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nowoyas · 5 years ago

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Picks and Locks

A/N: Izumonth day 16! For the rest of the lineup, head over here!

Summary: You stumble across a suspicious student from another course, apparently trying to break into a random lock. Might as well help him out, right? (support course!Izuku x reader)

Warnings: uhhhh there’s a handcuff at one point and implied bullying but that’s bout it

Word Count: 2100+

"What are you doing?"

The question is simple—no accusations, no hostility, nothing but pure curiosity—but it still causes the boy in front of you to flinch violently, his quiet muttering cutting off in a quiet 'eep!'. His hands freeze on the padlock he's working with, and if you're not mistaken, that's a makeshift shim he's trying to wriggle into the lock.

"Are you… trying to pick that lock?"

You'd been wandering the halls of UA after classes finished for the day, having no cause to stay but not quite wanting to go home yet, only to stumble across what appears to you to be a fellow first year trying to break open the lock on a toolbox.

"I-it's not what it looks like!" he yelps, turning around with a clatter as the toolbox slips from his lap. "T-this is my toolbox, I just... Someone stole the key to the lock, so I was trying to get it open..."

The boy before you at least has the presence to look ashamed at his actions. "Sorry, I'll get out of your way."

You frown. "You're going to cut your hand using a shitty shim like that. Have you ever picked a lock before?"

His mouth hangs open, and eventually, he shakes his head. "Uh, no, I was—"

You click your tongue, sitting on the floor beside him and rifling through your bag for something. "Let me help you." When your hand closes around the leather casing, you rejoice silently, laying your lockpicking kit out beside you and pulling out a proper shim. As you begin to work it into the lock, you give the boy a solid once-over out of the corner of your eye.

He's kinda cute, in a weird, plain way. Freckles dance among the pink painting his cheeks—either he's naturally flushed, or he's blushing, you're not sure which—and unruly green curls sit atop his head. He leans in to inspect the work you're doing on his lock, brilliant green eyes taking in every movement of your hands.

You wiggle the shim as best you can, but the lock doesn't want to give. "Maybe it needs two...?" you mumble, reaching for another and sliding it down the other side of the lock. With just a bit more work, the padlock clicks open, the contents of the toolbox freed.

"Ha! Success!" you cheer, turning to hand the opened lock over to the nervously silent boy. The moment you do, you're startled by the feeling of something clicking in place around your wrist and jerking you towards him. His own wrist is jerked into place, followed by another click, and it takes you a very long moment to realize that some guy just handcuffed you to this poor, shy stranger.

"...um."

The perpetrator bolts, laughing and shouting something over his shoulder about having fun. The boy you're now attached to flinches, remaining silent; you'd be concerned for him if you weren't still processing the sudden errant handcuffing. He doesn't even seem surprised.

You wave your free hand in front of the boy's face. "Hey, are you okay? Are you used to random assholes handcuffing you to strangers?"

He flushes, flinching. The motion jerks your wrist a little. Fucker definitely cuffed you too tight. "N-no, I—sorry, you were just trying to help and—" Tears pool in the corners of his eyes.

"Woah, hey. You're okay. It's not that big a deal, right?" You flash him a reassuring smile, slowly dropping your cuffed hand to rest between the two of you. "Seriously, does that kind of stuff happen to you a lot? Do you want me to come with you to talk to a teacher? I'm sure someone will—"

"I-it's okay, really! Sorry for worrying you. H-here, I can help you carry your stuff to one of the support labs and work on getting that cuff off of you."

You work on packing up your lockpicking tools one-handed, keeping your smile present as the boy wipes his eyes. "It's no big deal! My quirk lets me manipulate metal with enough concentration. I can take a look at it real fast." You concentrate on the metal at hand (or wrist, in this case), trying to morph it enough to release your wrist...

...

.....

"Um. So that's an issue."

"W-what is?"

"Either these aren't metal, or my quirk's broken."

He peers at the handcuffs again, face going pale. "Oh no. I recognize these..."

You tilt your head, finally managing to get your lockpicking kit into your bookbag. "Elaborate?"

"I made them," he admits, though he doesn't look too pleased. "They're quirk-reducing cuffs. A prototype. Come on, I'm going to have to disassemble them if Saionji-kun still has the keys."

"'Quirk-reducing'?" you question as he leads you to an unfamiliar part of the school. "Not quirk-cancelling?"

"N-no, um, so... Some people have quirks that severely alter their bodies, right? In some cases, they just look different from normal. But some quirks cause their users to produce stuff that could be really harmful to them if their quirk got completely cancelled, like if they naturally have glass in their body, or maybe they naturally produce a chemical that's normally dangerous to other people. I-I'm trying to develop cuffs that restrain the wearer without potentially severely harming them if they have a quirk like that."

Your eyes light up. "I see! That's a really good point! How far along are these, compared to what you're going for?"

"Well... I'm still fine-tuning them," he admits, rubbing the back of his neck. "Right now, I've managed to find an alternate method of quirk cancellation than the cuffs already on the market, and I'm trying to see how much I can scale it back while still effectively subduing a villain."

He stops and maneuvers the door to the lab open, sparing you a glance. "I-it might be a little loud, Hatsume-san's inventions tend to be a bit... explosive."

The teacher, a shirtless man with some weird fucking helmet on his head, spares the two of you a questioning look as you enter. The boy leads you over. "U-um, I know I haven't put in a request to use the lab after hours today, b-b-but, um, it's kind of an emergency..." He bows, raising your linked wrists.

The teacher scoffs. "How'd you end up cuffed like that?"

The boy stiffens. "Um! Y-y-you see, it was an accident, a-and I lost the k-key, and—"

You raise an eyebrow, but for now, you remain silent. Maybe he's just shy, and that dude really was his friend playing a prank. "I'm really clumsy, Sensei," you lie, bowing as best you can while your wrist is still cuffed to his. "I was helping him with a broken lock and I messed with his cuffs without asking and tripped, and we have no idea where the key is."

"Well, I can't very well let you kids be stuck together. Have at it, just don't blow anything up or touch anything, even if it doesn't look like it'll explode."

You nod, and the boy leads you by the hand to a free workbench. You set his toolbox on the table in front of you, and he somehow managed to wrangle his arm around until you're stretched across the table. Helpfully, you push the toolbox within his reach.

The boy sets to work immediately, lower lip sticking out in a pout as he begins searching for the right tools. "I-I'm sorry again, about all this."

"Don't be. So, you're a support course student?"

He nods, something like pain in his eyes. "Yeah."

"You don't seem very happy about it," you observe. Maybe you're more alike than you thought.

The boy doesn't respond for a moment. When he does, it's so quiet you almost don't hear it over the noises of... Whatever the hell that pink-haired girl is doing in the background.

"I guess I'm not."

You frown. He looks wounded at his own words, intently focusing on unscrewing the cuff on his wrist as though his eyes aren't shining at the admission.

"I know I'm a total stranger, but you've got my wrist, you know. I can lend an ear, too, if you ever wanna talk."

He flinches like he's wounded at your offer, the motion jerking your wrist and torso unfairly. You wince as your chest hits the bench. "Ah! S-sorry, sorry! I just... I'm not used to people offering stuff like that. I wouldn't want to trouble you."

"I won't force you, but I think we might be similar. I'm not where I want to be either."

His eyes flicker to study your face before concentrating on the cuffs. "You're not?"

"Nah. I hurt my wrist pretty bad the day of the entrance exam and didn't perform half as well as I could have. I don't even know if I would have made it into the hero course if I were at my best, but now I'll never know, y'know?"

He swallows, nods. "What course are you in now?"

"I ended up in General Studies," you admit sheepishly. "I'm going to try to transfer into the hero course if I can, but in the meantime I feel like I'm missing out on so much. It fucking sucks."

He flinches, the screwdriver slipping from its drive from the motion. "I couldn't make it into the hero course either," he admits quietly. "It's always been my dream, but..." The boy falls silent, re-slotting his screwdriver and finally managing to unscrew the piece of his cuff that he was working on.

You frown. "I'm sorry to hear that. Are you going to try to transfer, or...?"

He shakes his head. "I should have given up years ago."

"Hey, don't say that! I'm sure you'd be a great hero. I think people who can build stuff like these cuffs are pretty amazing too, though. I don't have the mind for this stuff. Pretty much all I'm good at is fighting."

He shoots you a pained smile as he finally frees his wrist from the cuff, moving to disassemble the cuff on your wrist now that both his hands are freed. "You wouldn't be saying that if you knew me. Thanks, though. For trying to be nice."

You frown. "I'm serious! You're kinda timid, but you seem really nice. You can train to fight, but you can't teach someone compassion."

"It doesn't matter," he insists, and you swear you see a stray tear slip down his cheek. "I'm quirkless. E-even... Everyone's always said I can't be a hero like that, and they're right."

"What the fuck" leaves your mouth before you can even think about it. "That's so shitty! Who the hell's going around saying rude shit like that?"

He blinks in shock. "It's... not that big of a deal. I'm used to that sort of thing, so..."

"You shouldn't be," you frown. "It's not right or fair."

Your words don't seem to help the boy at all. He simply turns back to working on your cuff in silence with a sad look on his face.

"If you ever decide you want to try to transfer, I could use a training buddy?" you offer, angling yourself awkwardly to pull out your phone and slide an empty contact over to him. "Or, you know, if you just want to talk. I don't really have a lot of friends in general studies, or at all, so, um."

The boy's face flushes. "Y-you, um, yeah! Sure! Sounds great, let me, um—" He pops off the piece holding the cuff in place on your wrist, allowing it to finally come loose and free your wrist. Just as fast, he's shakily entering his name and number into your phone. "—I uh, I never got your name," he admits quietly, words almost lost beneath the noise of the support lab.

You flush. "Oh! I'm so sorry, god, no wonder I struggle to make friends. [full name], it's good to meet you! Thanks for helping get the cuff off me, and uh. If you want, I can tell off that guy who stole your key and stuff for you?"

"Oh, no, that's r-really okay!" the boy yelps, sliding your phone back over to you. "M-My name's Midoriya Izuku. Thanks for helping me with my lock earlier."

"No, don't mention it! I should be getting home soon, but I'll text you, alright?" You roll your wrist, rubbing at where the cuff had dug into the skin slightly. Now that you're free, you slip your bookbag back onto your back, grab your phone, and give the Midoriya boy a little wave on your way out.

He watches you go, rubbing his own wrist with flushed cheeks.

Maybe it's worth giving transferring at least one shot, he thinks. If for no other reason than to have an excuse to train with you.

Tags: @tooloudarts @sapid-rose @xxangelpridexx @birds-have-teeth @icythotsenpai @warmchoccymilk @wesparklebitch @izoodles @fujimoribaby @my-bnha-things @denise-the-death-goddess @themerpenguin @sincerebubbles @fudobaby

#midoriya izuku x reader #izuku midoriya x reader #deku x reader #bnha x reader #bnha reader insert #mha reader insert #mha x reader #support course!izuku #izumonth server collab #my fics

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jbrentonparker · 5 years ago

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Plotting Method #7: Stream of Consciousness

Okay. Full disclosure. This is how I plot, and it’s a mess--but a lot of fun, in my opinion; and if you have a lot of thoughts all at once that aren’t necessarily coming out in a logical order, it may be the method for you.

This method doesn’t really have coherent steps, because it’s just based on the natural flow of your own thoughts.

Where to Start

Start with whatever you have. For the examples here, I’m going to make something up as a I go along, exactly as I would if I were doing this in real life.

Maybe you have an idea for a character, or a scene, or a concept. Start there by just writing it down. I write it as if I’m talking to myself, in full sentences, but may you’ll do bullet points, or a mind map, or some other method.

EXAMPLE: “Story idea: a story where a guy is on the run from death. Death is looking for him for some reason, and he’s trying not to be found.”

Expanding Upon the Idea

Okay, so now you have... something. And you don’t really know where to go with it. So start asking yourself questions, and try to answer them. They don’t have to be good answers, and you don’t have to use any of what you write. You’re just brainstorming until something clicks.

EXAMPLE: “So why is death after him??? Maybe he was supposed to die but found a way not to? May he was sick, knew he was dying, and somehow found a way to hide from Death (who is like an actual being in this world). Or maybe he died in some accident and made a deal with Death to get a little more time, and now Death is here to collect after the time runs out, but in the meantime the guy has found out a way to hide from Death? I think I like the first idea better though.”

Bouncing Around

One thing that is nice about this method is that you don’t need to work chronologically. You can bounce around as ideas come to you, and then go back and rework what you’ve come up with so far to fit in with the new ideas.

EXAMPLES: “I have this image in my head of a scene where the guy has finally been caught by Death, and is standing in like this... in-between, limbo world or something. Death is all pleased he’s finally caught up with the guy, but then the guy whips out this item, like a coin, that buys his way out of death. And maybe that’s how he does it, there are these special coins that can “buy” your freedom from death, and he has some way of finding them, over and over again, and always has at least one when Death shows up to collect the next time. And maybe he keeps dying over and over again in ridiculous ways, like eagles dropping turtles on his head and having sinkholes open up under his feet, as Death keeps trying to take him by surprise.”

Give Yourself a Goal

Once you have something to work off, start asking yourself questions about the conflict, climax, character goals, etc etc. Start working on getting your plot some direction, goals, and structure.

EXAMPLE: “So I know the conflict is this guy running from and outwitting Death, but what’s the climax? Where does that lead? Maybe he has to work WITH Death for some reason? Maybe he meets someone who needs to die by the end of the story? I feel like I want the main character to have to die in the end, but he has accepted it, and is ready to let it happen. Oh, maybe he meets someone who is going to die for some untimely reason, like they weren’t supposed to, and he has to give that person his coin to save them? Like, maybe he meets this woman, and while he’s in Limbo with Death, handing over his coin and getting out of dying for the millionth time, Death suddenly feels... like, a disturbance in the force. Something has happened that wasn’t supposed to, someone’s fate has been changed. Maybe Death pulls out this hourglass and sees that someone’s hourglass has suddenly lost a huge amount of sand at once--not supposed to happen. Death go,es there, bring MC for some reason? MC meets the woman, maybe she’s a Queen or leader of a group or country, and someone is planning to assassinate her. Death has a lot of work to do obviously, but can’t have this kind of reality-altering nonsense going on, so partly out of spite, he tells the MC to fix whatever has gone wrong and protect this woman, and he (Death) will stop trying to kill MC all the time. So then it becomes this political intrigue thing.”

Inevitable Changes

Do you see what happened up there in my example? Originally, I’d started out with an idea that the main conflict was between the Main Character (MC) and Death, and that the main antagonist was, more or less, Death. But now I have this completely different main antagonist, some shadowy assassin, and Death and my MC are forced to become allies. Things change as you work and come up with new ideas--and sometimes, you might follow a thread of an idea to the end, and find out it doesn’t work after all. You may have to throw it out and start over, possibly more than once. But it also helps you avoid plot holes later, by working through them in the planning stages.

Keeping Track of it All

The biggest challenge with this method is ending up with twenty pages of rambling plot, half of which you changed or didn’t use or is just you asking yourself questions.

How I combat this is by liberal use of my word processor’s highlighter. Once I feel like I’ve hit on something I’ll use, I’ll highlight it in the document, usually according to some kind of color-coded system (e.g. yellow for plot points, orange for actual scene ideas, blue for character ideas/background/development, green for lines of dialogue I’ve just thought of, etc).

Then, once I’ve plotted out as much as I can, I’ll go back through the document, pull those highlighted bits, and put them all in their own document--et viola, I have an outline.

The beauty of this method is it allows you to plot as minimally or extensively as you like. You can use it just to get a general sense of your overall plot, or keep drilling down until you end up with a chapter-by-chapter outline.

________________________________________________________________

If more structured plotting methods feel too restrictive or cookie-cutter, this could be a good alternative. If you’re transitioning from pantser to planner, it could be a good method to ease yourself into the new writing style. If you struggle with writing yourself into plot holes, this method could allow you to pursue plot threads in more depth before you write them, allowing you to spot pitfalls earlier on and avoid them later. Or if you find yourself just coming up with too many ideas all at once and struggle to get the first ones written down without forgetting the later ones, this method could allow you to just get all those ideas down and worry about stringing them together later.

#story plotting #plot ideas #plot #plot methods #plotting methods #writing tips #writing ideas #story structure #how to plot a story

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thoughtfullyrainynightmare · 4 years ago

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Hello Laura,

I’m 98% sure I’m accidentally going to end up rambling with this and also this may seem like a outta left field ask so... fair warning and I’m sorry in advance if it comes off as ‘huh?’ or something like that.

I’ve been out of the loop for a few days now and just logged on to see the Constellations Ask Game.

Personally, I love love LOVE comparing different methods like

horoscopes

zodiac

astrology/constellations

birth signs

cartomancy (probably one of my favs - I find this one really interesting)

tarot cards (both different and similar to cartomancy and vice versa... but, my opinion, these 2 methods are more different than they are similar)

palmistry

numerology

pendulums

spirit animals

and other fortune/horoscope telling methods/tools from all over the world through history. Practices like these and others alike that are scattered through history can seem small and insignificant in the grand scheme of things with everything that’s happened throughout the centuries...

but things like this, knowing the symbolism of something can give you a better insight of understanding different religions, mythologies, demonology, art, cinema, literature, etc. etc. because at the end of the day, when there isn’t much to go on, how symbolism is interpreted by someone and then used in whatever belief or work; based off of said interpretation can lead you to draw allegories between works, beliefs, or societies you probably would’ve never thought could’ve gotten something from one another; regardless if it was conscientiously or not - symbolism can open the doors to questions like

Why did this culture choose this to represent that?

Were they an isolated society that made it up on their own or could they have learned it from someone/somewhere else?

What was the interpretation then and the connection to how it is viewed today?

What allegorical conclusions can be drawn between this method ‘originated’ at point a and that method ‘originated’ at point b - if these two cultures are on opposite sides of the world and had to foreseeable means of communication with each other?

Etc. Etc.

& That’s one of my favorite aspects about Black Clover other than the story itself and the captain/magic-knight eye candy: Tabata’s use of symbolism and mythology is a talent in of itself; the way he dissects the tiniest context of something from various European mythologies and then uses it to his full advantage to hide in the crevices of a character, continually builds upon each reference and said reference(s) will start to reveal itself(themselves) as the character(a) develops throughout the progression of the story... sorry that was a bit of a tangent - but Tabata’s use of these things throughout Black Clover is so ingenious he deserves recognition and praise for that aspect of his storytelling...

I’m rambling aren’t I? (i warned you at the beginning this wasn’t going to be a conventional ask, sorry if I keep getting off topic) SO THE POINT OF THIS ASK — THE CONSTELLATIONS ASK GAME – I already knew there was a whole plethora of constellations named after figures in Greek mythology... however I was only briefly aware of a handful of Greek Mythology constellations that were used in astrology personality/horoscope predictions like our typical western Aries/Taurus/Gemini/Cancer/Leo(plod)/Virgo/Libra/Scorpius/Sagittarius/Capricornus/Aquarius/Pisces.

Dang it! I was rambling again wasn’t I? Stop rambling me! MY POINT IS: this ask game is one of the first times I’ve seen this many Greek Mythology constellations used that are apparently also used similarly to western zodiac astrology/horoscopes...

SO Laura, I was just wondering if you could please tell me if you knew the name or branch where these constellations stem from - in terms of fortune telling and birth signs? or just any knowledge basically you have in general related to the following?

Andromeda

Cassiopeia

Corvus

Draco

Hydra

Lyra

Persei

Pyxis

(tbh, going down the list, with all the Greek mythology references I almost asked about Taurus too because I read it as ‘Tartarus’ 😅)

Ursa Major

Ursa Minor

Apus

Aquila

Caelum

Canis Major

Crux

Indus

Lupus

Musca

Orion

Pavo

Phoenix

Puppis

Laura, if this is all too odd of an ask I completely understand... and again I apologize for how overboard I can get with my rambling... I just get very passionate and excited so when you’re trying to type it all down vs. talking to someone face to face where it’s easier to read social cues... it’s more difficult remembering when to cut off the sentence and shut up... like now🤭

Always, always, always enjoy your blog Laura! Regardless if this gets answered or not - I hope you have a lovely rest of your day!

Hiya anon~! ^_^

No worries, no worries, we all can ramble when we get exited!

But let me, let me try to get a hold of this first 😅

Okay, so:

I am not that well versed in mythology, but I do have a kind of fondness for it.

Andromeda & Cassiopeia: I believe that she was a princess in Greek mythology, the daughter of Cassiopeia. And the story goes that Cassiopeia boasted about being the most beautiful, which angers Poseidon. And Poseidon then sends a kind of sea monster (or a dragon) to torment the nation. Andromeda is to be sacrificed for the beast in an effort to calm it, but she gets saved Perseus (who later marries her and makes her his queen). And "Andromeda" apparently means "Ruler of men".

I don't know if the name "Cassiopeia" means anything, but it seems to be connected to beauty.

Corvus: It's a constellation that was known as "Raven" in some point, and was apparently one of the constellations that marked the Gates of the Underworld. So, an omen of death.

Hydra: Hydra was also another constellation to mark the Gate to the Underworld, and a general symbol/omen for death. Of course, there's the Hydra that Heracles defeated as his 12 heroic acts.

Draco: I might be mistaken, but I believe that Draco might be another name for Hyra. (If anyone knows better, please do correct me)

Persei: Is a triple star system, that I suspect is referring to Perseus. (Or named after Perseus)

Pyxis: I have no clue.

Okay, I'll... I'll answer on the longer list of constellations a bit later (because I need to wrap my brain around it). But I thought that I'd give a little something already now so that I don't keep you hanging 😅

And in the meantime, I do hope that you have a great day as well! ^_^

#lovely anon #I'll get back

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mego42 · 4 years ago

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hi! a song inside the halls of the dark is an absolute masterpiece of plotting and pacing (and prob my fave fic I’ve read for the show so far), so for the ask a writer meme, I’d love to hear about your planning process(es). the idea of even plotting out something like that, let alone actually finishing it, just breaks my brain lol. do you do a lot of outlining? how much does the outcome end up looking like the ideas that sparked it?

adsfghgsj okay well first off, thank you! that is unspeakably flattering and i don’t know how to cope! my weird robot emotions are misfiring! but also, thank you for this question bc this is the kind of nerd shit i LIVE FOR and up until, idk, 5? 6? months ago my answer would’ve more or less been ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ but sometime in between now and then i leveled up how much of a nerd i am.

okay so, the short answer to your (first) question is yes, i do a lot of outlining though the scale of outline varies based on the complexity of the story. in song’s case, how i outline actually evolved significantly over the course of writing it (see that level up) and if i were to outline it today, it would look very different from what i originally started with.

the short answer to your second question is in song’s case, the original idea was a v short, almost fluffy stuck in a hotel room for a night one shot i daydreamed up while listening to a halsey song (is there somewhere, if you were wondering). obvs what it turned into was uh, v different.

digging into how i outline is going to get long, excessively nerdy and borderline terrifying so i’m hiding the rest of this under the cut, read at your own risk.

I preface everything here with a couple of reminders:

1. i am a crazy person who straight up does not know how to have hobbies like a normal person

2. i am actively trying to push myself and grow as a writer including developing new skills and training myself to practice certain habits bc at some point I would like to push myself out of the nest and try my hand at original fiction one day with a vague goal of maybe seeing if i could get it published. idk if i’ll ever actually do that BUT in the meantime, i do stuff like the nightmare that follows to myself

initial outline / what happens next list

okay so the most basic of my outlines (and how i originally outlined song) are p much just lists of what happens next. i do them as bullet lists bc my brain finds them less intimidating and i just start with one and then ask myself what happens next. sometimes the bullets are v vague, sometimes they get so specific i end up writing what becomes dialogue, i try not to think too hard about it, i just keep asking what happens next.

it’s really specifically about what happens next, not asking myself what i want to happen in the story, bc next implies the bullet before informs the one after, so you end up with an overall picture of what you want with a base level of causality built in. it also gives you room to surprise yourself (i think literally every what happens next outline i’ve done has had me going oh, okaaaaaay at some point).

sometimes, this is all you need. for trade my heart for honey, i started and stopped here bc at the end of the day, the skeleton for that fic is super basic: beth and rio attempt to play pool without tripping over their horrendous sexual tension. they fail. the end.

for your monster looks like mine, i did a version of the what happens next list, but i brought in some of my tricks from the pace structuring method i’ve been honing for the multi-chapter i’m currently planning. instead of mapping tentpole beats by story pace, i mapped tentpole beats for what points i wanted beth and rio to be scoring against each other and then mapped out the lead-up and fallout to connect the two and also what they were doing to each other physically at the same time so i could see how it all played together so the conversation supported the smut and vice versa. it was a TOTALLY normal approach to writing pwp. not over the top at all.

song’s original outline was basically a SUPER long what happens next list and if i could go back in time i would slap myself upside the head like bitch you have no idea what you’re getting into and you are WAY TOO COCKY ABOUT IT, but it’s okay i learned.

the spreadsheet method

somewhere around when i was in the middle of i want to say ch 9 of song, @pynkhues posted about her outlining process including a super awesome spreadsheet she uses (i cannot for the life of me find the original post, forgive me but know that it was hers) and i immediately jacked a version of it to use as my own and oh my god it changed my whole life.

iirc hers was a bit more in depth but since i was sort of baby-stepping into it, i stripped it down into the following and did a sheet for each of the remaining chapters (well, ch 10 and ch 11, ch 11 ended up getting wildly out of control so i split it in two and mushed the epilogue i’d been planning onto the end of it as a closing breakout scene:

plot

character

it’s a lot of repetition, tbh BUT once i started using it, i found the repetition was incredibly clarifying and by making myself take the time to go through each column and go through the same stuff over and over, it honed in on the strongest, most relevant bits of what i was planning and helped me see patterns and connections i maybe hadn’t been thinking of on the onset.

when i outlined swear i used this method and added a layer to my chapter overviews where i track the lies and corresponding truths worked into the chapter narratives (bc that’s a key theme of the story), and color-coded the beats that corresponded to the main plot vs individual character arcs vs foreshadowing so i’d have an at a glance visual reference to make sure nothing was getting lost and all of the characters (even minor ones) had stuff happening to them and didn’t just feel like cardboard cutouts coming in and out of the story as i needed them

pace structuring

these are all fine and dandy but one thing they’re missing is pacing! for song’s pacing, i will be real with you, i v much went a lot with my gut. i’ve spent most of my life consuming and paying a lot of attention to stories. i’m fascinated with how they come together and literally cannot shut off the part of my brain that likes to pick them apart to examine the pieces to see how they all fit together. as such, it’s left me with a p instinctive grasp for how a story should feel when it’s working which is fantastic when it is, but really useless when it isn’t bc i struggle to identify where and why sometimes so i can fix it.

for the buffyverse, once i started to realize (with no small amount of horror) the scope of what i wanted to write, i realized p quick i needed some kind of tool kit to help me figure out the arc and pacing bc this was going to be a lot closer to trying to plot a whole novel from the ground up (which is great bc one of the things i want to practice is pacing and plotting out novels from the ground up, hahaha)

i’ve been working with a two main docs (and neither of them are spreadsheets, yet, bc one thing the spreadsheet method taught me it’s that while i find them very soothing, my brain works in bullet lists so i’m starting with bullets and then i’m gonna strain it through a spreadsheet):

1. Thoughts:

just a doc where I word vomit out anything I’m thinking, I don’t worry about keeping it organized, I just throw whatever I’m thinking in there so it’s memorialized and I can sort through it later.

2. Act Timelines / Scene Breakdowns:

basically, i have a basic three-act story structure with tentpole story beats broken out by general ballpark percentages of how far into the story/act they should occur for the pacing to feel right. i use that as the framework i run my plot and character beats through and do it in a couple of passes:

high level: i go through and break out what’s happening in the story for each tentpole beat (what the specific story and plot focus is)

by character: i go through and fill in (at least) one sub-bullet beneath each plot tentpole beat with what’s happening with each main character in their individual subplot, how they got there, what their general feelings and mindset is, if they’re having any revelations, etc (one thing i fucked up with song is not making sure i had stuff going on for all of the characters, the plot was super focused on beth and while i generally knew what rio was doing and why, ruby and annie more or less floated in and out of the story at whim and i hate that, so i’m trying to be better about it going forward)

by relationship: now i go in and fill in a layer of bullllets with how the plot and character beats are shaping relationships and how they’re progressing through each tentpole beat

at this point i’ve got a pretty fleshed out outline hitting on plot, character and relationship development at least in broad, general terms. i can look at it like a map and see how characters are growing and changing throughout the story and look for areas where the plot is pushing the characters vs the other way around and places where it seems weak or poorly connected/supported and i tinker with that for awhile until i feel like it’s in good shape.

next step is applying the what happens next approach to the scene by scene breakdowns. i’m trying an experiment with this one where instead of breaking the fic into chapters first, i’m breaking it into scenes and working out the beats of them so they incorporate all of my outlined stuff and then i’m gonna go back and see where the chapter breaks look like they fall.

I’m like, 75% of the way through my scene breakdown for this particular fic and once I’m done with that, I’m going to take everything and plug it into the spreadsheet I worked with for the last couple of chapters of song and highlight/color code like I did for swear to make sure my chapter breakdowns align with everything I’m trying to do and I’m tracking all of my themes and details and setting things up to pay them off later.

so, you know, an absolutely normal amount of planning for a hobby i do entirely for funsies in my largely nonexistent spare time.

(sorry this was i am assuming WAAY MORE INFORMATION than you ever wanted or needed to know but once i started i couldn’t stop)

(and seriously, thank you, am truly verklempt that you love song like that 💖)

bts fic writing q’s IF YOU DARE hahaha

#welcome to my brain #every time i show people this they either freak out #or expose themselves as giant nerds #which i love bc i too am clearly a giant nerd #idk how to tag this #how i write #meg's mental nightmare menagerie #fic writing q's #ask me stuff #lindybot #shut up meg

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heroprose · 5 years ago

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cusps;

request(s). Dusk and Shinsou? Excited for everything you come up with! You have a superb writing style / If it’s still open: Shinsou for Dusk [...]

a/n. part of my mini prompt list from a while back! thanks for requesting!! also forewarning for vampire au.

ship. hitoshi shinsou x reader

his mouth is at the crook of your neck when he finally speaks. his hair tickles your cheek and you find yourself turning away at the feeling. this, of course, only gives hitoshi shinsou better access to your throat.

“god,” you hear him mutter. “you really okay with this?” his breath is cool on your hot skin.

“well, yes,” you reply, glancing up at the ceiling of his home. “i’m the one who suggested it, after all.” your fingers curl on his biceps to hold yourself steady and close to him.

“i suppose you did,” he says. hitoshi does not warn you when his teeth skate on the side of your skin, pausing when your fingers tighten their grip on him. “but you’re still nervous, aren’t you?”

you can only let out a brief, pressed laugh. “i mean, can you blame me? it’s my first time and all.”

when he pulls his head back to peer at your expression, he only sighs. “i’d be a little surprised if it weren’t.” despite the dim lights in the living room and despite the gloomy skies outside the window, you still see the gleam of sharp teeth as he speaks.

this amuses you, breaking the nervous air for a transient period. perhaps his teeth will be so sharp that you won’t even feel them pierce through your skin. “wouldn’t that be funny,” you say, “if we met and i’d already had some neck hole scars.”

hitoshi is not so amused. “you do have a knack for going into spaces you don’t belong.”

“spaces i don’t belong? that’s not fair; we met in a town cemetery. public property.” your hands slide down his arms to hold his hands.

“after closing hours,” he adds flatly. “and you were trespassing in my mausoleum--”

“that you don’t use,” you interject. “plus it was open. your familiar has to do better.”

hitoshi scoffs. his hands pulls away from yours to cup your cheeks, palms against your jawline. the tenderness in his movements make you want to shut your eyes but you hold them consciously open to gauge any new development.

“as if that’s any excuse,” he says. “you’ve still to atone for this, i’m sure you know that.”

“hm,” you say. “so offering you my blood isn’t enough? so greedy. i think i’d prefer someone with some modesty. and a modest tomb because-- whew-- yours was a bit--”

“all you offer me is a moment of respite,” he says, ignoring your bluffs. his eyebrows twitch slightly. “tell me. am i so greedy to want more?” his voice drops to something of a whisper, as if part of him does not even want you to hear.

you pause, digesting his question. his veneer just barely conceals a somberness, in regards to the much nursed over thoughts of immortality and the eternal. it is a delicate subject, one that you’re not quite sure how to breach so it does startle you to hear him nudge it in his particularly ambiguous manner.

regardless, whether or not he meant it to be a serious rhetoric, you answer. “depends how you want it. you want to suck me into a lifeless husk?” you inquire, and then laugh more naturally this time as he grimaces. it’s such a lively, human reaction, his annoyance.

“this immaturity,” he says with biting frustration, dark eyes rolling and cold hands lifting off you. hitoshi begins to step away and a flash of surprise zips through you. “i’ve had enough.”

unsuspecting of how visceral his response had been, it’s a reflex that you lean towards him with wide eyes. “no, wait! hitoshi, i’m just joking--”

you see his mouth twitch, but not into a frown this time. when your hand nearly reaches the cuff of his sleeve to encourage him to stop, he crosses back at such a speed that, at first, you don’t know what’s even happening.

in the wind of things, he turns you around instead. hitoshi has your back pressed up against his chest. your heart rattles in your rib cage and there is little doubt he can feel the vibrations through you. his body is firm behind you, colder and without a heartbeat but protective and almost kind.

kind, if it weren’t for his left hand that had snaked over and covered your eyes, pressing your head to rest against his shoulder. kind, if it weren’t for his right hand that had crossed over your midsection so that your body was flush against his and that if he were to vanish, you would simply fall backward onto the hardwood floor.

nevertheless, you try to wiggle out of his grasps to no avail. “hitoshi,” you warn. “what are you doing?”

“i much prefer you like this than a husk,” he says. “writhing idiotically, even, if you must.”

a tired exhale leaves you. “that’s so sweet,” you mumble humorlessly. “i’ll remember you as the romantic one when i find a vampire that actually wants my blood.”

his head dips down to kiss the side of your neck, right at your pulse, and when he chuckles, it’s light across your exposed skin. but even so, with your lack of eyesight easing you through the moment, goosebumps form all about your arms. “yeah? good luck trying to find some other who wants this more than i do,” he says. “and won’t kill you for it.”

that’s fair, you think.

“you don’t have to hold me like this when you do it, though,” you say. any longer standing awkwardly upright like this, your neck will start to feel a bit stiff. “honestly, i think i’d prefer to able to see you altogether.”

“please,” he says. “we’ll try several ways and you can pick your preferred method. how about that?”

you instinctively reel back, but the hand that tilts your head and covers your eyes is keeping you grounded against his shoulder. “uh, what now?” you say, mouth full of cottony doubt. his other hand, starts sliding downward and you reach for it.

“why rush? it’s only dusk,” hitoshi reminds you, now chiding in a way that only entertains him. “in the meantime, let’s take this slow.”

#shinsou hitoshi x reader #hitoshi shinsou x reader #shinsou x reader #bnha x reader #bnha imagines #all mfs do is write vampire shinsou eat hot chip and lie FR

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black-streak · 5 years ago

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For the spitefest, can I request birthday (it's my birthday tomorrow)

Happy Birthday! Have some disaster humans for your special day. This piece is a little more secretly angsty hidden behind humor then expected, but I hope you enjoy!

~---~

Tim fell into his usual seat at the little cafe in a side alley close to WE, dropping his head into his arms and allowing himself to doze until a cup of coffee landed before him.

"You're becoming spoilt," a melodic voice spoke over him.

"Hmm?" Tim looked up at Marinette, who stood to his side, moving his elbow just in time to not knock the cup over and watching him grasp at the mug to sip at.

"You don't even order at the counter anymore. Just fall into here and wait for me to take pity on you," she gave a little amused smirk.

Offering a sheepish smile, he looked up with half closed eyes, "At least I tip well?"

"Oh yes, because that's why I keep you around," she rolled her eyes and ruffled his hair, "I'll be back in a moment," she spoke, moving back to wash her hands and help a customer, the first of the hour with how late it was.

Tim watched as she worked, a cute little swish to her step and methodical grace to her hands. It had been seven months since his first time stumbling through the door at some ungodly time of day, seeking anything to keep him alive for the upcoming hours. Marinette, the beautifully sweet darling she was, guided him to a seat and fixed him the most amazingly caffeinated, rich blended coffee he'd ever had in his life and talked quietly with him until the warm concoction had time to hit his system so he wouldn't fall asleep in the meantime. Since then, he'd come to her at least four times every week, occasionally meeting up with her on Sundays, her day off, to catch up and spend some time together without the interruptions of work life. Sometimes it bordered the territory of flirting, but he always pulled back, knowing this was her place of work and refusing to take advantage of the situation, friends or not. And at this point she truly was an amazing friend. One he could trust to listen to him and not judge. To just be there. He just hoped she knew he was there for her as well.

Marinette dropped into the seat across from him, tea in hand and customer gone, ready for their late night conversation to begin.

"Alright, you have your coffee, time to fess up. What Does the elusive zombie do on his birthday? Must've been something exciting to leave you in this state, you're even more dead than usual."

At that, Tim blanked. His.. His birthday? Was that. Was that today? Surely it couldn't be. Last night was Thursday, he had gone on patrol, everyone attended that night, they were out past three and he went home to close up a file. That's why he was so exhausted. Not from some, celebration? That was meant to occur. It couldn't be his birthday then, he would know if it were.

"Tim? You there?"

"It's not my birthday?"

"It's July 19th, isn't it?"

Oh god, it was his birthday. He just stared at her, not knowing how to respond, watching a concerned furrow appear across her brow.

"Did… you forget your birthday?"

"I… I guess?"

"None of your family mentioned it? Surely they knew?"

"Well. No."

"How do you mean?"

"Things normally go a little haywire around this time of year? Someone disappears or gets hurt or kidnapped and I kind of just forget?"

Her eyes only became more concerned and he rushed to reassure her, "It's alright, really. I'm glad to even have them around. My parents were always out of the country when I was little, so I've never really celebrated my birthday anyways," he cringed, realizing how much worse that sounded. And judging by the frustrated, determined look of sympathy on her face, she realized this as well.

Standing up she made her way over to the door and switched the sign to closed, beginning to clean up the cafe in a quick flurry of movement though the place was nearly spotless already.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to upset you," he rushed out, moving to leave.

"Nope. You will stay here. We are celebrating your birthday right now, no if ands or buts."

"No, Mari, I appreciate the thought but I can't get you in trouble with my nonsense, what if you get fired?"

She leveled him with a blank stare, "I'm the owner, so I'm pretty sure we're clear."

He felt a flush flare across his face. How did he not know this? Did he never actually do a background check on her? He looked into everyone he associated with. It was then he noticed her bite her lip in hesitation.

"Unless you're uncomfortable with it? I'm not holding you hostage, I just can't stand the thought of you leaving here without having at least done something for today."

"I'm not, it's fine, but really, it's fine."

"It isn't. Not to me. I want to celebrate your existence," she locked up the front door and cleaned up the table before him before grabbing his hand and leading him through the back and up a set of stairs. Unlocking a door at the top she led him into her home. Honestly the fact she lived above the shop should've been a dead giveaway.

All the while, Tim felt himself in a daze. No one ever remembered. Or at least no one ever mentioned. It was tradition by this point, to let the day pass without notice and yet here she was, acting like it mattered. His mind whirled, letting her drag him over to a sofa and dropping into it as she continued on, returning with a cupcake on a little plate and a small wrapped parcel under her arm.

Seeing his confused look, Marinette fidgeted, a nervous look crossing her features, "I was planning on giving you this regardless of the new development. Though now I'm considering stealing you away from your family. Obviously don't deserve you," she offered him the cupcake only to drop into the seat at his side, hand going to his arm when he took it without reacting.

"Are you okay? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to overwhelm you. Oh gosh, this was a bad idea, wasn't it? I know we don't really see each other outside of the cafe much so this probably seems like a lot and you just see me as your barista and I fucked up-"

He stared down at the cupcake, only to come out of his daze as her words registered and cut her off, "It's okay, really, you're definitely not just the person who brings me coffee, I swear. Fuck Mari, you're one of my best friends at this point. I just, wasn't expecting this? I don't know how to react."

"You really never celebrated it before?"

"Death dates are more of a tradition in my family," he joked.

"Well that isn't morbid or anything."

"Heh. Yeah.."

"Do you want your present?"

"You really didn't have to get me anything. You're going to regret it when I forget yours."

"I'm pretty sure I'm prepared for that considering you couldn't remember your own. It's fine, I wanted to," she pushed the package into his hands watching eagerly as he slowly tore it open to reveal a pair of black leather gloves, lined with red cashmere. Hand stitched.

"I can't. I can't accept this."

"Of course you can. I asked for your measurements one of the mornings Tam stopped in to apologize on your behalf for not showing up the night before," she giggled.

"I felt bad, I always keep you late and I worried you might've stayed open waiting on me," he defended.

"You know you have my number right? You could've just called. We've hung out outside of work before."

"Says the person who just panicked that I might not even see her as a friend."

"God, we are absolute disasters," she groaned.

"You're a beautiful disaster."

"What?"

He blushed, trying to cover up his slip up, "Thank you. These are wonderful, you made them yourself?"

"Yeah, took longer than I thought they would, honestly," she admitted, hand rubbing the back of her neck.

Feeling himself soften, he pulled her into a hug, gripping her tight, "Thank you. So much. You don't know how much this means to me."

He felt her relax into his hold, holding tightly in return, "Of course. Happy Birthday, Tim."

The words warmed him more than he expected and he couldn't help but tug her closer. Taking a deep breath, he decided to possibly ruin the moment.

"So now that we've established that we're definitely besties, how do you feel about a date?"

#timinette #timari #ml x dc #maribat #im writing timari prompts out of spite for its recent hate #if anyone wants to send them in ill be filling them as I can!

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shewantedtobeasecretgirl · 5 years ago

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10. Bathroom wall (Part Three) a.k.a. a queen bee, Prince in the shower and a backup Casanova

In the previous parts: The bunch spends a free evening in a bar, where local girls are trying to get closer to the band members. Dave suggests Jeff that he should make Judy jealous but she’s too busy with being outraged about a girl named Claudia dancing with Stone. Finally, Claudia backs down; after a fight with Stone, Judy reveals to Karrie, that her made-up stories about Stone had to do something with her reaction. In the meantime, Mike is feeling sick and refuses Karrie’s advice to take his health issues more seriously. She also shows him pictures of Effie but Mike’s evening ends with a surprising twist. Judy tries to calm down with the help a relaxing shower but she gets unexpected company in the common bathroom…

@shadowsonoureyes I think I almost completed your drabble challenge 😉

“I got a lion in my pocket and baby he's ready to roar…”

God, I wish this was only a nightmare and I woke up suddenly realizing nothing of this madness has happened actually, maybe I could even laugh at the whole setting. But now, laughing is the last thing I feel like doing, I’ve been standing here since who knows when, I’m freezing, I wanna finish my shower, I wanna dry myself, I wanna get out of here… this with the lots of “wannas” sounds like some random lyrics of The Ramones… But as things stand at the moment, I’ll grow old and die here because this skinny hippo has been splashing beyond the wall for at least fifteen minutes, performing the longest and most inconsistent mix of Prince songs ever, deliberately altering the lyrics, changing the range of lines or even skipping some of them whereas repeating other ones infinitely like a broken record player.

“You got the horn so why don't you blow it…”

Actually, I’ve even started playing with the idea of turning the water on again, maybe this capybara enjoys listening to his own voice enough not even to hear it. But no, that’d be too risky. But I could definitely get rid of the shower gel bottle to be able to rub along my body against cold, I’ve been squeezing that little plastic flask at full strength since he entered here, as if it could help me become invisible. I slowly stoop to place it on the ground in the corner feeling like a compromised spy who’s ordered to put her weapon down without making any suspicious or ambiguous move; but due to the slippery surface under my soles I lose my balance and as I catch towards the wall to prevent myself from falling I drop it… and it lands with a loud crash in the metal shower tray. Fuuuuck… I freeze immediately and perk up my ears holding my breath trying to figure out if he heard it too… of course he heard it, it was as ear-splitting as a rocket launch but maybe he was too distracted and…

“Is somewhere there? Who’s that?”

He heard it…

“Who’s that? Scully? Is that you? Don’t be so shy, we’ve known each other for ages, I’ll even wash your back if you need help…”

Okay, Judy, you can’t hide any longer, you have to find out something, anything… what if I just ran out with a battle cry and grabbed my towel and… okay, maybe something more discreet would be more adequate.

“Scully? I’m coming over…”

“NO!!!” I scream.” It’s not Scully… it’s me… Judy…” I manage to reveal my identity only for the third attempt since my voice won’t obey and insists on sounding comically high-pitched. “And thanks but I’d skip the offer, I can reach my back.” Jesus, I don’t know why I’m babbling this, it’s like…

“Oh… I didn’t know it was you. Actually, I thought I was alone, you were so silent… I couldn’t even hear the water running at you…”

“Because… because… it wasn’t running since… it’s a part of my shower routine, I begin it with hot water then I turn it off and stand a few minutes until I start feeling I’m freezing, this method works wonders on the blood circulation…” I basically yell the end of my bullshit excuse since I turned the water on in the meantime to finally put an end to this awkward situation. Unfortunately, when I turn it off, I can hear he’s still humming, seriously, how much time does he need to dry his balls?

“Anyway… you were right.” he speaks up out of the blue.

I was right? Meaning what? You’re a pervert? You’re a bitch who would bang everything that moves?

“The acoustics in this room are truly excellent.”

You don’t say…

‘I’m flattered by the fact that once in a blue moon you are willing to agree with me. And, uhm, I’m ready with my shower and as you’ve probably already noticed, my towel is hanging on the wall on the other side so… so I’d feel honored if you left…”

“If I left?”

Yes, I mean get the fuck out you pig, you heard it well.

“Why would I leave? I want to enjoy these fascinating circumstances a little bit longer…“

I should have known this wouldn’t be easy, this must be like a dream come true for him: holding me hostage, taking advantage of my miserable situation…

“But seriously, just listen: I really get a dirty mind whenever you're around… Awesome!”

I roll my eyes so hard that I can see my own frontal lobe… Being forced to listen to Stone’s falsetto serenade while being butt naked, fuck, I didn't know what I was missing in my life until now.

“What do you want? Should I sing a fuckin’ duet with you for my freedom?”

“That’s not a bad idea, actually… what about Together Forever by Rick Astley?” I hear him snapping with his fingers and giggling at his brilliant idea.

“Well, the performance of Under Pressure would sound more honest from my mouth right now…”

“You’re just so negative, nothing can please you today seemingly. But as a sign of my generosity, I’m ready to give you that towel.”

How can a voice be so irritating? This nasal tone with the mannered Northwestern accent makes sound everything what he says extremely annoying, I could punch him even for citing the headlines of a newspaper.

“Ha-ha, very funny, Gossard. But let’s skip your cheap tricks and move your aaa…self out of here.”

“Cheap tricks? I don’t think there’d be anything interesting to see here, plus, you’re forgetting about a very important factor: I’m out here wearing a towel whereas you are in there wearing nothing so it is me who makes the rules. But, again, I’m a genuine guy so I give your towel to you, all you have to do is to ask me.” the pain in the ass goes on with his rant.

“Okay. GIVE ME THAT FUCKIN’ TOWEL!” I scream angrily stomping of helplessness.

“Why do you have to be so rude? You’re hurting my sensitive soul all the time; if you want me to cooperate, you have to be kind and ask me nicely.”

Once I get out of here, I’m going to fuckin’ kill you, I swear, I’m going to kill you ten times, I’m going to kill your reincarnated bodies too even if you will be reborn as a cute kitten or a baby giraffe…

“GIVE ME THAT FUCKIN’ TOWEL! Please?” I yell again and append a fake, cheesy appeal to my words.

“You see? It sounds immediately completely different.” he snickers satisfied.

“Okay, but we have to clear the logistics first. I think the least awkward way would be you standing facing the door, handing the towel backwards to me and I would reach out for it and…”

“Do you really think I wanna peep?” he asks with amused smugness in his voice.

I do? I don’t? Shit, there’s no right answer to this question, I mean, I’m not interested in him at all, I don’t care what he might think about my look, my body, I don’t even know whether he would think anything at all or he’d just act neutrally like I wasn’t a woman or human at all but fuck, I’m a human, I’m a woman, I could be the possible subject of a guy’s interest too and when I mean “a guy” I don’t think necessarily about him although he’s a guy too…

“I don’t give shit about what you want, what I want is to minimize the level of my retinal damage by not seeing your face, so please do me a favor, turn away from me and give me that goddamn towel.”

By the time I’ve finished the sentence, a pale body with something bright blue at waist-level appears on my horizon with funny side-sliding steps. He’s standing with his back to me, as far as I can judge it even without my glasses, my assumption is only based on the dark trail of his hair on his back. Or he’s an aberrant psychopath who covered his face with his hair to deceive me. He pulls my towel off the wall… okay, that means he’s truly facing the opposite wall unless his shoulders are especially flexible… damn, he reaches it backwards to me lifting his arm to the same height… I’m still not sure about his exact posture…

I slowly walk to the edge of the shower tray, hesitating for a few seconds which one of my body parts I should keep covered before reaching out for it. With a deep sigh, I opt for my breasts and try to grab my towel but there’s still almost a one-yard distance between our hands.

“Stone… you’re too far… could you come closer?” I moan in agony.

“Interesting… until now, you wanted me to go away and now you’re asking me the opposite. Or you’re just trying to trick me into touching you and then get me arrested for sexual assault… no, Camden, I don’t buy it. Anyway, walking backwards is dangerous, what if stumble and fall and break my neck? It’d be safer if you came out of your hiding place, you can’t spend the rest of your life there when I’m gone, I don’t care…”

I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve this but I obviously have no choice… I approach him with sneaking steps while terrible thoughts are chasing each other in my mind… What if he can rotate his head 180 degrees like owls? What if he’s got extraordinary eyes like chameleons and due to his particularly developed peripheral vision he can see basically everything around him?

As I finally touch the terry cloth fabric, I immediately tear the towel out of his hand and wrap it around myself. His arm swings automatically back to his body as if it was pulled by a spring and while I pull back into my shelter to dry all my body parts, he keeps standing at attention on the same spot.

“Ahem… I’m ready so… you can go…” I make an attempt to get rid of him.

“You’re not a quick learner… and you’re pretty ungrateful… I haven’t heard the magic word yet.”

I can’t believe this. And I can be grateful to him for not humiliating me even more…

“Thanks…” I mumble.

“I didn’t understand it… it’s strange, the acoustics in that corner must be different, it absorbs sound waves…”

“Thank you, Stone Almighty Gossard, nothing could express my eternal gratitude, you’re my savior, I’d be nothing without you, from now on, I’m your slave!!!” I shout paying special attention to my articulation.

“Could you hear the echoes too? Much better.” he clicks with his tongue satisfied and disappears from my sight with the same hilarious moves he made earlier. “Good night, Judith, and if you happen to have erotic dreams this night, please keep them for yourself, I’d feel embarrassed if you told me about it…” he adds and as I open my mouth for some snarky retort, I hear the door slamming.

Finally. This… prick is just unbelievable, after his performance at the bar he thinks he did me a favor by not behaving a like a perv? And erotic dreams? Come on, I’d rather puked myself to death of his sight.

I have to use the awkward choreography I invented earlier to get back to my stuff I left on the chair, although I myself don’t really understand either, why, I’m alone after all... As I lean down for my glasses, my fingers reach out for… nothing. They’re gone! I grope the whole chair along… still nothing! I put down the shower gel bottle and try to crouch down to check the floor under the chair, which is not easy to do at all without exposing my intimate body parts. I keep adjusting the towel with my left hand while I try to scan trough every inch of this goddamn place with the other one and I’m about to drop the freakin’ towel when I hear a weird noise from behind my back. Snorts… silent snorts… like someone was suppressing laughter… oh shit. That moron, that son of a bitch… he’s Satan, I told it.

I straighten up as fast as I can, I can only hope he didn’t see my backside or my nipples or… why can’t I die here and now without more suffering?

As far as I can see him without my spectacles, he’s leaning against the sink and checking me out with folded arms.

“Taking away my glasses? That’s the most creative idea you could find out? Seriously, where are we, in third grade maybe?” I attack him but in the meantime I realize I should calm down, seeing me being upset is probably his favorite entertainment. “Okay, Gossard, go ahead. I don’t know why you crafted this vicious plan with trapping me here, taking away my glasses, stalking me… let’s get over with it, whatever you want…” I shrug resigned.

“Firstly, I didn’t know you were here, I just came in since I have the right to have a shower too. Secondly, I have nothing to say to you, it is you who should talk.”

“Me? Do you think I want to have a chit-chat with you here and now? Are you completely nuts? Just give back my glasses and get out of here!”

“Well, that has a price.” he answers irritatingly slowly, I can hear clearly he’s grinning.

“Is this a blackmail?” I scream outraged.

“Why do you have to use always such tough words? It’s a… mutually beneficial offer. You want your glasses whereas you also owe me an apology and I’m ready to accept it.” he explains with fake generosity.

“I’m not gonna beg you, you idiot.” I hiss between my teeth and grab towards his hands but I’m not fast enough to catch him off guard. He raises his arm high before I could get my property back and smiles down at me with a smug expression.

Does he want me to bounce like a puppy? Well, I won’t. Actually, the only possible weapon that comes to mind is as childish as his stupid little trick but the end justifies the means… But I have to be quick since my one hand is busy with keeping the towel around my body and I don’t want to grope him for too long time either. But he didn’t leave me any other choice, unfortunately.

“Fine, Stoney…” I pretend giving in. “You’re right. So listen to me carefully because you’re not going to hear this from me too often…”

“I’m all ears.” he spreads out his free arm.

Piece of cake.

“Sooo…” I approach him cautiously “Stoney, I just want to say… TICKLE ATTACK!!!” I yell and poke my fingers between his ribs.

The effect is beyond expression. He immediately doubles over letting out a wide range of animal sounds and it only takes a few seconds to tear out my spectacles of his hand maintaining the offensive with my other hand.

“Ha, victory!”I yell chuckling at his convulsion but as I hear a weird noise over his whining, I immediately stiffen. “What was that?”

“What’s… what?” he asks still groaning.

“Didn’t you hear that? I think someone slammed the door…” I stutter as I place my glasses on my nose. “And that means someone had opened it before… and maybe saw us…”

“Bullshit. And even if it happened as you think, all that could be seen was you committing sexual harassment on me so…” he smirks sassily leaning back against the sink.

What an obnoxious asshole. And he’s also wearing flip-flops, which I’ve always hated on men, seriously, I could slap him with them…

“Sexual harassment? I would rather jump on a male tapir than engaging into an erotic intermezzo with you!” I tuck my hair nervously behind my ear.

“You and a tapir? I wish I could see the offsprings…” he keeps grinning and flips his wet hair back… actually, it’s surprising, usually, he’s not a big hair washer. A tiny waterdrop is swinging on the end of one of the dark strands that are wavier than usual, this must be their natural state… then the drop slowly falls on his shoulder and follows the line of his collarbone, changing direction at his neck only to gain momentum and now it’s pulling a trail along his flat stomach and…

“Ahem…” he clears his throat “shall we go? Or do you want to examine my naked body for a while?”

“Let’s go” I start like I was waking up from a dream and I can feel my cheeks are burning for some mysterious reasons. “But you go first, I don’t want to make myself ridiculous in front of more people tonight.”

“Okay, okay…” he walks out with lazy reluctance. “All clear!” he shouts and I put my head out of the door to check he’s not trying to trick me again. How can he walk so leisurely, isn’t he bothered by the fact he’s almost naked? And why did he wrap that towel so tightly around his waist that it shows every curve of his…body parts…?

“Do you want to spend the night in there?” he suddenly turns back and I can only hope I managed to look away fast enough.

“No… no…I’m coming…” I mutter and follow him in duck walk, squeezing my toiletry bag.

He stops at his door and leans with one shoulder against the door jamb, of course he wouldn’t miss out my clumsy performance.

“Wow, gracious. You were born to the catwalk.” he giggles.

“Shut up or I scratch your eyes out!”

“Okay-okay but I hope we can agree that we’re even.” he waves an imaginary white flag.

“We are. And I say now good night before you happened to die under unclear circumstances.”

“Good night, Miss Hundred Pounds of Concentrated aggression.”

His audacious grin mellows into a boyish smile and I don’t know if I am only hallucinating or for a fragment of a second, he scans me from head to toe…

He pushes himself away from the wall and disappears in the dark room, leaving me frozen in the hallway. I stumble back to my room and I plop down on my bed. But what was that stare? He was probably just mocking me as usual, he’s surrounded by beautiful girls and he must find my dwarf body structure ridiculous. But he said we’re even… I stare at the toiletry bag on my lap, although I didn’t turn on the light, its pattern is clearly visible in the street lights filtering through the torn curtain. Musical notes, treble keys… wait. He claimed he didn’t know it was me in the shower. But who else in the bunch would have a bag with these motifs? He knew it was me. He knew it and he still came in. He wanted to humiliate me, it wasn’t just an embarrassing coincidence. Stone Gossard, we’re everything but even.

***

„These piggies are so cute.”

“Yes, they are totally adorable.” Layne agrees observing them with a tender smile. “Look at their mom, how patiently she’s bearing as they’re pestering her… geez, some of these little fuckers are pretty aggressive… look at that one!”

He points at a spotted piglet which is the greediest in the bunch; I don’t know much about domestic animals, I can only guess he’s a tiny boar. He’s tossing away all his siblings to get free access to his mther’s teats and even after he gets one of them, he keeps her poking with his power outlet-shaped nose. Well, moms are the most patient creatures on earth, I’m sure I’ve caused a lot of trouble to mine too…

“I wonder if we can stroke them, their hair seems to be so fluffy…”

“A bit later, now it’s mealtime. Their mother is very protective of them, she would bite your fingers off… I think she’s going to pass out in a few minutes, you can try to grab one of them while they’ll be playing around her.” the farmer-looking guy answers. He can’t be much older than us but he speaks in a slow, prudent manner, which makes him sound like a grandfather. He must be an employee of this place… whatever this place is…

“Effie would love them.” Layne remarks, still fascinated by the nursing process.

Effie? Layne knows Effie? Interesting.

“Is she here too?” I stutter confused.

“Of course, dude, you bought her here, remember?” Layne glances at me and raises one eyebrow.

“Really? And where is she know?” I scratch my chin still not understanding how she got in the picture.

“She stayed in the house. She was interested in the greenhouse and the gardener happened to be there, you couldn’t drag her away from the orchids. Seriously, Mike, are you stoned our what? You should take more care of your girlfriend if you want to take this thing between you seriously.”

Girlfriend? Effie is my girlfriend? Okay, that sounds strange too not that I want to complain…

“And… what’s that house you mentioned?”

“Shit… I’m not gonna help you out with weed ever again, this stuff has obviously terrible side effects on you, you’re like a drunk goldfish. Hey, Jer, tell to this asshole where we are!” he shouts at his approaching bandmate.

“Estamos a la hacienda Cantrell, hombre! This my ranch! And in a few hours, we’ll be eating the best food you’ve ever tried, Consuela is the most badass cook in the entire world! But we have the whole afternoon, I want to show you my new golf course, we could even play, I have tons of golf clubs, I can lend you one of them…”

Wait, something’s wrong here. I know they have their share of success because of this Seattle madness too, not that they don’t deserve it, they are a fuckin’ amazing band but I never knew Jerry had a ranch, I mean, it must have cost a buttload of money and however much I like him, I must admit he’s not that type who prefers savings to poker, dope and strippers.

“How… how long have you owned this… this huge farm?” I wave around clumsily trying not to sound too stupid.

“For like… ages…? Hahaha, man, I know my beautiful maids drive every man crazy, that was my point when casting them and choosing their uniform. But you can’t complain either, I checked the little blondie out, nice catch! That cola bottle-shaped body, damn…” the skirt-chaser underlines his words by drawing the mentioned contour in the air flashing a filthy grin. I don’t like this tone, I don’t like the idea of Jerry talking about Effie or looking at her, fuck, I don’t even like the idea of any member of Alice In Chains staying in the same state as her for more than three seconds.

“But first, we have to choose the dinner. Which one do you want?” the guitarist nods towards the pigpen and knowing his dirty humor, I’m not sure whether he refers to any food-related or he’s called hookers or what?

“How… how do you mean?”

“Mike, this is definitely not your day, just pick one!” Layne giggles glancing amused at his bandmate.

“But… what?” I still don’t get where this whole thing is going.

“Geez man, okay, I”ll do it for you. Come on, little dudes, it won’t hurt, I promise you!” Jerry leans over the fence and grabs two piglets by the skin around their neck.

“No, no, are you trying to say we’re gonna eat them? No, never, this is the cruelest thing I’ve ever heard, you can’t…” I protest shocked but the asshole doesn’t give a shit about me and carries the two victims under his arms to the pickup standing close to us. He ignores the desperate squeals of the poor little things: he throws them in the truck bed and climbs after them.

“Jerry, where are you going? You can’t… stop, don’t do that, man!” I yell almost crying but he just keeps laughing with that typical, pedophile Santa Claus laughter of him.

“What do you think, for what purpose do I breed them? They are cute and all but just think about a crispy, red, roasted pig spinning on a skewer over the fire… yummy… Consuela has a secret recipe, it’s delicious. I takes hours to prepare it, though, but I think I can keep myself busy until then, you know, that blondie is waiting only for me…” he winks and I catch to my stomach. Effie… Jerry… no, that can’t happen, I think I’m going to vomit, Jesus, this is terrible…

He pats the side of the truck bed twice, signaling to the driver that he can start the engine.

“Yes dude, until the pork gets ready, I’m gonna bang Effie… bang Effie… bang Effie… bang Effie…”

His words get mixed with the squealing of the piglets and the roar of the engine and the terrible sounds keep echoing in my head distorted by the Doppler-effect until the car disappears on the horizon.

“Bang Effie… bang Effie… bang Effie…”

…

I wake up with a start. My heart is beating so fast that it almost rips my chest, the blanket is soaking wet of my sweat, even my hair is stuck to my head and neck. This was the worst nightmare I’ve had in the past years… wait… if it was a dream, why can I still hear the snorts?

I slowly turn my head in the direction of the sound and suddenly, everything falls into place. The girl with whom I spent last night is snoring next to me… Her red lipstick and black eyeshadow is smeared all over her face making her look like a slutty panda bear and the little stream of drool in the corner of her mouth makes it even worse. Thus passes worldly glory… not that I have any right to criticize her look, I must look like crap too and honestly, I also feel like that. My head is about to explode, my intestines are burning… but I can only blame myself and that bottle of pure vodka we consumed last night together. At least the sex was satisfactory... yes, satisfactory is the best term, not more, not less. The beginning was creepy, though, with those weird outbursts of her about her nonsense prohibitions… I mean, who the hell wants to do stuff like that? Poor girl, she must have had hard sexual experiences. But that cowboy roleplay could have been even good with the hat and slight bondage elements and all… but her exaggerated behavior kept it in conditional. After all, we both got what we wanted and I don’t have to feel guilty. I didn’t force her, she offered, I just played along… it was basically her who fucked me. I don’t know if it had anything to do with me being the guitarist of Pearl Jam but even if it has, come on, is that really such a terrible crime if the “also ran” member of the band takes advantage of his situation once in a blue moon? The girls are never cueing in front of my hotel door, I deserve to have blast when a rare occasion occurs for some mysterious reason. And I don’t owe anyone any explanation, the guys and Eric are not my chaperones, I’m a single guy with needs and I can’t live in a fantasy world for good, pathetically sobbing after someone I haven’t even met yet, right?

Hydration. That’s the first thing I need right now. The only problem is that she’s sleeping with her limbs spread in four different direction and her left arm happens to rest on my chest. Shit, I wish I had left after we finished it as I always do after one-night stands, it spares both the girl and me awkward morning scenes, these things are not about romance, anyway. But this time the sex was intense and the booze was kick-ass so we both must have passed out after getting on top.

I try to slide out of the bed basically in horizontal position placing the pillow on the same spot where my upper body used to be hoping she’s sleeping deeply enough not to notice the change. I freeze when she lets out a few louder snorts after my maneuver but after a few satisfied smacks, she calms down and keeps snoring. I tiptoe around the bed to collect my clothes and I found all of them except my boxers… fuck, she must be lying on them. After a few seconds of hesitation I get dressed without them, they’re clean since I didn’t have any “accident” yesterday so trying to get them back is not worth risking.

I silently walk out in the kitchen and immediately spot a few bottles of mineral water on the counter… but taking one of them would be stealing, right? But if I turned the water on, she might wake up… I open all of the cupboards until I find a larger glass and turn the water tap cautiously until a thin spout starts running from the pipe. It takes a while until I fill the glass with this method but I gulp the content of it with one breathe in a blink of an eye.

My rumbling stomach directs me to the fridge, even if I don’t want to take anything, I can check its content, right? The cool breeze feels unbelievably good as I lean into it… let me see… further bottles of water, some milk, a piece of moldy cheese which probably isn’t supposed to be moldy, expired yogurt and a bunch of bananas. Shit, banana is my favorite fruit, the best resource of potassium and I’m dying to eat one. But I decided not to steal anything… but come on, it’s only a banana.

As I’m about to leave the crime scene, I notice a notepad and a pencil on the table. Maybe… maybe leaving a note would be a polite way of giving an explanation for what I did, right? Yeah, that’s it! Okay… “Dear…” Fuck, what was her name? Clarissa… Claudette… CLAUDIA! “Dear Claudia,” Shit, this is going to be harder than I thought… should I thank her for the sex? “thanks for the evening. I didn’t want to wake you up so…” so I ran away like a coward “I decided to say bye in this note. I was really hungry so I served myself with a banana.” and last night I served you my banana, Jesus, I’m a gross pig. “Sorry for doing it without asking, as an apology, I drew you another one.” I try to sketch the schematic picture of a banana but it looks like a nonfigurative or even phallic symbol from any possible angle. Shit, I can’t leave it like this. Luckily, the pencil has a quality eraser on the top so I can make the terrible scribble disappear and correct the message. “I drew you the only thing I can draw:” I close my eyes to recall the logo I’ve copied everywhere more times than anything else… “KISS” at least I can still do it… I go over the message again, I think it’ll do the trick. “I wish you the best, Mike”. I stop in the kitchen door on my way out. Even a KISS logo can’t undo a theft. I should offer her some compensation… I walk back and grab the pencil again. “Ps. Next time we come to Charlotte, I’ll invite you for a coffee.” But what if we bump into each other anywhere else? “Of course I also invite you in case we encounter anywhere else.” Okay, ‘Cready, you don’t have to write an epistle, you don’t have to surpass Tatiana, just leave finally before she wakes up. But what if… what if she doesn’t like coffee? Now that I glance around, I can see no coffee machine here… “Ps2. In case you don’t like coffee, my offer applies to tea or soda too, of course.”

Okay, enough, she won’t even notice, who the hell takes inventory about bananas? I shake my head, take a deep breath and sneak out of the apartment.

***

Coffee. The first thing that comes to mind in the morning. I know I drink way too much coffee but caffeine addiction is sort of an inevitable outcome if you’re a rock musician at nights and an espresso guy at daytime. Of course the receptionist or janitor or whoever confirmed my initial aiming: this shitty motel doesn’t sell any food or drinks apart from the broken vending machine in the corner of the lobby. He also said I can take all of its content if I manage to fix it. No, thanks, the late seventies-looking chips bags with their probably fossilized content aren’t particularly tempting.

I’m heading to the bistro on the other side of the street, it’s probably not much better than that place but a coffee without hair in it and a decent breakfast would already satisfy my needs. On entering I must admit, the smells are better than expected and as soon as I take place in a booth, a polite waitress appears at the table handing me a menu and producing a cup out of the blue. She immediately fills it with the hot beverage I was longing for. A cigarette would feel good with it too but there’s no one around I could grub from…

I’ve taken only a few sips of my precious drink when I see a familiar hat appearing at the entrance and in a few seconds, its owner plops down opposite me, munching a banana.

“The prodigal son has returned, huh?” I remark with a wide grin.

“I know you missed me, just admit it.” he answers with a deadpan. “God, I’m starving…” he grabs the menu and begins to study it.

“A coffee, sir?” the waitress emerges again and spills coffee in his cup too without waiting for the answer. “What can I get for you?” she inquires helpfully as she pulls a small notebook with a pen out of the pocket of her apron.

“One Aspirin and a bullet in my head, please.” Mike groans with a dark face.

“Excuse me sir?”

“Give us a few more minutes, please.” I try to send a “don’t ask” signal with my eyes and it seems to work because she leaves with a confused nod.

“The last time I saw you, you felt sick. But somehow you must have resurrected like a phoenix from its ashes since you were out all night… so… go ahead.” I lean back but my bandmate is avoiding my gaze, turning his head around like he was distracted by the interesting furniture of the diner.

“Look, it’s Judy over there!” he shouts pointing at the counter.

“Mike… no… please…” I groan in pain but it’s too late.

“Hey Jude!” he shouts and waves frantically.

Great… I bury my face into my palms.

Unfortunately, Mike comes to the brilliant idea of stretching his leg along the seat he’s sitting on while she’s approaching us; so by the time she gets to our booth, her only option is sitting down next to me. Which she isn’t willing to do, she’s just sending reproving looks at me until I realize the reason of her reluctance is my right arm on the backrest. When I remove it, she slides in the booth as far from me as possible, she’s probably sitting with half butt on the air.

“Hi Judy.” Mike greets her pulling his small metal flask out of the inner pocket of his jacket.

“It’s six o’clock in the morning, you’re not having vodka.” she tries to tear it out of his hand without even greeting us.

“Easy Jude, it’s empty, okay? It’s just a bad habit that I keep checking it.”

“Anyway, I doubt he would begin the day with spirits, seeing he was drinking the whole night…”

“What?” she screams outraged.

“Jesus, are you blind? He’s, like, the quintessence of hangover, circles under the eyes, grey face, he looks like a dirty dish cloth…”

“Jesus, guys, do you really have to talk so loud??? Anyway, thanks Stone, you know how to compliment…” Mike moans rubbing his forehead with his hand.

“I’m just telling the truth. Come on, tell us how did you get so fucked up… or… no… I don’t want to know the details.”

“You probably think I got wasted with a few local dudes I don’t even know and I fell asleep in the corner and when I woke up, I realized someone had drawn a dick on my cheek.”

“You left out the pissing-and-puking part but yeah, sort of. Ouch!” I whine when she tosses me with a strict face at full strength in the shoulder. “What’s wrong with you, do you think he’s a saint or what?” I complain.

“Don’t even listen to him, unlike him, I’m interested in the details. So tell me… were there pubic hair on the dick too?” she leans closer confidentially, flashing a cheeky smile and however much annoying I find her, I can’t help snorting.

“Jesus, six of one, half a dozen of the other.” Mike rolls his eyes. “Anywayyy… I wasn’t with some unknown dudes… but I wasn’t alone either…” he shrugs with a mysterious smile.

“Okay, you’re getting a vasectomy. That’s final. I don’t want you to get sued by teen moms from every single town we stop in.” I shake my head.

“Not that I’m the Casanova of the band, are we going to talk about the favors you’ve done to Seattle’s female population too? Do you begrudge me it or what?”

“I’ve had a long string of girlfriends, so what?”

“What?” our band parrot squeaks in again.

“A long string? There’s a herd of them!” Mike goes on.

“Just stop!” she screams and we both fall silent, surprised by her sudden outburst. “I’m new here. Explain.” she adds in a mellower voice.

“Judith, maybe you should improve your “reading between the lines” skills. My colleague is trying to say that he spent the night with a female acquaintance, I guess we can call her like that with some euphemism. And I recommended some fertility restrictions regarding Mike’s wasted adventures are like the cliché bad examples in sexual education videos.”

“As if you…” my bandmate is about to reply but he gets interrupted by the returning lovely waitress, and honestly, I don’t mind, somehow I don’t want him to reveal my dating history before the girl who never misses any occasion to point out my flaws.

“Did you manage to choose in the meantime?” she inquires.

“I’d like to have… scrambled eggs with ham and a sesame seed bun, fresh orange juice, pancakes with maple syrup, a peanut butter sandwich and chocolate chips with vanilla ice.” Mike reads enthusiastically.

“A sunny-side up with bacon and a cherry pie á la RR.” my neighbor lists.

“A vegetarian cheese plate and I’d like to try that deliciously sounding pie too.” I smile at the waitress.

“It’s even better than you think, Sir.” she winks back at me and as I watch her collecting the menus, I can see Camden’s disgusted face from the corner of my eye.

“Sooo… a Twin Peaks fan, huh?” I nudge her. “From now on, I’m gonna call you Nadine, it suits you in every sense.”

“Nice try, Bob… Anyway, Mike, if this is your hangover appetite, what is your normal state like? I got nausea even of listening to you…”

“I burned a lot of calories last night so…” he grins proudly, making me cackle up.

“Here we are, I want details!” I imitate a drum snare with my palms on the table.

“Jesus, guys, are you really going to disc…” Miss Prudery clucks in but luckily, my bandmate ignores her whining.

“It was… wild.” he smirks firmly.

“Wilder than that escort girl in L.A.?” I giggle since this is one of my favorite stories with which I tease Mike from time to time and it’s also a great topic to outrage this first communicant next to me.

“What? Mike? You’ve paid for sex???” Bingo.

“How many times I have to tell that…” Mike pinches the bridge of his nose between his fingers with a nervous gasp. “Judy, it wasn’t the way you think… when I was living in L.A. with the Friel brothers, I met a nice waitress at a concert venue… we sort of hooked up, she’d visit me at the record store I’d work at… she was busted all the time so I’d lend her my spare money, I mean what I didn’t spend on booking gigs for us… and Chris Friel tried to warn me gently that every time I’d give her money, we’d sex afterwards… and once we ended up in a strip club after a gig and I found out she was a stripper, she worked there, I mean, she was dropping her clothes right in front of me… and she wasn’t only stripping. So I realized that what I thought to be a friends with benefits situation was actually a prostitute-client relationship, she was just too good-hearted to enlighten me. Stone, are you happy now???”

“Awww, Mike, this is so sad… but it’s also somehow so sweet… I hope you got a discount at least. But what’s with that girl from last night? What’s her name?”

“Someone has suddenly become curious, interesting…” I throw in.

“Errrr… her name was…”

“Jesus, Camden, you know nothing about one-night-stands, don’t you?” I ask to buy Mike some time but to be honest, I don’t know what to think seeing the industrial amount of condoms I found in her toiletry bag last night. Either is she a wild cat and a really god actress at the same time or this tour is like a project for her to get rid of her virginity. Ten times at least. And Jeff Ament has the honor to assist. Jesus.

“Why, I only asked…”

“He doesn’t know shit about her, let alone her name.”

“You banged…” she yells but realizing everyone looks at us, she suddenly takes the volume back “You had sex with her and you didn’t even ask her name?” she whispers between her teeth.

“Why? Names are overrated. Anyway, she introduced herself, I just… can’t remember her name anymore. And she didn’t even care about my name either.”

“Judith, I understand this is new to you, you probably insist on swapping business cards before petting and ask the guy even to show his ID before the penetration but in most cases, these things are going in a simpler way…” I use the occasion to torture her a bit and she starts reddening so much that I almost feel sorry for her. Almost.

“Hey Stoney, don’t mock her! Jude, there’s nothing wrong with being cautious. I mean, the social security number can even be useful in case your partner suffers a sex injury.” he tries to help her out clumsily and glances at me for reassurance.

“Yeah, let alone the blood type in case he needs a transfusion after the experience.” I scoff.

“Could we go back to Mike’s experience?” she squints towards me with popped eyes making a nervous gesture. “I hope you had protection…”

“Jesus, of course, she was prepared…”

“She??? Mike, how can you be so irresponsible, it’s always the guy’s task, I would never ever… go out with a guy who expects me to provide him with condoms, Jesus…”

Ha. The little liar…

“Are we seriously analyzing these details? I mean, how was the chick?” I exclaim, earning one more toss arriving from my right side.

“She was… nice. I mean, she had that crazy vibe… It was weird, everything was okay until we left to her place, we drank, we played pool, she started flirting, I reciprocated it and so on… At one point, she threw herself on me, by the time I realized what’s happening, she was basically already licking my tonsils… not that I minded. So she dragged me to her place.”

“That doesn’t sound that bad…” I grin.

“Something tells me there was a “but” in the story…” the queen of condoms reacts ignoring my remark.

“Well yeah… she disappeared in the kitchen to bring more booze, so I turned on the TV, I thought some decent erotic channel wouldn’t hurt in the process but I stopped at a documentary, it was filmed in Kenya, I think, with beautiful shots and interesting narrations… she came back at the part on mating lions, she asked me if liked it, I found her question odd but I answered “of course” and she got completely hysterical.”

“How… how do you mean?” she asks fidgeting anxiously with her coffee mug.

“She… she freaked out saying she couldn’t believe I’m into that too. It so strange, out of context, I guess it was probably some dark secret with his ex, so I didn’t ask.”

What a coincidence!

“Interesting, the same…” I reply but a nervous little hand beats me in the thigh under the table. What the hell is she doing?

“Go… go on Mike, and what happened after that?” she inquires with a forced smile.

“I managed to calm her down, switched to Playboy channel, and you know… we begin to get into the thing on the couch… but my stomach started rumbling, I was starving since I hadn’t eaten the whole day. So I asked her if I could grab some food before we… you know… and she almost begin to cry, explaining she never mixes food into sex, it was so incoherent, I couldn’t even understand what’s happening…” he recalls causing me a lightbulb moment.

“Jesus Mike, I know why she acted like that…” I exclaim chuckling since it I know this is more than a simple coincidence, his story has too much in common with my conversation with Claudia. Actually, now that it’s not about me, it actually sounds funny. Hilariously funny, I can’t stop shaking of repressed laughter… But those restless fingers pinch me in the thigh this time and when I turn right to challenge her, all I can see are two, huge, warm, brown eyes, begging me concerned… and suddenly I realize what they are trying to say.

“And why?” Mike asks back. Okay, I have to find out something, and I have to do it fast, think…

“Because… because… she chickened out!”

“Yes, that must have been the reason.” she agrees as quickly as possible. Okay, crisis averted.

“She didn’t.” Mike smirks. “She finally allowed me to grab some snacks and then… mature content.” he illustrates with fitting hand moves the events. “Okay, she turned out to be into rodeo roleplay, which was new to me but… after all, it was fun.” he shrugs not too convincingly.

“Was she wearing boots with spurs?”

“Damn, Camden, you always grasp the most important details…”

“She wasn’t… but she had a hat made bondage stuff to me but it was fine.”

Our meals arrive in the meantime but somehow the consumption of my vegan cheese plate seems to be incompatible with the picture of the naked Mike tied to a bed and ridden by Claudia only wearing a cowboy hat.

“A lot of people are into it but of course, there are different levels.” our troublemaker plays the expert with her mouth full.

“It was the enjoyable level bondage. Anyway, she had one more outburst, when we were finished.” he tells stuffing a considerable pile of scrambled egg into his mouth. “After the action, she went out to the bathroom but she threatened to slit my throat if I’d follow her. Like, why would I do that?”

I snort but I manage to fake a cough fast enough not to be noticed by Mike and abused by the travel-size Terminator.

“I don’t know, shower sex?” she shrugs casually munching too. Like she knows.

“Yeah, but that’s a good thing, isn’t it? Whatever. Anyway, guys, how was your night?”

“Terrible.”

“Awful.” we answer at once.

“Why, was it because of the motel or…?”

“I had nightmares… I mean, during that one single hour I slept. I didn’t really dare fall asleep because of the cockroaches… and I kept dreaming about them.” she begins to play with the food pushing it around on the plate.

“Stone, you had nightmares too?”

“Oh, no… although I had every reason to do so. I don’t know, the bed was uncomfortable.”

There’s an awkward silence. Mike devotes all his attention to his food and honestly, probably neither of us minds that he stops asking about last night. Anyway, as for the Claudia thing, she was right. He was proud of his conquest, facing him with the fact he was only a backup target would have totally ruined his confidence. I have to warn Scully too, he’s such a gossip. And Ed would certainly disapprove it but come on, Mike just wants to enjoy being the member of a rock band. He doesn’t fuck girls in every bush we pass by, I don’t think he should be executed for it. Jeff isn’t better either, drooling over you colleague, how immature and irresponsible…

“Hi Jeff!”

Speak of the devil. Anyway, why is she so suddenly so enthusiastic of seeing him?

“Hi guys. Wow, that looks good.” our bassist leans over to check my plate while Mike pulls his leg back to leave him space. Of course he couldn’t do that a few minutes earlier, so typical.

“If you ask me, it tastes better without Mike’s bizarre sex adventures but it’s a matter of taste.”

“Bizarre sex adventures? Something tells me I have to catch up.” he laughs. “How are you, Judy? You disappeared tomorrow so early.”

“Thanks, I’m fine, I was just…tired. Look, Jeff, I was thinking… if you wanna hang out today before the show? I mean, you said you’d show me a few chords and…”

I can’t believe my ears. What made her change her mind? If Dave’s jealousy trick worked out, I have to re-evaluate my knowledge about dating.

“Sure.” Jeff’s face lights up. “Anytime.”

“Aaaanytime, Juuudy…” I mock. ”Just don’t forget to put some money in his G-string.” I add mumbling.

“Jesus, Stone, you’re gross!” Mike drops his fork annoyed.

“I’m the gross? Remember, Mike…” I’m ready to remind him of his various drunk performances but as the debate is about to get heated, Eric shows up in the diner followed by Ed and Beth.

“Guys, we have a problem…”

#pearl jam fanfiction #pearljam #PearlJamfanfic #eddie vedder #stone gossard #MikeMcCready #jeff ament #dave abbruzzese

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pixelchaos00 · 5 years ago

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Tradoshan Squad

Log: 1, Day: 1

The Base

(Author's Note: Thanks to @clonewarsreturns for helping me develop my characters and beta reading the story. My first language isn't English so I apologise for any kind of mistakes.)

„Get set and don’t let your guard down. This is going to be a high qualified mission, which is why General Unduli and I have chosen you here. This is more important than any mission before and needs to be perfectly executed. We mustn’t make any mistakes. This whole battle is sitting on our shoulders to win. So, don’t lag behind. Understood?”

Commander Gree’s words were loud and clear. The booming voices of identical men rang through the ship’s hull, each of them ready to fulfil their role. The hum of the bomber ship was an already familiar background noise. The Clones in 41st Battalion’s green stood ready to be deployed. Their mission wasn’t an easy one, since their input in the battle would turn the tides around in favour of the Republic’s grand army if they succeeded. They were supposed to land behind enemy lines and slowly work their way to the centre. The main base of the CIS was their mission’s objective. It had been a pain in the ass for the Republic since the beginning, providing the droids with never ending backup and maintenance. The Clone army suffered great losses, troops dying in major numbers with only little support and even less supplies. Commander Gree was leading the assault together with some of his best men, which he chose himself. Quiet whispers ensured after the commander’s speech, giving the troops one last time to talk before the true battle began.

“I’ve always wanted to blow one of those clanker facilities up. The five-o-first always make it look so easy.”

Some chuckles escaped the other men that were checking their gear.

“Not everything can be solved with explosions”, groaned one of them.

“Then you have never met Bootleg.”

“I have met Bootleg and I regret it.”

More chuckles.

“Aw, come on Checkpoint, I’m not that bad.”

“No, you are worse. Do you know how many times I had to patch you up in the medical bay because of your shenanigans?”

“That would be eleven times only last month and those were all unrelated to battles”, announced another Clone, squishing his locks under his helmet.

“Actually, Dropkick, it was twelve times but since he literally came half an hour later in again after leaving the medical bay, they wrote it down as eleven.”, corrected another Clone who was checking his backpack.

“As always, you have my back, Backup.”

“To be fair,” said Bootleg, crossing his arms. “My methods are working.”

“I do remember when you used an explosion to fight another explosion and it worked!”

This made the others in the transporter laugh but it was silenced by the pilot’s announcement. They would soon land and arrive at their destination. Lips were pressed into thin lines and helmets got strapped on. It was time.

The ship touched down on the soft surface, avoiding the large plants and fungi that took in most of the view. Not only were the turquoise and orange flowers taking up most of the space of the planet but they also blocked many free areas. Landing was a whole lot harder. Still, the skilled pilot of the 41st wasn’t so easily shaken. The ship doors slid open, allowing the troops to peek at the planet’s fauna, while the pilot’s eyes were scanning the ground for an open space. Gree scrunched his nose at the planet they were supposed to be stationed on. While he enjoyed learning about new planets and its life, he had a distaste for this particular jungle planet. It took too many men already, leaving the troops weak and open for attacks. The wildlife here was so different compared to anywhere else they had been. It was merciless. Gree read the reports about the beasts roaming through the thick leaves. Their terrifying screeches could be heard echoing in the night and on bad days in the day near their camps. Razor sharp teeth and equally dangerous blades, that were supposed to be the creature’s spindly legs, were haunting the dreams of many brothers. Acklays. Acklays and many other creatures called the bushes and thicket their home.

Gree felt the transporter land. The doors in front of him glided open, revealing the planet’s surface. The troops jumped off the ship and their feet hit the muddy jungle ground. The pilot closed the doors again and wished them all good luck before taking off into the air again. They needed to keep the ships out of the enemies’ radar. Gree gave the men a last salute. He turned to his team and called for attention. The troops were quickly divided up into their separate squads and positions.

“Alright, men! This is it. You know the goal of this mission is to blow up the enemy’s main base. If we don’t succeed, then nobody will and this fight will be over for all of us. Is that clear?”

The troops saluted, agreeing in unison. “Sir, yessir!”

Gree nodded, holding up a holomap of their target. The base was easy to spot and their positions were marked with green dots.

“As you can clearly see, the base lies straight ahead of us. Team Alpha will attack from the south side and sneak inside to turn off the alarm. Team Beta enters the base through the westside. One of the reactors will be located there. Team Gamma, you will enter the base through the east side.”

“Contact each other when you have arrived at your location. Set the detonators and leave this place. You only have a small time frame to leave this place before the bombs are ignited and the whole place blows up.”

“In the meantime, Team Alpha will take care of all the alarm and camera footage, giving you a free pass through the base. I’ll be joining Team Alpha for this mission and support them. The other teams will work on their own.”

“Contact each other as little as possible so they won’t pick up our signals. And the most important information for this mission; Do not, at any circumstances, get their attention. Do not engage in any firefight unless absolutely necessary.”

The Clones looked at each other and nodded, understanding the importance of the mission. They saluted Commander Gree before separating into their three distinct teams. Alpha was already ahead together with Gree. Beta was equally ready, heading straight for the jungle in the west side, led by their squad leader Corry. Checkup was bringing Gamma in position in the east.

Carefully they warded through the dirt and mud that kept sticking to their shin amor. The 41st color scheme helped them blend in with their environment and kept them hidden from unwelcome eyes. Despite the cover and camouflage, they had to be careful. Their white was still sticking out and the native creatures of this planet won’t fall for their trick. Not to mention the fungi and plants or diseases that couldn’t be fooled by their training and attacked on a different basis. For now, staying low and moving carefully was their best way to reach the base.

Checkpoint glanced back at his team only to witness Clickbait, in time, pushing a huge leaf out of his way and being smacked right back in the face with it. Backup stifled his snickering, holding his hand in front of his helmet, where his mouth was supposed to be. Clickbait huffed at the plant, ducking under it.

“I would rather be in the air.” mumbled Clickbait. It wasn’t that he had no training on the ground or that he disliked it, he just felt better in the air and away from all the ground obstacles.

Bootleg kept an eye out for patrols, blaster close against his chest. “Missing your jetpack already, huh?”

“’Course! I wanna fly”

“Well, right now you were called for this mission “, reminded Dropkick his brother, nudging Clickbait’s side. “Because we are supposed to be the top men who could -positively win- this mission.”

“Very funny, Drop. I know that. I just really want to activate my jetpack and go aloft, above all the fauna and away from the mud.”

Backup, who was a bit smaller than the others joined the conversation. “I understand that you would rather do something else. I miss the workshop, too but you need to get your head out of the clouds while we are still on the mission.”

“Betrayed by my own brother!”, gasped Clickbait. He looped his arm around Backup's shoulders and pulled him into a headlock. The support trooper started to whine, struggling under his brother’s grip.

“No, no head noogies!”, protested Backup, squirming around to try and pull his helmeted-head free.

“Quit fooling around and shut it, Click.”, warned Checkpoint in a low voice, reminding them that they were still on a mission.

“Yeah, ‘Bait. Quit fooling around”, repeated Dropkick in a mocking tone. The others snickered but settled back into their positions again.

Sometimes Checkup wondered if he was working with cadets. They were good at what they were doing but they weren’t exactly acting like it. The leader of the Gamma squad shook his head in defeat, quietly accepting of the team’s incompetence. Not that he was any different. His plans weren’t any less crazy or daring. He himself has a good count of stupid stunts he pulled off and survived, but at least he was more subtle about it. Or so he thought.

That’s when the beige color scheme of the droid base came into view. It’s bulky and edgy form sticking out between the natural fauna of twisting plants and colorful flowers that reached up toward the sky to get a glimpse of more sunlight than it’s competing greens.

Just as planned, Team Alpha was doing it’s job to turn off the alarm while Team Beta and Gamma went their separate ways to infiltrate the base from the opposite side.

Checkpoint peered out of his cover, looking both ways before rolling out into the open. Confirming one last time that his team would be safe to follow he gave them the ‘ok’. Soon enough Dropkick, Bootleg, Clickbait and Backup emerged from their positions. They followed their squad leader to the beige wall and settled down against it. By now Team Alpha should have disabled the alarm and cameras, making it easy for the rest to enter. Checkpoint moved up to a small panel in the wall and removed it. Soon the whole squad had squeezed itself into the small vent, snaking their way into the facility.

Checkpoint watched the droid patrol walk past them through the vent grid. Waiting for the right moment he signalled his team to get ready with a short hand gesture. The droids passed them and Checkpoint lifted the cover up to slide out of their hiding and into the hall. Soon four more troops followed him, sticking close to the wall. Backup reached into his backpack and pulled out a small device, similar to a holopad. He turned it on and a small dot started to light up in the upper right corner.

“This way”, pointed Backup. “The reactor is on our right side and should be easily accessible.”

The others nodded, letting Backup, their youngest batch mate, take the lead. He would know where to go with his fancy little devices. He would always tinker around on new things, show them their updated new weapons with greater firepower and attached mechanics. Not that they always know what they are for but they were never dismissive of his ideas. Backup was just their little brain when it came to weapons and electronics. He would sit all sleep-cycle long in the workshop, inventing tons of new gadgets. The Kaminoans never truly understood his potential, probably because of his mutation. They dismissed whatever he found out. It was a surprise for all of them that Backup was allowed to go with them in one team. His brother’s weren’t bothered by his blonde roots or heterochromia.

Backup followed the instructions of his datapad and walked straight ahead in the hall. He knew where to go but his attention was mainly focused on the screen in his hands. That’s when suddenly a hand gripped his arm and pulled him to the side, inside another room. Surprised, he looked up and met eye to eye with another brother, Clickbait. Backup tilted his head in confusion but Clickbait held a finger in front of his helmet. Staying quiet he could finally hear it. Steps. Heavy metal feet walking in sync down the hallway they just were in. That was a close call if it weren’t for Clickbait’s hyperawareness.

He had many qualities being a jet trooper. One of them was his awareness of his surroundings at all times. It came in handy whenever he was flying or on stealth missions like this one. He would hear or see things before others. It gives the Clones an advantage over their enemy, however Clickbait’s sensitivity to sound, touch and sight also make him vulnerable. His helmet has been modified by Backup. It filters out alarm sirens; Instead of the ear-piercing blaring, there would be a specific beeping, which he would recognize. His visor was darker than others, absorbing bright light to shield his eyes. Things like this help Clickbait to stay focused and perform his tasks just as well as others, however some things can’t be filtered out. He still gets distracted in briefings because something caught his eyes or he heard a particular strange sound. Usually a brother would update him individually on the plans for the mission. That way Clickbait would always be up to date.

Team Gamma left the room after the area was clear. Clickbait confirmed there were no more patrols outside. Rounding a corner, they could see the hall had changed from a narrow way to a much larger space, indicating they were in the main hall. There was a door at the end of the hall and a smaller path that led up on the right side. There were two rooms on the left and in the middle of the hall was a corridor leading to the right. There, this is where the reactor is supposed to be.

“The reactor room is around this corner”, explained Backup. “After entering we will contact team Alpha and Beta to inform them of our progress. Bootleg will attach the detonators and we will book it from here in no time.”

“Sounds good to me. I can’t wait to blow this damn thing up already.”

“Of course, you would say that, Bootleg. Let’s just get this over with and meet back with the other teams.”

Dropkick had a point. They headed for the door and with Backup by their side the door slid open in no time. In front of them opened up a huge, purple, illuminated room. Their target was in the middle, surrounded by empty consoles. No droids just as expected.

Checkpoint pulled his comm. link out and contacted the other two team leaders. Gree immediately picked up with Corry soon following.

“Team Alpha here. What’s your status?”

“Checkpoint from Team Gamma speaks. We infiltrated the base and am standing in front of the target. Asking for permission to attach detonators.”

“Team Beta is almost ready. We are picking the lock to the reactor room at this moment. We soon should be through.”

“Copy that. We will wait for Team Beta.”

Corry looked at his team as they tried to hack the door open. His team was good at what they did but this was a battle between time and sync. They had to leave the base all together so they could blow up the reactors at the same time. It would be futile if one team didn’t make it out in time. Sticking to the plan's time limit was important. That’s when the door hissed open and revealed the same empty room.

“Team Beta is set and ready to go.” explained Corry, keeping a lookout for droids.

Gree gave the others the a-ok and Team Gamma went straight to work.

“Finally!” gasped Bootleg, setting the timer. “I can’t wait to see the kids in action. It will be spectacular for sure.”

Dropkick rolled his eyes in amusement, enjoying the antics of his brothers. Bootleg always had an interest and knack for bombs and other explosives. While he would usually disable them for the Republic, he would rather like to build his own kids. He tried his hands on all kinds of explosions from small droid poppers to heavy artillery. The thrill with bombs always kept him interested and he would try new ways to disable or build new explosions. It got so far that Kaminoans perked up and listened in on his idea. That’s how they managed to make their droid poppers more powerful, giving them a bigger radius. Bootleg was still proud of that achievement. That’s probably why the Kaminoans aren’t as nosy about his almost daily medbay visits. He can’t stop trying out new things or test reckless ideas, which result in many absurd injuries. It’s said that the medics keep an extra file about his record. Checkpoint never agrees or disagrees about the theories, leading to some wild assumptions.

Bootleg set the timer for the detonator and gave his brothers a thumbs up. They were done and ready to leave this dump. The team gathered their belongings and headed for the door. It slid open with a loud hiss, a blaster barrel greeting the clones. Kriff! The new patrol was here and they weren’t exactly happy to see the uninvited guests.

“Clones!”, yelled one of the robotic voices in shock. “Blast ‘em!”, commanded another one, pointing his three fingered hand at the clones. Sithspit, Gree told them not to engage in a fire fight and leave immediately after the detonators were set because of the time limit.

A blaster clatter on the durasteel floor, pulling everyone’s attention to it. All eyes fell on Dropkick’s abandoned weapon. Another loud thud was heard and this time the droid's head was clean cut off. It met its fate fizzling and sparking. Confused by the unusual kill the droids stepped back in fear.

“What happened?”

“How can this be? B1-2222 suddenly went offline.”

That’s when another droid went down, a Clone without a blaster or blade standing above its body. That was Dropkick’s speciality; Hand to hand combat with a special liking for dropkicks. He always liked to watch the instructors show them new movements that he could use, memorizing the best ways to defeat specific kinds of opponents. B1 Droids were simplier to defeat than the heavily armoured super battle droids or sneaky and flexible commando droids. Magma Guards were a real challenge but not undefeatable with the right footwork, training and knowledge. Still, he would always prefer to take his opponents out with a dropkick. They were his favourite way to fight, leading to Dropkick abandoning his blaster more than once in favour of his hands and legs.

He threw one of the B1 droids over his shoulder, crushing another one’s neck in the same movement. He took the arm of a nearby standing witness and pulled him into the mess, switching places. Dropkick beheaded his opponent with a kick higher than most people’s standards and ended the fight with a dropkick to the chest. In just a hot second he took down a patrol of five droids.

“Let’s move it!” Dropkick was right. Backup tossed his brother his gun and team Gamma was on their way back again. The bomb would go off soon, taking this whole facility with it and turning the tables for the better for the Republic. Checkpoint glanced back while leading his men back out and grunted.

“Dropkick, you really overdid it this time.”

The clone shrugged mid run, believing he did a good job at destroying those droids. “It did the job, didn’t it? Commander Gree told us not to use our weapons unless absolutely necessary. I had everything under control.”

The medic rolled his eyes, looking down at Dropkick’s exposed right leg. “You lost your leg armor with that last kick!”

Dropkick could only shrug. “This won’t bite me in the butt later on.”

Checkpoint could only shake his head at his brother and kept running. If they were lucky, they would not only survive that mission but get back without a scratch. Hopefully the other teams had as much luck as them.

They dashed down the last corridor, rounding the corner and jumping each inside the vent. Crawling back outside, they each let out a whoop of excitement! Checkpoint took his comm. link to contact the others about their success but could only reach Corry’s team.

“We did it, we are done!”, reported the medic in an excited voice that indicated a mission with no casualties. Corry smiled ear to ear, looking back at his own full team, knowing all his men made it out as well.

“Congrats! Same for us, vod!”

“Thanks.” Checkpoint felt his heart race looking at the fauna of Felucia. A second later the picture turned blurry and the cold blackness welcomed Checkpoint’s consciousness as it slipped out of his grasp.

That’s when Team Alpha joined the conversation. Lense took the role of talking because Commander Gree was busy counting the seconds for the detonators.

“This is Team Alpha. We made it out in one piece with no casualties and minor injuries.”

Lense could hear the brothers from the other teams excitedly cheer for the successful mission, letting him instantly know that they were in the same good mood as the team he was in. He looked back at the base as the detonators went off. The ground was shaking and bird-like creatures looked for safety in the air. The facility itself was swallowed in the explosion’s blast, leaving nothing but rubble and droid parts back. Lense and Gree shared a meaningful look, knowing their mission was done. Without further ado the teams went their separate paths back to meet up at the splitting point. Team Beta arrived first with Corry smiling and happily chatting away at his brothers. Soon after them Team Alpha followed. Gree went up to Corry and affectionately patted his shoulder in good spirit, praising him and his team. That was until he noticed something crucial.

Team Gamma was missing.

Gree quirked an eyebrow at Corry and his team, looking back at his own. “Have any of you seen Team Gamma? They should be here already.” Corry only shrugged, taking a look around and noting that their third party did not come back to the meeting point. Did they goof around and ended up coming later?

Commander Gree told Lense to contact them just to be clear. The trooper nodded, immediately getting to work. Corry tilted his head in confusion. The other troops ceased their chatter at the sudden shift in the mood, looking around them. After a few more clicks Gree started to pace impatiently in a circle.

“Team Gamma, come in. Team Gamma.”

Commander Gree spun on his heel to face Lense, who desperately tried to contact the obviously missing team.

“What are they doing? We are supposed to meet here. Their detonator went off just like it should have. What is taking them so long?”, asked Gree himself more than the others. Team Gamma wasn’t the kind of team to just mysteriously cut all comms. Not that any team would do that since it would affect the other brothers in a negative way.

“Were they still inside the base when everything exploded?”, asked Lense, hoping for a response.

“No, can’t be. We had contact right before everything blew up.”, explained Corry in a thoughtful tone.

“That’s it I’m going to look for those slackers myself.”

“But sir, they aren’t picking up- “

“What do you mean they aren’t picking up? Call each of them. At least one has to hear their comm. link!”, commanded Gree anxiously.

“No, sir. What I meant is, that they aren’t picking up, there is only static; In fact, I can’t even locate their comm. links.”

“What?” breathed Gree in disbelief.

“We are doing our best, sir but it seems they have…” The trooper painfully paused. “vanished.”

Gree’s eyes widened as the truth finally hit him. Something bad happened.

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cetacian · 4 years ago

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The Fall and Rise of Orca: Monster Mash Team-Up in Gotham City Monsters Vol 1 Issues #1-6

Warning: child murder, brief mention of animal sacrifice

Under Cut for Length

After Nightwing Vol 4, Prime Earth’s Orca would end up back in Gotham’s waters, though when exactly these stories take place with regard to any kind of timeline for her is anyone’s guess. The timeframe we do get for Gotham City Monsters is it takes place after the events that created Monstertown in the storyline “Night of the Monster Men” and during the events of the City of Bane arc.

Several of the future members of the team found themselves in and around the section of Gotham City known as Monstertown, each with their own personal issues and agendas. Orca, meanwhile, stalked Gotham Harbor in pursuit of a boat carrying illicit cargo to Bane at Arkham Asylum. She soon managed to destroy the ship, taking one crew member captive as the other dissipated back into living clay, later revealed to be an extension of Lady Clay (Sondra Fuller) in order to experience more of the world to make herself feel more perfect:

In the meantime, future team leader Frankenstein narrated about Orca’s current activities and her desire to make herself seem more respectable to her young nephew, who she hadn’t yet met in person:

In the first issue, Orca refers to her nephew as Daniel, but later issues will refer to him as Jonah. It seems likely that he changed names because writer Steve Orlando seemingly couldn’t pass up the obvious joke.

In the meantime, the immortal magic user Melmoth The Wanderer staged what at first seems like a play within the Magnus Theater, trapping the building’s guardian ghost the Red Phantom (Michael Drown) inside a magical mirror to prevent his interference. Soon enough, Melmoth and his Martian Mandrill minions performed a dark magical rite that claimed the lives of all inside the theater’s auditorium, among them Orca’s nephew Jonah, Killer Croc’(Waylon Jones)’s friend Tusk and another of Lady Clay’s humanoid extensions of herself (something that was traumatic for her as it was akin to part of her soul dying):

Frankenstein, the vampire Andrew Bennett and the freed Red Phantom confronted Melmoth in the theater, who claimed to require sacrifices in order to perform a ritual that would save the Multiverse from destruction. As Melmoth escaped, Frankenstein realized he would need to gather a team of those who had connections to the victims in the theater in order to prevent more deaths. Red Phantom agreed to join him, though Andrew set off on an ill-fated mission to kill Melmoth alone. Frankenstein sought out Lady Clay first.

In Orca’s underwater cavern lair, she tied up her captive, explaining her motives and preparing to kill him. However, she soon became distracted by a news radio announcement about the explosion from the Magnus Theater and the voice of her sister Charity asking for assistance in finding her missing son. Her captive took this opportunity to cut himself loose. Orca broke down when it was revealed that her nephew was dead, unaware that her captive was attempting a sneak attack, only stopped by the good timing of Frankenstein’s sword, as he arrived to offer her vengeance as part of the newly forming team:

The team sought out their next member, Killer Croc, to inform him of his friend Tusk’s death and offer him a place on the team, though he was reluctant to join for personal reasons and due to distrust of Frankenstein, who had been created in part by use of Melmoth’s blood. Orca’s kind words changed Croc’s mind about joining and the team were soon on their way:

Orca mentions having a terrible disease that she was cured of by becoming a hybrid, which seems very different from being paraplegic due to an accident in the case of the New Earth version of the character. However, the miniseries never elaborates any further on her backstory.

The team headed to the Gotham Zoo, but were unable to prevent Melmoth from killing two night watchman, a python and the eggs inside her. However, they gained Andrew Bennett as their sixth member, realizing his previous folly which resulted in him being briefly mind controlled by Melmoth’s blood. Requiring a seventh member, they found Batwoman riding through Monstertown, with Orca being none to subtle in her method of getting her attention:

This action lead into a brief battle with Batwoman, with Croc aiding Orca before Frankenstein stepped in to break up the fight:

Croc stepping in help Orca because she was kind to him is very touching and it makes sense that another version of the characters would end up as a couple in the Injustice 2 comic series (which I’ll cover in a later post).

After explaining the situation to Batwoman and inoculating Andrew against Memoth’s influence via Frankenstein’s blood, the team set out to stop Melmoth’s next sacrifice, but failed in the attempt. A brief distraction from the Monster League of Evil forced the team to pick up Melmoth’s trail as they carefully made their way through Bane’s Gotham:

Orca KOing a mummy is awesome and I almost wish the Monster League of Evil were the book’s main villains. Maybe a story for another time.

The team were soon lead to Melmoth’s final sacrifice site: Slaughter Swamp, where Melmoth was able to bring two potential sacrifices with Solomon Grundy then currently elsewhere. Though Melmoth was able to raise an undead horde of smaller Grundys from the swamp’s countless dead.

Orca and Croc expressed their distrust of Batwoman along the way, though she stressed that their willingness to grow as people was more important than past grudges:

There’s strong themes of redemption and life improvement throughout the miniseries and it’s good to see that happening with rogues and a member of the Bat Family instead of just the usual fistfights.

As Melmoth prepared to sacrifice his latest victims, revealing that he was fighting against Perpetua (creator of the Multiverse and responsible for its many Crises), the team arrived to stop him. Several members fought their way through the horde of Grundys as Frankenstein and Croc tried a ruse to wound Melmoth:

Lady Clay turning into gauntlets for Orca is yet another badass moment in this miniseries. In general ,the issues make good use of her shapeshifting powers.

Just as the team seemed to be getting overwhelmed by sheer numbers, the Red Phantom’s quick thinking and Frankenstein’s execution of the plan, severely damaged Melmoth’s body and allowed Red Phantom to capture his soul. This caused the Grundys to fall dead once more as Orca and Lady Clay went to untie the would-be victims:

There are a few humorous bits of levity in the book that work and this won’t be the last time someone mistakes an Orca for a shark.

In the aftermath, Orca visits her nephew’s grave, accompanied by Lady Clay and Red Phantom. Lady Clay offers her condolences as she and Red Phantom promise to lend aid whenever needed:

In the meantime, Croc took over as the manager of Tusk’s hotel, as Red Phantom went back to his theater, with Melmoth trapped within the same mirror Phantom had once been imprisoned in. The team then recovieneied at the Tomb of Gotham, the place where evil first infected the city, to make their vow that they would come together again to fight whatever other evils might threaten the city and the greater Multiverse:

Summery Thoughts: You can probably tell by my enthusiastic comments that this is my favorite storyline that Orca has been a part of. Her self loathing has actual consequences this time around, as it prevented her from being there to save her nephew. Some might considered his death fridging, but given how many characters are motivated by revenge in this story, I don’t think it counts. I’m just glad they remembered her family at all and I really wish writers would remember Terry, but I’m getting off topic. Having some of Gotham and DC’s more monstrous inhabitants on a hero team paved the way for books like Justice League Dark and expanded on worldbuilding with the area of Monstertown, as well as on character development and following up on past stories. This was also a great first outing for Red Phantom/Michael Drown and I hope the character shows up again at some point. I worry though because the Joker War arc saw the destruction of much of Monstertown, along with the rest of Gotham, and put characters like Croc back at square one, just when he was finally getting a chance to do something more interesting than being a sad, sewer-dwelling thug. I don’t want to end this on a downer though, so I’m just going to hope that we’ll see more of the Gotham City Monsters somewhere down the road.

Up next, I’m going to talk about a couple of one-shots featuring Orca, before we head into a much darker universe.

#Landlubber (OOC)#Apex Predator (Muse Images)#Whalelore (About The Muse)#orca #grace balin #gotham city monsters #dc comics #steve orlando #tw child murder #tw animal death mention

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mimiplaysgames · 5 years ago

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Any tips on creating an outline?

Nonnie, thank you so much for your question! I know I took so long to respond, and I apologize for that - I was fighting off the demons in my mind among a daily work schedule and a side adventure into the Realm of Chores That Clog Up My Time.

I appreciate that you asked me, you are awesome!!

Outlining is something I surely do… though I am lazy. Very, very lazy.

There are different types of outline techniques that people use, and you can check out different styles as defined by this wonderful little blog post.

In the meantime, I will explain how my personal outlining process is shaped, and list certain things that I think is important for writers to consider no matter what style of outlining they choose.

The Start: A Daydreaming Mess

Like I said, I am lazy. I use bullet points. That’s it.

I start by recording all my thoughts (dumping them out, airing them out, whatever you want to call it). Each idea (a scene, a line of dialogue, an image, a symbol) is written down on its own bullet point. At this point, it doesn’t matter what order they are in. I’ll spend to weeks daydreaming scenarios and they get listed somewhere, and then I put them all together when I’m ready to map out a story out of them.

Then it’s like a puzzle: I figure out which of these ideas work to build up tension, which work to build up character development, which are perfect for the ending, and then arrange them in that way.

Honestly, the best part about this method is seeing those plot holes glare at you right in the face.

Now you got to vanquish them.

You know you’ll want the scene where your MC drinks coffee late at night because they’re terrified of falling asleep, and are tricking themselves into thinking they could get away with their third all-nighter in a row before the scene where they confront their father on top of an unmarked grave.

You just don’t know how to bridge the gap between those two scenes.

Armed with the knowledge that something needs to happen to make the connection, you then spend days or weeks daydreaming more, until you bless yourself with a solution. BAM. You have another plot point to add to your outline.

Outlining takes a long time, which is why I don’t personally like to get fancy with it - I’m itching to write instead, but an outline is an essential tool in weaving together a story that is more sensible in the long run, and it cuts down on your time revising.

As You Go: Weaving Something Seamless

There are two (2) major things to keep in mind when you’re outlining to make the process easier and more efficient:

1) Keep it relevant.

It’s even helpful for fluff, if you are the kind who appreciates cohesion in the stories that you read. You want to make sure the events you are putting down in your outline are relevant somewhere.

By the time you reach the end, you may see where the branches of your outline fray, and drift into nowhere. Do the merciful thing and trim them. You can save those wonderful ideas for something else.

And

2) Keep your characters in mind.

If you’re the type who notices you’re consistently drifting far from your outline once you put your mind at work, often the case is because you didn’t consider the characters enough when making decisions for them.

Consider that stories are essentially put together by the conflicting motivations of all the characters at hand. It’s easy to outline a plot on its own and then expect the characters to fulfill their roles as you need them to.

But once you throw in their motivations, their personalities, their needs in the way, suddenly you have a handful of imaginary figures with enough of their own agency to rebel against you - even if they are in your mind.

Whether you are creating your own characters or you are writing fanfiction, when outlining a story, it’s helpful to ask yourself what the character would do as you’re plotting. You want to ask yourself how each character would react, how they would decide their own next step forward, and who they would antagonize or call a friend after the fact.

If You’re Stuck, Work Backwards

It’s incredibly easy to get swept up by all the exciting images in your mind as you plot your story… only to realize that you’re making knots on your way to the ending.

Sometimes, you create too many scenarios, and too many what-ifs.

Untangling that mess is a heartache.

Alternatively, you have a the first third of your story figured out, and the last third all checked out, with the middle totally unaccounted for.

In this case, it’s best to work backwards. Doing this helps you figure out the events that need to happen in order to act as a catalyst for the climax/ending. From there, you can get inspiration for all the possibilities that could have sparked those first spurts of flames that would inevitably build into the larger inferno.

And there you have it, Nonnie. These are honestly the very things I think all writers need to keep in mind when outlining. I don’t actually consider the outlining process that fun a lot of the times - I need to work things out by writing the scene itself - but the outline has definitely saved me from getting lost in a story or straying too far.

If you’re reading this, let me know what kinds of techniques you like to do in your own writing!! Do you love/hate the outline process like I do?

#writing advice #writing fanfiction #let's talk writing #i'm always here to talk guys #i need to dedicate more time to my tumblr #i neglect things for far too long

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studythenight-away · 6 years ago

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i’m going to be taking the lsat in two years and i was wondering if you have any study tips? i’m going to be starting prep in january but i don’t think that’ll be enough :( i love your studyblr btw

Hey there anon! (aww tank you *blushes*)

I don’t know if I’m qualified to be answering this now as I haven’t taken the test yet and don’t know my score (but I did take the test once last June and got in the 97th percentile, so hopefully I sort of know what I’m talking about). I’ll do a more in-depth post if I get my score back and turns out my studying method actually worked.

Here’s some tips in the meantime ~

Two years is more than enough. Be calm! The brain is like a muscle and if you don’t use it constantly that reasoning part you’ve worked so hard to develop might go away. So studying too far ahead of time is not that helpful. For last year’s test I studied twice a week for three months and then studied 15 hours a day for a week. Not a good idea. You need consistency. This time around, I’m studying every day by doing at least something(timed section, review incorrect answers, etc.). I work full-time so can’t be studying much more than that on the weekdays. On the weekends I take a practice test in the morning, do a blind review, then review incorrect questions.

Be careful of burnout. Last year I took 3 practice tests a day for a full week before the exam. WOW. I hate past me. Granted my practice test scores did go up (by 7 points over the week omg), but I didn’t perform that well on the actual test because my brain was tired… Give yourself space between practice tests to recover.

Don’t be afraid of practice tests. Some people are really afraid of taking practice tests because seeing that score is just terrifying. It’s just a score. The point of practicing is to improve so of course your scores aren’t going to be pretty until later in the game. It helps so much with building stamina which you really need for the LSAT - 35 minutes x 5 of pure focus??? You can’t just come up with that mental endurance out of nowhere.

Blind review. Honestly 7sage’s article here spells it out really clearly. I didn’t do this last year and really wish I did. Even though my recent practice test scores haven’t been going up (and have been going down…), my BR score has consistently improved, which shows me that I’m actually improving and just need to work on thinking clearly under pressure.

Online resources. Get a 7sage account. You can grade your tests (with BR) and track which types of questions you need the most help with. They also have video explanations for all logic games that are super helpful and clear. Use Manhattan Prep and Powerscore forums to understand the reasoning behind questions you get wrong.

Make a wrong answer book. I cut out the LR questions I get wrong and paste them into a notebook with the reasoning behind it in a different color pen. It makes it so much easier for me to go through and see what I struggle with and be reminded of the typical kinds of reasoning/LSAT language that messes me up.

General note about studying. Try not to get upset if your practice scores aren’t constantly on an upward trend. The LSAT is designed to get you. Not every test has an equal amount of questions that happen to be in your weak area. Sometimes you have an off-day. Some series of tests are just trickier than others. So many reasons. Just keep going and try to master as many types of questions as possible. You can do it!!

Wow now that I’ve gotten started I feel like I could say a lot more, but again - who knows if my tips should carry any weight whatsoever. If I do well in October (T-24 days *screaming*) I’ll make a slightly more organized/insightful post. I hope these random tips help!! Good luck my friend! Reach out whenever for support ~ The LSAT sucks and I’m here for you.

#anon #ask #lsat

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charlotte-codes · 6 years ago

Text

This, Charlotte, is the internet ...

It was September 30th: day one, week one.

I cycled across Bristol that Monday morning with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. I am not a seasoned city cyclist, so crossing the leviathan of roadworks at rush-hour was my first test.

Arriving at the DevelopMe offices unscathed, I quickly found my seat. Although we’d all met the week before at a social event organised by DevelopMe (a brilliant idea because I was less nervous having already met some of my fellow classmates) the room was very quiet and you could feel the tension of 12 career-changers psyching themselves up for what was ahead.

Our teacher for the week was Keir, whose enthusiasm and sense of humour made us all feel relaxed and at home very quickly.

We started with a brief introduction to the internet.

Now, I knew that the internet was not contained in a small black box à la the IT Crowd, but I had never really considered its complexity: a global network of computers that can communicate with one another at sub-second speeds is something that takes a while to get your head around.

Although the fundamentals of the internet are fairly easy to digest, thinking about it too much at this point in my understanding is like thinking about the expanding universe - enough to make my brain explode and ooze out of my ears. So, we’re gonna leave that one for another day.

In the meantime, let’s talk about HTML and CSS, our topics for the first fortnight. This post will be an overview of what we learnt, I’ll get into the details in separate posts later on.

HTML (Hypertext Markup Language)

The phrase that has stuck in my mind from our first week at bootcamp is ‘Progressive Enhancement and Graceful Degradation’ - which sounds suspiciously like a general life lesson, or an advert for a skincare range. For our purposes, it’s a way of making sure that every user can access the fundamental parts of your website no matter what browser they use or how slow their internet connection.

The first few days concentrated on writing HTML, which contains the important ‘content’ of the webpage. CSS is used to make it look good and also deals with accessibility. We’ll get into Javascript later, but that allows user interactivity. All three together constitute Front End development. My beginners understanding of this is that a Front End specialist works on the client-side stuff you see and interact with - whilst a Back End specialist works on the server-side stuff you don’t. A Full Stack developer does both.

In terms of HTML, you can split your code up like a human body: at the top is a <head> tag wherein you store all the metadata. Just like a human head, you can’t see what’s going on in there on the webpage itself, but it contains important behind-the-scenes information. The part of the page you see online is the <body> and you can dress this up however you want using CSS.

Within the body you’ll probably have a <header>, a <main> and a <footer>, which are fairly self-explanatory ways to break up a page. A lot of this stuff comes from traditional methods in printing, so if you imagine your page layout a bit like a newspaper, then considering how to split it up seems logical: for instance, you’ll probably further divide your page up into articles, sections and asides.

Within these sections you’ll have tags for various elements like paragraphs <p>, images <img/>, links <a>, headings <h1>, <h2>, buttons <button> and so on: again, it’s all wonderfully logical. Here’s some I wrote earlier - this is just part of the <header> on my home page:

The above example is also styled and for the majority of the first fortnight of bootcamp we got to grips with CSS.

CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)

CSS is a little trickier, mainly because there are SO MANY THINGS and you have to think about accessibility and responsiveness (i.e how a screen-reader will understand your code and what it will look like on desktop and mobile devices - this requires the use of @media queries, which I’ve grown to really like because it is SO satisfying when they work properly).

Potentially one of the biggest challenges I found in CSS was positioning things evenly. When you start fiddling about with margins and padding, and forgetting what you’ve fiddled with, you start seeing issues arising on the page: maybe it’s an <h2> that just won’t align with the image underneath; or maybe it’s a <nav> bar that is squishing all the menu items too close together, and pushing them all a little off-centre.

Now, I’m mildly neurotic when it comes to visuals. I’m trained in visual analysis and I’ve spent the best part of the last decade explaining the composition of paintings and other images - why they have a central focal point, or why they don’t etc. etc. Positioning stuff correctly and with meaning is important to me.

So I became particularly enamoured with flexbox and CSS grid (and not just because I enjoyed playing Flexbox Froggy and Grid Garden). These do a large percentage of the positioning legwork for you and I found myself using them a lot for the project work that we did in the second week.

Some excellent resources for these can be found here:

https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/a-guide-to-flexbox/

https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/complete-guide-grid/

Week 2: More CSS and SASS

In week 2 we worked on a sample project.

The brief was to practice our HTML and CSS skills by building a pretend portfolio site for a commercial photographer. Our teacher this week was Ruth, who was also super cool and put us all at ease instantly.

The project consisted of a home page with a grid of featured photos and a nav that turned into a burger menu when reduced to a small screen. We also had to create a gallery page, a blog page (and a sample page for one blog post) and a contact page (to practice HTML forms).

One of the main focuses of week 2 was using SASS to organise our code so that we didn’t have to repeat ourselves throughout the site.

At first I didn’t get on with SASS (it felt complicated). But being a fan of flexboxes, I spent some time creating a mixin that I was particularly proud of so that I didn’t have to create new flexboxes all the time (a mixin is like a function that can be reused by passing values into the variables - in this case, $justify, $align and $flexDirection):

Turns out SASS is super useful.

And being a bit of a neat freak, I enjoyed putting all my code into separate files and tidying everything up.

I was pretty proud of my site by the end of the week:

home page ... big screen

two sample posts on the blog page ...

Every Friday, we have an individual review with one of the course organisers so that we can discuss how we are getting on. Both weeks I mentioned that I was tired, but in a good way! I was getting great feedback from my teachers too.

So far, so good.

Downtime

Learning new information day after day is super tiring and it’s important to have a break at the weekends.

So I’ve been kind to myself and made sure I get out into nature on Saturdays and Sundays and away from my desk. The temptation just to work through is there all the time - I love what I’m doing, so it doesn’t feel like work and I have to drag myself away from it in the evenings and at weekends. This can only be a good thing though, right?!

The entire cohort are so friendly and everyone gets on really well. A few of us finished the first fortnight with a celebratory drink at Bocabar.

Next week ... Javascript ... bring it on!

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aliceslantern · 6 years ago

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Beyond This Existence, chapter 18

Summary: After Xehanort's death, Demyx finds himself unexpectedly human in Radiant Garden. With nothing but fragments of his past and a cryptic statement from Xemnas, he's left to figure out who he is. When Ienzo asks for his help with a project, the two find common ground, but the trauma and secrets in both of their pasts could tear it apart. Zemyx (Demyx/Ienzo), post-KH3 canon compliant Read it on FF.net/on AO3

-----

The weeks wore on, one into the other. Coping with the mass amounts of chaos in his memory never became easier, but at least it was bearable now that he was no longer so alone. Demyx’s days took on a quiet sort of comfort. Studying, songwriting, socializing, and yes, therapy. Telling someone else these things was hard, but keeping it to himself was even harder. Similarly, listening to Ienzo’s own stories was no cakewalk. Their lives had been infinitely complicated and troubling.

With all this behind them, there was a start of a real sort of life, not the odd buffering phase of the previous few months. The castle was no longer so dreadfully uncomfortable, conversations between Demyx and the others no longer so stilted. He was starting to develop real friendships with these people. Oddly enough, Demyx found that aside from Ienzo, he was closest to Even. He’d taken an interest in healing theory as well, though more as a pet fascination than a vocation. Every now and again, Even gave him tests. It was his own way of reaching out.

“... How’d I do?” Demyx asked. He hadn’t had much written education of any kind, but at least the tests were something concrete to work toward. More structured than Aerith’s “give me a call when you finish the book” method of teaching.

“In all? Not bad.” Even passed the papers back. “Chemistry is your worst subject. But you knew that.”

“It’s the math.” Demyx skimmed the results and found that, overall, he’d done better than he’d thought. “I just can’t understand it.”

“Well--when it comes to calculating molarity--it’s typically just memorization of the base compounds.”

“And algebra.”

“For some reason I highly doubt you’ll have to deal much with kinesthetics in your everyday work. And if you do I’m a phone call away. I rather enjoy figuring it out.” He started shuffling through the sea of papers on his desk. “It gives me something to break the endless tedium of my days, anyway.”

“You’re not going to work on the Replica Program anymore?”

Even drew the hair out of his face. “On one hand, I believe that project has reached its peak. The replicas have gotten to a point where they’ve developed their own personhood, and their own hearts. That was the goal, to a degree. I’m of course going to study them as they age to see if they live out the same lives as ordinary humans. On the other…” He waved his wrist, as though dismissively. “What right have I to create new life? Now that I am becoming human, I feel more responsibility towards the way these replicas are treated. It’s as if I were to give birth. I suppose there might be a medical application to the creation of vessels--say, if someone were to be seriously injured or lose all neurological function--but again, what right have I to continue to meddle with such forces?”

“I can’t help you with that one,” Demyx said.

“No, it’s something for me to puzzle over. In the meantime, I’m going to continue to reflect on the ongoing intersection between magic and science within my life. It seems… most apt.”

“Why did you become a scientist?”

“Hm?” The question seemed to throw him off-guard.

“You’ve been with Ansem longer than anyone else. Why’d you do it?”

Even thought about it. “Why is it you play sitar?”

Demyx shrugged. “It’s just part of me. Always has been. If it hadn’t been sitar it probably would have been some other instrument. That one just happened to be given to me first.”

“Precisely. It’s part of your core, perhaps for no real reason. Or many real reasons, if you subscribe to fate or a divine. That is how I feel about my research. I could not separate the essence that is “me” from it. This is merely another phase of my life, and so I need to adjust my work accordingly.”

“To what?”

“Something that I hope is meaningful. I do not yet know what exactly.” He smiled. “Learning to change and grow after nearly twelve years of stagnation is taking most of my concentration.”

“It’s hard, isn’t it?” he mumbled, more to himself than Even.

“Incredibly.” He cleared his throat. “I’ll quiz you on the next three chapters next week.”

Demyx sighed. “No problem.”

----

Demyx was headlong into these chapters when Ienzo found him. With half his mind he was trying to figure out how to make the song he played better, the other half trying to puzzle out the complicated terminology. He wasn’t aware of his surroundings.

“How is it going?” Ienzo asked.

Demyx jumped, a discordant note throwing him off the melody.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Demyx let Arpeggio disappear. “It helps me remember, if I play,” he said. “Otherwise I can’t focus. If I read a chapter enough while playing a certain song, it sticks. I tried it the other way. I don’t know how you guys learn stuff.”

“Everyone studies differently,” Ienzo said. “So you’re really going to do it?”

“That’s the plan,” he said. “She told me to read these before I came to her for the practical stuff.” Demyx shifted the books around.

Ienzo kissed him lightly.

“So what’s going on with you? I figured you were working on something, but I don’t know what.”

“Well, actually, that’s kind of why I came to find you.”

“The score? Ienzo, you realize I can just read it to you, right?” He hadn’t yet looked back at it. In a way, he wasn’t ready, even though he knew what the contents were.

He shook his head. “Not that. Though I would like to know what’s in it, if you’re not afraid to share. No.” He took the lexicon out from under his arm. “I’m afraid there’s something only you can help me with.”

He smirked. “What was it you said? “If you want to be alone with me you need only ask?””

“What? Do I really speak like that? Never mind-- no, this is something else.” Ienzo sighed. His cheeks were pink. “I want to go to the basement.”

Demyx bit his lip. He’d had a feeling this was coming. Ienzo had been making leaps and bounds dealing with his guilt. No doubt he wanted to make true peace with it. “Okay. Two things. First, not a great idea, all things considering. Second, why me? Why not Ansem or Even or someone else who was involved in the experiments?”

“You’ve got a weapon.” Very matter-of-fact.

He felt the blood drain from his face. “So--let me get this straight. You want to go to the basement--where it’s crawling with Heartless and god-knows-what-else, not to mention where you’ve seen enough horror to go gray prematurely--”

“I haven’t gone gray. This is my natural hair color.”

“Babe, the last time you remembered something half as horrible you went kinda ballistic. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

“I’ve healed since then,” he said. “I have this--” he held out the lexicon, “whatever it means. I think the only way I can find peace is by helping them. Talking with them. Maybe I can help them find some little bit of dignity.”

Demyx exhaled, exasperated. “And do you really trust me to defend you? I’m out of shape, and I have no idea how strong the Heartless down there even are.”

He frowned. “What is this really about?” Ienzo asked. “Are you truly afraid of a few Heartless?”

Demyx didn’t know what to say, just that his gut was telling him this was an awful idea. “I guess not,” he said. “I just… I’m afraid that going down there and seeing all that will change how I see you. And I don’t want that to happen.”

Ienzo took his hands. “I know that. And it might change your mind. But I… I need to do this. I hope you understand.”

Demyx knew what had happened in the basement. Maybe he didn’t know all the details--the how or why of it all--but he knew Ienzo had been involved in this dangerous human experimentation. He knew, factually, that Ienzo couldn’t really be at fault, that he’d been a child and too young to accept responsibility, especially since he'd been so manipulated. But at the same time, Demyx knew seeing all of it would be a different story. It would make it tangible. And yet. “You’d do the same for me. Alright. Let’s free some ghosts, or whatever.”

Ienzo kissed him. “I love you.”

“I can’t say no to you. But you knew that.” He marked the place in his book and set it aside. “I’d feel better if we got some supplies. And if you rested. You look exhausted.”

“So tomorrow?”

He nodded. “Tomorrow.”

----

Later that night, while Ienzo read in bed, Demyx headed down to Even’s quarters. Slick, hot anxiety was building inside of him, making him vaguely anxious. He knocked, was let in. Even was folding laundry. “Did you need help with something?” he asked. Then frowned. “You do not look well.”

Demyx didn’t know what to say. “Ienzo wants to go to the basement.”

He paused just the slightest. “Yes. And?”

“Well--what if something’s down there?”

“I thought you could adequately defend yourself now?”

“It’s not me I’m worried about.” He exhaled and pulled his hand through his hair. “He’s got the lexicon. What if he tries using his powers again?”

Even shook his head. “He’s aware of the risk. I doubt he’d try.”

“What if he doesn’t do it consciously?”

He raised an eyebrow. “I had the impression it took a lot of effort for him to traverse your memory.”

“But he couldn’t control it. I don’t know what this is going to entail. If I’m just going to beat up some Heartless, or maybe there’s nothing down there and this is just for closure. But what if.”

“Since when was forethought a strength of yours?” Even asked, almost bitterly. “Boy, now you’re making me worry.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know who else to ask.”

Even sighed. He set aside the socks he was folding. “Come along.”

They went down to his lab. Even pulled out a first aid kit, some ethers, and some potions. He approached another cabinet and took out a vial and a syringe still in its wrapping. He placed them on the table.

“You’re aware of the correlation at this point, of heart failure and overuse of power.”

“Well--yes.” The sight of the medicine made him shiver.

“I’ve been poking through our research. The reason why it struck Ienzo so intensely has largely to do with the fact that he quite literally grew up as a Nobody. Trying to adequately corroborate his humanity with a Nobody will served to heighten the risk. It may not happen again. Perhaps he’s adjusted. At the same time… it may.”

“What’s that?”

“A serum to induce sleep. Should he begin to exhibit the same symptoms, you should dose him. And then call for help. I’m giving this to you as a precaution only.” Even unwrapped the syringe, prepped it, and then capped it off. Demyx caught sight of the label on the bottle. He knew enough by now to recognize it.

“That’s a poison. Not a sedative.”

“Sleep akin to death,” Even said, as though quoting. “Better than actual death, is it not?” He held it out. Demyx didn’t take it.

“I can’t.”

“You must. This is--” He exhaled. “For goodness sakes, you might not even need it.” Even placed it on the table in front of him. “Have you tried convincing him out of it?”

“Yes. But how can we escape it? We live here. He’s reminded of it every day. If it’s not now, it’d be some other time.”

“The boy is… determined.” He sighed. “I’m trusting you with this. With him. Do you understand?”

Demyx nodded.

“So take it.”

He took all the medicine back with him, feeling sick. He hid the syringe in the first aid kit and tried to pretend it wasn’t there.

Ienzo was still caught up in his book. “Did you get everything you needed?” he asked.

“Oh, plenty,” he said breezily. “How do you feel?”

“Surprisingly, not as anxious as I thought.” He shut the book and settled down in bed.

“Can I… stay with you tonight?”

Ienzo frowned. “Of course.” He lifted the covers and let Demyx crawl in. He drew Ienzo close, breathed in his smell. “I’m not sure why you felt like you had to ask. You scarcely sleep in your own bed anymore.”

“Dunno. I figured you might want some time alone.”

“I have spent a lot of time thinking about this alone. I don’t mind the company.”

Demyx looked at him. His eyes bright and alive. He kissed him once. Ienzo settled down against him and was asleep before long.

Demyx did not sleep a wink.

----

Morning. Breakfast. He bathed, feeling vaguely numb and dissociated, slightly outside of himself. When he saw Ienzo in his apprentice’s coat, he almost wondered if this was a bizarre dream. He gathered up their bag of supplies.

“You sure you want to do this?” Demyx asked.

“Yes. I’m sure.”

He sighed. “Lead the way, then.”

He followed him through the corridors, through the familiar, then down dozens and dozens of stairs to a locked door. The air down here was cold, and it smelled dank and musty. Crystal sconces lit everything brightly, but at the same time he felt as though he was squinting in the gloom. At the door, Ienzo hesitated.

“Did you forget the code?” Demyx asked.

Ienzo summoned the lexicon. The soft rustle of its pages barely broke the suffocating silence. Demyx felt his heart in his throat. This was not a good sign. Ienzo meant business. Demyx tried to tell him then what might happen. But he had to know. There was no way he couldn't, right?

He punched in the code, and in they went.

It did not look dissimilar to the containment cells of the Castle that Never Was. Gray floor. Black and silver doors. Stark, harsh fluorescent light. A couple of these spaces were offices, and what looked to be a small lab. Papers were everywhere, all over the floors. Beakers had been smashed, a computer screen cracked. Ienzo took it all in with little emotion.

The smoky, musty smell only ever got stronger. “They smell us,” Demyx said. He brought an arm up in front of Ienzo automatically. He pushed it away.

“Not yet.”

They moved forward bit by bit. Ienzo absently touched the numbers on the cells, peeking inside here or there. Demyx didn’t see anything, but he could taste it. The cells were riddled with scratch marks, places where the floor had been gouged away. A sink bad been torn out of the wall. A mattress ripped to shreds.

“There’s no one here,” Demyx said.

“Don’t speak so soon,” Ienzo said.

A silhouette of pure darkness crawled out of the ground. It looked weirdly human in shape, more like a Novashadow than the little Shadows he was used to. It did not give chase, but seemed to merely watch them.

Darkness began to slither out of the back cells, forming yet more Shadows. “Freaky,” he hissed. The Keyblade snapped into his palm. One rose out of the pool and shuffled towards them. “Stay behind me.”

“Not yet,” Ienzo said. He crouched down, and Demyx almost screamed, but the darkness on the floor didn’t crawl over him like it normally would’ve. “Do you remember me?”

Was he talking to the Heartless? It paused, tilted its head.

“I was little then,” Ienzo said. “Not anymore.”

The Shadow twitched and shuddered. A few more peeked out. “What are you doing?” Demyx asked.

“Giving it the Sora treatment.” He exhaled. “Put that away. We’re not here to hurt you all. Isn’t that right?”

The blade in his hand trembled a little.

“Demyx?” Ienzo prompted.

He let it disappear. Raised his hands, as if to show how empty they were.

Ienzo smiled kindly at the Heartless. “You’ve been here for such a long time, so alone.” The lexicon opened to a random page, of a little girl. “Isn’t that right, Jamie? That’s you, right?” He held the book out to the Heartless. It seemed to stare at the page within, of the photo. “I wanted to apologize for all we put you through. There was a bad, bad man. He made all the people around him sick with evil. And they took it out on you. On me, too. And my friend next to me. That doesn’t make it right, but the bad man’s gone and everyone wants to help you.”

The Heartless seemed to convulse.

“I can’t imagine it’s fun down here. There’s nobody and nothing to play with. But there’s another place with lots of friends waiting for you.”

The Shadow raised a claw.

“Ienzo,” Demyx hissed. Ienzo held out his hand.

The Shadow placed its claw on the photo of the girl. It was not twitching anymore, not in the way Heartless usually did.

“Do it now,” he whispered. “She’s ready.”

He slashed. The Heartless had no defense; it was almost made of smoke. Its heart rose and vanished into nothing. Demyx was shaking. “Oh my god,” he said. “Are you… are you okay? I should’ve given you my coat.” He gave him a good once-over. No threads of darkness, no injury.

“I’m fine. Let’s keep going.”

“How many are there?”

“Left? I’m not sure. But these aren’t ordinary Heartless. This was the genesis.”

The Heartless, having seen all this, did not flee the way they were akin to when their brethren died. They came forward in a lump. They did not attack. They left plenty of space between them and Ienzo.

“They’re making a line,” Demyx said.

“They want to be free.” He smiled. His eyes were watering. “Who wants to know who they are?”

It took hours.

Ienzo gave nearly every Heartless the same speech, but he altered it slightly, peppering in details he must have read somewhere--information about a beloved pet, a favorite color, updates about loved ones who were still alive. Humanizing them. It was only once this semblance of humanity was found that they could go. Peacefully.

Even though the Heartless were weak, the fact that there was so many of them and that this was stressful to watch tired him. He waited for one to break rank, to attack and injure. None did, though.

“Are you alright?” Ienzo asked. Demyx had been standing to his right and noticed his full face for the first time in hours. He was sweating, his complexion washed out. Demyx swallowed. No.

“Just a bit out of shape,” he said breezily. “How are you feeling?”

“I feel fine.”

More speeches. More Heartless. Demyx was wondering if it was just his eyes playing tricks on him, or if Ienzo was looking worse. Pale. Shaky. No blood yet. But soon? The darkness was getting thinner and thinner until there were no more Heartless waiting.

“Is that it?” Demyx asked hoarsely. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”

“Yes, that was--” He calculated quickly, then furrowed his brows. “Ninety-nine. There’s one left. Maybe it’s hiding? Can you handle one more?”

“I think. You?”

He nodded. When he stood, his knees shook, and Demyx helped him up. He was getting weak. They had to get out of here, to get medical help. Demyx tried to covertly steer him in the opposite direction. “Why did they forgive me?” Ienzo asked.

“What do you mean?”

“The bitterness… they just let it go. Without fail. There was not even one rogue Shadow that tried to attack.” His eyes were wide.

“They’ve been here ten years,” Demyx said. “That’s a long time to suffer. Sometimes you have to let it go to make the pain stop.”

He looked at his trembling palm. “I see. I… understand.”

Demyx glanced over his shoulder. “I think we’ve found our stowaway.”

It was the humanoid Heartless, the first one they’d seen. They approached it slowly.

“We’re here to help,” Demyx said. “Do you want to go be with your friends?”

The Heartless paused. It twitched irritably.

“Ienzo,” Demyx said nervously. “Maybe start working your magic, yeah? My buddy here seems a little agitated.” He was positive that it was stronger than the last. Strength sapped, Demyx didn’t know if he could honestly take it on.

A hint of panic crept into Ienzo’s voice. “I can’t--” He started manually shuffling the pages. “I can’t find their--”

The Neoshadow hissed. Demyx drew his Keyblade. “Come on. Let’s talk this out,” he said. “I’m offering you a get-out-of-jail free card here, friend.”

Once it lay eyes in the Keyblade, the Heartless screamed. The sound almost incapacitated him, harsh, like razors against his eardrums. It leapt at him.

Demyx found himself awash in darkness.

#beyond this existence #demyx #ienzo #even #zemyx #demyx/ienzo

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