#I’m in awe like if you’re doing a physics masters you’re insane to me

[dodgebolts]

wait this is so random but you’re the only person I’ve ever seen who knows how to code but has trouble with physics is it more the fundamental approach or specific parts of physics that you struggle with (I study physics at uni and like talking about it you sorryyyy)

-🌻

honestly I have no idea 😭😭😭 I think it’s the fact that I have a lot of trouble visualizing things so even in like algebra-based mechanics if someone asks me about circular motion my brain malfunctions a little bit

[scripttorture]

Hello! I have a few questions related to your most recent post and the definition of torture. You said:

"A trained person who was never tortured will always out perform someone whose training involved torture."

According to everything else I have seen on your blog, this makes sense - the mental and physical trauma from being tortured have lasting effects which make certain tasks more difficult.

However, this seems to juxtapose certain tropes I've seen in US military training advertisements. For example, "Hell Week" in the Navy SEAL training seems like it would be torture if it was forced upon someone (like if the soldiers didn't sign up for it and didn't have the option to quit.). *Hell Week is when soldiers are training continuously for 5 days in freezing, wet conditions, with little more than 4 hours of sleep for the entire week, under insane amounts of physical and mental stress.

- If someone chose to be tested both mentally and physically, I feel like it wouldn't be torture. However, if the same exact conditions were forced upon someone else (testing their mental and physical limits without their consent or understanding), does your quote above mean that the person who did not have a choice would not reap the benefits of the training/testing? Or would the Navy SEALs be better soldiers if they didn't have to go through 'torturous conditions' during Hell Week, regardless of their choice to do so?

(I used Hell Week as an example, but I meant this question generally. I'm trying to figure out how to best train an elite soldier and avoid any harmful torture apologia tropes, while also making sure that they are able to handle insanely challenging situations)

- My other question has more to do with the definition of torture that you quoted from the UN in one of your master posts. If someone is being seriously injured (pulled fingernails, whipping, starvation etc), but not for the purposes of interrogation, punishment, or intimidation, is that still torture, or is that just abuse? And, regardless of what we call it, would the effects be the same as if it were torture for any of the three motives above?

Sorry if this is long and hard to understand, I can clarify if needed!

It’s not the longest I’ve gotten and it’s perfectly clear, duck*. :) Honestly this is a difficult topic with a lot of nuance, it’s better to take a longer and more thoughtful approach.

 From the stand point of the legal definition and what we study/understand as torture any consensual activity, however extreme, is not torture.

 But here’s where it gets interesting: consent and our attitude to an activity actually changes our response to pain. It may even change how much pain we feel.

 I’m going to take a slightly different example to yours. There are a lot of cultures globally that have practiced scarification, ritual cutting to deliberately form scars. And this can be done for a lot of reasons: membership of a family or clan, coming of age, traditional medicine, religion, you get the idea.

 A lot of people in these cultures describe their scars as incredibly important and the process of getting them as a moving, deep and positive process.

 This does not mean they wouldn’t be traumatised if they were attacked by someone with a knife.

 Being able to approach something painful and see it as positive really changes our perspective. It makes trauma and mental illness a lot less likely. And being able to back out, even if it’s just for a little while to take a breather, seems to make us able to withstand more pain then we would have otherwise.

 The simplest and most famous experiment that dealt with this relationship between our mindset and pain asked people to keep their hands in ice cold water. They timed how long people could do it when they were told to stay silent and how long they could do it when they were allowed to swear. If they swore they could hold their hands under for longer. An average of forty seconds longer.

 Looking back over O’Mara (Why Torture Doesn’t Work, a very good intro to how pain works and what it does to the brain) the way he describes it as by thinking of the experience of pain as a collection of three things. There’s the physical sensation itself, the nerves firing. But there’s also an affective component, how we feel emotionally about the experience and a cognitive component, how we think about it.

 Did you ever play that game as a kid where you stuff as many chilis as possible in your mouth to see who would spit them out first? I… might have done. And from what I remember it hurts an awful lot. But those memories to me are mostly about messing about with my friends, I remember trying to be stubborn about it and I remember us laughing at each other.

 This is a completely different experience to someone being held down and having chili stuff up their nose. But the difference isn’t necessarily in the physical damage done or the physical sensation of pain. It’s in the other components, the emotional response and the rationalisation.

 I also had a filling drilled in my tooth without painkillers as a kid. I don’t know how common this is in the West? It happened in Saudi. Honestly my biggest memory of it is the language barrier between myself and the dentist.

 These are anecdotes obviously but I’m trying to show that you probably also have experiences in your own life that back up the experiments too. The way we think about a painful experience really does make a huge amount of difference. And that means consent matters enormously.

 These soldiers are going into this experience knowing what to expect, how long it will last and that they can stop at any time. That makes a huge amount of difference. Those same factors have drastically increased the time volunteers will spend in solitary confinement for research. I’m pretty sure if I dug even a little I’d find pain studies with similar findings.

 Here’s the flip side: the physical factors are still in play.

 Sleep is an important physiological process that’s essential to normal functioning. Studies on consensual sleep deprivation have shown massive negative impacts on memory along with a host of other things that you can read about here.

 Let’s take a non torture example. A student who stays up all night cramming for an exam is not going to develop the symptoms of trauma that a torture survivors who was sleep deprived would. But the effect sleep deprivation has on memory is due to sleep playing an essential role in preserving memory (and learning more generally.) So they’re both likely to have difficulty remembering things in days just before and just after sleep deprivation. They’re also both more likely to have false memories and catch a bad cold.

 As a result of this memory impairment I question the educational value of anything involving sleep deprivation: you can’t learn while messing up the processes that let your brain remember things.

 There have been cases in the UK of people dying during training for the armed forces. Because while consent makes a huge difference, mindset makes a huge difference- our bodies still have limits. We can choose to push ourselves past those limits and, whatever our motivation or feelings, it can do real harm.

 Personally? I’m unsure of the benefit of these kinds of exercises. As in I’m unsure there is a benefit. Learning is going to be shot, chances of injury are going to be a lot higher- I don’t see anything that could be improved by these sorts of exercises.

 Anecdotally people do report feeling like a closer unit after going through these sorts of routines. That might be the benefit: moral and unit cohesion, possibly self-esteem too.

 If you’re making up something for your story I think it’d be helpful for me to mention a little statistical effect that gets used to justify punishment pretty regularly. Get some dice out if you’ve got them and roll one. Let’s say the number represents performance in some kind of test (because effort and learning matter but our performance also varies because of things we can’t control.) A roll of 1 gets punished, a roll of 6 gets praised.

 Now after you roll that first 1 statistically speaking the chances are your next roll will be better. And if you roll a 6 then statistically speaking the chances are your next roll will be worse. People observe this effect in real life and they often conclude that there’s no point in praising someone but that punishment leads to improvement. Really it’s just a statistical effect, after a particularly, noticeably bad day the chances are things will be better next and vice versa.

 This effect can make it difficult for people to recognise overall, long term progress. Which is the kind of progress you should be paying attention to when designing a training program.

 If you want good performance from people, whatever the metric, the most efficient thing to do is ensure that those people are; well fed, have access to clean water, get plenty of sleep, have breaks and have access to medical treatment when they need it.

 I’d say the main things to keep in mind when designing this fictional training regime are:

Being honest about the effects you describe, ie if they’re spending long periods without shelter are they at risk from exposure? If they’re standing in cold water are they going to get hypothermia?

Remember that even if something is damaging or causes lasting trauma it would not necessarily prevent someone from doing their job. Torture survivors have serious, lasting symptoms but many of them still work.

 I think I’m going to leave that there because I’m not an expert in militaries or training people. And keep in mind that I am a pacifist, read this with my biases in mind.

 Getting to the second question, there is a little more to the UN definition then that. The primary factor is still who the abuser is. For it to be torture (legally speaking) the abuser has to be (or be ordered by) an on-duty government employee, part of a group that controls territory (ie an occupying force). Some countries also count international organised criminal gangs in this definition.

 It’s also important to note that torture can be targetted at someone other then the victim. So if the police arrest the brother of a political opponent and beat him in order to intimidate the politician, that is still torture.

 Basically there are a lot of factors in the legal definition of torture and it’s that way by design. The hope is that you end up with a framework that captures as much government abuse as possible.

 But it also means that there’s a pretty high barrier when it comes to proving torture. Which means that things which are legally torture can be prosecuted as assault, bodily harm or equivalents to these, because it’s easier to get a conviction for those charges.

 Technically you are correct: if abuse done by a government official doesn’t have one of the four motivations in the legal definition (attempts to obtain information, forcing a confession, intimidation or punishment) then it doesn’t meet the definition.

 However in practice I’ve not heard of a case failing because of the motive.

 I’m not a lawyer and I’m not an expert in international law. I won’t say it’s never happened. But it’s much more common for cases to fail for other reasons. Off the top of my head I’d say the most common reason is difficulty proving the abuse took place.

 The most common types of torture today are ‘clean’, a term we use to indicate that they don’t leave obvious marks. If someone turns up with fingernails torn out or the skin of their back lacerated by a whip that is clear physical evidence of abuse. Nothing else causes similar injuries. But if someone turns up at a doctor’s with swollen feet or reddened skin, if they’ve lost a lot of weight or they’re so tired they’re struggling to stand… Well all of those things can be caused by common tortures. But they can also be caused by common illnesses.

 A lot of the deaths from torture today are similarly hard to prove. Beatings and stress positions ultimately cause death by kidney failure. Which can mean that prosecutors are asked to prove a victim didn’t have an underlying health condition. Or take drugs.

 Honestly my instinct is that the motive is the easiest thing to prove. It’s often harder to bring charges against people in positions of authority, regardless of the country we’re talking about. Bringing those charges, proving abuse took place and proving it was done by the person in question, those are usually the tricky parts.

 The difference between torture and abuse is scale. Torture is industrial scale abuse.

 The law doesn’t define that scale but that’s what we’re talking about when we talk about abuse from organised authority. Abusers might have dozens of victims. Torturers have thousands, tens of thousands.

 If you want to explore a different motivation in your story, something outside the legal framework, consider the scale at which this abuse is taking place. Consider how organised it is. If it’s organised and large scale, with multiple abusers, with no prior relationship between the abuser and victims then torture will probably be a better model then abuse. If it’s smaller scale with a more personal relationship and if it isn’t supported by a legal framework/organisation then abuse might be a better model.

 For victims and survivors the difference isn’t so much about the symptoms they personally experience as the… side effect of that scale. Abuse victims are often very isolated and may not know anyone who has had a similar experience. Torture implies a community of survivors and possibly generational trauma. There are also effects to do with access to support, access to medical care and how likely it is that someone will be believed.

 Torture survivors are often systematically disenfranchised in a way that abuse victims are not. Torture survivors are often forced to leave their home country. Anecdotally, based on what I’ve seen globally over the last few years, I think that struggling to get citizenship is increasingly an issue for torture survivors. And without citizenship there’s difficulty finding legal work, getting accommodation, accessing medical care, accessing the legal system etc.

 I do not know whether torture survivors are more or less likely to be believed by their community compared to survivors of abuse. I do not think any one has attempted a comparative study. I do know that the prevalence of clean torture means that many torture survivors are not believed and this puts up a further barrier, making it harder to access medical treatment and bring charges.

 Rejali’s book was published in 2009, so things may have changed a tad. At the time he was writing the average wait for a torture survivor to see a specialist doctor was about 10 years.

 Abuse is to torture what murder is to genocide. And there are difference on a wider social scale as a result.

 I mention all that because I feel it’s relevant but the impression I get is you’re mostly interested in the long term symptoms? In which case, yes the legal definition makes very little difference. The physical injuries caused by particular kinds of abuse don’t change depending on whether it’s a private individual or a police officer holding the Taser.

 The lasting psychological symptoms are not particular to torture; they’re what the human brain does when traumatised. The same symptoms can manifest in people who witness traumatic events but weren’t actually hurt themselves. They can manifest in people who were injured in accidents and they manifest in people who were neglected or abused. Hell, I have a couple of them, though no where near the severity a torture survivors would experience. A sufficient amount of stress is enough for these symptoms to start developing in anybody.

 You can find the general list of symptoms here. There’s also a post specifically about memory problems over here.

 The pattern I describe; that these symptoms are a list of possibilities not ‘every torture victim will get all of these’ holds true for trauma survivors generally. Anecdotally there is some variability with chronic pain being reported more often with some kinds of abuse. That might be because it can have physical causes, psychological causes or a mix of the two.

 Whether it’s torture or abuse there isn’t any way to predict a survivor’s symptoms in advance. Much of the advice I have about writing torture survivors and their symptoms holds true for trauma survivors generally. Which is why I’ll still take a crack at some questions that aren’t about torture.

 Pick the symptoms that you feel fit the character and serve the story. We can’t predict symptoms and that means that there’s no reason why you shouldn’t pick the things that appeal to you.

 And I think I’m going to leave it there. I hope that helps :)

Available on Wordpress.

Disclaimer

*This is a weird English endearment. I had someone ask if this was me trying not to swear. 

[crystalelemental]

Well this wasn't too bad.  Probably because I'm not adding 2000 points of modifiers.

Lucian was pretty easy.  Dark-weak wasn't doing too much, but it's also just...none of the attacks or anything were scary?  He did have some boosting options it seemed like, but we kinda trucked through it.  Oops.

Flint had Sun.  I knew it.  Flare Blitz under Sun was actually pretty scary, too.  Still, Brock the Rock never fails.

Bertha actually surprised me.  I know it was half time to sync, but seeing her throw up physical shield and Catalyst of all things on sync, alongside some fairly threatening moves?  Not bad at all.

Aaron was weak to Fire, but my intent was MU Torchic on Cynthia, so I opted for a Stall team to cover three unique types.  Hilariously, I think I chose the worst option to face off against with stall cheese. He has First Aid.  And Endure.  This fight would be obnoxious at Master Mode levels.

Cynthia...yeah, okay, they definitely let her feel ridiculous, but in the worst way.  Evasion play?  Really?  That's really what we're doing here?  And it's actually way worse, because guess what.  Outsmart 9.  So, she drops your accuracy by 1 when you enter battle.  Okay.  Great.  Thanks.  Then, she buffs evasion +2 when it's time to sync.  Great.  Fantastic.  And she buffs special attack every time you miss.  Which is always.  So we had to bring Sycamore, because Valerie straight-up could not beat this.  Actually impossible.  And guess what!  He almost lost too, because Absol kept dodging attacks with only +2 evasion!  Rock Slide almost killed us anyway!  This fight is actually insane.

Sinnoh League is starting off strong.  I think with premium options, this likely would've been really easy, especially without needing to account for types, but goddamn did some of these strategies seem insane.  Aaron with team-wide Endure on entry is really strong, and packing First Aid is something I don't think any CS stage has done before.  Flint isn't too bad, but that Sun-boosted Flare Blitz hit like a truck, so not looking forward to seeing how that plays out when you're boosting his damage through the roof for 2k purposes.  And Cynthia having such an absurd setup, including the awful evasion play and guaranteed special attack buffs when you miss makes her really threatening really fast.  I'm really curious how these play in Master Mode.  And kinda scared of next week.  Guess we'll see.

[imaginewarehouse]

Yandere!Marcus White x Reader || Drabble

Plot: I’ve been watching Gotham, so, some delicious villainous yandere stuff for fun. 

Warnings: Abduction, toxic/abusive relationship, basic yandere character (He’s kinda chill though, so it isn't really mega level dark? I guess?) 

🔆  🔆  🔆

The bag is ripped off my head, along with a few strands of my hair, and I gulp down my first non-canvasy breathes in hours, looking around the room I’m in. As soon as I recognise the childish basketball themed bed sheets that I’m plopped onto and the blue walls that could only belong to a man-child that hasn't left his mother since the womb though, a deep, annoyed groan escapes my throat and my head falls back against the wall I’m leaning on. The frustration of another failed escape attempt honestly killing me. “Fuckkkkk. Marcus!” 

Why did I even look around? As if the surroundings after being kidnapped would be any different. It never is. Its always this stupid room. God, I hate it. 

“Hold on a moment- finishing this game.” He unsurprisingly responds, from the floor at the foot of the bed where a TV is set up on the floor- not at all fazed at the fact that his abduction victim is awake. 

I wriggle my wrists, trying to free them from the tent rope tying them together. “Whatever. Just hurry up and untie me. I’m getting rope burn.” 

“Mmm,” Marcus makes an unsure sound back, and I can imagine his face right now even though I cant see it, all twisted up at the nose and the mouth. A harbinger of dread, honestly. My heart feels like it plummets in my chest, right down to my feet. Don’t tell me- “Yeahh, I don’t think so. Not this time, babe. One too many escapes. I told you, you try to leave me one more time and you’ll lose Mr Nice Guy.” He makes a clicking sound with his tongue, as I screw my own face up in confusion. ‘Mr Nice Guy’, did he just say? Oh, please- “Well. You lost him.” 

That... doesn't sound good. I mean, no part of this situation with him is good, but this definitely feels like a tipping point. I feel nauseous suddenly. “What do you mean?” 

“Oh!” Suddenly the TV makes an especially loud noise and the sound of the controller clicking gets more vigorous, as apparently Marcus gets to a particularly difficult part of the game- then celebratory music plays and Marcus gets up, and flops on the bed next to you. “Whoo! I won. Beat the game.” He beams at me, like I actually give a flying fuck that he came first in Mario cart at 100cc, like the loser that he is, and I just look back totally deadpanned. 

I blink, trying to totally show him with my expression and my tone how little this matters right now. Or ever. “Like I care?” 

“Don’t be a bitch.” It should say something about me, and about him, that I used to flinch every time this boy called me that, but now I don't even blink. We’ve been doing this thing for over a decade, since high school when Marcus wasn't a total psycho, so nothing about him surprises me much anymore. 

Not that he isn't, unfortunately, full of surprises even so. 

“Don’t be a psycho kidnapper.” I beam back patronisingly. 

“Ahh, stalemate.” He grins, dropping his hand on my thigh... which... twistedly... still has an effect on me. Not that I ever let him know that, but, it definitely does. Sometimes I wonder, honestly, if that’s why I never successfully escape. Not because he or his butt ugly prison friends are master criminals or anything, but because I’m still holding on to an insane secret hope that somewhere in Marcus is the boy who took me to prom and spiked the punch, and turned up to drive me 3 hours home - to this bedroom, actually, - from a disastrous family holiday that made me cry to him for 2 more hours on the phone, and was happy to do so. Because sometimes he still is that guy.

... Because on a subconscious level I let him find me and drag me back here... even though consciously, I know this is 

-wrong. 

   And abusive... 

                and toxic. 

But on the other hand maybe not. Whatever. Moving on. Taking a deep breath to regather myself and glance up at him, eyes flashing angrily. Through my teeth, I hiss. “Let go.” 

Deeply, entirely hard-done-by, Marcus sighs and rolls his eyes, removing his hand. “Whatever.” I sigh, and lean my head back on the wall- tired. Tired of him, tired of this whole awful game. 

But we go on. We live on; We keep playing. Everyone does. That’s life. 

What else can you do? 

Finally, a couple of minutes later, I turn my head to look at him again and wait for him to catch my gaze and turn his own head to face me back. I talk quietly, calmly, tiredly. “... what did you mean by no more Mr Nice Guy?” 

“Just that.” He exclaims and shrugs, like it explains everything. Which it absolutely does not, but instead of snapping at him I just raise my eyebrows and wait for more of an explanation. “That... you’ll stay tied up. Most of the time, anyway. I mean, you can take showers and stuff without the rope, and on your birthday.” 

“Oh, well aren't you just a regular Prince Charming.” I sigh, rolling my eyes and gazing up at the ceiling now. Great. 

He either didn’t get a feel for the sarcasm or doesn't care. “Well I think so! So does mom.” 

“Oh god.” I groan, squeezing my eyes shut. He’s such a loser. “Norman Bates, much?” 

At the reference that he definitely gets, because we binged the first season of Bates Motel together, like nearly everything else that we do apart from my escaping hobby, Marcus shifts closer to me and bangs the back of his head on the wall. “Oh, Y/N, that’s gross.” Oh so he claims, I think sarcastically, rolling my eyes yet again. Whatever. “I love you.” 

“Yeah, right.” I respond, dully, not even looking at him. At my obvious doubt, he begins to laugh. First chuckles, then full out, raucous laughter. Like its the most hilarious thing that he might not be in love with me. Like- why would he do all this to me? Kidnap me, keep me prisoner, force me to stay with him, tie me up- If he didn’t fucking love me?

I mean I have some ideas, but lets go with his story.

“I do!” He shakes his head, eyebrows knit together in confusion and hurt at my ridiculous accusation that he doesn't love me. “I do, baby.” He shifts so he can look me in the eyes and force a serious look... a goofy grin still stuck on his face that is not encouraging or confidence building at all. “I do. I fucking love you!” 

When he gets like this, its best to pretend like I believe him. Take a deep breath, adjust my thoughts - like you’re going to school and you have to remember that the place is educating you, and that’s good... not thats it's a torture institution for youth. For example, Marcus isn't a psychopathic dick-face. He’s... sometimes, sweet,- , and force a gentle smile. Hold my breath and cup his face the best I can with my wrists tied up, with one hand and lace my fingers through his hair with the other- and try not to like it so much. 

Or like it on a purely physical level and try to ignore the way, deep down, I love him. 

“... You’re right. Sorry. I know you do, baby, thank you. I... I love you too.” 

Easily his expression and his body relax, and he grins that goofy grin again that unfortunately still releases the butterflies in the pit of my stomach. “I know. Sorry, I freak out a little when you say stuff like that.” Oh, I know. “I just wouldn't want you to think that I do anything to hurt you. I just want you close.” 

“I know.” 

He smiles brighter, happy for the positive appraisal and apparent trust from me- especially in the particularly sensitive mood he’s in with me touching him. 

Then he leans across the way and kisses me. 

[grimbeak]

hi! here’s another fun n cheerful ghost jay drabble, definitely not really depressing at all! :D 

Mistakes 

Pixal was expecting many things to be going on when she got back to the temple, almost a month late after her mission went awry. It was supposed to be only two weeks she was gone, but, well, duty calls. 

Out of all the things she has been expecting (mourning, an empty temple, arguing, etc.), seeing Jay on the couch talking to Cole was not one of them. 

“Um.”

Both boys look up, confused looks turning into delighted smiles almost instantly as they jump up. “Pixal!” Cole runs over to her, and she laughs as his arms wrap tightly around her in a hug. “How’ve you been? Zane and Lloyd are doing a patrol,” he explains, “something about a rogue batch of serpentine. They should be back in about an hour or two, unless something goes wrong.” 

“Great,” Pixal smiles, squeezing him back one more time before stepping away. Her eyes land on Jay, and her smile fades. “How- my apologies, but... why and how is he here?”

“Well, uh...” Cole trails off, clearly a bit uncomfortable. “He’s kind of...”

Jay’s smile, however, doesn’t falter, instead clearing his throat and pulling a paper out of his pocket (is he... see-through?). Reading from the paper, he says, “So, funny story, I died. And now I’m a ghost. With no memory of dying, or... anything that caused me to die. So, don’t-” he frowns, slightly- “don’t tell me anything that may trigger memories, and try not to act weird around me. And, um, that’s about it.” He folds the paper, slipping it back into his pocket. “Kai wrote that for me,” Jay explains. “Pretty informative.” 

Pixal blinks. “Right. Well. So you don’t remember... anything?” She’s been told about the island, but... apparently her friends have neglected to tell her that Jay is alive (well... half-alive. A ghost. Whatever) and well (as well as one can be with zero memories of their death.) 

Jay shakes his head. “Nope. And, apparently, no one’s allowed to tell me about it.” He sounds a bit disappointed at the last bit, but regains a smile that seems rather forced. “Anyway, good to see you again! I’ll go tell Kai you’re back.” 

Pixal waits until her friend (friend? Formerly-dead-but-now-alive friend? Formerly-enemy-friend? Hmm.) jogs off before turning back to Cole. “So. When did he turn up?”

The master of earth rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. “Few days after you went on your mission. From what I heard, he just kinda... popped out of the wall. Scared the crap out of Kai.” 

Pixal smiles, slightly. “So, I’m assuming I will be informed about what happened when the others return?”

Cole nods just as Jay re-enters the room, followed closely by Kai. The fire ninja offers a smile and a wave to Pixal. “Hey, Pix. How was the mission?”

“Long,” she sighs, and Kai smirked. 

“So, uh... wanna come get some tea? Lloyd made some, earlier.” Pixal raises an eyebrow, and Kai hurriedly adds, “Zane helped him. It doesn’t taste horrible, for once.” 

“Yes. That would be nice.”

***

So maybe Jay shouldn’t be doing this. 

But hey. He did figure out how to turn invisible all on his own (well, mostly on his own (having your best friend become a ghost for over a year and a half does have its advantages)), so he should use it. It’s his decision, not any of his friends’. 

Not that he’s told his friends about his ability to turn invisible, anyway, but still.

From what Jay understands, the other ninja are going to have Important Discussion Time with Pixal in around five minutes. Explain to her what happened on the island and what not.

So, the logical thing to do is sneak in while being invisible, listen to whatever happened on the island that nobody wants to tell him about, try to figure out why they didn’t want to tell him. Can’t be that bad, right?

Right. Everything’ll be fine, and Jay will be fine, and he’ll tell the others that he knows, and everything will be great. 

Pixal interrupts his train of thought, standing up with the others. “So, we’re gonna go...” She gestures vaguely to the living room, and Cole and Kai wince in unision behind her. They probably don’t think that Jay has noticed the fact that they shoo him away for a few hours every time that they have to explain his existence (half-existence?) to someone. Which, surprisingly, happens a lot. 

Jay pushes himself away from the wall he was leaning against (being able to touch solid things is a lot easier than being able to touch people, or have people touch him.) with a smile. “Yeah, sure. I’m gonna go rest for a bit, see you guys later.”

He’s not going to go rest for a bit. What he is going to do, actually, is pull the tracker off his uniform (it’s not as hidden as Zane thinks) and put it on his bed, then sneak back into the living room, invisible. 

(One of the first things he worked on as a ghost was turning invisible. Going invis is easier than getting out of invis, actually. It’s sort of like a switch you flick down to disappear.

Getting out is harder, due to the fact that it takes physical contact with someone to switch out. The last few times he’s done it, Jay just bumped shoulders with Zane while he had his nose buried in a book.

Jay hopes this meeting won’t take too long. The longer he’s invisible, the more he can feel himself fading away.)

The other ninja (and Pixal) dissapear into the Important Discussion Talk room, and Jay wanders off to his room. Quickly, he pulls the mini tracker that Zane made off his elbow (not the best hiding spot, seriously) and places it carefully on his bed. 

Time to overhear some things, like any good person questioning their existence and/or past would do. 

Once he’s back into the kitchen, Jay flips the internal switch.

And vanishes. 

It’s... it’s pretty much exactly the same as being a regular ghost, except for the fact that he can’t see himself.

Jay pushes the door open (and silently thanks the FSM that it doesn’t creak), and gets noticed almost immediately. Crap. 

Cole frowns, pushing himself up from the couch. “...Jay?”

Zane pulls something out of his pocket before turning it around so that Jay and Cole can see the screen. “No. He’s still in his room. We should really get that door fixed- does that all the time.”

...Oh thank god. 

Zane sets the tracker pad back down onto the table, Jay slinks farther into the room, and Cole closes the door before plopping back down onto the couch. “We ready to start?”

Pixal nods, slowly, looking a little less unsure than earlier. “Affirmative.” 

“Alright, so...” Kai leans back in his chair, in a ready-to-start-talking-about-our-friend’s-demise-and-resurrection pose. “Let’s begin.” 

And they do.

They talk about getting to the island, about being... not exactly welcomed by the locals (understandable), and about-

“His mother?” 

“We think so,” Cole says awkwardly. “Well, not think so, Master Wu did explicitly say that she was Jay’s mom. Said her name was Linda, or something.” 

“Liberty,” Nya interupts “But when they were kids, everyone apparently called her Libber. She used to be really nice and kind too- a lot like Jay, really, but...” She looks at the ground.

Jay can’t breathe. His mother was there, his mom, and they didn’t tell him about her? Why? 

He finds it very hard to stay quiet right now, and instead shoves his fist in his mouth and bites on it, hard. ...Doesn’t really do anything, but the numb feeling he always has grows worse. He’ll start sort of... tingling, soon. Always happens when he gets stressed, now.

“But she had lost it.”

Hold on, she- what?

Nya takes a shaky breath, and her brother squeezes her hand comfortingly. “Libber was... clearly not herself. Insane, really. Just kind of... bent on destruction. Something had happened, we don’t know what, but she wasn’t- wasn’t herself, anymore, according to Master Wu. Jay was kinda... messed up about that.”

“Of course he was,” Cole murmurs. “I mean, you meet your mom after not even knowing she existed for most of your life, and she doesn’t even care about you? Gotta screw you up a little. Along with... all the other stuff.”

Jay’s starting to think he really doesn’t want to know about all the other stuff. 

But the other ninja keeps talking, and he keeps listening, and Jay really understands why they didn’t want to tell him about any of this. 

“So,” Pixal says eventually, after Kai’s taken a break from speaking. “Just to be perfectly clear- Jay went evil slash insane because his mother didn’t care about him, and he thought that none of you cared about him as well?” 

Yes, Jay wants to scream. Yes, that’s exactly what happened. 

There are thoughts in his head, memories blinking in and out and Jay doesn’t really know what to do with all of them. 

“Well,” Kai starts slowly, “it wasn’t all that, but-” 

“Shut it, Kai,” Cole interrupts, and his companions stare at him in surprise. “Look, just- yes, Pixal. It was our fault. We made him feel like we didn’t care about him. Kai especially,” he added, and the fire ninja glared at him for a few seconds until he gave up, looking down at the ground. Cole continued. “And now we have another chance, and just- we can’t mess up this time.”

“And then what happened?” Pixal asks.

“The tribe got to him,” Cole says, “offered him a way out.” 

And they all keep tallking. 

And Jay listens.

Listens to how he turned against his friends, how he was going to destroy Ninjago to bring them pain and suffering, and how the others had no choice to but to take him down. And they did that by-

After a few seconds of silence, Pixal speaks up. “So... how’d you stop him?” 

No one says anything, and Jay’s stomach drops as Kai looks at the ground.

Pixal’s eyes widen. “You didn’t- you guys- you...” She trails off, shocked.

Kai whispers, eventually, “We didn’t mean to kill him. But he... we were just trying to hit him with all our powers at once, see if we could snap him out of it, maybe stop him, but-” he looks at his hand as if it’s covered in blood. “...We’re more powerful than we thought.” 

Jay’s frozen, and the one remaining part of his head that can think clearly hopes that this meeting’ll end soon, otherwise he’ll start to fade away. Once that happens... 

His friends-

They killed him. 

Jay had assumed it was something that happened with the tribe, or-or maybe even his mother and where was she?, but not his friends.

He feels sick. 

...Maybe he deserved it, honestly, with the way he was acting, but still. 

“OK,” Pixal says after a moment, “so he’s dead because you guys killed him.” Cole and Lloyd wince at the true accusation, but nod in agreement. “So how’d become a ghost, then? There’s... I can’t think of any logical way.”

“We think,” Cole starts, “that the tribe has some kind of resurrection ritual. But either something went wrong or there’s a cost, because Jay doesn’t know how or why he died. Also the whole ghost thing.”

“I see. And- was Libber there, too? Did... did she have to watch? Did you guys kill her, too?”

“No! She... she disappeared, just before Jay lost it. We’re not sure where she is- probably alive somewhere else. The tribe didn’t know where she went. She might’ve told Jay, but... if she did, he won’t remember.” 

...OK. So his mom is still out there, somewhere, probably insane. That’s... good to know, sort of.

“And, um...” Cole drums his fingers on the armrest of the couch he’s sitting on. Jay’s legs really hurt. “I think that’s about it.” 

“OK,” Pixal says slowly. “And I’m not allowed to tell Jay about this?”

The others shake their heads immediately. “Nope,” confirms Kai. “Too dangerous. Might go all insane-ey and lose it again.”

Jay...

Ouch.

...His friends don’t trust him, that’s for sure, and to be honest he deserves it.

But he deserves an apology, as well, not some half-baked lie about how when he died they realized they weren’t as nice to him as they could’ve been. 

...Maybe he can think of a way to tell him that he remembers, without them trying to kill him for it. 

As Jay’s thinking/beginning to have an internal mental breakdown, Cole stands up and starts walking towards the door. “I’m gonna go check on Jay, see how he’s doing. He’s asleep, right?” Zane holds up the tracker pad, which shows a little dot marked Jay on his bed. “Great. I’ll see how he’s doing, and-” 

Oops.

Jay had tried to go through the door just as Cole opened it, but apparently the other ninja has no respect for the personal space of friends he can’t see and didn’t know where there.   

Jay takes a few careful steps back, internally keeping the invisible switch down due to the fact that Cole bumped into him.

Cole hesitates, then reaches out a hand, and Jay is suddenly filled with so much dang panic that he can’t move, and Cole shoves him back so that Jay stumbles, landing hard against the wall and almost knocking over the coffee table. “Watch it!”

Cole’s eyes go wide and mouth drops open, the other ninja (and Pixal) twisting around in their seats to see what’s wrong.

..Jay’s not invisible anymore, is he.

One glance down at his body confirms that. He’s back to being a dark green/blue combo, the floor an odd colour beneath his feet.

 “You were...” Cole’s voice is quiet, but it quickly grows to a normal tone, albeit stunned. “You were listening? You were here the whole time?!” 

“I-” Jay glances around the room, eyes landing on Kai. “I didn’t-” 

His friends killed him.

His friends killed him. 

Kai swallows, before asking, “How do- Jay, are you... how do you feel?”

Jay looks at him.

And turns and sprints through the wall. 

It’s getting dark, outside, gray clouds indicating rain soon. Too bad. Jay can’t stay here.

His friends killed him his friends killed him- 

Jay hears a yell of “After him!” from behind him as the others claw their way through the temple.

He doesn’t have much time.

His friends killed him his friends killed him his friends-

Jay summons his dragon, pushing through the fear that seems to be overwhelming his body, more and more every second-

Hisfriendskilledhimhisfriendskilledhimhisfriendskilledhim-

He flies off just as the remaining ninja burst through the door. He can hear them calling their dragons, as well, with the sound of wings behind him within a few seconds.

He flies faster. 

“Hmmm, what you’re looking for is an Aeroblade, forged by Deepstone, an aquatic material mined from the bottom of the ocean. Very unique. Even more expensive.” 

Aeroblades.

Ronin.

He needs to find Ronin.

Jay looks back at the five dragons following him, their riders too far away to see clearly (he got a head start). 

He looks ahead of him, to Ninjago City the place that he apparently tried to destroy a few months ago. 

..He’ll lose them there.

[dappercritter]

Random She-Ra Season 5 Thoughts: THE FINAL RAMBLING

Yep. I finally got all my crazy absurd thoughts about this gay adventure-romance-drama cartoon summarized into one incoherent yet fun to read computer document/article! ...four months after the show itself ended. Oh well, no one’s perfect. Anyways, there are a whole lot more insane observations than ever before, so I had to put it below a link so this thing didn’t back up my blog or any of yours. Hope you enjoy reading through these as much I enjoyed spouting them for no discernible reason other than I felt like it!

-I feel that since is the last season, I ought to talk about an important part of the show that I’ve been putting off: the animation. It’s… okay. It’s definitely smoother than what the original 80’s show and it’s brother series (heheh) looked like, but at the same time it still seems to suffer from similar limitations which causes some distracting moments of stiffness. But other than that, it’s pretty good. It’s no Titmouse or Studio Mir but it looks good and it gets the job done.

         -After all, let’s not forget: “Imperfection is beautiful!”

-Even when things are at their lowest, Adora is a jock with a heart of gold.

-Horde Prime and the Galactic Horde’s aesthetic feels like a mixture of Catholicism, Scientology, Heaven’s Gate, and modern Microsoft, and honestly, that just makes him creepier.

-Speaking of Horde Prime, he didn’t waste any time with destroying Bright Moon. …apparently.

-Furthermore, on the topic of his giant holographic messages, WAS THAT A FREAKING MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE MOVIE REFERENCE?!

-Boy, Glimmer and Catra sure got along quickly! It’s almost like they magically understand each other because they both assumed leadership roles and screwed up big time! …I guess.

         -Either that or this season is going to be a speedrun.

-Wow, the Rebellion sure got used to having a once-thought-dead king as well as a known enemy general/abuser running around their camp awful fast, didn’t they?

-Mara’s got a spaceship, a cyber girlfriend, a magic grandma, a dragon, a tragic backstory, AND a force ghost?! Dang, even in death, the girl’s got it all. No wonder everyone likes her!

-(*me looking at the TV rating at the start of episode*) “Why is language in there? Is there surprise cuss words or something in this season?” (*sees Horde Prime seize control of a clone for the first time*) “HOLY FREAKING SH—oh that’s why.”

-Applause to the crew for making the “dinner with Prime” scene for making a meal between a sparkly princess, a catgirl, and alien cult leader feel even more uncomfortable than it had a right to.

-(*me throughout the season whenever a clone was onscreen*) Is that Hordak? Is that him? Is that him? Is that him right there? Oh it is—oh no wait. … Is that h—

-Extra applause for having Glimmer learn from her grey-area wetwipe phase and refusing to sell out her friends again whilst telling the imperialist cult leader where to stick it.

-I would pay a sizeable portion of my life savings to hear what a Scorpia and Swift Wind duet would sound like.

         -In fact, I’d double it if it was just Scorpia singing.

         -Ah what the heck. I would triple it for an entire She-Ra musical!

-As happy as I am to see to see Entrapta interacting with the other princesses again, I have to say that their big reunion left me with some mixed feelings. Here’s a quick rundown:

         -Entrapta, a grown autistic woman, being led around on a leash by non-neurodivergent teenagers—again: that’s bad.

         -The Princesses confronting Entrapta about joining the Horde: that’s good!

         -The Princesses blaming all their problems with the Horde bots on Entrapta’s actions and her hyper fixations alone: that’s bad.

         -Entrapta explaining herself, admitting that she regrets her mistakes, and getting the Princesses to understand that she thinks and communicates differently, but in spite of that, she really does want help find Glimmer: that’s good!

         -Entrapta never gets to call out the Princesses for how poorly they treated her: that’s bad.

         -Entrapta saves the day and goes to space: that’s good!

         -Scorpia and Entrapta still haven’t interacted even though the former is with the Rebellion in the first place because she went to look for her because she is her best friend: …can I go home now?

-How nice! Michah finally got to shapeshift!

         -And he’s rocking that She-Ra outfit to boot!

-So is Darla a back up of Light Hope or do they just run on the same operating system and have the same voice?

-I could watch an entire season of Adora, Bow, and Entrapta going on space adventure in a rundown ship with their custom-made spacesuits, tbh.

-Is anyone else weirded out that Catra’s younger self looked at her in her flashback(?).

         -Actually what WAS happening there, anyhow?

-(*watching Bow’s spacewalk to save Glimmer*) “Is that a Gravity reference?” asked the man who never saw Gravity.

-Speaking of spacewalks, how did Glimmer survive those precious few seconds in space? Does the teleporter teleport a breathable atmosphere too?

         -Also, Catra, WHY did you think it would be a good idea to teleport Glimmer into space? I know you had a plan and the ship was right there but… Ah, never mind.

-Not that I’m complaining but Glimmer’s apology to the rest of the friend squad for her HORRIBLE plan last season went… surprisingly quickly.

-You know as cool as The Star Siblings are, being a quirky band of space-travelling siblings with cool powers and some trans rep to boot, I only have one small problem with them: weren’t there already Star Sisters on Etheria back in season 1?

         -That doesn’t sound right, but I don’t know enough about Masters of the Universe characters to dispute it.

-Entrapta confirmed pan, objectum, AND horny on main. Dang girl, you’re gonna have fun whether you got Hordak back or not…

-“The Velvet Glove” is both a menacing and stupid name for a decadent overlord’s mothership.

         -Wait, it’s from the 80’s canon? Oh. That kind of explains it, actually.

-Goshdangit, I wanted Catra to face punishment for her crimes, but I didn’t think that would involve going to evil alien conversion therapy!

         -Nor did I want her to die! For a second. Actually, since it obviously wasn’t going to last I was… weirdly okay with that part???

-Horde Prime seems awfully okay with Catradora. I mean he’s still super creepy and manipulative about it, but also oddly progressive for an evil brainwashing cult leader.

-(*Adora transforms into a She-Ra through seer will*) First of all, called it. Second of all, WOAH MAMA now that’s a glow up!

-Wrong Hordak did not have to be a thing, and yet, I’m glad that he is.

-Hordak remembers the LUVD crystal and Entrapta… Hordak remembers Entrap—! It’s happening! Oh my gosh, it’s happening! Everybody stay calm!

-Wow, Entrapta didn’t have to be so forgiving of Catra for everything she’s done to her but she did. Only I’m not sure if that was Entrapta taking the high road or the low road.

         -Or which road the crew took for that matter.

-I remember when I thought those “Chipped AUs” floating around here on tumblr were just something the fans came up with and that chipping people was not an actual despicable thing Prime does in canon. I miss those days.

-I know it’s not the same as before or the original design, but True She-Ra’s designs and powers? I think they slappin’.

-Hooray, Adora and Catra are finally making up! And it only took four and half seasons worth of communication failures, toxic villainous behaviour, and physical violence for Catra to snap out of it!

         -…We can go back to Entrapdak now, right?

-Poor Elberon. First they unknowingly adopt a double agent then get invaded by the Horde and now they’re getting brainwashed and chipped by the Galactic Horde. They might be a cute village, but they got some pretty lousy security.

-You know it’s cute that Micah is doing his best to be friends with Frosta and get back in touch with his dad-side, but look I can’t be the only one worried about how the local King is a less proactive leader than the princesses or the known war criminal/abuser, right?

-“The Perils of Peekablue” or as I like to call it, “You Thought ‘Boys Night Out’ Caught You Emotionally Off-guard? Hah! Watch This.”

-You know I didn’t think Scorpfuma would be a thing aside that one moment of flirting near the end of season 4, but they really pushed for it to be a thing! This is… actually pretty great! Perfuma’s not perfect, and I would have appreciated giving them a little more time to bond and form some real chemistry, but at least she reciprocates Scorpia’s sweetness instead of rebuffing it in increasingly aggressive fashion.

-I’m not sure what’s more concerning: that Mermista set a boat on fire, that it’s worded like she had a fling as part of some experimental phase, or that Sea Hawk is turned on by this.

-Peekablue might not be real, (I think?) but he is one dapper dude! Female-to-male redesigns could learn a thing or two from him.

-It involved them getting stung and seizuring, but that was a heck of a way to reintroduce Double Trouble! I swear I got watching them cycle through their transformations in some sort of physical reaction.

         -Or maybe that was just me worrying about their wellbeing…

-Okay, I get the Chips are huge, and actually rather clever threat, but how do these characters get chipped in the first place? I get there are chipped people who spread the chips throught the population but where do they get those from???

         -Do one of those Horde Prime drones just sneak behind someone, slap a chip on their nape then hand them a whole bagfull and say, “Beep boop beep, Horde Prime’s Light, blah blah blah. Alright have fun, kiddo”?

         -Or is it some sort of Alien: Covenant deal where they’re just floating around and Lord help you if one sticks to you?

-HOLY CRAP THEY ACTUALLY GOT SCORPIA TO SING! AND SHE WAS GREAT!

         -Oh shoot. Guess I owe the crew twice my life savings now…

-Entrapdak might be what got me into this show, but it’s Double Trouble that kept me around, so you can imagine how happy I was to see them make their grand reappearance!

-Conversly, you can imagine my disappointment when they just disappeared until the finale.

         -And on that note: HOW DID YOU GUYS LOSE DOUBLE TROUBLE?!

                  -You forgot to cherish them, didn’t you?

-So, Scorpia sacrifices herself just after finding a new girlfriend and gaining some newfound confidence, Mermista and Sea Hawk are split up,and Double Trouble didn’t join the main cast. Why can’t you just have fun like a normal cartoon, show?

-Gosh, I love me some shifting title cards!

-Is it just me or did they sneak in some more Annihilation references on Krytis?

         (-Said the guy who was too chicken to watch the movie and just read about it and watched a few clips online.)

-(*audibly sighs*) FINE. I guess I like Catradora now. Are you happy now, SPOP Crew? ARE YOU?!

-Hooray, Catra’s got a emotional support animal! And they’re a shapeshifting magic alien cat. Those are the best kind!

-Is it weird that I knew that weird glowing stuff on Krytis was just magic all along, or was it just not hidden very well. Anyways, I like Krytis. I like that we got to see a truly alien world with its own form of magic.

-Plus, we got a logical advancement of the magic versus science subtheme with magic being Horde Prime’s weakness! Neato!

-Getting back on the “which is worse?” wagon for a second, I don’t know what feels less right: that Wrong Hordak’s big revelation and his resolution to free himself and his brothers and friends from Horde Prime’s control is played humorously, or that Real Hordak should be the one having this moment.

-That bit with Castaspella and Shadow Weaver where she tells Casta about Etheria being a living thing with inherent magical property, or whatever, while we got a peaceful shot of some boar creatures sleeping was actually kind of nice. It would have been nicer though if it wasn’t part of a power hungry abuser’s obvious scheme. If only there was a kindly old witch lady character who was in touch with nature and knew just what to say when someone was feeling downOH WAIT.

-Furthermore… Why did Shadow Weaver and Castaspella need to have romantic tension?

-Seriously though, where’s our Madame Razz quota this season? Where’s my supportive magic grandma timelord at, yo?

-Yup, they speedran this season.

-I’m actually really disappointed we didn’t see more of an intergalactic new rebellion rising up to fight Horde Prime’s forces across the universe. Especially if it meant we got to see more Star Sibling action!

-Again, I adore Wrong Hordak but I keep wondering what was keeping the crew from just bringing in Original Flavour Hordak. (You know, aside from teasing us Entrapdak fans and trying to distract us with a loveable new character in the meantime.) I mean he could have done the whole infiltrating the clone squads and tricking them bit, too.

         -Heck, he could have done the wink, too!

-I’d gleefully point out Loo-Kee’s cameo this season but apparently, they already made some several seasons ago. That’s what I get for not rewatching the 80’s show and training my eyes first.

-(*sees Erelandians*) Are those freaking Toads and Toadettes?

-So, what’s keeping them from just hitting Spinerella’s chip again? Besides emotional baggage and gale force winds, I mean.

-Perfuma coming out of a cave scared out of her wits, demanding to know who’s there, clinging to her friends as soon as they come back, and balling her eyes out is a big, BIG mood.

-Frosta absolutely decking Catra in the face was nestled somewhere between cathartic and excessive.

         -Netossa spraying her with a bottle of water on the other hand…

-Oh, so Greyskull was the name of a Rebel Squad! I think. Meh, the important thing is we got an explanation and it still sounds cool.

-Leave it to a couple of dads to make a secret message out of a dad joke.

-You know I made fun of Light Hope for being creepy, but I swear that avatar from the Spire is even creepier. I don’t know if it’s her face—those dang blank eyes, man—or just that it she’s less animated than the real thing, but it just felt… off.

-Aww, Noelle made Netossa’s princess weakness illustrations! So cute!

-Forget episodes that deserves Emmys, Keston John deserves one for voicing Hordak, Horde Prime, all the clones, and several minor villains and giving each and every single one a distinct voice! Where my king’s respect, eh?

-Yes, Catra you had a small disagreement with Hordak. …Over sending his girlfriend and your “friend” to DIE IN A LITERAL LIVING HELL.

         -Sorry, I just had to get that out of my system.

-Why does Perfuma get pressured to get angry and go wild when Entrapta’s the one who’s had it the worst out of all them? Why can’t my gamer girl go berserk, dammit!?

-Okay, but really, how do these fricking chips work??? Are they parasite devices who store Horde Prime’s Baptizing Dew then slowly pump it into their host’s bodies? Do they have their own nervous systems? Are they technorganic? Also, how and why do we need to make these chips are bigger threat then they need to be?

-Horde Prime showing up on Hordak’s throne in grand Killing Joke style and casually throwing shades at his brother’s overblown attempts to impress him is pretty awesome, but it feels strangely underdeveloped. Hordak’s not there to have his hard work insulted and we never got to see Adora have any similar encounter with Hordak here before, so unless you look at it from the perspective of someone who has been here before in the Horde story like Catra it lacks the dramatic weight it should have had.

-Scorpia resisting the chip to save her new friends was pretty great, though.

-I swear, when they got to the scene where Adora and the others figured out that Shadow Weaver was grooming her so she could use her to get to the Heart of Etheria, I was mouthing “You B***H” through the whole thing.

-They really brought back Etherian deep magic just so they had something to make Micah threatening. …okay.

-Okay, the rest of “Failsafe” messed me up, so here’s a rundown on all the other messy thoughts I had while the show ripped my heart and ground it to dog food:

         -Entrapta and Hordak reuniting: Yay!

         -Swift Wind yanking her away before she can get through to him: Boo.

         -Catra encouraging Adora to try and take care of herself for a change: Yay!

         -Adora hurts Catra and she runs away: Boo.

         -Adora finally calling out Shadow Weaver on what an utterly horrible person she is: Yay!

         -Adora resolves to risk sacrificing herself to save the world: Bo—okay, seriously, was all this suffering really necessary, show?

-I know I mentioned in my previous She-Ra random thoughts that I supported Glimmadora, but I am okay with Catradora and Glimbow ending up canon. The only problem I have is how rushed they feel—moreso with Glimbow. With Catradora, the crew had an entire season to make it work again and they took it. Glimbow it feels like they were down to the last few episodes and went, “Oh right, we were gonna do something with these two!” then did their darndest to fit in some chemistry in between all the other stuff going down.

-As ominous as it was, the music where Horde Prime starts hacking Etheria honestly SLAPS.

-Okay, I know everyone is magic or something, but I am legit surprised getting electrocuted in water didn’t kill the heroes right then and there.

-Sea Hawk tries to flirt with his girl even as she’s trying to kill him. Truly, he is a man of taste.

-What do you know, Shadow Weaver can only do good when she’s (canonically!) punch drunk.

-You know a whole lot of this could have been avoided if Holo-Mara was Adora’s mentor instead of Light Hope.

-When I think about it, it was actually really clever to make Horde Prime the final villain for Adora to face: a domineering decadent man who’s been in power forever against a humble emotionally vulnerable compassionate young woman.

         -Not to mention the divide between cult-like oppression and progressive freedom. Or something.

-Holy crap, did the First Ones get a great freaking a Great Old One for a guard dog?!

-So, you guys seriously didn’t bring Angella back to reunite with her family OR mention her all season after the impact her death had on everyone all last season until Glimmer needs a power-up at the last possible minute and then you never bring her up again. That is absolutely a dick move in bird culture.

-Entrapta’s hacker sticker gives me life. Gamer girl gremlin princess forever!

-On the one hand, I’m disappointed that Adora and Catra don’t get to have an awesome couple battle against the security monster and win. On the other hand, Shadow Weaver is finally dead. YAY!

         -With apologies to the writers and especially Lorraine Toussaint. She did splendidly bringing this character to life and even if I hated Shadow Weaver, I adored the effort she put into making her one of the most emotionally complex villains I’ve ever seen.

-Words cannot, will not, and will never describe the pure joy that I experienced when I first saw Hordak’s big scene: standing up to and disowning his tyrant brother, saving Entrapta, declaring his love to her (albeit in a nicely lowkey fashion), and then throwing Horde Prime to his apparent doom Disney style with Entrapta cheering him with sheer glee. GOSH, it was everything I could have hoped for from this season!

         -Now if only they kept the deleted scene where they got a moment to themselves before Prime body-jacked him again like the creepy sonuvabich he is.

-Horde Prime just wouldn’t be a religious villain if he didn’t tell everyone to burn.

         -Bonus points for actually trying to burn the frigging planet.

-Aside from the idea of Adora switching to wearing a She-Ra themed dress everywhere in the future, the future vision was really quite sweet, and seeing Prime step in to ruin it made it all the more impactful.

-Can I just say that it’s absolutely wonderful that the show, for all it’s flaws, said  “**** senseless heroic sacrifices”?

-BREAKING: Lesbian cat finally makes up with her jock ex, has a canon kiss so pure it saves the world!

         -In other news, Catradora fans are still spoiled rotten.

-Wow, look at all those character comebacks they skipped through! Look, there’s the chefs from Dryl, Double Trouble, Huntara, the Horde Trio, Imp, Madame Razz—are you kidding me?!

-Grumbling aside, I actually find the idea of the Horde Trio and Imp getting involved in a G-rated science-fantasy version of the first Hangover movie quite amusing.

-Oh dang, they pulled a Castle in the Sky with the Velvet Glove!

-As nice as it was to see Aodra save Hordak from Horde Prime and destroy the latter through exorcism via sheer compassion, I’m rather disappointed we never got to see She-Ra go full Metal Gear Solid Rising: Revengence on any creepy old cult leaders.

         -Yeah, it would have gone against the “love conquers all” set up, but love takes on many forms, does it not? So, why can it not manifest as cleaving your mortal enemies with extreme prejudice to save your loved ones?

-Furthermore, in addition to Holo-Mara being a better mentor, Hordak raising Adora instead Shadow Weaver could have prevented a lot of similar problems. Maybe. Possibly.

         -Eh whatever, he has a lifetime’s worth of fanfiction to make up for it.

-ENTRAPDAK IS CANON, ALL IS RIGHT WITH THE WORLD.

-And so is Catradora and Glimbow! That’s nice, too.

-Aww, how sweet of them to skip through Catra and Scorpia, and Glimmer and Micah’s big reunions! It’s not like we’ve been waiting forever for this stuff or anything. HahahahAHAHAHDHAHAHFHAFHKSADJHFKAJHDfine.

-And so it all ends with everyone either friends, in love, or both, as heroes decide to make up for it all with a grandiose sequel promising more exciting space adventures we probably won’t see! HOORAY!

-All snarky ranting aside, I actually really enjoyed the finale. It was exciting, heartwarming, and above all it ended on happy, hopeful note without leaving too many frustrating questions unanswered. (*glares with utmost contempt at Voltron and Star vs. The Forces of Evil*)

-You know, this wasn’t bad for a final season, but I think this might have worked better as two seasons. Not in Netflix’s cheap “split a regular 13-episode season in two 6-7 episode long seasons” strategy, but I mean two full seasons with their own storylines leading up to the grand finale:

         -First, one that starts out with Horde Prime’s arrival the downfall of Etheria, focuses on the space adventures, ends with their return to Etheria and gives the characters time to recuperate from season 4.

         -Then, we have one final season that focuses on the Best Friend Squad’s Return to Etheria, Horde Prime’s plan, gives everyone more time to properly reconcile before ¾ of the entire cast gets chipped, sets up a new Rebellion made up of Princess Alliance and former Etherian Horde members, maybe even set up a proper Hordak redemption arc or something, and then our big happy ending.

-On a mostly unrelated note, I also feel that the whole show could have turned out even better if it had been either a dedicated science-fantasy war drama with some levity (like the good Star Wars shows or Avatar: The Last Airbender) or a lighthearted yet empowering slice-of-life action-adventure romcom (i.e. basically a well-made remake of the original show in the style of Adventure Time and Parks and Rec or something).

-My final random thought for this whole thing: we really could have used a triumphant end credits song or something. Aside from obviously recommending Fabulous Secret Powers, I would have also recommended the original 4 Non Blondes “What’s Going On,” a reprise of “Warriors,” Gorillaz’s “We Got the Power,” or (my favourite) Talking Head’s “(Nothing But) Flowers” since the ending scenes remind me of it.

Thanks again to the crew for giving me something to live for and/or complain about!

Now, let’s hope the He-Man reboots do as well...

[minsimagines]

listen to me | yandere boss!jk

summary: your lover, your boss, is a tad bit too in love with you for your own good.

 request? yes.    “Hello, I really love your writing. I rushed over here as soon as I noticed your requests are open. It's my first request so I'm hella nervous hehe...If you have time can you please do a 'Yandere CEO/boss Jungkook' for me? It's up to you if you want to include smut or not. I'll wait for your answer. Please don't feel pressurized if I'm being a burden to you. It's okay if you don't want to do it. ಥ_ಥ “

 words: 1.6k.

WARNING: a bit angsty, yandere jungkook, choking, mention of abuse and very soft smut.

★ ⋆ ✰ ✦ ☾ ✮ ⁎ ★ ⋆ ✰ ☾ ⁎ ✦ ✮ ⁎ ☾ ★ ⋆ ✰

   Had you been obedient like he’d told you to be? No. Did that make any of this right? Absolutely not. The man, the God, had never been known for mercy as far as you were concerned, though to every other measly admirer of him, he was the image of kindness. You wished he would let you go, let you be out of his life, but as insane as it was you had also missed him. At least until he showed up again. Deep doown you knew you would never be without him. The thought had your guts wrenching.

   His eyes had gone from warm to downright frightening as soon as he looked at you through the open door to his office. Would you have said no to the job if you’d known what would follow? Probably not. He wasn’t awful all the time, and as sick as it was, no matter what he did, you didn’t exactly stop your brave comments.

   And, not that it was right of him, he only acted out when you didn’t do what he said. Other than that, his movements and his gestures were almost… sweet. Caring. Maybe that terrified you even more than his dark side. You sometimes wondered if he was ever like that in front of others, or if you really were the only one worthy of his punishments. His mercy, as he called it.

   Was he slowly making you believe you were the problem? Maybe. If nothing else, he was making you nuts. One second, he’s gently stroking his fingers up your arms, and in the next moment those same fingers clench around you throat, pinning you against the wall.

   The man was a walking contradiction.

   “Y/n,” Jungkook said. Demanded. You glanced up from the screen at your desk, meeting soft brown eyes. His meeting with a client was over. You had all his attention once more.

   “You’re not wearing it,” he said absentmindedly, his hand taking a hold of yours, his thumb stroking over your knuckles. He had given you a ring, a very expensive ring, for your birthday the day before. You don’t know why you didn’t wear it, maybe it was to purposefully piss him off? Why did you constantly have a need to keep doing that? His demeanor might have seemed calm and unbothered to anyone else, but you knew. He was boiling.

   “I don’t want to lose it,” you meekly excused the action, biting your bottom lip. A smirk stretched over his lips. You’d given him yet another reason to punish you.

   “Why don’t you… step into my office for a second, hm?” He suggested gently, his grip on your hand barely tightening, but you felt it.

   “I really need to finish this report,” you mumbled, but he simply chuckled and shook his head.

   “No, you need to do as I say,” he said, his voice low and leaving no room for debate, his eyes darkening, and you knew his other side had taken over.

   “Yes, sir,” you said quietly, somewhat sarcastic. You knew his goal, he wanted a nice little pet who’d call him master, but you weren’t about to give him that. You weren’t a pet. You slowly stood from your desk, and he loosened his tie as he followed you into his office. You heard the door close, and though your heart was thumping in your chest, you weren’t scared per say. Nervous, yes, and already somewhat humiliated, but not scared. He wasn’t interested in destroying you, not completely anyways.

   “So… I give you a very generous present, and you… you don’t even want to wear it,” Jungkook chuckled and you slowly turned to look at him, leaning against his desk.

   “Like I said, I don’t want to lose it,” you said, looking him right in the eyes. His smirk widened.

   “I thought we agreed to never lie to each other,” he mused, stepping close to you.

   “I would never lie to you,” you whispered, though you both knew you were full of shit. You’d lie about whatever fell into your mind.

   “You know what the problem here is?” He asked, and though you had a feeling it was a rhetoric question, you didn’t work hard to stop your sarcastic answer.

   “You?”

   “You just don’t have respect for me,” he said, slowly nodding his head, completely ignoring your remark. “And you know, it might be because I’ve been way to nice to you,” he murmured, reaching out to stroke a finger down your cheek. You took in a slow, deep breath, in case he would wrap those devious fingers around your neck.

   “You’re not,” you glared.

   One of his legs moved between yours, and no matter how much you hated him sometimes, you never wanted him to stop touching you once he’d started. Did his touches leave you hurt sometimes? Yes. Did you run away? Call the police? Were you afraid of him? No. Deep down you were afraid you liked this whole thing.

   His hands rested on the table, one on each side of you. His face was right in front of you, his eyes piercing into yours.

   “You’re too smooth, too gorgeous…” he whispered as he leaned in and let his lips brush against your neck, and for once, it felt loving. Not dangerous.

   “I hate to do this to you,” he breathed, his hand cupping the side of your throat, fingers brushing into your hair. You were tempted to close your eyes and lean into him.

   “Then don’t,” you whispered, your hand reaching up to take a hold of his forearm.

   “I have to,” he said quietly, leaning back slightly so he could look at you. “You don’t listen to me.”

   “I love you,” you murmured. “Is that not enough?”

   “Maybe you do,” he smiled sadly, his fingers wrapping around your throat though he didn’t squeeze. You swallowed thickly, looking into his eyes desperately.

   “Maybe when every person in this city have no doubt of who you belong to, maybe when you freely devote yourself to me, it will be enough,” he said slowly.

   You couldn’t really say where the strong emotions you felt for him came from. He was talking about you as if you were a prized trophy, he was everything you’d swore to never accept in a man, yet you couldn’t stop thinking about him. Couldn’t stop wanting him to just love you as you were. You were doomed to roll in this loop until your end.

   “I’m not your pet,” you said barely audible. As the words slipped out, his grip on your throat tightened slightly. It wasn’t painful, wasn’t cutting of your air, it was simply telling you who was in control.

   For the first time since you had been pulled into his life, you felt terrified. Not of him, not of being physically or verbally abused, no. You were terrified of not being enough, and you were terrified he would grow sick of you. You were terrified of not being his anymore. Your grip on his arm tightened as your eyes welled with warm tears.

   “Don’t you love me too?” You whispered.

   “More than anything,” he confessed, his lips gently pressing against yours. The warmth, the softness, it was almost too much.

   “But you don’t listen,” he whispered against your lips, his grip on your throat tightening enough to cut off your air. Your hands gripped his wrist, your eyes piercing into his.

   His free hand moved down, gently rubbing against your most precious parts, and you closed your eyes. You didn’t ever want to admit he made you feel good, you didn’t want to feel dirty, but there was no denying.

   Your hands tightened around his wrist as his free hand rubbed you just the right way, the pressure of his hand increasing slightly, and you couldn’t help the pleasant shiver running through your body, your lips parting, trying to fill your lungs with air. Your back arched slightly, and your body was flushed against his.

   A few hot tears ran down your cheeks, and his lips pressed against them, as if he was feeling sorry for you. This was his mercy. Not letting you breathe, but not killing you.

   “You never listen,” he hissed, the pressure on your groin hardening even more, the grip around your throat painful and throbbing. You looked up into his eyes, begging him to let you go.

   “Just listen to me,” he begged in return. You tried nodding you head, tried screaming, but nothing happened. As your vision was getting blurry, your head was hurting, the pleasure in your core was building, he let you go, and you ungracefully fell to the floor, half hating him and half wanting him to screw your brains out. You had officially lost your mind.

   “Go home, now,” he said, crouching down next to you, pushing the hair out of your face. You couldn’t believe those gentle fingers had been the same that had just choked you. “Clean yourself up, and when I get home… you better be wearing the ring,” he muttered as he took a hold of one of your hands and kissed the back of it, before he stood and left you in his office.

   As if you were going to be wearing the ring when he came home.

[queenof-literature]

Wolfie

Wild meets Wolfie. The second part of my series, Hero of Wild! 

https://archiveofourown.org/series/1778263

AO3: queenofliterature

Link could always talk in his dreams.

He didn’t know why, it always came out as a painful gargled mess in real life. Once, one of the treasure hunters at Dueling Peaks Stable heard him trying to talk to himself and said he sounded like a demented toddler, causing both brothers to cackle. He kept trying, he could feel the words on the tip of his tongue and each time he thought for sure he could reach them. He never did. There weren’t always cruel words when he tried to talk, sometimes it was just scathing glares like the gossiping women in Hateno. Sometimes it was mothers dragging their children away from him as if he were a rabid dog. Eventually, Link never talked again. Not that he couldn’t take a joke, but he was the Hylian Champion. What would people say if they heard their champion talking like that? Not to mention that using his voice sent waves of fire through his throat. Enough people knew sign language, he could get by with a notebook if he had too. It was fine.

It wasn’t fine.

Watching all the other Links chat the long traveling days away hurt more than he expected. They were fun, and they understood him in ways others didn’t. They were Heroes of Courage too, they knew how hard the expectations could be. But Link, or, Wild now, wasn’t one of them. He had failed his Zelda, his Hyrule, and his friends. Why should he deserve new friends? But a selfish part of him wished he could talk to them. Wished he didn’t have to try and wave for their attention to add an abysmal amount to their conversation that had already left without him. It wasn’t their fault they could talk. It wasn’t fair to ask them to slow down so he could sign something half of them didn’t understand completely. Apparently, sign had changed over the centuries.

He wanted so badly to be able to talk. He had so much to say, so much that his Zelda had taught him and what he had learned on his adventure. Did they know how cooking hot-footed frogs bring out certain properties that are cancelled out when combined with other materials with hidden properties? He had done so many experiments with his cooking and he had found out so much! Oh well. He’d probably just annoy them anyway. That’s what happened when he talked in his dreams. People would make fun of his voice. Zelda would make fun of him for being a failure who can’t even talk properly. The other champions would blame him for his death, and when they didn’t they told him to shut up and do his job, in his dreams he never took his vow of silence. He thinks he had dreams, deep in the Shrine of Resurrection. His death on loop, his failures repeating in his mind. Sleeping leads to dreams.

He didn’t like dreams.

~

Twilight had the last watch tonight, although Wild tried to take over a watch every single night. Twilight tried to connect with Wild, he really did. He just didn’t know how. Focusing on everything was hard to do. If Wild wanted someone’s attention, he had to wave and hope they noticed. He would never go out of his way to gain someone’s attention, and he would never do more than a little wave. Sometimes Twilight would be able to catch it and ask who he wanted. Most of the time it was just little facts about his Hyrule. He was trying to be helpful and Twilight appreciated it. It was just hard to communicate with the shy boy. Especially when they were walking, when they all had to look out for monsters.

Twilight could see why his name was Wild. In that battle against the Lynel, he was an elegant force of chaos, breaking equipment, finding odd ways out of a situation, and seeing the battlefield in ways no one did. That was his element, the wild. Twilight wanted to get to know him in his environment, but it’s not like he wanted to chuck the boy into danger. He just wanted to see that spark again. Ever since Wild joined the group, the hollow spot he felt wasn’t so hollow. He never told anyone, he would sound insane, but Wild was meant to be here the entire time. Twilight just didn’t understand why Hylia waited so long.

Speaking of Wild, the boy was sleeping curled up in his thin bed roll away from the campfire at the edge of camp. He wanted to sleep further away, but everytime he tried Time told him to get at least within the bounds of camp, as to not be taken by a monster in the middle of the night. Wild huffed through his nose, but did as he was told.

Everything about him was a paradox. He was untamed, and yet he wasn’t disrespectful. His scarred face showed experience, but his age showed adolescence. His eyes were ancient and haunted, but also carefree and bright. Wild was a conundrum that Twilight and the others desperately wanted to solve.

Wild came with so many questions. Why couldn’t he talk? Was it physical with the scars on his neck? Mental, with the anxiety he clearly faced? Both? Neither? Did he just hate them? Twilight and the others had no idea.

Something about Wild made the wolf within him claw to get out. Not in an angry way, or a way that hurt. But in a way that the wolf wanted to help him, protect him, and ease his pain. He wanted Wild to talk to him and to trust him. Perhaps it was him being jealous of Warriors and Wind, and he shouldn’t pull Wild into his jealousy. No… it was deeper than that.

It felt like Wild was to Twilight as Twilight was to Time. Damn. He’d have to talk to the Old Man about this tomorrow.

~

“Link.”

“Link.”

“Link!”

Link’s eyes snapped open, only to be met with a lid of glass, surrounded by water. No no no. Not again. He didn’t die again. He didn’t. He didn’t fail again!

“Link, you failed me.” The voice was Zelda’s.

“No. Please Zelda this is a mistake. I’m coming. Let me out! Zelda I’m coming!” Link screamed, slamming his hands against the glass, hands turning red. But the glass didn’t budge.

“You left me, Link. You arrive one hundred years late to stop Calamity and you disappear two weeks later. I’m rebuilding a kingdom and you’re playing hero. You think your shiny new friends care? You’ll kill them, just like your last ones.” Zelda’s voice filled his ears no matter how hard Link covered them.

“No! Zelda I’ll come back! They need my help! The Master Sword told me!” Link pleaded.

“So now you feel your connection to the sword? I prayed for seventeen years. You don’t deserve the sword Link. You deserve nothing.” Water began to rise within the chamber. Link panicked and banged on the glass once more, but nothing changed. Nothing would ever change.

~

Twilight was twenty minutes into last watch when he heard soft noises coming from within camp. Twilight sighed, there were many restless nights with eigh-nine Heroes of Courage in one place. Whether it be nightmares, insomnia, the Heroes of Courage sometimes just had a hard time with sleep. But someone would sense it and wake up to comfort their friends. Twilight was close with them, but he didn’t want to step on any toes or cross any boundaries.

Hm. He should have heard rustling by now, one of the other heroes rising to comfort another one. But all he heard were the same soft noises becoming increasingly strained. Now that he thought about it, Wild hadn’t slept in the past few days they were together…

Twilight whipped around and looked at Wild from across the campfire. His scarred face was pulled into a pained expression, even from what little Twilight could see under the hood he insisted on keeping pulled up, even in sleep. His skin was pale and clammy, and his hands were scratching at his scars, turning them a bright red. Oh Hylia, Wild suffered from nightmares, and pretty terrible ones if they all looked like this. Perhaps he hadn’t slept at all since they were grouped together because of them. Wild seemed like the type to be embarrassed at needing help. They all were to an extent.

Twilight desperately thought of a solution. If it were the others, he could wake them up and give them reassurances or a gentle hug, depending on who it was. But with Wild, he had no ideas. Wild didn’t like to be touched at all so he couldn’t imagine he’d be very keen to affection after a horrifying nightmare, Twilight knew for a fact he slept with a knife and his slate nearby. But he couldn’t just leave the kid alone in a nightmare that would probably only escalate. Shit, what did he like? Maybe Twilight could throw a rock at him to wake him up? Hylia no that’s an awful idea. Shit he was so bad at this. Oh wait! Animals! Wild loves animals just like him! He could transform into a wolf and be gone by morning. It wasn’t ideal, Wild wouldn’t assume he spoke sign and therefore wouldn’t be able to talk, but he could at least offer physical comfort if Wild wanted.

He would have to be careful. The others knew about Wolfie, but if Twilight wasn’t there come morning, they would panic and wonder where he was and why he left them unprotected. And Wild hadn’t met Wolfie yet, and there were many savage animals in his Hyrule. This wasn’t his best idea, but it was the only one he had. Slowly, Twilight crept out of camp. Not far enough to leave the camp unwatched, but far enough from prying eyes who might happen to be awake. His transformation to Wolfie didn’t really hurt anymore, it was just the uncomfortable feeling of bones shifting. Once he was fully transformed, he silently trotted back to the edge of camp where Wild was.

What was the best way to go about this? He certainly did not want to get stabbed if Wild saw a giant wolf looming over him. So maybe a quick wet nose to the face then back up? Yes that seemed best. Twilight stalked forward, pressing his nose between the hands scratching at scars to stop him before he hurt himself further, then quickly backing away as Wild jolted awake with a small gasp and grabbed the rusted knife under his bedroll. Wide eyes gazed rapidly around for a threat. Wolfie shrunk down and whined, trying to make himself look as nonthreatening as possible.

~

Link gasped awake. A threat. His hand immediately went to his knife, desperately looking around to what was trying to kill him tonight. Yiga? Bokoblin? Moblin? After frantic eyes scanned the whole area, they landed on a hunched over wolf, stunning Li-no Wild. That’s right, he was in the camp with the other heroes. Keeping the knife in front of him, he eyed the wolf suspiciously. Wolves didn’t act like this, they would have bit him immediately since he was at the edge of camp. He knew he should have slept in a tree like always, but it seemed rude to be up high and more protected than his new group. The wolf, still having his head down slightly, approached him slowly. Not in the slow stalking motion that meant it was waiting for an opening. It almost seemed inviting. Wild wished he could talk to it. Was it hungry? He could spare some food but he didn’t want other wolves coming to this area. What in Hylia was going on?

~

Twilight continued to approach slowly, watching the knife wearily. Wild let him approach, though Twilight could tell he was nervous. Who wouldn’t be? At least Wild has some sort of self preservation. Soon, Twilight was at the knife. This was the moment of truth. He ducked under the knife and sniffed Wild’s hand, before nuzzling it slightly. Wild almost dropped the knife in shock, blue eyes wide. Twilight began to walk closer to Wild, before huffing and laying his head down in his lap. Looking up, he saw the clear shock on Wild’s face. Hesitant and shaking hands reached to pat his fur. Once he realized it was okay, Wild buried his hands into soft fur. Twilight wagged happily that his plan had worked, until he felt something wet on his head. It seemed the soothing motion only had Wild’s nightmare come back full force. Wolfie whined guiltily.

Wild attempted to tell him he was okay, but all that came out were rasps and words so broken Twilight couldn’t even begin to comprehend them. Twilight’s heart broke for the boy. It seemed he really wasn’t physically able to talk. Wild’s hands went to scratch at his neck and face again, but Wolfie intervened. He wanted the boy to cope however he could, but he didn’t want Wild to hurt himself. Wolfie sat up and nuzzled into Wild’s neck to prevent his hands from reaching it. Wild tried to say something but Wolfie couldn’t understand no matter how much he tried. Wild’s dam broke completely as he buried his face into Wolfie’s fur and cried, trying to use the fur to muffle any sounds he made. Twilight stayed the entire time, even as Wild’s small cries turned to hiccups and he got drowsy, Wolfie stayed.

His original plan was to leave as soon as Wild fell back asleep, but the teen had all but collapsed on him as they laid down. He didn’t have the heart to move and possibly wake the boy, leaving him alone to transform back into Twilight who he felt he couldn’t open up to yet. So Wolfie stayed. Time could make up an excuse for him in the morning, he was the only one who knew. He would see Wild draped on top of him and the tear tracks on the younger’s face and know what happened. As a wolf, he had better senses. If something came close to them, he would know. For now, he stayed by Wild’s side.

~

Time’s eye opened a crack, he’s always one of the earliest risers in the group. He sat up, back cracking slightly from sleeping on the ground before turning to say good morning to his protege on watch. Time froze when he realized his protege was nowhere to be found. He grabbed his Biggoron Sword and stood quickly. Twilight wouldn’t just leave them unguarded. Time’s eyes scanned the area, before landing on their newest addition draped on the wolf form of his protege. Time’s posture relaxed, although his abrupt rising woke some others in their party. Legend and Warriors had also awoken.

“Seems the new guy has finally met Wolfie.” Legend smirked at the sight before him, smirk only dropping when he noticed the tear tracks on Wild’s face.

“Seems like he had a rough night.” Warriors commented. “Leave it to our resident wolf to cheer him up.”

Wolfies’ eyes peeked open glaring slightly at the other heroes, almost daring them to wake the boy on top of him before dozing off once more. Time chuckled slightly. Seems his protege was a little protective over their newest member.

“Where’s Twilight?” Warriors asked, masking his concern. “He wouldn’t leave us to the monsters would he?”

“No.” Time shook his head. “Wolfie isn’t panicking so I’m sure he’s just checking the perimeter or scavenging. He wouldn’t leave us without Wolfie here to alert us.” Time resonated. He held back his relief when the others bought his excuse. Time smiled once again at Wolfie and Wild, not making too much noise and risk waking the others. Breakfast could wait a little while.

[salt-warrior]

WHEN EARTH TURNS TO ASHES

Masterlist

Chapter Seven: Loner Loser

"And how did you get locked into that classroom, Miss Linh?" Principal Strom stared down at Selene, his eyes empathetic and kind. Selene wished to tell him, but it hurt too much to admit the betrayal of her best friend.

"I, uh- I accidentally locked it." Selene glanced down at her shoes, her stomach churning with guilt. "I don't really know how. Someone might have locked it earlier and I just got shut it."

Shrugging her shoulders, Selene continued the lie. "I passed out because it just had this horrible stench of smoke. I think some kids were smoking in there before me because it was awful." Selene wrinkled her nose at the memory of the real smoke and how it had made her feel. "I have these really bad allergies and don't do well with smoke. Or cotton, for that matter." Selene coughed for special effect. She was a master liar.

Principal Strom remained skeptical, his too big shoulders hunching as he analyzed her. "And you're sure that there was no... sabotage? Are there any students who may be out to get you? Have you been bullied at all in the past or at the present?" He was on to her, but there was no way that Selene was going to let him get her.

"Nope, I'm fine." Selene smiled her most brilliant smile. She was good at pretending. She was excellent at deception. She was clever and sharp as a knife; but that had never made anyone want to be her friend. She had a brain, but no one to share her witty jokes with.

"Well," Principal Strom sighed. He looked worn and tired, and Selene felt bad for the man. He tried so hard to do his job and help kids; but at the end of the day, he was still getting lied to. "I hope that you will report any behavior that is against school policies, especially bullying. We have no tolerance for it here at OHS. Have an excellent day, Miss Linh."

Selene stood from her stiff seat, paying a brief goodbye. She knew that what Pearl and her cohorts were doing was wrong. They were terrible people— monsters even. She hated them all, but some small part of her couldn't tell the Principal; because she couldn't bring herself to believe it had actually happened.

Cress Darnel was supposed to have been her friend. She had been the only person to stand by Selene after Peony's death, but times change. She must have been the one to tell Pearl and her friends her fear of fire.

No, Selene wasn't scared of what Pearl and her cronies would do to her. She was used to pain and heartbreak— but betrayal was something entirely new to her. Selene had never opened up enough to a person to allow such a tragedy, and admitting it would hurt her more than any physical wound.

Selene had lost too much in life, but losing her friend to betrayal was the ultimate tragedy.

***

The buzz of a telephone over one thousand miles away tickled at Kai's ear. It had taken him only a few hours to locate the Linh's phone number and only a few more to figure out what he was going to say. By now, it was nine in the morning.

He had checked everything, making sure that it would all be perfect. The time zones had only an hour difference and it was a Friday morning. No one should yet have left for work. It would all be perfect.

"Hello?" Said a voice from the other end. It sounded young and feminine.

"Hello," Kai said in his chipper voice. He had only slept for an hour and a half, but he felt more awake than ever. "My name is Kaito Crown, and I was hoping to speak with Garan Linh."

Silence followed, and Kai wondered if the girl had hung up on him. "Hello?"

"You can't speak with my father." The girl's voice was angry— defensive. "What kind of sick prank is this?" The girl sounded upset now, and Kai felt bad even though he didn't know what he had done wrong.

"I'm sorry," Kai cut in quickly, before she could call him out for anything else he hadn't done. "Who is this?"

"Pearl Linh." The girl—Pearl— huffed.

"Well, Pearl, like I said, I would like to talk to your father on behalf of his ward, Selene." Kai stated patiently. He couldn't quite understand why Pearl sounded so annoyed at him, or why she wouldn't let him talk to her father. It wasn't as if he were trying to scam them or anything.

An agitated snarl sounded from the other end. The animal-like sound scared Kai into nearly dropping the phone. "What is your problem? Do you like causing people emotional pain, or are you just insensitive?" Kai flinched at her words. He had not expected such a retaliation to such a simple and easy question.

"I-I'm sorry." Kai stuttered the apology, a chink in his armor.  "I don't mean to bring up anything upsetting. It's just that Selene has been in a terrible car accident and has suffered major injuries. I know that she's been estranged from the family, but I thought that you may still want to–"

"We don't want anything to do with that monster." Pearl's voice dripped with malice. She was furious. "Not after everything she did to our family. She took away not one, but two members of this family. She's a menace to society."

Kai felt his breath hitch. He knew that many children in Foster Homes struggled and often rebelled, but this sounded serious. Maybe the girl he had saved was mentally insane, or had done something terrible to this family.

"If you don't mind me asking," Kai said, "What did Selene do to you?" Kai hurriedly explained himself, "I'm the person who pulled her out of the car. I never met her before the accident, and she's been in a medically induced coma for about a week."

Pearl sighed from the other end. She seemed to be more relaxed knowing that Kai was just a random citizen. "I'll tell you what happened only if you promise to leave my mother and I alone. She hates talking about these kinds of things. Her mental state is already terrible and I don't need it getting worse."

"I promise." Kai said, his stomach jittering with butterflies. He almost didn't want to know whatever Pearl was about to tell him, but he couldn't help himself. He was a curious person.

"My dad took Selene in when she was sixteen. He knew what it was like to have bad parents, though he had never been in a Foster Home. He really liked her and decided to adopt her into the family. My mother was against the entire thing, and I agreed with her. The only person besides my father who wanted Selene was my younger sister, Peony. Funnily enough, they're the two who got the worst of it from Selene.

"Peony worshipped Selene. She thought that the sun shone from everything that she did. I despised her. Call it psychic abilities, but I knew that she was a rotten one. I did not expect her to murder my sister, however. I knew she was bad, but I didn't think she was so horrible as to murder a child. My sister was only fourteen.

"There was no proof that Selene did it, but everyone knew. It only took her a less than two months before she realized that no one wanted her anymore, and so she left.

"My parents had mixed emotions about her leaving. My mother was thrilled, and while my dad wasn't too fond of the thing anymore, he still wanted to help. My mom told him not to tell anyone that she'd run away. After all, Selene was almost eighteen. When Social Services found out that she'd run away and my dad hadn't told anyone, they were furious.

"My father was charged with child neglect for not reporting Selene's disappearance and being her legal guardian. He was sentenced to ten years in prison for not wanting to keep a monster in our house anymore.

"I hope that accident hurt Selene, because she ruined my life. My mother is destroyed because of what that fiend did, and left me all alone to pick up the broken pieces of my family. Don't call again." A dull buzz filled Kai's ears, and he knew that he would never speak to Pearl Linh ever again.

***

Kai smeared ketchup onto his french fry, lathering it up until it was fifty-fifty ketchup to fry ratio. He hated eating naked french fries. Thorne, on the other hand barely tapped his three fries into his BBQ sauce. Kai didn't quite understand the sauce choice, but Thorne had something against tomatoes.

"So how did Selene murder the little sister again?" Thorne asked around a mouth of french fries. Kai squirmed at spotting the specks of food in his friend's mouth. He hated when people talked while chewing food.

Kai swallowed his single fry, taking time to answer by swigging his water. "Pearl didn't say. She just said that Selene killed her and then ran away."

Right after Kai's conversation with Pearl, he had called Thorne. The phone call had drained him and set his mind into panic mode. Kai had dished out the entire story to Thorne, who seemed to think of the entire thing as one fat joke.

"Great," Thorne deadpanned, picking up his burger. "You rescued a murderer from death. Maybe she'll kill you next." Thorne tilted his head downward in a teasing way, pointing a fry dramatically at Kai.

Rolling his eyes, Kai began to dip another fry. "The thing is, I have a hard time believing it. I don't just want to condemn her for something another person thought about her. For all we know, maybe Pearl murdered the little sister and used Selene as a cover story."

"Too cliché." Thorne said. "But I do agree with hearing Selene out before judging her. This Pearl character sounds a tad bit biased."

Kai nodded his head absently, biting his lower lip. The phone call with Pearl Linh had upset him more than he thought a phone call could. He didn't want to believe that Selene was a bad person, but something inside him yearned to learn more about the angel.

"I think I want to go to Olympia." Kai said, looking at Thorne to gage his reaction.

Thorne munched on another fry. "You must be getting overconfident with your looks then." Thorne said, his words mushed by food. "Because I'm pretty sure that girl would be more than happy to punch you in your perfect nose."

"I don't mean to visit the Linh's." Kai corrected himself. "I want to talk to the school, or maybe even some friends of Selene." Kai had been thinking about doing this even before his phone call with Pearl. He wanted to understand the person he was now connected to.

"How do you know if she even has friends? The girl sounds like a loner loser to me." Thorne wiped his mouth with a scratchy brown napkin. Kai threw him a glare. "I mean," Thorne continued. "If she doesn't have any friends here after two years of living here, why would she have any up there?"

Kai had never thought about that before. He always assumed that there must have been somebody that cared about Selene, but maybe there wasn't. Perhaps she was more alone than Kai could ever imagine.

"Everybody makes acquaintances in high school whether they like it or not." Kai rubbed his eyes. He may have been energized during his call with Pearl, but getting no sleep the night before was finally wearing on him. He needed a nap.

"Alright then, Mr. Superhero. Fight valiantly, die bravely. Go figure out your girlfriend's backstory. I'll stay here... doing nothing." Thorne sipped on his Coke, pinky up.

"Like you're getting away that easily." Kai smirked. "I need you to look out for Selene while I'm gone."

Thorne choked, spitting brown bubbles onto the tabletop. "No way. Aces and spades, I am not going to watch over your murderer girlfriend. I've sworn off all women, especially those who may want to hurt or kill me." Thorne shook his head adamantly. "You can go to Olympia and do whatever you want, Crown, but I have my own stuff."

"Come on," Kai pleaded, knowing exactly how to win this kind of battle. "I'll only be gone for a day or two, and all you have to do is talk to her for ten minutes. I just don't want her to be alone again."

"I'm pretty sure she's used to it by now." Thorne muttered under his breath, earning a blazing glare from Kai. "But alright, I'll visit her."

Kai grinned at his friend. "Thanks, mate."

"Anything for my lovestruck idiot best friend." Thorne reached across the table, beginning on Kai's fries.

Kai swatted at Thorne's hand, but he had already stolen five of his fries. "I am doing you a favor though," Kai said.

"How so? I thought that I was the one visiting your murdering angel." Thorne guffawed, shoving all five fries in his mouth at once.

"Because, my dear friend," Kai simpered. "I think your lady-charming skills needs some touching up. If anything, you're the loner loser, not Selene." Kai laughed, and Thorne glared.

Thorne stared at Kai's fries, a mischievous grin crossing his features. Kai yawned, stretching out his back and closing his eyes for a split second. By the time he looked back at the table, all of his fries were gone, and Thorne was laughing.

[levitatingbiscuits]

Um, if you still want prompts: codywan, blending in by making people uncomfortable with physical intimacy?

“Blast,” Obi-Wan said. “Looks like someone’s not happy we’re here.” He nodded his head at a few rough-looking specimens were eyeing them from the bar, fingering their blasters and muttering to the barkeep.

He had been tracking a lead on one of the senators’ multitude of would-be assassins, as he so often seemed to these days. Every time Obi-Wan returned to Coruscant he had another three missions lined up for him, whereas Anakin seemed to always have enough leave to attend Senator Amidala’s various soirees. 

He really was getting too obvious; a few concerned knights and masters had told him that young Ahsoka spent most of her time in the Temple alone in the archives or tagging along with Master Koon or various other masters who made time for her in their off hours. A varied education was of course valuable (Obi-Wan had spent quite a lot of time with Yoda and his friends’ masters as a padawan, himself), but he was concerned that Ahsoka was learning far more about how to be a warrior than how to be a Jedi from Anakin. 

But at this point there was little he could do; Anakin was a knight, not a padawan, and Obi-Wan was currently in a shady nightclub on Corellia getting dirty looks from the regulars he’d been asking pointed questions to. 

“It seems there’s nothing for it,” Obi-Wan sighed, making to approach them and hopefully negotiate his way out of a fight, but a hand grabbed his arm before he could.

“Sir,” Cody said, looking dashing but supremely uncomfortable in the sleek vest and tight shirt (complete with a plunging neckline) that was in fashion for Corellian pilots at the moment. Obi-Wan understood; he usually never left the Temple without at least three layers of tunics on, but for missions like these discretion was the better part of valor. Typically Vos or another shadow would’ve been tapped for such a thing, but apparently the chancellor had (yet again) requested him personally, as he often did for off-planet missions.

“Yes, Cody?” Obi-Wan stressed. Cody had insisted on coming along, and Obi-Wan had insisted in turn that they not blow their cover by using titles. Cody was, perhaps predictably, struggling.

“If you go over now you’re going to start a fight,” Cody hissed, “and then everything will go to hell and I won’t be able to keep up like Skywalker always does because I’m not insane.”

Obi-Wan blinked, thrown (and perhaps a little affronted, though Cody had a point). “And what do you suggest?” 

Cody’s eyes flicked over his shoulder, then he blurted, “Dance with me.”

Obi-Wan blinked, his traitorous heart skipping a beat. “During an investigation?”

Cody’s face did something complicated, but there was a doomed resolve in his eyes as if he was about to face down a firing squad. He took Obi-Wan by the wrists and dragged him out onto the dance floor. 

Their friends at the bar had started shouldering past drunken, gyrating clubgoers toward them, which was evidently what had caused Cody’s alarm. Obi-Wan pushed past his own reticence--he should not let his... one-sided attachment to Cody get in the way of their duty, and if Cody wanted to avoid a fight in this environment, Obi-Wan would defer to him.

So he grabbed Cody, one hand low on his back and the other on his nape, and started dancing.

“Sir?” Cody yelped, face crimson and stiff as a board. He might have flinched away if Obi-Wan hadn’t just pressed closer.

“You asked me to dance, Cody, so I’m dancing,” Obi-Wan said, trying very hard to keep his voice light and unaffected. He might have only danced at diplomatic banquets the past few years, but as a padawan he and his friends had sneaked out to the lower level bars and nightclubs on more than a few occasions. 

He’d have to be careful not to fall back into old habits--Cody was his comrade and subordinate, and no matter Obi-Wan’s personal feelings Cody didn’t feel the same. But if they were to fool their new friends he’d need some cooperation.

“You have to touch me if we’re going to dance,” Obi-Wan whispered into his ear, beard brushing his jaw, and Cody’s hands came up lightning quick to grip hard at his hips. He still wasn’t moving.

“Aw, you pulled a shy one,” a gorgeous Twi’lek dancing next to them cooed, voice loud enough to be heard over the pounding music, an equally attractive human man and woman in each arm. “He’s delicious. Want to dance with us instead, pet?”

Cody shook his head rapidly. “No, thank you, sir,” he managed, and might have saluted if his hands hadn’t been glued to Obi-Wan’s waist.

“He’s with me,” Obi-Wan said with a sharp, rather unfriendly grin. He pulled Cody even closer, until they were pressed together from hips to chest. Cody shuddered against him, and Obi-Wan resolved to apologize profusely later on. His commander was clearly incredibly uncomfortable.

Obi-Wan managed to coax Cody into dancing, so close that it was more like grinding (albeit far too awkward to be as enjoyable as Obi-Wan used to find that sort of thing). Cody’s face was so red that Obi-Wan was worried he was going to get overheated. He tried to ignore the steadily-piling evidence that Cody disliked his closeness, disliked his touch. It was perhaps the most proper dancing Obi-Wan had ever engaged in at a club, and people were starting to notice.

“This isn’t working,” he said, as quietly as one could while still being heard over the music. “We’re just drawing more attention to ourselves.”

One of Cody’s arms abruptly circled his waist, the other hand coming up to press at his spine, and suddenly Obi-Wan was looking right into his amber eyes. His face was still red and he still looked horrifically embarrassed, but his gaze was dark and intent. 

“I’m gonna try something,” he murmured. “You can court-martial me later, Obi-Wan, but will you trust me to do this now?”

“Yes, of course, what--” Obi-Wan began, and then Cody’s lips were on his.

Even if he was uncomfortable with dancing, it was clear that this was an area Cody excelled at. Obi-Wan had to clutch at his solid back to stay steady, Cody’s mouth devouring his, stealing his breath and lighting up his nerves until he could barely focus on anything else. 

He made to pull back, to gather himself and catch his breath (and perhaps check to see where their pursuers were and if they had their weapons out), but Cody just followed him until Obi-Wan had to cling to his shoulders to stay upright. He felt Cody spread his fingers against his back and easily adjust to supporting the majority of Obi-Wan’s weight; he might literally sweep him off his feet if this continued.

Someone grabbed Obi-Wan’s shoulder and tried to yank him off, but Cody finally broke the kiss just to yank him back and snarl, in a passable Corellian accent, “The kriff is your problem? You looking to eat my blaster, wermo?”

Obi-Wan couldn’t actually see his assailant, because Cody was wisely pressing his much more recognizable face into his neck. Perhaps that was for the best; Obi-Wan was feeling a bit faint.

“Isn’t that that Jedi--”

“What kind of Jedi would be sucking face in a kriffin’ Corellian cantina?” Cody retorted. “Now kark off before I feed you your own karking teeth.”

At this point other disgruntled dancers started yelling and heckling them, and their assailant slunk away with his tail between his legs, both metaphorically and literally.

“Your boy’s got bite,” the Twi’lek woman from before laughed, watching with interest, and Obi-Wan couldn’t help but agree.

They continued dancing just long enough to avoid looking like they were running away. Anger apparently distracted Cody enough for him to become more at ease, which Obi-Wan wasn’t sure if he should be grateful for or not. They eventually peeled off and left to follow a new lead, hopefully without any angry, suspicious patrons this time.

They walked in silence for a minute, Obi-Wan wishing that Corellia was a bit less hot. The muggy night air was doing little to cool his hot face, which would be even more obvious than Cody’s on his pale skin.

“I’m very sorry you had to do that, commander,” Obi-Wan said at last, once he was sure his voice wouldn’t crack.

Cody tensed beside him, still close enough that Obi-Wan could feel it. “Sir, I’m the one who came up with the idea to dance, and I’m the one who... uh.”

“But still, I forced you into that position,” he said wretchedly, looking anywhere but at the commander. Gorgeous, amazing, duty-bound Cody. How could Obi-Wan take advantage of his loyalty and dedication? “If you no longer feel comfortable working with me, I’ll get you transferred wherever you want, I swear it--”

And then Cody took his face in his hands and kissed him again, in full view of everyone walking by. It was softer, but no less passionate than the one before, and he kept kissing him until Obi-Wan gathered the strength to pull away.

“Cody... you don’t have to--”

“I wanted to,” Cody interrupted, voice firm and eyes molten. “I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t want to, sir. O-Obi-Wan.” He broke eye contact to duck his head. “If you’ll still have me as your commander, I would be honored to continue serving with you.”

He should say no. He was attached, and Cody’s direct superior, and Cody might have been mentally and physically in this thirties but he was chronologically twelve, for the Force’s sake, but--

But Obi-Wan was so happy he could hardly speak.

“If you’re sure,” he said at last, and the grin he got back--shy and sweet and beautiful--was blinding.

[missholland]

Lan Wangji (mostly, his love)

LAN ZHAN! I read somewhere that this was said 102 times by Wei Wuxian in The Untamed. It feels like an understatement, cause I’ve watched the show so many times now I could hear ‘Lan Zhan’ being called in my sleep...

My first time watching the drama, I was full on Team Xianxian. I mean, who would not be? He’s the central character of the story, he’s the first thing you see within the first few seconds of episode 1, and who could resist his sunflower aura? I was not into Lan Wangji at all. I remember this clearly because I just found an old Instagram story in my Archive on the day I first watched this show: a screenshot of Wangji’s face in episode 3 and my caption was: ‘OMG how could Wei sunshine fall in love with this dry and boring man?’. And just like how Wangji eventually swallowed all of the statements he had made about the young Wei Wuxian (’I don’t touch other people’, ‘We’re not close’, etc.), I am not the same person on that fateful day tuning in the first episode on Netflix. I am now Team Hanguang-Jun through and through!

What I’ve been enjoying so much these days is watching random earlier/later episodes just to compare how Wangji’s attitude changed toward Wei Wuxian over 16 years-ish. It’s probably so obvious for everyone that he definitely falls in love first, even when the drama purposely made their early relationship a lot more intense comparing to the novel i.e. showing Wei Wuxian somewhat feeling the same way about Wangji in his first life, with the constant flirting and mutual pining (don’t even get me started...). Now that I kinda understand what the character is like, it makes a lot of sense the way he processed his feelings for Wuxian in his youth. I wonder how different he would have reacted without the push from the best brother/wingman in the cultivation world - Lan Xichen. Sure, Jiang Cheng had a lot to say about this too, but mostly out of a slight envy (I reckon) over Wuxian’s new subject of desire. But Lan Xichen sees through his brother, and has been pretty much WangXian fanclub admin since day 1. I don’t have a brother, but man, I wish Lan Xichen could be mine.

In my humble opinion, the fact that we were given 3 versions of Wei Wuxian throughout the series kinda gifts us 3 versions of Lan Wangji too in a way - the straight face, the confused heart, and the national boyfriend/husband. Considering the number of times I rewatched the latter half of the series i.e. episode 33 onward, I just want to write down all of my thoughts about the national boyfriend/husband Lan Wangji, and not just because that version seems to have the most lines comparing to the other two.

There are several details that were not explained much in the series (although shown on screen) so I have to read from the novel later on. But oh my god, the stuff I found... I never realized that the scene before Lan Wangji went to Mo’s manor where his guqin was playing behind him standing on the balcony referred to how he used Inquiry to find Wuxian. What Jiang Cheng said to him about having gone to a lot of places for 16 years and searching for someone completely went over my head in the first watch, and imagine how I scratched my brain revisiting that part. That plus ‘oh I’ve never seen you at a cultivation conference before’ in episode 41 - my goodness, because he was spending ALL of his time LOOKING FOR Wei Wuxian.

Another thing I hope would have been addressed in the series was the hot iron mark on his chest. I thought the story of him drinking wine and giving himself a mark identical to Wuxian’s was the prime work of a broken heart. He must have thought about their conversation in Xuanwu cave, about the mark staying on his skin forever and how Wuxian was convinced Mianmian would never forget him. Was that how Wangji was making a point of never forgetting Wei Wuxian? If that scene made into the drama, I would have thought Wangji’s character song Buwang to be play in the background. The lyrics fit the situation so much.

Personally, everything from episode 33 onward was perfection for me, finally getting to see Wangji embrace his feelings and ACT ON THEM toward the romance-blind idiot Wei Wuxian (yes, he totally is). All the caring touches and details played out so astonishingly. One of my favourite (which doesn’t seem to be a popular one since I have not seen many gifs of it on Tumblr) was when, after interrogating Huaisang, Wangji comfortably moved over the other side of the table and picked up Wuxian’s left leg to CLEAN THE EVIL SPELL - think of the level of intimacy this act is! Although that came after the romantic piggyback under the moonlight, I thought that speaks volume for someone who doesn’t even physically interact with his family members, and serves as a great follow-up right after he, again comfortably, pulled up Wuxian’s trousers to check his leg.

What I thought was always presented so beautifully is every time Wangji serves Wuxian liquor. The way he carefully picks up his sleeve, prepares the cup (I know they’re probably not called ‘cups’ but I can’t find another word), pours the liquor and slides it over to his partner is so well demonstrated and shows how much he wants to properly take care of Wuxian. Would you put so much effort in such a tiny mundane act if you’re not doing it for the most important person in your life? 

In a way, I feel like everything he does is making up for what he could not do the past 16 years, including remembering so many tiny details and keeping all sort of Wuxian-related things. My favourite Wangji keepsake moment, despite being a very short one, is the butterfly talisman at Yunping City which he gave to Wuxian to rescue Wen Ning. I don’t know why that moment makes me really really happy, probably because that was one of the earliest items Wangji could have kept hold of from Wuxian’s. That tells us how way long before he was developing feelings toward this little rebel. Not to mention, we did see Wangji even use this very talisman in episode 11 when he encountered Wen Chao on his way back to Cloud Recesses.

Yes, the ‘I knew he was Wei Ying all along’ while having all the swords pointed at you is highly pivotal as it’s basically the censored version of ‘I love you’. BUT, the moment all leading cultivators of all major and minor clans ran to Burial Mounds just to witness Lan Wangji standing proudly without flinch on the other side with Wei Wuxian makes me appreciate that whole arc a lot more than the big revelation in the last 3 episodes. Wangji ignoring his own Grand Master, Wuxian once again standing against every single person in the cultivation world but with so much confidence this time around - to me, is beyond satisfying. I love this arc so much so I wrote a separate piece about episode 44-45 - if you’re interested in more of my random thoughts, feel free to have a read here.

Thinking about all this, I’m absolutely in awe of how protective national boyfriend Wangji is to Wei Wuxian even before knowing he lost his golden core. They either have insanely accurate GPS, or just really good telepathy. Wangji’s constant attention to his partner (without having to verbally find out where he is) blows my mind every time. Remember how proud Wei Wuxian was having Lan Wangji come out just in time to fight Xue Yang at Coffin Town? That’s how much Wangji’s love and trust empowers Wuxian and makes him so so so secured, even when everyone was walking around in the fog hiding from the most notorious killer and his puppets. 

The one detail that pushed me over the edge completely (thanks a lot Lan Xichen) was the story of Wangji’s mom. Oh my god, baby Wangji sitting in the snow really messes with my head. I cannot believe it took 40 something episodes for us to learn about Wangji’s emotionally damaged upbringing and what shapes him into a stubborn lovebird as we know today. It adds A LOT more context and sadness to his famous phrase ‘bring a man back to Cloud Recesses and hide him’, as well as Lan Qiren’s statement ‘have you not learned from your father’s lesson’. I revisit the ‘bring back and hide him’ scene with a completely new perspective and can sense Wangji’s pain and confusion that Xichen described. The desperation in that statement of Wangji was a lot heavier in my eyes now that I understand the back story. If I were Wei Wuxian listening to all of that from Lan Xichen, I would probably have a meltdown right there at the doorsteps of the Silence Room.

Now we all know the source of inspiration of the infamous ‘I want to bring a man to Cloud Recesses. Bring him back and hide him’ in episode 25:

So after all of Xichen’s effort in telling Wuxian how Wangji actually feels about him through the tear-jerker story about their parents, Wei Wuxian STILL asked Lan Wangji WHY he was willing to seal Bichen and his own spiritual power so that Jin Guangyao would not hurt him. This dense man, of course, brought up the guilt card i.e. ‘Oh you don’t owe me anything’. I mean COME ON NOW YILING PATRIARCH! CAN YOU ACTUALLY BE THAT OBLIVIOUS WHEN IT COMES TO THE MAN THAT TOOK 300 LASHES ON HIS BACK FOR PROTECTING YOUR LEGACY? 

I know it went the other way in the novel, where the big confession happened. Maybe a bite from Fairy could do you some good, or just talk to Lan Xichen some more and then you can start appreciating your soulmate the way he deserves.

The silver lining after being deprived of an epic love confession is everything that happened in episode 50. It might have not been spelling-it-out clear as in ‘I love you’ ‘I love you too’ because of the government censorship, but it’s easily the most obvious yet emotional type of ending the production team has worked to hard to deliver. If you are still having trouble processing the allegedly ‘ambiguous’ finale, I can help with that - here. Just a heads up: it’s a happy ending. 

Good to know Wei Wuxian has the rest of his life making up to Lan Wangji. Everyday means everyday, because Wangji deserves THAT much!

[the-fanciful-fangirl]

Skywalker twins born during season 4 of Clone Wars?

Early Arrival

Anakin didn’t come out of his quarters aboard the Resolute for a full 48 hours when they all finally settled for their journey home. Not that Obi-Wan expected anything less, considering what they had all just gone through on Zygerria. He himself had to meditate almost hourly to keep himself in check. He noticed Ahsoka spending as many waking hours as she can practically glued to Master Koon’s hip. The Jedi master mused that she would have gravitated towards Anakin had he made any appearances. Obi-Wan couldn't even walk past Anakin’s quarters without feeling his tumultuous emotions leaking into the Force. It had been a long time since Obi-Wan had felt his former Padawan this unbalanced but he couldn’t bring himself to pry, not without a reason or an excuse. 

It is on the morning of their third day in hyperspace that an excuse presents itself in the form of Captain Rex. 

“Captain, is there something you need?” 

The clones’ barracks were several levels down from those of the Jedi generals and despite Anakin’s closeness with his men, it wasn’t typical for Rex to be loitering in the hallway outside his general’s quarters.  

“I uh, had the General’s comlink. Asked me to keep it for him for a bit. Think he wanted some peace and quiet after all this.” 

Obi-Wan couldn’t help but notice the way Rex absently rubbed his neck. He’d been feeling similarly sore for the past two days. He doubted any of them would manage to get over this whole debacle by the time they reached Coruscant. 

“But it’s been going off constantly for about an hour. I didn’t want to bother General Skywalker, said I could answer it for him, but the transmission’s asking for a security code. Seemed important.” Obi-Wan tried to shake the feeling that Rex wasn’t telling him the whole truth. 

“Did you ask Ahsoka? I believe Anakin has the unfortunate habit of supplying her with his codes.” 

“Tried the Commander when the message first came up. The code she knew didn’t work.” An awkward moment of silence passed between the two men before Anakin’s door slid open. He looked... well he looked awful. Bags hung under his eyes, what clothes he did have on were rumpled. His exposed chest was littered with bacta patches, bruises, and small scrapes. Obi-Wan reflexively cringed as he felt a renewed pain from the lines maring his own back. Anakin’s glassy gaze looked questioningly between the two men. Rex immediately tried to cover with formality. 

“Sorry to bother you General, but your com’s been-”

Before Rex could finish, Anakin lazily swiped the comlink from his hand and looked at the readout on the front. His eyes immediately grew wide and Obi-Wan almost physically felt his sharp concern in the Force.

“What’s wrong Anakin?” 

The young Jedi continued to stare at the readout for precious seconds before jamming in his code with surprising speed. The blue outline of a woman materialized.

“Thank the goddess you finally picked up!” 

“Sabé? What’re you doing on the emergency frequency?” 

In the half second it took for Obi-Wan to rack his memory and recall that this woman was one of Padmé Amidala’s handmaidens, a pained groan was heard in the background of the holocall. The handmaiden’s entire form seemed to sigh. 

“Well, first off General and I’m sorry that this is the first time you’re hearing of this I swear to the goddess I told her to tell you months ago but she wanted to wait till you were home,” another groan. “Congratulations you’re going to be a father,” another groan, “rather quickly it would seem.” 

Obi-Wan spent the next two days aboard the Resolute staying with Anakin and trying desperately to ignore the Member-of-the-Jedi-Council part of his brain. His padawan spent hours pacing back and forth in front of the private holoterminal they’d secretly commandeered to keep in touch with Padmé’s staff whenever they had updates. At the end of the first day, Rex and Ahsoka turned up blankets and sleeping mats to shove into the small ready room. When they left to acquire food for the pair, Obi-Wan was sure he heard Ahsoka mention something about winning a bet.  

Very early into the next morning, the three of them were all there when a baby’s first cry rang out and Anakin himself started crying. Rex and Ahsoka actually cheered so loudly that they almost missed the sound of the midwife calling out.

“You’re not finished yet Senator.” And they all whipped their heads towards the console. 

“What?” Despite the horrible situation the four of them had all just endured and the utter insanity of their current one, Anakin almost sounded like his old self. It was Sabé who turned to address them.

“There’s another baby.” Her voice displayed the same shock Anakin’s had but with much more elegance. 

Another fourteen minutes passed and Anakin was suddenly, and resolutely a father to not one but two incredibly healthy children. The two Jedi and clone captain, felt intrusive as the new parents, both tired in their own way, named the boy Luke and the girl Leia. So they departed, leaving Anakin to spend the entire rest of their trip happily locked in the ready room, his presence in the Force far brighter than before.

----

Sorry this took so long but it literally got three separate, but also unique, asks about Luke and Leia arriving earlier than they do in canon and my muse just decided to turn off...

Hope you enjoy :)

[p-artsypants]

Longest Night (45) Adjusting

Ao3 | FF.net

The few days they had spent at the Dupain-Cheng bakery so far were like a vacation. Not that their routines were much different…a lot of naps, video games, TV, reading…sometimes, Adrien would sit at the keyboard with headphones and tap out a tune. Whenever Marinette asked what he was playing, he’d just give her a little shrug and admit, “it’s not ready yet.”

The dinners with just Tom and Sabine were a lot more relaxed and warm, and they were usually followed with board games or a movie. At night, Adrien and Marinette would sit out on her balcony under a blanket, just enjoying the view of Paris. 

Just in general, the bakery felt more like a home than whatever the mansion was. Marinette’s loft bed was cozy, and provided privacy and comfort. Like a cradle or a cocoon. Many nights, Marinette and Adrien would sit up late, talking about anything and everything, or sometimes nothing at all. Allowing the soothing presence of the other to fill the silence. Yes, the move proved to be for the best. Marinette’s room provided an environment that aided healing, and allowed the two to indulge in old hobbies. Marinette had yet to touch her sewing machine, but she had sketched a little in a sketchbook. It was the start that counted.

“You remember when you asked me to get that constipation medication for you from England?” Adrien asked one night, late. 

Marinette had almost been asleep, but she groaned. “Ugh, yeah? Why did you have to remind me?”

“What was that about? I just assumed it was something we couldn’t get in France…but I wanted to do the friendly thing. But honestly, it’s been on my mind for a while now.”

She pushed up, propping up on one arm so she could look down at him. “First of all, that medicine wasn’t for me. It was for Master Fu.” 

“Wait what? Why?”

“So here’s the story: He got really sick and asked me to deliver a love letter to his sweetheart. He wanted to connect with her in case it was the end. The doctor gave me the prescription. And because Master Fu was taking the leap to confess, I thought I would too, so I wrote you a letter. So I delivered a piece of paper to Master Fu’s girl, the pharmacist, and to you.”

“Oh no…”

“I gave Fu’s letter to the pharmacist, the prescription to you, and my letter to Fu’s girlfriend, which was so bad that it got her akumatized!”

“Oh my lady…I’m sure it was lovely, just out of context.”

“That was probably my worst attempt.” She groaned, rolling away from him.

“Worse attempt? There were others?”

“Good night, Adrien.” 

He snuggled up behind her, whispering into her ear. “Please tell me your failures, my precious lady.”

She groaned again, kicking the blankets off of her legs so that she could sit up and face him. “Fine, you know what? Because of Alya, all of Paris already knows how hopelessly in love with you I was. And because of Lila, you know how much of a stalker I was.”

“A cute stalker.” 

“Gee thanks.” She rolled her eyes. “God, where do I even start? Oh…you know that blue scarf that you got for your birthday one year?”

“Yeah?”

“It was actually from me. I don’t know how the mix up happened, but you thought it was from your father. It made you happy, so I let it be.” 

Adrien leaned closer to her, his mouth opening in awe. “My lady…” 

“That beret that Ladybug hand delivered was also from me. That was my closest attempt, but I had to erase my name on it…”

“Whatever for? I would have cherished it more! It’s collecting dust in my closet somewhere now.”

Marinette looked away, trying to find the words to explain. The beret brought up so many sour memories, and even more trauma that she didn’t need right now.

“My lady?”

“I shouldn’t have mentioned that one. It’s stupid.” 

“Don’t shut me out,” he begged. “Please. I can’t stand it when you shut me out. I want to know everything about you, Marinette. You’re my best friend…and my wife. For better or for worse, right?”

She nodded, swallowing the thickness in her throat. “The first time I dropped it off at your house, I was shortly after stopped by Bunnyx. She said she needed my help because something had gone wrong in the future. So she took me into her burrow and dropped me off in Paris…” She shut her eyes, exhaling harshly. She had never gotten to tell anyone about this, and it weighed on her heavily, even after all this time.

“In Paris…?” Adrien urged her on.

“It was flooded. The Eiffel tower was toppled, and I could see the moon in the distance, completely shattered. You were there, all alone, and…akumatized.” 

“Into Grimalkin?”

She shook her head. “Chat Blanc. All white suit, hair, even your skin was pale. And your eyes were piercing blue.” 

He frowned, imagining that image. 

“You knew my name, and you said it was our love that destroyed the world. We fought, and I fell in the water, where I found myself and Hawkmoth frozen in stone. I touched my statue and it turned to dust. I don’t know how long you’d been like that. But you were desperate to get my earrings. You said…you said a lot of terrible things. It was horrible to see you like that…so deranged, so lost and unhinged. A little like Grimalkin, to be honest.” 

“I assume you won.” 

“Yes, but you still knew my name afterwards. I realized that in that timeline, learning my identity led to you becoming an Akuma. And I figured, you, Adrien-you, must have seen me leaving your room when I left that beret for you. And somehow that led to my identity. So, I erased my name.” 

“Why didn’t you tell me any of that earlier? That couldn’t have been fun to keep bottled up.” 

“It wasn’t. But...I prevented it. So it never happened. It was just a bad dream.” 

“But...it wasn’t. Your Miraculous Ladybug undoes all the damage akumas do. It’s like those never happened, but the memories remain. Why is it different if you’re the only one that remembers?” 

Marinette shrugged. “I guess I just didn’t want to worry you. I’m sorry.” 

Adrien leaned forward to bump his head with hers, affectionately. “As long as we’re being honest about erased timelines...there’s something I should have talked to you about too.” 

“What’s that?” 

“Aspik.” 

“Oh…that’s right! You used the Snake and Second Chance for a while.”

“25,913 times.” He answered, his voice portraying the pain the number brought. 

“How do you remember?”

“Every time I restarted, the number flashed in front of my eyes. It went up and up…every five minutes. Every time I lost you. Every time you turned to dust. Every time I failed.”

“You tried so hard…”

“You insisted that you needed the snake, and that you didn’t need Chat Noir. Several times.” 

“But it was only when you passed the snake onto Luka that we won. I did need you. I always need you, and I’m sorry if I made you feel like I didn’t.”

“Plagg warned me. Over and over, he said I was making a mistake. And I kept shutting him down. I was being selfish. Every time I restarted, I got five more minutes with you, as Adrien, not as Chat Noir. I wanted to do so good you’d fall in love with me. But I just ended up hurting myself, because I kept letting you down. It was so painful…”

“I’m sorry for putting that burden on you. That wasn’t fair.”

“You couldn’t have known.” He sighed, feeling lighter than he had in a long time. There was still plenty of trauma to work through, but getting this out of the way paved the road for clearing his head. “I’m sorry for traumatizing you in another timeline too. I know I’m not at fault for that, but I hate that any version of me hurt you.”

Marinette held his face gently, letting her thumb roll over his cheek bones. Her mother’s cooking had done well to fill in his face, but there was still a sunken look to him. His cheeks and his eyes especially. 

“You’re wonderful to me, Adrien. Always have been, in and out of the suit. And even with all the pain, trauma, and sadness…I’d still rather be with you than anyone else.”

“I feel the same. I feel connected to you. It might sound corny, but I feel it right down into my soul. When I was in solitary, there were moments where I would just hold my breath and see if I could feel you. If maybe I could somehow sense if you were still alive or not.” He looked away from her. “That sounds insane. I’m sorry.” 

“No. No it doesn’t.” She urged. “I did the same thing. Sometimes during akuma fights, I can tell when something bad happened to you. I’m sure it’s because of the bond of our Miraculous, but I had hoped it had extended beyond that.”

Tikki’s sleepy voice spoke from the bedside table. “You really felt that way?”

“Oh, sorry Tikki, did we wake you?”

“A little. But it’s okay. Are you really able to tell when Chat’s harmed?”

“I…think so? Yeah…even when I don’t see him, I can feel a little pain.”

“That does happen, but not usually so early into a partnership. but…you both have gone through a lot together. It would make sense.” 

“So...we are bonded?” Asked Adrien. 

“Loosely. It’ll grow stronger the longer you’re together. A pair of holders in their 80’s were able to read each other’s minds!” 

“Oh wow! That’s...that’s a little daunting.” 

“I’m not crazy then,” Adrien stated, with a hand over his heart. “Pretending like we were connected was just about the only thing that kept me going through solitary. I thought that maybe…maybe as long as my heart was beating, yours was too.”

Marinette fell forward into him, wrapping her arms around him and burying her face into his chest. 

That strong heartbeat beat for her in her ear. “I thought as long as I thought about how much I loved you, you’d feel it.” 

“I did, My Lady. Every time you whispered it to yourself, I got a warm feeling inside. Even in my darkest moments, I knew you loved me. Thank you. Thank you for loving me.” 

“It wasn’t hard.”

—

Interacting with Gabriel came sooner than they hoped. 

Today was a ‘progress day’, as Dr. Zollar had noted. A day that would push boundaries, and challenge them emotionally and maybe physically. 

They were going back to school. Just for the day, to find out graduation requirements, but even going on the property was going to hurt. 

The last time they were here…well, Marinette was still a ‘perverted stalker’. 

They were going in with their parents, while class was in session, so it wasn’t likely that they’d be cornered by anyone. 

“You ready, kiddos?” Asked Sabine.

Marinette nodded and slipped her hand into Adrien’s. For the first time since capture, they were both wearing jeans. The wounds on the back of their legs had healed enough to allow it, though it still wasn’t very comfortable. Adrien wore a loose T-Shirt, since his skin graft on his shoulder blades was still healing. 

Tom rested a hand on Adrien’s shoulder. “It’s okay son. We’ll be right there with you.”

So, they slowly made their way over to the school. 

The Agreste’s silver sedan waited at the curb, and the Gorilla greeted them as they approached, opening the door for Emilie and Gabriel to exit. 

“So this is your school?” Said Emilie, ever cheerful. 

Adrien nodded. He had yet to resolve the tantrum he had over her, now that Gabriel had come clean. But the sting of betrayal still lingered, even if Emilie couldn’t have helped it. 

Everything was just tense and no one was willing to talk it out. 

For now, they had time, and Emilie was willing to give him space. 

“It’s a really nice facility,” Sabine saved. “Adrien was on the fencing team!” 

“Oh they have fencing? That’s wonderful! Not many public schools do!” 

As the mothers led the group, talking, Marinette squeezed Adrien’s hand. “You doing alright, kitty?”

He tilted his head, and gave her a look, silently asking the same question. 

“I’m nervous. I know I should probably…you know, at least see the class.” 

“Don’t do anything you don’t want to.” Tom encouraged, patting her back patiently. 

They had only been gone for about  four months now, only a little longer than summer vacation, but the school just felt so small. It’s like that, when your world isn’t revolving around just one building anymore. In all of the nightmares Marinette had in solitude, the school was just so much bigger, and her classmates were even more vile, nasty, and cruel. Such is the poison of isolation. 

Thankfully, class was in session, and no one was loitering in the halls as they made their way upstairs to Mr. Damocles office. 

“Good afternoon and welcome back!” He greeted, too loudly. 

“Thank you for meeting with us, Mr. Damocles,” Sabine shook his hand. 

“Oh it’s a pleasure. I would like to do my part to make sure Adrien and Marinette are all set for whatever they have planned next in life. What are we thinking? College? Working with Mr. Agreste?”

Marinette hunched her shoulders while Adrien scuffed his shoe on the floor. 

“Let’s just think about getting their GEDs for right now.” Said Gabriel. “This is my wife, Emilie. She’s recently returned from an extended sabbatical.” 

Marinette held back a snort. That’s what they were going with?

Mr. Damocles looked skeptical, but managed to smile and shake her hand anyways. “Welcome back, madam.” 

Adrien and Marinette found chairs in the back of the room, allowing the parents to lead the conversation. 

“So, here we have Marinette and Adrien’s transcripts. Starting in College, they are basically identical, since they took the same classes together. Adrien’s fulfilled his foreign language credit, and Marinette’s completed her arts credit. It appears that this semester, Adrien was planning to take Visual Arts, Physics, Trigonometry, Written Rhetoric, and World History, then he had two free periods for studying, or taking college level courses. Marinette was planned to take Chinese, Anatomy, Economics, Written Rhetoric, World History, and Visual Arts.”

“Well,” began Sabine, “Adrien and I can certainly help Marinette complete her Chinese credit. You know, I’ve been trying to teach her forever, she’s just so stubborn.” 

“I’m just not good at it.” Marinette defended. “I haven’t had the proper motivation.” 

“I will sign off on Written Rhetoric for both of them. I think they’ve given plenty of speeches as superheroes to count. And I think Anatomy and Physics can be counted as well. So we will just need to get them homeschool work for World History, Trigonometry, and Economics. And Adrien will need a Visual Arts credit.” 

“His modeling wouldn’t count?” Gabriel asked. 

Mr. Damocles hummed and hawed over it, then finally asked. “Was he getting paid for it?” 

“Yes.”

“Then I don’t think I can count it for a credit. However, if he was allowed to work behind the camera for a little while, learning how to use the camera and the lights and such, I could count that.” 

Gabriel turned to look at Adrien. “That’s doable, right?”

Adrien nodded.

“Alright. Then I’ll get the paperwork ready. I will look through my contacts for tutors in those subjects.” 

“I wouldn’t mind teaching Marinette Economics.” Gabriel volunteered. “It’s something I’m rather proficient in, as a businessman.” 

“Can you handle that?” Sabine asked her daughter. 

Marinette wanted to say no, but she didn’t really want to spit in Gabriel’s face. Especially since he was just volunteering for her, and not Adrien. “I think that would be fine.” 

“You said you were still interested in fashion design right? Then I can tailor what I teach you based on the industry.”

That was a pretty sweet deal. And old Marinette would have leapt on the chance. But the new Marinette was frightened by change, by stress, by the threat of disappointment. 

And with how high Gabriel’s expectations continued to be, failure almost seemed certain. 

There must have been a big stamp on her forehead that said ‘I’m not sure’ because Emile came to her rescue. “Let’s just try it out for a little while. If you need something…less intense, we can switch to a tutor.” 

“Excellent.” Mr. Damocles stated, not really paying that much attention to the conversation anyway. “Adrien, Marinette…the rest of this meeting is going to be boring for you. Why don’t you both go pop in and say hello to your classmates, hm?”

Neither of them replied right away, as Adrien waited for her lead, and Marinette debated the pros and cons. 

“Alya and Nino will be there.” Sabine said calmly. “And your classmates were all very worried about you. It’ll be okay.”

Marinette wrapped an arm around her waist, squeezing the nausea away. 

Adrien stood, holding his hand out to her. She took hold, and let him lead her out of the room. 

After the door closed, he answered, “I thought I’d at least get you away from prying eyes. We don’t have to go.”

She gnawed at her lip, before finally deciding, “let’s go. Just for a little bit, to prove that we could.” 

“We don’t need to prove anything to anyone. They’re the ones that failed us.” 

“You’re right…but, I’m tired of being afraid of everything. I’m tired of being set off by every little thing. I shouldn’t let a bunch of stupid high school kids bother me anymore. We have Alya, Nino, and Chloe on our side.” She clenched her fist. “Do you want to say hi to everyone?” 

“I don’t care about them.” He shrugged. “I know Alya and Nino said everyone changed their tune after we were revealed on TV, but they failed us when we needed them the most. They couldn’t save us from Salo, but they could have made the days before a lot less painful.”

Marinette clenched her eyes shut, feeling the sting of his words. It was as if he was a mind reader, since that was exactly how she was feeling. He didn’t even need to ask. “They could have made my time in isolation hurt less. I might have been optimistic. If only they had cared when it mattered. If only they trusted me when I was just Marinette.” 

Adrien curled his fingers into her palm, brushing against the scar there that bore his name. “Do you think…we should say this to them? Would it help?”

“Dr. Zollar said we should let people apologize to us. That it’ll help more than we think.” She sighed. “But I’m afraid that they’ll sweep it under the rug, and pretend like it didn’t happen.”

“Then, we’ll sweep them under the rug. Cut our losses and forget them. We don’t need anyone anyway, right my lady?” 

“You and me against the world,” she nodded. She took a shuddering breath. “Okay. I think…I think I can go. You’ll be right beside me?” 

“Of course.” 

He never let go of her hand as they made their way down the hall. The classroom appeared far too soon for Marinette’s liking, and they stood just outside, waiting. Adrien would let her take the initiative, whenever she was ready.

She had to prepare for every bad scenario, no matter how unlikely. If she had a plan for each one, she couldn’t be surprised. Right?

Finally, she nodded to Adrien and then knocked on the door. 

“Come in!” Called Miss Bustier. 

Marinette turned the knob, holding her breath, before pushing it open. 

The class was silent, save for a few gasps. 

“Well hello you two!” Miss Bustier greeted warmly, tears in her eyes. “I didn’t know you’d be coming back!”

“We’re not. We just…came to visit.” Marinette barely whispered, looking only at the teacher. 

“That’s wonderful!”

“Are we interrupting anything? Do you want us to come back later?”

“No no, please come in, we’ll take a little break!” 

And then she dared to cast her gaze to her old classmates, her old friends. 

Every eye was on her, coupled with trembling lips, tense postures, and vainly restrained tears. It looked like everyone wanted to say something, but no one wanted to be first. 

She didn’t know what to say either. 

The front desk that her and Adrien had shared for one day was empty. 

“What brings you both here?” Miss Bustier asked, rescuing them.

“We’re…we’re uh…looking at graduation requirements. We won’t be…coming back to class.” 

“That’s understandable. Well, I’m sure any of your classmates would be willing to study with you anyways if you need help.”

“Alya and Nino have been coming around a lot…keeping us in the loop.” 

“Oh that’s good! Well, don’t let me take all of your attention, I’m sure someone has a question for you--”

“Yeah, I have a question!” A voice called from the back of the classroom. She stood, crossing her arms. “How the hell are you allowed to be here?” Lila asked. 

Marinette flinched at the sound of her voice. 

“Lila, I think you better sit down and be quiet.” Miss Bustier warned. “You’re on probation, you should watch yourself.” 

“I am! In fact, I have a restraining order on both of them. They are breaking the law by being here.” 

“If them being here is a problem, then why don’t you just leave?” Asked Chloe, also standing. 

“Because I belong here! I’m a student in this class and I have a right to be here! They, on the other hand, are monsters!”

Marinette clenched her fists as Adrien turned to hide his face in her shoulder. 

“Lila, shut up!” Alya shouted, slamming her fist on the desk behind her. “Admit that you dug yourself into a hole and you’re too proud to apologize! I’m not buying this stupid restraining order fib, just like we haven’t bought a single story out of your mouth in the last three months!”

“I’m not lying about the restraining order!” Lila shouted right back, with real venom in her tone. Her sweet veneer was completely gone, and all that remained was the nasty, snarling beast that had been hiding the whole time. “They came to my house! They cut out my tongue! Ask my mother! Ask the hospital!”

“Oh yeah?” Asked Alix, “If they cut out your tongue, you seem to be talking really well without it.” 

“Like they would bother with you…” Someone else muttered.

“It was when they were akumatized!” 

“Just save your breath.” Chloe huffed. “You can’t tell the truth even if you wanted to.” 

“She’s telling the truth this time.” Said Marinette, tone blank and devoid of emotion. 

The class turned to look at her, seeing the look on her face. It spoke volumes of pure wrath, and Adrien’s matched. 

“We cut out that bitch’s tongue.” She said, her voice calm, deep, and vacant of regret. “The last thing we did, we went to her house. I had a pair of clamps, and Grimalkin had his claws. We ripped it out. She cried the whole time. She cried and screamed…it was the happiest I felt in a long time. I’d do it again if I could. I’d rip out her tongue, I’d crush her throat…”

The body laid on the ground. 

“I’d cut her in half…”

Organs spilling on the floor. 

“Make her scream…”

Red hair sprawled across the bloody cement.

“Make her writhe…” 

The screams of men and women echoing through the halls, their dying breaths capping them off into silence. 

“Make her suffer…just as I suffered.” 

“Go ahead, kill me. Let your God punish me.”

“He’ll get his turn…he’ll get his turn…burn in hell. Burn in hell!” 

Salo’s body laid right in front of her, turning into dust from Grimalkin’s cataclysm. Marinette kicked in vain, trying to get it to disappear. 

“Go away! Leave us alone!” She sobbed. “Die! Die! Die!” 

By the time Marinette realized she wasn’t in the catacombs anymore, she was sitting on a bench in the school courtyard, head back with a wet washcloth on her face. 

“That’s right, just breathe. You’re alright, Marinette.” Alya held her hand, rubbing comforting circles on the back of it. 

A pair of strong hands gently massaged her shoulders, and opening her eyes, she found that they belonged to Kim. 

“Hey girly. You back with us now?” He asked softly. 

Marinette clenched her eyes shut. “Shit.” 

“If I had known you were going to visit, I would have asked Miss Bustier to get rid of her for a while. I’m sorry, girl.” 

Marinette sat up, glancing around. Alya, Kim, Alix, and Mylene were around her, just silently watching to make sure she was alright. 

“Where is he? Where’s Adrien?” Was her next concern. 

Alya simply pointed at the upstairs railing, where he was walking with Nino and Chloe. “He started crying when you started talking about...some violent stuff. We thought it best that we separate you until you calmed down.” 

“I’m sorry...I don’t know what got into me...” 

“Girl, you do not need to apologize. If Lila has a restraining order on you, she should have kept her mouth shut and left the room. She doesn’t deserve any rights.” 

“Did I hear Miss Bustier say she was on Parole?”

“For ‘disrupting police activity’. She couldn’t get jail time just for Libel, but the judge slapped her with that, since what she did wasn’t just mean, it was dangerous.”

“So if she got jail time, why is she here at school?”

“She only got a week in jail,” responded Alix with an eye roll. “But her punishment isn’t over. She has to stay with our class until she graduates, and then she’ll be reevaluated based on performance.”

Alya continued, “The judge wanted her in an environment where everyone knew what she did, and no one would want to be her friend. He wants her to focus on school, and not have an audience. This is according to Miss Bustier, of course, who instructed us not to talk to her.” 

“Wow. Go Miss Bustier.”

“Yeah.” Said Kim, “Except Lila makes sure we all know how awful we are and how this is as much our fault as hers. ’This never would have happened if you weren’t all so gullible! Marinette and Adrien wouldn’t be tortured if you weren’t so stupid!’”

“Oh my god, she said that?” Marinette sneered. “Our capture had nothing to do with her. Chat and I still would have fought against Edward Savauge and still made…her go out for revenge. Lila knows this. She was in that room. She saw my mouth—“ Marinette pressed her nails into her lip, feeling the sting of the needle. 

Mylene grabbed her arm and pulled it away from her. “We’re not listening to Lila. She’s loud and demanding, but we know the facts. She’s just angry she’s not getting attention. Don’t think about her anymore.”

By this time, Adrien, Nino, and Chloe had reached the bottom of the stairs. He ran to her, scooping her up into a hug with a shudder. 

“I’m sorry, Kitty. I’m sorry…” 

“It’s all okay now,” Nino assured, patting Adrien on the back. “We calmed him down. I think he’s more concerned about you.”

“I’m…I think I’m okay. Just seeing her face and hearing her accusing me…I just snapped.”

“It was pretty badass,” Alix commented. “Yeah, it sucked, but it probably instilled the fear of Jesus in her for a little while. I think she needed that.”

“Oh my god, you didn’t hear the best part!” Said Chloe, “She got jail time! And now she’s on parole—“

“Yeah, we already told her all that.” Said Alix with a smirk. 

“Well, did you mention the lawsuits? Gabriel and the city of Paris both sued her and her family for Libel. Her mother refused to pay it for her, so now as soon as Lila’s of age, she’ll be paying the city police department and both of you thousands of dollars. Most likely for the rest of her life!” 

“I don’t want her money,” Marinette scoffed. “Especially if I have to interact with her.”

“You won’t.” Chloe assured her. “Gabriel will be taking care of it for you.”

“And you don’t have to accept her money,” suggested Alix. “You could put it in a fund or a grant. Give it to other people who have been slandered against! Or people that what’s-her-face hurt! The possibilities are endless!”

“I don’t know if I have the will to run a charity right now guys…” Marinette shrunk on herself. 

“Then let someone else do it.”

“I volunteer!” Shouted Chloe. “After all, I’m the one with all the real contacts. You all can help, of course.”

Tom and Sabine hurried down from the Principal’s office. “There you are! Miss Bustier said you had an episode, Marinette. Are you alright?”

“I’m fine now, Maman. Just…had a run in with an old enemy.” 

“Well, Gabriel’s wrapping everything up now. So let’s get you kiddos home, okay?”

“Can we come visit you?” Asked Mylene. “We, as a class, wanted to so many times, but we weren’t sure if you wanted to even see us. Alya, Nino, and Chloe said you’d might not be up to discuss it.”

Marinette breathed slowly, considering the question. She turned to Adrien, asking him silently. He gave a little nod. 

“I suppose, that would be okay. Is that okay with you, maman?”

“Of course, baby. I’m always happy when you’re willing to have guests.” 

“Awesome!” Said Alya with a little clap. “We’ll come over after school! We won’t stay too long, just long enough to say hi and bye!” 

Marinette stood, holding out her hand to Adrien. “Can’t wait.”

—

After they returned home and closed the trap door to her room, Adrien embraced her, squeezing her tightly. “You worried me,” he whispered. “What happened?”

“I…don’t know. I just vividly remembered the night we cut out her tongue…and then I got lost. Salo was there, the last time we saw her. What did I do?”

“Just a lot of screaming. Over and over, you just shouted ‘die’ and ‘burn in hell’. It was…really scary.”

“I’m sorry, Kitty. You were right, we shouldn’t have gone.”

“Well…I don’t know about that. Chloe and Nino seemed to be really proud of us for stopping by. I like it when they say they’re proud of our decisions. Makes the pain worth it.”

“I suppose.” 

There was a knock at the trap door before Gabriel opened it. “I’m sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to let you both know you’re all set to start homeschooling whenever you’re ready. Mr. Damocles said even if you don’t finish your credits in time, you can still walk with your class, if you’d like.”

“That’s nice,” Marinette said quietly. 

“Are you alright? Your teacher said there was an…incident.” 

She turned to look him right in the eye. “Why do we remember being akumatized? No one else ever has. Is it because we had Miraculous for so long?” 

Gabriel shook his head. “I’m not completely sure, but I have a hunch. Since I made two akumas at the same time, I split the tether I had on you. That’s why you overpowered my control. Nooroo warned me it would happen, but I thought it would be worth the risk. I didn’t know you’d keep your memories of that, however. I never wanted to add to your trauma.”

“Well. If it wasn’t on purpose, I suppose we can’t be mad at you.” 

Gabriel shrugged helplessly. “You can be as mad at me as you want. I’m expecting it.” 

Adrien left Marinette’s arms and went over to lay down on the chaise. 

“At any rate, thank you for the explanation.” 

“Of course. Any answers you want, you deserve.” He swallowed. “Your outfits for the Mayor’s ball are coming around lovely. If it’s alright, let me know when I can bring them over for a fitting. It’s still several weeks away.” 

“Thank you, Gabriel. Whenever my mother is free for her fitting should be fine.”

“Alright. I’ll leave you alone now.” He took a step down, partially closing the door. Then at the last second he added, “bye son, I love you.”

—

Only a few hours later, after Marinette and Adrien had changed into more comfortable clothes, there was another knock at the trap door. 

“Come in,” said Marinette, as she spread cushions out on the floor. 

“Um…” Said Rose from below. “Could you…open the door and then stand back?”

Curious, Marinette did as instructed. 

A bunch of balloons floated up into the room, followed by a huge bouquet of flowers, and then a giant stuffed black cat. 

Both Marinette and Adrien stared in shock.

“Too much or not enough?” Asked Rose, poking her head in. 

“What is all this?” She asked, beckoning her classmates into the room.

“Offerings of apologies and gratitude, of course,” said Max. “Everyone in our class was akumatized at least once, and we all agreed we owed both of you a huge thank you for rescuing us. And of course, we all owe you an apology, Marinette.”

“O-oh…thank you.” 

“We sort of thought you’d never want to see us again…but you took the initiative to come see us at school…the least we could do was follow up.” Said Nathaniel. He handed her a handmade card. “I hope you can forgive us for ever doubting you.” 

Marinette took the card, admiring the artwork. The outside showed Ladybug and Chat Noir standing proudly over the city. Inside, a cartoon-ish Ladybug, bandaged up, was putting bandaids on an equally cartoony Chat Noir. The caption read, “you’re still Purr-Fect to us!”

It was enough to bring tears to her eyes. “I…I will forgive you. I have a lot of bad feelings, but my therapist is helping me work through them.”

“Do you do hugs?” Asked Kim.

“Gentle. Especially with Adrien, he still has some stitches on his shoulder blades.”

Getting hugged by each and every person who had doubted her did wonders. With each kiss to the cheek and pat on the head, she could feel some of the bitterness fading. It wouldn’t leave fully for a long time, but to see genuine remorse was like a soothing balm on an inflamed wound. 

It felt nice to have friends again. Adrien had worked so hard to get them in the first place. Losing respect for everyone he had known had really solidified his decision to stop speaking. 

But for them to come around and humble themselves and apologize really took the fight out of him. Maybe cutting them off wasn’t necessary. Maybe there was more to these traitors. Maybe people were capable of change.

Maybe it wasn’t just teenagers that changed either. Maybe adults too. Adults like his father and Salo.

“Oh Adrien,” asked Nino, sitting on the chaise lounge. “Is that the keyboard the Couffaine’s let you borrow?”

Adrien nodded. 

“Are you practicing anything right now?”

“Adrien’s been working on something. A song he had in his head in the catacombs. It’s in the works.” 

“Cool! Bro, you gotta let me hear!”

Adrien shook his head. 

“Sorry Nino, I can’t get it out of him either. He says it’s not ready yet.”

“Aw bummer!” Nino groaned. “But let me hear it the moment it’s done, okay?”

Adrien gave a twitch of a smile.

The girls had already settled on the cushions on the floor, and beckoned the boys to join them.

“Now,” began Alya, as she took a binder out of her backpack, “we have some very important business to discuss.”

Marinette frowned at her. “Hey wait a minute…that’s my—“

“Your dream wedding planner? Yes, I held onto it when we hid all of your personal belongings when you were first captured.” She cracked it open and set it on the floor. 

Adrien peered around, trying to get a look.

Marinette covered his eyes. “Alya, put that away! That’s private!” 

“Is it not accurate anymore?”

“I mean…I still would like to use it…” 

“Great! We’re going to start planning now! And don’t worry Sunshine, this book is tailored to you as the groom.”

Adrien smiled, despite Marinette’s hand over his eyes.

“Must you humiliate me this way?” Marinette asked, blushing.

The class shared giggles at that. 

“Don’t even sweat it Marinette,” said Chloe, waving her hand around. “We’re going to make sure you and Adrikins have the bestest, most glamorous wedding since William and Kate!”

Still blushing, “well, I don’t want big and glamorous…I want small and intimate.” 

“Small and glamorous it is!” 

—

This chapter was fun because I had to recall the classes I took in my senior year of high school. I felt like I was leaving a subject out, but Adrien and Marinette have no reason to be taking Bible classes lol (I went to a pre-seminary Christian School)

A friend who wishes to stay anonymous wrote this for me. She said she was inspired, and in turn, she inspired me! This bonus scene is canon to the story:

--

A creaking moan gently woke him. His eyes opened—once, then twice. He took a moment to realize that the cloud caressing his body, which still stung with every pulse, was not a cloud, but a down-alternative comforter.

He was in Marinette’s—his bed, in their room, in their house. And there was sound coming from his left—warmth and sound. A whimper. A cry. And, again, a moan—quiet anguish. He rolled over to face the source.

“Marinette,” he whispered. “What’s wrong?”

The dark figure of his wife’s frail form didn’t stir. He asked again. “My lady? Are you awake?”

Still nothing.

He brought his face closer to hers. The light pollution filtering through the skylight served as the only source of illumination. As his eyes adjusted and focused on hers, his stomach churned. Her face was a scrunched display of pitiful agony, and her hands were at her throat. She whimpered once more—her lips pressed together in a hard line, unmoving as her sad cries escaped them. The light reflected from her cheeks in dribbles of tears.

He sat up, electrified. “My lady! My lady!” His voice cracked. He grabbed at the hold she had on her own neck.

Her eyes shot open as she gasped awake. She saw his silhouette and was instantly sitting up to meet his gaze.

“Adrien! Adrien! What’s wrong? Talk to me! It’s okay! I’m here! You’re not alone! You’re not locked in!” She was panting.

“Nothing is wrong. I’m okay. I am worried about you. You’re crying in your sleep.”

She wiped at her face with bony fingers. “Did I wake you? I am so sorry, mon chaton.”

“Don’t apologize. I was just worried. Are you alright?” He was whispering now.

“Yeah, I am okay. Just another nightmare. Happens all the time. Go back to sleep.”

“Nightmares?” It hit him as the words left his lips. She was back there. All the time. The burns at her neck, the blood and the thread at her lips. The sounds and the smells and the cold and the—he choked as he took a deep breath; there was seemingly no air to take in.

“Adrien, breathe,” Marinette pleaded. Everything is okay.

He tried again, more slowly, through his nose. It worked.

“Good kitty,” she praised.

Her sweet praise, like a narcotic through his veins, made his muscles relax and his pain momentarily vanish.

He reached out and brought her closer to him. They embraced in silence. He squinted his eyes tightly so that his tears would not betray his resolve to finally become strong once more.

Like a divine epiphany, the sight of her suffering in slumber awoke something in him that he thought was long dead. It growled past the shadows of his worst repressed instincts. It brought a burning feeling back to his core—his soul.

How could he continue to let himself drown in self pity, when she was so strong a life preserver to him? Was he so preoccupied with his own suffering that he didn’t think to ask if she, too, was drowning?

Why? Why did she swim so strongly when he was watching, only for her head to go under as soon as he turned away? The bravery she displayed for him was full of cracks he couldn’t see.

And she was dragged back to Hell, every night, alone.

Never again. He would get strong. No—he would become even stronger than he was before—his armor, bulletproof and fireproof; his claws, devastatingly destructive; his senses, heightened to an atmospheric level. He would grow powerful enough to protect her and capable enough to rescue her from any evil. His magic would evolve into a force strong enough to infiltrate her dreams and deliver her from suffering. Silent was this promise as he held his life preserver tighter to his chest.

He let out a low, menacing growl. “I’ve come back, My Lady.”

[jay-cult]

Static and Stars: Episode 1 - Jay Day

Index

Jay and Nya haven’t been on a date in like... ever. So when they finally do go out on their own, some unexpected memories catch up with them.

AUTHOR’S NOTES:   Hey guys! At long last, S&S continues. I hope it hypes you up just like it does me! I was planning this for OC Day when I realized that it actually didn’t have any of my OCs in it (yet) so I’m happy to throw it out now.   This episode is quite guiltily Jaya-centered but PLEASE understand that it will be the only one. I laid out my plan for this fan season and I liked it, so I’m following through with having it kick off like this. This is a Jay fan season. Not a Jaya fan season. Thank you!

-

  A patronizing BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! rang out beside Jay.

  He groaned and sat up, hair messily flying all over his face. He slammed his hand onto where the sound was coming from, but found he slapped the smooth surface of his phone. He let out another grunt while the alarm was still judging him.

  He shot out a small current through his fingertips and the beeping stopped. Right… he forgot. They weren’t in the Bounty anymore.

  Jay climbed out of his sleeping bag and looked to his right, where Kai, who had just awoken, was trying to quickly rearrange his bed hair. Further past him, Cole was still sound asleep.

  Kai noticed that he was still as a rock and, mid-hair-fixation, kicked him hard.

  “Ow! Dad! Fine, I’ll get ready for dance practice-“ Cole jerked awake and then looked at Kai scorningly.

  “This sucks,” Kai groaned. He plunged his arms into his “hygiene” kit and pulled out a hairbrush, some cologne, and a bit of blush fell out.

  Jay stood up (while making sure his plushie stayed safely tucked in his sleeping bag) and smiled. “Aw come on guys, it’s not that bad!” He said, stretching.

  “Whatever you say,” Cole sighed, tying his hair up in a bun.

  In full pajamas, Jay exited the tent. Outside it was full sunlight, with shadows of leaves dappling the ground. He gazed at Ninjago City in the distance; it looked so much quieter from the outskirts.

  Zane was already outside making a meal for breakfast. He slept outside. Jay didn’t see the appeal, but he said that it was better for him to be out with the stars and one with the (mild) wilderness.

  “Good morning, Jay.” He smiled with ease. “You should really wash those gloves.”

  He took a look at his hands. “Funny coming from you, ya barely change your clothes,” he playfully argued, knowing already it was a useless excuse. Zane sat there in full gi wear and looked up.

  “I do not have the rather disgusting human body which pollutes cloth,” he responded simply.

  “Any updates on how the monastery is going?” Jay asked, changing the subject.

  “Indeed!” He flipped a pancake with a spatula. There was a whole contraption set up so that Zane could do his thing, even outside. “I have been notified that it is going smoothly.”

  Jay nodded. He sat on a cushioned log. “I’m still so glad it’s over.”

  “The First Realm was certainly a tiring event.”

  “Yeah, and Garmadon… that fight was insane, huh?” Jay scratched his head. He was grateful that even with this makeshift living situation, they could rest.

  “You don’t even know the half of it.”

  The two ninja looked up. Nya was strutting toward them, tying up her hair casually. Unlike Jay, she had already gotten dressed.

  “Nya!” Jay brightened up, even more energized from the sight of his girlfriend. The morning sun made her look quite phenomenal. She sat down by him, very close, physically. Zane’s (literal) inner timer dinged, and he stood up. “Breakfast is ready!”

  At that moment both Kai and Cole rushed out of the tent, still very unready. Kai’s hair was half-done, his arm through just one sleeve of his jacket, and he was still pulling up his pants. Cole had yet to do much. He was just running out with his pajama pants on, and… that was it.

  “What were you guys doing?” Jay asked.

  “Shut up,” Kai said immediately, his eyes suddenly very focused on the pancakes that were now out and ready.

  They all sat in their eating area on the cushioned logs in their circle beside Zane’s cooking tools and contraptions. It was a very average day, at least, for one where they had to camp together without a strong shelter and where they had nobody to fight anymore. But there were obviously some things missing.

  Nya turned to Jay. “Well,” she shrugged, “Lloyd and Wu are off on their things.”

  “As they have been for a while, making their own camp in Misako’s space,” Kai interjected, eyes narrowed. “Meanwhile we have to make it out here, in the wild, the cold-”

  She ignored him. “And we have nothing going on, finally. So.. well… we haven’t really done much recently. And you were off in the realm for…. A while.”

  Jay swallowed a chunk of bacon. “Right! How long exactly has it been since we’ve done something, just you and me, that didn’t involve snake venom or the fate of the world?”

  She looked at her paper plate of food, thinking. “Like. Never?”

  “Yeah.” He chewed more, a bit unbelieving. They’d only ever done fun things with at least one person from the team or when a villain was on their tail. Or if it was work or training.

  “We have never really had a normal date, like, at all, have we?” She looked straight at him, making her point.

  “Okay, today is perfect!�� Jay finished the last of his meal happily.

  “Alright, you guys, calm down,” Kai stood up, smirking. “I know that must mean you’re all very new to this, so if you’d like to ask the master-”

  And then Cole just straight up picked Kai up. He just yoinked him from off the ground and slung him over his shoulder. He turned toward the pair, genuinely smiling. “Hahah, he’s one to talk. Come on buddy.” As he carried him back to the tent, Kai let out yells of protest, but it was nothing against Cole’s strong hold.

  Zane smiled. “You enjoyed your meal, I hope?”

  “Breakfast was great, Zane,” Nya commented, laughing.

  “I guess this means we’ll finally have a day all to ourselves,” Jay winked, standing up. “I’ll devote this day to being Nya Day.”

  She winked back. “And I, Jay Day.”

  “Let me just go put on my clothes first.”

 -

  The wind of the mountains blew fresh through the couple’s hair. Jay had dug through his bag to try and salvage what he could of the nicest clothes in there and had just barely scraped out a clean look. He’d stepped back outside, surprised to find Nya in a brand new, somewhat formal outfit.

    “Oh,” she had said, reddening a bit. “Maybe I should go get that other stuff back on.”

    “No! No,” he’d interjected immediately. “You look really nice.”

    Now they were climbing down the rocky side of a steep mountain that led down to Ninjago City from their camp. Or, well, they weren’t exactly- their hybrid elemental dragon guided them down slowly, walking so as to not be easily detected.

    “Where are we going?” Jay asked from his spot behind Nya, who had the reins.

    She glanced at her boyfriend quickly with a sly smile. “You’ll see.”

    Jay grinned and kept his silence for a little while. But inside his thoughts were racing quite a bit. He felt tense and nervous- and not because of the date. It was all so familiar. Too familiar. Sitting behind Nya, holding onto her... the feeling of the dragon’s spine beneath him and the thrum, thrum of what was the dragon walking but what his brain turned into the panicked beat of wings. His thoughts wandered through that old experience and he wanted it to stop. But he decided not to say anything.

    At the edge of the city they, to Jay’s relief, put away the use of their dragon and grabbed a ride from a surprisingly mellow fan who was happy to provide service to the “folks who’d saved the city’s ass more than once.” Nya whispered the destination into his ear and he chuckled. “Well y’all enjoy your time, n’.”

    “Shut your eyes, boltbrain,” Nya pleaded, trying to hold back a laugh.

    “I wanna see, though,” Jay whined with a smile, trying to swat her hands away. She was reaching from her spot in the passenger seat of the car.

    He (eventually) complied and they stepped out onto what felt like some concrete. Jay heard the car drive away.

    “Okay,” Nya giggled, sounding slightly embarrassed. “You can look.”

    Light flew into his eyes as he shot them open. He blinked a few times and observed the building in front of him. It was a fairly average-looking concrete building on the outside, but the windows were plastered with 80s-themed patterns, stickers, and paint. He gazed up at the sign that marked the building, which read in bright neon letters, “Ninjago Roller Rink.”

    He turned to his girlfriend with a shy smirk. “Nya, what is this?”

    “Okay, okay, so. It looks a bit run down. But I remember that you were into roller skating as a kid. So I just thought-“

    He pulled her into a tight hug, his excitement growing. “This is awesome! Let’s go!”

    He tried to rush to the door, but Nya got there first and held it open for him. “Ladies first,” she said.

    “Ha-ha,” he joked, unable to hide his grin. They stepped confidently into the building.

    The floor, cheap carpet with an 80s pattern, stretched out beneath them. There were party tables all around them, broken up by counters on the side of the right wall selling the snacks and roller blades. And on their left down a ramp, in all its glory, was the large wooden rink with a disco ball hanging above it. Popular 80s music played but it was barely heard among the conversations of the many people in the building.

    The couple got stares as they entered, but they were too excited to care too much. They rented their skates and set off towards the rink.

    They stepped out onto the floor and the rink suddenly cleared. Bunches of people crowded around the edges to watch two ninja in fancy clothes do normal people stuff.

    While Jay eased on Nya stepped on immediately, and almost fell to the floor but grabbed hold of the edge just in time. She looked surprised.

    “You’ve never done this before, huh?” Jay questioned, sympathetic.

    She shook her head, blushing. “I didn’t know it was that difficult.”

    “Well it’s not, once you learn. Here, let me show you.” He held out his hand.

    She grunted but took hold of it.

    A scene flashed in Jay’s brain. He was forced to remember. The rooftops of the tall, wide building of the city stretched before him, and he felt a feeling of dread, the intrusive thought that this was where it started. He dropped her hand suddenly.

    “Jay? Are you okay?” Nya asked, worried.

    He took her hand again quickly. “Yeah,” he lied. “Just a little nervous, I guess.”

    He took her along the walls of the rink, guiding her with his words. But all the while, he was wondering what had happened. It’s not like it was the first time they’d held hands, of course. So why get so heavily reminded of that now? He was fooling himself. He knew the answer. None of the other ninja were around. Just like… he shook his head. No, stop Jay, you’re literally on a date, he told himself.

    They were eventually off of the walls together, rolling slowly and steadily around the rink. Since it was empty, there was no need to go in the required circles, so they freely went where was best.

    “Alright,” he said gently. “I’m gonna let go now.”

    She looked at him, panicked. “Wait! Don’t!”

    Jay gave her a serious look. “I’m going to, okay? Are you ready?”

    She paused for a second and then nodded.

    “You sure?”

    She nodded again.

    “Go!”

    With a gasp from the crowds, they let go together and Nya rolled ahead. She picked up her pace as they cheered, feeling confident, and then promptly lost her balance and fell down in a tangle of girl, skates and kimono.

    “Nya!”

    She punched the ground. “This is never going to work!”

    Jay frowned. “Don’t say that, you’re doing real good! Look,” he brightened up a bit, “next time I’ll wait until you really want to do it yourself.”

    Reluctantly, she nodded, and took his outstretched hand again. As he pulled her up the music turned to a certain kind of song. An incredibly sappy, incredibly overly fitting song.

    “Oh.” As Jay scratched the back of his head, getting all red, the crowds murmured in wondrous anticipation. He looked around and saw the guy behind the counter put his phone down with a wink. “I guess this isn’t really what you expected,” he told her nervously.

    “It’s cool,” she shrugged, smiling. “Besides, I wanna show you off.”

    He chuckled. “I wanna show me off, too.”

    And then it became perfect.

    Nya picked up the skating incredibly quickly and was able to do very well by herself after just a few seconds. They rejoined at certain points and laughed. When he caught gazes from the crowd, Jay did some age-old skating tricks from way back, rousing several cheers. He always looked back at Nya wherever she was, who was always sporting a proud smile. It was foolish. It was childish. It was fantastic.

    But their finish wasn’t as strong at all.

    They met up towards the end of the song and started to feel something deep in the memories of their bones. Deep in their roller dance, they didn’t think and posed in a way they’d done before- in a fight. Like an instinct of feel-good thrill, they posed, and Jay suddenly gripped his head and fell to the floor.

    It was dark and they were on top of a shining tower. Maybe they might’ve been able to hear the sounds of the black ocean, just maybe, if not for the cries and shouts of leader-blinded, bloodthirsty pirates. They were back to back, their swords drawn, fighting off the swarms of their enemies that no longer even existed within their realm. Jay thought of the lighthouse and this time he couldn’t stop.

    “Jay!” Nya gasped, and the crowd let out shouts of concern. He was brought back to reality with their noise- somehow not hers. He was breathing heavily, still on the dirty wooden floor.

    “I can’t…” he was almost okay when the music switched to something that bored into his brain. He’d never heard it before but it was saying things that couldn’t be unheard.

    “We’re alone together, in a familiar place.”

    He couldn’t stand it.

    “Waves beat upon the rocks and moonbeams shine upon your face.”

    It was pop and terrible but it still existed, and as Jay continued to fall in and out of reality he felt himself being hoisted from the floor by someone strong. “Let’s get you some water… ‘SM, this music… c’mon, Jay…”

    Nya was leading him out of the rink and back onto the carpet, and in her hold he found himself back in the roller rink’s building- but not completely. She sat him down at one of the tables and left him staring at the ground for a moment. When she returned she put an opened bottle of chilled water right in front of him, and wearily, he took a few sips.

    A teenage girl from the crowds, who were now mostly filtering back onto the roller rink, shuffled up to them shyly. “Is the blue ninja okay?” She asked.

    “Yes,” Nya snapped, which quickly sent the girl scuttling away.

    “Better?” She asked, her voice edged with worry. Jay nodded. She sighed, smiling in relief. “That’s good.”

    “Oh, but I ruined it…” he groaned, staring at the top of the table.

    “Ruined what?” She asked, confused.

    “Our date…”

    Nya gave his hair a ruffle. “No ya didn’t. Let’s go talk about this over some lunch.”

-

    Twenty minutes later they were ordering their favorite dishes from Chen’s Noodle House. They sat along the edge of the kitchen and a familiar face decided to pop into their conversation.

    “I think I know what happened,” Nya answered after said familiar face asked.

    “Oh, what then?” Pushed Skylor, leaning in.

    “I just can’t get it out of my brain. Now that we decided to do something on our own, I guess,” Jay frowned, feeling absolutely terrible.

    “What?”

    “It’s difficult to explain,” Nya said quickly, before Skylor delved too deep into speculation.

    The redhead left for a brief moment to grab their food, and returned looking excited for a tale.

    Jay picked around at his noodles. “You’re not gonna believe me, but it’s a different timeline. That only Nya and I remember, I think. It involves a lot of evil pirates, and everyone being trapped in a sword, and Ninjago being in the sky. You were part of my ninja replacements,” Skylor gave him a weird look as he was mid sentence, “and Nya even…”

    He paused and dropped his chopsticks back in the tub. Nya stopped eating suddenly, and looked down, feeling sick.

    “Nya what?”

    “Nothing important,” Nya said, trying to force another bite of food into her mouth.

    “Well, hm,” said Skylor, looking a little put off, “sounds like you guys need to somehow sort this out.”

    “Yeah,” Jay stared at his food. “I know. You’re right. We have to stop pretending like it never happened. We have to think about it. Sort out all the lost… stuff from it.” He reached into a pocket to pull out his wallet, but Nya was there first, holding her card out to Skylor with a smile.

    She shook her head. “Today’s on me, ya crazy lovebirds. I just hope things are okay for you from now on.”

“Thanks,” said Jay with an exasperated sigh. “You’re a life-saver, Skylor.”

    “Well, where do we start, then?” Nya asked when Skylor left them, looking at Jay with some nervousness.

    He narrowed his eyes and gave one of his eyes a rub. “The lighthouse.”

[devondeal]

Shadow of the Past

Note: Shoutout to @jedimasterbailey who inspired me with our awesome conversations causing this idea to flourish in the first place! Her input has been incredibly valuable when figuring out the details and other key elements and this fic wouldn't be the same without it.

Ch. 3

The light shone brightly until it dimmed down to a hazy dreamlike tone. They were in a valley surrounded by colorful forest and the sun was warm. There was a village of Togruta nearby.

Ahsoka and Barriss realized that the temple was showing them the planet Shili. That ugly chill Ahsoka felt before entering the doorway came back. This place was very familiar and she didn't like it one bit. Barriss noticed her discomfort.

Barriss: You know this place?

Ahsoka: I think so.

They suddenly appeared inside one of the buildings where there were several Togruta and a Zygerrian woman standing across from each other. There was also a Togruta toddler hiding behind a Togruta woman. No one seemed to notice Barriss and Ahsoka's presence. 

Togruta woman: I'm sorry, she's not usually this shy.

Zygerrian woman: I am a foreigner. This is to be expected. She is only a child after all.

Elder Togruta: We are honored by your presence of course. 

But as he said this, he gave the toddler and her mother a stern look.

The Togruta woman kneels down to the toddlers level: Come on Ahsoka. Say hello to the Jedi. 

The toddler clung harder to her mother keeping her head down in embarrassment and fear. She somehow knew this was no Jedi even though she didn't even understand what a Jedi was. When her mother attempted to pick her up to allow the "Jedi" to properly examine her, she struggled and ran out of the room. The elders groaned in disappointment and apologized profusely.

Ahsoka's jaw dropped. She had no idea how to process what she was looking at, but she didn't just recognize it, she felt it in her bones. Barriss immediately knew what they were looking at. Ahsoka had told her this story before.

Suddenly they were inside a much home-ier location where toddler Ahsoka was crying quietly and her mother gently held her.

Mother: Sweetie, what's wrong?

Toddler Ahsoka: Don't like her.

Mother: Why not?

Little Ahsoka didn't know how to answer. 

Toddler Ahsoka: She's bad.

Mother: She's been nothing but kind to us. What makes you think she's bad? Did she do something bad? 

The mother was genuinely concerned if something unseen had happened.

Toddler Ahsoka shook her head. The mother sighed in relief.

Mother: Well then, nothing’s wrong.

Toddler Ahsoka looked down and made a sad and frustrated expression that Barriss recognized too well. 

The image changed again to the outdoors where the Zygerrian's ship was right outside the village. The toddler Ahsoka was screaming and crying in her mother's arms. 

The elders were shaking their heads clearly frustrated at the child's reluctance. 

Elder Togruta: Forgive us, Master Jedi. We don't understand why she's behaving this way. 

Zygerrian: She is strong with the force. Through training, she will master her emotions. I see much potential in her. You should be proud.

Ahsoka's mother's eyes began to well up and she tried to calm her child

Mother: Shh... shh.. it's ok. You're going to become a Jedi. Like her. You'll be with your own kind, with people who understand what you are, who can help you with your special powers. The other children won't exclude you or make fun of you. You'll be one of them.

The child quieted for a moment.

Ahsoka's mother: I love you and I will never forget you. 

She kissed her forehead and the child began to wail again as she was handed to the Zygerrian. Her mother was crying silently trying to be brave for her daughter. As the Zygerrian walked into her ship the child was looking over her shoulder, screaming for someone, her mother or anyone, to take her back. Her arms reached out for someone, anyone to rescue her. But no one came and the door of the ship closed silencing the child's screams and suddenly the planet was gone and Barriss and Ahsoka were surrounded by darkness.

Barriss had been expecting Plo Koon to show up at any moment, but he never did. Now she partially understood why this reality - well at least Ahsoka, was the way she was. Palpatine must have been planning the inquisitor program years in advance. They probably were hidden, much like the clone army was before Kenobi discovered them conveniently in time for the separatist conflict. 

She remembered the report of the force sensitive younglings Ahsoka and Anakin had rescued from Darth Sidious in the Clone Wars.

To think that without Plo Koon, Ahsoka would have fell victim... has fallen victim to his grotesque plans... it was just too much. Tears streamed down Barriss's face. Ahsoka wasn't crying but her face was frozen with terror and she was shivering. Barriss pulled herself together and tried to reach out to comfort Ahsoka but she jolted away from her touch. 

Barriss realized that while this was just a visual memory for her, for Ahsoka this was so much more. She must have relived everything, from smells to physical touches, to the exact pace of her own past breaths. The dread  she must have felt when her loved ones didn't believe her and gave her away to someone she knew they shouldn't trust... The helplessness. 

Barriss: Ahso- ... I mean... I'm so sorry. I didn't realize the temple would...

Ahsoka looked at her with an expression that reminded Barriss too much of how she looked at the trial when she confessed to bombing the temple. But her yellow eyes glinted with anger. Suddenly Ahsoka's expression shifted to confusion and she looked down. Barriss followed her gaze down to see that her shackles had disappeared. 

Immediately Ahsoka force pushed Barriss away and ran further into the darkness.

Barriss: No! Wait! 

But her surroundings began to change before she could chase after Ahsoka. She recognized this place to be their home before this insanity happened. And for some reason she was lying down in bed with the morning sun shining in.

Much like how she had woken up to find Ahsoka gone and that reality had shifted to somehow becoming impossibly worse. She got out of bed and saw she was in pajamas instead of her previous attire. Had this all been some awful dream? She didn't know what to think anymore. 

She went to the kitchen to get a glass of water. Suddenly a pair of arms wrapped around her waist and Ahsoka's voice spoke softly in her right ear, "Gotcha" causing Barriss to jolt so hard, she dropped the glass and it shattered on the floor.

Ahsoka: Oh I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to startle you. 

Barriss turned around and saw Ahsoka and immediately noticed her eyes were blue. She also noticed Ahsoka was in pajamas too. She couldn't help staring.

Ahsoka: Hey. You ok? 

Barriss: I... um...

She looked down at the shattered glass.

Ahsoka: Don't worry about that. I'll clean it up. My fault anyway. I promise I'll never sneak up on you again, ok?

Ahsoka cupped her cheek. Her hand was warm.

Barriss: Ok...

Ahsoka kissed her forehead and Barriss went back to bed claiming she needed to lie down for a moment. 

Was this real? She thought to herself. The more she thought about it, the more those awful events were beginning to fade away like a dream does after one awakes.

Ahsoka came back from cleaning up the glass. As usual, she jumped in bed rather than just sitting and lying down. 

Barriss: You know I don't like when you do that. It shakes the whole bed. 

Ahsoka: Can I help it if Alderaanian beds are so jumpable?

Barriss laughs and cries at the same time. She missed this.

Barriss: That's not a word. 

Ahsoka: (concerned) Barriss? 

Barriss: I think I had a bad dream. And it seemed so real...

Ahsoka: I know that feeling... Can I?

Barriss: Please.

Ahsoka cuddled up to Barriss, holding her as they faced each other, their noses almost touching.

Ahsoka: We're gonna get through this, we always do. 

For a moment, it was quiet and Barriss felt peaceful. But then she remembered the sound of a child screaming. She opened her eyes and sat up suddenly alarming Ahsoka.

Ahsoka: Another dream?

Barriss: This isn't real. I have to get back. 

Ahsoka: What? What do you mean?

Barriss: I'm still in the Jedi temple. It's testing me. 

Ahsoka: Ok now I have no idea what you're talking about.

Barriss looked back at Ahsoka who was leaning on a pillow. She looked exactly how she was before the reality shift. Which means... She glanced at the bedside tables on each side and both had an engagement ring. The temple really thought of everything. 

Barriss: I don't belong here. Not yet. I have to go and fix things.

Ahsoka's face fell.

Ahsoka: Haven't you spent enough time fixing things? Why can't you let it go for once and be with me? 

Barriss: You know I can't.

Ahsoka: (sighs) That conscience of yours....

Barriss gently cupped Ahsoka's face and neck with her hands

Barriss: I love you, and I'm coming back. But I can't let the universe destroy itself. 

The vision of Ahsoka started to cry softly. 

Ahsoka: When this is real again, I'll be here.

Barriss began to wonder if there was some reality trapped in the illusion. They kissed each other, not a goodbye, but something for Barriss to hold onto during this ordeal. Barriss noticed that she was no longer in pajamas and back in her previous attire.

She stood and walked to the door of their house as Ahsoka watched her leave. Barriss took one look back, noticing the darkness start to consume her home. She locked eyes with Ahsoka, then turned and closed the door before she could see her home and her soon to be wife disappear. She was now back in the main temple room where that bright door had showed up in front of them in what felt like hours ago.

Barriss shut her eyes tightly, processing what just happened. The temple had tested her to make sure she was ready for the challenge ahead, then given her a gift. A memory to keep in her heart when things got too difficult. 

Ahsoka: You took long enough.

Barriss: How long…?

Ahsoka: I tried getting that door open. I used my strength, the force, leverage, that thing won’t budge. I had no choice but to wait for you. 

She said this with a snarl. 

Barriss: About that vision…

Ahsoka: I don’t care about the vision, I just want to get out of this tomb! You’d be dead if I wasn’t afraid of being trapped in here alone. 

Barriss could have retorted with a comment about how that was unlikely given her inferior fighting style, but she didn’t want to provoke. The vision was affecting her, no matter how much she denied it. 

Barriss: Did the temple show you anything else or try to test you at all?

Ahsoka: No, I’ve been sitting here alone waiting for you for ages. 

Barriss couldn’t tell if she was telling the truth or not until she noticed Ahsoka’s knuckles were bloody. Something did happen, but she felt it wasn’t the right time to ask. 

Barriss: Strange, the door should have opened now that I'm back. Perhaps the temple wants us to use the force together to open it.

Ahsoka: You’re a Jedi and I use the darkside. How is that going to work?

Barriss: I guess we’ll learn by trying.

They used the force together, willing the door to open. A few seconds passed by and it wouldn’t budge. Suddenly the temple began to vibrate and the door opened with an ugly scratching sound, stone against stone. 

Once it was open, they finally walked outside the temple.

Barriss: I’m surprised that worked.

Suddenly the temple began to sink into the ground with such a shocking ferocity, as if it had gotten sick from regurgitating it’s maligned force users. 

Barriss used this opportunity with Ahsoka distracted from the spectacle to cuff her again.

Ahsoka: Hey!

Barriss: What? You had a lot of these in your ship and I figured that you would give me enough trouble.

Ahsoka: So you kept a pair in your pocket?!

Barriss: Two pairs actually…

Ahsoka stared at her incredulously.

Barriss: Well it pays to be prepared.

Ahsoka: Or you could just kill me and rid yourself of a problem.

Barriss: Would you stop with the death talk, it’s really disconcerting!

Ahsoka: What’s “disconcerting” is how you Jedi won’t even kill your own exterminators! You’re all about the greater good until you have to do the dirty work!

Barriss: You sound as if this has happened to you before.

Ahsoka: You don’t know me, so stop acting like you do. Just take me to your ship and do to me whatever you have planned… I’m getting tired of this. 

Barriss frowned. She definitely wasn’t telling her something. No matter; that would come later. Right now she had to find somewhere safe to stay and try to decipher what the temple was trying to tell her. Temple visions were known to not always be direct, so there was definitely something useful in the visions she had seen… including possibly whatever Ahsoka might have seen and wasn’t telling her.

She would somehow have to get her to reveal it while continuing to challenge her beliefs about the Empire. She hoped she could turn her, but this Ahsoka had been through horrors different from her own Ahsoka. That vision of her as a child without Plo Koon to save her was heartbreaking. She’d have to remember she wasn’t the same person, otherwise she would never be able to persuade Ahsoka of her potential for good. And it was imperative she did. She couldn’t do this alone. 

[dato-potato]

The Lost Son pt. 3

Part three of the AU where Damian is left at an orphanage in Gotham when he’s five.

I’m so sorry this has taken so long! I busted my laptop earlier this week so I was trying to write this on my phone which was just absolutely annoying so I ended up stealing my friend’s laptop. It’s been an interesting week though, been in self-isolation thanks to my compromised immune system, severe asthma and heart condition, so it’s been fun. Anyway, you guys aren’t here for that, so let’s get to the good stuff! I hope you guys enjoy!

Part One

Part Two

Part Four

Part Five

Part Six

Part Seven

Part Eight

——————————

“Is everything ready?” Janet panicked, rearranging the flowers Damian brought home the previous night for the umpteenth time.

Damian placed a hand on her shoulder, “Yes, Janet. Everything is perfect. Why don’t you wait by the door, I’ll triple check the rest of the children.”

Janet pinched Damian’s cheeks in the way she knew he loathed, “What would I do without you?”

Damian shrugged his shoulders and rubbed his now sore cheeks, “Perish, most likely.”

Janet rolled her eyes at him and shooed him away. Damian gathered the kids, smoothing dresses and adjusting clip-on ties. Ideally, he would’ve rathered not have to do this at all, but the orphanage was funded by the man and he couldn’t leave Janet to fend for herself.

There was an excited chatter from the foyer and Damian knew they had arrived. As they rounded the corner he saw Bruce Wayne, an older gentleman following close behind, Timothy, followed by Richard Grayson, the eldest son.

Janet went down the line of children, though there were only five, not including Damian which was considerably less than the amount that had been there when Damian first arrived. 

“And that’s Aurora,” Janet chuckled gently and pointed to the small girl who clutched Damian’s arm, “She nearly never leaves the poor boy alone.”

Janet motioned for Damian to step forward. He sighed but did as he was asked, “Damian Alistair,” he introduced himself and held out his hand. 

Bruce Wayne nodded his head and took his hand, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Damian.”

“You as well, Mr. Wayne.”

Bruce Wayne threw back his head and laughed, an action that nearly made Damian physically cringe, “Please, just Bruce is fine.”

Damian smiled awkwardly at him knowing he would not call him by first name only. This man made Damian nervous, everything about him seemed so forced and fake, the boy wasn’t sure how to react. 

“Well,” Bruce Wayne started, “I brought some gifts for the kids, I only hope it suits their tastes,” he chuckled.

Janet waved a hand in the air, “I have no doubt they’ll love them,” she looked over at the kids who eagerly awaited the signal that told them it was ok to move. Janet nodded her head and they were off. Bruce Wayne chatted with Janet as the two of them made their way to the door to watch the kids.

Damian smiled and shook his head at the children before turning his attention to the tugging on his sleeve, “What is it, Rory?”

Aurora looked suspiciously at the other three men who stood close by, “Can I go look at the toys?” she asked in a whispered voice.

Damian chuckled, “Of course, little one. You may want to hurry though, the good stuff might be gone.”

Aurora let out a small gasp before bolting to the door.

“You’re pretty good with kids,” Timothy commented as he walked over to Damian.

“You get used to it,” Damian shrugged as he watched the last of Aurora disappear around the corner.

The older Wayne son stepped awkwardly towards the two boys, “So, Timmy. Wanna introduce me to your new friend?”

Smooth, Damian thought to himself, “You must be Richard, I’m Damian Alistair.”

Richard shook Damian’s hand, a pleasant smile on his face. 

Damian sighed, the remaining guests seemed to be waiting for something.

“Would anyone care for something to drink?” Damian asked, attempting to be pleasant or as pleasant as he could manage.

The two Wayne sons and the older gentleman nodded as Damian led them to the dining room. The men sat down, “Tea?” he asked them and they all nodded politely.

Damian left them and began boiling the water. A clatter behind him startled him, something that was quite hard to do.

“Apologies,” the older gentleman said when he saw Damian jump, “I was simply thinking of lending a hand, if that’s all right.”

Damian nodded and thanked him as the man searched for the cups. Damian pointed out the cupboard where they kept the mugs and the man made a sour face at them as he got them out.

“Tea tastes best in the proper wares,” he told the boy.

Damian was quiet for a moment, he didn’t think the man was insulting them for not having teacups but he still felt like he should apologize, “I didn’t know it tasted different.”

“Of course it does, even the smallest change from the wrong temperature, to steeping it too long will affect the taste.”

Damian hummed, “I had no idea, you seem to know a lot.”

The man nodded, “I know what is required to succeed as a butler.”

“I see, so you’re Alfred Pennyworth,” Damian nodded in understanding. 

The man nodded and apologized for not introducing himself earlier as the kettle began to squeal. Damian watched helplessly as Alfred took over, pouring the water, gathering the sugar and milk, leaving Damian to simply carry some mugs out to the room. 

“I see Alfred took over?” Richard mused as Alfred clicked his tongue at him.

Damian chuckled and shook his head, “Not at all, he was a great help. I suppose I don’t know much about making tea.”

Richard chuckled as he scooped some sugar into his cup, “So, Damian, was it?”

The smirk on his face irked Damian but he nodded anyway and sipped his tea. It did taste better than when he usually made it.

“How long have you been here for?” Richard asked.

Damian tilted his head to the side, “Nearly eight years.”

“You must’ve been quite young then,” Alfred mused as he smiled from behind his mug.

“Yeah, I was five,” Damian told them quietly.

Alfred set his mug down, “Forgive my forwardness, but what of your parents?”

Damian looked down at his hands as he felt the family leaned in, didn’t they know where they were? Were they not aware that they were sitting in an orphanage? One that Damian lives in?

Damian sighed, “My mother was the one who left me here, I found out she passed away some time ago,” Timothy flinched slightly at his words as he already knew.

“That’s awful,” Alfred shook his head before pressing on, “And your father?”

Damian shook his head, “I have no clue. My mother used to tell me that she’d tell me when the time was right, but she never got the chance.”

That seemed to be the end of the overly personal questions and Damian would be forever grateful for that. They spent the remaining time chatting idly, which he was surprised he enjoyed so much. Damian felt comfortable with the three others in front of him.

A man wearing sunglasses and a horribly fake mustache entered the dining room, the four at the table turning their attention to him, “Yo, Bruce said it’s about time to go,” he had a large frame, possibly even larger than Bruce Wayne, perhaps he was a bodyguard?

Timothy stood up abruptly, a panicked look on his face as he seemed to be choosing what words to use, “All right, we’ll be right out,” Richard told him

The man in the doorway rolled his eyes, when they landed on Damian, he smirked at the boy before nodding his head at him and ducking out of the room.

Damian turned to Timothy for an explanation, “That was our uh...” he struggled.

“Driver,” Richard offered as he stood up.

Damian nodded his head suspiciously as he led the men out. Alfred turned back to the boy, looking him up and down before smiling once more, “I’d like to invite you to the manor for tea, if you’d accept.”

Damian raised an eyebrow, “Can you do that?”

Alfred scoffed at him, “Young sir, I have most certainly earned the right to invite a guest or two over.”

Damian chuckled at the old man, “Ok, it’d be my honour to accept that invitation then, Mr. Pennyworth.”

Alfred smiled and nodded curtly as he made his way to the car the others waited in.

Later that night as Damian helped Janet washing up after dinner, Janet was still gushing about Bruce Wayne.

“Maybe he’s thinking of adopting again?” Janet continued excitedly, “Maybe he’s thinking about adopting you?”

Damian raised an eyebrow at her, “I sincerely hope not.”

“Why not?”

“The family seems,” Damian paused, considering how best to word it. He nodded, “Completely bat-shit insane.”

Damian was later given a long and arduous lecture for his language. He thought it was clever.

——————————

Bruce pulled his cowl on and turned to Alfred, “I’ll be back, Alfred.”

Alfred nodded, “As always, Master Bruce.”

Bruce pulled himself into the Batmobile, Tim close behind and Nightwing on the comms already, relaying information of a robbery in progress on Fifth street. 

Alfred sighed heavily as the Batmobile sped away, out of the cave. Once he was sure that Bruce was gone, he turned on his heel and headed to the Batcomputer. He sat down in the chair as he had done so many times before, but this time felt different.

He input his access codes and sat for a minute. The child wasn’t even an adult yet, he was fairly certain he wouldn’t find anything that Bruce didn’t already know, but it was worth a shot.

He searched Damian Alistair, the obvious recent kidnapping of Aurora came up, as well as some other minor incidents from before he met Tim and after as well. Nothing huge, but enough to get some attention. 

The boy’s movements were swift, as if he had done them a million times before. Alfred shook his head, “What have you been through, my boy...” he muttered to himself as he watched the footage they had of him. He continued his search, looking at his academic records, nearly flawless, but no clear direction either. No extracurricular activities, outside his family, of course. 

Alfred sighed, rubbing his chin with his hand in thought. He searched Alistair, but nothing pertaining to the boy showed up. He leaned back in the chair, could he be wrong? But he was so sure. All you had to do was look at the boy and you could tell, he looks exactly like his father when he was that age, all except his eyes. Those eyes, Alfred thought, I know them, but from where?

After searching for things that happened eight years ago that might be linked to Damian and running a facial recognition for the boy to see if anything before he came to Gotham cropped up, Alfred gave up searching on the computer. He considered bringing it up to Bruce, but if Bruce hadn’t noticed it already, he’d probably just deny it. Though, he would know best if he had a son out there, right?

Alfred pushed himself up, perhaps some tea would help him think clearly. He checked the time, Bruce would be back soon anyway, he had spent too much time reading about the boy. Alfred began toward the manor when he stopped and turned back to the computer, erasing the history. If Bruce didn’t know already, Alfred would tell him once he was more certain, at least.

——————————

Janet burst through Damian’s door, breathing heavily, “Holy, Janet, knock? Please?”

Janet waved Damian’s complaints away with her hand, “Never mind that, you’ll thank me later.”

She handed a newspaper over to Damian. He set his book down and read the headline, skimming the page for what it was she was trying to show him. 

“The Arts section,” she told him excitedly.

Damian eyed her suspiciously as he flipped and continued to skim. The largest headline read Central City Resident Wins Progressive Young Artists Award, Damian looked up to Janet who was still jittery. He looked back down to skim when he saw the picture and name. His last name was different, but it was certainly him.

“It’s--” Damian began.

“Parker!” Janet finished excited.

Damian looked down at the picture. He had grown, but he looked happy and healthy, his adoptive parents standing proudly behind him. Janet took the paper back carefully, looking at the picture again with a sort of sadness. Damian thought of all the times the small boy had come into his room to draw or watch Damian draw.

Janet looked back at him, “I’m going to put it up on the fridge.”

Damian nodded, handing over the paper, “That’s a good idea.”

He was glad the kid was doing good. He hadn’t checked in on Parker for a while. Damian tried not to check in on the kids too often, he knew it wouldn’t be good for him or for them, but just knowing that they were safe and living well was nice. 

Only a few minutes later, there was a soft tapping on his door as it creaked open. A very tired Aurora shuffled into his room, not waiting for him to answer, “I can’t sleep,” she told him, rubbing her tired eyes.

Damian shook his head, “Can’t sleep or had a nightmare,” he raised an eyebrow.

Aurora hung her head, “Nightmare,” she said, barely above a whisper.

“Come here, little one,” he said shifting the blankets and setting his book on the side table. She shuffled towards him and climbed into his bed, snuggling into his side as he tucked the blanket around her. 

Before he switched the light off, “What were you reading, Dami?”

Damian smiled down at her and picked up his book, “George Orwell, you heard of him?”

Aurora poked her head up to look at the cover, “Nope.”

Damian chuckled and set the book down, “All right, lay down now.”

Aurora began to protest as he switched the light out, “Don’t worry, little one, you know I won’t let the nightmares get you.”

Aurora nodded and buried her face into the blankets and Damian’s side. He held her close, he promised he wouldn’t let anything get her.

——————————

End of Part Three

Sorry it took so long, but I hope you guys enjoyed it! There’s definitely more parts if people want them!