#also those things on the monster energy are just scribbles. just in case anyone had a hard time reading them

[giratina-and-the-skys-bouquet]

duality of regi

video ver. below keep reading (loud sound and mild flashing warning)

[kagakusenpai]

Another HataMaou FanFic

This one’s an AU where....I’ll let you read and find out :P 

Enjoy!   -Roguecookie                            

--

A lone figure stood on top of Usui pass, basking in the last rays of the evening sun. The soft orange rays slowly dissipated as the setting sun disappeared behind the mountains. Soon, the void of darkness would envelop everything around him.

The man took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

Pure focus.

The whistling of the wind through the trees was soon accompanied by a growling sound. In the distance he could see a trail of small lights snaking their way up the mountain. Moments later, the rumbling of motorcycle engines surrounded the man on all sides.

He opened his eyes. His surroundings were illuminated by dozens of lights. Turning around, he faced the group of bikers that had approached him.

The leader of the group hopped off his bike and approached the man, sneering. “So, you’re the leader of the new Kanto gang? Awfully confident in yourself, showing up alone. Perhaps our crew will have to teach you how we do things here in Chuubu.”

“I’d really appreciate it actually, its my first time here and I could use a local to show me around.” The man, dressed in white, calmly replied.

“Hahahahaha, you’re an odd one. I’ll be sure to remember your pretty face before I turn it into a bloody pulp.” The grinning leader paused for a moment before letting out a bloodthirsty roar. “GET HIM BOYS!”

Dozens of men, dressed in similar black jackets, swarmed towards the outnumbered man in white. The man began smiling, his deep red eyes glowing with excitement.

--

A few minutes later.

On the side of the road a pile of men were groaning in defeat. Some had passed out, while others were too injured to stand up. None of them were expecting this outcome.

Their bloodied leader was currently being held up in the air by his jacket’s collar. Tears forming in his eyes, he struggled to escape from the grasp of the monster before him.

Those eyes full of despair, how wonderful! The white ‘monster’ brought the leader’s face up to his own.

“Now, how about you show me some of that lovely Chuubu hospitality you were talking about?”

Laughing, he threw the whimpering man aside. He turned around to observe the view from the top of the pass once more.

The bright headlights illumined the boldly embroidered characters on the back of the man’s tokko-fuku:

“Kanto Demon Army”

His laughter faded into the dark, moonless night.

--

“Aaaaaaaaaargghh! Not this again! And on my day off of all things.”

Frowning so hard her eyebrows formed a distinct ‘V’ shape, Emi Yusa sat up at her work desk. Crumpled papers in hand, she stared at the report placed in front of her:

Reported brawl between the Kanto Demon Army and Chuubu biker gangs reported last night at around 20:00 hours. Over 30 injured men were found, all claiming that the injuries were inflicted by a single man. Reports currently lead us to believe the suspect to be the leader of the Kanto Demon Army, known as the Demon King of Kanto.  Currently there are no leads to his whereabouts.

“AND I WAS THIS CLOSE!”

Emi threw all the papers in her hands into the air in a sudden fit of rage before sulking back down into her chair.

“Officer Yusa, what is the matter?”

“Ah, Captain Tojima! Apologies for my… unbecoming behaviour. I just let my emotions get to me, that’s all”

The tall man who approached Emi brought a chair and sat down in front of her desk. His neat blue uniform and spotless black cap showed that he was a man who cherished his public image. On the other hand, the bags under his eyes and stubble on his chin showed that he had been spending a little too much time occupied with work.

“I understand Ms. Yusa…if I had been working on a case as long as you have been without getting a single lead, I’d be frustrated too.”

“But that still is no reason for me to start throwing papers.”

Tojima let out a quiet chuckle. He pulled out a small note from his jacket pocket and tossed it over to Emi.

“Or is it now? I’ll let you know I was quite the accomplished paper thrower back in my day.” Clearly overstepping the boundaries of his joke, the man’s face suddenly turned serious as he leaned towards Emi. “Listen Officer Yusa, I reported no leads for a reason. There has to be an explanation as to why every single lead has been a false positive so far…catch my drift?” His voice has lowered substantially.

Emi understood the meaning behind the man’s words. Her opportunity had finally come. Many months after arriving from Ente Isla in search of the Demon King, joining the police force, and investigating his whereabouts she had her first reliable lead.

“I’ll give you permission to take one other officer you can trust with you. Backup will be on standby, but at a more distant location, to avoid any possible hints to the enemy.” Without saying another word, the exhausted captain stood up and headed back towards his office.

Emi grabbed the paper Tojima had tossed onto her desk. Its contents would finally lead her to apprehending the damned Demon King, Satan Jacob. She spun around on her chair, looking towards the person who sat at the desk behind her.

“Oiiii Rika! You got a moment?”

The girl sleeping at the desk jerked her head up. Her brown eyes sparkling, she looked at Emi and gave a huge grin.

“Ehehehehhhhhh…what’s up Emi.” Still a bit groggy, she tilted her head inquisitively.

This girl is basically a human cat, Emi thought to herself before rolling her chair up to Rika’s desk. Rika’s hair was dishevelled due to her constant worktime napping. Emi went ahead and straightened her hat and patted her messy hair down. Truly a cat, all I need her to do now is purr.

“…I got a lead on the Demon Army case.”

“AAAA! Oh my--”

Emi placed her hand on Rika’s mouth.

“SHHHHHH! Not so loud…it’s top secret for now.” Emi nervously looked around to see if anyone had heard their conversation. No one was within earshot.

“Listen, grab your bike tomorrow and come meet me at this address in your undercover clothing.”

“Wait, I can come in my undercover clothing? Kyaa~ I have the perrrrfect getup for this occasion. We should totally get you a new outfit too Emi! Let’s go shopping!” Rika was clearly excited for all the wrong reasons.

“How about some other time Rika?”

Sighing, Emi handed Rika the paper she received from the Captain. Rika read its scribbled contents.

21:00 – Z bridge, Y City, Saitama. X Gang vs Kanto Demon Army.

--

The steady rain poured down on a quiet neighborhood in Tokyo. A man stood in an alley, taking cover from the weather under the metal awning of a nearby ramen store. He pulled out an old grey flip phone that had just begun ringing.

“Yes, my liege?......Understood. We have complete control over Chuubu’s primary gang thanks to your hard work. Quite a few of our men were assaulted by Gang X in Saitama. I suggest we take their bait and take their main force on…...Yes, I’ll handle the escape routes and cover ups.” The man closed his phone and stepped out into the rain. His blonde-silver hair was lit by the streetlights as he walked down the streets. The Demon General Alciel, also known as the ‘Demon General Ashiya’, walked up to his bike, removing its cover. Putting on his black jacket, embroidered in white with the words ‘Demon General’ and ‘Victory’, he started his bike’s engine. Giving the engine a few ceremonial revs, Ashiya sped off into the distance, his red taillights weaving through the midnight traffic.

--

The next day, 21:00 hours Z Bridge, Y City, Saitama.

“Jeez, don’t you think all these biker gang fellas could at least pick nicer outfits? Like my gawd, look at that guy’s hair! It looks like it needs an oil change along with his bike. And he’s wearing orange, yellow and green. Emi that’s a crime against fashion!”

“Rika, shush! We’re undercover! Stay focused and don’t make so much noise.”

Rika and Emi were parked outside an abandoned warehouse near Z bridge. Their motorbikes were neatly hidden behind some old crates they had found earlier. Lying prone in the middle of a pile of abandoned equipment, they had an excellent view of the bridge with their binoculars. Being on surveillance for the past hour, Rika had begun to grow a bit restless.

“It’s not like they can hear us all the way over here! Give me some slack girl!” Rika nudged Emi.

Emi didn’t want to admit that it was this kind of attitude that made Rika so valuable to have on a stakeout like this. Even though she would joke all the time, Emi knew that her attention was still focused on their mission.

“Still, it’s a bit odd that nothing has happened yet. Its almost 15 minutes past nine.” Emi was starting to get worried. She was certain that Satan would show up, not missing a chance to feed on more demonic energy and expand his network of biker thugs throughout the region.

Over the past few months the Kanto Demon Army had slowly begun terrorizing all the local biker gangs and expanding their territory through brute force and subjugation. Not only did this provide ample negative energy for the demons to feed on and grow their reserves stronger, but it allowed them to slowly build an army of followers based on fear. Emi assumed that not even the military could stop a fully powered up Satan in this state. It was up to her to use the Better Half and take Satan down on earth, once and for all.

“Its not like these guys even care for showing up on time. Besides, these kinds of guys are the type to always show up late to a date…augh.” Rika rolled her eyes, clearly remembering an unpleasant experience. “Let me give you some life advice Emi, if a guy ever shows up late to a date, just dump him on the spot. True gentlemen are a dying breed I tell you, a dying breed!”

Emi didn’t bother answering Rika. Her eyes were focused on the sudden movements on the bridge.

“Rika, quick look!”

--

Maou peeked out from his hiding spot a few blocks away from the bridge. He had parked his motorbike here an hour ago and used magic to hide himself from passerbys. He looked at his phone – 21:05 – Ashiya was taking too long.

Normally he would have received a call saying that the escape route was covered, and any surprise attacks had been neutralized. This was key to Maou’s quick ‘in-and-out’ strategy for conquering the different gangs in the Kanto region. Defeat their leader, quell any rebellion and force the enemy to admit absolute defeat in a matter of moments to ensure maximum despair. Once defeated, most groups would stay loyal. All these biker gangs really cared about was being apart of the strongest and most powerful group so they could assert their dominance on others. Maou didn’t care much for politics.

“Shit, its 21:15.” Maou would run out of time soon, and the gang would likely disperse. He needed to defeat them all in one single blow if possible. “Here goes nothing.”

Disabling his illusion magic, Maou pulled out onto the street and raced down towards the bridge. Blocking the entrance was a group of bikers wearing dark purple jackets with yellow emblems that read ‘Light Bringer’.

Tokko-fuku flapping in the wind, Maou headed straight for them without slowing down. Extruding demonic energy from every pore in his body, he made himself as scary as possible. The bikers, clearly terrified to their core, grabbed their motorcycles and fled.

He continued down to the middle of the bridge before drifting his bike at an angle to a complete stop. Casually stepping off his motorcycle, Maou took a few steps forward towards the large group of bikers.

“So, who’s the leader that wants to challenge me, the Demon King of Kanto?”

It was absolutely silent as the thirty odd members of Gang X just stared at Maou.

“Don’t worry, I don’t bite…”

Maou leaned forward and grinned.

“…I’LL DO SOMETHING MUCH WORSE!”

He leaped forward at the bikers, channeling demonic energy to his arms and legs to increase his physical output to the max.

He pulled his arm back to throw the first punch when –

--

Seeing Maou fly through the bridge suddenly threw Emi and Rika into action immediately. Without wasting a second, they were both riding their personal motorcycles towards the bridge at full speed.

“Rika, secure the perimeter, make sure no one gets hurt! I’ll handle Sata- … err the Demon King.”

“Gotcha! Be careful Emi, this guy looks dangerous though…”

“I’ve handled demons like him before.”

“Demons?? Umm ok!”

As they turned the final corner to reach the bridge an immense flash of light blinded them both.

“What the hell!” Emi was in shock.

--

“It’s been a while, Satan Jacob.”

Maou couldn’t believe it.

“What are you doing here…. Lucifer”

Right before his first punch connected he was stopped by an immense amount of magical energy. The collision caused an immense shockwave that knocked down most of the bikers, along with their bikes.

“I couldn’t help myself join in on the fun here on Earth. You see, once the hero defeated me on Ente Isla I thought I was a goner, but it seems heaven had different plans for me.”

“Heaven?! Don’t tell me Lucifer….did you betray us?” Maou was furious. “We thought you….you were defeated.”

“Funny how that works, right?” Lucifer’s gaze pierced through Maou.

Maou tensed up, ready for Lucifer’s next move. He didn’t know how much demonic power he had stored up, but the power he used to stop his punch was more than enough to put him on full alert.

“my liiiiieeeeEEEEEEEEGGGGGEEEEE!!!!!!!”

In the distance, Ashiya’s voice grew increasingly louder. Speeding down the road at an incredible speed, he pulled up from behind Maou and stopped his motorbike in an instant.

“We…we’ve been betrayed…. I’m sorry … I couldn’t get to you faster my Lord.” Short of breath, Ashiya walked up beside Maou. “Lucifer is getting assistance fro-”

Maou barely had time to react to Lucifer’s barrage of magic attacks. All bets were off, Maou and Ashiya realized they had to use their demonic forms to survive this battle. Clothes ripping, they turned into the demons they truly were and sidestepped the magic projectiles.

“Once I defeat you and the hero, I’ll regain my proper position in heaven once again AHAHAHAHA!” Streams of purple light blazed past Lucifer towards Maou and Ashiya. “There’s no sense in running, I’ve acquired so much more power than you two combined.”

--

Seeing Lucifer’s sudden appearance along with Satan and Alciel’s transformation completely shocked Emi. The light and shockwave from earlier had stopped her and Rika in their tracks, both their bikes being tossed aside by the sudden blast.

Emi knew she had to act now but the situation was a complete mess. Beside her Rika was lying on the ground, regaining her senses.

“See… I told you guys who are late to their first date are trouble…” Rika groaned while she stood up.

Emi smiled at her friend’s comment. Still not fazed enough to stop making stupid jokes I see.

“Rika, handle those who’ve collapsed around the bridge. I have no idea how this is going to turn out but evacuate everyone as fast as possible. This bridge is likely going to collapse.”

“Collapse?!?! Ok, whatever I’m on it!” Rika picked up and steadied her bike. In the corner of her eye she saw Emi jump into the sky before disappearing completely.

--

The battle with Lucifer had taken its toll on Maou and Alciel.

“Alciel, we need to make a tactical retreat…this isn’t the right place to be fighting, not with our current state.” Maou knew that Lucifer had the edge with his immense amount of demonic energy. Maou had been expending his reserves carelessly in the past month, leaving him with just enough to stay on the defensive.

“Sir, what about the civilians?” Humans were still valuable pawns for the Kanto Demon Army.

“Get whoever you can out of the way, we can’t waste too much time.” Maou flew towards the river to drag Lucifer’s fire away from the bodies strewn on the bridge.

Ashiya flew down towards the bridge and began grabbing unconscious bodies and dragging them to safety. As he grabbed the last survivor, he saw the bridge crumbling.

Looks like I got them all before the bridge collapsed.

Then he noticed something in the corner of his eye.

A small girl was helping a man get off on the other side of the bridge. She’s not going to make it. Unsure why he did it, Ashiya threw the man he was holding towards the pile of unconscious bodies he had saved and dashed towards the girl.

By the time Rika noticed the bridge was crumbling, it was too late. She had tried dragging an unconscious biker off the bridge but was struggling to pull the heavy body towards safety. Even if she let go of the body and ran, she knew it was too late. Her legs buckled.

“E-E-Emmiii, h-help me!” She barely managed to cry out. Her voice wouldn’t reach Emi, who had been missing since the start of the whole fight. Still, she cried out hoping someone, anyone, would save her.

“Hold on miss!”

Rika extended her hand to the mysterious stranger who appeared in front of her. His body was black like charcoal and the arm she grabbed onto was cold as metal. She felt herself being pulled up into the air. She looked up at her mysterious saviour’s face.

Such emotionless golden eyes…

Rika felt her grip on reality fading … as if some strange energy was forcing her body to shut down all its senses. Her vision was fading to black. Before she lost consciousness, she saw the man’s face look down and managed to put together a faint smile.

“Thank…you….such…a…..gentleman…”

Alciel stared at the limp body of the girl he saved. He managed to hold her in his arms before she completely lost consciousness. 

A human who thanked me, how odd…

--

After giving Rika her instructions, Emi flew towards the battle that was taking place above the bridge. Activating her Better Half, she positioned herself carefully to avoid catching the attention of the two demons flying around in front of her.

Suddenly, she noticed the area around her turning black.

“What’s going on!”

She was trapped, in what seemed like a magical barrier, but one made from a mysterious kind of magic. She readied her sword.

“Who are you? Come out before I make you regret trapping me in this barrier…….!”

The Better Half was slowly fading from her hands, its sacred powers dissipating into the air, leaving Emi defenceless. She couldn’t believe it -

!

“w---w---who…are………..”

A crimson-stained scythe blade was sticking out of Emi’s chest. Vision beginning to blur, she knelt on the barrier’s floor, gasping for air as she watched blood spill out from her chest.

“….y….ou!”

A single white feather dropped down into Emi’s arms.

  To be continued…

[serendipitouscontaminant]

@intearsaboutrobots asked oh g o s h, how bout forgetting to eat and ray (he's very busy ! doing science !)

This is for Bad Things Happen Bingo. This is my card. 

Bingo square: Forgetting to eat 

Content notes for grief and canon character death. Strangely enough, this is 70% comedy.

____

Guess We’ll Never Know

Ray is doing science.

Normal.

Ray is doing science in silence, literally locked in the lab.

Less normal? That's debatable, apparently. 

Nate is convinced there’s something fishy going on here. Sara agrees. Zari and Mick both say to just leave Ray to do his thing. He’s a scientist, of course he’s going to lock himself in the lab sometimes, it’s not that weird. Nate and Sara counter that, yeah, that might be a stereotypical scientist thing, but it’s not a Ray thing. Ray loves spending time with other people, and he’s gung ho about living healthy, and when he gets really, possibly unhealthily, into something science-related, he usually at least tries to talk someone’s ear off about it.

He’s not the kind of guy who locks himself in his lab for nearly a week when there’s absolutely nothing even vaguely life-threatening going on, other than the Legends all living on the same ship, which might count.

Zari says that they’re being overbearing and they should just let Ray do what he does best, he can take care of himself and she could swear that she’s seen him in the halls a few times, probably going to get food or something.

This leads to the whole team trading Ray sightings and arguing as to whether they’re actually just making things up, right until Nate points out that they’re acting like Ray’s Bigfoot or something, and once you can switch out a conversation about your teammate with a conversation about a cryptid just by changing a single detail, in this case said teammate’s name, there’s a good reason to worry. He has a point, Constantine, who has no dog in this fight and has been playing both sides for a lark, says.

Mick says that this is all stupid, and walks away. Classic Mick.

However, in spite of Mick’s unceremonious exit, it can comfortably be said that at this point all opinions have been swayed towards ‘we should be worried.’

Well, not Constantine’s, because he cannot emphasize enough how he has no dog in this fight. He saves dogs for people he really cares about, and none of the Legends are there yet other than Sara. He quite likes Sara.

In spite of this doglessness, Constantine is the one to check on Ray, mostly because everyone else is debating on how to best check on Ray even though they could always just ask Gideon how he’s doing or go down there with no fanfare, two options that they have helpfully forgotten—much like how they have forgotten to be reasonable or efficient over what should quite frankly be low-stress decisions for a prolonged length of time—in the name of the continuation of the narrative.

Besides, they’re stir crazy without any actual missions. They’ll argue about anything at this point, and since Ray hasn’t been around (a pressing issue), there’s nobody to, say, arrange a catastrophic game night, which would at least get out everyone’s pent up energy.

…This is mostly because, while Constantine is a surprisingly affable and competent board gamer, he wins every game, and Mick is a terrible loser, Sara is a terrible loser, Zari is easily frustrated and also a terrible loser, Ray has the rules to literally every board game in existence memorized word-for-word and will not budge on them, and Nate, for all his ability to remember every single major fire in the United States since its inception, secretly still doesn’t really know how to play Monopoly, and is not above knocking the entire board to the floor to keep anyone from finding out his dark secret, even though fessing up would possibly spare everyone from having to play Monopoly, which would quite frankly be one of those acts of everyday heroism the Huffington Post is always on about.

(Mick knows about Nate’s Monopoly problem, though. How? Unclear. Mick just knows a lot of things. Why does Mick not tell? A mystery.)

Anyway, Constantine goes to see how Dr. Palmer’s getting on, mostly because he, like everyone else on the game nightless ship, is very bored and has nothing better to do. He is also a bit curious. He also feels a vague sense of doom about the whole situation, though that may just be the vague sense of doom he feels roughly one hundred percent of the time.

When he steps into the lab, he finds papers tossed everywhere, three whiteboards (well, ‘whiteboards’ is a little generous for what are more large plexiglass rectangles covered in scribbles, but that is not an issue at the front of John’s mind), and no less than thirteen empty cans of a drink called ‘Monster’.

He takes a step inside the lab (a can of Monster crunching underfoot), meaning to make his presence known to Ray, who currently has his back to him and is writing some equation on a fourth and comically large high fashion not whiteboard. (Too long, John has better things to do than think all those words over something so stupid.)

John is not sure when exactly this whiteboard was created or whether it did in fact exist before Ray went into this fit, because it really is excessively enormous, given that Ray is standing on a stool to scrawl mumbo jumbo on it, and Ray is six foot three.

“Hello, Dr. Palmer,” John says genially, only not fazed by this situation due to the fact that he consistently deals with different, more life-and-limb-threatening situations that border on the absurd, or catapult over the border and into the wide field of ‘what in the bloody fucking world is even happening, look like you know what you’re doing, John, you fear nothing’. He gauges that to be genuinely fazed, the cans of Monster would have to become actual small monsters.

Ray jumps and yet somehow doesn’t fall from his perch, even when he twists around to look at John, though he does sway dangerously, and John steps forward experimentally, wondering exactly how squished he will get if he tries to catch Dr. Palmer once the man inevitably loses his battle with gravity.

Ray’s hair is mussed and unwashed, his fetching chin is covered in stubble, his clothes are several days old, he’s shaking, and his eyes are full of the pure manic energy of a man who does not consistently drink large amounts of caffeine, and yet has made the unfortunate and currently inexplicable decision to replace half his blood with energy drinks.

“Constantine!” he says, voice both welcoming and edgy. His smile is so wide that John can see just about all of his teeth. The smile, paired with the general mad scientist vibe he’s emitting, makes him look like a serial killer, the kind that dresses his victims in fun outfits and then poses them in a whimsical manner while leading the police on a wild goose chase. He will never be brought to justice. “How’s it going?”

“You’ve been here for nearly a week,” John says. “Your friends are both worried and being utterly inconvenient about it.”

“A week,” Ray says, vibrating. “Wow!”

These are the last words he says before his eyes roll into the back of his head, and he falls to the floor.

John is briefly on high alert, given that eyes rolling into the back of the head is not a good sign in his line of work, but he quickly realizes that the good doctor is lying quite still and is happily unpossessed.

Wow indeed.

John wanders over to him to see if he’s just out cold or dead. He is thankfully just out cold, because even John would feel bad if Ray were dead. His gluten free cupcakes really aren’t so bad, and he very much enjoys winning all the games. He never wins against Gary.

Ray’s pulse is impressively fast. “Gideon, dear,” John says, “I think the others may want to see this.”

“Way ahead of you, Mr. Constantine,” Gideon says.

Of course.

It takes a matter of minutes—more than one, but less than five—for the others to rush in. Well, Mick doesn’t rush in so much as amble, brow furrowed in what might be annoyance and might be concern. (It’s both.)

Ray wakes up in under five minutes, which is good. He’s bleary-eyed and rubbing his head, and he’s discombobulated enough that he doesn’t really protest when Nate and Mick bodily drag him out of the lab, though he does give his enormous whiteboard a sad look, as if saying goodbye and promising to come back soon.

John stays behind, surveying the lab. He suspects that whatever happens in the medbay will involve feelings he’s not particularly interested in, so his work here is done.

In the medbay, Ray has finally found his voice again, and his voice isn’t happy about the saline drip he’s getting. He and his miraculously nonexistent concussion would rather take some laps around the ship.

“Actually, Dr. Palmer, I would suggest you eat,” Gideon says.

“Pish posh!” an actual human being named Ray Palmer says with zero irony. “You keep telling me that!”

“Because it keeps being true,” Gideon replies, dry as the toast that Ray could at least have tried to force down the past several mornings.

It turns out that, much like Bigfoot sightings, the Ray sightings were the product of wishful thinking. He really had not existed outside of the lab for all that time except to go to the bathroom. He even had Gideon make him seven six packs of Monster before going in.

And yet no food or water.

When Nate points out that astonishing oversight after hearing that Ray did prepare himself for his science fit, sort of, Ray shrugs sheepishly. “I forgot.”

“You, Mr. Three Square Meals a Day, just straight up forgot?”

“Yeah. There’s...I don’t have another answer, I really did.”

“Okay, so why did you go full absent-minded professor?”

Ray doesn’t answer the question, though a troubled look does flit across his face for about five point two seconds.

Instead, he decides to go back to the food thing.

“I’m not hungry anymore,” Ray says, clearly in a vaguely dreamlike and yet incredibly awake state. “I’ve transcended it.”

There is a beat as the others process the non sequitur and general insanity of that statement, and then chaos as everyone starts talking over each other about how stupid that very thought is, right up until Zari’s voice manages to break through.

“You’ve transcended hunger?” Zari parrots for about the third time. “Ray, take it from someone who knows—you’re just starving.”

“I feel kind of sick, actually,” Ray says in a polite rebuttal. “So there’s that.”

“Raymond, of course you feel sick, you’ve been overworking yourself and living off caffeine,” Nate says, all long-suffering hypocrisy.

“Oh, as if you don’t do the exact same thing, Mr. Do As I Say Not As I Do.”

“Yeah, I’m vetoing that nickname. And seriously, this isn’t really like you.”

“Actually, I was totally like this. I mean, I’ve been totally like this before. I missed work because I was so focused on work.”

“Yeah, but you’ve kind of...grown out of that. Or at least you weren’t like this about it other than when you were all imposter syndrome about your suit. I mean, buddy, I get being obsessed with your work, but you fainted. You’ve been mainlining energy drinks. It’s been six days. Even when you get weird and obsessed, you usually at least interact with...anyone. And energy drinks are like...caffeine and sugar. You somehow think both of those things are bad for you. Also, it’s been six days. This isn’t Ray behavior.”

“Oh, like you really know me,” Ray snaps.

His outburst causes only vague confusion. “...I do really know you, Ray. We all do.  We’re on the same ship and the same team. We have literally met you as a child.”

Ray flounders. “Okay, you might have a point. But I’m just...this is important! I’m brushing up on nuclear physics! I mean, not that I’m not good at nuclear physics, I’m possibly amazing—it’s healthy to recognize your own talents—but I’ve really been leaning on the engineering side lately, not so much the theoretical, and now without...” he trails off and swallows hard. “Without Marty, I’m catching up. There are some questions I never got to ask him and now...” his voice breaks, and he runs a shaking hand through his greasy hair, “I have to figure them out myself.”

Silence settles over the room like a shroud, and Sara, without even thinking, looks over at the corner of the room where no one is, half expecting to see a familiar form sighing in a put upon way and pacing back and forth like a ruffled chicken.

Maybe Stein could’ve talked some sense into Ray.

Sara clears her throat and Nate looks down at the floor and Zari looks up at the ceiling in the way people do when they’re trying not to cry and Mick just stares at nothing because he’s staring at memories instead—he and the professor made a weird amount of memories in this medbay—and Ray swipes at his eyes.  “If he was still alive, I could just use the temporal communicator to ask him, but he’s not, and I never got to ask him, and I don’t know if I’ll ever figure it all out.”

“He had more...time, Ray,” Sara says, and the words sound so ridiculous (he didn’t get enough time, he didn’t) she wants to laugh until she cries and then probably never stop crying, for Martin and Rip and Leonard and Laurel and even Jax, so far away and with half of him dead and gone. She doesn’t do any of that. She soldiers on. “He had more time to get it all figured out, and when you have...more time, so will you.”

And eventually, she absolutely does not say because no one says it, you’ll have even more time than he did, if everything turns out right.

Ray laughs a little. “That implies that I’ll ever be as good at theoretical nuclear physics as Marty.”

“Maybe you won’t be,” Zari chimes in. “But that doesn’t mean you’re not a genius and it doesn’t mean you’ll, what? Let us all down because you’re not him? You’re not him. You’re you.”

“He’s never coming back,” Mick offers in a grumbling undertone from where he’s leaning against the far wall. “You can’t replace dead people, and you suck at trying.”

He meets Ray’s eyes, and Ray remembers that time that they tried. He manages a smile. “I know.”

He sighs heavily and says, “I really went off the rails for a second there, didn’t I?”

Sara shrugs. “Happens to all of us.”

“I should eat,” Ray admits. “I can’t believe I forgot. I mean, I can, but that’s why I have alarms.”

“What happened to those?” Nate asks.

“I think I spilled Monster on my phone.”

“That checks out.” Nate heaves out a sigh. “Okay. Let’s go to the kitchen, big guy. You can go back to bothering us about three square meals again. And water intake.”

Ray agrees, because hydration is very important, no matter what the Ray who’d forgotten that Marty wasn’t actually just a call away seemed to think, and he only sways a little on his feet when he stands up after getting the saline drip out.

Constantine is in the kitchen when the rest of the team traipses in, sprawled on a chair and reading some kind of velvet-bound tome with his feet propped up on one of the other chairs. He looks up at the other Legends and says, “Ah, you’re back, then?”

Ray attempts one of his usual smiles, but it takes more work than usual. “I’m back.”

He wanders to the middle of the kitchen and just kind of stands there while the others wait for him to have a cardiac event or maybe pass out again.

Instead:

“What should I eat?” Ray asks the world at large, waffling. He really is not hungry, and he really does feel kind of sick to his stomach, like one might after drinking eighteen cans of a brand of energy drink he remembered seeing on a billboard in Star City.

“Waffles?” Nate suggests. “It’s breakfast.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, bro. Six days after last time you ate breakfast.”

Ray sighs and murmurs, probably to himself, “I just haven’t been able to figure it out without him.”

Nate and Sara share a look. It’s not a happy look. Trace amounts of the absences on the ship have traveled into every part of it, including the oxygen, and sometimes it hurts just to breathe.

“Grapefruit,” Ray says decisively, distracting everyone from their separate waves of grief for just a moment. “I want grapefruit.”

Very suddenly, everyone realizes that they also kind of want grapefruit, even though none of them can remember the last time they had it. Still, all of them—other than Constantine, who’s feeling a bit odd about the whole vibe in the kitchen right now, from Mick’s surprisingly glossy eyes to the way that Gideon’s already prepared a giant bowl of that infernal fruit even before Zari comes around to ask for it—know exactly where the craving is coming from.

(It’s an attempt to at least calm that empty ache in their stomachs that isn’t hunger, the one for Martin, because grief makes everything revolve around what—who—just isn’t anymore and somehow still is everything, like all of them have become planets orbiting a black hole, only surviving getting sucked in and pulled to pieces by a miracle of metaphorical pseudoscience, or maybe just each other.)

Zari plops the huge bowl of grapefruit halves down on the table, and Ray’s the first to take one. He digs his spoon into the fruit and sighs in pleasure when he takes a bite, clearly coming to the realization that his miraculous lack of hunger paired with queasiness is indeed actually the feeling one gets when starving. He gets through two grapefruits before he slows down at all.

All of them realize, while eating their breakfast, that, objectively, they don’t like grapefruit.

It’s still somehow delicious—though, Mick says critically, his is a little tart.

(They would all be horrified if they knew that somewhere on their Earth lives a woman—one they know and love, even!—who eats her grapefruit with salt, but there’s no one here who can share that particular little anecdote, and so the story goes untold.)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/14898194

[katelynrstricker]

The Face of Depression

Precisely 3 months ago today, I stepped outside without a nurse or nurse’s assistant by my side for the first time in a week. The prior days were spent abiding by a timely schedule, being shuffled to and fro in a maze of a building fraught with locked doors, and following a dress code that spoke of disallowing hoodies, belts, and shoestrings. I found myself in a land where your safety is prioritized over your freedom out of necessity, not out of desire for control. And thus, for 7 days, staff at a psychiatric hospital focused on a girl who arrived with a severe episode of Major Depression with suicidal ideation, and who was trying to fight for any shred of hope amidst overwhelming tears and terrifying, uncontrollable racing thoughts. 

And yes, that girl was me.

Now, the previous words scribbled above have probably already made several of you pouring over the bluntly honest words shuffle in your seat out of discomfort or disturbance. Wondering whether or not you should, or could, continue reading a post about such a bleak and arduous topic as mental illness and its facets. (Or perhaps some view mental illness as an imaginative falsehood people employ to excuse their shortcomings. Which I will say right now, I wholeheartedly disagree with, and I will speak to that in the coming phrases.)

But let me assure you, I am not devising this post as a means of promoting dismally destructive ideations, but of putting forth hope and love for all individuals, suffering from mental illness or not. So, please, keep reading.

And surely there are also those reading who are already mourning over my “reputation” that will now seemingly be tarnished by the admission of struggling with my mind at times. People who say: 

“You don’t want others thinking differently of you, do you?.....”

 “Now that you’ve posted this, surely future employers will see this and know that you’ve struggled with depression and take that into consideration.....”

“Men don’t want women who struggle with anxiety and depression because it’s too overbearing, so go ahead and get used to the idea of living your life as a single woman forever.....”. 

And yes, all of these are “points” people share with those who struggle with mental health, believe it or not. People, uncomfortable or dismissive of the topic, try to shove mental health back into the shadows using rejection as the key motivator. Because if we don’t address destructive monsters and stick our heads in the sand, recklessly ignoring crucial elements of life, then “the monsters won’t exist,” and we can continue to bask in our flawless reputations, right? 

To all of this, let me be clear: We cannot ignore mental health. It is VERY REAL and must not be ignored, but must be addressed with vulnerability and sincerity, aiming at figuring out how to better help those struggling with it, and how to better equip individuals on assisting those who are in need. 

And, as far as my “reputation” is concerned, I do not give a flying rip if others view me differently as a result. 

Because this topic needs to be addressed.

 And stereotypes need to be challenged.

Because, guess what? People suffer from mental illness silently every day, afraid to speak up out of crippling fear that others will indeed view them differently, or view them as “damaged goods”, or that they will be told that “it’s made up in their mind because depression isn’t real” or that someone will tell them that “they just aren’t trusting God enough”.

In my nearly 27 years, I’ve always been described as relentlessly bold in one way or another. Whether it be my outlandish sense of style, vehemently standing by subjects I deem of paramount importance, reiterating optimism despite a dismal outlook, or being decisively upfront in letting others know that I truly care about them despite the entire possibility (or probability) of rejection. 

I am not motivated by the reputation tattooed on me by man. 

I am motivated by the honesty, boldness, and passion God has placed within me. And I do not intend to let it lay to waste in any facet. And not when it comes to something as critical as mental health. I will not let my experience go unused. And thus, I continue.....

One of the things about mental health is that, often, there is a stereotype associated with those who suffer. Those who are overwhelmed by these illnesses are :

“The loners”.....

”Those who spend their days huddled in their bed with the lights off and blinds drawn, watching emotionally destabilizing movies until their tears could water a garden”.....

“The goth who dresses in all black and creates dark art”.....

“Those who are wasting away with drugs”.....

“Those covered with tattoos head to toe and who have multiple piercings”.....

The list goes on and on.

But hardly ever would you hear anyone say the one suffering is notably:

“The individual known for astonishingly optimistic speech”.....

“The one who is smiling at nearly all times”.....

“The one who wears whimsical and happy ensembles”.....

“The one who spends their time engulfed in social interaction”.....

“The one who has unequivocal energy and seeks opportunity”..... 

“The one who believes that God has a reason for everything”.....

“The one who thrives on making others smile”..... and so on.

You just don’t hear that. 

Because, subconsciously, many don’t believe that those people could *truly* be suffering internally if we cannot easily identify their struggle from the sidelines. 

We unknowingly become regulators and referees of the internal emotional lives of others, sometimes making horrendous calls due to the inability to see the play with clarity.

As a culture, we are often taught that you can tell everything you need to know about a person from the outer shell, or that you can easily identify whether or not someone is “doing okay”. But that is simply not always the case.

Many of those suffering, including myself, don’t fit the “profile of the troubled”. I have had numerous people speak to me since briefly opening up about my mental health, and many of them had said variations on the following: 

“You were always the optimistic, smiley one. I never even considered that you might battle with depression.”

“You look healthy, though.”

“You have so much going for you, though.”

“You are the energetic, nice one.”

“You looked so put together, though.”

“You are so laid back and easy to talk to, though. You’ve always been carefree.”

“You’re the most free-spirited person I know.”

Now, I know that each and every person who spoke those words to me are very well-meaning individuals and who in no way were discounting my experiences. And I love each and every one of those people dearly. They were merely speaking to the idea that I am trying to portray to you right know. Which is that depression and mental illness don’t follow our “guidelines”.

Unbeknownst to me, my reputation had apparently decided for me that I was not eligible to apply for a diagnosis of depression with suicidal ideation, anxiety, or panic disorder. And that is something I want to bring to people’s attention.

I am one of the many faces of depression.

Depression and mental illness does NOT have a “look”.

It does NOT follow stereotypes.

It does NOT care if you smile or frown.

It does NOT care if you are social or a hermit.

If does NOT care if you’re rich or poor.

It does NOT care if you believe in God or not.

It does NOT care if your life looks good from the outside.

It simply does NOT CARE.

Everyone is vulnerable to mental illness. Sure, there are individuals who may be more susceptible to it due to a family history, such as me, but that does not mean that everyone else will remain untouched.

Life is difficult. We may endure stress, trauma, physical abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse, PTSD, destabilizing life changes, and the like.

The smiling, optimistic individual is not invincible, just as the “stereotypically disturbed” person is not invincible.

Keep this in mind. 

It is NOT up to us to decide if someone is hurting or not. If they confide in you that they are hurting, BELIEVE THEM. Even if they do not radiate the stereotypical signs. And even if what is hurting them would not have hurt you to that degree. We do not get to decide for someone else.

Do not be afraid to ask questions and dig deep with people in emotional vulnerability. And don’t be afraid to ask the challenging questions should you find that someone is indeed hurting. There is nothing more loving that you could do in that instance.  I would rather someone ask a personal question, and everything be okay, than have someone assume someone is doing well, and find out that they were wrong, too late.

Don’t be afraid to ask them if they’ve considered hurting themselves. Don’t be afraid to ask them if they have a plan. Don’t be afraid to ask them if they’ve considered suicide. 

Many people feel as though asking these questions may instill those ideas in that person’s mind, but that goes against findings in the mental health field. If those ideas are going to be in someone’s mind, they’re already in their mind when you ask.

My sister, a counselor, asked me the hard questions through what was quite honestly, the most overwhelmingly unwelcome and distressing mental anguish I’ve ever experienced, and it is perhaps one of the reasons why I am still here today.  

Diving deeper into the hearts of those around you, suffering or not, is one of the most crucial things you could do to show your love and support, and that it is not superficial, but it is unwavering even in the face of difficulty.

Because suffering does not just happen externally, with broken bones and broken flesh, but it happens internally with broken hearts and chemical imbalances in the brain.

One of the reasons many people don’t consider mental illness or depression to be a “true medical issue” is the fact that it cannot be seen externally, with an X-ray, or a blood test. However, the lack of these distinctive exams does not indicate that mental illness or depression is a figment of the imagination. Rather, depression is caused by an imbalance of chemicals in the brain that creates mental AND physical reactions.

Yes, there is the mental misery (which can be unbearable), but there are also physical consequences that can occur such as: 

Elevated heart rate

Increased blood pressure

Tingling of limbs and / or other body parts such as the face

Shaking, trembling

Decreased / increased appetite

Lethargy

Crying spells

Insomnia or hypersomnia

Panic attacks (which often also boast of difficulty breathing and chest pain, and honestly feel like you will legitimately bite the dust in a matter of moments), 

and so forth.

Mental illness and depression impact people more than just emotionally and psychologically. It is also physical.

Depression is not a choice, as some people say. 

Nobody would ever choose to endure this debilitating illness. To have their mind turn against them....to have their body rebelling. I promise you, nobody would choose that pain, given the option.

I did NOT choose those destructive thoughts racing through my mind. 

I did NOT want to be afraid that I would hurt myself. 

I couldn’t explain to you how, the day after my panic attacks began and my depression entirely unleashed itself, I saw pictures of myself and my friends on my bedroom wall and my mind whispered that those would be the only pictures I’d ever have together with those I love, that they would be displayed at my memorial, and how I wept uncontrollably as a result of that lie. 

I can’t explain to you how precisely the mind wields its sword of destruction, causing torment. 

But I know that mental health and mental agony is REAL and it can be vicious and unrelenting. 

That is not to scare you. But it is to promote awareness in ourselves and others.

The images and thoughts were not my choice. 

My mind was looking for a way out of the legitimate pain I was experiencing, and that is precisely why I sought help. 

So I would still be alive today. 

Trust me when I say that I would never have willingly chosen that pain. Nobody would have. Although I do believe that God must have a purpose in me having walked through it. 

Whether it is that I have learned more about myself, or that I could help even one person through sharing my experience.

My week in the psychiatric hospital, was, in total transparency, a blessing. 

Yes, you read that right. A BLESSING.

It allowed me to separate myself from the immediate stressors that were slowly drowning me.

It allowed me to be placed on a medication to assist in correcting the chemical imbalance in my brain.

It was a refuge of safety in a time where I was trying so hard to reject satan’s lies and trying to fight for myself and a future.

It was a time of bonding with those around me, in solidarity, reiterating that EVERYONE IS IMPORTANT.

I sat with other women who shared their stories.

Stories of attempted suicide. When their saving grace was that they hadn’t yet pulled the trigger when they passed out from the meds.

Stories of relapsing in addiction and wanting to break free from its hold on their life.

Stories of losing their family members while using drugs and how they regret not being there in their loved one’s last moments.

Stories of hurting themselves, but having no recollection of it happening.

Stories of living with a physical disability after an accident and struggling with the will to live, and struggling with feeling as though they were worth it despite their handicaps.

It was a zone of vulnerability and realness that I hadn’t experienced before.

These women were REAL about their struggles. 

They were HONEST about their emotional state. 

And that is something that I have rarely crossed paths with in the outside world, but I’ve always hoped I would encounter. 

I am so thankful to know now that it’s possible to speak openly and have others embrace it and then reciprocate unabashedly.

Ultimately, the location in which I met these women is insignificant, although society would often label them (us) regardless. These women were there to get help, which ultimately signifies the bravery it takes in the admission of struggling.

I learned an abundance from them. 

You know, we are all exactly the same. 

No matter where we find ourselves. 

We are all worthy of love.

(There may be someone out there thinking “Well, maybe I could have sympathy on everyone except those who have an addiction, because doing those drugs was clearly their choice.” To you, I will say: Yes, using illegal substances is a choice, but who in this life has not chosen to do something that would cause them harm in some form or another? We have ALL made self-destructive choices, whether it be through lying, sexual immorality, pride, manipulation, drugs, etc. But that does not mean that we cease to love, and love wholly. That does not mean that we cease to encourage healing.)

I loved these women who were raw and encouraging.

Who comforted me when I began bawling and shaking at the start of the first day.

Who told me it gets better.

Who told me that I was worth it.

Who spurred me on to face this monster head on.

We were all admittedly “broken”, but used our scraps to make a beautiful work of art anyway.

Being a human is hard enough without the rift that mental illness can create in a conversation. 

Without the stereotyping and labeling that ensues. 

Without the judgment that others may rain down upon us in an attempt to drown out cries for help.

Please, be open. 

Be honest. 

Ask questions. 

Listen.

Be vulnerable.

Reach out.

We do not need anything else to separate us.

We don’t need mental health to continue to be a taboo topic, letting our friends and family believe that they should hide their pain out of sight, or disguise it so as to pass for normalcy.

We truly are all the same.

Sometimes we need to be hugged.

Sometimes we need a listening ear.

Sometimes we need to hear “I love you.”

Sometimes we need to hear “You are worth it.”

Sometimes we need to hear “Me too. You’re not alone.”

In the face of good times.

And in the face of bad times.

And in the face of depression.

Love goes further than we could ever comprehend. Truly.

So, I don’t mind talking about it. 

If you have questions or want to discuss mental health or my experiences, I would love to talk to you about it.

And please just know,

whoever you are reading this:

I love you.

Just the way you are.