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amateur-author597 · 3 years

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SERIOUS RISE OF THE TITANS SPOILERS

BUT I NEED TO RANT

SPOILERS ARE UNDER THE CUT I PROMISE

I STARTED ROTT TEN MINUTES AFTER IT CAME OUT AT 5:01 PM AEST AND FINISHED ROTT AT ROUGHLY 10 TO 7

I FINISHED THE MOVIE AND SAW 8 SPOILER POSTS WITHIN 2 MINUTES ON TUMBLR

PLEASE BE CONSIDERATE OF OTHERS AND PUT ALL SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT FOR YOUR POSTS AND TAG THEM PROPERLY

FIRST OFF

Everyone who said Blinky would die because of"and blinky" in the trailer

Fuck you

It was very fair but still I was so scared

Same to if those who said Archie died because he wasn't in the trailer

Again fair but I was terrified and anxious as hell

My heart could not have handled if he died or Douxie's grief but I'm still upset about what actually happened

And I wish Zoe showed up so they could give her some characterization

We find out she's known Douxie and been friends with him for over 900 years but she doesn't help with the Arcane Order?

And none of the hedge witches show up to help fight them to defend their home?!?!?!

SECOND!!! THE TRAIN SCENE!!!

YES

LOVED IT

GREAT

Jim you stupid string bean, I love you though

Claire, good job, that was some hard magic

Toby, go duke!

Douxie my husband, YAAASS QUEEN, GET IT BABY

The Police Station

It was so funny

Everything about it I loved

Douxari confusing the officers and being neutrally chaotic

Claire trying to be tough and silent

Toby spilling ALL the tea and the officers not believing him

Archie just being Archie and enjoying the confusion of the humans

KREL SHOWING UP WITH RICKY AND LUCY

YES

OMFG

Keep casually listing just about every spy agency in order

and then just

"And your mum"

What a legend

Literal King 👑

Honestly

Walter and Barbara

Them being engaged and happy

Y E S

Jim being best man

Y E S

Walter DYING before they could get married

N O

H E L L N O

ELI GREW UP!!!!!

MPREG STEVE

Very unpopular opinion

I loved it, so fucking funny

I don't even like mpreg normally

But I loved it as a random side plot cause they probably couldn't find an import part for every character and still give them their deserved screen time

Also, funny!

Krel was way too smug explaining to Steve that he would be pregnant, not Aja

You know how we as a fandom have all decided Krel is Aro/Ace icon or at least Aro spec and/or grey ace (something like that) I have no problem with this and love it, it makes me feel very validated, but what Krel just doesn't want kids and decided it's easier to not have romantic relationships, that's also a legitimate thing a lot of woman do

Does that mean gay guys can have biological kids on Akiridion 5?

BACK TO STEVE

I wish there was a bit where Steve called Lawrence on the phone calling him "dad" or "coach dad" and being like "Hey, I know you're probably busy, you're at school but I'm seriously freaking out and I need your help or advice" and explaining the whole Akiridion pregnancy and Coach just reassuring him gently and telling him that he and Steve's mum would support him and he wasn't alone and they weren't mad at him.

Douxie figuring out the sigil

Good job baby! Smart boy! I am very proud

You very smart

The Order bringing the Titans with Nari mind controlled

😬

That's all

Numora dying

Why! It's was so unnecessary!

I don't necessarily love her by any means

But still!

Dndndbebhsvehehrdidjbdisbeurbvtisjbsgsneosbsyneyjsosnsjdbdynsvsidbfindbzhndhdushdhushdbudhnm

*key spams in frustration*

This began much irritation that just increased

THE BRIDGE

ARCHIE LEFT DOUXIE HIS LONG LIFE FRIEND AND PLATONIC SOULMATE (NOBODY CAN CONVINCE ME THAT NOT JOW FAMILIARS WORK IDC)

YES HE WAS STAYING WITH HIS DAD AND I RESPECT THAT

BUT GODDAMN IT CHARLIE

CHARLEMAGNE COULD HAVE JUST LIT THE TROLLS FOLLOWING THEM ON FIRE AND THEN FLOWN OUT

THE PORTAL WOULD HAVE CLOSED AT THE SAME TIME

OR THEY COULD HAVE FREED THE TROLLS

EITHER WAY

THEY COULD HAVE GOTTEN OUT

WTF HAPPENED THE WHOLE FOUND FAMILY THING THEH WERE PUSHING IN WIZARDS

WHY PUSH A GRIEVING DOUXIE TO ESSENTIALLY GET OVER IT AND ACCEPT ARCHIE AS HIS FAMILY CUZ HE WAS ALWAYS THERE JUST TO GET RID OF ARCHIE ANYWAY

DOUXIE WOULD HAVE NEVER SEEN HIM AGAIN

HE WOULD HAVE JUST SEEN "TELL DOUXIE I SAID GOODBYE" IN THE KRONOSPHERE AS HIS LAST MEMORY OF HIM

*INCREASING FRUSTRATION*

"No More Running"DOUXIE ALMOST DIED BRINGING NARI BACK

I KNEW HE WOULDNT DIE BUT I WAS STILL SCARED

I was sad

NARI AND SKRAEL'S BATTLE WAS PERFECT

CINEMATIC MASTERPIECE I WAS NOT PLEASED WITH NARI DYING

NOR DOUXIE BEING HELD BACK ONCE AGAIN FROM SAVING A LOVED ONE

"Nor more running"

Simple line

Sweet

Shattered me and my very being THE SWITCHING SPELL

AMAZING.YES.ILOVEDIT.

DOUXIE YOU SMART BRILLIANT BOY I AM SO FUCKING PROUD

Douxari was so chaotic and funny and pure in a very weird way

I was sad that THAT screenshot of Douxie and Archie wasn't actually Archie because he looked so happy chddling his familiar but it was still cute

Narxie was so fucking sarcastic when the Arcane Order realized the spell didn't work and I live for it

Walter and Barbara

Them being engaged and happy

Y E S

Jim being best man

Y E S

Walter DYING before they could get married

N O

H E L L N O

ELI GREW UP!!!!!

MPREG STEVE

I loved it, so fucking funny

Krel was way too smug explaining to Steve that he would be pregnant, not Aja

Does that mean gay guys can have biological kids on Akiridion 5?

BACK TO STEVE

Douxie figuring out the sigil

Good job baby! Smart boy! I am very proud

You very smart

The Order bringing the Titans with Nari mind controlled

😬

That's all

Numora dying

Why! It's was so unnecessary!

Dndndbebhsve hehr didjbdisbeurbvtisjbsgsneosbsyneyjsosnsjdbdynsvsidbfindbzhndhdushdhushdbud

*key spams in frustration*

THE BRIDGE

ARCHIE LEFT DOUXIE HIS LONG LIFE FRIEND AND PLATONIC SOULMATE (NOBODY CAN CONVINCE ME THAT NOT JOW FAMILIARS WORK IDC)

YES HE WAS STAYING WITH HIS DAD AND I RESPECT THAT

BUT GODDAMN IT CHARLIE

CHARLEMAGNE COULD HAVE JUST LIT THE TROLLS FOLLOWING THEM ON FIRE AND THEN FLOWN OUT

THE PORTAL WOULD HAVE CLOSED AT THE SAME TIME

OR THEY COULD HAVE FREED THE TROLLS

EITHER WAY

THEY COULD HAVE GOTTEN OUT

Titan Nari

I was so scared when Douxie nearly passes out from lack of oxygen trying to save her

Claire did a great job and I like her but I feel like they're overpowering her without developing her

Nari and Skrael's battle was a cinematic masterpiece

Coach Lawrence seriously needs a break

NARI DYING WAS UNACCEPTABLE

DOUXIE BEING HELD BACK FROM HELPING HER WAS UNACCEPTABLE

"No more running" destroyed me

I AM STILL NOT OK

I DON'T THINK I EVER WILL BE

The 9th configuration

FOUND. FAMILY. CENTRAL.

I'M THE CHOSEN ONE BUT I CAN'T DO IT ALONE

YES

The Final Battle

I don't even know what to say

Aja. QUEEN.

RIP Varvatos

Rip Douxie that fall would have really fucking hurt

He definitely had broken ribs from that

I'm surprised he could walk after even while being supported against someone else to stand

Jim should have just stabbed Bellroc instead of talking

Jim should not have been able to walk and run perfectly fine after being stabbed even with all the adrenaline

Toby WTF MAN

GOOD JOB BUT FUCKING HELL

I LEGIT CAN'T EVEN FIGURE OUT HOW IT HAPPENED

THE MOVIE CAME OUT 4 DAYS AGO (IT TOOK ME FOREVER TO WRITE THE RANT DONT JUDGE) AND I'VE WATCHED IT 5 TIMES AND I STILL DON'T KNOW HOW I MISSED IT EACH TIME

HOW DID TOBY CRASH?!?!

ANYWAY

TOBY DYING WAS NOT ACCEPTABLE

JIM SCREAMING OUT HIS NAME AS SOON AS HE REALIZED TOBY WASNT THERE

BLINKY AND ARGH LOOK OF PANIC AND WORRY CUZ THEY REALIZED TOBY DIDNT COME BACK WITH JIM

DOUXIE REALIZING HE FAILED TO PROTECT SOMEONE ELSE IMPORTANT TO HIM (EVEN IF HE DOESNT HAVE MUCH OF AN ESTABLISHED RELATIONSHIP WITH TOBY, I REFUSE TO BELIEVE HE DIDN'T ADOPT THEM ALL AS HIS YOUNGER SIBLINGS)

"Always was, always will be" hurt my entire soul

The Time stone

This frustrated me so much it took me 3 days to write just this bit

Go back in time and save everyone?

Yes! Awesome!

Go back to the start the start

Also, I love and adore Toby

BUT IT MAKES NO SENSE

JIM GIVING THE AMULET AND RESPONSIBILITIES AWAY WHEN HE HAS 2 YEARS OF EXPERIENCE AND KNOWS ALL OF HIS MISTAKES AND HOW TO FIX THEM

WTF

AS I SAID I LOVE TOBY AND I LIKE HIM ACHIEVING STUFF

BUT HES NOT TREATED AS BADLY AS THE FANDOM ACTS LIKE HE IS

AND LOGICALLY JIM MADE A STUPID DECISION CONSIDERING WHAT HE KNOWS

I get that he was tired of being the trollhunter

Largely because he was tired of not thinking he would do a good enough job

But odds are Toby will make some of the same mistakes and they'll be right back in that same position except maybe Claire will die that time around

And if you're sick of the trauma and responsibility of it than why would you dump it on your best friend

Once again I say, it was an illogical and dumb decision

I WILL BE RUNNING TO FANFICTIONS TO ESCAPE THIS CANON

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freddiesaysalright · 4 years

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Part of Your World - Chapter 5

Ben!Prince Eric x Mermaid!Reader

Summary: Prince Ben is trying to escape an arranged marriage. A young mermaid wants to escape the sea. Their paths cross and they may just be what the other is looking for.

Word Count: 5.5k

Tag List: @psychosupernatural, @someone-get-a-medic, @bensrhapsody, @deakyclicks, @crazylittlethingcalledobsession, @minigranger, @crazyweirdocalledfriday, @the-moving-finger-writes, @assembledherethevolunteers, @rose-writes-prose, @queenlover05, @26-7-49, @drowsebaby, @im-an-adult-ish, @queen-paladin, @rogerina-owns-me, @mirkwoodshewolf, @seven-seas-of-ham-on-rhye, @radiob-l-a-hblah, @xviiarez, @butlegendsneverdie, @sunflower-ben, @godblessthisgardenpigeon, @okilover02, @xhaliemax if you’d like to be added, let me know!

A/N: Y’all ready to see a classic fanfic trope? I know we love it ;) Also, I’m sorry this update took for fucking ever I’m just horrible at time management

Warning(s): None :)

Moodboard

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4

Chapter 5 here we go!!!

The next morning, you woke to find Ben missing from his hammock. You rolled out of yours, careful to land on your feet, and then headed upstairs to the deck. The morning was misty and chilly. You shivered and hunched your shoulders as you pressed on. You found him at the bow, looking out over water, clouded by fog. His expression was hard. Distressed. You placed a hand on his shoulder to alert him to your presence. You felt his muscles relax beneath your touch as he turned to face you.

“Good morning,” he said shortly.

Is it? You questioned.

He shook his head. “No...no, I suppose it isn’t.”

Talk to me, you insisted. Why are you so upset by this?

“Because,” he said. “A king is supposed to protect his people. To run his kingdom with knowledge and care. Until I joined Behati, I didn’t know anything that was going on. I feel...stupid. And completely unprepared for the next step in my life.”

Well, you know now, you said, trying to be encouraging. Maybe now when you do get home, you can explain what you’ve seen to your father and work together to fix it.

“That’s another thing that’s bothering me,” he said. “I don’t like to think my father knows about this and is ignoring it, but what if that is the case? What if he isn’t ignorant and he just doesn’t care? What do I do then?”

I can’t say for sure, since I don’t know him, you signed. But if he's anything like you, then there is no way this information wouldn’t affect him. Look at how your heart is hurting for your people. If your father has half your heart, it will shock him, and he will do everything he can to correct it.

A hint of a smile passed over his lips.

“I hope so,” he said. “But who knows when I’ll be able to get back to him?”

You aren’t Behati’s prisoner, you reminded him. I’m sure she’d take you back home if that’s what you wanted.

He shook his head again. “No, not really. She’s so close now to finding Sycoria. And I’m not ready for this adventure to end yet. Crazy as it’s been, and as much danger as I’ve encountered, I’ve never had so much fun.”

You raised a questioning eyebrow at him.

“It seems completely mental, I know,” he chuckled. “But...before, I was looking at the life that was being handed to me. It was soft and comfortable in the palace. With a pretty wife who would take my word second only to God’s, and give me heirs. I’d do the same things every day, with the same people, without any idea of what goes on beyond the palace walls. It was frightening. Running away from that - especially the marriage - was the best decision I’ve ever made.”

You don’t want to get married? You wondered, a little dejected.

“I do someday,” he said. “But right now it just felt like a way to trap me and keep me right where I was. I barely even had a taste of freedom.”

Believe me, that I understand, you signed.

“Controlling parents?” he asked.

You nodded. A controlling father, mostly. My mother died when I was little.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “What happened to her?”

Pirates, you told him, because you couldn’t say “humans.”

Ben heaved a sigh. The wind blew and you shuddered.

“Cold?” he asked.

You nodded, hugging yourself. He offered a gentle smile as he shrugged off his coat and draped it over your shoulders. You smiled gratefully at him. Then, he did something you did not expect. He pulled you into his arms and held you there. Your soft gasp was lost in his shirt as you rested your forehead against his chest. His embrace was warm and comfortable. You could hear his heart beating.

“The world is cruel,” he said heavily. “I’ve seen a great deal of wickedness and devastation since I left home, but I must say that you, Y/N, have been a bright light.”

Your heart skipped a beat at his words and you felt heat rise to your face.

“Despite all you’ve been through, you’ve remained kind and gentle,” he went on. “You’re genuinely the sweetest person I’ve ever met. I know it’s only been a couple days, but you’re a very precious friend to me.”

You looked up and beamed at him. He held your gaze and seemed to inch closer. Your stomach turned at the thought. Was he going to kiss you? Already? You were definitely fond of each other, but was it love? It certainly felt like the beginnings of it.

He pressed his lips to your forehead. You released a breath of relief. As badly as you wanted to kiss him - and you knew what was at risk if it didn’t happen - now was not the time. He was vulnerable, and he needed support. It would have felt like taking advantage of a weak moment.

“You’re freezing, you should get out of the wind,” he remarked as he pulled away.

I’m warmer with you, you returned. Besides, I miss the sea.

His brow furrowed. You had not meant to make that thought apparent, so your mind raced to come up with how to back track.

I just mean that I miss my old life, you signed, going vaguer.

“Tell me about it,” he said. “Goodness, you’ve listened to me ramble on about my nonsense long enough.”

You smiled. What do you want to know?

“Let’s start with where you’re from,” he said.

It’s a whole other world, you signed. Beautiful in some ways and completely frustrating in others. I had interests my father didn’t approve of, and eventually I was punished for doing something I considered to be the right thing. I knew I had to get away.

“That’s the worst, isn’t it?” he said. “Feeling like your parents are just trying to control you.”

Especially when they say it’s just because they know what’s best, you replied. How can they know what’s best if they don’t listen?

“Honestly!” he agreed. “All we want is the choice to make our life for ourselves.”

Absolutely, you signed. It’s about freedom.

“Thanks for this, Y/N,” he said. “For listening and sharing. It’s been a real treat.”

You smiled again. Whenever you were around Ben, no matter how serious the discussion got, you always ended up smiling. You hoped that was how it would always be.

The sun began to rise over the water and the air warmed up. You returned Ben’s coat to him just as Behati was emerging from her quarters to address the crew.

“Ladies and Benjamin!” she began excitedly. “We now have the way to find Sycoria!”

Everyone cheered, including Ben. You clapped enthusiastically. Maybe if Behati was successful, you’d be free too.

“I’ve waited years for this moment,” she continued. “I’ve been a prisoner on my own ship all these years, but no more. But I wouldn’t be the captain I am without each of you. I collected my crew carefully, choosing those who I knew could work with me, and bring a fresh perspective. You have all proven more than worthy. Before we take on this final stretch of our journey, I’m letting you all celebrate. Our next stop is Dram, so you can all enjoy the Mermaid Festival, and then, we go after Sycoria with everything we’ve got!”

The crew cheered again. You shot Ben a questioning look. You had never been to a human festival before, and to hear they had one dedicated to mermaids was both scary and intriguing.

“The mermaid festival celebrates Saint Asenora,” Ben explained. When your face lit up with recognition, he laughed. “My mother is named for the saint, but is not the saint herself. They both come from Dram, and my mother got her name because she was the first girl born to the Duke’s family there since the time of the saint.”

That’s incredible!

“We’ll dock in Dram tonight,” Behati said. “So you’ll have the whole day to celebrate tomorrow.”

You counted it up in your head. That would mean after the festival, you would only have another day with Ben.

Why is the saint celebrated at the Mermaid Festival? You asked.

“Because the legend goes that Asenora was a mermaid, and she fell in love with a human man,” he said. “She went to a witch to make her human, and the witch did it, but at great cost to Asenora. Her new legs were painful, and if the man did not love her in return, she would become sea foam.”

You swallowed. That hit a little too close to home.

What happened with the man? You asked.

“She found him, but he was already married,” Ben went on. “His wife was not as beautiful as Asenora, but she saw the smile on his face, and knew he was happy. Unwilling to disrupt his peaceful life, she sacrificed herself to the witch’s fate.”

That’s a horrible story, you signed with a pout.

“It doesn’t end there,” he said. “God had seen what Asenora did, and that her love was pure. He saved her spirit, and named her saint of the sea. Sailors across the kingdom pray to her for safe passage. Every year, they celebrate her at the Mermaid Festival.”

Well, that’s not so bad, you signed. But it’s still sad she never found love.

“Perhaps,” he said. “But lots of good came of it.”

You shrugged. Makes sense.

You and Ben spent the day together, working, talking, and laughing. Ben found himself impossibly more attracted to you as time went on. All he wanted was to be by your side. As he watched you help Ari with a rope, the way your face scrunched up in your way which was so cute. Your bright smile and sparkling eyes. The goodness and openness of your heart.

He felt a hand on his shoulder which drew him out of his stupor.

“Y/N,” Behati said. “How do you feel about her?”

“She’s great,” he answered bashfully. “Really helpful and sweet and patient and -”

“Pretty?” she finished.

His cheeks got pinker.

“She’s beautiful,” he said.

“There seems to be a real connection there,” she observed. “She likes you too.”

“Captain, what are you getting at?” he asked pointedly.

“I’m saying that what I see is the beginning of what we call love,” she said. “And I think you should pay attention to that.”

He blinked, astounded. He had never thought about it like that. But his attraction and appreciation of you definitely stood out to him. He had never felt that way about a woman before. But love?

“I dunno if we’re there yet,” he said with a shrug. “But I...I really like her.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” she replied. “Show her a good time tomorrow.”

“I will,” he said. “I’m actually excited for it.”

Behati smiled, nodded, and then left him to his work again. She walked over to you.

You beamed at the captain as she approached, but it faltered at the look on her face. She looked serious.

“Y/N, come with me to my quarters, we need to talk,” she said.

What’s this about? You wondered.

“Just come with me,” she insisted.

You put down your things and followed her. You shot Ben a questioning look as you passed him, but he only shrugged. He watched you disappear into Behati’s room.

“Hey, Ben,” Ari said. “Don’t you think that a sweet, charming girl that’s right in front of you might be better than some mystery woman you aren’t even sure exists?”

He sighed. “I suppose…”

Inside, Behati sat on her desk, facing you. You stood before her, a questioning expression on your features.

“We’ve never addressed this, but I did see you that day you rescued Ben,” she began. “And you didn’t have legs. You were a mermaid.”

You looked at the floor and nodded.

“And I know Sycoria gave you your legs,” she said.

You nodded again.

“What was the price?” she asked. “And what are the conditions of your agreement?”

You took a deep breath. Then, you explained everything. How you’d always been fascinated by humans, that night you listened on the side of the ship and that was how you were there to rescue Ben. You told her your father punished you for it, and then you went to Sycoria to become human. You even told her the limits of your spell. That after the festival you would only have another twenty-four hours to get Ben to kiss you.

“Well, you’re in luck, he likes you,” she said. “How do you feel about him?”

I’m starting to fall in love with him, you signed. He’s so brave and kind and caring. And we both value freedom and love. It feels like we’re meant to be.

“You very well may be,” she agreed. “The only thing is Ben is still caught up on the woman he thinks saved him. I think you should tell him the truth. During the festival.”

You nodded. I agree. I want to be totally honest with him so that he doesn’t feel tricked.

“I like that,” she said. “To get this going, I’ve got something for you.”

A present?

She smiled and then crossed the room to her wardrobe. You watched eagerly as she opened the door, reached in, and pulled out a gorgeous gown that was on a hanger. Your mouth dropped as you looked at it. It was stunning - gold thread with soft pink lace and delicate frills along the sleeves and neckline. You had never seen such a garment.

“Wear this,” she said with a smirk. “That should put some serious hearts in his eyes.”

But if it’s yours, how will it fit me?! You wondered.

“It was actually part of a plunder I took a few years back,” she said. “I think it looks about your size. Dresses never suited me anyway. But they do suit a princess.”

You grinned. Thank you so much.

“You’re welcome,” she said. “Shall we try it on?”

You nodded enthusiastically.

Behati had everything that went with the dress - the undergarments, corset, and even gold slippers to match it. As she finished lacing you up, you finished letting your hair out of the braids. Then she walked you over to the mirror that was on the wall. You gasped.

“My, my, you’re stunning!” she cried. “Look at you, gorgeous!”

You blushed, flattered by her praise, especially since you found her so beautiful.

Thank you, you signed. I really feel like a princess now.

“You look like one,” she said. “You are one. Ben is a lucky, lucky prince.”

You blushed deeper.

“We’ll be docking soon,” she said. “Stay in here as long as you like. I’ll have Ari and Kay get you dressed tomorrow.”

You giggled together, and then she departed. You looked at yourself again, twirling gently back and forth. You pictured yourself on Ben’s arm, looking like you actually belonged there. The way this dress would shift and move, the way it would swirl as you danced. The festival became a whole lot more exciting.

When you docked at Dram, You had changed back into your crew clothes, but the dress was carefully packed and with Ari. Behati also handed Ari a pouch of gold to pay for rooms at the inn. She whispered some instructions into Ari’s ear that you guessed were about the dress. The captain shot you a knowing smile, and then you were all off into town.

Dram was much more peaceful than Henrietta. There was a heavier military presence and the people were clearly wealthier. Most of the women had jewels around their necks and fingers. Their dresses were made of luxury fabrics, and most of them were escorted by a man.

Not that there wasn’t poverty. There certainly was. The shopkeepers and merchants were dressed similarly to yourself and Behati’s crew. Although, the dress you knew was waiting for you would make you fit in right along with those fine ladies.

The inn was not too far from the dock, and Ari went to check you all in. The innkeeper gave Ari the keys, and she began assigning rooms. Your stomach turned when she said that you and Ben would be sharing.

“Strictly for space,” Ari said. “You see, everyone else is rooming with their partners.”

You nodded slowly. I suppose that’s alright. Ben?

“If you’re comfortable, Y/N, then so am I,” he said.

There was a reassurance in his voice that eased you.

“Y/N, come to my room tomorrow morning,” Ari said. “For your gift from Behati.”

She handed you the room key and winked. Ben looked between the two of you, confused.

“What?” he questioned. “Behati’s given you something?”

You nodded. It’s not important right now. Let’s just get to our room.

He agreed, and you walked upstairs together. You went to the room indicated on your key, and you turned the lock. You opened the door and walked in. The room was nice and cozy but to your horror, there was only one bed.

There must be a mistake, you signed. Ari would get us separate beds.

“Relax,” Ben replied, though he was also nervous. “I’ll go downstairs and see if there’s another. Wait right here.”

He left, and you stood in the doorway, anxiety coming off of you in waves. Being so close to Ben - sharing a bed - that would create a whole other level of intimacy between you. You didn’t have much time to fret before he returned.

“Sorry, no luck,” he said. “Between the Mermaid Festival guests and now us, all the other rooms are booked.”

You nodded and swallowed.

“If it makes you uncomfortable, I can sleep on the floor,” he offered, scratching his neck.

No, you signed. We can share. That is, as long as you’re okay with it.

“Of course!” he said, and at the look of surprise at his enthusiasm, he collected himself. “Sorry. I just, uh...I dunno, I like being close to you, Y/N.”

You smiled. I like being close to you too.

It was getting late, so you both got ready for bed. Ben watched as you slowly shed a few layers of clothing. He found himself blushing at the sight of your bare shoulder, and the soft skin there. He resisted a brutal urge to walk up behind you and press his lips to it.

He shook his head and began to take off his own clothes. You peeked over your shoulder and tried to not drool as his shirt came off and you saw his body. He had tan lines from his work and time with Behati, but it did not take away the appeal of his strong build. You happily would have thrown yourself into those arms.

“Are you ready?” he asked, bringing you back out of your thoughts.

You nodded stiffly. He allowed you to get in the bed first, and you hesitantly pulled back the blankets and slid into the spot. As he followed suit, you became acutely aware of his body heat beside you. You looked resolutely away from him, so you wouldn’t make him uncomfortable, but you felt his eyes on you as he settled in.

He chuckled. “You can look at me, you know.”

You turned your head in his direction, but your eyes remained fixed on the sheets. His forefinger and thumb came to your chin, and he gently lifted your face to his.

“Look, I understand that this is a bit uncomfortable,” he said kindly. “But I think we should focus on the positives. At least now, we have time to talk without any interruptions or worrying about anyone overhearing us.”

Should we have worried about that before? You asked.

He shrugged. “I dunno. But I like that it’s just you and me now. So tell me something new about you.”

You smiled. You considered confessing to him now where you really came from and the deal with Sycoria, but it still felt too crazy. And you wanted to know how he felt about you before taking the risk. So you talked about other things to pass the time. You talked with him until your eyelids grew heavy. You settled yourself against him and rested your head on his shoulder. Sleep took you. Ben watched you ease into slumber and admired your peaceful expression for a while before it came for him as well. He slipped out of consciousness with his arms around you.

You woke the next morning warm and cozy in Ben’s embrace. It was so comfortable you almost didn’t want to get up and go anywhere. But you were excited about the festival. And you thought it might be the perfect place for you and Ben to have your first kiss. And you could finally tell him everything.

Ben’s eyes fluttered open and met yours gazing at him. He smiled lazily.

“Morning,” he said, his voice gravelly from sleep.

Good morning, you signed back. I’ve got to get to Ari’s room, but I didn’t want to disturb you.

“I wish you could stay,” he said through a yawn. “You’re so cozy.”

You grinned. I’d be content to stay here with you for days, but we do have a festival to see.

“That’s true,” he conceded. “I’ll come get you in an hour, yeah?”

You nodded.

To your own dismay, you got out of bed, dressed quickly, and went down the hall to Ari’s room. Ben drifted back off for a bit, but found himself missing the feeling of you next to him.

When you got to Ari’s room, she, Kay, Sharna, and several other girls were in there waiting for you. Ari flashed you a knowing smile.

“How was your night?” she asked.

It was….nice, you signed with a sheepish grin. He just held me all night.

“Awww,” Sharna cooed. “What a sweetheart he is.”

“Well, let’s get you dolled up for your sweet man,” Ari said.

They all jumped in. While Ari was getting you dressed, the others were helping you with your hair. You really felt like a princess, but not the kind you were in the sea. The kind from storybooks. Only, you didn’t have servants. You had friends.

Before you knew it, there was a knock at the door. Ben had arrived. Ari went to answer it, and she allowed him in. When he saw you standing there, in that elegant dress, with your hair curled and styled, and just a hint of rouge on your cheeks and lips, his jaw dropped. The breath was stolen out of his body, and his face grew warm.

“Y/N, you - I - wow - you look….you look…” he sputtered.

“Beautiful?” Ari finished.

“Yeah,” he said, eyes still locked onto yours. “Stunning, actually.”

You flushed under his gaze and tried to relax. Somehow, you were more nervous around him now. It felt like he was properly courting you or something. The feeling only grew when he bent at the waist and bowed to you, extending his hand.

“Y/N, I would be honored if you would allow me to escort you to the festival today,” he said.

You took his hand, and he looked up. You beamed at him and nodded. He grinned back, losing the dignified air he’d created, and you were back to normal. Only, there was a real feeling of couplehood blossoming.

He began to lead you out the door. Ari wished you good luck and said they’d be around if you and Ben needed anything. You both waved to her quickly, and then you were off.

Ben took the lead, since he had been to the festival before. It was mostly local vendors selling products relating to the legend. People were everywhere, shopping and talking. Children darted back and forth, collecting candy and toys. Laughter and music floated through the air. Ben took you first to get a seashell crown to wear.

“That really suits you, Y/N,” he said, placing it carefully atop your head.

Thank you, you replied.

You continued walking. It shocked you to witness how fascinated humans were by mermaids. There was mermaid art, mermaid jewelry, mermaid themed food. None of it was accurate, but it was certainly amusing to you.

You stopped at another booth, where you purchased a pendant for Ben. It was silver, hung down to his chest, and had a perfectly round pearl at the end. It was delicate, but still looked handsome on him.

“Y/N, you don’t have to do all this,” he said, admiring it. “This is much too kind a gift.”

You have been most kind to me, you replied. I want to show you I’m grateful to know you.

He pulled you close and kissed your forehead.

“Thank you so much,” he said.

You beamed at each other.

Exploring the Mermaid Festival took most of the day, but it was a whole day you got to spend with Ben. You talked, laughed, shopped, and got to know each other. In the afternoon, you went to the town square to see the dancing.

A group of string players were creating a jaunty and upbeat tune. The dance was known to the citizens, as they were all in step with each other. You even saw Ari and Kay out there together. Ben looked over and saw your eager expression.

“Would you like to dance?” he asked.

You nodded so hard, he laughed.

Taking you hand, he led you out. You got a bit nervous since you had never danced before and you didn’t know the steps.

“Don’t worry,” Ben said, as if reading your mind. “Follow my lead, and keep the beat in your head.”

His reassuring smile made you forget all apprehension. You leapt into the crowd, one hand in Ben’s, the other on his shoulder, while his free hand took your waist. Nothing else mattered. You danced and danced, and whether or not the steps were right was of little consequence. You were in Ben’s arms, moving together, with laughter in your eyes and on your lips.

The song came to an abrupt, but jubilant halt, and you stopped, breathless and smiling. Ben was similarly delighted. Then you both burst into laughter.

“That was great, Y/N!” he praised. “For someone who once struggled to walk, you’re a helluva dancer!”

You smirked. Well, I think with dancing, it’s about having the right partner.

He blushed and smiled in that way that absolutely melted you. Then, the music began again, this time much slower. You watched all the other couples return to the floor.

“Do you know how to waltz?” Ben asked.

You shook your head. He quickly showed you a box step, and you told him you trusted him. So, he took you out again.

The waltz was smooth, with a romantic sway that was exactly what you had envisioned for the dress. You were much closer to Ben now - chest to chest. Both of you were rosy cheeked from the previous dance, but your breath was evening out. Your heart rate on the other hand was picking up rapidly.

“Y/N, I…” Ben began, but trailed off.

You poked him insistently in the shoulder. He met your eyes and you questioned him with a slight downturn at the corners of your mouth.

The truth was, as he looked at you now, the only thing on his mind was kissing you.

“I can’t begin to tell you how much I like you,” he said. “I think...it’s becoming more than just a liking, if you know what I mean.”

You did, but you wanted to hear him say it. You furrowed your brow and looked confused.

“Y/N,” he said again, and as the music slowed to a stop, so did your feet. “I think I’m starting to…”

He was leaning in again, and this time there was no confusion about where he was headed. He was going to kiss you. Properly. And you were more than ready to accept him. To break this curse and regain your voice so that he could know truly everything about you. And you weren’t scared to tell him anymore. Because you knew that he loved you.

Your eyes began to close as you got closer to each other. You felt his breath hot on your face. His lips just barely began to touch yours. Just a little closer. A little closer and then…

“Time for the mermaid tears!” cried a young boy who came bounding between you, forcing you back a few feet.

You tried not to look annoyed because it wasn’t intentional, but the moment was gone. Ben cleared his throat and looked at you.

“Well, I suppose we can’t miss the mermaid tears,” he said.

What’s that about? You wondered.

“It’s when we all go to the beach and make a wish,” he explained. “Everyone takes a bit of sea glass, makes a wish, and throws it into the sea. The sea glass is meant to be Asenora’s tears she shed for her lost love. But we give them back to her - and you let go of whatever is weighing on you - then she’ll grant your wish. According to the legend.”

Does it have to be right now? You asked.

He chuckled. “Yeah, it’s always right at sundown.”

How quickly the day had flown! You weren’t ready for it to be over, but maybe, once you got back to the room, there would be another opportunity for him to kiss you.

With a sigh, you took his arm and headed for the shore.

All the jewelers were handing out the pieces of sea glass as each person approached. Yours was a deep blue, which reminded you of home. Ben’s was a soft green, and matched his eyes. You walked out to the sand, kicking off your shoes about halfway to the water. You let the ocean come and swallow your feet.

You decided you were letting go of your old life in the sea. Where you felt trapped by your father and had no control. Your wish was for Ben to try and kiss you again. You hurled the sea glass as far as you could. It disappeared inside a wave. Then you looked at Ben.

“Go ahead back to the inn,” he said, still holding his sea glass. “I need a moment.”

You placed a comforting hand on his arm, nodded, and began walking back. He watched you go, making sure you met up with Ari and Kay, before you were out of sight among the crowd. Then he looked back over the water.

His heart was torn. He was certain that he loved you, but he could not forget about the woman who saved his life. It clawed at him, made him feel guilty for falling so hard for you. But how could he help loving you? Even if there was someone out there he owed a debt to.

That was what he was letting go of. He was releasing himself from the burden of having to love someone for that reason. If he ever found that woman, he would see his debt repaid. But he was committing himself to you. His wish was only that you loved him in return. And that you would have a long and happy life together.

He realized that he was now alone on the beach. He reared back to throw the stone into the water, when a voice caught his attention. He turned around and saw a woman walking toward him. At first, he hoped it was you, but he knew it was not your silhouette.

“Benjamin,” the woman said.

Her voice was intoxicating. He noticed an odd, purple and gold glow coming from a shell around her neck. It hypnotized him so that he dropped his sea glass without even hearing it hit the sand.

Behati was whistling to herself as she walked near the stern of the ship. She had a great view of the beach from her spot in the harbor, and she had seen you and Ben making your wishes together. Now, as she was making a second round, a foggy glow caught her eye. She stopped and watched.

A woman she had never seen was talking to Ben. The woman was certainly beautiful from what Behati could tell. But when the glowing fog went straight into Ben’s eyes and his body went rigid, the captain knew something was horribly wrong. The woman began to lead Ben into the sea, walking right into the waves.

“BEN!” Behati screamed, but he paid her no mind. “BEN, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?!”

He continued to ignore her. Then Behati watched with dread as the prince’s head vanished beneath the inky black surface of the water. A wicked cackle echoed through the air. A laugh Behati could never forget as long as she lived.

“Sycoria!”

#ben hardy #ben hardy imagine #ben hardy x reader #ben hardy x you #roger taylor #roger taylor imagine #roger taylor x reader #roger taylor x you #BoRhap #borhap boys #borhap boys x reader #borhap boys imagine #borhap boys x you #BoRhap cast #borhap cast x reader #borhap cast imagine #borhap cast x you #part of your world series

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iwritethat · 5 years

Text

Older Bat-Sis: Beats

Request: More older Batsis content please 💕

A/N: I have missed this.

>>>>——————————>

Already you were dreading the following 18 hours, having woken up on the worst day of the year - the day that set both your anxiety and paranoia on edge as you continued the unwilling ritual.

It was on this day that you were most grateful for living alone, you'd locked all windows and doors not that it'd do much good against lock-pickers but it brought you time at the very least. Time to escape.

An ominous ringtone sounded that rattled you to the brink of full consciousness and alerted you to exactly who was calling.

"Morning Bruce, what's up?" Came your raspy voice, yawning as you got the words out.

"What's up? I'm wishing you happy birthday, I do this every year at the same time (Y/n), you should know this by now."

"I know, I - wait! Who's in the Manor right now?!" Urgency took over, and Bruce automatically sensed the worry in your tone.

"What do you-" Before he could finish you had cut him off with something he couldn't argue with.

"Tell me exactly where they are Bruce, I'm serious."

"Dick is at the breakfast table with Damian, Tim is down in the Batcave and Alfred is on his way over." Bruce gave an exasperated sigh, it was too early for this nonsense but he answered you honestly knowing that he was probably the only one you could trust today.

"Okay... that's 3 accounted for, where's Duke and Jason?"

"Duke is out studying and lord knows where Jason is. All the best (Y/n), I hope your training helps." He finished, estimating Alfred should arrive soon.

"Thanks Batdad, I'll see you later."

It was no more than 30 minutes after you'd hung up that you received a knock on the door and there stood a pleased Alfred who you instantly embraced out of sheer happiness.

"Ah Miss (L/n) be careful, I put a lot of effort into making this. It's your favourite." The Butler explained, placing a box of handmade confectionary on your counter and you couldn't help but thank him as he handed you a card whilst engaging in idle conversation as you prepared beverages.

However, the moment was disrupted by the rhythmic thud of heavy boots and you couldn't help but glare at the smirking intruder whilst readying a defensive stance.

"Now now sis, you may've evaded me last year but I've got you this time."

"Doubt it Little Wing. Alfred it was a pleasure I love you very much and there's a cup of tea ready for you so please enjoy it during my absence." You politely informed, knowing Alfred favoured your tea before dodging Jason and swiping his grappling gun in the process. He came after you of course, but you side stepped toward the window and as your brother skimmed your wrist he tumbled to the floor courtesy of your precautions.

"You booby trapped your own home?!" Jason reprimanded, untangling the rope knotted around his ankle that left you with a running start.

"Oh my goodness gracious Jason, you've been bamboozled!"

"Damnit (Y/n), that’s copyright!" You barely heard his embarrassed shout as you grappled over to the next building with an echoing laugh.

You'd raced across Gothams skyline with a varying degree of grace but your new destination was Selina's place as at least she’d be on your side - however you were suddenly swept off course, wind racing through your hair as the light of early morning spiralled around you before drifting to a halt with feet once again on the concrete.

"Happy birthday beautiful, should I ask why you're running across buildings in your slippers?"

"You know why West." Your eyes narrowed at the charming speedster, knowing he’d been in the loop regarding this tradition for years.

"You're right, speaking of, I'm here on behalf of Dick and Damian - your presence is required at the Manor." There was a hint of sympathy in his tone but ultimately he was enjoying seeing you like this.

"No, Wally please! I'll do anything, don't take me back there!" You grabbed his shoulders, forehead resting against his chest to accompany your sincerity.

"(Y/n), you know your brother is my best friend." He said it as a statement, like it had already determined your fate though he did not want to follow through with it.

"We're friends too! I'll buy you food for a month! Wally I will literally marry you if you save me from them, please!" You gazed up at him with a hopeful yet mischievous expression but apparently it was no use.

"I'm sorry." With that you were rushed off of your feet once more.

Within moments you were in Wayne Manor, Dick happily grinned, stepping closer to your glaring figure as you stepped back only to bump into his partner in crime.

"Nice work Wally, sorry (Y/n) but I had to use all of my resources this year including Damian."

"With my help, the family will not fail beloved Sister.” The youngest Wayne approved, though you weren’t certain he knew the history of this sibling war.

Fortunately Cass appeared in the lounge area just in time, you waved over to her and with the girl being informed of your situation prior to your birthday she instantly jumped Dick as you took the opportunity to take the exit but your efforts proved futile when Wally beat you to the doorway. You heard a muffled sound of victory from the eldest brother but much to your surprise the speedster before you leant on the doorframe, a hand running through his hair and a wistful sigh escaping his lips.

“You owe me a wedding ring.”

“Thank you!” With that you took your exit leaving two frustrated brothers in your wake.

“Speedsters are useless! Titus after (L/n)!”

Now you knew the Manor well but there was no escaping a determined Damian and you weren’t completely surprised when he caught you off guard and had you cornered with an excitable canine by his side.

“Damian, my youngest and favourite sibling, do you know what they’re doing?”

“Grayson told me it was ‘Birthday Beats’.” He spoke the term somewhat questionably, suggesting he wasn’t familiar with it’s meaning.

“And did he tell you what that entailed and why they’re doing it?” You replied with skepticism, hoping that you’d be able to use this to your advantage.

“No...”

“Hm, then let me tell you everything.”

After that encounter you were able to remain undetected for the majority of the afternoon, returning home to change and finding a thank you note from Alfred and a gift from Jason for the drinks as they’d obviously caught up after you’d escaped. It wasn’t until you were brought back to the Manor for dinner which was, as agreed, time out to enjoy the meal and company of the family to celebrate and converse. After that it was a free for all and you found yourself caught between Dick and Jason.

“Gotcha!” The two smugly commented in unison, Dick continuing with his taunting.

“Your streak ends here master, sorry to ruin it.”

“TT - you will not be harming my sister! No matter how trivial it may be.”

“Yes Damian!” You celebrated as he revealed himself and stood by your side, you rustling the boys hair in a playful manner before smirking at the two dumbfounded vigilantes.

“(Y/n) has given us Birthday Beats without fail every year since we’ve been apart of this family and we haven’t gotten her once. Why are you on her side anyway Demon Spawn?” Jason could only give an exasperated sigh once he’d finished his passionate justification accompanied by varying hand gestures.

“Because I like (L/n) more than you Todd. That and we struck a deal.” Damian was relishing in pissing of the Outlaw but nodded signifying it was safe for you to leave without fear of losing your streak.

Upon leaving the Batcave you were greeted by a gleeful Stephanie but you knew better than to trust her on today of all days.

“Where is he Steph?”

“(Y/n) I can’t just give up my boyfriend, I’m on his side.” The girl pouted, hoping her facade would last longer than 2 seconds.

As you were already on high alert the sudden appearance of Duke and Tim was expected, unfortunately you had 10 minutes left until midnight but that was a stretch considering you were out of options. You’d evaded them for a good 8 minutes but Dukes abilities were incredibly useful in predicting someone’s next moves thus it became inevitable that you’d lose after all this time.

“C’mon guys, it’s late. Shouldn’t you be asleep?” Was your feeble attempt.

“Not gonna happen, you’re the only one besides Barbara, Cass and Damian that haven’t had Beats (Y/n) and that injustice has gone on long enough. From what I hear anyway.” Duke playfully shrugged, more excited to boast to Dick and Jason that Tim and himself had succeeded where they’d failed.

*SMASH*

The sound surprised everyone, the three of you rushing out to the origin as defending the Manor came before any games you’d decided to play but much to your relief you discovered a calm Alfred sweeping up the remnants of a shattered antique.

“Sorry for the disturbance, damn thing is heavier than I thought.” The butler sighed, rolling his eyes as he continued his chore.

At that moment the clock struck midnight and instantly you released a joyous celebration.

“You’re kidding me, we were so close this time!” Tim held the bridge of his nose but went along with Duke to no doubt inform the others that they were unsuccessful in their final attempt.

“Next year (Y/n)!”

“Thank you Alfred, I owe you.” Came your knowing gratitude, assisting in cleaning up the mess with a sly smile.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, accidents happen all the time around here Miss (Y/n). But, you know how I like my tea.” Alfred responded without any hint of mischief whatsoever but the last statement proved your assumptions.

At 00:07 you strolled into the kitchen, the same place you met your father on your birthday year after year and like always he was waiting for you with a newspaper in hand and drink for you on the table.

“What did it cost you this year?”

“My spare keys to the Batmobile for a month, a Ming Dynasty Vase, I’m also engaged now and Jason ate one of Alfreds confectionaries. The highest price I’ve ever paid by my calculations.” You slumped your head into your arms with a sorrowful expression as Bruce shook his head.

“For a start that vase was a replica made specifically for this situation so don’t worry about that and you’re welcome. As you remain unbeaten Barry will be shocked to hear of it.” Your father smirked, a proud look in his eyes as he chuckled to himself.

“You and Barry placed a bet?” You raised a brow at the billionaire before you who could only smile in return before answering your question.

“We did. Barry thought with his nephew helping Richard, your streak would finally be broken this year. But he severely underestimated how ‘whipped’ Wallace is for you.”

“I’m just getting over the fact you are using the term ‘whipped’ right now.” You couldn’t help but release a breathy laugh, smugness in your voice as you pointed to your father as it fell silent for a couple of moments whilst you took a sip of your drink.

“...”

“You have a spare key to the Batmobile?” It was as if it had just properly registered, tone more serious than previously and you had to quickly bring up a more threatening subject to focus on to prevent you getting into trouble.

“Whah - nooo - actually Batdad since I’m getting married can you walk me down the aisle? Yes? Great - thank you!”

“Married? - To who?! (Y/n) this isn’t over!” He called after your retreating figure, no doubt you’d be getting ‘the talk’ as soon as he discovered their identity.

#older batsis #older batsis imagine #batsis #dc #dc imagine #batfam #wally west

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cesabutterflywrites · 4 years

Text

The Duke of the Bay: Part 2

If you want to be put on a taglist for this please let me know!

[Spotify Playlist] [Youtube Playlist]

First Part, Ao3 Link, Next Part

Warnings: Guns, threats, alcohol, homosexual slang used pejoratively and positively, internalized homophobia ask me to add any if need be

Chapter Word Count: 2875

Summary: Patton O’Hearty was a great detective. Most people didn’t take him for one at first glance, especially when he dressed casual. He was abnormally chipper; he thought everything was the cat’s pajamas. He had a smile for everyone he met. He was always tipping his hat at the dames and gents when he walked the streets of the Bay Area.

The only person he could never catch was the leader of the planted mob in Emeryville, nicknamed The Duke. The Duke was good at hiding his dealings and joints well, and he rarely had a snitch in his ranks. The few who tried, well, somehow they disappeared before they could give the police any substantial information. He was well hidden, but popular among the residents of the town. People talked boldly of his rambunctious parties, never revealing the locations though. He was hard to catch, to say the least.

So what happens, when instead, the detective is the one that’s caught?

Logan closed his eyes in frustration. “Damn it.”

“That’s no way to talk in the presence of young ladies,” Lola purred next to them.

Logan jumped, and glared at the girls. “I don’t think someone who goes to places like this and dances as provocatively as you counts as a lady.”

Patton shot Logan a warning glance. He didn’t need more enemies in the room. Logan’s face quickly fell in shame. “I’m sorry, Lola. That was unkind of me.”

Lola threw her head back and laughed. “Please, sugar, that’s the manliest you’ve acted all night. For a moment I thought you were a fairy,” she leaned in with a wink, “You know...a pansy.”

Logan’s face flushed red. He sputtered like a broken faucet, unable to form a coherent response. “N-no! I’m not!” He vehemently denied.

“Hey, don’t sweat it if you are, honey,” Alice tried to soothe, “We’re not exactly straight, ourselves.”

Logan looked at them curiously, “You mean…?”

Lola smirked, “If anyone asks, we’re cousins.”

“Then why- then how come-what?” Logan’s brow was furrowed, trying to understand what they were trying to get up to. The girls just smiled at him. He looked desperately at Patton. “Do you know what they’re saying?”

“I think they’re trying to say that they're lesbians; kissing pals,” he winked at their blushing faces. “Though, I still think you’re a bit too young to know for sure, Alice.”

Alice jutted her pointed chin in defiance, “I’m sixteen,”

Logan choked on nothing, starting to cough in disbelief. Patton reached an arm out to steady him, but he was denied. Logan seemed to be having a rough time adjusting to the swinger’s life for the night.

Patton ignored him, turning back to the girls. “Why were you dancing with us, then?” he asked for his speechless friend.

Lola looked at Alice and shrugged, “I still like men, but Alice makes me feel things no man has been able to.”

Alice smiled fondly and nuzzled into her partner’s cheek. “Same here, Lola. There’s something soft about a woman’s touch that a man can’t remake.”

Patton watched them carefully. “Aren’t you asking for trouble, flaunting that around?”

“I’m surprised you haven’t noticed sooner, considering you’re one of the Duke’s friends,” Lola remarked, “Look around the room. There’s a reason this place is so well guarded.”

Logan put his fist in his mouth, trying to keep up. “So you mean the Duke…?”

“Doesn’t mind dropping the pins and letting his hair down,” Lola filled in. “So, neither of you are…?”

It was Patton’s turn to blush, aware of no longer being an outsider watching a circus performance.

He never gave it much thought. All he wanted was to make the world a better place. He never imagined how he’d settle down, or who with. He just expected it to happen one day.

“I suppose I never gave it much thought,” Patton muttered. He looked at Logan who was staring intently at the floor. “But I know I don’t mind folks who are. My parents raised me to be a loving man, which includes men who love men.”

Logan looked up at him, eyes conveying a secret bit of gratefulness. Patton just smiled encouragingly. He had his suspicions, but he knew Logan was a good detective no matter what. That was all that mattered, and in that moment there was an even bigger matter that was more important than discussing various sexualities.

“Say, girls, what did you mean when you asked about us being the Duke’s friends and being...queer?” The word felt weird to say out loud, especially in reference to himself. It wasn’t bad. Just a little bit different.

Lola giggled as Alice blushed then said, “We just thought, well, usually he only has special guests when they’re his arm pieces. We’re sorry for assuming.”

Patton took his fake glasses off to wipe the sweat off of his face. He felt the urge to get another gin, but he knew he needed his senses sharp so he could be prepared for talking to the Duke. He also felt a bit hungry.

“No worries, ladies. I think Mr. James and I need to go get something to eat, I’m famished.” He dipped his head as they smiled politely.

He and Logan made their way to the table next to the bar, and grabbed some plates of food. They made their way to the dining tables in the room next door. There were a few couples in the room, and the music was less loud in there. Patton was keenly aware of Mr. Doris who entered the room behind them. He felt those intense eyes staring straight through his skull.

He tried to ignore it while he ate with his companion. “So, what’s the attack plan?”

Logan thought as he chewed. “Maybe we just go along, and if our lives get in danger we use our guns. They haven’t confiscated them from us yet.”

“What if that was part of the trap?” Patton asked. “And further, why would the Duke lure us in? Why not have us kidnapped like he’s done with others?”

Logan shuddered, “I don’t know, Pat, and I don’t want to consider that at this moment. We’ll save the why’s for later. We need to focus on gathering enough evidence, and getting out of here alive.”

Patton just nodded. “So where do we go from here?”

“I don’t know,” Logan muttered, tossing his fork down when he finished his meal, “There are a lot more questions than answers. Frankly, my mind is still spinning from that drink.”

“It was barely half a glass of gin, Logan,” Patton snickered, “I’ve had worse.”

Logan raised his eyebrow. “When?”

“Before the prohibition,” he waved dismissively, “My pops used to let me have a bit of whiskey every Saturday night.”

Logan tutted, “No wonder you’re so cheerful. There’s silly juice in your blood.”

Patton laughed, “Yeah, well, I am Irish.”

The moment of brevity disappeared as a shadow loomed over them. Mr. Doris, their guardian of the evening, loomed over them. “The Duke will see you now.”

-----

Logan was put into a separate waiting room upstairs as Patton was led to an office down the hall.

He gasped as he entered the room. The office was full of oddities. The shelves had bizarre jars full of mysterious colored horrors. There were stuffed animal mounts hanging on the wall, along with a few posters with graphic depictions of murders and scantily clad people of both sexes.

“How professional, “ he remarked in a high pitch as he walked in.

The Duke smiled behind his desk, “Thank you. I like to keep my office cozy.” He looked at his henchman, “Go wait by the door, Mr. Doris. I’ll call if he pulls a gun on me,” he winked at Patton.

The scarred man just nodded, glaring at Patton as he left to guard the door. Patton gulped nervously.

“Come in, detective, sit. Make yourself comfortable.” The Duke gestured to the chairs in front of his desk.

Patton considered briefly before deciding to sit. The chair was surprisingly comfortable, but he didn’t let himself relax fully. He stared at the most dangerous criminal in the Bay. He was on guard, suspicious that the Duke would order him to be killed at any moment.

“Why did you bring us here, Duke?” he asked with narrowed eyes.

The man behind the desk snickered, “Oh, detective, please tell me you’re more creative than that? Try a different question. Something more...interesting.”

Patton tilted his head in confusion. What was this man’s deal? “Uh...okay,” he spoke hesitantly, “Rumor has it you drop pins…?”

The Duke guffawed, “Oh, there’s one I haven’t heard! Thank you!” He kept giggling as he spoke, “I’m sorry, it’s just, the usual gets so boring sometimes. ‘Why am I here?’ ‘What do you want from me?’ ‘Are you gonna kill me?’” Remus rolled his eyes, “But to answer your question, yes, I let my hair down.”

He raised a brow at Patton seductively, “Does that bother you, good detective?”

“No, Duke,” he said honestly, “That’s not why I’m on your tail.”

“Oh, I wish you were on my tail,” the man sighed with a dreamy smile, “I bet you’d be a good one.”

Patton blushed, “Just get to the point.”

“Right,” The Duke slammed the desk. “I want you, your partner, and your other copper friends to lay off my people. Just turn a blind eye, and in reward we’ll take care of you.”

“What if I refuse?” Patton asked warily.

“Well, I guess I’ll have to run and hide deeper in the shadows,” the villain smirked. “If you want me, come and get me. Have fun trying, at least.” He spread his arms out.

“You won’t kill us?” the detective asked in disbelief. “You won’t make us disappear?”

“No,” the Duke truthfully told with his eyes wide, “I guess I won’t…” but he leaned forward with a wicked grin. “But you’ll never be able to lay a hand on me as I take over the town.”

Patton stayed silent, considering his options. He could pretend to agree to the demands, and warn the captain in his next report. However, the Duke seemed smart. He’d probably have eyes and ears out anyways to know if any funny business was going on. Patton was starting to believe that Logan was right after all. Someone on the force was bought off already, just to get the Duke close enough to the lead detectives on his case.

The Duke stood up from behind the desk to lean over Patton, who blushed at the proximity. There was no denying the villain was handsome, and there was something seductive about the way he looked at Patton. Like a hungry wolf who cornered his prey. Patton shivered in dangerous delight. He tried to shake the lustful feelings coming over his body. His conversation with the young girls downstairs was playing through his mind.

‘I never gave it much thought’, he had said then. Well, suddenly, he was giving it a lot of thought at that moment. The Duke must be a magician of some sorts, or that gin was stronger than he initially thought.

The man was staring at him, waiting for an answer. He looked like the devil before he was cast down to earth. He was beautiful, especially since Patton could look at him up close. His face was sculpted perfectly, and his grin was a mockery of purity. He was well kept, but looked like he could go feral at any moment. That only increased the seductive, dark aura he radiated.

Patton shifted uncomfortably under the gaze. He didn’t really enjoy the way he was being looked at, mainly because it made him want to gaze back as intensely and succumb to his proposal…

He chose to focus on the case at hand. “You said you’d take care of us?” You’d take care of me?

The Duke tapped his chin in thought, “I didn’t expect you to cave in so quickly, Detective O’Hearty. I thought you were selfless. At least that’s the word on the street.”

“Maybe I’m tired of being a slave to unreturned good deeds,” Patton lied. He had a plan forming, and it required getting the man’s guard down.

“Well, you’ll still be a slave if you work for me,” the Duke smirked, “But a willing one after time.

“Back to the subject of your benefits. Your precinct will be receiving an anonymous donation of 5% of our profits. My guys won’t interfere with any investigation outside of our operation, and maybe we can help you out but turning in some of our criminal rivals. Every now and then we might need your help, and you, along with your partner, will be at my personal disposal”

Patton deflated. Those conditions were really good. Was this how cops turned? The mobsters sent in gifts and seducers to prey on the weakness of men. He could end up doing a lot of good if they worked together, and really, they weren’t doing much harm to anyone except with their own criminals in their world.

No. No, it was wrong. He pledged to uphold the law, to enforce a certain code of morals that kept the public safe. The man standing in front of him was a murderer, he was a psycho. He was clearly deranged. He was charming, and used his charm to nearly get Patton to budge.

He needed to get out of there, but safely. The Duke made it clear that he may not be leaving alive, but he needed some time to think. An idea formed in his head. He was slightly disgusted with himself, but it had a larger chance of working than any other option.

He stood up and took off his fake spectacles. He leaned in the Duke’s personal space to set them on the dark mahogany desk. He then stayed to look down at the grinning man. Two could play a Devil’s game.

He played with the black tie that was set against the light green dress shirt. He heard the shorter man’s breath hitch. He leaned in a bit closer, setting his thigh discreetly between the shorter man’s legs. He lowered his voice to an unnatural pitch.

“Tell, me, Duke,” he leaned in to whisper in the man’s ear, “Did you really suspect that I’d be squeaky clean?”

Putting on the act was easier than it should have been, and a part of Patton panicked. He kept his cool, giving just a bit into his own budding desires to keep it all seeming authentic.

He let go of the tie, choosing to use that hand to lean on the desk, subtly trapping the breathless man beneath him. He hesitantly bent in to stroke his nose along the soft neck of the criminal.

“I think a part of you suspected who I really am,” he pressed his body further, completely molding him against the shorter man. He smiled in triumph as he heard a tantalizing moan slip from the mustached mouth.

“Part of you knew my own sinful desires, didn’t you? You didn’t call me here for business,” he swallowed his nerves to kiss the soft skin below the earlobe he was speaking half-truths into.

“No, I didn’t,” the Duke squirmed.

Patton was intrigued. He hadn’t expected such a powerful man to become so easily undone. He pulled away from his assault on the man’s neck to look into the man’s eyes, to see the truth.

The truth in the crazy eyes he had made him momentarily forget all he ever learned in Sunday School. The nearly black eyes burned with heated desire. Patton felt some fear, with all that chaos was focused on him, he would surely break. He felt strange, completely out of his body. What was he doing?

The criminal pulled Patton in by his tie and they were kissing. Patton knew he let the scenario go too far by then. It felt so good, though. There was something more grizzly about kissing another man, and frankly the tickle of the mustache added to the appeal of the moment. He kissed back, shouting to himself that it was just to keep up appearances.

He needed to leave, before he tossed all his morals out the window.

He pulled away, “Give me some time to think about your offer? As appealing as it is, I need to keep up appearances.”

The Duke smiled maniacally, “My dear detective, but of course!”

Patton tried to pull himself off of the other quickly, however the Duke gripped his hip and held him in place. Patton gasped as the man’s hand wandered across his waist. Then, he realized too late, that his gun had been pulled on him.

He looked down in betrayal and shock, he had thought he was succeeding in getting underneath the man’s skin.

“Don’t look so surprised, my dear detective, I didn’t get up to the top by my pretty looks. I do have some bit of intelligence,” he gestured to have Patton sit back onto the chair. “Though, let me tell you, with that little show you put on, I nearly did lose my marbles.”

The Duke licked his lips and moaned rather loudly, “You’re a good actor. That surely will haunt my dreams tonight,” he looked to the door and called his henchman back in.

Mr. Doris came back in, the permanent scowl on his face made him look like a sort of reptile to Patton. He walked to stand guard behind Patton, placing a yellow gloved hand firmly on the detective’s shoulder. Patton flinched at the touch, chastising himself for what he had sacrificed...only to fail.

Shortly after another younger, smaller guard brought Logan in. Logan was resisting, though it was futile. The kid had a good grip, and shoved the other detective into the seat beside Patton. He has unruly black hair, darker skin, and a hateful look in his eyes. He mimicked the other guard’s grip by having his own hand on Logan’s collarbone.

The Duke moved back behind his desk, grinning like the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. “Well, gentlemen, let’s talk business.”

TAGLIST: @littlestr

Let me know if you wanna be added to the taglist of this story!

#Intruality #Romantic intruality #Patton sanders #Logan sanders #Deceit Sanders #Virgil Sanders #remus sanders #the duke #sanders sides #sanders sides fic #multi chapter #Mob AU #The Duke of the Bay AU #The Duke of the Bay Part 2 #gun mention #alcohol mention #internalized homophobia #The Duke of the Bay #Mama Cesa writes

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ladysmaragdina · 5 years

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I know I'm late as hell, but Dishonored 2... Which path should you choose (high/ low chaos) in order to stay the most true to Emily's and Corvo's character? I've always loved reading your Dishonored fics and analyzes, you always make the characters make such good sense =>

So this ask has been sitting in my inbox for over two weeks now. Which I feel terribly guilty about, because I want to give this question the thought and weight and few-thousand words it probably deserves, but… ugh, okay.

Dishonored 1 is my single favorite game, ever.

I’m utterly indifferent to Dishonored 2.

I’m not interested in Dishonored 2.

I have a hard time even saying that I like Dishonored 2.

I’m not going to be able to answer this question, anon. And I feel like I should explain why. (A lot of this is going to be a reatread of what I talked about in my big Dishonored 2 critique I wrote back when the game came out. Whoops)

I played through the game once, the instant it came out – as Emily in a Clean Hands run – and I really, really enjoyed it at first. I loved getting to play as Emily. I loved that the gameplay was objectively better than the first one. I loved how bright and different and rich the world looked. I was so fucking into Dishonored 2! I probably spent an extra couple of hours exploring every nook and cranny of the Royal Conservatory after knocking out the witches, and finding Corvo’s old apartment in the Dust District was a fucking treat. I love the Dishonored world. I wanted to know everything. I was gonna write so much fucking meta and fanfic.

But by the time I got to A Crack In The Slab, I was starting to realize that the story felt… off.

By the time I finished that mission and it was suddenly time to go get rid of the Duke… I mean, I was still having fun! The game was fucking cool! But I raced through the streets leadup to the Duke’s palace without really exploring. I raced through the Duke’s palace like I was speedrunning it. There are entire floors of that level I never saw, and wasn’t remotely interested in seeing. I didn’t care.

I was bored by the time I got back to Dunwall. I was frustrated by how long it took me to work through the many levels of the palace. I just wanted to get to the finale and find out how the story ended. (and then I found the ending profoundly unsatisfying)

I realized none of this mattered.

If this was ultimately a story about stopping Delilah from mantling the Outsider —- as the metaplot seemed to insist – what the fuck were we doing in Karnaca? Why did we care about Karnaca? Karnaca’s problems weren’t my problems, Emily’s problems, at least not in any clear direct way; Karnaca’s problems weren’t even bad. The bloodflies were endemic to the region instead of being a super-scary weird semi-supernatural plague; it might have been a particularly bad year for bloodflies, but it didn’t feel like anything the city couldn’t deal with. The streets were lively. There were nobles sitting in cafes playing guitar music. Shops were open and well-lit. I felt like I could go to the beach and sip mai-tais. Even the most run-down, awful section of Karnaca that we got to see – the Dust District – wasn’t much worse than anything we’d seen on a Tuesday in Dunwall.

And Karnaca wasn’t home. It didn’t feel like it mattered to Emily. Not really. It was in Emily’s empire, sure, but it was an ocean away and it wasn’t under her direct personal governance. And the Emily we met at the start of the game wasn’t interested in governing to begin with. I could never buy the sense that she cared – really, emotionally cared – about the well-being of Karnaca, because Karnaca was relatively fine, and because Emily seemed like she would rather fuck off and abdicate given half the chance. Being exiled from Gristol didn’t feel like exile – it felt like a sunny vacation, a chance for Emily to have cool swashbuckling adventures without the boredom and paperwork of sitting a throne.

I didn’t understand what I was really doing in Karnaca, and I didn’t understand why it was so urgent and important and needed that I get home to Dunwall. I was just told that I had to get home to Dunwall because Delilah was Bad. And that she was doing some Very Bad Things on the other side of the ocean, and that if she remained unchecked things would get Worse. YOU NEED TO STOP DELILAH, I was told.

But…. gosh, that was on the other side of the ocean. That didn’t seem to affect anything here. Again, Karnaca was fine! Karnaca’s had some issues, but they were were caused firstly by the Duke, not Delilah! What bad things was Delilah really doing? Can we see them? How are they worse than anything any other nobles and rulers are doing? How would installing Emily on the throne be meaningfully different?

What would Delilah’s plan to mantle the Outsider actually mean? The finale gives us a vision of The World As It Should Be, a supremely alien lotus-eater machine where Delilah is absolute monarch; it comes so late in the game, at the absolute eleventh hour, that it doesn’t feel meaningful. It also comes totally out of left field and is so bizarre and extreme that I had no fear that it could ever actually happen. Everything about Delilah’s ascension and ultimate goal is so bizarre and extreme that I had no fear it could ever actually happen. I didn’t understand how it was supposed to happen. The mechanics of magic had never mattered before; why did they matter now? Why did the half-baked explanation for Delilah’s endgame rely on lore from the previous game’s second DLC? (What the fuck, Arkane?)

What was my motivation? Why were my missions important – why did Emily want and need to do these things? What would happen, actually happen, if I failed? What was keeping me from just walking away?

I’m really not sure.

Maybe, just maybe, we could ignore the weird ascension to godhood plot. Maybe my real motivation had nothing to do with Delilah – maybe Emily just wanted to get back to the home that was taken from her. Maybe this was a “take back whats yours” story. But Emily didn’t seem to really want the throne back. The Emily we met at the beginning of the game was bored with governing and wanted out of Dunwall. If we’d had more time and attention paid to that shift in her character, I’d buy it, but you can’t do a complete and instant 180 on a character’s feelings and call it motivation.

Or maybe my real motivation was to get home to Dunwall to save Corvo. But the opening sequence made it seem like Corvo was dead. That’s not a valid motivation either.

Maybe my motivation was to avenge Corvo? I don’t buy that the way I bought Corvo avenging Jessamine in Dishonored 1; in Dishonored 2, Corvo is not the focus and meaning of Emily’s life, and I can’t see her structuring her entire life around fighting back from exile just to avenge him. Emily has hopes and dreams and a distant love interest and isn’t the same hollowed-out husk of vengeance that Corvo is. Sure, he’s her father figure, but I don’t buy that as her sole motivation.

This lack of motivation trickles down to the individual missions of the game.

If I don’t really know or care about what Delilah is doing, why is it so important to stop Breanna Ashworth?

Kirin Jindosh is supposedly making an army of Clockwork Soldiers, but what does that mean? How soon would they be ready, what are the logistics, how powerful are they, how are they worse than Tallboys or other existing technology, what was he going to use them for? Why is it so important to take him out? Couldn’t we just bribe him or write him a strongly-worded letter? I’m going to be the Empress – couldn’t I make his soldiers illegal or shut down his factories? Why do I have to go to such an immediate and awful extreme?

Sure, the Duke is a dick and should probably be replaced by a better ruler. Doing so doesn’t feel important. I’ve never met the Duke. He never did anything to me. Karnaca’s in decent shape, all things considered. Killing or replacing him feels like taking out the trash.

Where are the stakes?

Why do I care about any of this?

Tangent – I feel like I’ve got to talk about Corvo a bit here. Would Corvo have a different, stronger, more personal attachment to Karnaca? Sure, but I’ve never played Corvo’s route in Dishonored 2 and can’t speak to it. Personally, I always got the sense that Corvo felt like an outsider in Gristol and that he would have tried to distance himself from Serkonos in response to this, and that returning must have felt oddly alien, like an ill-fitting suit. Now, this is a cool thing to explore. It might make him more invested and interested in some aspects of the game – I’m thinking of the Duke and Stilton in the Dust District, specifically – but I don’t think it fixes the core issues about lack of motivation in the overarching plot.

So, let’s talk about that overarching plot. Would Corvo feel more strongly about getting back to Gristol and restoring Emily to the throne and/or bringing vengeance to her “killer”? Probably! Corvo’s arc in Dishonored 2 isn’t about toppling Delilah and seeking vengeance for his own sake, but rather for Emily’s sake (or at least the memory of Emily-who-we-think-is-dead). That’s less selfish and entitled, more emotional and tortured. That’s honestly more interesting to me. But that’s the exact same story we got in Dishonored 1. Corvo’s entire existence in Dishonored 2 feels like a rehash of Dishonored 1. The vengeance arc in Dishonored 2 feels much more muddled and unfocused and distant in comparison. It’s not as good.

I think Corvo’s story and motivation are more clear and pressing and straightforward than Emily’s; but I think Dishonored 1 did that exact same story and motivation much much better. Corvo’s story in Dishonored 2 honestly makes more sense to me than Emily’s story. Which feels utterly backwards! One protagonist has a storyline and motivation that has no real weight or drive or urgency behind it. The other protagonist has a slightly stronger storyline that is still a weaker, fuzzier retread of the first game.

I think Dishonored 2 is badly written.

I like it on the micro level – I like the characters and the levels – but on the macro, i think it’s a confused jumble that doesn’t know what it wants to be. Is it a vengeance story? Is it a story about stopping a supernatural threat? I don’t know, and I don’t think it does either. The game doesn’t manage to mesh those ideas at all, and neither idea holds water on its own. I am utterly confused and turned off by the game’s decision to make the vengeance so un-urgent and impersonal and the villain’s magic-driven plan so distant and obtuse and ill-defined. I think that in deciding to make the scope bigger, it bit off way more than it could chew and lost sight of what matters in storytelling.

Dishonored 1 was a tightly-focused straightforward revenge plot where I understood exactly what I had lost, how much it mattered, and what was at stake. Dishonored 2 is a fucking mess.

I can’t write about which choices Corvo and Emily would have taken because their choices don’t make sense to me; because their existence and participation in this story makes no sense to me; because the story hops from point to point without establishing thematic or plot coherence; because I don’t understand – emotionally, really buy and feel and understand – why I’m meant to give a shit about any of it.

I played the game once, started a High Chaos replay, wandered away from the game after the second mission, and uninstalled. I have no interest in replaying it. I have no interest in ever picking up Death of the Outsider. The fact that the writing seems to be moving away from the vengeance quest and doubling down on its focus on the supernatural (and the fact that they’re dragging back characters – Corvo in Dishonored 2, Daud in DotO – whose arcs had finished) has honestly killed my interest in the franchise at this point. I don’t feel anything about this other than a profound sense of disappointment.

I wanted to like Dishonored 2. The game is gorgeous and fun and an improvement on the original in many ways. I wanted to answer your question, anon. I truly wish I could, and I’m sorry for how salty this post has become. I’m sure someone else would have fantastic headcanons and insight.

But I just. don’t. care.

#Dishonored 2 #Dishonored 2 meta #Dishonored 2 critical #I HOPE YOU LIKE RATS #Anonymous #also thank you so much for sending this anon!#I'm really flattered #sorry that I'm apparently a salt mine when it comes to the second game

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inkribbon796 · 5 years

Text

Candy Man Can-Do

Summary: It’s November 9, and the city gets a rather colorful reminder of how powerful Warfstache is.

Chapter 1: A Rose-Colored Trap

A.N: I had a separate idea for this birthday story but story but it refused to be written, and it was too long for fit into one chapter. Chapter 2 has way more Warsftache in it, I promise.Have fun.

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It was the first official year the Sides had lived in Egoton when the month of November rolled around. They’d been coming and going from Egoton according to where the Dark Sides were, and now that Deceit and Dark has formed a truce, the Sides were practically here to stay.

This meant getting used to cold spells that were twenty degrees colder than they were used to. The fact that Deceit and Anxiety tended not to do much, leaving the Duke to run amok. And the fact that Warfstache’s birthday was right at the start of the month.

The first sign that there was something wrong was when Logan woke up. He hit his alarm at seven am and got out of bed, reaching for his glasses and heading to the shower. His glasses seemed like they had an odd film over them and Logan struggled to get it off, his shower being delayed by a whole ten minutes as he fought to fix his glasses and finally gave up in frustration, taking his shower and then storming out. Logan kept close enough to the wall, so that his poor eyesight wouldn’t strain too much trying while trying to step around stuff.

Walking down into the apartment’s kitchen, Logan fished out a second pair of glasses only to find the same blurry film on them as well.

“Patt,” Logan called back up into the apartment where Patton and Roman’s rooms were. “Did you and Roman do something with my glasses?”

There was nothing. Frowning, Logan slowly made his way to the stairs, putting his glasses on and just dealing with the glossy, almost pink film over his glasses. Placing a hand on the railing, Logan realized there was something wrong immediately when his hand hit cotton candy. Recoiling his hand away, Logan looked to see his entire banister was made of cotton candy, but pulling his glasses off made it turn back to normal.

“That is not good,” Logan looked at the film over it, peering as close as possible to the glasses as he could. Whatever was wrong with his glasses it wasn’t something on top of the lens. It was in the lens.

“Roman!” Logan called out. “What did you do to my glasses?”

An insistent pounding came at the front door, and after hesitating, Logan fumbled his way to the door and prayed it wasn’t Remus when he opened it blindly.

“Logan,” Dr. Iplier’s voice came at him through the brighter outside light. “Please tell me you’re still you.”

“Doctor?” Logan asked. “My glasses aren’t working.”

“Yeah, that’s probably how it got Patton,” Dr. Iplier pushed him back into the apartment. “The Host told me to give you these. Don’t ask how he knows your prescription, it’s not the oddest thing he’s done.”

Logan took the glasses he was passed, a perfect match for his actual glasses, and it didn’t have the film. “What happened, if you’ve already seen Patton I trust that he and Roman are not doing well.”

“That’s the problem, I don’t know how it started because Anxiety pulled me out. He took some convincing to set Roman free put he pulled him and Patton out. Whatever happened between you all, I think you need to call a therapist.”

“Anxiety pulled you out of what?” Logan asked.

Iplier frowned and marched over to the window to pull up the binds to reveal what was, to Logan, a nauseating amount of pastels and the entire city seemed to be made out of candy or some other kind of sweet. “It’s discount Candy Land! I completely forgot you guys haven’t been in town on November 9. This happens every year. Sometimes it’s just A Street and Jay Burne, sometimes it’s the area over Dark’s warehouse. Once he targeted it over the base and nowhere else because he had a problem with me. Wilford kinda goes crazy on this day, and I didn’t even realize that you three weren’t in the base until I saw Patton.”

“What happened?” Logan asked.

“Oh, I took pictures, Wilford’s magic completely took them over, but I’ve got the Host and Anxiety waiting, and I’m pretty sure if I leave the two of them alone together the Host will start bleeding, and then Anxiety will probably run off.”

“Right, let me get my costume,” Logan offered.

“Don’t put the visor on, if Wilford was able to hook his magic onto your glasses, then I guarantee you, it got onto your visor. Bring your costume, and hopefully the Host and Anxiety can do something with it.”

“Right, of course,” Logan answered and raced into his room to grab his duffle bag he kept all his gear in, and quickly raced out with Iplier. The entire city looked like it had been dipped in a late-60’s tinged candy nightmare. Almost everyone walking on the streets looked more like cartoon caricatures of themselves than actual people. Logan recognized some of his own neighbors, and didn’t like it. The walk was unnervingly slow.

“Why does Warfstache do this, if he has the power to take over the whole city, then why isn’t this the status quo every day?” Logan demanded as Iplier calmly led him into a side alley, where everything seemed a bit more normal.

“Honestly, I think he forgets he can do this,” Iplier answered. “It’s been almost fifteen years since he’s taken the entire city. Wilford’s a force of nature, it’s why Dark works with him. They don’t work for each other, they work with each other. That’s the scary part about Wilford, he survives daily encounters with Dark and neither of them have killed each other yet.”

“The Reporter and the Entity are incapable of killing each other,” Host announced his presence and Logan jumped in surprise.

“Is Anxiety still here?” Dr. Iplier asked.

“I’m shocked you think so poorly of me, Doc Obvious,” Anxiety called out from the first level of the fire escape.

“Didn’t want to push my luck,” Iplier reminded. “Just cause you freed me, doesn’t mean you’ll help me take Wilford on.”

“Dark’s already kicked us out,” Anxiety shrugged. “What’s one more thing on the list?”

“I appreciate it,” Iplier told him.

“Logic,” Host held out a coffee cup, looking his way. “This is for the hour.”

“Oh, thank you,” Logan took the cup and after a sip found it was incredibly similar to how he usually took his coffee. “This will suffice until I can get real sustenance.”

“Wow, you just took some random cup someone gave you,” Anxiety rolled his eyes, the action barely visible under his hood. “Real smart.”

“The Host would never poison someone,” Host defended firmly, any hint of humor gone from his voice. “There are easier ways to inflict harm and the Host has no need to harm Logic nor any of his allies.”

“I take it you were offered a coffee as well,” Logic took another sip, the caffeine greatly improving his mood. “Host is right, he would not poison anyone.”

“If you can’t trust them, at least take my word for it,” Dr. Iplier took a step forward. “You don’t have to take the coffee, just trust we aren’t going to sell you out.”

Anxiety was quiet for a little bit. “Don’t know if you haven’t noticed, Doc, trust isn’t usually something I’m given, and I certainly don’t give it out.”

A thud shook all of them from the conversation, both Logan and Anxiety jumping and looked up to see King of the Squirrels on top of the fire escape, about five squirrels hanging off of him, scurrying around him and the fire escape.

“Coast is clear, most of the villains are waiting the storm out,” King climbed down the outside of the fire escape, Anxiety pulled his hood farther down to hide his face and backing away from him.

“How fortunate,” Host gasped as his narrations let him speak again. “I take it Dark’s enforcers are not roaming the streets.”

“Well one of his Lieutenants was roaming around my park, so I had to hide over here,” King responded. “He’s got some new ones, or at least one new one. But if he got rid of Bargs, you can bet he got rid of Sierra too.”

“That only means Darkiplier is moving through the timeline faster than the Host predicted,” Host responded in concern, confusing Logan because it was abundantly clear that King and the Host were speaking in some form of code he hadn’t known they shared.

“So what are we supposed to do?” Anxiety said, keeping his hood drawn low, especially when King looked his way. Which intrigued Logan.

“The Host advises the Sides and Egos stand back,” Host motioned and King jumped off the fire escape to give Host some more room.

Iplier motioned for Anxiety to come down, and he did slowly, almost falling down to keep his hood covering his face. The Host held his hands up, as if he was shuffling through papers, and blood started leaking through the bandages. Anxiety looked like a cat about to bolt back into the candy cane lined streets behind them. Logic admittedly felt a little unnerved as well at the Host’s gift. His future sight tended to still get a rise out of him.

“Hey, Doc, is that normal?” Anxiety whispered to Iplier, his unease loosening his grip on his hood, and King studied his face. Logan could see recognition in his eyes for a moment or two.

“Unfortunately yes,” Dr. Iplier frowned, “I’ll have to take him back to the base after this.”

“I can take him,” King offered, keeping his voice low as Host continued to look into the future. “I can grab any of the other heroes we need when I bring him back.”

“As much as I’d like to, I need to change his bandages and he might need a saline IV,” Iplier reported. “King, you can take Logic and Anxiety to wherever the Host needs all of you.”

Iplier slowly moved towards the Host as his hands stilled and his head tracked down something. “Doctor,” the Host warned and Iplier was quick to move it to support the seer and keep him upright.

“Right, I’ll take you back to the base,” the doctor told him.

“The good doctor should listen and listen well,” the Host warned. “Let the King of the Squirrels take the Host back to the base.”

“I’m not going to let you bleed out,” Dr. Iplier spat at him, “I’m your doctor.”

“King cannot be present when Wilford is confronted,” the Host struggled to stand on his own, but Iplier just helped lower him to the floor. “The Red Prince is located on 8th Street. Let Wilford interview him, and he will survive. Anyone else will not survive being shot. Let Henrik treat the Host until the good doctor returns, he will survive.”

“You better not be pulling another—” Dr. Iplier spat.

“The Host is not,” Host spat back, blood dripping from his thoroughly soaked bandages, it was getting so bad that it starting to slip down his face. “King.”

“Right,” King moved in, trying to get Iplier to give him the Host. “Come on, Eddy, I got him.”

“You better,” Dr. Iplier warned.

“I’ll take the quick route,” King smiled. “Don’t want to wind up on your bad list.”

King quickly left with the Host, the two of them retreating into the streets to head towards the base.

“I hate it when they do that,” Iplier glared after them. “Let’s go.”

“Right, don’t have to tell me twice,” Anxiety commented.

#Superhero AU #Thomas Sanders #Markiplier #Wilford Warfstache #birthday post #Logan Sanders #Dr. Iplier #Virgil Sanders #Still a Dark Side Virgil #The Host #King of the Squirrels #accidental mind control #Virgil pretends not to care #He cares immensely #darkstache

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violetsmoak · 5 years

Text

Appetence [2/?]

AO3 Link:https://archiveofourown.org/works/20251420/chapters/47997634

Blanket Disclaimer

Summary: Red Robin is investigating the disappearance of a friend and stumbles into a spot of supernatural trouble. He doesn’t expect to be saved by Jason Todd, miraculously alive five years after his death and now with the inexplicable ability to commune with the dead. Meanwhile, when Jason returned to Gotham he meant to maintain a low profile and not get involved with Bat business. That was before he found out how hot his Replacement is.

Rating: PG-13 (rating may change later)

JayTimBingo Prompts This Chapter: N/A

First Chapter

Canon-Compliance: Alternate Universe; Jason still died but was not found by Talia when he was resurrected. All other events mostly follow the same chronology as New Earth continuity, with mentions made to events in New 52

Author’s Note(s): Enter Tim. And Tim's investigation. And Tim's tendency to make bad decisions.

Beta Reader: I’ll get back to you on that.

________________________________________________________________

Red Robin crouches on a rooftop in the Bowery, watching the thief he was just interrogating scramble from the alley. He was a bit harsher than usual tonight—the full ‘hang ‘em by the feet’ routine that’s more Batman’s thing than his, but he’s getting frustrated now.

Dante’s been missing for a week now, and in this town, that’s never a good sign. And if no one’s seen him…

His gut and five years of stalking the night as a vigilante are telling him he shouldn’t get his hopes up about finding his friend, but he can’t work up the courage to stop. To just, pack up and head back to California.

Things between him and the Family are…tense.

Bruce hasn’t quite been able to look at him without suspicion since the whole incident with Captain Boomerang and Freeze. Dick’s as focussed on Damian as ever, and whatever attention he has left over has been going to mentoring Duke. Steph and Tim are in another extended “off” period of their on-and-off-again relationship, Damian’s…Damian. And Cass isn’t around often enough to mitigate any of that.

As much as Alfred assures him it’s not the case, Tim’s been feeling more and more like Gotham doesn’t have anything for him any longer.

He never thought he’d ever feel like that.

Gotham is dank and dark and terrifying, but it’s home. It’s flying through the air and running across rooftops and diving into trouble at the last second to save the day. It’s everything he wanted when he was a kid, secretly following Batman and Robin around with a camera almost as big as he was.

But every year now, it feels like the city is a little danker, a little darker, a little more terrifying. A lot more hopeless.

Part of him thinks that hopelessness started growing following Jason Todd’s murder. Tim did his best to be there for him, but it’s been an uphill battle. And every year, the fight for Gotham’s soul becomes an even bloodier war of attrition, consuming more and more innocents.

Reminded of his goal tonight, Tim decides to involve himself more directly.

He rappels down to the alley floor and resigns himself to several hours of canvassing a hostile neighborhood. Though fear is an excellent motivator for some, for others a different approach is needed.

People are unlikely to tell a stranger—even a rich stranger—anything worthwhile. Especially here in the Alley, where throwing money at problems get people’s backs up. There’s a sense of pride down here, and an us-versus-them mentality that even the most destitute ascribe to.

And vigilantes are pretty firmly in the ‘them’ column.

Tim has better luck than most here; Red Robin has been frequenting this place a lot over the years, almost from the moment he put on the cape and tights. The other capes never bothered much with it—except for Jason, who when he was Robin made a point of ending his patrols with a quick check of his former home. Tim sometimes thinks that maybe his tendency to come here is an homage to that, a way of keeping his predecessor’s legacy alive.

Of course, he’s never said anything like that to anyone in the family. Even years later, the grief is still too raw. If he’s asked, Tim maintains that he’s cultivated a careful network of informants and contacts in the Alley, and nothing more.

I mean, it’s not like I can go wandering around Crime Alley in the middle of the day.

Tim Drake-Wayne’s face is too recognizable, causes too much trouble. People are desperate here, might try to grab him and use him to extort money from Bruce—and he’d have to let him because he’s not supposed to be able to handle himself. Bruce would come, of course, or whoever’s nearest that Oracle can get on the comms, but it would mean interrupting actual crimes in progress, with actual people who are in danger.

A worse alternative would be if whoever has Dante—and Tim’s sure someone has him because the kid wouldn’t just vanish on his own—they might harm him. Because Tim is the adopted son of the man funding Batman, and if they think he might cause them trouble, most people willing to kidnap are also willing to murder.

All of which assumes that they haven’t murdered him yet.

Tim’s plan of approached hinges on the locals actually being in a helpful mood tonight, but he soon discovers that’s not the case. No one’s feeling talkative tonight, even when he ramps up the intimidation a little.

Either there’s someone out there they’re more afraid of, or they really don’t know.

It’s only in the early hours of the morning when he’s considering returning to his Park Row apartment in defeat, that one of the working girls finally takes pity on him.

“Watchin’ you go back and forth is makin’ me dizzy,” Rhonda says. She’s been working the corner of Park Row and Fifth since before Tim’s time, and though she rarely goes out of her way to get involved with the capes, she does tend to be bluntly honest if the situation is right. “Who you lookin’ for?”

“This kid. Or anyone who’s seen him,” he says, pitching his voice into his approximation of Bruce’s Batman growl. He holds out the glossy picture he’s been flashing around all night; he took it off a security camera and increased the size of. “He was working at the bodega on the corner of Parker and Main just outside the Alley.”

“A bit weird for a cape to give a shit about some kid from ‘round here. Don’t you freaks normally deal with the bigger freaks?”

“Have you seen him or not?” Tim insists, ignoring the jab.

“Who’s he to you, sugar?” she asks, glancing at the picture Tim brandishes. “And don’t give me no bullshit.”

Tim sighs, knowing better than to test her; she’s got Alfred levels of talent when it comes to lies.

“He’s a friend of sorts,” he explains. “Sort of…a protégé. I’ve been looking out for him the past few months.”

Which is sort of true, though not in the way he’s implying.

During WE’s years board meeting to examine the various applications for the Scholarship Program, Tim took note of an applicant whose overall qualifications were outstanding and whose even on paper looked like a major boon to the company.

But the Board of Directors took one look at Dante Garcia’s prior assault conviction at age twelve and decided to toss his application. Without even reading the excellent essay the kid wrote to explain the reasons he had been fighting (to defend a friend from a police officer with a grudge). Or how the experience made him want to become an advocate for those who couldn’t afford it.

It was a brave move, being upfront about the criminal record, but likely Dante knew it wasn’t exactly something he could hide. His record wouldn’t be sealed until he was eighteen.

Tim tried to argue that one mistake made for good reasons shouldn’t deny a bright kid the opportunity and that Dante was clearly of the same caliber as Tim, just without the last name to help him.

(He hadn’t mentioned that Dante reminded him of another boy from long ago, given a second chance and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.)

He was still outvoted.

From the way the old bastards were looking at him, Tim felt sure it was more because of who he was than who Dante was.

The petty bastards never did get over the fact they have a teenager for a boss.

In spite of the Board not agreeing with his vote, Tim already decided he intended to help Dante. He tracked him down to speak to him in person and get a better measure of him.

He was immediately impressed upon their first meeting, especially when he discovered how easy it was to converse with him. He has an intelligence that reminds him of Duke, but his attitude put him in mind of everything he knew about the second Robin.

“I’m going to figure out a way to get you a scholarship,” he told him two weeks into their acquaintanceship. “Even if it’s not from the Foundation, we’ll figure it out. I’d be willing to hire you on at the Neon Knights if you’re interested. Criminal records aren’t exactly a deal-breaker there.”

(Especially since most of the people working there were once part of or are in the process of escaping gangs.)

“That sort of thing will look good on a resume and open doors for you, including getting you into events and putting your name out there,” Tim continued. “The Knights also sponsors educational initiatives, so you can get your general credits out of the way and eventually transfer into a college program of your choice.”

Dante stared at him, suspicious. “Why you doing this, man? You don’t know me from Adam.”

“Because I was taken in by a man who didn’t think someone’s last name or financial background should be an obstacle to greatness,” Tim replied honestly. “My brothers and sister came from harsh backgrounds, but he didn’t let that stop him from taking them in and trying to help them achieve their potential. They’re all good kids that could have gone a very different way if he didn’t get involved. Because he had the ability to do so. Having influence means nothing if you don’t use it to do good.”

“So what’s the price of this?”

“That you’ll be expected to pay it forward. And you’re already going to be doing that when you get your degree and start helping people. You’llhave the influence. Just keep your nose clean and away from the gangs, and you have a real shot, kid.”

“Excuse you, white boy, you’re my age. None of that ‘kid’ shit with me.”

Tim laughed.

It had still taken time after that to convince Dante that Tim’s offer was legit, but once he decided he was trustworthy, they’d started hanging out more. What started with Tim sponsoring a kid with huge potential turned into an actual friendship—and he didn’t have many of those with people who weren’t in the caped community. There was something about that he wanted to protect.

When Dante’s mother called him one day in tears, explaining that Dante had never come home from work and the police wouldn’t let her file a missing person’s report until 48 hours had passed, Tim didn’t hesitate to get involved.

At first, he’d worried that Dante’s disappearance was related to Tim—had someone discovered his identity and then decided to use his friend as leverage? The likelihood of that was low, however; anyone who did know his identity would come at him more directly, or at least have contacted him with some kind of threat.

Which meant what happened to Dante wasn’t vigilante related, but simply bad luck.

That doesn’t make Tim any less intent on figuring out what happened.

His thoughts must be projecting through his body language somehow because Rhonda’s usually sharp eyes soften a bit and she sighs. Looking around, she ensures there’s no one nearby, and then says, “You need to talk to Salvatore.”

“Who?”

“He’s a pimp, hangs out down the corner. He hooks, too, which is fucking weird. Does it because he likes it,” she says, making a disgusted face. “He tends to be the guy that’s always the last person to see someone before they go missin’, if you know what I mean?”

“You think he’s involved?”

“Nah, he’s too paranoid to do that. Likes to keep his hands clean, or pretend to. But he’s right near where your friend disappeared. And…” She hesitates here, sizing Tim up, and then nods to herself, “He’s got a rep. Lures new boys on the street into the business. He’s got a scary success rate at it, too.” She shivers. “Makes sense, he’s a scary motherfucker. Lots of his kids go missin’, but he always had some excuse. Letters and texts and shit provin’ they left the city or somethin’. No one knows how he does it, so you get him to talk, you’ll find out what you want to know. But I don’t see it happenin’.”

“Still. Thanks for the information,” Tim says and digs into his belt for a wad of cash. To his surprise, Rhonda shakes her head.

“Anyone sees me takin’ that from you right before you go after Salvatore, they’ll know I talked. No one’ll think I’d be stupid enough to give anything up for free. You come back a few days after you deal with that bastard, I’ll take it then.”

“That’s oddly trusting for someone like you.”

“Honey, you’ve been watchin’ these streets long enough I know you’re good for it. And catch me or anyone else ever telling you jack shit ever again if you stiff me.”

Tim snorts. “Fair enough. What’s this guy look like so I can find him?”

“Trust me, you’ll know him when you see him. Just don’t tell that creep anything ‘bout me sendin’ you in his direction.”

She doesn’t wait for his answer before sashaying away, returning to her activities for the night.

Tim keeps to the shadows as he heads to the corner Rhonda indicated, thinking he might have to wait around for a few hours—or even return the next night—if he’s going to find his next suspect.

It turns out he doesn’t need to.

A man who can only be Salvatore is leaning against the wall at the mouth of an alley, fiddling with his very expensive looking phone.

He is a tall, muscular, almost impossibly good-looking man with high cheekbones, intense blue eyes, and a full, cruel mouth. There’s something in a way that mouth lifts at the corners that makes Tim’s stomach thud, memories of a similar grin and devil-may-care laugh he only ever got to see through the lens of a camera or across a crowded ballroom.

But this isn’t him. This guy looks more like a crocodile than a robin.

“Well, hello there, handsome,” the man purrs when Tim materializes beside him, eyes flicking up and down Tim’s form with a look that does nothing to dispel the predatory image. “Looking for a pick-me-up after a hard night’s work?”

Tim ignores the innuendo dripping in the man’s voice.

“I’ve been given the impression you’ve seen this boy,” Tim says coolly, holding up his photo. “That you were the last one to see him. I need to know what you know.”

“I’m sure you do, baby, but I don’t come cheap, and neither does anything that comes out of my mouth,” Salvatore drawls.

Tim shrugs; if it’s money he wants, that’s not a problem. “I’m sure we could come to an arrangement.”

“Oh, I know we can,” Salvatore chuckles. “But not here.” His eyes flick around like he’s scoping out someone watching; his irises flicker strangely in the dim streetlight. “Not where someone might see us talking. I could lose customers for talking to a mask—and I’m all about discretion.”

“They’re already seeing us talking.”

“And as far as they know, you’re just asking about the price of the goods,” Salvatore purrs, moving so slowly as to telegraph his moves and stroking his fingers across Tim’s chest plate, and down. “Can’t imagine seeking justice satisfies all your urges, does it, little bird?”

Tim’s hand snaps upward, clamping around Salvatore’s wrist and exerting just enough pressure to earn and choked gasp of pain. “I am here for information. Nothing more, nothing less. Either you tell me what I want to know, and I compensate you, or you tell me what I want to know and leave here with a bunch of bruises that will definitely affect your bottom line. Assuming I don’t drag you to the nearest precinct in handcuffs.”

“Baby, I’m almost tempted to take you up on that,” Salvatore says, licking his lips. “But I also know there’s worse on the streets than me. Who knowswhat your friend might have stumbled into?”

Tim’s jaw clenches. “Meaning?”

“Meaning we’re doing this little info exchange my way, and that involves not being out in the open. This is private business, after all.”

This time Tim’s nose curls, sensing an implication there. Either this guy’s not too bright, practically broadcasting his intentions to a vigilante, or he knows something important enough he thinks Tim will do anything for it.

Tim considers him, trying to evaluate how he wants to play this. Obviously, he doesn’t trust Salvatore, but he needs information even if it’s the vaguest of statements.

Salvatore’s clearly unarmed—no weapon’s hiding anywhere with that little clothing. And Tim was trained by Batman and Lady Shiva.

Buddy, aren’t you in for a surprise.

“Fine,” Tim says. “Lead the way.”

Salvatore’s pupils dilate, once again catching the dim light in a manner that makes them seem like they reflect.

Then he jerks his head toward the dark, shadowy alley behind him.

Against every instinct of self-preservation that managed to survive the brilliant idea of a twelve-year-old becoming a vigilante, Tim follows.

⁂

Next Chapter

#jaytimweek2019 #jaytimweek #jaytim #fanfic #jaytim fic #tim drake #original characters #prompt: supernatural #drama #mystery #angst

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steve0discusses · 5 years

Text

Yugioh S3 Ep 19: Seto and Mokuba are Turned Into Inanimate Objects...Again

Last we left off on the world’s most awkward family reunion, Moki was being used to take advantage of Seto again, which happens at least 2 times a season.

What’s kind of wild about this, is that everyone jumps to the conclusion that Seto is absolutely going to murder his little brother. Seto. The guy who 2 seasons ago was willing to absolutely jump off a ledge for his little brother.

And then suddenly, Duke makes his feelings known about just life in general at this point.

Duke in the background just spiraling deeper and deeper into his IDGAF apathy. And to be honest, Duke might not be fully aware of who Mokuba even is. It’s not like they’ve ever had a conversation, other than maybe “ah, you work for Pegasus, he locked me in a tower for weeks and then killed me by turning me into a little paper card and then tried to seize control of my company. Nice. Nice that he isn’t in jail.”

In fact, since Duke does work with Pegasus who probably is still doing his best to compete with/work with the Kaiba business...Duke actually has a lot to gain, business wise, by killing Mokuba. Like, I’m pretty sure Duke isn’t a mole but he could be. He has...a lot of motive, actually.

If bro hadn’t straight up told me that Duke isn’t a mole like I suspected, than I’d still be waiting for that other shoe to drop. But it won’t. A shame.

Anyways this shows up:

All I’m saying is that a black hole is an astronomical region in space and a dark hole is very often a butthole, but youknow...maybe that’s just a very particular English language thing that no one will ever teach you from a textbook and it just didn’t quite get translated over correctly. But yeah, in my eye, Noah's just up there holding up a sphincter. It’s very fitting, he is an asshole. Congrats, Noah Kaiba, you’ve found your card.

Meanwhile, Yugi is doing his very best to try and backseat, even if Kaiba instinctively slaps it out of his hands at every opportunity.

So I figured that he’d mention that both of these boys carry these card lockets around their necks with a little picture of the other brother inside--a little thing they carry for no other reason than to remember eachother. Which makes sense, because Kaiba forgets things SO OFTEN. The necklace around their necks is almost like those bracelets you wear to let police and medics know if you’re prone to narcolepsy--it even has a nice picture inside to indicate “please return this boy to this pictured person in case you find him wandering about completely lost.”

I kinda figured that necklace would be used at some point but nah, we’re gonna talk about cards. Which is fine, because we get to see this good drawing Mokuba made once.

Which, PS, it was sort of hard to pick up on the first time Kaiba talked about this period of his life, but this time when he talked about this incident it like...left quite a bit highly implied there by what Seto meant when he said Mokuba “saved me.” It’s some pretty heavy stuff that kind of gets blown over by the massive magic dragon that shows up in the next scene and then just flies Mokuba, who is wearing very cute fuzzy socks, up into the sky and into the moon like ET.

Nowadays they do this by hanging off of Helicopters, but flying on dangerous things to escape their horrible childhood has been their Fantasy for a very long time. These kids and their obsession with heights and dangerous ledges.

And apparently it was this moment in his youth that Seto decided he wanted to be “worthy enough to hold a Blue Eyes.” And like...I remember S1 Seto. That was the worthy Seto?

I guess “worthy enough” doesn’t really imply any sort of moral code, just if you have enough money and can like play cards pretty OK.

Anyways, it was a lot of new stuff applied to this card that I just only recently accepted as a GF and so it was like “All right show, I see what you’re doing, I guess we’re going to walk slowly out of the paper romance realm and into...some sort of card-honor brother realm.”

So, using the Blue Eyes, Kaiba destroys a bunch of Gradius ships, which Noah was like “These Gradius ships represent our Father’s company!” in case you’re a child and didn’t see the symbolism. And, along the way, he destroys what he thinks is Noah’s Game Master card but like...it’s this show, so apparently inside the Boat was another dude and the game is going to keep on going, fml.

Ah buckle up this...this is going to be a long one. This is going to be a lot more cards, huh?

Anyway, when I saw this card that is clearly based on a couple of Gods I was like “so um...isn’t that a...God card?” so I looked it up, also because it was BS and I was frustrated that it was even here after the boat thing ended, and this card is a...get this...a Fairy card.

Cuz it has wings? Like a Seraphim? Everything about this looks like a conglomeration of different Gods but--I guess since God Cards can only have the 4 God Cards, this is a...Fairy card. Interesting. That is a huge ass Fairy. Yugioh biology really eludes me.

Anyway, First thing Noah does as a fairy is destroy his younger brother who is also older than him, don’tthinkaboutit. He’s again sporting the poorly photoshopped glowing romper that the dub gave us in order to spare us.

Hey!

Question!

So when Noah’s wearing the game Master outfit, he’s ass naked underneath--but the Big 5 weren’t? Like wouldn’t the Big 5 have had the same issue of Noah here where they have no body, so whatever they’re wearing is just whatever they’re in?

Meaning that when they were all shoved in Tristan’s body wouldn’t they have just been 5 naked fat old guys hanging out like a European sauna?

Or is this just Noah’s preference? To be ass naked when no one’s looking? Because he’s been here all alone for 6 years, so why the hell not? Like, no one cares. No one’s looking. You can’t get splinters or whatever. Just let it all hang loose, man, it’s not even a real body.

Like, if you look closely, Noah only has ... one outfit he’s had here for 6 years. I’ve noticed this maybe more than most because...it’s not a great outfit. He had that same suit and shorts combo right after he woke up and got out of his jammies from the accident all those years ago. He also wore a space suit once, but that was a Birthday present from Dad and I haven't seen the suit since.

Did Noah recognize that People Are Coming and was like “oh dammit, dammit, I have to cover the goods” and just throw on literally the only thing in his closet? The office shorts combo from 6 years ago? Is that why? Is that the big secret of the baby boy suit shorts? That he, in reality, never really wears them?

Questions about nudity aside, out of freakin no where Noah just turns the Kaibas into this:

Noah spent like 20 episodes saying no one is ever allowed to cheat and then just flippin does this and is like “What? It’s almost legal enough.”

I mean, it’s not like there’s any official rules for Duel Monsters anyway but apparently you can just turn each other into statuary and it’s like...fine. That’s fine.

Also, fun fact, about Yugioh statues, they come with eyeliner built in.

So much dedication to the guyliner in this show, mad respect.

And yes, I have sort of thought that Moki’s been sporting a teeny tiny Adam Lambert line this whole time. Like most our cast, honestly. But not Joey. I feel like Joey would never have the patience to learn how to waterline.

I mean the Kaiba’s are essentially brain dead, yes? Their brain functions have been removed and uploaded to the cloud to never be downloaded back into their vegetable bodies? That counts enough for me.

Seto Kaiba just 2 corpses away from 169ing the Hell out of that death scene. A shame.

Bro was like “well at least this crying statue stuff is more like something that normally happens in a kid’s show.” and I was like “THIS? So this ever happened in Pokemon?” and bro was like “It did actually, Ash Ketchum was turned into stone and then cried as a rock statue, and then Pikachu hugged him to make him all better” And as you may be aware my bro is full of spicy headcanons so I’m not sure if that’s actually true but it was like

“Bro, was Ash Ketchum ever turned to stone because his abusive Father’s secret son, who has been turned into an evil computer, wants to kill his brother and then take over his body to run the Patriots from Metal Gear? That happened on Pokemon?” And Bro admitted “Ok, maybe not so much.”

Anyway, Pharaoh awakens to put a stop to this nonsense by bringing up the long list of things that Noah did just now that is absolutely cheating.

Anyway, this is Noah now.

He’s just this...huge 100 story tall person with very bored judgy eyes just floating in the sky with vaguely religious iconography going on and bunch of wings like that one character design that we all have in our portfolio. Yeah, you know the one. It’s this guy. We’ve all drawn this guy. Anyway, it’s going to be very hard to take him seriously when this guy has Noah’s voice.

Again, he is not, he is ass naked in there, though the dub did try and cover it up.

Anyway, next episode we get to basically start this entire duel over.

That’s nice. That’s nice of them to do to me. At least these kids finally got a chance to do some duel prep for the actual tourney they’re supposed to be doing later this season. Yeah. Remember that apocalypse? That’s still going on somehow. Maybe by the time they’ll get to it, most of the competitors will be dead?

Here’s a link to read the recaps in order from S1 Ep1

#yugioh #yu gi oh #episode recap #photo recap #S3 Ep19 #tw suicide #seto kaiba #noah kaiba #yugi muto #joey wheeler #duke devlin #Noah is now a giant 6 winged angel #The Kaibas are rock statues #unfortunately this time they are in a much harder to transport state #you can't put a statue into your pants pocket so rip

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sidenotelife · 6 years

Text

A match day running diary

A running diary of the day when I find out where I will do my residency training (post-graduate medical training). For those not familiar with the medical training process, briefly, medical students send out applications for post-graduate medical training to become board certified physicians, and this occurs sometime in the fall of senior year. Then over the winter medical students interview with these programs, and then in February all the progams rank the students they want and the students rank the programs they want. This all gets thrown into a computer somewhere that optimizes all the rank lists and spits out assignments for students and employees for residency programs. This post is a running diary of March 15th, the day we get our residency assignments. This post is loosely based on a true story.

7:27 AM. Depart breakfast at Sunrise Bistro. Great corn beef hash. Would highly recommend.

8:55 AM. The costume theme for match day was “fictional characters” so we decided to dress up as son’s favorite thing which is Thomas the Train. Wife painted these shirts. Pretty legit.

9:10 AM. Prepare vegetarian chili in crockpot for maximum efficiency. I found a recipe that suggested putting quinoa in vegetarian chili to give it a little extra volume to it. I also put in my fave secret ingredient which is Dr. Pepper.

9:28 AM. Kids + Costumes ready.

9:28 AM. Son: Can I see the picture?

9:43 AM. Ken costume ready. I had to cut out a v so you could see my Sir Topham Hatt tie. Wife did not approve on my t-shirt cutting job. Can you blame her.

10:07 AM. Walking to Charleston Music Hall with family and friend.

Friend: Can’t wait to cheer really loud when you walk across the stage.

Ken: Wait I’m not walking across the stage.

Friend: *Massive disappointment* What why?

Ken: I don’t like the attention. Also I don’t like things with lots of people. Introvert probs. 🤷‍♂️

11:56 AM. Kids getting too crazy. Break out emergency Belgian waffles. It is truly an art to keep kids quiet and contained at any event.

12:00 PM. Open envelopes... Sioux Falls Family Medicine!

Hmm. I don’t look thrilled here. I think the exact emotion I had was how-should-I-feel-about-this, if that can be considered an emotion. Sidenote - Before I go further I feel the need to explain myself. I don’t want this to be conceived as disappointment that I matched where I matched. Sioux Falls was our #2 choice and honestly the only reason I didn’t rank it #1 was because of the weather. It is truly my privilege to have the opportunity to train there, but I feel it is of importance to analyze this emotion. This how-should-I-feel-about-this emotion.

Match has, for better or worse, come to represent the culmination of the whole med school experience. If you match at the place you wanted, your #1 program, your emotions are those of elation. You feel everything was worth it. All those days suffering in the library, all the shit you had to take from residents that were out of line, all of it. If you don’t match at a desired place or worse yet, if you don’t match and have to scramble, it’s a nightmare. But I worry that this is an oversimplification of the process, and I worry that med school has become nothing more than a way to ensure you get a desireable job than a place where you learn to care for sick people. I fear this sentiment about match is driving the Step 1 mania. (Currently being covered beautifully by @jpcarmody on his blog, The Sheriff of Sodium).

I think my emotions are also complicated by a personal change of heart I had sometime during the end of graduate school and the beginning of medical school. For so long I had worshipped at the throne of academia. When I came to medical school I dreamed of becoming the dean of my own medical school. When I started graduate school I dreamed of having a 30-person HHMI-funded lab/machine that would draw the envy of graduate students and postdocs everywhere. For so long I dreamed of my match day when one day I would announce that I was going to a sexy program like Stanford or Harvard or Duke. But I think during graduate school I started to understand the reality of academia, and especially the kind of academia that incentivizes the Cell/Nature/Science/NEJM rat race. My greatest frustration was that it was so hard to be ethical in academia. The academic system is fueled by the C/N/S/NEJM rat race, which in turn is fueled by stretching your data to look like it’s saying more than it actually does. It’s also fueled by outright lying and people producing fake data to get the data to fit the elegant hypothesis. I hated seeing mentors take advantage of students and postdocs, milking every last bit of productivity out of your underlings because that was truly the only way to survive. By looking out for yourself at all costs. I love science but I didn’t want to condone this sort of philosophy. I wanted to pursue physician-science in a way where I was not at the mercy of for-profit journal editors. I wanted to live in a world where we as a research team pursued science out of a desire to further the pursuit of knowledge and not just the next publication with a big impact factor. Maybe I was imagining a pipedream but it just didn’t feel like the right thing for me to jump into the traditional route of padding my resume at a top 5 med school.

When I went back to med school for my clinical years, I initially felt tentative but still willing to enter my hat into this foray. Gradually several little things gearshifted me off this track, most prominently working with one attending in particular. I worked with this attending during my addiction psychiatry rotation, and I watched him work for six weeks. He is a genius, but I admired him for more than that. More than any other physician I’ve ever met, the compassion he had for his patients was palpable. You could feel his frustration with the system that made it hard for physicians to help patients. You could see the depths to which he pushed himself in order to provide true patient-oriented care, and not just the cheap talk that often gets thrown around. I acknowledge that some of these tendencies are dangerous, and risky, but it’s also beautiful. That’s the sort of feeling that fundamentally pushed me into going to medical school. Other people’s suffering pained my heart and I had to do something to relieve this pain, if only to relieve my own pain. I don’t know exactly what happened to this attending, but he no longer attends on the addicion psychiatry floor. As far as I know he’s taking a break from seeing patients. My best guess is he burned out and gave up his fight against the system. Hopefully I’m wrong. I don’t know. Frankly, I’m too afraid to know the answer. But when I saw that someone who had such compassion and such raw talent couldn’t make it in academic medicine, I knew I had to do something different. I saw that something different in Family Medicine. I saw that this specialty, one that is treated by some as the specialty that you pursue when you can’t get good enough Step 1 scores to pursue what you actually want to do, I saw this specialty as the one that could offer a true path to patient-centered care. I saw the flexibility offered by the diverse skillset you could obtain during family medicine residency. I saw the potential for real long-lasting relationships with patients. I saw the value in being a generalist in a medical world that’s becoming overpopulated with specialists. I’m still convinced family medicine is the right specialty for me, and I feel it offers the possibility for me to pursue physician-science my way. Yet, there’s also a part of myself that’s grieving that I didn’t match at Harvard or Stanford, that I’m not working in the HHMI-funded lab, that my home isn’t the building with beautiful modern architecture looking out at the beach. It’s not a part of me that I like but regretably it’s still a part of me, and I think that moment when I opened my match envelope and saw the official match result it was the first moment it was real. I was really choosing to give up the glamors of a top 5 med school to pursue this off-beaten track. Am I crazy? Am I being too self-righteous? Did I make the wrong decision? I think that’s what gave me this feeling. This how-should-I-feel-about-this feeling.

12:23 PM. Kids too crazy... we need to leave.

12:57 PM. Get home.

Ken: Kids what do you want for lunch?

Kids: *opens fridge* Dad why is there so much beer?

1:03 PM. Looking up South Dakota-themed food. I remember when I went to interview there I asked them what the most South Dakota food was, and they told me it was Chislic. I don’t know if I’m spelling that right, but basically it’s fried chunks of meat. Sounds pretty legit:

1:15 PM. Daughter makes a sign. You may not be able to understand this sign so let me do a little interpreting. At the top it says South Dakota Bound, except the BOUND is backwards. Then the square-looking thing is the shape of South Dakota. Sidenote - The little divot at the bottom right corner kind of looks like Florida, which kind of makes the state of South Dakota look like a mini-version of America. The thick blue lines are water falls, which we drew because Daughter really wanted to draw something in Sioux Falls, so I said water falls! The four faces below that were commonly misinterpreted as Ken, Wife, Daughter, and Son but actually it’s Mount Rushmore.

1:57 PM. Son goes to rest time. Daughter cleaning up blankets from floor. Asking me, “Why do I have to be cinderella? Why do I have to clean the bathroom and the living room and the kitchen??” So basically we are raising a little martyr.

2:30 PM. Wife is already looking at real estate. I think she knows the stats for every single rental property in Sioux Falls. 🤣

4:13 PM. Recruit kids to help. Before this they were carrying cans of beer which was even funnier. 👶👧🍻

5:13 PM. Commence low country boil. I’ve always loved the idea of the low country boil and I’ve always wanted to do one but for one it’s real expensive to buy all the supplies, and for two I didn’t have the proper equipment for it. Fortunately my friend lent me his turkey frier and burner which made for the perfect low country boil setup. In retrospect, the low country boil was one of the funnest party meals I’ve ever made and I would recommend it 10 out of 10 times. At the same time, shrimp is one of my least favorite seafoods and I don’t love to eat low country boil. I feel like this makes sense.

Ok, those are the last pics I have so I’ll wrap up this post. Shoutout to everyone who was feeling how-should-I-feel-about-this.

See you on the other side,

From ken

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angelrider13 · 6 years

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FFXV: you can’t run from the shadow (but you can invite it to dance)

Chapter: 2/?

AO3 | FF | Master Fic List

By the time Rayna was five, she'd decided that being royalty was overrated.

She was barely out of her toddler years and already they had her and Regis going through court etiquette. Because apparently if you called a Duke "my Lord" instead of "Your Grace" or failed to properly articulate someone's name, it would offend their delicate, noble sensibilities. Personally, she's of the opinion that if a five year old acting like a five year old was offensive, then their sensibilities deserved to be shattered.

Watching their governess's face when she messed up on purpose was a thing of beauty and Regis's smothered giggles just made it even better. Honestly, if kids were a thing in her future (and they probably would be given the royalty thing), then she's holding off on court training until they were at least eight just so she could cackle at all the flailing nobles. If Regis let her, she'd do the same with Noctis.

But that was in the far off future and right now she was just a child with a weird amount of adult expectations. She was a bit baffled by it actually. She had thought that this was a modern age relatively speaking and that people would be well aware that treating children like small adults was not something that ended well for either party. Maybe it was just a royalty thing? She had no idea.

Another thing was that her supposed parents were hardly a blip on the scale. She was lucky if she saw either of them once a week, which was ridiculous even if they had a country to run. Regis didn't really notice, but he had no other frame of reference - this was normal for him, for him this is what parents were.

Rayna though, she'd had parents before. They'd had their ups and downs and didn't always see eye to eye and they were by no means perfect, but they had been present. Mors and his wife, whose name was apparently Ophelia, just...weren't.

They were strangers in every sense of the word and while Ophelia would hug them and coo over them when she visited, it was awkward at best and distant at worst. Rayna wasn't really comfortable with these two people who came and went as they pleased but still expected to be addressed as "mother" and "father" and be granted all the unconditional love those titles implied. It was obvious they'd had a child out of obligation rather than the actual desire to become parents.

Which she was fine with, for the most part. Rayna had lived to adulthood in her life before - she knew who she was, had had time to grow into herself. For all that she was in a different body, that knowledge hadn't gone away. No, she didn't really need parents. She had Regis and their governess and she was content with that.

What she was not content with were all the rules that came with her new life. It was bad enough that she knew disaster was looming just around the corner. Now she had to deal with other people running her life like they were entitled to it. She'd expected it to some degree - she was a child after all and children needed to be managed. But she had little time to herself, was always expected to be perfect, and though she could speak now, no one seemed to want to listen.

She got frustrated easily and she lashed out as children were prone to what they were overwhelmed. New life or not, new body or not, she was an introvert and being around people all the time without reprieve was exhausting. But people didn't seem to understand that. There was always someone there - telling them how to act, how to dress, how to stand, how to sit, how to play.

Rayna wanted to scream.

And she did. Quite frequently. Because no one listened when she tried to tell them she was done for the day, when she needed a break, when she needed to breathe. So she screamed and cried and once she even threw an inkwell at their tutor so hard that she ended up breaking his nose.

Regis would stand between her and the adults with a frown on his face, back straight, head held high, looking every inch a King despite his small stature. Rayna was guiltily grateful for it. Regis was child in body and in mind, but he would protect her first and always even though it should have been the other way around. Regis was determined and Rayna couldn't find it in herself to make him stop.

He'd drag her to the gardens, pointedly ignoring the guards trailing after them, babbling nonsense at her all the while and weaving flowers into her hair while she calmed down. It happened often enough that the landscaping staff became quite familiar with them. Loren in particular was fond of them and taught them how to make flower crowns. Regis was delighted by the very idea of them and between the three of them, they made enough crowns for everyone.

When their governess eventually tracked them down, Rayna shyly presented her a crown made of amaryllis flowers and day lilies.

"Sorry for leaving the lesson, Emelie," Rayna said, eyes on the ground, because she knew that her behavior was unacceptable for a princess. As an adult, she knew better and as a princess, she was expected to be better. Though physically a child, she felt her own behavior, however justified, was inappropriate. She expected better of herself.

"I'm not sorry," Regis said stubbornly, eyes defiant, even as she prodded his side, "We can't be in lessons all the time and no one ever listens when Rayna says she needs a break!"

Emelie sighed. "Your Highness -"

Regis set his jaw and glared at her. "No," he said with all the gravity a five year old could muster, "We're taking the rest of the day off and tomorrow too. And if you try to stick us in lessons, we'll just sneak out again."

Emelie eyed the young Prince, before looking at her. Rayna wasn’t sure what she looked like, but her eyes felt swollen and raw and her cheeks felt tacky.

Their governess sighed again at whatever she saw, the line of her shoulders easing. “Very well, Highness.”

Regis beamed and gleefully took the flower crown from his sister’s hands, presenting it to Emelie. Their governess huffed out a laugh and knelt, allowing Regis to place the crown on her head.

She smiled at them, fingers tracing the petals. “Thank you, Prince Regis. Princess Rayna.”

Rayna smiled back and offered her some crocus flowers. “Wanna help?”

Emelie settled herself down on the grass, carefully arranging her skirts. “I don’t know how to make flower crowns,” she said, “You’ll have to show me.”

The twins grinned at her.

Weskham was a lot like what she remembered of Ignis.

He was poised and polite and everything a chamberlain to the future king would need to be. He was kind and gentle, but had a cutting tongue and a quick wit to match. Rayna quite liked him. She didn’t really know what to make of him, that first day when Emelie introduced them to each other.

Her memories of her life before have faded and the fine details that she kept tucked away from prying eyes, encrypted in her mother tongue, made no mention. Whatever role Weskham played in the greater game was minor at best. She remembers that he was in Altissia by the time the main plot rolled around, but she knew nothing about why he left or his relationship with her brother.

Regis was…less than impressed with Weskham. Although, Rayna suspected that had more to do with the fact that it was made clear that Weskham was there to be his advisor with no mention of her at all.

(Rayna was forever grateful that she was the younger twin. She wasn’t sure if she’d have been the heir were she older given her gender, but now she didn’t have to worry about it.)

To his credit, Weskham didn’t let Regis’s attitude bother him, though it did take him about two weeks to figure out the cause. The day he greeted Rayna first and engaged her in conversation, completely ignoring Regis in the meantime, was the day Regis began to thaw towards him.

“If you’re going to mine,” Regis told him later, eyes serious as Rayna hovered over his shoulder, “Than you have to be ours.”

Weskham just looked between them and nodded.

He started attending lessons with them and when he noted the tension between the royals and several of their tutors, he placed himself firmly on their side.

“I quite like him,” Rayna whispered to her brother in Italian as they watched Weskham argue with their tutor about the benefits of hands on instruction, all of ten years old to their seven.

Regis snorted next to her. “You just like that he’s willing to argue with anyone.”

“It’ll be good for you when we’re older.”

Regis wrinkled his nose at her. “That’s what I have you for.”

Rayna laughed.

“This…could end poorly,” Weskham said, as he stood next to her watching Regis and Clarus go at it in the middle of the training yard.

Rayna grimaced. “It’s been a long time coming, Wesk,” she replied, “Let them get everything out in the open now.”

Weskham hummed in agreement, but the slant of his mouth told her he was not pleased.

The situation with Clarus had caught her completely off guard. What she remembered painted the relationship between Regis and Clarus as best friends at worst and platonic life partners or even lovers at best. They were loyal to each other, trusted each other. But that was their relationship almost forty years from now. She’d had no idea how they started out but it was becoming increasingly obvious that the bond she remembered was something that had developed over time.

Clarus was to be Regis’s Shield.

She knew it.

Regis knew it.

Everyone knew it.

But Clarus was an only child, and there were two royal children. Since Regis was the Crown Prince, he was the one Clarus would swear oaths too once he came of age. This left Rayna without a Shield of her own and Regis was not please about the blatant disregard of his sister’s safety. In everyone’s defense, it had been generations since there had been more than one royal child at a time and twins were even rarer – no one had expected it. Clarus was older than them and Lord Amicitia’s wife was unable to bare more children due to an illness that left her health in precarious balance. But at the same time, no one was making an effort to step up and accommodate the fact that they existed. Regis was the oldest and as such traditions that had been in place since the beginning of their line had fallen to him. And traditionally, only those of the Amicitia line served as Shields. This left Rayna by the wayside.

She was given a regular guard, but there was no one to be appointed as her future Shield, nor was there any effort put into finding one. The implications of this were…not positive. Guards were of course expected, but a Shield was something more than a guard and the fact that Rayna was indirectly considered unworthy of one rubbed the twins the wrong way. Regis was furious on her behalf, but Rayna wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about the whole thing. Somedays, she still felt very much like an outsider, like she was watching someone else’s life story unfold before her eyes even though she’d been here for ten years already. She wasn’t originally part of the story – obviously there was no Shield for her because she didn’t belong here. She had no place. Other days, she just felt resigned to the whole thing. She was distant at best with her parents and she had no expectations of them. The Council wasn’t much better.

Regis made his displeasure known at every available opportunity and Weskham was the king of passive aggressiveness.

In all honesty, Rayna wasn’t even sure she wanted a Shield.

She had guards. She received combat training. She learned to control her magic alongside Regis. A loyal companion would be nice, she supposed, but she wasn’t entirely certain she was worth it. It made sense for Regis to get the only Shield candidate available. He was the Crown Prince. He was light where Rayna was shadow. It was obvious to her.

Still, Clarus and Regis had not gotten off to a good start.

Regis had already been upset by the situation, but Clarus had made it worse by making it blatantly clear that he was only there to perform his duty. Technically speaking, he and Regis were strangers. They didn’t know each other and for all the oaths their ancestors had made to each other, it’s hard to be devoted to someone you’ve never met before. So Clarus was there because it was expected and as he was only expected to bond with the Prince, that was exactly what he did. He didn’t ignore Rayna pre se, but it was obvious that she wasn’t his concern.

Rayna didn’t take it personally. They’d never met and Rayna was old enough to understand that Clarus was a child living up to expectations placed on him.

Regis was not as understanding.

The two ended up clashing often.

Which led them to this moment where the two of them had rapidly dissolved from a training session into very actively trying to bash each other’s heads in. Both were sporting several bruises and Clarus had a lovely split lip he got in retaliation for the cut just above Regis’ left brow.

They were never going to get anywhere like this.

Rayna sighed loudly as she heaved herself up. “Right, then. Clearly they aren’t getting anywhere like this.”

Weskham blinked at her. “Rayna?”

“Just. Be ready to back me up?”

He eyed her and then the dueling pair. “Alright,” he agreed after a moment.

She nodded and stalked forward, reaching into her core and pulling at the magic that hummed through her heart. Cold flowed into her veins and frost bloomed across her skin, her breath coming in foggy wisps. She waited until Regis and Clarus pushed each other apart and before they could charge forward, she slammed her foot down on the ground, letting her magic loose.

Ice raced across the ground, freezing the boys’ feet in place. They both yelped in surprise, arms flailing as they tried to regain their balance.

Regis whipped around to face her. “Rayna!” he shouted, betrayal plain on his face.

Rayna crossed her arms over her chest, looking entirely unimpressed. “If you two are quite done?”

Clarus narrowed his eyes at her. “Princess – ”

“Nope,” she cut in, “This has gone on long enough.” She turned to look at Regis, met his eyes and held them. “Stop being mad at Clarus for something he has no control over. He’s the only Amicitia child. You’re the Crown Prince. Of course he’s going to be your Shield. It’s not his fault that our parents refuse to think around old traditions.”

Regis scowled at her. “You are just as important as me. You deserve – ”

“It’s not about what I deserve,” she interrupted, “And even if it was, it wouldn’t be Clarus’s fault. He has as much choice in this as you do.”

Her brother frowned, still clearly unhappy, but the line of his shoulders eased and he looked away from her gaze. Rayna nodded to herself and turned toward her brother’s Shield-to-be.

“As for you,” Rayna said, narrowing her eyes, “You could stand to put in a little more effort into this.”

Clarus’s jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”

“If you think I’ll let you be my brother’s Shield if you only see him as your duty, you have another thing coming,” she told him, “If all you see when you look at him is a job, then you will never be his Shield, tradition be damned.”

“Yeah?” Clarus challenged, “And who will be his Shield instead? Like you said, I’m the only Amicitia available.”

Rayna tilted her chin up, eyes hard. “I will,” she said firmly.

Clarus’s eyes widened and Regis made a choked sound behind her.

“I will,” she repeated, “Because if you think my brother is only your duty, then you don’t deserve to be his Shield. Duty is an obvious, common thing. Duty is for guards. You want to be a Shield? Then you have to give more than that.”

There was a stunned silence at her words and Clarus stared at her like he’d never seen her before.

“Rayna,” Regis said, and his tone had her turning towards him, “Rayna, you can’t – ”

“I can and I will,” she insisted, “Just because it’s whats proper and traditional and the way it’s always been done, doesn’t mean it should be done that way. You deserve better than that. You deserve someone who will care for you, not just the Crown.”

“I already have that,” Regis replied, looking at her pointedly, “You don’t need to prove that to me.”

Rayna huffed at him, a smile pulling at the corners of her lips. “Well good.”

“If everyone’s calmed down now,” Weskham drawled, “Perhaps, you can unfreeze them before someone gets frostbite, Your Highness?”

Rayna hummed, thoughtful. “If I let you go, are you going to start up again?”

Clarus and Regis glanced at each other before shaking their heads.

Rayna nodded. “Good,” she said and carefully released her hold on the ice, calling up a small thread of heat to help it along.

Next thing she knew, her knees were buckling as her vision blurred. A firm hand around her elbow was the only thing that kept her face from meeting the floor. She looked up, surprised to find Clarus looking back at her, a complicated expression that she couldn’t decipher on his face.

She was distracted as Regis all but descended on her. “Sorry, sorry,” she said as he pulled her up, “I think that was too much magic too fast. I’m fine. I’m fine.”

“Yes, well, perhaps we should not do that again?” Weskham said pointedly.

She shrugged sheepishly, not entirely able to bring herself to regret it even as she continued to lean on her brother to stay upright.

“It’s almost lunch time anyway,” Regis said, starting towards the hall with Rayna still secured in his grip. “Are you coming Clarus?”

Rayna and Weskham both turned to look at the future Shield, who blinked at them in shock, looking at each of their expressions. Rayna knew without looking that her brother’s expression was carefully neutral. She tried to keep hers somewhere between expectant and welcoming. She wanted the two of them to get along, to be King and Shield.

“Sure,” Clarus said after a long moment.

Weskham clicked his tongue at them. “The two of you are disgusting. Go clean up first. Rayna and I will meet you there.”

Rayna snorted at Regis’s peeved look. “You stink, brother mine,” she cooed as she pulled away from, “Go bond with your Shield.”

“He’s not my Shield,” Regis grumbled at her.

“Yet,” she countered, “You two have time to work it out.”

“I thought you were vying for the position,” Regis said as he eyed her cautiously.

Rayna tilted her head. “If worst comes to worse. For now, actually give him a chance and save your anger for those who deserve it.”

“What are they saying?” Clarus asked Weskham blankly.

“I’ve no idea,” Weskham admitted easily with a shrug, “They have their own language.”

“And they do this often?”

“All the time.”

Regis and Rayna smirked at each other. Ah, the joys of knowing a language no one else spoke.

As Regis and Clarus headed off to clean up, Rayna fell into step with Weskham.

“I think that went rather well,” she said.

Weskham sighed at her. “The magic might have been overdoing it.”

Rayna shrugged unrepentantly. “They both needed a kick in the pants.”

“Well, you’re not wrong,” he said dryly, “With luck, you shocked them out of their animosity.”

“There’s not really any animosity between them,” she replied, “Regis is mad at the situation in general, not Clarus specifically.”

“But Clarus is the on in front of him,” Weskham mused.

Rayna nodded. “And Clarus doesn’t know Regis at all outside of the fact that he was raised to one day swear his life too him.”

“So you’re saying they need to work on becoming friends,” he said with a tad more skepticism in his voice than Rayna thought was warranted.

“It’ll work. Boys are just dumb about this kind of thing,” she informed him matter of factly, delighting in the look of affront that crossed his face. She smiled and pat his arm consolingly. “Don’t worry, Wesk. You’re one of the few that actually has his head on straight. You’ll be fine.”

Weskham grumbled at her and she just laughed.

#ffxv #ffxv fic #final fantasy xv #regis lucis caelum #rayna lucis caelum #weskham armaugh #clarus amicitia #my writing #elri writes #you can't run from the shadow (but you can invite it to dance) au #you can't run from the shadow (but you can invite it to dance) fic

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crystalelemental · 7 years

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Well, it’s finally done. After all these years of just refusing to play the damn game, I beat Dark Souls 2 in its entirety. Which means, I have now beaten the entire series to 100% completion, and it is time to make a decision.

I’ll start with the game itself. I know a lot of people identify it as the jankiest, and that it just doesn’t function right. I’m not quite sure I’d agree with that entirely? It’s definitely weird, though. Like, when adaptability is low and your roll sucks, you’ll be rolling through something but still take damage for reasons. That’s kinda shitty. And it’s only really fixable by keeping low weight and trying to allocate points there early on. So we hope you enjoy playing melee only for most of the game. Not that it makes sense to do anything else anyway.

What is a major problem is how many times your slow-ass character is surrounded by like 5 enemies. Look, the Souls series is weird. A single boss with big attacks is not really that threatening, but a room of three normal enemies is a death sentence if you aggro them all simultaneously. There are a ton of bosses where the only real difficulty is crowd control. Skeleton Lords, Ruin Sentinels, Looking Glass Knight, Twin Dragonriders, Throne Defender and Watcher, Duke’s Dear Freya, Executioner’s Chariot (which extra sucks because adds are infinite unless you kill the necromancers), Darklurker, the fucking Belfry Gargoyles, Royal Rat Authority. Then in NG+ you get Lost Sinner summoning help, and the DLC introduces all kinds of fresh hell for you, like Elana (who I actually love, but only from lore standpoint), Lud and Zallen, the Ivory King, and the ganksquad. So much of this game is difficulty by suddenly being surrounded by too many units, and there are locations that are outright impossible to get through without a bow or spells to draw one person at a time (the run to Velstadt and the Ancient Dragon most notably).

That said...this is probably the easiest of the games. Not for any sensible reason like bosses just being easier or anything. It’s because you can power-level like a motherfucker, and are almost encouraged to do so. Levels scale so minimally that, at around level 200, you still only need around 50,000 souls to level. That is not a high bar to set, and level 200 means you can pack a lot of different tools, including your melee weapon of choice, spells of choice, and still have a good HP pool and a solid roll. Not gonna lie: actually love this fact. I think that the series as a whole suffers from not really allowing you to mix-and-match sets. A lot of things require specification, and quality builds are notoriously Not That Good. So being able to fairly easily cap most relevant stats in the first playthrough is fantastic.

That said, then you have the negative: Soul Memory. So, in this game, you can be summoned to help a player fight a boss, to regain your humanity without using the finite consumable Effigies. This is good, because going hollow means your HP gets cut pretty sharply, up to 50% of your max life. Which is stupid as hell, but whatever. Now, to be summoned, you need to be in the right tier as other players. Meaning that, if you want to be summoned reliably to fight Old Iron King, you need to be...not at Soul Memory 800k. Otherwise it takes like 3 days to get your 30 sunlight medals you need for that spell to get the trophies. Not that I’m bitter. Basically, as you fight the boss, you gain more souls, which puts you at a higher soul memory, which puts you out of range of typical players, so you can’t really farm reliably or recover humanity reliably from easier bosses. I like the idea of encouraging co-op, but the soul memory system is awful. It probably also influences invasions, but fuck invaders. If you invade people, you’re a piece of shit and I hope your system bricks.

As the last thing to note: the major complain I often see is “why are so many bosses just armored sword man; what is this, Smash 4?” Which is super legit. There are a lot of bosses that are just different variants on knight. Especially in the main game, this made it really easy to reach Velstadt...and basically beat him no damage. Because you know what’s happening now. You know how the knight fight goes, and there’s nothing all that unique. It’s very same-y. Of course, this does nothing to stop me from getting my shit pushed in like 37 times against Fume Knight, but honestly fuck that asshole.

Lore-wise, I feel like this is the weakest of the games, but I also feel like it’s closest to what I would want out of a sequel. I’m serious. I think that DS1 presented a fairly complete story, that didn’t really have a need for continuation in this way. DS2′s focus on bringing all these references to DS1 back is obnoxious, and the thing that holds it back the most. Focus on kingdoms within the world all you want. Focus on this entirely separate place called Drangleic and have it focus on all this unique stuff, in a place that doesn’t even know what the hell Lordran is or why the curse is showing up. But keeping it separate was really what is lacking here. Why is Ornstein just here? Just hanging out? Why is the statue for the Warriors of Sunlight still here when nothing else remained, and why is it near fucking Earthen Peak of all damn places? Why do the four great lord souls from DS1 just show up on NG+ with the new four great souls? Just keep them separate. You didn’t have to do this.

There is, however, one thing I actually like that’s a tie-in, and that’s the queens. I like the idea of Manus’ defeat resulting in the creation of these beings of the abyss showing up, and trying in their own ways to bring things back to the Dark. It’s something that ties in nicely, but isn’t just a shallow reference without meaning. It also helps that they’re pretty cool. Elana is, as I mentioned, my favorite, which has a lot to do with her trying to poison a dragon to death. Fuck that dragon up, girl. Stupid bitch lizard ain’t got shit. She’s also just the most outright conniving of the four, I think.

Overall, it’s not a terrible game, but it does feel very different. I think the main thing I take away is that it’s still very much a Dark Souls game. It’s all focused around difficulty meaning dying a lot, but this time with added penalties in the form of hollowing, and soul memory fucking literally everything up by putting you out of summon range whenever you suck and have to re-do runs to the boss, or try to farm levels to handle a problem. Magic is still boring a shit, and this game is almost the worst offender considering all my best spell options were just throwing Dark Orb at shit until it stopped breathing because it was fast and had a stupidly high number of casts compared to everything else in the game. I still feel like boss health is way too goddamn high given how unforgiving the game is toward any mistake in a fight, and how little variation there often is in a moveset. I’ve said before that I enjoy this series largely because it’s an active playing process that lets you build up your character, and that stat allocations are something I adore above all else, but it’s just not doing it for me. I’ve played about every type of build I can, in every game. Magic is always boring and way less effective than heavy armor with a stick. Melee weapons function very differently, but every major boss still boils down to learn pattern, dodge or block, attack one or maybe two times then back to defense so you don’t eat shit, repeat for 15 minutes until dead. It’s...kinda boring by now.

Which leads me to this: I’m trading this entire series in for Etrian Odyssey V on Tuesday. I don’t hate the games, but I find there is no further enjoyment to be had here. I’m more invested in completing a build, which leads to a lot of time just spent grinding, and I experience more frustration with getting through a run than anything else, since the series has become more of a placeholder between games than something I actually want to play on its own. In a weird way, it’s almost become too effective of a placeholder, and I could probably accomplish more significant things or branch out a bit instead of just replaying these whenever I’m bored and waiting on something else to come out. So, I’m done. I’m trading it all in, and honestly, thank god.

#dark souls 2 #I'm finally done with this series #time to get rid of it and never look back

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junker-town · 6 years

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Hue Jackson is running out of excuses for the Browns being terrible

The Browns head coach is looking everywhere but in the mirror to figure out what’s wrong with this team.

What is Hue Jackson good at? If you ask the Browns head coach himself, he’d tell you that offense is his specialty. “That’s what I know,” he claimed last week, after an overtime loss to the Buccaneers. His declaration came with a promise to jump in and help embattled offensive coordinator Todd Haley “figure out” why the Browns couldn’t score enough points to win games.

They scored 18 points in a loss to the Steelers. Six of those points came with just 13 seconds left in the game and Pittsburgh’s defense in cruise control with a 33-12 lead.

So what exactly did Jackson do to help the offense this week? Nobody knows. Not even Hue Jackson!

When he was asked about those comments after this week’s loss, Jackson brushed it off.

“I don’t want to talk about or give [credence] to anything about last week,’’ Jackson said after Sunday’s game. “I said what I said out of frustration. That’s over and done with.”

There he was clearly annoyed that reporters had the audacity to bring up the declaration he made waaaaaay in the past, a whole dang week ago.

So how did this become a thing in the first place?

Let’s turn back the clock to last week, another forgettable Browns game.

They lost 23-26 in overtime to the Bucs. Following that game is when Jackson promised to insert himself into the Browns offensive decision-making.

“I got to jump in headfirst, all hands, feet, everything, and go figure it out; it’s just that simple. I think I have to. And I want to. That’s what I know. So I’m not going to continue to watch something that I know how to do keep being that way. That’s just the truth.

”That’s nothing against anybody in our building. I just think that’s what I do. And I think I need to be a little bit more involved.”

Nobody’s going to look at the box score and think the offense was great in that loss to the Bucs, but a steady diet of feeding Nick Chubb the ball and Baker Mayfield leaning on Jarvis Landry and tight end David Njoku did get them out of a 16-2 deficit in the first half to force overtime.

It’s not rocket science.

This was the best, most ominous part of his statement last week though:

“I’m the head coach of the football team. I will do what I feel I need to do to get this team where it needs to be.”

Was that Jackson taking a some responsibility?

Lol, you should know better than that.

Rumors of a firing emerge

A familiar thing happened Sunday morning, before the Browns’ inevitable loss to the Steelers — rumors of a firing emerged. This time it was Haley whose head was on the block. According to Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network, the Browns could fire Haley if the struggles continued. That was at least one potential solution.

But you don’t really have to watch every down of Browns football (god, why would you) to know that the problems go well beyond the offensive play calling. Everyone in the building suffers from football anemia. It’s endemic.

Jackson and Haley, to the surprise of no one who’s remotely familiar with either of them, are not getting along. You saw some of those tensions on Hard Knocks this summer. They got into an argument about resting players. The tension over how Jackson treats players, i.e. with a lack of discipline, is reportedly still causing problems.

Last week’s remarks didn’t sit well — surprise — with the rest of the team. A head coach publicly castigating his veteran offensive coordinator isn’t going to be well-received. Their infighting made things more difficult in the locker room too.

Hue Jackson always finds a scapegoat. Last season it was Sashi Brown, a front office guy taking the fall for Jackson’s 0-16 season. This time it’s Haley getting served up.

So what happened this week?

To hear Jackson tell it after the game this week, his involvement in the offense was no more than usual. That’s a very convenient thing to say after getting embarrassed by the Steelers, who themselves had a pretty embarrassing moment on that free kick they didn’t realize was a free kick.

The difference is that the Steelers bounced back from their gaffe. For Hue Jackson’s Browns, now 3-36-1 since he was hired, it’s a way of life.

It’s the usual list of conservative play calls, terrible clock management and undisciplined play that’s always dogged the Browns under Jackson, no matter which hapless schmuck coordinator had the misfortune of working for him.

On the first drive of the game, the Browns were doing a decent job moving the ball. They moved 69 very nice yards to the Steelers’ 13, where they had a third-and-3. Pittsburgh knew what was coming, Duke Johnson right up the middle. They stuffed him for a 3-yard loss, and the Browns settled for a field goal.

My personal favorite moment came at the end of the first half. The Steelers, leading 7-6, got the ball on their own 13 with 7:20 left after Baker Mayfield threw an interception. They used all but eight seconds of the remaining clock time on a touchdown drive that made it 14-6. Hue Jackson had all three timeouts to burn when the drive started, and he had all three timeouts left when the half ended.

Hue asked why he didn’t use timeouts late in the second quarter: Honestly I don’t even recall that.

— Zac Jackson (@AkronJackson) October 28, 2018

Having a short memory is important for being a Browns fan. It’s a less appealing quality for the head coach.

When the Steelers got an, ahem, generous spot on that same drive, Jackson couldn’t challenge, but he could have called a timeout in the hopes to try and get the refs to take another look. Or if nothing else, a timeout just to give his defense a chance to collect itself before the Steelers converted the fourth-and-short on the next play.

Running out of excuses in Cleveland

Jackson’s short memory came in handy when asked about the drama last week too.

“Guys, I said what I said last week, and obviously, it had legs, but I never said I wanted to take away play calling. I said I wanted to help. That’s it. So today, now all of the sudden it’s this big ol’ thing because sure everyone’s going to look and say what’s going on?”

Whatever involvement he had in the offense this week, calling plays or just offering some helpful advice, it didn’t work. But because he had put that out there, it was that much harder to pin all the blame on the offensive coordinator. Jackson positioned himself as part of the solution, offered up a straw man and didn’t like being held accountable for the same terrible results.

Oh, and he and Todd Haley are fine too.

“There’s nothing wrong with my relationship with Haley,” he added.

Maybe not, but forgive me for not accepting that at face value. Some interesting reports began to circulate Sunday night, reports shedding some light on the two men’s disagreement over the offense.

Jackson, according to ESPN, reportedly wants the Browns to use more no-huddle offense, more quick slants and read options, plays designed to be a better fit for where Baker Mayfield is at in his first season in the NFL. Those kind of plays haven’t always worked either. And it probably doesn’t help that the Browns have a pretty bad group of receivers behind Landry. Haley prefers a more traditional offense, more dropbacks which can be a liability behind that offensive line.

Changing the arrangements on offense, we learned via Charles Robinson at Yahoo Sports, would require permission from the owner, Jimmy Haslam.

Whoever was the source for those reports, they would appear to give Jackson a little cover for the team’s offensive struggles, despite his “help” this last week. Whatever his weaknesses as a head coach.

Jackson’s always been pretty good about getting his version of events into the media one way or another. He survives by creating chaos and then positioning himself as a victim and the one person who can clean it all up.

But this time it might not matter.

There’s someone else who has Haslam’s ear now: general manager John Dorsey. Not even a year into the job, he’s done a lot to help clean up the team’s personnel issues ... removing Jackson’s greatest excuse for his shortcomings in the standings. If the losing continues, and there’s no reason to think it won’t, all of the excuses and scapegoats won’t be enough to save Hue Jackson’s job.

It makes for another tough season in the Dawg Pound, but at least once that happens, the Browns can finally get a new head coach and on track to start winning.

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kellyannecoaching-blog · 7 years

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A LiTtLe SoMeThInG YoU DiDn’T KnOw AbOuT Me!

Hi, I’m Kelly Barhorst, and I have Juvenile Myoclonic Epilepsy (JME for short....also link in the name)…..this is the part where you say “Hi Kelly!”. For some of you who may or may not know what JME is, it is a form of the seizure disorder called Epilepsy that usually forms in younger children who have absence (stare off), tonic clonic (the more known), myoclonic jerk (physical twitch ) seizures. Yes I didn’t know there were different types of seizures until I experienced these myself when I was officially diagnosed at age 14…..now I am 25 (*whew* time flies when you’re getting younger) and living in the warm suns of Arizona. I recently started to feel the urge to first share my experiences of being diagnosed and growing up with this disorder on my blog for anyone interested when I talked to family members coming home. Over this past summer of 2017 I have done a lot of healing, releasing and forgiveness around my life. Enough so that I have broken down my emotional barriers to share my personal experiences to help others, which is why I have become a life coach after receiving a bachelors in Psychology in Arizona. I have reflected on being in touch with what I went through at the time my seizures started and what events took place. Being this age, I felt pretty lonely going through all of this stuff and not being understood by anyone. Mostly people meant well, but how do you wrap your minds around a seizure disorder when you’ve never lived it or cannot see the damage? STORY TIME Let’s start a bit before the “war”, in a small town in Ohio. I was a young 13 year old girl who had been experiencing some stress at home with a sickness in the family, along with having a hard time making friends at a new school. I recall sitting bed one night with my sister in her room when I felt this small nod. It was so tiny that I thought it was maybe just me being so tired. It kept happening. Eventually, within the next school year, my stress started to heighten as well as the changes in my body. It finally showed up physically as my collapsing on the floor of my sister and I’s new bathroom getting ready for school and passing out. EKG’s, blood, and other tests were ran in hopes to figure out the cause of what was going on. We got our answer not too long after I returned to school. This is what I call “D-Day” for me. I remember vividly, being in 8th grade and going to lunch. After finishing all of my food, mostly everyone had left our table to go to the gym and play while I read my favorite book at the time “Maximum Ride”. Maybe one friend had been sitting across from be doing the same thing. Reading, yes reading, must have caused something to become triggered in side because that is the last memory I have.

MY FIRST BATTLE

If I could really describe a seizure, it would be something of this nature. Going into complete darkness….as if you do not exist. Consciously, you are not there and not aware of anything or anyone. It hits instantly for me, and time stands still in this dark void of a waiting room. Something seems (from what I am told) to take hold when I start to come to, because you could ask me anything under the sun and I will answer it full and truthfully. At some point, after the glaze in my eyes disappears I am released and return to my body with a welcoming headache of a thousand hangovers. My body feels like I have just been running for the past 3 days and on the way I pumped some mad iron at the gym while slamming my head against a brick wall. If I am lucky, I come out with no scratches or bruises. But alas, I’ve had (sometimes to me comical) bruises and scratches from a big fall. It’s needless to say, a magical moment in the family or relationship, depending on who is there.

I awoke to the paramedics and my parents standing over me saying my name. I remember thinking to myself Oh no! If my parents are here….I must have done something pretty bad! “Kelly, can you hear me?”, one paramedic spoke. “Yes, what happened?”, my voice was horse for some reason. “You just had a seizure.”, I recall asking myself what a seizure was and looking it up later. Quite a smart 14 year old! But won’t lie, it was embarrassing for me at that age to of had a seizure in front of all of my classmates. Some even thought I was dying at that age, at the same time my dark humor sort of chuckles at one of my classmates running the hall screaming that “I am dying” (if she reads this I want to thank her for alerting the teachers that day). Also to the teacher who came running and flipped a table to get to me! Well, at least I didn’t get in trouble, but I still wish the two squirrels in my head started to duke it out over that nut at my house rather than in front of my whole entire class. YIKES! Needless to say, I went home early from school that day. With my extra time I remember looking up stuff about seizures, which lead me to the possibility of me having Epilepsy. My path lead me to Dayton Childrens Hospital, where I had my first EEG (fun little party of colorful wire strapped to your head with itchy glue that can give your skin reactions) and the results were more off the chart than a politician on lie detector test. My first diagnosis was based on the fact of my symptoms and the fact my EEG had been irregular. I was also met with a following of catscans and bloodwork to conclude what has started this wildfire inside my mind....conclusion....nothing...doctors do not know. It was true I had Epilepsy, but my rediagnosis came after I switched doctors and better medication, that might come with a later post. But cannot say regardless of the medical professionals I have met, each and every one taught me something different and how to become even more of my own advocate because who really knows your own body but you. Being a young tot, I was given my Keppra pills and told to be a good girl. If I took these things for the rest of my life, I’ll be ok. I wish it was so simple. Oh and by the way this disorder will never be healed and you probably will never drive (doctors words). But if you do drive, it comes with at least 3 months (6 months to a year depending where you are) seizure free (at the time impossible). Having a child might result in you giving your child the same disorder. Especially, what no doctor could understand is the side effect each medication gives you. Walking through the fog and having the feeling that every conversation is like reading one page in a book 5 times over and over again and still not getting the freaking words. People not quite getting why you talk slower when you felt like you processed everything just fine. Being underestimated when you have all the capabilities, just need a little extra time the world won’t give or why you can’t get up out of bed as fast as anyone or you’ll risk another seizure. The emotional and sometimes personality changes different medications can cause. Being taken advantage of in friendships, relationships, and not to mention working life. The fear your parents have for your future and the confusion/ frustration you have sifting through the fog that is your mind while losing yourself. People have a underlying stigma which I feel I want to mention in future blogs. I’ve spoken to many different people and told them about my life. Once you show them a face, the fear and the stigma releases. Honestly, I have many stories, but it would turn into a long long post.

Being put into this corner at times you underestimate yourself and how many options you have out there. But really if at one point thats all you hear, why not believe it. I didn’t know until I and my family reached out to others who had gone through the same or similar things. I am grateful to my family reaching out to the people they did in my time of need. It was a confusing time especially through my teens at first with my having multiple seizures and a doctor that was hard to reach. It can be hard and at times lonely being: 1) a child with a disorder 2) a parent having a child with a disorder and doing your best

Becoming aware of diets like the Modified Atkins diet (if you have seizure, I suggest you look it up) is what started changing the chemistry in my brain. Along with going to a new doctor at the Mayo Clinic and becoming of all the other options as a adult and changing my medications to my needs. I personally drive right now, work through my own business, and strive to soon live on my own. It is possible, I have had my ups and downs where I have been set back with a seizure, but independence is possible. Maybe you’ll turn out more normal than me! But then again, who wants to be normal these days? =)

If you’re someone who has Epilepsy or knows of someone who has seizures please feel free to share. I understand what it is like to feel with Epilepsy not being as well known as it should. Becoming your own advocate and bringing light to the darkness of seizures is the best we can do. I’ve personally done this through my life coaching and my humor, because if you can’t laugh through the pain then you sink into it. WHAT I’VE LEARNED These are things I have healed from, and have learned deep lessons over time that I want to bring to people. Taking the time to reflect and realizing what I have learned and blessing the broken road makes it all worth it. I have learned a deep sense of patience and can listen to those who tend to not be heard. I tend to listen to my body way better over the years and have slowly gotten better at self love. Things like this always happen for a reason! I am perfectly imperfect as a result of it, so it is ok if I can’t get something right at first. The important part is that I have tried! I have learned if one thing doesn’t work, look elsewhere or outside the box and try everything! Take your time if needed, if someone is pushing you, they aren’t worth your time. Be grateful for what you have, not linger in what was loss. As a result the wounds, the scars, have made me a bad ass warrior along my journey to tell you the tale so far. I guess that kind of makes me cool!

If you’ve made it to this point I’d like to thank you for reading! And you’re awesome! If you liked this post feel free to look at my others and follow! https://kellyannecoaching.tumblr.com/post/165057903451/removing-the-mask

#epilepsywarrior #what its like #seizures #positive #epilepsyawareness #seizures motivation life coach

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