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imaginesfordifferentfandoms · 3 years

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It's Going To Be You

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Prompt - I knew I did from that first moment we met. It was…not love at first sight exactly, but - familiarity. Like: oh, hello, it’s you. It’s going to be you.

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Spencer Reid knew from the moment he laid eyes on you that you were something else, he could tell from one glance that you would change his life. No words needed to be exchanged for the man to be completely and utterly taken by you. He watched as you walked through the door, though your head was held high, shoulders pushed back giving the impression of complete confidence, he saw the way you fiddled with the strap of your bag with one hand. When he looked at your other hand he could see your forefinger picking at your thumb, clearly a nervous habit. He watched as you looked around the room, watched as Rossi made his way over to you, guiding you over to Hotch’s office with a smile.

“Down, pretty boy.” Derek grinned as Spencer startled, his head snapping around to face Derek just as you entered Hotch’s office. “I’ve never seen that look on your face and you don’t even know her name.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Spencer replied, cringing at how unconvincing he sounded.

He turned away from Derek and tried to focus on his paperwork but he could stop his eyes from straying over to the closed office door every few minutes much to Derek and Rossi’s amusement.

“Who is she anyway?” Derek asked.

“She’s lucky number ten,” Rossi told them, smothering a smile as Spencer looked over, “who knew finding another agent would be so difficult.”

“Wait,” another voice interrupted, “there’s a new person here? Is she nice? Why is that always my first question?” The group laughed as Penelope quizzed Rossi.

“Listen, I know as much as you people.” He said and before anyone else could speak Penelope was being handed a folder causing them all to groan.

“Agent Hotchner?” You asked as you were granted access to the office.

Hotch stood as you walked in, moving around his desk to hold a hand out to you.

“Yes and you’re Y/F/N Y/L/N, I presume?” He asked, smiling slightly at you as you nodded, still fiddling with your bag. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, please have a seat.”

“Thank you sir.” You smiled, taking a seat in the offered chair watching as he made his way back behind his desk.

“Your supervisor spoke very highly of you when I spoke with him, your success rate is impressive.” Hotch praised, glancing down at the file in front of him. “Your latest case seemed rather difficult, are you sure you’re ready to be back in the field again?”

“I passed all my psychiatric exams, I was cleared to return.” You told him stiffly.

“I’m aware of your results, I just want to be sure you’re ready. Infiltrating yourself into the life of Douglas Miller couldn’t have been an easy feat.” Hotch watched as a look of satisfaction took over your face.

“I’m ready, sir.” You told him, relaxing slightly. “It was a tough case, I’ll be the first to admit that seeing what I saw had an impact but I can do this.”

Hotch smiled at you before closing the folder.

“I believe you,” he said, “I think you’ll be a valuable addition to this team.”

The words were what you were hoping to hear, you’d wanted a job with the BAU for longer than you could remember but you paused. Surely it wasn’t that easy, right?

“Wait? That’s it?” You asked.

“That’s it.” Hotch confirmed, fighting back a smile at your expression.

“But- but I’ve been here less than five minutes.” You countered back, there were so many emotions going on within you that you felt slightly overwhelmed.

“Y/N, ever since your name was put forward I looked into your work and I was impressed. Your skills at undercover work are far above what I’ve seen in a long time, that alone would be an incredibly useful assest to the team but on top of that your ability to connect and empathise with unsubs, fast thinking and your profiling skills- trust me, you deserve this job and I have complete faith in you.” Hotch’s words had left you speechless, you had no clue how to respond but thankfully you didn’t have to as the door was pushed open and both you and Hotch turned to look at the brightly dressed woman in the doorway.

“I’m sorry to interrupt sir but we have a case.” The woman said and Hotch stood gesturing for you to follow.

“You have a to go bag?” He asked as you both walked out the door.

“Yes sir.” You nodded, still baffled by how well things had gone.

“Good, welcome to the team Y/L/N.”

“Everyone, this is SSA Y/F/N Y/L/N. I’m sure proper introductions can be made later.” Hotch said as the two of you entered the room before gesturing to Garcia that she could begin.

“Ok, yes, so, we have five bodies so far found in Wyoming. The first two bodies were hidden amongst some trees close to firehole bay. The ME presumes that the time of death was mostly likely a week ago but we should have full confirmation when you arrive. The victims, who we haven’t been able to identify yet, but I am working on it, were stripped completely and the wounds, that are in your files because I so do not need to see that, show heavy signs of torture. ” Garcia informed you all.

“The next body was a single male, again stripped and tortured and the ME says this death is most likely four to five days old. This body was found a few miles away from Basin Bay Point campsite.”

“Wait a second,” somebody interrupted, causing you to turn your head. There sat a man, younger than the rest of the team, he was…how you had missed him you didn’t know but now you felt like you couldn’t look away. “If I’m not mistaken those places are roughly twenty miles from each other at walking distance.”

“And driving distance?” An older man asked.

“I don’t think there is a way to drive to Basin Bay Point, especially not to where the body was left.” The younger man replied, looking down at the folder he was given with a frown.

“I’ll have a map ready for you on the plane.” Penelope assured him before continuing. “Now, the next two bodies were the most recent, ME says they were killed a day or two ago and these victims we have been able to identify as Taylor Gomez and her boyfriend Jack Gaskarth.” Penelope said as she brought their pictures up. “They were never reported missing because they had told friends and family they were going camping, which checks out because their bodies were found three miles away from Lewis Lake campground. They show the same wounds as the other vics.” Garcia explained.

You grimaced as you looked down at the tablet Hotch had passed you as you saw a young man and woman, naked with slices all across their bodies, as well as deep bruising to the neck.

“What was the CoD, Garcia?” The younger man spoke up again.

“ME still needs to run a full examination but her best bet is that it was asphyxiation.” She told him with a frown.

“That makes sense, there isn’t a lot of blood or scabbing which suggests they were done post mortem.”

“So what,” you spoke up, pausing for a moment when everyone turned to you, “the unsub blitz attacks the victims and kills them before torturing them? What’s the point in that?”

“It could be a number of things actually. Perhaps it’s not about the kills for him but more to do with the fascination of the human body, we’ve seen it before where curiosity leads to this kind of attack. It could also be that he has to kill, he has a compulsion to kill and once he’s given into that compulsion he gets to fulfil other urges. If I had to guess I’d say the victims are victims of opportunity-” The younger man rambled, his hands gesturing in front of him as he spoke causing you to smile.

“Because there is no set pattern, he crosses race and gender lines and there’s no secondary location.” You cut off the other man who looked at you with a grin.

“Exactly, the area is so isolated that he can get away with quick and easy killings but because it doesn’t seem like there’s a secondary location yet we have to presume that the torture is a means to satisfy himself when he can’t hold his victims hostage.”

“It’s a long flight and this unsub doesn’t appear to be slowing down. Wheels up in fifteen.” Hotch said as he stood up, everyone was quick to follow until it was just you and the guy you had spoken to left.

“Hi.” He said, causing you to turn around with a smile.

“Hi.”

“I’m Spencer, Spencer Reid.” He introduced himself.

“Y/F/N Y/L/N, nice to meet you.” You replied, reaching out your hand to shake his, your eyebrows pulling together slightly as he shook his head.

“Sorry, I don’t um,” He said, causing you to drop your hand and nod understandingly, “it’s nothing against you, just…germs.” He trailed off, berating himself in his head.

“No problem.” You smiled again, god that smile. Spencer felt his heart race.

“Congratulations on joining the team.” He praised as the two of you walked out of the round table room.

“Thank you, I’ve wanted this for so long.” He watched as the smile fell from your face before you shook your head slightly.

“Is everything ok?” He asked, understanding the nerves. He couldn’t help but glance down, almost smiling as he saw you picking at your thumb.

“Yeah, I’m just, what if I mess up?” You couldn’t help but ask. After wanting this job for as long as you had, all the hard nights and long days spent training you were finally here and you’d be damned if you screwed everything up.

“You won’t, Hotch wouldn’t have hired you if he didn’t think you were good enough, trust me. I think you’ll be amazing.” He told you, flushing slightly at his own words and the soft smile that replaced the frown on your face.

“Thank you Spencer.” You replied softly and before he could respond the rest of the team was calling for the two of you to head to the air strip.

On the plane you were properly introduced to everyone as you took a seat next to Spencer, sitting opposite Hotch and Rossi. On the table in front of you Spencer had both a map of the US and a smaller map of Wyoming. You watched his fingers trace invisible lines as his eyebrows knitted together.

You were trying not to stare, really you were, but there was just something about the man that made you want to get to know him.

Thankfully before anyone noticed your eyes glancing at Spencer every few moments, the man himself spoke.

“Guys, if you map out where the five victims were found,” Spencer began, circling three places on the map as he did, “it looks like the victims might have been hiking the continental divide trail.”

“Pretty boy, isn’t that trail like thousands of miles long?” Morgan asked, watching as Spencer nodded, pushing the little map of Wyoming out of the way for a moment and drawing a line down the map of the US.

“This is the continental divide trail, it’s 3,300 miles long and it’s actually quite difficult to hike. These people had to have been exceptionally fit and healthy which further backs up the theory that these were blitz attacks. You can go days without seeing other people when hiking the trail and most hikers have to give up because of lack of supplies or needing urgent medical care from injuries and illnesses they attract. A part of the Wyoming part of the trail includes a 120 mile stretch of desert with water sources few and far between.” Spencer rambled and you couldn’t help the soft smile, though you did try to hide it behind your hand, glancing away from Rossi when you locked eyes with him and he raised an eyebrow at you.

“So we have a serial killer and 3,300 miles of potential hunting grounds?” JJ asked.

“So far he seems to be focusing on Wyoming, which narrows the geographic profile down to…’ Spencer paused as he pulled the Wyoming map closer to him, “550 miles.”

“I hope you all brought your hiking boots.” Rossi said as groans filled the jet.

“Hello my crime fighters.” Garcia’s voice sounded through the speakers. “Hotch, the families of the latest two victims are at the station waiting for you.”

“Thank you Garcia,” Hotch replied before turning to the team. “JJ, I want you to come with me to the station and help interview the families. We also need to get ahead of the media on this before they start glorifying the unsub. Reid, since the geographic profile is mostly established, I want you to take Y/L/N and head to the latest crime scene. Dave and Morgan, the two of you head to the second crime scene.”

You and Spencer both shared a look at the news you were travelling to a crime scene that couldn’t be driven too. Whilst you managed to pass the FBI’s training and fitness tests you weren’t exactly athletically inclined and seeing from the look Spencer was giving you neither was he.

Judging from the chuckles that filled the plane the others had come to the same conclusion that you and Spencer were not going to recover from this trip.

You had driven as close to the crime scene as you could get, which was thankfully closer than the one Morgan and Rossi had to go to. It was still a hell of a hike to get to where the unsub had dumped the bodies.

“Ok, ok,” Spencer panted, cheeks flushed from the heat. “Let’s take a break.”

“Please.” You were quick to agree and the two of you sat down heavily on a fallen tree trunk. You had all been warned that you needed supplies, even for a short hike. So you had both been sent out with backpacks filled with water bottles and food. There were other supplies like maps, compasses and first aid kits that you were hoping you wouldn’t have to use. Thankfully you had been paired with the man with the eidetic memory because you couldn’t read a map to save your life.

After the two of you gulped down some water and caught your breath Spencer spoke up.

“Why the BAU?” He asked suddenly, causing you to look up in confusion.

“Sorry?” You replied.

“You said you had wanted to join the BAU for a long time, why?” He asked again, not pushing you when you paused.

It wasn’t a secret what had happened to your family, Spencer could easily find the information out if he wanted to but you wanted to be the one to tell him. It wasn’t a story you liked sharing with people but something about Spencer made you feel…safe.

“When I was a kid there was a serial killer but he was in the next state over and we were from a small town so nobody thought to worry and after a while things went quiet so everyone just assumed he stopped, you know? Anyway, one day I went to my friend’s house, it was summer and I was always out with my friends. I was there for a few hours but I was always home in time for dinner except for this day, I ended up losing track of time and headed home an hour late. When I got home, my momma was there in the kitchen. She was covered in blood and I just screamed. The rest of my family didn’t make it either. When the police came they said the markings were the same as the victims from the next state over.” You told him, not pausing for breath as you rushed through the story. You watched as his expression fell, his sympathy written on his face.

“I’m so sorry.” He told you and you could hear the sincerity in his tone. You gave him a small smile before continuing.

“I could just never understand why. The thing that kept me up at night was that question: why? Why them? Why did he come here? Why wasn’t I home? Why did I deserve to live? I started researching and somehow came across an article about the BAU, from there I knew I wanted to work there.”

“Most people wouldn’t be able to come back from something like that, especially at such a young age.” Spencer said, causing you to glance over at him. “They’d be so proud of you.”

You couldn’t help but let out what sounded like a chuckle and a sob at those words, causing Spencer’s eyes to widen in fear he had upset you further but then you smile brightly and he couldn’t help but smile back.

“I like to think so.” You said softly. “You ready to continue?” You asked, chuckling as he groaned before standing up.

“I hate Hotch.” Was the grumbled response and the laugh he received in return made every sore bone and the aching feet worth it.

“We know that this unsub is a physically fit white male in his mid to late thirties.” Hotch began.

“Looking at the geographical pattern it’s safe to assume that he too is hiking the Continental Divide Trail in search of victims who are isolated from the rest of civilization. He also has no problems taking down two victims.” Spencer continued.

“The period in between kills is lessening so we should expect to find another body soon, have as many officers as possible on the rest of the trail.” You picked up.

“Considering the last kill was two days ago, the average person could walk up to 30 miles a day on normal terrain but we have to consider that the terrain out there is harsh so lets say he walks 20 miles a day that gives up a 40 mile radius he could be in. He is guaranteed to stay on the continental divide trail so stop every male you see.” Spencer told the LEO’s and after some more information was shared everyone headed off in different directions, the BAU members heading into the room they had been given to work in.

“Y/N,” Hotch said, causing everyone to look over at you.

“Yes sir?” You asked, looking up from your laptop.

“You’re probably the most skilled undercover agent in this room,” He said, causing your cheeks to flush and Spencer couldn’t help but smile. “I know this isn’t exactly the type of case you’d usually be assigned but perhaps if we send you out there we have a better chance of catching him. This man is impulsive, if he sees you he won’t be able to control himself.” Hotch explained, ignoring the questioning looks he was getting from most of the team.

You, however, relaxed, thankful that you hadn’t done something wrong. Undercover work was easy, you were comfortable with it, you knew you were good at it. Obviously you weren’t as confident at this part of the job yet, how could you be on your first case, but undercover work? That was your area of expertise.

“Of course sir.” You agreed easily before remembering how fun the small hike to the last crime scene was…your body would not thank you for signing up for a much longer hike.

“Hotch, are you sure that’s a good idea?” Morgan spoke up causing you to frown. Sure they didn’t know you yet but surely your record spoke for itself. “No offence to you,” he said quickly as he turned to you, “it’s just-“

But before he could finish Hotch cut him off, “I have full faith in Y/L/N’s abilities.”

You couldn’t help feeling a swell of pride at Hotch’s words, a man who you looked up to, a man who barely knew you but was trusting you with so much already. You locked eyes with Spencer who smiled at you reassuringly.

“I’m not doubting the kid’s abilities,” Morgan continued, missing the way you rolled your eyes at being called a kid. “I’m just saying maybe don’t send her in on her own on her first case.”

“I’ll go with her.” Spencer spoke up before Hotch could argue back.

Your eyes widened at Spencer’s offer, he did just as well as you did on your first outing and now he was offering to put himself through hours more of that for what?

“Are you ok with that, Y/N?” Hotch asked you.

You didn’t even hesitate to nod, more than happy for the opportunity to spend time with Spencer Reid.

“We’ll be close by the whole time,” Hotch told you as he passed you your backpack filled with supplies, “the second we hear something, we’ll be there.” He assured you and you couldn’t help but smile at his concern.

“I’ll be fine, sir. This is actually the part of the job I’m good at.” You laughed, watching as his lip twitched upwards.

“You’ve been a great help in coming up with a profile too.” He assured you and before you could say anything the rest of the team was flooding in.

The plan for you and Spencer to hike up to a specific spot that Spencer had managed to pinpoint the unsub at and set up camp there. From there you would wait and hope for the unsub to appear. The man was impulsive and his need to kill would be overwhelming by now. The two of you were wired up so that if the unsub appeared the rest of the team could step in and help with the arrest.

You and Spencer were dropped off half an hour away from your campsite just so that if the unsub was around he wouldn’t suspect anything.

The walk was mostly silent, both you and Spencer focusing on not breaking an ankle on the uneven terrain when Spencer finally spoke up.

“Morgan didn’t mean anything insulting.” He told you, causing you to pause before shrugging your shoulders and continuing. When you stayed silent Spencer continued, “he’s just protective but sometimes he isn’t really good at showing it and it comes across…”

“It comes across like he thinks I can’t do my job despite this being my forte.” You finished with a huff before sighing. “I’m sorry, I just…you can’t imagine how many times a male colleague has said I can’t do something and then a supervisor has agreed, you don’t understand how hard I have to fight to be given assignments and not have somebody constantly berating me.” You ranted.

“People look at me like I’m a child. When I first joined the BAU nobody would take me seriously, without Gideon I don’t know what would have happened.” Spencer told you quietly, causing you to frown.

“So you can understand why it’s so frustrating that someone who doesn’t know me didn’t even want to give me a chance.” You replied, causing him to nod sadly. ‘I know he probably didn’t mean anything but…”

“You’ve heard that your entire career.” Spencer finished.

“Hotch was the first person to give me a chance without any hesitation.” You told him softly, watching as he smiled at that. “This should be close enough.” You said as you looked around, the place looked similar to the image Spencer had shown the team.

“Please tell me you know how to put a tent up.” You said, watching as his face twisted.

“I know the theory?” The way his response sounded like a question made you smile as you pulled poles and material out of a bag. The two of you staring down at the mess with matching expressions of confusion.

“Now would be a really good time for the unsub to attack.” He muttered, causing you to laugh loudly. Spencer couldn’t help but grin over at you, your cheeks flushing as you caught the expression.

It took longer than either you or Spencer were willing to admit to put the tent up, despite the fact that it wouldn’t get used, you had to make it look like the pair of you were really camping. There was a lot of grumbling, many curse words and a cut or two.

There was also a lot of laughter coming from the comms in your ears causing both you and Spencer to roll your eyes.

Once the tent was up, Spencer lay a blanket down outside of it and sat down, gesturing for you to do the same. Miraculously the two of you got a fire started and as the sun set and the night time air chilled you were thankful for it.

“I don’t camp but I guess I can see the appeal.” Spencer told you as he titled his head back to look up at the stars. You glanced up too, the sky wasn’t totally black yet, more of an inky blue colour and you could see every star on the cloudless night.

It was beautiful and yet you still found your gaze falling back on Spencer.

“Yeah, me too.” You replied softly, your voice quiet so as not to break the peacefulness around you.

Somehow the two of you ended up laying down and looking up at the sky, you had a smile on your face that refused to move as Spencer’s hushed voice told you facts about stars.

“I’m glad you’re on the team.” Spencer whispered after a long pause of silence. It took you a moment to register his words before you turned your head, coming face to face with the man.

“Me too.” You whispered back, meaning the words with your entire being.

Just as Spencer went to say something you heard a rustle in the bushes and locked eyes with Spencer who nodded.

The two of you waited, not waiting to disrupt the operation if it just turned out to be an animal, but as you pushed yourself up on your elbow and discreetly looked around you saw a faint outline of a man. He was hidden behind a tree but he was watching the two of you.

“The hike up here was exactly what we needed.” You told Spencer and through the comms you heard the team moving out.

“You’re right.” He played along, smiling up at you from his reclined position.

Before you knew what was happening Spencer had his gun out and the unsub grabbed you, placing you in front of him as a human shield. If someone asked you, you would never have been able to recall the events that led to you having a knife held to your neck.

You saw the panicked look in Spencer’s eyes but you couldn’t hear his thoughts, they were overwhelming. Thoughts of Maeve passed through his mind as he pleaded with anyone who would listen to let you be ok, he couldn’t lose you too. Hell, he’d only known you a few days and yet he knew you were special, he knew he had to have you in his life. If you died now…

“Just let her go.” Spencer said, keeping his gun trained on the man.

“I let her go, you ship me off to death row.” The man responded, his face close to your face, too close. The smell of his breath had you grimacing.

“I’ll make you a deal,” Spencer responded, not even thinking. He just needed to get you away.

“Spenc, what you doing kid?” He heard Morgan through his ear piece but he just shook his head before shooting you a reassuring smile, trying not to focus on the tears in your eyes or the blood on your neck.

“I’m listenin’.” The unsub replied after a moment of silence, gesturing for Spencer to continue.

“Let her go,” He said, lowering his gun, “I won’t arrest you. You can get a head start before anyone else gets here. Just let her go.” Spencer pleaded.

It was a tense few seconds in which Spencer never took his eyes off you, he hated to see that scared look in your eyes, the fear in them made Spencer ache.

“Let her go.” Spencer said once more and he let out a sigh of relief as you were pushed into his arms.

Just as the unsub ran to leave, you twisted around in Spencer’s arms and drew your own gun, shooting the unsub in the leg. The rest of the team ran in just as the man fell to the ground.

Spencer turned you around so that you were facing him, his hands on your shoulders.

“Are you ok?” He asked, Morgan and Hotch walking over whilst Rossi and JJ dealt with the man.

You didn’t respond with words, instead you wrapped your arms around Spencer. He didn’t hesitate to wrap his own around you, holding you close as you let the tears slid down your face.

You pulled away abruptly, rubbing your eyes as you did.

“Sorry, you don’t like to be touched and here I am-“ You said but Spencer just cut you off.

“It’s fine, really.” He assured you before his attention turned to your neck. The knife hadn’t pierced the skin too badly, there was a small bit of blood where the knife had nicked you when the unsub pressed a bit too hard.

“Are you ok?” He asked again, fingers on your jaw so that he could tilt your face and get a better look.

“Spencer, I’m fine.” You assured him but that didn’t stop him from getting you medical attention the moment you were back in the town.

Spencer watched as you squirmed away from the nurse seeing to you with a soft smile.

There was something about you that made him feel so free, like he could be himself and the thought of losing you…he didn’t want to think about it again.

“You like her.” Derek said as he came to stand next to the younger man.

“That’s ridiculous, I’ve known her for a few days.” Spencer shot back but he knew his friend was right.

“If she’s the right girl, a few days is all you need.” Was Derek’s reply before he walked away, leaving Spencer looking at you with a thoughtful look on his face.

The plane ride home was uneventful.

You took the seat next to Spencer again and watched him pull a book out. You couldn’t help but glance down at it, your eyebrows knitting together in confusion as you didn’t recognise the language.

“It’s Russian.” He told you quietly, not wanting to disturb anyone as they settled in for a long flight.

“You read Russian?” You asked just as quietly, watching as he smiled bashfully and shrugged before nodding. You glanced down at the pages again before letting out a small yawn. “Can you read to me?” You asked him, smiling as he nodded again.

“Of course,” He said and with that it wasn’t long before you fell asleep to the soothing sound of Spencer Reid.

“Ask her, man.” Morgan said as both he and Spencer watched you leave the office after finishing your paperwork. Spencer too was done and Morgan assured him he’d make sure Hotch received it.

There was only a brief moment of hesitation before Spencer snatched his satchel up and ran to the elevators, getting there just before they shut on you.

“Hey.” He greeted as he stepped in.

“Hi.” You smiled, brushing a piece of hair out of your face.

“I was wondering, I mean if you wanted to, of course you don’t have to, I was only suggesting but I’d really like it if you would,” Spencer rambled before cutting himself out with a groaning causing you to giggle.

“Are you asking me out?” You asked, cheeks flushing as you asked.

“I’m trying to,” he told you, “but I’m not very good at this.”

“Just ask.” You told him softly.

“Would you like to go out with me?” He asked after taking a deep and calming breath.

“I’d love to.” You grinned, thankful that the man had made a move. You wouldn’t have risked asking him on the chance that you were reading him wrong and he didn’t like you but thankfully he had taken it into his own hands.

“Good. Great. That, that’s great.” He repeated, a soft grin spreading across his face causing you to giggle as the doors opened.

The two of you walked out together and there was a moment of awkward silence before Spencer dipped his head down to kiss your cheek, making your blush even more prominent.

You looked so pretty when you blushed, Spencer thought.

“I’ll call you.” He promised.

“I hope so.” You replied before heading towards your car, when you turned around you saw Spencer still stood by the doors with a smile still on his face. You giggled to yourself but couldn’t stop smiling yourself if you tried.

Spencer Reid was something else and you couldn’t wait to learn everything about that wonderful man.

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ketamineharry · 3 years

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The Night We Met - Harry Lewis Requested: No Trigger Warnings: Knife crime, death

“When the night was full of terror and your eyes were filled with tears.”

You had met Harry on a drunken night out. He had ended up in a pub fight and he had bumped into you. He had tried his hardest to mask the tears that had threatened to spill, but you could see just how badly the fight had left him, so it wouldn’t have surprised you.

“If that’s what you look like, I’d like to see the other guy.” You found yourself saying, trying to lift his spirits. He offered you a half-hearted laugh, before trying to make his way out of the pub. “I’m a registered nurse by the way, I can help you with the clean up.” He had taken you up on the offer, taking a hold of your hand as he led you out of the pub and into the Uber. As you both arrived at his flat, you were instantly taken aback. This was certainly different from the small one bedroom flat you were able to afford with your wage.

“Where would I be able to find your medical supplies?” You asked, as he sits at a dining table. As he did, you were able to take in the extent of his injuries. A busted lip, a cut eyebrow and his nose was oozing blood. “In the bathroom cabinet.” He responds, wincing in pain. You had worked a fair few nights at your local accident and emergency, but for a pub fight, this was among the worst results you had seen.

You collected the relevant medical supplies from the bathroom, which, in relation to your tiny abode, was the size of your bedroom. “This is going to sting a little, but please just bear with it. It’ll be better for you in the long run.” You say, as you dabbed a cotton bud into some antiseptic, brushing it over his cuts. He winced again, placing a hand over yours.

“Thank you, but I think I can deal with the rest of this myself. You’re more than welcome to sleep on the couch though, because it is ridiculously late.” He mumbled, shooting you his best smile considering the circumstances. You huffed. You adored your job, looking after people gave you such a joy, and you hated not being able to do your job properly. “Fine. I have cleaned all of your cuts the best I can, but please take care of yourself next time.” You plead.

“I was wondering… if maybe I could have your number though?” He asked sheepishly, placing a hand behind his neck, rubbing the spot softly. “You know, just so that if I ever have another incident like this, I have a nurse on speed dial.” He adds, laughing awkwardly.

“Of course.” You beamed, reaching out for his phone and popping your number in. “It’s just a phone number though, no promise of anything else.” You teased, as you handed him his phone back.

You didn’t end up taking up Harry on his offer to stay on the couch that night, you had work in the morning and you really couldn’t afford the expense of an Uber from central London to East London, where you were based.

“When you had not touched me yet, take me back to the night we met.”

It didn’t take long for Harry to contact you again. In fact, it was the very next weekend. He had called you out of the blue, steaming drunk and he sounded distressed. He had begged you to come over and as you remembered the picture of what he had looked like the weekend prior, you wouldn’t have forgiven yourself if you knew he was in a similar state and didn’t go to help.

Harry did offer to pay for the Uber though, as a way to apologise for in his words, ruining your Saturday night. Although you insisted that he didn’t have to. You loved your job after all, and this blond boy had already secured a soft spot in your heart.

As soon as you entered his apartment, you could see Harry sitting at the dining table. Medical supplies already aligned for you. “I’m starting to think this might be a regular occurrence.” You jest, as you rolled your sleeves up, noticing that the almost healed cuts from last week were replaced with new ones. Again, you cleaned up his wounds with the antiseptic and cotton pads. This time, Harry allowed you to allocate plasters and bandages.

When you had finished tending to him, you sat and talked for a while. He was funny, he had a sense of wit about him that you hadn’t seen in many other people and it both charmed and enticed you at the same time. You hadn’t noticed that Harry had placed one of his large hands over one of your smaller ones. You were just so focussed on his face. He wasn’t your usual type, although you were unsure if you had a ‘usual type’, but he was beautiful. Breathtaking.

All of a sudden, you had your hands in his hair, as his hands snaked around your waist hoisting you up onto his lap. Your lips interlocked, greedy for each other. Your inhale bleeding into his exhale. You craved him. You tugged on the hair by the nape of his neck, causing him to groan into your mouth. Increasing your desire for him, tenfold.

He walked you both back into his bedroom, throwing you onto his bed. He climbed on top of you, peppering kisses from your face, lowering himself down slowly until he reached your neck. He softly tugged at the skin there with his teeth, as he sucked it. His tongue soothed the pain. Once he had finished, he continued his quest downwards of covering every inch of your skin with kisses. When he reached a certain point of your neck, slightly lower down than he had left the love bite, you couldn't help but let out a slight moan.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do, haunted by the ghost of you.”

That night was just one of the many you had spent with Harry. The both of you decided that you did really like each other, and you wanted to explore how things would go if you were to start dating. The exploration, so far, was going impeccably well. Harry was one of the most thoughtful, kind people, when he wanted to be of course.

You had learned though, that he was a violent drunk. He also didn’t like to back down from a drinking challenge when his friends were around, which caused you to worry immensely. You just had a niggling feeling that one of these days, Harry was going to get into a fight where you couldn’t easily tend to his wounds, where you couldn’t help him. The thought plagued you every single time he went out without you.

One night, Harry had left to go on a lads night out. Insisting for you not to worry as usual, because everything was going to be fine. If worse came to the worse, the most damage he would have would be a few cuts, a broken nose perhaps. Nothing he couldn’t handle. You were lounging at home, you had a few girlfriends around, deciding on a movie night. You were drinking prosecco, and were waiting on a pizza when your phone rang.

Not recognising the number, you had assumed it was the pizza guy wondering how to get in the building.You placed the call on loudspeaker, absentmindedly. Instead, it was one of Harry’s friends, Josh.

“Y/N,” He said quietly, you could sense a tone of defeat in his voice. “Harry’s been taken to the hospital, he got into a fight again. But these lads… they had knives. He’s been stabbed.” You couldn’t quite believe what you had heard. There’s no way that Harry would’ve been stabbed. He had reassured you that the worst thing that could happen would be him having a broken nose. Not being critically injured.

“What hospital is he at?” Jenna, one of your friends asked. Instantly breaking you out of your thoughts.

“Queens.” Josh responds, as he ends the call. Jenna, and the rest of your friends make sure that you are ready, as they strap you into Jenna’s car. You didn’t really know what was going on. It felt like an out of body experience. Working in a hospital yourself, you knew what the dangers of being stabbed were. You just couldn’t comprehend it happening to someone you loved so much. Everything felt like it was going in slow motion, so when you arrived at the hospital with Jenna helping you out of the car, it just seemed strange.

Jenna walked with you into the building, holding your hand tightly, giving it a comforting squeeze as you approached the front desk. The conversation she had with the receptionist, passed you by. It’s like as soon as you stepped into the hospital, the speed changed from everything happening as slow as possible, to being unbearably fast. With Jenna’s guidance you ended up at Harry’s room. As you looked through the window, you were met with the most horrific scene you had ever seen.

Harry was hooked up to life support, the slow beep indicating there was some life there. How much though, you weren’t quite sure yet. You entered the room, taking in the full horrors. His t-shirt drenched in blood, was in a ball on the chair next to his bed. At least someone had gotten him to stop the bleeding with his shirt. A gash going from his lower left side, all the way along to his abdomen was visible. It was huge. His chances of survival were at least halved by this.

You wiped away a tear, unsure of when they started, not like it mattered. They were not going to be useful in this situation. You moved the blood-stained t-shirt from the chair next to Harry’s bed, as you sat down.

“I don’t know if you can hear me,” You sniffed. “But I love you and when we get out of here, I’ll make you a nice cup of tea and some cheese on toast. Your favourite hangover cure.” You took his hand in yours, placing a gentle kiss on his bloody knuckles. He had tried to fight back, that much was obvious but one man against a knife; that was never going to end well.

Harry’s eyes fluttered open, a weak smile spread across his face as he took in the sight of you. “You are so beautiful,” he whispered before closing them again. Which was swiftly followed by the sound of a flat line. This had not happened. It couldn’t have. You reached for the big red button, and pounded it. The doctors and nurses could help. It wasn’t uncommon for someone to come back from the brink.

As you expected, you were ushered out of the room by the professionals. His life was now in their hands. You just hoped that they kept trying, because you knew that you would not have given up. However, you had been in the place of those doctors and nurses with many patients. Sometimes, no matter how hard you wanted a different outcome it didn’t change the object of reality. You sat down in the waiting room, the hospital suddenly becoming too sterile and professional an environment for Harry to die. Harry was extraordinary, he lit up every room he was in. He was special. Someone so special, did not deserve to die in a place so ordinary, so mundane.

You were knocked out of your thoughts by a doctor tapping you on your shoulder. “Hi, Miss Y/L/N. I’m Doctor Singh. Unfortunately, there’s nothing more we can do…” He informed you, but you had to tune out. Perhaps you were a hypocrite, but you just couldn’t listen to the same drivel that you had told many families, especially when it concerned Harry.

“Is there anything we can do for you?” He asked. You look up at him, your eyes bloodshot and stinging. A blood curdling scream forced its way through your throat.

“Just take me back to the night we met.” You screamed.

#Harry Lewis #wroetoshaw #w2s #sidemen #Harry Lewis Imagine #wroetoshaw imagine #w2s imagine #sidemen imagine #Harry Lewis x reader #wroetoshaw x reader #w2s x reader #sidemen x reader

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carry-on-my-wayward-butt · 4 years

Note

He did? Umm.. what happened exactly?

(referring to this post)

my 11th grade chemistry teacher had an associates degree in liberal arts.

you know how in virtually every class you’ve ever had since middle school, your teachers made a big stink about the syllabus? she didn’t have one. this was her first teaching job, which she got because of her length experience as a substitute, not by her licensing qualifications. we were, at first, excited to have her, because she was a “fun sub” and we were 17 years old and stupid as all shit. we were the “normal chem” class in a system where the only other options were “honors chem” which was filled with children who actually know how to study (or cheat) and have an air of proper student activity, and “AP Chem”, which is clear enough if you’ve been an american student in the last 15 years.

she followed the mcgraw hill chemistry book in order of chapters, despite the fact that our state standardized tests did several of the chapters out of order. ever notice how you’ll suddenly be looking at chapter 11 when just last week you were on chapter 5, then the next week you’re on chapter 8? standardized testing is the reason. anyways by asking my friends in other classes who had chemistry teachers of relative competence, i was able to discern which chapters i should focus on, and while she was distracted with literally watching youtube videos all period, I was turning around in my seat and walking across the classroom helping my friends and enemies with the packets. (she was a two-packets-a-week kinda teacher.)

yes i said enemies too. the people i hated, i hated because they were sons of bitches i wouldnt piss on to put out a fire. i hated them so dearly i used to pray to god that they would bump into me so i could throw myself into the concrete and split my forehead open and get them expelled due to the blood-clause of our “zero-tolerance policy”. two of the kids in my class had, only the previous year, attempted to set my hair on fire.

i hated the teacher more.

it gave me extreme pleasure to see her fume and clench her fists when a student would say “i need help” across the classroom and she would move to get up and they would say “oh not you miss, im waiting for vicky.” jesus christ the only time ive ever felt a comparable high was when i was at a halloween party in college where i was literally so zooted i couldn’t move.

it got worse over time, her getting more and more angry, my ego growing larger and larger. i was a huge bitch in high school, i really thought i was the smartest bitch in the room at any given moment. severe main character syndrome. imagine that kind of person actually being right for 45 minutes out of every day. can you even comprehend the kind of frustration that would create? in a room full of little sociopaths who dont give a shit about anything but getting this joke of a class over with so they can graduate? your first real teaching job and they look right past you, the teacher, to this annoying little shit whose grades are completely abysmal? how are they managing to learn anything from a child who can barely speak in front of more than 10 people? who turns cherry red in the face of literally every authority figure in the building except you? who can’t concentrate and stay still in one spot for more than five minutes? all of your other classes behave! they listen! they sit down and shut up and do the packets! so what fucking gives!!!

so you say “fine, since you all HATE ME so much i just won’t teach then!!!” on literally week fucking ten of teaching. and instead of prostrating themselves before you, begging you to like... point at transparencies and read directly from powerpoints i guess.

and they all collectively say “okay” and let the chipmunk child flutter between desks and help them memorize formulas and mnemonic devices and shit. surely her grades will suffer if she’s constantly dealing with other people and you’ll have justification that her horseshit is “distracting” and “a detriment to her studies”. she got bored gave up on that after two days after nothing changed.

then we did the midterm.

except at the end of the exam packet was something we never learned because again, she was going through the book chronologically. because i actually enjoyed the chem book (so much that i stole it when the year was up lmao), i knew the material.

it was about lewis dots/structures. i couldn’t tell you a damn thing about it today but in december 2010 i absolutely knew that shit. i didnt have too much of a problem with it in the exam, but the students who had gotten to that point were complaining and at first she pulled that “you should have been studying independently uwu” shit but the class was about to get loud during exam period so she shushed us and said that when we get to that point, just stop, and she’ll mark it correct during grading, no harm no foul just keep it quiet. one of the more confrontational students called horseshit and said theres no way we’re trusting that and there’s definitely no way anyone will keep an entire classroom cheating at the instruction of the teacher quiet.

i offered to teach it.

she scoffed, rolled eyes, said “sure fine but you can’t get your exam back” and i said “okay.” so when everyone was to the point in the exam, we piled them all on her desk and i used the whiteboard to briefly and quietly explain lewis dots, used the book examples and problems, and helped the other kids understand. there were a couple exam questions that were lifted straight from the book problems so i skipped those. while teaching i realized i had gotten a couple wrong which sucked :( it was an incredibly stupid experience overall, and no teacher worth the paper their certification is printed on would have allowed that to happen. and fucking yet.

anyways everyone but me got their exams back and finished it and many of us passed, only a few of them did particularly well.

discussing the chem exam with friends who also took the chem exam, many students found their anecdote about the lewis dots to be confounding, for you see, the exam we took was not, in fact, the midterm, but the god damned final.

she had us taking the fucking final because she didnt read the fucking folders which read “midterm” and “final exam” on them

she was reprimanded severely and we all had to take the exam on different days, in different classrooms, sitting very far apart. after that she hated me even more. like girl it was your fault lmao i am literally a teenager grow up lol. anyways you can imagine how much more fucking insufferable i became, knowing how miserable she was.

it all came to a head in february when some students were giggling quietly following a minor fuck up on her part regarding bellwork. they were making fun of her like “are you sure thats not tomorrows bellwork lol” and a friend next to me did the “hey i need help wait no miss not you sorry” thing and when i answered him, she solidly snapped. blah blah YOURE SOOOO DISTRACTING blah blah YOU THINK YOURE SOOOO SMART DONT YOU blah blah blah and she was like demanding i leave the room and shouting at the top of her lungs at me “ YOU POISON THE MINDS OF EVERY OTHER STUDENT HERE. YOU’RE POISONOUS VICTORIA, YOU’RE A VIRUS IN THIS CLASSROOM.”

i will never forget that line as long as i live. it was like crack to me. i moved to open the door to leave and the vp opened it first. he escorted me to the office and asked me what happened, then told me to keep my head down in class from now on, and that if i wanted to help my friends i should give them my number and help them out on our own time. i was like “bro thats really stupid” and he was like “thats all we can do right now but i promise we’re working on it”

i lasted the rest of the year giving smug smiles as we did packet after fucking packet for the rest of the year. they were all take-home work. i wasnt comfy giving my number to my enemies. the class camaraderie ended.

the final was altered. my class took a different final than the rest of the normal chem classes.

i started 12th grade and got a solid case of senioritis. i told that story to anyone who would listen. while it was happening, i obviously told my favorite teacher everything as it happened. when i mentioned it senior year he was like “oh yeah i forgot about her,

she was fired over the summer.”

#let me tell you bitch i SCREAMED......#anyways im not sorry this was long #its literally the only cool thing thats ever happened to or about me so shrugs #Anonymous

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walkerwords · 3 years

Text

“The Savior Sessions” Part 18 of 33 - Negan x GN!Reader

IMAGE CREDIT: AMC

SERIES MASTERLIST

Summary: The fair is in full swing, but an unseen enemy still has her sights set on the ones that took her daughter from her. How will this play out when people go missing? And what happens when the reader is faced with a new kind of horror while Negan waits for them to come home to him?

Word Count: 7939

Warning: Swearing, Death of Major Characters, Angst, Graphic Description of Gore

Song I Wrote To: “You Are The Reason (Duet Version)” by Calum Scott and Leona Lewis

Note: I’m Sorry. This is where we get some canon divergence. I will be changing a few things. For one, I don’t think Aaron went to the fair in the show, but he’s there in this story with Gracie. As we move into season 10, I have changed quite a bit. Thanks for sticking with me so far! ALL OFFICIAL DIALOG IS PROPERTY OF AMC

—————

It had been a long time since you had seen the walls and roads of The Kingdom.

King Ezekiel had just given his big speech as he welcomed everyone to the first community fair. Aaron had run off with Gracie as soon as you had arrived. The two of you had left Alexandria before Michonne and Judith were about to head out. Michonne assured you that she would be fine even though you offered to go with her as a security escort.

It was so strange to see so many of your old friends in one place. Tara was there with her people from Hilltop, Alexandrians milled about, and you even spotted Rachel smiling with her women from Oceanside.

If you weren’t feeling the dread from what was waiting for you beyond the safety of the walls, you would have been smiling along with her. However, you couldn’t. The entire ride to The Kingdom, you had been on edge and you thought your reins were going to shred beneath your fingers.

Aaron had told you to relax. He figured Alpha wouldn’t be stupid enough to do anything on the main road. While you wanted to believe that, the sheer fact that you didn’t run into any of the Whisperers made you even more nervous.

Still, you tried for Aaron, for Ezekiel and Carol, and especially for yourself. Aaron had been right, you needed a break. Negan’s tired eyes and concerned smile were still fresh in your mind as you walked among the stalls. He said that you would have a lot to talk about when you got back and he was right. Perhaps then, you would be able to finally get words out that weren’t drenched in frustration.

Till then, you needed to learn to breathe again.

Enid walked next to you, smiling as she too, took in the joys of the celebration around you. You noticed her in the crowd with Alden as soon as you arrived and she had just gravitated towards you, chatting away about the stall she was going to be doing.

“Did you hear what I said?” Enid asked you and you turned to her.

“Sorry, what?” you asked. She gave you a sheepish smile.

“I was just asking if you thought about setting something up?”

“A stall for the fair?”

“Is that such an odd idea?” she asked.

“I just don’t know what I would do,” you said with a shrug.

“You’re a great shot,” Enid reminded you.

“With a gun,” you said. “Not many of those around these days.”

“Yeah, I guess not,” she said with a shrug of her own. As the two of you headed for the main gate, Enid peeled off to go find Alden and you pushed on to meet Carol.

You had briefly said hello when you had arrived, but she was doing her “Queenly” duties and you hadn’t had much of a chance to speak to her. Now, she looked to be gearing up. Ezekiel was next to her along with Kelly, Magna, Luke, and Yumiko.

“What’s going on?” you asked as you approached.

“Henry isn’t back yet,” Carol explained.

“He’s not? But they left last night. They should have beat us here,” you said with a furrowed brow.

“That’s what I thought,” Carol said and you could see a worried look in her eyes. A look you were all too familiar with. A weight settled on your chest as your hand rested on the pommel of Paul’s sword. “I have to go look for them.”

“I’ll go with you,” you promised. While Carol was worried about her child, you were suddenly very concerned for the other teen in the group.

Where was Lydia?

“You don’t have to,” Yumiko said as she pointed over your shoulder. You all turned to see the large doors open. Running ahead of a horse-pulled carriage was a familiar dog with its tail up in the air.

Michonne and Judith sat in the front of the carriage as Daryl walked alongside it. In the back were Connie, Henry, and Lydia. Dog began making circles around everyone as Henry hobbled out of the makeshift carriage and towards his parents.

Carol didn’t hesitate to pull him into her arms. Connie was doing the same thing with her sister and the rest of her family. As Ezekiel grabbed onto his wife and son, you went for Daryl.

“Ya showed,” he observed as you hugged him.

“Aaron suggested I needed a break,” you said and then stepped back so Carol could launch herself at her best friend. Henry was still hugging his dad and that’s when you noticed Lydia watching the interaction with an awkward stance.

You moved immediately to her side and slipped your arm around her shoulders. “Hey, kid,” you greeted and she gave you a closed-mouth smile.

“Hi,” Lydia said.

“Ya alright?” you asked, checking her over in case she was hurt. Lydia just nodded and fiddled with the wooden pendant around her neck.

“I’m glad you’re here,” Lydia whispered and you squeezed her shoulder, pulling her tighter against you.

“I figured it would be boring without my winning personality,” you teased and she laughed a bit at that. She then became very stiff next to you. “What’s wrong?” you asked, but she was staring at something ahead. Looking up, you saw Tara staring at Lydia with venom in her eyes.

“What is she doing here?” Tara said and you placed Lydia behind you protectively. Henry then moved to her side and took hold of her hand. Tara watched the movement with anger.

Michonne, who had been speaking with Ezekiel and Carol as they got acquainted with Judith turned to the King and Queen.

“Gather the leaders,” Michonne said and then nodded at you as an invitation, “We need to talk.”

—————

“I know I haven't always seen eye-to-eye with everyone in this room,” Michonne began, “but I never stopped caring about any of you. I was just trying to protect my family and do right by my people. Alexandria's future is here. Together, with you. And we lost sight of that for a while. But... I'm here now. We're here now.”

Michonne then turned to you and gestured for you to speak. “Michonne, Gabriel, and I have all spoke with the other council members at the fair, and we all agree. Alexandria is willing to grant asylum to Lydia. She's one of us now. We hope the rest of you can join us in doing the same.”

“Since when do you speak for Alexandria?” Tara asked.

“Since I asked them to,” Michonne defended. “(Y/N) has taken up a role that I had never expected. They are more than capable of not only speaking for us but defending us as well.” Tara was quiet after that and you couldn’t help but feel pride swell in your chest at her words. You had been so worried about how Michonne would see you after everything that had been going on with Negan, but she was still the woman you had met all those years.

“Thank you,” Lydia spoke up from her spot between Judith and Henry in the theater seats. “I'll do whatever I can to earn my keep and pay you back.” You sent her a wink and she gave you her signature closed-lip smile.

“If her mother retaliates, it's gonna be against Hilltop, not Alexandria. I have to do right by my people. I thought we were on the same page,” Tara said.

“We were,” you said.

“Look, when she came to my gates,” Michonne said, “I asked her to run away. And when she didn't, I was angry.”

“Then you know why I'm not okay with this,” Tara said.

“I do. I also know why Rick didn't trust me when I showed up at the gates of the prison. And how people didn't trust you after seeing you on the other side of the Governor's firing line,” Michonne said.

“Or how Daryl nearly took my head off when he met me,” you added and Daryl raised a brow at you, remembering the moment.

“I was gonna kill you on sight when you washed up on our shore,” Rachel added.

“Okay, okay,” Tara said. “That’s fair.”

“Lydia didn’t choose where she came from,” you said. “None of us did, but she deserves the chance to be apart of something. She deserves a family who will care about her.”

“Second chances don’t come around often,” Rachel added, supporting you. You thought that statement was ironic considering who was constantly living in your mind.

“I left some of my best fighters at Hilltop, but if Daryl's right about these skin job numbers, it's not enough people,” Tara said.

“We should take a group to Hilltop to protect ‘em just in case,” Daryl said.

“I’ll take some from Kingdom,” added Carol.

“Oceanside can spare some,” Rachel said.

“Alexandria, too,” finished Gabriel.

“Nobody is going to fight this war alone,” you said. “The only reason we won the last one is that we were together. If Alpha does come after us, we can’t afford to be on different sides anymore.”

“So, we head out in the morning?” asked Rachel.

“Nah, we go today,” Daryl said. “Best not to give them any more time.” Michonne then spoke up again.

“In order to face this threat, the four communities have to present a united front. Which is why I'm proposing a mutual protection pact. An attack against one community is an attack against all of us. Together, we can make these people think twice before moving against the Hilltop,” Michonne said and you and Gabriel nodded, backing her up.

“The leadership of the Kingdom is very amenable to this idea,” Ezekiel said after looking to his Queen.

“Oceanside is in,” Rachel agreed.

“So, how do we seal it?” Tara asked. “Cause I’m not doin’ a blood oath with (Y/N).” You just smiled sweetly at her.

“I have just the thing…” Ezekiel said as he got up and walked into the wings of the stage. From a crate, he pulled out an old theater poster frame, and from it, he pulled the community charter.

“You’ve had that thing this whole time?” you asked, impressed.

“I’m a man of many surprises,” he said and you raised your hands in surrender.

“Fair enough.”

Ezekiel lay the charter on the table and one by one, the leaders of the communities signed. Rachel signed for Oceanside, Tara for Hilltop, Ezekiel and Carol for The Kingdom, and Gabriel for Alexandria. You looked at all the people in that room as you stood next to Daryl and you felt as something big had just happened.

Everything was finally coming together and your family was finally whole again.

--------

You and Judith began walking laps around the fair.

The young girl picked at a candy apple that she held in her hands. “Can I ask you something?” Judith asked, peering up at you from under her hat.

“Go for it,” you said.

“Did you talk to him before you left?” she asked.

“Subtle,” you said, flicking her hat.

“I’m just making sure you’re okay,” Judith said. “I don’t like it when you two fight.”

“When did you become such a matchmaker?” you asked.

“I’m not!” she said. “I can just see that he likes you a lot...maybe more than a lot.” You paused in your tracks.

“What do you know?” you asked, your eyes narrowed.

“Nothin’,” Judith said, but you weren’t buying it.

“Remember Jude, I watched you grow up. I can see through you,” you said.

“Nope, I’m a wall!” she announced as she bit into her apple again.

“Right,” you snorted.

“But are you okay?” she asked, this time her voice was a bit more serious. Well, as serious as a ten or eleven-year-old could be.

“Yeah, kid, I’m okay. I actually think I figured it all out,” you said. Which was true, you had figured it out, but now you were just trying to get the courage to do something about it. All in all, no matter how angry you were with him or how upset, what you felt for Negan was bigger than all of it.

“Good,” she said with a smile. As the two of you walked, you began to feel a chill in the air. You noticed Lydia and Henry up ahead walking hand in hand and as your breath became visible before you, you shivered. “I think a storm is coming,” Judith said.

“Yeah?”

“I can feel it,” she said.

“Where’d you learn that trick?”

“From Mom who learned it from Uncle Daryl,” Judith said. You couldn’t help but smile at her then.

“Smart,” you said and she laughed before grabbing your hand and dragging you further into the fray, her candy apple swinging alongside her.

---------

Back in Alexandria, Negan lay on the floor of his cell as he tossed a ball in his hands.

When the door to the cell opened, he had no idea who it could be and because he knew it wasn’t you, he didn’t care. However, when he heard the person clear their throat, he did sit up.

“What do I owe this pleasure?” he asked. Laura stepped further into the light and in her hands was a new winter coat.

“there’s a storm on the way,” she said. “I was asked to give you this.” Negan stood as she passed it through the bars.

“Thanks, Laura,” he said and she nodded. Negan hadn’t spoken to his former lieutenant since the fall of the Sanctuary, at least no more than a few words here and there.

“I’m sorry,” Laura suddenly said. Negan was confused as he braced a hand on the bars.

“What are you apologizing for? Isn’t that my job?” he asked.

“I’m sorry that your life ended up like...this,” she said, but Negan was already shaking his head.

“Don’t apologize for the shit that I did,” he said. “You know better than anyone that what I was doin’ was eventually gonna get me dead or locked up. I guess I can just be glad that Rick didn’t cut any further than he did.” Laura nodded, hearing him.

“Still, you were always fair to me and kind. I also wanted to thank you. While being a Savior wasn’t the most moral of things, if you hadn’t found me all those years ago and brought me to the Sanctuary, I’d be dead.”

“Silver lining, then?” he offered.

“A small one,” Laura said. Negan smiled softly at that.

“I’m proud of you, Kid. You managed to make a new life, one that I should have tried to give you years ago. Don’t screw it up.”

“I won’t if you won’t,” she said and then offered her fist to him. He bumped it with his own.

“I’ll take that deal,” Negan said. Laura smiled and then went to leave, but right before she left, she turned one last time.

“Oh and if you hurt (Y/N), I’ll castrate you with a rusty spoon,” she said with a grin before leaving. Negan stared after her and he was suddenly very aware of everything on his body.

“Fucking hell.”

-------

Eventually, it was time to head to Hilltop.

When you told Aaron you were going to help, he wasn’t surprised. “I knew you couldn’t sit still for long,” he had said. “Just be careful.”

You promised that you would and headed to the main gate to prepare to leave. Daryl was getting his bike off the trailer when you found him. You were tightening your sword’s scabbard when he looked up.

“Ready to go?” you asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “Lydia is gonna stay here and then Aaron and Gabriel will bring her to Alexandria.”

“Sounds good,” you said.

“Mmhmm,” he said. “Are you in any rush to get back there?”

“You and Judith spend too much time together,” you said with a knowing look.

“So, you and Negan…”

“We really don’t need to talk about it, D,” you said.

“Are ya sure?”

“I’m so over talking about it,” you admitted. “I just gotta do something.”

“When ya do, I don’t need the details,” he snarked.

“Asshole,” you muttered and he just smirked. “Where ya gonna go after we get to Hilltop? I heard Ezekiel offering you to make Kingdom your home.”

“Not sure if this place is gonna last much longer,” he said with a sigh.

“You know that Alexandria is always going to be your home, right? No matter how long it’s been.”

“I know,” he said.

“We can’t keep running, Daryl. Come home,” you said. He was quiet for a moment before he dropped his head.

“Alright,” he agreed, “but after we handle Hilltop.”

“Okay.”

Soon everyone was saying goodbye and assuring that they would all be safe. Tara was sending her people out first before following after. Ezekiel was trying to get her to stay for the rest of the fair, but she said that she needed to get home. So, Dianne was going to lead her soldiers home.

As you were securing Daryl’s bow to his bike, you noticed him with Dog as he spoke to Connie. It was subtle, but there was something about his body language that told you a lot. Perhaps Connie was more than just a friend. You watched on as he awkwardly waved to her and when he turned back to you, his eyes narrowed.

“Shut up,” he said as he went up to you.

“I didn’t say anything,” you said.

“Nah, but you were thinking it. I can see it on your face,” he said.

“She’s pretty,” you said.

“And yer annoyin’,” he countered.

“Hey, who am I to judge?” you said with your hands raised.

“Yeah, exactly.” With a roll of your eyes, you climbed onto the back of Daryl’s bike as he took the spot in front. Michonne waved to Judith as you and the others pulled out of Kingdom. You hadn’t seen Lydia before you left, but Ezekiel said that he would keep an eye on her for you.

It was odd that you had essentially become her advocate with Daryl as her main protector. You never imagined you would essentially become a parent to a messed up teen, but here you were.

Yumiko and Magna rode behind you, their weapons at the ready and you kept your head on a swivel as you all move through the woods. Walkers were around, but only a few at a time and were easily taken out by the archers. Still, any time one would make itself known, you could feel Daryl tense in front of you. It was going to be a long night.

You were well into the ride when you came across three men who flagged you down.

Carol seemed to know them as she walked up to meet them. “What’s wrong, Ozzy?” she asked.

“Ya gotta see this, Boss,” the man, Ozzy, said. He seemed very concerned as he gestured you all forward. Daryl shouldered his bow as he followed and you and Michonne were right behind him, both of your hands on your swords.

The Highway Men, as Carol referred to them, had been acting as security and watchers for The Kingdom. They were good trackers, fighters, and were the newest addition to the community. What they had found on their patrol, worried you a lot.

It looked as if a pack of wild animals had attacked a caravan. “We were clearing the roads. Spotted tracks leading here,” Ozzy said.

“It's from Hilltop,” Yumiko said, holding up one of the wooden pendants that were crafted there. The same one that Lydia wore around her neck.

“Walkers didn’t do this,” you said with a glance to Daryl “This was people.”

“Skins?” Michonne asked and then looked to the Highway Men. “You know about them?”

“We got the download,” Ozzy confirmed. “We would have seen any people out here with my patrols, but not if they were covered in Skins.”

“Fantastic,” you said, your nerves growing.

“(Y/N),” Daryl called, “look at this.” You met him down by the broken carriage and realized what he was seeing.

“They fought back,” you said. “They were dragged away. That way,” you said with a point.

“Come on,” Daryl said.

“We can’t all go,” Dianne said. “If this was the Whisperers, then they would have followed this from Hilltop. We need to get back.”

“Michonne and I will go with (Y/N) and Daryl,” Carol said. “Rest of you ride for Hilltop.”

“We can continue our patrols around here,” Ozzy said and Carol nodded.

“Alright,” said Michonne. “We’ll see if we can find them and bring them home.” You nodded to Michonne and then everyone was shaking hands and promising to meet up later. Yumiko then joined you, offering her bow.

“Stay close and if you see Walkers, don’t hesitate. They could be Whisperers,” you said.

“And if they are,” Michonne said, “go for the kill.”

—————

“I really don’t like this,” you said as you walked next to Yumiko. Carol and Daryl were in the front while Michonne was at the back, her Katana in her hand.

“Neither do I,” Yumiko said as she gripped her bow tighter. “Do you people do this a lot?”

“Only when it’s necessary,” you said. “We try not to get involved, but we usually end up doing just that.”

“I don’t know how you do it,” she said.

“We do it because nobody else will.”

“And your families, are they okay with this?”

“My family is right in front of me,” you said. “We’ve been fighting since day one, I don’t think any of that is going to change.”

“Then I’m glad that I have you on my side,” Yumiko said and you gave her a half-smile.

“Me too.”

Daryl was tracking the Hilltop members that were attacked. You kept back, but mirrored his steps, just in case he missed anything. He never did, but it was a force of habit. All you could think about was Alpha’s face and every shadow in the woods was keeping you on edge.

“Don’t give her an inch…” Negan had said. He had wanted you to be strong and you weren’t going to let him down. Whatever happened when you saw him again, it didn’t matter. You just needed to see his face again. That was what kept you going.

You had to get home to Negan.

“Magna is worried about me,” Yumiko said, trying to change the mood. You nodded, grateful for the distraction.

“That’s actually a good thing. It means she cares about you,” you said.

“Do you have one? A Magna?” Yumiko asked.

“Sort of,” you said with a sigh. “It’s complicated.”

“Word of advice,” Yumiko said. “Uncomplicate it because if you are lucky to have them, you better keep them.”

“Thanks, Yumiko,” you said and she knocked your shoulder with her own.

As you walked, Michonne and you both took down Walkers with your blades, taking their heads off their shoulders. It took you a few to get the hang of the new weapon, but it was beginning to feel natural. You would definitely need to do some proper training with Michonne when you got home though.

It was after dusk when Daryl told everyone to halt. Then, from out of the trees came Walkers that you instantly recognized.

“They’re from Hilltop!” you said as you went for the first one. In a long arc, you swung your sword at the Dead man who came at you. His head was cut from his body and you pierced the brain as it rolled to your feet.

From there on, more and more Dead converged as the sun set and darkness wrapped around the five of you. “I can’t see,” Yumiko said.

“Stay together!” Daryl shouted, placing you at his back as you and Michonne leveled your blades. The archers, all three of them, let go of their bows and drew their knives. Daryl held two blades in each of his hands as he prepared to strike.

“Watch their hands!” Michonne yelled as the Walkers fell upon you. You could feel the blood from the other Dead splashing on the back of your neck as you fought your own Walkers.

Your arms stung from the exertion, but you couldn’t slow down. Fear settled into your bones as you fought, but Negan’s voice returned to you.

“You are stronger than them and the only way they win is if you let them,” he had said and with those words being screamed in your head, you swung again, feeling your adrenaline spike.

“Back to the road!” Daryl yelled and everyone began running. “This way,” he grunted reaching for you, but before you could find him in the dark, the sound of a gun cocking had everyone freezing in their steps.

“Drop them,” a horrific whisper said and if you hadn't already been scared, that sound chilled you to your soul. More and more whispers came from around you and your grip loosened on your sword. “I won’t ask twice.”

“Beta…” Daryl sneered and you felt your heart fall into your heart. Beta was alive and you could feel the anger that echoed around him. One by one you all dropped your weapons and the Skins picked them up. Seeing the dirty hands of a Whisperer touch Paul’s sword made you sick.

“You just had to give me the girl,” Beta whispered. “No one else had to die. Now that deal...is done.” His words washed over you and no matter how many times you tried to focus on Negan’s face or his voice, all you heard was Beta’s horrifying voice.

“You touch the girl and I’ll tear your throat out with my teeth,” you snarled. Beta walked up to you and grabbed you by the throat, angling your face to meet his. You stared back with unwavering disgust.

“You make veiled threats,” he said.

“Come a little closer and we’ll see how veiled they are,” you said, pushing in closer. Beta shoved you back and you stumbled into Carol who quickly righted you.

“Take them,” Beta ordered and his people moved in.

One by one, you were tied up. The Skins tied your hands behind your back and pressed blades to your backs, forcing you to walk ahead, leading you somewhere. Your heart was trying to leap from your chest, but you took deep breaths as you tried to keep a level head.

You could still smell the rot that revolved around Beta and it made your stomach churn. You were forced to walk behind Yumiko whose hands were moving. In the moonlight, you could make out some of the shapes and realized she was signing.

“Stay calm,” she was signing over and over again. You were very grateful then that you knew ASL well enough to understand her.

You walked for a bit longer before you reached a clearing and suddenly, you were seven years younger. You half expected for headlights to light up the surrounding area. Daryl and Michonne must have felt it too as they were tense as well.

However, this time, Negan would not be there to just kill two of you. Beta could slaughter all of you for no reason and then turn his sights on Kingdom, Alexandria, and then Hilltop and Oceanside. This was it, you thought, you were going to die.

The Whisperers pushed you into a semicircle, making sure your hands were still secured. You were between Daryl and Michonne and tried to focus on their breathing, but it was difficult. Even if they were thinking of an escape plan, nobody could voice it and nobody was coming to save you.

From the darkness, Alpha finally made herself known. She crept through the night like a predator stalking her prey. Expect, Alpha didn’t kill for food, she killed for sport.

“You ain’t getting her back,” Daryl said, facing down the Matron of the pack.

“You think this is about my daughter?” Alpha asked, tilting her head. “I ran into some trouble on the road,” she said, wiping blood from the knife in her hands on her pants. You struggled against your bonds, wanting to rip her eyes out with your nails. “It was unavoidable.”

“Bullshit,” you shot, but Alpha ignored you.

“Do you like my new camp?” she asked. “My people like to keep moving, keep roaming.”

“We’ve granted Lydia asylum,” you said. “You try to take her and we will fight back.”

“What is your name?” Alpha asked, stopping in front of you.

“...(Y/N),” you said.

“Do they speak for you?” Alpha asked the others.

“We speak for each other,” Daryl countered. Alpha sniffed, unaffected by Daryl’s attempt at camaraderie. Instead, she continued to pace in front of the five of you.

“My daughter isn’t a concern anymore. She was weak, she never lived up to expectations.”

“Was?” you asked as the worst-case scenario entered your mind. “What did you do to her!” Still, Alpha ignored you.

“To be clear,” she said, “your group is in no position to threaten me. That is a habit that needs to be broken.”

“Oh, I’ll break something,” you threatened and Alpha merely smiled at you as if you were some child she was humoring. Turning her attention back to Daryl she pointed at him.

“Come with me,” Alpha said. “Just you.” Beta cut Daryl’s bonds and then pushed him forward. You struggled to go after him, but you couldn’t move.

Daryl glanced back at you once more before following Alpha into the darkness of the trees.

-------

Daryl was gone for a while, and with every minute that ticked by, you grew more fearful that his body was somewhere being torn apart by the Dead.

You, Michonne, Carol, and Yumiko were sitting together by a fallen tree as you waited to be released. Beta was across from the four of you, watching the woods, waiting for his orders.

You began to think about Rick. What would he do right now? What would he say? You also began to think about the conversation you had once had with Negan about evil and humanity.

Alpha and Beta were evil and there was no doubt about it. Evil was around you and you could not find a shred of light to hold onto. Rick had wanted to build a new world, but if this is what it was going to look like, you didn’t want it.

“This is not how I’m dying,” you whispered.

“Nobody is going to die,” Michonne said. “I don’t think Alpha wants to kill us.”

“She said ‘no one else had to die’, meaning she already killed those Hilltop people and now she’s going to keep going. With us.”

“Just try to stay calm.”

“This is me calm. I’m calm and I’m pissed.”

“We’re going to get out of this,” Carol said who hadn’t taken her eyes off of Beta since she sat down.

“I left too much shit unfinished,” you admitted, unable to stop yourself.

“I know,” Michonne said and there was a bit of pity in the tone of her voice. “You know, I actually wish for his psycho ass right about now,” Michonne said and you couldn’t argue with that.

“Don’t we all,” you agreed.

“Who?” Carol asked and Michonne hesitated, but you just shrugged.

“Negan,” Michonne said.

“Who’s that?” Yumiko asked.

“Asshole who we have locked up back home,” said Michonne.

“You think he could take on Beta?” Carol asked, but you shook your head.

“I don’t think a bulldozer could take on Beta,” you said with a glare in the man’s direction.

“Negan would be a good distraction,” Michonne figured and then stopped speaking as she saw the look in your eyes. “Or not.” Carol looked at you in confusion.

You couldn’t imagine Negan going up against someone like Beta. Everyone you had seen him fight, he had been the bigger one. He had been the one in charge and the one with the edge. Negan fighting Beta would have been like a Mustang charging a Semi Truck. That was not something you wanted to see.

“Am I missing something?” Carol asked.

“No,” you and Michonne said at the same time. Carol narrowed her eyes but didn’t push it any further. Instead, you all sat there in silence as you waited for the fate you were sure you were about to meet.

You didn’t know how much time had passed when the sun began to rise again. Nobody spoke and nobody moved as the Whisperers began to disperse. Beta then gestured to you and your companions.

Slowly, his people approached and cut your bonds. Nobody dared to move as Beta watched over you. He then ordered his people to hand back your weapons.

“Go West,” he sneered. “You’ll find your man.”

“Come on,” Michonne said, moving Carol in front of her as Yumiko followed. You hesitated, glaring at Beta who leveled his knife at you in something that felt like a promise. Almost as if he was saying that the next time he saw you, he was going to kill you. In your mind, you made the same promise.

The sun rose quickly as you hiked through the woods, following Beta’s orders. “Something feels wrong,” you said as you fastened your sword to your side. Carol was holding Daryl’s bow and blades as you walked.

“We got out, that’s all that matters,” Michonne said, but you had a feeling something was very wrong.

It didn’t take long for you to find Daryl.

He seemed unharmed, but you could tell he was angry. Carol reached him first, handing him his bow and kissing him on the cheek. Michonne hugged him too and Yumiko clapped him on the shoulder. When he reached you, you hugged him tightly.

“I thought she was going to kill you,” you said.

“Nah, not yet,” he said and then nodded his head in another direction. “This way.”

You all followed Daryl who seemed to be on a mission. Whatever Alpha had told him had him set on a path and you were willing to go with him no matter what.

You walked until the sun was finally above you and then, Daryl picked up his speed. “Daryl?” you called, but he just kept running. Eventually, you saw what he was running towards. “Oh my god.”

“Siddiq!” Michonne yelled as she ran up the hill towards the Doctor who was leaning against a dead tree and behind him, was another.

“Enid!” you yelled as you saw her struggling as well. You slid to her side, using one of Daryl’s knife that he tossed to you to cut her bonds. As soon as she was free, she nearly crawled to you, gripping you tight. Enid was shaking and so was Siddiq who held onto Michonne. “Shh, it’s okay,” you assured her.

“What happened?” Michonne asked, but both of them could barely speak.

“I… I…,” Siddiq stuttered out as Enid pointed up the hill with tears in her eyes. Slowly, you pulled Enid into you and began the trek up the hill.

“No…” you whispered in horror as you saw what was ahead. It was too far to make out details, but the smell of fresh and Dead blood wafted towards you. Enid was trembling in your arms as tears fell down her face.

Nobody spoke as you crested the hill, but nobody needed to as you got closer. As soon as it became apparent what was before you, Yumiko fell to her knees and Michonne gasped in pain.

At the top of the hill were nine pikes and on each one, was the head of someone you knew.

You started at the beginning, your bones as cold as ice as milky white eyes stared at you. They hadn’t killed the brain and as you looked at the first pike, Ozzy, the Highway Man, was staring at you with vacant eyes and a gaping mouth. Next to him was Alek, and then, DJ.

Your heart sank as you saw who was next. Frankie, one of Negan’s former wives and a spitfire of a woman. Her red hair blew in the wind as blood and gore dripped from the flesh at the base of her severed neck.

Tammy was next and Enid cried harder as she saw the older woman. A woman you knew who had taken care of Enid at Hilltop. You struggled to keep the young woman upright, but it was difficult as you nearly collapsed when you saw the next two.

Rodney and Addy.

The teens that you knew from Hilltop were gasping with their breathless mouths as their gray skin dulled in the sunlight, but who was next made you crash to the ground.

“No!” you screamed as you saw Tara’s dark hair blowing in the wind.

Enid fell next to you as the woman who she saw as a sister stared at her with empty eyes. Sobs echoed out of you as you stared at her, but that wasn’t compared to Daryl who immediately began yelling.

“No, No!” he yelled as he ran for Carol “Just look at me, just look at me,” he said as he held onto his best friend. That’s when you finally looked at the final pike and everything around you broke.

It was Henry.

Enid was leaning all of her weight onto you just as Siddiq was doing to Michonne. Carol had fallen into Daryl and Yumiko was crying as she beheld the horror.

Alpha had done this. She had taken these people from you, but left two alive as witnesses. She had killed children, friends, leaders, and left you feeling empty.

You had been through so much, lost so much, and, yet this felt as if someone had torn your soul from your body. As the wind continued to blow, all you could hear were Enid’s screams and Carol’s sobs as yet another child was stolen from her.

---------

“We were there,” Siddiq began as he stood on the stage in The Kingdom.

You stood next to Daryl and Lydia was in front of you both as you listened. Enid was across from you in the protective arms of Alden who hadn’t let her go since you returned.

“Enid and I were taken with the others. And I saw... We were supposed to die with them and I was ready to.” Siddiq went on, speaking for both him and Enid considering she could barely say a word. Aaron was sure she was in shock.

Siddiq went on, “Then, Alpha whispered in our faces as she knelt before us, ‘Tell them’, she said… she then said that two sets of eyes were better than one. Then, something hit me, and everything went black.”

Lydia leaned back into you and you gripped her tight. You noticed that Daryl was holding onto the other side of her. You knew that you needed to protect her now more than ever.

“And when I woke up, it was just the two of us,” Siddiq said with a look to Enid who stared back with red-rimmed eyes. “What happened was evil. It was evil. And I think she left us alive to tell you that story. To scare you and to drive us all apart again. But I want to tell you a different story.” Siddiq then looked at you and you could see that he was struggling. You gave him a nod of encouragement.

“See,” he went on, “before the end... Ozzy, Alek, and DJ found us and they gave us an opening. And everyone fought back. They fought like hell. And what they did was more than brave. 'Cause they defended each other. And they sacrificed for each other... And some of them... they didn't even know each other, but they still fought like they did. Like they were family. 'Till the very end.”

Tears were flowing from his eyes and your own, but you tried to put on a brave face for him, for Enid.

“And in the end, they... Their time was cut short, but ours keeps going. So we have to keep going. For them and for all of us. We need to honor them. We need to honor them, and we need to remember these friends, our family, died as heroes. That's the story that I want to tell you. That's the story that I want us all to remember.”

In the quiet of the fair as Ezekiel and Carol cried in silence, you swore that you would remember and when it came down to it, you would avenge them.

—————

Once the pikes were taken care of and the tears stopped, for the time being, people began to move out.

However, as winter moved in, The Kingdom was no longer capable to house the members of the community. They would need to move and Michonne was going to stay to help them do that.

While you wanted nothing more to help, you needed to be somewhere else, with someone else. As you stood by the main building of The Kingdom’s square, Michonne approached you.

“There’s a storm coming,” she said quietly, her voice a bit hoarse from crying. You were sure that yours sounded the same.

“I know.”

“We need to move these people to Hilltop and Alexandria,” she said and you nodded in agreement. “(Y/N),” she said, “can you get her home, please?”

Turning to look at her, you were surprised to hear the desperation in her tone. “Michonne?” you asked.

“Please, get Judith home and protect her. Protect my daughter,” she said, once again on the verge of tears. You pulled her into your arms and clutched at your friend. You hadn’t been the closest with Michonne since she arrived at the gates of the prison, but you had a feeling that was about to change.

When you pulled back, you held her by the shoulders and looked her in the eyes. “I will,” you said. “I will protect her with my life.”

“They were brave,” Michonne whispered and you knew who she meant.

“Yes, they were,” you agreed. “And we will not let their deaths be in vain.” Michonne nodded, gripping your arms.

“Go to him,” she said.

“Michonne…”

“No, you listen to me,” she said as it was her turn to be serious. “I do not care what people think about him. Don’t worry about that. He could have lost you and as much as I have my demons when it comes to Negan, you have to go. Trust me when I say that Death does not discriminate when it comes to the man someone loves. Even if that man is...unconventional.”

“But…”

“No,” she cut you off. “Take Judith and go home. Stop overthinking it, (Y/N). You said you had left things unfinished, right?”

“Right.”

“Then, finish them.”

—————-

The ride to Alexandria was very different than the departure.

You rode on a horse alongside the carriage that held Gabriel, Aaron, Gracie, Judith, Eugene, and others. Nobody spoke and nobody relaxed until the comforting gates of Alexandria were in view.

For the kids’ sake you put on a brave face, but as soon as your horse came to a stop and the gates slid closed, you could barely keep it together. “Scott!” you called as you dismounted. He ran up to you as you helped Judith down from the makeshift carriage. “Take her,” you begged the man. He nodded as he gathered his bag. You then turned to Judith. “You need to go to your brother,” you said.

“What?” she asked.

“Go find RJ and give him the biggest hug he can handle, okay?” Judith nodded at your words.

“Are you going to be okay?”

“Not for a while,” you admitted, and then she was wrapping her small arms around you and you let a tear slide down your cheek. “I’m going to come over later and we’ll have dinner, okay?”

“Okay,” she whispered and with a final squeeze, you let her go as she ran after Scott who was waiting for her. Ignoring Aaron, Eugene, and the others, you turned your back on the stables and began to run.

You didn’t slow as you ran towards the main street. Your boots slid on the slick spots of ice that littered the ground, but you kept going. Stopping before the Grimes house, you searched your pockets for your key ring.

You couldn’t get your hands to stop shaking as you found the right one and jogged down the steps towards the jail. Slipping the key in the lock, you shoved the door open.

The loud noise alerted Negan to your presence. He was laying on his cot, but when he saw the tears that flowed down your cheeks and coated your collar, he launched to his feet.

“(Y/N)?” he asked, staring at you in shock. You kept moving, switching the key on the ring and inserting it into the lock of the cell itself. You wrenched it open and faced him, taking him all in. “What happened?” he asked, staring at you with concern.

You didn’t answer him right away. Instead, you took your time to memorize his face, the set of his jaw, how his shoulders were settled on his torso, and especially that wonderful light that was in his eyes. You choked back another sob as you moved into his space.

“(Y/N)?” Negan asked you again. Reaching up, you placed your hands on his face, feeling the warmth of life beneath his skin. With a deep breath, you got your voice back.

“Don’t make me lose you, too,” you whispered and then, you gripped him by the back of his neck and pulled his lips to yours.

Negan immediately wrapped his arms around you, holding you closer to him as he kissed you back without hesitation. It was as if a dam broke inside you as light burst behind your eyes. Negan kissed you tenderly, but it was full of urgency as well.

Pulling yourself tighter against him, you were worried that he would be pulled away at any moment. He didn’t seem to be ready to let go either as he lifted you up, tilting his head back to get a better angle.

Your tears dripped down onto his face, wetting the stubble on his jaw, but he didn’t care. Negan didn’t care about anything else at that moment. All he cared about was you in his arms as he finally got to show much you meant to him.

When you pulled back to get some air, he set you down. Negan looked at you in awe and while you knew you had to explain what had happened, there was something you had to say first. Something that you had felt for a long time.

“I love you, Negan,” you said, your voice soft as it mingled with his own breath. He looked in your eyes and you watched as the words resonated with him. His eyes grew softer and all the tension in his body dissolved. Negan reached up and placed his hand against your face.

“I love you, too,” he said and then pulled your lips back to his.

You clutched at the man in your arms, your new reason for living. You knew that war was finally coming and that Death was not done with any of you yet, but in that small cell, in the arms of the man you loved, you let it all become whispers on the wind as the first snowflakes began to fall.

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#the walking dead #walkerwords #the savior sessions #twd imagines #negan imagines #negan imagine #negan x gn reader #negan x reader #angst #the walking dead fanfics #whisperers #canon divergence #twd #twd fanfiction #negan x you #negan x y/n

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namjoonchronicles · 3 years

Text

please | jm

↳ genre angst, established relationship

↳ words 3k

↳ summary there’s always setbacks in married couple. it had been quite clear that you and Jimin don’t see eye-to-eye about certain things and habits, but the secret to long lasting marriage, is how you fix what’s broken.

↳ warning mentions of miscarriage

↳ song taylor swift ‘champagne problems’, dean lewis ‘waves’, rihanna ‘complicated’, olly murs ‘you don’t know love’

Fast steps dashing across the hallway, the bathroom door blasted open. A pair of knees wearing damaged jeans, kneeling over the toilet. The toilet seat whacked open, hand gripping its sides dependently. He wretches. His torsos strained and his veins began to pop. Wet, frothy sound hits the water in the toilet bowl. You sped to the toilet, rubbing his back up and down, passing him a towel. But he wasn’t done. He continued to hold the toilet brims, vomiting every content in his stomach. The smell of alcohol wafted around the extent of the room. You hate to see him like this. It wasn’t a majestic view. With half his head buried in the toilet bowl, his ‘young & forever’ tattooed in the back of his arms, it wasn’t a pretty view at all.

Flickering light on the hall. The stillness in the air. With the fridge light lighting the way, you pour a glass of water for him. When you return to the bathroom where he is, he is seated, backed away from the toilet bowl, leaning against the wooden cabinet door. Dirty blonde hair, loose white shirt and torned jeans, he wipes his mouth with the towel you gave. He glanced to the side where you stood idle, and flashed a cunning smile. Jimin dropped his gaze on his propped knee then let the back of his head hit the wood. Then he laughs, chuckling through his nose. But not in the way you know as happiness, more like bitterness. It reminded you everything Jimin is, was. He reeled you in with that same smile and that same pain. The way he charms, the way he spoke and the way he looked at you, he knew what he was doing half of the time, but this time, you took the time to figure out who, what he is.

He had been feeling dreadful; half of himself all the time. Felt the need to fill the void inside him with as much alcohol he could, just to feel something. He comes home to you, but you’re not here. He needs the music louder than he thoughts so he frequented the clubs. He could have any girls he wanted in the place, but it wasn’t what he looked for. If anything, he was lonely but none of these companions would have suffice. He was afraid that if he started, he wouldn't be able to stop. Isn’t it enough hurt he’s caused you? With you pulling away at every advances he made, and the stranger in the bed situation every time he returns home to you alone, he gets frustrated from the thing you couldn’t talk about.

To make matters much worse, he’d rather live like his dying next to you than live without you. It’s a puzzling thing, love. How it gutted you out and filled you in. How it makes you feel alive and dead at the same time. The things you would do for the ones you love is limitless. Death of love. How it seemed inevitable.

You put on a toothpaste on his toothbrush, help him clean up. Took his shirt off, unbuckled his belt for him, and had him shed his jeans. Jimin never once took his eyes off of you when you did this. But he didn’t say a word. If he did, he must have said it in his head. It felt like he was raking your brain apart to put himself together. If anything, love was disdained in this household. When was the last time you held him? Or spoke to him? Or kissed his lips or loved him? Those days felt so far away. As you put away his clothes into the front load washing machine to wash, you protest that love too; is putting away one's clothes, is taking care of them when they’re drunk and half loved. He stepped into the shower, stood under the running water. The hot steams of the water wafting up the ceiling, and he sighed. Water cascading down every inch of his skin, through his hair, down his earlobes, along his jaws and under his chin. Dimples of Apollo and Adonis belt well defined, he leans his forearm on the wall and lets his thoughts run. He mulls over how it used to be; you would join him in the shower, and be quite inseparable. Why is it so hard to be like that again?

Jimin fishes out a plain T to go to bed in. Unlike the nights before, he refused to take his pillows out and sleep on the sofa outside. Tonight, he is determined to get in the same bed his wife slept in.

When you returned to see him in the bed, eyes shut and curled in a ball and laying on his side, you couldn’t lie, you wanted to keep him safe. You wanted to chase away everything he might fear and save him from anything that’s eating him alive. But you hated him so much. His party life and the cunning charming smile he would throw others. And then, there’s the reckless spending. The relationship feels like it’s going nowhere. He is never home and you feel like a stone. He is only getting the attention he needs, knowing he couldn’t get any at home. How could you blame him? How do you churn out the hurt and start talking to him, instead of running polar opposites from where he is?

“Murderer,” he said. You turned to him.

“How did you live your life knowing that you’ve killed me?” His eyelids fluttered open, and staring straight at you.

The pain in his voice shot through your heart, welling up your eyes as you remembered the things you both had done in the past.

“I’ve killed you?” you asked him in gentle whispers, through broken voices, “Do you not see where this relationship is not going? Your partying, your spendings? Your utter disrespect to the foundation of this household? I hate seeing you drunk and still you do it…” You roughly wipe your tears away with the back of your hand.

He caught your hand, and stead, gently thumb your cheeks. His eyes glided on you. You switched to your back, eyes holding at the ceiling as he moved closer to you, the tip of his nose poking the skin on your neck, inhaling your scent. His hand snuck underneath your thin fabric, and his lips peppered kisses around the expanse of your neck and shoulders, jaws and cheeks.

“Please love me,” he pleaded, with his entire being.

It must have been around mid-March, winter ended, and spring began. It was raining heavily, the raindrops splattered on the glass windows of the cafe you were in. The coffee half-drunken, sitting on its saucer by your right wrist. You were reading a piece on Franz Kafka, when blood dribbled down your philtrum and onto the pages of Die Verwandlung. You hurried to grab a tissue from under the saucer, causing the spoon to fall clattered on the marble floor and pulled the attention to you. The waitress came running to your side, squatting down to see if you’re alright.

Now, at your close friends’ clinic, you patiently waited for her medical deduction of you. Her expressions are unreadable and the shame hasn’t subsided either, for you. You came to give her a gift you’ve bought her but she insisted to have her time with you by checking your wellbeing. Once she’s crossed out that you’ve been working hard, her furrowed brows and thinking forehead lines begin to soften.

“When was your last period?”

Blink. Blink.

“Your acne resurfaced, you have been having mood swings, you also had headaches and you told me about a smell I couldn’t sense,” she pauses, and smiles triumphantly at you, “Your hormones are changing… I am suggesting… possibilities of pregnancy?” She leaned forward, and stuck her hand into the drawer under her desk and took out a fresh box of test kit. She tapped it on her table, and propped an elbow to rest her chin on her palm and grinned. She winked at you and now is smiling so widely. Too widely. You took the kit and stood up.

“There’s a loo over here, if you want some company…” she giggled.

You begin with a sigh.

“How long am I in, do you think? I drank coffee almost everyday…” you spoke through the walls, echoes on the tiles but your best friend heard them very well, then you resumed, “But it can’t be, could it?”

“I don’t know, you’re the one having sex, you should remember…” she shrugged, leaning against the counter as you sat on the toilet bowl. Your smile didn’t last very long, and noticing this, she asked you.

“Is there something wrong?”

Your friends knew how much you wanted kids, and with the possibilities of having one now, you looked pretty upset.

“Jimin’s… Jimin isn’t fit to be a father,” you confessed and when you did, a weight seemed to lift themselves off of your shoulder. Then comes the waterworks. You cried easily these days and it became close to annoying. You cried at sad commercials, at dog videos and a sight of cute things. Your friend comes kneeling next to you as you wait for the lines to develop.

She rubbed your back, in effort to calm you down.

“He isn’t home till late, and I get it, it’s because of his job but I feel so lonely sometimes and I think he doesn’t care about that… he just goes out with his friends and starts drinking, and he won’t answer the calls I make. It’s been awhile since we even had dinners together. Last week, a girl called the emergency number on his phone saying he was drunk laying flat on the floor and needed me to get him home…” you covered your face and started crying harder, “And that’s not even half of the shit he does…”

Jimin recently emptied half of your joined accounts to buy a leather jacket and bag he wants to be a gift to his friend. When you approached him about it, he said he was going to recover the money soon. He said many things and did it time and time again, and sometimes, you wished you could scream in his face to tell him to stop. The money could have been for the future, it could have been a start for a piggy bank for kids you might have, and if Jimin doesn’t stop his uneventful spendings, you would be eating from scraps. And there was no gentle way to say this, but to give him the cold shoulders. You don’t want to cry in front of a man that feels that it is okay to spend without asking their partners first. Taehyung might have loved that leather jacket, but you would rather the fridge filled with half the cost of that jacket. You could really eat well these days.

When the double line appeared, you cried even harder in the arms of your best friend. She cried with you too. Closed the clinic for the day so she could be with you. And pour out your heart contents, like a dam broke and it comes flooding. There were so many things you wanted to say, and you held back all these while to save whatever that you could save. But there’s just so much tolerance you could give and there’s just so much you could take.

“My darling,” your best friend said softly, “You’re talking in circles.” Maybe it’s because your life was going in circles. With Jimin’s recurrent attitude and you continue to persevere at every receiving end, succumbing to your hurt, it was going in rounds.

The car comes to a stop at the lobby, and the windows wind down. Your best friend stroked your hand through the window and held them tight.

“Talk,” she advised, “Tell him how you feel… Be strong.”

I can’t be strong and tell him how I feel at the same time.

The car sped off and you walked into the lobby. You walked into the lobby and suddenly felt cramping on your torso. You had to clutch over the handrail as you stood in the elevator, people coming in starting to support you, asking you what happened. They helped you call Jimin over but the calls don’t get through until their third try. With the loud music, Jimin couldn’t hear the phone. He went to remind himself that he had to track a new order of a bomber jacket he bought online to see how long it takes to get here when he saw your name flashing on the caller ID. He excused himself, brushing knees with three to four ladies on the sofa where he was before sprinted outside to catch the call.

So here he is, arriving at the level and jogging to where you are.

“Why are you leaving your wife alone when she’s unwell…” the crowd dispersed but it was clear that the comments were thrown by an uncle that was there. Jimin carried you bridal style and got the door open before laying on the bed. He brushed your hair out of your face.

“It’s just the cramps…” you lied.

“Those monthly cramps right? Nothing serious?” He repeated.

You nodded. He doesn’t look like he wanted to stay there any longer. He is rushing to get away it seems.

“So…” he drawled, “If you’re alright now, and there’s nothing serious, I should remind you that I bought a bomber jacket and it’s expected to arrive soon… I’m best going because the birthday boy is coming around midnight, you’re alright right?” He is already at the door frame, walking sideways, mashing his lips together and looking at the time and then his phone. His face shone by the light from the screens, his jawline, his attentions, how handsome he looked and you tried so hard to not break right there and then. You turned the other way and said that you’re fine. You clenched your eyes shut and you felt him breathing next to you, a faint scent of nicotine on his shirt and a light kiss on your hair.

“Please love me…” you begged, placing your palm on your tummy where the baby is. Just as desperately.

It shouldn’t have been difficult to ask for affection with your significant other. And yet. It just had been a while since you spent time together. Asking for his time after a while felt awkward. But when he smiled, and he smiled so bright, you felt a tinge of confidence. It felt like he, too, was waiting for the invitation.

“What’s the occasion?” He asked, with a shy smile.

“It’s just been a while since we spoke…” you set out saucers and poured him tea.

I want to tell you everything. Everything I have and all that I carry with me. I am going through a hard time, and I want you to be there.

“You’re pregnant…” his eyes became so round and his accusation turned into fact. Since you took the time to confirm them, he was certained. That you are indeed carrying his child.

You hung your head low and began to sob. Jimin stood up immediately from his chair, he held your shoulders and his hand raised up to your neck, then he thumbed your cheeks to slowly lift your face up.

“I lost it, the night you left for Taehyung’s party…I didn’t know how to tell you,” you begin explaining frantically, but Jimin gathered your head under his chin and he softly held the back of your head, cradling you. You shuddered against his body, shivering like you’ve walked in the cold and finally found warmth. His eyes stunned and unblinking until tears wells up on its own. His nose turned red and he sobbed gently. As you grew limp in his embrace, he held you tighter, firmer--as if making up for the nights he couldn’t hold you close. Or when he is too occupied with things that aren’t his family. He was punishing himself for what he couldn’t control and things he couldn’t say. After the cramps you felt, there was blood on the sheet that you lay in. You’ve bawled alone on the bed, cradling the bloodied lump, knowing full well that you’ve suffered a miscarriage.

You have lain in bed for the rest of the evening after the reveal. Jimin had been home and holding your hands and refused to be parted from you. He laced his fingers in yours and thumbed your knuckles while he smiles at the TV show. He even laid with you, holding your tummy and whispering gently, encouraging you to eat and giving out ideas on what to eat. He offered to cook and to tidy things up. He washed the plates in the sink and kept your body warm with his own.

“It’s my fault,” he began, “If I was home more often, I would have noticed…”

“Jimin…” you protested weakly.

“I wasn’t as attentive as I should be, I will become better now…” he decreed, “Whether you like it or not, I will be home.”

“I’d like that…” you hummed to yourself, and it seemed he heard it quite clearly, because he smiled and returned to wipe the plates dry and arrange them on the plate drying rack.

Maybe, you don’t always have to tell. Maybe, he could just see.

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olivinesea · 3 years

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Space Is Only Noise If You Can See, pt. 4

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

a/n: Alright angels, here it is. I’m giving you options. When you get to the end of this post there’s two links, read whichever one you fancy, or read both. A demented choose your own adventure. Thanks for joining me on this ride, I’ll try to be nicer with whatever’s next. TW major character death, guns, violence, stabs, blood, car crashes…also, I do not totally understand how the drugs work either, I’m just going with how they used them on the show which I imagine was likely a bit of fantasy created by the writers anyway. <2k

“Reality is merely a delusion, albeit a very persistent one.” Albert Einstein

Everything was chaos. The horizon tilted at an obscene slant and the night air had been replaced by acrid smoke. Hotch’s eyes stung as he struggled to turn his head, to check if Dave was okay. All he could make out was a dark shape, joints that might be elbows bent unnaturally. Between the seats he saw a flashing light. A phone, the source, he realized of the loud noises that had now resolved into cries. He had thought the voice was in his mind but no, someone is on the other end of the line, someone who might be able to help them. Limbs clumsy, he grasped at it, trying not to notice the spray of blood all around the car. He managed to get the phone, stared at the cracked screen, trying, always trying, to remember what was happening.

“H-h-hello?”

“ohmygod, sir, is that you? What happened? I already called for help! Where is Rossi?”

His head was swimming, too overwhelmed by the sudden rush of questions, the piercing voice cutting through the dull ringing in his ears.

“Dave is…” he got a good look at Dave and his heart sank. “Tell them to hurry.”

He barely got the words out, it felt like his lungs were collapsing. The edges of his vision grew darker and he was just so very tired. He let the phone drop out of his hand.

“Dave,” he whispered, willing the other man to turn his head, to show he was alert, but Hotch doubted a neck bent at that angle had much mobility in it. He used all his remaining strength to stretch his hand out again, to tug at Rossi’s sleeve, the wool warm beneath his fingertips. He was thinking about the warmth, wishing he could surround himself in it, as he fell unconscious.

He was sitting on a hard wood bench, staring at his knees. He didn’t need to look up to know where he was, this place had become so familiar. Maybe if he didn’t look up he wouldn’t have to see the proof of all he had lost. Maybe it wouldn’t be real if he wouldn’t acknowledge it. His team, they had died, but they hadn’t. He had been there, he should know, shouldn’t he? He felt warm air on the back of his neck but he couldn’t turn to look behind him.

"Do you see how this works?” The words oozed into his mind, touching his memories and turning them sour. He grabbed his knees with tight fingers, hoping that the pressure would wake him up, would return him to whatever moment his mind had slipped away from. He couldn’t remember when that was. Why couldn’t he just remember?

He opened his eyes and found himself in a hospital bed. He was stiff and the lights were far too bright. Something was covering his face and he reached up to knock it away, gasping for air. He was connected to an assortment of monitors and tubing, translating his body’s operations into waves of sound and color. One of those waves picked up speed as his movements become more frantic.

“Hey, you’re okay,” a familiar voice came from his right side. He had just managed to hook the corner of the plastic mask that sat over his mouth and nose. He turned away from it as he pulled it down and looked at his companion.

“Penelope?” he sounded hopeful, in need of reassurance.

“It’s me, boss man,” she sounded dispirited and her eyes were red from crying, mascara smudged beneath them. Even her outfit was somber, a pink sweater the only color over a dress with a muted black and gray pattern. In her lap she had some yarn and needles, she had clearly been trying to soothe herself with knitting. But based on the number of holes and tangles it hadn’t been very helpful.

Hotch’s movements were slow as he tried to scan the rest of the room. It was only the two of them.

“Is Dave…?”

Garcia shook her head, fresh tears welling up in her eyes. “They—they said he was gone before they got to you. That there was nothing they would have been able to do for him.”

The memory of the crushed insides of the SUV, the awkward angles and improper placement of atoms came back to him. He had known then that Dave was gone. It was cruel of him to be asking Penelope. She didn’t deserve all this. This was his fault for not stopping Peter Lewis; for letting the other man get into his head and run amok.

“Someone tampered with the lights in the intersection.” There was still a wobble in her voice but she was trying to sound strong.

His eyes cut back to her, needing to hear exactly what she was saying. “It wasn’t an accident?”

“Well it was, but I checked the traffic cameras, after everything that’s happened, you know? I needed to be sure. And someone made it so that both directions had a green light. There was no way Dave or the other driver could have known.”

Hotch frowned. “Why?”

“I don’t know, sir. But I do know that something terrible is happening to my friends and I’m not going to just let it keep happening!”

Hotch considered this. “I think I might know something about it,” he says hesitantly. He was still not sure whether Peter Lewis was in or out of prison and being wrong would reveal a lot more than he would like.

“It’s frustrating because all the evidence just points to accidents or…or…” she can’t say the word. “Except this light thing!” She was clearly proud of having figured that one out.

“What about JJ?”

“Hmm?” Garcia was still thinking about the traffic lights and how someone might be able to alter their timing.

“Do they know how she died?”

“Died! JJ’s not dead!”

“But—“ Hotch froze. He looked closely at Garcia.

“JJ went home after you left to check on Derek. It was just me and Rossi in the office when we got your call,” she said it slowly, as if he was hard of hearing.

“My call?” His confusion grew, nothing she was saying matching up with what he remembered. Something was still very wrong.

She pursed her lips in concern. “I told Emily to meet us here—“

“Emily! No! She can’t be here, she needs to go home.” He had forgotten he’d called her, he wished he hadn’t. He didn’t want her anywhere near this, longed for her to be safely an ocean away from the destruction he was mixed up in. He was staring at his hands trying to focus, to connect one thought to the next. To reconcile what he was hearing with what he remembered.

“Was it like you imagined?” Something in her tone had shifted.

He looked up. “What did you say?”

“Losing them. Was it like you imagined?”

“Why are you…”

She was smiling now, not a warm Penelope Garcia smile but some eerie funhouse version, lips stretched too wide, showing all her teeth. He felt a sickness creeping in his gut, he groped around trying to find the call button but his hands wouldn’t obey him. He watched in horror as she lifted her hand, a long shiny needle grasped in her fist.

“He thought you’d like a chat first. No one is coming to help you, Aaron Hotchner.” With those final words, she stabbed herself in the neck.

Giving up on the call button, Hotch struggled to get out of bed, to get to Penelope and stop the blood suddenly pouring out of her. He was shouting but no one was coming. He would lose her too.

please stop, you’re a lunatic

hurt me (remember, you chose this!)

#Criminal Minds #tw major character death #tw guns #tw suicude #tw car crash #aaron hotchner #penelope garcia #emily prentiss #mr scratch #i'm so sorry #i did warn everyone

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stuonsongs · 3 years

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My Top 10 Favorite Songs of All Time - 2006 Edition

2021 Editor’s Note: I was looking through some old files and found this thing that I wrote sometime in the summer of 2006 at age 22. For all I know, it could’ve been 15 years to the day! Looking back, I’m not sure how many of these songs would still make my top 10. Don’t get me wrong, I still love all of these tunes, but I’m sure you know how it goes - You get older, you get exposed to more things, and your idea of good music expands. Anyway, I thought it might be nice to share with anyone who still uses this site. I present it in its original format without edits to my writing. I ended up writing full posts in this blog about some of these songs if you go through the archive.

Stu’s Top 10 Favorite Songs…Ever

Let’s start with some honorable mentions. These were so close, and I thought about it for so long, but they had to be left off.

Honorable Mentions

All Summer Long – The Beach Boys

All Summer Long. 1964. Capitol

This song has been described so many times as being “the perfect summer song.” When you listen to it, you can’t help but smile from the opening marimba intro, all the way through. It just screams “summer” and it hurt me to leave The Beach Boys off my top 10.

Bleed American – Jimmy Eat World

Bleed American. 2001. Grand Royal

So full of energy, so rocking, and so what would’ve been the most recent song on my list. I wanted to keep it in the top 10 just so I could have a song from the ‘00s, but it wasn’t meant to be. When the chorus kicks in, I can’t help but headbang.

Marie – Randy Newman

Good Old Boys. 1974. Reprise

Randy has said that a lot of young composers pick “Marie” as their favorite Newman song, and I can see why. The idea of a guy having to be drunk to tell his wife that he loves her is pretty funny, and throughout the whole song it’s just the beautiful melody with tons of strings, all to a tune about a guy ripping on himself as he comes home drunk to his wife.

Does He Love You? – Rilo Kiley

More Adventurous. 2004. Brute/Beaute

I guess this is newer than Bleed American, so it would’ve worked too. This is another more recent song that it killed me to leave off the list. The outro is an arrangement of the main tune with a different chord progression performed by a string quartet. Very beautiful. Also when Jenny Lewis screams “Your husband will never leave you, he will never leave you for me,” I get chills every time.

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

So here it is. After a long day’s work, I’m finally finished. It actually turned out much different than I was thinking when I first started. The number one wasn’t really even in my top five when I started, but I slowly realized I loved it so much. I also left Ben Folds (Five) off this list completely, and I don’t know, I just feel the whole catalogue of Ben is so solid, none of the songs stick out to me that much. But anyways, here it is! After the break of course…

Stu’s Top 10

10.

(Love Is Like A) Heat Wave – Martha and the Vandellas

Heat Wave. 1963. Motown.

This one beat out “Bleed American” just barely. The reason being that somehow, despite being nearly 40 years older than Bleed American, it still has so much energy that it kills. Dan Bukvich once told our Jazz Arranging class that you can boil all the oldies you hear on the radio down to three categories: 1) Great Song. 2) Great Performance. 3) Great Arrangement. This song is one of the great performances. The handclaps throughout, combined with the driving baritone sax behind everything and constant snare drum action will keep anybody with blood running through their veins dancing all night long.

Bodhisattva – Steely Dan

Countdown to Ecstasy. 1973. MCA

This song is my Freebird. It’s just a basic blues progression song at its core with some minor changes at the end of the form. The real kicker that drives this song home is the three minute guitar solo in the middle that isn’t nearly as rocking as Freebird, but it is highly proficient and takes me to places that just make me want to play the song over and over again. I have no idea what this song is about, probably Buddhism, but hey, this once again proves that lyrics rarely matter and the music itself is the core.

Zanzibar – Billy Joel

52nd Street. 1978. Columbia

This song reminds me of long car rides on vacations down the west coast with my parents growing up. They used to play a tape of 52nd Street, or at least their favorite selections, constantly on these trips. I didn’t hear this song again until early in my senior year in college and remembered why I loved it so much. The song has a heavy jazz influence, displayed in the breakdown where Jazz trumpeter Freddie Hubbard does a solo. The best part of this song though is at the end of the 4th line of each verse, Billy does this “Woah oh oh!” thing that just makes me want to sing every time. It was between this and “Miami 2017 (Lights Go Out On Broadway)” which is also a great song, but the “Woah oh oh!” is too much for ol’ Stu boy.

Rosalita (Come Out Tonight) – Bruce Springsteen

The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle. 1973. Columbia

Early Bruce Springsteen records have something that very few other artists can ever pull off without sounding cheesy or forced. It has this undeniable sense of urgency, like the world will fall apart and life will crumble through your fingers if this one moment in time doesn’t work out the way Bruce describes it. There are so many early Springsteen songs that just set a scene of “We have to get out of this town right now girl before it kills us, no matter what any of our parents, friends, anybody has to say.” There’s a line that kinda sums it up: “Well hold on tight, stay up all night ‘cause Rosie I’m comin’ on strong. By the time we meet the morning light, I will hold you in my arms. I know a pretty little place in southern California down San Diego way. There’s a little café where they play guitars all night and all day. You can hear ‘em in the back room strummin’, so hold tight baby ‘cause don’t you know daddy’s comin’.”

I’ve Got You Under My Skin – Frank Sinatra

Songs For Swingin’ Lovers! 1956. Capitol

This song falls into the category of great arrangement. This Cole Porter classic tune was arranged for Sinatra by Nelson Riddle. The story goes that he was still copying down parts for the players while riding in the cab to the recording studio on the day of recording. After the players ran through it once with Frank, they stood up and applauded. The Baritone sax takes control here, outlining a Db6/9 chord throughout the intro. Of course, Frank’s vocal delivery is spot on and goes up and down in all the right places for the biggest emotion impact. It’s amazing how a song with no real chorus can be so good.

A Change Is Gonna Come – Sam Cooke

Ain’t That Good News. 1964. RCA Victor

This song was not even going to be on this list, but then I ran across it while scouring my collection of music and remembered how good it was. Then I listened to it and was blown away by the level of detail that went into this arrangement. Sam’s vocals soar above the mind blowingly beautiful arrangement. The lyrics to this one actually add to the tune itself, speaking of wrongdoings in the world around him, and how social change is on its way in the form of the civil rights movement. The song flows with such ease out of Cooke that one might forget the weightiness of the content, but the song’s content is just so heavy that it’s impossible to deny it.

Whatever – Oasis

Whatever EP. 1994. Creation

This song was released as a Christmas present to the U.K. from the Gallagher brothers and company. It never appeared on any full album, only being released as a single, and amazingly, it blows away anything else they’ve ever done. Think “All You Need Is Love,” but with tons of rocking energy and a snide, nonchalant attitude. The chorus speaks, “I’m free to be whatever I, whatever I choose and I’ll sing the blues if I want. I’m free to be whatever I, whatever I like, if it’s wrong or right, it’s alright.” Not exactly poetry, and the song isn’t exactly breaking any new ground either, but the song is absolutely perfect in every way, and it was going to be my #1, but perhaps the only reason it’s not at number one is because I’ve played this song so many times that at the moment, these next three are beating it, but who knows how I’ll feel in a few months. This song also pulls the same “outro performed by a string quartet” thing as “Does He Love You?” but even better. It’s so simple, but I can’t get enough of it.

Mr. Blue Sky – Electric Light Orchestra

Out of the Blue. 1977. Jet

This is obviously the best Beatles song that the Beatles never wrote. The staccato guitar during the verse combined with the strings present in just about every ELO song combine to make a force that is undeniably catchy and musically challenging at the same time. This is really what makes ELO so good. I didn’t discover this song till probably Nov. 2005, and it was one of the best days of my life. I didn’t want to include two songs by the same artist in my top 10, but if I did, I probably would’ve added “Turn To Stone” on this list too because it is almost as awesome as this one. It’s a shame that just like Billy Joel, most critics at the time hated ELO for being overly creative musically (they called it pretentiousness). These days we have acts that really are pretentious (see Radiohead), but everyone loves them, even critics. I’m not knocking all Radiohead, just most everything post OK Computer. Sorry, got a little sidetracked there.

Only In Dreams – Weezer

Weezer. 1994. Geffen

This has been my favorite Weezer song since about a month into me picking up Weezer’s debut album back around early 2000. It has this ostinato (a repeated motif over and over again) in the bass throughout most of the whole song, never even really resolving to the Gb major chord (excluding chorus, which never really resolves) that it wants to until the end of a 3 minute contrapuntal guitar duet when everything dies out except the bass which just retards on its own until it finally plays the single Gb we’ve all been waiting for. The song on the whole up until the guitar duet is pretty tame, but once those contrapuntal guitar lines start intertwining, my ears perk up every time. I can sing both lines at separate times upon request and when the drums finally kick back in fully at the climax of the song, I let out a sigh of relief or bang on my car wheel in exultant joy, whichever is more of an option at the time.

All Is Forgiven – Jellyfish

Spilt Milk. 1993. Charisma

I always loved this song from the first time I heard it, but I didn’t realize how much I loved it until maybe April 2006. I found out about Jellyfish first semester of college in the Fall of ’02 and heard this song, and knew it was great. The constant tom-tom driven drums, the fuzzy, almost white noise distorted guitar, and the half time bass throughout. It was great. Then in April I put it on my mp3 player for the walk to school, and then I listened to it for about two weeks straight. Seriously. It runs into the next song entitled “Russian Hill” which is almost as good, but because it’s a separate song, I couldn’t include it on the list, but in my mind, they always run together and are basically one long 9 minute song. The ending just gets more and more white noise filled until you can barely take it anymore and then it just cuts off completely into the slow acoustic intro for Russian Hill. It’s perfect in every way. I think this would fall into the category of great song. And the way the song builds up right to the middle of the song and then cuts out completely except for some very VERY faint xylophone noodling, and then busts back in with some feedback directly into guitar solo. Man I love this song.

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punsandfuturekingsmen-archive · 3 years

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//If you go to read this, also consider reading Splatter’s original version here!

A lot of the events are very much the same as they are in that piece, and the dialogue parts are pretty much word for word since it’s from Splatterlewis’s perspective! I just added a bit from Arthur near the end and here and there, and just played around with describing things haha.

He thought that might be the end of it, or at least he thought he knew what to expect next, given his own history with his own Lewis.

So when the next flash didn’t involve trucks or fights with tree yokai, he felt confusion fuzz at the corners of his brain. No… it was somewhere deep and dark. He wandered in some kind of stupor, filled to the brim with a hundred thoughts and feelings, all of them cutting at his skin like knives and a rage that continued to burn in his chest. The rest was vague to leave an impression, but it still stabbed at him as he stumbled along.

But even in the haze he wandered in, he noticed when something began to stalk him from the shadows. The signs of their presence were clear: the area seemed to shift green and bleed it from the earth and sky. Smoke filled every nick and cranny, thick enough to choke on by any who might need to breathe.

He felt himself pulled from the daze with a snap. Something about the spirit set off alarm bells in his mind and left the hairs on his arms and neck standing on end. The smoke and the green consumed everything, the shade just right to remind him of somewhere else. His brain fired on all cylinders, trying to remember anything Vivi might have said that could help him. All that came to him was that this was something powerful. Something dangerous.

He still couldn’t see it in the smoke, but he could feel the weight of its presence. He called out for it, shouting into the green void an almost challenge. Seeing the cave’s greens made him wonder, and he asked if it came to finish what was left of him. The cry reverberated around him in the emptiness, seeming to ricochet off smoke.

The feeling of something dangerous grew stronger, rocking against him like a crescendo in a song mourning his end. But he didn’t want to end here, and his hands ignited with shimmering violet-pink flames. His eyes darted around the whole of the place, searching for movement.

A laugh alerted him, though the aura of power from the thing that found him might have done just the same if it hadn’t. A voice old as time and antique in accent spoke. The tone was something that itched at his skin..

“Boy, I have never met you… Lewis, is it? Such a lovely name, for a lovely soul… So full of fire, of power, and rage. Why would I wish to drive you to hell, when you are the key to my freedom?”

He could feel himself heating up. The fires in his hand seemed to brighten until they blurred the air at the edges of each flame. His hair felt warmer, and shades of pink glistened and reflected off green smoke from where it was now glimmering, ready to ignite.

A clarity struck him, that this was not what he’d met before. It was something greater.

“Show yourself!” He called for the thing, teeth flashing in a grimace. Anger bubbled at the notion of being scared by this thing. By it trying to intimidate him. He was not about to lose, not after everything he had gone through.

But then they obliged.

The skeleton that moved into view was verdant, a hue of green that was deep and dark. Scant remains of decaying flesh still hung from putrid bones, and each piece that lingered had names endlessly scrawled, carved and etched into every inch of skin until they nearly lost meaning, but did not overlap. A cloth kilt and robes hung from its form and swayed with the steps it took, barely clinging to the emaciated remains of the creature and worn in places to threads.

On the head of the skull was a carving. One that recognition pricked at him distantly for. It was the one he’d seen on Lewis’s head for years. But this one, blackened as char and cracked, seemed to give off a shadowy aura, absorbing the light to nothing around it in way that made it seem to glow. It had never looked like that on Splatter. Or… not that he knew of. But what did he really know?

The memory seized him again. “Such a demanding tone, for someone about to lose their soul… You have a fire in you, a fire I need. And you will give it, aye?”

He felt a flash of pride, or protective fury, and he pointed to the creature with a fist wreathed in fire and a glare Mrs. Pepper would have been proud of (the thought hurt as it struck him). “You can never have my soul, I refuse. No one can have it!”

The skeleton moved in a way that divulged something of its thought of what he had said, but he didn’t have the moment to process it. The corruption that hung in the air seemed to thicken and shift, forming blade-sharp arrows, tainted and green. He barely moved out of the way as they streaked by. A few sliced holes in his already damaged shirt, a testament to how close they managed to get to striking him.

With a growl that twisted his face in a snarl, he returned fire. But as the flames blasted over the creature, it stood there, taking the attack without flinching. It laughed, even at it stumbled back from the force, seeming wholly unfazed.

The shock after seeing what his fire could do held him still, and it was enough for a return blast from the skeleton to strike true. The bolt crashed against his chest, the pain hard and heavy and making him double over with a wheeze. He gasped for breath as if he needed it, clutching at his bruised chest and stomach.

The creature seemed amused and its tone held danger, a promise of a cruel fate. “You have no idea who you fight, boy…. In life, centuries and centuries ago, I was once known as Professor Hean Feramin. A genius of studies of names and their power and origins, as well as medical studies… But now, in death, I am known as ‘The Splatter Man’… Do you have any idea the number of people I have killed? The souls I have claimed and the power I wield…? The hordes of monsters that followed me, and respected me, their king?!”

It laughed again, something deeper, and with a flare of green smoke, a quill formed that he took between thumb and forefinger. It twirled with a flourish as it brought a skeletal hand up as if to write on a chalkboard, stroking the tip of the quill against the empty air.

Where it scratched, letters formed, Large and flamboyant in a way letters often were when they began a chapter of a book, like fanciful olden English. Each letter that adorned the air became red, droplets of it falling off and towards the ground.

His head began to spin, and he stumbled.

He didn’t realize when he hit his knees, but he was on them now, the energy to return to one knee felt like it took all he had. His stomach lurched and a sense of exhaustion burned at his eyes.

The Splatter Man held the quill as if poised for the next letter, but instead he twisted the quill against his palm and crushed it to nothing, blood dripping from his hand where it had been before fading.

Hands laced behind his back, the Splatter Man approached. He could see even more names along the pallid skin, burned in or cut in jagged lines. The skin on his face was gone, and he could see fire-red embers aglow in the sockets, sizing him up. He felt something touch his feet. Something scaly and thick, and the sound of hissing told him what it was.

“Are you starting to understand? I can use your name against you, I can learn any name by staring… And everyone’s’ name holds their soul, their strength… And can be manipulated… Hold still now, and welcome the warm embrace of death. You will free me from this prison.”

He was down on his knee, fighting for that will to stand again, hissing through his teeth at The Splatter Man. He could feel blood soaking the tatters of his shirt, spilling red in thick rivers from what once had been the scars of his death. They were open now, weeping blood until he was slick with it. Weakness had sunk into his bones. His thoughts slipped to his name, but they quickly snapped back as a boney hand found the front of his shirt, gripping the fabric tight. He was sure of one thing.

The Splatter Man was preparing for the kill.

The thought ended nearly the moment the hand lifted, hoisting him easily into the air. He gagged, choked on blood and agony, and looked down at The Splatter Man, panic seeping in and turning everything icy. He was aloft, feet not touching the ground.

Fear crept along his spine. A fear he’d only felt once before.

It made him sick.

He could hear the way a smugness threaded the chuckle of the Splatter Man. He watched, limp in his hold as his free hand twisted, and a dagger formed, hilt curled perfectly to his hand. The gemstones along the hilt glittered with the green light, and the runes also etched almost seemed to glow in their reflections.

He realized what the intention was, when the dagger raised back with the hand.

It came forward at an unnatural speed, piercing his chest over his heart so hard he felt sure he was about to cave inwards. He screamed, screamed as he felt like he was being torn asunder, screaming louder than he thought himself capable. Blood seeped around the blade and it ripped another cry from hi as the dagger twisted, cutting deeper, opening the wound ever further. His chest was on fire and his voice gave out as his scream reached a climax, even his own ears ringing with the sound. The tendrils of corruption magic began to ebb towards the new wound, and he felt slithering along his clothing, before seeing the snakes he’d only heard and felt. They also pressed against the bleeding wound in his chest, and a sound escaped as it seared, the curls of his shirt at the edge of the blade blackening from the heat.

“Ah, you have some fight in you. Good, I will need that… You will free me from this purgatory. This prison. And I shall reclaim my throne… The death left in my wake will be unlike anything this world has ever seen, and you will help me, boy. Your essence will be mine.”

The torture burning him turned to lava, melting through the wound and his veins and then melting down to the organs and viscera. The sounds he thought he would make were gone now, rendered to silent convulsions. He could hear something, and he swore it was his soul, creaking and shuddering as agony struck blows that threatened to crack it in pieces.

But he grit his teeth, jaw squaring, and a snarl crept along his face. He couldn’t end here. Not when…. Someone needed him. Someone….Vivi.

Vivi.

VIVI.

VIVI! HE HAD TO PROTECT HER!

HE HAD TO PROTECT ALL OF HIS FRIENDS!!

A second wind surged through him, his heart beating fast and wild as his eyes widened. Gold light reflected off the bone in front of him from them. The skeleton paused.

“NO! I SAID. THAT. I. REFUSE!!”

His fingers stiffened on one hand that he reared back with, and then he jammed it forward, letting them force their way through the bones of the Splatter Man. His fingers searched blind, until he felt something. It felt rotted, soft and dry like the withered husk of a jack-o-lantern left out far past Halloween, and his fingers squeezed it to his palm.

The Splatter Man flinched as he did, yelling himself, and then howling as his flames returned, glowing violet inside the skeleton’s chest and hungrily eating at the thing left in his hand.

The Splatter Man summoned things, things that snapped at his body and slashed at his skin. Magic that pounded against him with bruising, bone breaking force. But he didn’t let go. He didn’t falter. His eyes stayed focused on his task, and his hands stayed tight around that heart as the flames began to grow and eat. He held on, determined with every fiber of his being, fighting tooth and nail for every inch over what felt like eternity locked together.

But inch by inch he gained traction, pushed further. The Splatter man’s eyes widened, a grimace taking it and a trickle of fear seemed to stitch itself to the edges of his expression. He could hear it in his voice, the slightest way it quavered even with his anger.

“What the hell are you doing?! You will destroy us BOTH YOU FOOL! What is keeping you from giving up the ghost?!”

He ignored him, hissing in his fury like a skillet of oil. His fire crackled and popped within the other, and he grabbed the Splatter Man’s wrist with the hand not in his chest, holding tight. His voice was a battle cry.

“Because I have REASONS TO COME BACK! I will use YOU!”

His hand on that rest continued to move, shooting forwards at lightning speed. He dug his fingers into the bone of the skull in front of him, grip crushing and bones creaking at the sutures. He wasn’t sure what he was doing, but he held on, and pulled at the energy of the Splatter Man.

The Splatter Man seemed to realize what was trying to do nearly the moment he started, and he tried to pull back, retreat with fervor. The blade in Lewis’s chest came out, spraying them both with red so red it was black and bright red from the arteries and purple that glowed. It all saturated their clothing until they dripped with his blood. But he didn’t falter. Didn’t once blink.

Well. Lewis didn’t falter. He probably would have.

The Splatter Man screeched.

“Release me!”

“Never.”

The fire in the Splatter Man’s was glowing brighter, white hot as it lashing out in heated waves like solar flares. The skeleton screeched, something high pitched and bone grinding, and he just leaned closer feeling vitality running through him, strengthening him.

He screamed one last time, and then his skull gave way beneath Lewis’s other hand, crumpling inwards like dried paper beneath a vise grip.

Purple and green light flashed, and Lewis fell the short drop to his feet, and then his knees. He panted for breath, clutching his chest, but watched with a sense of satisfaction as the skeleton crumbled, falling to pieces on the earth in front of him, a hallowed husk.

But with that power came a price, and he could see it seeping into the tips of his fiery hair, that curved just over his eyes. What had been pale shades of embery pink was now shifted, flickering green. Thoughts were flicking through his head over what the Splatter Man had meant and triumph at defeating him, even if he was exhausted by the effort. He could feel the power now, pulsing through himself.

Clambering to his feet, he rubbed at his face, before looking up, and seeing the same emblem that had adorned the skull of The Splatter Man, hovering in the air. It still glowed as it seemed to hum, before it arced forward, making him jump. It slammed against his forehead and he screamed as it burned, melting, burning through his flesh and then further into the bone of his skull and just a little further still until the imprint was etched into him, unmistakable for what it was. It continued to burn and burn and tear at him and—

Arthur woke up screaming, hand going to his forehead and chest where blood had started streaming down the side of his face and torso, down along his side where he was still pressed into the grass. His fingers turned slick as he held them against his forehead and shirt and he squeezed his eyes shut, shaking so hard he convulsed where he lay.

He couldn’t die. But at this point he almost wished he could.

#tw injury #tw blood #drabble #the splatter man scene #arthur speaks #ic #M!A: Memory Pain #aaaa this fought me which is sad because i had the original to reference a lot jdjdjdj #but well i did ittttaaaa #splatterlewis mention #long post #and now at least a short nap jdjdj maybe a full rest #we shall see

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sddfgsfdsdf · 3 years

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the Interstate

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wellimaginethat · 4 years

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Bruises: Chapter 2

SPOILERS FOR THE SEASON 5 FINALE OF CHICAGO MED!!!

Pairing: Crockett Marcel x (female) Reader

Word Count: 3121

Author’s Note: SPOILERS FOR THE SEASON 5 FINALE!!! This happened because of Chicago Med’s season finale. I got this idea and it just stuck. I couldn’t shake it so I had to write it. (I know I said it would be posted at 21:00/9PM central time but I was playing cards with my mom, sorry!)

Trigger Warning(s): MENTION OF CHILD’S DEATH (Dr. Marcel’s daughter, Harper), ABANDONMENT, divorce, CAR ACCIDENT, MENTION OF BLOOD (in later chapter), slight injury (in later chapters), hospital stay (in later chapters), bad medical knowledge because I’m not a doctor (yet, maybe someday, lol), Dr. Manning is a noisy brat (no hate, maybe a little shade, but no full on hate), DEPRESSION (in later chapters), mention of alcohol abuse, mentions of self harm (in later chapters)

Disclaimer: I don’t owe nor am I affiliated with any of the Chicago shows, I just like to play with the characters

Summary: This is probably, kinda, sorta AU because I’ve missed some of Chicago Med (the others too due to work) so I’m just going based off what I know and research (which has come up that we don’t know much about Marcel’s past, other than this shocking new tidbit). Also, the name is from the song Bruises by Lewis Capaldi, which is the song I was listening to while writing this

Y/N = Your Name

Y/EC = Your Eye Color

~ I've been told, I've been told to get you off my mind; But I hope I never lose the bruises that you left behind ~

You didn’t know what to expect. Whether you thought he would call you or not, which led to a lot of pacing back and forth in your hotel room. You actually hoped he would call, having decided that if anything, you would at least be able to bury the lingering feelings so you could officially move on.

You figured Crockett already moved on, and you didn’t blame him, you were the one that actually left.

Part of you wondered if you had stayed, if your marriage would have survived. If you would have been able to work it out, grieved Harper and moved forward together. You wondered if he would’ve stopped staying out so late, if he would’ve stopped avoiding you.

You then started to think of how nice it would have been if you guys could have worked it out and gone back to how things had been before everything happened, sure it wouldn’t have been exactly the same, but back to how loving you two had been towards each other.

You were so deep in your thoughts that you were startled when your phone started buzzing on the bed. You grabbed it to look at who was calling you and were greeted by a number you didn’t know, hoping it was your estranged husband, you slide the answer button across the screen and put the phone up to your ear.

Pausing to take a breath before you said anything, you prepared yourself for it to be him, but you were also ready for it to be a telemarketer. “Hello?”

“Y/N?” Once his voice came across the line, your chest tightened and you forgot how to breath. It almost felt like when you first started seeing each other, how you’d get all excited just by his voice. “Hello? Y/N?”

You cleared your throat. “Sorry, bad reception, you kept breaking out.” You lied, not wanting him to think you were the giant dork you were. “I wasn’t expecting you to actually call me.”

“I wasn’t expecting you to leave your number.” Came his response with a slight chuckle.

You smiled, glad that he didn’t seem upset right now.

“So do you actually want to talk or are we just going to make small talk again?” You could hear the apprehension in his voice.

“I want to talk. Like actually talk. I think the only way for us to fully move on and leave things in the past is for us to talk.” You responded, trying to swallow around the sudden lump in your throat.

He was quiet for a moment before speaking again. “Do you want to have this conversation over the phone or are you free to grab a cup of coffee?”

“I could get behind grabbing coffee.” You nodded even though he couldn’t see you.

“Do you want to meet up tonight or tomorrow morning?” He asked after you told him the hotel you were staying at.

“What would work better for you?”

“I think I’d have more time tonight, I have to be at the hospital pretty early tomorrow.”

“Then tonight’s fine. Want me to meet you there?”

He paused. “Do you need a ride? Since your car…” He trailed off.

“Oh yeah, I forgot about my car being totaled. Great.” You sighed. “No, I can get a cab.”

“Cabs are expensive.”

“Really? I haven’t really noticed, they didn’t seem that bad.” You said offhandedly, then after you heard him sigh, you stopped. “If you want to give me a ride, you can pick me up at the Dayside Hotel.”

“I can be there in a half hour, I’d like to go home and change first.”

“Okie dokie.” You replied with a smile, then mentally kicked yourself. “I’ll see you then, I’ll meet you out front.”

You were pretty sure you heard him breath out a laugh, like he was trying to suppress it. “Alright, I’ll see you then.” And with that, he hung up.

You made sure the call was over before tossing your phone back onto the bed and falling forward on it, groaning. “Stupid, stupid, stupid.” You huffed to yourself, mentally kicking yourself for letting yourself daydream before the phone call, and for letting yourself get flustered by his voice. You knew you needed to get this over with and get out of Chicago and put some distance between the two of you before you got yourself hurt.

You pushed yourself off the bed and went into the bathroom to take a look at yourself, leaning towards the mirror to make sure your makeup was still decent, then you ran your hands through your hair. You didn’t want to seem like you were trying too hard, but you didn’t want to look like you just rolled out of bed either.

After you were done getting ready, you still had twenty-eight minutes to kill before he was supposed to be there. You just then realized that you should have insisted on taking a cab, because you started to doubt that he’d want to give you a ride back after your talk.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

He was there right on time, you started to walk towards his car as he drove into the hotel’s parking lot. As soon as you got to his car, you took a deep breath before opening the door to get in. “Hey.”

“Hey.” He greeted you, waiting until you were in the car and buckled up before he pulled out of the parking lot. “How’re you feeling?” He asked

“Hmm?” You turned to look at him.

“How’re you feeling?” “Fine.” You assumed he meant because of the accident. “My head still kinda hurts and I’m still a little achy but I’m fine.”

“Good.” He nodded as he turned his full attention back to the street ahead of the car.

You nodded once before turning your attention away from him and directed it out of your window, wishing you would have just taken a cab, it wouldn’t have been so awkward. And it was going to be even more awkward if he did give you a ride back to the hotel.

Soon enough he was parking the car on the side of the street, you couldn’t get out of the car fast enough, practically throwing yourself out once it was in park.

He walked over to the meter and put a few quarters in. “I think I have some quarters.” You piped up, going to dig in your purse.

“It’s fine, I’ve got it.” He told you with a small smile, turning his attention away from you to finish what he was doing.

You nodded reluctantly and stood there a bit idly, waiting for him to finish so you could head in to the coffee shop and get this over with.

He walked over to you once he was done and motioned for the two of you to carry on up the sidewalk towards the coffee shop.

You began walking and he fell into step next to you, neither of you talking yet.

Once the two of you got to the coffee shop, he hurried a step ahead of you to open the door for you.

“Still the same gentleman you always were, I see.” You commented with a bit of a smile and he nodded to you, letting you walk in before following you into the coffee shop.

You headed over to the counter to order your coffee, and you made sure to have your card ready to swipe it before he could even think about trying to pay for the coffee.

“I would have gotten it.” He told you.

“And that’s why I made sure to be ready.” You smirked a bit.

“Y/N.” He sighed.

“Crockett.” You retorted in the same tone of voice.

You could see him slowly give up this silly argument and you felt a small sense of victory.

“Don’t look so smug, I’m just trying to keep you in a good mood so you don’t run out.” He told you under his breath as soon as the barista turned away.

You huffed as you frowned up at him, getting ready to throw a snide comment when you stopped yourself. “Well a victory is still a victory either way and I won this argument.” You tell him in a soft voice, meaning it as a joke.

He heard the slight humor in your voice and smiled down at you.

The minute his eyes met yours, your heart clenched and you had to turn away, facing back toward the front counter, waiting for your drinks.

Time seemed to slow down as you watched the barista make your drink and bring it over, she handed your drink over to you.

You took it and turned to Crockett. “I’m going to grab a table.” You just didn’t want to stand there next to him and pretend this isn’t awkward.

He nodded to you as he waited for his coffee.

You found a table near the wall, away from the others sitting in the coffee shop, and took a seat. He joined you within moments and took a seat across from you, you could feel his eyes on you but your eyes were trained on your drink.

“So are we going to talk or are we going to sit here in silence?” He asked after a few minutes of complete silence between the two of you.

Your Y/EC eyes met his brown ones, and you nodded. “Yeah, just trying to figure out where to start.” You breathed out. “I don’t know how to start.”

“The beginning would probably be a good start.” He commented, not taking his eyes away from yours. “I’ve asked you twice now why you left, and while you did answer me, you could probably elaborate on that.”

You sighed. “I don’t-” You stopped and ran a hand through your hair, looking away from him for a moment before looking back at him. “I don’t know how.” You tell him honestly. “I don’t know how to explain what was going through my head at that time. All I know is that I felt like you stopped caring about me. It felt like you shut down completely. Harper died and you cut me out.” You stopped yourself and looked out the big front window, willing yourself not to cry. Your eyes were filling with tears but you blinked them away, you didn’t want to draw attention to the two of you by crying.

“I never stopped caring about you.” He whispered out, his hand coming across the table to rest on top of yours.

You looked back at him. “It sure seemed like it.” You replied quietly. “You were never there. You left me at the hospital and then you were never home and it felt like you just...shut down.”

“I did.” He said quietly. “But I didn’t stop caring about you. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to grieve her and be there for you.”

“I wanted us to grieve her together. I was scared of losing you too. I was scared that one night you weren’t going to come back home.”

He stopped. So that was what you had meant, not that he was going to find someone else. “When you said that yesterday I assumed you meant that I’d find someone else.” He admitted quietly.

“Well I was afraid of that too.” You admitted just as quietly, a bit sheepishly in fact. You sighed. “It was always a fear. But I was more worried that something was going to happen to you, you were drinking every night and you were grieving on top of that, I was worried something bad was going to happen.”

He nodded to you before sighing. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.”

“And I’m sorry I left.” You told him honestly, your eyes meeting his. “But there’s not much we can do about it now, it’s in the past.”

He nodded. “But we can still talk about this.”

“Or maybe we can just leave it at that and move on.” You didn’t even realize you had said it until you saw his expression turn into a pained one, but he quickly masked it. You swallowed hard. “I think we owe it to ourselves to leave the past in the past and move on, to part ways on good terms and go our separate ways.”

He was quiet for a moment, studying your face before he finally spoke. “Is that what you want?”

“Yes.” You breathed out the lie with a definitive nod. “Yes, I think that’s what’s best.”

“But is that what you want?” He asked again.

You paused, it wasn’t what you wanted, but you weren’t going to go down that rabbit hole. “Yes.”

He nodded. “Then that’s what we’ll do.” You could see the change in his demeanor, he straightened up, slowly pulling his hand away from yours. “We can get some divorce papers drawn up and sign them, it shouldn’t be too difficult since we’ve already been separated for seven years and living separate lives.”

You cleared your throat and nodded. “All we’d have to do is sign the papers and then it’ll be over and we won’t have to worry about it anymore.” You gave a halfhearted shrug. “I, um, I’m gonna go.” You said quietly after a moment. “I’ll just get a cab back to the hotel.” You stood up.

“Y/N.” He stood up, only to be met with you holding a hand out to stop him, shaking your head.

“It’s fine.” You said quietly, heading towards the door. You were looking back as you walked out, seeing him sit back in his chair, and ended up running right into someone. You quickly turned to face them. “Oh my god I’m so sorry, I wasn’t watching where I was going. Are you okay?” You asked the woman in front of you quickly, recognizing her as the female doctor that Crockett was talking to earlier, this must be a frequent coffee spot for the hospital staff, or maybe it was their place. You felt a twinge of pain at that thought but pushed it away.

The brunette smiled at you and waved it off. “It’s fine.” She assured you. “You’re Crockett Marcel’s wife, right?”

You cleared your throat. “Soon to be ex wife, yes.” You nodded to her, hating the sound of it.

“Oh.” She seemed shocked by that statement. “I thought the two of you were going to work it out.”

You tilted your head and raised a brow at her. “Why would you assume that?” You hoped that didn’t sound as rude as you feared it did.

“Well, he just...seemed like he wasn’t over you.” She said uneasily, then shook her head. “I’m sorry, it’s really none of my business.”

“It’s not.” You replied with a slight shrug. “But you two seem to be friends, so it’s okay.” You brushed it off. “What do you mean he seemed like he wasn’t over me?”

“Well when we were talking earlier, when he thought you left without saying anything, he was hurt.” She told you.

“Oh.” You barely spoke out as you looked around a bit, shocked by this new information and not sure what to do with it. “I’m sorry, I’m Y/N.” You offer out your hand to shake hers, which she does.

“Natalie.” She told you with a smile, releasing your hand.

“Well Natalie, it’s nice to meet you. I’m sorry if I’m not more friendly, I’m just…”

“Going through a lot, obviously.” Her smiled turned warmer, almost knowingly.

You nodded. “Yeah, you could say that.”

“Well with everything that’s going on, plus the car accident you were in, I can imagine you might be a little frazzled.” Natalie commented with a slight shrug.

You nodded again. “Yeah…” You trailed off, a slight silence falling between the two of you and you were getting ready to make your exit.

“Again, I know this is none of my business, but if you still care about Crockett, I think you should talk to him. You guys might be able to work it out, if that’s what you want of course, because I’m pretty sure that’s what he wants.” It was obvious that she knew this was none of her business, and it was obvious that she was overstepping, but you couldn’t be mad because it was obvious that she was just trying to help.

You offered her a smile. “I’d love nothing more than to fix my marriage, but I don’t see that happening. There’s a lot of hurt there and I don’t think we’d be able to move past it.” That was a lie, you wondered if it was obvious. “And I don’t want to cause him any more pain than I already have.”

She nodded, she looked like she wanted to say something but didn’t.

You smiled a bit wider at her. “It was nice meeting you, Natalie, but I should really get going.” You stepped away then. You heard the door open as you were walking away and spared a glance back to see your husband step out, you had expected it to just be Natalie walking in. You quickened your pace, not wanting him to try to stop you from catching a cab.

Crockett saw you retreating from the cafe, then saw Natalie standing there, looking like she had just meddled.

“You should go after her.” Natalie told him, looking up at him with a friendly smile.

He looked at her for a moment before sighing. “Listen, I know you’re just trying to help, but don’t. She obviously doesn’t want to talk, much less work things out.”

“But she does.” Natalie insisted softly, still looking up at him. “I just talked to her and she does.”

“Please just stay out of it.” Crockett sighed.

Natalie sighed then too. “Fine, I will, but not before I say this. I just talked to her and she wants to work things out, she’s just scared.”

“And did she tell you what she’s scared of.”

“Being hurt and hurting you more than what’s already been done.” Natalie told him. “Don’t give up, you have a chance to work things out and get her back. I know if it was me and I had a chance to get my husband back, I’d do whatever it took.” She spoke softly, reaching out to squeeze his arm before stepping around him and walking into the coffee shop, leaving him standing there on the sidewalk alone with his thoughts.

#crockett marcel imagine #crockett marcel x reader #dr crockett marcel x reader #chicago med imagine #chicago med imagines #one chicago imagines

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weekendwarriorblog · 3 years

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The Weekend Warrior 4/23/21: MORTAL KOMBAT, DEMON SLAYER, TOGETHER TOGETHER, STREET GANG, SISTERS WITH TRANSISTORS

Ugh. Trying to maintain this column as a weekly entity during the final few weeks of the longest Oscar season ever has been really hard, and I’m not sure that will change once the Oscars are over either, because I look at the number of movies being released both theatrically and streaming over the next few weeks, and it makes my head hurt. Sorry for the kvetching, it just is what it is.

There are two big theatrical releases this weekend, Warner Bros’ MORTAL KOMBAT and DEMON SLAYER THE MOVIE: MUGEN TRAIN from FUNImation Entertainment, both which have already been released internationally. I also probably won’t be able to watch or review either before this column gets posted.

Mortal Kombat seems like the easiest sell being that it’s based on the popular Midway Games video game franchise introduced in the early ‘90s that led to a series of films, books, comics and you name it. It was a very popular fighting game that had over a dozen iterations including one in which MK characters fought against DC superheroes.

The very first Mortal Kombat movies opened in 1995, right amidst MK-mania, and it was directed by one Paul W.S. Anderson, his very first movie in a long line of video game-related movies, including a number of Resident Evil and the recent Monster Hunter. There are a lot of people who love those games, and yes, even people who love that and other movies, but to others, who may have been too old to get into the games when they came out, the whole thing about different fighters fighting each other just looks kind of studio. Even though I’m interested to see what producer James Wan brings to this reboot, I just don’t have much interest otherwise.

Unfortunately, and this is pretty daunting, Warner Bros. wasn’t sending out screeners to critics until Wednesday with a review embargo for Thursday night at 7pm, which is never a good sign, and yet, it continues Warner Bros. continuing the trend of being one of the only studios that screeners EVERY movie to film critics rather than just making them pay to see it on Thursday night or Friday. I hope to watch it and maybe add something Thursday night, time-permitting. Not sure you heard but the Oscars are Sunday.

As far as box office, Mortal Kombat opens on Friday but also premieres on HBO Max, and I’m not sure there will be as much urge to see MK on the largest screen possible, as there was with Godzilla vs. Kong. Because of that, I think the cap for this one over the three-day weekend is about $10 million but not much more and probably more frontloaded to Friday than we’ve seen in some time.

Mini-Review: As you can imagine from my statement above, I don’t hold the Mortal Kombat games or other iterations in any particular high esteem, so I’m basically jumping into this movie, directed by Simon McQuoid, just as a movie and not necessarily as a video game movie.

It starts off promising enough like a samurai movie with a flashback where we watch Hiroyuki Sanada’s hero sees his wife and son be killed by Joe Taslim’s character that will later become Sub-Zero. The general principle seems to be that there’s a world where people from other worlds fight each other to gain complete control. The hero is Lewis Tan’s MMA fighter Cole Young, presumably a popular character from the game? He is also soon attacked by Sub-Zero presumably because he’s marked with a dragon tattoo that deems him a champion of these fights, but he needs to find someone named Sonya Blade (Jessica McNamee) to help him get to the “Mortal Kombat.” At the same time, he meets the movie’s most entertaining character, Kane,

played by Australian actor Josh Lawson, mainly because he swears constantly and cracks wise -- he’s a bit like Wolverine, actually, and he’s actually the best part of the movie.

Otherwise, everyone and everything is always so deadly serious that everyone else we meet just doesn’t have much impact, because frankly, none of these names or characters mean jack shit to me. Sure, some of them sound vaguely familiar but I was more interested in the great Asian actors who turn up including Tadanobu Asano’s Lord Raiden, who is gonna claim Earth if its champions lose at Mortal Kombat. And Sub-Zero basically just shows up and tries to kill everyone.

As with far too many action movies, the action itself is great, the writing and acting not so much.

As it goes along, things become more epic and fantasy-driven but that also makes the dialogue seem even worse. Similarly, the fight choreography is pretty great, but the movie still leans way too heavily on visual FX to keep it more interesting for anyone not too interested in MMA… like myself. When all else fails, they can show off Sub-Zero’s cool ice powers every chance possible as well as the other’s powers, but some of them (like Lord Raiden) just made me think of this as a rip-off of the great Big Trouble in Little China.

The thing is I’m not a fan of the video game nor of MMA, so Mortal Kombat really doesn’t have much to offer me. The whole thing just seems very silly, just like almost everything from the ‘90s. (How’s THAT for a bad take?)

That said, I thought the final battle was great, and I enjoyed some of the gorier aspects of the fights, too, and it all leads to my favorite part, which is the three-way fight between Cole, Sub-Zero, and… actually I’m not sure if it’s a spoiler or not, but it’s a pretty cool fight that almost makes up for some of the dumber characters introduced earlier on. (LIke that guy with four arms. I know he’s a character in the games, but I didn’t even care enough to look up his name.)

It’s perfectly fine that they decided to go Rated R with the movie since most of the nostalgia for this movie and franchise will be towards older guys, but at times, the CG blood is so hinky it feels like the decision to go R-rated was made well after it was filmed.

Even though I went in with the lowest of expectations, I still found most of Mortal Kombat kinda trite and boring, maybe something I’d appreciate more as a teenager but not so much as a grown adult. But what do you expect for a movie based on a video game that’s just a bunch of “cool fights”?

Rating: 5.5/10

And yet, Demon Slayer could be the surprise breakout of the weekend, considering the theatrical success FUNimation has had with theatrical releases of the My Hero Academia movies into theaters in 2018 and 2020, and the hugely successful Dragon Ball Super: Brolly, which grossed $31 million domestically after a surprise $20.2 million in its first five days in roughly 1,200 movies. In fact, it made $7 million its opening Wednesday in January 2019, and FUNimation is hoping that Demon Slayer will have a similar success by opening it for a single day (Thursday) in IMAX theaters before Mortal Kombat takes over on Friday.

Demon Slayer has already grossed $383.7 million internationally compared to Mortal Kombat’s $10.7 million, and you cannot ignore the huge popularity that anime has seen over the past few decades. In fact, a bunch of screenings for Demon Slayer in NYC have already sold out, although you have to bear in mind that these are 25% capacity theaters. Even so, I still think this can make $4 to 5 million on Thursday and another $7 to 8 million over the weekend, depending on the number of theaters. Yes, it will be quite frontloaded, and I’m not sure what the cap is on theaters and how that will affect how it does over the weekend, but expect a big Thursday and a more moderate weekend but one that might give both Mortal Kombat and Godzilla vs. Kong a run for the top of the box office.

Also hitting theaters before streaming on Netflix (on April 30) is THE MITCHELLS VS. THE MACHINES, the new animated movie produced by Chris Miller and Philip Lord, following their Oscar win for Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. It’s a little weird to open a new animated movies, presumably in select theaters, when such a hugely anticipated animated movie like Demon Slayer is opening, but Netflix won’t

The movie itself is directed by Michael Rianda and Jeff Rowe, and it involves a family named the Mitchells, whose eldest daughter Katie (voiced by Abbi Jacobson) is leaving home for college, so her father (voiced by Danny McBride) decides that he’s going to drive her there and use it as the chance for a cross-country family trip. Meanwhile, it’s set up how the world becomes overrun with robots when a tech giant creates a new personal assistant.

I wasn’t sure whether I’d like this even though I’m generally a fan of all of Lord/Miller’s animated movies including both Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs movies. It took me a little time to get into the family and the general premise. In some ways it reminded me of Edgar Wright’s The World’s End where it’s trying to merge these two disparate genres, but when they actually merge, it just doesn’t work as well as it may have seemed on paper. That worry is soon expunged, because Rianda finds ways to integrate the two ideas over time.

On the trip, the Mitchells run into their perfect family neighbors, the Poseys -- voiced by Krissy Teigen, John Legend and Charlyne Yi -- and you’d think they might be a bigger part of the movie then they actually are. I’m not sure I would have liked doing the family-vs.-family thing so soon after last year’s Croods movie, but I did love the dynamics of the Mitchells being a very relatable imperfect family with Danny McBride being particularly great voicing the family patriarch. It even has a really touching Pixar’s Up moment of Katie’s father watching old home movies of them together when she was younger.

In general, the filmmakers have assembled a pretty amazing voice cast that includes Conan O’Brien, Olivia Colman, Fred Armisen and Beck Bennett. Actually the weirdest voice choice is Katie’s younger brother Aaron, voiced by Rianda himself, and it sounds like a strange older man trying to be a kid, so it doesn’t work as well as others.

What I genuinely liked about Mitchells vs. the Machines is that it doesn’t go out of its way to talk down to overly sensitive kiddies or skimp on the action while also including elements that parents will enjoy as well, and to me, that’s the ideal of a family film.

While some might feel that The Mitchells vs. the Machines is fairly standard animated fare, it ends up being a fun cross between National Lampoon’s Vacation (cleaned up for the kiddies) with Will Smith’s I, Robot, actually, and yet, it somehow does work. It’s a shame that it’s really not getting a theatrical release except to be awards-eligible.

Next, we have two really great movies I saw at Sundance this year and really enjoyed immensely…

So as I mentioned, I first saw Nikole Beckwith’s TOGETHER TOGETHER (Bleecker Street), starring Ed Helms and Patti Harrison, at Sundance, and it was one of my favorite movies there with Helms playing a middle-aged single guy named Matt, who hires the much-younger Anna (Harrison) to be his surrogate, because he wants a baby. It’s a tough relationship thrown together due to each of their respective necessities.

Part of what drives the movie is how different Matt and Anna are, him being quite inappropriate with his suggestions and requests but not really having a working knowledge of female anatomy, pregnancy, delivery etc, but being really eager to raise a child and having the money that Anna clearly does not.

While I was familiar with Helms from The Office, The Hangover, etc. I really didn’t know Patti Harrison at all. Apparently, she’s a stand-up comic who hasn’t done a ton of acting, comedic or otherwise. That’s pretty amazing when you watch this movie and see her dry sardonic wit playing well against Helms’ generally lovable doofus. What I also didn’t realize and frankly, I don’t really see this as something even worth mentioning, is that she’s a trans woman playing a clearly CIS part, and she kills it. I certainly wouldn’t have known nor did it really affect my enjoyment of the movie, yet it still seems like such a brave statement on the part of the director and Harrison herself. The thing is that Harrison isn't just a terrific actress in her own right, but she brings out aspects of Helms that I never thought I would ever possibly see. (If it isn't obvious, I'm not the biggest fan of Helms.)

The movie has a great sense of humor, as it gets the most out of this awkward duo and then throws so many great supporting actors into the cast around them that it’s almost impossible not to enjoy the laughs. There’s the testy Sonogram tech, played by Sufe Bradshaw from Veep, who tries to maintain her composure and bite her tongue, but you can tell she’s having none of it. Others who show up, including Tig Notero, Norah Dunn and Fred Melamed. Just when you least expect it, Anna Conkle from Pen15, shows up as one of those delivery gurus that make the two of them feel even more awkward.

What’s nice is that this never turns into the typical meet cute rom-com that some might be expecting, as Beckwith’s film is more about friendship and companionship and being there for another, and the lack of that romantic spark even as chemistry develops between them is what makes this film so enjoyably unique. Beckwith’s sense of humor combined with her dynamic duo stars makes Together Together the best comedy about pregnancy probably since Knocked Up.

Another great Sundance movie and actually one of my two favorite recent documentaries AND one of the best movies I’ve seen this year is… you know what? I haven’t done this for a while so this is this week’s “CHOSEN ONE”!! (Fanfare)

(Photo courtesy: Robert Fuhring/Courtesy Sesame Workshop)

Marilyn (Mad Hot Ballroom) Agrilo’s STREET GANG: HOW WE GOT TO SESAME STREET (Screen Media/HBO Documentaries) is a fantastic doc about the long-running and popular PBS kids show that’s every bit as good as Morgan Neville’s Mr. Rogers doc, Won’t You Be My Neighbor? Which was robbed of an Oscar nomination a few years back.

Let me make something clear on the day I’m writing this, April 21, 2021, that this is my favorite movie of the year, the only one I’ve already given a 10/10, and the end of the year might come around, and I have a feeling it will still be my #1.

You see, I was raised a Sesame Street kid. It’s not like I didn’t read or play outside or not get the attention of my parents or family, but there was so much of my happy, young life that I could attribute to my time watching Sesame Street, and when you watch Marily Agrilo’s amazing doc, it all comes rushing back. There is stuff in this movie that I haven’t seen in maybe 50 years but that I clearly remember laughing at, and there’s stuff that got into the mind of a young Ed that influenced my love of humor and music and just outright insanity. Sure, I loved The Muppet Show, too, but it was a different experience, so to watch a movie about the show with all sorts of stuff I had never seen or knew, that’s what makes Street Gang such a brilliant documentary, and easily one of the best we’ll see this year. Of that I have no doubt.

From the very origins of the show with Joan Cooney developing a show that will be entertaining and educational to the kids being plopped down in front of the TV in the ‘60s and ‘70s, so they can learn something, it’s just 1:46 of straight-up wonderment.

Besides getting to see a lot of the beloved actors/characters from the show and many of the surviving players like Carol Spinney aka Big Bird/Oscar, you can see how this show tried to create something that wasn’t just constantly advertising to young minds.

More than anything, the show is a love letter to the bromance between Jim Henson and Frank Oz, and you get to see so many of their bits and outtakes that make their Muppets like Burt and Ernie and Grover and, of course, Kermit, so beloved by kids that even cynical adults like myself would revert childhood just thinking about them. Then on top of that there’s the wonderful music and songs of Christopher Cerf and Joe Raposo and others, songs that would permeate the mainstream populace and be remembered for decades.

The movie is just a tribute to the joy of childhood and learning to love and sing and dance and just have fun and not worry about the world. I’m not sure if kids these days have anything like that.

It also gets quite sad, and I’m not embarrassed to say that in the sequence that covers the death of Mr. Hooper, I was outright bawling, and a few minutes later, when Jim Henson dies in 1990, I completely lost it. That’s how much this show meant to me and to so many people over the decades, and Brava to Ms. Agrilo for creating just the perfect document to everything that Sesame Street brought to so many people’s lives. This is easily the best documentary this year, and woe be to any Academy that doesn’t remember it at year’s end.

The other fantastic doc out this week, though I actually got to see it last year, is Lisa Rovner’s SISTERS WITH TRANSISTORS (Metrograph Pictures), which will play at the Metrograph, both on demand and part of its Digital Live Screenings (available to join for just $5 a month!). This is an endlessly fascinating doc that looks at the women of electronic music and the early days of synthesizers and synthesis and some of the female pioneers. It’s narrated by Laurie Anderson, which couldn’t be the more perfect combination.

The movie covers the likes of Suzanne Cianni; Forbidden Planet composers Louis and Bebe Barron, who created the first all-electronic score for that movie; the amazing Wendy Carlos, who electronically scored one of my favorite movies of all time, Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange; Delia Derbyshire, who was also the subject of Caroline Catz’s short, Delia Derbyshire: The Myths and Legendary Tapes, which tragically, I missed when it premiered at the SXSW Film Festival in March. Derbyshire was also famous for creating the iconic theme to “Doctor Who” while working at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in the '60s. Others who appear in the movie, either via archival footage or more recent interviews are Pauline Oliveros and Laurie Spiegel, who I was less familiar with.

The point is that as someone who was a fantastic for electronic music and synthesizers from a very early age and for someone who feels he’s very familiar with all angles of music, I learned a lot from watching Rovner’s film, and I enjoyed it just as much a second time, because the footage assembled proves what amazing work these women were doing and rarely if ever getting the credit for what they brought to electronic music, something that still resonates with the kids today who love things like EDM.

An endlessly fascinating film with so much great music and footage, Sisters with Transistors can be watched exclusively through the Metrograph’s Live Screening series, so don’t miss it!

Hitting Shudder this week is Chris Baugh’s BOYS FROM COUNTY HELL (Shudder), which I didn’t get a chance to watch before writing this week’s column, but Shudder in general has been knocking it out of the park with the amazing horror movies it’s been releasing on a weekly basis. This one involves a quarelling father and son on a road who must survive the night when they awaken an ancient Irish vampire.

Also hitting theaters and streamers and digital this week:

THE MARIJUANA CONSPIRACY (Samuel Goldwyn Films)

MY WONDERFUL WANDA (Zeitgeist Films)

WET SEASON (Strand Releasing)

CRESTONE (Utopia)

VANQUISH (Lionsgate)

BLOODTHIRSTY (Brainstorm)

SASQUATCH (Hulu)

SHADOW AND BONE (Netflix)

And that wraps up this week. Next week? No idea… I know there’s stuff coming out but I probably won’t think about it until after THE OSCARS!!!! On Sunday.

#movies #mortalkombat #demonslayer #weekendwarrior #reviews #sisters with transistors #togethertogether #mitchellsvsmachines #streaming

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letterboxd · 4 years

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Empathy Machine: The Value of Film.

Kambole Campbell surveys the rapid rise in films our members are watching to deepen their understanding of racism, and recommends some deeper cuts once you’ve finished with the ‘first five’: 13th, Do The Right Thing, I Am Not Your Negro, Malcolm X and Selma.

As worldwide action against police violence (as well as a normalization of state-sponsored racism and armed-citizen violence) continues in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, it can feel strange and perhaps inappropriate to be talking about film, or even considering it.

But although the act of engaging with film is far from activism, there is still value to be found. These events are cyclical, and painful, and exhausting; you shouldn’t insist that your Black friends help you understand, you should be doing the work yourself. One easy way to start: with the many creative and galvanizing works by Black filmmakers. The likes of Spike Lee, Ava DuVernay, Cheryl Dunye and so many others have already done the job, all you have to do is watch.*

And, as clichéd as it feels to invoke, the simplest reasoning comes from Roger Ebert, who said: “Movies are the most powerful empathy machine in all the arts. When I go to a great movie I can live somebody else’s life for a while. I can walk in somebody else’s shoes.”

A lot of Letterboxd members feel the same way. Just as cinephiles flocked to Steven Soderbergh’s Contagion as the coronavirus pandemic began to spread, viewings of the likes of Ava DuVernary’s documentary 13th, Spike Lee’s magnum opus Do the Right Thing and Raoul Peck’s elegiac James Baldwin essay film I Am Not Your Negro—along with more films focused on Black experience, history and protest—have spiked in viewing and review numbers in the past fortnight.

Malcolm X, Selma, Daughters of the Dust, The Hate U Give, If Beale Street Could Talk, Just Mercy, Fruitvale Station, and more are all enjoying an undeniable surge of viewership—in some cases, an increase of a thousand percent over their historical viewership numbers. And a matching rise in the number of reviews gives us insight into the feelings, or sense of catharsis, people are seeking from these films. Here, we take a survey of recent reactions to the top five—followed by suggestions for digging deeper.

Activist and scholar Angela Davis in ‘13th’.

13th (2016) Directed by Ava DuVernay

At the time of writing, 13th was the current most popular film by volume of activity on Letterboxd. (Within 24 hours of its release, Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods jumped into the top spot, with 13th now in second place.) It’s easy to see why Letterboxd members gravitated to the film—Ava DuVernay’s 2016 documentary on the loophole of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which effectively allows slavery in the modern day, is comprehensive and convincing.

Built around interviews with a number of Black academics and a thorough history of Jim Crow laws through to modern-day mass incarceration in the US, it’s an important and effective primer for anyone looking for a basic comprehension of new methods of oppression from the state. Part of the film’s power comes from, as member and film critic Josh Lewis puts it, “the way DuVernay sequences this, the way she moves us through the major events, records and timelines with passion and anger, allowing Black voices and art to naturally narrate”.

As with a number of films from the last decade that examine Black protest, there’s a juxtaposition between modern imagery and rhetoric, and systemic racism from a history that America too often insists it has left behind. It makes clear the repetition of this history of oppression for Black Americans with powerful editing, as DuVernay organizes archive footage from the past through to the present day to emphasise this point.

Spike Lee on the set of ‘Do the Right Thing’ (1989).

Do The Right Thing (1989) Directed by Spike Lee

It could be said that the recognition of this repetition is part of why these particular films have proven so popular in recent weeks. Perhaps the most significant part of the engagement with older work like Spike Lee’s (arguably best) film Do The Right Thing, is that the imagery hasn’t aged. As Ashley Clark says in a recent piece for Time on films about Black history and protest, “…it’s amazing to see those patterns repeat now, specifically in the discourse of people focusing more on the destruction of property than on lives that are lost”. Do The Right Thing’s palpable anger and unending relevance make it one of the best fictional films to watch right now, if not for understanding and empathy (“I have a lot of empathizing to do,” Letterboxd member Ted agrees), then for some kind of catharsis.

Denzel Washington as Malcolm X in Spike Lee’s 1992 biopic.

Malcolm X (1992) Directed by Spike Lee

It’s not just Do The Right Thing either—even just going off the numbers, Spike Lee is a go-to name when it comes to engaging with Black people’s history in America and in American film. He’s been engaging with these subjects of protest and anguish for the longest time, and there are few such prolific directors in the way he broaches the subject, crossing the line back and forth between fiction and non-fiction, readily blending the two together in many cases.

That status feels evident in the corresponding surges of popularity for Malcolm X, one of his most acclaimed works, and BlacKkKlansman, one of his most recent. His latest work, the excellent, galvanizing war drama Da 5 Bloods (streaming on Netflix now), acts as a reminder that institutional racism is not just a symptom of the current establishment, but something deeply embedded in American ideology. It’s a multimedia examination of the overlap of racism and imperialism, its arguments backed up by clips of Angela Davis, Kwame Ture, Muhammad Ali and of course Malcolm X.

Malcolm X is a valuable watch in that it provides a loving and complex portrait of a man often vilified by white liberals as much as white conservatives, an example of the ‘wrong’ way to protest or take action. It’s a counterpoint to the reductive and often-held perspective of the man, who is often presumed to have stood in opposition to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It’s a humanist portrait of a man constantly changing, one brought to life by, as Jaime Rebenal writes, “one of cinema’s very finest performances” from Denzel Washington (whom, I must reinforce, was truly robbed of that Oscar). A long film, but not a minute wasted.

David Oyelowo is Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in Ava DuVernay’s ‘Selma’ (2014).

Selma (2014) Directed by Ava DuVernay

On the flip-side of this is Ava DuVernay’s Selma, which paints an equally complicated portrait of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., focusing on the organized action that lead to the Voting Rights Act of 1965. “As sobering as it is galvanizing” writes Letterboxd member and correspondent Ella Kemp. Selma’s vision of MLK was of a complicated man, one steadfast in his commitment to peaceful resistance and protest for civil rights, but still a man as opposed to a saint.

I could talk at length about that supposed saintliness being thrown back in the faces of Black people, as well as the gossip compounded by American institutions to discredit the man’s work—DuVernay and David Oyelowo’s interpretation of MLK saves me that time.

All beautifully lensed by the—at that point—upcoming cinematographer Bradford Young (whose subsequent credits include Arrival and Solo: A Star Wars Story), and with typically gorgeous costume design from Black Panther Oscar-winner Ruth E. Carter (a long-time associate of Spike Lee), it’s a visual treat as well.

Novelist, poet, playwright, essayist and activist James Baldwin.

I Am Not Your Negro (2016) Directed by Raoul Peck

I Am Not Your Negro, Raoul Peck’s documentary-slash-adaptation of the unpublished James Baldwin memoir, provides a similar juxtaposition between America’s past racism and its present. Narrated by Samuel L. Jackson, words from Baldwin’s unfinished manuscript ‘Remember This House’ explore American anti-Blackness through a mixture of archival footage and anecdotes from Baldwin, as he recounts the lives of his civil rights leader friends Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Medgar Evers and others.

As with many other Letterboxd reviews, Daisoujou reflects on the persistence of state-sponsored racism, writing that it’s “a movie that feels like it was made yesterday, based on writings from roughly the 80s, which also feel written yesterday, in the most depressing way”. A lot of identifying with films detailing Black protest is to recognize this cycle, the seeming neverending-ness of it all; that engagement with racism is not just something occurring in the present moment but something that carries the weight of history, at all times.

A scene from Cheryl Dunye’s ‘The Watermelon Woman’ (1996).

These are all strong starting points for the beginning of an empathy with Black protest, struggle, history and art on film. But it’s just scratching the surface. The five films above mostly skew towards the recent, when there’s a long and exceptional history of Black cinema.

It’s important to consider the expansiveness of Black art, that not all of it is about our tragedies, there’s more to witness than our pain, and this deserves attention after crisis as well. K. Austin Collins’ introduction for his Vanity Fair list says it best: “Black defiance on-screen is bigger than Do the Right Thing, however. Black defiance (including but not limited to outright protest), Black anger, Black art: These are vast territories.” As Collins’ excellent two-part list states, the history of our representation and the self-determination of our on-screen legacies of course goes far beyond just the work of Spike Lee and Ava DuVernay.

You could watch Cheryl Dunye’s The Watermelon Woman for a film examining just that: how the narrow idea of ‘representation’ has failed so many, that their own histories have to be invented, and how Black people often have to deal with art’s frequent rejection of their own image.

You could watch the work of Kathleen Collins, you could watch Paris is Burning for a history of New York City ballrooms and drag culture (and here’s K. Austin Collins again with a recent re-reading of that film, in conversation with its white director). The history of Black Britishness also often gets left at the wayside—both Collins and Clark recommend Handsworth Songs and Blacks Britannica for pictures of Black thought and struggle in the context of Thatcher’s Britain (and many more in their aforementioned lists, both well worth checking out).

The protests have also, naturally, lead to conversations around representation of Black people across media, in front of and behind the camera. Such discovery is both vital and easier than ever, as the protests have inspired artists and streaming sites to make their library of work more accessible—among those, the Criterion Channel, having dropped the paywall for much of its collection focusing on Black lives.