"

"Deku!"

Their entire table and, really, all of the tables in the Great Hall turn toward the familiar booming voice that make his presence known before Izuku even catch sight of that blond hair and glaring red eyes as he heads their way.

Izuku swallows nervously.

He'd thought he would have more time to prepare himself before he can confront Katsuki, but he'd forgotten that Ochako sent someone to get him earlier. Still in his quidditch gears and looking like he had ran several laps around the school grounds, Katsuki stomps toward him.

Everyone scoot back as though to give them room and privacy, averting their gaze from the always entertaining and embarrassing Bakugou-Midoriya Show that is permanently in theater since their first year even as he can see some of his friends casting concern glance at them.

Katsuki narrow his eyes and there's a dangerous glow to them that make the entire hall on edge, but not Izuku. Never Izuku. "What the fuck did I hear about you not coming to Yule Ball?!" he hisses. "You know we're going together!"

Izuku lips thin out. "No, I didn't, because you didn't tell me." He pauses, more quietly now: "Didn't even ask me."

"What," Katsuki sneers defenselessly, "were you going to tell me no?"

Izuku huffs. "I was going to say yes either way, but you had assumed my answer without bothering to ask me first. You can't do that, Kacchan!"

Katsuki throws his hand up in the air in frustration. "Why does that matter when you're going to say yes anyway? Stop being such a little bitch, Deku!"

"You don't get it." He shakes his head disappointingly. "It's the same reason why you were furious when you found out I'm your mate."

Katsuki draws back in shock, face flushed an angry red.

Unfinished, he continues relentlessly, "You spent years and years cruelly rejecting and hating me because my existence took your choice of finding your own mate for yourself." He stares up at Katsuki with clenched fists. "But now you're doing the same thing to me."

"I love you Kacchan,” he admits, the confession comes easily even as the words cut him deeply as he say them. “Maybe I have always loved you even when you had hurt me deeply and I didn’t even know what it had meant back then, but you can't take it for granted. You have to work for it just like everybody else." He abruptly stands up. "I may be your mate, but I'm not a guarantee thing so stop assuming that you know me at all!" And he runs out after that, face flushed and heart palpating erratically in his chest, like it’s going to claim out of it and fall to the ground.

But not before he hears Ochako yelling at Katsuki, “You’re a veela and he’s your soulmate so how are you so bad at making the one person who the entire universe is telling you that you're destine together happy?!”

Izuku may be a Hufflepuff and softhearted, but he's no doormat.

Not anymore, anyway.

In that moment, he feels brave even as his hands haven't stop shaking since he'd hallow out his chest nd spilled his feelings all over the Great Hall and for all to see, but the thing that haunt him the most is the distraught look on Katsuki's face that follow his every step.

#bakudeku #series: truly madly deeply #fic snippet #:'D um lol

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twentiethcenturymoviesandtv · 4 years

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Ladyhawke: The Characters

The problem with putting a fairytale on screen is that the characters are usually the least interesting part of the story.

In most legends, the focus of the story isn’t really on the characters. It’s on the plot, and what the characters do. When you come right down to it, the point of most fairytales isn’t really about character growth, it’s about good vs. evil, heroic deeds against acts of villainy. The characters tend to be archetypes, with the side of good led by the Hero, the Champion, the Dragonslayer, and the side of evil led by the Ruler, or the Classic Villain. There are damsels in distress, mentor figures, and sometimes sidekicks along the way, but when it comes to fairy tales, there isn’t a huge amount of variety or development in the people involved. The characters exist to champion a side, to move the plot forward, to give us someone to root for.

In a story so reminiscent of a fairy-tale, Ladyhawke could be forgiven for using these archetypes as a way to advance its plot. The thing is, it doesn’t.

Instead of marching out the clichés of standard sword and sorcery characters, Ladyhawke does something different: it plays on subversions of simple archetypes, developing them in different ways that adds to the distinctive style of the film. Today, we’re going to be taking a closer look at these characters and the unique way they are used, beginning, of course, with our protagonist. (Spoilers below!)

As I’ve mentioned in previous articles, the most interesting thing about our main character is that he really has no business in this story.

In any other fantasy story, Phillipe Gaston would be a smaller character, perhaps a comedic sidekick or a helpful rogue, taking up his own part of the narrative without changing too much or growing as a character. He is an Action Survivor, a shrewd thief that possesses both boyish charm and wry cynicism. He’s smart, but impulsive, lies often, but is honest about himself. He avoids battle at all costs, and wavers back and forth between arrogance and apprehension depending on the scenario at hand. In short: Phillipe is by no means a fantasy hero, and really doesn’t belong at the forefront of this conflict. Even more interestingly, he knows it.

Again, as I’ve mentioned earlier, Phillipe seems very disconnected with events around him. He is only involved in the plot simply because he is the only person who has ever escaped from the place Navarre is trying to get into. He is involved because of his skills, not his importance to the plot. Phillipe has no connection with anyone, not Navarre, Isabeau, the monk Imperius, or even the villain, the Bishop. With no connection, he has no investment in the characters, no reason to help. On top of that, he doesn’t really have any of the traits befitting traditional fantasy heroes.

Putting it like that, Phillipe really seems like a terrible choice for a protagonist.

Now for our next question.

Does Phillipe as a main character work anyway?

Actually, yeah.

Now, wait a minute, you might say. You just told me why he doesn’t work as a main character, and now you decide that, going against all good characterization of main leads, it works anyway? Isn’t that going against the laws of film critiquing?

Here’s the thing.

Sometimes, characters who seem like bad ideas in theory turn out to be good ones in practice. In my opinion, Phillipe Gaston is one of those characters.

In my last film review, I talked about what made Dorothy Gale such a good protagonist for The Wizard of Oz, and one thing that I mentioned was that every protagonist needs a problem, particularly a problem pertaining to the plot. At first, it seems like this is fuel for the argument that Navarre should have been the protagonist and not Phillipe, a closer look perhaps proves otherwise.

At the beginning of the story, Phillipe’s problem would appear to be not only simple, but being taken care of: he’s in prison. More specifically, when the story picks up, he’s escaping prison, trying to stay ahead of the Bishop’s guards. He doesn’t want anything except to get away. Nothing drives him. He has no goal except that of escaping pursuit, which, while not being a traditional fantasy hero’s goal, is extremely understandable, and relatable to the audience.

I want to draw your attention to that fact, because that’s extremely important to both Phillipe’s character, and his role within the story.

Throughout the entire film, Phillipe responds to everything in a reasonably realistic manner, one that is relatable to the audience. He learns things at the same rate that we do, and as a result, Phillipe ends up being the audience surrogate, hence his aforementioned ‘outsider’ viewpoint on the story. As mentioned in the ‘story’ segment earlier, it is an inversion of the ‘Hero’s Journey’: an unheroic hero being forcibly drug along on a quest that is not his own.

This is part of what makes the character of Phillipe work so well for the first half of the film, and here is where things get tricky.

You see, if Phillipe had remained this type of character throughout the entire film, he really wouldn’t have worked as a protagonist at all. For a main character to work, they have to change, and in the case of characters whose goals don’t fit with the story, the goals have to change as well.

In Phillipe’s case, it’s moving from a selfish goal to a selfless one.

Like I said, Phillipe’s objective at the beginning of the story is to escape. His concern is for his own skin, as it remains even after being hauled along into Navarre’s quest. However, something happens during the story that affects a change in his plans, and in the process, his character.

After Isabeau’s injury, while Imperius is explaining the curse and the history of the lovers to Phillipe, his focus shifts from himself to Navarre and Isabeau. Due to growing friendship with the couple (Notably Navarre), Phillipe decides to do the right thing and help them, to the point where he is attempting to convince Navarre of the way to end the curse.

That change is where the magic (forgive the pun) happens. Phillipe’s introduction into the grander scale of what’s going on is the realization that jolts him into being a more active part of the story, putting him firmly in the actual main conflict. The second half of the story is where the ‘protagonist’ part of his character comes in: when his goals begin to match up with the story. He is the catalyst, the thing that prevents the other characters from total despair, and it is because of him that the curse is broken. It is Phillipe that causes the other characters to regain their hope, and as a result, reach their own happy endings.

If that’s so, you might say. If Phillipe grows into being the main hero, then why isn’t he a bigger part of the climax? Where’s his ‘hero’ moment?

That’s a fair question. With character arcs, we like to see them end, satisfactorily. How does his arc cumulate?

Like Dorothy, Phillipe’s ‘hero’ moment isn’t a dragon slaying moment, and unlike Dorothy, his hour of bravery isn’t even at the climax. It comes earlier.

As I pointed out in the ‘story’ segment, Phillipe’s ‘hero’ moment arrives when Navarre, in wolf form, is falling through the ice over the water. This is the scene where, for the first time, Phillipe puts himself in harm’s way for someone else. Going in after Navarre allows him to fully switch from selfishness to selflessness, or, in other words, from petty thief to hero.

In short? Phillipe Gaston, while seemingly out of place in both personality and role, somehow manages to be a compelling, if unusual, supporting protagonist.

But of course, the main draw of a fantasy movie is the Knight in Shining Armor, right?

At first glance, Etienne Navarre seems like the perfect fantasy hero. He is stern, quiet, an expert swordsman and great warrior. He’s decked out in black armor, possesses an ancestral sword, a horse, and, of course, the secret of his curse. Navarre is the one with the quest for this story, and as a result, has a connection with every other character in the movie. He is an active character, driving the plot with his own goal.

Remember what I said earlier about the character subversions?

It is Navarre’s goal that receives the subversive treatment.

In many fantasy stories, the hero’s quest is a great moral battle, a good and evil, right vs. wrong. Luke Skywalker wants to overthrow the Empire. Harry Potter wants to stop Voldermort. Frodo Baggins wants to destroy the Ring of Power to stop Sauron. These are all larger-than-life stories about defeating an evil for the good of the world.

Following this pattern, you’d think Navarre’s quest would be to break the curse and overthrow the Bishop for his tyrannical rule, whether by consulting a wizard or raising a rebellion, or going on a great journey to find a way, but it’s not. Navarre is cursed, and he knows it, and in a world with magic so infrequently used, his mission is that of revenge.

Navarre wants nothing else but to kill the Bishop at the start of the film, and that is where we get our subversion.

This decision is not to indicate that Navarre is a bad person, or an antihero in any way. Like I said earlier, the characters in this film respond to things with startling amounts of realism. Most of us wouldn’t search for a magical cure, most of us would immediately think to the ‘realistic’ way of dealing with it: revenge.

So it is with calm, cold precision that Navarre waits for two years for a sign to attack, and the sign comes in the form of the escape of Phillipe Gaston from the Bishop’s prison, causing their paths to cross. Navarre’s plan is smart and simple: use Phillipe to get in, and murder the Bishop with the sword of his ancestors, completing his mission.

What’s interesting about Navarre is that he too experiences a goal change, albeit a little later than Phillipe does.

See, at the point where the film begins, Navarre (and Isabeau) have lost hope, if they had any to begin with. They are worn down with the effect of the curse, and Navarre’s anger at the situation comes out in this revenge plot. It is to the point that, when Phillipe experiences his own goal change, realizing he wants to help the couple, Navarre refuses to believe in a way to break the curse, and commands Phillipe not to tell Isabeau.

At first, this seems kind of selfish on his part; it almost seems like he’s putting his revenge plan over an actual way to save them both, and he doesn’t even give Isabeau a say in the matter. The thing is, once again, it’s a realistic answer. Not believing in the miraculous would seem like a good way to not be let down easily. On top of that, the curse breaking isn’t plainly worded, and seemingly impossible to fulfill. For both their sakes, Navarre refuses to believe in what he sees as a foolish hope.

What changed?

Phillipe.

It is his change of character, his dive into the water after Navarre, and the following day’s realization that Phillipe had rescued him at personal risk, (with the scars to prove it) that makes Navarre decide to give the breaking curse a chance. By the same token, he does remain practical, and changes his plans back to revenge when there seems to be no sign of a ‘day without a night’.

In the end, of course, Imperius and Phillipe are right, and the curse is broken, reuniting Navarre and Isabeau, giving them their happy ending. And in the end, Navarre is also changed, becoming a more hopeful person after the proof that sometimes, miracles do happen.

But what of the other half of the couple?

Let’s talk about the titular Ladyhawke: Isabeau d'Anjou.

The interesting thing about Isabeau is, once again, tied to her utter practicality and realism. Neither a helpless damsel nor a great warrior, Isabeau is a subversion of most female fantasy archetypes, being very simply a woman with a problem. It’s just that the problem is a little more fantastic than most.

We don’t really know a lot about Isabeau’s character, since she doesn’t appear a lot within the movie itself. Human by night, she carries with her an air of sadness and mystery, gentle and warm, but with a heart of steel underneath. Isabeau is an incredibly strong person, living out her days by night, never seeing the man she loves except for at twilight and dawn, and having to fend for herself each night for survival. Time and time again, she displays incredible strength of character, rushing out into the wolf-trap-littered woods to save Navarre, and, during the curse-breaking, takes the hawk jesses and coldly throws them at the Bishop’s feet in her own show of victory.

By the time of the story’s opening, Isabeau too has lost hope. After two years of living like this, separated from all she knows, she is despondent, with no discernable way out.

Once again, it’s Phillipe to the rescue.

It is his intervention on the couple’s lives that brings them to the point of hope. Without him, there is no catalyst for the plot, there is no knowledge of a way to break the curse. And at the end, when Isabeau stands with Navarre, fully human, she is finally joyful, full of hope for the future.

But there would have been no curse-breaking if not for the monk, Imperius.

Imperius is an ex-priest, living as a monk as penance for his accidental betrayal of the couple. Being the one person confided in about the relationship, Imperius, while drunk, accidently informs the Bishop of it, leading to the curse in the first place.

Horrified and distraught, Imperius becomes a monk, desperately seeking the answer to this curse to seek redemption. His growth comes in that redemption.

Rejected by Navarre, he is encouraged to follow them by Phillipe, proving his worth as he assists them in both the rescue of Navarre and the breaking of the curse. It is this man’s desire to make things right that allows the happy ending in the first place, giving him peace and granting him forgiveness from what he inadvertently caused.

Although, let’s not lay excess blame at his door. After all, the Bishop is our big baddie here.

The Bishop (no name given) serves as the main villain of this film, and once again, is a subversion of the traditional fantasy villains. He’s not an emperor, a warlord, a king, or a leader of a band of orcs or goblins. He is a selfish, controlling, old man who is driven by his lust and jealousy. (Think a version of Frollo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame.)

The curse, as mentioned previously, is his fault. After his pursuit of Isabeau is rejected, his anger causes him to lash out at both her, and the person she is in love with. This curse, an unnatural thing called up with considerable effort from a darker realm beyond ours, causes the animal transformations that prevent the couple from ever being together. What’s notable about this is that the curse does not only affect Navarre, but intentionally Isabeau too. The Bishop’s line of thinking is even said out loud: “If I can’t have her, no man shall.”

The Bishop is not extremely powerful in a traditional sense. He is the leader of the church, which gives him power over the people there in an influential way, and uses this power unjustly. He has no armies other than a band of guards (which Navarre dispatches) and himself is no match for the fury of a trained warrior. In fact, it is because of this that the curse needs to be broken the way that it is.

The curse is not broken by killing him.

In many fantasy films, all curses are undone by killing the curser. Not so here. Against a villain with no physical power, what better way to pose a problem for the protagonists by making the answer one of non-violence?

To break the curse, Navarre and Isabeau must confront him together, as humans, demonstrating that he has no power over them. The curse is broken in a way that demonstrates direct defiance of his jealous and lustful nature, the couple reunited and human, despite his best efforts. Sure, he dies anyway, but the principle of it is that show of boldness against him.

Another interesting thing about him is how he relates to the realm of villains in general. In many cases, villains have personal ties with the main hero, or a symbolic connection, something in common or in contrast with the main character that draws some kind of connection.

Harking back to what I said earlier, the Bishop has no ties with Phillipe whatsoever besides being the one whose jail he escaped from. The main conflict in this story is between the Bishop and Navarre, again, nailing home that final point of what I’ve mentioned earlier: Phillipe is an audience surrogate character slowly turned into a protagonist, not a heroic fantasy character. The Bishop is Navarre and Isabeau’s enemy, not Phillipe’s.

So how does this make him work as a villain?

Surprisingly well.

He has elements that very much make him seem like a real-world villain. He has no magical abilities of his own, he has no armies, no physical abilities. He is a man placed in power who chooses to abuse it. He is selfish, controlling, jealous and hateful, like any rejected suitor who tries to use his power for his own gain. His curse is not of his own, but the result of much searching to intentionally make the couple’s lives utterly miserable because of his denial. Once again, the key to his characterization is the utter realism in which his motivation and execution is rooted.

He is thoroughly believable, and thus, the audience rejoices over his defeat and death.

The beauty of all of these characters is the total reality in which they are grounded. These are very real people, stuck in fantastic circumstances, dealing with it the best they know how. The characters are relatable to the audience, whether it’s the cold anger of Navarre, the sad sincerity of Isabeau, or the bewildered but witty reactions of Phillipe. You feel their emotions, and you understand where every character is coming from because of the realistic way they are portrayed, and the lifelike ways in which they react to the events around them. No one is superhuman, nor unrealistically incapable, they exist as people that we can easily see existing.

Ladyhawke’s characters work as subversions of traditional ‘fairy-tale’ stories because it plays the ‘fairy-tale’ aspect straight, while playing around with the character archetypes. There is a romance, a curse, and true love conquers all, but the way in which it is done, and the way in which characters go about acting out the fairy-tale turns it from a bright children’s story to a familiar-feeling, simple, but emotional story about people the audience, no matter what age, can relate to.

As with The Wizard of Oz, these characters are not overly complex, but in this case, they are not simple, either. They serve their purpose, which is to relate to each other and make us care about what happens to them, and this film definitely succeeds in that. In a film much more grounded than contemporaries such as Labyrinth, the characters and their struggles hit that much closer to home, and we feel the sincerity of what’s going on. Even in the unbelievable aspects, such as the effects of the curse, Isabeau and Navarre’s pain is tangible, and the audience isn’t immune to that.

The characters in Ladyhawke leave a strong, unique impact in an equally unique film, a film that really does deserve a higher place in the history of fantasy films, if for nothing else it’s courage to combine the tried-and-true and the innovative ways of conveying story and characterization. These people make the plot compelling, and they make us care about them, and in the end, that’s the point of characters. With that in mind, Ladyhawke certainly does its job, memorably so.

Thank you guys so much for reading! If you enjoyed it, stick around for more, since we’re not done talking about the elements that make up Ladyhawke. If you have something you’d like to add or say, don’t forget that the ask box is always open! I hope to see you all in the next article.

#Ladyhawke #Ladyhawke 1985 #1985 #80s #Film #Movies #Fantasy #Adventure #PG-13 #Rutger Hauer #Michelle Pfeiffer #Matthew Broderick #Leo McKern #John Wood #Richard Donner

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boyancient · 4 years

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i wanna write a full on analysis of that reggie and five scene in s2 (you know the one) bc it’s my fave scene in all of s2 and it makes me go fucking feral and there’s SO MUCH TO UNPACK THERE FROM START TO FINISH but i’ve been wanting to do that since i remade and have yet to get my ass to do the fucken thing, so: have a word vomit w all my feral thoughts on that goddamn scene bc i gotta get em out there somehow amirite.

anyway. let’s start with establishing facts: five’s childhood is the best part of his life. let me repeat: five’s childhood is the best part of his life. it never got better for him after he left the academy. those were his happiest days, objectively, and while he rebelled and defied his father during his childhood, as an adult, five draws on memories of those days for comfort. when we hear him talk about his childhood in s1, he’s fond. he’s reminiscing. he’s not grappling with the unfairness of the abuse they went through, he’s not fighting resentment and anger towards his father, he’s not drowning himself in distractions. for all intents and purposes, he seems to have made his peace with it, however he managed to achieve that.

but that’s not true: five’s view on his childhood is simply distorted. after forty years in an apocalyptic wasteland, then five more as a weapon for the commission, the far away days of family dinners and sparring with diego and sneaking out with ben and listening to vanya’s music pieces are heavenly. it wasn’t that bad, he thinks now. not anything he couldn’t have handled better, surely, not anything he shouldn’t have been stronger for.

second fact before we really get into this: five blames himself for the apocalypse. this is an objective truth. five sat for forty years with the cold and certain knowledge that he killed his family by running away. how many times did he say, this time you have me? how many times did he say they’ll avert the apocalypse this time bc he’s here with them? it’s not arrogance, it’s penance. it’s desperation. five carried that weight on his shoulders for forty-five years, and still carries it, even --- or especially --- after finding out that vanya’s the cause of the apocalypse. and it’s crushing him.

all that aside, for now, let’s talk about five’s reaction to seeing his dad for the first time in forty-five fucking years. his body language is taut, tense, and mission-focused during the whole supper scene, and still so when he and reginald are at the bar.

then reginald takes five’s age in stride and offers him a drink. he acknowledges five as an equal, and talks to him like he would any other man his age. and five’s whole demeanor changes. he smiles, he can’t stop himself from smiling, has to look down and away to hide it. he’s so happy bc that’s reginald giving him recognition and treating him like an equal, which is something that five apparently always and still does crave.

for the rest of the encounter, five’s body language is vulnerable, and open, and pleading. he admits to his shortcomings and failures. he asks and pleads for help openly. he apologizes to his abuser for not being an obedient enough victim. the sheer scale of the impact reginald has on five simply by giving him a sliver of acknowledgment is extremely telling and heartbreaking. it’s so clear that no matter how old five was, he was still viscerally affected by his dad’s presence and swayed by his opinion of him, just like when he was a kid. just that bit of recognition and five was a kid again, in over his head and overwhelmed and desperate for help, and who does he turn to? his dad.

five’s apology is not a sign of character growth. it’s not a sign of character regression either. it’s simply the natural outcome of his crushing guilt over what jumping forward did to his family, something he perceives as being entirely his burden to bear, and his distorted view of his childhood.

that’s not to say five thinks their childhood was fine. we know from his speech at the end of s1 that he knows that it was messed up, that dad messed them up and that it still affects them to this day. he doesn’t think his childhood was okay or fine or normal. but he does think that he could’ve been stronger. that he could’ve handled it better and with more patience and resilience, that he could’ve listened to dad more and been more rational. which is just bullshit. he was a kid. he should’ve been safe, not strong. he should’ve been living not enduring. children should not need to be resilient, and that’s something adult five doesn’t recognize, at least when it pertains to his own trauma.

i could honestly talk about this scene for hours. it was so complex and nuanced and revealed a lot about five as a character. it’s my favorite scene. i’m giving the writers the benefit of the doubt, i really think this apology was intentional on their part and that five’s guilt as well as this apology will be addressed in s3.

#also notice how five takes reginald's advice as criticism #as dad telling him once again he's not good enough to time travel #instead of considering the advice itself....... being around dad literally regressed him to his childhood again im ;-;-;#also five is v sympathetic / understanding of his siblings trauma particularly ben and vanya but when it #comes to his own he's like :///// no rights for five should've known better than to have bad reactions to abuse smh ://///#KSDHBCSHCB I CANNOT STAND IT OKAY I LOVED THAT SCENE SO MUCH IT BROKE MY HEART MAN #meta.#child abuse tw #gaslighting tw #abuse tw

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the-sara-voe · 3 years

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Chapter 5: The Bitter March

Masterlist

Luke coasts down the street, the dial tone blaring through the car's speakers. The tone barely skips one beep before Tusa answers.

“Scam calls not accepted”, she stated, as she tip-tapped away on her keyboard.

An arrogant grin spreads across Alvez’s face, as he asks, “I’m a scammer now”?

“Well, you didn’t answer my text about movie night. So yes, you are a scammer”.

“I’m sorry, Pen got a new kitten behind my back, and we are trying to get Roxie and Belle to get along”, he said, the grin still present in his speech.

“Oh”, Tusa said with surprise, a somber hint filling her voice. She bit her tongue to keep her thoughts at bay, saying “Well that’s alright. Is the cat cute”?

“Despite me not being a cat person, it is adorable”, Luke said, feeling her discomfort on the other end. “Hey, we can have a movie night another night okay”?

His voice is buttery to her, but his words slip past her ears. Just as quickly as he could raise her pulse, it would slow the minute he talked about Penelope. The woman didn’t have a face to her name, but she could summon the rains of the Amazon through Tusa’s eyes.

They have never met, but Tusa has heard nothing but great things. How she is kind, witty, talented. Garcia even left a note for her. Everyone talks about Penelope Garcia like she is a legend, because she is one.

Tusa hates being the one to fill Penelope’s shoes. It makes her skin prickle and her throat sour. She doesn’t want to, but she resents the woman. The unfortunate part is, it isn’t because of her reputation that Selemani disliked Penelope so much.

She perked up her voice, going an octave higher, before saying, “Yeah, yeah I know. I was just looking forward to it. But on the upside we avoided Sena rooting for Monty Python for the hundredth time”.

“That’s a good point”, he said before saying, “Hey while I got you, can you help me find-”

“Find the Church that belongs to those shirts? Bud who do you think I am? I already did it”.

Alvez chuckled as he listened to her. “Address is 7226 Grand Blvd, and it’s a Mormon Church. The t-shirts are for a program they have called Home Sweet Home, and proceeds help the homeless. The church makes a lot of money, and last I checked they ordered 6,000 t-shirts”.

“And they got to be storing those somewhere”.

“That’s what I thought”.

“Alright, thank you Chica I’ll talk to you later”.

“Bye”, she said, rushed, hearing him hang up.

She sat, frozen from the conversation, before she threw her hands to the air. Her hands encompass her face, leaning back in her chair and releasing a groan. All the pressure behind her eyes had moved to her stomach. The aching in her gut festers with every thought of him.

Slipping her palms down her cheeks to her lap, she says, “Luke Alvez, you are breaking my heart”.

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The black pavement glisten in the sun from the unforeseen water shower. Rossi's shoes kick up water drops; upchucked tequila and wasted food becoming more fragrant. The open corridor housed a soiled, kelp-colored dumpster, its neighbors being wrinkled heaps of plastic. Hidden from the opening of the alley, where the ground lay littered in cigarette butts and chewed gum, is the temporary resting place of Daniella Cortez.

"She was propped up against the dumpster", the detective remarked.

Rossi observes the corner. Although the untrained eye would be unable to tell, a small stain of rusty brown glued to the asphalt. Daniella's body had made its presence.

He crouches down, examining the stickers and graffiti that lingered on the brick and steel. The majority of them had faded around the edges and are stained from the decaying muck. "The alley seems fairly secluded in the daytime. How trafficked are the alleyways at night"? Rossi asked while the gears in his head turned.

"Everyone tends to stay away from the alleyways at night, but on Fridays and Saturdays some prostitutes sit here, waiting for guys to drive by. That's how she was found actually".

Rossi's eyes squint. There is one piece of paper, crumpled over itself, but not colored by the garbage mildew. "A prostitute found her"?

"Yeah, said she came back looking for her wallet and found the body instead. She said that the victim wasn't anyone she had seen before, but she saw the victim come out for a smoke".

"Did she see anyone that picked her up"?

"No. She said that she picked up the last guy of the night, and their alibis checked out. Daniella was alone out here".

As the detective continues to ramble, David's eyes fixate on the brick. He slips his hand into a latex glove, plucking the paper from the brick wall. His fingers swivel the folded square open, revealing a manufactured drawing. The thin, black lines branch from one another, to make a set of twig feet, wings, and a minuscule beak. But most startling, the image is clouded in a burgundy red.

"Detective, does this sticker seem familiar to you"? Rossi asked.

The detective hovered over Rossi's shoulder, looking at the image. "That's a sticker a bar nearby uses instead of stamping. Bar's called A Larkin'".

Rossi's face scrunched at the name. "Probably where she was before. Did you guys interview bar staff yet"?

"No, but it is just across the street, I'll take you over there".

Rossi thanks the detective, putting the sticker in a bag for evidence. He stares at the blood-stained lark. Gideon would have thought the lark symbolism was clever for the bar, despite the dumb name.

David halts his walking. Jason believed birds were like people, that they explain themselves through their behaviors. Jason studied their symbolism in various cultures and religions. Birds always had a significance for Gideon, so what was the significance of his letter being with a robin painting?

He pulls out his phone, dialing Tusa. "Selemani"?

Before he could hear her speak, the background rings with metal gently scraping plastic. She must be on her lunch break. Her voice thick and full, she spouts, "Present, sir. You guys get a good lead yet"?

"Not on my end, but would you do me a favor"? He asked, his words spilling like those of a child caught red-handed. "An old friend asked me to look at a case of his. I may have found a potential lead for him, but I need your expertise".

On the other end, Tusa ceases her fidgeting. David could feel her sincerity through the phone. It is something he appreciates about her. Although Penelope's presence is well missed at work, Tusa carries a similar warmth as Garcia. If someone she cared about truly needed something, she would get it for them.

Her voice takes a serious tone, "Alright sir, I'm all ears. What do you need me to do"?

"What is the symbolism of the robin"?

The rattling of the keys is followed by her saying, "Robins represent perseverance, fresh starts, good luck. Associated with spring, Robins tend to migrate during March. Any of this help"?

It was sheer luck that Rossi and Stephen discovered the letter. Stumbling upon that one book, out of all the books Gideon had, and turning to that page. Sheer luck learning about Harper. Does the robin pertain to her?

Rossi's face relaxes slightly, the corners of his mouth upturning. "Yes, that does help. Thank you, Tusa".

"You’re welcome, sir".

After hanging up, Rossi took a moment of pause. His hand found the picture of Harper before he had told it to. Staring at the baby picture, he said to it, quietly, "You're a March baby, aren't you Harper"?

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moro-nokimi · 3 years

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Chapter 6: January 6, 2011

Summary: All hell breaks loose.

AN: HERE WE GO LESBIANS THIS IS THE PENULTIMATE CHAPTER. Okay, excitement aside, when Light screams and collapses, google search “Light Yagami confession italian” - first result on youtube is the one you want. Would also recommend google searching “Struts somebody new” after the January 22 pagebreak, but it isn’t mandatory. I just like to torture my readers. TWs: death of a loved one, suicide, burning. Ask to tag.

ffn.online

“How’s it going, Gevanni?” Rester asked.

“I haven’t been able to confirm the presence of a Shinigami for the past week. And Mikami’s still on his regular routine.”

“I think it’s safe now,” Near said.

“Huh?”

(Poor guy looked wiped the fuck out, no wonder he was a bit slow in the brain area.)

“I want you to get your hands on the notebook again when you go to the gym tomorrow. And this time, take photographs of all the pages.”

“Photographs?” Rester repeated.

“Yes. I want to see for myself how the names are actually written. Most of Kira’s killings occur after midnight, but I want to find out if that’s because of Mikami’s clockwork life, or if he’s controlling the time of death. And if there are any rules to the way he writes the names down, if he has any habits… What does this notebook look like? Its appearance, front cover, back cover. I want to see all the small details with my own eyes.”

“All right.”

January 7 “So, what do you think, Near?” Rester asked.

“Gevanni has done well.”

“That’s not what I meant!” Rester sounded exasperated, and Naomi couldn’t hold in a snicker.

“Relax, Rester. This will all go more or less smoothly,” Naomi said.

“You sound convinced.”

Because if I die I see Raye again. And if I don’t, I get revenge. Either way, I’ll be at peace and I can move on.

“The handwriting on this matches Mikami’s handwriting on the investigation records he wrote as a prosecutor. This is definitely written by Mikami," Near said.

“Right.”

“Apart from Demegawa and the man on the train, everyone else’s name is written in after midnight. And only their names have been written down. A page per day. He stops killing people when the page is full. Yes, looks like I can put my plan into action.

“Commander Rester, get me Gevanni. … The photographs are very clear. We should be able to do it, then,” Near said.

“Right…?”

“But I was expecting the killer notebook to be much stranger, with some kind of magical power radiating from it. But it really is an ordinary notebook, just like Mello said.”

“Like he’d have a reason to lie when he came to HQ for an exchange?” Naomi pointed out.

“Still, you never know.”

“Either way, it still looks like a regular college notebook.”

“I can see that,” Naomi said.

“Anyways, the important thing is that your name isn’t written down in this, Gevanni,” Near said.

“Uh huh.”

“The notebook at the Japanese task force headquarters is under Mr Aizawa’s surveillance. So long as this notebook isn’t possessed by a Shinigami, I think it’s safe to say that you’re not being controlled by another Kira.”

“I told you that I’m fine. Do I look like I’m being controlled? If I was, I wouldn’t have been able to take those photographs in the first place,” Gevanni replied, distinctly peeved. Ah, I remember the days I’d be annoyed at a superior for supposed micromanagement.

“Just to be safe, please go down to the hospital to receive a complete physical exam to see if you’ve developed any illness.”

“Okay…”

“If you’re still alive 23 days after the first time you touched the notebook—on January 23rd—it means there was no Shinigami possessing the notebook when you touched it, and Mikami doesn’t know about you. And if there is no Shinigami, then there should be no problem with you tailing him, so after January 23rd, at the first possible opportunity, we’re going to settle this fight once and for all.

“Until then, we’ll concentrate on Light Yagami, Kiyomi Takada, and Teru Mikami—as we’ve been doing so far. But there’s one last thing we must do—every one of us, but especially you, Gevanni… I’m going to have to ask you to do something.”

⁂

Naomi exhaled and laid on her back. It was quickly approaching five in the morning, and she hadn’t slept since she woke up at six the previous day. Nausea was starting to set in. Whether it was from the sleep deprivation or the fact that she could only stomach liquid, only time would tell.

She stood and walked to the kitchen for what felt like the fifth time that day. Rester had went to sleep roughly an hour ago, and Gevanni had came in about 45 minutes ago. Stupidly enough, she was thinking about when Lidner would next come in.

Stupid.

Her and Lidner hadn’t seen much of each other since that spat and the fact that Lidner had the luck to come into that bodyguard job, but she managed to luck out—in its loosest form of use—and meet with Lidner.

“Listen, I really do want to say that I’m sorry for… bringing up your fiance like that,” Lidner said, cringing as she paused. “I definitely crossed a line and I’m sorry.”

Part of Naomi had wanted to say that she should fucking well be; there are plenty of things that are off limits and bringing up dead people close to you is one of them. Before she knew it, she was nodding. “I definitely shouldn’t have snapped at you as quickly as I did—even in having my grief prodded at like that.”

Lidner nodded. “It’s all right, I don’t blame you. Truce?”

They shook hands.

She was grateful to not have that to worry about, to say the least. The last thing she needed was to be perpetually kicking herself for spilling her guts to Lidner like that and reacting the way she did.

January 22 “It went well. I did everything you said.”

“Okay.” Vertebrae cracked in Near’s neck as he rotated it to get a closer look at his action figure. “Now, I want you to keep your eyes on Mikami as you’ve been doing, until the 24th. If you don’t notice anything different about Mikami by then, we’ll go head to head against L right away.”

Lidner walked in at midnight.

“Oh. You’re still here,” she said.

Naomi nodded. “Fortunately or not. I can’t sleep for the life of me.”

“Yeah, I feel you. Gevanni’s whiny ass is constantly talking about how screwed up his sleep schedule is, but I can’t say as I blame the man. Near gave me the rundown as to what was going on. Sounds exciting.” Lidner wiggled her toes as she stepped out of her heels. Naomi didn’t envy her.

“Agreed.” And here was the part that stuck in Naomi’s throat even as she rehearsed what she’d say. “Um, listen… if all doesn’t go well when we meet with L, I do want to say that I—”

Emotionally, it felt like Naomi had been hit in the chest with a sack of bricks. She didn’t feel it physically, thankfully, because that was always a sign that a panic attack was coming—and no one wanted to have a panic attack in front of a woman they were even remotely into.

She exhaled. “I’m going about this badly. I’m sorry if I’m wasting your time.”

“It’s all right. I think I’m overdue for having my time wasted by someone that’s not Kiyomi Takada.”

Naomi nodded, too wired to laugh however briefly. “I’m trying to say that I have f—” She winced. “I have fff—I like you a lot. A lot, a lot.”

“I would hope so. Having two coworkers at each others throats isn’t conducive to an environment like this one.” Lidner cleared her throat. “Lampshading aside, I…”

“I mean it’s fine if you don’t reciprocate I was just—” Naomi really regretted this now. Regret plus feeling like you’re replacing your dead fiance isn’t exactly conducive to coherency of a confession of romantic feelings of your coworker to said coworker.

“Hey! It’s all good. Truth be told, I like you that much too.”

Naomi exhaled. One thing out of her way. “But the thing is… I mean, I don’t want to presume or anything—”

“I don’t think you’d be presuming anything.” Lidner ran her tongue along her lower teeth. “If you’re talking about getting into a romantic relationship, I can say as I’m not ready for it.”

“Oh—Jesus, that’s a relief—I mean, I’m not either.” Naomi hit herself upside the head. “This is coming out badly.”

“It’s all good, I get what you’re trying to say. In the future, perhaps, but…”

She nodded. “Yeah, it’s not a good idea. And working for Near in the middle of the most controversial case in the world is a full time job.”

“Agreed.”

In an unexpected reaction, Lidner leaned forward and pressed a quick kiss to Naomi’s cheek. She retreated down the hall. Naomi didn’t realize she was repressing tears until her entire head and neck began to ache.

January 25 “I think this plan’s going to work,” Rester said.

“Gevanni here.” He cleared his throat. “I’ve checked the notebook. It’s been one page per day, as always, for the past three days. Those who’ve been killed match with the names in the notebook as well. And there’s nothing different about Mikami.”

“I see…”

“Everything’s set,” Rester said.

“Yes.”

Near called L two and some change hours later. “L.”

“What is it, Near?” L asked.

“I want to meet you.”

“Uh huh…”

“There’s something I must show you that pertains to the Kira case.”

So is that how he’s phrasing things? But I suppose that’s better sounding than “I’m about to show your entire team who you are and completely destroy you and your reputation with them.”

“But if you think I’m Kira, right? Then you shouldn’t want to show your face to me.”

“Well, I can’t really show you anything unless I show my face. Showing my face will reveal something, of course, and then will bring the case to a close.”

“Very well. I want you to realize that you’re wrong.”

You have a lot of nerve to say that, don’t you? You know, that arrogance will be what brings you down.

And I can’t wait to watch it happen.

“There are several rules I must ask you to follow in order for us to meet.”

“Go ahead. You’re the one who suspects me of being Kira, so I’m sure you want to state which conditions we meet under. We don’t have any.”

“First of all, investigators from both sides are to be there. In other words, everyone who is looking for Kira will be there when we meet each other.”

“Why all of our investigators?”

“If you and I are to meet face to face, there ought to be witnesses. And even if I succeed in proving that you’re Kira, you could always take the extreme of strangling me.” Near’s brow furrowed as he added, “We’ve all been risking our lives to find Kira. if I prove Kira’s identity there, then everyone has the right—no, the responsibility—to attend. And by having everyone there, I want to make sure that any information about this meeting or my face doesn’t go public.” Near took a breath. “Everyone on this case will see what happens at this meeting—and after they see the outcome and the reality of the whole story, we’ll cooperate and decide what to do next.”

“Okay, I’m fine with that.”

Near moved his hand closer to the Misa figurine he made, hands splayed almost like an OK sign. “As I said before, there are five of us, including me. That’s everyone in the SPK. I’ll have Mr Mogi, who I’m keeping in my custody, accompany me there. I’ll release Amane before that—” and to demonstrate, he flicked the figurine, “and be sure not to tell her where we’ll be meeting.” The figurine rolled. “You can meet me after you make sure she’s actually been released. How does that sound?”

“Very well.”

Near began to stand. “Mr Aizawa will be able to tell you if the five people you see, plus Mr Mogi, are the real members of the SPK.”

“To me, it doesn’t really matter if the person who appears there is Near or not. You’ve just been stressing that point because you believe that I’m Kira, and that I won’t appear unless I know that you’re really going to come—right?”

Near paused, considering his actions.

What sort of attempted checkmate is this? You know this, the task force knows this, the rest of us know this. And the task force is—I assume—not largely full of idiots. And I’d think you’d have learned your lesson after the whole Lind L Tailor incident almost a decade ago.

“We’ve had many conversations like this in the past. Even if I don’t know your face, I’m sure I can figure out if it’s the real you once I talk to you in person. But I’ll make sure to have Aizawa tell me to double check.”

“I agree with that…”

I think, if I took a scalpel and some other tools to his skull, I’d find the gears turning in his head, Naomi thought.

“We have five investigators including me and Mogi. You’ll have to trust me on that. We’re a small group of people chasing Kira in a world like this, so I’d like to quickly settle this problem and cooperate with you and your team.”

“Very well…” Near settled into a position almost similar to her unprivate detective acquaintance in LA. “As for the place we’re going to meet, I’m thinking of one where the people inside can’t be seen from the outside.”

“You suspect me of being Kira, so it’s the natural thing to do.”

“I want it to be a place that can’t be seen even with telescopic lenses and whatnot, so I’d rather it had four walls and a roof.”

“Do you have some place in mind?"

“Daikoku Wharf. There’s an abandoned warehouse on the southeast side, called the yellow box. If that’s fine with you, I’ve taken the liberty of buying it. There’s nothing around it, and the place is empty as well. I’m sending you an image.”

Near smirked. “It’s not locked, so you can go and see it for yourself whenever you want to. And if you don’t like it, I can look for another place.” He smiled toothily. “And each of us can check for hidden cameras when we enter the building.”

“Do you have any other requirements to make sure that your face isn’t known to anyone outside of that warehouse?"

“Yes. I’d like to prohibit any communication equipment when you enter. That’s to ensure that nothing that goes on on the inside gets leaked. And to be sure that no one takes a photograph of me on their phone.”

Naomi held in laughter. What a nice callback to the incident with the girl on the train.

“No communication equipment. Okay.”

“I’d also like someone apart from L to bring the notebook from your headquarters.”

“Why do you need it?"

Near reached for a clay replica of the notebook. “Simple. If every one of you leaves the headquarters, no one will be left to guard the notebook. I promise you that I won’t try to take it from you. And I’ll refrain from touching it. If Mr Aizawa claims that the notebook you brought is the one from headquarters, I’ll believe it. But, again, please make sure that someone other than L is carrying it. Understood?”

“Very well, Near. But I can’t overlook the chances of you conspiring with someone on my side to steal the notebook. I won’t carry the notebook, but I’ll choose who carries it. Is that okay?”

“Yes. The only thing that’s left to settle is the date and time of our meeting.” Near got onto all fours.

“Of course…”

“How about three days from now, on the 28th at one PM?”

“Any time’s fine with us.”

“Remember, three days from now at three o’clock.”

“Yes.”

January 26 “Near, Mello kidnapped Takada,” Lidner relayed.

Near paused. “Lidner, have you been leaking information about our investigation to Mello?”

Lidner paused. “Yes… But I haven’t told him about Mikami.”

“If that’s the case, we should still be okay. But if Mello finds out about Mikami from Takada and seeks him out, this will all be a waste. I want you to find Takada—no. I want you to stop Mello at all costs.”

“But—”

Near’s tone brokered no argument: “Do it.”

“All right.”

Near called L.

A task force member said, “It’s Near. Maybe it’s his usual ‘I took the liberty of confining her’ routine.”

“L, I’m not the one who kidnapped Takada.”

“I see. Then that means… Mello.”

“Yes. I’ll be honest with you. The individual I have guarding Takada has told me so.”

“Near, don’t you have means of contacting him?”

“It’s no use. I can try to contact Mello, but he’ll never respond to me. He must plan on capturing Kira himself, using Takada as bait.” Near pouted and twirled around the microphone. “I didn’t want him interfering for the next three days, and I really do mean that.”

“Very well. I trust your words and I believe that you’re not collaborating with Mello.”

“I’m going to track them down with everything I’ve got.”

“I’ll do the same.”

⁂

“So, please keep your eyes on Mikami as long as possible, making sure to arrive at Daikoku Wharf by one PM on the 28th.” Everyone in the room minus Lidner gave acknowledgement.

The screen beeped. “It’s Lidner,” Rester said.

“Get her on the screen please.”

“Near.”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry. I never thought that Mello would…”

“It’s okay.” Near moved down to eye level with his figurines. “Everything will be fine so long as Light Yagami goes through with our meeting as planned.”

He called L.

“L.”

“Yes?”

“Granted, we’ve had some distractions. But I want to confirm our meeting is staying where it was.”

“Of course.”

“As for our conditions—they’ll remain in place. Right?”

You’re practically daring him to say no, aren’t you, Naomi thought.

“Yes. I didn’t set any of the conditions anyways.”

“Then I’ll see you on the 28th.”

He hung up.

“Gevanni?”

“Yes?”

Near wiggled his L figurine on his finger. Naomi wanted to crawl out of her skin. “Will you make it?”

“Yeah, no problem.”

“Commander Rester, Lidner, Gevanni, Maki… Let’s put our best into this.”

Naomi nodded.

Relief and anxiety curled up in her chest and made their homes.

January 28 “I’m heading down with Mr Mogi and Amane in my car,” Lidner reported.

“Mikami went to work at the usual time. Nothing out of the ordinary," Gevanni reported.

“Start heading over there,” Near instructed.

“Will do.”

Near called the task force.

“Good morning, everyone.” He brought a knee up to his chest and rested his temple on it. “For starters, I’ve released Amane. You can call her if you’d like to check for yourself.”

“Near, please get Mogi on the line for me. In order for us to bring the notebook, we need a PIN number that only Mogi knows.”

“I’ll get him right away.” Near patched Mogi through to the rest of the task force.

"Near, I have the notebook right here. I’ll take it along with me,” Aizawa says.

“Are you sure about Mr Aizawa handing the notebook?” Near asked.

“I’ve decided that Aizawa would be the best choice.”

If Naomi could’ve, she would’ve glared at L. This was just plain irritating. The second his face got rubbed in the fact that the SPK was right all along, she could die happy.

“Thank you. See you at the warehouse, then.”

Naomi threw up a wave as Aizawa entered the warehouse. The plastic L mask still made her skin crawl.

And then the task force entered.

She could’ve sworn that she saw just a hint of recognition on Light Yagami’s face.

Hm.

“Those are definitely the SPK. Near’s the one with the mask.”

“Yes,” Mogi said. “I was with Near even before he put the mask on. It sure is him.”

“Whether the real Near is here or not is of no interest to me,” Yagami said.

Naomi clenched her jaw, biting back a retort of something like “you clearly haven’t learned your lesson from the Lind L Tailor incident.”

“Wait a minute,” a task force member said, “I don’t care who he accuses of being Kira. But that mask proves he’s only trying to protect only himself.”

“It would be kind of redundant to hide our faces, seeing as how all but one of us have been sighted by Takada before,” Naomi muttered.

“Matsuda, Near thinks I’m Kira. It can’t be helped,” Yagami said.

“He was talking so much about seeing you face to face. It’s not fair!”

Naomi was beginning to get a headache.

It was about to get worse.

“I’m telling you,” Yagami said, and that alone made Naomi want to claw at him and beat him to a pulp, “Near has his own ideas about what’s going on here, so it’s not going to help if we complain about it. Let’s get on with this.”

Near smirked thinly and touched the mask. “This mask is just insurance.”

He was in for it, no matter if he was taken into their custody.

“Insurance?” Matsuda repeated.

“I’m confident that both Kira and the person being ordered to do the killings—X Kira—don’t know my face. But there’s a possibility that everyone else’s face is known to these individuals in question.” He knocked down the figurines of the SPK. “Of course, this is all assuming that L is Kira. So, since the time and place for our meeting was decided upon three days ago, there’s a chance that everyone else’s name, excluding mine, may already be written down in the notebook to be killed.

“If that were to happen, only Kira and I would be left, and all Kira would have to do is write my name in the notebook that Mr Aizawa has with him right now. Though it’s my hypothesis that the Kira here doesn’t have the ability to kill just from looking at our faces.

“So, please give me an hour—no, 30 minutes—to be sure that no one else here is already marked to die by the notebook.”

“You’re waiting to see if we die?” Matsuda asked.

“That’s okay,” Yagami said. “We’ll let Near do as he likes. If not, we won’t be able to clear things up.” He turned to Near. “I believe that you’re the actual Near, and I care little about the face behind the mask. What I’d like to see is what you were going to show me pertaining to the Kira case.”

Near twirled a strand of hair. “That can only be revealed to you after I take my mask off.”

“You can’t show the evidence to us unless you take the mask off, but you’re not going to take it off? Aren’t you contradicting yourself?” Matsuda demanded.

“He means he’s going to take it off once he makes sure that everyone else remains alive,” Yagami clarified. Near confirmed as much.

You sure seem agitated, seeing as how you can’t keep Near’s stipulations straight, Naomi thought.

“It’s been more than 30 minutes—and nothing’s happened.”

“Of course,” Yagami said. “That’s because Kira isn’t here.”

Near took off the rubber band. “Very well. It seems you’re all safe. I’ll go ahead and take off the mask.”

He smirked immediately.

“Okay, so now that you’ve taken the mask off, what are you going to show us?”

“Don’t rush him,” a task force member chided.

“I’m sorry,” Near said, “but you’re going to have to wait again.”

“Again?! What are we waiting for?”

“Excuse me, do you think this is a massive waste of time or something?” Naomi asked. “If you want to prove that your leader isn’t Kira so badly, shut up and wait.”

She didn’t typically have such a short fuse or snap at people so easily. But she was face to face with the one who killed her fiance; and as much as she’d like to get this out of the way and take him into custody already, the fact that he’d have his face rubbed in the SPK’s being right would feel a little bit better than if they took him into custody without much of an explanation. And it’d help out if they could make the task force see reason.

“Oh, I’m sorry—”

Key word being if.

“Enough,” Yagami said.

“We’re waiting for the one who’ll solve everything to arrive,” Near said. He exhaled. “I assure you that this person will come. So we must wait. This building is completely sealed. The only way to look inside is to open that door right there. Therefore, this person will come through that door, or try to peek through it.”

“Who’s going to come…? This meeting was kept a secret from everyone except those who are here right now.”

“That’s right. So the person coming is X-Kira, Kira’s most loyal follower, who learned about our location from none other than Kira himself.” He paused. “Mr Aizawa. You kept an eye on L even after Takada died, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then X-Kira will come. Kira used Takada to contact X-Kira.

“The night we decided when and where to meet, L met Takada, and Takada relayed the information to X-Kira. I am completely sure of this. But Mello’s kidnapping of Takada was a surprise to L and I. With Takada dead, L could no longer contact X-Kira and was unable to call his plan off.” He knocked down the Takada figurine. Near tilted his head. “Actually, it would’ve been meaningless for him to call everything off. The thought wouldn’t have crossed his mind because he didn’t want to interfere with his plan or mind.”

And Matsuda and his co-worker immediately launched into contrarianism:

“Why do you assume L is Kira?”

“Yeah, if a third party is really going to show up here, isn’t it more likely that you’re the one behind it all?”

Ah, this is familiar. I almost feel like I’m 27 again and watching the NPA and L squabble. Maybe without all the signs of aging. Thank God for retinol and sunscreen.

“No, because the person we’re waiting for is the person currently in charge of carrying out Kira’s judgements. So, obviously, this person is coming under Kira’s orders.”

“Hey, wait a minute. If this person is the one doing the killings, you also mean they’re bringing the notebook too?”

“Yes, this person will bring the notebook for sure. And then, after looking at my face, will write down my name.” Near mimed this scenario with the figurines of X-Kira/Mikami and himself.

“So you’re going to prove that this person is Kira’s henchman by being killed?!”

“No, rather by having him try to kill me. There was a similar stunt that was pulled when L was investigating the Yotsuba Group.”

“Wait a minute,” Aizawa said.

“Yes?”

“If X-Kira is going to kill you, then they’d need to kill everyone here, since we all know about the notebook.”

“That’s right. It would be the perfect victory for Kira, not to mention the sole reason Kira agreed to this meeting in the first place.”

“I… I don’t get it,” Matsuda said. “What are you meaning? The third party is going to bring the notebook here to kill us?”

“And you’re asking us to stand here and watch?” Ide asked.

“That’s right,” Near said calmly.

“That’s ridiculous! Then you’ll be playing into Kira’s hands. We’re going to lose no matter what we do.”

“No. We’ll win. If you all do as I say, we’ll win without a doubt. So, if X-Kira enters through that door, I want you all to let him in. And if that door opens, however slightly, I want you all to pretend not to notice.”

Aizawa wrestled with himself. “You’re making it sound like you’re Kira. You’re the one who proposed the idea that we meet here, and now you’re asking for us to let our names be written down in the notebook. It’s only natural for us to think that. But… I’ll do as you say.”

“I’m with Aizawa,” Mogi said. Matsuda muttered dissent.

“He’s already here,” Near said. Naomi's headache was getting considerably worse.

Yeah, that’s one way to make them listen, she thought.

They stood in silence for roughly a half minute.

“I can’t just watch!” Matsuda snapped, bringing a revolver out of his jacket’s inner pocket.

“Don’t move!” Rester snapped, lining Matsuda up with his sights. Gevanni followed suit.

“Are you kidding me?” Matsuda exclaimed.

Naomi whistled. “Sorry, Near. First of all, don’t point your guns unless you intend to fire, Rester and Gevanni." (To this, Gevanni glowered and lowered his after Rester did.) "Second of all, what did Near say? Pretend that nothing is happening.”

“You expect me just to sit there while our names are being written?”

“I’m sorry, I thought I said ‘pretend nothing is happening’!” She put her hands on her hips and glared.

“Enough!” Near said. “I said that you won’t die. Please be still. Everyone relax, please.” He took a breath. “Even if our names are being written down, we won’t die. Kira’s identity will finally be revealed.”

“How can you be so sure?” Aizawa asked.

Near held up the miniature notebook he made. “I’ve tampered with the notebook. We managed to get it into our possession and replaced the pages. The person behind the door—the one in charge of the actual killing—has been filling up one page every day, so I just calculated which page would correspond with today’s date, and replaced all the subsequent pages.”

“Replaced?”

“You actually got a hold of it?”

“The person writing the names down outside will eventually look inside to see if we’ve all died. At which point we’ll seize him, and the individual whose name isn’t written down in the notebook will inevitably be Kira.”

Aizawa agreed, while his coworker was borderline speechless.

“To the one outside,” Yagami said, “did you write the names down in the notebook?”

“I did,” X-Kira answered, almost reverent.

“That’s strange,” Near said, half to his thighs. “Why would he reply in earnest, yes I did when you asked him if he wrote the names down?”

“Who knows?” Yagami replied. “Maybe he’s honest, or is confident for some reason. It may be that he knows your plan.”

Naomi barely resisted rolling her eyes.

“Teru Mikami, why don’t you come in here?” Near ventured.

There was a pause.

“Teru Mikami, right?” Yagami said, looking smugger by the second. “Stop hiding and come inside.”

Still no Mikami.

“Teru Mikami, I know that you’re in charge of carrying out Kira’s killings right now. You’ve already written the names down, so there’s nothing to be afraid of. Please come in. Or did Kira order you not to?”

“Your wish is my command, God,” Mikami said, his expression almost malicious in his devotion.

Naomi almost recoiled in horror.

“How many seconds has it been since you wrote the first name down?” Yagami asked.

“35… 36… 37… 38… 39…”

“I win, Near,” Yagami said.

That sure is one way to dig your own grave, Naomi thought.

“40!”

Still, Naomi clenched her fists and waited for the pain Raye must’ve felt in his chest.

“We… We’re not dead! It’s been a minute and we’re not dead!”

“I’ve been telling you that no one would die,” Near said.

Naomi traded a glance with Lidner. Even the SPK didn’t have a hundred percent faith in this plan.

“Why? Why won’t they die?!” Mikami said. “G-God—I did everything you told me!”

Near signalled Rester and Gevanni to take Mikami into custody.

“The notebook, Gevanni,” Near said. He held up the notebook once Gevanni brought it over. “See for yourselves.”

The task force took in every word.

“The first five names are unmistakably the real names of the SPK members. And the only one missing from this list is Light Yagami. The first nail in the casket was Mikami calling you God, and the other was that he said he did as you told him to.” He brought the notebook down. “This proves it.”

“This is a trap! Near set this whole thing up to frame me! It’s impossible that no one’s dead after their names have been written in the notebook!” Yagami screamed.

Near tilted his head to the side. “But I told you no one would die because I replaced the pages.”

“That’s—this is a setup. I don’t know this guy!”

Mikami wailed and sagged.

Aizawa approached Yagami and put a hand on his shoulder. “Light, it’s too late. Near wins. Just a second ago, you declared that you won. That’s as good a confession as any.”

Matsuda repeated Yagami’s given name and sank to his knees. “Why…?”

Mogi broke ranks and brought out his handcuffs. Yagami ran, slipping and faceplanting, then leaned against the warehouse wall.

“This is it,” Near said. “You lose. You claimed your victory a second ago. And to tell you the truth, you might have won and I’d have lost if it weren’t for one thing. You had Mikami use the fake notebook and had him carry it around in front of us so we’d believe it was the real thing. You even went so far as to suspect that I would replace the pages of the fake notebook, so that I wouldn’t die even if my name was written in it. Things turned out exactly as you expected, and we replaced the pages in the fake notebook.

“That was the plan I had in mind as well. I replaced the pages of the notebook that happened to be a fake, and you had Mikami bring the real notebook out for the first time to kill all of us. And that was your plan. But when I said that I replaced the pages in the notebook, I meant the real one as well. Meaning that I tampered with both the fake and real notebooks. I replaced only a part of the fake notebook, and I replaced the pages of the real notebook completely.” To demonstrate, he pulled the replica notebook from the Mikami figurine, revealing a FAKE label across the back.

Near brought out the real notebook from under his shirt. “This is the real notebook. Gevanni did it overnight. Whether he was able to replace all of it or not was the key to this plan. He did replace a part of the fake notebook with ease, but it was quite difficult to make a forged copy of the real one. Gevanni promised me, however, that it could be done.

“He used the same pen Mikami used, copied Mikami’s handwriting to perfection, and even made a perfect copy of the cover in addition to the interior pages. And since I’d touched the notebook beforehand, I could see the Shinigami from the moment you entered this warehouse. Nice to meet you, Mr Shinigami. I’m Near.”

Hair stood up on the back of Naomi’s neck.

“Ryuk… until today, I always believed that Shinigami had skulls for faces and carried sickles. … I looked through this notebook and found some pages that were clipped out. Can it be that people die even if you write names on pages that have been cut out? … Even pieces are effective… I’m sure there must have been many uses for that. I can’t even begin to think of how many people were killed and deceived because of that.”

“I almost died with that method. My fiance, the busjacker,” Naomi said. “Others, I assume.”

Yagami’s face lit with recognition.

“Raye Penber…”

She nodded, throwing a thin and outright malicious smile to him. “The one and only.”

“That’s one hell of an indictment,” Rester said. (He wasn’t the only one surprised; Gevanni was gaping and Lidner’s eyes were wide.)

“That anecdote just proves something that the previous L knew. Light Yagami, you are Kira.”

Yagami stood in silence, calculating.

“You’re wrong,” Near said, holding his Mello figurine. “I owe this to Mello. I’m sure you understand what I mean by that.” He flipped the notebook’s pages. “Look at the page I just turned to. This is the fake notebook we created, but it’s exactly the same as the real one. The first line of the page on the left…”

Kiyomi Takada. Suicide; burns to death by setting fire to everything around her, including what she wrote. January 26th, 2:33 PM.

Yagami and Mikami stared at each other. “If Takada was in a situation like that, then it’s my job to…,” Mikami said.

“That’s right. When Mello kidnapped Takada, Mikami took out the real notebook—the one he had hidden in a safe deposit box at the bank… and wrote Takada’s name down.”

“After Takada’s kidnapping was announced on the news, Mikami broke from his schedule. October 25th was a Sunday, so he went on the 26th. But all other previous months he’d went to the bank on the 25th. Mikami rarely breaks from his habits, so it immediately stood out to me. I entered the bank and saw Mikami go into the safe deposit room. This was the first time I’d seen him concerned if someone was following him,” Gevanni explained.

“Mikami lives a completely fixed life, but suddenly broke from his routine as Takada was kidnapped. I wonder how much can be explained away, if at all. Going to the bank for two days in a row… I’ll be honest, I only thought about the possibility of the notebook being a fake after Gevanni told me of this. Though, come to think of it, we should’ve suspected that when he took a picture of a man harassing a woman on a train before supposedly writing his name down, and when he talked to himself about the Shinigami not appearing to him. The fact that we found out so quickly about Mikami actually worked against us.

“But until then, we were completely tricked by you, Takada, and Mikami, and had replaced the pages in the fake book. So we’d have lost if I hadn’t found out. When Mello kidnapped Takada, you were no longer able to get into contact with Mikami. But Mikami still made his move for you, to perfection in his role as Kira’s stand-in. His overt adoration, sense of responsibility and attention to detail, and his intelligence worked against him at this time.

“It wasn’t difficult for us to sneak into the safe deposit room to crack it. It was an old fashioned safe at a local bank. And since you allowed us to look through Mikami’s bag when he was at the gym, we already had made copies of all his keys and cards.”

“It was easy. Once I got inside, there was a notebook with Takada’s name written in it,” Gevanni added.

“And an idiot would figure out everything from there.” Near added, “This is very interesting. In the fake notebook, the one we replaced the pages of first, one page was filled in with names every day, but the real one jumps from November 25th to January 26th, when Takada’s name was written down. So that means you, Light Yagami, had Mikami walk around with a fake notebook starting two months in advance to trick us.

“Before January 26th, the time of death wasn’t specified, same as in the fake notebook. But after Takada’s name was written in it, all the judgements for January 26th were set to the early hours of the 27th, and the judgements for the 27th were set for the early hours of the 28th.

“In the fake notebook that Mikami made, Takada’s name is probably written down exactly like this, but the rest of the page is only names and no written down conditions for their death. So that means that when Mikami wrote Takada’s name in the real notebook on the 26th, he also wrote the names of those people who were to be ‘brought to justice’ on the 26th and 27th.

“Mikami could’ve killed the people using the scraps from the notebook, but if he wrote on them in his house, assuming we’d have installed a camera, we might have found out about the fake notebook and the fact that you can kill people with just a scrap of it.

“In order to make Mikami’s notebook look real, you probably cut the pages out and handed them to Takada and had her actually do all the killings. All Mikami had to do was send a list of people to be killed via cell phone or computer and delete the data.

“For the deaths on the 26th and 27th, you might have had him send a list of people to Takada after she was kidnapped, but just in case, Mikami wrote those names down too when he wrote Takada’s name. As for the 28th, today’s killings would be at your leisure, since it would’ve been after you killed us.

“So, though it’s nothing I would’ve taken notice of under normal circumstances, if you look closely, there aren’t any killings of new criminals on the 26th or 27th. And that’s because Mikami wasn’t allowed to take out the notebook until today. And according to your plan, that shouldn’t have happened no matter what.

“And thought I don’t know who was first, this means that you killed Takada too. Since the scraps of the notebook can be used to kill people, it’s hard to believe you wouldn’t have had one on you. Because you killed her too, the announcement of Takada’s death was reported on the news quickly, and since Mikami also knew of her death, you wouldn’t have assumed that Mikami made a move on his own.” Near dropped the notebook. “Too bad. When Mello kidnapped Takada, Mikami wrote her name down in the real notebook too.”

Mikami and Yagami stared at each other again.

“For both you and me…,” Near began, “having Mikami write down our names on the page on the right was the plan. We had to do that. If not, we wouldn’t have been able to capture Mikami, get the notebook from him, or take a look at the notebook. Whether the page on the left was filled with names or not, it had to be the page on the right. And you tried to kill us by having us replace the pages of a fake notebook and having Mikami bring the real one here, but we went a step beyond you by having Mikami bring a fake version of the notebook. It’s a lot harder to find out that the notebook has been switched if you replace the whole notebook rather than just a part of it.

“Of course, this is in large part due to Rester and Gevanni’s efforts in duplicating the notebook in a day. But the biggest thanks goes to the one who created this situation. Mello.”

Lidner suddenly looked very sad. She looked askance. “Mello may have known about it. I told Mello that Near was talking about bringing an end to this case with his own hands. But now that I think of it, he…” She stopped, frowning. “After a long silence, he just said then I guess I’m going to have to do it, and hung up.”

She sighed. “At first, I thought he only meant that he was going to bring an end to the case before Near. But if Mello hadn’t made his move, then we would’ve…”

You’re telling me I owe my life to a corpse? Naomi thought.

“The fact that we replaced the pages in the notebook, and that notebook happened to be a face, I find it hard to believe that Mello thought that far ahead. But, I’m sure that he was always trying to get ahead of me. And that’s not all—even if he didn’t surpass me…” Near wet his lip. “Even if he didn’t…”

Rester traded looks with Gevanni, who traded looks with Naomi, who traded looks with Lidner, who traded looks with Rester.

“Mello always said that he was going to be number one, and that he was going to be better than me and L. But I always knew I would never be able to surpass L. It could be that I lack attention span and he lacked impulse control. And even thought we couldn’t surpass the one we admired on our own—together, we can stand with L. Together we can surpass L. And now, we’re facing Kira, whom L could find no proof against, the very Kira who L was defeated by, and facing him with solid evidence before his own eyes.”

Near let that sink in.

He kept the puppets up.

“Let’s try to see you talk your way out of this one.”

Yagami screamed, high pitched. All the klaxons in Naomi’s brain fired, telling her to get the hell out of there, because something was deeply wrong.

Yagami began to shake.

And he began to laugh.

Against all her primal instincts, Naomi stayed.

He cackled for a good half minute.

Every muscle in Naomi’s body tensed. Every hair stood on end.

“That’s right,” he said, staggering to stand, “I am Kira.”

#so if u listened to that italian dub was that terrifying or what #apparently the VA did it in one take at *18 years old*#that's fucking cool #tws in post #my writing

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blackfemmecharacterdependency · 3 years

Text

11. This is Fucked Up

Who. Did. This. Null. Think. He. Was?

Xander had every intention of simply observing, recording, collecting, submitting. And waiting for Grace’s approval… But, even through the course of knowing that this particular potential X… No.. this confirmed X; Xander somehow convinced himself that perhaps Grace had actually simply found someone who could safely and comfortably accompany her baggage. He wanted to be wrong, even though he had known that he was right.

This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up. This is fucked up.

“I can explain,” Simon said. His Adam’s apple bobbed and his eyes were wide. The arrogance from earlier seemed long gone and with this realization, Xander was as cold and hard as steel.

“The fact that you even believe that there is some type of way that you ever could explain this makes me morbidly curious. Please, explain to me why you have an entire man cave of stalker paraphernalia on the single most important person in my entire life. Explain to me a scenario in which me finding that you have cameras set up in my sister’s home doesn’t end in your death. Make me, a feral child with a little hair dye and a cool kid’s outfit, react in a civilized way to you marking my family as prey.”

“Not prey…”

“I’ve been doing things like this for years. I know how the mind of somebody like this works. You don’t watch someone this way unless it's to seek out details to give you an advantage over them. There's no person who does this for reasons other than power and/or predation.”

“Protection,” Simon said. “I did this to try to protect her. You weren’t there with her…” Xander flinched for a moment. “She was trying to do everything on her own. She lost Heath. She los…”

“You don’t get to speak about him like you knew him.” Simon silenced himself. Xander began to pace, slowly, assessing the storage room, but keeping his distance. “He told me about when you stopped into the flower shop. You called Grace by a label that I know she never would have told you. I knew then that you were suspicious, but I never thought that you were like this!” He gestured his pinky around the room, absolutely horrified to see so much of Grace’s face in one place… in this place. This box with pictures and products and everything appeared to be either her image or something pertaining to her. “This is disturbing , Simon. Even to me, and I once stabbed off a man’s genitals with a serrated blade…” Xander watched for a reaction to that.

Simon hardly showed any, but he was definitely uncomfortable. Still, that wasn't the response of someone who was afraid… It was the response of someone who was… plotting. Simon shifted. Xander warned him, “Stay where you are. If you come near me, I will kill you, and judging by your non-reaction to what I said, I think you know that I’m more than capable of it.”

“Capable, definitely. But… I don’t think that you’re that reckless.” Xander raised an eyebrow. Nobody had ever accused him of not being reckless before. This had to be another one of Simon's lies... “Sure, you’re impulsive and you have very little self preservation, but you know as well as I do that I matter to Grace," Simon couldn't help but to smirk about that. "I don’t think that you’d take that away from her. She’s already lost so much. That’s why you’re even talking to me right now instead of stuffing me in a bag and throwing me in the van.”

Xander’s nostrils flared. Simon was smart. Arguably, the most book smart person that Xander had ever met, personally. He might be able to trip him up if he said too much. Regardless, Xander knew that he was right about this . Grace had already taken his side in the swing of things, as far as Xander believed, by even having him hold this space in her world, undeserved…

Simon casually leaned back on his table and held on to it. “Let me ask you this, Xander. Has Grace ever allowed you to hurt anybody who didn’t hurt anybody, or do you all hunt down every potential danger in the city?” Xander flinched. The O’s. If he couldn’t prove that Simon was dangerous… she would be upset with him, but she wouldn’t let Xander kill him, even if it was obvious that he was a threat! Xander’s breath hardened and Simon’s arrogance returned. “I didn’t think so. Because, she isn’t some sadist searching for victims like Dexter to fulfill a bloodlust. She’s an avenging angel. Everyone she kills has hurt people and that is why she hurts them. She doesn’t even like to do it. She just thinks that she has to…”

“Is that something that she told you, or something that you stole from her?”

“It’s something that I understand, because I know her better than anybody ever has…” Simon said, stepping forward.

“Fuck you. STAY!��

“I want to show you something. Something that I collected in secret before I decided to do this…” Simon slowly moved, with his hands where Xander could see them to retrieve something. Xander snatched photos from his hand and stepped back. “When Jalicia was grieving, because Heath died and you nosedived… Grace came over for an alibi and fell asleep.” Xander was flipping through photos of bruises on her body. He felt dirty for even having seen them, because she was sleeping and Simon obviously took these without her permission, and guilty, because that never would have happened if he hadn’t slipped up. Xander flung them and they slapped Simon in the face. He let them fall to the ground. “I was worried that one of those times, she might get hit harder than she could stand. She needed someone else, because nobody else was there for her.”

“You really think that I’m naive. I know what you’re doing. You think that you can make me feel guilty for being sick and unavailable to Grace and make me think that this is why you needed to do this… but all you’re doing is making me see why it has to be me that handles you. She won’t be able to do it, because I left her exposed to the elements and you poisoned her. She’ll be hurt at first. She’ll be angry that I took away her favorite new thing. She’ll be hurt that you wasn’t what she thought… But, she’ll be safe, and I care more about that than I do her having a tantrum over losing you.”

“You want to add to the list of names that she cries out in her sleep?” Simon asked.

Xander had flashes of Grace through the years. That was precisely what she did. At 12, when he met her, she whimpered in her sleep for kids that were even right next to her in bunks, dreaming about the things she’d seen them go through. Of course she still did this. There were so many names. So many losses. If she loved them, she’d probably lose them. All she had left was her Apex survivors. And Simon?

Xander fumed and rushed forward. How dare he try to use Grace’s pain to save himself! He didn’t care about her! He just wanted to… do SOMETHING to her that Xander wasn’t sure of, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to let him. He tackled Simon to the concrete and Simon bumped his head on the table as they knocked it over. It caught Simon completely off guard. He was on guard, because it was a stressful time and still caught off guard. He tried to get away, but Xander pulled him into a chokehold and wrapped his legs around him. Elbowing Xander only made him punch Simon extremely hard in the ribs and gut.

Simon began to pat him down, panicked, but still thinking. This dude was… sort of impressive, Xander noted, until Simon found what he needed. Xander’s syringe. Xander tried to get it from him with one hand and keep him choked with the other arm, but that gave Simon enough room to unseal it and stab him in the arm with it. Xander flailed for a moment, but he managed to sputter out. “You can’t do anything, Simon. You’re… still… fucked…” He was disoriented whenever Simon got up and looked at him, on the floor, trying to move away.

Of course, Xander was absolutely right. Simon couldn’t kill him! He wasn’t sure that he had the stomach to kill anybody, not even somebody who hated him as much as Xander clearly did, but this was Grace’s… there wasn’t even an accurate word for what he was to her. Brother, best friend, hell even soulmate seemed so pale in comparison to whatever it was that they had going on… Not in a romantic way, but in a... ugh symbiotic way, in which he didn’t think that Grace was any more capable of living without Xander than he was without her. Hurting Simon would have hurt her, but hurting Xander? That would kill her. She would kill him, probably.

Whatever they gave their victims to knock them out was doing it’s job with Xander. Simon checked him for his phone. It wasn’t on him, so probably in his vehicle, if he even brought it along at all. Simon grabbed his gun. The last thing he needed was Xander to wake up and find it somehow. He looked around. He’d have to figure something out. Did he want to try to throw Xander in his trunk? Tie him up here? He searched for something to tie him up… he didn’t have anything. At least nobody could ever accuse him of being prepared to abduct. He improvised, with Xander’s overshirt. That wouldn’t hold him for long, but it might help a little. He grabbed a few things that he valued and put them in his trunk. He didn’t believe he had the time or the room in his car to grab the surveillance equipment, but he at least unplugged it all.

He shut the storage and left to go meet up with Grace. He was crying, but at least Xander couldn’t warn her that he was coming. But, he had to determine what he was going to do about him.

He holstered his gun and pulled his hoodie over himself. He just… was on edge, felt unsafe, didn’t know WHAT to think or do… He paced for a little bit outside of her apartments before daring to go knock on the door.

She flung it open, looked relieved, and hugged him tightly, “Simon! You’re okay…” He wrapped his arms around her, positive that this was probably his last time to do so. Once she found out about Xander, his world might come crashing down.

Then he saw her. That girl with the bomb on her neck and it finally hit him where he recognized her from. He’d seen her on Xander’s social media months ago whenever he was trying to find out more about Grace. She was in on this… Was Grace? D id Grace know Xander had found him out? Did she send him? She cupped his face and kissed him quickly on the lips. “You’re safe.” He shivered and she wiped his tears, “It’s okay. Come on…” She led him in and the tattooed lady folded her arms and stared at him. “I think you’ve met my friend, Alexandria.” Grace covered her face with her hands, then took Simon’s into hers. “You’ve been super patient with me through a lot of questionable shit, but I know, with what happened earlier, that you’re probably so tired of me and my mess…”

“That’s not..” he shook his head. “It.”

“Where is Xander?” Alexandria asked.

Grace was so consumed by the thought of her friends breaking into Simon’s home and potentially hurting him that she got distracted. But, Simon turned pale whenever asked that, so she immediately tensed up and stared at him. “He’ll be here shortly… He was following him, right?”

Alexandria showed Grace her phone. The picture mail from Xander was of Simon opening a storage unit and being inside of it and the caption, “747: Gonna engage the X” Now, Grace and her both looked at Simon. “Redness on his neck, little blood on the side of his face. Xander engaged with the X.” She jumped up and rushed at him, “What did you do?”

Grace quickly slid between them and held her at bay. “I’ll handle this, please have a seat.” She turned around and studied Simon’s visible signs of a struggle and smiled softly at him, “Hey. Xander can be scary. He’s not very big, but he makes up for it in other ways. He’s tough, and he’s always been a fighter. If a fight occurred, I would imagine that somebody who isn’t very used to hand to hand combat might panic and try to defend themselves however they could, so… What did you do?” Her voice was calm, but her heart was racing and beating in her ears as her face was red and tears burned to escape the stronghold of her ducts. She was on fire, worried about why Simon might be so pale at the mention of Xander. Was Xander somewhere with head trauma, bleeding out while Simon found the courage to put it into words?? She didn’t want to alarm him and make it harder to find her friend, but she also was the most unsettled that she had been in a long time.

Simon nodded, “I defended myself. He.. He had a syringe, but I was able to get to it and I stuck him with it.” Both women sighed with relief. Simon started crying.

“Hey… Mon Beau Petit,” it sounded so pretty in her voice, and she was smiling, relieved that her symbiotic other was still alive as she touched Simon’s chin. “Can you take us to him?” He wasn’t bleeding out, but the tranquilizers in his system probably would make him sick, especially having recently detoxed.

“I locked him in my storage closet.”

“Okay, then we won’t have to search for him. But, let's just get to him so that I can make sure he’s okay, and I’ll keep them away from you and then… you’ll never have to worry about us again. I’ll leave you out of this mess. I just have to get Xander returned safely to me, okay?”

Simon sniffled, “You don’t understand. The reason he was trying to attack me…”

“Let’s… get to him first, okay? Please?” He nodded.

In the car, he tried to explain to Grace what happened. “Do you remember whenever I told you that I follow people?” Alexandria tilted her head, surprised by hearing this interesting tidbit. Grace blushed. She didn’t want to speak about that in front of someone else, but Simon kept going. “I thought maybe you realized. There were definitely moments where I said to myself, she knows. She has to. You must have sensed it, at least… Xander did. He sensed what was happening and he got suspicious and he came after me because I was watching you…”

Grace sputtered some air through her lips and cracked her fingers, “This isn’t really the time.”

“It has to be, because whenever we reach Xander, he’s gonna have the floor. I have to tell you now!” He sounded very urgent and Alexandria was already reaching for her butterfly knife.

“Stand down,” Grace said, not even looking at her. Then to Simon, “Listen… I know that you and Xander were fighting for a reason and I love Xander very much, but I don’t always side with him. I just think we need to get to him, then we can…”

“I did it to you!” There was a lengthy silence in the car. Whenever he finally stopped, in the lot of a storage company, he added on, “Xander found proof that I did it to you and he knew that wasn’t enough, so he was going to kill me and I… I didn’t want to die… I don’t want to die.”

“You aren’t going to die, Simon,” she said, but she felt like she had been gutted. Of course she knew… There was always a little sign that he knew too much. But, he was harmless. If Xander wanted to kill him, she just… there had to be more to it than this…

They could hear him before they reached the unit. He was throwing things and yelling. “Let him out!” Grace said. Simon unlocked the pad and opened the storage.

Xander was ready to lunge, but he saw them first. “Grace!” He hugged her tightly and then whimpered, “Xandria.” Simon stepped into the storage container. Xander had made quite a mark. So many things were tossed around… months of research and fixation…

“Simon… what is that?” Grace wondered, pointing the monitors. Her home, the inside of her car, her locker at work??? “Simon…?” Xander had plugged them back in and didn’t damage them… of all the things that he had taken his frustrations out on.

“I… just… needed…” She backed away. He stopped. Damage had been done.

Her lip was quivering and she was still holding on to Xander, who was sobbing, mid panic attack, yet still zoned out from the tranquilizers. She didn’t want to let go of him. He was clean, and now he had chemicals in his system, along with being locked up for however long he was conscious, the fear that maybe Simon had gone to find Grace and hurt her and surrounded by… what Grace could only think of as a room of horrors. Her photos, artwork, partial figures… he even had what appeared to be a mannequin or a life sized doll… and she didn’t want to let Simon out of her sight or be in his presence, simultaneously.

“X confirmed,” Xander whimpered, over and over. “X confirmed. X confirmed…”

“Shhh shhh shhh…” She strummed his hair and guided him over to Alexandria. “Take him home. Don’t… say anything to the others, yet. I’ll take care of this.” She gestured at Simon.

“By yourself?” Alexandria wondered, looking at Simon. He didn’t look like much, but he was a little bit larger than Grace and he had somehow gotten the drop on Xan, of all people. Xander wasn’t able to fight right now and did need to be brought to safety, but she didn’t know about leaving Grace alone, especially getting a look into this storage room.

“Yeah. Simon, toss me your car keys.” He bit his lip, and obeyed. “I’m gonna take his car and I’ll um… I’ll be okay.”

“No, Grace! He’s an X.”

“Who has he hurt, Xander? What child did he attack? What person has he abused or killed or did anything to?”

“This… This is fucked up, Grace, look at this!” Xander said, shaking Alexandria off of him. “You’re gonna give him an O? You’ll make him an O instead??? You trusted him, the first person you trusted and he violated that trust.” He began whispering to her, but everyone could still hear him, “You know how much damage I’ve been able to do with my reconnaissance… He’s doing what I do to perps, but to YOU. And his budget and his system is massive. You can’t let this stalker walk.”

And after that, he knew that he knew how to do Xander’s job, and do it better.

In the moment, he was more concerned by what Grace thought. Would she kill him for this? Surely not. That wasn’t the woman that he had come to know. Under all of the things that she made herself into, there was this precious woman who was soft and caring...

“He told me who he was, Xan. This is… This doesn’t feel good, but you can’t X him over it…” Simon smiled at the fact that she wasn’t willing to kill him. He didn’t like that she didn’t feel good, but presently, it pleased him more that she hadn’t dismissed him outright. So, he reflexively let out a pleased little chuckle and Xander broke free from her, determined he would take Simon out right then and there.

He wasn’t cohesive enough, but he still had pretty good form to punch (albeit not as hard as usual), and he managed to get him to the ground where… a gun fell off of him… Grace kicked it aside and Xander laughed, vindicated as his best friend actually crumbled before them. “You have a GUN?” Grace asked. “I’ve never seen you with a gun before, Simon…” her eyes were wide, shocked, frightened.

“I have a license…” He began to pick himself up from the ground.

“But… Why… did you bring your gun to see me ?” she asked in a small voice, already crying, holding her arms out for the sky to drop an answer into them. Her face showed him she’d deduced an answer on her own.

He shook his head, ��No. No. I wasn’t gonna… I would never hurt you, Grace! All I’ve wanted to do since I’ve met you is know you and love you! Why do you think I’ve never turned you in? You think that I wouldn’t do my research? I know what you’ve been doing. I don’t know where they vanish to, but I’m guessing it’s someplace for the dead.” He laughed nervously, but came too close, so that she flinched when he neared her and he froze… He shook his head. Why would she flinch? Why didn’t she understand that he wouldn’t hurt her? “Have I ever done anything but support and comfort you? Grace… My Doll…”

“Don’t.” She was crying, now and her eyes couldn’t manage to stay still as they retraced every thought of every interaction that they ever had. She shook her head, “Oh my God… I was never even a person to you, was I?”

“A person? Grace… People are disgusting... animals! They’re scum that prey on others and harm them. You’re someone who cleanses the world of such filth… So, no… You’re no person. You were always more than that and I just needed to BE with you!” He took a swallow and said, “I didn’t want it to come to this. I tried to be close to you organically and you pushed me away every time it felt too good, because you just couldn’t believe that anybody could adore the real you. You MADE me do this!”

“808, stay on the O,” Grace said. Her voice was cold, but he saw in her face that it hurt her to walk away from him. Alexandria picked up his gun and whipped out her knife.

“Grace, don’t leave. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. I’m just upset. Please don’t…” He tried to follow her.

“I can injure an O,” Alexandria said, pointing the gun at him as Grace and Xander got into Simon’s car. Simon pulled out his phone, but she slapped it from his hand. “Are you trying to make me kill you? Because, I really don’t like to do that. Not like this, anyway. An explosion or a fire, yeah. I hate getting blood on me. It’s hard to clean off and the smell makes me gag. But, behind them, you’d better believe that I will.”

He smirked and raised his hands, “I understand. She has that effect on people.”

“Come here…” She grabbed him and shoved him towards Xander’s car, popped the trunk and said, “Get in.”

“Are you going to kill me?” He seemed numb as he asked it.

“Grace said not to, so no. But, I’ve gotta make sure that you don’t get anywhere near her. So, hop in or I take out your limbs and throw you in.” She almost felt bad for him. Grace had just walked away from him and she obviously mattered a lot to the dude. But, he also was an enemy.

“That sounds unpleasant,” he said and climbed in. “What do you usually do to O’s?”

“Usually they don’t know we exist. We wait for them to fuck up to get the proof to bump them up to an X.”

“Grace doesn’t like to kill harmless people,” he said.

“We saw children die before they ever had the chance to even know who they were. You don’t kill innocents, then you’re no better than the nulls that we kill.”

“No matter what I did to get close to her, she was never going to let me into her world, was she?”

Alexandria sighed and stuck his gun into one of her pockets and zipped it up. She kept the knife brandished though. “Why would you want to be? Xan looked you up. You had academic trophies and shit. You were writing books as a child. You’re famous to people who give a fuck about books. Your mom loves you. You’ve got a sister or something. You get to speak on panels at conventions or go to them and play dress up, and that’s something you appear to love, and with people you have things in common with. Why was it so important to you to be…” she gestured at the storage with her blade, “This close to somebody like Grace?” ‘ I wish I never met these people,’ She didn’t add.

He crossed his hands over his belly and wrapped his fingers in each other. “Have you ever watched something die?”

She scoffed, “You know what we’re about. I’ve seen plenty of “somethings” die.”

“Then, you know how it is at the end of their lives. They fight. They move. They do anything to stay alive one moment longer. Even if it hurts. Even if it only kills them faster. Survival mode has been initiated and they will not stop until they recover from even the sense of death, or until they die…” He shut his eyes and began thinking about the pain in Grace’s when he first met her. “Seeing Grace live was a lot like watching something die. Always in survival mode, even if it hurt, even if it could kill her faster. With most situations, when you’re watching something die… you want to do something about that. You don’t just want to watch it die. Sometimes, you just can’t help. But, sometimes… they let you get close enough to take them in and patch them up and see them through.” He let out a sad chuckle. “She left survival mode when she was with me. She knew that I was there to help and to heal her.”

Alexandria had tears in her eyes and she turned her face towards the moon. “That’s not really love, though. I mean, it’s nice or whatever, in certain cases, but if the only reason that you wanted to be with her was so that you could save her, that’s some self important bullshit and only serves your ego.”

“Only?” He sat up, but she didn’t get alarmed. He adjusted, and sat next to her. “Yes, it felt really good to know that I had been given access to her, but you saw how she was with me… have you ever seen her that way with anyone? Xander thinks he helped her but he’s the person who sees you helping and comes along and says, “Leave them alone. They don’t need help”… Then you both just watch them die…”

“Man… What. Even are these metaphors of?”

“That one was about the bird that Paul Levchefsky said was fine and told me that if I touched it, its mom wouldn’t want it anymore. It died. Paul just continued playing at recess, and there was a dead bird near my action figures that had just died because I didn’t do anything to save it…”

“In Paul’s defense, if you were young enough for recess, you totally couldn’t save that damn bird on your own. They have like… bird doctor specialists or something.”

“I watched a lot of shows and documentaries on animal habitats and wildlife rescue whenever I was a kid and I was very smart. I could have at least tried, if he hadn’t interfered.” She shrugged her shoulders. Simon kept talking, “I was fixated on those shows for years. I remember seeing certain scenes where the cameras would be filming something being mauled to death, crying out while being ripped to shreds…”

“In a wildlife rescue show?” She asked, laughing.

“What? No… two different… Animal habitat shows AND wildlife rescue shows…”

“Shit, I was gonna say…”

“We are so off topic…” he did notice that she wasn’t holding her knife as tightly.

“Doesn’t matter. We have nowhere to be at the moment. We can chill and talk about Grace… and animals being ripped to shreds, apparently.”

Back to his point, “The cameras recorded for us. We were able to see these things. My mom would be like, ‘Why would you want to see something like this?’ and the truth was I didn’t. I hated seeing animals die. I hated seeing it, but it was nature. It was for their survival. I’d just ask her, ‘Why would anybody want to record it?’ They recorded it because they wanted those of us who weren’t in the wild to know how it was. It was allegedly educational. They’d have a British guy explaining what you already were seeing with your own eyes, just in case you couldn’t comprehend why everything was so brutal and why you couldn’t turn away. People are similar. I’ve been watching people for a long time. They’re interesting to a certain degree. But, despite what reality television series would have us believe, if you looked at people’s lives, there’s not much to be interested in over an extended period of time. The only people that we want to see is one with a story that gives us that feeling that we get when we watch animals in the wild.”

“Are you comparing Grace to a wild animal?”

“I’m comparing mankind to wild animals. Grace is... something else. There’s never been something in the wild like her before. She’s seen what animals do to each other and she’s stepped in on their behalf. She’s like a saint…” Alexandria stared at him, looking at this zealous passion in his eyes as he marvelled over Grace and how wonderful she was. He didn’t know her like she knew her. Grace was definitely the Queen Bee, but Saint was absolutely stretching the truth.

He laughed again, “St. Catherine… You know… I think I know which St. Catherine she chose her last name for.” Alexandria looked uncomfortable. “St. Catherine of Alexandria!” He cheered. She didn’t seem phased by this discovery of his. “The patron saint of… philosophers and scholars? Grace loves reading, has a Messiah complex and a friend named Alexandria…”

“She wasn’t thinking of me whenever she named herself that. It’s just a coincidence. Definitely probably the… scholar thing, or whatever you said. She does think she’s so smart. But, if she’s so smart, how did she let you get this close?”

He smirked, “Almost seems like she wanted me there, huh?” He shrugged his shoulders and laid in the trunk again. Alexandria had all but put her knife away. She was thinking about that one statement. Out of everything else this man said, (and he could talk a lot), that was the one that wouldn’t leave her mind, even as he spouted out all of the facts that he remembered from when he read up on St. Catherine of Alexandria (to predict why Grace chose that last name. Hell, she could have just chosen from a list or something!)

But… for her to not notice that Simon was watching her so closely… IF she didn’t want him there, that meant that she maybe was in those last moments, before death. She was weakened or dimmed, somehow. She… was potentially a threat to herself and the operation and most likely a liability… Xan would NEVER hear that. Not about his Grace, and look at the mess she’d gotten him into tonight! He’s got tranqs in his system. As a recovering addict, was having a full blown meltdown and really believed that this guy needed to go to the Field of Nulls. The problem was that usually, neither of them were wrong. Xander made mistakes, but was rarely wrong. Grace didn’t usually make mistakes, but had obviously made one this time, unless the throwaway comment was accurate and she wanted this from Simon… Alexandria was vexed, and Simon was STILL talking

Simon’s car was in the driveway whenever Alexandria let him out of Xander’s trunk at home. “She’s gone.” He sighed. “I’m going to find her, you know. I’m never going to let her go.”

“That’s not my problem,” Alexandria knew that when it came to that, Xander would definitely make it hers. In order to make it hers in less time, she wouldn’t mention that little comment to him.

“It was nice to meet you.”

“As a hostage?”

“I didn’t consider myself a hostage. We were in fellowship. Discussing Grace.”

“I don’t worship her.”

“Then why do you do everything that you do for her?” She furrowed her eyebrows and he nodded, “You do it for him. He’s got a girlfriend though. At least, they seem… cozy…” He saw her eyebrow twitching. “Of course, you know that. You’re all a close knit group of friends. That’s precisely why Grace was all alone whenever he was incapacitated...”

“Until next time, marked O. Be careful.”

“Same to you, 808…” She clenched her fists and took off walking down the hill of his driveway.

It had never been used, so she broke it in with housewarming, even though she didn’t want to be there long. Her friends all came. Xander complained the entire time that with that O out there, they were foolish to come to her safehouse in Canada. But, she was both confident that she had no sign of this place anywhere that Simon would have had access to, and she was lonely.

Xander didn’t want Alexandria to come. He told Grace that he feared that she had been compromised while keeping Simon away from her while she got away. To not start an argument, she simply let it go. She and Alexandria were once very close, but they hadn’t been lately. They’d always all be Apex, but 808 had left them for a time, too… Grace wasn’t worried. Xander was taking care of things. “Training someone to do Heath and Jalicia’s work isn’t easy. Heath’s not here to show his system and…” he looked over at Jalicia, who may have been asleep or not, with a cowboy hat resting on her face. “I don’t like to bother her. It’s still all too much, I think.”

“I have a responsibility to help everyone that I said I would help. So… I’ll see what I can do. I still have plenty of shady contacts from back in the day...”

“We can’t trust them. We can only trust us.”

“Well, according to you, we can’t even do that. Alexandria was “compromised?”

“Well… She’s been behaving oddly. Like she has ideas that she didn’t have before. I know he tried to get into her mind, like he tried to get into mine… like he…” He began to fasten and unfasten the velcro on his shoes.

“Like he got into mine?”

“She did have one point… There’s no way that you’re both on your A game and didn’t realize what you were dealing with. I think he played every angle that he learned from watching you to make you vulnerable… So, maybe it’s good that you took this vacation. You can even work from here…”

She blinked away tears. “I’m all alone here. I hate being alone. Alone is when the monsters get to you.”

“Hey. What did we say whenever I had to be in rehab? It’s not forever, just ‘til it’s better.”

“There was a building full of people there. I’m off the grid and far from home.”

“Let me deal with him, and then you could come back.”

She raised an eyebrow, “I can come back any time I please.”

“Of course you can.” He felt embarrassed. “I only meant… I don’t think it’s safe.”

“What’s he been doing?”

“I’m making sure he’s not able to reach out to you… Unless that’s not why you’re asking?”

She felt hot, “He was a soft spot, Xan. Somewhere that I could rest my head and just breathe for a little bit. That was taken away from me, and I’m sorry that I haven’t bounced back in a matter of days.”

“I watched you bounce back in a few minutes after your first beheading.”

“That was before I realized that monsters are people like us… I thought a steward was some type of dragon. They’re all people. Horrible people… but people. Simon wasn’t a horrible person. He did something that I never thought anybody could do… he made me feel like I loved him, and it was different than how I love you. It was different than how I love Mom and Dad. It was… I felt like he was in my system… in my bloodstream.”

“That was fucking oxytocin.” She bursted into tears and he chuckled too, even though he was serious.

She leaned on him and gave him a hug. “No. This is oxytocin. That was something else.”

“Whatever it was… you don’t need it.”

“No. Whatever it was, I didn’t know I needed it… and now, I do.” She grabbed her phone and went online. “I want so badly to check his pages. Then, I wonder, does that make me a hypocrite? I got so mad…”

“That he placed cameras in your personal spaces without your permission. He could have cyber stalked you all day and night for all I care. But, I wasn’t going to allow him to do that .” He could tell from her face that she was about to justify things and take up for him. She had been back and forth with this for the past few days. Reminding them that he didn’t actually hurt anyone, confessing that she told him that stalking wasn't even that bad (one time), and regretting walking away from him and fleeing town...“Remember that he showed up with a gun.” She nodded. That was always the reality check. He did show up with a gun. Why? If not to harm or threaten her? And just seeing a gun (sometimes just in media) gave her a visceral alarm. The red flags were drenched in blood and she didn’t want it to be her blood. She had too much work left to do, after this little staycation. She had to let Simon go the way that she had to let everyone else that she loved and lost go.

The storage room went up in flames the day that Grace found out about it. Simon tried to salvage what he could and had the storage insurance, but the things that couldn’t be - certain recordings and photos that he no longer had access to, with Grace blocking him and blotting him out! He was trying to be sensible about things. It was a volatile situation. He knew that, but he just couldn’t believe that she was going to stay angry about this. The things that she had been through in her life, and this was where she chose to draw a line? Of course, he was grateful that she hadn’t allowed him to be killed. He truly feared for his life whenever he saw Xander Helstrom.

That was why whenever he was trailing Grace’s friends, if Xander ever appeared, Simon quickly caught ghost. He knew that he had at least warmed Alexandria up a little bit whenever they talked. She didn’t have friends outside of this group (like most of them), but the difference was… she wasn’t really friends with them, either. She felt more like a trauma bonded obligatory participant than like one of Grace’s other inner circle acolytes. The ones that he needed to work on were those other two ladies.

He rented an apartment to rebuild his… research facility, and fortunately for him, he knew where an apartment had just been vacated, and he also had the money to get it immediately, telling the renter that he needed it too urgently to wait until they cleaned it out, so he would just do so and was willing to sign a waiver stating such… Grace left a lot behind. Nothing about the organization, of course, but just other things. Whenever you were related to people like the Monroes, you didn’t really need to hold on to things. She took what mattered to her. She hadn’t left behind anything that might be sentimental, but her furniture, many of her clothes, and stuff like bedding, towels, etc were still there… Simon searched through everything and… nothing that he had ever given her was there. “She took me with her…” Or she threw you in the trash…

He set up anew in the space and didn’t get rid of any of her old things, either, though he moved much of it around to clear a room for all of the things he needed.

Simon read several “tips” on hacking, talked to Tulip and some of his computer nerd associates. Hypothetical questions… you would expect them to only be able to go so far, but for the most part, a few laughed about his “nefarious plans” with the information and kept talking but several didn’t seem bothered at all. They’d ask, “What project are you working on?” and depending on how well he knew them, he might say, “I’ve been trying to look up an old friend who I heard moved away, but I’ve lost her info, or research for a story.” Either way, the only person who seemed bothered was Tulip, and he’d tried to be as vague as possible with her.

“I told you not to come to me with anything else crazy.”

“How is this crazy? I’m just trying to figure out what systems this guy used and in what way!”

“Well, this guy, whoever he is, was doing some pretty sad work and honestly, if someone were to try to track him down, they’d find exactly what they were looking for… A lot of spying on a lot of people, people… who it looks like have VANISHED, Simon.”

"WAIT. So, this hacker wasn't even good at what he was doing?"

"He wasn't wonderful… I mean the cops probably wouldn't catch him but hopefully the FBI or CIA or something would. I say those because there are dozens of missing people in this man's computer. Simon… I told you not to…"

"Tulip, listen to me. This is very important, okay? It's life or death."

"Dear God…"

"I need you to give me that information and tell me how I would be able to defend against somebody doing what you're doing right now."

"Simon. Is this for that woman? Grace? Your mom told my mom that you're "seeing someone" named Grace. I thought it was odd, because of the information we discussed before and…"

"This is a dead person's computer. What he has on it is why he's dead."

"You promised, Simon. This is really unfair…"

"Life or death, Tulip. Could be mine, could be somebody else's…"

She looked at the first figure that Simon ever made her, of one of her first video game characters and whispered, "This is the last time that you get to do something like this. I feel manipulated and I don't appreciate that this is potentially dangerous to you or anyone else!"

"I'm sorry, Tools… I had nobody else. You're my only friend and I just happened to be lucky enough to have you be the best at this kinda stuff." She was there, because he heard her sigh repeatedly as she thought about it. “I’m really in love with her. She found out about me looking into her and she felt betrayed.”

“She’s justified in that.”

“And now, she’s out there alone, and people like those on that list, the ones who vanished… I know that you’re in the process of researching them… They’re bad people. They would hurt her. I just want to protect her.”

“I would ask if you’ve been disappearing these guys, since I obviously don’t know you at all… but the timeline isn’t right. They’ve been disappearing since before you ever looked into her,” she groaned, “Why on Earth could you not have mediocre white man first world problems? I don’t want to cross the mafia because you want to… whatever it is that you’re doing with these people… I… What is happening to them? Do you at least know that?”

“Thankfully, I don’t. I wouldn’t want to have to give you any more madness. But, from what I understand, Grace is helping to take down a child trafficking ring.”

“Taking them down, alright.”

“Is that so wrong?”

“We all say stuff like, “I’d like to get rid of them all!” but… None of us actually do it, most of us don’t actually want to do it, and all of us should not do it. We just don’t know enough. What if they’ve done nothing wrong?”

“They all have.”

“But how do you know, Simon? Did you see them? Were you there when they did it? Was it real, or was it an interpretation of scared children? There’s just so many variables, and with the types of proof that your dead source came up with… why not just turn these people in? Why do they have to vanish in order to handle them?”

“Look up Washington’s laws on these things and see for yourself.”

She sighed again but it was a different type. “10 years does not seem like a lot of time for trafficking.”

“And it would have to be proven, beyond a reasonable doubt. I just had to convince my closest friend that I’m not working for the Seattle mafia, if that is even a goddamn thing.” She chuckled. “I don’t say it enough, but I appreciate you, and especially this mess from this year. I never should have involved you. But… your tuition is paid up!”

“Therapy is next, Buddy.”

“Send me the bill. It’s done. I PROMISE promise.”

And after that, he knew how to do Heath’s job, and do it better.

Whenever he first went to Heath Farmer’s home, it was indecent. He knew two things at the time. One - that he was killed on the night that Grace first asked him to lie for her and her friends and two - that he seemed to be where Grace picked up the paperwork. So, whenever Jalicia was having a moving out garage sale, Simon stopped by to give Grace a cupcake, look around, and phish his computer on the sly. He found out soon that Jalicia had been Heath’s long time girlfriend, and also that he eventually planned to marry her. Heath’s computer was like a shrine to her. Her photos were backgrounds and there were folders of them and she was in his calendar a lot and… They LIVED together. Why did he need this calendar? What was important was that Heath left a lot for Simon to work with.

This woman was young. She wasn’t even old enough to drink yet, but apparently was really great at games and puzzles…

There were photos of her gaming (Simon knew to try to find out what games and what her handles were online), photos of her putting puzzles together, finished products, several of those puzzle books in their home, and Simon wondered if she ever put this little gift into play for Grace. How might she have contributed? What did she do for work, he wondered… Not that it mattered for this project, as Heath Farmer’s work didn’t have much to do with his job for Grace and these people, but he was curious, all the same.

Alexandria Jones was not a threat. He knew how to do Xander’s job. He knew how to do Heath’s job. He pinned up two photos of his next studies. Jalicia Barrett (227) and Sunetra Kincade (1000). He placed a sticky note on the corner of hers: Xander’s GF? Destroy that.

12. On Your Side

#AU Infinity Train #Infinity Train #Nesha Fanfiction #Infinity Train Fanfiction #fics #People Watching

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kob131 · 4 years

Text

https://sssn-neptune-vasilias.tumblr.com/post/621976494005207040/are-you-in-the-mood-to-go-off-on-why-weiss-is-bad

Weiss was bad because she was just blatantly rude, disrespectful, obnoxious and arrogant during the early seasons. While, yes, her feelings were valid with everything pertaining to Jaune- being rude to someone like Jaune was back during season one and two is totally justified- how she was acting towards Ruby and Yang and Blake was just abhorrent. I get that some characters are just abrasive and catty and stuff- and some people like that about characters and that’s totally okay!- but Weiss landed up higher on my list of “annoying characters” than Draco Malfoy, and was only one step below Katsuki Bakugo, so like... she pissed me the fuck off. There was literally nothing redeeming about her until like, 1.10 when we find out she can actually not be a total bitch for longer than 2 seconds and had an actual conversation with Ruby.

So you have no concept of a flawed protagonist, especially considering other examples you give.

Weiss is bad because victim complex was also so annoying to watch. “I’m a victim” she shouts at Blake, wiping her tears with her million dollar handkerchief. “My daddy took his anger out on me when the White Fang hurt his multi-billion dollar empire,” she says as she tries to justify her abject racism against Faunus, as if that same empire hadn’t orphaned people and branded others as property. She was infuriating during season 1, and then at the end of the Stray arc, she doesn’t even apologize to Blake for the racism! She doesn’t apologize to Blake for the dirty names she was calling Sun or the racist things she was saying about the White Fang Faunus or for scaring Blake and making her so uncomfortable she accidentally outed herself and then ran away! Instead she forces Blake to apologize and they hug it out. What the hot fuck was that about?

You know, this very point illustrates why I loathe this man from the depths of my heart

He ignores the fact that being rich does NOT make parental abuse any better and then tries to blame Weiss, someone who has NO say in the company’s decisions and is even shown to NOT LIKE THEM, for the SDC’s actions. He also blames Weiss for Blake’s own insecurities even though the show made it clear she didn’t want ANYONE, not just Weiss, to know that shit. And then forgets that Blake apologized WITHOUT PROMPTING before WEISS cut her off to show she didn’t care.

He ignores people’s pain, blames them for the actions of others, ignores context and just makes shit up- all to justify his own feelings instead of being an adult and learning to respect the truth. You’re no adult, you’re a child stuck in a man’s body.

Weiss is bad because the narrative just pretends that she got over her racism after season 1 and just... doesn’t address the fact that she was racist and most certainly still harbors racist beliefs. She didn’t talk to Blake about her experiences as a Faunus or being in the White Fang, she didn’t take a Faunus history class, she didn’t attend any rallies, she didn’t talk to friends like Neon or Velvet or Sun about their experiences, she didn’t do any work to move past her racism. But the narrative pretends she did. You don’t just become not racist because you just decided to. Shaking off one’s racism, homophobia, sexism, transphobia, classism, ableism, xenophobia, etc. is a constant journey with no real end point. Just a constant attempt at being better. You don’t grow up in a homophobic society and then one day decide “ah, I’ve finally shaken off all my cultural biases! I am no longer homophobic!” It just doesn’t work that way. And if it did, it definitely wouldn’t happen in twelve hours looking for a friend you threatened to call the police on.

Except does it really? Weiss is still uncomfortable around Sun and doesn’t help a Fanaus again until Velvet when she runs in to protect her at what she assumed was the cost of her life. It sounds more like she became comfortable with Blake.

Also source for that ‘threaten to call the police’ thing. No wait, I’ll do it for you!

Weiss: "Oh! You know what might be able to help? The police!"

Ruby: (crossing her arms in irritation) "Ugh, Weiss..."

Weiss: "It was just an idea!"

Ruby: (walking down the sidewalk) "Yeah, a bad one."

Yang: (following behind Ruby) "Weiss, I think we should hear her side of the story before we jump to any conclusions."

Weiss: (following behind Yang) "I think that when we hear it, you'll all realize I was right!"

Gee, sounds more like a bad joke.

Weiss is bad because she’s such a fucking white-savior that my friends call her WSS in our group chat; Weiss Savior Schnee.

SSSN, I've literally seen you use race as an insult

“What’s that supposed to mean” is such a grating fucking question to hear from her when she of all people should know exactly what it’s “supposed to mean” because she meant the same thing not too long ago!

ALmost like she had...character development.

Even when Blake clearly doesn’t want to stand up for herself and just wants to leave (which is infuriating in itself) Weiss decides to be her White Knight and come to the rescue and make a big thing out of something Blake didn’t even want to be involved in. She didn’t throw that drunk asshole in a dumpster for Blake. She did it for herself. Because she wanted the ego boost. It was performative.

Or you know....she doesn’t like that shit personally. You know, same reason I’m here.

That’s why Weiss is bad.

If you wanna see my previous opinions on Weiss, I literally have a tag called “Weiss sucks” lmao

So basically: Personal bullshit. Gee what a shock.

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coconutknightshade · 4 years

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Hii, I hope this is okay.. I get bullied a lot at school and I was wondering if you could write a fic where Flash is bullying Peter and they get into a fight and Tony gets called to the school? If not that's okay!

I can’t believe I posted this on Ao3 and forgot to post it from my drafts. Forgive me, my salt. (@blondsak - Literally cannot say forgive me these days without finishing it off completely so cheers for that my dude)

A/N:

Okay, not to be a fandom mom here, but as someone who went through it growing up, I can empathize. Which means I can also empathize with how overwhelming it can be.

Because of this, I want to provide a bit of information about the 24/7 Crisis Text Line. Reaching out to this helpline is completely free (outside of your standard texting fees) and connects you to a trained volunteer/crisis counselor. It's very easy, and aims to be a stress free experience. If it helps, what's going to happen is - After your initial text, there will be a few automated messages before you're connected with a Crisis Counselor. This may take a few minutes, but you will be connected.

This Crisis Text Line isn't limited to any specific subject, and is prepared to assist with issues ranging from bullying to depression to the current pandemic. If you aren't comfortable texting, their site also provides additional resources and helpful information pertaining to several issues.

USA & Canada: Text HOME to 741741 UK: Text HOME to 85258 Ireland: Text HOME to 086 1800 280

/Mom-ing Over. On to the fic!

***

Shove Off Word Count: 2,960

It's when Peter's face - chin then nose - collides with the floor that, in a haze of sleep, he thinks to himself, "something is very wrong."

Peter Parker does not simply fall out of bed.

With a grunt, he pushes himself from the floor just enough to roll onto his back. The ceiling is… Blurry? That can't be right. Their apartment building is older. The kind of old that means it was built when popcorn ceilings, for God only knows what reason, was stylish. But the thing is, Peter can barely make them out. Even scarier, everything is silent. He can't make out the sound of May rustling around in the other room- Hell, by the distinct absence of her heartbeat, Peter doesn't even know if she's home.

Everything is so quiet, and after nearly a year with enhanced everything, the sudden silence is deafening.

Peter wholeheartedly panics.

He lurches forward into a sitting position, subconsciously pressing his hands all across his chest and abdomen as if to make sure there is no physical harm, all the while glancing around for his phone. The clock reads 7:26, and a high pitch distressed sound leaves him.

"Fuck. May!"

---

It's when he steps into the classroom and sees everyone's eyes on him that he realizes it's going to be a shit day. He's late. Really late. And it's not entirely because he overslept. No. He's truly late because he and May spent twenty minutes trying to track down his old glasses… And another ten minutes fretting over his sudden loss of abilities.

"Hey Peter, I don't know if you've realized, but you're wearing glasses."

Peter groans as he slides into the seat next to Ned, pushing the aforementioned glasses further up his nose and flipping to the appropriate page in the textbook. When he glances up, Ned is staring at him expectantly.

"Yeah, fam, I know." There's no way Ned is going to leave it at that - not that Peter can blame him - and so continues with a pained sigh. "I don't have answers, Ned. I don't even know where to begin. I woke up this way, and I'm pretty sure it has something to do with whatever was in that dude's syringe the other night. Like, a virus or something."

"Holy shit." Ned drops a sympathetic hand to Peter's shoulder. "Do you think it's permanent?"

"I sure as shit hope not. I'm hoping Doctor Strange can take care of it. I just, ya know, need to get in touch with him on the D-L. I feel like I'm moving through the day behind a foggy glass window. It's like my senses are dialed down to almost nothing. I hate it."

"Oh no," Ned's voice is monotone, dry. "You're a pleb like the rest of us now."

Peter playfully rolls his eyes and elbows his best friend. "You know that's not what I meant."

"What did Mr. Stark say?"

Peter side-eyes Ned, already looking contrite.

"What did…? Ned, I can't tell him. I'm an Avenger -"

"No, you aren't."

"Don't get technical, Ned. It wounds me." This time Ned rolls his eyes with a grin. "Anyway. I can't tell Mr. Stark. It's embarrassing, ya know? Spider-Man isn't supposed to have asthma."

"Listen, Peter. You can't not tell Mr. Stark. He's Iron Man. You spend, like, every other weekend with him and sometimes you get to work as like, the B-Team. He'll want to know. Besides, we don't even know if it's permanent."

"Ned, this sucks." He drops his head into his hands.

---

It's when he's walking down the hallway, books held tight against his chest that things get really interesting. Yes, he's had nearly two asthma attacks since History, and for the first time in nearly two years, he's had zero appetite at lunch. But-

He and Ned are talking about how long he can reasonably wait before he absolutely has to tell Mr. Stark when someone bumps into him. Well, not so much bumps into him as shoves their shoulder against his as they pass, harsh enough that he loses his balance. His textbooks spill onto the floor, and he has to close his eyes to keep it together. Fucking Flash Thompson.

"Watch where you're going, Penis." Peter wants to wipe that smirk off his arrogant face. "Or are those glasses just some pathetic attempt at aesthetics?"

"Shove off, Flash. Bullying me won't suddenly make mommy love you."

Something in Flash's eyes spark, and it's as he's closing in on the three, maybe four feet between them, that Peter thinks, shit. He stumbles backwards as Flash firmly places his hands on Peter's chest and shoves. He's furious, and Peter swallows thickly. "You want to try that again, Parker?"

The threat of things turning physical looms just out of reach, and Peter automatically takes a step back. Self-control. As much as the thought of knocking Flash on his ass fills him with unadulterated glee, he can't do it. He knows he can't - That he has to be the bigger person. With his abilities -

Peter sucks in a breath, eyes scanning the crowd for his best friend. Ned, always on the same wavelength, is already wide-eyed and nodding somewhat emphatically. It's the adrenaline of the moment, an opportunity afforded to him that likely won't come around again. While Flash is usually all talk, the two of them have tied up on numerous occasions. From those scuffles, it's only ever Peter who walks away hurt. Because, yeah.

But it's different this time - This time Peter doesn't have an unfair advantage. No, this time he has an opportunity to push back. And, maybe, he can put a stop to it once and for all. It's with that in mind that Peter raises his chin and says, "You heard me."

Flash is still invading his personal bubble when he says, "At least I have a mommy."

This time it's Peter who shoves Flash away from him. "This again? You've got a real hard-on about me being an orphan. Or maybe… you just have a real hard-on for me. Is that it?"

"Fuck off, Parker. You wish! I've got better taste in partners than someone as sad and pathetic as you. A liar- News flash: Jerking off to Tony Stark doesn't make you his personal in-"

Peter's fist connects with Flash's nose, resulting in what has to be the most satisfying crunch he's ever heard in his life. He steps back and shakes his hand, shakes out the pain. It's positively electrifying, but he barely has time to let the euphoria sink in before he's being slammed up against the locker, Flash's hands fisted in his shirt. The blow has his glasses slipping off his face, but he can still see the blood dripping from Flash's nose and the fury in his eyes. He pulls Peter away from the locker and then shoves him back against it, looking satisfied when Peter's head connects with the hard metal.

"You're dead."

Peter doesn't respond, just grips Flash's wrists tightly and headbutts him without thought. It's enough to force Flash into releasing his hold before stumbling back with a surprised yelp, hand flying up to where their heads connected. Peter's ears are ringing, a headache already blossoming from both the headbutt and where it had been slammed into the locker.

"Oh, yeah? I'm shaking," he says through his teeth, crossing the distance between the two.

It's not long before they're rolling around on the ground, wailing on each other in a long-overdue brawl. When finally Peter is being pulled off the ground by Coach, he's got a split lip, a bloody nose, and what promises to be a very spectacular shiner. But God, does he feel good.

---

It's when Peter's sitting in the office with toilet paper up his left nostril and an icepack pressed to his face that the pain really begins to set it. His everything hurts: face, head, ribs. And for once, unless his spidey powers somehow miraculously return overnight, he's going to wear the injuries as a badge of honor. After a few years of letting Flash push him around - sometimes literally - knowing if he fought back, he'd hurt the kid, he finally had the chance to do something about it.

May is going to be pissed.

Except, it's not May that steps into the front office radiating anger, and when Peter spots Tony Stark, he pales, blood running cold. Forget May being pissed…

Peter Parker is fucked.

"Mr. Stark," his voice cracks. Tony won't even look at him, jaw set as he approaches the front desk.

"I'm here for Peter Parker." Tony's voice is as icy as Peter's skin suddenly feels. The receptionist, Sherry, stands frozen in place, mouth opening and closing in surprise. She must sense the tension rolling off him in waves, for she recovers quickly, clearing her throat and looking down at what Peter knows are the suspension forms in front of her.

"Peter was in an altercation with another student, both of whom were left… Well, looking like that." She nods in Peter's direction and finally Tony turns towards him, eyes sharp as he appraises the damage. Peter wilts, pointedly avoiding his mentor's gaze. "Per school policy, they'll face suspension. The length of which is at Principal Morita's discretion. He's currently with Mr. Thompson and his father."

Tony takes the forms handed to him and hesitates for a brief second. "Do you have somewhere private that I can speak with Peter?"

Maybe, if he's lucky, Peter will have a heart attack before Sherry answers. Unfortunately, no such luck. She nods and gestures towards a small conference room attached to the main office. Tony turns towards Peter, narrows his eyes, and jerks his head ever so slightly towards the door. God, Peter wants the floor to open and swallow him whole. Gingerly he crosses the office and into the conference room, not turning towards Tony until the door is shut.

The man is downright angry and, while Peter gets it, he also doesn't? Like, sure. Peter is a superhero. He's supposed to be above all of this, but he's also a teenager. They aren't out there in the streets, there are no Avenger - or even Spider-Man - level threats. So really, Tony hadn't even needed to show up. It's not like the man can be embarrassed by him. Not when he so easily could have circumvented any connection between the two of them by simply sending Happy in his place, or really any other possibility that didn't include his physical presence. It's not like anyone believed the legitimacy of Peter's internship anyway. Though, this definitely isn't his preferred route for validation.

Yeah, Peter thinks, a little self righteously. He's a teenager. And currently, he's a teenager without superpowers, and once Tony realizes that he'll cool off. It's not like the ferry instance- No lives were put at stake. He just needed to explain…

"You've got ten seconds, Kid."

"Listen, I know what you're thinking, but-"

"Ohh," Tony drags out, unimpressed, "I highly doubt that."

"No, I'm serious. But the thing is-"

"There is no thing, Peter! What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking-"

"No, Pete, wrong answer. You weren't thinking. If you had been thinking-"

"I thought I had ten seconds!" Peter interrupts angrily, tired of being interrupted himself. Tony's nostrils flare, but he stands straighter and crosses his arms over his chest expectantly.

"I am sick and tired of Flash Thompson walking around this school like he owns the place! He's a bully, Mr. Stark, and-"

"Spider-Man stands up against bullies. I get it Peter, but at school-"

"Ten seconds," Peter interrupts again, anger only deepening. He knows where Tony is going. He's Spider-Man, but at school, he's just Peter Parker- He has to be just Peter Parker. He can't walk around plain as day flexing his abilities and fighting ignorant bullies who don't know when to keep their mouth shut- Not when fighting back risks injuring them disproportionately.

"Your ten seconds are over, the adult is speaking now. I cannot believe-"

"I lost my abilities," Peter whisper-shouts through his teeth. He's not being heard. "I woke up without them, and it sucks, Mr. Stark. Real bad. But I'm not going to pass on the chance to stick up for myself and my friends. I'm done letting Flash Thompson bully me. I'm done letting him shove me around, and I'm done going home with bruises - no matter how temporary - just because I can't de-"

"Hold it," he cuts him off with a finger. The Finger, Peter has dubbed it. The zip it one. Peter holds his breath, waiting for Tony's reaction to this new information. He knows it's irrational, but can't entirely shake the feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach when his brain provides him with - When Tony realizes Spider-Man is gone, that you're just a kid without any abilities, it's all over. Without Spider-Man, you're just a bright kid from Queens.

That's the thing with insecurity - Knowing is one thing, but feeling is a whole other matter, usually acting without the brain as a pilot. Therefore, after a half-second preparing for his Doom and Gloom Worst Case Scenario, Peter is caught off guard when Tony merely continues with, "More bruises? Meaning, other fights?"

Peter frowns, confused that that's what Tony's chosen to focus on. He stumbles over his words when he says, "Well, no. I don't fight back- That would be wrong. But since ya know, like I said, I don't have my abilities, I wasn't going to pass up the opportunity to do something about it."

Tony pinches the bridge of his nose. "Peter, why didn't you tell me that you were being bullied? We could have done something about it." Again, Tony not immediately acknowledging what Peter feels is the bigger issue here catches him further off guard, and he once again stumbles over his words.

"Because... I didn't think it was relevant?" His brows are furrowed, taking in Tony's agitated expression that doesn't seem to relate at all to the fact that he's lost his abilities. How is this not the more pressing issue? What's Tony's beef here?

"Didn't think it was- How is it not relevant, Kid? I ask you how school is going every time I see you, and you don't tell me you're being bullied? What gives?"

"I don't know? I didn't think you'd-" He cuts off, staring at his feet, feeling utterly stupid now for what he was about to say.

"You didn't think I would care." The hurt in his voice is subtle, but it's there. Peter's head shoots up, eyes wide.

"No! No, it's not that at all, Mr. Stark! It's just, you have so much going on right now, and you're taking care of so many things, ya know? And it makes sense that Spider-Man would fall in line with that, but you just have so much on your plate-"

"You didn't think I would have time for both Spider-Man and Peter Parker." It's a statement, not a question. Peter's gut sinks at the way Tony's voice is now thick with hurt. "Christ, Kid. Do you think I only care about Spider-Man? That I only prioritize Spider-Man?"

Peter purses his lips, eyes narrowing pensively as he searches for an answer that will dig him out of a hole he's unintentionally buried himself in without even knowing how deep of a hole it actually is.

"No?"

Tony drops down heavily into one of the chairs near the conference table. "Listen, Peter. I don't care about Spider-Man. I mean, I do, obviously. But you are my priority. If you decide to give it all up tomorrow, I'll still be here. Nothing would change - I'll still want you over, I'll still want to know how you're doing. And I will definitely want to know if you're being bullied."

"So, you're not mad that I got into a fight because it wouldn't have been a fair fight, you're-"

"I'm pissed because you were in a fight at all, Pete. I realize the irony here, but violence doesn't solve everything. Especially cases like this. I wish you would have talked to me. Or anyone. Even Happy would have been an option."

They sit in silence for a moment, Tony rubbing his forehead and Peter wringing his hands together.

"Mr. Stark?"

Tony sighs, raising his head. He looks exhausted now, and Peter winces, knowing just how deeply wrong he was.

"Yeah, Kid?"

"I'm being bullied," he begins quietly, hesitant almost as he meets Tony's gaze. "By this kid at school. He's been an ass to me for years, but it's gotten worse lately. Sometimes it gets a little physical, but not always. Usually, I'm able to shrug it off- Just Flash being Flash. But it's become harder. Especially when he targets Ned."

Tony eyes him with consideration, corners of his mouth twitching into what could have become a borderline amused, soft grin. He nods, almost as if he's come to some sort of decision, and pulls himself to his feet. "I'll take care of it, Pete."

At that, Peter can't help the slow spread of his own smile, expression now lightened into one of relief. It quickly falls though when Tony stretches an arm out towards him.

"C'mon, kid. Time to face the music." Peter groans as he steps towards Tony, who wraps an arm around his shoulders and guides him to the door. It dawns on him that after all of this, he'll still have to face May.

"And, about the other thing?" he whispers as they cross the threshold back into the office.

Tony stops, turns so that he's facing Peter head-on, hands still gripping his shoulders, when he says, "That one, we'll take care of together."

#irondad #irondad & spiderson #ironfamily #coconut writes #shove off #tony stark #peter parker

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