#and this child you would destroy if you tried to set her free || ( aesthetic. )

[raaorqtpbpdy]

Phantom Boy (4)

When the Doctors Fenton lose their son in a lab accident involving a ghost portal, the distraught parents will do anything to get him back. Even if it means breaking the immutable laws of life and death. But that thing? That’s not their boy.

First Chapter | Previous Chapter

Chapter 4: Entry of the Gladiators (Read it on AO3)

[Warnings for mind control minor violence]

Slowly, the ghosts started to come out of their hiding places. They collected their things and went back to their hobbies and projects and games. Normally, everyone left Ember's concerts with smiling faces, gushing about her new songs and still high on the excitement and exhilaration of the music she played. But now, they were somber, mournful.

"What are you all doing?" Phantom demanded. "We have to go get her back!"

"There's nothing we can do, child," Technus told him, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder which Phantom shoved off with a scowl. "We could follow the train into the human world, but there's no way to break the enthrallment. We would only end up being controlled ourselves."

"Well, we can't just stand around and do nothing!"

"Weren't you listening, Whelp?" Skulker bellowed. "We can't save her! No ghost can." His deep voice quieted. "A human might be able to free her and all the other ghosts from Freakshow's spell. All they'd have to do would be to destroy his staff, but none of them will. We can't. Just... give it up. She can't be saved."

Phantom fixed them both with a defiant glare. "I'm going anyway!" he declared.

"Child, you'll only be captured and made into an act for that horrible man's circus," Technus said. "Don't do that to yourself, Phantom."

"I just got here, became friends with you, got to spend time with all of you," Phantom said. "When you all found me, I had just lost my whole family, and you let me into yours. I don't want to lose anyone else."

"None of us want to," Skulker sneered. "We don't have a choice! You think I don't want to save Ember? I love her! But she wouldn't want us pointlessly sacrificing ourselves trying to do the impossible."

"I'm going anyway," Phantom repeated. An ordinary ghost might not be able to resist Freakshow's control, but he was no ordinary ghost. "I have to try."

He took off into the sky and cut through the ectoplasmic air like a rocket toward the closing portal the train had left the Realms through.

"Foolish whelp!" Skulker shouted after him.

The portal was shrinking rapidly, and Phantom wasn't sure he'd make it through, but he kept going at full speed, squinting his eyes almost closed from the force. He just managed to eke through, the closing gate just barely clipping the end of his spectral tail. He slowed, sighing with relief.

Below him, train tracks stretched forward and back. Not far ahead of him was a train yard, where Freakshow's circus train was slowing to a stop. Turning invisible, Phantom flew toward the train. He tried to phase inside, but for some reason, he couldn't pass through the iron sides of the train-cars. Was it ghost-proofed? Something about the metal? Phantom was beginning to wish he'd paid more attention during his parents' ghost lectures.

The train finally pulled to a complete stop with a hydraulic hiss of the steam engine, which, Phantom noted, was very old fashioned and gothic. Freakshow was nothing if not dedicated to his aesthetic. The doors of several cars slid open, and Freakshow himself stepped out of one and immediately began barking orders to the ghosts that flew out of the others.

Dozens of ghosts started to set up the massive black and red striped tent and the smaller side-show tents. Ember was one of them. All Phantom wanted to do was grab her and shake her out of her stupor, but then he caught sight of the glowing orb atop Freakshow's staff, and he stilled. He watched as a ghost of a tattooed woman with a spiked Mohawk flew over to him and whispered something in his ear.

"Is that so, Lydia?" Freakshow asked. "Well, why don't I greet our unexpected guest? Where is he?"

To Phantom's horror, the tattooed ghost pointed directly at Phantom, and Freakshow turned his sickening grin on him.

"Reveal yourself," he said, and Phantom dropped his invisibility right away. "Where did you come from?"

"I came to try to save Ember," he answered. He couldn't stop himself. He couldn't move.

"How noble," Freakshow mocked, "and yet, how incredibly idiotic! No matter. It seems I've gotten myself two new acts for the price of one. I'm sure I can find a suitable place for you in my show."

Phantom nodded. Despite all the warnings he'd received, he hadn't expected the magic staff to be such a powerful influence on his mind. He felt as if his mind had been attached to a wireless game-controller, and someone else was pressing the buttons. He wondered if the other ghosts were aware like he was, even as they blindly followed Freakshow's commands, or if that was a side-effect of the fact that he wasn't a natural ghost, that he himself was a freak show, an experiment gone horribly wrong.

How stupid he'd been.

Phantom was on a tightrope, draped in black robes to look like the grim reaper, swinging a scythe as an audience of all flavors of goths looked on in amazement. Below him, Ember sat on a piano bench, playing suspenseful music on a calliope with blue flames billowing out of the pipes as she hit certain notes.

He'd thought... hoped... that maybe in just this one instance, being different from the other ghosts might turn out to be an advantage, but instead, he was just as helpless as the rest of them. He should have listened to Skulker and Technus. He should have stayed in the Zone, where it was safe. But he just couldn't imagine kind, free-spirited, anti-authoritarian Ember under the thumb of some sick ringmaster. She didn't deserve that. None of them did.

He had to resist.

Resist.

RESIST!

A broken ring of white light flickered around Phantom's waist, not transforming him back into his human form, but doing something. It gave him a jolt, a mental reset, and he was finally able to shake off the mind control. He swooped down off the tightrope and swung his scythe once more, directly at Freakshow. The ringmaster yelped in alarm and jumped out of the way, but the scythe distracted him long enough for Phantom to try something else.

He flew right at the ringmaster, phasing out of the black robe as a misdirect, so Freakshow didn't know where to look, and flying right into his stomach, knocking him to the ground and sending his staff skidding across the dusty floor.

"What is this?" Freakshow shouted in alarm. "How did you break free? No ghost can break free."

"You've never met a ghost like me before," Phantom said, and phased Freakshow halfway into the ground while he went to pick up the staff.

"No! Ghosts! Get him! Retrieve my staff and bring it to me! Lydia! Get me off this floor!"

Every ghost except the tattooed lady rushed Phantom at once, but the half-ghost was faster. He shot toward the staff and as soon as it was in his hand, he raised it and swung the top end toward the ground as hard as he could.

Scores of ghosts were already on top of him as the orb cracked and shattered on the circus floor. A wave of red mist shot outward, engulfing everything and everyone in the tent, and the ghosts all stopped in their tracks.

"Well... that's not good for me, is it?" was all Freakshow had time to say before they turned their wrath on him.

Phantom couldn't be sure what exactly happened to Freakshow. He got pushed out of the way when the rest of the ghosts swarmed the ringmaster, and lost sight of him. Then, when the ghosts dispersed, Freakshow was gone, not even his top hat or his earring were left of him. But whether they'd obliterated him, or he'd somehow escaped, it seemed like no one was entirely sure.

The crowds of humans ran out of the big top and away from the circus, screaming in terror, until, soon enough, it was just the ghosts, alone on the floor, a few drifting spotlights passing over them and through them.

"How did you do that?" asked a ghost Phantom couldn't recognize. "How did you break free of his control?"

"I don't know, I just... did," he answered lamely. "Maybe the magic wasn't as strong against me because I only recently became a ghost." Yeah, that sounded like a plausible explanation.

"I don't know why that would make a difference, but I suppose that could be it," another ghost said thoughtfully, and he tried not to actually sigh in relief that they'd bought his lie.

But Ember narrowed her eyes at him.

"What was that ring of light about?" she asked.

"What ring of light?" Surely that hadn't exposed him, had it? Did she know that light was part of his ability to switch between human and ghost forms? She couldn't... could she?

"Right before you broke free of his control, there was a ring of light around you," she pressed. "I thought I saw...." Had she figured him out after all? "Nevermind."

If she had, at least she wasn't about to expose him in front of all these ghosts. Whether he freed them or not, if they found out he was half human, human like the man who'd enslaved and exploited them all, like the crowds that came to watch their humiliation and suffering, they probably wouldn't be too happy about it.

"So... how do we get back to the Zone?" Danny asked. "I, uh... I wasn't really thinking about the return trip when I came here."

"The train," answered the strongman ghost. "It can travel through the Realms. We just have to get it going, and get off when the sky turns green."

Luckily, Freakshow used a ghost conductor who knew how to work the train―whom the train had belonged to in the first place before Freakshow co-opted and repainted it for his circus―and soon enough, they were all aboard and headed home to the Zone.

Next Chapter

[khakerskayavdova-arch]

tag drop ic

girl with a backpack of shrapnel and wire || ( faceclaim. )

half formed explanations for a life half taken away || ( isms. )

these are the scars that silence carved on me || ( headcanon. )

locking up everyone who ever laid a finger on me || ( red room. )

and this child you would destroy if you tried to set her free || ( aesthetic. )

there's a reason not to want this but i forgot || ( desires. )

the one thing they can't take away from you || ( skill set. )

[khakerskayavdova-a]

faina sannikova & sarah walker aesthetic for @brokenspy

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 301: All My Todorokis

Previously on BnHA: We learned that when a bunch of superpowered villains are suddenly set loose with nobody around to stop them, things get fucked pretty quickly. Old Man Samurai and a bunch of other useless people decided to make “I pretend I do not see it” their new mantra, and resigned. Endeavor had a moment of despair on account of being crushed by the guilt of having ruined the lives of himself, his family, and basically everyone else in the entire world. For various reasons the heretical notion of “person who has done bad things feels sorry for doing them” sent fandom spiraling into a meltdown, so that was fun. The chapter ended with the entire Todoroki clan descending upon Enji’s hospital room to have a dramatic chat about Touya and All That General Fuckery.

Today on BnHA: Horikoshi is all “here’s the story of how Baby Touya slowly went insane trying to win his father’s love.” It’s a tale full of subverted expectations and heartbreaking inevitability, and also like twenty panels of the cutest fucking kids who ever existed on planet earth, who are so fucking cute that I can’t stop thinking about their cuteness even with all of the horrifying family tragedy unfolding around them. It is absolutely ridiculous how cute they are. Touya is out here pushing his tiny body past its limits because he inherited the same obsession as his dad and neither of them can put it aside even though it’s destroying them, and yet all I can think about is Baby Shouto’s (。･o･｡) face. Anyways what a chapter.

so I have to confess that even though I managed to avoid being caught off-guard by the early leaks, the number of people reblogging my Endeavor posts from earlier this week and using the tag “bnha 301” kind of gave me an inkling that this chapter will include more Tododrama lol. that said, I don’t know anything else about it, so we’re still good spoiler-wise

AHHHHH FLAHSBAKC AHHHH. omg I know I typoed the shit out of that, but I’m just going to leave it lol I think it’s fitting

holy shit holy fuck. so this is Rei and Enji’s first meeting, then??

yepppp, oh shit

so wait, I know this is not even the slightest bit important, but are they meeting at Enji’s home or Rei’s? because I always figured that Enji was the one with the super-Japanese aesthetic, but maybe that was Rei’s side of the family all along

(ETA: from what I found during my very brief google search, omiai meetings are often held at fancy hotels or restaurants, so maybe that’s what this is.)

there’s such a period drama feel to this setting. like it’s so outrageously formal fff how can anyone stand this kind of atmosphere though seriously

OH THANK GOD

I mean they’re still stiff af but at least they’re not rigidly sitting in seiza and staring at each other unblinkingly anymore lol. Enji’s actually got his hands in his pockets now. why is this somehow almost cute

oh damn it’s the flowers

Rei seems so subdued and it’s so hard to get any idea of what she’s actually thinking. I want to see her side of this dammit

but anyway, so at least from Enji’s perspective it seems like even though the marriage was arranged and he picked her because of her quirk, he still loved his wife and wanted to do right by her. the fact that he was watching her and noticed that she liked the flowers, and remembered that detail for all these years -- there’s a reason why Horikoshi’s showing us this. we know what’s going to happen later on; we know how much fear and violence and breaking of trust is coming up ahead, and while it may seem like this scene is serving to soften Enji’s character further -- which to be fair it is -- it also helps drive home the full impact of his abuse. that it’s so terrible not only because of the trauma of the abuse itself, but also because of the way it retroactively destroys all of the good things as well. this could have potentially been such a sweet scene, but it’s inescapably tainted by the knowledge of what’s to come, at least for me. and that’s just brutal

anyways, shit. is the whole chapter going to be like this?? feel free to toss in something I can actually make a joke about sometime, Horikoshi

oop, back to the present

omfg lol

“are you all right” “NO I’M NOT ALL RIGHT WHAT THE FUCK.” “oh, right, because of all the stuff that’s happened with me abusing you and you having a mental breakdown and being hospitalized for ten years and then our son coming back to life and killing thirty people, right, right. I almost forgot.” whoops

omfg you guys I’m loving this new and improved steely-eyed Rei. I’m loving her a lot

and what do you mean “part one” fkjds how long is this going to be. TOO MUCH DRAMA FOR ONE CHAPTER TO HANDLE

oh, hello

yeah I’ll say you did. didn’t seem to bother you much at the time, though

HMMMMMMMMMMMM

Dabi Is A Noumu intensifies even further. anyways though would you fucking look at this boy lounging on this moth-eaten couch doing his best DRAW ME LIKE YOUR FRENCH GIRLS impression wtf

Dabi what if you actually had killed him??? what would you feel?? satisfaction?? regret?? anything at all?? tell me your secrets goddammit

who are you talking to buddy

Fuyumi-chan, Natsu-kun (is it common for brothers to address each other as -kun?? can’t recall seeing that in many other anime, but hey), and “dot dot dot,,,,,, SHOUTO” lol thank you so much for this bountiful heaping of Tododrama Horikoshi we are blessed

AH, WHAT DID I SAY THE OTHER DAY

ULTIMATE MELODRAMATIC THEATER CHILD. “I’M JUST GOING TO LIE ON THIS COUCH SHIRTLESS AND ALONE AND MAKE SPEECHES TO MY FAMILY MEMBERS WHO AREN’T THERE AND SAY THINGS LIKE ‘WATCH ME IN THE PITS OF HELL’ WITH A STRAIGHT FACE BECAUSE NO ONE’S THERE TO JUDGE ME.” WELL JOKE’S ON YOU MISTER CHATTERBOX BECAUSE I AM IN FACT JUDGING THE SHIT OUT OF YOU LOL

(ETA: and on a more serious note, it’s interesting to see that “look at me”/”watch me” theme being used again though, because we see that same sentiment uttered repeatedly by the younger Touya in the flashback. well kid, you definitely got your wish at last. don’t know what else to say.)

OKAY HORIKOSHI HAS DECIDED THAT’S ENOUGH FUN, TIME FOR MORE FLASHBACKS

oh my sweet precious lord

just as cute as we left him. giving us a child this cute when we all know full well what’s going to happen to him is just unspeakably cruel though

HOMG

I’m fucking speechless. you broke me, congratulations. what am I even supposed to do with this

I can’t get over this. moving forward my life will be split into two distinct parts, B.P. (Before the Pout) and A.P. (After the Pout)

and meanwhile there’s ALL THIS BACKGROUND ANGST BUILDING UP, AND I CAN’T EVEN FOCUS ON IT. Touya’s arm and cheek are covered in bandages (I’m guessing this is shortly after that “ouch!” panel we got some chapters back), and Enji is deliberately avoiding training with him because he doesn’t want him to hurt himself further. I can’t fucking get over the irony that all this time everyone thought Touya had died because Enji pushed him too far in his training, and it turns out that it’s the opposite -- the tragedy ultimately happened because he didn’t want to push him. but I’m jumping ahead of myself though I guess

by the way,

remember this?? just wanted to remind you that it exists just in case you forgot

so now someone is talking and basically saying that Touya is the exact opposite of what Enji was hoping for when he decided to start playing with quirk genetics

-- okay hold up

...lol no, never mind. for a second I thought “holy shit he looks kind of familiar WHAT IF IT’S UJIKO OMG” before I remembered that Enji would have recognized him during the hospital capture mission if that was the case. so NEVER MIND, PROCEED

IMAGINE THAT, ENJI DOESN’T QUITE SEEM SATISFIED WITH THIS SUGGESTION OF QUITTING NOW

(ETA: how the fuck did this man go around saving 62 towns in a single day what even is All Might.)

[clicks tongue several times] trouble a���brewin’

MEANWHILE BABY TOUYA HAS UNFORTUNATELY INHERITED HIS DAD’S STUBBORN STREAK

KLDIHWOEIJFL:KSDJ

!!!!!!!!!!!

oh my god. oh my god. what is this chapter. WHAT IS IT

so now Touya is all “YOU JUST DON’T UNDERSTAND MY MANLY DESIRE TO BURN MYSELF ALIVE” well you got her there champ

THEY’RE TOO CUTE. OH MY GOD. HIS FURIOUS LITTLE TEARS. HER CHUBBY LIL FACE. HIS STUBBY LIL FISTS. SOMEONE HELP ME

also are they just home alone lol or what. “hey Touya, you’re what, like six now?? do us a favor and look after your baby sister for a couple hours for us would you? make sure not to set yourself on fire or anything.” WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG!!

now it’s nighttime and Enji and Rei are arguing, presumably about his decision not to train Touya anymore

whew. okay. so, a couple of things here

1. first of all I think this conclusively shows that Enji really was trying to do the best he could for Touya. he stopped training him as soon as he realized it was hurting him, but Touya was still determined so he tried to make it work anyway, and even visited doctors to try and figure out if there was anything they could do. then, once they were absolutely sure that it wasn’t going to work, he tried multiple times to explain to Touya why they had to stop. he didn’t just abandon him out of the blue, which is really important to note. “no matter how much I tried telling him...”

so yeah, that debunks another common fandom accusation. so by the time he finally makes this decision, which we all know is going to turn out horribly, it’s basically because he’s already tried everything else he could think of. which, by the way, still doesn’t mean he handled this right. but at the very least he was taking Touya’s feelings into account and he was trying, and he didn’t just abruptly toss his son aside (at least not yet)

2. buuuut, then there’s this panel right below all that

which is the other side of it. if he’d just quit like the doctor person advised him to, that would have been the end of it. Touya would still have been upset, but he would have eventually gotten over it and the family would have moved on and possibly even been happy. but what happens next happens because Enji can’t let go. he still has this maddening urge to surpass All Might, and so he and Rei keep having more children, and then Shouto is born, and Enji finally has a kid he can start projecting all of his hysterical ambitions onto once again, and everything starts spiraling out of control soon after

though p.s. none of that is Shouto’s fault though!! he’s one of the few good things to come out of this whole mess and I’m very happy that he exists. the tragedy is that his dad fucking lost his mind over his quirk and fucked everything up. but that’s on him, not Touya or Shouto

anyways, SLKFJLSHGLKJL

I CAN’T FUCKING TAKE THIS YOU GUYS??? LOOK AT THAT LIL BUTTON OF A NOSE??? I’M LOSING IT HERE???

AND TOUYA JUST SEEMS DEVASTATED OMG

because children aren’t stupid, after all. he understands that his dad is still looking to surpass All Might. and so he feels like a failure, and feels like his dad is trying to replace him because he wasn’t good enough. and even now, isn’t that what the adult Touya is trying to prove?? that he was good enough after all?? “I’ll show you what happens when you give up on me, dad”?? “I’ll show you what I can do”?? fuck my life fuck everything

AND YOU CAN SEE THE TOLL THAT IT’S ALL TAKING ON REI GETTING WORSE AND WORSE AS WELL OH GOD

really nice touch here with the panel outlines becoming all shimmery from the heat of Endeavor’s flames (and/or becoming more unstable as the family gets closer and closer to their breaking point). but man, Horikoshi I can’t handle this, please show us more cute kids or something I can’t

GKELKWFJLDKSHFLKL

WITTLE BABE. BEEB. BUBS. SMOL. lkj; oh ouch a piece of my heart just detached and latched onto him huh look at that

TODOROKI “I’M SO SMALL AND I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT’S GOING ON AND I DIDN’T ASK TO BE HERE” SHOUTO AHHHHH

crazy how they all just seem to know right off the bat lol. kid doesn’t even have object permanence yet, let alone a quirk. but do they care?? IT’S THE HAIR, RIGHT. WE’RE ALL THINKING IT, I’M JUST GONNA COME OUT AND SAY IT. they knew the minute they looked at him lol

AND MEANWHILE TOUYA IS OFF HAVING UNSUPERVISED TRAINING/CRYING SESSIONS IN THE MOUNTAINS OR WHATEVER, AND, UH OH

are those blue flames yet?? they seem pretty close

(ETA: this is one of the few cases where the manga being in black and white is infuriating lol.)

OH MY GOD AND STILL

so it’s not like he was so disinterested that he didn’t notice what was happening, and he was still trying to stop it and get through to him. trying to reassure him that it wasn’t the end of the world and there were other things he could do with his life, but this one particular thing just wasn’t going to happen

fucking hell. it’s agonizing seeing how close they actually were to fixing it. if he’d only said the right words, or if he’d realized at this point how destructive his obsession could be to his kids, and backed off from putting that same pressure on Shouto. we came so close to possibly having a happy ending

AND ALSO THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ANYTHING BUT PLEASE LOOK AT HOW TOUYA IS LIKE THREE AND A HALF FEET TALL AND HIS DAD IS LIKE NINE AND A HALF FEET. Touya barely comes past his knees flkjlkg. the Todoroki household must have been so filled with like plastic stepstools to reach the bathroom sink and all the little baby toothbrushes, and baby gates to keep the kiddos out of the important grown-up rooms and stuff. and also days-old half-empty cups of water and stale crackers and hot wheels and my little ponies strewn everywhere

“BUT EVERYONE AT SCHOOL SAYS THEY’RE GONNA BE HEROES” a wild Deku parallel appears?? how bout that

I know this is like a pivotal moment in the Todo Tragedy and all, but fucking look at this lil dumpling

“sup bro, it’s me, the manifestation of your fears of inadequacy and lack of fatherly affections. a GAAA. ba-baAA-baa [gurgling baby sounds]”

OHHHHH IT’S THE SOUND OF MY HEART BREAKING OH NO

HE WANTS TO BE LIKE YOU ENJI. good lord somebody please just get this family some therapy

“DAD YOU IGNITED IT IN ME” flkjslkj nope, nope. not ready for this pain here

baby Shouto, would you like to weigh in on this affair? “DA!! ba-ga-daaa, [pacifier chewing noises]” oh my, you don’t say. so insightful for one so young

OH MY GODDDDDD

IT’S SO DRAMATIC BUT ALL I CAN THINK ABOUT ARE THE SHOUNEN WOOSH LINES SURROUNDING FOUR-MONTH-OLD SHOUTO LOL HE WAS LIKE THIS FROM BIRTH OH MY GOD I AM DYING HELP

SHOUTO YOU’RE RUINING THIS ENTIRE CHAPTER!?!?!

“yo, the fuck kind of family was I fucking born into” oh, son. if you only knew. IF YOU ONLY KNEW!!

(ETA: lmao I got so distracted by the ridiculous cuteness that I glossed over the fact that Baby Touya seems to possibly be aiming at him?? it’s hard to tell because he’s also super out of it from heatstroke and may just be losing control in his attempt to show off his upgrade.)

ANYWAY THAT’S THE END EXCEPT WHAT’S THIS LAST LINE OMG

ffffff. and we’re in for ANOTHER chapter of this next week?? MORE drama?? MORE BABIES?? MORE OF EIGHT-YEAR-OLD TOUYA’S SLOW DESCENT INTO MADNESS. MY HEART CAN’T TAKE IT, BUT ALSO YES PLEASE SIGN ME UP

[merakiclosed]

Taehyung - Bunny love

》Pairing: Hybrid!Reader x Single Parent!Taehyung

》Summary: Moving around and trying to find your home that your animal side craved for, you find your love of teaching kids art. Being a rare, albino bunny hybrid, you have to hid your appearance with baggy clothes and hats. What happens when a certain little girl takes a liking to you and what happens when that little girls very single, very hot dad also takes a liking to you?

》Genre: Fluff, a little bit of angst (tiny)

》Word count: 5k

》Notes/Warnings: Fem reader, choking (not sexual), slight harassment for a very short period.

Ah this took me a long time, I couldn't think of a proper ending but I quite like the ending and how it ties it together. Enjoy ! <3

Masterlist | All messages and requests are open <3

All rights reserved © Merakiiverse. Do not repost, translate or claim as your own

Moving around to new cities wasn’t new to you but moving to an entirely different country is. You never felt like you was home, even when you was living with your parents, it never felt right. It never felt like you belonged in your little town, you never felt that warmth of finally finding comfort. Your parents said that it was because of your genetics, that when you find that warmth feeling, don’t let go because that will be your home. It will be the place where you belong.

You are now living in Seoul and you were slowly but surely getting more comfortable. The language wasn’t hard to learn, you are a fast learner after all. You found the perfect job as an art teacher for a primary school and found that your classroom was where your heart and soul was. The walls were covered in splatters of paint, the children’s artwork splayed across the three walls that didn’t occupy the interactive whiteboard. Cut outs and spiral hung across the ceiling like Christmas decorations. Luckily for you, you were only small, so you didn’t get tangled with the hanging artwork. However, trying to get them on the ceiling was hard as you were scared of heights and being at the very top of a ladder was scary.

Being an art teacher meant that you could be quite laid back as you didn’t have to worry about students not understanding nor worry about teaching them about certain words. It also didn’t require the kids to fully think as you often promoted that they should create whatever their hearts desire. Because of this, you found that the kids were a lot more happier and open to you than the other teachers causing you to get side eyed sometimes by other teachers. You just shrugged at them, kids didn’t like to learn and listen all the time, they wanted to be free for a while. You were also good with smelling emotions that the kids felt, causing you to be good with kids in general. If they were sad? Juice box and fruit. If they were angry? Give them some paint and a blank canvas, let them express what they are feeling.

The headmaster liked your teaching style and the way that you were ‘talented with children’ - their words not yours. You also really liked the headmaster for allowing you to wear whatever clothes you wanted, which was good because of your situation. The situation was the big, white, fluffy flops on top of your head and the white fuzzball that was at your lower back.

Yes, you were an albino rabbit hybrid.

Hybrids are extremely rare. Hybrids came about when some crazy scientists thought that they could create a superior race where they were stronger and smarter than humans but were more obedient. The government and animal control was involved with taking it down and not much was said on the news about the whole situation. The government made up an organisation called The Hybrid Move. They basically take care of anything to do with hybrids and make sure to keep track of them so that none of them get taken and get experimented on by other crazy scientists. They were a lovely bunch of people; you knew quite a lot of the employees as you have to keep in contact with them.

Your parents were a part of the experiment, they never talked about it much and you can’t imagine how awful the conditions were. Once they were free, they ended up having you and moved to a small town, outside of the city. Seeing as they were both hybrids, it was inevitable that you were too.

From a young age, they told you that you always had to hide your tail and ears so that nothing bad happens to you. This meant that you had to wear baggy clothes and hats in every public setting and because of this, you had very little friends as they didn’t understand why you wore hats in summer, or why you couldn’t go swimming or go to sleepovers. Many people talked about you behind your back, name-calling was common. It seemed that even if you did hide your animal features, you were still a freak. A group of boys once took it so far, that they cornered you and tried to take your hat off. This then resulted in parents coming in and you being supervised by at least one teacher at every single hour of the day.

At first, you was confused at why there wasn’t anyone else that had ears or tails. You were also confused because, “Why do I have to hide something that I can’t help, it’s my nature?”

This, in turn, led to a conversation about the hybrid experiments that your parents went through and how they are in contact with The Hybrid Move organisation.

It hurt to bend your ears into a beanie at first, but after a while you got used to it, but now, from the years of fitting your ears into your beanie, they both bent outwards permanently at the top. Your tail hurt when you snatched it on somethings, and it killed when it snagged on your clothes. You always wear flowy, long skirts and baggy pants, making sure to cut a hole in your pants and that your top was always long enough to hide the cut. You have a very, artsy aesthetic, neutral and earth colours are your thing.

You live in a little bungalow, the large backyard was filled with flowers, plants, and vegetables. At the very back of your garden, you had a small selection of overgrown trees so that if you do shift, you have your own little hideout where you can properly connect with nature without being chased by a predator. You have a little cut in the middle of your right ear because of a fox. You had to shift at least once every month, otherwise, you get extremely uncomfortable and can cause you to shift in places where you really shouldn’t.

The only downside to your job, other than the snarky teachers was that you couldn’t go to any events that they held. You couldn’t exactly go to a posh event because you would end up wearing a beanie, very classy. And, you couldn’t wear fitted clothing.

You did have two teacher friends, first being Namjoon. He teaches English and has an incredibly beautiful husband, Jin who teaches history. How lovely the both of them are, they are so in love. Jin is so nice, he likes to look after both you and Joon. He often brings in food, of course they were vegan friendly for you. As much as you love Namjoon, he is clumsy and because of this clumsiness, they found out about you being a hybrid shifter.

What happened was, after school one day, you were on the ladders, hanging up some artwork when a loud crash came behind you as Namjoon dropped his mug of coffee. You are scared of loud noises because of your sensitive ears and the mug dropping caused you to shift. They had no words when one minute you were climbing the ladder and the next there’s a white bunny on the floor. Jin went to scream but Namjoon shoved his hand over his lovers’ mouth, causing the scream to be muffled. Joon is as clumsy as he is smart, so he connected the dots fairly fast and quickly went to shut the classroom door and pick the shaking bunny up in his arms. It only took 5 minutes of Joon and Jin stroking and whispering sweet words for you to shift back- Luckily with clothes. After that fiasco and explaining everything, they were very understanding and you three became very close friends, with you often feeling like you were third wheeling.

It was coming up to the end of summer, which meant that you could no longer just sit in the sunny spots of your living room and stay up to watch the sunset. You were excited nonetheless as you got to meet a new set of students that were coming up to their last years of primary. The whole process went smoothly and after a few months, they were well on their way with their current projects.

A little girl named Sujin became particularly close to you, sometimes choosing to stay in your classroom for lunch if she noticed that you wasn’t busy. Sujin had chubby cheeks and short, black hair with a wide, boxy smile. She was incredibly talented and was always excited about coming to art class, always skipping, singing, and dancing. Sujin was also a very curious child, always asking questions. You don’t mind answering them and you don’t even mind answering the ones about your personal life because, who on earth is she going to tell that your favourite snack is strawberries? One day after school she even asked if you had found your ‘prince or princess’. It took you a while to register what she was talking about, but you answered with a big, fat nope, ‘I haven’t found my prince’. After you answered, she just ran off and giggled, a cheeky smile painting her face. You shrugged, not minding her curiosity.

December comes and it’s time for parents evening. You have talked to multiple parents, a few have you scowling as they say how you ‘don’t dress like a teacher’ or that you ‘look too unprofessional’. Whilst you’re waiting for your last appointment with Sujin, you go around the classroom and pick up the swirl cut-outs that parents hadn’t notice where hanging from ceiling, causing them to waft their arms around and destroy some of them.

You stand in the frame of the door once you are done when you hear a very distinct laugh. Sujin comes bounding in, dragging a very, very tall and very, very handsome man down the hall. You can tell straight away that this is her father, his boxy smile unmistakably the same as Sujin’s.

Your mind buffers looking at him and your animal inside goes feral, ‘He could easily protect you; he looks strong and he’s so tall, he could defend you without much energy’. You blink rapidly, trying to stop yourself from jumping on top of him asking him to be your buck. Stupid animal instincts.

You look down when you notice that the man has stopped smiling and is now starring at your feet, to find that your right foot is slightly thumbing the ground. You try to stop yourself but you’re leg ends up twitching and shaking. Ignoring it the best you can, you smile awkwardly but in Taehyungs mind, you look annoyed; you’re leg stomping with a very forced smile. He looks sheepish, rubbing the back of his neck with the hand that isn’t holding Sujin’s

“I’m sorry I’m late, the traffic was worse than I thought”

Once again, your mind malfunctions at the deepness of his voice, ‘please, earth swallow me now’ you thought. You shake your head and mumble to him that it’s fine and you wasn’t waiting that long.

You lead them into the classroom and turn around when you hear Sujin giggle as the man almost runs straight into one of the swirls from the ceiling. You really should have asked Joon if he could have taken them down beforehand. You cover your mouth when you chuckle, his sharp, dark eyes finding yours when he hears you and coughs, his cheeks blushing slightly. You stop laughing and sit down at your desk, gesturing them to do the same.

Throughout the meeting, you say various praises for Sujin as she is a literal angel and is extremely talented. You question the man, that you now know as Taehyung, if there has been artistic people in the family.

“Um, no not really, I mean, I do. I only do art as a hobby though. One day she came home and asked if she could get some art supplies because she really enjoyed your lessons and loved how she could express herself” Your heart hammers in your chest at the thought of inspiring someone, even if it is a child, it’s a massive compliment for a teacher.

The meeting doesn’t last long but you do notice that the entire time, you had a very warm feeling in your heart. You felt comfort. You ignored your thoughts, deeming it to be from the warm classroom.

Just as you’re about to turn back into your classroom, his voice echoes in the, now empty, hallway, “Are you going to Parent-child Christmas dance?”

You pause in your tracks and stare wide-eyed at hm, “Uh-I-Uh”

‘Omg WORDS Y/N’ you thought

Quickly gathering your thoughts, you reply “I don’t usually go”

You see his shoulders sag as his smile falters and quickly add “I might go this time though”

You inwardly freak at your words, what were you thinking??

His boxy smile once again makes an appearance “I’ll see you there than, Ms L/N” His voice showing his excitement

Without a second thought you run to Joon’s room to get help. Oh gosh, what have you gotten yourself into?

On the night of the dance, you’re wearing an A-line dress so that it doesn’t catch your tail and your ears are free as you stand next to Namjoon and Jin who have fake bunny ear headbands on their heads. When you freaked out about going to the dance wearing a hat, they proposed that you just went without a hat. Immediately, you shot the idea down, but they suggested that if you went without a hat, they went with a headband so that you wasn’t alone.

You’re a bunch of nerves as you’re dart across the many parents and children that fill the decorated gym hall. You have to restrain your ears from moving towards every sound that they hear, not used to being uncovered. Lucky for you, many teachers were dressed up in a Christmas themes as you see many antler headbands and Santa costumes.

“Hey, you good?” Namjoon’s voice breaks you out of your trance as you look up at him with your wide eyes.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine. Totally fine” You nod your head so many times, Jin thinks that your head might pop off.

“Your ears are twitching, darling” Jin says, going to rub your ears to soothe them, your body visibly relaxing at the administration.

Your eyes briefly flutter at the calming motion but soon shoot open when you hear the gym door opening. He walks in, once again, being tugged by Sujin who ditches him as soon as she sees her friends on the dance floor.

He makes eye contact with you and you can feel your face heat up. You see him take big steps towards you, not seeming to notice Jin or Namjoon who look at the both of you curiously. They step away when Taehyung gets close enough, wanting to watch the interaction from the side-lines.

You both stand side by side in silence until it’s broken by Taehyung, “I’m going to get a drink, do you want anything?”

You shake your head, too nervous to speak, your ears almost twitching.

He walks off as you stare at his broad back. He looked amazing tonight as he wore a flowery coat with a black tuxedo underneath it, his hair fluffy and curly, you want to run your hands through it. His jawline is sharp, and his eyes are a deep shade of brown, you could get lost in them.

Your lost in your head by the time he comes back to you, jumping when he appears in front of you, bending his back to look into your eyes because of the height difference. Even in heels, you only just reach his shoulders.

“I bought you some strawberries, Sujin says that they are your favourite”

Your big eyes stare into his, he remembered? You told Sujin that like 2 months ago. You don’t dwell on it too long as you look at the plastic plate in his hand that is full of strawberries and snatch one so quick that Taehyung didn’t think he’s seen anyone move so fast.

His chuckle causes you to strain your head upwards to look at him with your cheeks full of strawberries. With your cheeks still full you smile shyly, some strawberry juice escaping but Taehyung just grabs a napkin and softly grabs your chin with his other hand and gently wipes it away. All you can do is look at his face, noticing that he has one monolid and one double lid, as well as having a little mole on the tip of his nose.

He doesn’t move when he is finished and just looks you in the eye, his eyes filled with curiosity of wanting to know you more and adoration because he thinks, that he might have just fallen, even if you don’t know each other fully.

Throughout the rest of the night, it’s filled with random questions and you learn a lot about this man. When your both looking at the kids dancing, you see him look at the kids with adoration and care, a smile always present on his face, you wonder why he isn’t a teacher.

However, when you think that everything is going well, it goes downhill, fast.

The music seems to be getting louder and your ears twitch slightly, you feel a whimper wanting to leave your throat at the discomfort. You turn to face Taehyung when you find that he is already looking at you, specifically, your ears.

“I’m going to get some space” you whisper to him, your voice small. You see Taehyung nod at you, still fascinated by your ears.

You walk into the hallway outside of the gym and lean against the wall, breathing heavily. You closed your eyes to try and focus on relaxing your ears from all of the sounds that surrounded you, the music booming, the sound of the AC, footsteps. Footsteps.

You looked up frantically, looking at the man that was staring at you intently, the disgusting smell he gave off showed his intentions. Frozen in place, he came up to you and slammed his hands next to your head. His lips contorted into a smirk as he dragged his hands down to your face and stroked your cheek, “I’ve been looking for you, I knew I would find you eventually”

Your throat hurt felt tight as you gulped. His hand that wasn’t on your cheek slowly caressed your figure, going down to your waist, his grip tight. You let out a whimper when he pulled your right bunny ear, your eyes filling with tears. Your animal instincts of submitting made you shake, both of your ears dropping to the back of your head.

“Aren’t you a sight, little bunny” he stated, his breath smelled like smoke, making you want to gag. Your breathing became heavier as he started to pull you closer to his taller and more muscular frame.

“Hey, what do you think you’re doing” a voice growled, surrounding the empty hallway.

The man that held you turned you around to face Taehyung, one of his arms going towards your neck and the other wrapping around your waist. Your arms go up to his arm around your neck as your nails dig into his skin.

“Aw, the boyfriend has come to rescue the doe” the man snarled at Taehyung, anger radiating off him.

Taehyung’s eyes are sharp, his jaw clenched as he looked at the arms around your neck and waist but softening as he saw the tears running down your face. Taehyung saw red when the man tightens his grip on your throat, he lunges towards the both of you when the man holding you speaks.

“Did you know these pretty things are real?”

Taehyung stops, his face void of showing emotion. The man that held you pulled your ear once again as you whimpered in pain, tears finally making their way down your face. You start to cough when the lack of oxygen gets too much.

The noises and the stress of situation was getting too much for you and it was like Taehyung knew as he made eye contact with you as your ears started to twitch on their own, your tail feeling fuzzy.

The arms around you slip as you shift into your bunny form, the man stumbling slightly which gives Taehyung the perfect advantage as he runs to the man, punching him square in the face. The man hits the floor with all of his weight, his eyes shutting. You don’t have much time to think about how strong Taehyung must be to knock him out with one punch as you sprint down the hall, your small legs jumping as fast as they can to find somewhere to hide.

“Y/N wait” You hear Taehyung cry out as he runs after you.

You’re fast, but Taehyung is faster with his longer legs as he scoops you up in his arms. You kick him with your back feet, trying to get out of his grip but not with all of your force so that you don’t injure him.

“Shh, shh, it’s fine, it’s just me. You’re fine” He shushes and coes at you, calming you down, one of his hands rubs against your fur.

Taehyung slowly slumps down against the wall of the hallway, not too far away from the gym but not close enough that someone will walk down. He is still holding you as you calm down, whispering soothing words into your ears and rubbing your back. You look up at him and all you see is love in his eyes. You sit up a bit more on your back feet, your front paws going onto his chest for stability as you nudge his nose with yours. His laugh rings out down the hallway as you start to lick his cheek.

Taehyung feels a significantly heavier weight on his lap as you shift back into your human form, your legs over his sideways, your right side leaning into his chest and your hands resting near his collarbone. There are still tear tracks on your face as you look up to him with your big eyes.

“I knew these bunny ears looked scarily realistic” he chuckles, no disgust in his voice.

 You stay seated in Tae’s lap when you call the hybrid organisation, as he occasionally kisses you head when you choke on your words, encouraging and supporting you. You both sat there for a while afterwards, with his left hand wrapped around your waist and his right brushing your bunny ears. Your teeth clicking together in contentment as no words where said, none were needed.

Taehyung is nearly tackled to the floor when you both walk into the gym hall as Sujin jumps on him and wraps her arms around his neck. She babbles at how she had such a good time dancing and that one of the other girls, Yuna, showed her some dance moves. You and Taehyung laugh as she talk animatedly about it. You move your hands to brush your hands through her hair, gathering it all so that you can redo her ponytail, whilst Taehyung looks at both of you with fond eyes.

“you know, there’s a job opening for another art teacher, the other one left” your voice was soft as you glanced at Tae. His eyes looking straight at you, excitement evident. Sujin joins in, encouraging her dad to start working here. You knew that he would love the job, he is great with kids, and for your own selfish reasons, you really want him to teach by your side. When Taehyung says that he will apply, you feel warmth start to spread in your chest, a wide smile making its way onto your face.

“Daddy, look it’s a slow song, go dance with Ms. L/N” Sujin whispers into Taehyungs ear. She noticed that her daddy was looking at you when you was talking to Namjoon and Jin about something across the hall. Your ears pick up the words she spoke as you weren't fully paying attention to what Joon or Jin was talking about. You didn’t mean to, but with Tae stood there, you couldn’t help but savour every moment that you were near each other.

Taehyung puts Sujin down and walks over to you in wide strides, confidence oozing out of him. A sly smirk makes its way onto your face when you make eye contact with each other, making Tae falter in his steps.

“May I have this dance?” His voice cuts through the convocation Jin and Joon was having, both of them looking at Tae with their mouths open.

“You may” You say shyly, taking his hand.

The both of you make it to the dance floor as other parents fill up the space. You put your arms around his shoulders as he puts his on your waist, the warmth once again coming back and filling up your chest.

“I’m sorry about what happened earlier” you said in a low voice, not making eye contact with him.

Taehyungs heart cracks a little at how small you sounded, “It’s completely fine, I should have gone out with you” his voice equally as low.

You look up at him and your heart beats a little bit faster. You shake your head side to side to disagree with him, neither of you could have predicted what happened.

“Ever since I met you at parents evening, I thought about you ever day. Every time I see you my heart beats erratically and there’s a warmth in my chest that I can’t explain” Tae mumbled, only for you to hear.

You place your head on his chest as you both sway to the music and whisper “I’m the same. But I have, um, something to tell you”

“My parents said that whenever I find warmth, this warmth, it’s where my home will be” you pause, “Tae, I think you’re my home”

Taehyung stops dancing, causing you both to be stood in the middle of the gym, the parents around you still swaying past both of you. You don’t separate from him nor look at him, scared of what he may say. The palpitations in your heart, the closeness and the heat in your chest have your feelings soaring, so much so, that a tear escapes your eye at the thought of him being disgusted by the words you spoke.

He raises his hand to life your chin up to meet his eyes, he briefly looks down at your lips, then back to your eyes, looking for permission. You nod slowly, standing on your tip toes as he leans down, his hand now cupping your cheek. The dim lights casted shadows onto his face, though you could see him perfectly. You can feel the hand that lays on your cheek softly, contrasting with the strong grip around your waist. Leaning closer, your lips met in a sweet kiss, all of your emotions coming to the surface. You clutches his shirt into your hands, tears now fully coating your cheeks. He pulled away slightly, his breath danced across my lips as he whispered, “I don’t think you’re my home, I know you are my home”.

You smile to brightly that it hurts your cheeks, he brings a hand up to wipe away your tears. Even with mascara smudging at the bottom of your eyes, tear stains on your cheeks and bloodshot eyes, Taehyung hasn’t something more beautiful.

3 years later

Explaining what you were to Taehyung was easy, but explaining it to a young girl, was interesting to say the least. It sent her imagination wild when she asked you to shift, she loved to give you kisses and hug you close to her.

You now lived in Taehyung’s house with Sujin, who has recently started to call you mummy. She first said it when you tucked her in bed when one day, your ears stood up to attention, eyes stinging to avoid from crying with happiness. As soon as you got to your shared bedroom with Tae, you flopped onto your side in front of him, instantly shifting to your bunny form. Tae laughed at you as he rubbed your fur and asked, once you shifted back, what caused that reaction. When you told him, he seemed to be as happy as you were.

Both of you are art teachers at the primary school. When you first properly introduced him to Namjoon and Jin, they interrogated him for a least an hour. But nonetheless, the four of you created an amazing friendship group, you could finally be yourself, your tail and all.

You smile at the thought of the four of you having a sleepover this Saturday as you pack your Taehyungs bag. You’re so happy that you get up and run to Taehyung, only to run away from him, giggling like a mad woman, “be careful love” he calls. You turn around and come back towards him at full speed and once you’re a few centimetres away from him, you start to circle his standing figure, your socks slipping on the hardwood floor. His laugh is deep as he catches you around the waist and flops you both backwards on to the sofa, cradling you in his lap. His eyes soften as you start to rub your chin on his shoulder. You relax against his body as you now start to nibble his shoulder. After being together for 3 years, Taehyung is used to this display of affection as he knows what it means – you’re happy and in love.

Taehyung kisses the top of your head once you’ve finished scenting him and pulls you closer together when Sujin bounces on top of the sofa next to you, joining in on the hug.

Your little family was perfect, and you loved it.

[agusvedder]

I DON’T CARE if this doesn’t get any notes. I need to vent.

My name is Agustina, I’m 27 years old. I’m a nonbinary, queer, latinx person, parent of a 4 year old, non-verbal authistic child. I suffer from depression and anxiety.

I’m 9 thousand kilometers away from the woman I love.

I’m not a victim. I am a minority. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

I started watching Supernatural in 2015, you know, being a stay-at-home parent, who dropped her career and her job to live the first years of their child, there wasn’t much I could do in my free time but to watch a show. I caught a few episodes of season 11 on tv and then I decided to start from zero. I always acknowledged how problematic it was in terms of representation, but always saw small threads of light filtering in the message it sent, recognizing how its writers were trying to shed a little light, creating a jenga tower of storylines and new characters, only to be thrown away by poor, useless deaths and the erasure of said characters.

Since my first run on season 1 I related to Dean. I saw myself on him. (I will never be as brave and cool as him tho, never ever, but his personality traits, some of his family issues, his self worth issues, his loneliness, his unaddressed childhood trauma, his growth in a circle of violence, his reticence to address his feelings until he explodes?... Yeah. There are days where my girlfriend makes fun of me saying “Ok Dean”). I kept looking up to Dean in his geekiness, in his way he always put his life on the line to protect the people he loves and put them always first… even in the supernatural side of the storyline, he still was profoundly human and abnegated to the people in his life. Also because I’m deeply in love with Castiel but that’s another subject. Thanks to this show, I’ve found people in my own country who now I recognize as my family beyond SPN, who helped me accept myself the way I am, who are always there for me. My found family, my chosen family. Because family don’t end in blood, because family cares about you, not only for what you can do for them, because that’s what all of us have in common, and why this show resonated as strongly as it did for us. That’s why we found each other and ourselves in the process, in a circle of love, support, non-judgement and willingness to find a family in ourselves when our own blood relatives ignored us, abused us, refused to recognize us. We’ve found love and family. I’ve found the woman with whom I wanna spend the rest of my life with because of this show.

That’s the power of this story. I know my small circle is not the only one who lived this, who continues to live it.

I can talk about this forever, but there’s something I wanna talk about specifically here. When the ending aired.. what I felt was… like a bucket of cold water was thrown over my head. You know when your parents come home, or call you and give you the devastating news that someone you love died? that exact feeling. The adrenaline, the heartbreak, the feeling of loss. 

The whole season 15 and 15 years of storyline were completely overturned. The misogyny the writers tried so hard to erase, it was there again, in a faceless woman who was supposed to represent the person a lead chose to spend the rest of his life with, reduced to a lilac dress, a blurry face and a uterus. We never seen acknowledged the existence of Eileen Leahy, Sam Winchester’s romantic interest since season 11, his perfect partner whose disability wasn’t an obstacle for her to be a badass hunter. (BUT COVID!! <- No. Eileen Leahy appeared in two episodes this season without Shoshannah being on set: Last Holiday and Despair. If they wanted to include her, they would have. They didn’t because they don’t give a FUCK). Sam Winchester is an academic, a witch, a leader, a powerful hunter, a kind human being, and the ending that was given to him was living an unfulfilled life, dying at a ridiculous young age, having a son only to replace his dead brother? It was sad. Sammy deserved better. He always did.

My beloved Dean Winchester, who I love so deeply, who taught me a lot about myself, about life, love, family, about *ejem* VICIOUS CIRCLES and the power of breaking free from them, of learning to embrace one’s self, our real tastes, our real identity, to come out of a shadow of being reduced to someone’s caretaker instead of having an identity of our own, to spend life loving family the healthy amount.. well, he was killed in a ridiculous way, on a milk run of a hunt.  After being eager and ready to kill himself so many times. After all he’s been through, after saying he’s good with who he is, after considering retirement, after standing up to his dad, saying he already has a family, ready to cut the “I’m Okay” bullshit, address his feelings, his trauma, don’t letting those define him. He deserved better. He always wanted a family, he always wanted to break free from the version of himself he was created to be, “daddy’s blunt little instrument” (For fuck’s sake, he even said it in the same show 10’ before dying, man. If we don’t keep living, the sacrifice the people who died for us did, was for nothing). Are you telling me this man really would refuse his brother to call an ambulance? Refused his brother to get the first aid kit even knowing it was more serious than his brother thought? He was ready to live. He CHOSE life, and at the end his choice was stripped away from him. He clearly was a bisexual man and they never explored it.

Cas. The misfit. The fish outside of the water. Ambiguous gender and sexuality. Finally makes a homosexual declaration of love after all he’s been through. After being brainwashed, used, suicidal, isolated. After telling Sam and Dean he loved them more than once, that they meant everything for him. After confessing he’s been in love with Dean since he pulled him out of hell…. Was erased from the story. Erased, literally. Two emotionless mentions aren’t enough for a 12 year old family member who pulled both brothers out of hell, who died for them more than once, who until 2 seasons ago he didn’t even feel like he belonged there ‘cause he was never told he was loved. No one ever told him “I love you” back. Not Jack, not Sam, not Dean, not Mary. No one. Ever. And still, he died for love. And with his death, he was erased from the finale, being that the first finale Castiel wasn’t in since his appearance on the show. He deserved better. 

All roads lead to Rome and you know what we got at the end of that road? a bottomless pit of NOTHING. The building up towards a different end isn’t just in s15. It’s been there for years and years. And if you watch the show, you see it at plain sight.

 

Sam Winchester hurried to die to reunite with his brother in heaven EVEN WHEN HE SPENT 30 MORE YEARS WITH A WIFE AND A KID he only wanted to die to go back to his brother? it’s insane, it’s ridiculous. That’s not what the show has been about for seasons now. SEASONS. The road was paved towards a healthy brotherly bond, each brother living their future the way they wanted, finally breaking free from the curse John dropped on Dean that Sam’s destiny was in his hands. No no. What was that? Did it ever happen? Was it a fever dream? They really destroyed everything in 38 minutes of the finale? 

Stupid. 

Representation is important, stories are important. They change lives. You know how it changed mine? After I saw Jonathan Van Ness coming out as non-binary, I started to realize how I never called myself "a woman, a girl" or anything like that, how my "female presenting" aesthetic changes drastically depending on how I feel when I wake up  how I always called myself a "person", no gender involved. I realized I was a non-binary person even after becoming a parent. Thanks to Jonathan Van Ness. Thanks to seeing a person like her being unapologetically herself. 

Representation matters. 

It matters. 

It helped my mom understand me when I was 13 and had a girlfriend. It helped my dad educate himself about trans identities. It helped my sister understand about her demisexuality. It helps break circles of ignorance and stereotypes. It helps people process what these characters wanna tell, and realize they're human beings above it all. We suffer, we laugh, we grieve. We love. We exist. 

Supernatural missed a chance to be a historical show in terms of representation. And it breaks my heart.  I cant believe they decided to erase Dean's sexuality, to erase Castiel after saying loud and proud he's in love with a man, to erase Eileen whose disability only was a disadvantage when they KILLED HER in the most ableistic way in s11, to never show Charlie and her girlfriend again, that they decided to make God bisexual AND a villain, thay they decided to turn the only regular non-binary character of color into the villain too (Billie).

I'm still grieving.

This is why "a stupid show" is so important for me, and for lot of people like me. Cause representation can change lives. Stories can change lives. It certainly changed mine, and I'm not the only one. 

Don't let anyone tell you you're just a butthurt fan because you're suffering this ending. Every one of us have a story and this is mine. All of us are valid, our feelings are valid. And we'll get through this eventually

[iknowyouthinkimbulletproof]

The Scar- Calum Hood

A/N: another 5sos fic! Calum hood x y/n. Y/n’s gender is female for this fic, it just made it easier to write, my apologies to anyone it might upset, but you can always request. Feel free to correct any mistakes! there will be a part two!

WARNINGS: this fic does contain multiple mentions of an abusive family, read at your own risk.

Not my gif!

plot: y/n and Calum meet for the first time!

2430 words

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When y/n was still a child she had always dreamed of becoming a celebrity, like every other kid. unlike the other children though, it seemed impossible to her. To y/n, she sounded horrible, not to mention the looks. y/n had always thought this way because there was never one person to tell her otherwise. It's not like anyone knew what she was struggling with to be fair. Years of practice and motivation from her parents, the only time they encouraged y/n, lead to y/n being the perfect actor in front of others. No one would notice the damage done to y/n because the walls built around her took a team of three to build and would most likely take an even bigger team to deconstruct. Or at least that's what she thought. Apparently all y/n needed was a wrecking ball.

Day after day y/n would wake early to sit in front of her mirror with a brush. She normally wasn’t the type to hate anything, other than her parents, because nothing could compare to the years of trauma her parents had stocked her up on. So when y/n said she hated her foundation brushes, she meant it.

Makeup used to be one of her favorite things, she used it as a pastime. When she was a young teen, she spent most of her time in her room trying as many looks as possible. It wasn’t like her to believe that you could only have one aesthetic, she would change her look up as many times as she wanted. Going from “emo” looks one day to “kawaii” looks the next. It only made sense that she would do the same with her makeup as well. Her parents didn’t seem to mind the looks. Whatever would cover up the bruises they gifted her seemed to be helping them in some twisted way. One day it all fell apart though. Everything her parents had built was destroyed. 

The process left y/n with a humongous scar on her face. The scar started right above her right eyebrow. If it had ended below the eyebrow, it would have just seemed like she wanted an eyebrow slit, she might have even been able to cover it easily with a brow pencil. If it had ended there, but it didn’t. It ended right above her jaw bone. It wasn’t straight either. Most scars can go away with time, but hers was too deep. It would never go away. It showed her and the world her past. She hated it. 

So, as much as she hated the foundation brushes she used every morning, she continued to use them. That hideous scar needed to be covered up. Especially with all the attention she was getting. Once news came out that two well liked members of y/n’s small hometown abused their child, people were furious. Many tried helping y/n. One of the teachers at school had convinced her to try out for the drama club. She received the leading role in Annie for the school’s play. News spread fast in the town and soon people had begun to call colleges and agencies to come watch her performance, all of which y/n had no clue they were doing.  One specific agency had agreed to work with her for free until she got off the ground. She almost rejected the opportunity. That was until her foster mother had informed her that her parents weren’t going to spend as much time in jail as they had hoped. Taking the opportunity had forced y/n to continue high school in Los Angeles. She was also set up with a new foster home. Throughout all of this, the scar was hidden. She didn’t want her chance to leave to be taken away. 

Years later and no one she surrounded herself with knew of her past, or even seen her scar. Not even the makeup artists she’s worked with. She always showed up a foundation on and since it was a perfect match to her color, the makeup artists let it slide and just continued to transform her into her characters.

y/n had in fact gotten off the ground, it was now a daily thing for her to be recognized. She even met some celebrities she grew up with.

There was one day though, soon after her 23rd birthday, that y/n had not put on foundation. She felt that she wouldn’t be recognizable without it, so she wanted to try it. She had woken up later than usual then dressed herself in shorts and a tee. She went on a run and low and behold, no one recognized her. She ended up at her usual cafe. Just like every morning, she walked up the cashier and ordered her usual. The cashier, Linda, a nice old lady, who had worked there every morning tried not to stare.  It was a weird experience for both of them. Linda could have sworn that y/n looked familiar, but she shrugged it off. y/n was holding back an expression of surprise, she thought that out of everyone Linda would have noticed her. Once she received her coffee, she went to leave. That is when she ran into her wrecking ball, not that she knew it. y/n had spilt her coffee all over the strange man she knew as Calum. She didn’t know much about Calum, she only knew his name from the few times she had heard his name being called for his coffee. She also knew that Cal was well aware of who she was, with makeup that is.

“Im so sorry!” y/n exclaimed. She might’ve still been in shock from the events that had happened so far into the day, but there was no way she could have missed the look she received from the man. It wasn’t one of disgust, but more of one of surprise. The look he had however, didn’t match hers. He wasn’t in surprise from the coffee he had spilt on him, but rather the girl in front of him. 

“It’s fine really.” Calum stated as kindly as possible. There was no way he could ever even think of being rude to a lady so beautiful. 

“It’s really not, I can pay for the shirt and for whatever you were gonna order.” she offers in a hurried tone even if she wasn’t in a rush. This is because she thought he was trying not to give her pity. 

“No need, I actually feel as if I should buy you another one-” he offers, “- it was my fault anyways, i'm so clumsy i’ve been in this situation before.” he lied. y/n was well aware of the lie. Most of the time she was here before him and left after him, she had not seen it happen. An argument be that he’s done it before she moved into the neighborhood, but that also wasn’t true because y/n had witnessed him and Roy struggling to carry a couch into their home while on her run. She had actually had a conversation with Roy and she probably could have become good friends with him if she had tried. 

“It's fine really” the words coming out of her mouth this time. Before they could interact anymore though, Linda had appeared to usher them both out of the way to clean the mess that was made. She had begun to lecture Calum, one of her favorite clients, on making a mess when y/n slipped out of the Cafe. she stuck her head back in though to apologize to one last time to both of them before running off. 

She had made it home and took a shower when there was a knock at the door. Realizing that her scar was uncovered, she tried to cower. 

“Y/n, it’s Roy! I...um brought cookies to celebrate your new movie! Oh and a friend.” That was the last thing she had expected to hear through her door. She knew the friend had to be Calum, she also knew she would have to explain herself to the men. Finally getting the courage, she opened the door. Before you could say anything Calum had begun to talk. 

“Hey, it’s you again. What are you doing here?” he asked. Suddenly feeling shy y/n lowered her head. 

“Are you ok?” Calum pressed. Looking up again she can see both the boys now wearing concerned faces.

“Y/n?” Roy questioned. Gulping, y/n decided to just rip the bandage off.

“Yep, that's me. Nice to see you Roy.” slightly shaking she opens the door wider as if to invite them in. Roy understood what she meant and walked in, his expression now gone and replaced with his original smile, Calum on the other hand still wore his as he followed his friend in. She led the men into her living room.

“Sorry for the mess.” she states. Calum and Roy looked around to see what she was talking about. Cal’s brows frowning more. There was no mess. To them anyways, to y/n her only thought was that her parents would murder her for having friends over without vacuuming and tidying every corner of the house. They sat down and y/n left to go get them drinks. While in the kitchen she could hear them whispering about her. Wiping any look of sadness from her face, she picked up the drinks and headed back into the living room. Handing them their drinks, she places coasters onto the table for them. They have a light conversation, them being Roy and y/n. Cal was too busy staring at her. He was confused, how could he have not realized. How come he didn’t know that the beauty of both women was actually the beauty of one. Finally giving into the stares y/n sighs.

“I know you’re probably confused about the...um you know-” she says, gesturing to her face, “i just didn’t want anyone to find out about it yet. There’s not really any good memories that came with it. You understand right?” 

“Of course!” Roy claims, nodding his head then nudging his friend, who also nodded but not nearly as harsh as Roy had done. 

“We won’t say anything if that's what you’re asking” Calum states, he could see that them agreeing with her hadn’t reassured her enough. She smiles gently at him as Roy agrees again.  The conversation had now been a lot more free. All three of them were involved now. The conversation drifted to her movie and their music at points. y/n felt bad as she had genuinely gotten a liking to them, Calum in particular. She wanted to talk to them again, but her past was coming to haunt her, she couldn’t. The cookies were amazing, store bought, but amazing. They trio all slowly coming quiet, they had spent hours together chatting. It was now 4 in the afternoon. It seemed as neither man wanted to leave. It had been a while since they had made a new friend. Calum excused himself to the bathroom, leaving y/n and Roy. she tried her best to hint that it may be time for them to leave without seeming rude. Roy helped her bring the cups and trash into the kitchen. He watched as she cleaned each cup multiple times. To him it must have seemed as if she were nervous because she was being watched. To her though, each mug needed to be perfectly spotless or something bad would happen. It was rooted into her mind. If you dug deep enough into it, you would see y/n’s memories of being yelled at and having dishes and pots thrown at her for not having the house perfectly cleaned. Calum, finally out of the bathroom, joined Roy. together they watched the woman dry her hands before turning towards them. Before she could get a word out, Roy suggested that they should get going. Cal’s eyes couldn’t have missed her smile quickly dropping before resuming back to its original place. y/n nods before leading the kind men back to her front door. Roy leaning slightly to give her a hug and saying a quick bye, she responded as she knew how. 

“Goodbye.” It was a simple statement really, but she was taught to never try to stay in touch with people outside of necessity. Though she did give him another kind smile, one that shows her teeth in just the slightest way. Now facing Cal who, unlike his friend, was staring at the floor. Roy, waiting for him at the gate, tries his hardest not to watch their interaction. From his point of view, he can see them talking before y/n goes completely still. y/n was in shock, she had never been in this situation before. She didn’t know how to respond. Cal had asked for her number. She didn’t have anyone who wasn’t work related on her phone, should she let herself add a contact for Cal? She didn’t know the answer, she stayed still, evening out her breathing while she felt two different sets of eyes on her. Still as stiff as humanly possible, she smiles and hands her, now open, phone to Calum. He grins so softly that y/n missed it, he handed her his unlocked phone as well. He creates a contact in her phone with all his information before snapping a quick photo of himself. He listed himself as “cute neighbor”, which is quite bold seeing as he had no idea if y/n liked him, and pressed save. On Calum’s phone, y’n had simply only typed her phone number and listed herself as “y/n”. Before she could press save, Calum handed her phone back to her, she looked at the contact and her lips lifted. She turned off her phone and put it in her pocket. She looked back to Calum’s phone and changed her name to “scar girl” before saving the contact and passing the phone back to him. Unfortunately for her, Calum didn’t look at the contact and just shut off the phone. Which might have been better if she thought about it. She didn’t want to see Calum’s reaction to the name, she just hoped it was positive. As they looked into each others eyes, a blush formed onto their cheeks. y/n whispered a silent goodbye before walking back into her home and softly closing the door. 

[mysteriouslyswimmingfan-blo-blog]

Damian’s Sister

So I read @unmaskedagain‘s Lady Noire In Gotham and @monkeebratz‘s SMOL DAMIEN MARIBAT AU. Which created this idea.

A tad bit of background info.

Marinette, as well as most of the class, is between 15 and 16.

Damian has barely turned 11, having spent barely a year with the Wayne’s, so some of the things that they are teaching him are slowly root in his mind, which is why in the beginning he will come across as a bit of a lost boy. Not entirely sure of himself but sure of what he wants.

Marinette has the Black Cat Miraculous, and is notorious among everyone in her class for taking phones. Everyone just laughs about it whenever a phone is missing because it is most likely with Marinette.

*Line Break Inc.*

Marinette sighed as she looked around her classmates, everyone very unimpressed. They all realize that their lives are at stake and that a gun is being pointed at Marinette’s head. But Marinette wasn’t panicking, so why should they?

Marinette wasn’t panicking because she realizes that she had died before. While they aren’t pleasant memories, she still knows how it is to die, and she doesn’t panic just because some villain thinks that they can have a large pay day from the people in her class, from the French government.

Only thing is that they never negotiate with terrorist.

So, no. Marinette was not worried. Not for her life. For her parents, yes, she is worried for them. But not her life.

Marinette looked back to her class and see that the men that have surrounded the class with guns, weren’t paying attention to their guns, very much. Allowing Plagg to slip in and go through the guns, doing whatever it is that Plagg will do to cause luck on their side.

“Hey,” The class president called to her class. Every single one of their eyes turned to her, while also keeping an eye on the men in front of them. The men also turn their entire attention on the young Parisian fully ignoring their guns at that point. “Have we or have we not survived akuma after akuma?” The teens straightened their backs and looked more defiant. “And how did we survive them?” Marinette saw Alya and Cholé smirk before the two and every other female kicked the men in front of them, in the pelvic.

Marinette looked away from her classmates as they cause havoc and escape. The man in front of her smirked as he pulled his trigger, causing nothing to happen.

Marinette is so lucky she is Lady Noire.

The Asian Parisian raised a single eyebrow before she kicks the man in his jaw with her heel. Shame she was wearing her flats that day.

She looked around to her classmates and how they captured the group of men. Adrien and Nino were rounding up the guns and putting them a safe distance away from everyone. Ivan and Myléne were sitting on one. Cholé and Sabrina were putting makeup on one, who looks to be happy to be having makeup being placed on him, or her, Marinette wasn’t getting into that. Alya and Alix had one on his knees and were each pulling his arms behind him. Nathaniel had somehow convinced one to pose for him, every time that the guy tried to move Nathaniel would scream about aesthetic, in French. Rose, Juleka, and Lila were talking to one about all of his regrets in life, well Rose was getting him to talk about it and Juleka was there while Lila was digging into for everything that the man said. Kim and Max were arguing over the best way to hold a person down while demonstrating with two different guys.

“Alya, switch me and call it in.” Marinette walked over to where Alya was with Alix and took her spot, planting her foot in the man’s knee cavity and pulled his arm back towards her. Alya walked away and pulled a phone out from somewhere on her body. Marinette wasn’t going to question it. “Adrien, Nino, will you two check on Madam Bustier?”

Their teacher was rather violently knocked out when she took a stand, alone, against the men. They waked her with one of their guns on the side of her head, she fell over and has been bleeding from where she was hit.

It took another twenty minutes before police or paramedics showed up. Twenty minutes listening to Max and Kim argue, of listening to Rose comfort and Lila berate the same man in broken English, of listening to Cholé give the man (or women) makeup tips in perfect English and listening to Nathaniel occasionally scream in French about aesthetic.

Marinette was proud of her class.

Yeah, they could survive in Gotham as long as they were together.

However.

Three hours later, Marinette has winded up alone. She simply got lost in a crowd and thought she had heard her teacher call for her in one direction, the paramedics had slowly cleared the class and the teacher. The mass hysteria of the area, from the police, to the paramedics, even ten different new reporters (some yelling over each other after having set up too close to one another, both looking like they want to destroy the other one with their mic) has caused Marinette to completely miss her class getting onto their bus back to their hotel.

So, Marinette made a mistake and ended up walking down Crime Alley. She admits it is her fault.

And looking a group of three men in the eyes, all of them having knives, Marinette has had it for the day.

“Plagg, transform me.” She felt the power of creation wash over her as she continued to look the men in the eye. “You are all the worst. I just wanted a vacation from my own villain, but instead I had to come here to deal with other heroes’ villains.” They were in such a state of shock she was easily able to take them down tie them up to a light pole and left an anonymous tip on the GCPD website. When she turned around, she saw a jaw dropped Robin.

“Welp. I’m died.”

“No, no you are not.” He quickly countered and started muttering about five different things and he paced back and forth in front of her. He was talking so fast and so low it was hard for Marinette to understand completely.

“Uh, so sorry but I must be going to my temporary home.” Marinette waved to the side before taking her staff and launching herself the other way that she waved. Marinette got all the way to her room, with there being nine girls on the trip Marinette ended up with her own room. She had just closed the window and dropped her transformation when she heard a tapping on her window.

“AH!” Marinette screamed, jumped, and spun around wielding her purse as a weapon. A throat cleared, making Marinette open her eyes, finding Robin there. “Oh, hello.”

“Hello, I wish for you to be my sister.” Robin stepped off of the windowsill and took a step into the room before turning around and closing the window and the curtain.

“What?” Marinette did not know what was happening, do people just adopt other people in the States?

“You’ll get to know who I am under the mask as well as the rest of the dubbed ‘Batfamily’.” He kept his back towards Marinette as he talked.

“Wait.”

“As well a bit more formal training. You are good; however, you could use some work.”

“Stop.” Marinette finally got Robin to stop talking and turn towards her. Marinette also saw how tense he is. His posture, his face. Marinette was sure that if she could see his eyes, she’d see tears welling up in his eyes.

“Do you not wish to be my sister?”

“Well, it’s just that…”

“Yes of course, it was foolish for me to assume.” He turned away from her and clenched his fist at his sides, Marinette swore he had his eyes clenched underneath his mask.

“Robin, stop.” Marinette reached for him and brought him to sit on the bed with her. “I have parents.”

“Better than mine, I’m sure.” He continued to not look at Marinette, his fists tightened even more.

“I was a sort of miracle child. My parents never thought they could have me, or any child.” Marinette brought his face to look at hers.

“You have no siblings?” His fist unclenched as realization came upon him.

“I’d like one though.” Marinette opened her arms to receive a hug. She kept them open while Robin turned away and took off his mask, bringing his hand up to his face to rub at before turning back around, without his mask, and buried his head in her shoulder and wrapped his arms around her middle.

“I have three brothers and one sister as well as two sorts of sisters. But I had no say in them. I had no say in my parents. But I want a say in who my family is. It would mean the world to me to be your brother and your parent’s son.”

Marinette knew that this moment was very delicate. She had to remind him of his own family, but she didn’t know the situation of his family or how they treated him. Marinette sighed as she ran her fingers through his hair, deciding to just be quite for now and talking to Robin either in the morning or the next night.

A knock at the door interrupted the moment. In a second Robin had gotten across the room and hid in the bathroom and had silently closed the door. Marinette just blinked not sure if what she saw was correct. She slowly stood up and got to the door just as the person on the other side knocked again.

Marinette waited for the knocking to finish before opening the door to her teacher.

“Hello, Madam Bustier.” Marinette smiled brightly and subtly kicked her shoes off, to show that she has been there the entire time.

“Hello Marinette. I need you to do bedroom checks. You know where everyone needs to be. My head is still killing me.” Caline Bustier held up a clip board with a sheet with names across the top, room numbers right next to the name, as well as boxes underneath the names and numbers.

“It is a good thing that tomorrow is supposed to be a free day.” Marinette grabbed hold of the clip board and held it to her chest.

“That is another thing. Everyone is supposed to report to me tomorrow, but you mind if they reported to you?” Bustier leaned against the door jam, seeming to have a difficult time to just stand at that point.

“Not at all. Let me just get my slippers to walk around in the hall with, and I can get started on those bedroom checks as well as tell everyone that you will need to rest tomorrow so they will need to report to me.” Marinette backed out of the doorway a tad to start heading towards the bathroom to put her slippers on her feet as well as warn Robin of what was going on.

“Thank you, if anyone has any questions have them email me.”

“Of course. Rest well, Madam.”

“You’ll also need to do a morning check in and check ins through the day tomorrow.”

“How often do I need to have everyone check in with me?”

“Once an hour, use the clip board to keep track of the times.” Marinette nod and ensured that Bustier made it to her room before slipping back into her own and heading to her bathroom.

“Hey, I need to go…”

“Room check, I heard. I know French.” Marinette nodded, he seemed more hesitant.

Marinette after a moment of neither saying anything asked,  “Do you need to go home?”

“Yes, unfortunately.” He moved back to the bed and picked up his mask and turned back to her still as hesitant. “I’d like to spend the day with you tomorrow. If you are alright with that?”

Marinette smiled and pulled him into a hug. “I’d love to spend the day with my brother.”

[crazyyanderefangirlfan]

The Rabbit of Night Raven Chapter 1: Demons in high places Pt 2

Part 1 is here

For the next few days, Amane was running her dry with all his demands, as well as her money. They ranged from annoying to atrocious. But she bared through it all.

Jack, Epel, and Sebek found not long after, been informed by Ace and Deuce. They offered to take care of Amane so she could rest but declined. Amane might blackmail her that she wasn't doing her job as a hostess, not to mention he might make them uncomfortable as well. She just had to soldier on.

"I forgot to ask, how did you end up with those wounds?"

It was a Sunday morning, and Valerie just brought his breakfast. A plate of raspberry and chocolate waffles, and Darjeeling tea. He demanded it to be made since he said he wanted his favorite breakfast. He nearly emptied her wallet, because of how expensive the raspberries are.

She also decided to eat with him this time, to hopefully build a better level of trust. Grim was downstairs, saying he didn't want to be in the same room as him. He paused mid-bite and narrowed his eyes.

"Why the fuck should I tell ya? We don't exactly see eye-to-eye ya know."

"I know, but I thought I could understand you better. Despite, the sexist nicknames, and overall rudeness. I can tell you're not a bad person."

Amane studied her face to find any hint of mockery, or deception. However, to his surprise there was none. Her face was earnest, as she patiently waited for him to speak. He sighed.

"My shitty dad did this to me."

This shocked her, but he paid no mind and continued.

"I did something he didn't like and got punished."

"Wha-What did you do?"

"I gave some information to our rival company, safe to say my old man was not pleased. My friend is the CEO's kid, my dad was planning an assassination attempt on him, but I eavesdrop on one of his meetings and managed to phone her just on time. He saw this as an act of betrayal and punished me for it."

"Didn't you're mother do anything! What about the rest of you're family?"

"My mother had no power, and the rest of them agreed with my dad."

She went silent and contemplated. She had one question in her mind.

"But...How did you manage to end up in that crater? Night Raven is miles away from any other piece of land."

It was his turn to be silent. Amane looked away as he pondered for an appropriate response. Finally, he faced her.

“You see Sugar tits, my family and I are demons, sex demons to be exact. He probably used teleportation magic to get rid of me, and erase any evidence."

A demon, an incubus no less, well, that did explain why he didn't die so easily when she found him. Though she should have guessed he was a supernatural being, his ears were a dead giveaway. Speaking of which, she remembered what she first thought he was and let out a giggle.

Amane furrowed his brows. "What's so funny?"

She turned to him still giggling.

"I thought you were some kind of fae, with you're ears and all."

He knit his brows at her answer, before giving out a hearty chuckle.

"Haha, you actually thought I was one of those guys. Fairies are overrated  Hun, demons are what's hot."

"Oh really? they've been so overused in the media, I thought they were the overrated beings." She smirked. He gave out another chuckle.

"Oh, honey. That just means we're more lovable."

They let out another good-hearted laugh before the girl asked another question.

"So...Is there anything else I should know about you or demons?" He let out a thoughtful hum before answering.

"You know about demon pacts, yeah?" She nodded.

"Well, back in the old days my family would perform blood pacts with people who they are eternally grateful for and give them gifts as a sign of their loyalty."

He gave her a close-lipped smile.

"But of course, you won't see me that Sugar tits, I ain't exactly grateful to be in your care but it will do.'"

"Keep that attitude up, and you'll be relying on Grim."

"He's cute but unreliable and a bit whiny for my tastes."

She laughed. She was about to reply when she heard the said monster calling for her. Valerie muttered under breath on how he's such a whiny baby, but there was a smile on her face.

"I'll see you later. Call when me you need something." She got up and left. Leaving Amane in his thoughts.

No one, but his mother and his best friend were that kind to him.

Maybe she ain't so bad.

_____________________________________

Night came quickly. Valerie decided she and Grim will have dinner with Amane. Technically, she had to bribe him with her tuna casserole to get him to cooperate, and just like that he's happily eating his third serving with them.

"Mmmmm~ The cheese complements the tuna so well! You really outdid yourself Henchwoman!"

"Is he always like this?" Amane whispered as he watched Grim loudly eating his food with a blank look on his face.

"Yeah, but it's his charming point, I guess."

Unexpectedly, after their conversation this morning. Amane didn't bother her as much, just an occasional glass of water or a trip to the bathroom. She didn't know what changed his attitude, but it was welcomed regardless.

"So. After you get better, wanna hang out sometime?" He glanced at her mildly surprised, but a cheeky smirk made it's to his face.

"Asking me on a date are you Sugar tits? So bold~ But alas, girls aren't my thing, but if you're setting me up with one of your boy toys I'll happily oblige."

She giggled and lightly punched his shoulder. "No, I mean for us hang out as friends, and I don't think I should introduce you to guys just yet. Unless you want to traumatize their minds with all your flirting."

"Their loss if they can't handle this firecracker."

Valerie smiled. She liked this side of Amane better, he was easy to talk to and made great jokes, even if his humor is a little...Vulgar. After dinner, she helped Amane get ready for bed, then her and Grim's turn to retire.

"Kid, hey kid." She groaned and turned over. But she felt the covers being forcefully removed.  Groggily she sat up, she asked what's wrong.

"It's Amane, he's been crying for thirty minutes. We tried to comfort him but it got worse." Wilbur answered, concern evident in his voice.

Blinking the sleep out of her eyes, finally registering the loud screaming and crying, and the ghosts concerned expressions. She rapidly got out of bed, waking Grim up in the process, and sprinted to Amane's room.

He was a mess when she got to him. Amane was thrashing around, covered in sweat and tears leaked out of his eyes. He was mumbling in his sleep.

"N-No! Stop it!... Please I-I'm sorry, no more." He choked out a sob. Her heart clenched at the sight. She climbed on the bed and managed to wrapped her arms around him.

"Amane! Amane it's alright, no one's here to hurt you. It's not real!"

He jolted up and she caught the sight of his face. His eyes were red and his breathe were ragged. He started to chew on his bottom lip, and his eyes welled up with tears again. He buried his face on her chest, his body wracked with an onslaught of sobs and tears.

She rubbed circles on his back in an attempt to comfort him and whispered more words of reassurance. It took a while, but he managed to calm down. They sat in silence, save for Amane's occasional sniffles.

"Hey, Valerie." This was the first time he said her name properly. "Ratting my dad out wasn't the only reason he beat me."

He confessed that the other reason he was actually a bastard child. His mother had an affair with one of his father's employees once she found out he had a mistress. She was going to announce the divorce during their anniversary when his father blackmailed her to stay with him. Amane didn't know what it was, but it worked.

He told her that since he was the only child, his father expected him to take over his place one day, and produce an heir. Unfortunately for him, he was interested in boys and didn't like the idea of taking over his father's company.

His mother was the only person who accepted him, while his father was outraged. He argued he could just adopt a child, but it only made it worse. The rest of his family expressed their disappointment in him, in everything he did, and voted him to be banned from the family.

Valerie, just sat there as he continued to cry. She soothed him, telling him that it's okay, that it's not his obligation to live up to his family standards, whatever he does his choice only not theirs. That he should be free from their hateful opinions.

She spied the ghosts and Grim at the doorway but didn't say anything, opted to just comfort the man in her arms.

_____________________________________

After that night, their relationship changed drastically. He was more open to her, more friendly, and used her name often. He told her stories about his childhood and his best friend Lorelei, who was also a demon descendant, notably a spider demon. A famous idol who's known for incorporating spiders into her aesthetic. He promised her to introduce them sometime.

In return, she confessed to him she was from another world and he didn't look a leased bit surprised.

"Honey, after all the shit I've been through, nothing surprises me at this point."

She told about her life in Night Raven, how she constantly solved the school's overblot problem, and how she's basically Crowley's errand girl.

"The school is lucky that I don't have any magic. With all the stressful situations I've been through, I would have overblotted and destroy the entire school.'"

She shared stories about her and her friends' shenanigans, and the rest of the boys. He questioned if any of the boys were her boyfriend, cause he noticed how affectionate she was to all of them. She told him no, she was just like that normally.

"I don't understand why they turn red whenever I hug them or kiss their cheeks. I mean, showing affection to friends is normal."

Ahh. The oblivious type.

_____________________________________

It was finally the day Amane recuperate, and to go home. They were in the mirror chamber and Crowley was there to wish him the best of health, (and maybe exploit some money from him.) He wore the clothes when she found him, all clean and fixed.

"Mr. Mania I hope your stay was pleasant, and I wish for you the best of health, A reward is not needed, a simple thanks will do for I am gracious. But if you like, then I am in no room to argue."

Valerie mentally rolled her eyes at that but gave Amane a soft but sad smile. She was slowly getting used to his company and almost asked if he could stay longer, but she refused to be selfish. Instead, she just hugged the man, which he reciprocated.

"I hope you come back soon."

"Of course I will Val, ain't nothing gonna stop this firecracker." He turned his attention to Grim and gave him a noogie.

"Of course I'll come back for you too, ya little shit."

"Fguaa! Just get out of here!"

He gave them a crooked grin and walked away. Valerie watched as he walked away, hoping she could meet him again. However, after a few steps, he stopped and ran back to her. This perplexed them, especially when he got into one knee and took her hands.

"Valerie Kemonihito, I wished to have a blood pact with you, I am forever in your debt."

They stared at him as if he grew three heads. None of them couldn't believe his words. A blood pact? What was he doing? Valerie was the first to recover.

"Amane you don't have to do this, you don't have a debt towards me." She tried to reason, but he furiously shook his head.

"No, I do. You have saved my life and brought me peace and comfort when I am at my most vulnerable, you have accepted me as I am, and have not judged me for my past, and for those reasons. So please, accept it."

They all stared, waiting for her answer. After a few agonizing seconds, she responded.

"It won't hurt that much right?" Amane smiled.

"Not much, just a tiny prick will do."

"Alright let's do it."

"Are you sure Ms. Kemonohito?" Crowley cut in. "Blood pacts are a serious oath that should not be taken likely if ever one of the party's' will break it, death is the only punishment."

Valerie gazed at Amane, there was no hint of mischief, the determination is clear on his face.

"I'm sure." Amane smiled and got up.

"Okay." He brought his hand up, claws grew and took his index finger and slowly cut a small line in both their hands. Valerie winced but bared with it.

"Now we hold hands and recite our own oath, I'll go first." He cleared his throat.

"I, Amane Mania will dedicate my life to serve you. Wherever you are and whenever you are, I shall protect you with my life, and bring you justice if ever I failed to protect you."

"I, Valerie Kemonohito will do my best to be kind and just to you. So you may never suffer or feel lonely, you are welcome to be with me as much as you want so you may never feel ostracize again."

As they said these words, a dark reddish light enveloped them. The blood on their hands swirled and mixed together before engraving it in their skins like tattoos, going up to their arms all the way to their faces.

Grim and Crowley watch the spectacle, astounded but frighten as the light died down, and their marks disappearing.

Valerie blinked, she stared at their hands. All healed as if he didn't cut them. She cut off from her musings when Amane spoke.

"With this blood pact, you can summon me anytime time you want, no matter the place I will be with you. All you have to do is either call my name three times or use your blood and call my name." He informed.

"And now for my tribute. Give me a moment."

He raised his hands, chanting words under his breath a pinkish glow covered his hands, when the light died down a silver necklace inlaid with pink quartz appeared.

“Alright, c’mere.” He turned her around and clasp it on her.

“This was an heirloom, but only those who we think are worthy may have this and I want you to take it.” Valerie admired the the craftsmanship of it and beamed up to him.

“Thank you.” He ruffled her hair.

“No problem, now time to to get my ride. Y’all better step back.”

They did just that. Amane closed his eyes before muttering incomprehensible words, a star pentagon appeared before their eyes, it glowed a red malevolent aura, then a screech.

It was horrendous. The sound shook the ground and cracked the windows but weirdly not the mirrors, finally, a giant figure swooped up and landed next to Amane. It was a monster, it was twenty-foot tall, it had a humanoid body but its hands and feet had dangerously sharp talons, its wings were big as its body, and it’s head reminded her of an owl but the sharp teeth made her reconsider.

"Mr. Mania! Do you realize what you have summoned!?" The fear and shock were clear in Crowley's voice as he stared at the creature.

'"What is that!? It's so ugly!" Grime cried. He hid in Valerie's clothes as it's glowing amber eyes glared at him for his comment.

"This is a Strix. A demonic vampire owl that feasts on human flesh and blood. Lucky for you, this girl likes what normal owls eat so your good." The strix's feathers were the colors of pecan and it had small tufts of white.

"Her name is Lisha, I saved her when she was being bullied from her own kind. Lisha that's Valerie." Valerie shrunk when the strix's gaze shifted from Grim to her.

Lisha tilted her head curiously before leaning towards the girl, sniffing her hair and clothes. Valerie stood still as it goes on. Finally, she let out a happy chirped and nuzzled her. Valerie let out a surprised gasp but laughed and wrapped her arms around her head.

“How about that? Lisha doesn’t usually like strangers, but it seems your an exception.” He grinned

Valerie ran her fingers in Lisha feathers, they were soft and smooth. The monster purred in content.

"I'll be off, for real this time." He got onto Lisha’s back, but Valerie spoke up.

"Wait where are you staying?"

"I'll go to Lorelei. Her dad and I are cool cause I saved his life." The star pentagon glowed. He looked back, he gave one final smirk and disappeared.

Valerie smiled fondly, she scratched Grim’s ears as an attempt to comfort him.

"Well." Crowley coughed. "Now that's over, Ms. Kemonohito I hope you learned something from this experience.”

"Yes, sir."

"Good now I must be off. Crewel will have my hind if I keep him waiting." He muttered as he walked off.

Just as he walked out, her first-year friends ran in. All with worried expressions on their faces.

"Valerie! We heard a screech and it came h-"

"Oh, it came from Amane’s familiar.” She answered.

“Damn, nice ice Val.” Ace commented looking at her necklace.

“Thanks. Amane gave her to me as a gift." The mentioned of his name sent shivers to the ADeuce duo as they recalled his...Advances towards them.

"Its beautiful." Epel was sure Vil would approve of it.

"He didn't do anything obscene, Valerie?" Sebek eyed at the peice of jewelry, feeling something different about it.

"No, but we did a blood pact though." That made them froze.

"You did what?" The fae's voice was low for once as he and the rest of the boys stared her, wide-eyed and slacked jawed.

"A blood pact."

All hell broke loose.

The boys were screaming at her, asking why would she do that, and promising to beat the life out of Amane, thinking he forced it on her.

Valerie pursed her lips, she set Grim down before hitting their head. They grunted in pain.

"Okay before you guys go off. Amane did this as a sign of his gratitude and gave me this necklace as a sign of loyalty. He was actually a great guy once you get to know him, and he's just misunderstood. He even promised to come back and hang out, you should join us."

Ace and Deuce paled at the mention that he was coming back to Night Raven, but jealousy grew in their stomachs like the rest of the boys. Hearing her talked so fondly of him irritated them, but she didn't notice.

"Fine, we'll consider your offer Princess. But we won't hesitate to gut that guy if he makes you upset." Ace huffed. She grinned.

"Thank you so much. Now if you excuse me, I'll have to buy groceries." She kissed their cheeks.

She happily walked out leaving five red-faced boys and made her way to Sam's shop. 

"Hey while we're at it, can we buy some premium tuna. I need it after all I've been through."

"Fine, you've deserved it." He cheered.

She giggled. Admiring her necklace, it glinted brightly under the sun. Her thoughts drifted to Amane, hoping he was alright. She knows she'll see him again after this is Twisted Wonderland

[justablobfish]

An unusual snowman

Day 12 of my Advent Calender. A new drabble or oneshot everyday until Christmas, following the Continent’s favourite found family and what they’re up to in the winter season. Based on this prompt list

No witchers were harmed in the making of this fic. Everyone’s fine! :3

Read on AO3

Day 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

______

This is bad. Very bad. They should never have stopped in this goddamn village. 

When they arrived, it was the middle of the night and - with everyone and their grandmother trying to sell Ciri out to Nilfgaard - they decided to get a room at the inn and smuggle the princess in through the back door unseen. 

Which turned out to be a mistake. Because that way no one could tell them. 

The next morning they woke up and Ciri had vanished without a trace.

When they asked around the village they soon found out that she hadn't been the first child to disappear. A few weeks ago children suddenly started disappearing overnight. No one had seen where they had gone to; no amount of locked doors and safety measures could keep them from being taken. 

Jaskier paces up and down in their room, uncertain what to do. 

It's been three days since Geralt set out to find the missing kids, since Geralt ordered him to stay here in case Ciri comes back. 

When Geralt took off, he only said he'd be back 'soon', unspecific and unhelpful as ever. Surely three days were no longer encompassed by the term 'soon'. Something must have gone wrong. 

And the more time passes, the less likely it becomes that Ciri and the other children will return unharmed. 

Jaskier stops in his tracks and gives a short, determined nod. There's only one thing to do. He has to go after them as well! 

While the children have disappeared without leaving any kind of clue to mortal humans, Geralt must have found some sort of trace, because once Jaskier reaches the edge of the village he can see a clear and straight trail of Geralt's footprints leading into the nearby woods. 

"Dark, gloomy forest. Always a good sign!" Jaskier tries to encourage himself and sets out to get his little family back from the clutches of whatever monster stole them. 

The tracks lead deep into the forest. While at first there are some felled trees, bird houses or the occasional discarded apple core, eventually the signs of nearby civilization become rarer and then disappear altogether. And still Geralt's tracks lead further. 

Jaskier soon falls into a sort of trance, placing one step in front of the other and with his eyes fixed on the ground in front of him. 

He almost doesn't notice when Geralt's trail ends. 

Jaskier blinks and Geralt's heavy boot prints are gone, replaced by a variety of far smaller imprints, that criss-cross all over the place. Surprised, he looks up. 

The first thing he registers is a small, crooked hut several feet away. The way it's decorated with pieces of candy and pastry (most of it clearly chewed on) practically screams evil magic trap. 

In front of the hut stands Geralt. 

Actually, no, at more than a glance it turns out it's not Geralt. It has Geralt's pauldrons and it holds Geralt's swords but other than that, it's a snowman. 

Dread spreads in Jaskier’s guts and he quickly jogs around the figure to get a closer look. On the other side, yellow eyes and furrowed eyebrows glare back at him. 

Except the yellow eyes are slices of carrots and the eyebrows are made of twigs. 

"Oh Geralt! What did they do to you?" Jaskier gasps. His knees suddenly feel very weak and he begins to think that following Geralt all by himself might not have been the smartest idea. 

The child of legend, whisked away right from under the nose of a Witcher, said Witcher turned into a snowman and only a humble bard left to save the day. What chance does he stand? What was he thinking? 

Then again, maybe there's something he can do. It always works in the old stories told to children and the weird hut with its candy decor definitely gives off the same kind of vibe as those tales. 

"Here goes nothing," Jaskier mumbles and places his lips on the snowman's mouth. Or, well, on the coals arranged in a frown on the snowman's face. 

And then he waits. 

For a moment. 

For a minute. 

For ten. 

Nothing happens. Seems true love's kiss only works in the stories, after all. 

Which begs the question of what he's supposed to do now. 

What chance does he stand where even a Witcher failed? And yet, what choice does he have? Whoever did this has taken his daughter, his family. He can't exactly just walk away. 

He'd never be able to look Yennefer in the eyes again. 

Hell, he'd never be able to look himself in the eyes again. And he so loves mirrors! 

So Jaskier reaches forward and grabs the steel sword from where it's sticking out of the large ball that makes up the snowman's torso. 

As his fingers close around the grip of the sword his hand brushes against the snow. 

And like a - well, like a snowman left in the sun for too long - it crumbles. 

"No, no, no!" Jaskier screams. "Stop! Don't do that! Please!" 

Before his eyes, the snowman that is his lover falls apart. He can only watch helplessly as the fractured part falls in on itself and slips off the bottom part. The head rolls to the side in an almost human-looking manner, until it falls to the ground as well. Before his eyes, Geralt turns into nothing but a pile of snow. 

The fact that his kiss didn't work he could live with but this? Even if there was a way to undo the spell that turned Geralt into a child's plaything, there's no coming back from this. Geralt is gone, his body destroyed. Jaskier’s best friend, the love of his life, has died. 

"I'm so sorry, Geralt," Jaskier whispers as he sinks to his knees. A dislodged slice of carrot glares at him accusingly. 

Jaskier absentmindedly places the sword he acquired at such a high cost on the ground beside him and wraps his arms around himself. 

"I shall write you the most glorious ballad ever written," he mumbles. "The whole Continent will know of your bravery." 

The words sound hollow, even to his own ears. A song won't bring Geralt back. What he really wants to do is curl up on the snow-covered ground and never get up again. 

But he can't do that. There's still Ciri. And he will get his daughter back, if it's the last thing he does. 

So Jaskier slowly gets up, grabs the sword again and turns towards the hut. The fear that had settled into his bones earlier at the idea that even Geralt couldn't best this sorcerer is gone. Now there's only fury and rage burning inside of him. This villainous toad-spotted miscreant of a mage has taken his family from him. They're going to pay! 

He opens the door and steps inside. 

The hut is bigger on the inside. Of course it is. Jaskier doesn't know why he expected anything different. The foyer itself is wide enough that the hut's exterior would fit into it twice. 

He also shouldn't be so surprised that the inside of the hut is entirely made of ice. Everything from the floor to the windowless walls to the twin set of stairs leading up to a second floor, which the hut definitely wasn't high enough for, looking at it from the outside. The mage is really going heavy on the whole fairy-tale villain aesthetic. 

Flickering candlelight from the huge chandelier overhead reflects off of every surface and makes the whole room seem to move and shift constantly. Jaskier starts feeling nauseous. 

It's hard to tell how many doors there are and which ones are only reflections, so he simply walks towards the large double door underneath the stairwells and heads through it. 

Unlike what he expected, the ice isn't cold to the touch and feels more like normal wood under his fingers. Maybe the ice is just an illusion. 

The room he finds himself in next is an even larger hall, equally made of ice and very clearly once intended as a ballroom. Various sconces illuminate an intricate pattern carved into the wide floor, while once colorful paintings of fancily dressed dancers on the walls are glossed over with the ever-present ice. 

Now, the room seems to serve a different purpose though. The floor is littered with various toys, dolls and plush animals. Chalk drawings cover not only several stacks of paper, but also the long banquet table at the far end of the room. It appears Jaskier is getting closer to the mystery of the missing children. They must have been playing here recently. 

While Jaskier looks around and tries to find any proof that Ciri was here as well, a side door opens and a curious voice asks "Hello?" His presence has been noticed, then. 

He turns around slowly, sword at the ready. 

In the door stands Ciri. 

"Jaskier!" she yells, relief and happiness swinging in her voice. Then she takes off running in his direction, followed by a group of other children. 

Ciri throws herself into his arms and clings to him like a curious kid's tongue to an icicle. Not that Jaskier has any experience with that particular situation. 

"I tried to get back to you but every time I tried to run away I always just ended up in front of the hut again," she whimpers. "It's enchanted or something!" 

"Well isn't that just adorable," comes a sneering voice from the other end of the room, where an elegantly dressed woman has appeared, seemingly out of nowhere. 

Her flawless skin and almost unnaturally symmetrical face mark her as a mage from Aretuza. 

Jaskier wraps his free hand around Ciri and pushes her behind him, while eyeing the sorceress warily. 

Ciri pays him little mind and steps back to his side. 

"Look, Gretel, you got it all wrong!" she tells the woman. "Parents do care about their children. This proves it." 

 "Nonsense!" the sorceress huffs. "My parents abandoned me as soon as money got a little tight. If Aretuza hadn't taken me in, I would have ended up just like my brother and died a horrible death at the hands of the awful witch that built this house!" 

"Then why is Jaskier here, risking his life to get me back?" Ciri counters "And Geralt, too?" 

"That proves nothing!" the mage all but shrieks. "The Witcher came to do his job. He came for the money he was promised. And this one? I bet he doesn't even know you well enough to keep you apart from the other children!" 

With that she raises her hands menacingly and suddenly, instead of Ciri and a dozen or so other kids, Jaskier is surrounded by several perfect copies of the Cintran princess. 

It's his worst nightmare. As if one Child Surprise wasn't already more than enough to handle. 

The Ciris stare at each other in surprise for a moment, before one of them breaks the silence by yelling "I'm the real one!" 

A split-second later Jaskier is surrounded by the gaggle of Ciris, yelling and giggling and trying to convince him that they're the right Ciri. It all seems to be a funny game to them. Jaskier’s head starts to spin from trying to get a good look at even one of them. 

"Stop!" he screams at the top of his lungs. "How am I supposed to pick someone if you keep running around me?" 

The children come to a halt and arrange themselves in a loose circle around him, quiet except for the occasional giggle still breaking through. 

However, only one of them rolls her eyes at Jaskier’s demanding tone. 

Jaskier places his hand on top of the real Ciri's head and glares at the sorceress. 

"See? I told you he couldn't do it! Parents are useless!" she gloats and waves her hand dismissively. The Ciris turn back into the children they were before. 

Only the one Jaskier chose remains the same. 

"Impossible!" Gretel shouts as the smug grin falls from her face. "But that doesn't prove anything! We need another test! How about-" 

With few short strides Jaskier crosses the room, grabs the sorceress by the front of her dress and shoves her against the wall. 

"Enough," he presses out between clenched teeth as he places the sword across her bare throat. "I am done with your games! Undo the spell that keeps the children trapped!" 

"Cute," the witch muses without any sign of fear or worry. "But you do know that I can turn you into a pile of dust with a snap of my fingers, right?" 

"Do I look like I give a damn?" Jaskier growls. "You took my daughter away from me! I don't care what you do to me, I will tear you to pieces if you don't let her go!" 

"Hmm," she replies solemnly. "Interesting. Perhaps I was mistaken in my judgment. There do seem to be some parents who love and protect their children." 

Before Jaskier can further comment on that, the witch is gone. Vanished into thin air, just like how she appeared. He stares at his empty hand in surprise, where he had clutched the fabric of her dress a moment ago. 

There goes his chance to avenge Geralt. The fury that was gnawing at his guts starts to settle. Jaskier holds onto it desperately. He knows that once the anger is gone, only grief will remain. 

At least Ciri is unharmed. Jaskier turns around slowly and faces the group of children, who stare back at him expectantly. 

"She wasn't malicious, you know?" Ciri explains. "Just misguided and lonely. Although she did curse Geralt with a spell that turned him into an inanimate object." 

"I know," Jaskier whispers, barely audible with the lump that has formed in his throat. How can he possibly tell Ciri what happened to Geralt? That her guardian is gone and won't come back? She's lost so many people already in her short life. 

"He's in the room over there," Ciri adds chipperly and takes off. 

"... wait, what?" Jaskier stutters as he scrambles after her, followed by the rest of the children who chatter with one another excitedly. 

Ciri leads him to an adjacent room. It's not nearly as big as the ballroom, but still large enough that it couldn't possibly fit into the little hut he saw from the outside. An enormous feather bed occupies most of the opposite wall, big enough for at least three or four grown people to sleep on, or a dozen or so kidnapped children. 

The rest of the room is taken up by various shelf boards mounted to the walls, filled with dozens upon dozens of porcelain dolls. Their empty eyes seem to stare at him as Ciri leads him further into the room 

"Over there," Ciri declares and points at one particular doll. It doesn't look much different from the other ones, safe for its face. Its mouth is sculpted in the shape of a frown instead of the cheerful smiles of the other ones and its yellow eyes, despite being made of lifeless glass beads, seem to glare back at Jaskier angrily. 

"That's… That's Geralt?" Jaskier asks carefully, not quite ready to allow himself to hope. 

"Of course," Ciri chides. "Who else would it be? Look at the face! I tried to sneak around Gretel's laboratory and look for a way to turn him back, but I couldn't find anything."

"We had lots of fun playing with him while Ciri was away!" a little boy announces happily. Some other children giggle affirmatively. 

"Anyway," Ciri sighs as she gently pats the boy's head and ruffles his hair. She seems to be the oldest kid around. The others appear to be looking up to her. 

"I'm sure if you just kiss him that'll break the spell!" Ciri continues. "And then we can finally get out of here and return these little monsters to their parents." 

"So uhm…," Jaskier mumbles. "Entirely unrelated, totally random and unimportant question, but, uh, what's with that snowman outside the door?" 

"The children built it earlier today," Ciri shrugs. "I told them not to use Geralt's armor, that he'd want it back once he gets uncursed, but I don't think they listened. Why are you asking?"

"No reason!" Jaskier huffs and quickly grabs the doll before Ciri can notice how he's turning bright red. 

She narrows her eyes at him, but he turns his back to her and presses a kiss to the doll's…well, face. It's not exactly big enough for more precision. 

A bright light emits from it and Jaskier has to close his eyes firmly. 

Suddenly, his hands are no longer holding on to the doll but instead are wrapped around a very firm and familiar waist. 

The light slowly dims and flickers out. Jaskier opens his eyes carefully. In front of him stands Geralt of Rivia, unharmed and scowling even more than usual. 

"Well, aren't you a sight for sore eyes, my fair lady," Jaskier teases. 

"What?" Geralt grumbles and looks down at himself, taking in the bright pink dress made up of an abundance of ruffles, as well as the intricately woven braid that rests on his shoulder. 

"The fuck?" he concludes. "When the witch cursed me my clothes stayed the same size. Why did the dress grow with me then?" 

"Well, there are children around," Ciri huffs with an annoyed click of her tongue. "Now can we finally get out of here?" 

"I need some pants," Geralt growls. "This is far too impractical. I can't fight the witch like that." 

"Well, the witch is gone," Jaskier shrugs. "And I don't think she'll be coming back." 

"Then what about the enchantment that kept the kids trapped here?" Geralt huffs. 

"Lifted," Ciri explains. "At least she said she would." 

"Oh," Geralt remarks. "Any… other monsters in the area? Some rabid dogs? Anything else?" 

"No, dear," Jaskier answers. "I think all the work is already taken care of. You can relax for once." 

"Riiiight," Geralt mumbles slowly. Then he nods to himself. "Then I guess I'll just keep wearing this for now." 

"Absolutely, love!" Jaskier encourages. "It suits you tremendously." 

"Gross," Ciri comments as Jaskier leans in for a proper kiss with his rescued lover. "Now can we please get out of here, already?" 

[st-just]

I've seen you post a few times some interesting world building snippets, is there a setting your working on at the moment, or are they unrelated? (Feel free to use this an invitation to talk about the world, I'd love to hear about it)

Well, since you did ask for it!

They’re mostly theoretically written to be in the same setting, with a sort of acceptance that when put together it’ll probably be a bit incoherent around the edges. Given that it started as the setting for a D&D game that ended like a year ago and has just stewed and metastasized since then, that’s kind of a given, really.

But honestly, the initial impetus was reading...I think it was Strangers Drowning?, anyway, there was a discussion of how rather than just ‘selfish versus selfless’, a more useful distinction is how people distribute moral weight between themselves, their friends/family/close circle, and the general public/world at large. And, being an utter nerd, my second or third thought was “huh, that’s a pretty decent chassis for an alignment system that’s meaningfully distinct from good vs. Evil”.

So then I ended up working out three Great Powers for a world as sort of ideal types/expressions of each extreme, and then coming up with cultures and aesthetics that seemed kind of fitting after the fact, which I’m fairly sure is not how you’re supposed to do it, but anyway.

So on the one extreme you’ve got the Sublime Commonwealth, called the Esheri by everyone without a government job. A universalist, bureaucratic state, governed by Janissary-technocrats plucked from orphanages and schools, without family or property or the right to any sort of legacy beyond what they can contribute to the Common Good. Mandatory public education, but it’s solely in the equivalent of Esperanto. Religious freedom, as long as the temples accept state funding and choose their preachers and officials from government-approved seminaries and madrassas, with the more or less explicit goal that after a few generations of modernist theology and Higher Criticism the whole thing will be unnecessary. Family ties considered broken at the age of majority, or when the parents are deemed negligent, with newly formed households encouraged to take their name from some civic virtue or geographic feature rather than anything related to their cultures or ancestries. Public sanitation and healthcare and food relief, but also if the Committee on Strategy determines that they really need a new naval port you might find out you’re moving in a month, all your sacred rites and trade secrets will be carefully recorded for inclusion in the next edition of The Encyclopedia, and so forth. Titles like “Empiricist.” “Special Adviser to the Secretariat,” “Alternate Member of the Committee on Industry and Progress”.

The second power would be the Holy Ilyrin Empire, or possibly Ilyrin-Belthaya, depending on who you ask and where you’re standing. Not so much a unified ‘state’ as a vast and sprawling collection of crown in personal union, sworn vassals, various sorts of tributaries and protectorates, and a thousand other sorts of distinctions fit to make any central administrator cry. The Empire’s exceptionally big on tradition, you see and while the Queen-Empress is clearly the Heavens’ chosen Vicegerent, she and her court have no special authority to meddle in the natural and organic constitutions of her various subjects, save to defend them from unnatural innovation or outside influence. Family, lineage, and inheritance  are all exceptionally important, with infertility being treated like a malignant tumour that’s too humiliating to discuss in public, and disinheriting a child or repudiating ones family being more or less unthinkable, though the particulars of just who counts as your ‘family’ or ‘children’ can vary quite a bit, depending on location and circumstance. Regardless, nepotism and patronage are so widely accepted there’s barely words for them, and certainly no stigma attached-really, not going out of your way to help out distant relatives or family friends with any jobs or trading tips you happen to be able to hand out is what would get you ostracized and looked down upon. Religion is everywhere, and all-encompassing, but despite what the Hierarch in Imir might desire, most minority faiths have sort of official compact with their lords and ladies mandating toleration as long as they keep to themselves and know their limits. Education is handled through guilds and churches, without any sort of central organization or certification scheme, and the vast majority of really useful or impressive knowledge is hoarded by particular sacred orders or guilds or family lines. Absolutely all relief against misfortune relies upon your local churches and notables and whether your family or social circle can support you, but on the other hand if you’ve got a good thing going there’s essentially zero chance someone is going to come in from on high and destroy it, and if some system works then it’s going to be allowed to keep working. Titles like “Earl Marshal,” “Lady Protector.” “Witchfinder-General”

Third and the Free Cities, or the Federal Republic, or the Unconnected Collection of City-States Who Share Many Prominent Citizens And Trading Interests. Words are wind, and honour is an affectation, duty and loyalty are chains the cunning try to fasten around the necks of the strong. Notably, the only democracies-in a somewhat Athenian sense, with crimes against the City being tried before an assembly of citizens and determined by popular vote, without reference to written law, and open campaigning for command of armies and bidding for the right to exact tribute from the various hinterland tribes. As a matter of principle, there is no obligation that is not freely accepted, whether to family or faith or sovereign. The great and good of the Cities enrapture the masses with their feuds and romances, and a vital part of any political career is providing grand spectacles and public feasts to entertain and sustain the masses living on the street, the vast majority of whom can rely upon no other source of charity. Religion is commonplace, though objectively a large fraction of them are probably better called ‘cults’, sustained by direct sponsorship or force of personality, feuding with all the other street gangs and syndicates in bloody, shadowy affairs, each sect rising and burning out like a seasonal fashion, though each City has something like an official patron and a few festivals widely observed enough to have the mob firmly behind them. As the City Assemblies assign duties or assignments and not occupations, there’s officially speaking no title higher than the elected captain of a ship or mercenary company. Not allowing this to humble them, it’s an accepted practice for the famous and important to take various grand sobriquets and epithets-”The ingenious,” “the magnificent,” “Maestro of Falling Stars,” “Weaver in Blood and Bone,” and so on.

....I can keep going on pretty much indefinitely, but I’ll stop writing their in the interest of actually posting this relatively soon after receiving it.

[khakerskayavdova-a]

a mood board for faina & natasha ( @gcroinya​ )

[ofcloudsandstars]

I had a really colourful (but long) dream last night! I haven't had such a vibrant adventurous dream like this in a while. It was very vivid and somewhat thrilling. I used to get them more as I was younger but now the pop up every once in a while.

It is a bit long so I'm going to make a read more

It was sometime in the near/far future and I'd guess I was somewhere warm (yet not tropical??) in south east Asia. I was on a beach with a rich pink sunset, brown sands and castle ruins with this extremely attractive dark skin Indian guy. We were apparently investigating the castle ruins together, flirting, checking out the wildlife and showing off some talents. I had certain magic powers in this world like I could fly gracefully and control things with my will and he was impressing me with his skill of chemistry and showing me local nature I was deeply interested in. The space was beautiful it felt like another planet. The grass was tall and bronze and would glimmer in the setting sun, and the trees I don't know how to describe it but were slightly different with large brown circular leaves.

We were hunting for mutations which I was reading as natural unbalances. Like I vaguely remember it was us looking for strange animals we've never seen before cause nature survived some environmental crash and new species emerged to correct it but humans survived and were still living their old ways but the new creatures, society named mutants and put them of course in a bad light cause they often are the cause of why we can't continue living the same way now that there are 'monsters' lurking out there. Of course the big ones get battled off and killed (though even those are difficult cause some evolved to resist destruction) but the more troubling ones would be like small worms similar to electric eels that have an appetite for electrical wires that destroys cities power systems, or bugs that evolved to thrive in algae polluted waters that make new toxic ecosystems that humans and livestock can't be around.

I was trying to understand these new 'monsters' and was checking out this vibrant blue and neon striped scorpion/lobster crustacean on the beach (apparently locally referred to as tiger scorpion in case you want to know the local names of monster creatures in my dream world), that was threatening to puncture a highly toxic venom in us if we didn't keep away. We clung to the side of the castle as it menaced us but as I made sure we were both calm and sent it calming/friendly vibes it calmed down too and left us alone. I held the extremely hot guy and floated us down gently to the sand and I was trying to explain that maybe these creatures weren't bad it's just evolution. He was very VERY open minded I could tell cause apparently this belief was highly controversial for the future society we were living in but he somewhat agreed. He took me around the castle and off the beach towards some bronze grassy fields where cows were grazing. There was a pond with dark brown water and a few dead cows around it. Some had large holes in their heads. It was from one of the bugs that live in the toxic water. For some reason animals can be attracted to the water like flies to a pitcher plant and the bugs get to them. I had to agree that the site was very ugly and gruesome but we still shouldn't villanize these 'monsters' but see this as some grave imbalance. I kept asking 'how did this happen?' As if I knew deep down it was more than just humans being irresponsible with the environment but also governments not controlling something they've been keeping a secret and now it's karmic consequences humanity is facing.

Suddenly a very elegantly and luxuriously dressed woman emerges from a black car. She's upset yet too polished and elegant to show it outwardly. I could just feel her anger and disapproval. She had a long taffeta type iridescent wine gown that shone bright red, lots of onyx jewelry, a tight upbun with more black jewels in it and beautiful red shoes. She's clearly the guy's mother and is asking him what he's doing so far from the estate in some dangerous area (we were awfully too close to the pond and it was weirdly tempting to at least dip a foot in though your logical brain was screaming don't do it). She couldn't fathom why someone normal would want to be out in the wilderness, especially a space with wild beasts and monsters JUST to appreciate nature? Who even appreciated nature?¿? That was her expression. She looked me up and down and dismissed me as someone wayward and obviously lower class since I was dressed not in the most expensive gowns capitalism could buy. I don't remember my clothes, they were comfy and average as much as I could remember.

Anyway I thought it was the end. I hugged him goodbye and was going to be off but he asked his mom if I could come. She said of course and I was surprised? But excited! I got into the car, they took us to a train station where we saw more beautiful views of the landscape (and towering metallic iridescent neon city spires far away on the horizon), and then finally to an estate where the manor was like several huge black cubes stuck together in a mowed bronze grassy lawn that was expansive until the foresty horizons.

There were servants but they were mutated. Like it reminded me of brave new world where there were an epsilon class of humans. These guys were like mutated monkeys that could talk and were just aware of themselves and their surroundings so they can serve. They looked cartoony with huge watery blue eyes, white fur (she got the white fur breeds for the fashionable aesthetic) and dressed in colourful red vintage clothing like the uniform of an elevator man. It was really sad and unnatural but the wealthy class was happy they could buy something to work for free for them. I asked why she couldn't get AI since they have android servers (in this world apparently) and she listed all the reasons of them being faulty and breaking down and having to invest in new models every other year while these creatures live for at least 8-10. And I'm like: I remember reading they inject them with diseases on purpose so they die earlier and you have to buy another one and she gave me this Irritated look. You know that look someone gives you when you point out that their new iPhone was created by exploited child labour in Africa but they're the type of person who doesn't care cause they just want to look cool and show off their money? Yes that look of apathy towards capitalisms wrongs and irritations for you pointing it out.

Anyway the guy was so happy I was still there and was ready to show me around but his mom reminded him he had to spend time with (I forgot her name so let's call her Carmella since I remember it starting with a C.) Carmella was a beautiful yet terrifying woman who was my age and her beauty was also subjective but I'd guess she fit the beauty zeitgeist that was the standards of this future. She was south Asian too but her skin was pale like she bleached it until it was milky tea coloured. Her hair and eyebrows were a metallic platinum blonde and her eyes were the colour of greenish blue opals with the same opal like specs that flash. They were pretty but you could see they were artificial like implants. She wore Indian Jewelry like the bridal nose ring that connects to the ear and the hair jewelry that ran across her silvery blonde parted hair but they were both made from turquoise stones and fiery pink crystals that matched her bright hot pink iridescent gown with turquoise and goldfish orange accents on it. I think it was the style of the upper class to dress almost like Marie Antoinette royal court fashion that was modernised by the unnatural colours and blended with the local culture by mixing it with south/south East Asian jewellery, shoes and accessories. Carmella looked like a living doll but had the personality of a kardashian. We found her in her suite of the home surrounded by hypercolorful boxes filled with shoes and bags of all different colours and textures. She didn't really budge to say hello to him until she saw me with him then she smothered him in hugs and aggressive kisses and though I couldn't understand their language she said something to him that I could tell was dirty. She kept asking him in different ways if he wanted to spend time with her and was was sucking on some type of sweet loudly and suggestively and he did not want to but his mom was there and he felt pressured so the mom closed the double doors and ushered me away. I was confused but the mom explained that him and Carmella were engaged and that Carmella parents were some insanely wealthy oligarchs (clearly as well as this family and I could tell the marriage was arranged to keep money and power with the family) and she further mentioned that she would gladly liked to have left me dumped by the fields by the beach but she never saw her son so happy in years so I could stay as his servant (strongly hinted as concubine).

I was so confused, I tried to protest but she showed me my room which was very doll like and custard yellow. It was near the rooms where the white monkiesh servers slept. She forced me out of my clothes and wanted me to wear something fashionable which was a white lacy Victorian gown with a long lacy collar. I wore neon yellow boots and custard yellow and neon elaborate jewelry (like necklaces, a nose ring I was sure was a tracking device but was too painful to remove, chandelier earrings).

I was restricted from entering parts of the manor like there were no locks on the doors but the doors could read the details of your face and register if you were allowed to pass or not. I was stuck in the servants quarters unless the guy would visit me. I realized I was imprisoned but that didn't stop me from my investigation of where humanity went wrong with its experiments and disregard for nature. The mutated servants were a small piece of the puzzle. I was devising ways to escape as well but the mother scared me and has a personality similar to cersei so I was trying to be as sneaky as possible. Even though the doors wouldn't let me pass I'd sneak across the elegant black marble manor by using my powers to open the doors mechanical lock with telekinesis.

I finally met up with the guy who I saw for the first time was wildly depressed. Something happened which he felt he had no control over his life (probably cause his parents controlled his life and his future) and he turned out to be a heavy drug abuser in effort to escape his reality. He was just very drugged when I found him and lounging in the corner of a room. He warned me that I couldn't use my powers in his home cause if his mother sees they'll think I'm some mutant/monster as well and will hand me over to the government that'll get me killed or worse, experimented with. I asked if he wanted to run away with me and he looked so sad I could feel pain in my chest. I understood it that he was just a very important person and no matter where he left to he'll be found. He just said that he'll never be free before doing another fat line. I understood he'd be no help and I'd have to escape the manor by myself.

I got a slightly interesting revelation from that final conversation. Maybe I was a monster too. Still in this futuristic world there were witches, even more powerful than before with powers of telekinesis. We evolved, and we evolved with nature. We could communicate with our emotions to other animals and monsters that could read our vibrations. We understand the earth and can understand her change and adapt to her, yet still the capitalist society that clings onto her like a parasite won't ever accept that and nature has to undo it with force. The monsters are only villanized cause they challenge that way of life and bring destruction to cities and resources humans depend on and I would be villanized since I still love and accept a changing environment and hate capitalism and have the ability to break through mechanical doors that oligarchs put up.

I can't tell you what happens after cause my FUCKING ROOMMATE WANTED TO PLAY FUCKING SHOOT EM UP GAMES AT 9 AM THANKS but that was my dream!

[poisonwonders]

                                              POISON IVY.

                                     pamela lillian isley. twenty six.

                                     biochemist / botanist / toxicologist.                                                          MOTHER NATURE.

                             i am not ruined. i am ruination.

okay so ------- ivy is mostly based on the PAMELA ISLEY we encounter in DC’s prime earth universe, but some influences are also drawn from new earth and DC rebirth. a lot is also just AU / headcanons.

BASICS: ivy is 26, currently working at a lab that works on researching different toxins & poisons. she did not die during the whole thanos ordeal.

obviously no one has to read all this because i got carried away as per usual ! i’ve labeled each section if there is something in particular u want to know ! c:

BACKGROUND.

domestic abuse cw, child abuse cw, parental death cw, murder cw:/

she grew up incredibly sheltered, hidden away from sight. her father locked her away and used threats and fear to force her to stay inside. he also made her believe that if she went outside, into the sun, she would burn. pamela wholeheartedly believed this, because she did have a rare skin condition that made her sensitive to sunlight.

so her mother home schooled her, and tried to protect her the best she could. it was never enough, for either of them.

ivy’s mother emptied her heart of sorrows and poured all her energy into her garden. as a result, it was a beautiful place, filled with carefully tended flowers from all over the world and meticulously trimmed fruit trees and bushes. pamela could see it from her window, and she spent most of her days looking through the blinds and daydreaming about what life outside might be like. she didn’t notice that her mother’s garden grew little by little, every time her father was sorry for yet another unforgivable, unspeakable thing that he had done. but how was pamela to know that her mother’s pain was measured in flowers? that the reason her father showered ( no, drowned ), her mother in the most expensive bouquets, flower arrangements and exotic plants - was to keep her quiet? buy her forgiveness.

every now and then when her father was away for work, her mother would let pamela out into the garden, just as dusk was setting. she’d bask in the day’s last ray of sunshine, taking in the feeling of warmth across her face, stinging her skin ever so lightly. she wouldn’t dare be out there for long. her fear of her father, combined with her fear of her skin igniting, made her careful.

but no matter how careful she and her mother were, disaster eventually struck when ivy was eleven. her father came home from a work trip early ------ and saw his ‘beloved’ daughter outside, flowers in her hair, pale cheeks rosy with laughter. that night, her mother was sent to the ER. she came home the next day, her skin stained black and blue. her mother pretended like nothing had happened, and instead immediately went out to her garden. it had grown, over night. slowly, but certainly, ivy began to see a pattern form. when her mother was trying to hide another bruise, the garden expanded, and a new vase of beautiful flowers stood on the kitchen table. she may have been young, but pamela finally understood that flowers could be used to manipulate, to destroy, to conquer.

but her mother didn’t stop - she refused to let her daughter be cooped up like a beautiful bird in a cage. so she continued to bring a young and frightened pamela outside. she spoke to her in a low voice, about how flowers bound this world together, how they were linked to its very core. she spun tales of girls just like pamela, with flowers in their hair, dancing underneath the starlight, transforming into fairies and witches and elves. she explained that her garden always listened, and if you spoke to flowers, and you kept very very quiet, they’d answer. so pamela was bewitched, and her daydreams of the magical garden continued. she’d sit perched in her bedroom window, her gaze fixed on the roses below, watching them sway in the wind.

daydream turned into yet another nightmare when she was twelve. she saw it all happen, from her window. she saw how her father dragged out a lifeless body, and began to dig up the roses that pamela & her mom loved so much. she saw how careless he was, how flowers were thrown aside, how he barely looked at his wife before tossing her into a hole beneath the garden that she had poured her soul into. now she became part of it.

it took a few weeks of ‘your mother has gone to live with her sister, who is very ill’, before the police came knocking. they took her father away, and a few months later, he was sentenced to a life term in prison. 

pamela’s aunt moved into her house and started taking care of pamela instead, and pamela’s life took a drastic change for the better. she was now allowed to go outside, received treatment for her skin condition, and was enrolled in a private school. all of ivy’s free time went to her mother’s garden. on some level, she thought that through her flowers, she’d be able to keep her mother alive.

end of cw.

COLLEGE YEARS / BECOMING POISON IVY.

teacher / student relationship cw, human experiments / testing cw, abuse cw, ptsd cw.

ivy enrolled in college with a double major - chemistry and botany. she excelled in her course and soon became one of her chemistry teachers’ favorite. they embarked on an erratic relationship, their power balance completely skewed, with a naive pamela completely lost in love, thinking she had met the one. she was willing to do anything to maintain that feeling. so when he asked her to steal some seeds from another lab? there was no way that she would say no. and so it continued - he asked her to steal, from museums, from labs, from botanical gardens.

eventually, he found what he was looking for, and her perfect dream turned into yet another nightmare. he locked her up and experimented on her, injected her with every biochemical poison imaginable, a little at a time. seeing how her body reacted, how she slowly became immune to his tests. how almost succumbing to their effect drove her a little bit mad. what he didn’t count on was that pamela’s body would take to more than the poison [ continued in power section ].

after pamela broke free of his prison, she killed him. no remorse. just anger.

she dropped out of college. accidentally killed her new boyfriend with a kiss, and decided to go on the run.

at first, she had some trouble controlling her powers. the first few months, she didn’t dare touch anyone. too afraid that her touch would be toxic, deadly, disastrous. but a new rage had been ignited within her, and it was a rage that would soon become everything she was afraid of.

what was really nice though was that the sun now made her stronger, instead of weakening her!!! cool cool cool

she had been controlled by men many times by now - with disastrous consequences. people wanted to make her feel like she had been ruined, that she was now rotten. pamela refused to be anything other than their ruination in return. she wanted to prove to herself that she was now in control, that she had the power over men.

suffers PTSD after everything she has been through. it sucks

so maybe she went on a murder spree or two, while on the run. what about it?

also became very involved in environmental activist groups!!! often went to protests and was heavily involved with several pro-environment groups and their leaderships.

eventually.... started taking things waaaaaay across the line of what could be considered decent. became involved with underground groups, and turned to crime as the only answer to get the justice that she thought that she, along with mother nature, deserved.

end of cw.

ASYLUM YEARS / ‘MOVING ON’.

was eventually caught while trying to take control of los angeles, by threatening to release lethal fungus into the town’s water supply, and equally as lethal spores into the air. she wanted them to meet her environmental demands. they refused, and she was eventually captured.

after that, she was deemed insane, and was sent to an asylum. 

eventually escaped, and returned to her ways of crime.

was caught again, and sent back to serve a year within the asylum’s wall.

decided to be smarter about it, and pretended that she was changed by her stay in the asylum. 

she found a job in new york, at a local lab that researched biochemical toxins. it’s rumored that ivy has created poisons capable of wiping out half of the earth’s population. at that, she just laughs.

CURRENTLY / MOTIVATIONS.

ivy has managed to keep her job at the lab. possibly because the boss is a questionable figure, himself. mostly interested in money. 

her motivation is to keep plants safe. she can feel every plant around her, and she can hear their pain. she communicates with them, and through them. they willfully do her bidding, and she can take control of any plant close enough to her. she is mother earth’s protector, first and foremost. any harm to her also hurts ivy.

working closely with both underground environmental groups and larger, public groups. her motivations never change. neither does her anger, or her ambition.

she will do ANYTHING to get what she wants.

pretty girls cloud her morals even further, we love a chaotic bi

PERSONALITY / CHARACTER TIDBITS.

murder cw.

that girl that’s always fucking running in high heels

loose morals? yeah

has her own very specific agenda and follows it religiously! 

mood swings? yes. sweet like sugar one minute, sour like venom the next.

can be so cold!!!! literally doesn’t care 98% of the time if it isn’t related to plants or someone she loves.

she’s in a bad mood? probably would be best to hide.

might hate humanity, but she loves children. can be so maternal! will always protect kids and take them under her wing.

has a really nice aesthetic! wears a lot of dungarees, wooden shoes, flowery patterns and pastel colors.

uses her sexuality as a weapon.

so so so smart !!!! 

kinda unstable, too? 

lowkey into the idea of sisterhood. will have girls’ back.

used to be super naive, now she’s more cynical :c

thinks that humanity ain’t shit ( except for her gf, who is The Shit )

lowkey just wants to live on a deserted island with her gfs and her plants but she can’t do that yet because !!!! people !!!!! keep !!!! fucking with her plants. and ivy is also of the belief that someone’s gotta keep this world pure. so that’s what she’s about, really. purity. a peaceful world where plants are safe from harm. by any means necessary.

end of cw.

POWERS.

IMMUNITY:

ivy is completely immune to all toxins + poisons and can also use them as weapons through her skin and lips. the natural oils that her body produce are also laced with biochemical toxins, so her mere touch can be lethal, if she wants it to be. she can also conjure up toxins and manipulate plants into becoming toxic. 

also possesses specialized toxins, such as truth serums & love potions.

MENTAL CONTROL OF PLANT LIFE:

ivy can control plants, completely and effortlessly. she can animate them to attack and ensnare her opponents. she can also create new plant hybrids and accelerate a plant’s growth and strength and size. if she has seeds with her, she can also grow new plants quickly.

ivy also has a very special relationship with plants, and treats them as her children and family members. they thus respond to her will and command.

she has also brought back formerly extinct plants to life !!!

she can also feel plants. what they’re feeling. she shares a deep telepathic bond with wildlife, and can communicate with all flowers, trees and other plants. 

she can hear through plants! if she focuses, she can eavesdrop on people through plants. super useful, really.

hmmmmm plants also act as her spies, a lot!

DURABILITY & STRENGTH:

all that poison and it just made her stronger!!!! really though, it’s the sun that makes her strong!!!

anyways she’s more agile than the average human and less prone to injury.

[qqueenofhades]

the tangled web of fate we weave: xxi

you.... you might wanna buckle up, because this is a Chapter.

part xx/AO3

For a very long moment, those words – spoken with a curled lip and arched eyebrow, making it plain Emma is deliberately echoing the last time she said them, when she kidnapped Lucy and Flynn from the reading room in Penn – echo in the air. I think it’s time to take a ride. Lucy has hold of her gun, is still pointing it, but Emma jerks her own gun harder into Amy’s head, Amy lets out a gasp, and Lily wakes up and starts to whimper. Amy tries to comfort her, the best one can in the present situation, but Emma’s nostrils flare. “I’m not really a fan of babies crying. Put it down, princess, or I’m shutting her up.”

Lucy’s hands are frozen. She doesn’t know if even Emma is so pathological as to shoot a child at point-blank range, but she’s not about to find out. Slowly, letting Emma see her do it, she bends down and sets the gun on the floor, then straightens up, hands raised. “There,” she says, as coldly and calmly as possible. “I put it down.”

“Good.” Emma smiles faintly, giving Lucy half a look that makes her think that if Emma wasn’t so completely devoted to Rittenhouse, they might be friends. A bizarre thing to ponder when the woman just broke into your house, is still holding a gun to your sister’s head, and has straight up threatened to shoot your infant daughter, but strength recognizes strength, and Emma, a formidable adversary herself, is prepared to acknowledge the same. “Now come on, all of you. You can even bring the rugrat – actually, yes, especially bring the rugrat. Mommy dearest does want to see her.”

“You – ” Lucy chokes. “You’re doing this for Carol?”

“She’s waiting, yes. We have a big night planned, Lucy.”

“She sent you to kidnap us?!”

“Actually, she sent me to pick you up. Warned me you might not want to come easily, so the kidnapping part was my decision.” Emma shrugs. “Chop chop.”

Lucy calculates frantically in her head. She can’t run back for her dropped phone without Emma shooting either Amy or Lily – there might be the chance that Carol has issued orders for her daughters and granddaughter not to be harmed, but there’s no certainty that Emma intends to obey them, at least where the spares are concerned. She certainly can’t call Flynn in time, and even if she managed to tell him that Emma was here, even if he turned around and roared home on the spot, they won’t still be here by the time he arrives. Emma is taking them somewhere else, and if it’s another Rittenhouse black site, like the one in West Point, there is no guarantee of fighting their way out. Amy has a black belt in karate, she’s not totally helpless, but Emma is a trained and ruthless killer. Oh God. Oh God, what do they do?

After a final pause, Lucy can’t see anything for it. Hands still up, she allows Emma to usher them through the broken patio door, across the yard, and through the gate to where Emma’s car is parked in the alley. (Illegally, but that’s probably not something that concerns hitwomen for powerful shadowy crime syndicates.) Emma opens the back door with her free hand and forces Amy and Lily in, then nods at the passenger seat. “All yours, princess.”

“Stop calling me princess.” Lucy glances around, trying to stall. Maybe if one of the neighbors spots this and calls the cops – she doesn’t know what good it will do, but at least it would raise some kind of alarm. But they’re hidden from view by a fence, a tall hedge, and trees (damn Californians and their fondness for aesthetic landscaping). Unless some poor kid on a bike rolled up at the end of the alley – and Emma would plug him anyway – nobody can see them. They are just going to vanish. Possibly in more ways than one.

“Well then, Lucy.” Emma inclines her head with gracefully lethal sarcasm. “How about you get in the car and let’s go?”

Lucy wants to kill this woman with every fiber of her being, with a fury that alarms her. Pulses through her body and bangs in her eyeballs and trembles in her fingers, makes her not that far from thinking that Flynn’s plan to crash through time and murder them one by one is altogether bad. She debates her odds of doing it, even bare-handed, untrained, and three days postpartum. She would definitely get shot, but if she could somehow overpower Emma –

“You really want to?” Emma aims the gun more steadily at Lucy’s forehead, as it doesn’t take a genius to see what she’s considering. “With them already in there?”

Lucy doesn’t know what that means – though she doesn’t put it past Emma to have fitted her own car with a bomb, or a poison gas tank, or anything else – but it drains her of any resolve to find out. Maybe they can get to her mother and she can convince her of how insane this all is. It’s a very slim chance, but it is the only one they have.

Lucy opens the passenger door and gets in.

Emma comes around the far side and swings behind the wheel, careful to keep her gun out of Lucy’s reach. Not that Lucy could take much chance of crashing the car with them all inside, but either way, Emma is not underestimating her or writing her off as a negligent threat. Lucy supposes it’s oddly flattering that she could be categorized as an actual danger, but right now, she just wishes she was. Still, this is going to take other tactics. As Emma pulls out of the alley, Lucy says, “You must have a family of your own. You must have people you care about.”

“Oh, so you’re trying to bond with me now?” Emma smiles coolly. “Fine, I’ll play ball. I make plenty of money to give my mother a very nice life. She has a mansion in SoCal and she doesn’t want for anything. After what she did for me, and what she got us out of, it’s the least I owe her. She’s chatty and she likes lemon cookies and she always loves hearing what I’m doing at work. She still keeps my pictures on her fridge like I’m in grade school. Probably invite you in for tea if you stopped by.”

Lucy doesn’t answer immediately. Her imagination conjures a picture of an older Emma, a warm, matronly woman with grey-streaked ginger curls and a ready plate of cookies. She tries to work out how such a woman could have ever had a daughter like Emma, stone and steel with no soft places at all, and then wonders how Carol had a daughter like her. Not that she thinks they’re so different, or she’s so much better than her mother, but it still seems like a mystery. She ventures, “What’s her name?”

Emma glances at her sidelong, never taking her eyes off the road. “Why do you want to know? Send your psycho husband to shoot her in the head?”

“I think it’s a little rich of you to be calling anyone else a psycho, don’t you?”

Emma laughs, but in a way that makes it clear she doesn’t appreciate it. “I’m not a psycho. You don’t like what I do or who I work for, but believe me, there’s a reason for it. Rittenhouse has always wanted me, always pursued me and given me real responsibility and known I was destined for greatness, and happily, for the most part, they’ve been right. You do know this isn’t personal, right? What we have to do. It’ll be fine. You won’t remember.”

“Won’t remember.” Lucy feels that sink into her stomach like a rock. “That is what you’re doing, isn’t it? You’re planning to change the night that Gar – that Flynn and I met, the car accident in 2003 when he fished me out of the Bay. So he never meets me and never saves me and none of this happens.”

“Clever.” Emma doesn’t seem upset that her plans have been rumbled. “Essentially, yes.”

“You can’t.” Lucy turns to her. “Emma, please don’t do that. Please. Please don’t do that. We’ll – look, there’s something we can do, we can – ”

“We can what?” Emma almost looks tired in the early-evening shadows. “Make a deal? Do I believe that Flynn is going to stop hunting us or trying to destroy us? Frankly, no, I don’t, and it would be a dereliction of duty on my part to leave that much of a threat unchecked, on his word that he was going to be a good boy from now on. So I don’t think there’s anything you can offer me, princess. Sorry.”

“Please,” Lucy repeats. “You’re a smart woman, you can see that Rittenhouse is – they’re evil, Emma. They’d probably turn on you too, if the price was right.”

“Nope.” Emma smiles, as if she is enjoying pricking each of Lucy’s hopeful bubbles with the sharp needle of reality. “Hard for them to do that when you run a major sector of it. The men in charge are idiots, I’ll give you that. They kept me on the bench for two years while Flynn was out causing chaos – the desk job in London, getting boring bureaucratic ducks in a row, rather than letting me off the leash. But that’s why I have to take control and institute an executive purge. You don’t like ol’ Benny Cahill very much, do you? He’s a stooge. I can easily arrange for him to go.”

Lucy opens her mouth, then shuts it. In a twisted way, you have to admire Emma’s ambition and commitment, her sense that she is chronically undervalued by a bunch of incompetent male supervillains and will rise to the top by crushing them beneath her fashionable high heels. “What?” Lucy manages. “Are you asking me if I want to join Rittenhouse?”

“It’s a thought, isn’t it?” Emma changes lanes without signaling and throws up a middle finger when she’s honked at. “It’s in your blood on both sides. Remember Nicholas Keynes? I mentioned him back at Penn.”

“Yes,” Lucy says warily. “Why?”

“He’s your great-grandfather. On your mother’s side. He died in 1918, in World War I, like I said, but he’s the founder of Rittenhouse’s vision for the modern world. All our major writings, our manifestos, our plans for everything, they owe a great deal to him. Who knows. Maybe one of these days we’ll rescue him too.”

“Wh…” There is, obviously, not much you can say to that. Lucy feels tainted and unusual. How many generations back does this go, how deeply is she tied to this? Emma looks at her like this is something to be proud of, something to be envied. “How… how far?”

“I don’t know,” Emma says. “A long way. Carol is trying to prove that you’re descended from David Rittenhouse himself, did you know that? The record of his son John’s descendants get a little fuzzy in the nineteenth century, but it’s possible. So even if you did manage to travel back to the eighteenth century and kill both of them, there’s a good chance you’d never exist. How’s that for a conundrum?”

“You know,” Lucy says flatly. Rufus has told her, and there’s no point in pretending otherwise. “You know that’s what Flynn wants to do.”

“Yeah.” Emma taps her fingers on the wheel. “It’d be a stupid idea, for that and other reasons, but I don’t get the sense that your boy is really into smart ones.”

“Come on,” Lucy says pleadingly. “Come on, Emma. How can the three of us be a threat to you? He was willing to leave it behind, if you just let us have a real chance to live with Lily, we’re not going to – ”

“Willing to leave it behind?” Emma raises both eyebrows. “Until the moment he heard Benjamin Cahill had dropped by Stanford and went racing out, leaving you alone and pregnant, on the merest off chance that there was another battle to be had? While he thinks that America shouldn’t exist if Rittenhouse does? The way he has all but convinced himself to steal a time machine and do it himself? Garcia Flynn is never going to stop hunting Rittenhouse, Lucy. Not even for you. Don’t delude yourself that he loves you more than the war. He’s already proven he can live without one, but not the other. Honestly, I didn’t want there to be a kid in the equation. I’m not a monster. But you two made that choice, and the innocent die in war. And is it even dying if she’s never born?”

“There has to be something.” Lucy is well aware that she’s grasping at straws, but straws are all she has left. She doesn’t want to admit that Emma is right, that she isn’t sure she could ever talk Flynn into stopping the hunt – not when Rittenhouse is this much and this relentless and this unmerciful. “What if – if he doesn’t save me, am I just going to drown?”

“I’ve arranged that,” Emma says. “Someone else will be there to save you. Just not him. It’s this or joining Rittenhouse. And if you thought you’d do that and then double-cross us, I wouldn’t recommend that. We’d also keep custody of Lily until we thought you were ready to raise her in the right way, and Flynn, well. You definitely couldn’t see him again.”

“That is – ” Lucy opens her mouth, keeps it that way, then shuts it. “That is – ”

“You wanted an option other than us changing the night of the accident. I gave you one. You can still remember him, you can still have your daughter. Pretty nice of me, don’t you think?”

“No. No, it’s not.”

“I’m sorry, Lucy.” Emma glances at her with something almost close to genuine regret. “But I didn’t get into this to care about your feelings, and especially not about Flynn’s. You’ll be happier without him. He’s put you through a lot of shit. Honestly, the clean break sounds like a more humane idea to me, rather than you just hurting and brooding and obsessing over him. You yank a rotten tooth, you know. One quick jerk, and over.”

“The love of my life is not a rotten tooth.” Lucy clenches her hands on her knees. “I don’t care what you think. Especially if you don’t care about what I do.”

“Love of your life.” Emma looks amused. “That’s sweet, you know. I mean it. You two do have a sort of twisted fairytale love story, I can see it. If he’d stayed out of the Rittenhouse stuff, I’d have been happy to let you have it. Mazel tov and all that. But since you both made the choice not to do that, there’s something we call consequences. It’s a bitch, but there you have it. Last chance, princess. Rittenhouse, or restart?”

“Neither,” Lucy says through gritted teeth. “Actually.”

“Unfortunate.” Emma takes the freeway exit, turns once and then again, as Lucy realizes that they’re headed to Mason Industries. “Well. I advise taking a good look at everything now. Maybe you’ll dream about it, I don’t know. We’re still getting a handle on how this works, so you’ll be an important test case. If we can manage changing history with this, we can manage it with others. Thank you for your service.”

Lucy has nothing to say to that, can’t even form words, as she glances at Amy white-faced and silent in the backseat. They turn into the Mason Industries parking lot a few moments later, as Lucy’s brain goes on red-hot overload. She could run (but that would leave Amy and Lily behind, and she couldn’t get very far). She could once more try to attack Emma. She could wait until they get inside and see if there’s some convenient vat of industrial acid to push her into. She could try to appeal to her mother’s love for her (it has to be somewhere, doesn’t it?) She could try to get away and steal a phone and call Flynn. Anything besides marching meekly to her nonexistence, or her life’s reset, like a cow in the slaughterhouse.

They park. Emma takes out the gun again and beckons them out of the car. It’s cool in the April evening, and Lucy and Amy shiver in their shirtsleeves, as Amy passes Lily back to Lucy and they stand there in a defiant huddle. They could possibly charge her together, but they’d have to put Lily down to do it, and besides –

The front door opens, and three men in dark suits walk out, clearly Emma’s colleagues and backup henchmen. They’re all the size of linebackers and are packing serious heat, and don’t seem perturbed by the fact that they would be using it on defenseless women and a child. “Good job, Whitmore,” one of them says, which gets a tiny eye-roll from Emma; she has to do everything around here, God. “Let’s get them inside.”

The goons fall into lockstep around Lucy, Amy, and Lily, escorting them toward the looming building, as Lucy has the distinct sense that she is a condemned prisoner walking into a death chamber. Her heart is racing. For better or worse, she’s been half-convinced that Flynn will sense something wrong, turn the car around, and race back here to stage a dramatic rescue. But for the first time, she starts to realize that that might not happen. He probably has no idea. Unless he saw her missed call, tried to call back, and got suspicious when she didn’t answer, but that is only wild hope. There is no way he can know where she is now, that Amy and Lily are in danger as well. This might happen. They might die – or rather, be erased, rebooted to factory default, like a defective iPhone. She has to fight. But how?

Lucy twists her head as they walk past the empty reception area (no Tammy) and through a set of several doors, onto the warehouse floor where she and Wyatt literally ran into Flynn and first saw the time machine. It’s there now, an imposing white plasteel orb banded with blue lights, and it’s surrounded with scaffolding like the space shuttle preparing for launch. Rittenhouse has everything ready, apparently. They are doing it tonight.

The goons come to a halt, and Lucy and Amy stumble to one as well. Lucy is still holding Lily, which severely limits her ability to look for something heavy and solid to hit Emma with.  Panic buzzes blankly in her ears. Is her mother here? Not that that’s necessarily an improvement, or someone she wants to see, but at least there might be a chance, however remote, of prevailing on her. Emma and the goons aren’t about to be moved by tender pleas. It looks like Emma has pulled rank and cleared out Mason Industries for the night, claimed she had some big project (which, strictly speaking, is true) that needed privacy, so none of her unwitting coworkers will stumble in. What is –

“Lucy? Amy?”

The Preston sisters start, grimace, and wheel around in unison, just in time to see Carol emerge from across the way. By the expression on her face, she clearly knows this isn’t going to be a happy reunion, and Lucy clutches Lily closer. She doesn’t rear back like a cobra, but barely. “You.”

“Me.” Carol comes to a halt. “Emma, what is this? I told you to bring them, not to – ”

Emma shrugs. “They weren’t exactly leaping at the opportunity. Honestly, I don’t blame them. It’s not like you’ve been Mother of the Year.”

Carol opens and then shuts her mouth, clearly not expecting a burn from that quarter, as she turns back to her stone-faced daughters. “It will be better for us,” she says entreatingly. “We’ll be a real family, all of us, once this is done. We can get a chance to mend it, to – ”

“Reality check, Mom.” Amy’s tone is cold and flat as glacier ice. “When people want to fix their relationships with their estranged children, they make effort to examine their own behavior, maybe think hard about some changes, go to therapy, see where they were in the wrong, and accept that a new relationship has to be on the children’s terms. Not get their evil secret society friends to erase their oldest daughter’s last ten years of life, partner, and newborn baby. So if you thought Emma was getting in that machine to do whatever, and then we’d wake up having been Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind-ed and would be ready to frolic in the strawberry fields forever, you can fucking choke.”

Carol looks as if she’s been hit with something heavy. She turns to Lucy appealingly, then presses her mouth shut and takes a few steps back. The goons grip Lucy by either arm, clearly to keep her in place while this happens – and then, as Emma turns and starts toward the machine, Amy lowers her head and rocks back on her heels. There’s no time for Lucy to shout – not that she would, not that she knows what she’d say – as Amy runs full tilt at Emma. Jumps on her back, wraps her arms around her neck, and manages to leverage enough momentum to throw her flat to the polished steel floor.

There’s a horrendous crack as Emma’s nose hits the metal, and a spurt of blood, but she’s too well trained, and she’s already reacting as she falls. She lunges around like a viper, punching Amy ferociously in the face to return the favor, and they roll around, grappling, kicking, trading hits. Carol is frozen in place, clearly unsure who she should assist, until she starts, “Emma – Emma, don’t hurt – ”

Emma bares her teeth at Carol, deliberately ignoring her, as she and Amy wrestle to their feet, grabbing each other in half-headlocks. Emma is trying to pull her gun, and Amy is trying to prevent her from getting it, and it’s a blur and muddle a moment more, until their arms both twist up, there’s a lot of scrabbling, and then the sound of the shot goes off like a clap of thunder. It’s utterly impossible to know who it hit, if it hit anyone, as Lucy’s scream turns to char in her throat. For a moment more, there’s nothing. Only silence.

Then, slowly, Amy staggers backward, pressing a hand to her stomach. Wet redness wells beneath it, staining her fingers, as she reaches woozily behind her with her other hand and doesn’t quite manage to break her fall. She goes down hard on her rump, grimaces, and manages a breathless, “Well, shit.”

“No!” Lucy finds strength she didn’t know she had as she rips free of the goons and dashes across the floor to her sister, throwing herself to her knees next to her. She has to put Lily down, which she hates doing, as she catches Amy in her arms. “Amy, Amy. Amy, it’s all right. It’s not that bad – Mom. Mom, for God’s sake! For God’s fucking sake! Call 911!”

Still Carol hesitates. Her eyes flicker between Emma, looking like the embodiment of all four of the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and Lucy clutching Amy.  Then she says, “Emma – if you go, if you reset it – Amy will be fine, she’ll never have been – ”

“No!” Lucy screams. “Call 911!”

Carol’s face is sheet white. She seems to be having a genuine struggle, though between what, it’s impossible to say. Perhaps she does actually think that the best way to save Amy is to send Emma back to change the timeline, just as planned, so Amy doesn’t end up here tonight and doesn’t get shot. That is twisted in a way Lucy can’t begin to envision, and she’s desperate – she doesn’t have enough arms to hold both Amy and Lily, this isn’t –

A moment more. Utterly, deathly, ghastly silence.

And then, from behind, there’s another gunshot.

Flynn has been in the car with an absolutely murder-faced Wyatt Logan for about – oh, forty minutes, there having been the bare minimum of conversation as they plow south on I-5 – when his phone rings. He squirms around to fish it out, sees it’s Lucy, and frowns, swiping to answer it. “Yes? Lucy?”

There’s nothing on the other end, except for what sounds disconcertingly like muffled crashes. Another pause, and then the line goes dead.

Flynn’s pulse jacks up a few uncomfortable notches. He immediately redials, but it rings and rings without being answered, and the result is the same when he tries it a second time. When he’s quite sure that she’s not picking up, he kills the call and looks over at Wyatt, who has been hyper-concentrating on the road with a muscle going in his cheek. The plan has been to drive straight to San Diego and obtain a prison interview with Wes Gilliam by hook or by crook, but Flynn can feel cold foreboding spreading through him like poison. He clears his throat. “I think something’s up with Lucy.”

“What?” Wyatt, attention torn off the asphalt for the first time, glances at him. “Why?”

“She just called me, but she wasn’t on the phone. There were a few crashes, then it went dead. She didn’t answer when I called back, either.”

“Maybe it was a butt dial.” Wyatt doesn’t sound entirely convinced. “Look, if we’re going to stay ahead of the traffic, we need to – ”

“No.” Suddenly, Flynn has no idea what the hell he was doing, what he can possibly have been thinking, to do anything but stay at Lucy’s side all night, every night. “Turn around. Turn around, take me back to San Francisco. Then you can do whatever you want to Gilliam, I don’t care. Just take me back right now. Right now!”

“What?” Wyatt challenges. “You don’t want to babysit me?”

“You can drag him into the prison yard and beat him with a tire iron, I don’t care. Your wife will still be gone either way, it’s not like a little more time will make a difference. But mine, but Lucy – she could – TURN AROUND!”

Flynn’s bellow rattles the inside of the truck, and Wyatt stares at him, white-faced and tight-lipped. Then he nods once, swings into the right lane, takes the next exit, and loops around to get back on I-5 north, without another word. He is gunning it several miles past the posted speed limit, and Flynn is on the edge of his seat, when it’s Wyatt’s phone’s turn to ring.

Since he’s still driving like a bat out of hell, Wyatt tosses it over to Flynn to answer, as Flynn catches it and restrains himself from a smart remark as to whether Wyatt really wants him to act as his secretary. According to the caller ID, it’s Rufus. “Yes? What?”

“Flynn?” Having expected to speak to his roommate, Rufus is forgivably surprised to reach his still-kind-of-nemesis instead. “What are you doing with Wyatt’s phone?”

“He’s driving. What is it?”

“Where are you?” Rufus starts, then changes his mind. “Wait, no. Never mind. You need to get over to Mason Industries right now. I’m on the way over myself. It’s a long story, but – Rittenhouse knows what you were planning. It’s my fault. Then tonight Emma insisted she needed to work by herself, and – it’s tonight. Whatever they’re doing, it’s tonight.”

Flynn’s stomach turns over. “What do you mean, it’s your fault that Rittenhouse knows what we’re – what I was – ”

“I really do not have time to explain.” Rufus sounds tortured. “And I would give anything for it not to be the case. But we need to get to Mason Industries. Right now. I’ll meet you there, I’ll let you in. Tell Wyatt, if you’re with him. Seriously. Please.”

Flynn hesitates a split second more. He could shout at Rufus, he could demand answers, he could swear to kill him for whatever he’s done, even inadvertently. But there is no time for that, and no space for anything but consuming terror. He hangs up without another word and turns to Wyatt. “Mason Industries. Right now.”

Wyatt looks briefly about to demur, and then doesn’t. He clocks up what would be a substantial increase on his speeding fine if he was caught, and they roar through the maze of Bay Area freeways and into Silicon Valley, laying rubber all the way, until they reach the technological campus. Wyatt almost runs over the Google Street View car as he guns it to the end, into the Mason Industries parking lot, and the two of them jump out practically before he’s turned the engine off. Rufus is waiting by the entrance, waving frantically, and they don’t break stride as they run to him. He swipes his ID card, curses when it blinks red, rips open the control panel, and performs some sort of admirably fast complicated override that finally dings it open. Then he, Wyatt, and Flynn sprint flat-footed inside.

There’s a commotion coming from up ahead, shouts and bangs, as they put on even more speed, dodging and weaving through doors and sealed access areas. Rufus has to override each one, which slows them down – Emma has clearly tried to lock out everyone but her. Then they pound through onto the factory floor, and Flynn’s heart stops.

All he can see is Lucy, on her knees, holding her sister in her arms as Amy struggles and jerks for breath, shirt turning red. Lily is lying on the ground next to Lucy, though she is trying to scoop up the baby somehow without letting go of Amy. Carol Preston is across from her, the murderous conniving bitch, and in front –

Flynn pulls his gun by completely unconscious reflex. It’s up and pointed before he can even think about it, whether it would be safe to kill her or not, he doesn’t care. He squeezes the trigger, and almost simply, it goes off.

Emma ducks just in the nick of time, so the bullet grazes her scalp instead of drilling her forehead. She spins around to see Flynn, Wyatt, and Rufus all charging at her like a herd of furious rhinos, and it’s clear from the expression on her face that she did not see that coming. There are three goons nearby, turning slowly, too slowly, and Flynn shoots one of them square between the eyes, dropping him like a stone. The other two pull their own pieces and return fire, bullets clattering and banging off the steel walls, as Flynn can think of absolutely nothing but getting to his wife and daughter. He hears the sharp crack of Wyatt’s gun, and another of the goons yells and staggers. Emma’s running full-out for the time machine, and Flynn spins and fires at her, but his hands are shaking too much, and he misses. “WYATT!” he roars. “WYATT, SHOOT HER!”

Wyatt tries to do just that, but he’s distracted as the third Rittenhouse goon tackles him, sending his gun flying out of his hand. Flynn reaches Lucy, Amy, and Lily, but can’t throw himself over them to shield them, because Emma is now running up the steps of the machine and about to seal the door. If she gets in there, there will be no stopping her. It will be over.

The following moment is the worst of Garcia Flynn’s entire life, as he has to decide in that instant what to do, who to go for, who to help. Rufus has grabbed hold of a piece of rebar, runs up and takes an almighty whack at Wyatt’s assailant, and Flynn fires at Emma as she is climbing into the machine – this, then, would be the Mothership? He might have hit her, but only glancingly. Then the door cycles shut and it starts to whir and flash, even as Flynn runs furiously at it. If he grabs hold, he’ll be scraped gruesomely out of existence when it jumps, worse than being run over by a freight train, but he’s about to take his chances. “NO!”

The gyration increases, the lights blink, and then, with a pop of bent space-time, the Mothership vanishes altogether. Flynn keeps running, even as it is registering that he just saw a time machine work, it’s real, it’s all real – and it’s too late. Emma just jumped. She is at large in the past now like a wrecking ball, and he knows exactly, instinctively, where she’s gone. There is still a chance, a tiny, insane, desperate chance, and –

There’s another gunshot behind him, and Flynn whirls around to see that a panting, bloodied Wyatt has just finished off the third goon, thanks to Rufus’s timely assistance. Flynn runs back, but even now, he can’t stop, can’t grab onto Lucy and Lily and can’t, can’t, do anything but this. “The Lifeboat!” he bellows at Rufus. “Where’s the fucking Lifeboat?”

“Wh – ”

“In London. Remember? You told me there were two machines! The Mothership and the Lifeboat! In case the Mothership’s crew needed a rescue. There’s another one. We have to go, right now. We have to go after Emma and – ”

“Go where?” Rufus looks stunned. “Emma could have gone anywhere, anywhen, we can’t just hop in and plug an address into the GPS – we were working on linking the processing cores, but that isn’t done yet, we don’t – ”

“1950,” Flynn says. “She went to 1950, Juarez, Mexico. When I was in the Bay Area in 2003, when I saved Lucy’s life, I was tracking a cartel kingpin, Albert Costa. I had been following him for a while, I knew about him, read all his files. He was born in Juarez in 1950. She’s going there to – I don’t know, pose as a nurse and drop him out the window. He never grows up, he never founds his trafficking empire, I never go after him in 2003, I’m not there to save Lucy. It has to be. It has to be!”

“Are you sure?” Rufus continues to look flattened. “We haven’t run any tests with the Lifeboat, let alone full jumps. I’ve only piloted it in the simulator, I have no way of promising that we’d get remotely near 1950, let alone survive, or not be dismembered in the time stream. It’s absurdly dangerous, we – ”

“Just get it!” Flynn shouts. “Now!”

Rufus looks about to protest, and then, as his eyes flick between them – Lucy still on her knees, Amy shot and bloodied, Wyatt and Flynn looking equally desperate – he stops. He whirls around and opens a keypad, starts punching in numbers, and a panel in the ceiling opens with a whir and whine of hydraulics. As it lowers an ugly grey metal eyeball, smaller than the Mothership and clearly less refined, toward the launch pad, Flynn finally runs to Lucy and Lily, scooping up his screaming daughter and trying fruitlessly to calm her. “Lucy – Jesus, Jesus Christ, are you – ”

“No, I’m not hurt, I – ” Lucy stares frantically at Amy. “We need to get her to a hospital.”

Flynn throws a loathing glance over his shoulder at Carol. “Are you really going to do this?” he demands. “Stand there and let your own daughter die?”

“I thought – ” Carol’s lips are white. “Once Emma – once Emma – ”

“GO! CALL! AN! AMBULANCE!”

Something about that – whether Flynn’s sheer volume, or maddening rage, or perhaps, finally, her own guilt – gets through to her. Carol turns and runs off across the warehouse floor, and while she might be summoning more Rittenhouse backups, Flynn presently does not have the luxury to care. He looks at Rufus. “How many people does the Lifeboat take?”

“Three.” Rufus stares at the machine as it descends. “I have to pilot it, and if you’re going too, that leaves one more spot. But I don’t – ”

“I’ll go,” Wyatt says. “Used to spend a lot of time around that part of the border, and near that line of work. Of course, not in 1950, but.” He shrugs grimly. “Still.”

Flynn wants to ask what exactly a seemingly clean-cut, all-American boy like Wyatt was doing near Mexican drug-running – he doesn’t mean just the Colombian Black Eagles job, apparently – but there’s no time to ask. He looks at Wyatt, volunteering to come along on an unspeakably dangerous mission that’s leading him farther away from Wes Gilliam, from Jessica, from everything else he’s been fighting for this whole time. It could be just to see how the Lifeboat works for future reference, but still. Flynn stiffly inclines his head in half a respectful nod, and Wyatt nods back. A truce, at last. It’s taken them long enough.

Flynn hands Lily back to Lucy and stares into her eyes, as Lucy grabs hold of his face with both hands and kisses him as desperately and frantically and adoringly as any human being could possibly kiss another. They know this has absolutely no guarantee of success whatsoever, that he’s about to embark on a journey through time to an utterly unknown end, and this is the very last shot they have. “I love you,” Lucy says. “I love you, Garcia – I love you.”

“I love you too.” He kisses her once more, then gets to his feet, striding toward the Lifeboat, as Rufus pulls the lever to open the door. Wyatt clambers in first, and Flynn ducks in after him, staring at the backup time machine and its janky seats with a judgmental expression. Beggars can’t be choosers, but he didn’t realize they were trying to save the love of his life in a fucking Yugo. “Does this thing even fly?”

“We’re about to find out, aren’t we?” Rufus climbs in last and gets into the pilot seat, flipping switches and peering at readout screens. Wyatt and Flynn sit down across from each other and fumble with the seatbelts, as being strapped in seems like an excellent idea when you’re about to jump fifty-three years backwards in a sardine can. The buckle seems more goddamn complicated than is really necessary, but Flynn pulls it tight.

“On the bright side,” Rufus goes on, hitting another row of buttons. “If it doesn’t work, we won’t even know, because we’ll already be dead. So. I guess that’s an upside?”

Flynn doesn’t answer, straining his neck to get another glimpse of Lucy, clutching Lily and still on her knees next to Amy, as the Lifeboat door cycles shut and locks with a clunk. He tries to imagine what this can possibly be like, and then decides then since he’s about to find out, it’s probably not worth it. He can feel the spinning building speed beneath him, more and more, prepares to lurch forward or back in any direction at all –

– and then, with a sickening clunk, it stops.

“What was that?” Flynn demands. “Isn’t it supposed to still be going?”

“I told you.” Rufus stares at the console. “We haven’t run any tests. Let alone any jumps. There was no promise that this thing even worked yet.”

“Reboot it,” Flynn snarls. “Reboot it now!”

“I don’t know that that’s going to help.” Rufus starts hitting keys, hands shaking. “If the system isn’t complete, we’re still not going anywhere, no matter what I – ”

“We have to. We have to!” Flynn absolutely, categorically refuses to get this far and then be foiled at the last instant by technical difficulties. Yes, a time machine not being finished is a little different from your internet losing connectivity at an inconvenient moment, but still. “We have to go after her!”

“I’m trying!” Rufus enters in an override sequence, briefly gets a row of lights to flash green, and even as Flynn’s heart leaps savagely, they die. The panel goes black. All of Rufus’ efforts can’t get it to spark back to life. The machine is dead silent. They are not going anywhere. They are not going to stop Emma. They are not going to stop her.

Flynn crashes back in his seat, feeling cold adrenaline surging through him from head to heel. His instinct is to shout, to pull his gun, to threaten Rufus to try absolutely anything, but he knows in his gut that it’s no good. He has done everything possible, even pushed into the impossible, and it’s not enough. They sit there in tomblike silence for a moment more. Then Flynn says in a croak, “Let me out.”

“I – ” Rufus is barely able to meet his eyes. “I – I’ve done everything I can think of, everything I – if there was anything else, I – ”

“I know.” Flynn barely feels like it’s him speaking. The words echo as if from a distant tunnel, nothing to do with him at all. “I know you did. Please. Let me out.”

Rufus hits the door lock. It cycles open again, Flynn struggles to undo the buckle, and bangs his shin against the side of the Lifeboat as he climbs out. Presumably Wyatt and Rufus do the same, but he doesn’t look back. Strides to Lucy and gets down on the floor next to her, taking her head in his hand and leaning their foreheads together. “I’m – ” He can’t get the words out. “Lucy, I’m so sorry. I’ve failed us. I’ve failed.”

“No.” Lucy is holding onto Amy with one hand and Lily with the other, she doesn’t have enough to spare for Flynn, but she presses her face into his, as he can taste the salt of her tears on his lips. “You didn’t. You didn’t fail us.”

Flynn tries to answer, but he can’t get the words through the massive, unbearable wreckage in his chest, the pieces of his broken heart, as he takes his love’s face in his hands and cradles it, gazes at her, gazes at her as if he can’t have enough – because in fact, he can’t. He can hear sirens in the distance, wonders if Carol actually went to call an ambulance for Amy, and isn’t sure if they are ever going to find out. He looks down at Lily, lets her tiny hand wrap around his finger, bends to kiss her, as he puts his arms around Lucy and the baby and Lucy tries awkwardly to get Amy’s head into her lap. Both of them shake with crying. Amy’s eyes are closed, her face grey. It’s not altogether clear if she’s still breathing.

“I love you,” Lucy says, desperate and ragged, over and over. “I love you, Garcia, I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you. I’m not going to forget you, it’s not going to happen. I’ll remember, I’ll find you, I’ll find you.”

Yet again, even as the words are spilling from her in a ragged gasp, Flynn can’t bear to get his tongue around the same. He cradles her face, touches her chin with his thumb, kisses her eyes and her mouth and her nose. He can hear (or perhaps only thinks he does) far off, a rushing noise. Like a freight train speeding down a tunnel, or wind over water, the onset of a coming storm, the instant before the thunder claps and the lightning strikes. Before the rain sighs down, and all the world is swept clean.

He stares into Lucy’s eyes. Kisses her one last time.

“I love you,” he breathes back to her, not sure if he’s said it in English, or Croatian, or Russian, or German, or Spanish, or any or all of them at once. “I love you, Lucy, I love you. You and Lily, I won’t forget, I won’t, I love you, I won’t forge – ”

The word is never finished.

Instead, indeed, it is never spoken at all.

[cinnamon-pigeon]

pre-rewrite: chapter 3

Saving the older versions of rewritten chapters of After the Bust! Predominantly for my own later reference, but also if anyone wants to see :)

What changed: Took out a lot of exposition that ended up feeling kind out of place. I started writing this with a pretty half-baked (to be generous) characterization of King Dice and although the exposition was helpful to me to flesh out his character, it wasn’t necessary where it was.

To Dice’s surprise, it was Cuphead who brought him dinner, unaccompanied by his brother or the Elder Kettle. The boy set down a tray holding a bowl of soup and two cartons of apple juice in front of King Dice, then grabbed a carton of juice from the tray and retreated to sit in a chair in the corner of the room.

Remembering the tea that had been prepared for him earlier, Dice inspected the bowl of soup closely before taking a bite. It looked like some kind of chicken and wild rice soup, speckled with carrots and celery. The carrots were a little undercooked, and the creamy broth was a little less seasoned than he would have liked, but it was nonetheless quite tasty. His stomach growled, reminding him that he couldn't remember the last time he had a proper meal.

“Can I ask you a question?” Cuphead spoke up suddenly. The boy’s voice had an edge of unnecessary force, as if he had been waiting for the right opportunity to speak.

“I'm certainly not in a position to stop you,” Dice responded pointedly.

“What happened ? I mean, really.” Cuphead leaned against the edge of his seat. “Mugs thinks we busted you up like this, and he just tried real hard to forget, but I’d remember... that. ” Dice tried his best not to grimace as Cuphead gestured in his direction.

To stall, Dice carefully tore open the carton of apple juice and took a long, slow drink. He wasn't sure what advantages or disadvantages would come from Cuphead knowing that he had gotten into a fight with the Devil. If he was going along with the idea that he was suddenly free from his soul contract with the Devil, then it should follow that he no longer had powers to defend himself.

In the end, it was a mixture of exhaustion and indifference got to Dice. “What d’you think happened?” he responded with a sigh.

Cuphead tilted his head, and stared at him with wide, curious eyes. “The Devil wasn’t happy with you,” he said finally. “We beat him up pretty bad, too, though, so…”

Right on the nose--the kid wasn’t quite as clueless as he looked. Dice snorted. “It’s the Devil , Cup,” he said. “I’ll give ya credit where it’s due, you did a hell of a job with those debtors and the Devil himself. But don’t go thinking that it’s ever gonna happen again.”

The boy looked reproachfully at Dice, then directed his face towards the floorboards. Dice paused, remembering the Elder Kettle’s warning words about being indebted to the cup brothers. Perhaps now wasn’t the right time for him to lash out about how unlikely the whole situation was.

Before he could speak, though, Cuphead broke the silence. “So, what are you gonna do, once you get better?” He asked, kicking at the floor idly. “Are ya gonna go back to the Devil’s Casino?”

The earnestness in his tone caught Dice off-guard. He hadn’t had the time or capacity to think much about what was going to happen next, and the mere suggestion of a future beyond his next few weeks of recovery twisted a knot in his stomach that made it difficult to breathe. The Devil’s Casino had been his pride and joy, his lifeblood; though he had been the one to walk away, he still hadn’t come to terms with losing it.

“Don’t go back to working for the Devil,” Cuphead interjected suddenly. “You know what he called you? His ‘good-for-nothing lackey’. It’d be an awful shame for you to go running back there when you’re finally free now.”

The resolve in the boy’s words was unwavering. Completely disarmed, Dice stared into his bowl of soup. It occurred to him that his dinner was getting cold, and he shoved a spoonful into his mouth.

Get a load of this guy , he thought, numbly stirring his spoon through the soup. Mugman, the younger brother, seemed sweet and legitimately concerned for Dice’s well-being, but there was something about Cuphead’s bluntness that made him feel unnerved. It was blatantly out of line, the way that he was being spoken to. Any other day, he wouldn't have taken such blunt advice from a kid while lying down.

The stabbing pain in his chest reminded him that, in the current circumstances, he didn't have any other options.

The Devil’s abuse was nothing new to him--he had worked at the Casino for years, after all, long enough to make his share of mistakes and see his boss on many a bad day--but he had always been able to dismiss the mistreatment, because it happened behind closed doors. On occasion, one of the casino’s staff would overhear the Devil lashing out at Dice, but they always had the good sense not to ever mention the incident. Dice had always been a bit of an outsider amongst the staff of the Devil’s Casino--while most of them were a fun-loving bunch who had long since accepted their lot in life, Dice had always been aloof, and made no secret of the fact that he saw himself as above them because of his cunning and ambition. Most of the employees who worked at the casino had been around long enough to watch his unexpected rise from a simple blackjack dealer to the casino manager and hand of the Devil, and he relished the look of fear in his former co-workers’ eyes as they watched his power continue to grow. Even if the Devil’s position over him was wrought iron and absolute, there was no question that Dice was his right-hand man, and that gave him the strength to withstand even the worst of the Devil. He was good at what he did, dammit, and he was a grown man, not a child looking for a handout for being good.

The look on Cuphead’s face, more concerned than spiteful, twisted the knife further into Dice’s chest. He didn't want pity from a kid.

“Mister, um, King Dice?” Dice didn't realize that he was taking so long to respond until Cuphead jumped in. For the first time, Dice heard a note of hesitation in Cuphead’s voice. The look on the kid’s wide eyes was like that of a deer in the headlights of a steam train. The conversation had certainly taken a turn into territory that Cuphead had neither expected nor prepared for. Dice was surprised to feel a twinge of empathy as he looked at the boy’s face. It was only a few days ago that the kid had the scare of a lifetime, traveling the Inkwell Isles to collect debts and brawl against fully-grown opponents who were imbued with the Devil’s powers. Cuphead and his kid brother had won, sure, but it was bound to leave a pretty nasty scar on their psychology.

And he was responsible. For the first time, Dice thought of what he had done and felt a sickening wave of regret.

Cuphead was clearly beginning to panic at Dice’s sudden wave of emotion. He ground his heels into the ground and wrung his white-gloved hands together. “Erm…” the boy muttered.  

Dice leaned back into his pillow, turning his face towards the ceiling. “Yeah?”

Cuphead appeared to be thinking very hard for a moment, before a slightly devious grin crossed his face. “The Baroness made us a cake, for...um, you know.” He tactlessly avoided mentioning his deal with the Devil.

Well, that was out of left field. Dice’s eyebrows furrowed. “Baroness von Bon Bon? I've heard of her,” he responded.

“Yeah, she made us a cake,” Cuphead responded with a nod. “Mugman and the Elder Kettle left to get some stuff from the emporium. The Elder Kettle said no dessert tonight, but do you think…maybe...you want some?”

Dice regarded the kid with amusement. “What’s in it for you?” he asked wryly. It occurred to him that Cuphead was trying to cheer him up under the guise of childish antics, and he appreciated the gesture enough to play along.

Cuphead couldn't contain a soft giggle. “Well, the Elder Kettle can’t be mad if I brought the cake to make you feel better. But gee, it would be rude to just eat it in front of me without offering me any...”

Dice smiled knowingly. “Alright,” he said. “You know, some cake sounds just swell.”

⚀

Dice or no Dice, the Devil would have to start rebuilding the Devil’s Casino at some point. He was almost back to full health, though he knew that, without the souls of the Inkwell Isle debtors, his powers wouldn't quite be what he remembered them to be.

The ruins of his casino were more depressing than he remembered it, from the time he had come to the overworked to confront Dice. He lit a cigar, puffing slowly as he made his way around the destroyed casino floor, surveying the damage.

He half-expected to see Dice amongst the rubble, restored to full strength and wearing his favorite lilac suit, playing idly with his favorite deck of magic aces. ‘ I’m on it, Boss,’   Dice would say. ‘ People are gonna be as dumb as they were before, don’t worry ‘bout that. In no time at all, we’ll have robbed them blind twice over, eh, Boss?’

Dice’s arrogant and sycophantic “Devil’s right-hand man” schtick used to annoy the Devil to no end. It annoyed him even more because he knew Dice was too hard-headed to understand that, in the grand scheme of eternity, the life and death of little Caleb Dice would mean very little to Satan himself.

What annoyed him the most was that how he was finding himself wishing Dice were here right now. Dice had always been just useful enough to think he had some value to the Devil, and just annoying enough for the Devil to wish that he didn’t. Dice really was a spectacular casino manager, and shockingly adept at swindling people out of their souls; it eventually reached the point where the Devil granted Dice the power to sign the soul contracts as his proxy, since it was becoming so cumbersome to deal with each case individually. Dice had been right about the casino, too--after he was promoted to manager, the aesthetic upgrades that he gave the casino had been good for business. Looking around at the ornately detailed red carpet, the ballroom-style ceiling, the polished wood furnishings that practically glowed even in the dim light of the casino--the whole thing screamed King Dice .

The Devil hissed with frustration and clambered over a card table that had been crushed underneath a chandelier.

Although nobody was speaking about it out loud, news that the King had left the Devil’s Casino spread like wildfire through the rest of the staff. Although nobody dared ask him about what would happen to Dice, from what his minions were reporting, it seemed to be the general consensus that Dice was going to be captured, tortured, and maybe have his head mounted on the wall of the Devil’s Casino.

It was kind of tempting, considering the mess that Dice had left in his wake. But the Devil knew that would never work if he wanted to preserve a chance at winning souls again. Dice was a well-known, if not entirely well-loved, figure to the Inkwell Isles, and killing him off would be a sure way to ensure that nobody with an ounce of common sense would come within a mile of the Devil’s Casino ever again. Image was important, Dice had been the one to teach him that--there was a reason that he had never sent anyone to collect on the soul contracts until the cup boys begged him for a way out of their own debts.

The staff of the casino were also deeply reluctant to see their boss be, as they whispered about in hushed tones, torn limb from limb by a beast form of the Devil. They were too terrified to do much of anything right now, cut off from the overworld and without a leader, but who knows what might happen when Dice returned? The beating he had taken from Cuphead and Mugman had been bad enough to make the Devil think twice about taking on a fight that he wasn't absolutely certain he could handle.

Something would have to be done, that much was certain. For now, though, he needed to rebuild the Casino. With his minions to keep a careful eye on the staff of the casino, he could do that much without Dice.

The Devil paced aimlessly as he thought, and was surprised to find that he had led himself to Dice’s suite above the Casino. The room was orderly and ornate, just like everything about Dice. A purple robe was draped over the duvet, and a few purple jackets, the ones that Dice insisted on wearing at all times during work, were hung on the door frame.

The room still smelled faintly like Dice. It was odd, how a place could smell so distinctly like someone, so strongly that it felt like the person was there. Standing in the empty room, the Devil could almost hear Dice’s haughty laugh. Dice always smelled like tobacco and mints and that expensive cologne he insisted on having sent to him, even though it was entirely impractical. In Dice’s presence, the Devil always hated the smell of that cologne. Like Dice himself, it was sleazy and unnecessarily pompous and had all the subtlety of being hit in the face with a baseball bat.

The Devil heaved a sigh and curled up on Dice’s violet duvet, resting his head on the robe that lay there, patiently waiting for its owner to return home. Sunlight streamed in past the maroon drapes, making the room comfortably warm.

He didn't miss King Dice, the Devil thought to himself, as he closed his eyes and let the warm overworld sunlight lull him to sleep. He’d just been through a lot lately, and he needed some rest…