#and uh not to mention i look quite similar to jim (have been for a long time if im being honest)

[scourgebrocreate]

as you may have noticed i suddenly got reminded that treasure planet exists and i would also like to add that it turned out weirdly autobiographic to me, in a way that im realizing only now

[rosyfingereddawnn]

That’s The Way (Chapter 4)

Pairing: Jimmy Page x Reader

Word count: 5.7k

Warning(s): Jimmy and Y/N falling in love at first sight🥺, nsfw insinuations in the beginning but nothing bad, language

Author’s notes: It’s Jimmy time, mates! I’m so sorry for making you wait so long! Slow burns can suck like that sometimes. I hope you’re enjoying the plot so far, and that it wasn’t what you expected! There’s so much more drama to come, though, so I hope you’re excited for that😂 As usual, please enjoy, happy reading, and send us messages if you have theories, comments, music recommendations for the playlist, or if you want to be added to the tag list :)

Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3

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Y/N’s train ride home from The Yardbirds’ hotel was a constant swirl of what the fucks booming in her mind: what the fuck just happened, what the fuck does this mean, what the fuck am I doing, what the fuck is Jim doing, what the fuck will this become?  

Out of all the things on God’s good, green earth he could have wanted, he wanted her to kiss him. What the hell was that supposed to mean? Y/N thought when she initially heard the request. Then, when she questioned it, he escalated it to a blowjob since she thought a kiss was “too tame.” Y/N eventually did kiss Jim, as he wished. She was pretty sure that he still wanted her to kiss him after his little upgrade, and boy, was she right. ‘He called me a princess’, she remembered...what the hell was that supposed to mean?

As contradictory as it was, her mind was racing with so many thoughts, yet, at the same time, none at all. She was in overdrive, unable to think straight. Y/N forced herself to come to her senses as the train neared her stop, since her parents could not see the sheer bewilderment in her eyes and facial expression as she walked into her home. They would ask question after question, interrogating her as if she had committed a crime they had to get to the bottom of. She had to admit, reluctantly, that this was exciting. The star-studded aspect of it, the secrecy… It was a rollercoaster ride, yet Y/N wasn’t sure she wanted to get off anytime soon. In the back of her mind, though, she knew this little dalliance wasn’t going to lead to anything serious.

Jim, however, currently sitting at the foot of his bed in an empty hotel room, was in a complete daze. He couldn’t comprehend that this was reality. The most beautiful girl in the whole world had just sucked him off, and then kissed him! She was completely obedient yet willing, and adorably shy, blushing every two seconds. But the kiss. It was dizzyingly soft, sweet, and passionate on her part. To Jim, this meeting of lips was perfect. Addictive. Devastatingly addictive, like a drug. He wanted more. Her lips were something else to taste and feel. He wondered if she would ever come back to him with intimate intentions. Perhaps even to spend the night, or something even more serious. By the way she so often smiled in a bright and enthusiastic way, Jim thought she just might. He had come to the conclusion, after continuously replaying what had happened just minutes ago in his head, that he was falling hopelessly in love with this girl. His Y/N.

Jim had never felt like this before.

And he didn’t know what to do about it.

~~~~~~~~

A few weeks later...

Y/N’s mum had sent her and her brother Charlie by train into London to go grocery shopping, and perhaps to visit Carnaby Street, Portobello Market, and the Oxfam charity shops to get some new clothes for themselves. Pushing the cart around the supermarket, Y/N and Charlie looked intently at the handwritten list their mum had given them.

“Alright, what do we need next?” Y/N asked, her head tilted to see the small piece of paper.

“Uh, we still have to get oatmeal, eggs, and some fruits and vegetables,” Charlie replied, mirroring Y/N’s position as he gazed down at the list in his hands, which was slowly being painted with black ink. They were making good time, all things considered.

“Let’s go to the produce section then, so we can get everything all in one go,” Y/N decided, starting to push the cart in that direction.

“Yeah, that makes sense.” Charlie’s nod served as confirmation, and the two walked on, gazes captured every-so-often by the gaggle of people passing by.

Once the two siblings reached their desired destination, Y/N began inspecting the clear clamshell containers of assorted berries as Charlie went to fetch a bag of broccoli florets and a variety of potatoes. As Y/N began placing the fruit in the cart, she heard a familiar voice calling her name.

She turned around to see a very domestic-looking Jeff Beck, pushing around a grocery cart, just like she was. It was odd to see him going about his life as though he was just an ordinary working-class man, especially being the revered guitar god he was. Y/N laughed at the sight as he came over towards her.

“Hi Jeff,” Y/N greeted, walking over to give him a hug.

“Hello darling,” he responded, tilting the girl back and forth in the hug, long arms cradling her against his chest. “How are you doing?”

Y/N looked at him with a small grin after pulling away. An exhale passes through pursed lips as she replies. “As well as I can be, I guess. How ‘bout you?”

“Can’t complain,” he smiled, which then turned a little more solemn. He reached out a hand to place on her upper arm in solace. “I’m still really sorry about Sam, love. I wish I could’ve told you, but he swore me to secrecy… and I don’t want to lose my job just yet.”

“Don’t worry about it, I completely understand. It’s not your fault.” Y/N’s chuckle chimed through the air, much like the birdsongs that seemed to fill the space around them, and she paused, “I’ve done quite a bit of soul-searching recently, and I don’t think I truly loved him...the situation was all so new and exciting, that it made me believe I did. But now, I realize I didn’t.”

“I’m glad you found the light at the end of the tunnel, kid. But that’s life, Y/N. You win some and you lose some.”

“Thank you, Jeff. Really. For being so supportive,” Y/N said in gratitude, as Jeff flashed her a toothy smile.

“Ah, don’t mention it...actually, it’s funny I ran into you because I was actually going to call you, but I… may have lost your number.” A sheepish hand ran through the short hair at the nape of his neck, and Y/N giggles at the man’s hesitancy.

“That’s okay. Here, I’ll write it down for you,” Y/N grinned as she took out a spare piece of paper and a pen from her bag, “what did you need to call me for?”

Jeff watched Y/N’s hands as she scribbled down her number. Her handwriting was neat, soft spirals decorating the ends of her letters. Playful, yet full of grace. Just like her, Jeff thought. “There’s a May Ball at Queen’s College in Oxford on the 18th, and I was wondering if you’d like to come. It’s outdoors, and it should be a nice day.”

As Y/N handed Jeff the piece of paper, he continued. “More importantly, a good friend of mine is attending, and I thought you would like to meet him. You two are pretty similar, so I think you’ll hit it off really well.”

“Do you mean that this meeting is supposed to be a sort of… romantic proposition?” Y/N tilted her head in playful confusion.

Jeff smirked. “Not necessarily. He’s friends with the rest of the guys, so it’s only fair that you meet him, since we consider you a part of our inner circle.”

Y/N grinned at his statement, shaking her head, a chuckle tumbling past her lips. “Well, for the record, Jeff, I’m retired from dating for a while,” she admitted, “the whole thing with Paul shook me up a bit, and I need time to trust again, y’know?”

“Yeah, I understand. But my friend is a nice bloke, so I don’t think you’ll have to worry too much, or put up a front. If you’re uncomfortable, of course we can—”

Charlie came running up to Y/N’s cart and placed the bags of broccoli and potatoes inside. He then stood next to Y/N to see this stranger that she was talking to. Jeff noticed the little boy who suddenly appeared next to Y/N, and smiled warmly. Pointing to the boy, and changing his voice to be a bit gentler than usual, he asked, “Who’s this, Y/N?”

“This is my little brother Charlie,” Y/N said, softly putting her hand on her brother’s back, bringing him to the forefront. Charlie widely smiled at Jeff, baring his childish grin that was missing a couple teeth. Charlie couldn't wait until they grew in, because it would “finally make him look like a real man”, as he exclaimed so often at home.

Jeff crouched down to Charlie’s level and stuck out his hand to shake Charlie’s. “Nice to meet ya, mate. I’m Jeff, a friend of your sister’s.”

Charlie’s eyes widened as he recognized who this man was. “Jeff Beck?” Charlie asked hopefully, “as in the guitar god, Jeff Beck?”

Jeff chuckled as he looked up at Y/N. “Is this the shit you’ve been feeding him?” Y/N nodded and laughed.

“There’s an ounce of truth in that statement, isn't there, Beck?”

“Yes, I’m Jeff Beck, but I’m just the lead guitarist for The Yardbirds. The guitar god title goes to Hendrix, or Scotty Moore,” Jeff explained. What a humble change of pace for Jeff, Y/N thought.

Jeff stood back up and walked with Y/N and her brother throughout the store, pushing their carts in sync and grabbing food as they went. He asked her about what she was up to musically, and she talked about how she was polishing up some Debussy and Rachmaninoff pieces, as well as fiddling around with some old Fats Domino and Everly Brothers records. Charlie and Jeff bonded over their love of cars, which made Y/N very happy.

~~~~~~~~

18th June 1966

The day of the May Ball came. Y/N was excited for the show, but she didn’t want a sour encounter with Paul to ruin her good time. Jeff had called her earlier in the week to give her instructions on what to do upon arrival, and how to access the backstage area safely.

The backstage area was a white tent with the sides covered. Inside, there were multiple long tables of different distinguished people, such as Mama Cass and Graham Nash. Alcohol and little finger foods littered the tables, served in such abundance that it seemed no one was going to see tomorrow.

Y/N walked over to where she saw her friends, and upon spotting the girl, they all waved and said their cheerful hellos. Y/N walked over to sit with them, and ended up taking a seat between Chris and Jeff, crossing her legs and folding her hands in a sophisticated manner, always the lady she was taught to be. She chose her seat at the table very carefully, sitting very far away from Paul Samwell-Smith.

As everyone chatted away, she noticed there was a tall, thin young man with short, dark wavy hair who sat down in a seat between Jeff and Keith, delicately holding a flute of champagne. He was looped back into the conversation immediately, as if he had known the band his whole life. When Y/N saw him, her heart stopped.

This new boy was the most beautiful man she had ever seen. He looked like an English James Dean; with the kind of attractiveness that anyone, male or female, completely swooned over with a single glance. This stranger could get anything he wanted at the drop of a hat, with his gorgeous looks and his graceful countenance. He had a sullen, mysterious edge to him, but he also looked gentle and sweet at the same time. He had eyes as green as a forest full of lush deciduous trees, flawlessly framed by dark, bushy eyebrows and accented by long, thick eyelashes. His nose was adorable, petite as it was, and his lips were full and pouty. His smile and laugh made Y/N melt on the inside, his perfectly straight teeth illuminating his porcelain face.

For a moment, Y/N thought she was in love. She was pulled back from her daydream quickly, though, because Jeff realized that now was the perfect opportunity to introduce his two friends.

“Y/N, this is my friend Jimmy, who I was telling you about,” Jeff said, getting Y/N’s attention. Y/N grinned as she refocused on the situation.

Jimmy turned towards Jeff when he heard his name, and that’s when he saw the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, sitting right next to Jeff. Lucky bastard.

His breath hitched in his throat upon sight of this girl. She was perfect; she looked like an actual angel. The way her hair, soft-looking and slightly wispy in the light summer wind, cascaded down her shoulders; her doe-eyes seemed to twinkle in the dimming light of day, pulling him in like the strongest of currents. Her  pillowy, supple lips encased a perfect smile, slightly crooked. It was, like the rest of her, completely endearing.

It was then, looking at this beautiful woman, (Y/N… Jeff had said her name, hadn't he?) that Jimmy remembers he was taken. His girlfriend, Jackie DeShannon, was waiting for him at home, but he only had eyes for the girl in front of him, and it would stay that way, it seemed.. He had to get to know her.

Jimmy snapped out of his hypnosis in the nick of time. He softly smiled at Y/N, a smile that made Y/N’s insides lurch, holding out his hand for her to shake as he turned on the charm. “Jimmy Page,” he initiated, his voice being softer and more calming than Y/N expected.

Y/N shyly smiled at him, a dark pink flush gracing her natural complexion, as she reached out to grasp his hand. “Y/N Y/L/N. It’s so nice to finally meet you. Jeff has told me about you.”

“All good things, I hope,” Jimmy chuckled.

“Yeah, I’d say so,” Y/N beamed, a feigned contemplative look on her face.

“How do you know Jeff?” Jimmy asked, turning his body towards her, now fully invested in getting to know Y/N.

“I met him...a year ago I wanna say? Is that right, Jeff? At a Yardbirds gig at the Marquee,” Y/N asked for clarification. The last thing she wanted to do is lie about Jeff to Jimmy, even if it was something as insignificant as this. In addition, she wanted to use Jeff as a temporary crutch in the conversation. Jimmy’s beauty was making her feel shyer than she already was; she felt as if she was curling into herself.

“Yeah, that sounds about right,” Jeff intervened, “but she didn’t just meet me, she met the whole band.”

Jeff immediately noticed that the band was leaving the table to get ready to go on stage. Jimmy and Y/N didn’t even notice the table’s departure because they were so wrapped up in each other’s presence and words. Jimmy even moved a seat over to get closer to Y/N, although he said it was an attempt to “hear her better since the room was so loud of drunken buffoons”. Y/N had giggled at that, and it had sounded like music to the man’s ears. Jimmy was completely taken with her, as easy as it was to see.

“Wait, so how do you know Jeff?” Y/N asked curiously.

“I've known him since I was… gosh… thirteen or fourteen? We bonded over the guitar and blues. Indian music, too,” Jimmy grinned, taking a sip of his warming champagne.

“You play the guitar too?” Y/N gasped. Jimmy nodded his head enthusiastically.

“Oh jeez, I should’ve known! No wonder you’re tight with the Yardbirds,” she giggled.

Jimmy’s eyes twinkled at her now-flustered demeanor. “You’re okay, Y/N,” he chuckled, placing a hand gently on her forearm. Y/N felt her entire body break out into chills.

“I’m a session musician, actually,” he began, his hand lingering on the girl’s arm, for what seemed like a millennium to Y/N. “I’d hate to simplistically explain what a session musician is to someone like you if you already know what it is.” It sounded like he was holding back a bout of embarrassed laughter. “You must be quite intelligent, especially in matters of music, if Jeff has stuck by you for all this time.”

Y/N smiled bashfully. He’s so sensitive, she thought dreamily. “Yes, I know what a session musician is,” she giggled, “I’ve been a piano player all my life, so I know a thing or two about what you blokes are talking about when it comes to music.”

Jimmy’s heart began to thump a little faster as his smile widened. “Wow! That’s brilliant. Are you classically trained then?”

“Yes, but I do know quite a bit of blues numbers.”

“Oh, so you really know what you’re talking about! I have to admit, although I am a session musician, I’m not particularly good at reading music. Maybe you could teach me a few things about sight reading and we can jam some time?”

Y/N blushed as her lips pursed together in a grin. “I would love that. We’d have so much fun!” The way that Y/N’s full lips twisted together in a smile looked so damn kissable to Jimmy.

“My girlfriend was actually supposed to teach me music theory, but we never got around to it, unfortunately,” Jimmy continued.

“Ah, okay. Well, if you give me a time, date, and place, we can definitely make it work,” Y/N beamed.

“Wonderful!” An awkward, pregnant pause filled the space, and Y/N cleared her throat, unconsciously sliding closer to Jimmy. There was almost a magnetic pull to him, and Y/N was caught up in it.

“So, what’s it like being a session musician? I’m sure you get asked that all the time,” Y/N laughed.

Jimmy smiled. “It’s quite grueling, brutal at times, but I find it fulfilling. One mistake, and you’re fired, so it’s a lot of pressure.”

“Oh wow! That must be horrible to deal with.”

“Yeah, sometimes the pressure can really settle into you, but for me it dissipates once I’m in the booth. There’s three sessions a day, five days a week, so I don’t have much time for leisure. It’s been getting really dry lately since all I’m playing is rhythm guitar. I love experimentation and stretching out on lead guitar, so constant rhythm is getting quite annoying.”

“I understand where you’re coming from then, from a creative standpoint. How long have you been a session player?”

“Four years, roughly.”

“You must be quite dedicated then!” Y/N exclaimed, “who have you played with?”

“Oh gosh,” Jimmy exhaled deeply, calloused fingers raising to land on his chin. Slight stubble shadows it, and the sharp scent of aftershave wafted towards the girl. Lost in the scent, Y/N nearly missed his reply. “The Rolling Stones, The Kinks, Donovan, The Who, Petula Clark, Jackie DeShannon, Carter Lewis and the Southerners, Neil Christian and the Crusaders, Herman’s Hermits, Marianne Faithfull… just to name a few.”

“Wow! What a resumé!” she gushed, “That’s incredible. You should be so proud, Jimmy.”

“Thank you very much, love, I appreciate it.”

Suddenly, an announcer’s booming voice cut through Jimmy and Y/N’s conversation as he introduced the Yardbirds to the stage. As the five men walked on, Jimmy stood up from his chair.

“Come with me to the wings so we can see and hear them better,” he smiled, holding out his arm for Y/N to take. Y/N agreed, standing up and linking her arm with Jimmy’s as they walked in sync to the side of the stage.

The first few numbers were played perfectly, and it was clear that the audience (and even the road crew) were enchanted by the spectacle. Y/N knew from past shows that the next song would be “Train Kept A-Rollin’,” and she knew that they always knocked that one out of the park. It was always stimulating and explosive.

Jeff and Chris began the opening riff, the low E, G, and A notes thundering out of the monitors melodically. Just as Keith sang “got a train” on his cue, he fell straight backward and hit his head off Jim’s bass drum. Jimmy and Y/N’s jaws dropped in shock as a loud gasp echoed through the air from the audience. The music abruptly stopped as the rest of the band crowded around Keith’s fallen figure to see if he was alright. Murmurings of “fucking hells” were all that were spoken from the road crew as they tried to redeem the concert.

“He was drunk,” Jimmy whispered to Y/N giddily, “he was completely out to lunch and wobbling as he walked onstage.”

“I didn’t even notice,” Y/N replied quietly with a grin, “that definitely explains all the empty bottles and glasses on the table.”

Momentarily, Keith got back up and motioned for the band to restart “Train Kept A-Rollin’” and they finished the song without another mishap. The rest of the set was completed smoothly, and everything sounded sonically incredible. Jimmy and Y/N stood close together the entire time, Jimmy sneaking glances at Y/N from time to time. He lost his breath with the way her eyes were almost aglow in the fading light, and her soft-looking lips parted in childlike wonder as she watched the live music.

The Yardbirds came off the stage, begrudgingly making their way into the backstage tent, where Jimmy and Y/N had situated themselves. No one looked happy, especially Paul. Jeff had his usual stoic look, but he was rushing around for any alcoholic beverage he could find to ease his nerves after what could have been the worst possible scenario.

Everyone took a seat at the table where they were before the show. Jimmy and Y/N sat next to each other as they took in the distressed expressions of the five other men. Jeff was slumped in his chair, next to Jimmy, taking swigs of a beer he’d found. Jim and Chris just stared at the ground, drink in hand. Paul just looked royally pissed off, to the point that it almost scared Y/N. Keith, however, was still totally out of it in his drunken stupor.

“Hey, Jim,” Jeff said quietly to Jimmy, “look, you know, I’m really sorry about the gig. I’m sure you aren’t interested in joining the band now…”

“Oh no,” Jimmy chuckled, “that was amazing! Absolutely brilliant! I loved it.”

Y/N’s interest piqued as she heard their whispers of new information. “Wait! Jimmy’s joining the band? I thought there were only supposed to be five live Yardbirds,” she whispered.

Jeff leaned over Jimmy to whisper back to Y/N. “Oh yeah! I can’t believe I didn’t tell you this already. Paul is probably going to leave the group...and I think it might be sooner than we thought, especially after the whole Keith fiasco...Jimmy is going to take his place on bass, and hopefully he’ll take on dual lead guitar at some point. Then Chris will do bass,” Jeff’s eyes diverted to Paul, who was sitting with his arms crossed and face angry, staring off into space. Jimmy and Y/N followed Jeff’s line of sight mischievously.

“Oooh! Great plan,” Y/N smiled.

A little smirk creeped across Jeff’s face as he quietly counted down, “3...2...1…”

At the very prompt “1,” Paul abruptly stood up from his chair very loudly, capturing everyone’s attention.

“You know what? I’m done,” Paul exclaimed, stepping away from the chair as he pushed it in under the table.

“Woah, woah, woah!” Jim began, standing up from his own chair, “what do you mean ‘you’re done’? What the hell does that mean?”

Paul sneered at Jim. “What do you think I mean? I mean I’m done with this bullshit. I’ve had enough of the horrid travelling, not being noticed, and this drunk-off-his-ass bastard,” he exclaimed angrily, pointing at Keith.

“You need to relax, Sam,” Chris said gently, “look at everything we’ve accomplished over the last three years. You want to give that up? You’re losing your shit over one bad performance.”

“It’s been on my mind for a long time now, Chris. I fucking hate it,” Paul continued, anxiously running his hands through his hair, “and you know what? Y/N hanging around all the time has made it worse. She’s just here to be our fucking groupie. She’s only eating off our clout to be friends with famous people.” The entire table went silent, looking around nervously.

Y/N’s eyes widened at Paul’s awful accusation. “Are you serious?” she shot back coldly, “I knew you were an asshole, but I didn’t know it was this bad.”

“Oh what, you think I don’t recognize that that’s your motive?” Paul said condescendingly.

“If you think that being absolutely obsessed with you all is my sole hobby, my motive, whatever that means... you are sadly mistaken,” Y/N responded, her eyes closing to slits and her lips pressed together in disgust.

“You’re probably sleeping with Jim or Chris now for all I know!” he shouted, arms flailing in the air.

Y/N was fuming now, standing up from her own chair facing Paul. “How dare you make me seem like I’m a whore for the Yardbirds! Even if I was sleeping with Jim or Chris, that would be none of your business because you pursued me when you were fucking married, you dipshit.”

Paul’s maddening countenance grew. “You’re just an insecure little girl who needs famous musicians around her to validate her and make feel better about herself. You’re a fucking nuisance, like a gnat that just won’t fly away even when you swat at it again and again.”

Y/N gasped, the sound drowned out by the screech of metal against tile, as Jimmy stood up from his chair. He was distraught, upset at the antics between the two bitter exes, and stepped in front of Y/N to protect her from the horrible verbal blows served by Paul Samwell-Smith. Jeff beat him by a second, as he started to berate Sam for his little episode.

“You listen up, you wanker,” Jeff started, wagging his index finger in front of Sam’s face, “you’re just being a butthurt little bitch because Y/N found out that you were married. If anyone’s the whore here, it’s you. Y/N is our friend, even Jimmy’s now, and she takes care of us and makes us happy. She’s not just some whimsy, disposable groupie like the way you used her; she’s an intelligent, sweet, pretty girl who has our best interest at heart. And we have hers. You have to be a fucking idiot not to see that.”

Paul was taken aback. “I write, produce, and play bass for this group. All you do is play lead guitar. Trust me, Beck, I’m not the idiot here.”

“Well, your goddamn head isn’t screwed on straight, then,” Jimmy added, “I’ll be taking your place, thank you very much. And you will never mistreat Y/N on my watch. Ever. I’ve known her for about an hour, and she’s already absolutely magnificent.”

Y/N’s throat felt clenched, but some of the tension was relieved when she realized how protective Jimmy was being over her. As mad as she was, butterflies filled her stomach at his warm ways.

“I’m out of here! You all suck anyway. Have a nice trip to hell, all of you,” Paul said as he walked away to the road crew to get his belongings, flipping the people at the table off.

Y/N sat back down in her chair once Paul was out of sight, slouching and holding her cheeks with her hands as she blankly stared at the edge of the table. Jimmy and the four Yardbirds dragged their chairs closer to a saddened Y/N, who was determined to fight off the tears that threatened to roll down her fury-flush cheeks.

Jeff frowned at the state of his friend, starting to softly rub her cardigan-clothed back to console her. “I’m so sorry about Sam, Y/N. His behaviour was absolutely horrendous, and I can assure you, none of the things he said about you were even close to being true.”

Keith, still a bit drunk, stood up and walked over to Y/N, planting a peck on her cheek. “We’re so glad you’re here, dear. Truly. That belligerent little asshole can suck a fat one.”

A close-lipped smile found its way on Y/N’s lips. “Thanks Keith,” she chuckled.

“I’m going to go get you a cup of water, alright love?” Chris said as he stood up to walk over towards the bar.

“Thank you so much Chris,” she called after him. Chris flashed her a kind smile as he walked away.

I guess Mum and Dad were wrong...they really do care about me, Y/N thought happily, they really, truly do.

~~~~~~~~

After the May Ball was over, and the sky was growing darker with the coming evening, Jimmy and Y/N walked around the grounds of the venue together, talking about anything and everything and sharing laughs.

The lighthearted mood took a drastic shift at one of Jimmy’s followup questions.

“So, Y/N, if you don’t mind me asking, what was the whole row between you and Sam about?”

Y/N flashed a sad smile, but it quickly faded as she took a deep exhale. “Well—”

Panicked, Jimmy took this as a cue that she didn’t want to talk about it. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, I get it because of how heated it was. I’m just worried about you, is all,” he interrupted.

“No, it’s okay. Really. I trust you,” she replied with a pursed lip-smile. Jimmy returned the sentiment, internally relieved that Y/N had already seemed to take a liking to him.

“Alright, so about a year or so ago, I went to a Yardbirds gig at the Crawdaddy Club, a few months after I met the band for the first time. Paul asked me out after that show, and nobody told me he was married, so naturally, I accepted.”

“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry, love. What a shitty thing to do, especially to someone as wonderful as you,” Jimmy replied with a little flush, giving the girl a little rub on the small of her back.

Heat rippled throughout Y/N’s body at his touch. Regaining her composure, she sighed. “Thank you Jimmy. That means a lot. More than you know, actually.”

After a short silence, Y/N continued. “We went out for about eight months...and in retrospect, it now makes sense why I could never go over to his place. But anyway, I found out about it before the band played on Ready, Steady, Go in February. Keith, Jeff, Jim, and I were all talking at the front of the stage before rehearsals and it slipped.”

“Who ended up telling you?”

“Jim, but it was purely an accident.” Suddenly, all of the events that had happened between her and Jim guiltily flooded her mind. Now with Jimmy beginning to infiltrate her mind and cloud her vision, how was she supposed to genuinely enjoy the secrecy? Ah shit, she thought, here we go again.

“After the show, I confronted him about it,” Y/N continued, “and he was blaming me for our time together, a-and for ‘tempting’ him into asking me out just by being… me?”

“He seems like a right wanker, I can tell you that for sure,” Jimmy muttered, sliding his hand from its resting place on her back, to her shoulder, squeezing it lightly in solidarity. Y/N met his eyes then, tears filling her gaze, and Jimmy frowns. No one as lovely as her should be feeling this way. He smiles at her, and to Y/N, it is filled with comfort and appreciation. Some emotion… something akin to love, perhaps, lit a fire in her chest, and she looks away. The evening ambience does nothing to hide the traitorous blush that painted her cheeks.

“It’s getting quite dark out, love. How did you get here?” Jimmy asked, stealing another glance at a girl as she looked down at her ballet flats once more.

“I took the train, actually,” Y/N replied.

“Oh, so did I! Here, I’ll walk with you over to the station then.”

Y/N grinned at him. “That’s so kind of you, Jimmy. Thank you.”

“No problem, love. What’s your stop?” Jimmy asked as they began to make their way over to the station.

“St. Alban’s. How about you?”

“Epsom. I still live with my parents, I’m afraid,” he chuckled sheepishly.

“Oh, it’s okay!” she laughed with him, “so do I. It’s nice though, to still live with your parents… home-cooked meals and laundry and all. Plus sleeping in your own bed, and using your own bathroom, of course.”

“Those are very good points,” Jimmy agreed with a chuckle.

The two boarded the train once they got to the station, only waiting on the platform for a few minutes. They continued to talk all the way to St. Albans, where Y/N got off to walk home.

“Say you’ll see me again sometime soon, Y/N,” Jimmy half-asked, half-declared as she stood up to get off the train.

Y/N grinned at him. “I definitely will, Jimmy. It was so nice meeting you tonight...I loved getting to know you.”

“The feeling is mutual, love. Please stay safe and take care of yourself, okay?” he reached out his hand to grab Y/N’s, shaking it a little and smiling at her. Y/N nearly swooned at the gesture.

“I’ll try my best. You do the same as well. Have a good night!”

“Thank you, you too!” Jimmy waved as Y/N walked out the train’s doors. Her scent, a delicious mixture of vanilla with a hint of laundry detergent, lingered in the air as she passed by, weakening him both physically and his rational judgment.

He had a lot of thinking to do on the ride home.

————

Taglist: @blood-on-blood @reincarnated70sbaby

[autisticcassandracain]

So I was debating asking you this after I read Death of hte New Gods cuz I know you read a lot of the New God stuff (I've read the first like 17 issues of the original mr miracle? til whenever the writer changes. but not a ton more). How does it compare tonally to the rest of the new god comics? it felt really weird for me that suddenly the source was going around as some ultra-godly serial killer and also had like a '1-hit-KO button' for pretty much everyone. Mostly it felt narratively unsatisfying that the new gods were all being killed off without being able to react in some dumb event that wasn't even about them (and there was no point cuz none of that source stuff was even mentioned in final crisis darkseid could've been dying for any dumb reason). I was curious your take on it though since you've read more New God stuff

(good on you for not reading Mr Miracle after the writer changed, it sucked really really bad, like I truly cannot stress enough how bad Englehart's Mr Miracle run is, PSA for everyone don't read it)

Death of the New Gods is uh. Bad. Like really bad, lmao, but I'm sure I don't need to tell you that. Even aside from how it uses Fourth World lore, it's just a badly constructed story. It's not the worst New Gods story I've read (that dishonour goes to New Gods (1995), which was so bad it was pretty much unreadable for most of it), but it's a very solid contender for second place.

This got longer than planned and is very rambly so tl;dr: Death of the New Gods bad, it’s tonally darker than most of the New Gods stories, many of the gods’ deaths are deeply disrespectful to their characters, its portrayal of the Source is not substantiated by most of the pre-existing lore and banking heavily on Starlin’s own old works, the way it ended the Fourth World was not thematically consistent with Jack Kirby’s original series, and also Starlin’s characterization of Scott is bad and he should feel bad.

Before the Review(TM) I should note that I know far more about Scott specifically than I do the New Gods in general, and haven't read all of the New Gods solos (mostly bc quite a few of them don't look very good). That said, I think I know enough to do some basic judging, though if anyone wants to correct me on something, feel free! Also my memory is bad and I blocked out a not insignificant part of the actual nitty gritty of Death of the New Gods bc it suuucks so if I get stuff wrong or miss stuff sorry in advance. That said I'm not re-reading it lmao.

Tonally, Death of the New Gods is definitely darker than most of the New Gods stories. The difference isn't quite 'Tom King's Mister Miracle vs literally any other Scott story' bad, but it's still noticeable. The New Gods do routinely handle darker subject matters and stories specifically focused around Orion/New Genesis are often pretty dramatic/grandiose in tone, but Death of the New Gods is relentlessly depressing in a way that few New Gods stories are. In addition, its gore is much more graphic than usual.

In terms of it lore-usage, the main plot relies fairly heavily on a view of the Source that most New Gods stories really don't ascribe to. Which makes sense once you realize the writer, Jim Starlin, also wrote Cosmic Odyssey, which the plot of Death of the New Gods relies pretty heavily on. From what I've read of him, he seems to have a decent amount of knowledge about the Fourth World, but his interpretation often leaves a lot to be desired. Cosmic Odyssey, for example, had the glaring issue of character massacring Orion by making him far more violent and bigoted than he usually is. Death of the New Gods seems to be in a similar boat (at least to me), where most of what Starlin does is technically possible within the lore, but a large stretch and/or bad-faith interpretation of something.

The Source was originally introduced by Jack Kirby as the literal 'source' of the universe. Highfather found a small wall in the middle of a destroyed battlefield as he despaired during the seemingly never-ending war with Apokolips, and a flaming hand started writing on it. The Source is usually portrayed as such; a mystical force beyond the edge of the universe that communicates with Highfather via a hand writing advice on a wall. 'Advice' being the keyword here. A surprising amount of writers do this thing where they make the Source capital G God in the Christian sense and the New Gods its loyal servants/children, but at least in Jack Kirby's original vision, it was more a guiding hand than anything else. The New Gods were explicitly not bound to follow the advice of the Source, and often debated the merits of doing so vs not doing so. It was wise, and generally helpful, but it did not control them. (Which, side note, seems pretty in line with Kirby's Jewish faith, though I really don't know enough about that to talk about it.)

Over the years, many authors have played with the Source and what it is, and almost all of them have aggressively missed the point imo, since the whole point of the Source was fairly obviously to be a guide, not a master. Making it some kind of fickle, all-powerful God the way Death of the New Gods does fundamentally misses the point of what the Source was in the original New Gods stories, both literally and thematically.

Which brings me to my next point: the actual destruction of the Fourth World and how it happened is uh. Not in line with how the destruction of the Third World happened.

The reason the New Gods comics are called 'The Fourth World' are that, according to the lore established in New Gods (1971), they're literally the Fourth World. Three worlds died before this one. The Third World is usually portrayed as having been inhabited by the Norse Gods. Usually, this world is portrayed as having been destroyed due to their own arrogance and battle-lust; unending battle eventually caused their world to be ripped apart, which basically fits with the myth of Ragnarok.

It’s why the choice to portray the Source as having been the source (pun not intended) of all that, and having it be responsible for the destruction of the Fourth World essentially just because it thought it was imperfect is so weird. The Third World is a cautionary tale against senseless war; it’s why it’s thematically so important for New Genesis to keep striving for peace. It should also be noted that the Source chose to make contact with Highfather - then called Izaya - when he was willing to denounce war and choose peace:

[Images: three pages from New Gods (1971) #7. The first panel shows a warship with a huge explosion around it, the narration saying: “Larger! Larger grows the war! Larger grows the “god-machines”! An impacter, the size of a planet, is sent crushing into an enemy-capture sun.” It shifts to Izaya, looking on with an expression of despair. Narration: “And inside Izaya of New Genesis, something dies with each such deed!! Where will this end? How can he destroy the cosmos - and yet, save New Genesis!?” Izaya hides his face in his hands. He says: “We are worse than the old gods! They destroyed themselves!! We destroy everything! This is Darkseid’s way! I am infected by Darkseid! To save New Genesis, I must find Izaya!” Izaya moves through a war-ruined city, saying: “Where is Izaya?? - not the warrior - the general - but, the true servant of those he leads!! Not here, in these tortured ruins of war! But Izaya is there! - somewhere - out there!!”

Izaya moves through war-ruined plains. The narration says: “Out there is an ungly landscape, empty of all that was once New Genesis!! Its soft, green forested lands are gone!!” Izaya thinks: “The rotting hulks of war machines instead of trees!! This has become Darkseid’s world!! A wasteland!! - seared and cracked and gaping with endless pits - in which bacterial monsters fester and play!! Darkseid’s plan!! Like foolish Steppenwolf, I’ve allowed myself to follow the mad dreams of Darkseid!! - from which no-one can survive!!!” He tears off his shirt and heaves his staff into the air as wind picks up around him and lightning strikes behind him, shouting: “I tear off my armor! I reject this war-staff as a weapon!! I reject the way of war!! Darkseid’s game is not mine!! Where is Izaya!!!?? Where is Izaya!!!??” Izaya’s face has become almost entirely obscured by wind, the narration says: “The dry wind rises and the elements disturb the sky!! Violent electrical flashes twist and stab across the darkened land!!” Izaya shouts his own name.

A small, white wall appears behind Izaya. The narration says: “The echo becomes a roar! The roar becomes a thousand drums beating to the mad music of the wind storm!!! - driving - driving - driving the questing spirit - to the wall!!! Ageless, inscrutable!! - it stands - as if waiting - waiting in the sudden calm for Izaya to communicate!” Izaya heaves his staff and shouts: “I am Izaya the Inheritor - What is my inheritance!?” There is an explosion around Izaya, and the narration says: “- And from the wall, an answer comes!!!” The wall has blackened with purple and blacks, and a flaming hand writers on it: “The Source”. Narration: “And across the wall a flaming hand brings Izaya - the uni-friend!!”. End description.]

What I’m getting at is that the Fourth World, if it were to end, should end with war. It should end with New Genesis forgetting the cautionary tale of the Third World, of Izaya’s quest for peace and the Source’s advice, and plunging itself into a never-ending, ever-expanding war with Darkseid/Apokolips, ultimately culminating in their own destruction. New Gods (1971) is filled with discussions on war and battle, when it’s necessary, when it’s warranted, when it should be avoided or stopped. It only makes sense that the end of its world should come when they stop having these discussions in favour of mindless battle.

All that’s to say that Starlin making the Source decide to just off everyone with no real good reason for it is a narratively unsatisfying end of the Fourth World. It would’ve made more sense if Apokolips and New Genesis had started fighting more than normal, and a war was growing so out of control the Source felt it had no choice to interfere before they destroyed everything else along with themselves (as Highfather states earlier), but that’s not what happens. It’s literally just some floating ball of energy that one hit kills everyone because of ~reasons~. It’s deeply unsatisfying and counter to the philosophy in Jack Kirby’s original Fourth World saga.

Getting into the small details rather than big lines and leaving the problems with the plot set-up behind, its execution of its ideas isn’t great either. Starlin’s characterization for most of the New Gods isn’t great. I do think his characterization of them is better than it was in Cosmic Odyssey, but that’s a low bar. Orion is still a touch too rough, everyone’s a little too jaded. There were questionable character choices made with Scott in particular. His Darkseid’s fine though, from what I can remember, and while I thought Starlin’s treatment of Metron in Cosmic Odyssey was deeply disrespectful to his character, I don’t hate him in this comic, as far as that goes.

I do want to elaborate a bit more on Scott here. If you’ve only read the OG Mister Miracle series and not much else, you might not know that Scott having the anti-life equation actually pre-dates Death of the New Gods. He was retconned into/established as having it in the Orion solo; he only had a minor role in it, but this establishment was obviously quite impactful. To my knowledge, Death of the New Gods was the only comic that explored it, and it did so, uh. Questionably.

In the Orion solo, it was established that while Scott had the anti-life equation, he never used it. He’d used it once, when he was younger, and accidentally did mass murder. This made him realize that the equation is far too dangerous to be used, even with the best of intentions, so he just hasn’t. Scott was portrayed as completely in control of the equation and not at all tempted by using it; he considered it a burden and really hated it. This is emphasized by the fact that the plot for pretty much the first half of the series was Orion getting the anti-life equation, trying to do good with it, fucking it up big time, and then the second half was him trying to redeem himself from that. The plot contrasts Orion’s lack of control and understanding of the equation with Scott, who is completely in control of it and understands just how dangerous and evil it is. Like this is really hammered home.

So it was quite jarring to go from that to Death of the New Gods, where one (1) death makes Scott go ‘well nevermind all that’ and just go buck wild with it. The idea that Scott would just completely loose it like that just because Barda died is... quite the uncharitable character interpretation, to say the least. He loves Barda, absolutely, but he’s not emotionally dependent on her. He escaped Apokolips before her and established a life on Earth without her. Would he mourn and be angry? Sure. Would he loose 95 to 100% of his morality? No. It’s a deeply unsatisfying end to his character.

Then we have the way the Gods were killed off, and specifically, how disrespectful it was to a lot of them. The Black Racer just gets axed off screen, if I remember correctly, which, come on, he’s death itself! Surely death literally dying would be a bit more impactful! Barda also gets killed off-screen, unceremoniously, purely to make Scott sad, which has a name and it’s called ‘fridging’. The Forever People likewise got axed off screen, and they deserved far better than that. They’re less popular than their other Fourth World friends, but their series was still one of the three major ones that established all the lore and they’re good characters and deserve more respect than to be used like plot devices, especially since Infinity Man was the killer. Infinity Man is summoned by the combined motherbox of the Forever People, when they say the magic word. I get that killing them off was supposed to be a Hint or whatever, but I just think it would’ve been much more interesting if they’d been allowed to properly interact with Infinity Man.

I didn’t hate everything in Death of the New Gods; it had some decent dialogue here and there, and I actually did like how Metron’s death was handled; Metron dying after he decides that he simply doesn’t want to learn anything more is something I actually found to be a pretty good end to his character. Also I think galaxy blob Scott is cute, and I found Superman just kinda Being There for most of the climax to be unintentionally hilarious. Aside from that though, I have very little positive things to say.

Overall, I’d say Death of the New Gods is tonally much darker than most New Gods stories, and thematically dissonant with at least Jack Kirby’s original view of the Fourth World. It doesn’t seem very interesting in playing with the themes established in that original series, preferring to play on Starlin’s earlier work Cosmic Odyssey and the few elements of later works he seems to have found interesting (such as Scott having the anti-life equation). It is a narratively unsatisfying end to the Fourth World characters, and many are disrespected.

[feralrunaway]

A New Day

CHAPTER 2

Summary: Captain Syverson finishes his latest tour and returns to his hometown only to find that things have changed since he’s been gone.

Warnings:  Cursing, Slight angst, Mentions of alcohol, Mentions of religion, Bad coffee, General confusion

Word count: 1,466

Chapters: 1 , 2

**Hi.  This is my first fanfiction ever, so bear with me.  I don’t know what I’m doing or how to tag things.  Also, I’ve never shared a story before it’s finished, and I’m doing this chapter by chapter and it’s giving me hella anxiety. I’m sorry if this sucks! I don’t own anything related to the SandCastle movie or its characters.  However, this is my original writing and I do not give permission for use of the idea or reposting without credit.**

*Also also, I’m trying my best to avoid any grammatical errors but if you see any, please let me know. I’m having a lot of fun getting to write in my own accent but spellcheck is having an absolute aneurysm over it so I’ve gone a bit blind to all the red lines.*

Sy’s morning walk through town was unusual, to say the least.  Waking up with a throbbing headache wasn’t making him feel the most chipper to begin with, and finding the only coffee available to him at the local convenience store was cold from a bottle had him scowling.  He was getting restless.  He’d known things would feel odd at first, given how long he’d been away.  But this?  Fresh paint, manicured lawns, nothing out of place anywhere he looked. Every street corner, every billboard, shop window, and newspaper had some advertisement for the local church. His parents had been pretty religious, but it hadn’t been something the whole town was engrossed in.  Seemed his brother was right about one thing, it definitely was a new day.  

Shrugging to himself, he made his way down to the shops in the small downtown area. Pushing open the door to the closest clothing shop, he was greeted by the ring of the bell above the door and the startled “oh” of the diminutive woman behind the counter.

“Good morning sir. What can I help you find today?”

“Call me Sy,” he said, “and I’m just gonna have a browse around if that’s okay?”

“Of course, sir,” she said quietly.

He quickly selected a few pairs of Levi’s in his size and a few plain tees in varied colors, and made his way to the counter.  

“Will that be all, sir?” she woman intoned.

“Sy, and yes, just a few things to get me by darlin’.” His usually charming grin was missed as the woman kept her eyes trained on the shop counter as she rang up his purchases.

“Vera! How’s a woman like yourself gonna forget your manners?” came the voice of a man approaching the front of the store.  “Syverson here has been away so long he probably near forgot what hospitality feels like!”

Sy recognized the older man as one of his father’s old buddies.  If he remembered correctly, old Jim Cade and his father used to play a similar tune at their favorite bar in town, loosening up and tossing their money at the bartender most of the evening before coming home a’stumblin to their families.  

“Jim.  How ya been?” Sy asked.  “Still keepin’ the waterin’ hole in business?”

“Oh definitely not,” Jim replied seriously. “Bar’s been out of business for over a year now, Sy. Ain’t none of us drinkers anymore. Church’s set me straight.  My only problem now is keepin’ old Vera here in line,” he smirked.

“Keep hearin’ a lot about this church.  Didn’t know y’all got so spirited while I’ve been away,” Sy said delicately.

“The church damn near saved this town Sy.  We was all lost and sinnin’ before they came along.  We learn the ways, keep to the roles we’re s’pose to, the church provides. It’s a new day, son.  This town’s learned to value a good hard workin’ day. It’s only too bad your daddy isn’t here to see it.”

Sy grunted in reply, not knowing what to say to that.  All this “new day” business had a ring to it that didn’t sit well with him.

“Well, Jim, Vera, thank you.  Best be on my way.”

Jim waved at him as he walked away, but Vera remained quiet, staring down at the shop counter.

_________

After stopping in at the local diner for lunch and yet another bottled coffee, then grabbing a newspaper to look at the classifieds, Sy drove his rental car on toward the local car dealership.

He approached the door expecting to be jumped on by one of the salesmen, but beyond a few friendly smiles, they left him to his own devices.  He found what he was looking for with little fuss.  He considered himself a simple man.  A good solid truck would be just fine by him.  As he inspected the blue F150, a flutter of yellow floral fabric caught the corner of his eye.  He turned his head fully and what he set his eyes upon made his breath hitch in his throat.  If he had one regret about disappearing, he was looking at it.

“HOO-LYY shit,” he drew out the syllables as his face broke into a shit-eating grin. “Little Olivia Harper. What a beautiful sight for sore eyes.  How the hell have ya been?”

Delicate fingers trailing over the side of a black version of the same truck Sy had been looking at, Olivia turned slowly, her short yellow sundress and long wavy auburn hair moving in the small summer breeze.

She looked up into his eyes at his question, a slightly confused smile crossing her face, as though she was trying to drag recognition up from deep in her memory.  

“…….Jude?” She sounded as if she was unsure if that was really his name.

What a punch in the gut.

“Uh…yeah Liv, it’s me. I’m back home for a while,” Sy replied, feeling more awkward by the minute as she watched him quietly.  

The Liv he remembered would have immediately given him shit for calling her “little”.  He always had, even though she was only a few years younger. He’d tease her constantly, but she would always throw it right back.  They had been friends all throughout high school and up until he’d left on his first deployment.  Troublemakers, the both of them.  He would never have told her at the time, but if he hadn’t been so desperate to run away from this town, he would have gone beyond their one single, forbidden kiss, shared one night after sneaking out to lay in the bed of his truck and watch the stars.  Her father had always hated Sy.  In his eyes the loser son of a drunk would never be good enough for his daughter, so when Sy left, he figured it was best to leave things the way they were.

Olivia stared and stared at the large man.  Something felt familiar about him. Something was tugging at her memory but it was hard to focus.  Always so hard to focus.  His voice made her feel warm inside, like she was basking in sunlight.  Sunlight?  Oh yes, she was outside in summer. Of course.  Who was this man talking to her again?  What was she supposed to be doing?  Blake would tell her.  Her eyes met the man’s blue gaze and she felt that tug again.   “Jude.” She said again, in confirmation.  This man’s name was Jude.  She was certain of it somehow, but it still felt off.  Her eyebrows furrowed slightly.  Had she called him by some other name before?  “Sy?”

His name on her lips held so much uncertainty that he was positive a small piece of his heart just chipped off.  

“Olivia!” A well-dressed man stepped out from around the other vehicles and up to her side. “Olivia, what are you doing over here?” He said testily, but stopped short when he saw Sy. “If you’re quite done wandering, we have a purchase to complete.” He handed her a bottle of water.  “Drink.”

Drink.  Blake.  Yes. She was supposed to be waiting with Blake.  Something had caused her to wander over to the truck she was standing by.  She touched it again.  Wouldn’t it be nice to lay in the back and watch the stars?  Drink. Yes, she should drink.  

Sy observed the exchange, completely bewildered and concerned.  Had something happened to Liv while he was gone?  Something requiring a caretaker?

The man looked Sy over, taking in the fatigue pants he was still wearing, giving him a winning smile, then stuck out his hand.  “Blake Turner.  You must be Captain Syverson.  Your brother told me you would be coming home.  Welcome back, and thank you for your service to our great country.”

Blake Turner was a smooth operator.  Too smooth. Sy hated him already.

“Nice to meet ya,” he said, accepting the proffered hand. “How do you know my brother?”

“Jonah works for my company. A great man, we love having him on board.  He really embodies the values we aim to represent within our company.  We can really do some good in this town with more men like him.”

“Yeah?  He didn’t tell me much about what he’s been doing for work now.  We didn’t have a lot of time to catch up yesterday.”

“Well,” Blake said, taking Liv’s arm in his grasp, “we have to go finish up.  Nice to meet you.  If you’re looking for work now that you’re back, have your brother contact me.” Sy knew instantly that he would do no such thing.  Blake steered Liv away and she followed with one more slightly confused glance back over her shoulder.  

Sy’s blue eyes met her green ones, and he found himself determined to find out what was going on.

[mhaccunoval]

i finallyyyy finished the explanations for my tlb playlistttt so come get yall juice

if you haven’t already seen my first (official) post about this silly little playlist then you are still in luck !!! here is the spotify and the youtube links !!! oh yeah also all of the songs are in chronological order (maybe not by month but definitely by year) because i had to be organized like that sbjhshsjbs

———

❥ title

i mean. there isn’t much to explain about it but sbjshbsjhs it’s based on sam’s line “you’re a creature of the night, michael!” of course but i made it plural because this playlist is sort of a. general boys / movie playlist, if that makes sense??? but yeahhhh they’re all littol creechers who love the night >:o]

———

❥ paint it, black — the rolling stones

so !!! i was kind of trying to relate it to the boys vampirism and. love of black clothes sbhsjbshjs but no. similar to the title, they. literally live in darkness because of not being able to go into the sun and because of the few lights in the lair but there’s also a sort of duality where being vampires in an internal darkness??? like. each of the boys takes heavy advantage of the benefits of being undead but i can’t imagine it’s without its faults outside of the lack of sunlight and such. i’m sure there’s a kind of uh. monster complex that follows it, especially with the way outsiders view them, which certainly fits with the song’s vibe of being washed with this sort of sensory overload to color and earning weird looks for it

———

❥ riders on the storm — the doors

first of all, there’s a giant ass jim morrison poster in the lair therefore the boys definitely listen to the doors (if not idolize jim) so jot that down. but also !!! it has very Them vibes !!! i think the storm effects definitely relate to boys in how storms create a darkness that is soothing in its own way, and comes on strong, just like the boys’ presence. and. technically they Are killers on the road that Will kill a sweet family sbhjsbshjsb but no most of all the !!! “into this house we’re born // into this world we’re thrown” and !!! the found family that the boys have going. like, if you look at. vampirism as the house they have LITERALLY been born into it and been thrown into a whole new world, depending on each other for comfort and pleasure !!! oh also. they ride motorcycles so they’re also literal riders sbhjsbshjs (fun fact, according to genius lyrics: apparently it was the last song jim recorded before he died a few weeks later 😳)

———

❥ love her madly — the doors

whole jim morrison poster and listening to the doors reasoning is sustained. HOWEVER for the rest of reasoning… perhaps it’s more straight up 95060 than anything but sbhsjbsshj the whole woman walking in and out of the audience’s life is very symbolic of michael being in and out with the boys, never really deciding whether he wants to fully join them and straining. all of his relationships with that indecision and sitting on the picket fence (those who sit on the picket fence are impaled by it). although, it could also be partly symbolic of that indecision, as he does find Some charm in the boys’ lifestyle and keeps finding himself drawn back enough to even consider partaking in it. also, if you wanna go the parko route, paul loves marko madly enough to go after the frog bros personally for killing him <3

———

❥ walk this way — aerosmith

i am. blanking on how to tie it in other than being on the movie’s soundtrack (yes i avoided it and people are strange until the very end of making the playlist, but one of the evils got me clearly— have always ADORED people are strange though). but. i guess you can make the case that the song is full of innuendos and some scenes, like the feeding scene, are lowkey horny sbsjhbshjsbs and YES it’s the aerosmith version instead of the run dmc one because. i prefer this one and it’s my silly little playlist <3

———

❥ the boys are back in town — thin lizzy

technically the boys never Left town but !!! *christopher walken voice* Boys !!! them cast ARE crazy and they’re ALWAYS dressed to kill, ready to spill some blood and pick a fight !!! yeah no it’s just a very fun song that i think really works to. represent their crazy lifestyle and infamy around town due to causing trouble !!! and you can almost say that in this scenario star is the girl who used to dance a lot and slapped the shit out of someone <3 just girlboss moments <3

———

❥ xanadu — rush

hehehe… this started as the. desire to add more rush to the playlist for my own amusement but the more times i listen to it, the more i’m like “!!! it actually fits”… like. xanadu here is meant to a sort of utopia that’s long searched for, partly BECAUSE of the promise of immortality which !!! the boys have (unless. harmed in one of the ways at the end of the movie) because of their vampirism. like even if we don’t know the exact reasons they got turned, they all still, mostly indirectly probably, sought out that same principle. And the dining on honeydew and drinking the milk of ‘paradise’ is similar to their thrill-seeking tendencies and general enjoyment of being unable to die, leaving them to enjoy their undead lives to the fullest. not to mention, in [b part 2] (as genius refers to it) there’s talk of many, many years passing and waiting for the world to end, which we know there’s been quite a few years in between the boys getting turned and the movie, as well as i’m sure they sit back and wait on Some apocalypse, if not just to watch the world burn. in writing this, i’ve ALSO realized how it can be considered very Michael; he didn’t exactly seek this life out but he found it and indulged, only to be that “mad immortal man” towards the end of the song

———

❥ runnin’ with the devil — van halen

i just van halen is neat sbjshbsjsh and would definitely be something the boys would actually listen to hsjbshjsb i don’t Necessarily think vampires are in any way tied to the devil but. here it’d be more like a metaphor of “taking a walk on the wild side” if you wanna call it that; also, they all truly live their lives like there’s no tomorrow (not that they have to worry about death until the very end), have stolen a lot of things just to get by (probably in life AND death), don’t bode well with the ‘simple’ life (likely including the idea of a nuclear family like max proposed) because of it’s lack of pleasures, and don’t exactly have any “love [that] you’d call real” unless you read into the subtext 

———

❥ hot blooded — foreigner

originally this was going to be another joke about the. lowkey horniness of the boys and the movie as a whole but i’ve realized in writing these explanations thus far and rereading the lyrics that it’s. it’s just michael-centric sbshjsbsh sam is “at the mercy of his sex glands” and so is the audience of both the movie and the song sbhsjbshsj like. michael finds himself attracted to star immediately and tries for two secret rendezvouses, with only one working, and. can be said that he also finds a fever running within him when he’s around david and the boys sbhjsbshjs i just 🙈

———

❥ renegade — styx

renegade is my favorite styx song so i just said “fuck it” and added it sbshjsbshj but !!! you can say that, again, the boys live their lives on the wild side and. probably commit enough crimes to warrant dozens of sentences, some that would lead to death row (like, ya know, the. manslaughter) but they manage to get away unscathed. And the law man serving as an allegory to all of the people, including the frogs and grandpa, that want them dead for being vampires, with the bounty to be rewarded being the ridding of their trouble from santa carla

———

❥ big shot — billy joel

mikey :o) … ok yeah he isn’t the. silver spoon in hand (nose) type but he’s LITERALLY the type to open his mouth and get himself deep in enough shit that a fight breaks out, potentially bloodied his eyes, nose, and/or fists. i don’t have much of an explanation outside of he is a himbo jock who pulled a “i didn’t know how to talk to my crush so i wrote a note telling them to get out of my school” except he said it with his fist instead of his mouth sbjshbshsj

———

❥ boys don’t cry — the cure

pretty sure this is one of the ones i stole off of shovel (@/iswearimavamp) sbshjbshjs but i do love this song in a general sense too. in regards to the movie, like. none of the guys. obsess over masculinity or anything— and both david AND michael cry at different points— so that’s not necessarily an issue. but, there *is* still a lot of hurt and stepping on toes in many of the relationships in the film that can be stretched to fit, i would think sbjhsbshjs

———

❥ highway to hell — ac/dc

this and back in black were some of the last two i put on here because i. wanted to make an ‘even’ 35 sbsjhsbshjs BUT, like with runnin’ with the devil, it’s about a devilish lack of care for one’s own life or the “status of their soul” and just doing what feels right or like the most fun, no matter if it lands them in hell or not. and !!! “my friends are gonna be there too” fits with the friendship within the boys’ found family and how they’ll all always be together, no matter what !!!

———

❥ back in black — ac/dc 

i can’t really think of an explanation that differs from highway to hell so just reread the above sbsjhsbsh

———

❥ witch hunt — rush

OK !!! this is the song i’m the MOST excited to explain !!! right off the bat, moving pictures as a whole is an IMMACULATE album, absolutely love it. right so !!! this song literally SOUNDS like it belongs on the movie soundtrack; it has the same overtones and sounds as cry little sister and it’s just !!! and with the title, a witch hunt is BASICALLY what sam + the frogs went on in search of the lose boys, relying on little else but hearsay and catching glimpses at what was happening to michael, “confident that their ways are best” and moving along like a mob of three to get to the bottom of it. “features distorted in the flickering light // faces are twisted and grotesque” is very reminiscent of the faces the lost boys pull when they’re about to attack, and “they say there are strangers who threaten us” is symbolic of them being outsiders/outcasts that make everyone uncomfortable, even if You aren’t going to be their next victim. “the righteous rise with burning eyes” AND “quick to judge, quick to anger // slow to understand // ignorance and prejudice // and fear walk hand in hand” can apply to any number of characters, particularly the mains who are all pitted against each other, the humans fighting for their lives and the vampires fighting for their Right to live, neither taking into consideration the other’s perspective. i just… ADORE this song…

———

❥ red barchetta — rush 

this one was mainly just because of the car that grandpa keeps in the barn and both sam and michael’s fascination with it sbhjsbsshj and just to get more rush on here shjsbshjsbsh

———

❥ maneater — hall & oates

one of the first songs to hit the playlist !!! because the boys eat people !!! they’re the lean and hungry type that only come out at night !!! they’ll be sitting with you but their eyes are on the door and if you want love from them, you won’t get very far !!! the beauty IS there but there are beasts inside that can rip your world apart !!! they’ll chew you up but also leave you begging for more :o)

———

❥ hungry like the wolf — duran duran

the second song to have gone on the playlist !!! the boys are always on the prowl for fresh meat (in both the food AND turning senses) and they come alive while on the hunt, blood no doubt rushing through their veins (assuming it still can) !!! and in the movie, michael is the one they’re after for the turning connotation, all wanting a taste of him for themselves !!!

———

❥ subdivisions — rush

this rush song actually went on before the others shbsjsbshj but !!! it still fits just as well (certainly better than red barchetta)… the movie all takes place on the fringes of the city, “in between the bright lights // and the far unlit unknown”, and while it’s not exactly in the suburbs, there’s still little comfort to soothe the restless dreams of youth. there IS a drawing like moths into the city, for both the emersons and the lost boys, which is what ends up bringing all of them together, although it starts are cruising for action just to feel the living night. and just !!! NOBODY fits in !!! if you take the movie title as them being Lost instead of an allusion to peter pan, then you get slapped with thinking about what actually makes them lost and how they don’t conform in any way, shape, or form to just about. anything. and !!! the emersons are new, which immediately puts them at a social disadvantage, but they Also don’t seem too terribly great at making new friends in general so !!! “nowhere is the dreamer or the misfit so alone”!!! 

———

❥ abracadabra — steve miller band 

i just love this song for whatever reason. and i think the allusion to magic to very fitting for the hallucinations that david gives michael, putting a sort of magic spell on him if you want to look at it that way. not a lot of silk and satin going gone but plenty of leather and probably some lace in there somewhere ( ;o] ) … also michael DOES heat up like a burnin’ flame whenever his name is called and the situation with the boys just keeps going round and round with no exact end in sight, only the calling of desire 

———

❥ separate ways (worlds apart) — journey

you would think i would have more journey on here ??? because i love them ??? but instead i stole this off of shovel too ??? it’s fine. time to be back on the 95060 bullshit sbsjhbsjhs we all know david Really wants michael to join them but. michael is reluctant, so that hesitance sets them worlds apart from each other— as if they weren’t already— and there’s still love between them, or at least the bgeinning sparks of it, even if michael refuses to act on them and only keeps pushing david away 

———

❥ cum on feel the noize — quiet riot

just some boys loving to party <3 some boys with evil yet dirty minds, out of time singing, funny faces, and that have a lazy time <3 yeah no this is one they’d rock out to and someone would probably pull a muscle over because it’s just such a banger sbshjsbsjh

———

❥ rebel yell — billy idol 

Another stolen off of shovel sbjhsbsjhs also ever since it’s been pointed out to me that david looks like billy idol i’ve just been losing it a little sbhjsbshjs Anyway. they’d definitely idolize him to some degree, even if just for looks, and it certainly fits the way that they. most Definitely let out a rebel yell at the midnight hour if you know what i mean— *taken out by a sniper*

———

❥ every breath you take — the police

would to believe to know i took it from shovel (i swear the last three where i say that will be rock you like a hurricane, livin’ on a prayer, and cherry pie sbshjsbsh) BUT !!! the watching every move is yet another. david keeping watch over michael and uh yearning from afar moment, heart aching the longer he’s away and the longer he keeps up this game of not knowing what exactly he wants to do 

———

❥ handsome devil — the smiths

ok THIS one was lent to me by ej (@/maybe-strawberry-blue) sbshjbshjsbs and let me tell you. this song (especially when paired with this charming man) is Very homoerotic, aka perfect for this movie shbjsbshjsbs like what got me first was “let me get my hands // on your mammary glands” and just. thinking about trans parko sbhsjbshjs but also in general the. “and i would like to give you // what i think you’re asking for” and “a boy in the bush // is worth two in the hand” and just sbhjsbshjs Everything. fits the ambiguous homoeroticism. And i think the boys would listen to the smiths (will elaborate more in the other smiths song explanation)

———

❥ panama — van halen

i Told you all i think van halen is neat sbsjsshjb what can i say. the boys like fast moving vehicles, hard partying, and tender loving sbsjhsbhsj also forgot to mention that i think they’d all be :eyes: about pre-1985 david lee roth and i cannot blame

———

❥ rock you like hurricane — scorpions

third to last shovel snatch sbshjsbh Here you can replace any one of the boys with the animals mentioned, as they’re always hungry and need to feed… they come out scratching and ready to win, willing to rock anyone who gets in their way like a hurricane— including with lust, depending on the situation 

———

❥ livin’ on a prayer — bon jovi

i actually can’t even manage an explanation for this one either just because of the song’s plot and how greatly it differs the movie plot <3 however it will stay because shovel said one of the boys (i forget which) would listen to it and friendship is more powerful than my small brain <3

———

❥ the queen is dead — the smiths

rightttt so here’s the deal, buds and duds. something in my gut just tells me that david would pull a me and. listen to this entire album on repeat, particularly bigmouth strikes again and i know it’s over when in dramatics bshjsbsjh BUT to make a case for the title track itself, breaking into buckingham palce— or really any major building— with only a sponge and rusty wrench would ABSOLUTELY be an endeavor the boys would get up to And they’d all pale (worse than normal) about finding out they’re the descendant of some royal. “oh, has the world changed, or have i changed” and “life is very long, when you’re lonely” is quite fitting of their immortality, which i can only imagine would leave them questioning how the world has evolved and, although they have each other, i’m sure living forever still can get a Little lonely. And they’d certainly celebrate the death of a royal (because anarchy <3). mostly i’ve just been listening to this song on repeat for days sbhjsbshj but, i think it’s the most. generally related to all of the boys, whereas like. cemetry gates would be more solely 95060 

———

❥ need you tonight — inxs

my favorite inxs song… technically the 21st century Wasn’t yesterday when the movie came out nor when the song did sbhjsbshjs but there *is* a lot of sweating from desire and aiming to put that passion into use, very blatantly letting everyone know that sbjhsbshjs

———

❥ bad medicine — bon jovi

there’s just something so fun about this song… and while listening to it on the drive home, i was thinking about it from a 95060 perspective where. david’s a bit lovesick (hence the love like bad medicine) and the choir of voices in the bg, saying “that’s what you get for falling in love”, would be the other boys knowing he’s gotten himself in over his head over what was supposed to be a minor tease or a small fling (would be a real fun and poppy animatic i think)

———

❥ pour some sugar on me — def leppard

legitimately this started as a “haha what about my ‘what if the blood was kool-aid instead’ joke” and then i realized it was. a fair enough fit, especially with the feeding scene. except they’re actual vamps not just video vamps sbjhsbshjs anyway. sugar highs and red hot flames of passion for one another <3

———

❥ cherry pie — warrant

ok THIS is the last song i took from shovel and. my reasoning is pretty much the same as pour some sugar on me and. Friendship

———

❥ somebody told me — the killers

i wasn’t going to add any modern songs but. i thought it’d be funny if michael had had a girlfriend before leaving phoenix that looked a bit like david sbshjsbshj and then it only just added to angst sbhjsbshj

———

❥ you know what they do to guys like us in prison — mcr

i was reminded that vampires will never hurt you exists but. i went with my favorite mcr song instead because. vwnhy is more like ??? a vampire that fears themselves ??? so like. an edward cullen type ??? while ykwtdtgluip is more about the homoeroticism and community ??? i said what i said

———

❥ house of wolves — mcr

thank god this is the last song because i’m getting tired sbjshsjshb a little less homoeroticism, a little more general sinning and egotism <3

[thiswasinevitableid]

The Wicked House

Prompt for the 31st was: Wicked. Thanks to @thats-amnesty-babe and Morgan E Ashton for the help brainstorming.

Duck whacks his hands together, clearing the dust from them, before raising a hand in friendly farewell to the movers. He picks his way through the boxes, up the stairs, and to his bedroom. Opening the door sends a bolt of dark, fluffed-up fur into the hallway.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m sorry fuzzball, but I couldn’t have you bein underfoot or runnin out the door.” He scratches the cat behind her ears, and her affronted glare gives way to forgiving purrs. 

He unpacks for awhile, finds a good luck note from Juno tucked in the winter coat she gave him (“I mean it, Duck, winter up there’s a hell of a lot colder than here in West Virginia”). Orders pizza, gets the kitchen table set up in time to eat it. Flips through his to-do list for the next few days as he does. 

ka-BOOM

Winnie yowls and runs from the room as Duck nearly falls out of his chair. 

“What the fuck?” He dashes outside, expecting to find an exploded car or downed powerline.

He finds nothing of the sort. None of his neighbors are even poking their heads out. There’s a smaller boom, from the house next to his (his is on the corner, so only has one neighbor). 

“Well, Woodbridge finally managed to offload one of these places, huh?”

He turns to find a rather prim looking woman walking a furious looking Pomeranian. 

“Beg pardon?”

“You’re the first person to buy any of the houses near that wicked place in years.”

Duck looks around again. Every house on the block, save for his own darkly painted victiorian and the brightly painted one next to it, has a sun-worn for sale sign in the yard. 

“What the fuck?”

---------------------------------------------

“Oh, so you’re the guy who bought the house next to Indrid Colds place?” The man at the grocery store asks as he rings him up. Duck  was overjoyed to find a real mom and pop place near his house and Leo, the owner, has been chatting with him.

“So it seems.”

“Don’t let folks make you too jittery about it. Indrid’s an odd guy, but he don’t mean no harm.”

“What the hell does he do? All kinds of weird lights and noises and shit coming from that place.”

“Not a clue. Seems like you’re in a better position to find out than most of us.” He tilts his head towards the beer Duck is loading into a bag.

“Dunno, kinda like havin all my limbs. Not sure I’ll keep ‘em all if I go in there.”

Leo shrugs, “suit yourself.”

As Duck walks home with his groceries, he mulls over the suggestion; sure, the loud noises aren’t great, but they no worse and no more frequent than a loud party or a neighbor with barky dogs. 

He sets the bags down on his front step, fumbling to find which pocket he put his keys in. 

“Don’t move!”

He freezes, finds a tall man with silvery hair moving purposefully up his drive. He’s in a long, silk bathrobe and bunny slippers, bright red glasses perched on his nose. When he places his hands on Ducks shoulders and starts moving him back off the porch, Duck tenses, tries to pull away.

He can’t. The man is surprisingly strong for such a beanpole.

“Hey, pal, look-”

“No, you look.” He points a finger, and Duck squints for a beat before seeing it; a black widow, dangling on a thread as she lowers down from his door frame. 

“Shit, almost walked right into her.”

“Yes, you did. I thought you might prefer not to.”

Duck takes another look at the stranger, including the spot where his hand is still resting on Ducks arm. The other man follows the gaze, pulls his hand back apologetically. 

“Gonna go out on a limb here and say you’re Indrid Cold.”

“Oh, you’ve heard of me!”  Indrid smiles brightly, only to have the expression falter, “oh, ah, you’ve heard of me. I can’t say I blame people for trying to warn you away from me, given my reputation.” The last few words come out so soft and resigned, the kind of vulnerability that’s either a trap or the truth of someone who has gone a little too long without the benefit of the doubt.

“Reputation don’t matter half as much as your actions. Far as I’m concerned, the only thing I know you done for sure is save me from a nasty spider bite.” He smiles kindly, holds out his hand, “I’m-”

“-Duck Newton.” Indrid takes it, shaking it with an oddly wide smile. 

“Uh, right. Well, I’m gonna get rid of that widow, but if you wanted to come in for a beer or coffee or somethin I wouldn’t be opposed.”

“That sounds wonderful but, oh, oh dear, um, excuse me something’s just come up. Hope to see you again.” He dashes back down the path, down the sidewalk, and up the steps to his bright yellow door. 

“Huh.” Duck watches the door for a moment, then goes to get a broom. 

--------------------------------------------------------

The diner smells like eggs, bacon, and butter when Duck steps in from the chill of the early September air. 

It’s quiet, but he settles on a spot at the counter all the same, in case they need the booths for bigger groups. 

“Good morning,” a cheerful, somewhat crunchy-granola looking blonde woman greets him, pad in hand “any coffee or tea this morning?” 

“Coffee, please.”

“You got it.” She spins, grabs the pot, and pours him a mug. Several of the flatops are where Duck can see them, being worked expertly by a man who must be well over six feet tall. Whatever he’s moving about on them smells incredible.

“Ready to order.”

“Whatever he’s cookin right there.”

“Hash it is.” She smiles again.

The cook nods, and as he sets to work he asks, “you just passing through?”

“Naw, moved here a few weeks ago, got a job in the national forest.”

“Right on.”

“Oh yeah.” A voice behind him says, and he finds two older men sizing him up, “you’re the fella who got duped into buying next to Cold’s place.”

“He’s a man, Clarence, not fucking black mold.” The cook grumbles.

“How’s living next to the wicked witch treating you?” The second man, in a red ball-cap, asks.

“Warlock.” Says a clipped voice. It takes Duck a moment to see it belongs to the man going over receipts at the register, slick dark hair flecked with grey and face movie-star handsome, “if Indrid did have those abilities you all seem convinced he does, he’d be a warlock, not a witch.”

“How would you know?” Red cap retorts.

“Ey, shut up Jim, you know the boy was in the CIA. Better not disrespect him.”

“FBI, not CIA

“All I’m saying is that wherever Cold goes, disaster follows. Not to mention the man’s a known f-”

“One more syllable and you’ve got a lifetime ban.” Barclay points the spatula towards the men.

In the midst of the standoff, the bell dings. 

And Indrid Cold walks into the diner.

 He’s bundled up like it’s snowing, walks up to the counter and pauses when he sees Duck. 

Duck pats the stool next to him, “Nice to see you again, neighbor.”

“Likewise.” Indrid gives that odd smile again and sits down, “Good morning Barclay, Joseph.” He nods first to the cook, then the man at the register, “Oh, and hello Dani. The usual, please.”

Dani grins, turns to one of the drink machines and comes back moments later with a cup of cocoa.

“I can’t handle how bitter coffee is, even with sugar.” Indrid says, two seconds before Duck is going to ask him why that drink.

“You’re braver than I am, that much sugar this early’d have me on the ceilin.”

Indrid smiles softly, “Lightweight.”

Duck barks out a laugh, making Indrid snicker as well. 

“Any plans for this weekend, Duck?” 

“Got some new model ships to work on, might go for a hike, nothin too excitin.”

“You don’t get enough hiking at work?” Indrid cocks his head.

“I mean, not really? It’s different when I’m on my own; I don’t got an agenda or shit I’m supposed to be takin care of. I can just go at my own pace.”

Indrid makes a noise of understanding right as Barclay sets two plates down. Indrids’ is piled with pancakes and strawberries. 

Barclay points a can of whipped cream down at the plate, “say when.”

The tower of cream is almost a foot high before Indrid goes, “when.”

As they eat, they chat about this and that, though mostly Indrid asks Duck about his move, and how he’s liking the town. Then he muses, “I’d like to go hiking sometime. I really ought to get out a bit more.”

“You can come with me sometime, if you want.”

“Really?”

“Sure, long as you don’t mind me talkin about trees.”

“Not in the slightest.”

Duck raises his glass in cheers, “well, if you decide you want to, you know where to find me.”

---------------------------------------------------------------

Duck balances the plate of cornbread (his fathers no-fail recipe)  in one hand as he lifts the other to knock on the door.

“Come in!” Indrid calls a half-second before his hands meets the wood. 

The inside of Indrid’s house is laid out much the same as Ducks own. This is where the similarities end. There are drawings scattered everywhere, pinned to walls and strewn across tables. Art and posters and letters cover the walls, each of which is painted a different color.

As he makes his way into the kitchen he notices chalk and bottles of salt, piles of old books, and many, many, many sweaters. 

Indrid is at the sink, filling a kettle with water. 

“You’re right on time, I was just making myself some tea. Though I can make something stronger if you prefer.”

“Tea’s fine.” Duck sets the plate down, “figured I oughta make a proper, neighborly introduction.”

He leaves out the part where, in the two days since they spoke at the diner, he’s thought about Indrid quite a bit. And that whenever an explosion or other odd occurrence came from next door, Ducks’ first response is no longer annoyance; it’s worry. What if something bad happened and Indrid had no one checking on him?

“I’ve been thinking” Indrid sets a mug down in front of him, sits across from him at the rickety table, “there’s a little get-together at the Lodge, that hotel on the edge of town, this weekend. If you were interested, we could hike out that way and then stop by after.”

“You know the folks there?”

“I do. Barclay and Joseph live in one of the cottages, Dani lives in the lodge proper, and they were kind enough to invite me to movie night once. I suppose I found my people, so to speak, there even if I still am a bit solitary.”

“Be happy to come, like to get to know more folks in town myself.” Duck glances back from examining some nearby drawings, and immediately knows he gave the right answer. Indrid is looking at him like he hung every star in the sky. 

------------------------------

Ducks’ gotten used to the occasional smoke detector cry from next door.

But this one isn’t stopping. 

He grabs the fire extinguisher from under his sink and bolts out one front door and into another. 

Smoke drifts down the stairs and Indrid is nowhere in sight. So up the stairs he goes, turning into the room where the smoke is the worst. Mercifully, there is no actual fire, just clear signs of one being hastily and messily put out. He opens the windows, and after a few minutes of cross-breeze the alarm shuts off. 

It’s only then that he hears a tap running and someone muttering. 

He crosses the hall, finds Indrid glaring into the mirror over the bathroom sink, trying to sooth a nasty looking burn on his arm. 

“Shit, what happened?” 

Indrid stares at the water, “just an accident. I was careless. I’ll be alright.”

“Here, lemme look at your arm-yeah, okay, I’m gonna go grab my first aid kit from my place.”  

He’s out and back as fast as he can manage, returns to find Indrid sitting on the toilet lid, sulking. 

Duck holds out his hand and Indrid flops his wrist into it. As gently as he can, Duck tends to the burn. It’s not bad enough to need a hospital, but it’s still a nasty looking mark.

“What were you tryin to do?” He asks softly.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me?”

“I have certain...abilities. Magic. Most of it related to seeing the future. But some of it is more general, or is in other fields of the discipline, and I was trying to use one field to influence a future and it backfired.”

Duck considers him a moment, then gently squeezes his hand, “hey, it’s okay if you don’t wanna tell me. Don’t gotta make a story up on my behalf.”

“I’m not MAKING IT UP!” Indrid shouts, yanking his hand away and standing up.

“Indrid, you don’t expect me to believe-”

“ What? That I’m stuck seeing futures I can’t stop, stuck with powers I still can’t fully control, that I’ve made myself an outcast time and again all because of these blasted things.” He rips off his glasses and chucks them down the hall. Crumples to the floor, head in his hands.

Cautiously, Duck scooches across the hardwood. He wants to reach out, to soothe the tensed lines of Indrids’ body. But he’s not sure that’s what Indrid wants. Not sure if he’s royally fucked everything up.

“Okay, I’m listenin.” His voice, gentle as it is, may as well be coming through a megaphone for how Indrid flinches. Then he looks at his newly bandaged arm. 

“Ten years ago, I bought those glasses from a little curio shop. I thought they were stylish. I put them on when I got home and everything changed. Long story short, the glasses are a conduit to a demonish creature. When I put them on, he became my patron. I gained his ability to see the future, as well as some other powers. I panicked, tried to take the glasses back, but the store was simply gone. Turns out if I try to forsake his gift, it will go very badly for me, so I have to wear them all the time, save for sleep and things like that.”

“Jesus.”

“I’ve been trying to use my powers to stop the disasters I see coming but so often it doesn’t work, and then I have to watch it play out in real time after seeing it again and again in my head.” He stands, slowly, and walks to retrieve the glasses, “or when I try to do enchantments, sometimes things go haywire. Did you happen to see the little succulent garden in the living room?”

“You mean the one that’s as big as your coffee table?”

“Yes. That was originally two succulents. I bought them as a housewarming gift for you then decided maybe four was better. So I tried to magic up two more. And got a garden instead.” He’s still as he speaks, glasses held in his palm, “It isn’t all bad. I have been able to stop some things, and I’ve gotten much better at magic. But the failures so often dwarf that.”

“Indrid?” Duck stands in the bathroom doorway, waits for his friend to turn around before continuing, “thank you for tellin me all that. And I’m sorry I didn’t believe you.”

Indrid’s smile is weak, but genuine.

“Are there, uh, things that help when this happens? You seem real upset and if I can help you feel better, I’d like to.”

“T.V, the mindless kind.”

Duck holds out his hand, “C’mon, let’s go downstairs.”

Indrid settles on the violet couch, wrapping himself in a thick blanket as Duck flips channels. 

“You’re from West Virgina, right?”

“Yep.”

“Then you may be familiar with my patron. I don’t know his true name, but everyone just calls him mothman.”

Duck drops the remote.

“Mothman? As in Silver Bridge, Point Pleasant, TNT plant, and all that shit?”

“Yes.” Indrid says mildly. 

“Holy shit.” He fishes the remote from under the couch.

“That’s a remarkably succinct reaction.”

“Hush you, you know I ain’t a man of many words.”

“Duck, two days ago you talked for half an hour about Kudzu.” Indrid shoots him a teasing smile, and Duck elbows him lightly. 

“Oooh, a Halloween cooking championship! Let’s watch that.”

Duck sets the remote down, joins Indrid under the blanket when the taller man opens it for him.

“You doin anythin for Halloween?”

“No” Indrid sighs, “I love it, but after the ‘living pumpkin incident,’ parents stopped letting their children trick or treat here.”

“Hmmmmm” Duck rests his hand just beside Indrids’, strokes it absentmindedly with his pinkie “y’know, Indrid, I think I got a way to fix that…..”

-----------------------------------

Duck waves goodbye to the group of trick or treaters as they scurry back down the walkway. He has to hand it to Indrid: the man really has an eye for decoration.

The yard is strung with glowing cobwebs and purple lights, bats made of purple shadow and glitter flitting through the air.  The multitude of Jack’O Lanterns flicker in a rainbow of colors, thanks to Indrid doing an enchantment on the flames. 

Ducks house is equally festive, Indrid choosing orange lights and one (magically) large pumpkin to contrast with the dark wood of the building. Currently Aubrey (Dani’s wife) and her giant rabbit (Dr Harris Bonkers, PhD) are seated on Duck’s front step on candy duty. Duck had asked for his new friends help after realizing just how nervous Indrid was that something would go haywire, and decided it was best if he was there to keep him company.

It’s been a successful Halloween so far; no explosions, no disasters, no decorations accidentally coming to life. He and Indrid chat between visitors, The Creature from the Black Lagoon plays in the background, and both of them have eaten more candy than two grown men probably should. Not a single kid who’s come to the door seems afraid of Indrid. Some are curious, and some have parents that definitely watch them closely. But most are just happy to get candy.

Best of all, whenever they’re seated on the couch, or waiting to open the door, Indrid holds Ducks hand, or sighs happily when Duck rests his arm around his shoulder.

The groups are becoming less and less frequent, and stars peek out from behind the clouds, when Indrid turns to him.

“Thank you, Duck.”

“Hey, wasn’t gonna miss an excuse to hang out with you and poach your candy.”

Indrid chuckles, “Not just for that. For everything, for being kind, for getting to know me and not writing me off as wicked. I-” He falters, turns away suddenly.

Duck may not have foresight, but he’s perceptive all the same.

“Want me to finish that sentence for you?”

Indrid looks at him wide-eyed as the ranger steps into his space, “Please.”

“I wanna get to know you better.” Duck grins, moves to pull Indrid to him.

Indrid beats him to it, grabbing his shirt and pulling him into a kiss. Ducks back hits the door, Indrids fingers digging into his hair. He holds him tight, and as demanding as his kisses are the taller man’s whole body is shaking like the last leaf on a tree.

When they pull apart, Indrid rests their foreheads together.

“Yes, Duck, I would very much like to get to know you better.”

Duck kisses him again, keeps him close as he whispers, “well, happy fuckin halloween to me.”

Indrid kisses his cheek, “Indeed.”

[of-thoughts-and-phobias]

  Of Thoughts And Phobias

Part 4: Under Wraps

Edited by @a-faithful-fanartist

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  "Robin!" Sean cheered when he came through the door. 

"Hey hey!" He dropped his bag on the floor and brought Sean into a hug.

"Haha, welcome to the mess. How was the trip, man?"

"Ugh, don't get me started. Seems like anything that could've gone wrong did at the same time. It's like something didn't want me to come here or something."

    He tiredly walked over to the couch, Sean making sure to stay in between him and the shattered counter. 

"Just don't wake me up and we'll be fine," he said, flopping face-first on the couch. 

"Y'good man?"

    A muffled confirmation came from the cushions closely followed by snoring.

"Been a long day for both of us, I guess."

Sean grabbed a pillow and blanket from the closet and carefully draped it over him.

"Goodnight, dude," he sighed, switching off the lights. 

    He swapped into some pajamas and fell onto his bed. It was impossible trying to get comfortable. His mind was just so active and awake that even blinking was a traitorous act. His brain was shouting at him all the possibilities of what was happening to him. He couldn't hide for long. He knew that. There was no way that this would end well. He groaned. 

Sleep didn't come for a while.

~~

    Waking up felt even harder than falling asleep. He struggled to keep his eyes opened as he felt around for his phone.

He fell ungracefully out of bed and landed with an "oomf".

 As he got up, he saw a quick flash of bright red from under his bed. He didn't want to think about it.

    He was interrupted by a loud snore coming from the other room. He forgot he wasn't alone. Sean poked his head out into the living room to find a bundled- up figure on the couch, snoring loudly. Only his feet and hair were visible. He chuckled and went back to his room to get ready.

    Getting dressed was a chore when running on a few hours of sleep, but Sean pushed past it. He fixed his hair, brushed his teeth, and went to check on Robin again. 

"So I was thinking we could start by recording-" He walked into the living room to be greeted by a Robin who was still out cold.

"Uh. Hello?" He tried. 

"Earth to Pixlpit? Roooooobiin, come 'ooon man. We have thiiiings to do," nothing. 

"Geez," he backed off into the kitchen, where he remembered his shopping list. He had forgotten all about it and yep, the only thing he could find food wise was the junk in the fridge and an old box of spaghetti noodles. 

"Whoops," he said. That won't do.

    He snatched a sheet of printer paper and a sharpie and scribbled down a note for Robin when he woke up. After grabbing his phone and placing the note lovingly on Robin's face, Sean left once more. 

     It only took him about an hour to get groceries and come back. Robin was up by the time he came back, sitting at the table.

"Morning Sleeping Beauty! How was the couch?"

Robin chuckled.

"It was fine, but I woke up with this hanging out of my mouth," he held up the note.

    "Had to put it somewhere you could see it," he shrugged slyly, slacking the grocery bags off his arms. He turned on the coffee maker and started to put the food away. 

    "So, I was thinking we could start with the Reading Your Comments and then go into the challenge vids," Sean explained, pulling out eggs and milk to put in the fridge.

    "And tomorrow we can get some playthroughs done before we get started on editing," Robin added from behind his mug.

    "Exactly. Sorry about the lack of food, want me to whip something up before we get started?"

"That sounds awesome," he laughed.

    Everything was alright.

He smashed a few eggs unexpectedly and startled Robin by cracking the counter a bit when he accidentally gripped it too hard, but it was nothing he couldn't brush off.

It's fine. 

~~

    Spending time with Robin almost made Sean forget about everything. It all just seemed to fade back into reality after he fell through crazy town. Recording felt... normal. And he needed that. He needed something ordinary.

That left the two of them walking down town to a cafe that Sean had recommended. They had gotten quite a lot of work done and decided to take a lunch break.

    "No way," he continued, "there is no way the remake was better than the original."

    “I’m telling you man! The plot line was more realistic and they fixed multiple plot holes in it!” Sean followed alongside him. The door dinged behind them.

“There was nothing wrong with the plot, you just couldn’t wrap your small head around it!”

Sean gasped dramatically.

“Insulted. By my best friend! For shame, Robin, for shame.”

They both laughed and sat down at a booth.

    It was a nice place, quiet and homey, and it always smelled like coffee and chips. Relaxed chatter from other customers filled the room. Music played overhead and the TV in the corner murmured away about sports, and it all blended together into a pleasant white noise.

“Wait ‘till you try the bread, man. They make it from scratch!”

“Is that why we walked five blocks to get here?” Robin laughed again.

“Yes,” he deadpanned.

They continued talking until their food came.

"Thank you, miss. Oh, more chips, please?" Sean asked as the waitress walked away. 

He dove into the fresh batch of chips.

    It took him a moment to realize that Robin had stopped talking. He looked up and saw him staring back with a concerned look. 

"What's wrong?" He tried. 

"Dude are you alright? That's the sixth plate of chips you've ordered."

    Oh. He didn't realize. He vaguely recalled something similar happening the other day at the pizza restaurant. Did it have something to do with his new.. predicament? Probably, seeing as he was still hungry.

"Um, told ya?" Robin furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. 

"Best chips in town!" He laughed nervously. 

"Right. Maybe next time you'll actually let me try some," he was smiling but the worry was still visible in his eyes. 

"You'll just have to beat me to it!" 

Stupid.

They continued to eat in silence until the waitress brought them a check.

"Let me," said Robin, "you've al--" 

   

 Sean knew Robin was talking but he couldn't hear him. His eyes were attached to the screen nearest to them. It was a news reporter, discussing reports on stuff that happened throughout the day. But the video that was playing in the corner...

Oh no.

"It really is an odd sight," the reporter stated, "This anonymous clip shows what appears to be a bolt of green lightning flashing in the sky. The same lighting was also spotted a second time not long after, a few miles away. That's not the weirdest part, though. If you pay attention, it almost sounds like someone screaming.-" 

The TV was turned down as to not interrupt the patrons but Sean heard it clear as day.

They found him. 

    "Some call it a joke, just a gag someone sent us to get on the news. Others say that the footage shown is real, unmodified and definitely something to be wary of. What are your thoughts, Jim?"

It switched to another anchorman, appearing next to the videos.

The clips shown showed a bright flash in the sky, appearing above an airplane. It disappeared shortly after that. 

Oh no no no.

"Well I don't know about you, but I think they look very convincing-"

No, no no no no no no no no-

"Sean!" 

He snapped back. Robin was looking at him, concern all over his face. He swallowed down the knot in his throat. 

"You good, man? You zoned out pretty hard there. What're you even looking at?" He started turning around. Sean quickly grabbed his arm, forcing him back. 

"No," he whispered.

Robin shook his arm out of his grip. "Why? what's wrong, my hair messed up or something?" 

"Don't," he tried again. "Please." Why did everything have to be so loud? Tears pulled at his eyes. 

"Can we go home?"

Robin nodded knowingly. "Yeah man, let's get you home."

Sean was silent on the walk back. Robin didn't think to mention it. 

~~

Sean fell down face first onto the couch.

"Oomph."

Robin pushed his legs off so he could sit down instead. He tapped Sean on the shoulder. 

"Hey, are you feeling better?"

A muffled noise came from the cushions, then Sean pushed himself up so he was sitting too. 

"Yeah. I.. sorry," he sighed.

"No no," Robin interrupted. "It's normal dude, it looked like it was just an anxiety attack. Those aren't a joke."

Sean nodded slightly. "Yeah."

"Do you want to talk about it?" He tried. 

"No, Robin," he grumbled "I'm fine. 'S just anxiety, I'm fine."

He got up from the couch and started towards his room.

"Sorry. I think I'll just take a nap or something. You alright with that?"

Robin sighed.

"You know where to find me man."

"Thanks Robin."

"Any time."

    Sean closed the door behind him and fell down against it. Small bursts of light shakily pulsated all down his arms. He decided to focus on that instead. 

He wasn't even sure why he was panicking. Sure they *caught* him on camera but they didn't *know* that it was him. He watched the neon colors trickle down his arms like water. What would he do if they did find out? What would he do if Robin did? He didn't want to think about it. But what if?

Losing it won't do anything, Sean, he told himself. You need to calm down.

He inhaled deeply, filling his lungs completely before exhaling.

In.

And out.

In.

And out.

Come on, Jackieboy, you got this. 

    He stayed there for a while, contemplating whether he should get up to go to bed. The thought was interrupted by the bright red peeking out from under his bed.

He could hear Robin outside furiously working on his laptop. Knowing him, he wouldn't move for hours.

He supposed sleep could wait.

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That wraps up the prologue!! Three years in the making and we're finally getting to the good stuff! Buckle up, bitches it's only getting worse from here!

[mobius-prime]

121. Knuckles the Echidna #22

Dark Alliance (Part One of Three): You Say You Want a Revolution…

Writer: Ken Penders Pencils: Jim Valentino Colors: Barry Grossman

So fair warning - this arc is very politics-heavy. I've already criticized the inclusion of politidrama plotlines in the comic before, despite my own personal interest in them, so I won't go over it again. What I will go over is that this arc also includes quite a few tasteless references to the Nazi regime of World War II, starting with the intro page. See, every issue in this arc begins with, rather than the traditional intro page that recaps past events and introduces plot points to come, instead a speech or quote relevant to the current story. This one is a parody, if you will (though played completely straight) of the "First They Came" poem by the German pastor Martin Niemöller, referring to how many people stayed silent while the Nazis oppressed and enacted genocide upon groups that those in silence didn't belong to. In this altered version, "Anonymous" claims that Robotnik came for hedgehogs, squirrels, rabbits, and foxes first, during which the speaker stayed silent as they were an echidna and didn't want to get involved, and so by the time he came for the echidnas there was no one left to speak up for them. Of course, quite aside from the fact that this is completely disrespectful to the real-world situation that the actual poem describes, that's not even how the Robotnik coup went down. Robotnik, upon dethroning King Acorn, pretty clearly just started roboticizing all Mobians indiscriminately without regard to their individual species. Not only that, but he didn't even get a chance to start on the echidnas, as all of them were either contained in their pocket universe on the Floating Island, or hanging out in Albion, which it appears Robotnik never even knew existed. I don't know, the whole thing is clearly an attempt to seem really intellectual and deep on Penders' part, but it just comes off as insensitive instead.

Anyway, onto the actual story. We open in the house of High Councilor Pravda, who appears to be the main political leader of the city. In the dead of night, Pravda is awakened by a window smashing downstairs, and angrily stomps down to confront the intruder, believing it to be "dingo trash up to no good." Instead, he is dragged out of his house roughly by several Dark Legionnaires, while the leader, called Kommissar (her title, not her name), admonishes him for his apparent hypocrisy regarding his anti-technology stance.

Well, she seems lovely! As she has her people drag him away, we pan to Haven, where Knuckles is demanding answers from his grandfathers on his father's whereabouts. To his credit, Sabre is genuinely apologetic to Knuckles, believing that they should have been a lot more forthcoming with him a lot sooner, but Knuckles really isn't having it, and can you blame him?

As a side note, this is about the point in the comic where the eyes of characters such as Knuckles and Tails, formerly depicted as black pupils as in the classic games, start to gain some color. We already saw it with Tails a little while back during the Sand-Blasters two-parter, and it's very inconsistent between issues (for example, you'll notice his eyes are blue instead of purple up there), but you'll start to notice it in screenshots from here out before their designs finally stabilize to their modern forms, similar to their designs from the games.

While Knuckles continues to demand to see his father, we ourselves see Locke, who is dropping off Remington, Julie-Su, Lara-Le and Wynmacher back in Echidnaopolis. Remington asks him how things went with Lara-Le again, and Locke acts like he's all regretful that he couldn't woo Lara-Le back to him or something, which like, really man? You're divorced and haven't spoken properly in years, and she has a new fiancé now, did you really expect to just manage to sweep her off her feet again and get remarried? Julie-Su tries to approach Locke to thank him for saving the whole group, and finds herself recognizing his appearance somewhat. Upon asking, she's shocked to find out that he's Knuckles' father, and asks him about Knuckles' whereabouts. Remington ushers her away before they get a chance to speak further, probably to protect Locke's privacy, and as he jokes with her that it seems like she actually cares about Knuckles, Locke muses to himself that his son is likely furious with him, which, yeah, not far off there buddy. He has an idea of where his son might have gone, and as he speeds off in his air vehicle, we jump over to the Kommissar, who has by now dragged her captive all the way back to the Dark Legion's current hideout… and oh boy, inside we get to see a familiar f- …uhh… okay, well, I won't call him a familiar face, because we've never seen him looking quite this messed up before, but it's Dimitri, okay? It's Dimitri back on his BS.

Guess he had to have some, uh, extensive reconstructive surgery after his rather literal fall from grace. And unfortunately for everybody who doesn't want to be ruled over by a cyborg'd up monstrosity of a dictator, he's got a new takeover plan in mind for the city!

Back in the more civilized areas of Echidnaopolis, Remington is having his driver take Wynmacher and Lara-Le back to their apartment when they find the streets blocked by a protest from dingoes, agitating about their lack of housing and accommodations within the city. Remington tries to resolve the situation peacefully by requesting that if they must protest, to at least let traffic pass while they do, but at that moment a giant flaming fireball comes out of nowhere and starts wrecking the place, and the whole thing devolves into a big brawl between the protesting dingoes and the watching echidnas.

Remington calls Haven for backup, and while I'm not sure who exactly in that nest of grandpas he expected to go rushing out of there for something as simple as a protest gone wrong, luckily for him he mentions Lara-Le over the comm, and Knuckles immediately enlists Archimedes' help to poof him out there to help his mom. Meanwhile, we get to see that Locke has completely, thoroughly misjudged where Knuckles would be hanging out at this moment, having thought for whatever reason that he would be brooding inside the Chaos Chamber next to Mammoth Mogul's ugly frozen mug.

Now this is some well-appreciated character development from Locke. I've been heavily criticizing him this entire time for how he's handled his interaction, or lack thereof, with his son, and I'm glad to see that Lara-Le's admonishments seem to have gotten through to him. While he won't get a chance to catch up with his son right at the moment, at least we know the big talk isn't that far off in the future.

Knuckles and Archimedes poof into the fray on the streets, and Knuckles begins throwing punches at whoever gets close enough, which as everyone knows is the single best way to end a violent brawl - by participating! Despite being an echidna himself, he doesn't hesitate to throw punches at other echidnas in the bunch, with Archy adding some of his own fire breath into the mix. If anything, I'd say he accurately judged the situation, which is that the dingoes were peacefully demonstrating and it appears to have been an angry, racist echidna who threw the first molotov. General Von Stryker makes his entrance, and despite him predictably acting aggressive and blaming echidnakind in general for the dingoes' treatment, Knuckles actually agrees with him that the echidnas are being really crappy, and offers a truce so they can discuss what went wrong and how to resolve it. Meanwhile, back in hell - I mean, the Legion's hideout…

This is probably the single most disturbing page in the comic so far, if you ask me. This guy is begging, screaming, for mercy and they put him under like nothing's wrong and start doing surgery without his consent (obviously) on his brain. Dimitri, watching the proceedings, starts mwahaha'ing to himself about the whole affair, as apparently Pravda is the direct descendant of Menthor, the councilman who denied his and Edmund's proposal to use the Chaos Syphon all those centuries ago. He's determined not to get careless with his power again in the future, and now that he's defeated death by old age through the sheer power of adding more and more cybernetics to his failing frame every time something goes wrong, he's ready to get his long-due revenge.

In another part of the city, Knuckles and Archimedes poof right into the middle of the Chaotix, who are pleased to finally see him and hopefully get a chance to catch up. As he explains what was going on with the protest, Julie-Su arrives and gives him the "why" he was looking for, which is that, naturally, Pravda was kind of a racist ass and wasn't working very hard to ensure the dingoes would have housing built for them in a timely manner. However, elections for the position of High Councilor are coming up in a few days, and Pravda has ever-so-mysteriously been missing since the previous night, with his traumatized wife too messed up to be able to talk about what she saw. She slyly mentions when questioned that "a little birdie" gave her all this information, leading Vector to rather rudely blame her for "having friends in low places" and generally acting as distrustful of her as ever. Seriously, Vector's been kind of a jerk to her ever since she left the Legion, and you just know that situation is gonna come to a head sooner or later. But enough of them - let's head back to the Kommissar, who's having her people reenact Kristallnacht in the streets of Echidnaopolis! (Told you this arc is full of tasteless references to WWII…)

She reports in to Dimitri, who is pleased to hear about her progress on the senseless property damage and random citizens she's beating up for no reason. Like, the regime seems cacklingly evil enough to want to do this kind of stuff, sure, until you hear Dimitri's actual plan for takeover this time - he's implanted control chips into Pravda's brain, and is going to use him as a mouthpiece for the Legion's ideals in the upcoming election!

So, wait. You want to get your new mind-slave to cast your organization in a positive light, and at the same time you're having one of your main commanders go around smashing windows and beating people up in alleys? How is this master plan of yours supposed to work, exactly? That entire Kristallnacht page could be removed from the comic and not only would it not impact the story, it would make it make more sense than it currently does. I seriously think that it was only included to draw more parallels to the Nazi regime, because there's just no way it makes any real sense otherwise. Sigh, Penders. Why do you have to be like this?

[elizabethemerald]

Dreams of Drowning: Chap 2

AO3

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Claire. He can't pull her name from his mind. She can't be real. Can she? 

***

Jim worked quickly in the kitchen. He was still the lowest chef on the totem pole, though even since his first week one of the cooks who had been there longer had already quit. They would be hiring a new cook in a couple of days. No wonder he had been able to get hired here. The facility went through cooks at an astonishing rate. 

His weekend had been largely uneventful. He had no further dreams of the mysterious woman, but his thoughts still swirled around her. Who could she be? What could she want? What was she? 

That last question echoed the loudest. She had called herself Claire. Seemed like a regular enough human name for such an ethereal being. If he had been religious he would have sworn he just met god. Though he would be more than a little concerned that god tried to drown when he first met her. 

Jim’s line of thought paused as a sound kicked on. It sounded like a massive piece of machinery somewhere close. He placed a hand on the work table and sure enough he could feel the vibrations through that as well. He looked around at the other cooks. 

“Does anyone know what that sound is?” Jim asked. 

“What sound?” One of the cooks responded. He had been there the longest at five months. 

“This one.” Jim grabbed two glasses and set them on the table next to each other. The vibrations made them clink together rhythmically. 

“Oh that’s the pump turning on.” He said. “You get used to it. I hardly ever notice it anymore. No wonder it vibrates everything here, the pump room is just down the hall.”

“What on earth does a research facility like this need a pump that size for? Do we have a secret aquarium somewhere?” Jim and the cook laughed. Then Jim thought about his dream. “Or maybe its because of massive chamber filled with purple cloudy water?”

He laughed but the others grew still. The other cook, who had remained silent to this moment whirled, his face red with anger. 

“We don’t talk about that! We don’t ever talk about that!” The man shouted. Then he stormed out of the kitchen. Jim looked to the first chef but he had gone back to work and ignored him. Jim set about his own work, including covering for the man who stormed out. 

He couldn’t get this new thought out of his head. He wasn’t the only one who had these dreams? The other cook hadn’t mentioned seeing the woman though, had she only appeared in his dreams? Had other people been greeted by drowning as well?

These thoughts continued to rattle around his head as he prepared the chum. He had spent all weekend thinking up how best to change up the recipe with what he had available. This time it was going to actually have a taste that didn’t make a person want to gag and die. 

The cook who had stormed out never came back to the kitchen. And he didn’t show up the next day either. Or the rest of the week. The cook who had been there longer didn’t mention his absence. It seemed he was used to folks leaving and never returning. 

Jim kept a careful eye on the news for the next couple of days. He wanted to be sure the man didn’t drown in his sleep, but he never heard of the other cook again. 

Toby and Darci were having a special date night that Friday so Toby asked if they could move their drink night. Wednesday worked just as well as any other night for Jim and he was always happy to see his friend again.When Jim arrived his friend was bent over at one of the tables a jeweler’s glass in his eye as he looked at a rock sample. 

“Tobes! What have I told about bringing work to drinks night!” Jim said cheerfully as he walked up. He laughed even harder when Toby looked up the glass still in his eye, making one eye seem huge and the other squinty. 

“You told me not to lick rocks at the table!” Toby laughed and gestured to the open spot. “I was the one who had to tell you to stop cooking every time we hung out! Why do you think we meet at bars now rather than at one of houses!”

“What can I say, I love to cook!” Jim sat and waved to the bartender. Him and Toby were regulars the staff knew their prefered drinks. Toby removed the jeweler’s glass and set it and the rock he had been looking at aside. 

“Do you?” At first Jim thought Toby was joking, but his friend’s face was deadly serious. “I’ve heard nothing but you complain for the past couple of years about every cooking job you’ve had.”

“I just needed to find the right one.” Jim said with a laugh. He didn’t want to talk more about his work so he gestured to the rock. “What’s going on with this?”

Toby smiled at the waitress as she set down two drinks in front of them. Then gestured to small sample. “This continues to defy me. I’ve been a practicing field geologist for ten years. A hobbyist rock collecter for more than twenty. I can properly ID hundreds of minerals on sight. And I can’t figure this one out. I’m waiting on chemical analysis to come back but it continues to frustrate me that I can’t nail this one down.”

“It’s not uh, radioactive is it?” Jim said. 

“Nah. I’ve gotten in the habit of checking each sample as soon as the boss’s kid sets it down on my desk. A few too many have tested positive for my liking.”

“The boss’s kid? I don’t think I’ve seen him.”

“Massive brute of a man. No respect for the finer needs of a geologist. His name is Bular.” Toby paused for a moment. “Of course I call him a kid but he’s at least as old as I am. Though twice as much of a jerk. Always dresses in black leather like he’s in some kind of biker gang. I’m pretty sure he only has a job because his daddy owns the security company.”

“Huh, well I guess it’s for the best that I haven’t met him. I tend to piss that sort of person off. And then get either beaten up or shouted at.”

“Yeah like you and Steve from highschool! I swear he beat you up so many times!” Jim snorted and rolled his eyes. “Though did you hear he and Eli finally tied the knot? They went over to Vegas and got married by a guy in a martian costume!”

“Really? Good for them!” Jim and Toby laughed for a long time at that thought. Neither were surprised by either bit of news. The two had been pining for each since highschool. And Eli was a die hard conspiracy nut. What would Eli think of a giant woman who drowned people in their dreams? Jim sobered at that thought. 

“Uh, Tobes.” Toby picked up on the somber tone and focused closely. “Have you ever had a dream where you were sinking in purple water?”

“And I started drowning in it?” Jim’s jaw dropped as Toby supplied his exact next words. “Yeah. I had a dream like that.”

“What happened in your dream?” Jim asked. 

“Well I appeared in this dream, immediately felt like I was drowning. It was awful. I think I had only been at 49B for two days. Then in the dream you and Darci appeared. And Darci started drowning as well. I couldn’t just let her drown! She’s the girl of my dreams, I’ve loved for years and years. I tried to blow the last of the air in my lungs into her mouth. Then I could breath again, and woke up sputtering a few seconds later. Darci said I had sweat so much in my sleep I soaked the sheets!”

“Wow.” Just like in Jim’s first dream, Toby had seen his loved one and been spared because of how he treated her. But there was one detail missing from Toby’s dream. “Did you see anyone else?”

“Other than you and Darci? No. I’m a little surprised I didn’t see my Nana. But it was just my best friend and best girl.”

“Hmm. I had a similar dream my first week. It was you, Darci and my mom who I saw.I think a couple of the other cooks have had the same dreams.” He didn’t mention the mysterious woman in his dreams. 

“Yeah, they don’t talk about it much, but everyone who works at 49B has them.”

“Wha-what? Why do you think that is?” Jim leaned forward with an air of conspiracy. Was there something more to these dreams?

“Micro vibrations caused by all the machinery in the building.” Jim’s mystified look must have shown on his face because Toby elaborated. “Humanity’s ancient ancestors were cave dwellers. Micro vibrations are cause by two objects moving against each other, which could be a sign of a possible cave in. The vibrations cause paranoia, irritation and fear. Most likely projecting as fear of our loved ones getting hurt. Once you get used to it your body ignores it. I’m not surprised the cooks get it the worst. There’s a lot of machinery down there. I work next to the head researcher’s office. So everything up here is more insulated.”

“Huh. Micro vibrations.” That...made sense. Toby certainly knew more about science than Jim did. Especially any science that didn’t relate directly to cooking. Then could Claire be a projection of his longing for a relationship? The rest of drinks night passed quickly as Jim retreated into his thoughts. 

Jim took a deep breath in the kitchen. The lunch rush was over. The kitchen stocked the cafeteria that all the researchers and security personnel used. Unfortunately the cooks were currently down two staff, so keeping up with the demand had been exhausting. It was time for his own lunch now. 

He checked his phone. Oh, a new text message from his mom. ‘I have great news. Call me when you can :)’ Jim stepped out of the kitchen and hit the call button. After a few seconds she answered. 

“Hey mom! What’s up?”

“Hi baby. I have the best news! Guess what it is!”

“Uh… I’m going to have a baby brother?”

“Jim.” His mom did not sound amused. “Do I have to explain to you how that’s not possible?”

“Please do not. Sorry, Toby and Darci are trying for a kid and he was telling me all about it. What is the good news?”

Jim could tell his mom was struggling with deciding between continuing her guessing game and just telling him the news. Her excitement won out. 

“Zelda got us tickets to go on a trip for our anniversary! We fly out tomorrow morning!”

“Oh my goodness. How fun!”

“Yeah she was so sneaky about it. She even contacted my work to arrange for the time off. She’s so good at surprises, I love her so much. And I get to spend an entire week in France with her!”

“That’s great. Do you need someone to drive you to the airport?”

“No, Zelda’s friend Walter will be driving us.”

“You mean your ex boyfriend Walter?” Jim said with a slight chuckle. His mom huffed. 

“No I prefer to think of him as Zelda’s friend.”

“Well have an amazing time mom! Call me when you get there so I know you’re safe.”

“Thanks Baby, I love you so much!”

And she was gone. Jim laughed quietly and walked back to the kitchen. He was glad his mom and Mr. Strickler had broken up. It would have been too awkward to work alongside his father-in-law during his brief tenure teaching his high school’s home ec class. 

Though he would miss his mom. He was a little sad that he wouldn’t get the chance to say goodbye in person before she left for her trip. 

That night he dreamed of Her again. 

As soon as he opened his eyes he knew he was under water again. He could feel it’s weight pressing down on him and all the small swirls and eddies in the flow around him, moving his hair and arms. 

Claire was in front of him again. Her purple skin glowed and was almost translucent. He could only look up at her in awe. It was hard for him to think about things like Micro Vibrations when she was here in front of him. She looked at him curiously. Her head tilting this way and that. 

She reached a hand as large as his whole body towards him. It was stopped by thick chains on her wrists. Jim had noticed the chains during his first dream of her. If this really was a projection of his anxieties then he was really worried about the state of his psyche. Claire gestured and the current in the water pushed him close enough that she could press a finger tip as large as his whole face against his forehead. 

Jim looked around in confusion. He was in what looked to be the Arcadia airport. He had only been there a few times but recognized it vaguely. There in front of him was none other than his mom. 

Barbara Lake struggled under the weight of a massive amount of luggage. The suitcase was taller than she was and kept popping open throwing her stuff around the airport. People were staring and laughing at her as she stumbled around trying to gather all her clothes and shove it back into the suitcase. 

Jim stepped forward and the laughter stilled. He walked to his mom and helped her pack her things. When everything was packed he took some of the bags and his mom took the rest. 

“Nervous about the flight tomorrow?” Jim asked his mom as they walked through the airport together. 

“Yes I just…” His mom hesitated. “I haven’t gone on a trip like this in years. Not since before your father left. What if something goes wrong?”

“If something goes wrong, you two will deal with it. Together. Just like you’ve dealt with every other problem together.” He set the bags he was carrying down and watched them vanish into the floor. Then he hugged his mom close. “Ms. Nomura has always taken good care of you. That’s not going to stop now that she’s Mrs. Lake-Nomura.”

Jim gestured forward. His mom’s wife was waiting at the gate. Zelda had a bag and two tickets in her hand and was looking around. Barbara pulled away towards her. She turned back to face him again. 

“I’m glad I got to say goodbye to you!” Jim said. “I love you mom.”

Barbara ran forward leaving the rest of her luggage behind. Zelda got his mom in her arms and twirled her around. Jim smiled. 

“Let’s give them some privacy shall we?” 

Jim turned away from their embrace to face Claire again. The purple water eddied around them stirring up her hair. Her pure white eyes were almost blinding in their brilliance. 

“Thank you. For letting me see her off.” Jim said. He couldn’t tell if he said it out loud or in his mind. But She seemed to understand. She smiled at him. The smile made her eyes seem softer. He was lost in her smile. She was everything amazing and wonderful in the world and he knew in that instant that he would do anything he could to keep her smiling. To make her smile again and again. He was in love. 

She giggled, an impressive sound considering her size. She tossed her head back in forth causing her hair to wave wildly around. She pressed a hand to her face then blew him a kiss. 

Jim woke up gasping. His hair was wet like he had just gotten out of the shower. And there was the taste of the sea on his lips. Claire. He can't pull her name from his mind. She can't be real. Can she?

I’d love your comments or questions about this AU. It’s such a fun one to write. 

[mezzomercury]

Bohemian Rhapsody in Blue:Chapter Five: A New Life is Born (Part II)

A/N: Here it is, finally! I’m so excited for y’all to read it.

Word Count: 2.6k

Warnings: Pregnancy, Childbirth, Mentions of surgery, hospitals, IVs, minor LGBT discrimination

********************

January 17, 1986

The Lindo Wing, St. Mary’s Hospital

London, United Kingdom

2:08am

The Lindo Wing of St. Mary’s Hospital seemed to be in complete disarray, as one of London’s most famous residents and his husband were occupying the labor and delivery suite with their surrogate mother, whose contractions were currently two minutes apart. The three of them had been in their private suite since the previous evening, and Nadia’s labor seemed to progress at a snail’s pace, while she opted to do a completely natural birth. Every so often, a nurse would drop in and check in, reassuring the three of them that this part of labor is usually the slowest, but it Nadia’s cervix seemed to be staying dilated only at six centimeters for several hours, while her contractions only got closer and closer together.

At this time, Freddie was pacing around the suite nervously, while Nadia was shifting in the bed and trying to make herself as comfortable as she possibly could, given her current condition, with Jim’s assistance. 

“They’ve been saying she’s still at six for forever, darling. How do we know if something’s wrong? They’re not telling us anything else!” Freddie exclaimed as he continued to pace, trying his best not to scare the other two watching him. 

His husband tried his best to reassure him, but was quite occupied with his concern over Nadia, who would cry out in agony every two minutes. 

“We just have to trust them, love. They’ll tell us if there are any complications. Please try to relax.” he reassured Freddie, who in turn sat down on the other side of the bed with a loud, discontented huff. 

Then, as if on cue, another painful contraction hit Nadia and she screamed out again, with Jim holding her hand, and now with Freddie trying to calm her and kissing her forehead, him trying not to panic again. 

“You’re doing so well, darling. Just remember to breathe.” he shakily whispered into her ear as she tried to breathe the best she could through the pain. 

Tears streamed down Nadia’s face, as her body was so exhausted from thirteen hours of labor and counting, and everything felt so out of control. She choked out a sob, 

“t-hurts. So much.” and continued crying as Freddie rubbed her back, trying to hide his own nerves and tried to comfort her the best he could. 

She was abundantly embarrassed that the couple had to witness her be in such a state, but was thankful that they were here with her. They had been at her side every step throughout the past nine months, and they wouldn’t have it any other way. Now, at the final moments of this surrogacy, Freddie and Jim were there with her, caring for her, holding her hand, and reassuring her that everything will be alright.

One of the nurses assigned to them entered the suite again to do an hourly routine check on how far along Nadia was in labor, as she checked to see how dilated her cervix was and the position of the baby. As she did the examination, everyone held their breath, hoping that they would get closer to delivery, but were met with disappointment as the nurse shook her head. 

“It’s still six. It doesn’t look like it’s progressing at all.” 

She then got up and had an orderly set up a fetal monitor, which was promptly wrapped around Nadia’s belly. 

“We’re going to start monitoring the baby’s heart rate and mum’s contractions. If she doesn’t dilate soon we may have to perform an unscheduled c-section.” 

As she said that, Nadia nearly jumped out of the bed, panicking at the thought of surgery. Jim tried to calm her, while Freddie’s face lost all color again. 

“The doctor and I will check back in about an hour, and then we’ll know for sure whether or not we have to.” the nurse told them before checking the equipment before exiting the room.

Freddie kept an eye on the fetal heart rate monitor, watching it as it beeped softly.

The next hour went by even slower than the ones before it, as Nadia, Freddie, and Jim were anxiously waiting for their doctor’s final verdict on the delivery method. During all of this, Nadia’s contractions were starting to pile on top of each other, and the fetal heart rate monitor that she was attached to gradually began to slow down, causing everyone to grow more and more uneasy. The three of them nearly shouted in relief when the obstetrician finally entered their room before doing an examination. Jim carefully observed the doctor’s face as she read the monitor, then went to once again inspect Nadia’s cervix. The room fell silent as her mouth curled down into a slight frown and she furrowed her brows in concern. 

“Nothing is progressing at all and the baby is showing signs of distress. At this rate, we’re going to need to operate in order for the baby to survive.” 

She broke the news to them with a grave tone, to which none of the three parents could fully process. Nadia gripped onto both Freddie and Jim’s hands, earning back a tight squeeze from each of them. 

“The procedure should be relatively quick, about less than an hour, but we need to prepare for it immediately.” the doctor continued, “Mr. Mercury, Mr. Hutton, we’re going to need you two to leave the room for a bit as we get Ms. Eldan ready. She’ll be out in a few minutes.” 

Freddie was about to protest until Jim stopped him and held his hand. 

“Let them do their job, Fred. We’ll see her again very soon.” he murmured to his husband, as the other sighed again and nodded as they each kissed Nadia on the cheek and exited the suite. Nadia wanted to beg them not to go, but of course neither of them had a choice.

As the couple were waiting outside their suite, another nurse approached them, holding a set of scrubs, 

“Alright, which one of you will be in the operating room with her?” 

Both Freddie and Jim’s eyes widened in surprise as they tried to comprehend what the nurse just told them. 

“P-Pardon me, but what do you mean by that?” Jim stammered out in question, fearing the worst. 

“It’s hospital policy that only one other person can be in the operating room.” The nurse replied bluntly, causing Jim to feel like his heart was dropping. 

Freddie, meanwhile, flew into a scorching rage. 

“What do you mean, only one of us??? We’re both the fathers, it’s our baby!!!! You’ve got to be joking me!!!” he spat out. 

The nurse sighed in frustration and tried to avoid escalating the conflict, 

“I’m sorry, sir. It’s our policy. If I let you both in I could lose my job.” 

This didn’t help solve the argument at all, as Freddie grew more and more enraged, 

“I’ll make sure you lose your fucking job then! Both of us deserve to be in there! I will sue the entire hospital and the NHS if I have to!!!!” 

Jim could only just stand there dumbfounded, hiding his face in his hand as his husband continued to shriek at the poor woman. He feared that something like this would happen, as society hadn’t really accepted their relationship for what it was, and seemed to be going against their quest to start a family together. He couldn’t even think about what could be done at this very moment, he just sighed in defeat and let the disastrous scene unfold before him.

Thankfully, before Freddie could say anything that he would regret, the doctor stepped outside their suite and tried to break up the argument. 

“Alright, alright, settle down, the both of you. We can’t have a fist fight in the maternity ward.” She exclaimed as the two parties cooled down. “Nurse, I’m going to allow both Mr. Mercury and Mr. Hutton in the operating theater. They are both the fathers, after all.” 

Before the nurse could ramble on about how it’s violating hospital policy, the doctor silenced her,

“Uh uh uh! I don’t want to hear another word about it. I don’t give a damn if it’s against our policy. I’m allowing them both in.” 

This came as a huge relief for both Freddie and Jim, as they tried to prevent themselves from hugging the woman. 

“Thank you, Dr. Paxton, thank you so much.” Jim choked out, trying not to tear up from the emotional rollercoaster he was riding. 

“It’s my pleasure, Mr. Hutton.” the kindly woman replied before stating, “Now, Ms. Eldan is all ready to go. I just need the two of you to put on these scrubs and we can finally deliver the baby.” as she ordered the nurse to bring in another pair. 

The couple adhered to her request and promptly went to change. As they both dressed in the large blue surgical gowns, masks, caps, and gloves, Freddie looked at himself in a nearby mirror and scoffed, 

“Dear god, these are absolutely hideous. This hospital really needs to update these, they’re fucking atrocious.” 

Jim chuckled a bit at his husband’s wisecrack remarks, 

“I couldn’t agree more, dear, but that’s the least of our concerns right now.” he replied cheekily, earning a smirk from Freddie before they practically sprinted back to the suite door.

The doctor was already in the operating room, but Nadia was there to meet them lying on a gurney, accompanied by two nurses and attached to several monitors and IVs. Her nose and mouth were covered by an oxygen mask and her hair was bunched up in a cap similar to theirs, but her eyes showed fear, as the anesthesia was slowly enveloping her into a nearly unconscious state. Both Freddie and Jim were at her side and once again trying their best to keep her calm. During all of this, Freddie nervously glanced at his husband, who couldn’t return his trademark reassuring one as he normally did, and was instead showing a fearful look identical to his. Their eye contact was broken when Nadia whimpered softly, causing them to divert their attention back to her. 

“Nadia, darling, please don’t panic.” Freddie cooed to her as they started to walk towards the operating theatre, “Just focus on how hideous we look in these outfits.” Nadia smiled slightly behind her oxygen mask and tried to breathe normally, as she felt nauseous upon entering the room.

The operating theatre was almost a pure white color, with a feeling that could only be described as sterile.  Nadia was wheeled in and parked into the the center of the room, underneath large bright lights, with Freddie and Jim following closely behind her. Dr. Paxton and several assistants were waiting behind a large partition covering the lower half of Nadia’s body. Before the procedure could officially begin, Freddie and Jim assumed their positions on either side of Nadia’s head, holding both of her hands and staring at her intently. 

“Alright, everyone. This hopefully shouldn’t take too long. The first part should be about fifteen to twenty minutes. Then, once the baby’s out, we’ll need another forty-five or so to finish the stitches.” Dr. Paxton announced, “Are we all ready over there?” she asked, earning three small approvals. 

“Alright then, let’s get this baby out to meet you all.” she remarked, before beginning the procedure.

What was fifteen minutes truly felt like fifteen hours, as time seemed to suddenly slow down at a remarkable rate. The room was almost totally silent, save for both Freddie and Jim muttering words of comfort into Nadia’s ears, trying to make her forget that she was being carved like a Sunday roast. Phrases like, “You’re doing so well,” “She’s almost here,” and “We are so thankful that you’ve done all of this for us.” were repeated almost hypnotically, until they were met with a very sudden and deep silence. Nadia couldn’t feel too much down there, but she had the distinct feeling of something leaving her body in that moment, and she tried to gasp knowing what it was. The two men beside her noticed this and immediately held their breath, before looking over at the large tarp acting as a partition between them and the graphic scene. Time stood still and silence remained upon them for a few moments, until the softest, faintest whimper could be heard. The tiny sound grew and grew, until suddenly there was an impressively large wail coming from the other side of the screen, seemingly echoing throughout the entire hospital. All three parents silently gasped, with a tear streaming down Nadia’s cheek, Jim feeling like his stomach was doing somersaults, and Freddie’s eyes widening more than they ever had before and his mouth resembling a fish out of water. It wasn’t until the doctor held up a squirming, crying, little human covered in blood above the screen that all parents immediately lost it and broke down right then and there. 

“You have a healthy daughter. Congratulations.” Dr. Paxton cheerfully announced, smiling behind her surgical mask as she noticed all three of their astounded reactions. 

The next minute or two was spent with Freddie, Jim, and Nadia, staring at their tiny little girl, who was still wailing and wriggling in the doctor’s grasp, all three of her parents completely speechless.

Before long, Dr. Paxton made an effort to resume time and finish the procedure, 

“We’re going to get her all cleaned off and have mum all stitched up,” as she cut the baby’s umbilical cord and handed her to a nurse to be cleaned, “You’ll see her again once we check all of her vitals. Don’t worry.” she reassured them as they seemed close to crying out in protest as they took the baby away from their view. 

As the procedure was finishing and Nadia was being stitched up, Freddie and Jim chose to stay with her, knowing their daughter was in good hands for now. 

“She’ll have a voice just like her daddy’s.” Jim quipped, finally finding his ability to speak again. 

Freddie’s smile grew even wider, “How can such a little thing make that much noise?” he stammered out as he knelt down and kissed Nadia’s cheek. 

“You are the most magnificent being to ever walk the earth, darling. You are so brave and strong, and I couldn’t be more proud of you.” he whispered in her ear before hugging her the best he could. “Isn’t that right, Papa?” he cheekily asked Jim, who joined him in kneeling down to Nadia’s level and placed another kiss on her cheek. 

“Couldn’t agree more. We love you so much.” Jim responded.

It wasn’t long before the doctor declared that the surgery was officially complete, and Nadia, Freddie, and Jim were whisked off into a recovery suite. As they were settled into the room, they waited impatiently for their baby to be brought to them, all while very exhausted. Freddie and Jim embraced each other immediately once the door closed, kissing each other passionately while tears streamed down their faces. Nadia observed them in pure bliss, feeling overjoyed that she could make the couple so unbelievably happy. Her feelings though quickly soured when she came to a realization that had been lingering in the back of her brain for a while now, but had reared its ugly head at the worst possible time: I will never see this baby again, will I? Before she could think about it any further, everyone was interrupted when there was a knock on the door, followed by a nurse slowly opening it. All time seemed to stop again as the she whispered, shifting a tiny, cooing bundle in her arms.

“Someone wants to see you….”

**************

Permanent Tag List: @siriuslovesmarlene, @r-ahh-mi, @unknownauthor, @yousaycoke-isaycaine, @ramibaby, @rami-malek-trash, @britishmoonchild, @onexlittlespark, @rami-hoe, @xtrashmammalstefx, @wanderlustnightwanderer

[magic-and-moonlit-wings]

Chapter 36: Burning Riddles

Becoming The Mask

It was weird, seeing Mr Strickler in Trollmarket.

Darci got that he was secretly a troll as well, like Jim or Not Enrique. But she was so used to only seeing him at school, and so used to not seeing other (supposed) humans in Trollmarket, that this felt like that time in second grade when she'd first seen a teacher at the grocery store. Or like seeing a lifeguard wearing clothes instead of a swimsuit.

"The Triumbric Stones," he said, unknowingly reiterating what Blinky had told them before Strickler arrived, "refer to three stones magically intertwined with Gunmar's life force. They can supposedly be forged together into the only weapon capable of slaying him. A troll scholar by the name of Bodus –"

"The Dishonorable Bodus," Blinky corrected. Strickler gave him the same look he gave students who interrupted him in class. Blinky, to whom Strickler could not assign detention, seemed unphased.

"The Dishonorable Bodus, then, discovered where these stones had been hidden. Naturally Gunmar's forces hunted down Bodus and his pupils and destroyed any copies we could find of his work. But here is where the scholar proved himself to be particularly clever. Rather than writing down the path to the Triumbric Stones directly, or even in cipher, he magically concealed a message within his Final Testament … a message which reveals itself when the book is burned."

Blinky and Jim both gasped, with very different facial expressions.

"Like how The Book of Ga-Huel can update itself?" Jim asked.

"Not quite. The Final Testament of Bodus is completely destroyed in the process, not merely altered. The message embeds itself into whichever surface on which the burning occurs."

"And how do you know this?" demanded Blinky, clutching a book to his chest with all four hands. "You stood idly by and allowed knowledge to be desecrated?"

"Obviously I was the one ordered to destroy the books. Only a deeply foolish Changeling would risk accusations of treason by reporting to a superior that they'd seen a way to destroy Gunmar."

Strickler and Jim both looked at the petrified severed head Toby had been poking at earlier. Darci wasn't sure if Strickler shuddered or he was just shaking himself to get back on topic.

"Defiler!" Blinky roard. Even AAARRRGGHH's gentle hug – oh, he was lifting Blinky right into the air, maybe he was actually holding him back from attacking – didn't calm him down. "Book burner! You – this is a grave injustice! A loss perhaps on par with the Library of Alexandria!"

It was not an appropriate moment to laugh. Darci, Mary, Claire, Toby, and Jim all made sounds of amusement anyway. Mr Strickler drew himself up and began the same speech he'd given them at the start of their unit on the Crusades.

"The loss of a centralized bastion of knowledge such as Alexandria was considerable. It was not as extreme as popularly portrayed. The majority of collected volumes were copies of books that existed elsewhere. The libraries of Islamic nations were vital in preserving ancient knowledge over the centuries –"

Jim cleared his throat. Blinky had settled, and AAARRRGGHH had set the smaller troll back on his feet. Strickler deflated.

"I took no pleasure in it, I assure you. Fortunately, the method of concealment meant it was not a security risk to transcribe the text into an unenchanted volume before destroying the originals."

"And the secret message?" said Mary. "I'm guessing that would've been a security risk to keep around."

"Indeed. But as it was thoughtfully composed in rhyme, it was a simple matter to memorize it." Strickler and Jim held weirdly-significant-feeling eye contact. "Entirely as a precaution. In the event that someone else found another copy, we would need to know what they learned."

"Of course," his fellow Changeling agreed.

"So what's the rhyme?" pressed Claire.

"In darkest tide, when daylight darest wane," Strickler recited, "the Myrddin Wylt obscured a shadow's bane. Three forces elemental thou must seek, in marshland, caverns deep, and mountain's peak. Where worthy perish, ye'll prevail in night, and eclipse all who quarry with thy might."

"Okay, I have several questions," said Toby. "One, after all that, it's still a riddle? Two, what's a medi-fred wench? Three, anyone else a little freaked out by this 'evil parish' we're forming?"

"That's not what he said, Tobes."

"Myrddin was one of the earlier recorded names of Merlin," said Strickler. "There has since been some speculation as to whether it was in fact a title, akin to, say, Archbishop, raising the possibility that the legends actually refer to several different men. After the Norman conquest of Britain in 1066, the nobility spoke French, and Merlin was renamed after the species of falcon. It was presumably difficult to take seriously a figure whose name was a false cognate of the invective merde."

Darci would not call herself fluent in French, but before and during her family's trip to Paris, she had learned enough of the language to laugh now. She hastily muffled it behind her hand, so all that got out was "Pffthmmhm!"

"Daylight probably refers to Jim's sword," said Claire. "Or, well, the Trollhunter's sword. You said that couldn't hurt him," speaking half to Jim, half to Blinky.

"Using fading sunlight symbolise loss of hope is more of a human thing," Jim agreed.

"And the next couplet, that's where the stones are hidden." Claire was starting to grin. "In marshland, caverns deep, and mountain's peak."

"So we just need to find out which marsh, cave and mountain these stones are in?" Darci hated to rain on Claire's parade, but … "Simple enough. That's only, oh, about a third of the world to search."

"We already have one, which means we can skip the caverns." Mr Strickler took his favourite pen out of his jacket and toyed with it. "The Janus Order … recovered Gunmar's Eye, some centuries ago."

For some reason he was looking over Blinky's shoulder at AAARRRGGHH. Was he scared of him? AAARRRGGHH could be intimidating if you didn't know what a sweetie he was. But Strickler hadn't seemed at all concerned when AAARRRGGHH escorted him into the library, and they'd been alone together then. Plus, AAARRRGGHH has been the one to hold Blinky back when Blinky was yelling at Strickler.

"We haven't been able to retrieve the Killstone or Birthstone, but I'm reasonably confident that the marshland Bodus refers to is the swamps of the Quagawumps. Gunmar unintentionally created the Killstone when he shattered their beloved Wumpa King – a sorcerer of great power."

"Like how Voldemort accidentally gave Harry the power to defeat him!" gasped Toby.

"This sounds more like a revenge curse," said Jim. "That explains a little. I mean, it's the one Triumbric Stone that was never physically part of him. Unless Gunmar ate the body and, uh, I'm gonna stop talking now."

Everyone grimaced.

"We should talk to Glug," said Mary. "She's a Quagawump, and she has family visit from the swamp sometimes. She might know if they have it. Or if she doesn't, she might know who to ask."

"I'm all for getting an insider crash-course in swamp troll etiquette before we actually go there," said Darci.

"The Quagawumps are indeed reputed to be unfriendly to outsiders," Blinky agreed. "An insider might be our best chance of getting in and out alive."

That was like a splash of ice water. Darci shivered.

"… If I frame it as avenging their Shattered King," said Jim, paging through the book on the Triumbric Stones that had been left open on the table, "and promise to give it back once Gunmar's dead, they'll probably agree to lend me the Killstone without making any other demands."

"You're gonna build a super-weapon and give part of it back?" Toby shook his head and clicked his tongue. "Jimbo, Jimbo, Jimbo."

"It's an artifact of historical, cultural, and possibly religious significance to the Quagawumps, and it's a body part from a possibly-vengeful dead sorcerer. Yes, I'm going to give it back."

Previous Chapter (The ‘Quest for Triumbric Stones’ storyline begins)

Table of Contents

Next Chapter (Jim and Barbara meet again)

Blinky learns most of what he knows about other troll cultures from the books in his library rather than talking to other trolls around the market. This is my justification for why Glug, Trollmarket's resident Quagawump, was not introduced until Season Three when she would've been really useful to have around in that one episode of Season Two. Luckily, in this timeline, the kids are in the habit of wandering Trollmarket and gossiping with the locals.

I know Toby actually asks if the others are also "a little freaked out by this 'evil perish' poem", but I misheard him saying "evil parish we're forming" the first time I watched it and decided to throw it into the fic.

Darci mentions in Season Three that her family has been to Paris.

A cognate is a word that sounds similar enough in multiple languages (usually because it traces back to a common root) that it can be understood by a person who only speaks one of the languages; like how 'idiot' in English and 'idiota' in Spanish are very obviously the same word. A false cognate is a word that sounds like something completely different in another language; like how 'embarazada' in Spanish sounds like it should translate to 'embarrassed' in English, but actually translates to 'pregnant'.

'Merde' is French for 'crap/shit'.

Horrible Histories – a series of books intended to get kids interested in history by presenting data in easily-read, entertaining format, and leaving in some of the gross parts – has a volume on Arthurian legends, which was where I got the bit about Merlin's name being speculated to have actually been a title held by a few different guys, and that the French were the ones to change it.

The book actually said the change was made by medieval French troubadours, who were also the ones to add in the Lancelot/Guinevere thing, but I decided that Strickler, as a history teacher, needed to date-drop the bit about William the Conqueror and the influence that using Norman French at court had on the English language.

It's got a lot of other cool stuff, like there being nine sisters who co-rule Avalon (Morgan and possibly Nimuë among them, other seven names unrecorded); and how Morgan le Fay got conflated with Morgause, the youngest of Arthur's three half-sisters; or the possibility that Guinevere marrying Arthur was actually what let him have the crown, due to how Celtic politics worked, and the scandal later in their marriage (Lancelot wasn't invented yet, but the Queen had other lovers) was because Arthur refused to step down for a younger, stronger warrior when Guinevere decided to pick a new king (as was her right), which got hushed up in Medieval times because it didn't fit the Catholic church's view of how marriage worked; or that the scabbard that came with Exalibur, when the Lady of the Lake gave it to Arthur, was enchanted so its wearer would never bleed, but the scabbard was later stolen.

[ad1thi]

Mamma Mia AU P3

i was in a writing mood so

--

this part backtracks slightly to flesh out the story 

-- 

as always, the idea belongs to @blackberrywidow

--

premise can be found here

part 1 can be found here

part 2 can be found here

--

this is kinda long (by my standards anyway) so i’ve added the “keep reading” or “read more” break, so just be aware of that

--

Both Bucky and Steve arrive together

They arrive within a day of Stephen (that was going to get old so quickly), and Peter has just enough time to appreciate that all three men came before he notices the obvious similarities (and differences)

Steve, like Stephen (it was already old) shows up in a suit, while Bucky is stressed in a polo shirt and shorts

The first thing Peter says when he sees Bucky, stupidly, is, “You have a metal arm”

And then he slaps his hand across his mouth in shock because he is the absolute worst that is so insensitive what is wrong with him he’s ruined everything for his P-

but Bucky is laughing so he figures it’s alright

“Like Father like son eh?” he says, and wow that’s a strong Brooklyn accent

Peter rubs his hand behind his neck, “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to say it quite like that, I just don’t remember reading about a metal arm”

“Reading?” Steve’s voice is a weird pitch and Peter really needs to stop opening his mouth

“So the thing is,” he starts as he’s walking up to the hotel, “Pops doesn’t actually know you’re here”

--

--

The minute they step off the island Steve feels charged in a way he hasn’t in over 15 years old

He had a decent ride over to the island (Bucky was someone he was going to get along with he could tell), but the butterflies in his stomach were persistent 

(putting a face to James wasn’t the best start to this trip but Steve was willing to roll with the punches)

But stepping onto the island, the place Tony came to get away from Steve, it makes him want to instantly curl into a ball and cry

And then Peter is suddenly in front of them, talking a mile a minute and it stuns Steve, just how much like Tony he is

He bites down the urge to tell Peter how much he’s grown, because he’s fairly certain that Tony never mentioned him to his kid, and Peter had been too young at the time to remember

but the need to wrap Peter in a hug, to kiss his forehead and ask how his A stòr is, its overwhelming

the fact that Tony doesn’t actually know he’s on the island doesn’t help things

but he’s rolling with the punches, so he tamps down all his feelings and puts on his aw chucks smile

(from the way Peter’s face softens slightly, he thinks its working)

--

Meeting Pepper and Jim again is, in a word, terrifying

“Jim,” he says, extending his hand, “how’ve you been”

“It’s Col.Rhodes. Or did your years out of service make you forget your manners Captain?”

Steve gulps, and lifts his hands against his forehead, “Apologies Colonel”

“He’s not the one you owe an apology to,” a voice behind him makes him turn, where he sees Pepper (and behind her, Bucky valiantly trying not to laugh)

“That’s why I’m here Ma’am”

Pepper is all smiles and insists that he call her Pepper, they’ve known each other for years after all, but her heel still digs into his shoes anyway so he’s not fooled

After they leave, Bucky slings an arm across his shoulder, “You must’a really fucked with Tony huh?”

Steve shakes his head, blinking back tears, “You don’t know the half of it”

“I’ve got some idea”

There’s a certain bite in Bucky’s voice that makes Steve turn to face him, and the hardness in his jaw reminds Steve that he isn’t the only ex on this island

--

Peter begs and pleads with all three of them to avoid Tony until he’s had a chance to break the news to him; which- given that Bucky’s first instinct when they saw Tony was to go to grab his ass Steve can see where he’s coming from

but it doesn’t make it easier

knowing that after so many years Tony is just a few steps away from him, that all he had to do was walk into the patio and he’d see him again, it’s the hardest thing he’s ever done

Spending time with Bucky helped though

for someone that he’d just met a few days ago, he and Bucky got on like old friends; and it was nice to distract himself from Tony by following Bucky around the island

according to Bucky, him and Tony had met while Tony was vacationing on the island for the very first time; and they’d got on immediately

“I’ve always had a thing for mouthy brunettes,” he says; mouth full of berries that he found on the side of a rock (of course they’re safe Steve i’m not insane), “something that his son seems to have picked up from him” he nods to where Peter is with his 2 friends

“Adopted” Steve hears himself, and at quizzical look being set his way he elaborates, “Peter’s adopted. The kid of an old friend of Tony’s”

He rubs his hand behind his neck, “I uh, met Tony a few months after he adopted Peter”

Bucky whistles lowly, “You really fucked up didn’t you”

--

It continues like this for about a week

In the morning, Steve and Bucky go exploring

they come back to an extremely stilted (on Steve’s side anyway) meal with Jim and Pepper; and when he can- Peter

Seeing Peter is still incredibly hard for Steve, because he’s constantly faced with the sheer amount of time he missed in the boy’s life

He still remembers with stunning clarity, watching Scooby Doo reruns with a small runt with a massive mop of hair, and its jarring to realise that, that little boy has grown into the man who’s god, about to get married in a few weeks

he can’t even begin to imagine how Tony must be feeling

--

Steve’s walking across the property, hands shoved into his pockets, when he sees Tony and his whole world just stops

Tony looks, god, he’s barely fucking aged

which is a complete lie since he’s clearly got crow feet and peppered hair but he just looks so good; wearing those damned overalls that fit him so well even years later

and Steve, god

Steve is still so in love with him even after all these years

and its so irrational because Steve was the one to fuck it up by going back to Sharon but he just, he loves Tony so much 

he makes to move away, trying to respect Peter’s wishes

but then he sees Tony trip and all bets are off

He’s stuck his hand out to brace Tony’s fall before he can properly think of it, and he’s so swept up by finally having Tony in his arms that he forgets everything that Peter says

He leans closer without consciously realising what he’s doing

and then Tony says Steve? in that shocked, incredulous voice he usually reserves for subpar science work

and it jars Steve back to reality

Fin

[sam-i-am-27]

April Fools Pt. 1

Summary: Virgil and the Sides awake to a household full of April Fools pranks.

Word Count: 1850 

Warnings: Mentions of nudity

Virgil awoke and instantly realized something was wrong. His room was… too bright. Far too bright. He sat up and stared around his room, unsure whether to be impressed or horrified. Every inch of his room, which was normally gray, purple or black, had been transformed into pastel pink and yellow. His black headphones had been replaced with neon ones with large fluffy cat ears on top, as if to mock him of his allergies and hate of bright flashy stuff. He noticed as he descended the stairs that the cobwebs that normally hung from the bannisters had been replaced with cotton candy while the fog that usually hung in the air was now visible smells. He caught whiffs of sweets, gunpowder, and… he hoped that wasn’t blood. The TV was on and currently playing what looked like some sort of weird sitcom starring Mark and all his friends. He recognized it as that one show pitch that Wilford had back in 2017.

Then it dawned on him. It was April 1st. The Septics had warned him about how seriously the Ipliers took this day which left one explanation. Wilford. Wilford did this. Almost as if the room had heard his thoughts, every photo that held an actual face suddenly had a bright pink mustache covering the person’s upper lip.

A mixture of anger and awe at the mere fact that the clinically insane (well… formerly insane since Patton managed to help begin the healing process of a shattered mind) Ego managed to do this bubbled in his stomach as he snapped his fingers, returning the room to it’s normal state.

He sighed and left the dreamscape, only to find the original version of his room in a very similar state, but… worse. Before he could avert his eyes, before he could even make an attempt to warn himself that something might be on the other side, his eyes had been burned with the image of a naked Mark Fischbach, straight from the calendar but without… censoring. He shut his eyes tight but the image of the naked man plastered on every single surface was stuck in his mind forever. He wished, now more than ever, that every mention of brain and eye bleach on the internet was now in his hands to be used on himself.

“I should… probably warn the others…” he whispered and sunk down into Patton’s room. He landed and felt something sticky and soft squishy under his feet. The heavy scent of peanut butter hit his nostrils and he looked around. The floor, walls and ceiling had been coated in peanut butter and as he stood there, looking at the mess, large glops of the stuff dropped onto his head. At least they had been considerate enough to put all of Patton’s beloved items into a box that was closed tightly to keep any of the drops from getting into it. Virgil guessed they had used a bit of Wilford’s reality bending powers to fit it all into a box barely bigger than the normal moving box.

“Patton?!” he called.

“Up here, Kiddo!” Morality called from upstairs. With a lot of difficulty, he made his way upstairs, ending up with a thick coat of the stuff all over his shoes. Patton was sitting on his bed, which was clean of peanut butter, and was staring at everything else.

“It’s April 1st,” Patton said. “They really… they really did a good job.”

“Yup. Wilford hit me. Everything was… pink,” he shuddered. “And in the real house… we need to clean it up before Thomas gets out of bed wakes up.”

“Why?”

He opened his mouth to say something but then realized that if this Side didn’t even know the true definition for adultery, maybe it wasn’t the best idea to tell him what awaited him in the physical realm.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll ask Roman to help me if you can clean this up and get Logan up,” he said.

Patton nodded and clapped his hands, cleaning up every bit of the sticky substance and replacing it with his normal decor. Virgil smiled before transporting into Roman’s room. For a second, he thought everything was the same. Every single playbook, panorama, script, draft and story that he and Thomas had created or even brainstormed was laid out across the walls in such an organized manner that Virgil had thought it was Logan’s room when he first visited. Then he noticed the coloration of everything.

“What the hell?!” He felt as if he had just stepped into a 3-D optical illusion but without the glasses and even looking around gave him a headache. Anything that wasn’t red-and-blue was a light shade of gray that gave off a cold energy that made him shiver intensely but his breath wasn’t steaming, making him believe it only affected people, not the environment. Virgil knew that Wilford, King and Bim would most likely participate in the event but Dark?!

His headache was getting too much to bear so he summoned himself some 3-D glasses to level it out a bit. “Roman?”

The Creative Side looked over the counter, looking slightly shaken. “Hey, Virgil. Did they get you too?”

“Yes, they did. It was Wilford and believe me, only Patton would have liked it,” he said. “It was bright pink and smelled like cotton candy.”

Roman smirked. “Oh, I am going to use that someday, you’re going to regret saying that.”

“Whatever Mr. 3-Dingus. Listen, we got a major problem.”

His face went from disdain to concern in an instant. “What’s wrong?”

“They pranked Thomas too and… well, Patton isn’t the type of person to help clean it up. I warn you though…” He shuddered. “It’s pretty but not… pretty.”

He brought the two of them into the physical realm and Roman gasped, turned bright red and covered his face. “Oh my- Goodness! That is… that is quite a sight. This is… scarring.”

Virgil, already scarred for life, nodded in agreement, staring at the pictures without flinching. “Now you see why I grabbed you, not Logan or Patton. We need to get this cleaned up before Thomas or his friends wake up or…”

Roman nodded and they started grabbing each picture and either crumbling it into a ball or treating it like a ticking time bomb. It took the two of them nearly ten minutes to clean up every single image that was in-sight, hidden in cabinets, behind, stuffed into or under the furniture, in the books, and in the framed photos. They threw the hundred-odd photos into a pile in an empty corner of the Mindscape, put it into a twenty-foot-deep hole and lit it on fire. Seeing the images try and drift out of the hole to infect Thomas’ brain but failing was extremely satisfying even if the effort gone into cleaning it all up was a bit overkill.

“Well, for the first time in my life, I believe that I am jealous of Logan and Patton,” Roman said, looking down at the firey pit.

“How so?”

“They didn’t have to deal with… this…” he gestured to the pit. Virgil laughed and then felt a tug at the back of his mind- not Thomas calling him, but Logan.

“Logan’s calling; come on,” he said and they rose out of the Mindscape. Logan and Patton were sitting on the couch, Logan looking slightly shaken from whatever prank the Ipliers had pulled on him.

“What’d they do to you?” Roman asked.

“They set up screens all over… with the Jim’s reports,” he muttered.

Virgil snorted but quieted down at a cool but stern glare. “Well… Logan, that… That sucks.”

“They don’t even know how to use a green screen!” he blurted.

“I know, I know,” Patton said soothingly, reaching out to pat his shoulder but the Wall stopping him. Roman and Virgil glanced at each other, sharing a smirk before sitting down on the couch. They barely had time to relax before a strangled yell echoed down the stairs. At the same time, they all felt the same overwhelming shock, horror and disgust.

Thomas.

Virgil realized what was happening as soon as he remembered that the prank had never been confined to just the downstairs.

They glanced at each other and in an instant, were rushing to the stairwell. The only problem was that they all went at once and ended up running into the wall before even stepping foot on the staircase.

“One at a time!” Logan said, taking the lead. The other Sides followed quickly, bursting into Thomas’ room with their eyes shut tight but knowing what was on the other side. Unfortunately, neither Patton nor Logan had seen these before and soon their shrieks of horror joined Thomas’.

“For the love of- Roman, get them out of here!” Virgil said.

“Thomas!” Roman cried. “Close your eyes, we’ll take care of this!”

Virgil didn’t see what Thomas did but kept his eyes shut tight as he pulled down the pictures that he could unfortunately imagine in clear detail. He snuck a peak and saw Thomas sitting on his bed, eyes shut as the other Sides rushed around, taking the rest down.

“Roman, take Patton and Logan’s and then back to the pit!” Virgil said, stuffing them into his arms.

“What?! Why me?!” he asked, shoving them back to Virgil.

“Because I gotta help Patton, Logan and Thomas!” he replied, gesturing to the three, all of whom were curled into a ball, looking horrified and scarred. Roman nodded, collected the rest and disappeared. As soon as he was gone, Virgil rushed between the three and suddenly realized what it was like to be Thomas before Virgil first started showing up at meetings.

“Uh, guys… I know it’s a very unpleasant sight but… Thomas, if you let me, I can block out that memory if you want. If that’d make you feel more comfortable” he said to Thomas. Thomas looked at him and nodded. Virgil popped back into the dreamscape, collected every iota of those memories from Thomas’ mind and then shoved it into the back corner, blocking it off with a wall labeled ‘DO NOT ENTER: PRIVATE PARTS’.

When he returned, Thomas looked considerably better and was talking to someone on the phone. Patton and Logan were over to the side, looking slightly less shaken but still a little on the scarred side.

“Yeah. Yeah, it was bad. Alright, I’ll see you in a bit.” Thomas hung up and said, “That was Jack. Apparently he and the Septic Egos had a very similar experience but since there were more of them, it was more of a combined effort between the Ipliers; 3-D Jim recordings, Pink peanut butter, that type of stuff. They’re coming over later for the Mindscape Egg hunt with the Ipliers. We’ve agreed that next year, it’s a Septic-Sanders team-up against the Ipliers.”

They nodded and stood in silence for a while, not even saying a word when Roman showed up. Finally, Patton broke the silence.

“Let’s never speak of this again… if they ask… we don’t say anything…”

Virgil awoke and instantly realized something was wrong. His room was… too bright. Far too bright. He sat up and stared around his room, unsure whether to be impressed or horrified. Every inch of his room, which was normally gray, purple or black, had been transformed into pastel pink and yellow. His black headphones had been replaced with neon ones with large fluffy cat ears on top, as if to mock him of his allergies and hate of bright flashy stuff. He noticed as he descended the stairs that the cobwebs that normally hung from the bannisters had been replaced with cotton candy while the fog that usually hung in the air was now visible smells. He caught whiffs of sweets, gunpowder, and… he hoped that wasn’t blood. The TV was on and currently playing what looked like some sort of weird sitcom starring Mark and all his friends. He recognized it as that one show pitch that Wilford had back in 2017.

Then it dawned on him. It was April 1st. The Septics had warned him about how seriously the Ipliers took this day which left one explanation. Wilford. Wilford did this. Almost as if the room had heard his thoughts, every photo that held an actual face suddenly had a bright pink mustache covering the person’s upper lip.

A mixture of anger and awe at the mere fact that the clinically insane (well… formerly insane since Patton managed to help begin the healing process of a shattered mind) Ego managed to do this bubbled in his stomach as he snapped his fingers, returning the room to it’s normal state.

He sighed and left the dreamscape, only to find the original version of his room in a very similar state, but… worse. Before he could avert his eyes, before he could even make an attempt to warn himself that something might be on the other side, his eyes had been burned with the image of a naked Mark Fischbach, straight from the calendar but without… censoring. He shut his eyes tight but the image of the naked man plastered on every single surface was stuck in his mind forever. He wished, now more than ever, that every mention of brain and eye bleach on the internet was now in his hands to be used on himself.

“I should… probably warn the others…” he whispered and sunk down into Patton’s room. He landed and felt something sticky and soft squishy under his feet. The heavy scent of peanut butter hit his nostrils and he looked around. The floor, walls and ceiling had been coated in peanut butter and as he stood there, looking at the mess, large glops of the stuff dropped onto his head. At least they had been considerate enough to put all of Patton’s beloved items into a box that was closed tightly to keep any of the drops from getting into it. Virgil guessed they had used a bit of Wilford’s reality bending powers to fit it all into a box barely bigger than the normal moving box.

“Patton?!” he called.

“Up here, Kiddo!” Morality called from upstairs. With a lot of difficulty, he made his way upstairs, ending up with a thick coat of the stuff all over his shoes. Patton was sitting on his bed, which was clean of peanut butter, and was staring at everything else.

“It’s April 1st,” Patton said. “They really… they really did a good job.”

“Yup. Wilford hit me. Everything was… pink,” he shuddered. “And in the real house… we need to clean it up before Thomas gets out of bed wakes up.”

“Why?”

He opened his mouth to say something but then realized that if this Side didn’t even know the true definition for adultery, maybe it wasn’t the best idea to tell him what awaited him in the physical realm.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll ask Roman to help me if you can clean this up and get Logan up,” he said.

Patton nodded and clapped his hands, cleaning up every bit of the sticky substance and replacing it with his normal decor. Virgil smiled before transporting into Roman’s room. For a second, he thought everything was the same. Every single playbook, panorama, script, draft and story that he and Thomas had created or even brainstormed was laid out across the walls in such an organized manner that Virgil had thought it was Logan’s room when he first visited. Then he noticed the coloration of everything.

“What the hell?!” He felt as if he had just stepped into a 3-D optical illusion but without the glasses and even looking around gave him a headache. Anything that wasn’t red-and-blue was a light shade of gray that gave off a cold energy that made him shiver intensely but his breath wasn’t steaming, making him believe it only affected people, not the environment. Virgil knew that Wilford, King and Bim would most likely participate in the event but Dark?!

His headache was getting too much to bear so he summoned himself some 3-D glasses to level it out a bit. “Roman?”

The Creative Side looked over the counter, looking slightly shaken. “Hey, Virgil. Did they get you too?”

“Yes, they did. It was Wilford and believe me, only Patton would have liked it,” he said. “It was bright pink and smelled like cotton candy.”

Roman smirked. “Oh, I am going to use that someday, you’re going to regret saying that.”

“Whatever Mr. 3-Dingus. Listen, we got a major problem.”

His face went from disdain to concern in an instant. “What’s wrong?”

“They pranked Thomas too and… well, Patton isn’t the type of person to help clean it up. I warn you though…” He shuddered. “It’s pretty but not… pretty.”

He brought the two of them into the physical realm and Roman gasped, turned bright red and covered his face. “Oh my- Goodness! That is… that is quite a sight. This is… scarring.”

Virgil, already scarred for life, nodded in agreement, staring at the pictures without flinching. “Now you see why I grabbed you, not Logan or Patton. We need to get this cleaned up before Thomas or his friends wake up or…”

Roman nodded and they started grabbing each picture and either crumbling it into a ball or treating it like a ticking time bomb. It took the two of them nearly ten minutes to clean up every single image that was in-sight, hidden in cabinets, behind, stuffed into or under the furniture, in the books, and in the framed photos. They threw the hundred-odd photos into a pile in an empty corner of the Mindscape, put it into a twenty-foot-deep hole and lit it on fire. Seeing the images try and drift out of the hole to infect Thomas’ brain but failing was extremely satisfying even if the effort gone into cleaning it all up was a bit overkill.

“Well, for the first time in my life, I believe that I am jealous of Logan and Patton,” Roman said, looking down at the firey pit.

“How so?”

“They didn’t have to deal with… this…” he gestured to the pit. Virgil laughed and then felt a tug at the back of his mind- not Thomas calling him, but Logan.

“Logan’s calling; come on,” he said and they rose out of the Mindscape. Logan and Patton were sitting on the couch, Logan looking slightly shaken from whatever prank the Ipliers had pulled on him.

“What’d they do to you?” Roman asked.

“They set up screens all over… with the Jim’s reports,” he muttered.

Virgil snorted but quieted down at a cool but stern glare. “Well… Logan, that… That sucks.”

“They don’t even know how to use a green screen!” he blurted.

“I know, I know,” Patton said soothingly, reaching out to pat his shoulder but the Wall stopping him. Roman and Virgil glanced at each other, sharing a smirk before sitting down on the couch. They barely had time to relax before a strangled yell echoed down the stairs. At the same time, they all felt the same overwhelming shock, horror and disgust.

Thomas.

Virgil realized what was happening as soon as he remembered that the prank had never been confined to just the downstairs.

They glanced at each other and in an instant, were rushing to the stairwell. The only problem was that they all went at once and ended up running into the wall before even stepping foot on the staircase.

“One at a time!” Logan said, taking the lead. The other Sides followed quickly, bursting into Thomas’ room with their eyes shut tight but knowing what was on the other side. Unfortunately, neither Patton nor Logan had seen these before and soon their shrieks of horror joined Thomas’.

“For the love of- Roman, get them out of here!” Virgil said.

“Thomas!” Roman cried. “Close your eyes, we’ll take care of this!”

Virgil didn’t see what Thomas did but kept his eyes shut tight as he pulled down the pictures that he could unfortunately imagine in clear detail. He snuck a peak and saw Thomas sitting on his bed, eyes shut as the other Sides rushed around, taking the rest down.

“Roman, take Patton and Logan’s and then back to the pit!” Virgil said, stuffing them into his arms.

“What?! Why me?!” he asked, shoving them back to Virgil.

“Because I gotta help Patton, Logan and Thomas!” he replied, gesturing to the three, all of whom were curled into a ball, looking horrified and scarred. Roman nodded, collected the rest and disappeared. As soon as he was gone, Virgil rushed between the three and suddenly realized what it was like to be Thomas before Virgil first started showing up at meetings.

“Uh, guys… I know it’s a very unpleasant sight but… Thomas, if you let me, I can block out that memory if you want. If that’d make you feel more comfortable” he said to Thomas. Thomas looked at him and nodded. Virgil popped back into the dreamscape, collected every iota of those memories from Thomas’ mind and then shoved it into the back corner, blocking it off with a wall labeled ‘DO NOT ENTER: PRIVATE PARTS’.

When he returned, Thomas looked considerably better and was talking to someone on the phone. Patton and Logan were over to the side, looking slightly less shaken but still a little on the scarred side.

“Yeah. Yeah, it was bad. Alright, I’ll see you in a bit.” Thomas hung up and said, “That was Jack. Apparently he and the Septic Egos had a very similar experience but since there were more of them, it was more of a combined effort between the Ipliers; 3-D Jim recordings, Pink peanut butter, that type of stuff. They’re coming over later for the Mindscape Egg hunt with the Ipliers. We’ve agreed that next year, it’s a Septic-Sanders team-up against the Ipliers. Mark’s going to help us cause they pranked him just as hard. Also, we have to teach Jack and Mark before the Egg Hunt how to actually go into the Mindscape and then leave it.”

They nodded and stood in silence for a while, not even saying a word when Roman showed up. Finally, Patton broke the silence.

“Let’s never speak of this again… if they ask… we don’t say anything…”

OKAY BUT TELL ME THAT THEY WOULDN’T DO THAT

@nightmarejim @petunia9402 @fandom-trash1214 

[nonbinarysasquatch]

I Never Want to See Josh Again.

Hope is a powerful thing.

In moments where I’ve been low, I’ve definitely searched for hope. What is the thing that can keep me going?

I’m going to tackle this episode in two halves, since for the most part events in West Covina and Scarsdale aren’t really interacting.

So first, West Covina:

Nathaniel is amazingly to sleeping in Rebecca’s bed. He is woken up by movers coming to take Rebecca’s things away, including the guy from season 1 who claimed not to speak English.

Nathaniel is in denial. In denial about the fact that Rebecca is gone and in denial about the fact that he has for realz feelings about her. He once again tries to put his wall back up and pretend he’s serious boss guy, but inside he’s obviously a wreck and not coping well. There’s a quick, sad beat with Nathaniel where he mentions that the only time he ever heard his father say the word love was in reference to fax machines.

Also very amusing that Maya thinks Nathaniel is a furry. I mean, who knows, maybe he is! No shame!

I’ve seen a lot of people complain about Maya’s millennial speak and while I do think the focus on her as a millennial is odd (since as mentioned before, literally the entire cast but Paula and Darryl are millennials) I actually find all her millennial speak sort of endearing. Also her cherry covered bikini was adorable.

Darryl is still coping with his relationship troubles with WhiJo, which really distresses Maya who ships them heard. Darryl also needs to maybe work on his antisemitism a bit more. He, uh, clearly hasn’t fully worked that out.

Also, wow, Mrs. Hernandez really is mean to Maya.

Jim, the character at Whitefeather who has possibly interacted with Rebecca the least, believes that the two of them had unresolved sexual tension.

After Rebecca resigns, Nathaniel quickly brings in a replacement in the form of Cornelia Wickfield, played by Bayne Gibby who did this YouTube music video about John Hamm’s penis.

Cornelia is, unfortunately, a bit of a normal person, not at all prepared for the eccentricity of Whitefeather. It also allows us to see how Rebecca was, in a strange way, a stabilising force for these people. She was a center point of gravity and now she’s gone, throwing everything into chaos.

Cornelia leaps at the chance to run off to a resort with Nathaniel for work, a resort that Paula and her family also happen to be staying at.

Paula has naturally taken Rebecca’s absence harder than anyone, especially since it is now the one year anniversary of Rebecca’s arrival in West Covina. Scott is thankfully there to be a good partner, not allowing Paula to wallow in her misery. It is, in a way, a mirror to what’s going on in Scarsdale. Healthy coping vs unhealthy coping (and abuse.)

Naturally, the entire Whitefeather office ends up at the resort, forcing Cornelia to quit with a promise to file a bunch of HR reports.

Paula confronts all of them then talks to Darryl and Nathaniel in private, telling them that they have no choice but move on. Darryl decides to fix his problems with WhiJo, leaving Paula and Nathaniel alone. And we get an actually touching scene between Nathaniel and Paula. He’s really being honest about his feelings, which is a definite step forward for him.

And now we can talk about Scarsdale:

Rebecca is all out of hope at the beginning of this episode. She’s believes she’s lost all her friends. She’s certainly lost Josh, though curiously for the first time in the entire series, Josh doesn’t appear in this episode outside of flashbacks (meaning that Donna Lynne Champlin and Rachel Bloom are, I believe, the only two actors to appear in every single episode.)

Rebecca cedes all control of her life to Naomi, who is more than willing to take the reins. Naomi is unkind and judgmental as per usual, even trying to be invasive when she thinks Rebecca is looking at porn. Of course, Naomi instead sees that Rebecca is looking at suicide websites, researching the least painful ways to kill herself.

A lot about this episode has been foreshadowed since the beginning. In the first episode we saw Rebecca looking at some websites with some dubious content and we also saw a willingness of Rebecca to mix alcohol with sleeping pills, which is what resulted in her dream ghost experience.

Rebecca herself has joked a lot about suicide, particularly in the songs she has imagined. But this is the first time, really, the show has made us confront this reality.

Rebecca Bunch is a deeply unhappy person. She’s never had a healthy relationship… with anyone. One parent was overbearing and abusive, the other wanted nothing to do with her. Her romantic relationships have all been disasters, not only because of the patriarchal love narrative but because people who grow up in abusive relationships have an unfortunate tendency to end up in them as adults.

I grew up with an abusive tyrannical grandfather who cut me (and my mother down) only to somehow ending up married to someone who was uncomfortably similar. One might think having lived through abuse would make me shy about it and honestly, I can’t explain how that happened, only that it did.

I do worry that maybe my ability to judge character is broken and that if I ever seriously try to get in a romantic relationship, I’ll be blind to abuse or just too obsessed to back away. I hope I’m wrong but the fear is there…

After seeing the suicide websites, Naomi starts to act differently, bringing Rebecca milkshakes, something that seems odd when you remember that this woman has fatshamed Rebecca her entire life. It leads Rebecca and the audience to believe that maybe Naomi is changing her behaviour. She’s since the damage that has been inflicted on Rebecca and is attempting to course correct.

Alas.

Everyone’s favourite frenemy, Audra Levine who immediately sees that something isn’t right and warns Rebecca that Naomi is up to something.

Rebecca decides to investigate and realises that the milkshakes that Naomi has been giving her have secretly been drugged with anxiety medication, intended to make Rebecca feel good in the hopes of making it easier to convince Rebecca to get help.

But instead, Naomi gave Rebecca false hope in a moment where she had no hope. Because the one damn thing Rebecca needs is empathy. She needs love and acceptance. But Naomi obviously also doesn’t know how to handle things in a healthy way. Maybe she doesn’t trust Rebecca and thinks that the only way to get her to change is to force her to change.

I’ve said before that Naomi is a good example of how abusers can still genuinely love the people they are abusing. Naomi does love Rebecca but drugging her without her consent was not OK. To put it mildly.

And so Rebecca leaves Scarsdale, only to realise mid-flight that there’s nothing left for her in California either. A flight attendant offers her help, suggesting a Merlot to ease the trip, which Rebecca happily accepts.

Suicide attempts are just generally… handled terribly in media. They are glamorized, turned into horror movie scenes and just generally handled tastelessly.

The scene that ends this episode is thankfully tasteful and it doesn’t make the mistake of ending on a cliffhanger, forcing us to wonder if Rebecca has survived. That would’ve been a cheap, cruel tactic. Instead, Rebecca and the audience finds hope. Or in this case, Rebecca sees the help button and momentarily thinks it says hope, pushing it and finally asking for help.

The Songs:

Maybe She’s Not Such a Heinous Bitch After All: Great song but so painful. It’s really disheartening that Rebecca has had abuse so normalised for her that she thinks even just hating her only a little bit would be normal.

I Feel This Isn’t About Me: A pleasant sounding number that is appropriately short.

Episode Rating: 10.0 out of 10.0.

Hats off to Jack Dolgen for writing such a devastating and emotionally challenging episode about what is a difficult subject to write about.

[justanoutlawfic]

Scrabble: Chapt. 8

Story Summary:  Mary Margaret and David are two best friends who desperately want a baby. One night, over a game of Scrabble, she suggests they have one together.

Chapter Summary: A few months later, David and Mary Margaret find out the sex of their baby. Later on, Mary Margaret has a confrontation with a former friend.

Also on AO3

Mary Margaret rubbed her swollen belly as she paced in front of her class, going over the book they were ready. She caught a few staring and smiled a bit. Her pregnancy had spiked a lot of excitement in the classroom, all were excited to find out if it was a boy or a girl. Luckily for them, she’d have news to share the next day.

 Both she and David were taking half days so they could go to a special 3D imaging place a half hour away. There was a knock on the door and Jasmine opened it, revealing David on the other side.

 “Alright guys, Miss Jasmine is going to take over, please be good.” All of the kids shouted their goodbyes and Mary Margaret grabbed her stuff, following David out the door. “Can you believe we get to  find out?”

David shook his head. “I just can’t believe you’re already 18 weeks.”

 Time had flown by rather quickly. It was already June and school was due to let out in a few days. As usual, Mary Margaret would be heading up summer school, but it’d leave her afternoons free. She hoped to get some baby shopping done during that time, not that there was a large space to work with. David was sleeping in the upstairs room, so it’d have to be set up next to her bed. It’d be worth it, though, to have him there. She’d love to have him sleeping in her bed…

 Now wasn’t the time for such thoughts.

 “Ooo,” Mary Margaret winced, holding her stomach as they drove. “They’re kicking hard.”

“Our little karate master.” He gleefully glanced over at her. “We’ll need a name after this.”

“I already have a name for a girl,” she admitted.

“Really? Care to share?”

“I know it’s super popular, but how do you feel about Emma?”

David grinned. “Emma. I love it. It also goes with the middle name I had in mind.”

“I told you, I don’t want to name a kid after me.”

“No, I gave up on that. Emma Ruth.”

“After tour mom,” she squeezed his hand.

“And Robert for a boy’s middle name after my dad. Is that okay?”

“It’s perfect.”

“I just wasn’t sure if you wanted to name the baby after your mom?”

“Emma Eva? A bit much there.”

“True, plus not sure how well that’d work on a boy,” he said with a laugh.

“Dreams aren’t always accurate, you know.”

 David winced as he was reminded of the dream he had about Mary. He had it a few more times since moving in. He never told her about the sexual part, but the truth was, it got him thinking. He loved Mary Margaret and had always told himself it was as a friend. Lately, that all felt like a lie. He was attracted to her, he thought of her constantly. He felt like a lovesick teenager.

 He was in love with the mother of his child and in any other circumstance that’d be okay. Except, they had agreed to no strings attached. Mary Margaret was constantly saying how happy she was to be doing this with a friend.

 David knew he couldn’t rock the boat, especially not with her still pregnant. There was a baby to consider. He couldn’t jeopardize getting to be there every day because of his heart. The baby came first.

 Soon, he pulled his truck into the parking lot and they got signed in.  It wasn’t long before they were called into the back, Mary Margaret downing her third bottle of water. She saw David snickering and threw him a look.

“It’s so we can see the baby!”

“I know, I know, it’s just funny watching you chug so much.”

She rolled her eyes and looked over at the technician. “I’m 18 weeks, you should be able to tell, right?”

“As long as all goes well,  we should be able to get a good look,” she replied.

 The technician started, squirting the gel on Mary Margaret’s stomach and moving the wand around it. A chill ran down her spine and she clung to David’s hand. A few moments later, the baby was on the screen. Tears sprung to Mary Margaret’s eyes, as they often did when she got to see her baby. This time was a little different. In 3D, the baby was more lifelike and in sepia, rather than black and white. Every time, they got a little bit bigger, with more things growing.

 “Well, the baby is about 5 inches long and 9 ounces, a little on the small side, but that’s okay,” the technician explained. “They have some time to grow.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

“Just keep up with a healthy diet and talk to your doctor if things don’t improve. Really, it’s nothing to be concerned about right now. I’ve seen ultrasounds like this at this point and then the baby is 10 pounds at birth.”

Mary Margaret made a face. “Well, I certainly hope they’re not that big.”

The technician chuckled and wrote a few more things down, getting some pictures. “So, you two sure you want to know?”

David looked down at Mary Margaret, who nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “We do.”

“Well, it looks like the little one is showing off quite a bit.” She zoomed in for safety and then turned to the two of them. “Congratulations, it’s a girl.”

 Mary Margaret’s mouth dropped open and she wasn’t sure why she was so surprised. She really hadn’t had a guess either way, David was the one who kept insisting it’d be a boy. Even so, she was having a little girl, a baby girl. She had been scared about becoming a mother, she never had one herself. Now, she’d be getting the chance her own mother was robbed of, a chance to raise her baby girl. A small smile went across her face and she reached out, touching the screen.

 “Hey there, Emma,” she whispered.

David had a few tears falling down his face. “A girl…we’re having a baby girl.”

“Are you okay with that?” Mary Margaret didn’t look up from the screen.

“More than okay. I assumed it was a boy, but I think that was just because of my dream and the fact that I come from so many boys. My father had two brothers, I had a twin. Even so…a baby girl.”

Mary Margaret finally gazed up into his eyes. “Our baby girl.”

 He nodded, smiling as he kissed her forehead. In just a few months-time, they’d be parents to Emma Ruth Nolan.

Mary Margaret and David decided to go to the diner to celebrate the news. They were immediately ambushed by Ruby, who was practically jumping out of her skin to find out the news.

 “Well? Did you find out?”

“Gosh, ya know, we went all the way there and just forgot to ask,” David teased.

Ruby rolled her eyes, looking at her best friend. “Mare, come on.”

“It’s a girl!”

Ruby squealed and hugged her tightly, before doing the same to David. “I knew it! Ming is going to have a little gal friend to play with, Alex too!”

“Who knows, maybe they’ll even date one day.”

“Nuh uh,” David interjected. “She’s not dating, ever. Boy or girl, she’s going to be our baby forever.”

Ruby chuckled. “I knew you’d be an overprotective daddy. With all this good news, dinner’s on me.”

“You don’t have to do that, Rubes.”

“I want to. Anything you want, on the house.”

 The two headed towards their usual booth and Mary Margaret felt like someone was staring at her. She turned to look and found Kathryn sitting at a booth by herself, which made her chew on her lower lip. While she and David hadn’t told his ex themselves about the baby, word had obviously gotten around. They ran in similar circles and it was a small town, plus Jim worked at the school. Kathryn would have to be an idiot to not know about what was going on. Mary Margaret hadn’t expected a congratulations from her, but the staring still felt a bit off.

 They settled down to order and then David headed to the bathroom. Mary Margaret could still feel Kathryn’s eyes on her and wasn’t sure if it was the hormones or what, but she was done. She got up and stormed over.

 “Can I help you?” She asked.

Kathryn’s mouth formed a thin line. “I don’t know what you mean?”

“You’ve been staring at me since I walked in. I know I’m getting fat, but you’re a nurse. It shouldn’t be anything new for you.”

“It’s not that.”

“Then what?”

“I’m just not surprised that this is happening. I saw this from a mile away, even back when I was married to David.”

“You saw us co-parenting?”

Kathryn snorted. “Please. You two don’t have to pretend for me. I’m with Jim now, I’m happy. If you two are settling down, it’s none of my business.”

“We’re not together, not like that. For the millionth time, we’re just friends!”

“You and David haven’t been just friends, ever.”

“We never did anything when you two were married.”

“Oh, I believe that.” Kathryn shook her head. “What I don’t believe is that you two don’t have any feelings for each other whatsoever, romantically. The whole town can see how you look at one another.” She threw down some money onto the table and rose to her feet. “Just hope you can get your shit together before the baby’s born.”

 Mary Margaret watched her walk out of the diner, awestruck. She wanted to chase after her and yell at her for making such accusations, but she couldn’t. She knew that Kathryn was right to an extent, at least on Mary Margaret’s end. She had feelings for David for the longest time. She just knew that he wouldn’t feel the same way.

 What David didn’t know was that Mary Margaret had heard the voicemail he got from Cristina. He had been listening to it when she came home from work one night and assumed it ended before she got in the room, but she lied. Cristina still wanted him to go to New York, to take that job. She even mentioned something about them being together. David never mentioned it, but she was waiting for the day he would. The day he would talk about splitting time with Emma and seeing her a few times a month.

 She wanted to give him a benefit of the doubt, but the more it went undiscussed, the more she worried. So, yes, maybe Kathryn was right. She had feelings for David Nolan…but nothing could ever come of it.

 “You okay?” David’s voice came from behind her. She turned around, folding her arms over her chest and he frowned. “Did Kathryn say something?”

“She thinks we’re in love, that we’re just too stupid to see it.”

“Oh.” He frowned. “Why would she tell you that?”

“Hell if I know. Look, I’m starving, I’ll go order for us. Want your usual?”

 David nodded and she walked away. A sinking feeling fell into the pit of his stomach, reflecting on the words that his ex-wife had told him at their last hearing. He had avoided her for the most part since that day, but maybe it was time to talk to her.

 The next morning before his shift, he made his way to Kathryn and Jim’s. The latter was already at work and Kathryn had the day off, she had agreed to meet him with him briefly without even hearing what he wanted. Wordlessly, she made some tea (Earl Gray, his favorite) and they settled down at the table.

“I’m assuming your girlfriend told you what I said last night,” she said.

David sighed. “She’s not my girlfriend.”

“Not yet, anyway.”

“How…how were you able to tell that I had feelings for her?”

Kathryn was quiet for a moment, clearly losing herself in thought. Finally, she broke out of it and smiled a little. “You went to her after James died.”

“Huh?”

“She was the first person you called. I was your fiancé and you went to her first.”

“Oh.” Regret filled his stomach. “Kathryn, I…”

“I get it. Look, David, I am really sorry that I hurt you. I was wrong to have an affair, rather than to just admit defeat and walk away. You weren’t a bad husband, quite the opposite. I know you loved me, just not in the way I needed. And I was too stubborn to say anything, mostly because I knew you’d deny it.” She shrugged. “You know, at the end of the day, I realized that I could write novels about you, but you’d never be able to fill a pamphlet about me.”

David frowned. “Kathy…”

“And that’s okay, because we weren’t meant to be.”

“Still… I didn’t see it at the time. If I did, I wouldn’t have…I mean…”

“I get it. Again, I didn’t handle it the best either. At the end of the day, I did a cowardly thing.”

“It ended for the best, though. You’re happy with Jim…you are happy, aren’t you?”

She smiled and nodded. “Yes, very happy.”

“Good, good. So am I.”

“Congratulations on the baby, I know it’s what you always wanted.”

“Thanks. It’s…it’s a girl.”

“You with a little girl, huh?” She paused for a moment. “I can see that, you’ll be an amazing daddy.”

He chuckled a little and it felt good to be laughing with Kathryn again. “Thanks for letting me come over. I…I’d like to work on us being friends. We were good friends at one point, weren’t we?”

“We were. A lot better than husband and wife.”

“It’s a deal then.” David checked his watch and then downed his tea. “I better get going, I have to relieve Graham from his shift.”

 He rose from his seat and headed for the door.

 “David?” He turned back to face her. She suddenly looked serious again. “So, don’t wait too long, okay?”

David raised an eyebrow. “To what?”

She tilted her head, smiling sympathetically, as if she thought he was the most clueless man on Earth. “To tell her.”

[cas-backwards-tie]

A Wrinkle In Crime

Gotham x Batfam + Batsis!Reader x Clark Kent

Request: Gotham!Jim, Alfred, Oswald and Bruce end up somehow knocking on DC Batfam’s door. Basis!Reader answers the door and calls for Bruce... Bonus points if Batsis is dating Clark. Include the boys reactions.

Warnings: Mentions of manhandling Oswald (poor Os), Cocky!Bruce, and nothing else.

Author’s Note: Okay, so... This took not terribly long but a long time, and also- it was also hard to come up with a reason Oswald would be with them on good terms so I kind of left what happened before they were sent into this universe as  ambiguous and up to you guys. I hope you like this! I thought it was interesting to write, for sure. I put Oswald as the gif for this because it just seemed to fit so well. <3

*This is Written from the Gotham characters POV’s as well as kind of 3rd Person*

“Let’s just get back to the Manor and then we can get things all cleared up, yeah?” Alfred comments as he dusts his pants off, standing up he guides Bruce by the back towards the exit of the building they were currently standing in.

“It’d be best if you followed along, Mister Gordon” Alfred beckoned Detective Jim Gordon and the currently unconscious Mister Oswald Cobblepot to follow them back to Wayne Manor so that they could all get cleaned up before sorting out what exactly had just happened.

Jim somehow manages to lug Oswald into the backseat of his undercover cop car before switching the engine on and following the much nicer car in front of them down the familiar streets which led to a place Jim had only been a few times since the murder of Bruce’s parents. Jim felt sorry that he and Bruce had to meet through such unfortunate circumstances but glad that their friendship was able to be kindled through such events.

Reaching the Manor Alfred parks the car out front, which Bruce thought was odd as Alfred always parks in the garage, but quickly he remembers the circumstance they’re in. Almost ask quickly as Bruce’s mind can move in the current condition he’s placed in, he notices that the Manor is off.

Stepping out of the vehicle with no aid from Alfred, as circumstances were somewhat urgent and unknown, Bruce couldn’t quite place his finger on how the Manor might be different, but all he knew was that it was.

“Do you need help getting’ em’ out of the car?” Alfred says quickly making his way towards Jim’s car. 

“No! Nope! He woke up while we were driving.”

“And didn’t try anything?” Bruce commented not looking away from the Manor.

Jim moved around to the back passenger’s side of the car, opening the door and yanking Penguin out by his collar, sure to keep a firm grip on him. “Unhand me you hooligan! I will NOT be treated with such uncalled for disrespect!” Jim doesn’t listen to Penguin’s commands, only trying to pacify him and inform him of the dire situation all four men were faced with, and needed to resolve. Having, unfathomably asked for his presence in the Manor- Jim had to oblige- despite his wishes or recommendations or even assumptions as for what’s to come.

Bruce distinguished more greenery. Flowers, bushes, even the cobblestones out front were much cleaner than he’d seen this morning- though who would really insist he was paying that much attention to the cobblestones this morning? “You comin’ in, Master Bruce?” Alfred takes the lead as he walks hastily towards the door, getting out his key. “What the?” Alfred fumbles once more and murmurs words and various other sure-to-be curses under his breath as he tries to unlock the door. Oswald huffs as he waits in Jim’s custody for the old man to unlock the door, which honestly shouldn’t take this long.

“It- it’s doesn’t work.” Alfred says over his shoulder to the group. Quickly trying to remedy this, Master Bruce leans down and reaches into the similar flower pots near the walkway for the duplicate key they keep in case of emergency. Now of course they’d have to arrange for a different hiding spot as Oswald had seen where they’d gotten it from. “Good thinking Master Bruce.” Alfred comments proudly as he reaches to put the key into the lock.

The door swings open just as Alfred had inserted the key. A young girl dressed in a sweater and jeans looks muddled by their presence, she wasn’t too tall, certainly not taller than Master Bruce for sure. However she had Y/H/C hair, and  a seemingly small twinkle of something in her Y/E/C eyes. “Uh... Bruce?!” The girl says a little distressed before slamming the door quickly.

Immediately after slamming the door is then opened again, and the girl peeks her head out to say “sorry,” and then closes it again. The men are dumbfounded- who the hell got into the house and why was she calling for Bruce when Bruce was right here? The boys were stuck in their spots, shell-shocked and rooting for answers.

Soon enough the door creaked open once more before anyone of the men could utter a word to one another. “I don’t- I’ll check.” The girl from before poked her head out, “Yes- they’re still here.” She then disappeared for a second only to fling the door open all the way.

There were many people inside, most of the people- kids- Alfred noticed, were huddled behind the man in the middle, poking their heads out once and awhile. Shock and bewilderment struck across the features of the huge man in the middle. The man stumbled back a bit, before taking a few steps forward, “Alfred?”

Alfred felt his stomach drop and his heart pulse at the single word. 

“Yes, Master Bruce?” An older man popped his head out of the kitchen. Walking up to the huge man this older man Alfred had to assume, was... well, also named Alfred.  “Oh- not me, well, nevermind then. Who is thisss...” ‘Alfred’ draws out as he stares at the four men in the doorway.

“Who are you?! Where did you come from?!” The huge man in the middle, whom Alfred would say looks very similar to his once-employer and friend, Mister Thomas Wayne- turns to the old man, “Alfred why would they clone you!? Who could’ve cloned you? Dick, I need you to go downstairs and see if you can find anything or anyone who knows anything about this! If anyone has seen these four walking around downtown then we need to wipe all the traffic cams!” The authoritative man sidesteps and waves his arm in a friendly gesture contrasting his previous words and tone, “Please, come in.”

A few minutes later, with no conversation besides asking if the four guests wanted tea, only simple nods and ‘yeses’ as response, the four were lead to the humungous couch in the middle of the living room. Bruce would’ve only known this area to have been a hallway to be in his home, yet despite being eerily familiar, this was not his home.

“Where are we?” Bruce demands from his seat, not faltering his own stare, as the big man had been staring at him alone for quite some time. “I demand you answer me!”

“Wayne Manor... you don’t recognize it?” the big man puts his cup of tea down in the saucer on the coffee table which was the only boundary separating them. “I know you must have many questions, and I can say for the most part that I have answers. Before you ask, this has happened before and that is the reason for me not ‘reacting very strongly or visibly’ as my wife would tell you. However I have not met this version of any of you, but even despite that I could presume who each of you are. I do intend to have my boys get you home as soon as possible so hopefully there will not be any delays or too much interference with either of our universes.” He crosses his arms and sits back in the armchair, obviously waiting for some sort of reaction.

“Mmmm.... So you’re Bruce Wayne? In this universe?” Oswald scoffs as he puts his own teacup back into it’s fitting saucer on the coffee table. “And what do you do?” 

“I am the CEO of Wayne Enterprises Mr. Cobblepot.” this universes’ Bruce raises an eyebrow in cockiness, something our own Bruce could never imagine himself doing unless speaking to a foe, which Oswald was not more than a minor annoyance in Bruce’s gaze.

“You mentioned a wife- you have a wife in this universe? And children you said?” Alfred speaks up as he tears himself away from his sip of tea, questioningly watching the grown Bruce for his response.

“Yes, I do... a wife, four boys and one girl, which I’d say is fortunate considering all the other Bruce’s I’ve had the pleasure of meeting.” He refers to the others in sarcasm... perhaps those Bruce’s were evil or not quite up to the same standard as this one? Alfred would never know. “Of course I can’t tell you if you’ll end up like me or not Bruce, but after meeting others that would be the only advice I could give you. Don’t close yourself off.” 

This universe’s Alfred walks in and stops by the couches. “Sir, Tim has gotten the portal all set up and ready when you and your guests are.” This much older Alfred bows and bids farewell to the four guests before exiting to presumably Bruce would guess, the kitchen... maybe all Alfred’s have similar tastes.

“Uh, hey Dad?” the girl who originally had opened the door peeks her head around the corner. “Tim’s ready for you guys.”

“If you’ll follow me please.” Older Bruce stands up and gestures for the men to follow him down a hallway to where Younger Bruce knew his Father’s study was.

“Dad can I go? Clark’s supposed to pick me up soon and I really don’t want to have to cancel, but I’ll understand if I do. We just haven’t seen each other for a month and I really miss him.” Jim watches as Older Bruce’s daughter gives him puppy-dog eyes. Bruce of course caved and told her to go get ready. The only question running through Jim’s head was: Who’s Clark?

The four guests wind up in what Younger Bruce only knew as his Father’s study. Many things were either misplaced or gone, which Bruce could only assume to mean that this universe’s Bruce had taken it to his own and made it fit for his liking. It didn’t look bad- but it just wasn’t his Father’s study anymore, which Bruce thought was devastating as he could never rearrange things other than the way his Father had left them. The thought killed him internally.

Alfred only wondered where this Tim boy was and if he was ready for them than why wasn’t he here? Wasn’t Grown Bruce taking them to him? Before Alfred could further question the truthfulness of this Bruce, the man himself decided to comment.

“Before we go any further, I now realize that this situation is a bit different from the others I’ve been in, as Oswald- you are here... However, I want to say that in your universe such a thing might not exist. You may never stumble onto this future. Oswald in this universe you are a villain against a man which I endorse, who goes by the name Batman. For that reason I need you to turn around.” Oswald gives Older Bruce an incredulous hateful look before turning around and putting his hands up in the air for dramatization. 

“Also, for this sake I actually think it’d be best for all of you to turn around” Older Bruce adds. The others don’t have a problem with obliging his request as they turn around, only for Oswald to look at the three of them and stick out his tongue and make a farting noise in an attempt to ‘show them’ Jim would’ve assumed.

“You all can turn around now, but I want to say that this might not be your future , Bruce. You may never endorse a man who approaches you by the name of Batman, but if you do, then, good luck.” Bruce gestures for them to step inside was looks to be an elevator by the looks of it. Bruce joins them before pressing his hand to a scanner, which accepts his handprint and makes the fireplace move back in front of them, closing the door to the elevator which begins to move.

When the elevator opens, the four are left in awe. They walked out into an underground base by the looks of it. It’s huge, spacious and honestly very well kept for a frickin’ cave Oswald thought to himself. There was a waterfall with a pool which seemed to run underneath them with only cement and some sections of grates to keep them from plummeting into it’s stream. The space was well-lit and organized. It was clean.

There was, to the right, an arrangement of glass display cases filled with not only seemingly gadgets and probably mementos, but colorful and not so colorful suits which had to be from this ‘Batman’ that Bruce spoke so highly of. There were many people down here, which Jim assumed to be Bruce’s children as they looked familiar to him and were around what Jim would assume is the right age for Bruce’s children to be.

After the display cases came what Alfred could only consider to be a medical bay of sorts with all the equipment from what he could see from the outside, a hospital. Walking further along there were a heavy set of computers. Many, many computers which shown with bright, almost blinding light. Alfred was surprised that there was for one thing, wifi down here in the cave, but also that it meant somehow Bruce and presumably Alfred (if Alfred is also Bruce’s best friend in this universe) had gotten the computers and everything else wired down here. Outlets? Down in a cave which from the elevator ride had to be at least almost fifty feet underneath the Manor? Incredible. Simply incredible.

“That’s the Batmobile- it’s Batman’s car in a sense. Or a tank, kind of both- however you want to phrase it.” Older Bruce comments as he notices where Younger Bruce’s gaze has fallen to. Bruce leads them over to where Tim is currently waiting, running around to make sure the machine he’s operating is fully up and running. “You ready?” Bruce asks him as with the clones gone it’s one less thing he’ll have to worry about maintaining in his Gotham.

“Yup, fully up and running and good to go, Boss!” Bruce ruffles Tim’s hair before beginning his last speech to his unexpected guests.

“Good work- thanks Tim, I know you this interrupted study time. Is Stephanie still upstairs? Nevermind... So. This is our last stop.” Tim nods to Bruce before waiting for him to end his speech. “This machine is the portal that is going to take you guys home. We caught wind of the site where you guys crashed in, which left us some traces of your universe- therefore- we were able to deduce which universe you came from and can send you back, got it?”

“Got it,” replied the three, a grunt from Oswald was the fourth response. The four each took one last look around what possibly could be what their futures might look like, if not what it could be a part of.

Oswald stepped in first, only to stick his head back out and abruptly ask Bruce a question, which startled him. “Am I a good villain?” a pause, “to Batman, you said?”

“Uh...” Bruce didn’t know how to answer this question. Could a villain be good? But of course what Oswald was asking wasn’t that, but if he did a good job at being bad. “I suppose?” This was the best answer Bruce thought he could give. Oswald, seeming annoyed and fulfilled with this answer popped his head back in the machine eagerly waiting to arrive back home where he could get back to his own mansion where he could relax and not have to be around pesky Jim Gordon and a hormonal Bruce Wayne who was starting to become an annoying, cocky little brat.

Jim Gordon stepped up next, but also asked a question. “Who am I in this universe? You never mentioned anything about me, so... Does that mean I’m... dead?” Bruce looked at him more softly before replying.

“No, you’re not dead. I don’t know what you are in that universe but here you are Commissioner Gordon of the GCPD. You have a daughter named Barbara, who also works with us.” Jim is a little taken aback by his answer. Why would he name his daughter Barbara- of all things? of all people? Surely he wouldn’t name his daughter after Barbara Kean- that’s for sure. 

“Thank you,” Jim says before entering the machine.

Alfred steps up next and by the looks of it, you’d think that Bruce wasn’t from an alternate universe but was a psychic whom everyone wanted to know their future from. Except, this time it wasn’t a question from Alfred, but a request from the Older Bruce, “you take good care of him. Well, I know you will. You always do.” Bruce pats Alfred’s back before bringing the semi-stranger in for a brief hug.

“I will, I can promise ya that.” Alfred steps into the machine, content with all that he had seen. Alfred sometimes worried that at the rate things were going with friends, Bruce would possibly quite end up alone in his life. Sure it was too early to tell for sure, and of course there was always Miss Kyle, but sometimes Alfred wondered.... and this gave him hope for the younger Master Bruce.

“Hey you,” the Older Bruce comments to the Younger as he steps up. “You be tough, alright? It’s definitely not gonna be easy- by any means. But you’re stronger than you think. Stronger when you’re with a team, even though you won’t know that for a long time... Don’t be closed off- just remember that, will you?” Younger Bruce pats Older Bruce’s bicep before looking him dead in the eye with his newfound confidence and replies.

“I will. Thank you, for everything.” They share a moment before they get in and are whisked away by the touch of a button back to their universe... a blast from the past.