#anyway happy wednesday have some grief :)

[livingmeatloaf]

WIP Wednesday snippet

"washed up nobody worms his way into local governmental leader's heart" was in the lead when i last checked the Out of Context Wip poll.

Taxes fried my brain on Wednesday, so you get it now! What is time anyway!!

The summary refers to "A Serpent Among the Lotus", my double-post-canon crossover with endgame Jiang Cheng/Zhuzhi-Lang. Zhuzhi-Lang is stuck in a form closer to his birth form right now, mostly monstrous.

"I am dangerousss."

"Yeah? So am I. And so is the sect leader. If he's not worried, I'm not." Jiang Cheng shrugged. It had gotten easier to shed the awkwardness of referring to himself like that with each day. Now, Jiang Wanyin sat separate from Sect Leader Jiang, held at a distance if only for the hours they spoke together.

Zhuzhi-Lang considered him, propping his head up on his folded arms. "Tell thiss one about your ssect leader? He musst be different from thosse I've met before."

Jiang Cheng sighed. "What's there to tell? He's loud and short tempered and yells a lot {lists his negative qualities as he sees them or has heard}."

"Jiang-gongzi does not like his sect leader."

"What? That's not true!" Jiang Cheng huffed at Zhuzhi-Lang's disbelieving look. "He's powerful," he said slowly. "He has a very strong core." That little fact comes with a bewildering stab of guilt and grief that he shoves back down. "He looks out for everyone in his sect. He makes sure no kids are running around begging on the street with no home. He does his best to be fair in dealings." He was quickly running out of nice things to say about himself. "Um, he looks fine, I guess? People used to say he was the fifth most handsome bachelor of his generation."

"Only fifth then? What doessss he rank now?"

Jiang Cheng stopped. Lan Huan was still technically a bachelor, secluded though he was. Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian were married. He did not dwell on them. Jin Zixuan...

"Second, I guess, of those who were originally ranked."

"Handssome man."

"I guess."

"Oh? Jiang-gongzi preferss women?"

"Maybe?" He scratched his head, then shook it. "Who has time to consider romance or attractiveness or anything? We're still reestablishing our sect."

Zhuzhi-Lang hummed. Songs of insects filled in the long stretch of silence. Jiang Cheng fidgeted.

"Do uh... Do you prefer lady demons or guy demons?" Zhuzhi-Lang looked at him and Jiang Cheng puffed up defensively. "Fair's fair, you asked first!"

"Thiss one hass only found a human man attractive." Zhuzhi-Lang tipped his head, long hair sliding over his arm to pool against his chest in a dark waterfall. "Where does Wanyin-gongzi rank on the list?"

Jiang Cheng choked on the sip of water he had just taken. He sputtered some incoherent response about not ranking at all.

They turned to safer topics, Jiang Cheng complaining about the water ghouls that cropped up around this time of year and how annoying they were to hunt down. It was nice to complain casually. As sect leader, he didn't really have anyone he could talk this candidly with. They compared water ghouls to some demons and similar resentful dead further west.

The notes Jiang Cheng has taken from his conversations with Zhuzhi-Lang far outstrip the few scrolls they have on demons. He sets some of the scholarly disciples who work in the library to organize and transpose his notes into useful scrolls. After all, if one demon has floated down the river, what would stop more from following?

Whatever choice wins the poll will get a snippet post like this! Go vote, or send me an ask with a summary and I'll be happy to talk about any of these! :D

[that-disabled-princess]

WIP Wednesday/COTTA Wednesday

Happy COTTA posting day to me! And thanks for the tags this morning @youarenevertooold @artsyunderstudy @angelsfalling16 and @cosmicalart!

If you haven't read my COTTA fic yet, you can read that here! Mind the content warnings.

I am also having A Time with my ruthari week plans. I had plans for days 1, 3, and 5, so I thought about doing day 7 to round it out, and now my brain won't let me rest until I figure out how to do all the odd-numbered days xD I have a completed one-shot planned for day 3 and a chaptered fic planned for days 1 and 5, but adding day 7 has thrown the whole thing off.

ANYWAY! Here are some new words from the chaptered fic--titled Lotus Lies--that may or may not stay. For context, Ethari took his grief out on his forge.

He starts with the easiest task—organizing papers. They get sorted into piles on the workbench as he picks through them.

The last paper is somehow miraculously still on the workbench. It’s... the piece he designed for Runaan’s birthday this year.

This is from the chapter for day 3, which is why it might not stay--the fic is either gonna be all four days or just two days with one-shots for days 3 and 7. It's about the balance.

Grief is a really difficult and personal subject for me to write about, so I've been struggling a bit with this fic.

Tagging @bazzybelle @youarenevertooold @stitchyqueer @imagineacoolusername @aristocratic-otter @hoothalcyon @j-nipper-95 and whoever sees this, it's been a long few days and my brain isn't cooperating 💖💖

[purplesigebert]

WIP: Wednesday #3: DW Crossover

Alrighty so, since my brain wouldn't settle on what it wanted to write, you guys get two different scenes this week!

Caroline looked around the theatre, torn between people watching and watching the play.  It was Love’s Labour's Lost, not one of her favourites, and so she chose to watch the crowd in the stands instead.  It had been a while since they had been to the sixteenth century and Caroline was enjoying herself.  She glanced at Martha and smiled at the other girl’s happiness, this trip was well deserved after the adventure at the Royal Hope hospital, Judoon upon the Moon indeed. 

The Doctor was another story, the grief of losing Rose was still hanging over him in a way that Caroline had never seen before.  She wondered if he was sleeping, never mind that he always mentioned his “superior Time Lord biology.”  Caroline thought that he was avoiding sleep because he didn’t want to have any nightmares.

As her eyes swept over the crowd, she was arrested by the sight of a man with shining golden hair, standing in one of the upper boxes. Even from her position in the pit, he was clearly a noble. He wore a royal blue doublet and had stubble covering his sharp cheekbones.  Beside him was a girl a little older than Caroline, blonde haired and richly dressed.  There were some facial similarities between the two, cousins perhaps, or maybe siblings.  Either way, Caroline was content to ogle the man that looked to be in his early to mid twenties.  Martha, noticing where Caroline’s attention had wandered off to, elbowed her in the ribs.  When the blonde groaned and turned to look at her, the medical student shook her head, “He’s too old for you.”

“I was just looking, Martha!”

“I know we just met but I can already tell that you are the type of person who looks before they leap.”

Caroline laughed at the memory that emerged at those words, well she wasn’t wrong there.

When she turned back, the two nobles weren’t there anymore, and Caroline was confused.  How was that possible? She shook her head, turning back to the performance, which had just ended. Martha was fascinated at the validity of the play and said that it was worth putting up with the smell of around 3000 people crammed closely together in one building, before the invention of air-conditioning. Truly, the amount of people packed together in the height of summer, never mind that it was evening, was not the best idea. She could feel her back being drenched in sweat under her cotton t-shirt. How was Martha even withstanding the heat in her leather jacket?

**

The party was bigger this year. There were more people, more food, more of a spectacle. The atmosphere in the room was smothering, almost like the whole castle was holding its breath in anticipation. She couldn’t see the guest of honour anywhere.

However, she could see the girl waiting in the corner of the hall, one of the many besotted vampires and humans, Trevor, hovering around her, a moth drawn to a vibrant flame.  Caroline shook her head unsurprised, but still fascinated by the phenomenon.  Katerina was the third Petrova doppelganger that she had met, and the allure never faded.  It was like she was an olive-skinned, brown haired, brown eyes, Veela, a siren on land. Although, by definition, the doppelgangers were identical, there were subtle differences between them.  Elena always held herself tightly, braced constantly against emerging threats. Katerina was more relaxed, proving that ignorance is indeed bliss. Katherine was snarky, graceful, and funny.

Anyways, back to poor Trevor, she knew how his story ended, and because of the laws of time-travel, his fate was sealed. A fixed point in time. Elijah, sorry, the Lord Elijah, she rolled her eyes, was making his way through the crowd and Trevor’s heartbeat increased.

He never should have reached out to the Original family. Too bad this birthday party was twenty years in the making. He never stood a chance; Caroline wondered how long would it take for Rory to talk to her again when he found out what was going to happen on April 6th?

[streaminn]

in an alt. universe of streamer enid feat. twin sibling

enid sees that wednesday starts dating her twin, and, of course, she's devastated. she basically drops off the face of the earth while going through the five stages of grief. acceptance is...hard, and really, it feels like reluctance, but she manages to get back on her feet and crawl out of the hole of despair she was in.

so she tries to move on, and it's hopeless at first. date after date, and she just can't seem to mesh with anyone. that is, until one day, she basically has a meet-ugly with someone. maybe she gets a fist to the face due to a mistaken identity or something, but whatever happens, charms enid enough for her to her ask this hot-headed stranger on a date.

and it actually goes well!

soon, one date turns to two, then three and so on and so fourth. and she's actually enjoying herself. sure, maybe the feelings she has for this person aren't as intense as the one she has for wednesday, but she finds herself thinking more and more, "i can be happy like this."

her and whoever this person is start dating officially. she's introducing them to her friends and posting it on her socials. hell, they even have some cameos on the blonde's streams. eventually they get engaged, but enid actually hasn't introduced them to her family...or wednesday

when wednesday eventually learns of the engagement, she is enraged and doesn't know why. she angry every time she sees their couple photos, any fan compilations about them, and goes absolutely apocalyptic when she learns through a 3rd party that wedding invites are being sent out. cue the oh-shit-im-in-love-with-enid epiphany, with a shit load of angst and self-loathing, and she decides to break it off with sin (that's the twins' name, right?). the goth doesn't care that enid's in an obviously serious relationship and attempts a grand confession. [douche move, wednesday]

but enid isn't the type to just drop someone (hopefully) and well, she's finally met someone who's chosen her first. her.

yes, she is still completely in love with wednesday but she's accepted that she was with her twin. wednesday chose someone else. they were on the brink of something special and wednesday still left the second she could, but enid is not going to do that. so she refuses the confession, no matter how hard it was, and maybe wednesday fucks it up more by calling enid the wrong name in the heat of the moment. and that, that was the final straw for enid. she goes on to marry her lover and now wednesday is left heartbroken.

wednesday keeps trying, though, attempt after attempt, but enid doesn't budge. she dedicates books to her, poems, and scripts. she professes her love anyway she can, and she doesn't care that her rep takes a downward turn for continuing to fawn over a married woman.

and that's basically how it goes for the rest of their lives. two people who love each other fiercely, but love wasn't enough in this situation.

definitely sorry for the uber ramble and this going all over the place. It was going to be short and then I just couldn't stop 🥲

Hello, what- nothing to be be sorry abt cynadquil just pleasantly surprised and hey totally understand wanting to write smth short and it just expands to a whole big thing

Its a writers ability

Anyways, I didn't expect people to be so interested in the lone path spin off after all

Seriously tho, very douche move on Wednesday's part. I read all this and it felt like a whole Rollercoaster.

Damn, this really is just a bad timeline. Nobody getting what they really content with in this au 💀

[epigaea-repens]

I have been having a very nice time waiting for Good Omens Season 2. I’m very busy tomorrow, and I’m going to see the first two episodes on Wednesday, so I’m writing about it now in order to memorialize the experience.

I have been on the edges of fandom all my conscious life. I learned to read at seven and at once commenced with the cycle of reading stories, drawing the characters, contemplating them, and continuing the stories for myself. With occasional breaks in times of intense study or intense grief, I have always had some fictional world or other in the back of my mind, keeping me company.

I found my way onto Tumblr in 2011. Someone had posted a beautiful picture of Loki from the first Thor movie on Deviantart with a moving little blurb and a link back to a Tumblr account. I was twelve and in a period of intense internal and external conflict - tumblr fandom in that time gave the secret part of me that was always thinking about stories a place not to be alone. I never contributed anything; my stories were much too personal for that. But I consumed others’ conversations and art and fanfiction voraciously, and I joined in with fandom tumblr’s anticipation of the upcoming installments of its commonly beloved media. That was my first time waiting for anything to come out. Up to that point, all my favorite stories had been in books many decades safely completed. I would gobble them up and digest them at length.

I have very fond memories of waiting for The Avengers and Sherlock and Fantastic Beasts, and all sorts of other things I’m forgetting now. It was thrilling, reading theories and predictions and fanfiction, some of which was very much as good as its source material. It taught me a great deal about how stories are constructed, and it gave me a space to feel a whole rainbow of emotions which weren’s safe to feel about real life.

Pretty much all of it, when it finally came out, was an awful disappointment. A great deal has been said, in exhaustive detail, about why people were or were not disappointed by those stories we were following together. In my case, I had fallen in love with aspects of the stories which were not carried on and were often actively contradicted by their continuations. I’ve long since moved on, but at the time, that was very alienating, being so full of delighted hope and then having it sort of collapse in on itself. I’ve not had time or energy to be very invested in The Media for some time, and I haven’t had the inclination, because as an adult I’ve had scope to engage with life that I never had before.

I have been very much immersed in waiting for Good Omens, and I’m really happy about it. It’s all the fun of my early fandom experiences, only it’s canonically a love story and it cares about the little things in life, and there is no dawning sense of dread as it approaches, because everything I’ve seen about it indicates that it will carry on everything that makes it wonderful. I’m going down to Cape Cod on Wednesday to see the premier. I’m going to stay over and go swimming and pick up a new inverter so my home can have electricity. On Saturday, my sister and I are going to curl up in the nook I’ve made in my closet and watch the rest together. I understand it’s a mystery, so we’ll pause it regularly and think it through, and I am sure we will be surprised and delighted by where it goes. I imagine it will be very funny and poignant, like the first installment, and leave us with a lot of feelings to experience. People will talk it over and draw bits of it and write further extensions, and hopefully season three will come out in some years and it will become a completed story. By then, I will have my own little house, and my sister will be doing something very interesting and dangerous, and maybe I’ll go back and read this post and think myself insufferably earnest. Future me always does, but I have high hopes for her anyway.

[pepaldi]

Hi, how are you doing? Hope everything's great. Well, this is gonna be long, I apologize in advance. I stumbled upon your blog about a month ago, read pretty much all of your stuff, and I couldn't stop thinking about it. I thought it was just beautiful and adorable how much you love Harold, the way you write about him is so endearing, honestly, I admired you for exposing your feelings with such sincerity. But as much as I admired him as well, I couldn't relate to you that much, I thought your experience was a lot more intense than mine, and I could only respect you for it. But as the weeks went by, something grew in me, intensified, and as soon as it hit me that I was in love with Harold I ran back to your blog, went through all of the posts again, and realized I was now feeling the same as you. I laughed to myself when I thought “I’m like that cool Ramis girl now, aren't I?”. I relate to you now, and I realized it's not easy. I guess loving Harold is not just laughs, admiration, and inspiration, it's also grief, longing, and tears that come suddenly on a random Wednesday because now you miss him like you've never missed before and you just don't know what to do with yourself. Forgive me for rambling, I barely even know what I'm trying to say here to be honest, I just knew I needed to talk to you, the only other person I know that shares these experiences with me. Maybe I'm asking for permission to ask you questions, maybe I'm asking for advice, or maybe I just wanted to say a very long “hello there, friend!”. Either way, I'm just glad I found you, I'm glad that I'm not alone. Thank you for sharing your heart, and thank you for reading all my nonsense 🩷 —🦊

Hello, hello!

I am doing alright, thank you. Hope you are also.

I am not sure when you sent this but if you had to wait for me to answer I appologize.

You do not have to apologize for being long BTW. Happy to read it.

I stumbled upon your blog about a month ago, read pretty much all of your stuff, and I couldn't stop thinking about it. I thought it was just beautiful and adorable how much you love Harold, the way you write about him is so endearing, honestly, I admired you for exposing your feelings with such sincerity.

Oh, wow. All the stuff? I am not used to people actually spending much thought on what I write but it feels honoring to have written something that impacted you. I tend to write from the heart. Some times the words flow right.

But as much as I admired him as well, I couldn't relate to you that much, I thought your experience was a lot more intense than mine, and I could only respect you for it.

We all have our own experiences and what I love about the internet is that we can share that. If we want to that is. Oh, I think the intensity that we feel comes in waves. Mine tend to anyway,

But as the weeks went by, something grew in me, intensified, and as soon as it hit me that I was in love with Harold I ran back to your blog, went through all of the posts again, and realized I was now feeling the same as you.

He is very easy to love. Personality greater than life. Wait, you went through the posts .. again? Damn!

I laughed to myself when I thought “I’m like that cool Ramis girl now, aren't I?”.

Oh, gosh. Aww. You really made me smile with that. I haven't had a nickname in forever but “Cool Ramis girl” is adorable. Love it!

I relate to you now, and I realized it's not easy. I guess loving Harold is not just laughs, admiration, and inspiration, it's also grief, longing, and tears that come suddenly on a random Wednesday because now you miss him like you've never missed before and you just don't know what to do with yourself.

Yes, so much yes! Powerful feelings. This dude who you never met but yet you have read and learned so much about. The stories that makes you sad you never got the chance to interact with him but at the same time you are grateful that he once existed with us.

Forgive me for rambling, I barely even know what I'm trying to say here to be honest, I just knew I needed to talk to you, the only other person I know that shares these experiences with me.

No no. No need to apologize. I know how it feels to feel like you are rambling on. I have done it and probably will again. I feel honored you felt that way.

Maybe I'm asking for permission to ask you questions, maybe I'm asking for advice, or maybe I just wanted to say a very long “hello there, friend!”.

Feel free to ask me anything. Advice, well if I can I will be Happy do so. "Hello there, Friend." right back at ya.

Either way, I'm just glad I found you, I'm glad that I'm not alone. Thank you for sharing your heart, and thank you for reading all my nonsense 🩷 — 🦊

Aww, I am glad to have been found. It is always nice to know one is not alone and can share.

Thank You for sending his incredible lovely and touching note. For your very, very sweet words. It was a joy to read.

It is not nonsense. Not at all!

If you need to vent, share or just say hi I am just a mess away.

I'll end with one thing Harold wrote in autographs at times ..

Best Always.

~Karin~

[mo0n-water]

hi :)

i’m sorry to hear that you had a bad day yesterday. i hope that you were able to give yourself some time to feel and then to recover because you deserve it! sending you lots of love and i hope that today was/is bit better.

what time zone are you in, btw?

my tbr is basically just any fic that i’ve seen someone like so it’s extensive and spans many ships and tropes so there’s something for any mood i happen to be in. i mark things for later on ao3 and it’s about 5/6 pages of fics… i can’t remember many off the top of my head but i want to read everything that eyra has ever written because i loved ‘a brief history of dragons’ so much and i’ve been putting off reading choices for forever but i’ll eventually get round to that. and of course black mass, i started it before exams but then i stopped so i’m going to go back and start it again.

i’ll have to give noah kahan a listen, everyone i know has been talking about him recently.

i love love love that you’re asking me questions back, you are genuinely making my day <33

good things recently… one of my friends, who i’m not particularly close to, bought me flowers for my birthday a few months ago after a conversation we had about how people don’t give flowers to each other enough, especially between friends. it was her birthday a few days ago and so i bought her some beautiful flowers and she was so happy with them. it feels so innocent and intimate to give flowers, i love it and i definitely will be doing it more often and without reason.

a lovely thing about my life at the moment is my friendship group. for a long time i’ve felt out of place with other people or not settled but now i feel so safe and comfortable with my close friends. it’s like i’ve suddenly matured and found my place. there are no arguments and no tension and it’s nice to relax into a group that is calm and loving and still exciting. i’ve finally got to the point where i’d have them over to my house just to do nothing with them and that’s saying something because i think domesticity is the highest form of flattery.

i’m looking forward to many things. i’m going to see a performance of the great gatsby tomorrow, i’m going to a harry styles show on friday, next wednesday i’m going to the bfi premier of asteroid city, the new wes anderson film and then next friday i’m going to a music festival, which i can’t wait for! after that it’s about a week or so until me and my best friend leave for our month long holiday through france and italy which i still can’t believe is happening!

sorry, i’ve been waffling for ages but questions:

- what’s your favourite picture on your phone and why?

- what’s your love language?

- what’s your favourite trope?

- what’s your favourite lyric of all time? do you write songs? if you have, what about of the ones you have written?

- if you could time travel, would you go backwards or forwards and what year for both would you go to?

again, sending you lots of love and hoping you feel better soon xx

ps. 264 HOURS

i ended up being a total bitch for a few days & concerning everyone around me, but i’m doing a lot better today! cried it out to the new noah kahan songs, reread looking for alaska, & the intersection of those two artistic experiences happened to help me realize why i was feeling the way i was. isn’t it lovely how art can offer you that? i’m thankful for that today. also thankful for your kind words!

i like your answers, especially in regards to giving flowers to friends. i’ve been thinking a lot about flowers, lately, both as gifts & as a symbol of finding love within grief. that’s a tad melancholic, but i think flowers are so beautiful as a sign of love (to anyone) because they imply a sort of commitment. a flower is going to wilt, so are you going to be there to replace it? rhetorical question. but anyway it makes me think of something john green likes to say about how love is not a feeling, but a choice we make again & again (loosely paraphrased!)

it sounds like you’ve got a wonderfully busy time ahead of you! have fun! lots of experiences. so jealous in regards to the harry show, omg, & the music festival? that sounds like a blast. (actually thinking of going to a music festival on thursday, so i wonder if it’s the same one haha!)

to answer your questions!!

i’m in est! same timezone as nyc. i’m pretty close to cst though. i feel a conflicting sense of loyalty to each timezone. i hope that tells you something about how bonkers i am in personifying things that have no business being that personified. but yeah it’s currently 3:30 am here. (4 now)

i don’t know if i have a favorite picture on my phone? there are a lot that represent really important memories, so it’s hard to choose a favorite. everything means so much to me in the moment. so i have a lot of favorites, but i’ll tell you about one. it’s a somewhat blurry selfie of me & my best friend sitting at a restaurant in savannah, georgia. i like that picture so much because that was one of the best nights of my life - and the best trips tbh, so iconic - and to me it represents a lot of things that bring me joy. (that friend is like the only person who reads these posts, so hello to her <3!!)

everything i do is done in an effort to express love. all of it. one thing that i find underrated is giving someone your time. what says ‘i love you’ more clearly than choosing to spend the day with someone? & what spells indifference more clearly than not making time for someone?

ooh, favorite trope! i think someone asked me this recently, & i can’t remember what i said? hm. well, if you’ve learned one thing about me from this, it’s that i hate picking favorites. but if i had to, i’d say enemies to lovers! i like reading about people learning to look at familiar things in startlingly new ways. i’m a sucker for a good road trip au as well, & stories about going back to a familiar place once you’ve changed quite a bit.

OH I LOVE YHIS. i love this so much. favorite song lyric!! okay omg i adore you for asking this.

all-time favorite: “i was cleopatra / i was taller than the rafters / but that’s all in the past now / gone with the wind” from cleopatra by the lumineers - i know that one’s technically like half a verse but UGHHH i can’t explain how much it means to me. and that whole song just means everything to me.

current favorite: “if i could leave, i would’ve already left” from paul revere by noah kahan. OUCH. this motherfucker from vermont captured my small town appalachian pain so succinctly.

favorite of mine: “i like to say i can’t get homesick for tennessee, ‘cause i’m always thinking of kentucky.” i love that line but it also haunts me because whenever i sing it, i get overwhelmed with this deep sense that the people listening Know Too Much lmaooo

time travel question! fun. okay so i have no interest in spending the rest of my life in the future or in the past, but i would like to spend a yom kippur in jerusalem in the time of the first temple. so that’s what i’d do if i could time travel. i don’t want to travel to the future at all, because that sounds like a lot of responsibility & i am a coward haha.

for your questions… there is a lot i want to ask you that wouldn’t sit well with your interest in continued anonymity, like what your name is, & how old you are, & where you’re from. also lots of other things that i’m not even gonna write here because they’re just embarrassing. i am giving you these instead!

- what is something kind that you wish someone would do for you?

- what is it that you like about anonymity? you could just as easily send asks with your name attached, so i’m curious what makes anon preferable to you

- and, of course, favorite song lyric? (also, favorite harry song? gotta ask)

sending good vibes & flowers 💐

[twiwwleo]

The Ways In Which We Love Each Other

9/1/22

I have no idea what I’m doing. But I think I can make something of this. It’s been 2 months since grandpa passed. I have a lot of things I’m processing, and it’s all jumbled, but it’s there. I just need to clear away the excess stuff- not less important, just not strongly tied together. I have a lot of writing to do.

9/6/22 Week 0

Lots of jumbled thoughts still. My writing just feels like rambling, but it’s like I know there’s a thread in there that I can pull and it will untangle all of it. I can’t really gauge how my presentation of my project proposal went- Everyone was so quiet. did I make a mistake in picking this? I just kept talking because I didn’t know what else to do. Does everyone think I’m weird for doing (yet another) project on death? I hope I didn’t. I hope this was a good choice.

9/14/22 Week 1

Got my project schedule laid out. Notes and quotes all organized. Blog set up. More nonsense ramblings. Part of this is identity, and how a person’s impressions of someone else’s identity may be just a snapshot of who they are, and how like... that transfers to the info someone may put online, and how that’s a fragment of who they are, and how long will that memory last. idk. That will double as my glass self portrait project too.

9/21/22 Week 2

I remembered the book Ghostland by Colin Dickey, it  talks about hauntings and story and how that connects to the times these stories originated from and how it all connects. I’ll have to dig that out and reread it. Add it to my research materials. 

Writing version 1: done

it sucks and I hate it. That’s all. Onto #2.

9/28/22 Week 3

Definitely behind schedule. V2: Done.

Next week? idk

I’m overwhelmed. Tired. Working through it. Still a bunch of jumbled thoughts. Slowly getting clearer I think.

10/7/22 Week 4

Glass self portrait due in a week. I’m sandblasting sheets of glass with an image of my face layered so it’ll look kind of ghostly? Gonna call it “here then gone again”

A snapshot of what someone else sees in me, and its impermanence or permanence in someone’s mind. I’m a ghost flickering through their lives. 

10/12/22 Week 5

Had no idea what to show for my studio practice midterm presentation yesterday but I definitely almost cried. Glass critique went so well I almost cried in a good way though. I was smiling when I left Sherman. 

I haven’t even started filming yet and I have like... 4 weeks left now? It’s... slowly getting there.

10/19/22 Week 6

Way behind- adjusted schedule to “fly by seat of pants.” Will adjust as necessary. I had this visual out of nowhere of a graveyard full of identical numbered tombstones, but as the camera zooms out it shows each tombstone is actually a USB stick plugged into a hub. Each one is a bit of information a person left on the internet, anonymous, left behind as they move on. 

(Danvers State Hospital info)

Need to model some tombstones.

10/23/22 Week 7

 I think I finished the written portion. Think anyway. I went out and filmed and shot at the Grove City and Greenlawn Cemeteries. It was nice to spend an afternoon with the dead.  Peaceful. I also had to take a moment to consider that their participation in my project, but their lack of consent. These were all people once. Their stories aren’t mine to  use. I don’t want to commodify their deaths, nor their family’s grief. I need to consider how I’ll respect their privacy, and their family’s too without disrespecting them.

10/31/22 Week 8

Happy Halloween + Blessed Samhain!

Final edits being made to the written/spoken portion. Going to record on wednesday and finish editing the video by next Monday. 

Tombstones are finished. They’re cute. I accidentally printed them @ 6.8mm instead of 68mm. I have 49 comically tiny tombstone USBs that I have no clue what to do with. Maybe I can have a little dish of them beside my work and offer them to people as take-aways?

Gonna build the tiny cemetery hub tonight!

11/6/22 Week 9

I’m done. 

And I’m

proud and 

tired.

[redrobin-detective]

exile

Maddie Fenton woke up on the worst day of her life with a headache. That wasn’t at all unusual, Jack’s snoring could be grating even when asleep. Combined with too many late nights in the lab, too much coffee and just general stress about her work and her kids... it seemed Maddie woke up with a headache more often then not. Jack was the early riser of the two of them so he was already awake and likely starting work in the lab. He’d knock on the kids’ doors to get them up but Danny always needed a special touch, or an aggressive shove, to get up. 

Maddie got up and dressed and made her way downstairs, Jazz’s room was cracked and she heard her daughter bustling inside. Danny’s was still shut tight. She knocked forcefully on the door. “Danny honey, it’s 6:30, you need to start getting ready for school.” She got no answer but she didn’t always get one. She had a feeling it was going to be one of those mornings. Setting downstairs, she’d just started the coffee machine when the phone rang.

“Now who is calling at this hour?” Maddie asked herself, picking up the phone. “FentonWorks, this is Maddie Fen-”

“You tell my daughter to come home right this instant!” Pam Manson’s shrill voice came over the phone. Maddie winced and pulled the phone back from her ear. “And you tell her she can kiss that horrible death metal whatever concert she was going to on Saturday goodbye! I will not have my young, impressionable daughter thinking she can tramp around god knows where-”

“Pam, slow down,” Maddie interrupted, irate as always when dealing with the woman. “Sam isn’t here, I didn’t see her at all yesterday or today.” Or Danny, Maddie thought privately with a frown. Pamela’s fury and frustration was understandable in a way. Maddie also had no idea what her own child was up to most days. 

“She’s not there?” Pam said quietly after a few moments of silence. “Are you sure?” She added a bit more frantically. “Because she’s not in her bedroom and her bed looks like she never slept in it. She’s not answering her phone but she sometimes doesn’t when she’s sees it’s-” Pam took a deep steadying breath. “Can you check and make certain she’s not there? I’m going to call Angela.” Pam hung up suddenly and Maddie pulled back and looked at the phone, biting her lip with nerves. The coffee maker screeching to life behind her startled her so much that she jumped.

“Goodness,” She said, setting the phone down and thinking. She was certain she hadn’t seen Sam. The last time she’d seen her son’s friend was the day before last when she and Tucker had dragged a very exhausted, bruised up Danny home. Took a fall down the stairs, they’d said, not explaining why their clothes were worn and hands scratched up. Frowning, she wandered to the top of the lab steps. “Jack, you haven’t seen Sam around, have you? Danny’s friend?”

“Sam?” She heard Jack shout back, he poked his head around the corner. “No, did she stay the night? By the way, did you move some of the weapons. I can’t seem to find a few of them...” 

“Jack that’s not important right now, Pamela doesn’t know where she is,” Maddie said sharply. She felt a little bad watching as Jack’s face become pensive but she was too anxious herself to apologize. She turned and walked towards the upstairs steps. “I’m going to ask Danny.” 

She can’t deny that a subtle little thrill went through her when she got onto the second floor landing and saw Danny’s door open. The sink was running in the bathroom and she knocked heartily on the door. “Daniel Fenton, Mrs. Manson can’t find her daughter and if I find you had her over without telling anyone you are going to be in so much-” 

The door opened revealing Jazz with her eyes wide and a toothbrush sticking out of her mouth. “Waz goin on?” she asked around the brush. She took out the brush and spit out into the sink. “I poked my head into Danny’s room to wake him up but he wasn’t in there.” Her eyebrows furrowed, “they can’t find Sam?”

Feeling lightheaded, Maddie walked down the hall to Danny’s room to find no one there. She can’t put her finger on why but it didn’t just feel empty but vacant. Danny’s clothes weren’t on the floor, his desk was practically clear for the first time since they bought it. His bed was made just as she’d done it the morning before when she’d rousted her son. Distantly, she heard the phone ringing again but Maddie couldn’t bring herself to leave the deserted room. 

Danny had several photos on his wall and desk, she couldn’t help but notice that two were missing. A framed photo of the entire Fenton family they’d taken last year for New Years and a particularly nice shot of Danny with his friends Jazz had snapped. They say in a crime scene, something is always taken and left behind. But why... The sound of footsteps approached her rapidly from behind.

“Mom,” Jazz with a small fearful little tone. She was holding the house phone in one hand and her cell in the other, Danny’s contact information open on her screen. It was just ringing through. “It’s Mrs. Manson, not only is Sam not at Tucker’s but... the Foleys can’t find him either. I... I told them we don’t know where Danny is at the moment. I’m trying to call but its just ringing and ringing...”

“Jasmine, calm down,” Maddie said, taking the phone away from her. “Keep trying his cell and go get your father. Pam, are you still there?” Maddie said speaking into the phone. She was met with tears on the other end.

“Where are they? How could this happen? Sammy... she has a sizable trust and could be a target for ransom but your boy and Tucker? It doesn’t make sense.” Pamela paused to take a few loud, sobbing breaths that pounded at Maddie’s headache like a jackhammer. “Unless they ran away but why? Samantha’s always been spirited but nothing like this... God, I need to call the police, we’ll be in touch.” She clicked off without another word.

“-swer your phone, please little brother. Please, I know. Know-know, I was waiting for you to come to me but now we can’t find you, Sam or Tucker and everyone’s freaking out and we just need to know that you’re all okay.” She heard Jazz speak quickly into her cell, curling in on it like she used to do with her old stuffed animals. Jack’s hands gripping her shoulders from behind, taking in the abandoned room just like she’d been.

“Mads,” Jack whispered, “where’d he go?”

Maddie would ask herself that same question in the coming days, weeks, months and years that would pass. Over the course of front page headlines and tv spots begging for information. When they found a large amount had been transferred out of Sam’s trust, when Tucker’s phone and computer was found broken in two near the dump by the interstate, when their weapons catalogue came up short. As more time passed, it became increasingly obviously the kids not only had left of their own volition but it had been a calculated, planned affair. 

Maddie would lie awake late into the night and wonder where it all went wrong? What had she, or any of the grieving parents, done to warrant their children to up and leave in the middle of the night. Something had happened, something that had been under their noses, something they’d missed. And they were now paying for it.

Back in the present moment, with her husband’s warm hands on her shoulders, her daughter’s increasingly more frantic voice talking into Danny’s phone that just kept ringing and her headache pounding worse than ever, all she could do was moan. “I don’t know, they’re just gone.”

The worst day of her life was just getting started and was going to continue for a long, long while.

[sparkypantaloons]

Only Pieces

Every time he sees Jason he has to remind himself that it’s real. His son, his precious boy, is here and breathing and living. But, alive or not, he still died. And that bit never goes away.

Jason came back, but Bruce still mourns his death.

Love is the whole thing. We are only pieces.

It hits Bruce out of nowhere. Like a rabid wolf materialising out of the warm afternoon air, savaging him in to pieces of the man he once was. Breath, bone and sinew; torn apart and thrown up into the atmosphere. He can’t see, he can’t hear, he can’t speak. Why would he need to? He’s nothing but fragments now. Left to rot down into dust.

“You okay, B?” Tim asks, looking at him concerned.

He pulls his mortarboard hat off Jason’s head, elbows his brother in the ribs.

Bruce blinks. Tries to pull the shards of himself back together. Cobble them into something that resembles human.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, old man.” Jason says, side-eyeing him. He shrugs off the graduation gown as he speaks, throws it over Tim’s head.

Tim huffs, grabbing at the swathes of fabric. His hair sticks up in all directions as the cloth falls into his hands.

Bruce manages a stiff nod. Clears his throat. “We need to leave in five.” He says. The words rise in his throat like glass.

Tim shrugs. “Ready when you are.”Jason doesn’t say anything. He just stares at the older man, eyes narrowed.

Bruce turns. Leaves the library. His vision is blurring, he feels like he might be sick.

Somehow he finds his way to his study. He closes the door more heavily than he intended and it rattles in its frame. The sound is like an assault, all at once too loud and barely audible over the rushing in his ears.

He sits in the chair behind his desk. Gropes for the second drawer down on the right hand side. The whiskey bottle rattles as he yanks the drawer open. Then the liquid rattles down his throat as he drinks straight from the bottle. It doesn’t burn the way it used to, but it still works. Just.

His senses return. Taste first, then smell, the woody flavour of the spirit left lingering in his mouth. Then he can feel the bottle in his hand, round and smooth under his calloused fingers. He watches the liquid settle as he places it down on the desk, the blurring at the edge of his vision disappearing. He can breathe again.

He slumps back in the chair, tilts his head back and takes a deep breath through his nose. A tear escapes the corner of his eye before he can stop it. He wipes it away quickly and takes another deep breath. He can’t do this now.

“Master Bruce?” Alfred is stood in the doorway. His eyes slide from the younger man to the bottle on his desk, and he tilts his head knowingly. “The boys are waiting.” He says gently.

Bruce nods. His eyes are in danger of blurring again. “Jason, he…” He croaks. He screws his eyes shut, takes another steadying breath.

“I know, Master Bruce.” Alfred says kindly. “I saw.”

~

Bruce drives Tim to his graduation ceremony and Dick comes too. Tim makes his brother sit in the back because even if Dick is the oldest, it’s Tim’s graduation. They chatter away on the journey and Bruce makes sure to laugh or interject at the right moments, to frown or make disapproving sounds when he should. But he’s gripping the steering-wheel too tightly and he’s not fool enough to think they haven’t noticed.

When they arrive, they have photos taken of the three of them. Dick and Bruce in dark blue suits, Tim in between them in his academic regalia. They grin brightly but Bruce only just remembers to let go of Tim when it’s over. Remember’s that he can’t hold his children in his arms forever, no matter how much he wants to.

They mingle before the ceremony, meeting some of Tim’s friends and their families. Brucie Wayne comes out, and Bruce manages to lose himself in the performance. He almost convinces himself that he’s okay, is sure that he will have at least convinced the boys. But when he and Dick take their seats in the hall and Tim has left to sit with the rest of his class, Dick reaches down and takes his hand. He squeezes it tightly and says under his breath “You’re okay, Bruce. It’s okay.”

Bruce has to take another deep breath, then makes the command decision that enough is enough. He slips his hand out of Dick’s, takes out his phone and opens an old WhatsApp group. He sends a short message, then mutes the chat before any replies come through.Today is about Tim.

Bruce slips the phone back into his pocket. He can fall apart later.

~

Tim accepts his degree and they have more photos. He throws his mortarboard higher than any of the other graduates, and then he puts the cape on Bruce and the hat on Dick for one last photo, grinning between them and clutching his certificate, one arm wrapped tightly around Bruce’s waist.

Back at the Manor there are more photos and Alfred opens some champagne. Steph and Babs are there, Cass and Damian and Jason too. Together they laugh and hug and clink glasses and order pizza for dinner, because Tim didn’t want Alfred cooking when he should be celebrating with his family.

Bruce lets himself slip under the surface of the noise, the sound of his children, bickering and joking and breathing and growing. The sound of the living. He lets the sheer life of them wash over him, feels the splinters of his heart float to the surface. He can breathe again.

Dick watches him from across the room. Bruce pretends not to notice.

~

It’s a long few hours later when he checks his phone. The old group chat full with unannounced messages.

He slips quietly out of the drawing room. The hallway is cold away from the warmth of his family. He suppresses a chill and makes his way to his study.

Sat at his desk in the quiet and the dark, he feels some of his resolve seep out of him. The Zoom loading wheel spins, then faces begin to populate the screen. There’s Judy in the top right, her horn rimmed glasses sitting atop her thick curly hair. Sal is just beneath her, his French bulldog snoozing in his lap. Top left is Bhavin, Ganesh sat on a shelf behind him, peeking out behind the cloud of white hair. Beneath him, in the bottom left of the screen, is Bruce. Elbows resting on the desk, heels of his hands pressed into his eyes.

“Oh darlin’.” Sal’s southern drawl comes through the speakers. “What happened?”

Bruce can’t speak. His throat has closed up. He’s trying desperately to force his tears back into his eyes, but they slip down under his hands anyway.

"Didn’t your boy graduate today?” Bhavin asks. He’s lived in the US fifty years, but his voice still carries the sound of his native Mumbai.Bruce manages a nod.

“Ah damn.” Judy says softly, pushing a hand to her chest. “That’s hard.”

“It’s been years.” Bruce croaks out. “This shouldn’t… I shouldn’t…”

“Shouldn’t what?” Bhavin asks him sharply. “Shouldn’t still mourn your child? What his life could have been?”

Bruce takes a deep breath. He finally looks at the screen. “I just… I know today was about Tim, but all I could see was Jason in the cap and gown, clear as day. And all I could think was how he should have graduated. How he should have grown up and been safe and happy and whole and…” He trails off. Stops himself before the tears threaten to spill again.

“He should have.” Judy says emphatically. “Jason should have had all those things. And so should my Tiana, and Sal’s Michelle and Bhavin’s Darshan.”

“It’s not fair.” Sal adds. “It’s not fucking fair and it’ll never be easy. Because you love your boy and he shouldn’t have been taken so soon.”

“My Darshan died forty years ago.” Bhavin says solemnly. “I still cry. I still wonder what he would be like now, who he would have become. Still rage he is not here with me. It never goes away.”

Bruce nods, and it’s Bhavin’s last sentence that keeps the guilt at bay. Because of course Bruce can’t tell them that Jason isn’t dead anymore. He can’t tell them how Jason dragged his small broken bones out of his own grave and clawed his way back to life. How he’s currently sat not fifty feet away, under Bruce’s own roof, surrounded by family and warmth and love.

And part of it doesn’t feel fair. That his boy came back when their children didn’t. But he’d gladly spend the rest of eternity paying whatever debt it is he owes for that miracle. Every time he sees Jason he has to pinch himself, remind himself that it’s real. His son is alive, his precious boy is here and breathing and living.

But, alive or not, he still died. And that bit never goes away.The grief of it comes out of nowhere. On a Tuesday afternoon, in the middle of a board meeting, or out on patrol on a Thursday night. It’ll hit him when he’s eating breakfast, or brushing his teeth, when he’s in the gym, or lying in bed… and the ground will fall out from under him. He’ll plummet into an abyss of grief and despair and rage. His boy, his darling boy. Dead. The life he could have lived, the wonder he could have been. Gone.

Because even if Jason is back, is alive, the dying never goes away.

All the pain and torment that came with it is here to stay, for good. He’ll never be what he could have been and Jason never deserved that.

It’s these three people, these once-strangers, who in some ways helped keep him alive just as much as Tim did, that bring him back from that edge. People who understand just as well as him that feeling of loss. How a taste or a smell can mean nothing one day and have you drowning the next.

Bruce hadn’t bothered to respond when Leslie had suggested he join a support group. She couldn’t possibly understand what it was to lose a child; what value could her advice possibly have? But then the rational part of his mind, what sad, little fragment of it was left, said that a support group could understand. That that was the whole point.

So he’d done it. Apprehensive though he was, he’d shown up on a rainy Wednesday evening all those years ago. At a church hall that wasn’t quite warm enough, serving coffee that was all but cold. Bruce Wayne, Jason Todd’s father. Turns out grief takes the edge off celebrity. Judy and Sal and Bhavin didn’t care who he was, only what he’d been through, only what he’d lost. Being a billionaire didn’t make you immune from loss. Hell, neither did being Batman. Nothing did. They understood that. In a way no-one else in his life did. And all these years later they understood it, still.

“You’re allowed to be sad, Bruce.” Judy says. “A hundred years from now you’re still allowed to be sad. But you have to keep on.”

“Remember Tim did it for him too.” Sal says. “Your boys and Cass are living for Jason too. Just like you are.”

Judy and Bhavin nod in agreement and Bruce finds himself joining in.

“Thank you.” He says. And he means it. “As always.”

“Any time, beta.” Bhavin says. “Any time.”

The screen goes black, and Bruce sits with his thoughts a moment. Already a weight has started to lift and he finds himself glad the night isn’t over yet. That his family is waiting just a short walk away.

Ace pads into the room, rest his head on Bruce’s knee. He scratches the dog behind his ears.

“Err… what are you doing?”

Bruce startles. Dick is stood in the doorway, staring at him with a look of concern.

“Why are you sat in the dark?”

Bruce can’t quite help himself when he says. “I’m Batman.”

Dick rolls his eyes so aggressively they might pop out of his head.

“What are you two doing?” Jason walks in to join them. “Why are you in here in the dark?”

“Why are you in here in the dark?” Dick shoots back.

“I came looking for you.” Jason shoves Dick lightly.

“I came looking for him.” Dick shoves him right back.

Bruce stands and walks towards them. He can't help but smile. “Mission accomplished.” He says. “What fine detectives you both are.”

This time Jason rolls his eyes, but Dick says, “You okay, B?”

Bruce nods, puts his arms around both of their shoulders as they leave the study, and maybe, just maybe, he squeezes Jason a little tighter than normal, relishes the solid aliveness of his second son in his arms. “I’m fine.” He says. “Just fine.”

[redroomwidows]

Wildest Dreams | F.W

SUMMARY: They’re in a war, everyone’s life is on the line and Fred doesn’t want Y/n to forget him.

WORD COUNT: 1.6k

WARNINGS: fluff, but then angst. canon character death...not described, but there’s some grief. 

A/N: This is my second piece for @gcdric​’s Taylor Swift writing challenge! This fic doesn’t follow the song as much as Mr. Perfectly Fine did, it’s very much a looser interpretation of it. I hope you enjoy nonetheless! 

fun fact! I’ve never actually written for Fred before, so this may be really ooc. I’m apologiding in advance lol but hopefully it’s not too ooc!

Fred Weasley x fem! reader

‘Say you'll remember me’

It was quiet. 

Silent even. Usually, this would worry Y/n, but today, today it was calming and was a reminder that neither her nor Fred were in imminent danger. Their shared bedroom had rays of sunlight beaming through the curtains and Y/n almost blamed herself for not shutting them properly when she first woke up because of the light on her eyes. Almost. Because when she rolled over, she realised the sunlight let her see Fred’s sleeping face and let her admire the bronze and gold mixed amidst the ginger of his hair.

“Mornin’ love,” he croaks and Y/n smiles slightly, of course he wasn’t actually asleep

“Morning,” Fred slowly opens his eyes and raises an eyebrow slightly

“Were you watching me?”

“Maybe,” 

“Weirdo,” he tries to stay serious, but a wide smile breaks through and he scoots closer to his fiancé, snuggling into her shoulder “What were you thinking about?”

“Hm, nothing,”

“So, you were just staring at me?” Fred knew when she was thinking, he always had.

“Fine,” Y/n sighs “I was thinking about how pretty you are,”

“Pretty?” Fred raises his head from her shoulder and looks her in the eyes “You mean handsome,”

“Nope,” she pops the p “pretty,” then kisses his nose, something she knew he hated.

“No, handsome,” he insists

“Pretty,” Y/n sings and Fred raises his hands up in a tickling motion

“Say I’m handsome,”

“Pretty,” she repeats and starts laughing even before Fred’s touched her, and when he does and starts moving his finger around, she laughs louder, kicking about “Stop!”

“Say I’m handsome!”

“Freddie!”

“Say it!” he keeps tickling her and when she starts to struggle to breathe, she shouts out: 

“Fine! Fine! Handsome! I was thinking you were handsome!” he stops and Y/n lays still for a moment, breathing deeply and Fred watches, his elbow squashed into the bed as he holds his head in his hand. 

Eventually, Y/n regains her breath and leans in to whisper in Fred’s ear “Pretty,”. He doesn’t tickle her this time, just smiles fondly as she giggles to herself, staring up at the ceiling. He’d let her have this one, in fact if he himself wasn’t so stubborn, he’d let her win every time. He liked her like this, calm and happy, unable to keep a smile off her face. He wanted to see her like this forever.

“Let’s run away,” 

“What?” Y/n turns to Fred, eyes still glassy from his ‘attack’

“Let’s run away,” he repeats, but he can tell Y/n is still confused “leave here and find a cottage in the woods or something,”

“Fred… are you being serious?”

“Yes!” Fred smiles and excitement floods his voice “Bill and Fleur did it, why can't we?”

“We’re not Bill and Fleur,” Y/n says in disbelief, not sure if Fred was joking or not “they have a baby on the way, your future niece or nephew,”

“Yours to,” Fred gestures to the ring on her left finger proudly. He’d proposed their first year out of Hogwarts, Molly had said it was too soon but when Death Eater attacks became more frequent, she was happy to see her son so happy. She also knew Fred wouldn’t listen to her anyway. He loved Y/n L/n and he would marry her anywhere, anytime. But soon preferably. He adored the idea of being able to say ‘my wife’ and he wanted to call her Mrs Weasley and come up with a whole new branch of nicknames for her based on her new status. But he had to wait, he could do that.

“Our future niece or nephew,” she corrects, “and you and George have the shop,”

“It’s not even open at the moment,” Fred mutters quietly, knowing Y/n was right, but still wanting to believe for a minute more that they could leave “Please?”

“You know we can’t go…” Y/n takes a deep breath as the somewhat jokey conversation becomes serious “we’re gonna be needed…” she looks left and out the window, holding a hand over her stomach.

“I know,” Fred smiles, putting his hand over Y/n’s “Can’t blame me for being in love with ya,”

“Guess I can’t,” Y/n smiles with him as she remembers the last time he said that to her.

It was their last year at Hogwarts and George and Fred had finally grown tired of Umbridge. They haven’t fully told Y/n the plan, but she knew they weren’t coming back. Fred had minutes to say goodbye before him and George had to set the plan into the motion, and he was grabbing Y/n’s hands so tightly she thought the circulation might never come back.

“Come with us,” he whispers and she looks down, smiling lightly

“You know I can’t,”

“Why not?”

“My parents would kill me,” she laughs and presses a kiss to his lips, whispering into them “You would kill me,”

“I would,” he nods “What are you thinking, throwing away your future for a boy?”

“A ginger one nonetheless!” Y/n gasps, playing along

“Oi!” George shouts from behind a door and Y/n laughs as Fred shouts out to him

“Stop eavesdropping you prat!” shuffling is heard and Y/n gazes at Fred again, trying to memorise his face before he leaves.

“Promise you’ll write?”

“Of course. You can hear everything about mine and Georgie’s experiments and how I came up with all of the ideas” Y/n would laugh, but all she can manage is an amused brow raise

“And you’ll be here for graduation?” 

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” he nods “Promise,” There’s a knock on the door, a signal Fred needed to go.

“I love you,” Y/n says quickly

“I love you too,” They share one more kiss and Fred whispers into her lips “Come with me?”

“Fred!”

“Can’t blame me for being in love with ya!” with that, he gives her hands a final squeeze before leaving, giving her a wink as he shuts the door. 

“Y/n…” Fred waves a hand over her eyes “you there?”

“Hm?” she turns back to him

“You alright?”

“Yeah,” she rolls onto her right side so she can look at him properly “You?” Fred seems to be thinking about his answer and Y/n puts her left hand over his shoulder, rubbing soft circles on the soft cotton of his t-shirt “Freddie?”

“We’re gonna be needed,” he repeats her earlier statement slowly “And when we are, something may happen to me...If I don’t make it -”

“Fred!” Y/n’s eyes widen, completely not expecting such a sombre topic to come up on a Wednesday morning, especially after such a somewhat cheery morning “Can we please not, not now?”

“I need to say it Y/n, I need to get it off my chest, I’ve been thinking about it for days,” he had been acting differently, he’d been quieter at dinner and seemed to want to cling to her and George more, talking about going to the Burrow when it was safe to. So maybe that’s why she gave in, or maybe it was the soft ‘please’ he muttered afterwards that he paired with pleading eyes.  She could never deny him, not when he looked like that, so sad.

“Okay,”

“If I don’t survive…” he keeps pausing and Y/n supposes that if she was talking about the same thing, she would do the same “I want you to remember me, I want you to remember us -”

“Of course, I’m going to remember you!” Y/n couldn’t believe he’d think she’d ever forget him.

“I know! I just need you to promise. Promise you’ll remember me and us. Promise me you’ll remember when we used to wake up at god knows when just to watch the sunrise and when the sun used to set in summer and we’d just lay out by the lake. Because you always talked about how it calmed you. I want you to remember how you used to write crap poetry and dramatically read to me and I could never really tell if you were joking or not, so I didn’t laugh and you always thought I was annoyed with you,”

Y/n feels a bit hot in the face at the mention of that, she was just a tad bit embarrassed. 

“Promise me you’ll remember the sunrises, the sunsets, the parties and the snogging but also promise me you’ll remember this, lazy mornings in bed, cooking together and cuddling. And promise me you’ll see me again, even if it’s in a Quidditch portrait at school or photos around the flat, or memories or dreams. Promise me you’ll remember me?”

“I promise,” she whispers, kissing him slowly “But don’t worry about it too much. Neither of us have to worry, because you’re not dying. Not on my watch,”. Fred smiles and in seconds, the subject seemed to be forgotten as he bops his fiancé’s nose and starts a conversation about what their brunch should be.

Y/n remembered that conversation now as she stood in a graveyard, staring down at what would have been her future husband's tombstone where she’d recently placed some flowers, right next to George’s. 

She remembered the sunrises,

“Freddie...I’m too tired for this…”

“Promise me, it’ll all be worth it love,”

and the sunsets, 

“Are you okay?”

“No... but just, watch this with me,”

 the parties,

“You have had far too much to drink,”

“Y/n! I missed you!”

“I just went to the loo,”

“Yeah, but I love you!”

 the snogging,

“Fred...we cannot be doing this here,”

“Shhhh, tell me you don’t get a little bit of satisfaction from doing this in Snape’s classroom,”

 and the lazy mornings in bed, cooking together and cuddling. 

“I love you,”

“Are you talking to me or the pancakes I just brought you?”

 “Y/n, it’s on fire!”

“What?!”

“Joking…”

“You twat!”

 “We should get up…”

“No! Stay here, just a bit longer,”

 She remembered everything. She would never forget and while she may only ever be able to be with Fred in her dreams, she still loved him more than anything. She’d be with him someday, when it was her time to go. 

 ‘Say you'll see me again

Even if it's just in your wildest dreams’

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[for-the-ninth]

Happy Sunday Mothertruckers! Posting this from the bed, where I'm nursing my girlfriend back from the brink of a migraine.

Wrote chapter 8, hated it, so decided to rewrite it. The bones are still there, but the accoutrements have changed. This excerpt is a continuation of the last bit I posted, in which Shielan is in charge of sentencing Cullen for his crimes in Kirkwall.

Chapter 4 of The Life That Left Me goes up on Wednesday!! Read the first three chapters here. Tags and some ramblings about my feelings on Cullen under the cut!

“That was a joke.” She paused and met his gaze, the faintest hint of a smile tugging at her otherwise steely expression. “Which isn’t to say I won’t do it, but considering your penchant for following orders, I’m certain it won’t come to that.”

He wanted to laugh, but felt empty inside. His eyelids were still heavy and swollen from the night before, the skin beneath them red and puffy from tossing and turning until morning. He’d cried for hours, curled up in a tight ball, knees hugged to his chest, gasping for air between sobs. Not even the death of his parents had inspired such unabashed displays of grief. Yet all the while, he'd thought, What right have I to sit here weeping like a child, after all I’ve done?

“I’ve no plans to escape,” he said, with a rasp rough as gravel. “Weapons I’ve left in my quarters, so I’m ready now if you are."

Shielan, having resumed her chaotic rifling, ignored him in favor of muttering curses under her breath, and he was momentarily perturbed by her lack of gravitas. Perhaps this ordeal was merely a blip in her frame of consciousness—understandable, considering all she’d had thrust upon her in the last month alone—but it was earth shattering to him. He made it a point to clear his throat louder than was truly necessary, and immediately regretted it. 

“Surely,” she said, yanking open another desk drawer and throwing the contents out onto the floor, “it is not the disgraced Commander—for whom I’ve already dreamt up seventeen wildly creative methods of execution—who plucks at me with such childlike impatience.”

As I design this redemption arc for Cullen, there are a few key points that have become important for me, and these are the reasons I've chosen to write parts of the fic from his perspective.

If you've ever done something hurtful, no matter how big or small, you know how heavy it weighs on your conscience. I've certainly hurt people in ways they found unforgivable, and I had to figure out how to hold myself accountable for that and move forward knowing forgiveness wouldn't be possible for me. Too often, I believe we get caught in a trap of seeking forgiveness first, and it can hinder our growth if we believe our integrity is dependent on someone forgiving us.

Cullen aided and abetted a lot of heinous shit in Kirkwall - shit that the survivors are not going to readily forgive him for, because even him acknowledging it and being willing to atone doesn't fix their trauma. He has to learn how to live with that and how to find meaning in moving forward despite that lack of forgiveness.

People don't fit neatly into categories of Good vs Bad, and accountability is rarely easy. I feel it's important to show the journey from Cullen's perspective, so we can see the very human guilt and shame he contends with.

Anyway, thanks for reading my rambles, and here are some tags: @oxygenforthewicked @roguelioness @cleverblackcat @scribbledquillz @noire-pandora @charmcity-jess and anyone else who feels like it! No pressure to post obvs.

[love-bokumono-fics]

WIP Wednesday - Trio of Towns

Trio of Towns has no shortage of wonderful works that are in progress. Some of them I know are years in the making and I always look forward to an update.

So here's hoping you find a new story to love!

If you're reading or writing a Trio of Towns WIP that didn't get featured today, please feel more than welcome to drop it in the Submission box and share with the rest of us! (When I only share 10 fics at a time, there's always something that's bound to be missed.)

Two in One - by PineconeTheKitten; WIP, 1/?, 1.3k

Rating: Mature; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Categories: F/M, M/M, Multi

Fandom: Trio of Towns

Relationships: Ford/Wayne, Female Farmer/Ford, Female Farmer/Wayne; Characters: Female Farmer, Ford, Wayne, Dessie, Inari, Witchie

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Magic Revealed, Gods, Goddesses, Spirits

Summary: Ford and Wayne were once two people. Now they aren't. Holly doesn't know what to do. As it turns out, Ward is pretty into Holly, and she into him.

Two Individuals in Love can be Asexual, a Case Study - by chickadeequill; WIP, 1/?, <1k

Rating: General Audiences; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Category: F/M

Fandom: Trio of Towns

Relationship: Farmer/Ford; Characters: Ford, Female Farmer, Wayne

Additional Tags: Asexual Relationship, Romantic Fluff

Summary: After years of painstakingly avoiding romance, the town's eligible and single doctor Ford finds himself facing a simple question: is there room in his life for love? It seems the hardworking farmer just past the crossroads is still single as well, and Ford just can't figure out why she keeps declining advances from the other eligible singles in all three towns.

Watered-Down Ideals - by LemWrites; WIP, 3/?, 4k

Rating: Not Rated; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Categories: M/M, Multi

Fandoms: Trio of Towns

Relationships: Farmer/Ludus; Characters: Original Male Character(s), Frank, Megan, Hector, Colin, Noel | Noelle

Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Self-Esteem Issues, Slow Burn, Fluff, Self Confidence Issues, ADHD, I gave a farmer adhd and anxiety, this may have more projection then intended

Summary: Join Steve, the newly appointed farmer in the Trio of Towns world, on a journey full of; useless gay pinning, being a disaster, self hatred and more!

Earth and Rebirth - by TheBeckster; WIP, 17/?, 66k

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Categories: Multi, Gen

Fandoms: Trio of Towns

Characters: Holly | Nanami, Frank, Marlena, Wayne, Ford, Lisette, Brad, Carrie, everyone

Additional Tags: Undecided Relationship(s), Additional Tags to Be Added, lots of headcanons, Minor Character Death, Eventual Friends to Lovers, I'm not going to tag every single character, but they will all have a part in the story, Grief/Mourning, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, Pregnancy, Unplanned Pregnancy, New friends and found family, world building, Angst with a Happy Ending, Holly is an extrovert, endgame ship tbd, Cover Art

Summary: Holly considered herself fortunate to be living about as close to the dream as any young twenty-something could. A great family, a loving husband, and well, she'd admit their apartment was awful, but they'd be moving onto bigger and better things soon enough. She truthfully couldn't wish for more. But when an accident rips it all away from her, Holly finds herself seeking a change of scenery. Her Uncle's farm out in the middle of nowhere is the perfect place for her to hide to mourn. A familiar story with a twist or two.

Fire and Dew - by Juliko; WIP, 9/26, 73k

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences; Archive Warning: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings; Category: F/M

Fandoms: Trio of Towns

Relationship: Yuzuki/Original Character(s)

Characters: Original Female Character(s), Yuzuki, Sumomo, Lisette, Colin, Wayne, Brad, Carrie, Shizu, Yaichi, Tatsumi, Omiyo, Umekichi, Lynn, Marlena, Daryl | Darius, Ittetsu, Moriya

Additional Tags: farming, Slice of Life, Drama, Family Drama, Family Issues, Autism, Autism Spectrum, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Original Character(s), Major Original Character(s), Female Character of Color, Friendship, Male-Female Friendship, Friendship/Love, Past Child Abuse, Child Abuse, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Eventual Romance, Romance, Slow Build, Slow Burn, Slow Romance, Humor, Eventual Happy Ending, Comedy, Friends to Lovers, Adoption, Sick Character, Lulukoko characters won't appear in this fic, Falling In Love, Dorks, Ableism, Happy Ending, Romantic Fluff, Break Up, Past Relationship(s), Cows, Chickens, Sheep, Rabbits, Flowers, Stimming, Family Fluff, Bisexual Female Character, Pansexual Character, Lesbian Character, Children, Childhood Memories, Childhood Trauma

Summary: For as long as she could remember, Harper Leigh Maxwell's dream has always been to become a farmer, but her father's job makes it hard to do so, since it involves lots of moving. After graduating from college, she finally decides to take a chance and get her own farm. She's determined to make the most of this opportunity and do what she's wanted. In the process, she makes new friends, learns many new things, and faces many hardships. One of the friends she makes is Yuzuki Fujiwara, a mellow, sweet natured man from the town of Tsuyukusa who doesn't have the best constitution. The two of them form a strong connection that may even end up blossoming into love. But Harper's past might make things complicated, and when it threatens to catch up with her, she may find herself facing the demons from her pre-adoption early childhood. This is the story of two different people, with different interests, passions, and paths in life, walking the same dirt road every day...

Tiny Steps to Big Leaps - by Distracteddiddlin; WIP, 29/?, 28k

Rating: Mature; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Category: Other

Fandom: Trio of Towns

Relationship: Ford/Holly | Nanami; Characters: Ford, Holly | Nanami, Brad, Wayne

Additional Tags: Fluff, Developing Relationship, surprise parenting, rating and tags will update, NB Farmer, Idiots in Love, Wet Dream, Love Confessions, oh it's fucking started now, Mildly Dubious Consent, for like the smallest split second

Summary: Me while writing this months ago: what if I did that that Ford/farmer fic again but with a twist? Basically it's what if Ford accidentally became a single dad after the farmer meets him

Stranded - by TheBeckster; WIP, 2/?, 4k

Rating: General Audiences; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Category: Gen

Fandoms: Trio of Towns

Relationships: Ludus & Siluka, Ludus & Iluka, Iluka & Siluka; Characters: Ludus, Iluka, Siluka, Tototara, Zahau, Caolila

Additional Tags: all aboard the childhood trauma boat!, Pre-Canon, Peril, Wilderness Survival, Mild Blood

Summary: Desperate for an adventure to break up the interminable boredom of a long summer, three kids set to the high seas and get way more adventure than they ever hoped for or wanted. AKA: Let's explore the Lulukoko Trio's shared childhood trauma!

Trio Of Towns - Figuring Out Love - by vampireprincess624; WIP, 6/?, 5k

Rating: General Audiences; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Category: Multi

Fandom: Trio of Towns

Relationship: Ford/Pixie; Characters: Ford, Pixie, Wayne, Brad, Lisette, Carrie, Noelle, Colin, Miranda, Frank, Megan, Hector, Other(s)

Summary: Pixie Fawn is left with a mess she has to sort out after leaving Ludus at their wedding because Ford, who had been away for seven months, appeared as a guest. But how is fixing things with the stubborn doctor more difficult than sorting things out with her ex husband-to-be? Are they destined to be friends or will their stronger feelings for each other lead to love? A lot of Ford/Pixie scenes where they figure out their love for each other. This is Part 3 to my series, Life In The Towns, and I strongly advise you read Part 1 (or at least the last few chapters) before this, but it should still make sense anyway. Hope you enjoy :)

The House That We Built - by CherryQDoodles; WIP, 2/?, 8k

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences; Archive Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply; Category: F/M

Fandom: Trio of Towns

Relationships: Holly | Nanami/Ludus; Characters: Ludus, Original Characters, Lulukoko Villagers, Westown Villagers, Tsuyukusa Villagers

Additional Tags: Slow Burn, story building, Learning from the Past, Tons of fluffy moments, farmlife shenanigans, Festivals, Romance, Dark skinned MC, Other Additional Tags to Be Added

Summary: Nicola knew as soon as she was able to talk that she was very different from the family she was raised in. From her dark skin to her snow white hair she stuck out as the black sheep, but she loved them like they were her blood, and vice versa. But Nicola always dreamed of wanting more: to become a farmer. Growing crops, raising animals and everything in between! She just had to convince her father that she could handle the hard work within two years time. Follow Nicola's journey to becoming the best farmer she dreams of, and her adventures in the Trio of Towns!

Ford's Roses - by thelighthouse33; WIP, 5/?, 3k

Rating: General Audiences; Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply; Category: F/M

Fandom: Trio of Towns

Relationship: Farmer/Ford; Characters: Ford, Female Farmer, Wayne, Megan, Frank, Miranda, Carrie, Brad, Lisette, Noel | Noelle, Colin

Additional Tags: My First Work in This Fandom, better late than never, Ford x Holly, Story of Seasons Trio of Towns, Harvest Moon - Freeform, Gaming

Summary: This is a story of how the doctor of Westown, in charge of The White Capsule Clinic, falls in love with the new farm girl...

[schrijverr]

'Till Death Do Us Part

Part 3 out of 13

When Alex has to bring Philip to work, he and Thomas discover that they both have something in common: they lost their love. They form an unexpected bond and connection about this that grows into something more.

A medium burn with parental feelings about Philip and flowers.

On AO3.

Ships: Jamilton

Warnings: grief and mentions of unhealthy coping, terminal illness and death.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter 3: Virginian Spiderwort Means ‘Momentary Happiness’

“Eat lunch,” a sandwich along with a muffin and coffee was dropped on Alex’s desk, who jumped slightly in his seat and looked up.

“What?” he asked dumbly.

Thomas rolled his eyes: “You’ve been at it since six, I don’t even know why you were in that early that’s ridiculous, who comes in that early on a Thursday? And I haven’t seen you leave once. You need to eat, so eat, dumbass.”

“How do you know I started at six?”Alex asked.

“I didn’t, you send me an email around then, so I made a guess and you just confirmed it,” Thomas shrugged, ignoring Alex’s squawk, “Now eat.”

Alex picked up the lunch and started eating, while Thomas dropped into the chair opposite of him and watched him, sipping his own coffee.

“You’re just gonna sit there and watch me the entire time? Where is your lunch?”

“Already ate it and yes,” Thomas answered, “I know how this goes, you’ll come up with a good sentence and stop eating to write it down and then it’s a few hours later.”

Alex looked guilty and chastised, so he closed his laptop, which he had been staring at, and focused on Thomas: “So, how have you been?”

“That’s so awkward, I feel bad for us both,” Thomas cringed.

“Well, I’m sorry that I am not a great conversationalist,” Alex threw up his hands in defeat.

“According to Angie you are,” Thomas immediately regretted it, he didn’t want Alex to know he and Angelica talked about him.

“Yeah, but most of the time people I’m talking to aren’t you.” Fuck, was that too revealing? Did Thomas know he was struggling, because of stupid feelings?

“I’m sorry my face upsets you,” Thomas rolled his eyes, misinterpretingthe comment“Anyway, how did you get in so at six, I’m pretty sure schools don’t start that early. Where did you put Philip?”

“Oh, Pip is with Eliza and Maria for the week,” he said, “Eliza is so busy after the opening of the orphanage and they thought having a kid comfortable with them there would help the others get out of their shell and Pip had missed his Aunties. He’s staying till Wednesday.”

“And you decided that working abnormal amounts was smart when you got a bit of a break from your usual responsibilities?” Thomas judged, not so silently.

Alex grinned sheepishly and shrugged: “It’s what I do best, but I’m not being a complete dumbass, I leave a a somewhat normal time, I swear.”

“Hmmh.”

“I’m serious, I promised Angie I’d leave each day before six and she checks, it’s terrifying,” Alex shuddered and Thomas laughed: “Hear, hear.”

After that Alex quickly ate his lunch while they talked about the latest meeting, which lead to Alex complaining about Lee and Adams and how they could go fuck themselves.

When his lunch had completely disappeared, Thomas got up to leave. Before he could, however, Alex called out: “Hey, Thomas?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks again. For, you know, checking up on me,” he said awkwardly, “If you, like, ever need help or something, call me, okay?”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Thomas promised, not thinking the day he would take Alex up on it would come anytime soon.

He was wrong in that assessment, because that Monday he called Alex, hands shaking and eyes blurry.

“Thomas? What is it? I’m already at work.” Of course he was, it was only 6:15 in the morning, who wouldn’t be at work at that time.

“Can you-” a shuddery sigh that he hated, “Can you tell Wash- Washington that I’m not coming- coming in today?” he asked.

“God, Thomas, are you alright?” the worry was evident in Alex’s tone.

“Not really,” Thomas sounded small, “I didn’t want to bother you, but Jemmy is away and I normally can handle this stuff, but it was all unexpected and now I’m here on my fucking kitchen floor calling you. Fuck.”

“I’m coming to you.” Alex said.

“You don’t need to-”

“Yes, I do. Come on, I’m not leaving you like that. You’re getting a motherfucking patented Hamilton hug, live with it,” Alex told him, “I’ll be there as soon as I can, hang in there.”

“…Okay,” the line went dead.

Alex hurried to Washington’s office, for once grateful that the man liked to come in early on Monday’s to ‘kick off the week right’ or whatever.

“Come in.”

“Sir, I’m taking the day off,” Alex burst in, “Thomas is not coming in either, he just called me. I thought, I’d let you know.”

Washington looked surprised: “You and Thomas…?” he trailed off curiously.

“Nothing like that, sir,” sadly enough, he added mentally, “He helped me out in a rough spot and I’m returning the favor. We found we had something in common.”

“Well, then go. An honest man always returns his favors, son,” Washington shooed him out of the office.

“Not your son and thank you, sir,” Alex said gratefully, before rushing off.

The drive to Thomas’s, admittedly very impressive, house took about thirty minutes and Alex was out the car and on the driveway immediately as he practically ran to the door and knocked: “Hey, hey, Thomas. It’s me, open up.”

After a moment the door swung open, revealing a Thomas Alex had never seen before.

He was in sweatpants and a loose tank top, his eyes were red-rimmed and his hair a mess. But above all, he looked small, hunched in on himself and lacking the confidence and arrogance that usually clung to him like a second skin.

Alex didn’t waste a second gathering him up into his arms. It wasn’t as comforting as it could have been because Thomas was a fucking giant and therefore could not fit into Alex’s arms completely, but that didn’t stop him from trying.

Thomas clung to him tightly, chocked off sobs being ripped out of his chest as he cried.

They just stood there in the door opening. Alex couldn't really move Thomas around like the other had done him, so he just had to wait.

“Sorry,” Thomas said after a while, his voice raw as he broke away.

“No sorry, not today, okay?” Alex told him, “Now, why don’t we set you down on the couch, yeah? It’s more comfy and definitely better than the porch.”

“Yeah, sounds good,” Thomas agreed and numbly walked over to a living room, Alex trailing behind him.

Thomas collapsed on the couch, looking like a miserable heap and Alex had to pause and think of a plan of attack. He’d been a Lieutenant Colonel, he could do this. First, he needed to know the situation.

He sat down next to Thomas: “Hey, dude, can you tell me what happened? You said it was unexpected, what hit you out of nowhere?”

“Phone,” Thomas gestured vaguely to the kitchen, then didn’t elaborate beyond a, “Got an email.”

Okay, not much information, but a lead.

Alex went to the kitchen, there was an uneaten bowl of soggy cereal on the counter and a phone on the floor. He threw the cereal away and toasted some bread before he picked up the phone and read the start of the email:

My dearest, Thomas

I hope the future finds you well. Yes, the future! I found this site in which you can write emails that will be send 10 years later, so I do hope you’re still using the same email address or this will be awkward.

You may be wondering why today? It’s not a particular date for us, but I’m writing you this email because I know I won’t be there when you read it.

I had another attack today, but you know that of course, though maybe you’ve forgotten all the attacks through the years. We’ve been doing this for over three years already and I know I have not been writing the dates down.

But none of that now, this was supposed to be a pick-you-up, because I love you, dearest.

Alex stopped reading, this was not for his eyes. He quickly did the math. Thomas had said she’d died seven years ago, this was written ten years ago, so they still had three years together at this point.

God, he couldn't imagine what it was like to know your lover was dying and you could do nothing to stop it, just prepare for the inevitable.

The toast popped out the toaster and Alex locked the phone, before putting the toast on a plate and getting a glass of water. He walked back to the living room and handed Thomas the food as he gently said: “Come on, you can’t be sad on an empty stomach.”

That got a small amused huff from the Virginian, which Alex counted as a win.

He ate slowly and in silence and Alex just waited for him to gather himself. This was not a date on where you expected the missing to hit, there were no fun rituals – like on a birthday – to keep or something to celebrate or commemorate.

Just sadness.

Sudden sadness.

Alex looked at Thomas, who softly chewed on his toast. He didn’t think dragging Thomas outside today would be good for him. He needed time to process the message, to think of what his late wife wanted him to know for when she wasn’t there.

He now regretted not reading the rest of the message, just so that he could have a grip on Thomas’s thoughts, but he knew it had been the right thing to do.

When the plate was empty and the glass gone, Alex announced: “Okay, we’re having a sad couch day, but you need to tell me how to operate your TV and where you keep blankets, because you need a blanket nest to be sad in, alright.”

Thomas blinked at him owlishly for a moment, then shook his head with muted amusement and whispered: “TV is just normal and there is a guestroom, second door upstairs, I keep the blankets there.”

“Good,” Alex got up, “Are you alright for a moment?”

The other only nodded. Alex didn’t like how quiet Thomas was. He might not be the loudest person, but there would always be a presence hanging around him that made him feel like the loudest person in the room and that was now completely gone.

Alex rushed through the house, dropping of the plate and glass in the kitchen and putting on the kettle, before taking the stairs two steps at a time.

At times like these he was happy he had top surgery, because catching your breath with a binder on fucking sucked and running overall was a bad idea.

The guest room was less extravagant than he’d expected. It was decked out for comfort and stylish, but it wasn’t over the top. Actually the whole house was more stylish than expensive just for the sake of being expensive, something Alex hadn’t realized before.

Of course, the only befores there had been were company parties that Thomas had offered to host wherein he showed off on purpose.

Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t seen pictures during those parties either.

He grabbed the blankets and some pillows from the guest room and went back downstairs carefully, he didn’t want to trip or drop the blankets, but he also just wanted to be nosy.

The walls were still void of pictures.

It tugged at Alex’s heart, his own walls had been bare before he’d met John and all his other friends and they’d filled it up over the years of happy moments, but Thomas had nothing. Though he didn’t have time to dwell on it now, he had more important matters to attend to.

Thomas was still in the same position he’d left him in, staring at the still turned off TV. Alex dropped the blankets on the floor, only scooping one out of the pile to drape over Thomas’s shoulders, before finishing the tea.

How strange, he mused as he made the tea, me and Thomas are neither tea drinkers, except on days like these, except with each other.

He walked back to Thomas and handed him the mug, relieved when the other took it gratefully and let the steam warm his face as he burrowed into the blanket slightly.

Alex was still concerned about the hunched over position, which was rich coming from him, he knew, but getting lost in work and fucking up your posture was different than getting lost in grief and fucking up your posture.

So, he gently pushed Thomas back into the pillow of the couch and Thomas went easily. For all the man could fight him on every little thing at work, he wasn’t putting up a fight now and Alex was glad for that fact, even if it was slightly disturbing.

Taking the blankets, he draped them over Thomas and himself after he’d grabbed the remote and put on a nature documentary.

Thomas gave him a bemused look and Alex was never more relieved that Thomas was judging him, anything was better than that empty look in those usually lively eyes.

“It’s soothing,” he shrugged, “and low effort.”

“Fair,” Thomas nodded, his voice hoarse and raw, making Alex regret not putting honey into his tea, because it sounded like it hurt.

They sat in silence as they watched a frog hop over a leaf while the narrator told them slightly horrifying facts about the creature in a monotone voice.

After about an hour of animal facts and nature relations, Thomas spoke up: “She asked me if I had any kids yet.”

Alex looked up, but didn’t speak, just let Thomas figure it out.

“We wanted kids, I think maybe me more than her to be honest, though she loved being an aunt,” he went on, “But with her condition, well, pregnancy was just too risky and when we knew just how serious it was… Neither of us wanted to make an adopted child go through losing a parent again, so we never had kids.”

He took a shuddery breath: “And then she asked if I had them, she hoped I found that and I don’t know-”

Tears were falling again and without thinking Alex pulled Thomas into his side and Thomas didn’t protest as he burrowed his head closer. He whispered: “I always knew she wanted me to move on from her, live a good life, but hearing it again after having time to process her being gone. It’s- it’s different.”

Alex just ran a soothing hand over Thomas’s back as he thought about that. After a second he slowly said: “Knowing and accepting are different things and sometimes one is harder than the other.”

Thomas mulled over his words, then said: “Well, I hate accepting.”

He didn’t tell Thomas that moving on was good, that it was healthy. Both of them knew that well enough, they must have heard it a thousand times from concerned friends. It was always meant well, but sometimes you just didn’t want to hear it, not in moments like these.

“She told me she had something to say to me, but she didn’t know what just yet and that she had to think about it and tell me when she figured it out, because she still had time,” Thomas broke the silence again.

“That- that must be hard to read,” Alex told him.

The other nodded into his side, then said: “I think I know what it is though…”

“Do you want to share?” Alex asked.

“Yeah, she- I never realized this, but she started telling me how I would do great things and I better have a picture of her with me so that she could see it. I keep her in my wallet. I always thought she meant in the world. Big responsibility to have on my shoulders, but I tried. For her.”

Thomas fiddled with the blanket, he wasn’t looking at Alex, but he seemed content to curl up in the shorter man’s side.

“But I’m suddenly startingto think that’s not what she meant,” the words sounded small and Alex’s chest constricted painfully. He didn’t know how he would react if something he’d believed about John for years would be ripped out from under him one day without warning.

“What do you think she meant?” he asked, trying to keep Thomas talking, maybe if he said it out loud it would make more sense than when it swirled around in his head.

“I- I think she meant that I would- ugh- it’s- you had to-”

“Take your time.”

“She was always telling me about the great things in life, but she loved The Lord of the Rings, those books and movieskept her company throughout all the hospital visits. Her favorite quote was: ‘Saruman believes it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that’s not what I found. I found it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folks that keep the darkness at bay’,” he explained.

There was a moment of silence in which Thomas hesitated.

“It might be stupid, but I think she subconsciously absorbed that. That for her the great things were the small things,” Thomas said, “I once took her on a simple picnic and she said it was the greatest day of her life.”

Alex nodded along, he could already see where this was going, but he let Thomas set the pace of the conversation.

“I think she meant that I would get to do all the little things that made life great, have all the milestones we never got to have, but she phrased it in her own Martha-esque way,” there was a smile in his voice as he said that.

“Did she always have her own way of saying things?” Alex asked, hoping to keep whatever was bringing that smile to Thomas’s face going.

“Yeah,” a success, “she read a lot and she listened to a lot of music. She played guitar, wrote her own lyrics too. She was great with words, much better than me. I think she just consumed so many ways people expressed themselves through words that she had her own dialect. It was completely English, but just slightly different. It’s hard to explain.”

“I get it,” Alex assured him, “She sounds wonderful.”

“Oh, you would have liked her,” Thomas said, sounding strangely proud of that fact, “She took the time to make fun of my magenta suits in her email to me,” Alex snorted at that, “And you both take no shit and it’s easy to talk to you.”

Alex was shocked at that, no one told him he was easy to talk to. He had opinions and would let you know immediately, making you debate if you disagreed with him. Sure, he could be charming, but he made you think when you talked. It wasn’t easy.

He said nothing.

“Apparently she wrote it while I was next to her,” Thomas suddenly said.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was asleep in a chair. It was after one of her attacks, I think I remember this one, because it suddenly got way more serious after that, it was the heaviest we had in months,” his voice trailed off into a whisper, “We’d thought she was doing better.”

God, Alex couldn't imagine and that voice felt like a punch in the gut, his arm reflectively tightening around Thomas.

“Fuck, in the email she said she still has time,” Thomas breathed, “I know it was still a while after that before she- she died, but- God, it fucking hurts, Alex. We knew we didn’t have forever, but reaching thirty would have been fucking nice.”

There was that all familiar anger at what could have been if faith hadn’t decided to be so cruel. Alex knew it oh so well and just watched as Thomas clenched his fist, but didn’t get up. The anger drained out of him almost as quickly as it had come and his heaving breaths turned into sobs.

And if that wasn’t familiar as well.

Alex quickly brought up the other arm and pulled Thomas into a hug. They were cocooned in blankets and cuddling on the couch and it should be weird, but it just wasn’t.

It seemed Thomas was done talking now, because he stayed silent as the time dragged on. Once Alex realized he wasn’t going to talk, he started humming. Alex had never done well with quiet, though he didn’t mind that much, but he more thought it would nice for Thomas to have something other than his thoughts to focus on.

They sat there until their stomachs decided it really was time for lunch. Alex offered to make it so that Thomas could stay seated, but while Thomas gratefully accepted his offer to make lunch, he followed him into his kitchen and sat at the table.

His eyes fell on the phone that Alex had left on the counter when he had made them tea. His fingers twitched, but he didn’t move any further than that, conflicted look on his face. Alex let him figure it out on his own and just focused on making French toast.

In the end he picked up the phone and stared at it for a moment, before putting it down on the table, screen down.

He pushed the French toast around his plate for a while, Alex didn’t say a thing, just watched him patiently. If Thomas didn’t want to eat that would be bad, but it wouldn’t be the end of the world for just a day.

It might be bad for Alex to let Thomas indulge in bad habits, but he promised himself he would make sure it was a one of thing. He managed to make sure Philip ate and slept enough despite his own inability to take care of himself, he could do the same for Thomas.

Thomas ate a few bites, it was hard to pretend to care about food right now, but Alex had tried and he knew Martha would hate him neglecting himself.

God, Martha and her stupid- No, he couldn't think that, she meant so well, but it just hurt. She should have told him.

Though that might have been worse.

He looked at his phone again, uncertainty creeping in. Would Alex think it was a bad idea to read the email again? He just wanted to know if he hadn’t imagined it. He hadn’t really committed it to his memory like all her other writings through the tears, but he doubted he would be able to read it without crying all over again.

An idea suddenly came to mind. It was a stupid idea, but Alex had seen him suggest multiple stupid ideas so it wasn’t anything new.

“Can you read it to me?” the words were out before he even realized.

“What?”

“The email,” he clarified, “Can you read it to me?”

“You’d want that?” Alex seemed unsure and Thomas could feel the doubt creeping in.

He shook it off, he’d made up his mind: “Yes, I just want to know the whole thing, but I can’t really read it, because I’ll start crying, so you have to.”

Alex hesitated for a moment: “Alright, if you’re sure…”

“I am.” Thomas unlocked the phone and handed it to Alex, trying to ignore how his hand shook slightly.

After a deep breath, Alex started:

“My dearest, Thomas

I hope the future finds you well. Yes, the future! I found this site in which you can write emails that will be send 10 years later, so I do hope you’re still using the same email address or this will be awkward.

You may be wondering why today? It’s not a particular date for us, but I’m writing you this email because I know I won’t be there when you read it.

I had another attack today, but you know that of course, though maybe you’ve forgotten all the attacks through the years. We’ve been doing this for over three years already and I know I have not been writing the dates down.

But none of that now, this was supposed to be a pick-you-up, because I love you, dearest.

I know I tell you all the time, but maybe you haven’t heard this in a while by now, so I’m telling you again. I love you so incredibly much and you deserve all the love in the world and I hope you have someone to remind you.

It might seem strange for your wife to hope you have found love again, but I truly do hope you went on to live a happy life with people who love you and make you happy.

God, maybe you’ll have kids.

If you do, tell them that their Aunt Martha is watching over them from the stars. I promise to guide their little feet home to you safely and sing them lullabies when they’re having a nightmare, just a song between them and the moon.

I don’t want my passing to be the end for you. I have seen your soul and I know there is so much in store for you, I just can’t place my finger on what, but I still have time to figure it out and I’ll tell you when I do.

Now that I’m writing this, I honestly don’t know what to tell you. I thought I would have a hundred pages ready for you, but I don’t.

You know that moment when you have dinner with someone, but you’ve been with each other the whole day, so you can’t ask them how their day has been? It’s kind of like that.

I have seen you the entire day today and if I hadn’t I can tell you in person in a bit, but by the time you’re reading this, you’ve had time to make new memories without me and you can only tell them to my grave or my picture.

This is so morbid. Sorry, dearest.

I could take more time to think about what I want to write you, but I have this strong urge to finish it now. It’s almost like I’m running out of time. I am, in a way. But I still have tomorrow, the doctors said I’ll make it through the night with no problem and I’ll be discharged tomorrow. They say I have a good chance at a few more years and by God I hope they’re right.

It’s ironic how you’re asleep in an uncomfortable hospital chair by my side as I’m writing this.

You stress too much. It makes you look old. I know I’ve always joked about you being an old man, but you don’t have to make it a reality by aging from the stress.

I hope the creases by your eyes become more pronounced than the ones on your forehead. I hope so many things for you and I hate that I can never give you all the care you’ve given me.

You’re a good man, Thomas. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

I know you worry. You worry too much, just like the stress. Just promise me you won’t give in to all the doubt you create for yourself. Appearances aren’t everything, I know you care about style (the magenta suits are really taking it a bit too far, you are lucky I love you, you ridiculous man), but try comfort every once in a while as well, okay?

Now, I’m sounding like my mother, God this whole email has gotten out of hand…

Not that I had much of a plan to start with. I saw this and just had to write to you, to tell you how worthy you are and how much I wanted to have a forever with you.

It feels rude in a way to write you like this, you might have moved on, created a new life and I’m disrupting it from beyond, but I know you, Thomas, I know you so well that it hurts sometimes and I also know that you have a hard time letting go.

I hope you have that life we could never have.

I hope you’ve found a job that makes you happy, with a spouse that cares for you and a picket white fence that America tries to sell in every movie with a happy ending.

But I fear that you got stuck on us, on me.

And while I am flattered if that is the case (and not bitter if it isn’t, God I’m so happy for you if I’m wrong, dearest), then I want you to know it’s okay to move on, it’s okay to live.

God, this is one depressing sappy mess.

But we’re both kind of sappy depressing messes, aren’t we? You brought me flowers to the hospital today, you remembered my favorites are Virginian Spiderworts. Did you know they mean ‘momentary happiness’?

Momentary happiness, like I said: depressingly sappy.

I don’t know if I told you the meaning, but it is an interesting bouquet to bring to a hospital bed of someone terminally ill, you know? And I love you for it. Never change, Thomas, never change. Stay my sweet little dork, I beg you. If someone tries to change you, tell em no or I will come beat them up for you.

I will forever protect you, I promise.

I think this is good and if it isn’t you won’t really get to leave a review, so I’ll be safe either way. So, this is it, this is goodbye, for now at least. I still have the luxury of giving you a hug when you wake up and I’m gonna keep doing that till the end.

Stay strong, I love you,

Martha, your beloved wife”

In the end they were both crying and Alex was impressed with himself that he had managed to make it to the end. The email gave him more questions about Thomas, but he it wasn’t really the time to ask about his late wife’s protectiveness.

He cleared his throat after a moment and said: “Martha was amazing.”

That got him a surprised chuckle as Thomas’s breathing started to become more regular. He swallowed and agreed: “God, she was.”

“Tell me more about her,” Alex requested. He remembered how nice it had been to tell Thomas about John and he found himself curious about the woman that had enchanted Thomas.

“She was the most intelligent woman I’ve ever met, and I know Angelica,” Thomas started, Alex let out a small amused huff, “Martha- Martha was the kind of person you had to look at, you know? When she walked into a room, it got brighter.”

Thomas perked up considerably when talking about Martha. He was still slightly curled into himself on the kitchen chair, but he was at least making eye contact with Alex.

“I used to be overly anxious – still am, but I’m managing – and she was always there for me when I needed it. She was a spitfire, she talked when I couldn’t and stood up for me,” Thomas confessed, “I try to embody her when I need to make a presentation.”

Alex was taken aback by it: “I didn’t know you got anxious.”

“It’s better when arguing with you, I have to think too hard on how to counter you to think about stressing,” Thomas tossed out casually, immediately hoping that wasn’t too revealing, he’d already compared the man with Martha once today.

But Alex just smiled happily, though it seemed unconscious to Thomas’s eye.

“Martha never argued with me like you do, though,” Thomas mused trying to save himself, “She would just roll her eyes at me whenever I did something she found unnecessary.”

“Like what?” Alex raised a brow with amusement.

There was probably too much glee in the man’s eyes for the question to be innocent, but Thomas didn’t care: “Well there was one time a lady stopped me on the street and she asked if I did a lot of desk work, which I did, so I said yes. Then she asked me if it made my back hurt-”

“Naturally also yes,” Alex nodded.

“Indeed, so then she asked me if she could touch me and at this point I’m scared, but too far in to say no,” Thomas tells him, “So she just put her hand on my back and starts praying.”

“She blessed you?” Alex sounded delighted and disbelieving.

“Yes and I did not want to be there. So, I was sending Martha ‘come help me, please’-looks, but she just shook her head and watched me. I think she would have stepped in, if she didn’t think it hilarious,” Thomas rolled his eyes fondly, “She always asked me if I felt blessed whenever we visited a church afterwards.”

“That is hilarious,” Alex giggled at the story and Thomas felt a strange sort of pride that he made Alex giggle like that. He’d heard the other laugh before, but never giggle. It was a light sound that eased some of the pain in Thomas’s chest.

He smiled at Alex and admitted: “Maybe in hindsight it was.”

There was a natural pause in their conversation, until Alex asked: “How are you feeling?”

Thomas thought about it for a moment. The ache he’d felt in his chest when he had seen the email that morning had dulled. It was still sharper than on most days, but it didn’t feel as overwhelming and never ending as it had done.

“Better,” he answered honestly.

“That’s good to hear,” Alex said, “Do you want to go back to the couch and watch a movie? This time I’ll even let you pick.”

“Sure,” Thomas agreed easily.

“Great, do you have popcorn or something?” Alex asked, already moving around in his kitchen to check the cabinets, not even waiting for an answer.

“Upper left,” Thomas said after a while of watching Alex struggle to find it.

Alex looked up to the shelf, then back at Thomas, before he huffed: “This is just discrimination against short people.”

Thomas laughed, before getting up to grab the popcorn.

They stayed on the couch for the rest of the day, Thomas leaning into Alex’s side, neither of them caring.

For dinner Thomas made Mac-’N-Cheese and they ate while having a passionate discussion about whether the characters in the horror movie they’d watched had made the right decisions.

When Alex said he was going home, Thomas felt kind of sad about it.

“Goodbye, Alex. I- Thank you. For coming. You didn’t have to do that, but it was nice, so thanks,” he said awkwardly.

“Hey, anytime,” Alex smiled, “Besides, it was the least I could after what you did for me and-” he hesitated, “and you’re actually not that bad of a company now I know you better, so-” he shrugged, “did it with pleasure.”

Thomas smiled, it was genuine and crinkled his eyes in the way Martha had adored. He didn’t know Alex melted at the sight too.

“You’re not that bad either, Alex,” he said softly.

“Well, I see you at work,” Alex cleared his throat and stepped away then he looked back and added, “Don’t come in if you’re feeling shitty tomorrow, okay.”

“I won’t,” and Thomas found it wasn’t a lie.

Again, this is not a guide on how to deal with grief, for the love of god don’t take advise from fics. I have tried my best to make it not shit and somewhat accurate, but I can promise nothing.

I debated posting the letter separate of the fic, but it’s important to the fic and the chapter title, so I kept it like this even if it’s a bit clunky. I only decided here to make the flowers important and I thought it very descriptive of their realtions, since both knew it would end sooner than later, no matter how happy they got to be during their time together.

Also, the blessing thing actually happened to me, slightly different, but it happened. And no, I do not feel blessed and yes it was awkward and none of my friends came to my rescue.

[anathewierdo]

Call of the Ocean  Chapter 28: Déjà vu and Date Night

Pairing: CEO!Mechanic!Dean Winchester x Mermaid!Reader

Word count: 6279

Chapter summary: Thasman, Roan and Y/N have been living on land for a month now, with no way of knowing how things in Sindarta are going. Thasman and Roan are just... not talking, and Y/N is sick of it. Dean asks about the tournaments.

Series summary: CEO of Winchester Auto Dean Winchester has had enough of the office life. With his father keeping him from what he wants to do, which is work on the plant floor, Dean decides to leave for a quiet life. In Matagorda, Texas, he finds something he never thought he would, a chance encounter with a mythical creature.

Call of the Ocean Masterlist

A/N: And here it is folks! We have officially caught up to the point where @flamencodiva​ posted the series! Isn’t that awesome?! This series is a collaboration with her and I’m so damn proud of what we’ve created here. The text dividers were made by the awesome @talesmaniac89​

Next chapter of Call of the Ocean will be posted on Wednesday, December 2nd

They had been on land for a month now, and things were not looking up for the three merpeople. Just days after the plan had been crafted, Thasman and Roan had gotten themselves into a massive discussion, and it got to the point that Thasman had to stay the night at Dean’s dwelling. Since then, the two mermen had barely spoken a word to one another. Thasman out of grief, Roan out of grudge.  

Y/N’s relationship with Dean was going well, they were closer than ever before, considering that Y/N had been on the surface now for over a month. Regarding their ‘human lives’, things were progressing as the three merpeople adjusted to the strange customs and tools the humans used. It was the lack of contact from the ocean that worried them all, Thasman especially. Liara had not made another appearance since she delivered the letter from Y/N’s father, and possibilities were plaguing Thasman’s mind. More than once, he’d been caught observing the ocean, waiting for some sort of sign. There had been times when Thasman found himself marching towards the cave and reaching the edge of the lagoon, only to freeze and remind himself that it was too dangerous. With Michael in control, who knew what was happening to the people of Sindarta. 

The merman’s desperation grew with each passing day, to the point that even Roan had voiced his concerns to the princess, but refused to talk to Thasman about it.

Y/N could still feel the tension between Thasman and Roan. Many times she found herself hiding from them at the diner, or even the garage. Even if Dean wasn’t there she tried to get away from their bickering. This time however, Roan had a human male flirting with him. Thasman had come into the diner for lunch when Roan was speaking to the human who gave Roan his number. 

“Why subject yourself to heartache when you know he can never understand what you are?” Thasman had said as the three of them swam around the lagoon. 

“Y/N, can you tell Stingray that it is none of his concern,” Roan ignored Thasman and swam away from him.  

“Thasman,” Y/N sighed as she swam around, “will you just please talk to him outside of when you have to?” 

“And have him repeat all the things he said last time we spoke to each other? No,” the merman scoffed, “I’m just trying to warn him.”

“Don’t give me that, Thasman,” Y/N whined with a slight bitch face. “We’re here. Might as well let him have his fling if you are too stubborn to chase after him.” 

“I tried to chase after him and you saw what happened!”

“I will not have this argument with you Thas,” Y/N swam to her friend and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Now, we could always find someone for you,” she shrugged before letting go of his shoulder and swimming in a small circle around him. 

The fire that had begun to flicker in Thasman’s eyes was gone in an instant. His anger replaced with a stoic but defeated expression, “I’m fine, Y/N.”

“Okay, fine,” she sighed. “Just remember that Dean invited everyone over tomorrow for a bar-be-que,” Y/N enunciated, reminding him. “It would be wonderful to hang out all together. I know you’ve been working at the garage studying about cars. How is it?” 

“It’s progressing,” he shrugged. “I learned how to change oil and my driving is getting better according to Bobby.” Thasman paused as if he was thinking of what to say next, “I’ll be busy tomorrow. Can’t go to the human thing,” he said dismissively. 

“Thas,” Y/N ran her fingers along her friend's hair affectionately, “you need to get out of that head of yours. Too much work is bad for you.” She looked at him, “Andrea and I can distract Roan so you can hang out with the boys. It will be fun.” She pouted her lips and looked at him with sad hopeful eyes, “Please? I need my best friend there.”

“Those eyes of yours are a danger. It’s not fair,” Thasman grumbled. “I’ll go. But you’re gonna let me leave early.”

“Why?” she asked. “What could you have that is more important than hanging out with your friends?” 

“Things,” he brushed off, averting his gaze as he tried to swim around the princess. 

“Tell you what,” Y/N said as she stretched a bit in the water, swimming with her chest facing up. “If you can beat me in a small race around the lagoon. I will allow you to leave the party early.” 

“You could just let me.”

 “No,” she denied his request, offering a sweet innocent smile. “Besides, have you not gotten to know Cas, Benny, and Dean for this past month that we have been here? They are not going to let you leave early anyways.”  

“But what if Liara finally comes and she doesn’t find me?” Thasman pressed. “They will understand.”

“I’ll tell you what,” Y/N conceded, “I will come with you to check for her presence and then we go back. You can’t close yourself off, Thasman. I will not let you do that to yourself.” She gently bumped him, “What kind of friend would I be if I didn’t try to help cheer you up?” 

Thasman didn’t know how to answer that and he couldn’t exactly explain how his heart had swelled at his friend’s words. She was right and he knew it. With a small shake of his head to try and push back all the sea monsters that had haunted him for the last few weeks, he tried to give her his best smile, “So… race around the lagoon?”

“Loser is a blowfish,” she said as she pushed off ahead of him.

                                            ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

“Where’s Y/N today?” Cas asked Dean. “She’s usually here to bring you lunch.” 

“She said she had a busy day today with Thasman and Roan. They were going to try and get some news about what’s going on back on the island.” Dean sighed, “I know she’s having fun, but I can tell she’s still worried about her dad.”  

“Wouldn’t you be if you were a princess to a very closed off island with basically no means to communicate with the people, your people?” Cas began as he stopped reading the paper work on the clipboard to look up at Dean, “People that you had to leave behind because something happened and now you have no idea how, when, or if you’re ever going to hear from the only family that you also left behind? Along with a father who just so happens to be the fucking King of the island?”

“You okay there Cas?” Dean asked, shocked at his friends outburst. “And yes, I would be. I know she’s worried.” Dean sighed as he cleaned his hands, “I just wish I could help her. I would do anything to make sure she was safe and happy.” 

“As far as we know, she is safe. And you make her pretty happy.” Cas assured. “It would be worse for her if she didn’t have anyone to keep her sane in this waiting game.”

“Yeah,” Dean chuckled. “So, is Meg coming tomorrow?” 

Cas’ smile turned goofy, “Yes,” he confirmed. “She’s very excited, even wants to know if you need us to bring anything.”

“Booze? Or whatever you want. Benny, Thas and I are going to man the grill. Going to teach him how to grill meat.” Dean smiled, “He learns quickly, right? Might hire him as a part-timer if we get more business.”  

Castiel gave him a big smile as he took a rag to clean his hands, “And that, is the best proposition I have heard from you since we got here. We could also use his strength. He would be an expert with cars in no time.” 

“Yeah,” Dean chuckled. “He is freakishly strong. Did you see how he could lift that car without a jack easily?” he let out a whistle. “Must be a strong regimen in Sindarta for guards.” 

“I think Andrea almost passed out that time, and he just stood there, Dean! Just stood there for a full minute with no effort.” Cas laughed at the memory but gave Dean a serious look afterwards, “You were an idiot when you tried to fight him. You could have died!”

Dean gave Cas a shrug, “Could have, but I think it was something we both needed. I got good shots in.” he defended. 

“Oh yeah? From what Benny told me, you barely gave him a scratch.”

“What?!” Dean scoffed. “I got in some good punches! You can ask Thasman when you see him tomorrow.” 

Castiel brought his hands up in joking surrender, “Maybe I will,” he teased. “And the sooner you hire him, the better.”

“Yeah,” Dean smiled. “Any idea on how we get him and Roan to talk? Y/N’s been running to the house every time they fight. Not that I’m complaining, but it would be nice if my girlfriend wasn’t worried about her friends.” Dean scratched the back of his head, “I mean… Thasman seems like he wants to talk to Roan, but--” he trailed off.

“He’s spent the night with us ten times now, Dean. It is pretty bad.”

“Yeah, I know,” Dean sighed. “I mean, Y/N said Roan was super worried when Thasman was hurt. I mean, maybe if we said Thasman had an accident on site?” Dean wondered.

“Roan would ask Ellen to check on him. Wouldn’t work.”

“Hey, It’s an idea. I mean, those two… From the way Y/N describes their relationship, they had a deep bond man. I think it could work.” 

“They had a moment at the party as well but then they went back to keeping their distance,” Castiel pointed out, following Dean into the locker room to retrieve their lunch. “A month ago the plan looked fool proof, and now it looks like something out of those Mission Impossible movies.”

“Look, I’m going to be taking Y/N out tonight anyways.” Dean gave Cas a pat on his shoulder, “So if you have a chance to hang out with Thas, take it. See what would get him to worry about Roan. We need to get those two to get their heads out of their asses,” Dean sighed. 

“Alright. But I’ll need your Netflix password. And the help of Kate and Leo.”

“Who? And you should know the password!” Dean grubled. “It’s the usual.” 

“Kate and Leo, assbutt! Rose and Jack? My heart will go on?”

“Oh no! You are not going to add Titanic to my watch list!” Dean groaned as he grabbed his lunch. “Why can’t you pick something else to watch?”  

“Because I haven’t seen that movie in a long time, and from what Thasman has mentioned the three times we have watched movies with him, they don’t have movies of any sort on their island. So yes, Kate and Leo are helping.”

“Fine,” Dean relented with a sigh. “Just... make your own profile, okay?” 

“You’re a fool if you think Y/N’s not watching it at some point,” his friend scoffed, taking out his lunch of the day.

“Come on, let’s get back to work,” he encouraged after they finished eating. “Y/N said she would be back at Ellen’s around 6 pm and I want to start the evening early.” 

Cas gave him an excited smile. He loved how nervous Dean got every time he went out with Y/N, “Alright, boss.”

“Hey Benny!” Dean knocked on the door to the storage closet. “Stop making out with Andy and get back to work!”

                                           ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Reaching Ellen’s house after spending the day in the water, Y/N stood between Roan and Thasman. She could feel the tension building from both of them. 

“I’m going to go take a shower to get ready for my date,” Y/N said, breaking the silence. “Will you two be okay?” 

Thasman was the first to answer, already making his way inside, “I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me.”

Y/N sighed as she looked at Roan, “Do you have to freeze him out like this Roan? You are acting worse than he is.” 

“I’ve been treating him the same as he has been to me, he’ll be fine,” Roan argued. 

“He won’t if you both refuse to stop acting like guppies,” she pointed out, placing her hands on her hips. 

“There are more important things to worry about than Thasman and I’s former relationship, Y/N.”

“Not if it makes my two best friends miserable!” Y/N shouted, frustrated at their impractical stubbornness. “You two are worse than the dolphins fighting the sharks!” she groaned, dragging Roan to her room and closing the door. “Why are you angry at him, Roan? I deserve to know what caused it!” she pressed, their ridiculous banter seeming pointless as she didn’t know the reason behind it.

“If you don’t lower your voice, he’ll come in here and we will fight again,” Roan warned, his nervousness shining through with the widening of his eyes and the bobbing of his foot. “We decided that we weren’t going to work. We weren’t good for each other. That’s it,” he rushed out, hoping that would be enough to cease her advances.

“You’re lying,” Y/N sat Roan on her bed and crossed her arms across her chest, his leg still bouncing. “Before my surprise party you two seemed happy. You were talking and smiling and… you were perfect,” she finished, dropping her arms to her sides and locking her eyes with his. 

“And then reality settled in. Thasman is protective; he always has been,” Roan reminded her, hopelessness settling in his tone. “But he has a knack for pushing and keeping everybody in the dark in his decisions until the truth comes out and it’s too late to stop him,” he finished angrily, his inner thoughts threatening to rise to the surface and spill out of his mouth.

“What are you saying Roan?” Y/N questioned, her eyes narrowed in interest. “What decision did he make this time?” 

“The night of your birthday party, we talked,” he began with a sigh. “He kept talking about how we were supposed to ‘lay low’ and how we would be going back soon and proceed with, well, everything.” Roan cried out as he waved his arms around in frustration, “I told him you wouldn’t want to go back, not with the way you look at that human.” 

“He is right, you know,” she whispered, not wanting to return, but knowing it was inevitable. “I will have to go back. I would have to tell my father and the kingdom that I cannot be their queen.” She looked up at Roan, “Thasman is logical in that aspect. He knows it will hurt, but he is right. I will have to tell Dean I still need to settle things back home.” 

“There is a difference between logical and too stubborn for his own good,” the merman argued.

“Roan,” Y/N whispered, attempting to break through his own stubbornness, “you know he is right. He might have waited until we discussed it, but you know deep down he is right.” She looked at her friend, “I think you’re just scared. And in being scared you’ve hurt him Roan,” she finished softly. 

“Of course I am scared,” he reluctantly admitted. “Mostly of going through it all again. Who’s to say that out of nowhere, the King will just break tradition and let the only heir abdicate the throne?” he pointed out as he stood from the bed and began to pace around the foot of her bed. “Thasman could be king,” he shrugged, looking up at Y/N with pain and hesitation in his eyes. “He should be king, he won that preposterous tournament. But how can I be sure that he won’t turn around and repeat the very same actions that led to our downfall? I wasn’t perfect, I am still far from it, but I can’t go through that again,” he shook his head as his voice cracked, threatening to break. “I just can’t. And this time I’m not willingly going to do it.”

Y/N nodded in understanding, “Then go out with the human,” she shrugged with a soft smile, giving up the fight, for now. “Might as well move on and let your anger go.” She grabbed a dress from her closet and held it in front of her, turninging to Roan, “What about this dress?” 

The merman gave a defeated groan, but still took a peak at the piece of clothing, “You could be wearing nothing but algae and that human of yours would think you look stunning,” he chuckled. “The dress will look good on you.”

“Good,” she smiled. “Now, you can call that human who gave you his number and go out with him.” She prepared her things for the shower, “It would help you get over Thas, if that’s what you really want.” 

“Maybe I should,” he considered. “I left his number in the room,” he revealed, placing a finger to his chin in thought. “Good luck on your date, I suppose?” he wished her as he walked out of the room. 

“Good,” she smiled, following behind him. “This way, Thasman can move on too if he wants,” she finished as she made her way to the bathroom. 

It was a short shower overall, considering she had to be ready in order to have a few minutes to unwind before Dean came to pick her up. Y/N shut off the water once she was finished and stepped out, the steam from the water cascading into the room. Taking hold of a towel and wrapping it around her, she looked at the now clouded mirror, appreciating her human features for a moment before realizing that she needed to get dressed and ready. Walking towards her room, she hummed in contempt. To say that she was excited was an understatement. Dean never ceased to surprise her on their dates and she was looking forward to what the human had planned for them this time. 

Entering the room, the dress Roan had helped her pick was hanging behind her door, waiting to be worn. Soon enough, the blue dress was put on and she took a hairbrush to try and untangle the mess her hair had become under the shower, until finally, she saw herself in the mirror and smiled, satisfied. Reaching for the makeup Ellen bought for her, she began to apply it. Ellen had taught her how to decorate her face with the mysterious paint, simple, yet elegant. Or at least, that’s what the human woman said. Once she was satisfied, she opened the closet door to pick out her simple sandals. 

With one last look in her long mirror, Y/N nodded in approval and opened her door. As she stepped outside she noticed Roan, now wearing a black pair of pants and a button up shirt, inspecting himself and smoothing the fabric of both his pants and shirt over. 

“Roan,” Y/N gave him a smile, “are you going out as well? Did you change your mind about Thasman?” 

Roan shook his head, “I called the human.” 

The princess looked at him, her eyes widened in surprise, “You actually called him?” 

“Yes,” he shrugged. “Might as well start trying to move on. “Could you and Dean give me a ride to the restaurant I’m supposed to meet him at?”

“I cannot believe you. But yes, I think we can.” The princess said as she shook her head, “I hope you know what you are doing Roan.” 

“Don’t worry, Your Highness,” Roan gave her a reassuring yet nervous smile. “I am ready. And who knows, maybe this human won’t be as stubborn as Thasman.” 

“Or as stubborn as you,” she muttered. “Come on, Dean will be here any minute now.”

Their descent down the stairs was quiet, and Y/N’s heart broke a little more for her friend when she came to the view of Thasman sitting at Ellen’s kitchen table, munching away on a chocolate bar. 

“Thas?” the merman jumped in his seat, turning to look at his friends. 

“Yeah?” he said as he swallowed the piece of chocolate bar in his mouth. 

She gave her friend a small smile as she walked up to him and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder, “I’m going out with Dean. He should be here any moment now. Don’t wait up for me, alright?”

The guard nodded and smiled at her, “Okay,” he breathed. “I hope you have--” 

Y/N watched as he stopped midsentece while he looked at Roan. Her friend looked like a guppy out of water. His mouth slightly agape while his eyes roamed over Roan's body and what he was wearing. 

“And where are you going?” Thasman as he avoided looking at Roan’s face.  

“With the human I told you about,” Roan explained, playing with one of the shirt’s top buttons. “Dean and Y/N are giving me a ride.”

“Oh,” Thasman whispered. He nodded and bit his lip before responding, “I-- I hope you have a good time.” He took in a deep breath, “Just be careful, please.” 

Roan was surprised by Thasman’s response. Swallowing the lump in his throat, he forced a smile on his face, “I promise I will be careful.” 

“I know you will,” the merman smiled to the best of his abilities, his eyes glistening with unshed tears at his lovers new interest. A knock on the door resounded and he took in a deep, calming breath, “I guess that’s Jellyfish. Have a good time, guys.”

Y/N looked at her friend as Roan walked towards the door, “Thas? Will you be okay?” 

“I am Thasman, member of the Royal Guard and personal Guard to Princess Y/N,” he recited. “I think I’ll be just fine.”

Y/N nodded and kissed his cheek, “Stay out of that head of yours, Stingray.” 

“Mhm,” he nodded, all but screaming in his head for them to just leave already so he could wallow in his misery alone.

With a pat on his cheek, Y/N made her way to Dean and kissed his lips. 

“Hi,” she giggled softly, “I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind dropping Roan off somewhere on our way to our date?” 

“Uh, sure,” Dean said as he looked over at Roan. The human gave him a small smile, noticing his formal attire and raised his eyebrow slightly, “Just tell me the address and I’ll get you there.” 

The trio made their way to the car with Y/N watching as Thasman looked out the window at them, his ear to the phone as they drove away.

                                            ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Dean and Y/N dropped Roan off at the local Italian restaurant before heading off to their own reservations. 

“Is Roan out on a date?” Dean looked at Y/N. 

“He is,” she sighed. “I told him if he really was done with Thasman he should move on,” she whispered sadly. “I was kind of hoping he would snap out of it and realize what a stingray he was being.” 

“I’d say that kind of backfired. But I get it; at this point of the game, something has to happen,” Dean said as he drove down the road. 

“I think it hurt Thasman more,” Y/N whispered. “But in all honesty, If Roan doesn’t love Thasman he shouldn’t have given him hope,” she huffed. “It makes me mad.” 

He took one of her hands in his when they stopped at one of the few red lights that Matagorda had and gave her a comforting little squeeze, “You wanna talk about it?”

“I miss my father,” she whispered. “We haven’t heard anything and I’m worried. I’m scared something was done to him.” 

The light had already changed color, but fuck it, Dean thought. Matagorda’s traffic was basically non-existent. They were the only ones there, ��What do you think he’d tell you? If he heard what you were saying right now, I mean.”

“That I was being a silly clownfish,” she muttered with a small laugh. “But I can’t help but worry about him. My strong father who to me has always been indestructible, in a prison in our own home. That stupid tournament invited the leech in and it ruined everything.” 

“He’s alive, sweetheart. The asshole that did it wants to use him being incarcerated against you, or maybe he thinks your father knows where you are and is waiting for him to talk. He’ll be fine.”

“Thank you,” she smiled at him. “I don’t know what I would do without you, Dean. I can’t wait to see where you will be taking me tonight.” 

“I’m here for ya, sweetheart. I hope you know it.” He squeezed her hand once more before turning his face back to the road and starting to drive again, “Now, regarding our date, I’m hoping you’ll like it.” 

“Is it a movie?” she guessed. 

“Nope.”

She giggled at his response before trying again, “Restaurant?”

“Maybe.”

With a slight hum she thought about her next guess, “Park?”

“Perhaps.”

“What kind of park?” Y/N looked up at him with curious eyes. 

“I’m not denying nor confirming anything, sweetheart.”

As he stopped at another red light, she turned to face him with a pout, giving him her best sad eyes, “Come on, De. Tell me.”

Dean let out a chuckle before tweaking her nose gently, “We’re almost there, I can tell you that.” 

She huffed playfully, “Meanie.” 

“Yup,” he confirmed with a goofy smile. 

“Has your Dad tried to talk to you again?” she asked gently. 

A few weeks after the surprise visit, John Winchester had started trying to call Dean nonstop. It got to the point that John had started calling the garage under different aliases to talk to Dean. Every time it seemed to make Dean hate the man more. She wasn’t sure what was going on, but she hated seeing Dean hurt. 

“Only twice today,” Dean sighed. 

“Will you ever give him a small chance?” she whispered not wanting to anger him. “I know he hurt you, but is it worth not speaking to him forever?” 

“I don’t know,” Dean said as he took her hand and placed a kiss on her knuckles. “But… I’m not ready to talk to him… yet. I want to make sure the garage is running as smoothly as possible.” 

“It’s had a very good start from what you’ve told me.”

“I guess,” Dean sighed. “Come here gorgeous,” he pulled her closer, closing the gap between them as his arm draped over her shoulder while the other worked on steering.  

A comfortable silence fell between them after that until they reached one of the three parks that Matagorda had. Dean helped her get out of the car and took out of Baby’s trunk, a huge basket along with a couple of blankets. He proceeded to guide Y/N into the deserted park, passing by all sorts of flowers Y/N was sure would look even more beautiful under the light of the morning sun.

They kept passing beautiful spots amongst the trees and flowers that Y/N was certain would work perfectly for their date outdoors, but Dean would shake his head and keep going. Finally, Dean settled on a spot that was not covered by trees or flowers, just grass. He asked for Y/N to lay down the blankets as he started to take out a couple of candles and a lighter from the basket. Once the candles were lit and the blankets draped, Dean invited her to sit down next to him, as soon as she’d done it, he draped his arm across her waist and made them lay down, admiring the purple-ish dark blue sky.

“We’ll eat in a minute,” he promised. “Just wanna cuddle first.”

“Sounds good to me,” Y/N agreed.

At first, Dean had blushed in embarrassment when the time to eat arrived and Y/N took out the sandwiches, pasta from Ellen’s diner and cake from Al’s bakery that he’d brought along, but the way Y/N looked at it as if she’d been served a banquet for kings had made him melt.

“I want to pay for our next date,” she stated, the last bite of Al’s cake forgotten on the plate for the time being.

“What?”

“Yeah,” she shrugged. “You put so much effort in things like these, and I know that I can’t exactly pay for everything but I want to do something for you on our next date. Buy you ice cream at least. Or buy you a bear like the one from that nasa place. I’m not asking you, De, I’m telling you.”

“You know you really don’t have to, Y/N,” Dean reached over and caressed her cheek. 

“I want to pamper you the same way you do me. Make you feel as special and loved as you make me feel.”

“You already do, sweetheart. I promise.”

For the billionth time, Dean felt his heart skip a beat as she gave him that soft smile of hers, “Good. But I’m still doing it.”

“Alright,” Dean surrendered, starting to put the food and dishes away. In a matter of seconds, it was just them, the blankets and the candles under the now starry sky. Y/N watched amused as her boyfriend stood up and gave a bow, “But for the time being, would you allow me the honor of dancing with me, Princess Y/N?”

“Please, don’t call me that,” she requested, getting herself up, but giving a curtsy back nonetheless. “But my answer is yes.”

“Awesome,” he whipped out his phone, tapping on the screen until a soft melody filled the air through the device’s speakers. 

They danced for what Y/N felt had not been enough. Their grips on one another would tighten at times, but be extremely delicate at others; both wanting to make sure the other wouldn’t disappear if they let go, but not wanting to break the other either.

“This has been perfect, De,” she mumbled into his neck as they swayed, barefoot, on the blankets, accompanied by the light of the stars. The soft glow of the candles and the sound of what Y/N now recognized as rock ballads.

 Dean nuzzled the top of her head with his nose, “Glad you’re enjoying it.”

Shifting her head, Y/N looked up into Dean’s sparkling green eyes, “I love you, Dean Campbell.” 

“I love you, Y/N--” he paused and let out a small laugh, “you know my last name, but I don’t know yours. I don’t think you ever told me.” 

Y/N could feel her heart stop at what he mentioned. A last name? She had one, but it didn’t seem normal compared to the other human ones she had heard. Then again, she came from an island noone has ever heard of. 

“Tal,” she said quietly, “my full name is Y/N Tal.” 

“Y/N Tal,” the name rolled off his tongue with a smile. “I like it. It’s unique.” 

Y/N blushed as she moved her hair behind her ear, “Thank you.” 

Dean only smiled softly in response, continuing to sway them along to the music. After two more songs, he began to sing softly, at first serenading Y/N as they held each other close. After a few moments however, Dean began to feel playful. With each verse he began to escalate the silliness, going as far as making different voices, his antics making the princess join in on the fun. Before she knew it, they were both screaming the lyrics of the ballads to the top of their lungs, putting on a show for an invisible audience until Dean suddenly stopped, simply staring at her with this big smile on his face.

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing,” Dean chuckled as he caressed her cheek. “I’m just watching.”

If there was any more light around them, Y/N was sure that Dean would be able to see how red she was blushing. Dean took that opportunity to pull her in for a searing kiss. Their mouths melding together as arms wrapped around one another. The princess could feel nothing but love for the human she was spending time with. They stood out under the stars making out before Dean pulled away. 

“Want to take a drive in Baby?” he asked as his nose gently brushed hers.  

The princess smiled as she pecked him once more, “Yes.”

Dean smiled widely, “Let’s pack up and take a drive.”  

After a few minutes of cleaning up, the blankets were folded and their trash was put in their proper place. Dean and Y/N were once again in the car and Dean was driving them back towards his house, but taking a more scenic route. He would glance every now and then towards Y/N, who was looking out the window. 

There was something about the way she marveled at the scenery that reminded him of simpler days. Days when his father would take him and Sam out in the Impala for long drives. A time where he felt there were no worries about running the company; no pressure in doing things he didn’t want to do. Much sooner than he wanted, they were back at the house, the car parked in the driveway. 

“I guess I should head inside,” Y/N muttered as she twiddled her thumbs together in the Impala’s front seat bench. 

Dean couldn’t help but smile at her. Everything about her was beautiful. Always. It wasn’t fair; he loved it. He took a deep breath as he reached out to separate her hands and take a hold of one of them. He watched their entwined hands for a moment before looking up at her.

“We– you know, it– we haven’t talked about what happened back then.”

“When?”

“I mean the tournaments, Thasman winning and the whole plan and– I mean it’s been a month and I realized, I never asked how it went apart from Thasman getting hurt. How everything happened.”

Y/N’s eyes widened as she caught up to what he was saying, “Oh,” she licked her lips. “It was– what do you want to know?”

Dean looked at their hands once more, murmuring, “How it was, how it worked, how it feels to have a bunch of people fight for your hand– the whole thing is archaic and I know you hated it. I do too. I just, I never really asked how it all felt like,” their eyes met, “how watching it play out affected you.”

“It was just like I pictured: awful.” She took in a deep breath, staring off into the distance, “I was very much on display for the whole week leading up to the big event. I was expected to watch the practices and observe, but I was also pushed and pulled in different ways.” She let out a small scoff, “I hated my birthday banquet. I was angry at Thasman for his stubbornness and his reluctance to be with Roan.” 

Dean could see the anger and hurt in her eyes as she thought about it. 

“The day of the tournament, I sat next to my father on the main balcony overlooking the arena. Roan had the dolphins trained to perform for the opening ceremonies. The whole kingdom attended. I can’t remember much, really. I remember a few rounds, but I didn’t pay attention to most of the fights. Next thing I knew, Michael was up against Thasman and Thas beat him like the leech he is.” A bitter smile graced her face at the memory. “Tradition dictates that for the fight to end, an opponent has to yield or die. Thasman made him yield… and you know what happened next.”

“Does that mean you and Thasman will--” Dean trailed off. 

“Oh, no. No. We won’t,” she rushed. “I don’t want to be Queen. He knows it.”

“He also mentioned something about you having to go back.” 

“I do. He was right about something: I can’t leave my father and kingdom behind without an explanation or saying goodbye.”

“You do want to stay here, right? With me?” he asked, seeking reassurance.

“Dean, I have been here, by your side, with Ellen and a job and your friends, for a month now.” Y/N gave him a soft look, “I can’t think of anything better than staying here. With everybody. With you.” 

 Dean tugged at her hands, drawing her in for a hug as he kissed her cheek and the top of her head. Her arms slid around him, letting out a content sigh.

“You know,” Dean said after a minute of just holding her. “if you ever– if you ever felt like you were not happy here, it’s ok if you would want to–”

“Please don’t finish that sentence.” She squeezed him tightly, “I won’t. I missed you too much when I left the first time. I am happy here. I swear.”

“I believe you, sweetheart. I just had to say it. Just in case.”

Y/N pulled away from the hug, now holding Dean’s face in her hands to make him look at her in the eyes. 

“I– I... love you. I think I truly do.”

He smiled widely, the crevices of his eyes crinkling in delight, turning to kiss the palm of her hand before leaning in to kiss her lips, “I love you too.”

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[maybeimamuppet]

dream a better dream

hello my little muppets!! happy wednesday!

this is a request fill for @erikascadys who requested sharkboy and lavagirl au! janis is lavagirl and damian is shark boy. and cady is just cady :))

i don't think i need any trigger warnings, but as always if I've missed one please let me know so I can add it!

anyway, please enjoy!

---

Cady has always been a dreamer.

Growing up in Kenya, it was nearly the only thing she could do to entertain herself. Sure, she had a few toys, or books to read, or lions to chase. But in terms of other humans, all she had were her parents and her dreams.

Her personal favorite dream first appeared one night when she was ten. Cady’s family had just gotten the news that her older brother, Rhys, had been killed in the line of combat. The only place Cady has as an escape from her grief is in her dreams.

She dreams of two people. Friends. A boy and a girl. The boy is part human, part shark. He has legs, but also fins. A human face, but shark teeth. And human hands, but sharp claws. In spite of everything, he seems kind. He cares for his shark friends and all the fish, carefully tends to the corals and feeds the seaweed and anemones. Cady cleverly dubs him Sharkboy.

The girl is very different. She’s made of lava and fire, with bright pink hair and the ability to shoot lava from her hands. Cady doesn’t know much else about her. She names her Lavagirl and leaves it at that.

-

Cady frantically writes her dream in her dream journal when she wakes up the next morning. She’s kept one since she learned how to write, detailing all her most precious dreams. She has a feeling this one is extra special.

“I’m going to the watering hole to take a bath!” She yells to her parents as she runs out of their tent. Her dad grabs her by the back of her shirt and scoops her up before she can make it out. “Hey!”

“Why are you suddenly so eager to take a bath?” Her dad asks, setting her down again.

“I’m not! I’m just excited for the day! I had a super special dream!” Cady says, bouncing up and down a few times. Her dad gives her a sad smile and ruffles her hair.

“Okay. Watch for crocs and hurry back for breakfast, binti.”

“I will!” Cady says, dashing out again.

-

After a quick but expert assessment, Cady dubs the small pool to be free of crocodiles and any other predators. The zebras wouldn’t be drinking here for so long, otherwise.  Cady leaps in with a small splash and opens her eyes under the water. She’s been trying to learn how to do that recently.

But someone else is there. She screams and pops her head back above the surface. The figure follows. “Sharkboy?”

“Yeah!” Sharkboy says. “Hi!”

“You’re real?” Cady asks in awe.

“Yeah, duh! I’m right here,” Sharkboy says.

“Whoa,” Cady whispers. “Um… can I finish my bath, please? Then we can get to know each other!”

“Oh! Yeah, sorry!” Sharkboy says, turning around and covering his eyes. Cady swims back down and finishes cleaning herself, then dries herself off and gets dressed. Sharkboy swims up and rests on the shore.

“I thought you were a dream,” Cady murmurs, tilting her head. Sharkboy shakes his head.

“Nope! Well, kinda. But everything that is, or was, or will be, began with a dream.”

“Huh,” Cady says, tilting her head. “Okay, do you wanna go play? I’ve never… I’ve never had a human friend before.”

“I’m not human,” Sharkboy says, smiling so she can see his teeth.

“Oh, right,” Cady giggles. “I’ve never had a shark friend before either.”

Sharkboy smiles wider. “Yeah, come on. I bet you’re pretty fast growing up out here.”

“Tag! You’re it!”

-

Cady shares her breakfast with Sharkboy, and they play together in between Cady’s chores. She learns his real name is Damian, and that he was a marine biologist with his mother. Their research base was destroyed in a storm, and he was practically adopted by the sharks. And now he searches the universe for his mother.

“I hope you find her,” Cady says genuinely. “We lost my brother a while ago. But he’s not coming back.”

“I heard. I’m sorry,” Sharkboy says. Cady shrugs.

“It’s okay. I miss him a lot, but my parents say he’s still with me. Anyway, you wanna come see the lions? They’re my favorite.”

Sharkboy nods and runs after her to help feed the lions their dinner. The sun is setting, painting the sky gold and orange and pink as it makes its way down for the day. Once the first stars are just beginning to twinkle for the night, a bright flash of pink light suddenly glows from behind them.

“Lavagirl,” Cady breathes when she turns around. Lavagirl smiles slightly and nods. Maybe that really is her name. “You’re real too!”

“Sharkboy, I need your help,” Lavagirl says. “You have to come with me. A great crisis is developing on the Planet Drool.”

Sharkboy nods and heads to her side. They begin to run off together, before freezing and turning back to Cady.

“Can you come as well, Cady?”

“Er… I would,” Cady stutters. “I’d really like to, but… I have homeschool tomorrow.”

Lavagirl nods in understanding, and they both turn back and continue running off. Cady doesn’t see them again.

—-

Until six years later. Cady’s parents have lost their funding and are forced to move back to America. Cady is both upset and excited. She’s sad to be leaving the only home she’s known, but eager to experience life in the west. And go to real school for the first time.

She starts at North Shore High three days after they move to Chicago. Her wishes for a happy American life are quickly dashed.

The building is massive and meandering, built of a labyrinth of hallways and classrooms that all look the same and packed wall to wall with other kids all shoving and pushing and yelling. Like sardines.

Sharkboy would like that, she thinks with a little smile. And he could use his navigation instincts to help me get around this place.

By some miracle she makes it to homeroom on time and plops herself in an empty seat near the front of the room. She looks up when it suddenly goes quiet and the teacher begins speaking.

“Hello class, I’m Ms. Norbury, I teach AP Calculus,” she begins. Cady looks up in relief and checks her schedule. This is her math teacher. “And we have a new student this year, I see. Caddy Heron?”

“Uh-it’s Cady,” Cady stutters quietly, raising her hand. “I used to be homeschooled.”

That gets a few snickers from people in the back of the room, and Ms. Norbury’s demeanor seems to change slightly. “That’s a fun way to steal from my union.”

“Oh! No, no,” Cady says immediately. “I grew up in Kenya, my parents are zoologists. Not many unions there.”

Much to her relief, Ms. Norbury relaxes slightly and gives her a kind smile. “In that case, welcome to North Shore. I saw you on my roster for the afternoon, I look forward to seeing what you can do.”

Cady gives her an eager smile back and nods as she gathers her things once the bell goes off.

—-

In her English class, she gets an assignment to write a short story about her favorite childhood memory. Cady thinks long and hard about which moment to choose. The time a lion broke into her tent and cuddled her all night? Or the time she got to see the city of Nairobi for the first time? Her first airplane trip?

Suddenly, it hits her. She had never had more fun as a kid than when she spent the day with Sharkboy. So Cady writes about that. What could go wrong?

As it turns out, reading the essay aloud in front of the whole class is what can go wrong. Cady eagerly volunteers to go first. Mistake one.

She looks up when she finishes reading, to the sneers and smirks of her classmates. And that’s before they start laughing out loud. One of them even throws a ball of paper at her.

“Sit down, Cady,” her teacher says gently. Cady sits down quietly back at her spot, trying to ignore the jeers of the other students. “Cady appears to have merely misunderstood the assignment. I asked for true stories. But that was a very well done work of fiction.”

“It is true!” Cady says, much louder than she’s spoken all day. Another paper ball hits her. Cady pulls her dream journal out of her backpack, where she also wrote about the day she got to spend with Sharkboy. “He said everything that is, or was, started with a dream. It’s true.”

Her teacher looks at her sadly and gives a slight head shake as the next kid gets up to read their essay. Cady doesn’t speak up again until the bell rings.

“Cady, a moment please,” her teacher asks quietly. Cady sheepishly heads over to her desk. “You have a real way with words. But you’re sixteen, in the eleventh grade. It’s time to stop dreaming, okay?”

Cady takes the pencil she had tucked behind her ear and scratches that down in her journal. “No dreaming. Got it. I-I’ll try harder.”

Her teacher looks at her sadly but nods, sending her off to her next class. Cady is pulling her schedule out of her backpack to check the room number when she’s suddenly knocked to the ground.

“Watch where you’re going, jungle freak,” the girl she’s bumped into spits.

“I’m sorry,” Cady says desperately. “I didn’t see you, I didn’t mean it-“

“I’m sure you didn’t. As payback… what is that?”

“My-my dream journal,” Cady says, clutching it to her chest.

“Can I see it?” The girl asks. Cady naively hands it over. The girl flips through it and laughs. “You’ll get an edited version tomorrow.”

“Wait, give it back!” Cady yells, trying to run after her. The girl’s two cronies block her path.

“Trust us, don’t mess with Regina. We’ll try to keep her from doing too much to it. But she can do a lot worse,” the blonde one murmurs.

Cady hollowly stops fighting them and steps back. The girls give her an apologetic look before they run after their friend.

————-

Cady cries herself to sleep that night. America is nothing like she thought it would be. She wishes she could be back in Kenya, where the only things around for miles to laugh at her were the hyenas. Or, at the very least, that she wouldn’t have to go to school tomorrow. Maybe there’ll be a bad storm. With tornados.

In her dreams, Sharkboy and Lavagirl make an appearance for the first time since she was eleven. She’d gotten little glimpses of their work on planet Drool, as they helped make it into the awesome planet of Cady’s dreams. They seemed happy.

But something is wrong, now. Cady can’t quite piece it together, but the scenes she can see clearly aren’t right. She wakes up with a gasp and runs to the window. A bright, clear day greets her mockingly.

“Guess I didn’t dream hard enough.”

—————

Cady trudges through the morning. Her parents are arguing over something or other, probably trying to get her father a job again. Cady’s mom asks her to come right home after school so they can all talk. Cady suddenly starts wishing something will happen at school so she doesn’t have to go home.

By lunch, the sky about matches her mood. Dark clouds block out any hint of blue that wanted to shine through, and loom ominously over the building. Her science teacher takes the opportunity to teach about tornados and their origins.

Regina strolls in casually about ten minutes after the bell, holding a bag that must be too small to carry all her books. Not that she cares.

Cady stands and goes to her desk, holding out a hand. “Give it back.”

“Ladies, is there an issue?” the teacher asks.

“Regina took my dream journal yesterday.”

“Ooh, a liar, too, how fun,” Regina titters.

“Regina, give Cady her book. It hasn’t even been a week and you’re already picking up the bullying again,” the teacher huffs. Something tells Cady that Regina had never set the bullying down in the first place.

Begrudgingly, Regina picks up her designer bag and roots through it. Cady thankfully takes her precious book back. But as she opens it to check that all her dreams are where they were before, she gasps in horror.

Every single page has been scratched out one way or another. Lipstick, black marker in swirly handwriting, even a few pages covered in letter stickers that spell out particularly cruel taunts.

“She ruined it!”

“Where’s your proof, you little freak?” Regina retaliates.

“That’s enough! Both of you will be reporting with me to the principal’s office after school. With your parents,” the teacher yells, trying to get her class back under control. It turns out to be a futile effort when the windows suddenly blow open with the force of the winds outside. “I do not get paid enough for this.”

Everyone ducks underneath their desks as papers start flying around the room, covering their heads and faces for protection. In her haste to get back to her desk, Cady accidentally drops the journal by Regina’s feet, who bends down to pick it up with a coy smirk.

Cady has curled up in a ball beneath her desk when there’s suddenly a thunderous crash accompanied by the sounds of breaking glass. Carefully, Cady peeks up above to see…

Sharkboy and Lavagirl. Evidently having entered through a new hole in the wall.

“I’m looking for Cady,” Lavagirl says, staring down Cady’s classmates. Everyone points to Cady’s desk in the far corner. Cady squeaks and ducks back down. Lavagirl makes her way over regardless, setting homework alight on her way. When she reaches her, Lavagirl lifts Cady’s desk off the ground with just one hand, revealing Cady curled in a frightened ball. “We need your help, Cady. Come with us.”

“Wh-what do I have to do?” Cady stutters, following after the girl made of fire.

“Just come with us, we’ll explain on the way.”

“Hi Cady!” Sharkboy says, waving eagerly. Lavagirl whacks him gently.

“I can’t go with you.” Cady says.

“Why not?”

“Be-because you’re not real! Both of you! You’re just a dream,” Cady says, trying to admit it to herself as well. “And-and you’ll be gone when I open my eyes.”

Cady squeezes her eyes shut for a moment.

When she opens them again, Sharkboy and Lavagirl are gone. Or so she thinks.

“We’re still here, Cady,” Sharkboy says from behind her. Cady screams and whirls around.

“If you want to stop The Darkness from destroying our worlds,” Lavagirl growls slightly. “You’ll come with us.”

“You should probably go with them,” Cady’s teacher squeaks, poking her head up from behind her desk. Cady nods.

“Okay. I-I’ll go with you.”

——————

“Where are we going?” Cady yells, trying to keep up with her friends. Creations? No, friends is much better.

“Planet Drool!” Sharkboy yells over his shoulder.

“It’s real?!”

“Yeah! We just punched a hole in your school, is it so hard to believe?”

“How are we getting there?”

“Enough with the questions!” Lavagirl demands. Cady suddenly notices the shark shaped rocket ship in front of them.

“Oh. Sorry.”

“Put on the goggles,” Lavagirl says, handing Cady a pair of electric blue ones. Hers are purple, and Sharkboy’s are pink. Cady doesn’t judge.

“So how do you fly this thing?” Sharkboy asks. Cady looks at him.

“You don’t know?”

“That’s our whole problem!” Lavagirl says angrily. Cady blinks at her a few times sheepishly before she slams her foot on a pedal. It reveals a green ‘GO’ button. Cady presses it, and they’re off.

Cady looks out the window at the tornados, before they’re suddenly in the atmosphere.

“How do you control it?!” Lavagirl yells at her over the roaring of the engines.

“It has an auto-pilot!” Cady yells back. Lavagirl smacks the button in front of her.

“Wow, you really thought of everything!” Sharkboy says happily.

“Er… not exactly,” Cady says.

“How the fuck do we land?!” Lavagirl says when she realizes.

“That’s the bit I forgot!”

“Well, there’s Neptune,” Lavagirl spits. “Hold on to your asses!”

Cady braces and shuts her eyes, clinging to her harness for safety. Luckily they don’t seem to crash too hard. The ground is almost… squishy.

The mouth of the shark-rocket opens for them to step out onto the surface of the planet. Cady looks out in awe at the world she’s created.

“Do you recognize it, Cady?” Sharkboy asks quietly.

“Not really,” Cady admits shyly. “I feel like I should, but I just… don’t.”

“It’s affecting you too, then,” Sharkboy says sadly. Lavagirl glares at him. “I thought she’d remember!”

“Remember what?”

“Your dreams,” Lavagirl says. “The whole fucking planet? Us? Your powers?”

“I’ve got powers?”

“More than any of us,” Sharkboy says. “Remember what I told you when we met? Everything that is, or was, or will be, began with a dream. And you dreamt us, and this whole place!”

“Every dream you ever had landed here,” Lavagirl says.

“Oh. Why-why is it so dark? I don’t have that many nightmares,” Cady says.

“It began yesterday. What’s the calculation, Sharkboy?” Lavagirl asks. Sharkboy pulls out a shark-shaped device. It’s beeping quietly and seems to be scanning the environment for something.

“About forty-five minutes,” he replies.

“Forty-five minutes until what?” Cady asks.

“Until the planet… is… destroyed,” Sharkboy says sheepishly.

“We didn’t pick you up to save you,” Lavagirl says, looking out over the darkening horizon. “We need you to save us.”

“Oh. How-how do I do that?” Cady asks anxiously. This is way more responsibility than she asked for when she started keeping a dream journal.

“The dream lair over there. That’s where your dreams are going bad,” Sharkboy says sadly. “We have to get you there and find out what’s happening to them. And hopefully reverse it.”

Sounds simple enough.

“We’ll have to travel through the Passage of Time, catch the Train of Thought, swim down the Stream of Consciousness, and skate across the Sea of Confusion. Because it’s frozen now. Nice going, Cady,” Lavagirl grumbles.

“Lava, don’t be mean! It’s not her fault,” Sharkboy admonishes. “We brought Cady here to put things back in order. We just have to stay positive! It’s not the end of the world.”

“It literally is, though!” Lavagirl yells from a ways away. She turns around and walks backwards away from them for a moment. “The planet is dying, come on!”

“What’s her deal?” Cady asks anxiously as she and Sharkboy run after Lavagirl. Suddenly, a groaning creak is heard, and they both turn around to find the shark rocket being swallowed by the Darkness. “Run!”

Everyone picks up the pace, until they’re suddenly on a platform moving rapidly towards a sort of carnival.

“How is this here if you’ve never been to a carnival?” Lavagirl asks.

“I read about them in books and stuff. I always wanted to go to one,” Cady says sheepishly. “I was, like, ten, give me a break!” Lavagirl shrugs and turns away from her with a huff. “Where is everyone? My dream planet shouldn’t be so lonely.”

“They’re stuck,” Sharkboy says, pointing to a roller coaster weaving around a tall mountain that looks remarkably like Kilimanjaro. “Trapped. Ms. Neverbury has everyone kind of held hostage.”

“How awful,” Cady says sadly. “My world was supposed to be fun.”

“Oh, it’s fun, alright,” Lavagirl chuckles sardonically. “Endless fun. Once you get on, you can’t get off.”

“Kids aren’t allowed to rest here, because if they rest, they sleep, if they sleep, they dream, and if they dream…”

“It takes power away from Neverbury. But we have a secret weapon to stop her,” Lavagirl says mischievously.

“Oh, good,” Cady says in relief.

“It’s you, dipshit,” Lavagirl huffs.

“Oh. You know, you’re a lot more rude than I remember!” Cady yells as Lavagirl rushes up to the coaster. “You’re very dismissive!”

“Get used to it!” Lavagirl yells back, reaching up a fist and floating up to the carts rushing around.

“Don’t mind her, she’s having a sort of… identity crisis,” Sharkboy says apologetically. “She’s usually pretty nice, but she’s scared, and she gets angry when she’s afraid.”

“Would you two shut up? We’re on a time crunch here!” Lavagirl reminds them, dangling upside down from the coaster.

“Oh, oops,” Sharkboy says. He does the same motion and joins Lavagirl above their heads, moving to stop the coaster. Cady tries it too, but she can only jump about a foot.

“Man, why can’t I do that?”

Luckily for her, there’s a ladder a few feet away. She’ll have to use that until she figures out how to jump the way her new friends do.

“Whoa,” she breathes as Lavagirl suddenly lands on the cart of the coaster, somehow perfectly steady even as it hurtles around the winding track. Everyone on the cart cheers in relief. Lavagirl hops down in front of it, causing sparks to fly as she attempts to stop it with one hand and shoots lava to weaken the tracks with the other. Sharkboy grabs onto the back and pulls, and their combined strength makes the coaster grind to a halt.

“Who knows where Neverbury is hiding?” Lavagirl demands. She tilts her head in confusion as everyone appears to have both hands raised. “All of you?”

“You’re all upside down,” Cady giggles from her position on the ladder.

“Oh.”

Suddenly, a booming voice echos around them. “Who is stopping my unstoppable fun?!”

Lavagirl gasps and shoots small jets from both hands to release the bars on all the kids, allowing them to fall gently to the ground and run to safety.

“Who is Neverbury?” Cady asks, hopping into the coaster herself and bringing the bar down for protection as it begins to move again. Sharkboy sits next to her, and Lavagirl stands on the front to coast along.

“She’s supposed to be the sort of protector here,” Sharkboy says. “Keep everyone safe. Be a light. But all she brings now is darkness.”

Cady is about to respond when she’s suddenly slammed backwards into her seat. She screams as the coaster suddenly rockets off, hurtling down the track at impossible speeds. Nothing is impossible here, she reminds herself.

“She’s taking us up!” Sharkboy yells. Cady clings to his arm in fright. She decides she’s not quite so interested in riding roller coasters anymore.

Cady peeks up from Sharkboy when they finally come to a blessed stop, letting out a little squeak of fright. Sharkboy gently pats her head to let her know it’s alright before he hops out of the cart. Lavagirl follows him, and Cady scrambles out once she can feel her extremities again.

A large robot has its back to them, fiddling with various buttons and levers to bring images up on the large screens in front of it. It yells something at whatever she sees before it turns to see them. Cady screams quietly. It looks a lot like Ms. Norbury. What I wouldn’t give to be in calculus class right now.

“Well well well, if it isn’t Sharkboy and Lavagirl,” the robot says. “What do you want? Why have you halted my endless fun and infiltrated my lair?”

“We don’t need permission from you, you circular bitch,” Lavagirl huffs.

“Man. Fiery today,” Neverbury huffs. She appears to notice Cady then. “Hello, I don’t believe we’ve met. I am Ms. Neverbury.”

“Um-hi,” Cady says anxiously.

“Why are you doing this to our planet? You’re supposed to be running it,” Sharkboy demands.

“You’re supposed to be running it,” Neverbury mocks. “I am running it, I do run it. Right into the ground. Er, those are my orders.”

Maybe Cady has less control here than Sharkboy and Lavagirl thought. Everything here is supposed to be under her command, but she would’ve never ordered something like this. “Who ordered that?”

“No school, no discipline, no rules,” Neverbury continues. Cady loves school. She loves rules. This is clearly the work of someone else. Not even childhood Cady would’ve done something like this. “And no dreaming.”

“Dreams can destroy you, can’t they?” Lavagirl asks coyly. “That’s why we have to stop you.”

“You and what army?” Neverbury scoffs.

“Guys,” Cady says quietly, pointing behind them. A series of electrical plugs appear to have come to life behind them, sparking ominously. That’s probably not good.

Sharkboy and Lavagirl snap to attention, doing a series of very sophisticated moves and fighting the plugs back. Lavagirl looks very eager to be demonstrating some rather violent tendencies.

“Hey Sparky,” she calls loudly, getting Neverbury’s attention. “Catch me if you can.”

Cady and Sharkboy watch as she sets her hands and feet alight and rockets herself upwards, to another metal platform higher up. Neverbury follows and winces as Lavagirl shoots jets of magma out of her hands.

Cady doesn’t quite know what to do. She was never much good at fighting. Sharkboy snaps back into his fights, punching out several of the plugs and grinding their circuits with his sharp teeth. Wanting to be helpful, Cady grabs a cord and tugs as hard as she can. Eventually, it gives, and Cady winds up on her behind looking up at a plug. It rattles rather ominously and gives chase, so Cady bolts. So to speak.

She runs as fast as she can, and being Kenyan, she’s still pretty fast. She turns to check that she’s lost her pursuer at one point, and finds the plug straining at the confines of its cord.

“Aww, are you a bit short?” She teases. “We’ve all been there. Come get me, loser!”

“Cady, stop trash talking, it doesn’t suit you,” Lavagirl yells, still fighting off Neverbury above them.

“Fine,” Cady huffs. She tips her head and coos quietly as the plug continues straining. Suddenly it appears to ‘look’ to its left and spies another plug. Cady watches in horror as it plugs itself in and gives itself more reach. “Ah, shuck!”

She runs again, but pauses when she hears crunching behind her. Sharkboy is jumping up

and down on the plug, smashing it to bits and stomping out any hint of current still running through it. He smiles at Cady when the last spark flies and fizzles out.

“You’re amazing,” Cady beams.

“You had to be scared of electricity?!” Lavagirl yells.

“I grew up in a tent, I don’t like it!” Cady yells back.

“Both of you shut up!” Neverbury yells. Lavagirl shoots a stronger jet at her face. Neverbury closes her eyes and drifts down slightly. Lavagirl relaxes, but Neverbury quickly pops back up. “Haha, pranked.”

“Good one,” Lavagirl huffs, grinding her heels in an attempt to get a good stance to continue fighting.

“Did you really believe you could stop me? Aww,” Neverbury coos.

Lavagirl kites her back down to Cady and Sharkboy. Sharkboy runs up to aid in the fight.

“I know we can’t,” he says threateningly. “But she can!”

They both point to Cady, who stands there uselessly. Neverbury laughs. Cady holds up her fists.

“Show ‘em what you’re made of, Cades,” Lavagirl huffs.

“What am I supposed to do?” Cady asks urgently. Lavagirl takes a moment to smack Sharkboy upside the head.

“I told you this would happen!”

“I thought she would remember!” Sharkboy defends, rubbing his sore spot.

“Remember what?!” Cady demands from the both of them.

Lavagirl is about to answer when she’s suddenly snatched up by one of Neverbury’s metal claws. Cady shrieks as the other claw grabs her by the foot and dangles her upside down.

“Your dream! Remember the dream,” Sharkboy yells at her.

“I don’t remember half my dreams!” Cady yells back. “That’s why I write them in my journal!”

“What part of your dream do you remember?” Lavagirl yells, trying to get free from Neverbury’s grasp.

“I remember this,” Cady says, feeling like she’s about to hurl. Keep it together. Sharkboy is grabbed by a third claw and brought up to their level.

“Where are you taking us?!” He demands.

“Oh, where all useless dreams go. The dream dump,” Neverbury shrugs. The three of them are suddenly dangled over the chasm below, and dropped.

“This is not what I signed up for!” Cady yells on her way down.

—-

They fall for who knows how long before thudding down onto a metal platform. It spits them back out, onto a sort of conveyor belt. At least they all made it.

“Cuckoo!” Sharkboy warns. Everyone ducks down to avoid being decapitated by a large bird. “At least we’re on the passage of time! Maybe it’ll take us to the dream lair!”

Cady looks around at the various clocks they’re surrounded by. Something isn’t right with them. They’re going backwards.

“It’s going the wrong way,” Lavagirl huffs. “Dream lair is that way, genius.”

“What is the dream lair?” Cady asks quietly.

“It’s where all the dreams that fuel the planet are stored,” Sharkboy replies. “But they’re being destroyed.”

“How?”

“That’s what we have to find out. Soon, even the two of us will cease to exist,” Sharkboy sighs, gesturing to himself and Lavagirl.

“Duck!” Lavagirl yells, pointing. Everyone hits the deck again to avoid a duck-shaped cuckoo. “Heh.”

“Cady, just out of curiosity,” Sharkboy asks as they warily stand once again. “Where is this dream journal?”

“Oh, good idea,” Lavagirl says, the first positive thing she’s said all day. “We can read it out loud and set everything back the way it was!” She adds in a whisper, “And maybe find out my true identity.”

“What?”

“Nothing. Where is it?”

“I… uh…,” Cady stutters, feeling around in her pockets. “I don’t have it. I must have dropped it during the storm.”

Lavagirl’s hair suddenly sets ablaze in anger, and she shatters the next cuckoo in a single punch. “I was really starting to think you were the answer, Cady.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Sharkboy grumbles protectively. “She’s just mad because she’s having an identity crisis and you didn’t fix it for her.”

“Shut up, Sharky!” Lavagirl yells. “Look who’s talking. You’re mad she didn’t make you… king of the ocean or whatever the fuck, with a giant fish army. Cady thought her dream world would be a happy place. We’ve all been had.”

“Guys!” Cady yells, interrupting their bickering. “End of the line.”

“Oh, shit,” Sharkboy says, as the end of the conveyor belt gets ever nearer. There’s nowhere to go but down. Lavagirl falls first, followed by Cady and Sharkboy.

Cady yelps in pain as she lands smack on top of Lavagirl, scrambling away to avoid any serious burns. Lavagirl buries her face in the dirt and groans. “I think you dislocated a few of my craters.”

“Sorry,” Cady says frantically. “Ow, you’re hot.”

“Thanks,” Lavagirl teases. “We gotta find a way out of here.”

The three of them stand and dust themselves off carefully, before setting off in an attempt to find an exit.

“I don’t think there is a way out of here,” Sharkboy says after a while. “And the Darkness is coming.” He appears to realize something, suddenly. “Wait! Cady, sit down.”

“Uh… okay,” Cady says confusedly, sitting down on a pile of calculus textbooks.

“Now dream,” Sharkboy commands. “What do you see?”

Cady closes her eyes carefully and tries to dream. “I see… a giant… Kälteen bar.” Both her companions look very unimpressed when she opens her eyes again. “I’m sorry, I’m starving! I never got my lunch.”

“For the love of magma,” Lavagirl huffs, massaging the bridge of her nose.

“Here,” Sharkboy offers, brandishing a… fish? Maybe? “Fresh sushi.”

“Blech, that’s not fresh,” Cady nearly-heaves. “I don’t even know if that’s sushi anymore.”

“Just a few weeks old,” Sharkboy shrugs.

“You want me to cook it for you?” Lavagirl asks, wrapping a fist around the poor… thing. When she pulls away, it’s been charred to a crisp. “Oops.”

“Er… on second thought, I’m not that hungry, it’s fine,” Cady says. “Let me try again.”

“Hey, um… if you happen to dream about, like, who I am… how I fit into this world,” Lavagirl murmurs. “That would… really be helpful for me.”

“Stop distracting her. Focus on the problem at hand,” Sharkboy insists.

“I can put her to sleep,” Lavagirl huffs. Sharkboy grabs her and pulls her away. “Come on, one punch?”

“She made us!”

“And where has that gotten us?!” Lavagirl roars. Cady backs away in fright, until she hits something with a metallic clang. She whirls around and looks up to see…

“Tobor!”

“Huh?”

“It’s Tobor! I tried to build him out of our old food cans and stuff when I was little,” Cady says happily. “But… I could never get him to work.”

“So here he is, forgotten in the dream dump,” Lavagirl says, finally seeming to calm down.

“He’s supposed to be very smart. Maybe he can help,” Cady says. “Tobor, wake up!”

“Yeees?” Tobor replies. Cady gasps in shock. That voice is… familiar.

“Rhys?” She asks, eyes brimming with tears. She hasn’t heard that voice since she was eight years old. She thought she had forgotten.  Tobor just gives her a wink. That’s all the confirmation she needs.

“Hello, Cady Heron.”

“You can answer anything, right?” Cady asks, wiping her eyes and looking up at Tobor’s large tin head.

“That I can. Whether it is correct is another matter entirely,” Tobor replies ominously.

“It can answer anything?” Lavagirl asks, unceremoniously shoving Cady out of the way. “Tell me something about me. Please.”

“Never heard you say please before,” Sharkboy grumbles under his breath.

“You are extremely bright,” Tobor says to Lavagirl. Her brow furrows, but she gets a slight grin as she tries to work out what that could mean. Sharkboy goes next.

“Hi Tobor! Am I king of the ocean?”

“No.”

“Damn it.”

Cady chuckles and pats his shoulder comfortingly before she goes to ask Tobor her question. “How do I save this planet?”

“The answer… is in your dreams,” Tobor says.

“You mean if I put her to sleep?” Lavagirl asks, brandishing what looks to be a tire iron.

“No, where did you even find that?!” Sharkboy says, wrestling her to take it and throwing it as far away from them as he can.

“No… at least, not here. Darkness is falling. Any dream of hers will become a nightmare. And you don’t want those becoming a reality,” Tobor continues. “But, if you go to the land of Kälteen bars… that’s where the good dreams are.”

“Oh, duh!” Sharkboy says, as if it should’ve been obvious the whole time.

“That’s where the answers are.”

“Can you take us there?” Cady asks Tobor.

“I would, but I have no body. I can’t move,” Tobor says sadly.

Lavagirl looks him up and down suspiciously. “You can move your eyes and your mouth.”

“I suppose that might work.”

Lavagirl and Sharkboy each take one of his eyes, and Cady climbs into his mouth. Suddenly, they detach from the large tin can that made up Tobor’s head a drift off to the land of Kälteen bars. What a day.

——

“Tobor, why didn’t you work when I built you?” Cady asks, drifting peacefully over what looks like a forest of brains.

“Some dreams are so powerful they become real on their own, like Sharkboy and Lavagirl. I, on the other hand, am still only a dream.”

“Oh.”

“Um…” Tobor says.

“What’s the matter?”

“Train of thought. I’m losing it.”

“Land of Kälteen bars,” Lavagirl huffs.

“No, I’m literally losing the train of thought,” Tobor says. “Down there.”

“Huh,” Cady says interestedly, looking down. “I never thought I had a train.”

“What did you think you had?” Sharkboy chuckles.

“I dunno,” Cady shrugs. “Maybe a race car. Doesn’t get too much use, but when it does it goes fast and needs frequent pit stops.”

Lavagirl chuckles at that, but stops abruptly and tries to cover it up with a cough.

“Well, since I do actually have a train… how do I keep it on track?” Cady asks anxiously.

“With your mind. You are easily distracted. Stay focused, and it will speed you directly to the land of Kälteen bars,” Tobor explains. “The rest is up to you.”

Cady and her companions jump down onto the train. Cady looks back at her old creation for a moment. “I’m sorry I forgot you.”

“Are you kidding? You’ve just saved me,” Tobor chuckles gently. “I’m free.”

“Cady!” Lavagirl yells. “Get your ass down here!”

Cady gasps and whirls around. Lavagirl has her head poking out the window of the engine car.

“What’s wrong?!” Cady yells over the roar of the train engine.

“We can’t control it!” Sharkboy says as he and Lavagirl frantically press every button and flip every lever they can reach. Cady joins in as if she knows what she’s doing.

“All you have to do is keep it on track,” she says. Sounds easy enough.

“There is no track!” Lavagirl reminds them. Cady freezes and looks out the window. She’s right.

“What do we do?” Sharkboy asks anxiously.

“Uh… scream?” Lavagirl says. “I don’t know.”

Sharkboy flips another lever, and the door opens. “Jump! It’ll be fine!”

He leaps out the door and is quickly blown off by a gust of wind. Lavagirl follows almost immediately. Cady is left alone on a crashing train. At least if she jumps she’ll crash with her friends.

Cady closes her eyes and leaps, hoping for a miracle. The wind blows her hair everywhere and stings her skin as she hurtles to the ground. Until it stops. Warily, she opens her eyes.

“A Kälteen bar!” She says happily, pushing herself upright. It tips slightly, so she puts her arms out for balance. “Whoa. In a river of milk. Huh. Um… do you guys know what it means when your train of thought… crashes?”

“Nothing good,” Lavagirl says, sounding remarkably chipper. “How much time, Sharky?”

“Twenty minutes,” Sharkboy replies anxiously. He takes a step forward to look around, but his foot suddenly sinks into a puddle of something. He yelps in surprise, but crouches down to inspect it. “Chocolate?”

“It must be the s’mores flavor,” Cady chuckles. “There’s marshmallows too.”

“Why Kälteen bars, though?” Lavagirl asks. “And not, like, cookies, or something?”

“I never had cookies as a kid,” Cady replies. “But we always had Kälteens. And I wasn’t really allowed to eat them, I ate a whole box in a row once and got sick, so my parents hid them and I could only get them if they gave them to me. They were a special thing.”

Lavagirl gives this a moment’s thought and nods. “Try to dream again. Lie down.”

Cady does, using a bit of marshmallow as a pillow. She closes her eyes, but the bar beneath her begins to shake. “It’s too shaky.”

“I hear it too,” Sharkboy says, listening around with his highly trained ears. Lavagirl raises a suspicious eyebrow at the two of them.

“Let me try.”

“No, Lava-“ Sharkboy says, but it’s too late. Lavagirl rests her head on the marshmallow, and the whole thing is suddenly charred. “Hothead.”

“Cady,” Lavagirl says suddenly. “When you dreamt up these giant bars… who did you expect to be able to eat them?”

Cady shrugs. “I dunno, I never really thought about that part.”

“Because if you dream giant bars, something has to be created to consume giant bars,” Lavagirl explains. The rumbling sounds get louder, suddenly, and everyone looks around for the source.

“Giants!” Sharkboy yells, pointing off to the left. He abandons ship again, followed by Lavagirl. Cady is so distracted looking at the giants that she nearly doesn’t make it off, leaping at the very last second before one of the giants chomps down on the Kälteen bar raft.

Luckily for them, they appear to land on…

“Hey, this was my ninth birthday cake! That thing was awesome,” Cady laughs. “Nice and springy.”

“Too much frosting,” Lavagirl grumbles, trying to brush herself clean.

Cady removes herself from her cake and turns around, watching the giants leave peacefully hand in hand. Sharkboy approaches her and rests a hand on her shoulder.

“Those giants look a lot like my parents,” Cady murmurs.

“They seem happy together,” Sharkboy nods. “Is that… another dream of yours?”

“Family,” Cady nods. “Hasn’t really been coming true lately.”

“Well, most dreams don’t come true on their own. You have to make them true,” Sharkboy says. “It takes a lot of work. Not easy. But it’s not impossible either.”

“Alright, we’ve had enough sweets, go to sleep,” Lavagirl huffs, joining them.

“I’ll try,” Cady says anxiously, laying down on the granola ground. Sharkboy gently plays with her hair to help her drift off while Lavagirl paces around.

Flowers begin to bloom around them as Cady dreams, and a shark-shaped motorcycle suddenly drives up. Sharkboy gasps excitedly and runs to check it out, so Lavagirl takes over his position by Cady’s head.

“Dream about me next,” she says quietly. “I need to know who I am. Dream of me as something good.”

A clap of thunder suddenly booms overhead, making Lavagirl whirl around. She looks back to Cady’s face and finds it pinched in concern. “She’s having a nightmare. Sharkboy, get back here!”

Sharkboy runs over and tries to shake Cady back awake, to no avail. Lavagirl stands and aims her hands carefully at Cady’s backside.

“Sorry Cady,” she murmurs, firing a jet of lava.

“Jesus!” Cady yells, her eyes snapping open as she leaps to her feet. “Ow! What the hell was that for?”

“You weren’t waking up,” Lavagirl shrugs sheepishly. Sharkboy kindly fires a jet of water to help cool her off. “Thanks Sharky. Cady… your nightmare… it was about me, wasn’t it?”

Cady tries to think. Surely that can’t be right. She can see bits and pieces, but can’t quite reach them enough to put them back together. “I don’t remember. I’m sorry.”

“Plug hounds!” Sharkboy suddenly yells, pointing to an ice cream hill above them. Neverbury makes her way to the top.

“I have the high ground!”

The hounds suddenly run towards them, stumbling down the hill. Cady and her friends run to the shark bike, but nothing happens when Sharkboy attempts to start the engine. Other than…

“Ah, fudge,” Cady says. “I forgot to dream of gas.”

“Oh my-“ Lavagirl says angrily, storming off in a huff to fight the hounds off. Sharkboy joins her. Lavagirl shoots a jet of lava at one, before she looks at her hands. “My powers are weakening.”

One of the hounds suddenly unravels, wrapping her up in tight confines while a few others zap at her toes. Sharkboy, on the other hand, is doing remarkably well, punching out several with a series of very elaborate karate moves.

He rips off a part to the shark bike to use as a staff, and takes out several more. Unfortunately, he doesn’t notice one that hasn’t quite been beat down rise to its feet, followed by another. They both shock him, causing him to fall to the ground with a pained moan.

“Hey! Leave my friends alone!” Cady yells, bending down and swiping some frosting onto her face like war paint. She’s in the middle of a battle cry when she also gets shocked and falls to the ground. It didn’t quite go to plan, but it did allow Sharkboy to escape his attackers and rush to her side.

“I don’t-I don’t have much fight left in me, Cades,” he pants.

“Where’s Lavagirl?” Cady puffs back. Lavagirl comes… flowing over, so to speak.

“What?” She asks when they both give her confused looks. “How else was I supposed to escape? Oh, don’t look at me like that, I’m literally made of lava. It’s up to you now, Cady.”

“Cady, you can dream us out of here,” Sharkboy realizes. “We believe in you, go on.”

Cady squeezes her eyes shut and tries her hardest to dream. Lavagirl quietly pleads for a lava bike behind her, and Sharkboy asks for a shark boat.  Cady opens her eyes to reveal…

“A banana split?” Lavagirl spits. “Seriously?”

“They’re really good!” Cady defends, crossing her arms over her chest protectively.

“Still hungry?” Lavagirl says threateningly, popping back into her human body and holding up a fist. “How about a knuckle sandwich?”

“Lava, chill,” Sharkboy says, batting her hands away from poor Cady’s face. “Look at it, it’s a banana split boat!”

“Then let’s split,” Lavagirl yells as another wave of plug hounds rounds over the hill. Cady helps Sharkboy push it into the milk river and start rowing just before the hounds reach them.

Once they’re steadily drifting down the river and being steered by Lavagirl, Cady and Sharkboy finally get to sit down on a swiss roll bench. “This is great, Cades. You’re starting to daydream. If you can keep this up, they’ll never get us!”

“Really?”

“Yeah! If you learn to dream with your eyes open, you don’t have to be asleep to dream,” Sharkboy explains. “You’ll be able to make anything happen at any time. You’ll be unstoppable.”

“Grool,” Cady says. She freezes suddenly. “I-uh… I meant to say great, and then started to say cool…”

Lavagirl bursts out laughing, a remarkably bright, clean sound. Cady likes it. She smiles back at her before scooping some whipped cream onto a finger to taste it. “Mm!”

“Sugar will give you nightmares,” Lavagirl says, already back to her typical brooding. Cady immediately spits out her mouthful before she swallows any. “How much time, Sharky?”

“Uhm… best not to ask,” Sharkboy says anxiously, checking his radar. “The lair of dreams is across the ocean of ice. We’ll have to travel there on foot. What did you see in your dream, Cady? Anything we can use?”

“I saw an object, shaped like… do you have something I can draw with?” Cady asks. Lavagirl holds up one of her fingers and shrugs.

“Sharky, come steer.”

Sharkboy takes hold of the cherry stem to steer their raft, and Lavagirl offers Cady her hand. Cady takes it gently and aims at one of the ice cream scoops. Lavagirl fires a jet of lava from it, letting Cady steer it around.

“A heart?” She asks, tilting her head when Cady finishes. Her eyes go wide when she puts it together. “The crystalheart!”

“It’s the treasure of the kingdom of ice, it can freeze anything!” Sharkboy says excitedly, coming to join them. The raft spins wildly until Lavagirl leaps to grab the cherry stem to keep steering. “Even time.”

“Wow,” Cady breathes. “I’ve only ever dreamt of freezing a moment in time.”

“And, even better,” Sharkboy says. “The ice kingdom is ruled by the ice princess. She’s said to be the most beautiful girl in the world.”

Lavagirl’s jaw drops open indignantly, and she fires some magma at Sharkboy’s bum.

“Ow! What the hell, man?” Sharkboy pouts, rubbing his sore backside.

“She is not! She’s cold and cruel and cares for nobody but herself! And you don’t even like girls,” Lavagirl accuses.

“Cady does!”

“I do?” Cady says in shock. She thinks for a second about her past crushes, and then shrugs. Lavagirl certainly doesn’t look too bad. “Eh, yeah, I probably do. Have you met her, Lavagirl?”

“No,” Lavagirl replies sheepishly. She puffs out her chest before continuing, “But I know we don’t get along! She’s ice. I’m fire. We must be enemies.”

“We need that crystal heart,” Cady says pleadingly. “But I’ll need you both to get it.”

Lavagirl sighs and lets go of the cherry stem. Sharkboy leaps to grab it so they don’t drift away too far. Lavagirl looks out off the edge of the raft and huffs. “I just hope this isn’t a trap.”

—————-

“Wow,” Cady breathes happily, looking around at all the beautiful crystal clear ice and powdery white snow surrounding them. It’s absolutely gorgeous, and clearly very intricate, but the air is barely chilly. Even in her thin flannel, Cady isn’t cold.

They approach a thin bridge, made of solid ice. Cady is a little apprehensive at the height, but carefully steps out onto it. Sharkboy follows. Lavagirl thinks about it, but pauses and hunches in on herself a bit just before she tries.

“I can’t go with you,” she calls. Cady and Sharkboy pause and turn around. “I’ll melt the bridge.”

“Can you chill enough to get across?” Cady asks, reaching a hand for her. Lavagirl looks at her feet, then back at her.

“I’d have to be asleep.”

“Try sleepwalking!” Cady calls to her. “You can do it!”

Lavagirl nods slightly and closes her eyes, shaking out some of the tension in her muscles before warily taking a few steps forward. She mumbles under her breath about… a dream of her own. To live on Earth. Someplace warm. And to be accepted.

“Oh no,” Sharkboy says suddenly, anxiously watching his best friend as she crosses the bridge. “No, Lava, don’t sneeze!”

He runs to block her nose with a finger, and breathes a sigh of relief when she relaxes again. He carefully removes his finger and takes a small step back.

“Achoo!”

Lavagirl sneezes, unleashing a rush of hot wind that blows Sharkboy backwards and off the bridge. He grabs onto it with one hand just before he topples all the way off to a certain doom. Cady runs to help him back up.

“Look,” she says quietly, gesturing to Lavagirl. She’s somehow still upright, but deeply asleep. She’s actually snoring quietly, which is remarkably cute. “She’s sleeping.”

Lavagirl sleepwalks towards them carefully, slowly, but isn’t melting the bridge. Cady watches her with a small smile. Until she looks behind her.

“They found us again,” Cady says, her heart sinking. “Lavagirl, behind yo-“

Sharkboy claps a hand over her mouth before she can finish her sentence. “If you wake her up, she’ll reheat. She can make it.”

Cady nods and clings to his arm in fright. “Come on, Lava.”

Sharkboy holds her back, feeling himself growing more tense. They’re all in danger, and his instincts are demanding he protect his best friend. “Lavagirl, they’re behind you!”

Cady frantically slams a hand over his mouth, and he covers it with his own hands in shame. But it’s too late. Lavagirl opens her eyes and looks behind her, bursting into flame when she sees the hounds closing in.

Cady and Sharkboy both scream in fright and run away, barreling for the other end of the bridge. Lavagirl follows them, the bridge melting and crumbling away beneath her feet as she goes.

“Come on, Lava, hurry!” Sharkboy yells. He and Cady both reach out to help her make it onto the platform holding up the castle, but yelp and quickly pull away as she burns them. They made it.

But the ground beneath them begins to crumble. The three of them whirl around.

“It’s a trap!” Cady yelps, instinctively shoving her friends behind her. A small pit suddenly forms from the ground that’s crumbled away, and Neverbury leaps out at them. Cady furrows her brow in thought. “This can’t be right. Someone-someone else’s dreams are in here.”

That’s the last thought she has before the world goes black.

—-

When she comes to, she’s suspended from the ceiling by a spring over a hole in the ground. Sharkboy is also hanging next to her, and Lavagirl is on the other side with her feet stuck in a block of solid ice.

“Welcome to the dream lair,” an ominous voice says. Ominous but… familiar, somehow. “I am the leader of this planet.”

“No you’re not!” Sharkboy yells, wriggling to try and get down. “Cady is!”

“Cady might have dreamed it originally,” the voice says with an airy titter. The large chair in front of them suddenly rotates to reveal none other than Regina George. “But I’m, like, so much cooler, wouldn’t you say? I… am Requiem.”

“How did you get so much power here?” Cady asks. “This is my world.”

Requiem pulls out a small book and holds it up to show them. Cady gasps in understanding.

“My dream journal! That’s why all my dreams are going wrong! You’re changing it!”

Requiem gives a quiet chuckle and sashays her way down in front of them. Sharkboy gasps and goes into a sort of Superman pose when he spies the tank of electric eels beneath them.

“Shocking, isn’t it Sharkboy?” Requiem hums. “Reminds me of… when an electrical storm blew apart your mother’s research lab.”

Sharkboy stops struggling for a moment and looks at her. “Where is my mother?”

Requiem flips through the journal to see if it says anything, and gives a particularly evil sounding chuckle when she finds the right page. “Check the bottom of the ocean.”

Sharkboy snarls at her and tries to get loose again. Requiem moves to Lavagirl. “And you. Once I figure out how to freeze the core of this planet, all your powers will disappear.”

“I have powers?” Lavagirl asks quietly. “What powers?”

Requiem doesn’t grace her with a response, walking to stand in front of Cady. “And last, but least. You. You thought you could escape fear by running to dreamland, hm? But fear exists in the one place you can never escape.” She hops a few times, and is suddenly floating at Cady’s eye level. “Your mind. I’ll show you the true meaning of fear.

“Anyway, for now, you must all leave. I have dreaming to do. Kisses!”

She blows them a mocking kiss with two fingers before they’re dropped, plummeting through the holes beneath them. Sigmund Freud would love it here, Cady thinks to herself.

——————

They land in a large bird cage. Lavagirl paces back and forth while Sharkboy sits next to Cady on the uncomfortable bricks they have for chairs. “If only I had my journal. Then I could turn everything back to the way it was.”

“My fire is dimming,” Lavagirl says quietly. Sharkboy looks at her sadly. He grabs one of the bars behind him and pulls as hard as he can. Nothing happens.

“My strength is fading too.”

“How much time is left?” Cady asks.

“Who cares?” Lavagirl huffs. “We’re never getting out of here.”

Cady frowns at her, but looks up in confusion when a quiet song can be heard. “That’s freaky.”

“Aww, hi La-La’s,” Sharkboy says, playing with the small bubble creatures. Lavagirl bats them away from her face angrily.

“Where did these come from? They’re so annoying.”

“Don’t listen to her, she’s just mad you’re not made of fire,” Sharkboy comforts the little things.

“They piss me off,” Lavagirl grumbles. “That song. Disturbing. It’s so high!”

“Sing louder. Higher,” Cady encourages them quietly. Lavagirl’s hair is on fire again, and she’s visibly tense. Sharkboy grabs her and pulls her close.

“You don’t want to be too close to her when she erupts,” he says quietly.

“Enough!” Lavagirl yells, firing lava out of both hands at as many La-La’s as she can reach. Inadvertently, she also melts them a way out.

“Nice progress, Lava! Much more control this time,” Sharkboy praises. Lavagirl grins at him sarcastically before she crawls out of the hole she’s made. Sharkboy and Cady follow quickly.

—————

“She’s asleep,” Lavagirl whispers to her friends beneath her. Cady crawls her way back up into the dream lair and tiptoes back over to Requiem. Ever so gently, Cady lifts her journal off of Requiem’s chest. She tiptoes back to her friends, and slides down the pillar holding the lair aloft.

“Okay, first things first,” Cady says, flipping through the pages. “A way out of here.” Suddenly, she finds the perfect page. “Oh, Lavagirl! You have a lava bike!”

“I do?” Lavagirl asks. The bike suddenly materializes next to her and she gives a delighted cackle. “I do!” She eagerly gets on and revs the engine. “Hehe, this is tits!”

“Chill out, babes,” Sharkboy chuckles.

“Even has fuel this time! Now, Sharkboy,” Cady continues, flicking through to another page. She quiets when she reads the first few sentences of it. “Your mother really is at the bottom of the ocean.”

“Oh,” he says quietly. Lavagirl takes his hand and squeezes it gently.

“She’s in a submarine, she’s looking for you! She has been since the storm,” Cady continues, looking up at him with a smile.

“Oh!” He says again. Lavagirl squeezes him one more time and smiles at him too. Sharkboy comes to read over her shoulder to figure out specifics of where it is. “I’ve gotta get back to Earth.”

“What does it say about me?” Lavagirl asks quietly. Cady flicks to yet another page.

“I’m not sure what this is.”

“I can figure it out!” Lavagirl replies, climbing off her bike and running over to them.

“Lavagirl, no, you’ll-“ Cady tries to warn, but it’s too late. Lavagirl grabs the book and turns it to ash. “Burn it.”

Lavagirl stares at her hands in shame. “What have I done?”

“Hey, it’s okay-“

“Why the fuck did you make me out of lava? Why? What fucking good am I?” Lavagirl yells, holding up glowing fists and with her hair on fire yet again. “Look at me! Why, Cady?!”

Cady looks at her sadly, and tries to follow as she storms off, but Sharkboy grabs her shoulder and pulls her back. “Let her cool off a little.”

Cady doesn’t listen, running over to where Lavagirl is sitting on a rock, head in her hands. “All I’ve ever wanted is to be good. I know I can be. I-I can feel it. But I destroy everything I touch.” She turns to Cady with tears in her eyes, boiling away into steam the second they touch her cheeks. “Why-why did you make me like this? I have-I have more potential.”

“I’m sure you do,” Cady says quietly. Lavagirl stands suddenly and turns around to see her.

“And why did you make us a team?” She continues, pointing to Sharkboy. “We’re nothing alike! I fizzle out when I touch water. When he’s near heat, he shrivels. We aren’t compatible!”

“You’re… really on fire,” Cady murmurs sheepishly.

“Yeah. I do that,” Lavagirl huffs. Sharkboy shoots some water at her to put her out. “Thanks, Sharky.” Sharkboy nods.

“No problem.”

“Maybe I really am evil. So far, everything sure looks that way,” Lavagirl murmurs, sitting down again. “Everything else you’ve dreamed has been right. Maybe I do need to learn to accept it.”

“That’s it!” Cady says. “Everything else I’ve dreamt has been right, the crystal heart!”

“We were captured last time,” Lavagirl sniffles.

“Because Requiem doesn’t want me to have it! That must mean it’s important, we must be able to use it to stop her!”

Lavagirl’s face suddenly splits into a wide smile, and she rejoins her companions.

“We have to get back to the ice kingdom!”

“We only have ten minutes left,” Sharkboy says. “We’ll never make it!”

“We can do it!” Cady yells, running off.

“How?!” Sharkboy and Lavagirl yell at the same time as they follow her.

Cady freezes in her tracks and turns back to look at them with a small smirk. “You’re Sharkboy and Lavagirl. You can do anything.”

—————

“This way,” Cady says, beckoning Sharkboy and Lavagirl over to a sort of slide into the ice palace.

“You had to pick ice?” Lavagirl grumbles.

“Hey, Kenya is really hot,” Cady defends. “Not my fault that’s where I wound up. I’m sure if my parents were studying penguins we’d be somewhere hot and you’d be having a better time right now.”

Lavagirl just crosses her arms and pouts. She’s remarkably precious, for a girl made of fire. Cady chuckles before turning back around, stopping just in time to avoid crashing face first into a tall ice pillar. Sharkboy is already looking up at the large heart shaped crystal floating above it.

“Is that what you saw, Cades?”

“Uhhuh,” Cady nods. “You’ll have to climb up there and get it. But it’s as delicate as a snowflake, so don’t drop it. And don’t touch it or you’ll freeze, use your claws.”

“Got it,” Sharkboy says, using his claws as a sort of ice pick to climb up the ice pillar. He makes it rapidly up the tower, but as he’s reaching for it, he loses his grip and slides back down. He ends up dangling from his fin a few feet off the ground. “You’re up.”

“Lava, can-“ Cady asks. Lavagirl raises an eyebrow at her. “Er… nevermind. Chew on some ice, it’ll help you cool off a bit.”

Lavagirl looks confused when Cady hands her a chunk of ice, but gnaws a bit off with her molars. “Hmm.”

Sharkboy removes his claw gloves and hands them to Cady to climb the pillar herself. It’s slower going for her, but she finds enough hand and footholds to make it to the top. Carefully, she puts on the gloves and reaches out.

“Hey, nice job, Cady!” Sharkboy calls up at her when she grabs it. Just then, he slips, and the crack caused by his fin splits the whole tower in two. It crumbles beneath Cady and she’s forced to drop the heart to save herself.

“I got it!” Lavagirl yells, lunging to grab it before it can hit the ground. She makes it, but is immediately frozen into a solid block of ice.

“Lavagirl!” Cady yells, sliding down what she has left to hold and helping Sharkboy out. She knocks carefully on Lavagirl’s forehead. “She’s frozen solid.”

Just then, a creaky rumbling echoes throughout the cavern as several ice golems rise from the ground and come to life. One with a large club looms over them threateningly and escorts them to a different room.

Once they arrive, they’re roughly shoved to the ground with a command to, “Kneel before the ice princesses.”

Princesses? Cady thinks. There’s more than one?

Sure enough, two girls in white dresses come out onto what appears to be a small stage, hand in hand. They look familiar too. An uncanny resemblance to Regina’s little minions back on Earth.

“You try to steal our crystal heart,” the one on the left asks gently. “Why?”

Cady is too distracted staring at the both of them to hear her. Why are they here? Sharboy nudges her gently to get her back into the moment. “Oh! Uh, we believe it can stop time. Long enough for us to defeat Requiem.”

“Our crystal heart cannot help you,” the other one says. “Only the two of us have the power to use it.”

“Then you can come with us!” Cady says.

“They cannot leave this castle. The crystal is the only thing that protects our kingdom,” one of the ice golems says.

“Please, princesses, we’re running out of time,” Cady begs.

“Perhaps we could… give it to you?” The first princess says. “But are you worthy to wield it?”

“I think so!” Cady chirps. “I hope so.”

“The crystal you stole was a decoy,” the second one says. A rumbling noise sounds off behind them, and several more ice pillars rise from the ground. “The real one is somewhere in this room. Choose the correct one, and you may take it with you.”

Cady and Sharkboy both turn around and look at all the crystal hearts glimmering above them. Sharkboy points to the one nearest them. “That one looks nice, pick that one.”

But Cady shakes her head and turns back to the princesses. “It’s around your hands. Tying you together.”

Sure enough, the gem dangling from what Cady originally thought to be a simple bracelet gives a magical glimmer, and the princesses give her a kind smile. She heads to stand before them politely.

“How’d you know?” Sharkboy asks in awe.

“Saw it in a dream,” Cady murmurs.

“Be aware, Cady,” the first princess says, more serious this time. They gently remove the necklace they had looped around their entwined hands and rest it in the palm of Cady’s. “If anything happens to the crystal heart, our entire kingdom will be destroyed.”

“I won’t let anything happen to it,” Cady says bravely. “I promise.”

“The crystal will now work, but we must stay here,” the second one says. “Good luck.”

And with that, they’re all tossed from the palace onto the frozen sea of confusion. Sharkboy and Cady have no choice but to push a still-frozen Lavagirl to their destination themselves.

—-

“We’re almost back to the dream lair!” Cady yells when she has it in her sights. “How much time do we have?!”

“Uh… we’re out of time!” Sharkboy yells back. “Ten seconds!”

Cady stops Lavagirl and hops off, standing on the frozen sea. She holds the crystal heart aloft. “Here goes nothing.”

The crystal gives a promising glimmer, but then… everything goes dark. Including the crystal.

“What happened?”

Sharkboy shrugs. “It didn’t work.”

“How could it not work?”

Suddenly, a crunching noise can be heard as Lavagirl finally frees herself from her ice cocoon. “Only the ice princesses can use it. I was trying to tell you.”

“There’s nothing,” Sharkboy says, staring at his shark radar. “No readings, no nothing.”

Suddenly, a small crack forms in the ice, revealing a melted chasm. Neverbury’s cackling laughter can be heard.

“Sharkboy, no!” Lavagirl says. “She’s baiting you.”

Sharkboy tenses, and clenches his jaw. “I can’t… resist my instincts!”

Before either of them can react, stop him, Sharkboy dives into the water in front of them and swims rapidly to the other side. Neverbury stands ominously above him. Sharkboy tilts his head in confusion as she tries to make a poorly timed electrical joke.

“Oh, fuck it,” Neverbury huffs. “Electric eels, eat up.”

“Sharky, no!” Lavagirl yells, lunging for him. Cady grabs her to hold her back. “Swim away! Run!”

Sharkboy tries, swimming as fast as he possibly can. But the eels are faster, and quickly surround him. Cady and Lavagirl watch in horror as he suddenly goes limp and sinks to the bottom.

“No!” Cady says, trying to touch the water. It’s still electrified, the current nearly melting off the rubber sole of her shoe. “Can-can he survive down there?”

“He can hold his breath,” Lavagirl replies, staring hollowly at the water. “But not forever. He’ll drown if I don’t save him.”

“No, I can’t let you go,” Cady says with a sob, clinging to her arm. “You’ll die too.”

Lavagirl turns to look at her, gently cupping her cheek with a warm hand and kissing her. She pulls away before Cady has time to process what’s happening. “He’s my best friend. I have to. We love you.”

With that, she turns back and dives into the water, swimming down to Sharkboy on the sea floor. Cady watches as she grabs him by a hand and hauls him back up to the surface. Cady helps lift them both back onto the shore.

“Sharkboy?” Cady asks frantically, trying to shake him awake. “Wake up, please! Come on, please, please please.”

She’s so distracted with Sharkboy that she doesn’t notice Lavagirl crawling away from the water before collapsing. She’s not breathing, and her fire has been extinguished.

Cady whirls around when she hears a rattling breath, and finds Lavagirl’s lifeless form. “No, no, no, Lavagirl, please! Not both of you!”

Neither of them wake. Cady frantically shakes them, crying harder than she thinks she ever has, but to no avail.

“I can’t do this without you!” She sobs. “What am I supposed to do now?”

Suddenly, the disembodied face and voice of Tobor appears. “What do you think you should do, child?”

“Dr-dream… a better dream,” Cady whimpers, holding the lifeless hands of both her friends.

“Interesting,” Tobor says kindly. “Explain.”

“I wanted all my dreams to come true,” Cady sniffles. “But… I only dreamed for myself. This whole place only exists because I wanted to escape my real world. But I should’ve dreamed to make my real world a better place. Selfish dreams shouldn’t come true.”

“You’re becoming a very good dreamer, Cady,” Tobor says. “You always were, monkey. Get it back.”

“What do you do?” Cady asks hollowly. “When your dreams have been destroyed?”

“Dream a better dream,” Tobor replies. “An unselfish dream. You can do it. I believe in you, monkey.”

“I love you,” Cady says as Tobor floats away. She never thought she’d hear her brother call her ‘monkey’ again. She needs to say it. Tobor winks at her, and then he’s out of sight.

Cady takes a deep breath, and squeezes both of the hands in her own. “Dream a better dream.”

Sharkboy suddenly snaps awake next to her, coughing some water out of his lungs. Cady tips him onto his side and pats his back to help. He looks at her thankfully before crawling over to Lavagirl.

“She knew this would happen,” Cady murmurs. “If she saved you. I couldn’t stop her.”

Sharkboy nods sadly, taking Lavagirl’s hand. It’s cool to the touch, for the first time since their creation. Suddenly, a bright light is visible from behind them. Sharkboy and Cady turn around to see Lavagirl’s volcano home glowing brightly.

“Lava,” Cady breathes. “We have to get her there.”

“I’ll go,” Sharkboy says. Cady grabs his arm to stop him. “I’m stronger, and faster.”

“No, I can’t let you go again. You’ll burn up,” she says desperately.

Sharkboy doesn’t listen, cradling Lavagirl’s body in his arms. “Are you sure this will save her?”

“It’ll do more than save her,” Cady agrees quietly. They have a stronger bond than they’ll ever have with her. She knows she can’t stop him now. She blinks, and Sharkboy is gone. She can faintly see a blue and pink blur running at inhuman speeds towards the volcano. Cady hunches in on herself and says a little prayer.

“I know who you are now, Lavagirl. You are not fire, or a simple flame. You are greater than that. Something more important, and so necessary. That is why you have to live. You are not destruction. You are not evil.”

Cady winces as she sees Sharkboy chuck Lavagirl into the mouth of the volcano, and watches in horror as he’s thrown back by the force of the eruption once she makes contact.

But then, she sees Lavagirl standing where he just was, and watches her hands suddenly glow bright like beacons.

“You are light.”

Cady closes her eyes as a bright glow rushes over her. Lavagirl has realized her true power. And so has Cady.

“Holy shit!” Sharkboy screams when she suddenly appears beside him. He holds a hand over his heart as he tries to get his breath back. “How-how did you get here so quick?”

Cady doesn’t answer that. “Hold off Neverbury. I’m off to deal with Requiem.”

“I’ll need my fish army,” Sharkboy says. Cady turns to look at the frozen ocean they were just on.

“I’ll unfreeze the ocean.” With a snap of her fingers, it’s done. “Good luck. I love you both.”

-

“I’ve become what you feared most,” Cady murmurs to Requiem’s turned back. “Requiem.”

Requiem whirls around in surprise. “How’d you get in here?”

“I’m the day dreamer,” Cady replies. “Able to dream with my eyes open.”

“Hate to burst your bubble here, dream girl, but I’ve read your little book,” Requiem says. “There’s not one dream you have that I haven’t already seen. So what do you say? Let’s blow the roof off this place.” She raises her arms, and suddenly they’re on what appears to be a battlefield. “May the best dream win.”

She sticks out a hand towards Cady, releasing a wave of piranhas. Cady winds up and sticks out her own hand, releasing a wave of…

“Bubbles? Come on,” she whispers. But, as the bubbles make contact with the chomping fish, they’re suddenly trapped inside and carried off with the wind. “Oh. I guess that worked.”

She winds up again, and blows a wave of butterflies towards Requiem. Requiem unleashes her own swarm of wasps.

“Wait!” Cady yells. All the bugs suddenly disappear. She puts a finger to her temple and closes her eyes. “Brain storm.”

Requiem looks at her in confusion before she puts the pieces together and looks up in horror. “Eww!”

Brains splat down to the ground all around her, and she puts her arms up to protect her head from the falling craniums. She screams when one lands in her hands and throws it as far as she can, wiping off the fluid on her cape.

“Brain… freeze!” She yells, lifting her arms to the sky. All the brains raining down pause in place before landing in the ground in a single sheet.

“Brain.. fart,” Cady replies with a giggle. Requiem’s head suddenly swells to roughly one hundred times the size it’s meant to be, and she leans from side to side in a ditch attempt to keep her balance. Before she knows it, she’s completely upside down resting on top of her hand. “Nice headstand!”

Requiem’s head deflates, and she lands back on her feet. She looks at Cady and gives her a quiet chuckle. “You’re afraid of me, aren’t you?”

Cady watches in horror as she moves her hands down her sides in a quick motion, and suddenly rockets off into the sky on a stone tower. Cady repeats the motion and rises to the same height on a pillar of her own.

“I used to be,” she says quietly. “But now I understand. Someone ruined your dreams, and now all you can do is ruin everyone else’s.”

Requiem scowls at her, and sends her tower even higher. Cady follows again. The air is getting a bit thin up here. Hopefully she won’t have to go any higher.

“We can create a better dream than this,” Cady pleads. “A better world. Don’t you see?” She snaps her fingers, and a makeshift bridge suddenly appears between each of their towers. Cady carefully walks halfway across it and reaches out a hand. “What do you say? Regina?”

Regina looks at her in shock for a moment, but slowly joins her on the bridge. She looks at her own hand, before inching it toward’s Cady’s.

Just before they touch, a creaking can be heard and the bridge gives way beneath them. Cady uses her day dreamer powers to sort of float, rushing quickly after Regina.

“Don’t let me fall!” Regina screams, covering her face so as not to see her rapidly approaching doom. Cady grabs her wrist and floats them gently to the dream lair.

“Wouldn’t dream of it. Don’t ruin people’s dreams, Regina. Because you ruin your own, too. And then you’ll stop believing.”

Cady is suddenly tackled to the soft ground from behind. She screams, but looks up just in time to see Lavagirl before their lips are slammed together. Her warmth is back.

“Cady,” Lavagirl whispers against her lips. “I am light. Thank you.”

“You always were,” Cady replies, holding Lavagirl’s hips as she straddles her. “Nothing to do with me.”

Lavagirl kisses her again. “But now I know. So thank you.”

“Big deal,” Sharkboy teases. “The real news is what I am!”

“A pain in the ass?” Lavagirl asks, finally standing and helping Cady up.

“I’m king of the ocean!”

Cady giggles at their bickering.

“Yeah, yeah. Thanks for saving me,” Lavagirl says quietly, leaning in to kiss his cheek. There’s a quiet sizzle and flash of light when she makes contact.

“Ouch,” Sharkboy says, rubbing his cheek. At least he’s smiling.

“Everything will return to the way it was,” Regina says from behind them, joining the conversation. “You will be able to travel to Earth and back again as you wish.” She gestures to Sharkboy. “You can search for your mother.” To Lavagirl. “You can rule Earth’s lava realm.”

“And just what am I supposed to do?” Neverbury asks, appearing out of nowhere. “Now that you’re all… buddy buddy.”

“You can go back to being the good guardian of the planet,” Regina replies.

Neverbury cackles. “Oh, really? Keeping everything running? Making sure this loud, obnoxious world is a happy place?”

“Hey!” Cady says sadly.

“You’re dreaming.” Neverbury chuckles.

“I dreamt you,” Cady says boldly, letting go of Lavagirl’s hand and puffing out her chest at Neverbury. “And I can un-dream you.”

“You think you can just snap your eyes open and make me vanish?” Neverbury threatens. “Not so easy. I am the danger of dreaming. For every person who dreams up the lightbulb, there’s the one who dreams up the atom bomb. This is one dream you won’t be waking up from. I’m gonna put an end to this ridiculous tangent at it’s source.”

With that, she takes off towards Earth. Cady yelps and leaps out of the way. “Where did she go?”

“She’s headed to Earth,” Sharkboy says, tracking her on his radar.

“She’s going to try to destroy you in your sleep,” Regina says.

“In my sleep?” Cady asks quietly. “You mean I’m asleep?! All this time I’ve been asleep?!”

“No,” Lavagirl says calmly, coming over to her. “You’re dreaming, Cady.”

“With your eyes open,” Sharkboy adds.

“Make the dream real,” Lavagirl says, taking her hand again. “And you can live out your dreams on Earth. Just like you made us real.”

“Make it real,” Sharkboy commands gently. “You can do it.”

“Blink three times,” Lavagirl murmurs, gently cupping Cady’s face in her hot hands. “One.”

Cady listens. “Wait, but-“

“Two,” Sharkboy says. Cady blinks again.

“Will I ever see you again?”

Lavagirl kisses her one more time before letting her go. “Three.”

Cady blinks.

——

When she opens her eyes, she’s back on Earth, huddled under her desk in the science room. The teacher is trying to gather everyone to head to shelter from the storm, with the help of Ms. Norbury.

Ms. Norbury lifts the desk off of Cady. “Cady, get up! There’s a tornado heading our way!”

Cady scrambles to her feet and dusts herself off. “It’s not a tornado!” She yells over the gusts of the wind. “It’s worse!”

“Regina, wake up,” Ms. Norbury commands, tapping Regina at her desk. Regina snaps awake and winces at the large puddle of drool coating her desk. Gross.

Cady leads them to the gaping hole in the wall, created by Sharkboy and Lavagirl. That was a mere moment ago, but it feels like years. “Look!”

The tornado barreling towards them suddenly begins sparking, and Neverbury emerges from the cyclone before it dissipates into a simple thunderstorm.

“It’s Ms. Neverbury, from planet Drool! The one from my dreams!” Cady explains.

Ms. Norbury and the science teacher both look at it in confusion. “You mean… this is real? Your dreams are real?”

“Some dreams are so powerful they become real,” Cady says.

“I don’t believe it,” Ms. Norbury says.

“It’s literally right there!” Cady yells.

“No, yeah, I can see that!” Norbury replies. “What I can’t believe is… you dreamt me! As a big, round bad guy!”

“Sorry!” Cady says. “Kinda took on a life of its own!”

Ms. Norbury sighs before turning to the class, watching in horror as the storms grow again and Neverbury looms ominously just outside.

“Okay class, we’re just teachers,” Cady’s science teacher says. “And we are here to inspire the answers in you! And there’s some damn good inspiration outside. So, this is now a pop quiz. We need to defeat that lady! Any ideas?!”

Regina raises her hand, surprising everyone.

“Wow, Regina. Yes?”

“I can take her,” Regina says boldly, running outside.

“No, you can’t!” Cady yells, grabbing her hand and pulling her back in. “Not by yourself. We need another idea.”

“No dumb ideas, come on,” Ms. Norbury says.

“Maybe we can freeze her circuits,” Regina suggests.

“That’s literally the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard,” Ms. Norbury replies. “We’re in Illinois in August. Next?”

“No, that might work!” Cady says. “Regina, where are your friends?”

“Gretchen and Karen?”

“Yeah, where are they?”

“Uh… English, I think?” Regina says with a shrug.

“Then come on!” Cady yells, grabbing her hand and hauling her out the door. The English wing is on the other side of the school.

“I am in heels!” Regina yells.

“Take them off, then! This is kind of an emergency!” Cady yells back, breaking ahead. Regina pauses to snatch her shoes off before barreling after her.

The teacher looks up in shock as a very disheveled Cady and Regina suddenly slam the door open. Cady points at them and pants, “We need… Gretchen and… and Karen.”

They already seem to have known this was coming, and stand to join them. Regina says, “Take off your shoes now, save yourselves. Just come on.”

When they make it back to the science room, Cady reaches into her pocket.

“Those jeans are horrific, by the way,” Regina says. Cady waves her off as she pulls out the crystal heart.

“Is this yours?” Cady asks, holding it up to show Gretchen and Karen. They both look at it and each other in shock.

“I’ve only seen it in my dreams,” Karen says quietly, gently running a finger over it.

“Me too,” Gretchen murmurs.

“It can freeze anything,” Cady murmurs, looping it gently around their intertwined hands and fastening it.

“Even time,” they both say at the same time before looking at each other with a small smile.

“Let them out,” Cady commands. Everyone parts like the Red Sea to make way for them to get outside. “Do you know what to do?”

“Yes,” they say. “Stand back.”

Cady watches with a smile as they approach Neverbury casually and each hold up a hand. They still hold each other with one, and fire a beam of ice at Neverbury with the other. Neverbury freezes solid, and then shatters. Snow begins to fall around them.

Everyone cheers and runs outside to play in the magical snow, except for Cady.

“You’ve made me a great teacher today, Cady,” Ms. Norbury says.

“How did I do that?” Cady asks. “I punched a hole in the school.”

“A good teacher learns as much from her students as they learn from her,” Ms. Norbury explains. “You’ve awakened something in me. That being said, I’m going to start looking into a different career.”

“I don’t blame you,” Cady chuckles, before Ms. Norbury pushes her outside to join her peers. Cady heads out aimlessly, not really knowing who to join. Until she sees Sharkboy and Lavagirl standing with her parents. “Sharkboy! Lavagirl!”

“Hey!” They both say. Lavagirl catches Cady as she barrels into her and slams their lips together.

“Oh, um…” Cady says sheepishly when they break apart. “Mom, Dad, I’m bi.”

“After today, we’re just glad you’re alive,” her dad chuckles, ruffling her hair. Cady throws her arms around both of them, and smiles as they squeeze her tightly. They feel like a family for the first time in years.

—————-

epilogue

“The following story is true,” Cady begins. “It may have began as a dream, but as we all saw last month, when you let your dreams become reality, reality becomes a dream.

“Sharkboy and Lavagirl both live here now. Sharkboy rules the ocean as king, and is searching for his mother. He says his instincts tell him he’s getting closer every second, so he’ll find her soon. And Lavagirl lives with me. We just have to keep the heat on max.”

That gets a chuckle from everyone.

“She gets to live her dream too, don’t worry. She rules all of Earth’s volcanos, a source of light and life for all of us. Just from a distance. So… so she can be with me. My advice to you all is… dream your best dreams. Then work to make them real.”

The end.

---

hope you enjoyed!

I'm sorry it wasn't the most romantic, but i did my best to make it fit with the story. we'll be back on earth next week :))

thanks for reading!

lots of love,

ezzy