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itskatastrophe-x · 3 years

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Unhealthy Competition (CH1) c!Punz x Reader

The enemies to lovers fic has turned into more than one chapter so fuck it more than one chapter!!! Here’s the first one :3

TRIGGER WARNINGS!!! : Blood, death, suicide, swearing

Word count : 1,540

Chapter 1 , Chapter 2

^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^v^

Competition was always your favorite thing about your job. There were two other people you had to fight with for power in the SMP constantly, and somehow you always came out on top. There were few occasions where one of the others would beat you to a kill, and you took pride in that. You had travelled to the SMP a handful of months back on a mission, and decided to stay since a lot of these people seemed wealthy, and you were right. The payout for jobs was astronomical compared to your homeland, so you stayed. You honed your skills and became the best damn mercenary they had ever had here. You had jobs to kill kings in far off kingdoms, regular townsfolk, and even take out towns. You had quickly climbed the ranks and hoarded your wealth, making a base deep in the woods away from everyone else to keep the illusion of being bottom rung. There were moments where you would come in contact with the other two mercs, sparring on those rare meetings. Other times, you would meet at a kill and have to fight for the right to take the kill. Those moments were terrifying, but almost every time you won. Most of the time it would be against the kid that went by the name Purpled. He was agile and quiet, good in the shadows and dark areas. He was a silent killer, made perfect to be an assassin.

Even more rarely, you would have to fight the other man, Punz. He was just below you in rank, and he was more likely to steal kills. He flaunted his wealth and power and had a large plot of land in the main lands of the SMP, surrounded by tall, dark walls. He was arrogant and selfish and all he cared about was money and bragging. He loved the praise that came with the power, and that annoyed the hell out of you, so each time you beat him, you couldn’t help but to be as cocky as him, wearing a smug smirk with your axe pressed against his throat. There was one day where you were sparring with him, both covered in blood and bruises, swearing back and forth at each other, and you ended up pushing him against a tree. His head flew back against the sturdy bark, making him see stars as he went down. You took that opportunity to snatch the dumb gold chain he always wore, and before he had the chance to even stand up, you stashed it away in an ender chest and took off. You felt like that knocked him down a few pegs, but now you couldn’t sleep.

So here you are, sitting at the edge of your bed, eyes wide open in the dead of night listening to the sounds of crackling and the smell of smoke. The forest around you had been set on fire while you were asleep, and you knew it had to be Punz. Who else knew where you lived? Him, and only because he stumbled across your little lodge once trying to escape a really bad storm. It was awkward and he was angry the whole time that you had been so hospitable. And now your lodge was in danger. You packed as much as you could before the fire reached you, opened a hatch under your small house, and jumped in. You had hoped you wouldn’t have to use your escape, seeing as it went all the way to bedrock and was a dangerous route, but it had to be done. You were surrounded by fire and you knew there was no way through it. The fall lasted about ten seconds before you hit a pool of water and swam back up. The area around you was small and cramped. There were a couple chests lining the walls, brewing stands, a small emergency farm, and tunnels leading in every direction. You had spent almost every waking second to dig under everything possible. A tunnel leading to every major destination in the SMP possible. What you didn’t expect to see, though, was Punz sprinting full speed at you from the direction of L’Manburg. It took you a second to gather what was happening, but when it hit you, you climbed out of the pool and ran to a chest, pulling out a potion of invisibility, and chugging the bitter liquid. Seconds later, you were completely invisible, eliciting swearing from the man halfway to you now.

“You pussy, get out here and fight me,” he yelled, still sprinting towards you. You snuck to the tunnel heading west, making sure to press yourself as far against the wall as you could, hoping you could just melt with the cool deepslate behind you. “I did my research, bitch,” he spat as he made it to the main room. “While you were hiding away, I was learning everything about you. You really shouldn’t have pissed me off. Do you not know how I was the top dog before you even got here? I helped put that powerful, green bastard in prison. I killed some of the most wealthy, powerful people you couldn’t even touch.” He stood there, listening, so you stopped your movement, hoping he wouldn’t hear your shallow breaths. To your surprise, he started off in the opposite direction, still yelling. “Two can play at that game,” he yelled, pulling out a potion of his own. Fear finally sank in as he disappeared. The last thing to fade was his face as he turned around and smirked. He knew. And now you were fucked.

You took off running, weaving through the hundreds of tunnels you had dug. You had every path memorized down to the pebble just in case something like this happened, but he said about research so he must know too. You stopped at another small room and stood there for a second. “I know every movement,” his voice echoed to you. You were surrounded by his voice and it sent chills down your spine. “I told you I did research,” he said. “You fucked with the wrong merc,” his voice came from behind you. You could feel his breath against your neck and slowly, the freezing metal of a weapon came to your throat. He had you pinned and there was nothing you could do about it. You shivered at the touch of netherite and the warmth of another person behind you, unable to see anything.

“Yknow, at first I thought it would be fun to let you keep running, but killing you right now would be a lot more fun. Sending you back to spawn while you lose everything you own. Now, give it back.” His voice was laced with anger, but somehow it was playful. You couldn’t lie to yourself, the man was hot. But you were competitors and merc life wasn’t easy. But the thought crossed your mind relentlessly about a life you could have with him. You wouldn’t dare admit it out loud. “What if I didn’t,” you retorted, keeping up the playful atmosphere. The blade dug farther into your throat, now drawing blood and bringing tears to your eyes. “Oh sweetheart, you really aren’t in the position to deny me what you stole.” Slowly, your body came back into view, the potion finally wearing off. You smirked and scoffed at him, relaxing against the blade. “Now, what kind of mercenary would I be if I admit that I lost? Why would I give up right here?” You slipped your hand into your pocket carefully, the smooth surface of gold hitting your fingers. He slowly came to your vision. His potion wearing off as well. The large netherite axe in front of you held to your throat was intimidating. The surface was scratched and chipped from years of use. It dug farther, making it hard to breathe.

In one swift move, you wrapped your hand around the totem in your pocket and pushed against the sharp blade, effectively killing yourself. The shock on his face was the last thing you saw before things went black. Seconds later, on the floor, light rushed back and you saw the man standing over you in complete horror. You had taken him off guard and that gave you enough time to get up, set tnt down, and run off. The explosion was deafening but you kept running, zigzagging. You pulled out a lever and placed it against the wall, flipping it to reveal a secret door that blended in perfectly with the rest of the stone. You took the lever, entered the door, placed it on the other side, and closed it all in ten seconds. You ran down the hall. Up some stairs, and to a small pool of water. You pulled out your trident from your inventory and positioned yourself to fly up the small tunnel up. It took you multiple times and multiple stops to get to the surface, and the full moon greeted you happily. The woods in the distance gave off an eerie glow as they burned. You smiled, pleased with yourself, and ran off in the direction of your secret hideaway through the nether.

#dream smp #dsmp #mcyt #punz #punz x reader #c!punz #mercenary #possibly triggering #triggering themes #death #minecraft #x reader #reader insert #dsmp fanfic #lore #roleplay

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greatworldwar2 · 3 years

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• Battle of Kohima

The Battle of Kohima proved the turning point of the Japanese U-Go offensive into India in 1944 during the Second World War. The battle took place in three stages from April to June 1944 around the town of Kohima.

The Japanese plan to invade India, codenamed U-Go, was originally intended as a spoiling attack against the British IV Corps at Imphal in Manipur, to disrupt the Allied offensive plans for that year. The commander of the Japanese Fifteenth Army, Lieutenant General Renya Mutaguchi, enlarged the plan to invade India itself and perhaps even overthrow the British Raj. If the Japanese were able to gain a strong foothold in India they would demonstrate the weakness of the British Empire and provide encouragement to Indian nationalists in their decolonization efforts. Moreover, occupation of the area around Imphal would severely impact American efforts to supply Chiang Kai-shek's army in China. The objections of the staffs of various headquarters were eventually overcome, and the offensive was approved by Imperial General Headquarters on January 7th, 1944. Part of the plan involved sending the Japanese 31st Division (which was composed of the 58th, 124th and 138th Infantry Regiments and the 31st Mountain Artillery Regiment) to capture Kohima and thus cut off Imphal. Mutaguchi wished to exploit the capture of Kohima by pushing the 31st Division on to Dimapur, the vital railhead and logistic base in the Brahmaputra River valley. The 31st Division's commander, Lieutenant General Kotoku Sato, was unhappy with his role. He had not been involved in the planning of the offensive, and had grave misgivings about its chances. He had already told his staff that they might all starve to death. He and Mutaguchi had also been on opposite sides during the split between the Toseiha and Kodoha factions within the Japanese Army during the early 1930s, and Sato believed he had reason to distrust Mutaguchi's motives.

Starting on March 15th, 1944, the Japanese 31st Division crossed the Chindwin River near Homalin and moved north-west along jungle trails on a front almost 60 miles (97 km) wide. Because of a shortage of transport, half the artillery regiment's mountain guns and the infantry regiments' heavy weapons were left behind. Only three week's supply of food and ammunition was carried. Although the march was arduous, good progress was made. The Indian troops were the 50th Indian Parachute Brigade under Brigadier Maxwell Hope-Thompson, at Sangshak. Although they were not Miyazaki's objective, he decided to clear them from his line of advance. The Battle of Sangshak continued for six days. The parachute brigade's troops were desperately short of drinking water, but Miyazaki was handicapped by lack of artillery until near the end of the battle. Eventually, as some of the Japanese 15th Division's troops joined the battle, Hope-Thompson withdrew. The 50th Parachute Brigade lost 600 men, while the Japanese had suffered over 400 casualties. Meanwhile, the commander of the British Fourteenth Army, Lieutenant General William Slim, belatedly realised (partly from Japanese documents that had been captured at Sangshak) that a whole Japanese division was moving towards Kohima. He and his staff had originally believed that, because of the forbidding terrain in the area, the Japanese would only be able to send a regiment to take Kohima.

Kohima's strategic importance in the wider 1944 Japanese Chindwin offensive lay in that it was the summit of a pass that offered the Japanese the best route from Burma into India. Through it ran the road which was the main supply route between the base at Dimapur in the Brahmaputra River valley and Imphal, where the British and Indian troops of IV Corps (consisting of the 17th, 20th and 23rd Indian Infantry Divisions) faced the main Japanese offensive. Kohima Ridge itself runs roughly north and south. The road from Dimapur to Imphal climbs to its northern end and runs along its eastern face. In 1944, Kohima was the administrative centre of Nagaland. North of the ridge lay the densely inhabited area of Naga Village, crowned by Treasury Hill, and Church Knoll. South and west of Kohima Ridge were GPT Ridge and the jungle-covered Aradura Spur. The various British and Indian service troop encampments in the area gave their names to the features which were to be important in the battle e.g. "Field Supply Depot" became FSD Hill or merely FSD.

Before the 161st Indian Brigade arrived, the only fighting troops in the Kohima area were the newly raised 1st Battalion, the Assam Regiment and a few platoons from the 3rd (Naga Hills) Battalion of the paramilitary Assam Rifles. Late in March 161st Brigade deployed in Kohima, but Major-General Ranking ordered them back to Dimapur, as it was felt initially that Dimapur had more strategic importance. Kohima was regarded as a roadblock, while Dimapur was the railhead where the majority of Allied supplies were stored. As the right wing and centre of the Japanese 31st Division approached Jessami, 30 miles (48 km) to the east of Kohima, elements of the Assam Regiment fought delaying actions against them commencing on April 1st. Nevertheless, the men in the forward positions were soon overrun and the Assam regiment was ordered to withdraw. By the night of April 3rd, Miyazaki's troops reached the outskirts of the Naga village and began probing Kohima from the south. The next day, Ranking ordered the 161st Indian Brigade to move forward to Kohima again, but only one battalion, 4th Battalion Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment commanded by Lieutenant Colonel John Laverty, and a company of the 4th Battalion, 7th Rajput Regiment arrived in Kohima before the Japanese cut the road west of the ridge. Besides these troops from 161st Brigade, the garrison consisted of a raw battalion (the Shere Regiment) from the Royal Nepalese Army, some companies from the Burma Regiment, some of the Assam Regiment which had retired to Kohima and various detachments of convalescents and line-of-communication troops. The garrison numbered about 2,500, of which about 1,000 were non-combatants.

The siege began on April 6th. The garrison was continually shelled and mortared, in many instances by Japanese using weapons and ammunition captured at Sangshak and from other depots, and was slowly driven into a small perimeter on Garrison Hill. They had artillery support from the main body of 161st Brigade, who were themselves cut off 2 miles (3.2 km) away at Jotsoma, but, as at Sangshak, they were very short of drinking water. The water supply point was on GPT Ridge, which was captured by the Japanese on the first day of the siege. Some of its defenders were unable to retreat to other positions on the ridge and instead withdrew towards Dimapur. Some of the heaviest fighting took place at the north end of Kohima Ridge, around the Deputy Commissioner's bungalow and tennis court, in what became known as the Battle of the Tennis Court. The tennis court became a no man's land, with the Japanese and the defenders of Kohima dug in on opposite sides, so close to each other that grenades were thrown between the trenches. On the night of the 17/18th of April, the Japanese finally captured the DC's bungalow area. Other Japanese captured Kuki Picquet, cutting the garrison in two. The defenders' situation was desperate, but the Japanese did not follow up by attacking Garrison Hill as by now they were exhausted by hunger and by the fighting, and when daylight broke, troops of 161st Indian Brigade arrived to relieve the garrison. The British 2nd Division, commanded by Major General John M. L. Grover, had begun to arrive at Dimapur in early April. By April 11th, the Fourteenth Army had about the same number of troops in the area as the Japanese. The British 5th Brigade of the 2nd Division broke through Japanese roadblocks to relieve 161st Brigade in Jotsoma on April 15th. After a day's heavy fighting, the leading troops of the Brigade (1st Battalion, 1st Punjab Regiment) broke through and started to relieve the Kohima garrison. By this point, Kohima resembled a battlefield from the First World War, with smashed trees, ruined buildings and the ground covered in craters.

Under cover of darkness, the wounded (numbering 300) were brought out under fire. Although contact had been established, it took a further 24 hours to fully secure the road between Jotsoma and Kohima. During April 19th and into the early hours of April 20th, the British 6th Brigade replaced the original garrison. 6th Brigade observers were taken aback by the condition of the garrison; one battle hardened officer commentated: "They looked like aged, bloodstained scarecrows, dropping with fatigue; the only clean thing about them was their weapons, and they smelt of blood, sweat and death." Miyazaki continued to try to capture Garrison Hill, and there was heavy fighting for this position for several more nights, with high casualties on both sides. The Japanese positions on Kuki Picquet were only 50 yards (46 m) from Garrison Hill, and fighting was often hand-to-hand. On the other flank of Garrison Hill, on the night of April 26th, a British attack recaptured the clubhouse above the Deputy Commissioner's bungalow, which overlooked most of the Japanese centre. The Japanese reorganised their forces for defence. Their Left Force under Miyazaki held Kohima Ridge with four battalions. The divisional HQ under Sato himself and the Centre Force under Colonel Shiraishi held Naga Village with another four battalions. To support their attack against the Japanese position, the British had amassed thirty-eight 3.7 Inch Mountain Howitzers, forty-eight 25-pounder field guns and two 5.5-inch medium guns. The Japanese could oppose them with only seventeen light mountain guns, with very little ammunition. Nevertheless, the progress of the British counter-attack was slow. Tanks could not easily be used, and the Japanese occupied bunkers which were very deeply dug in, well-concealed and mutually supporting.

While the British 6th Brigade defended Garrison Hill, the other two brigades of 2nd Division tried to outflank both ends of the Japanese position, in Naga Village to the north and on GPT Ridge to the south. The monsoon had broken by this time and the steep slopes were covered in mud, making movement and supply very difficult. In places the British 4th Brigade had to cut steps up hillsides and build handrails in order to make progress. On May 4th, the British 5th Brigade secured a foothold in the outskirts of Naga Village but was counter-attacked and driven back. On the same day, the British 4th Brigade, having made a long flank march around Mount Pulebadze to approach Kohima Ridge from the south-west, attacked GPT Ridge in driving rain and captured part of the ridge by surprise but were unable to secure the entire ridge. Both outflanking moves having failed because of the terrain and the weather, the British 2nd Division concentrated on attacking the Japanese positions along Kohima Ridge from May 4th onwards. Fire from Japanese posts on the reverse slope of GPT Ridge repeatedly caught British troops attacking Jail Hill in the flank, inflicting heavy casualties and preventing them from capturing the hill for a week. However, the various positions were slowly taken. Jail Hill, together with Kuki Picquet, FSD and DIS, was finally captured by 33rd Indian Infantry Brigade on May 11th, after a barrage of smoke shells blinded the Japanese machine-gunners and allowed the troops to secure the hill and dig in. The last Japanese positions on the ridge to be captured were the tennis court and gardens above the Deputy Commissioner's bungalow. On May 13th, after several failed attempts to outflank or storm the position, the British finally bulldozed a track to the summit above the position, up which a tank could be dragged. A Lee tank crashed down onto the tennis court and destroyed the Japanese trenches and bunkers there. The terrain had been reduced to a fly and rat-infested wilderness, with half-buried human remains everywhere. The conditions under which the Japanese troops had lived and fought have been described by several sources, as "unspeakable".

The situation worsened for the Japanese as yet more Allied reinforcements arrived. Nevertheless, when the Allies launched another attack on May 16th, the Japanese continued to defend Naga Village and Aradura Spur tenaciously. An attack on Naga Hill on the night of May 24th gained no ground. Another attack, mounted against both ends of Aradura Spur on the night of May 28th, was even more decisively repulsed. The repeated setbacks, with exhaustion and the effects of the climate began to affect the morale of the British 2nd Division especially. The decisive factor was the Japanese lack of supplies. The Japanese 31st Division had begun the operation with only three weeks' supply of food. Once these supplies were exhausted, the Japanese had to exist on meagre captured stocks and what they could forage in increasingly hostile local villages. The Japanese had mounted two resupply missions, using captured jeeps to carry supplies forward from the Chindwin to 31st Division, but they brought mainly artillery and anti-tank ammunition, rather than food. By the middle of May, Sato's troops were starving. He considered that Mutaguchi and the HQ of Japanese Fifteenth Army were taking little notice of his situation, as they had issued several confusing and contradictory orders to him during April. On 25 May, Sato notified Fifteenth Army HQ that he would withdraw on June 1st, unless his division received supplies. Finally on the 31st of May, he abandoned Naga Village and other positions north of the road, in spite of orders from Mutaguchi to hang on to his position. Miyazaki's detachment continued to fight rearguard actions and demolish bridges along the road to Imphal, but was eventually driven off the road and forced to retreat eastwards. The remainder of the Japanese division retreated painfully south but found very little to eat, as most of what few supplies had been brought forward across the Chindwin had been consumed by other Japanese units, who were as desperately hungry as Sato's men. Many of the 31st Division were too enfeebled to drag themselves further south. During the Battle of Kohima, the British and Indian forces had lost 4,064 men, dead, missing and wounded. Against this the Japanese had lost 5,764 battle casualties in the Kohima area, and many of the 31st Division subsequently died of disease or starvation, or took their own lives. After ignoring army orders for several weeks, Sato was removed from command of Japanese 31st Division early in July. The entire Japanese offensive was broken off at the same time. After Sato was removed from command, he refused an invitation to commit seppuku and demanded a court martial to clear his name and make his complaints about Fifteenth Army HQ public. At Kawabe's prompting, Sato was declared to have suffered a mental breakdown and was unfit to stand trial. The huge losses the Japanese suffered in the Battles of Imphal and Kohima (mainly through starvation and disease) crippled their defence of Burma against Allied attacks during the following year.

#second world war #world war ii #world war 2 #wwii #military history #history #british history #indian history #japanese history #battles of ww2

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radramblog · 4 years

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Have a plan to kill everyone you meet- Fallout New Vegas Genocide run notes

For some reason, and I can’t say why, I’ve had a hankering to play through Fallout: New Vegas again. There’s always a few quests I haven’t beaten, I guess, 100%% achievement completion or not.

However, video essays on moral choices in video games have been part of my feed recently, and like many, apparently, I’m someone who usually tries to pick the goody two-shoes options. But NO MORE! In this hypothetical future playthrough I wanna try and fuck over every single person, and for once end up with Bad Karma at the end.

I’ve seen a few things online about people doing murder only runs of this game, but I don’t think anyone’s tried this particular undertaking. Specifically, I’m not just gunning to gun down everyone I see, I’m going out of my way to kill as many named characters as possible. Using the Fallout Wiki as a hitlist, everyone it is possible to kill will be killed.

The following are my notes about routing such a playthrough. I hope they’re entertaining enough! :p

New Vegas Genocide Mode

The following characters cannot be killed for any reason:

The Forecaster, Melody, Max, Stacey, Lindsay, Pete, and Hector are all children and as such are undamagable- I’m sure a mod exists but I’m not gonna go download that, I don’t wanna end up on a list.

Festus is a robot whom projectiles pass through and who takes no damage from physical attacks. Besides, his artificial intelligence is limited enough that are you really actually killing anything there?

Vendortron is in an impenetrable booth, and while I’m pretty sure you can glitch into its box, I’m also pretty sure he respawns anyway.

Yes Man can be killed as many times as I like, and I will, but he always respawns so even if you piss off/kill off other factions you still have a path to endgame.

The following characters are mutually exclusive- i.e. you can get one, but not the other.

Ranger Stevens and Cato Hostilius- The missions You’ll Know It When It Happens and Arizona Killer are about being on the opposite sides of an assassination attempt on the President of the NCR. Ranger Stevens only shows up if you’re trying to stop it, and Cato Hostilius is your contact for trying to cause it.

Gabban, Alerio, and Martina Groesbeck- This all comes back to Vulpes Inculta. Vulpes shows up in two events- in Nipton when you first arrive there, and in the Strip when you leave the Tops after confronting Benny. Gabban replaces Vulpes in Nipton if you kill him in the Strip, and Alerio replaces him if you kill him at Nipton. If you don’t kill him at either, he returns to the Fort where you can receive a quest from him involving Martina. To my knowledge, she doesn’t spawn without that quest. I do need to investigate if in theory you can get the quest from Vulpes before killing him and without visiting Nipton, letting you kill both him and Gabban.

The Big Problem: Reputation

There are four characters whom only show up in their faction’s respective safehouses, requiring a significant dedication to not murdering people to unlock. In addition, access to certain quests with named characters (e.g. I Fought the Law) requires not being hated by the relevant faction. As such, we can’t start wantonly killing people until a certain point.

This gets complicated when it comes to the main 2 factions, being the Legion and the NCR. Fortunately, however, after the first act of the main story, reputation with both gets wiped (by Vulpes/Alerio and Crocker), which we can manipulate pretty well. It makes sense to do the NCR first, as reputation with them is more relevant overall and often costs Legion reputation.

This is the route I’ve figured out for how to work around this issue, including every quest that spawns uniquely named characters for us to murder. DLCs and Companions are currently not included, but shouldn’t be too hard to figure out. Except maybe Joshua Graham.

Start the game as a male character (Legion won’t let you in the pit fights if you’re a woman bc they’re sexist) and take Wild Wasteland (necessary for one event).

AVOID THE FOLLOWING LOCATIONS/QUESTS: NIPTON, anywhere with major Powder Ganger concentrations, Ghost Town Gunfight/Run Goodsprings Run, Boulder City Showdown. We’re trying to maintain relationships with the NCR, Powder Gangers, and Great Khans as long as possible.

(At some point get enough Sunset Sarsaparilla Star caps to get Malcom to show up)

Head to Primm, picking up Ed-E and beginning his quest. This quest needs to be continued at minimum until April Martimer spawns in Freeside.

Solve Primm’s deputy problem somehow so Layla spawns later.

Make way to Freeside/New Vegas, however necessary.

Donate medical aid to Julie Farkas, raising Followers of the Apocalypse fame, until access to the Followers Safehouse is granted.

Go to the Atomic Wrangler and get Debt Collector (spawns Caleb McCaffery)

After acquiring the Cannibal perk, proceed down Beyond the Beef by working with Mortimer until Carlyle spawns.

Get and complete Bye Bye Love, spawning Big and Little Beard, making sure to kill everyone involved after Joanna gives the quest How Little We Know (spawns Cachino)

Go to Camp McCarran, and acquire quests Dealing with Contreras (spawns Keller), There Stands the Grass (spawns Keely), and Silus Treatment (lets you into Silus). Suck up to the NCR until access Colonel Hsu lets you into the Ranger Safehouse.

Go to Jacobstown and proceed along Guess who I Saw Today until Norton shows up.

Go to North Vegas Square and get Someone to Watch Over Me, proceeding until Greasy Johnny spawns.

Go to the Great Khan Encampment to get Don’t Make a Beggar of me, spawning Tyrone.

Go to the NCRCF and proceed down I Fought the Law, then betray the Powder Gangers to get Sergeant Lee to spawn.

Go to Hidden Valley and start Still in the Dark, spawning Ranger Dobson and killing him. Complete the quest to gain access to the Brotherhood of Steel Safehouse.

Go confront Benny at the Tops, resetting negative reputation with the Legion and NCR.

Proceed to the Fort and start the Legion questline, making sure to complete Laurifer Gladiator and start The Finger of Suspicion.

Keep going down the Legion Questline, eventually reaching Arizona Killer- make sure to kill Cato after assassinating Kimball and Watson.

If Lucius hasn’t given access to the Legion Safehouse yet, do bullshit for the Legion until he does (e.g. give Aurelius NCR Dogtags)

Once access is granted, it is now safe to start killing everyone! Have fun.

After the blood of your enemies, friends, and strangers covers everything, proceed down the Wild Card route to the endgame, making sure to kill Yes Man after every conversation, so you can get to the Second Battle of Hoover Dam and murder Legate Lanius. Don’t let Yes Man kill Lee Oliver, do it yourself!

As the credits roll, use glitches/godmode to regain control so you can go behind the slideshow and kill Ron the Narrator.

Still during the credits, end it all the only way we know how- blow yourself up, killing the last named character available to kill.

Maybe consider using console commands to spawn in the 2 characters that were mutually exclusive just to kill them. Might as well.

#ramble #...ish?#video games #fallout new vegas #genocide run #man i dont want to kill veronica though

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nelllraiser · 4 years

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fish bites | grace & nell

TIMING: during the fog fish potw, before the morgue scream. LOCATION: the woods. PARTIES: @silveraccent��& @nelllraiser SUMMARY: nell and grace decide to take a walk, and run into some foggy-fish- and even though they may be misunderstood, they decide to take the L and leave.

What had started as a truth serum mishap seemed to, thankfully, be turning into a budding friendship. With things seemingly and momentarily slowing down for Nell, it meant that now she could take the time to actually enjoy friends rather than simply worry about their lives and her own being in near constant danger. Of course...that was still something she worried about, and often still had nightmares of, but if the danger kept itself to her dreams and out of the real world it meant she could do things like go on harmless hikes with Grace. As the pair walked through the dense forest of the Outskirts, Nell trudged along confidently, rather familiar with the woods as they’d frequently been her hunting grounds when it came to bringing in monsters for the Ring. “So how’s everything been with adjusting to White Crest? Hopefully no one accidentally slipped you some truth serum or anything equally ridiculous.” The words were an obvious and light jab at herself.

A few months ago, Grace wouldn’t have been able to imagine being friends with somebody who accidentally dosed her food with truth serum. Now, she thought it was fitting to the way that the little town had welcomed her. She and Nell, and even Blanche, were growing to be quick friends. She was grateful, if not slightly wary. Not due to the situations that they had found themselves in revolving around one another, but due to her inability to let go of the fact that one day, her friends might not be around any longer. Still, she pushed through it, thus finding herself on a hike with Nell in the woods she hadn’t trapeized through yet. “It’s taking some time,” Grace admitted to her as she stepped over a fallen branch on the pathway. She looked over at Nell with a smile, “there have been a few things to top that, don’t worry.” She wasn’t lying, either. Between the reanimated corpses, the airplanes, seeing Renee. Her stomach churned. “I wouldn’t worry about me,” Grace said as she stabilized herself on a neighboring tree. “It brought us here, didn’t it?” She asked with a tilt of her head.

Nell’s childhood had been spent among these pines, running along with her sisters until the sun began to set, and Bea would round them up to get back to the East End in time for dinner. Being famous Vegas magicians on par with David Blaine had left the Vurals quite well off, and though Harris Island had the most extravagant houses— Nisa and Demir had wanted a place where it was easier for three growing girls to stretch their wings and breathe. Considering that yards were rare on the island, the East End had been the obvious answer. So the forest was something of a sanctuary, a place that could be rife with danger, but also comfortingly hidden away. “That’s fair,” Nell commented. “There’s a lot to get used to in White Crest. What do you mean a few things to top it, though?” Had trouble been finding Grace? “Well you can’t tell me not to worry about you after you just said that,” she finished with a brief chuckle. “But it’s true. I guess we have truth serum to thank.”

Despite its miseries, White Crest had brought things to Grace’s surface. She had begun to think about things more clearly, and though she had originally taken refuge in a new town for the sake of wanting quiet, it was anything but. She could blame herself, sure, but she had the means to leave, to disappear into the night. Did she want to, though? Maybe whatever White Crest had to offer was a little more interesting than Grace had originally thought. She was curious, that was for certain. Maybe a little naive, too, but Renee’s words in her head, just live! Just live, Grace! It was what kept her moving forward. Grace gave Nell a sideways smile and shrugged, “I mean, you live here too, I’m sure you can imagine.” Truthfully, whatever it was that she had gone through, she couldn’t imagine it to be too wild, what with the stories she had heard. “Do you know Connor?” Grace asked as she stepped over another wayward branch, “I ran into him after-- well, after I saw my old friend, the one I mentioned.” Grace wasn’t sure if she trusted Nell because of their first meeting, or because she felt nothing ominous from her. “We saw some stuff, it was…” Grace shrugged, “it’s definitely an eye opener, I can tell you that much.” Grace carded her fingers through her hair as they came to a smaller trail that looked like it led off of the main path. “Do you want to go that way?” Grace asked, curious.

At the mention of Connor, Nell tilted her head to the side in vague acknowledgement, not entirely sure if her one meeting with the exorcist counted as knowing him. “Yeah, I know him,” was what she settled on. Unconsciously, Nell slowed her walking, realizing the conversation might be about to take a rather serious turn. “Your friend…” she began tentatively. The one who had died? “The girl you mentioned when we were under the truth serum, right?” There was no need to rake over old wounds. “You saw her as a ghost?” There was no delicate way to put it, not with the world they lived in. Maybe it was best to say it outright and quickly, to rip the bandaid soundly off in one go. “Are you alright?” she asked as her follow up question, though she had a suspicion that the answer was no, regardless of what Grace might say. How would seeing your dead friend fall into the category of alright? Nell followed Grace’s question with her eyes, looking the trail over. It was one of the more secluded routes. Maybe the bigger and thicker trees would help Grace feel a little more sheltered. “Yeah, for sure.” It didn’t take long for things to change the further along the path the got, a thick fog quickly settling around them. Fog wasn’t an strange oddity in White Crest, but for it to have come on this quickly was possible cause for questioning. “Fog doesn’t usually come on that quick here…” Nell mused aloud, a frown tugging at the corners of her lips.

“Yeah, her.” Grace smoothed her fingers through her hair. She didn’t open up easily, and the majority of that had to do with her ability to figure out others’ emotions at the drop of a hat. It felt like cheating. She could see inside of them, but they couldn’t see into her. The truth serum had certainly helped pass that roadblock, and Grace couldn’t be sure if she was embarrassed or grateful for it. “Yeah, it was…” Grace forced out a laugh, “usually I’m all for a good scare, but--” She shrugged and cleared her throat. It suddenly felt thick. “I’m fine, but, you know it’s weird… she looked the same way when I identified her--” Grace’s sentence broke away as they stepped into thick fog. It pooled towards them quickly. Her eyebrows furrowed as she looked around. It was thick enough that if she weren’t standing directly next to Nell, she’d lose her line of sight. Grace tugged at the straps of her backpack nervously, tightening it against her. “Does this always happen?” Grace asked as she moved slightly closer to Nell. Just in case, she thought.

As Grace spoke, Nell’s brows drew together in the beginnings of concern, the emotion flickering alive inside her as it woke, sensing that there was a friend in need. “I mean good scares are fun. It’s just a little different when it’s someone you know.” She hadn’t seen Bea’s ghost when she’d been dead, though it wasn’t for lack of trying. However, she’d seen it all when Evan had formed along with the cursed coins all those months ago. Nell knew firsthand that seeing that was the opposite of fine. “They do that. Ghosts. Appear as they did when they died. I’m sorry you had to see it, though. Both when you identified her and when you saw her as the ghost again.” Nell’s selfish curiosity wanted to ask what it was that had happened, but managed to bite her tongue this time around. But the fog was growing far too thick to be anything normal, and a frown was quick to form on Nell’s lips, her not liking this in the least. She could barely see her hand in front of her face, and being blind to her surroundings did nothing for the seemingly ever-present paranoia that someone was out there...waiting to attack...just like Montgomery had. “No. It doesn’t.” As Grace shuffled closed, Nell reached down to grasp the empath’s hand in her own, both for comfort and practicality. As Nell squinted into the fog, she finally spotted them— a set of fins forming from seemingly nothing as a fish’s face greeted them no more than a foot away. “Oh shit, it’s one of those fucking foggy fish or whatever.

Grace hadn’t told anyone about Renee, nobody but Connor. For Nell to know, too-- albeit originally, without prompting due to the truth serum, Grace had become afraid. She had become afraid to form friendships, or any connection for that matter. She had come to White Crest with the intent of silence, of solitude. The life she had thought out for herself, however, was turning into something entirely different than what she had pictured. “It wasn’t really--” Grace looked up to the canopy of trees, she let Nell take a hold of her hand. She squeezed it tightly as she looked at the fish that began to surround them. “I haven’t actually,” Grace gasped out, “I haven’t seen any of them, I’ve heard of them, but--” Grace stared at the fish, eyes wide as it began to float closer to them. “What do we do?” She asked Nell as she gave her a quick glance.

Nell wasn’t sure how to approach the fog fish, electing to stay where she was and not make any sudden movements. For the most part, they seemed docile. “I…” It was rare that she wasn’t sure how to proceed with the supernatural, but this wasn’t something she’d seen in her entire life. “I don’t think it’s...aggressive.” As if in answer, one of the fish swam closer to nudge the pair of them gently with its nose, almost seeming curious. Nell tensed when it did, still not trusting the foggy fish as magic began to instinctively pool and gather in her stomach. “I don’t know what it wants?” Another of its fish friends came up to prod Grace with its strange nose. “If we just stay here, and stay still— maybe it’ll just go away?”

“You don’t think?” Grace asked, tone maybe a little too accusative. She cleared her throat. “Sorry, I’m just-- This isn’t normal.” She whispered. Grace winced as the fish floated closer to them, its mouth and what she figured was its nose coming to touch against their forearms. “If we just stay here?” She asked uneasily. She watched the fish as it watched them warily, its eyes blinking slowly-- or did it even have eyelids? She couldn��t tell. Grace bit the inside of her cheek as she cast a glance Nell’s way. “You’re way too calm for this, does this happen to you a lot?” She asked.

“I mean I don’t know for sure,” Nell replied, just the smallest bit defensive. “No, it’s fine.” She couldn’t expect Grace to take every weird thing White Crest threw at her in stride. That would be vastly unfair. “It’s not normal. Even by White Crest standards.” Of course White Crest had seemed particularly active ever since she’d returned. “We could try and leave if you want?” Something about the fish was almost hypnotizing, making Nell want to stay and learn more about them. “I mean- this specifically doesn’t happen to me. But a lot of weird shit...does. I also sort of sought it out for five years before I came home.” Somewhere in the distance, another fish formed, though this one looked a little different. Sharper and leaner.

“Good to know,” Grace shot back, a nervous smile pulling at the corners of her lips-- an involuntary reaction to the situation before them. She looked at the fish and did her best to avoid its eyes, as she was unsure of where to look. It looked sort of like the fish in her bowl at home, but with two eyes instead of one. “Do you think we can?” Grace asked under her breath, tugging the other girl alongside her, “they’re everywhere, aren’t they?” She had gone on the walk with Nell with no other intention other than stress relief, but it didn’t seem as though the Fog Fish were going to allow that, not now, at least. She blinked at them, disbelief settling on her features when another two fish formed behind the newest. “Maybe we should go?” Grace asked, a little more urgent as she pulled Nell backwards, down the path that the two had made their ways up.

“Unclear,” Nell replied on the subject of whether or not the fish would allow them to pass. “I guess there’s only one way to find out, though,” she said as she too took a step back up the path they’d come. For a moment she hesitated, curiosity momentarily getting the better of her as the cloudy fish continued to sail the gentle breeze of the forest. The way they moved was nearly mesmerizing, and Nell wanted to know just what it was they were. The fish began to part, the fog once again gathering thickly around their pod as another fish began to form. This one was sharper, leaner, and apparently meaner as it moved aggressively towards the pair of girls, a overbite of sharp teeth somehow glinting in the lowlight. “Okay- definitely time to go!” Nell grabbed onto Grace’s hand once again in an effort to tug her along the trail, steps quickening into a run as the enormous barracuda gave chase. Standing to fight was Nell’s general instinct when it came to hostile parties, but it was glaringly apparent that fighting fog wasn’t going to be all the fruitful.

Grace arched a brow, “you’re not going to go pet it, are you?” She wouldn’t put it past Nell to do so, and then again, maybe Grace would too, but these were floating fish in the air surrounding them, fog following their tails. Grace’s attention was diverted to the mass of fog that hovered over the hoard of fish, and only when she saw the fish with the overbite head their way did Grace hear the fear in Nell’s voice. Finally, she thought. Grace let Nell guide her down the pathway from where they had come. “Do you think it can actually hurt us?” Grace yelled out as they ran, tossing a cautionary glance over her shoulder as they avoided branches and low hanging limbs from trees. The last thing she wanted to do was be eaten by a fog fish. Grace rarely ran, and her breath was already running ragged. “I don’t want to get eaten,” She whined out as they ran. The clearing was just ahead-- they hadn’t gotten very far, lucky enough for them. As soon as they broke from the fog of the woods, the sun kissed the crowns of their heads and Grace twisted around to look at the fog as it began to dissipate. “So it was just territorial. Cool.”

The fish was hot on their trail as the gled through the forest, and Nell swore she could feel some sort of ghoul-ish breeze pass over the nape of her neck when it gnashed its teeth together a little too close for comfort. But as the crisp sun beat down on their skin, Nell turned to see that Grace had been correct. The fish was gone as quickly as it had appeared. “What the hell?” Nell asked no one in particular. It wasn’t all that often she came across a creature she couldn’t even begin to identify, but this was definitely something new for the catalogue. “Maybe it can’t leave the fog?” she pondered aloud. “Since it’s made up of it?” Either way, it was probably for the best that the thing was gone— even if she was a little too curious about the foggy fish. Turning back to Grace, she gave the girl a once over in an attempt to make sure her friend had escaped unscathed. Once she was satisfied with that she simply said, “Do you think it would make good fish sticks?”

“I don’t know,” Grace whispered, her heart thudding. She glanced towards Nell, “maybe?” She squinted into the fog, barely able to make out any other floating figures past them. “That’s…” Grace tugged on Nell’s hand, “we should go before we figure out if it can, right?” She let out a nervous laugh as she tried to guide Nell back towards where they had come from. “Fish sticks? I mean, probably not. I don’t think it has any substance.” Grace ran a shaky hand through her hair as she stepped over another fallen branch. She hadn’t expected today to turn into running away from a fog fish, or a few, but anything was possible in White Crest, she was seeming to notice. Grace took a deep breath, “at least we didn’t get hurt.” Grace laughed uneasily, finally letting go of Nell’s hand as they broke through the brush, back towards the open space.

Despite Nell’s curiosity about the fish, she followed after Grace. Had she been along, she might have ventured back to explore further, but she wasn’t willing to potentially risk her friend’s safety. Of course...she could always come back later. “That’s what tartar sauce is for, then,” she quipped back playfully. “Of course we’d need a big container of it. Maybe just fill a pool and dunk the whole fish in.” Once they were out of the woods, Nell continued down the path towards town. “You know...I think I just made myself hungry.” And even if she wasn’t, Nell was always down for a good meal. “Let’s swing by Al’s and see if fish is on the menu today,” she laughed with Grace, apparently already recovered from their near brush with the strange creature. No doubt Grace would develop the skill as well once White Crest really got its hands on her. People always adjusted to the town one way or another.

#wickedswriting #ch:grace #fish bites #chatzy

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jarienn972 · 4 years

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Weathering the Storm - Part One

I dreamed up the crazy idea for this story a couple of weeks ago (yes, this was actually a dream) and I finally found some motivation to start writing it. The basic premise is that it’s a pretty lousy day in Storybrooke. A severe thunderstorm is looming, vandals are on the loose and Killian makes a ill-fated error while trying to be a Good Samaritan that leaves him relying on an unlikely ally for his very survival.

I haven’t written a multi-chapter whump story in a while so @hookaroo, this one is right up your alley. Lots of whumpy fun (and a little comedy thrown in too). And I’m sorry @killian-whump if I’m overloading your to read lists this month.

You can also find this on AO3 and FF.net

Peering through the windshield at the darkening horizon, Killian's brow furrowed. He was still getting accustomed to driving the Sheriff's vehicle himself and while it wasn't entirely unlike manning the helm of the Jolly Roger, he'd learned that the automobile responded much faster to course adjustments. He was becoming increasingly comfortable driving on dry roads, but he didn't yet have much experience driving on rain-slickened asphalt so he was hoping that the forecast storm would hold off for a tad longer.

With Emma occupied assisting Henry locate the proper attire for some sort of ball called homecoming, Killian had volunteered to take this morning's call on his own. It was a case that seemed innocuous enough on the surface - the now magic-less former Wicked Witch had phoned in a complaint to the station after someone threw a brick through her living room window. Neither she nor her child had been harmed but she was livid and wanted the vandal caught. She was quite vocal that she preferred Emma be the one to respond but after being advised that Emma wasn't available - and several minutes of unsuccessful argument, she resigned to the fact that it would be Killian coming to investigate. There had been two similar attacks in town and he had a pretty good idea who was responsible already but more evidence was always welcome.

So now he found himself driving to the outskirts of town, on his way to Zelena's farmhouse with a thunderstorm looming. At least the weather was keeping the traffic light as most in town chose to stay off of the highway with a severe storm threatening. But it was the very lack of cars on the road that made the vehicle pulled off to the berm stand out so starkly. It wasn't a vehicle he recognized, much newer and sleeker than the majority of the cars in Storybrooke, although he had seen similar ones when Emma had taken him on visits to nearby cities.

He could tell that there was a driver still seated behind the steering wheel and at quick glance, nothing appeared to be amiss. It was possible that the vehicle had broken down, as he'd learned they were prone to do. So, as Deputy Sheriff of this town, the neighborly thing to do was to see if the motorist was in need of assistance. He slowed down after passing the parked car which was facing opposite of his direction, flipped on the lights and made a slightly awkward three point turn in the middle of the road. (There were still a few maneuvers that weren't particularly easy for a man with a hook for a hand.)

He eased his vehicle to the side of the road, stopping a few feet behind the dusty black sedan that displayed New Hampshire license plates. Before exiting the vehicle, he made sure that his badge was properly displayed, clipped to the chest pocket of his hip length leather coat. He also double checked that the little camera mounted on the vehicle's dashboard was recording just as Emma had insisted. She'd had the device installed so that they would have video of every traffic stop, saying that it was for everyone's protection although Killian had scoffed at it. Wasn't like it would be hard to manipulate it with a little magic, but if Emma wanted the camera used, he'd use the bloody camera.

He turned off the cruiser's engine and stepped out into the road, approaching the vehicle cautiously, but trying not to project a threatening air. He was merely offering aid if needed and noted that the driver was already rolling down the window as he neared.

"'Afternoon, mate," Killian greeted the motorist with a welcoming smile. "I'm Deputy Jones with the Storybrooke Sheriff's Department. I noticed you pulled over here and I was wondering if I could be of any assistance?"

The dark haired driver raised his chin to glance up at Killian, or at least Killian thought the man was looking at him. It was impossible to be certain as he couldn't see the driver's eyes behind his mirrored sunglasses, a strange accessory to be wearing in such overcast weather.

"All's good, Deputy," the man replied. "Just had to pull over to try to make a call but it seems cell phone service kinda sucks around here."

"So I've been told," Killian chuckled. "You'll likely get a better signal about three miles or so ahead, on the other side of the county line."

"That's good to know. Thanks." It was a valid reason to be parked here and the driver seemed courteous enough but Killian's keen intuition sensed something was off. His gaze drifted unconsciously past the driver where he caught a glimpse of a map of Maine with a meandering route plotted in yellow highlights, one that avoided all major highways and towns. Something was telling him that this person wasn't the scenic backroads type.

"Well, I'll not waste any more of your time. Enjoy your drive, mate." Killian gave a little nod to the driver as he made a mental note to run the license plate number with the state police as soon as he returned to the cruiser, chastising himself for not doing that in the first place. He barely had time to take a single step back from the sedan before he found himself staring at the muzzle of a pistol trained on him through the car window. The driver had brandished it so rapidly that Killian had no time to draw his own weapon.

He heard the gun go off and time seemed to slow. The bullet struck his right side, entering somewhere around the bottom of his rib cage. The pain didn't hit him immediately as he staggered back a few steps before his legs gave out beneath him and he dropped to the asphalt. He watched the driver lean out of the window and fire a second shot at the cruiser, hitting the front tire and flattening it. By now, a searing heat was spreading through his torso but as he lay there in the middle of the empty highway, Killian noticed that there was a pair of feet visible beneath the car and his ears picked up a second voice shouting.

"What the hell did you do that for?" the second, deeper voice demanded. "We weren't supposed to draw attention!"

"You were the one who had to take a piss," the driver's voice responded defensively as a car door squeaked open and then slammed closed seconds later. "I told you we shouldn't have stopped."

"You didn't have to shoot a cop!"

"He saw the map...What if he ran the plate?"

That was the last of the conversation that Killian could make out as the sedan's engine roared to life and the vehicle sped away, kicking up a cloud of dust and gravel in its wake.

Clutching his wounded flank, Killian lay unmoving in the road for a few minutes but to him, it felt like hours had passed. Get moving, Jones his head urged but his body was less willing to comply. He practically dragged himself back to the cruiser, using the front bumper to support himself as he managed to raise up to his knees. Beneath his layers of leather, he could already feel the sticky dampness of blood, warm against his skin. He knew he should get to the radio. He should call for help, but who would answer? There was no one at the station to hear his plea and he didn't know if any other law enforcement would get the transmission as Storybrooke wasn't exactly on any regular patrol route.

Maybe he could call Emma? If he could get a signal on that infernal device, maybe she could get to him? She could teleport. He couldn't.

Trying to ignore the increasing pain, he pulled his hand away from the wound, patting his coat pocket for his phone, hoping it was still inside. As he'd become more adept with the technology, Emma had upgraded his phone to a fancier version she'd felt would be simpler to operate one-handed. The new device had proven easier to access features other than what he still referred to as the Emma button, but he was about to rue the change. The new device was covered in a shiny sheet of glass that he'd initially questioned the durability of but he was assured this was typical of newer devices. As he slipped his bloodstained hand into the pocket, his fingertips came in contact with his phone - and the razor sharp edges of the shattered glass screen.

He drew it from his pocket carefully and confirmed the damage. He must have landed on it when he'd fallen. He tried in vain to press the power button, hoping the device would light up but it barely flickered in his hand, leading Killian to quickly realize the dire predicament he was in. He was on his own out here in the middle of nowhere and he needed to think of a plan right now or he'd bleed to death before anyone was likely to find him. His closest option to get assistance was to head to Zelena's farmhouse which was approximately another half a mile up the road. With a flat tire, he couldn't easily drive there and he doubted that he had the strength or the dexterity to change it. Could he feasibly make his way to the witch's home on foot?

Clenching his jaw tightly, he swung his hook up onto the hood of the cruiser, anchoring it into the narrow gap above the headlight. He grimaced and cried out in agony as he pulled himself upright. He rested against the vehicle for a few moments, willing himself to move. He could make it a half a mile. He had to make it, he kept telling himself as he pushed away from the car, leaving behind a sizable smear of crimson on the vehicle's white paint.

**********

Thankful that she'd located the bright blue tarp in the decrepit barn behind the house, Zelena was trying hard to work while ignoring the pleas of her cranky toddler. She currently stood atop a sturdy chair attempting to nail that plastic sheet over the shattered living room window. It was a hasty fix that wouldn't last long, and it had her once again lamenting her lack of magical powers. She had hoped to convince Jones to assist with the temporary repairs by covering the window with a few boards salvaged from the barn - after he finished up with whatever he needed to do to locate the little cretin who'd vandalized her home. It would have been a stronger repair until she could get someone who still possessed magic out here to take care of the glass, but since he hadn't shown up yet and unfortunately, the rain had, she had to wing it.

The plastic wasn't keeping all of the weather out but it was holding up better than she'd anticipated as the wind whipped up out of the west. She'd already tried calling Emma to see where her ne'er do well husband might be but found phone lines down even before the power went out. Cell phones rarely worked out here so she wasn't surprised to see No Service on the device screen. Maybe she should start thinking about moving closer to town…

Before it got too dark inside the house, she tossed a few logs into the fireplace and got a nice, warm fire going. From the kitchen, Robin continued to wail in her play yard but Zelena needed to find more candles and flashlights first. This storm was forecast to be a severe one. The arrival of the thunderclaps and lightning flashes ahead of the rain had the child screeching but the weather was only partially responsible for the child's tantrum. She was also vocally protesting that mum had put her into this restrictive baby prison when she wanted to explore and see why mummy was making so much noise in the other room. She didn't like the play yard and she was going to make sure that everyone within earshot knew it.

"I know you don't like it in there, my little pistachio," an exasperated Zelena called out to her daughter. "Mummy just has to finish up some work and then I promise, we'll go snuggle and I'll read you a story. Does that sound good?" She didn't wait for the child's response as she placed the four candles and two flashlights she'd located onto the kitchen counter then stepped over to the stove and turned on the front burner, thankful that the gas was still working. With one hand, she placed the tea kettle atop the blue flames while her other hand opened the cupboard to her left and retrieved a bright pink sippy cup. "How about I get you some juice while I finish up?"

The mention of juice tempered the toddler's mood momentarily as she intently watched her mother pour a few ounces of white grape juice into the cup and twist the lid onto it. Robin greedily snatched it from her mother's hand, the thunderstorm momentarily forgotten as she swallowed her sweet treat, plopping herself down next to a fluffy stuffed rabbit. Exhaling a sigh of relief, Zelena was about to return to the tea kettle when she heard a thud against her front door. Had something blown into the door or was that a knock? Had that miserable pirate turned deputy finally shown up?

"Is that you, Jones?" she asked loudly as she crossed the room to answer the door. "It's about bloody time you showed up… What's your…" She was going to say excuse but stopped herself mid-utterance as she swung open the door to find her door frame smeared with a mixture of blood and mud and a barely conscious Killian Jones collapsed on her front porch. He was laying face down, head resting on her woven straw welcome mat and clothes dripping wet as though he'd been out in the elements for a while. "What the devil happened to you? Where's your car?" Her eyes quickly scanned the gravel drive that led up to her house but saw no sign of a vehicle and realized she'd not heard a car approaching either.

She lowered herself to one knee in the doorway and took hold of his arm, wanting to help him get up and out of the storm. Her gaze caught sight of the series of puddles on the steps leading up to her door noticing that they were all tinged with reddish swirls.

"Are you injured?" she queried. He groaned what must have been an affirmative as he made a feeble attempt to raise his head, managing to force open one dull blue eye that pleaded for help. "Okay - we've got to get you inside. I have no idea what's happened but even I can't leave you out here in this awful weather. He pushed himself up onto his elbows and Zelena grasped his shoulders, feeling him shaking as if his strength would give out at any moment. "Think you can get to your feet with a little help?"

Killian nodded in response as she stood up, extending her arms towards him. His hand was slick with rainwater and blood as he clasped onto hers, hindering him from getting a secure grasp.

"Let's try something different…," she said as she shifted her position, stooping over and sliding her hands beneath his arms then wrapping her own arms around his upper torso. "I can't believe I'm doing this…" she muttered but at least he understood her actions. He scrambled to get his wobbly legs beneath him and pushed himself upward while she steadied his upper body. He caught his hook on the doorframe, using it to help balance himself once he was standing until she could move next to him, placing an arm around his back to guide him through the opening and over to her solid wood kitchen table. She let him brace against it while she kicked the door closed, the slam drawing a shriek from the startled Robin.

"Hang in there, little one. Mummy's got a bit of an emergency here…" As the tea kettle whistle drowned out the toddler, Zelena turned off the flame beneath it before turning her attention back to the ailing pirate dripping blood and water all over her floor and table. "I'm going to get you over to the sofa where you can lay down but first, we need to get you out of that sopping wet coat. It must weigh a ton with all the water it soaked up." Killian offered little resistance as she slid the heavy, rainwater laden leather off of his right arm and then repeated the process on his left, easing the sleeve over his brace and hook before allowing the coat to drop to the floor. She'd worry about it later.

With the burden of the leather coat now off of his shoulders, he huffed out a little sigh followed by a pained moan while nearly toppling over. Zelena caught him and wrapped his arm around her shoulders as she let him fall against her. "Okay, Jones - just a few more steps, okay?" She led him slowly, nearly dragging him at times, into the living room to her floral print sofa and let him flop onto it. "Lie down and I'll be right back. I'll get some blankets out of the closet and I have some first aid supplies in the cabinet in the loo…"

"Thank...you…" he stuttered through chattering teeth as she pulled the colorful crocheted afghan off the back of the sofa and draped it over his shivering form. She hadn't expected an answer since he could scarcely keep his eyes open so his response caught her off guard.

"You're welcome. Now, just rest a minute." What the devil am I doing? She had this and so many other questions swirling about in her overwhelmed head. Was she actually trying to save the life of the very same man she'd nearly killed just a few short years ago? And he was really trusting her to do this? Had becoming a mother changed her that much? Had sacrificing her magic helped her earn back her humanity? Okay - maybe not that since she'd kill to get her magic back. Well, that probably wasn't the best choice of words…

She shook off the barrage of unanswerable questions as she yanked open the linen closet door to collect some necessary items. She gathered up a pillow from the top shelf, two more blankets and a stack of towels and threw them all into an empty laundry basket. Before closing the door, she reached back in and grabbed a handful of washcloths too, then headed into the bathroom to see what first aid supplies she could locate. With Robin now walking, she'd stocked up on bandages and antiseptic but most of what she had on hand was sized for a child so she might have to improvise a bit. She tossed anything that might be useful into the basket with the linens and then hurried back to the living room.

"Alright, Jones - are you still with me?" He mumbled something unintelligible in his semi-conscious state that she took as a yes. "Okay, first thing we've got to do is get you out of some of these wet clothes and see where all of this blood is coming from…" He seemed to understand what she meant. His jeans were thoroughly soaked, covered in mud from when he'd fallen while trudging up her driveway and they were plastered to his chilled skin. He'd be able to warm up faster without the dampened clothing in the way. There was nothing gratuitous about it, but it didn't mean that Zelena was going to enjoy this part.

There was no pretense of modesty as she unbuckled his belt and unfastened the buttons on his trousers, keeping her eyes squeezed shut the whole time. She tugged the heavy, uncooperative fabric over his hips, praying that the pirate wasn't going commando. It wasn't that she hadn't seen male anatomy before; she just had no desire to see a former enemy's private parts.

Once she'd managed to get the denim pulled down to his knees, she quickly threw the afghan back over his hips before daring to open her eyes. Seeing Captain Hook's bare knees and shins was something she could handle as long as the rest of his lower extremities were covered. She did immediately come to the realization that she'd forgotten a step - she'd neglected to remove his boots. Thankfully for her, even though the black leather boots were as waterlogged as his matching coat, they were only ankle height with elastic sides to make them easier to slip on and off. She barely managed to stifle a giggle as she yanked them off of his feet and uncovered his navy blue socks that had tiny white sailboats printed on them. Novelty socks were not something she would have thought him to sport, but she kept any commentary to herself as she finished removing his jeans and set them aside on the hardwood floor.

Now came the hard part. She had to get a look at the wound.

He flinched and writhed in pain as she began to undo the buttons on his leather waistcoat and the midnight blue shirt beneath. She picked up one of the towels and held it at the ready while she peeled the layers of leather and fabric away. He hissed and then howled in agony as she raised the shirt and pressed the towel to the deep crimson puddle pooling on his abdomen, allowing the cotton to soak up some of the blood before taking a second glance at the hole in his side. She raised the towel slightly so she could see it better - small, but bleeding profusely. Keep pressure on it, her brain reminded her as she held the towel firmly in place and Killian cried out in protest.

"I'm so sorry. I know this has to hurt but we need to slow the bleeding," she insisted. "Is this a bullet wound?" She had limited experience with pistols, preferring fireballs to firearms, but she couldn't think of any other weapon that would have inflicted this sort of wound.

Killian gave a slight nod of his head as his body trembled through another resurgent wave of pain. "Call...Emma…" he begged, words coming out in staccato through tightly clenched teeth.

"I would if I could," she informed him. "The storm knocked out the power and the phone lines. Wouldn't be a problem if I still had magic, but you've got a pathetic waste of a witch here… Anyway, I had already tried calling her earlier when you hadn't shown up. I thought you'd blown me off…"

"Would...be...bad...form...Got...shot…" he explained what had already been obvious.

"I know that now. I have a tendency to think the worst of people, you know?"

He tried to crack a smile but found it hurt too much. "The…bullet…? Did…it… go...through?"

"I hadn't checked that just yet. Think you can roll onto your left side a bit?" He nodded and did his best to shift his weight to his left hip and turn his body towards the rear of the sofa, giving her a clearer view of his back to search for an exit wound. She raised the hem of his shirt higher and located the slightly wider hole where the bullet had passed through his flesh. "I see where it came out," she told him as she picked up another towel to cover the exit point. She sensed a little relief from him at this revelation. "Is that a good thing?" she couldn't help but ask.

"Better than... a chunk of lead… bouncing around… inside my chest," he grimaced, bracing himself for what he had to ask of her next. "Do you… have anything… to disinfect…?"

He didn't need to finish the sentence as she answered right away. "I do have antiseptic, but you should know, this is going to sting." He didn't really need the warning. He knew and his breath was already hitching in his throat in anticipation as she picked up the bottle that presumably contained the antiseptic she spoke of. It conveniently had an aerosol sprayer for easier application but there was no amount of preparation that could halt the primal, guttural scream that escaped his lungs the moment the substance came in contact with tender skin. The tidal wave of sensations proved to be more than his weakened body could bear as he allowed himself to succumb to the blissful peace of unconsciousness.

Zelena watched him go limp as the dueling howling of the wind and wailing of her daughter echoed through the farmhouse. She could still hear his labored breathing indicating he was alive but there wasn't much else she could do for him. She did her best to patch up the wounds by covering them with clean folded washcloths that she'd sprayed with the antiseptic solution before securing them in place with strips of cloth tape from her medicine cabinet. She tucked the pillow under his head and layered the two additional blankets over top of him to protect him from the drafts making their way around the blue tarp. She could only keep her fingers crossed that her improvised window covering would hold.

It wasn't perfect but it would have to do until the storm passed, she reminded herself as she gathered up the bloody towels and his dripping wet jeans, placing everything into the laundry basket for now. She kicked the basket off to the side as she stood up and headed to the kitchen to wash up, tossing another log onto the flickering fire as she passed by. Once she'd scrubbed away the blood and dried off, she scooped up her teary-eyed daughter who vocalized her displeasure once more as a flash of lighting and an instant rumble of thunder shook the house. Bouncing the toddler on her hip to ease her sobbing, Zelena stared out of her kitchen window watching the rain pelting against the glass.

This was turning into one very long day.

#ouat ff #whump fic #killian whump #cs ff #weathering the storm #tagging this cs even though emma doesnt come in until part 2 #and wanted to keep it in my main tags #is there a friendship name for Killian and Zelena?

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bubble-tea-bunny · 5 years

Text

monster monster!

[link x reader]

author’s note: was really hurting for inspo when suddenly i got an idea revolving around fang and bone not being owned by kilton, but someone else ;))) (also i did tweak how the shop works a lil bit for the sake of this story, which i hope you do not mind)

word count: 6,125

With the amount of rain beginning to pour from dark clouds, which had slowly crept in these last several hours and concealed the sky, one may hardly believe it had been perfectly sunny this morning. The expectation that the weather would be agreeable the whole day is why Link had decided to begin his journey this morning and not tarry any longer. He still has a large distance to cover until he arrives at his destination, and while he would have liked to continue on a bit more before stopping for the night, it wouldn’t be a good idea. A small voice in the back of his mind reasons he could keep going, if he really wants to, but the quick flash of lightning in the distance and the rumble of thunder close on its heels kills that notion in a heartbeat, and Link finds himself taking shelter at the stable just off the main road.

After he checks his horse in with the stablehand, he steps beneath the canopy and heaves a deep sigh of relief, the roar of the storm now muffled. Warmth washes over him, sinks into his skin and seeps through damp clothes. He does his best to wring himself out by the entrance so as not to track water along the wooden flooring. As the minutes tick by, his shivering ceases, and he digs enough rupees out of his pocket to pay for a bed.

There are a few other travelers here. One sits at the table writing in a journal, the scratching of pen on paper overpowered by the relentless shower outside. The two others are asleep on the far side, so Link takes care in setting his bag gently down by his bed, to make as little noise as possible. Instead of following the leads of those slumbering Hylians, he walks back to the threshold, leaning against the wooden frame to watch the rain. Another streak of lightning illuminates the sky for a brief moment, and Link absentmindedly counts off the seconds in his head—One, two, three…—until thunder growls so strongly the earth seems to shake.

The noise of the torrential downpour makes it difficult to hear much, but Link’s learned to be perceptive. Boots thud heavily against the floor, sending shockwaves Link can feel traveling towards his own. The silent newcomer claims the open spot to his left, but doesn’t assume a casual stance like he does, remaining straight and on high alert. Link spares a quick glance at the one who has joined him—a guard—then turns back to the scene in front.

Both of them stand there quietly, but that doesn’t last long. Link’s eyes pass over the blue flame flickering in the lantern, wholly unbothered by the raindrops, just as the man next to him speaks.

He introduces himself as Hoz, and he shares with Link rumors of a shop only open at night, featuring wares of the less savory sort, and some might even say the ominous or unsettling. It isn’t simple to stumble across, and perhaps that’s on purpose, for the cover of darkness ensures not everyone has the opportunity to peek at the sinister merchandise. It’s called Fang and Bone, Hoz says, and if you’ve an interest in monsters, that’s the place to go.

Link hadn’t been too absorbed in the topic at the start of this spiel, but his curiosity grows the more Hoz expounds on the hearsay that’s been flittering throughout Hyrule. If this shop had been restricted to this one region, here in Akkala, Link might not have been too invested in finding out more immediately, and would consider it a topic set off to the side for another time. But it’s something else entirely that its reputation stretches across the whole land, because though that’s true, there are few who are able to attest to its existence and its goods and, most importantly, its owner, for who could possibly be at the center of the sinister business of dealing in monsters?

Apparently Link needn’t voice his newfound interest in discovering this shop for himself, for Hoz to pick up on it. The man merely looks over at him and smirks.

“I see the glint in your eye,” he remarks. Though they stand next to each other, he needs to raise his voice to be heard over the rain. “You want to find it too.” He suggests asking around the region as a way to glean useful information of its whereabouts, and politely requests that should Link come across this mysterious emporium, that he return to these stables to tell him all about it.

Link, feeling sleepy now, gives a sleepy smile in response and nods, a silent promise that he’ll do just that. Hoz bids him a goodnight then makes his leave to give Link some time on his own. Link watches as he does a quick scan of the interior, in search of suspicious activity he knows there is none of (there isn’t much to be on high alert for), before he walks up to the counter to chat with the stable master.

Another bout of lightning. Another roll of thunder. This storm shows no signs of stopping anytime soon. Link crosses his arms as he lingers to observe it for a couple more minutes, and he wonders distantly if Fang and Bone is still open for business somewhere out there.

By morning, his plans have changed. If he resumed his original route, he would be in the next region over by sundown, especially since the skies have cleared up and, unlike yesterday, remained as such. But he decides to stay for another day or two instead, inquiring from those in the area about a store that specializes in monsters. He’s hoping to learn of details that at least point him in the right direction, provide a starting point, but the vast majority of those he speaks to look at him like he’s suddenly grown two heads and they don’t say it out loud but they’re wondering why on earth he could be seeking out anything like that. And those who don’t react that way, those who know what he’s talking about and pretend they don’t but Link can tell deep down they do know something, however small, aren’t very eager to share.

It takes a good deal of convincing to get the answers he wants. His words worked most of the time, but when they didn’t, he used rupees to make up for it. He’s lower on money than he would’ve like to have been at the end of all that, but somehow it’s easy to brush off when he sinks into one of the chairs at the Tarrey Town inn and studies the map on his Sheikah Slate.

The name Skull Lake is so on the nose it almost makes him laugh. It could also be no more a fitting location for a place called Fang and Bone to set up shop. Now that he thinks about it, he’s surprised, and a little irritated, that he hadn’t figured it out himself, because if he did, he’d have saved himself a lot of trouble (and rupees). Though he supposes the idea may have been so ridiculous in theory that his subconscious hadn’t bothered to make the connection, already assuming it would’ve been a dead end. His subconscious really ought to get out of the habit of doing that. Who knows what else he could miss…

“I heard tell of your hunt for a shop of monsters.”

Link’s gaze slides from the screen over to Kapson standing behind the counter, the only other occupant of this building. Link’s brows furrow in confusion, wondering how he could know that when he hadn’t said anything, but he realizes Pelison must have mentioned something. The young Goron is always excited to hear of Link’s most recent adventures, and of course, on this visit, Link recounted the rumors Hoz had shared, though in less frightening terms. He has no desire to be responsible for nightmares.

“Another traveler came through here just a few days ago looking for the same thing.” Kapson walks the short distance to the table Link sits at and takes the seat on the opposite side. He has no reason to stay by the counter. It’s late, most of the town is asleep, and there aren’t many who arrive in the middle of the night. “I imagine they must’ve found it by now.”

Link sets his Sheikah Slate aside, the zoomed in image of Skull Lake staring up at the ceiling for several seconds before disappearing as the screen shuts off. You believe it then? he asks. The stories.

Kapson inhales deeply, as though to take those moments to put together his response. And when he has it, he smiles slightly, amused in a sardonic kind of way. “There have been much stranger things afoot in Hyrule.”

Link can’t help chuckling and nods in agreement. He’s witnessed many of said “strange things” up close, often being at the forefront to investigate and, if need be, set them right. The whispers about Fang and Bone hardly sound bizarre in comparison. And he realizes that’s how he’d been approaching it this whole time—he had never believed it to be just rumors. Once Hoz had brought the topic to his attention, Link had every intention to find it, had been confident there was anything to find. A clear contrast to those he had asked for more information who assumed he’d gone crazy. Perhaps his sense of what was normal and what was atypical has been skewed, but he takes comfort in the fact he’s not alone in his sentiments, judging by the words Kapson has shared.

He’s due to set off for Skull Lake the next day, but he’s in no rush. The ride won’t be long and the shop is only there at night. So he wakes at mid-morning and kills time restocking his supplies and talking with the other villagers. Then when the sun has passed its highest point, now beginning its journey to the western horizon, he packs up his saddle bag and mounts his horse. He gives a final wave to Pelison as he leaves, and gradually the sounds of Tarrey Town fade behind him.

The last minutes of the dying light paint the world orange. Link pulls out his Sheikah Slate to ensure he’s riding in the right direction, and surmises that the cluster of rocks up ahead are part of the lake’s shoreline. The lake itself is still hidden and would require getting closer and maneuvering through stony outcrops to be able to spot it. Link has to hand it to whoever owns this shop—this is no easy place to happen upon. Which he supposes is exactly what they want, for it means that those who do find this place have sought it out intentionally, and possess a legitimate, vested interest in a selection of goods not entirely conventional.

As though sensing that Link has reached his destination, the last slivers of sunlight extinguish themselves in a sigh, blowing strong enough to ruffle Link’s hair and cold enough that he sees his own breath when he exhales. To minimize noise, he dismounts from his horse and tethers it out of sight from anyone who might be on the lake, then proceeds on foot. Pulling his cloak tighter around him, he peeks around tall columns of stone, eyes narrowed as he scans the expanse of Skull Lake.

It’s a full moon tonight. Link makes a habit of tracking the phases, and earlier today, he had mused that if the moon were waning on this particular evening, he probably wouldn’t have adequate visibility to discern anything out on the lake. But while standing here, with his blue gaze on blue waters, he learns that his assumption was wrong. Even if it had been a new moon, the dim yellow light from the center of Skull Lake would draw his attention right away, a beacon in the dark night.

There are no patrons browsing from what he can tell. He guesses he might be the first of the evening. Stepping out from behind his hiding place, he walks across the small land bridge leading to the island where the rumored monster emporium stands alone, lanterns hanging from the wooden counter with more attached to what Link notices as he gets closer is a large patchwork hot air balloon, the colors of each piece mismatched and oddly charming. And painted on the wooden sign hanging above the shop counter window in thick black paint, so the words can’t be misread: Fang and Bone.

The shop owner is turned away, preoccupied with organizing the shelves. Link surveys the selection, passing over the horns and fangs of various creatures; guts and hearts that he swears twitch every few seconds; severed wings and tails and eyeballs that squelch as the merchant grabs a few and drops them into a glass jar. Finally, among the many other spooky items in stock, are small purple flasks with gold accents and gold stoppers.

Nearly a minute passes and the shopkeeper has taken no notice of Link, and he’s not sure what he should do. Does he talk? Does he rap his knuckles against the counter a few times, for lack of a bell? Eventually he decides to clear his throat, loud yet succinct, enough to announce his presence but not enough to startle.

“Yes?” the merchant says as they twist around, prepared for any inquiries. “Is there anything you’d like to see?”

Bright eyes are trained on Link from beneath a hood, and it catches him off guard. To be honest, he had envisioned the owner of this kind of shop to be much more… menacing, with mad eyes and a suspiciously wide grin, gnarled and sharp fingernails like claws, surrounded by an aura that spoke of trouble and disturbing delights. It’s certainly not the most outrageous expectation, and he’s confident anyone else who’s heard of Fang and Bone has thought the same. But you’re none of that.

Lithe fingers push down the hood to reveal your face and you look, well, perfectly normal. Your eyes show you’re sane as can be, and you smile a tight-lipped smile that matches those of the other shop owners in the villages, who wear them to be polite as they deal with customers. He feels no sense of dread to be this close, has no inkling that you could be evil or up to something bad. Poking out from your hair, which is tied back into a neat braid, are long pointed ears. Just like his.

Link has no need to stock up on monster parts. He gathers his own during his travels, and he’s not running short on any supplies. But you’re watching him intently, waiting for him to talk, to ask about what items you’re offering, and it’s fair for you to assume he does want to buy because why else would he have come all this way? The biting curiosity, Link thinks to himself. It’s what keeps him rooted to this spot despite harboring no intention to purchase anything. However, there is one thing he wants to ask about…

He glances over your shoulder at the small purple flasks and asks what they are. You smile at his piqued interest and reach back to grab one, holding it up, the soft glow of the lanterns bouncing off the glass. Monster extract, you explain. An essence of my own creation. Cook with it and you’ll experience a significant energy boost.

While you spoke, you’d been staring at the flask, gaze and voice filled with pride at your work. Thus, you miss the mixture of emotions lining Link’s face, but when you finally do notice his dubious expression, knitted brows and a slight frown that bordered on distaste, you laugh, and he sees sharp canines that look remarkably like fangs.

“Don’t worry, I’ve done careful research. Mix it well, and you can hardly tell it’s there,” you state. You pull the stopper off and stretch out your arm so Link can take a closer look. His eyes drop down to the flask then slide back up to you and you nod in reassurance. “Some customers like to inspect the wares more closely.”

Tentatively he grabs it, fingers curling around the narrow neck. Dark purple tendrils float from the opening and dissipate in the air as they rise. He brings it close to his nose to take a sniff and does his best not to recoil at the stench. He fails, and you chuckle again quietly, reminding him of its concentrated nature. You aren’t quite drawing the extract from flowers.

Link hands back the flask and you replace the stopper, asking what he thinks. Initially he’d been on the fence, and was leaning towards saying no thanks, but your stare is piercing, like you can see right through him, and he finds he doesn’t want to say no. So he doesn’t. He says he’ll buy one and you smile in satisfaction at another satisfied customer and there’s a glint in your eye like you know what you’ve done. Who could say no with a gaze like that?

Before Link can get rupees from his pocket, you inform him that monster extract can only be paid for with monster parts. And as he has no shortage of those, he pays easily, and the disorganized mess of guts and tails and wings in his bag is replaced by one neat purple flask.

“Pleasure doing business with you.” Your grin is courteous and you don’t appear to be affected by the fresh smell of rot emanating from the monster parts now sitting on the counter between you. “I hope you’ll stop by again.” For a moment this statement gives Link pause, and he wonders if you say that to everyone. (And would it matter to him if you did?)

No one else is in sight as he makes his leave, but the night is still young, which leaves plenty of time for others to arrive. Once on the shore, he glances over his shoulder and sees you’ve returned to your original task of sorting your inventory. Your back is turned to him and you’ve brought up the hood of your cloak again, and he’s staring at two large, different colored buttons and a piece of fabric sewn and stuffed to resemble a beak. The goofy-looking makeshift monster makes him smile as he walks to his horse.

The following morning, he finally resumes the journey that had been put on hold these last few days. It’s still a lengthy ride down to Necluda, but with little to no detours, (certainly not any that last as long as his hunt for for Fang and Bone had been), he arrives by the end of the week.

He deeply inhales a breath of fresh air as the houses of Hateno come into view just over the hill. His body seems to know he’s home, for suddenly his shoulders sag, full of fatigue from his extended bout away from the village, and he’s yearning for a good night’s sleep in his own bed. It’s dark when he passes the gateway and steers his horse onto the main road stretching through town, but there are plenty of people outside who wave in greeting.

Ivees’s face lights up as Link pushes open the door to the general shop. Pruce isn’t behind the counter, which means she’s the one in charge tonight. She sets her broom aside and asks how he’s doing and what he’s been up to. Link’s response is curt, borne out of exhaustion, and as he talks, she’s smiling sympathetically because it’s not difficult to tell from the tone of his voice that he’s tired.

“I’m glad to know you’re okay,” she says. “No cuts or bruises on you, but I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

Link chuckles good-naturedly, then picks out produce to bring back with him to his house. His food stores were depleted right before he left, done purposely so nothing spoiled while he was gone. Ivee counts the costs of everything he’s chosen and placed on the counter then provides a total, and Link opens up his bag for her to place it all into while he counts out the correct amount of rupees.

“What’s this?”

At Ivee’s question, Link tears his focus from the rupees in his hand. Her fingers are wrapped around the neck of the flask of monster extract, not taking it out of the bag but merely angling it so she can see the accents on the glass more clearly. Because she isn’t a child, he doesn’t have to sugarcoat his answer, but he does take a moment to figure out how to explain. He settles on starting with a question: Have you heard those rumors of a shop selling monster parts?

Ivee purses her lips in thought, and several seconds later, she nods. Link tells her it’s real, and that’s where he got the flask from. It’s monster extract. Ivee’s eyes widen in shock once she learns what she’s holding, and she emits a horrified squeak and lets go. He laughs and assures her it isn’t toxic, and that the only danger to be worried about is the stench.

After the produce is put away in Link’s bag, he shrugs it back onto his shoulder. But one more query from Ivee prevents him from leaving.

“What’s the owner look like? You know… of that shop.”

Link smiles but it’s not so much directed at Ivee as much as it is to himself, as he remembers your eyes reflecting the low lights of the lanterns and remembers your lips forming a delightful curve he wanted to see again as soon as it was out of sight. And all he tells her is that the owner isn’t nearly as scary as she might be imagining.

He’d been excited to make dinner once he returned home, but the intimate, cozy setting makes him incredibly weary, and instead, he drops right into bed, still in the clothes he’d worn since this morning. The weather is cold but within these four walls, with the gently crackling fire, he has no need to burrow beneath his blankets. Not that he’d have much energy to do that anyway.

The rooster crowing wakes him up, but the pain in his neck is what prevents him from being able to go back to sleep. He passed out the moment he hit the bed, and it hadn’t been in the most comfortable position. Rubbing at the sore spot, he sits up and walks downstairs to make breakfast. His stomach grumbles as he cooks, having missed out on a meal last night. The last time he’d eaten was yesterday early afternoon.

His day is spent in town, catching up and swapping stories with the others. They usually prefer to hear more of what he’s been up to, reasoning that there’s never anything too newsworthy that occurs here, nothing worth sharing, but Link doesn’t think that’s true. The monster-slaying and traveling across the whole of Hyrule has become standard for him, so to listen to stories of the goings-on of home is refreshing. He voices this to Tokk, who laughs and, with a smile that crinkles the corners of his aged eyes, muses The grass is always greener, isn’t it?

Link also fills his time doing any odd jobs anyone approaches him with. He pitches hay for Dantz on the farm, carries in the boxes of produce for Pruce to restock his store, helps Sayge clean up the floors in the dye shop. He’s moving around until sundown, and while he’s tired by the end of it, he also feels satisfied to have been so productive. Offering his assistance around Hateno is his method of relaxing. He isn’t sure if he’d be able to sit around. If he tried, it’s inevitable that he would get the itch to do something, and he’s in luck, for the villagers are sure to have that something to keep his hands busy.

A practice of his had gone neglected since he came back, one he should’ve done yesterday but failed to carry out due to fatigue clouding his mind. Once his tasks are done and the moon is high in the sky (it’s a crescent tonight), he traipses over to the goddess statue, his boots sifting the grass with each step. The statue is barely lit by the light of a nearby torch, and he kneels down before it to pray to Hylia. It’s a tradition he has had for a long while now, done after every safe return to Hateno.

At the tail-end of it, a hard gust of wind blows out the torch, and the orange glow which had run down the length of the statue disappears. Link stands and makes his way over to it, prepared to grab it from the sconce and reignite it with one of the torches farther down. But a faint light in the distance grabs his attention, and he squints in an attempt to discern the faraway source better.

His head tilts and internally he’s debating if he’s actually seeing what he thinks he’s seeing. No, it can’t be that, he tells himself. It can’t be because that wouldn’t make sense. But the fact is it’s hard to deny that what rests on the hill is a large balloon, stitched together with a curiously mismatched patchwork. Kapson’s words flood back—There have been much stranger things afoot in Hyrule—and Link concedes that to discover the balloon here, quite far from Akkala, is not the most outlandish phenomenon he’s ever bore witness to.

So when he finally accepts that yes, that is exactly what he’s seeing, he turns left and right to check if anyone else had noticed the balloon’s presence, but no one is staring, nor had anyone noticed him staring and tried to check out for themselves what he’s concentrating so hard on. He places the torch back in the sconce, still unlit, and jogs down to the dirt path leading out of town.

He follows it for a while, then veers off as he approaches the hill where Fang and Bone has set up for the night. The numerous lanterns bathe him in soft light, their radiance like a greeting, and his eyes slide down from the balloon to you behind the counter. Your back is turned, just like last time, but he doesn’t have to clear his throat or speak up or knock on the counter because, as though you could feel someone there, you turn around, and upon seeing him, you smile widely. You do it so well you could put the moon out of business.

“Hello again.” Clearly you recognize him, based on the familiarity in your eyes which are striking beneath the hood of your dark cloak.

Link’s chest bubbles with warmth to learn that you remember him, but that heat tempers as he wonders if you remember everyone. How large could your customer base be? You must have a sizable pool of patrons to stay open, but small enough that knowledge of your shop isn’t widespread, remaining for the majority of Hyrule a simple rumor. Those who buy your wares are most probably repeat customers as well, giving you ample opportunities to memorize faces. So perhaps he is not so special as to stand out as much as he assumed he had.

“Here for another flask of monster extract?” you ask, interrupting his train of thought. “Or something else?”

Your opening questions would typically merit no extra consideration. They’re signs of a good merchant assisting their customer, initiating a discussion to help them find what they’re looking for. But Link’s hesitation to respond is only a reasonable reaction when he’s been arguing internally since you greeted him about whether he does stand out, and therefore whether your questions mean anything more. Now he stands here, silent for an amount of time toeing the line of awkward, if it hadn’t crossed that already, wholly unsure if you’re implying something. Are you referring to the other products behind you or yourself?

He scolds himself: This is ridiculous. He’s reading too deeply into it. The case might very well be that you are implying absolutely nothing and he’s projecting his own feelings because it’s true that he is here for something other than monster extract but it’s not the pulsating bokoblin guts nor the glassy keese eyeballs on the shelves. He’s here for your utter fascination with the creatures he slays on his travels, a task he views as mere routine. He understands the basics, what parts of a monster he requires for what elixirs, but never has he been laden with the curiosity and pure elation burning in your eyes as you speak of those beasts, a distinct sense of fondness in your voice. It’s this seemingly paradoxical behavior which made him want to come back because he has never known anyone like you. He’s here for you.

Of course, he doesn’t just say that. In fact, he dodges the questions entirely, opting instead to admit that he hasn’t gotten around to making anything with his current flask of monster extract. He rubs the back of his neck sheepishly, and you chuckle, nodding in understanding. Not intent on trying to scramble for answers when you inevitably ask if he’s interested in any of the other products in stock, he changes the subject: I didn’t know Fang and Bone changed locations.

You nod. “I move all over Hyrule. And tonight, luck would have me in the same village as you.”

Link’s speculations start up once more. Were you calling yourself lucky? Had you been wanting to see him again too? Maybe he’d been correct in discerning a reciprocated interest, and it hadn’t just been the result of paranoia and doubt, hazards against potentially making a fool of himself. And he’s silently agreeing that yes, the circumstances were lucky indeed.

Where will you go from here? he inquires, and you say you aren’t sure yet. You like to follow the road, let the wind guide you where it will. The corner of his lips lift in a small smile, and it widens as you continue to explain that this lack of a set destination gives you the freedom to track monsters’ movements in the vicinity if you happen to notice any. So I guess the wind points me towards monsters, and I just end up in the closest town, you state with a quiet laugh.

“Maybe I’ll run into you again,” you then remark offhandedly, and Link swears it almost sounds hopeful, and his chest tightens upon this realization. He isn’t imagining that softness in your gaze, filled with an optimism that luck would be on your side again—both your sides—and when you grin, he thinks his heart might burst.

He does buy three lizalfos tails, less because he needs them and more because he doesn’t want to leave empty-handed. The rupees they cost are worth it anyway, as he witnesses the care you take in grabbing the tails from the shelf and setting them down on the counter. He tucks them into his bag which is mostly empty now that he’d had the chance to offload unnecessary items at home. But before he can leave, you suggest out of the blue that he bake a cake with the monster extract: I’ve been told it’s quite tasty!

Link’s smiling to himself on the walk back through town. He passes no one on the way, for it’s late enough that even all the adults have turned in for the evening. The chill melts away once he enters his house, and as he prepares for bed, he’s already thinking ahead to the next time he should come across you, on another clear midnight with the stars a backdrop to that colorful hot air balloon. He’s envisioning it behind closed eyes, playing on a loop the gentle sway of it in the breeze. And he dreams of it too.

Eventually he’s on the road again, traveling west. He always hates to say goodbye to those in Hateno, but he comforts himself in the fact that it won’t feel like very long before he returns. It never does, perhaps owed to the innate longing for home that seems to make the days pass just a little bit faster.

The weather has been better too, with no risk of rain. The sky is cloudless and blue and the temperature has remained moderate and pleasant. Link’s sure that’s going to change as he passes central Hyrule and reaches the fringes, but he’s no stranger to the more extreme climates there, and he’d packed appropriately.

However, for now, any concerns of weather too hot or too cold are far from his mind as he spots a sleepy Outskirt stable. Smoke gently rises from the fire outside, and the air smells of baked apples. There’s only one other horse being tended to by the stablehand, and Link’s horse makes it two. He doesn’t plan to stay overnight, for there’s plenty of daylight left to keep going. Rather, he’s taking the moment to rest and give his horse a much-deserved break, since they’d gotten an early start today, packing up and moving on before the sun came up.

There is a third horse here, a large one, which is standing facing the main road. It pulls along a cart, the contents of which are covered up by a layer of burlap. Link passes it on his way to the fire, where he takes a seat on the tree stump. He assumes the one currently in conversation with the stable master is the owner, but he doesn’t care to linger on it for long as he pulls up the map on his Sheikah Slate. He’ll need to plot out the distance he’d like to travel with the remaining hours of sunlight and find a safe stopping point.

“Thank you!” the person talking to the stable master says, and the sound of their voice tears Link’s focus away from studying the map.

He only sees a profile of the Hylian’s face, given he’s sitting off to the side, but it’s unmistakable that it’s you walking towards the large horse waiting patiently. He notes how peculiar it is to see you without your large cloak and heavy hood, and with your features illuminated by the natural light of the sun and not the artificial lights of all the lanterns. No one might ever expect you to run such a monstrous business, though maybe that’s exactly what you want.

The point is, you aren’t any less wonderful to behold in broad daylight, and the shock to find you here, which makes Link’s stomach bubble as the world suddenly feels to have been turned upside down, prevents him from calling out to you. (Not that he would know what to say.)

You’re facing him when you angle yourself to mount your horse, and before you hoist yourself up, you spot him, and without missing a beat, you smile. To the outsider, it appears as nothing more than a polite grin, the likes of which are shared with a stranger when catching their eyes across a room. But Link knows better, and he detects a similar recognition in your own gaze.

The smile reaches your eyes and it’s amused, and you watch each other for that brief second you take to throw your leg over your horse to sit down in the saddle. It feels like eternity and Link is aware of the wordless connection flittering between you, an unbridled excitement like you’re doing things you aren’t supposed to, like you’re sharing secrets you shouldn’t have learned of in the first place.

He stares after you, your horse, and your cart leaving the stable and continuing down the road, and he watches until you’ve gone over the hill and you’re gone from view. A small part of him wants to follow you, to see where you might go this time, but he gets the feeling that if he were to mount his horse and run after you, he’ll discover you’ve disappeared into thin air, like a magic trick. Perhaps that hot air balloon of yours is secretly good for flying after all, and you take off in it when you’re far away from any prying eyes. So he figures he’ll spend his hours traveling through Hyrule with his eyes on the sky, in search of a mismatched patchwork balloon.

#link x reader #botw imagine #legend of zelda imagine #botw x reader #legend of zelda x reader #legend of zelda #bubble-tea-bunny #queue

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vios-rockland-corner · 4 years

Text

RoR Article 2: Help Callum

To make things easier on myself, I’m splitting up my thoughts on the Rumors of Rockland second article. I already gave an overview of this game. Here, I’ll cover whatever random thoughts and observations I had for the events that occur when you choose to help Callum.

[Major spoilers below for Rumors of Rockland Article 2]

First surprise here, Callum can actually hold his own. Have to admit, wasn’t really expecting that (dude kind of looked sickly in older sprites). Well honestly, I wasn’t exactly expecting the MC to be capable of driving off the drunk dudes themselves unless they were going to threaten to call 911. More like…I didn’t know what to expect. Since it was now 2-on-2, was the MC suddenly going to start throwing down? I just didn’t see it happening. No, turns out Callum was quite capable of taking these guys out by himself.

What I love about this though is that the minute the MC enters the scene, Callum actually goes into protection mode. He may genuinely have not been afraid of these guys from the start and thought it was even funny to see them riled up. He’s initially holding back his laughter when the two guys are initially antagonizing him and only got a little serious when they brought Whesker’s name up. Between the first two articles, Callum’s now shown concern for people like Avery, Whesker and the MC. The MC isn’t even someone he’s close to yet. Maybe I’m calling this a little too early, but Callum might just be a nice and well-meaning guy. There are certainly a lot of dangerous characters in Rockland, but so far nothing to suggest anything sinister about Callum whatsoever.

Getting back to the scene, I kind of found it adorable that the MC rushing in flips a switch for Callum. It was like he was going, “Hey, woah woah woah. These guys are a joke, but seriously I don’t want anyone getting hurt now.” So his playtime had to end. Otherwise, he seems like he’s pretty goofy and relaxed most of the time.

By the way, who else took a good look at that CG of Callum giving a good kick? If you look in the background, you can actually see the silhouette of a person. SOMEONE saw that whole altercation go down, but didn’t interrupt. We can’t be sure though if the MC hadn’t been there, if this person would have come down to assist Callum instead. Might not have been someone concerned about Callum (just watching out of curiosity). In the “Do Nothing” path, Callum does not even mention what happened outside when he goes to talk to Avery (but he doesn’t act frazzled at all).

A curious thing about the silhouette though is that it’s very reminiscent of the drawings seen in the “Nightmare Realized” teaser game for the Misfits. Coincidence? We do even see Sydney show up in the “Do Nothing” path. Was he the one watching and came to help out Callum if the MC doesn’t help in anyway? Sydney did mention helping his friends, but whether that’s related to Callum or something else, I’m not sure. Callum is Quill’s brother, but we don’t have evidence yet that Sydney and Callum are friends with one another.

Moving on, it seems Callum is quite similar to Quill when it comes to being very chatty and dropping names like crazy. Must be a Willow thing (wonder if the parents are like that too). Callum gives you a lot of interesting information though, but it differs vastly depending on what person you’re most interesting in asking about.

If you ask about Sergio, you learn that the town is basically run by the IRISH MAFIA. That…explains a whole lot. Prior to this, I had theorized that some of the crime syndicates may have some pull with finances and politics of Rockland when I was trying to think about how the Professionals could operate for so long without repercussions. I believe this might sum it up pretty well. It’s kind of funny how normal Callum treats the matter too. I mean, I appreciate that the mafia aren’t racists and try to keep some order (mafia is indeed ORGANIZED crime). That’s always nice. Still…it is a mafia. Not only does that mean that people in Rockland might not want to get a swelled head for justice around these parts, but crime is still crime. We don’t know yet what kind of illegal activities the mafia does yet. Could be just a lot of theft and forgery. Or perhaps there is a lot of murder and human trafficking behind the scenes.

This also explains why a lot of the characters in Rockland have Irish accents. Before these games, I knew a couple of the characters like Trevor and Roy were Irish. Apparently Whesker has an accent too. I genuinely just thought it was just a foreign type the creators’ favored. But there’s actually more meaning to having numerous Irish characters in Rockland now. It also means if you come across someone in Rockland with an Irish accent…maybe do your best to stay on their good side. Just in case.

Wait a minute…Roy is Irish (or at least he was)…That either could be just a coincidence, or there might be something interesting later down the road about that. Is he linked to one of the Irish mafia families in anyway? If so, did he cut ties and is in opposition? Or is he actually still part of that group too? If it’s the latter, that would mean the police force in Rockland IS under the mafia’s thumb too. We won’t know this I think until much later though. Like I said, could also just be a coincidence that he’s Irish (if he still is). Not all Irish people know each other. It’s more likely though in such a small and tight nit town like Rockland.

If you ask about Scarlet, then you just get some fun image in your head of family gatherings for holidays. Cute but what I really want to focus on here is that BEASTKIN ARE OFFICIALLY MENTIONED IN GAME FOR THE FIRST TIME! I know there are probably several people who are excited about that. It’s officially our first supernatural element introduced if you don’t include the Zeitgeist demo. Now we don’t know a lot about beastkin, just that they’re around. Both Scarlet and Foal are beastkin, but you probably wouldn’t be able to tell Foal is one at a quick glance. They can have tails (though unfortunately some had their tails cut off), but we don’t know what other kind of physical aspects usually manifest. With Foal, she has darker skin and white hair. The darker skin isn’t really a giveaway, but the white hair might be. I had figured she just dyed it or something, but it’s possible that’s her natural hair color.

If you’re trying to make a beastkin OC for Rockland, not much I could say yet for what is fair game in canon. Just tails and possible hair color at the moment can give their beast status away. We don’t know anything about abilities yet. I feel like we’re also going to be focusing on the more human elements of Rockland for the most part. The beastkin are around, but not the main theme here. Still nice to know it’s an existing element though.

If you ask about Jett, you learn Callum and Avery play music. On the website, the Callum and Avery are indeed listed under “The Band” section. This was more foreshadowing I believe for a future “Battle of the Bands” themed game. Fun, but not much else I feel I need to comment on here.

After talking with Callum so long, I can’t be certain to say you gain full friendship status with him in this route, but you’re definitely on some pretty good terms now. Avery probably appreciates hearing that you went to help Callum, but otherwise he’s more occupied with his troubled thoughts in this situation rather than getting to know you better. You probably have earned good points with Avery here, but not nearly as much as if you do the “Get Help” route where you get much more conversation time with him.

Since you let Callum go after Avery though, Foal seemed to appreciate the choice and you get some positive interaction with her. So points earned there too.

In the end, choosing to help Callum yourself gets you in good with Callum of course, and a slightly better reputation with Avery and Foal. Not bad. I can’t be certain if you’ve earned brownie points as well from the person who was watching in the CG because I don’t know if they were looking out for Callum’s safety or just looking for a show.

#Rockland #Rumors of Rockland #RoR #runawayoutlaw #rottenbonethief #Callum Willow #Rockland Games

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human-enthusiast · 4 years

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Antagonist: Buggy (East Blue - And Before This Time Frame)

At first, I was still on and off about my decision on whether or not I would make an analysis on Buggy at all. My analysis pages aren’t necessarily about the villains of One Piece in general, but more towards humanitarian or misanthropic topics reflected in their world from ours. In the first few appearances, I thought I had nothing to go off from, at least in context of World Issues. But I started writing out his characteristics and anything known about his past that could reflect on it, and then I started writing on something to reflect later after writing out other analogies with other villains and their world.

Characteristics:

Stereotypical behavior of a pirate

Narcissism: Blames others for his mistakes (Shanks)

Treats a majority of his underlings as replaceable/worthless

Alignment: Chaotic Evil/Neutral Evil

Worthy Notes

He was one of the recognizable characters who witnessed Roger’s execution up front.

Before this, he knew him personally and grew close with his captain.

To me, he and Shanks are friends/crewmates that had similar circumstances but different outcomes - two sides of the same coin (Important Distinction).

Buggy is a character that I both dislike and love for various reasons. If there was a person, who had a striking resemblance to him (in both looks and especially personality), there is a 100% chance I would not get along well with him. The arrogance, laugh, and overall characteristics of a narcissist that gets his ass handed to him in nearly every encounter is annoying to the point of wanting to punch him personally.

However, he also handles many of his problems and the crazy reality that is their world with great comic relief like a majority of the characters. He himself has great one-liners and funny encounters that make him a great antagonist towards Luffy and an overall character of One Piece.

He’s one of the few designated antagonists of the East Blue Arc that popped up later, not only in the same arc, but in other arcs afterwards. Alvida does as well but she isn’t treated very much like an antagonist after Loguetown. More mild and laid back as Buggy’s vice captain, without straying from her original personality.

The thing about him from the beginning is how iconic of a character he is, mixed with some stereotypical personality traits as the main character’s villain. With the listed traits above, he actually isn’t the most original kind of villain under a broad definition.

I use the moral alignment chart for these analysis and/or characters because it’s one of the easiest ways to place and understand the foundation about them. For Buggy, he could go either way for being neutral or chaotic in the evil row. He does things for his own gain. But he also does evil acts because he is under the notion that he can with no other reason. Many of the East Blue antagonists are essentially like this.

Before knowing anything about Buggy later on, and even after, I would put him in the same boat as Krieg and Arlong. These are very chaotic pirates who also display typical pirate personas. Greedy, foul playing, captains without any remorse or care for others (although Arlong, towards fishmen and crew mates, tends to be an exception). They appear to not have an underlining motivation to be the way they are. Just regular, run-of-the-mill pirates.

But taking in consideration his past affiliations on being a cabin boy to Gol D. Roger, his attitude, in tune with Arlong’s, makes a lot of sense.

The start of the Pirate Era sparked a grand affiliation to the massive sweep of pirate crews to take to the seas. A historically popular phenomenon done in a way that no other sailor accomplished the way Roger did: conquer the Grand Line. When an ever-changing event like this occurs, you have a mix of on-lookers who are changed by this. Characters like Luffy are filled with adrenaline. A need to seek adventure, making him the perfect predecessor for Roger’s Legacy, but in a way where he can call it his own.

Then there are characters like stereotypical, unnamed pirate crews, a majority of which mainly focus on the prospect of Roger’s treasure One Piece. They physically have nothing to tie them down, so they feel it necessary to pursue that challenge. This sparks greed or a search for infamy, something that actually connects to Ace’s motivation the most, but he has a more dynamic change that alters his motivations. Compared to others, this change is due to an instance where he is showed an alternate approach on life and dreams, a somewhat more healthy version. But when this alternate approach isn’t introduced to others, they are bound to the same mindset, installing more harm along the way.

The known reactions are like two sides of the same coin. They’re broad chances of what someone will turn out in response to this freedom on treasure hunting and adventure seeking. And the two characters that are on those sides are Shanks and Buggy.

Personally, I find this to be an excellent coincidence. Now whether Oda intended for there opposing characters to mean anything significant is up for debate. But my interpretation proceeds them as the differing approaches when they (1) lose something significant in their life and (2) in retaliation against the unfair advantages life threw at them.

Buggy takes on the evil, greedy and infamy route in response to Roger’s execution.

As selfish as he is, Buggy did care very much for his past Captain. Most likely as a father figure of sorts considering he was rather young when he first joined as a cabin boy. He was able to make bonds with the crew mates, showing the more humanistic side of him.

In the events of Roger’s untimely sickness and later execution, I say it created an unfathomable emotional downfall on Buggy. In love and loss, it can have a negative influence on someone. He doesn’t seem to stray away from a greedy persona even with the Roger pirates. However, they acted as a sort of buffer, suppressing that intent need enough where it tends to affect only him.

With instances like Orange Town in Episode 5-8, his greed has an outward impact on the people and environment. I doubt he had any monetary reasoning for docking in the small town. There could have definitely been some looting, but that probably wasn’t their main purpose. It seems more along the lines of a power move.

Throughout his stay, he ultimately uses his Buggy Balls to obliterate different sections of the town, describing it as “his idea of fun.” Now whether because he lacked the resource or motivation, he never seemed to be this destructive as a younger cabin boy. He was still capable of violence and only doing so when needed.

He offers insight about the potential in taking on negative behaviors against the world, in combination of this obtainable freedom. He takes it with a motivation in the form of retribution.

Now how does Shanks play into this?

I said before that these two are like the sides of the same coin. And this is how far it goes:

They, literally and figuratively, were on the same boat. That being the Oro Jackson’s crew and witnessing first hand Roger’s execution.

Unlike Buggy, however, Shanks wasn’t affected in a downward spiral of vengeance. Where Buggy took on the active persona of a vindictive route, he took to Roger’s will. The concept of inherited will within One Piece is a powerful notion. Especially with how it plays into the influence of a character and the world around them.

Roger’s will is directed more towards the importance of adventure and unbridled freedom. Doing something for yourself and “destroying” the world in a round-about way.

He is the opposite of Buggy by choosing the path of piracy in leniency. He isn’t necessarily upright and morally good in all regards. Because I’m certain he could have done bad things. But his outlooks on life make him move forward from the past.

Meanwhile, Buggy is situated into his past persona, and possibly due to the loss of his captain, by striving to be the King of the Pirates. Buggy has a connection to it that many others wouldn’t have known about until around Sabaody and Marineford. This need with the title is one of the defining elements of being greedy to an unexpected turn in his life.

This plays in well with his narcistic attitude in blaming others for mistakes he’s made in the past. Specifically where he blames Shanks for “making” him accidently eat his devil fruit. While he does find a use in his powers, he remains to be bitter about it. A reaction like this shows a character that ties himself with things he wish were different, believing that acting on them in the future will somehow change it. And about the only way he finds some use in it is fulfilling his desire to be at the top. A familiar form that ties him to Roger in the past.

Of course, I’m not implying that Roger’s death sparked his greed, because it is quite obvious he was always like that. No, it’s more of he represents the expected type who find satisfaction in titles. The expected results of Roger’s last words that the world paints into perspective. Buggy’s the negative aftermath that people expect when the world changes.

Because in simplistic sense, change begets destruction.

Change creates numerous responses that guide people, and it can be interpreted in broad groups. The results of these events divide people and their motivations, creating a diverse but also destructive world within One Piece.

~~~~~~~~

#one piece #analysis #themes #manga #world issues reflection #antagonist reflection #honestly this is me rambling trying to make a clear point #one piece analysis

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sethrine-writes · 5 years

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Devil-sitter May Cry, Ch. 3

Pairing: Dante x F!Reader, Vergil x F!Reader (Undecided)

Words: 2150

Warning: Cuteness, Defensive/protective Nero

Story Summary: Low on cash and desperate for a job, you reply to a flyer for a babysitting position. Little did you know that the opportunity to watch over two special boys would bring your life so much mayhem and adventure…and, perhaps, a chance at a family of your own.

A/N: First day on the job! How does the morning go down? Guess you gotta read to find out...!

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Chapter 3 - Early Morning Start

Waking up at 5:30 a.m. had never brought upon such relief and excitement as it did that particular morning.

The brothers of Devil May Cry had asked you to be at the shop by around seven, and given your one-hour commute, the early morning wake-up was a necessary evil you would gladly deal with.

A hasty breakfast of toast and the last few dredges of orange juice in your fridge were downed quickly as you rushed to get ready for the day ahead. You flung your bag over your shoulder, ensuring for the third time since waking that your bus pass was in the front pocket, and practically ran out the door and out of the complex to the bus stop just down the block.

Devil May Cry was on the other side of Red Grave City, and you happened to live near the outskirts of the bordering town. Luckily, the bus route had a drop off close to the shop, barely a five minute walking distance that gave you time to, once again, calm the nervous energy that had been building during your ride.

First day jitters were always the worst, but having met the boys beforehand gave your mind a sense of ease you were glad to have.

You approached the shop with time to spare, enough to ask any last-minute questions you had about caring for the boys. Just as you made to open the door, it swung out, revealing a grinning Dante on the other side.

"Ah, right on time," he mused, and you barely had a moment to wonder how he knew you were right there in the first place before you were being ushered inside.

"We got an easy job lined up for today," he began straight away, "so we should be back before dinner time, if everything goes smoothly. If not, then the boys will be sure to hound you for something decent to eat, so anything in the fridge is fair game."

You nodded along as Dante gave you the general run-down of how the day usually progressed, as well as giving you some tips for general things that would come in handy for caring for the boys. He even ensured you knew the basics of answering the phone, just in case a call came in.

"I think Vergil wrote some other things down," Dante mused after a moment, shifting some papers around on the much neater-looking desk with a bit of confusion.

"On your left," Vergil spoke up suddenly, nearly causing you to jump out of your skin with how close he was. Where did he even come from?!

"You're really good at that sneaking thing," you said aloud, flustered from having been surprised.

"So I've been told," he all but deadpanned as he moved to the opposite side of the desk and plucked a small notebook from under a few sealed envelopes.

"I've not written much," he said, "only the most important details. See to it that V's schedule is kept to."

Vergil held the small notebook out to you, of which you took immediately from his grasp. You thanked him sincerely, of which earned you a small nod from the intimidating man.

"I think you've got it from here," Dante grunted as he hefted what looked like a massive sword over his shoulder with ease, one you hadn't realized had been leaning against the desk this whole time. You were sure your eyes were as big as saucers at seeing such a display, forgetting momentarily that you had been hired by demon hunters to watch over their sons.

"Y-yeah, of course," you assured, rattling off the few things that deemed to be highlighted. "Uh, Nero is high-energy, so keep him snacked up and occupied; inhaler for V is in the second desk drawer; outside play after lunch; no naps after three, or bedtime will be hell. And keep to V's schedule, got it."

"She may survive us, yet," Dante chuckled as he glanced over to Vergil, who answered with a quirk of a smile.

You only had that moment to really study the twins and their attire, how they both wore full length coats made of well-worn leather, hands braced with fingerless gloves. Instead of a massive sword like Dante's, Vergil held a sleek katana within his grasp, elegant in its design, from what you were able to see of it.

They were so very different.

"Nero and V are awake," Vergil informed as he and Dante moved toward the front doors. "They will be ready for breakfast."

"I'll get to it, then," you assured, watching the twins head out. As a final thought, you couldn't help but wish them luck on their hunt.

"Be careful out there!"

They both turned to fix you with oddly amused looks, Dante giving a playful scoff as Vergil simply continued out the door.

"Don't miss us too much, babe," Dante parted with a wink, and just like that, you were left alone in the main room of Devil May Cry, both a business and home to two demon hunters and their young sons, of whom you would be watching over for the foreseeable future.

What a world you lived in.

You glanced down at the small notebook in your hand, flipping it open to find Vergil's neat penmanship inside. True to his word, there were bullets of immediate information, such as specific times V usually did specific things. Medicine and stretches after breakfast, usually a small nap after outside play, and more stretches right before dinner.

Bedtime routine wouldn't be necessary for your first day on the job, but it was nice that Vergil had the forethought to jot everything down for when you would inevitably need it. You'd been told they had hectic schedules and often responded to calls as they came in, so there were certain to be days you would be on night watch, as well.

Closing the notebook, you placed it within your bag for safekeeping, hefting the tote off your shoulder and leaving it in the chair behind the desk for the time being.

The kitchen entrance was just to the left side of the desk, obscured somewhat by a slight wall partition. You made your way into the area, finding the kitchen and dining area modest in size and pretty well kept. The counters and stove top were clean, as was the table, yet there were some dishes left in one side of the double sinks from what looked like their dinner the night previous.

Well, they were busy, single dads who ran a business together - what did you honestly expect?

Already set on the task at hand, you began shifting the dishes about as you filled the opposite side with warm, soapy water. You'd be dirtying some, anyways, so there wasn't really any reason to leave soiled plates and pans and cutlery lying about if you were already going to wash what you used.

It was as you were sliding the dirty dishes into their makeshift bubble bath to soak that you heard movement from behind, a yawn and the soft little thumps of feet hitting hardwood.

You turned, smiling sweetly at finding Nero and V standing just outside the kitchen, groggy-eyed and still sporting their pajamas.

"Good morning, you two," you greeted warmly, shifting into babysitter mode, or as your best friend liked to call it, your "mother hen" mode.

"Morning," Nero replied, followed by a grumbled, sleepy version of V's own greeting as he yawned and rubbed at his eyes sleepily.

It seemed he was a bit more on the sluggish side, but Nero took it in stride and carefully led V by the hand toward the table, ensuring his cousin had made it into the chair before taking up the one right beside him.

Frankly, it was an incredibly cute display, one you had a feeling you would be seeing quite a lot of in the future.

"Anything in particular you boys want for breakfast?" you asked as you opened the fridge, finding a decent variety of foods for both meals and snacks. "I was thinking maybe omelets-"

"Oh, spinach and cheese and bacon!" Nero shouted out excitedly, hands fisted against the table in an eager display. "V likes ham and cheese in his."

"Yeah? Well, I think I can manage that just fine. How about some juice?"

"Orange juice!"

"Apple, please."

You grabbed the two containers and set them on the counter, rummaging through the upper cabinets until you came across the cups. You poured each juice a little over halfway to avoid any major spills and handed them over, orange for Nero, and apple for V.

They both thanked you and smiled big, Nero almost immediately downing half his cup's worth while V sipped at his as he slowly continued to blink away the lingering sleepiness he held.

Satisfied that the boys were placated for the moment, you went about starting breakfast, gathering all the ingredients and rummaging around to find the utensils necessary to cook with. Lucky for you, it wasn't too hard to find what you needed, and within minutes, the kitchen was smelling of fried bacon and ham pieces.

As you cooked, you could hear Nero talking animatedly to V about the dream he had last night, going into vivid detail about the monsters he fought on a far-off planet.

It still amazed you just how vibrant a child Nero was, especially after seeing his bashful demeanor upon your first meeting. It really did seem like he was just wary of new people, not necessarily shy, just guarded. Once he'd gotten a chance to be around you, it had been such a jarring change into seeing his true personality, and it was largely thanks to V's eagerness to include Nero in what he had been doing.

You continued to muse on your thoughts while cooking, plating up the omelets as they finished. You then made your way back to the table and placed their respective meals in front of them, once again heralding thanks and sweet grins as both of them dug in.

Satisfied, you went back to the double sinks, going about washing the dishes that had been soaking. Luckily, there weren't too many, and the stuck-on bits were washing away with relative ease.

"Aren't you going to eat, too?" V asked suddenly.

"I already had breakfast before I got here," you assured, turning to see that Nero had nearly devoured his omelet, already over halfway finished with his meal.

You were suddenly glad you had made his out of two eggs instead of just one.

V stared at you for a long moment as if contemplating something, but eventually tucked back into his food with a little smile. You paused to refill their cups with juice and handed over napkins for messy mouths, moving back to finish off the previous night's dishes and beginning on the ones you had just sullied..

When you turned back to see if V had finally finished so that you could gather their plates, you were met with Nero eating half an omelet, and V missing his plate.

"Whoa, hey!" you startled, catching the boys' abrupt attention. "Nero, isn't that V's?"

Nero's baby blues narrowed immediately in a defensive way, but V was quick to cut in.

"I was finished! I got full," he said, though you were momentarily doubtful.

"You sure? You didn't eat very much," you gently questioned.

"I don't really eat like Nero does," he supplied with a little smile. "Uncle Dante says he's got lots of energy that needs lots of fuel, but I don't have that."

"And that's okay," Nero defended rather vehemently, "because you can still do lots of things, and I can help finish them. Like breakfast. And races in the park."

"Alright, alright, I understand," you appeased, though it was something that was still cause for some concern. "I'm not angry. I'm still learning how you guys do things, so be patient with me, and I'll keep a willing and open mind, okay? If there's something I need to know, don't hesitate to tell me."

V nodded as Nero gave a somewhat affirmative hum, though he still seemed a bit defensive, perhaps still thinking he was getting in trouble. Whatever the case, you cleared the table once he finished off the rest of V's omelet, leaving behind their juice cups, and made back to the soapy water.

"Why don't you two go get dressed for the day, and we can do V's morning stretches before finding something fun to play. Sound good?"

Both V and Nero seemed on board with the plan, both scooting out of their seats with more vigor than they came into the kitchen with, finally up and at 'em and ready for the day.

Something told you that you had your work cut out for you.

#dmc #devil may cry #dmc dante #dmc vergil #dmc nero #dmc v #dmc au #kid nero #kid v #babysitter au #reader #reader-insert #female reader

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darkmindsthinktwistedthoughts · 5 years

Text

Devil’s Trust pt2

Warnings: Strong language, Moblord styling warlords.

Masterlist

---

Chapter 2

Rumour mills were in full production. The gossip circles were tapping out messages on the underground jungle drums throughout the city and word was out … The Ghost was here!

“Beware the shadows and its moving shade. Be mindful of your actions and the repercussions made. Judgement comes to those who don’t. Beware the Ghost.”

Every family with ties to the underground knew the stories. They were told and passed on generation to generation. Tales the grown-ups told the children the same way the ordinary everyday people would recite a fairy tale. Except these were different.

Fairy tales were edited narratives, sugar-coated and glossing over the gory details to give the next generation growing up in the world a little moral guidance. When it came to the stories about the Ghost there was nothing sweet about them. Even in the dark underbelly of the world, there were lines you didn’t cross, rules you obeyed and when that was ignored it was the Ghost that took you.

It was because nothing about it was hidden and all of it was true that is struck fear into the hearts of all those living in the underworld. The Ghost was the avenging angel in their world. The Judge, jury and executioner at your final supper. They were responsible for making the unrepentant pay the price owed. Every detail behind the stories of the Ghost could be easily found in the lines of text written by the coroner; if they found the body at all. The question hanging in the air… who was the Ghost targeting now?

---

Two minutes, it was all he could claw back from the time given to him by Sasuke. He had to get out of the main flow of traffic. The road opened up after a few sharp turns, the wheels of his car were smoking as he pulled hard on the handbrake and went down some roads that were so narrow, they could take the wing mirrors off the car had he not been more aware of the space provided.

His engine as it raced through the old cobblestone routes of the old city filled the air with a monstrous roar even as the vibrations threatened to shake the chassis from the rest of the car. The other vehicles had not given up the pursuit but were now forced to follow him in single file. He wanted to get them out of town but that would be asking for too much. He followed the labyrinthine roads following a map in his own head and decided drawing them out to the dockyard was the best option. You’re in my playground. Don’t presume you can back me into a corner when I know all the short cuts.

The smile on his face grew deeper as his focus on the road ahead cleared. He was not so much the vision of a man being pushed in a murderous pursuit through the twisting veins of the city but that of one that was simply out for a drive on a long weekend. Yes, this was his city. The dark side streets and alleys were his bread and butter, all the old roads the jam that just served to make his nightlife all the sweeter for his hunt.

As the front of his car exited the alleyway like a bullet from a shotgun. The cobbles under his wheels gave way to slick dirt. The moisture from the water in the air here meant the ground was never what you could call dry. The natural clay content of it meant it was like skating on an icy pond. The other cars exited behind him and began to separate up to cover as many routes behind him as they could.

It was laughably predictable and he couldn’t avoid the dry chuckle that left him as he glanced in his rear-view mirror and once more pulled on his hand brake causing his car to spin on the ground under it so he could come face to face with his pursuers. The salt clogged mud slick sprayed in arcs by his rear bumper before falling still on the ground once more. He could almost feel the hesitation from them as he changed the game from cat and mouse into one of chicken.

Mitsuhide put his hand up to the handle on the roof clicking a hidden button that slid back a small compartment there revealing a primed and loaded gun. Now then, who’s first?

---

Stepping foot back into HQ Nobunaga was almost immediately accosted by a highly strung Hideyoshi. The man had been sitting in a chair by reception and practically pounced the second he saw his Boss’s highly polished shoes touch the tiles.

“You’re back!” The man blurted out as if in shock. Warm caramel brown eyes searched Nobu from top to toe as if he were expecting some sort of mortal wound to be present.

“Naturally.” Nobu replied rather lazily as he fixed his right-hand man with a nondescript look. He was a little amused but mostly thankful that it was past office hours and there were no clients that would be in need of explanations as to why the Vice President was acting like someone had put itching powders in his boxers.

“You didn’t answer your phone. I was worried.” Hideyoshi spoke with panic still clear in his voice and slightly shaking. You really would make someone a fine wife one day Yoshi. Still, for all your fussing I can’t deny you have been a dependable ally during some of the darker times.

“When are you never worried?” Nobu replied in exasperation failing to suppress the sigh that was building inside him.

“Why didn’t you answer?” Hideyoshi appeared hurt by being ignored and it was obvious it had been yet another thing he deemed life-threatening or at the very least major enough that could yet again bring down the foundations of their company that were already standing on rocky terrain.

He didn’t know if it was the lingering effects of his time at the Birdcage or if he had simply found the eye of the emotional storm that had been raging inside him. He was reluctant to dwell too long on such a thing but he couldn’t keep his newfound amusement from escaping him.

Nobu smirked slightly and replied. “I left for a few hours. I fail to see what disasters could have befallen during that time that could not be easily handled by the men I left in my place. A fact that was confirmed when I turned my phone back on and was bombarded with several messages one of which was our new resident tech expert informing me that the matter was in hand.”

Hideyoshi stood where he was mouth agape at the succinct rundown of events. A surge of satisfaction washed over Nobu as he succeeded in rendering the other man speechless. The doors to the underground car park opened revealing a spectacled arrival carrying a bag printed with a grocery store logo.

“You fixed that?” Having found his voice again Hideyoshi stated more in shock than as a question as he turned his attention on the new arrival. Sasuke quickly looked between the two men noting that they were both showing polar opposite levels of the emotional spectrum and made the connection to the only incident of interest for the day.

“Yes. It did take a little bit of creative hacking to do it but I was able to shut down the news drone and have the incident written off as a scene being filmed for a new movie. Hardly something out with my skill set.” Sasuke pushed up his glasses causing them to glint in a way that made him look even more like a casual superhero than normal.

“You think people will buy that?” Hideyoshi stammered at the unbelievable ease with which Sasuke replied. Nobunaga stood silently watching the two converse. He plunged his hand deep into his trouser pocket his fingertips finding the edge of his key that would allow him to escape to his rooms.

“They already have.” Sasuke flashed his smartphone with a still image of the street view below the drone and the new headline “High-Speed preview of new action movie – was the Director’s choice of using the real world refreshing or irresponsible?” Nobunaga’s lips tugged into a large satisfied smile and chuckled with the amusement of the audacious plan as well as the apparent effect, it had on Hideyoshi.

“You don’t exactly look shocked by any of this.” Hideyoshi stated trying to figure out why he seemed so lax about the events. Ever since the companies had merged, he had to confess he had a hard time getting a read on this young man. His expressionless face gave nothing away and it was unsettling to not even be able to detect a real shift in tone as he spoke. Hideyoshi was a people person or as Mitsuhide had pointed out on more than one occasion a people pleaser. To be unable to get even subliminal guidance from someone as to how to assist them or what they are even thinking unnerved him.

“Kenshin is my Boss. Being asked to shut down a few cameras and changing a few things on the city grid to redirect attention is nothing.” Sasuke replied in a calm manner with a little shrug that only seemed to frustrate Hideyoshi even more.

---

The sound of tape being pulled from a roll and placed over cardboard almost seemed to echo in the almost empty rooms as the last of their things was finally packed. Her cat sat by the window where it had claimed a place for itself the second Mitsuhide had retrieved it from Takahiro’s loft space. Swishing its tail unhappily, as its blissful time enjoying the sunlight was being disturbed by the sounds of moving.

It had been a whirlwind experience coming back to Azuchi HQ after everything that happened. She had thought to try to explain everything at the church about her living arrangements but it seemed Mitsuhide already knew that she no longer had her apartment. He could have left her to return to Takahiro’s apartment but it seemed that was not an idea he wished to entertain. All of the familiar faces welcomed her regardless of the tension that was present in the air. Something had clearly been happening but it was going to be a few days before anyone explained the current situation to her.

Staying in his rooms at Azuchi was only ever supposed to be temporary. He was pulling strings and taking late-night phone calls trying to secure somewhere new. He wanted her to be safe it was key and his number one priority. Whilst it was safe at HQ Mitsuhide hadn’t felt entirely comfortable leaving her there on a permanent basis. [Name] was effectively a magnet for danger, as far as he could work out. Whilst they had survived a lot, he had no liking for the idea of leaving her in a place where she could easily become embroiled in yet another “plan”. On top of that if the others discovered [Name] was related in some distant way to the enemy he really didn’t like the idea of what might happen to her.

She took another look around the room just in case she had missed something they needed. Thinking that it looked just as empty as it had done when she first came here. Mitsuhide wasn’t exactly minimalist by choice it was something to do with his work. The less you have the fewer things people can use against you, but the lack of luxury items or things you might expect as a common standard of living somewhere were also not present in the apartment. He was never really at home to notice that an electric kettle or a microwave might actually help him a little in the mornings or late evenings. The longer she stayed the more she noticed little things she had taken for granted, like a hairdryer. She had taken to picking up these missed items on her way home from work.

Mitsuhide said nothing to the accumulation of objects appearing in his apartment. He knew what they all were and how to use them just had never seen a need to have them. They were together and would be for a long time. His small isolated little hole had been filled with something far closer to a kind of peace than he ever thought someone like him would even have a hope of seeing. It was a form of culture shock that was not entirely unpleasant. Despite his home being taken over with progressively more acquired bric-a-brac and miscellaneous goods, he felt comfortable and at ease. She had turned his place into the same warm and inviting area her apartment was, and he found he sort of liked it.

“Hey Kitten, you got any more ready to go?” A lively voice called out before the person attached to it had even managed to make it into the room.

“Think this is the last one.” [Name] called back turning to smile at the men who had been helping shift most of the belongings.

“Good because I’m not making any more trips.” Ieyasu huffed cracking open the lid on a bottle of mineral water and chugging half of it in one go.

“It was nice of you to help out Yasu.” [Name] smiled sweetly unaffected by the salty blonde’s attitude.

“I’m only doing it to shut Hideyoshi up and to get you and the body collector out of my hair.” Ieyasu hastily started to make an excuse desperate to hide the redness he felt breaking out on his face. He wasn’t exactly a stranger to interacting with women but there were certain types of them that seemed to trigger him to fluster badly. Masa often teased him that it looked like he was a teenager having a short circuit because a pretty girl spoke to them.

“Body collector?” She inclined her head a quizzical expression replacing that beaming smile.

“Best not to ask Lass. Yasu’s still a little salty over having to deal with what is left of your fella’s… whatever he does.” Masa chuckled and put his hand on her head. [Name] pulled herself back swatting the hand from her and met his smile with a brief glare that was rendered powerless by the man’s lack of concern.

“It’s strange to think I’m leaving here again.” She rolled her eyes and glanced about again.

“It’s not too late you know Kitten. Just have to say the word and I could steal you away…” Masa moved like a cat sliding up closer and leaning over to whisper in her ear. Failing spectacularly as his volume control was definitely off.

“My-my, someone is feeling confident despite his lack of depth perception.” A teasing voice came some somewhere behind them carrying a chilling edge to it. All three of them turned to see Mitsuhide propped up against the doorway, one hand in his trouser pocket. The smile on his face at first glance appeared pleasant but didn’t reach his eyes at all, it could send a shiver up anyone’s back.

---

It had taken some time to secure a residence for them but after conducting some final checks he was finally back at HQ. That little diversion from earlier had been interesting but he was still thankful for it to have reached its conclusion swiftly. He parked his car alongside the van that stood there with its loading doors wide open revealing box after box piled up methodically, each one labelled in her delicate handwriting. Looks like I’m a little late to the party on this one. I wonder who got the job of assisting the Princess. I could see Hideyoshi doing that, the man never knows when to stop smothering.

Moving from the car park to the elevator in the lobby he was hit with a feeling of something a little nostalgic. He had never really taken the time to appreciate the building. It was a base of operations, somewhere to work out of and run back too. It was also naturally a legitimate business and on a weekday was as busy as an anthill at a picnic. Today though it was quiet and as he stepped into the lift, he realised that the significance of the place was about to shift for him. He would be here but it was only going to be for work. He would maintain a room but it would only be for use on occasion. Is this what a normal life feels like? Working and then going home somewhere else?

The closer he got to his rooms the more he was aware of activity. And then just before he entered, he heard the unmistakable voice of Masa.

“It’s not too late you know Kitten. Just have to say the word and I could steal you away…”

“My-my, someone is feeling confident despite his lack of depth perception.” He stopped in the doorway adopting an air of nonchalance when he was, in fact, feeling anything but. The familiar tease in his voice didn’t manage to cover for him either. Of all the people why him? It’s not as bad as Shingen I suppose but still…

“I knew you were there.” Masa snorted meeting Mitsuhide’s smile with a knowing grin of his own. It was like watching a cat and dog in a face-off about to have a scuffle.

“Then you are also lacking in your sense of personal preservation.” Mitsuhide slowly moved closer to [Name] pushing himself between her and Masa forcing the other man back. Masa was chuckling and looking at Mitsuhide as if he had just found something brand new and shiny to play with. Don’t try to play games with me. You can only imagine what I will do and even then, I would easily surpass your delusions. Wait a minute why am I so annoyed right now?

“Have you met Masa? The guy is a walking disaster who is basically a pain in my ass.” Ieyasu spoke up disrupting the atmosphere enough to dissipate some of the friction.

“Haha, I’m going to miss you guys.” Her laughter from behind him snuffed out the last of his rising turmoil. She was a miracle balm to his fraying nerves. He was still not used to this thing called “love” they shared. It still threatened to be an all-consuming fire he would happily die in.

“No need to pull that face [Name].” Masa adjusted himself and pulled back. He had amused himself enough and didn’t wish to upset Mitsuhide further. It was so easy to see the emotions playing in the usually unreadable man. He had seen them clear as day in his friend after that fake funeral incident and the only one oblivious to it was apparently the man himself.

“He’s right, not like you are going so far away you can’t visit. I will probably be busy but you will no doubt find a way to disturb me.”

“Wouldn’t hurt you to be a bit more honest there Yasu.” Masa laughed and roughly rubbed his knuckles over the top of the fluffy blonde’s head, before picking up the last sealed box. “Anyway, I’ll take this down to the van.”

“I’ll hold the door for you.” Ieyasu leapt forward and barged past Masa nearly knocking him over in a rush to escape the room.

“Being awfully friendly today aren’t you Yasu?” Masa looked a little shocked at the sudden show of enthusiastic helpfulness.

“Not really I just don’t want to stay around here and play gooseberry.”

“Those two make a good pair.” [Name] said wistfully as she watched the others leave. It made him feel like he wanted to make her look at him.

“They do have an extraordinary ability to make up for each other’s deficiency.” He turned around locking her small frame in his arms. “Now then little one whatever shall I do with you?” I never had myself pegged for a possessive man. You really do have a curious power little mouse. The things you do to me.

“Me? What did I do now? I haven’t done anything.” [Name] startled and her blue eyes began to flicker around wandering the room attempting to remember anything that might have incurred punishment.

“You are very guilty my dear, you just haven’t realised it yet.” He dipped low and sealed her lips shut with his. I will never get bored with watching you, my love. If this is a dream I don’t want to wake up.

“Mmfph… Mitsuhide! Don’t tell me you’re jealous.” She placed her hand on his chest pushing him back. Her upturned eyes looking at his searching for answers he didn’t wish to give. Jealous? Ah, so that’s what that was…

“Alright… I won’t tell you.” His lips curved into a wolf-like grin as he claimed her mouth again.

---

The stars in the sky were obscured by that sickly glow from the city. He could only very faintly pick out one or two points of light above him. The air felt heavy but he was unsure whether that was an omen of rain or the echo of his own discomfort.

His time at the club had been a welcome distraction even if he hadn’t been able to completely let go. The carefully crafted world of his was becoming more unstable. Voices carried in the wind, not wanting to openly admit the facts. They were concerned once more and it all had a negative impact on the trust, they had in Azuchi. A trust they had in him. The firm hand he once held the city with was being pried open and he could feel it slipping like sand through his fingers. But who the hell is it? Who is still pulling strings?

He sighed and lowered himself down onto the bench in the pavilion. His gaze moved from a fixed point in the past to the present and he frowned. Nobody liked change, but that is exactly what was happening. Esshu should have collapsed but didn’t. There was one reason for that, the only one that made any logical sense and it was that there was more than one head running the show. Wheels and cogs began to turn in his mind as he thought through various proposals and suggestions that he could use to secure a foot in the door at the other company. Anything I offer would be much harder to refuse if I could just find the focal point. That weak link in the chain that holds all the strings. Who do I know that could find that?

---

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savvyqueen18 · 4 years

Text

SilveeLocke | Let's Go Eevee ZombieLocke | Pt.3

This features one of my friend’s characters, he enjoyed seeing him when he read it. Tambien, feliz Cinco de Mayo! AND TACO TUESDAY!!!

♡♡♡

Part 3: Bee-tween Cities

♡♡♡

>Next Part

>Previous Part

>Part 1

>Meet Silviana

>Meet Xander

The forest was lush and green at this time of year. As Silviana walked into the beautiful forrest, she felt the soft grass squish beneath her feet. The sounds of many different pokémon could be heard throughout the forrest. If she listened closely she could make out the distinct joyful squeals of Butterfree, the buzzing of Beedrill, and the tiny cries of the Caterpie and Wurmple.

"Wow," Silviana breathed, "I didn't know my pokémon journey would bring me to such beautiful locations. Being out here," she breathed slowly, "it just makes you forget doesn't it?" She looked at Junipur who was walking alongside her.

Junipur had a look on her face that Silviana couldn't entirely comprehend. Its little brows were furrowed and one ear was flat, the other ear was open to Silviana's voice. She walked along silently beside the young girl.

I know she doesn't like me, but trust has to be earned right? Mom said trust between pokémon and trainers is a mutual thing, so maybe I don't trust her enough.

Silviana looked down solemnly as she thought. Klunk

She blinked a couple times as something hollow hit her head. In front of her was a yellow pokémon dangling from a string.

"Oh hello!" Silviana gently held up her hands, the pokémon lowered itself to them. It's eyes shown happily and its hard shell shimmered brightly even in the dim light of the forrest. Silviana smiled, "You're so pretty, I'd love to have you on my team. We're going to tour around the entire Kanto region."

The little yellow pokémon made a noise that Silviana could only interpret as happy. Pulling out a pokéball, she genty tapped the pokémon. A bright flash sucked it up and the ball moved three times before stopping.

"Wow that was easier than I–" Silviana paused midway through her sentence, a hard buzzing sounded behind her. She turned swiftly around to come face to face with a large group of Beedrill. She took a slow step back, "J-J-Junipur, do something."

Catching the Beedrills attention, Junipur walked confidently up to the first Beedrill. It began to growl, from the little spots of sunlight on the ground, little stars began to shoot up at the buzzing pokémon. A majority of them scattered, but some of them stood their ground and withstood the attack.

Junipur backed up a couple of steps and took off.

"Hey Junipur!" Silviana turned around and called to her. She glanced back to see the Beedrill shaking off the attack, "No, no you're right. Run!"

As quickly as she could, she chased after the little Eevee, she was out of breath within seconds as she followed Junipur through paths that were ultimately made for small pokémon. She was scratched as prickly bushes and branches clawed at her. Still she kept running, until she didn't hear the buzz of the Beedrill she would keep running. Silviana looked down to see where Junipur had went. Gone, the brown pokémon was gone.

Oh no, Oh No, OH NO! This can't be happening!

Silviana looked back to see if Junipur had somehow fallen behind, something on the forrest floor caught her foot.

With a yell, she tumbled to the floor and rolled halfway under the cover a bush. Groaning, she clutched her arm. She made a move to try and slide out from her half cover when Junipur came flying at her, the little pokémon tried to push her further into the bush, and when Silviana opened her mouth to object, Junipur’s tail was quickly shoved into it. Silviana saw Junipur swing her head around, her ears flicked all over. When Silviana really tried to listen, she could hear the buzzing of the Beedrill’s wings fade.

When there was nothing but the ambient sounds of the forrest, she put her hand on Junipur. The little brown pokémon shuffled Silviana’s hand off and slowly walked from where they were hidden.

Silviana achingly got up from where she had tripped, feeling around she sighed with relief that nothing was too badly hurt or broken. She looked about her, they had been run off of the path by the Beedrill, she pulled out the map she had gotten from the forrest rangers.

“Okay, if we entered from this way,” she examined the map further, “but did they chase us this way? Or that way?” She looked around to see if there was any markers, seeing nothing but the lush green forrest aorund her, she sighed, “We’ll just have to find our way out of this mess by ourselves Junipur.” She looked at the Eevee. It was glaring back at her, “Don’t think you can blame me for this,” Silviana crossed her arms, “you’re the one that thought using swift on all of them was a smart idea.”

Junipur just flicked her ear and proceeded to walk off. Slapping her hands on her sides Silviana walked to catch up with her.

After a long hour, they had finally made their way to one of the main paths. Silviana glanced down one end of the path, she was surprised by a voice calling out to her in the opposite direction.

“Hey girl! Are you lost?” A friendly voice called to her. The young man looked much older than her and was dressed casually in a black tee-shirt and jeans. He had a red cap that covered his green hair and a red and white jacket. He smiled at her, “You a trainer? Is this your first time out?” He threw a few more questions in her direction.

Silviana’s head spun, “I, ummm… I am lost,” she said at last, “If you could help lead me out, I’m on my way to Pewter and–”

“VEE!” Junipur yelled at her, hopping up onto Siviana’s backpack, she stared the stranger down from Silviana’s shoulder.

“Wow, that’s a spunky little Eevee you have there,” The man smiled.

“Oh please tell me you don’t want to battle,” Silviana gave him a defeated look.

The young man just let out a bellowing laugh, “I’m not going to battle a trainer that’s just started on her journey!” He laughed in between each of his words, composing himself after a moment he said, “I’m way too strong for you, I’ve already completed my badge challenge,” he opened his coat to reveal many more than the eight Gym badges for this region.

“Oh wow! There’s so many!” Silviana gasped.

He chuckled and turned around, “Well let’s get you started on some then, Pewter should be your first gym battle right?” He asked as he began to lead her.

“Yes that’s right.”

He thought for a split second, “Have you caught any grass types yet?”

“Umm,” She pulled out the pokémon she just caught and released it, “I have a Bellsprout and this one,” she held the yellow pokémon in her arms, “I’m sure once it turns into a Butterfree I will have–"

She was interrupted by more laughing from the other man, "That's a Kakuna! it's not going to turn into a Butterfree, it will turn into a Beedrill!"

Silviana looked at the Kakuna, "A B-B-Beedrill," holding it out with a defeated sigh, "I guess I know what to call you now... Steng." The yellow pokémon smiled at its new name.

"Nice name," the boy said as she put her pokémon away, "you said you had a Bellsprout? I'd use that and train them up a little more." He kept talking as he walked, he sometimes told stories of his adventures as examples for her.

"Wow, you've been all over the world haven't you?" Silviana gazed at him admirably. She then looked at him questioningly, "Why are you headed back to Pallet Town if you're on a journey to travel the world?"

His look changed then, his smile disappeared and there was a hard emotion flickering in his eyes, "Just for... Hireath, you could say." He gave her a solemn look, his half smile didn't cover what emotion was swirling in his eyes.

"Ah, right," She felt like she should drop the conversation right there. She awkwardly rubbed her arm. She stopped when the man's hand stretched out to stop her. Junipur tried to swat at it, but Silviana stepped back before she could scratch him. Looking at him, he had one finger over his lips and pointed forward.

Coming out of the bushes was a little green pokémon, its round head with dark spots was looking around cautiously. It waddled out to a patch of sunlight and the big bulb on its back began to shift as it soaked up the sunlight. Silviana smiled.

◇◇◇

She walked up the little flight of stairs to the route gate, she turned and happily addressed her forest guide, "That was amazing! I thought Bulbasaur were really rare!"

"Well the professor must be doing something right if they are being seen in the wild," he looked back to the forrest and with a smirk he pulled out a pokéball, "besides, I'm a Squirtle fan at heart." He turned and waved as he walked away.

Silviana waved back. She looked at Junipur as she hopped off Silviana's shoulder. The little pokémon shook out its fur, it turned to look at where the man left and flicked one of it's ears.

"Oh man, I never got his name," Silviana pouted slightly, "Oh well, I'm sure we will run into each other again," she smiled at Junipur, the Eevee turned and started walking into the building behind her, "Oh now someone wants to get moving," Silviana chuckled and walked after her.

#zombielocke #silveelocke #nuzlocke #pokemonnuzlocke #pokemon nuzlocke #pokemon #let's go eevee #let's go pikachu #my writing

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greatworldwar2 · 4 years

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• Siegfried Line

The Siegfried Line, known in German as the Westwall, was a German defensive line built during the 1930s opposite the French Maginot Line.

The official name for German defensive line construction program before and during the Second World War that collectively came to be known as the "Westwall" (and "Siegfried Line" in English) changed several times during the late 1930s reflecting areas in progress. Border Watch program (pioneering program) for the most advanced positions, Limes Program, Aachen-Saar Program, Western Air Defense Zone, Geldern Emplacement between Brüggen and Kleve. These programs were all pushed forward with the highest priority, putting a concentrated demand on available resources. The origin of the name "Westwall" is unknown, but it appeared in popular use from the middle of 1939; there is a record of Hitler sending an Order of the Day to the soldiers and the workers at the "Westwall" on May 20th, 1939.

The Border Watch program was a series of small bunkers with 50 cm (20 in) thick walls were set up with three embrasures towards the front. Sleeping accommodations were hammocks. In exposed positions, similar small bunkers were erected with small round armoured "lookout" sections on the roofs. The programme was carried out by the Border Watch (Grenzwacht), a small military troop activated in the Rhineland immediately after the region was re-militarised by Germany after having been de-militarised following the First World War. The Limes Program began in 1938 following an order by Hitler to strengthen fortifications on the western German border. Limes refers to the former borders of the Roman Empire; the cover story for the programme was that it was an archaeological study. Its Type 10 bunkers were more strongly constructed than the earlier border fortifications. These had 1.5 m (4 ft 11 in) thick ceilings and walls. A total of 3,471 were built along the entire length of the Siegfried Line. They featured a central room or shelter for 10-12 men with a stepped embrasure facing backwards and a combat section 50 cm (20 in) higher. This elevated section had embrasures at the front and sides for machine guns. The Aachen-Saar program bunkers were similar to those of the Limes programme: Type 107 double MG casemates with concrete walls up to 3.5 m (11 ft) thick. One difference was that there were no embrasures at the front, only at the sides of the bunkers. Embrasures were only built at the front in special cases and were then protected with heavy metal doors. This construction phase included the towns of Aachen and Saarbrücken. The Western Air Defence Zone continued parallel to the two other lines toward the east, and consisted mainly of concrete Flak foundations. Scattered MG42 and MG34 emplacements added additional defence against both air and land targets. Flak turrets were designed to force enemy planes to fly higher, thus decreasing the accuracy of their bombing. The Geldern Emplacement lengthened the Siegfried Line northwards as far as Kleve on the Rhine, and was built after the start of the Second World War. The Siegfried Line originally ended in the north near Brüggen in the Viersen district. The primary constructions were unarmed dugouts, but their extremely strong concrete design afforded excellent protection to the occupants. For camouflage they were often built near farms.

Standard construction elements such as large Regelbau bunkers, smaller concrete "pillboxes", and "dragon's teeth" anti-tank obstacles were built as part of each construction phase, sometimes by the thousands. Frequently vertical steel rods would be interspersed between the teeth. This standardisation was the most effective use of scarce raw materials, transport and workers, but proved an ineffective tank barrier as US bulldozer tanks simply pushed dirt bridges over these devices. "Dragon's teeth" were blocks of reinforced concrete stand in several rows on a single foundation. There are two typical sorts of barrier: Type 1938 with four rows of teeth getting higher toward the back, and Type 1939 with five rows of such teeth. Many other irregular lines of teeth were also built. Another design of tank obstacle, known as the Czech hedgehog, was made by welding together several bars of steel in such a way that any tank rolling over it would get stuck and possibly damaged. If the contour of the land allowed it, water-filled ditches were dug instead of tank traps. Examples of this kind of defence are those north of Aachen near Geilenkirchen. The early fortifications were mostly built by private firms, but the private sector was unable to provide the number of workers needed for the programs that followed; this gap was filled by the Todt Organisation. With this organisation's help, huge numbers of forced labourers up to 500,000 at a time worked on the Siegfried Line. Transport of materials and workers from all across Germany was managed by the Deutsche Reichsbahn railway company, which took advantage of the well-developed strategic railway lines built on Germany's western border in World War I. Working conditions were highly dangerous. For example, the most primitive means had to be used to handle and assemble extremely heavy armour plating, weighing up to 66 short tons.

The Siegfried Line at the start of the Second World War had serious weaknesses. German General Alfred Jodl said after the war that it was "little better than a building site in 1939", and when Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt inspected the line, the weak construction and insufficient weapons caused him to laugh. Despite France's declaration of war on Germany at the beginning of the Second World War, there was no major combat at the Siegfried Line at the start of the campaign in the west, except for a minor offensive by the French. Instead, both sides remained stuck in the so-called Phoney War, where neither side attacked the other and both stayed in their safe positions. The Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda drew foreign attention to the unfinished Westwall, in several instances showcasing incomplete or test positions to portray the project finished and ready for action. During the Battle of France, French forces made minor attacks against some parts of the line, but the majority was left untested. When the campaign finished, transportable weapons and materials were removed from the Siegfried Line and used in other places such as the Atlantic Wall defences. The concrete sections were left in place in the countryside and soon became completely unfit for defense.

With the D-Day landings in Normandy on June 6th, 1944, war in the west broke out once more. On August 24th, 1944, Hitler gave a directive for renewed construction on the Siegfried Line. 20,000 forced labourers and members of the Reichsarbeitsdienst (Reich Labour Service), most of whom were 14–16-year-old boys, attempted to re-equip the line for defence purposes. Local people were also called in to carry out this kind of work, mostly building anti-tank ditches. Even during construction, it was becoming clear that the bunkers could not withstand the newly developed armour-piercing weapons. In August 1944, the first clashes took place on the Siegfried Line; the section of the line where most fighting took place was the Hürtgenwald (Hürtgen Forest) area in the Eifel, 20 km (12 mi) southeast of Aachen. The Aachen Gap was the logical route into Germany's Rhineland and a main industrial area, and was therefore where the Germans concentrated their defence. The Americans committed an estimated 120,000 troops plus reinforcements to the Battle of Hürtgen Forest. After the Battle of Hürtgen Forest, the Battle of the Bulge began, starting in the area south of the Hürtgenwald, between Monschau and the Luxembourgish town of Echternach. This offensive was a last-ditch attempt by the Germans to reverse the course of the war in the West. German loss of life and material was severe and the effort failed. There were serious clashes along other parts of the Siegfried Line and soldiers in many bunkers refused to surrender, often fighting to the death. By early 1945 the last Siegfried Line bunkers had fallen at the Saar and Hunsrück. The British 21st Army Group also attacked the Siegfried Line. This Army Group included American formations and the resulting fighting brought total American losses to approximately 68,000. In addition, the First Army incurred over 50,000 non-battle casualties and the Ninth Army over 20,000. This brings the overall cost of the Siegfried Line Campaign, in American personnel, close to 140,000.

German propaganda, both at home and abroad, repeatedly portrayed the Westwall during its construction as an unbreachable bulwark. At the start of the war, the opposing troops remained behind their own defence lines. As a morale booster for British troops marching off to France, the Siegfried Line was the subject of a popular song: "We're Going to Hang out the Washing on the Siegfried Line". When asked about the Siegfried Line, General George S. Patton reportedly said "Fixed fortifications are monuments to man's stupidity." During the postwar period, many sections of the Siegfried Line were removed using explosives. In North Rhine Westphalia, about thirty bunkers still remain; most of the rest were either destroyed with explosives or covered with earth. Tank traps still exist in many areas; in the Eifel, they run over several kilometres. Since 1997, with the motto "The value of the unpleasant as a memorial" , an effort has been made to preserve the remains of the Siegfried Line as a historical monument. This was intended to stop reactionary fascist groups from using the Siegfried Line for propaganda purposes. Nature conservationists consider the remains of the Siegfried Line valuable as a chain of biotopes where, thanks to its size, rare animals and plants can take refuge and reproduce. This effect is magnified because the concrete ruins cannot be used for agricultural or forestry purposes.

#second world war #world war ii #military history #wwii #history #german history #fortification #german engineering #siegfried line #world war 2 #battle of the bulge

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