#anyways gar wrote the first half and i wrote the last half

[lune-de-miel-au-paradis]

Who you belong to

Summary: You plan a date night with Wolffe going to a concert for a band you both love. You decided to have some fun and choose a sexy, tempting outfit for your Commander. Turns out the lead singer had his eyes on you and Wolffe needs to remind you who you belong to.

Pairing: Commander Wolffe x f!reader

Warnings: NSFW,18+ (minors pls don't read), biker!Wolffe, sorta possessive Wolffe, jealousy, fingering, kinda public sex, grinding, language, growling, biting, kinda dom!Wolffe, blowjob, Wolffe being Wolffe, soft Wolffe, feelings, mention of a real life band and band member, a few easter eggs as characters, mention of readers looks, a bit long  (I hope I haven't left out anything.)

A/N: This is a gift for my lovely dear also super talented writer (check out her fics!)  friend Gabi! 💖@cloneloverrrrr

I know you love Wolffe and this band so this is especially for you to enjoy! I wrote this in vacay so pls forgive me if I mistyped something. Also this is my first fics post for a very long time so pls be kind. And this is my first ever smuty, spicy fics so Im super excited but also anxious about it. I really hope you'll like it. (I like criticism, but only if you guys are kind and not rude.) And forgive me if something is not correct with the grammar because english is not my first language. There is gonna be a part 2. (smutty!) coming in this week. 

Moodboard made by me in Canva and pictures from Pinterest.

Pls enjoy! 

Satisfied, you looked at yourself in front of the three-part standing mirror. Today promised to be a particularly good day. You finished your job early, so you had time for a pleasant bubble bath and some pampering rituals, which only boosted your confidence even more. Somehow your feminine energies were at a high level today. Several of your customers asked what serum you use, telling you that your skin is almost glowing, and even your hair is shining brighter. Maybe it's the position of the stars, maybe it's the full moon, or even more so, the fact that you happen to be on a date with the hottest Commander of the GAR, Wolffe. Your Wolffe.

Hound introduced you to each other when little tooka kittens moved into the air vent of Fox's office. You were the only applicant who was willing to take in the black and orange colored kittens. Fox and Wolffe were having a few words over a cup of caf when you and Hound arrived at the office. As soon as Wolffe saw you, he knew it was over for him. He fell into you hard, deep and inexorably. He immediately introduced himself, and although you were a bit surprised at first by the approach of the grumpy intimidating clone, you noticed over a little time, the softening of his dark and serious gaze as he looked at you with his silver and whiskey colored eyes. 

You were the only woman who found a crack in his hard, cold armor and moved straight into his heart.

It's been half a year already that you are officially a couple. As far as the strict rules allow. (You had Master Plo's blessing, and that was all that mattered to you. Rules are meant to be broken, anyway.) 

Wolffe has to go on another mission tomorrow, but tonight is all yours. So you certainly had some great plans.

A couple of scented candles in your apartment that made the air smell of pumpkin and cinnamon in honor of the coming autumn. Several outfits have been prepared for your black gothic styled bed and on the soft velvety blankets. The black kitten was sleeping curled up on the cushion of your reading chair. While you swept the orange one off the bed yourself. The little mischievous one really wanted to play with the shoulder strap of the small bag you chose to go with one of the dresses.

Your nails matched your lipstick, which was exactly the same dark rich burgundy as the spicy sweet wine you were sipping while getting ready, and it matched the  love bite marks that Wolffe gave you on your last evenings together. Little gifts, or you can say reminders of who you belong to, and how much he craves you. You loved them, even though they started to fade away a little.

"So it's a good excuse to get some more" you thought cheekily. 

You looked at the outfits, you weren't sure which one to wear, but you were sure of two things you definitely gonna wear. Your new long black vinyl jacket with matching boots and your new black lacy underwear set . The make-up was done, your hair smelled of your favorite shampoo and fell softly in raven black locks on your back, you had already put on your underwear and boots, both of which were surprisingly comfortable. You also talked to two girlfriends on comm.

All three of you lived far from each other, in different rims but you still made time for a little chat several times a week.

You met on a platform where several blogs ran stuff about clones (how little rights they have, how can their situation be helped, what is like dating in such straight circumstances.) and you've been good friends ever since.

One of them used their connections and gifted you two tickets to the concert of your favorite band. You and Wolffe were both fans of Bad Omens, so you couldn't wait for tonight to start. You just asked their advice on what to wear.

"Whatever you choose, knowing the Commander, you won’t be wearing it for long." teased one of them. 

Starting with this, an idea occurred to you!

Risky and bold, but it can turn out well...

You knew that Wolffe would arrive soon, so you said goodbye to your girlfriends and sipped the remaining wine from your glass, making up your mind confidently. You threw your clothes on the floor and only put on your coat. It was perfect: the size, the material, plus it covered enough to not get into an awkward position, as it was long enough. You sprayed a little perfume on yourself, which made you know that Wolffe would only go crazy for you. 

Wolffe had a bike, but not just any speeder bike. It was a big, solid, black, shiny, sport bike. He worked hard for it and put aside all the credit so it could be his. It was his treasure that was guarded with fear until he got to know you. After all, you took the first place in his heart. Anyhow he took great care of her and often maintained her, giving her the name Selene, which is basically the moon goddess in mythology. Until he knew you, she was the only one he cared about, and yes, he even howled sometimes when he drove with her on the capital roads.

He stored it in the small garage belonging to your apartment, which you allowed him to do and for which he showed his gratitude so many times in the form of kisses.

Right now, leaning on the motorcycle, you watch as the person of your desires and love approaches you.

Instead of his usual GAR gear, he wore black pants, boots, and a leather jacket. Smelling like a divine god, woody musk mixed with leather, amber and a hint of bergamot. An elixir that made you crave him more and more every time. 

"Hey handsome. Care for a ride?" you teased him. 

"With a woman like you? Always mesh'la. I will even go to hell with you, it will be heaven for me as long as you are mine and I can kiss you on those lush lips of yours."

You shuddered when you saw his eyes darken, and his seductive tone only made you more aroused. You loved everything about his voice, its depth, the accent, the way he whispered those sinfully sexy words into your ear every night when you were together in his own language.

He wrapped his two strong arms around your waist and kissed you passionately. You haven't seen him in a week, so the kiss quickly turned into tongue and teeth kinda kiss. With this kind of kiss, the world ceases to exist, it's just you and the butterflies in your stomach are about to burst out of excitement and there is only him. His honey-like taste in your tongue, his scent in the air your lungs breathe in, his grip in your body that makes you crazy and his love for you that makes you so utterly obsessed with him. 

You just stayed like that for a while, not paying attention to the outside world, lovingly kissing freely like young lovers. When you separated, both of you were gasping for air and your foreheads touched.

"Miss me that much Commander?" you asked

“So. Very. Kriffing. Much.” 

After every word, he planted a kiss on your lips, emphasizing his truth.

You both put on your helmets and biker gloves headed towards one of the downtown nightclubs on the lower level.

Wolffe drove fast, took the corners confidently, but with certainty. You loved riding a motorcycle with him, the excitement, the feeling of freedom, the fact that your body was almost completely smoothed over his. Wolffe promised that he would teach you to ride a motorcycle after the war, but you knew that together with him you liked riding much more. On the way, the pack members appeared on both sides, Sinker and Comet saluted and waved, and Boost boosted past you at full speed balancing on a rear wheel, all of them howling. You laughed as Wolffe shifted into higher gear more enthusiastically. You thanked the Maker for the hair foam that, when you apply it to your hair and drive at such a high speed, the air creates wonderful tangle-free volume in your hair.

With the tickets, they let you in out of line and you were already inside. Smoke machines and flashing red lights made the concert halls vibe. Upbeat music played that became one with your heartbeat. You chase out several acquaintances in the crowd, to whom you waved enthusiastically. You saw members of the Corrie guard, some troopers from the 501th and the 212th battalions. 

“You look amazing my dear. Absolutely stunning!”

When you heard the familiar chuckle, you turned to Gregor with a big smile as he winked at you from the center of a lady's wreath. He greeted you with two kisses on the cheek, which caused most of the ladies gathered around him to frown glumly with their colorful lips. But you didn't care, you and Gregor were good friends before you got together with Wolffe.

"I see you are not bored. You have quite an amount of pretty ladies as company."

"Well, somehow I have to make up for the time I was gone. And they can't resist the famous 'Gregor charm'." 

When he did his iconic hair straightening motion one girl almost passed out, you just rolled your eyes laughing. Gregor took a good look at you and knew right away.

"Naughty girl! You're gonna kill this poor bastard with your sexiness. Has he noticed it yet?"

"Not yet."

"Good. Play your cards smart dear. And don't sit on cold benches!"

He planted another kiss on your cheek and returned to his ladies. Such a ladies man.

There was a kind of unspoken agreement between you two, when Wolffe was around Gregor would try to flirt with you. This made Wolffe a little jealous and left delicious bruises on your soft skin to your delight while fucking you to heaven. And Gregor's current lady was also jealous and gave the Captain what he wanted much sooner. A win-win situation.

Wolffe put his arms around you. You enjoyed the concert together. You sang the lyrics with the band, you danced as much as the crowd allowed. The music and the atmosphere permeated you completely. You were upbeat and happy, a gorgeous smile was on your face and sparkle in your eyes.

Wolffe looked at you and couldn't get enough of you. He adored you. He was kind of obsessed. Your beautiful appearance, which seems to have been made for him. Your raven and shiny silky hair, your pretty face, your soft and divine body. Your kind heart, which holds so much love. The care that you put in your friendships. The nurture care you showed for the adopted kittens. As you shower his newly acquired war scars with kisses. Your passion for your work. 

He didn't believe in his wildest dreams that he would ever be able to feel this way about someone. 

As he observed you lovingly, he noticed a small blush appear on your cheeks. Then he noticed how the band's lead singer looked at you. Noah kriffing Sebastian was ogling you like you were a delicious dessert to him. Wolffe knew he was your celebrity crush since you were young. Wolffe was no longer paying attention to the music, but to the way the singer almost sang to you, and that he even winked at you. This clearly had an effect on him, because the Commander decided it was time to act. There were two options. He rips out the musician's heart with his bare hands in front of you, or reminds you who you belong to.

Unfortunately, he wouldn't win much with the first move, as he would be arrested and convicted, which would be a lot of paperwork for Fox, leaving option number 2. He took your upper arm and gently but firmly led you out of the crowd and into one of the deserted corridors.

He pinned you to the wall, the cold metal cooling your back. He covers your mouth with his, hot and heavy.

"Wolffe! What's gotten into you?" you asked.

He didn't answer, he just studied your face in silence, the neon lights in the reflection of his cybernetic eyes only made him even more dangerously handsome. The shadows on his face highlighted his strong nose, high cheekbones and attractive lips.

"I decided it's time for a little reminder for you mesh'la. I see you're enjoying the concert too much."

"Yes it's amazing! Aren't you enjoying it?"

"Not really when that bastard singer have eyes on something he shouldn't. I see how he basically eyefucked you. Do you want it mesh'la? Want to fuck him? Don't even get me started on Gregor."

"No. I'm only yours, you know that."

You cupped his face and looked into his eyes, soon you realized regardless, you still get a little reminder how to behave. You smiled at him.

"Good. Now be a good girl, and open up." he commanded.

You obeyed, opened your mouth and looked up at him seductively through your eyelashes.

"Make them wet."

You sucked them in and you gently started to caress his fingers with your tongue and enjoyed the effect you caused him. His eyes are fixed on you, lustful and dark, he swallows, then takes them away from your lips and straight towards your hot, longing center.

That's when he discovers that you're not wearing pants or a skirt. You see the surprise slide across his face and then turn into a satisfied smile. He relaxes his free hand on the belt of the jacket as he unbuttons it, then discovers that you are only wearing your underwear under the jacket, and the thigh high boots. He almost growled with desire.

"Such a dirty girl. You're gonna be the end of me."

He basically groweld in your ears. While he pulled your panties to the side out of his kriffing way and started gently stroking your folds and found that sensitive spongy spot as he slid two fingers into you. You were already wet all evening from the excitement of your choice of clothing and the feelings of his closeness.

His fingers moved rhythmically inside you as he massaged your clit in circular motions with his thumb. You moaned loudly with lust.

"Funny Gregor said that too." you let out a chuckle.

Wolffe suddenly stopped with his motions, eliciting a moan of complaint from you at the lack of his fingers. He grabbed your chin with his fingers wet from your juices, squeezing it a little.

His veins on his neck straining from how hard he's clenching his jaws, the wild nearly homicidal look in those amber colored and silver dark eyes, you began to understand how he came about his name. It aroused you to no end.

"I'm only going to ask this once, and you better have a good answer for me, mesh'la. Who does this pussy belong to? Who do you belong to?"

Maker, you were a whimpering mess, you wanted him so bad to take you right here right now while the concert still plays in the background and with the excitement that anyone could caught you in this position.

"You. Only you Commander." you said

"Will you think about other men when I'm pleasing you?" he asked in a gentle tone but from his eyes you saw how serious he was.

" Never. I'm only yours."

"Wouldn't you like anyone else to touch you like this? Hmm?"

He asked slowly oh so slowly circling your clit with his free hand, the other kept you still by the jaw.

"Are you wishing it was someone elses fingers inside of you? Noah Sebastian maybe? Or Captain Gregor? Do you think they make a better job at knowing you? Loving you like I do?"

His voice was low warm toned, it sent shivers down your spine.

He slipped to fingers in your tight aching cunt. You whined in pleasure wanting more, but he was torturing you with his sweet slow motions. Maker you wanted more.

"No there is only you. Only you my Commander. Oh, Wolffe, give me more! I need to come so bad. I don't want anyone else but you. No rockstar."

"What about the Captain you want him?"

"No, I don't wish for Gregor. Only you my love."

"Good. Don't ever say his name while I'm inside you. Understand that pretty girl?"

You loved it when he spoke to you in his commanding tone.

"Yes."

"Yes, What?" He leaned in closer to you, your lips almost touched.

"Yes, Commander." you said and he let out a satisfied grumble which made your pussy twitch in answer.

Oh, how he loved hearing that rank roll off your lips. Just the thought of it made him rock hard. Just as much as you loved to hear his growls and moans.

You palmed his turgid length through his pants and earned some more pleasant noises from Wolffe.

His fingers begin to swirl on your sensitive bud, you open your legs wider to allow him better access, and let out a small gasp when he gently nibbles your ear. He can feel how wet you get by his movements. His fingers curl in you the way he knows it makes your knees weak you can't help it but to grind into his palm. He starts to explore your neck and jaw gently kissing biting and sucking delicious lovebites on your pale skin.  You can feel you're close to your climax as he moved his hand in you and rubbed on your clit, when he felt your inner muscles clench around him he let out a satisfied growl in your ear, when you decided to lean closer to him and lick a long stripe over his pulse.

"Fuck...Wolffe...I'm close.." you moaned.

"Then cum for me mesh'la, give it to me sweet thing..."

Your climax hit you hard and you felt so wonderfully helpless as the room spun and you saw stars, you heard the music from the still running concert show.

He still had his hand in you still hit that oh so sweet spongy spot to help you ride out your orgasm. Wolffe loved to make you cum. Feeling you fall apart in his arms seeing how beautiful you were and how vulnerable in those moments it turned him on like nothing else.

"Shhh you such a good girl." he shooted you and kissed your forehead. "But you have to earn another one. Is it okay for you sweet thing?"

"Yes. Please. Please I need to taste you Commander."

You knelt down, running your fingers gracefully along his thick muscled legs up towards the zipper. When your hand was on his hardness, you looked up seductively.

"May I Commander suck on your cock sir? "

"Yes you fucking may. I like it when you know how to behave. Good girls get a reward."

Some concern appeared on your face when you saw his huge cock bounce out from his pants. He was perfect and you became more aroused when you see the effect you made on him. You rubbed your red plum lips gently to the tip to smear his salty pre cum then you slid it fully into your mouth ever so slowly and Wolffe let out a sexy hoarse voiced moan. You welcomed him with wet hotness and a tight throat as you moved up and down on his shaft. You tried to take him further, still only getting half way.

Your mouth felt a little dry, since you had been singing and shouting at the concert so far. Wolffe caressed your face lovingly, then turned up your face by the jaw:

"I got you. Open up, pretty girl, let me help you."

You obeyed, you opened your mouth with your eyes closed and felt him kiss you passionately and spit in your mouth.

You couldn't take it, you reached down with your hand and played with yourself until you were now completely wet and hot and could let him into your mouth and suck on him rhythmically up and down. His head fell back in pleasure.

"Just like that...so kriffing good...so good with that pretty mouth of yours."

You gently wrung guttural moans from him. Holding his gaze was hard but something in his gaze just kept you there. You couldn't look away from him.

He had that lustful loving look on you full of feral and hunger for you. Only you can get this reaction out of him. Only you hold this power over him, that makes him rock hard and wild for you.

You enjoyed and valued this power, this connection you two had. Force bond? Fuck that! You two were so perfect, so meant to be. Fucking soulmates.

You might have closed your eyes for these sweet thoughts because you heard his command.

"Don't you dare look away from me mesh'la."

He was satisfied with your quick response because he gently grabbed your hair and with one hand he guided you on his cock.

"That's it, keep your eyes on me. I want you to watch me as I fuck that pretty mouth. "

He couldn't have looked away if he tried to. The way his cock disappeared in and out from your mouth, as your talented tongue worked on him it almost made him lose his mind. If he was gonna die this is the way he wants to leave this life, with you, inside you. Loving you.

"Ah sweetheart I'm close... Will you be good and swallow? You can say the safe word if you want to stop."

You worked on him with more passion and gripped his hips as an answer.

You knew exactly what made him feel heavens, what movements he needed to tip over the edge and cum.

Your pace quickened and your tongue too, his grip tightened in your hair and his moans were louder.

You didn't care about the world around you, what mattered is the two of you, to bring pleasure to each other. And luckily he  chose a well hidden corridor. So you weren't disturbed.

He came hard, his head fell back, eyes closed growling like a real wolf. His salty warm cum came down your throat as you swallowed all of it. He looked down on you with lovesick eyes.

You looked so lovely, your mascara a bit smeared from your tears, your mouth is red glistening with his cum, your hair is messy and your eyes full of emotions.

He helped you up, kept you close to him, kissed you with love and passion.

"I'm so crazy for you mesh'la."

He whispered to your locks when he gave you a forehead kiss. You hugged him tight, intoxicated with his warmness and his cologne.

"Should I help you with something?"

"I just go for a quick touch up in the bathroom." you said.

You went into another corridor with still wobbly legs and acknowledged that there was no line in frotnt of the bathrooms so the show must be still going on.

You only saw a pretty lilac twilek girl press Gregor to the wall kissing him furiously. When he saw you he held his fist out and you fist bumped it while going in the ladies room.

You cleaned yourself up, put on another coat of lipstick, wiped away the smeared mascara and noticed all the lovely bruises your Commander gave you. Your neck was full of maroon colored lovebites, they were very noticable and very sexy on your skin. Wolffe guaranteed everyone saw he marked his territory.

When you went back he was waiting for you, and when you entered the crowd again he whispered to your ear as he wrapped his arms around you.

"Don't worry mesh'la the night isn't over yet. I have some plans for you after the concert. When I'm done with you my love, you won't even remember your own name."

...

Part 2. is coming soon!

[clonesimpextra]

Supposed to Be

Pairing: Commander Wolffe x Reader Word Count: 1.1K Rating: Explicit (18+ Only) Summary: In the aftermath of the Malevolence attack, you try to comfort Wolffe. A/N: I wrote this a long time ago but didn't post it because I thought I might use a refurbished version of it for my WolffexOC fic, A Shattered Peace. I've since changed directions a bit over there to the point where this exact scene wouldn't exactly fit in anymore. SO up here it goes. I didn't originally plan for it to be so sad, but I guess I ended up in an angsty mood and I can only apologize LOL.

When you land your fighter at the GAR headquarters and walk into the 104th barracks, the first thing you notice is how quiet it is.

Where there normally are dozens of clones roaming the hallways, shouting from the rec room, or snoring so loudly the sounds pierce through the durasteel walls, there is now only quiet, empty space

When you knock on the door to Wolffe’s quarters, you almost expect him not to answer. You wouldn’t be surprised if he wanted to be alone after everything he and the 104th had been through on the last mission . . . everything you had missed because you’d been called back to the Temple.

The seconds pass with no answer and you’re half turned to leave when you hear the swish of the door opening and you’re looking at Wolffe’s face. Or at least, you would be if he wasn’t staring down at the floor.

You resist the urge to step forward, not wanting to barge in where you might not be welcome.

“Wolffe?” you ask tentatively, unsure what it is you’re actually asking.

But his shoulders sag as soon as his name leaves your lips, and his hand shoots forward to wrap around your arm and pull you inside before you even have a chance to take another breath.

The door locks shut behind you and Wolffe has you wrapped against his chest, his head bent down to rest in the space between your neck and shoulder. You rub your hands up his back, pressing down slightly to try and ease the tension you can feel in his muscles even through his black undershirt.

“Wolffe,” you whisper into his ear. “I know what happened. I—”

He lifts his head suddenly and covers your mouth with his, breathing in the words you were going to say that probably wouldn’t have helped anyway.

He slides his tongue across the line of your lips and you open for him immediately, a moan already pushing up from deep in your chest. Wolffe is always a passionate kisser. He might be a man of few words, but he doesn’t need to say much when his lips find other ways of speaking for him. 

Right now, though, despite his urgency, Wolffe isn’t rough. You can feel his want, his need, to have you as close to him as possible. To make sure you’re really here, you think. To put everything you know he can’t say into the kisses that are now trailing down your neck.

 He presses a gentle bite into your shoulder, pulling another moan from you in the process, and his hands move to your waist. Gripping tightly, he stumbles backwards with you to the bed. When he sits down, his mouth reluctantly leaving your body, he finally looks at you. And it breaks your heart.

His one brown eye is bloodshot, the skin around it bruised and puffy and you don’t need to ask to know that he’s been crying. You cup his face in your hands, run your thumbs across his cheeks until he closes his eyes, sighing into one of your palms.

The urge to hold him against your breast and keep holding him until the pain you know he’s feeling subsides is overwhelming. But you push it away. That’s not what he needs. And you came here tonight to take care of him.

Moving slowly, you let go of his face and sink to your knees in front of him. At the loss of your touch, he opens his eyes and tilts his head down at you. He still doesn’t speak as you place your hands on his knees and run them up his muscular thighs. You don’t need him to tell you what to do, not tonight, but you need to make sure this is what he wants.

“Wolffe,” you say for the third time tonight, your voice loud in the dark silence of the room, “tell me what you want.”

Quietly, Wolffe places a hand on top of one of yours, weaving your fingers together. His eyes never leaving your face, he raises your hand to his lips and presses a soft kiss to the back of it before placing it on top of his length, still buried beneath his tight pants.

Moving further between his knees, you feel him slowly hardening as he rubs your hand up and down. You grip him tightly, stopping the movement, and cock an eyebrow up at him.

“I know what I’m doing.” You raise your other hand to gently lift his off of you. “Let me do it.”

You stare at each other for a moment, your hand still around him but not moving. Finally, he gives you a slight nod and his cock twitches when you loosen your grip and slide up the length, leaving him behind in search of the seal to his pants that will give you all of him.

Wolffe’s eyes never leave you. Not when you slip him free. Not when you run your tongue, slowly and gently, from the base of his cock all the way to the already leaking top. Not when you take him in your mouth and suck. It doesn’t matter if you can’t see him watching you — you can feel it in the Force around you. The pain, the longing, the desire for something to push away the nothing.

You give him as much of you to fill that void as you can. You’d give him more, if you could.

When your jaw’s aching and your cunt’s begging for attention of its own, you feel tears fall down your cheeks and you don’t know if it’s from the pressure of his cock, ready to release, or from the fresh wave of agony piercing the air.

You open your eyes.

You look up.

And just as a wave of another kind fills your throat, you see a tear that isn’t yours fall to mix with your own. This isn’t the way things were supposed to be, but it’s the way they are. 

Wolffe pulls himself out, releases his clinch on the mattress, and pulls you to the bed with him. Later, when your heads are bent close together, each of your breaths tasting like the other, he whispers something into your mouth.

It’s only in the morning, when you wake to an empty bed and a wall in the Force blocking you from Wolffe, that you realize what he meant when he said he was sorry.

[mothmannnnn]

Hello sexy beautiful awesome cool swag mutuals, Gar asked me to finish a fic they wrote and we wanted to share :p Read at your own risk <3

-

If luck—a notion he’d only allowed himself to entertain after meeting James Kirk—really did exist, then it was only logical to assume its opposite existed as well. Bad luck. 

Spock couldn’t think up the logistics of the situation he and Kirk had found themselves in: why he was injured on a too-cold planet, how they had lost their communicators, how they had run into the sort of intelligent life they weren’t supposed to interact with—why they now sat, shoulders pressed together, inside a hollow alien tree. In his current, less than stellar state, he wondered if it was statistically possible to have this much bad luck.

They were able to elude their assailants through Kirk’s resourcefulness. He had eyed the hiding place while they were running from their assailants, an area near the roots they had just been able to squeeze past and fit inside. Spock vaguely wondered if the tree had rotten out, or if a creature similar to the earth woodpecker inhabited the planet and had once called the space they now sat in its home. He wondered why the wood on this planet was a pale shade of blue, the trees even more massive than the redwoods, and how this miraculous life could happen somewhere so cold. He wondered about the probability of his survival. Spock ghosted his fingers over his bloodstained abdomen. 

“Spock . . . Spock.” Kirk had his hand on his shoulder and was looking into his eyes, and Spock had to rip himself from his own mind. “You’re shaking,” He said. Spock was suddenly aware of the almost violent tremor of his own body, of the biting cold on his ears and hands and everywhere except where Kirk had his leg pressed up against his. 

“I’m very cold, Captain, and I believe—” he had to stop himself, he had to stop shaking, he had to gain back some control. He took a breath—too deep—and pain blossomed in his side, time tripping over itself. It was so cold out. “I believe I may be bleeding internally, from the injuries I sustained.” he said. 

Kirk was leaning over him then, eyes wide as they searched over him, one hand on Spock’s shoulder and the other hovering hesitantly over the blood stains on his uniform. “How bad is it? is there anything I can do? Are you—“ Spock grabbed Kirk’s wrist before he could flood him with more questions, before he could touch him and defile his hands with his blood. He didn’t like to see Kirk like this, anxious, and he especially didn’t like that he was the cause. 

“I can do something about it but . . . I must focus all my energy on healing myself.” Spock said, finally meeting Kirks eyes. He nodded, his mask of cool command back on. 

“The healing trance?” Kirk confirmed. 

“Yes but I—” There was too much going on, the cold, the bleeding, the hiding (James Kirk’s thigh pressed against his, hand in his, his worry) “I can’t regulate my body temperature while in the trance, I need some external method of—” Kirk pulled his hand away from Spock’s grip and went for the hem of his own shirt. He’d had it half way up his chest before Spock was able to catch Jim’s shirt and pull it back down. “No captain, you can’t-” Spock started, taken completely off guard but beginning to catch on to what Kirk had been thinking. 

“The extra clothing will keep you warm Spock, please just let me—“

“Your body heat is sufficient, Captain,” Spock insisted. Although he knew it was not logical, as Kirk’s body was better equipped to withstand the cold and therefore he would be able to spare the cotton shirt, Spock felt hesitant prioritizing his captain’s comfort below his own. 

Kirk looked thoughtful for a minute, his brows furrowing and his hands absentmindedly rubbing his jawline. 

Spock was getting delirious—he knew it was due to the increasing loss of blood in his body. He must begin the healing trance as promptly as possible, but a strange, illogical thought wormed itself into his mind. What will Jim do while I am gone? 

If they were to be revealed by their assailants, it would be highly unlikely that Jim could fend for himself, and it would be too dangerous to pull himself out of the healing trance. 

Before Spock could think of a solution, he felt warm hands around his waist, a strong chest against his, and the point of Jim Kirk’s chin on the crook of his neck. 

“Captain, you’ll get blood on your uniform.” 

“Tough luck,” was Jim Kirk’s eloquent reply. “We’ll have to be in close proximity for my body heat to do anything for you.” 

“Well, I . . .” Spock’s words trailed off, and he was, for perhaps only the second time in his life, at a loss for words. 

He found something akin to courage in his deliriousness, pulling away so that he might look Kirk in his eyes. “I do not like showcasing my . . . differences, as compared to you, Captain.” He motioned to the greenness of his blood, slowly darkening and expanding across his abdomen. 

“Spock, that is perhaps the most illogical thing you’ve ever said.” Astonishingly, he heard amusement in Jim’s voice, despite their current situation. When he looked over, eyes barely able to open, he saw that his captain’s lips were pulled into a ghost of a smile. His eyebrows, however, were still furrowed with concern. “What does it matter if your ears are pointed or your blood is green? Why would it ever matter to me?” There were unspoken words within that statement, even Spock was able to identify that. But he was not quite able to extract the meaning. Why would it ever matter to me? 

“I know it is not logical, but I have always envied the redness in your veins, Jim.” If Kirk had noticed the slip in formalities, he did not reveal it. “Red is the color of vitality, of passion. It is something I will never possess beyond a medicinal diagnoses. But green . . . green is the color of cowardice. Of envy.” 

“You’re not speaking any sense, Mr. Spock.”

“There are many things I do not have the courage to tell you, Jim.” 

If the silence that followed was indicative of disgust, Spock might have felt shame. But Kirk only lifted one gentle hand to Spock’s cheek, and wiped a tear that he had not known had fallen. 

“I’ll be here when you wake up, Spock,” Kirk reassured, prompting him to fall into his healing trance. He could not hold out for much longer. “We’ll get through this, I promise, and . . . when you’re awake, maybe you’ll feel a little more courageous.” 

Through their connection, both physical and emotional, Spock could feel the tug of emotions in Kirk’s chest. Stress, worry, regret and surprisingly—the last thing he felt before slipping off to unconsciousness—affection beyond platonic admiration. 

He slept. 

-

As promised, Jim was there when he awoke on the Enterprise again. He was still a little bruised, and his lip was split, but other than that, Spock could not discern any permanent physical harm.

“You’re awake,” 

Humans had an interesting habit of announcing something that was not in need of announcement. 

“I am,” Spock nodded, noticing that he had been relocated to a corner cot in the medical bay. “How long was I in the healing trance?”

Before Kirk could reply, a voice interrupted from the doorway. A booming, slightly southern accent that Spock recognized immediately, despite the state of his foggy memory. “A week,” Doctor McCoy said. “And what a hell of a week!”

“Hello, Doctor,” Spock greeted the newcomer. 

McCoy went on as if he had not heard him, muttering, “I thought Jim might go mad and strangle me! Waiting in here like some wartime widow, what a hassle!”

He went on like this, spewing good-natured insults until he exited the room, holding Spock’s file (which he presumed was what McCoy had originally came in the room for). 

Kirk looked at Spock, the tips of his ears red. This blush, which creeped up his neck, was what prompted Spock to remember the last conversation they had. 

The color of vigor. Of passion. The courage that Spock had lacked, until, in a lapse of judgment, he had admitted his best-kept secret: his feelings for James Kirk. 

“I’m glad you’re awake, Mr. Spock—even if Bones isn’t,” the tone of his voice was light, nothing remarkably fond, but his hand reached down and gently held Spock’s. 

The action was innocent enough, Spock knew. He had seen many humans hold each other’s hands for comfort, for solace. But to himself, a Vulcan, the intimate action made his own ears glow green.

“It’s okay if you don’t have the courage right now, Spock,” Jim continued. He smiled, and Spock found himself wanting to do the same. “You were very brave on that planet.” 

In a rare show of physical affection, Spock lifted Kirk’s hands to his lips, and kissed the soft palm. 

Understanding the meaning of this action, Kirk in turn lifted Spock’s hand to his own mouth, pressing a warm kiss on the back of his hand. 

“When you’re ready, Mr. Spock,” Kirk smiled, “I think we should take a long shore leave—somewhere warmer, preferably.” 

Spock squeezed the hands still holding his, hoping that this seemingly modest reaction could begin to express all the feelings he had for Jim Kirk. That perhaps Jim might feel, through his own human senses, Spock’s unfailing devotion to him. 

“Yes, Captain,” he said. “I would like that very much.” 

[cabezadeperro]

😅🤲💖🎉 🤯

hi tru!! thx for asking!!

😅 What’s a story or scene you’ve created that you’re a smidge embarrassed exists?

i still can't read the smut follow-up i wrote for a good man is hard to find lol. i don't think it's bad, necessarily, but back then i wrote even less smut than i do now and i think it shows. i second-guessed myself so much writing that.

🤲 Would you please share a snippet of a wip?

this was harder to find than it should have been ngl. i have been writing shorter stuff lately and it shows. anyway htis is from that codex persuasion au i talked about in the circus :>

Rex looked good. Bucket under his arm, easy smile on his face, dark eyes clever and seeing everything there was to see. Cody fell into step behind Kenobi. He made the young commander laugh and then he let himself disappear, half-hidden by the general’s shoulder, while Rex looked through him instead of at him. Cody smiled at him politely, found himself being smiled in turn, and then it was time for Cody to leave for the bridge, and for the Jedi to comm their Council and for Rex to see to his men, and that was that.

Cody had known they’d see each other. Kenobi and Skywalker weren’t just good friends, master and padawan: they worked well together, and Kenobi oversaw the whole Third Sector Army. Cody had known they would see each other, that they would be forced to be civil and professional and detached, and he knew he could do it; he knew Rex could do it as well.

A year, or close to. First ARC training, then six months as an ARC lieutenant, and then his promotion to captain and Skywalker’s SIC. Cody doubted it would stop there: Rex was clever and competent and charismatic and brave, and he was very good at his job. The GAR needed men like him almost more than it needed men like Cody.

A year. Cody nodded his head in goodbye before stepping into the turbolift, and didn’t miss the way Rex did the same, polite distance in his expressive eyes and face.

💖 What made you start writing?

it was because of harry potter lmao. i must have been around seven or eight and i suddenly realised that books were written by actual people, and that anybody could learn to write stories like that, too. back then i spent a lot of time making up stories with my friends and acting them out, so it was kind of a natural next step, i think.

🎉 What leads you to consider a fic a success?

if it does what i want it to do the way i want it to do it. funnily enough, me considering a fic good or "successful" doesn't mean it will be very popular though. (case in point: i think the last rexakin i wrote is very good, but it has yet to reach 30 kudos lol, and my favourite single chapter fic i wrote for the codywan kiss bingo is the least popular by quite a lot)

🤯 What’s a genre you struggle with as a writer (ex. romance, action, etc.)?

plot is so fucking hard. SO HARD. i almost gave up at least three times while i was trying to write a room with a view because i couldn't get the story to work they way it needed to work, it was so frustrating

ASK GAME

[itzagothamcitysiren]

Welcome to the Family

So yesterday was Tim’s birthday and I had planned out a fic for it BUT I’ve been working a lot and just hadn’t had the time to sit down and write it out. I had kinda forgotten about it and when yesterday came around I was annoyed BUT I was given this idea after going out for the day with my niece. 

We had drove by a Red Robin after eating somewhere else and I was mad salty, cause yesterday would’ve been the perfect time to go. Then for dinner we ordered take out and I kind you not, our delivery driver was named Timothy. Like what the hell? lol, I was dude I need to write something now. 

So today after work I sat down and wrote this. It’ll be three parts, taking place after my mother’s day story. I’ll post up part one and two tonight, and once I finish three I’ll post it tomorrow hopefully :) 

Tell ‘Em That It’s My Birthday pt. 1

           “What day is it?!”

           Halley’s voice seemed to shriek through the room, causing her now startled teammate, Kori Anders, to jerk her head up from her laptop. The girl’s off guard silence caused Halley to go bug eyed, repeating herself but more frantically. “The day! What day is it?”

           The alien princess stared up at the wide eyed brunette unsure as to why the younger girl was so frantic suddenly. The coffee mug she held paused as it touched her lips and now was being held still. Cocking an eyebrow up, Kori gave her a soft and hesitant response,

           “Monday?”

           “Yes, I know its Monday. The date, I mean the date!” Halley shouted back, using one hand to run it through her hair as the other reached for her phone that she had tossed across the couch only seconds ago.

           It was only minutes ago that the device was being held in her hands. She had been ordering herself and her team dinner from their favorite Thai place via Door Dash, it being her turn as Kori treated them to an array of Sushi the a few nights ago. She had found herself chuckling at the realization of the name of their Dasher. His name was Timothy and she couldn’t help but think back to yesterday when she and Kori were out on one of their many shopping trips. They had drove past a Red Robin and she had joked about how if they hadn’t already eaten lunch that they should’ve gone there and taken a picture outside the sign and send it to her Tim.

           Why hadn’t it clicked then, she cursed to herself once her phone was in her hands. She let out the loudest groan she felt like she ever had when the date haunted her vision. It was July 20th; fucking July fucking 20th, she cursed to herself again, furiously rubbing her face with her hands as the phone dropped back down onto the couch. She was literally the worst sister in the entire universe.

           She had been so consumed with her own life that she had completely spaced that Tim’s birthday was yesterday.  She’d never done so before. She had never forgotten a birthday or any day of importance; she’d always made sure to leave herself reminders and be on top of stuff like that. Of course there were times where she would let certain things sneak up on her but she usually had a pretty solid excuse for days like those. But now that she was officially graduated from college she had no other big obligations to keep her truly and utterly distracted.  

           Sure, she was offered a job at the Gazette, but she didn’t have to start until the fall when they had a spot for her open. One of their tenor reporters was moving to Metropolis around then and Halley was more than okay with being able to take the summer off until then. Kori had asked for her help with getting the new Tower back up and running so it was ready for their new team of recruits.

           The team of Titans she knew were mostly disbanded, having gone off to do their own things or another, a new team, a team Tim was a part of, taking over their Tower.  Now Dick was in Bludhaven, Hank and Dawn giving up the hero life, Victor now joining the Justice League and Wally and Roy off somewhere no one really knew. Kori had reached out to Halley, asking her to help train her new recruits; Halley agreed and had been here for the last two and a half months.

           But this was Tim. How could she just up and forget his birthday?

           “Fuck, fuck, I need to call Tim,” She let her hands drop and grabbed her phone once more.

           Going to her favorites, she clicked on the second name, dialing his number within seconds. She tapped her fingers against her thigh nervously waiting for the other line to be picked up. Her heart dropped when it had only been brought to voicemail. She didn’t wait to leave a message, hanging up and calling again. The phone brought her straight to voicemail.

           He was ignoring her, she gulped.

           She held the bridge of her nose, pinching it as she listened through his voicemail, waiting for the beep before opening her mouth to speak.  When the beep rang she found herself unsure of what to say. She couldn’t just wish him happy birthday a day late through a voicemail. Biting the inside of her cheek she quickly composed herself, saying, “Hee-hey Tim. Uh it’s me, Halley er-. Look, can you call me? Please? Okay, love you, bye-,” Stupid, she hissed to herself as she hung up.

           “Well that was almost as hard to listen to as Garfield when he flirts.” Kori chuckled, watching the girl hang up the phone and let her head drop into her hands.

           “Shut up.” Halley spat but was muffled by her hands. She took her head out of her hands, leaning back into the couch and looking up at the ceiling.

           Maybe he wasn’t actually in Gotham. Maybe he was with his own team of Titans. Yeah, maybe he was. And maybe he was on a mission and that’s why he couldn’t answer the phone. No, she frowned. She knew that he was in Gotham. Steph had sent her a snap a few days ago of the two of them out at Bat Burger. Wait, she though, bringing the phone back up to her ear. She dialed the blonde’s number but was met the same fate as with Tim’s.

           “Ugh they hate me!” She cried out, finally meeting Kori’s eye. “I forgot about Tim’s birthday, Kori. He’s hates me now.”

           “Tim would never hate you.” Kori rolled her eyes, waving the girl off and turning back to her laptop and work. “He looks up to you. He’ll understand that it just slipped your mind.”

           “Yea but it shouldn’t have slipped my mind. And he’s clearly mad since he’s ignoring me!” Halley yelled, standing up. “Let Gar or Jaime have my plate; I need to catch a flight to Gotham.”

           “Halley, wait a bit for him to call you back, don’t just jump on a plane.” Kori squinted at her, noting how similar to Dick she had gotten over the years. He had done the exact thing to her once, way back when she hadn’t answered her phone.

           “No, you don’t get it, Kor, we always remember and I can’t believe I forgot.” She frowned, grabbing her phone and heading out of the common room as quickly as she could.

           She was so mad at herself. She knew that Tim wasn’t one to just ignore people and send them right to voicemail. She knew he was mad and she was worried that if she waited for him to call her back it would take a couple of days. Halley wouldn’t wait that long, already trying to think of an apology as she looked up flights on her phone as she power walked to her room.

           As her head was buried in her phone she found herself walking into a hard chest, instantly looking up with narrowed eyes. In front of her stood one of the last members to join the Titans before the newest kids and Halley showed up. The firm chest of the Atlantean sidekick stared her straight in the face as she slowly craned her head up to make eye contact with his purple eyes.

            “Hey Garth, sorry” she said offhandedly, side stepping and moving to walk around him. She frowned when she felt his hand reach out and grip her upper arm, making her stop. “Come on, I gotta go. I have to go to Gotham; it’s an emergency.”

           The Atlantean frowned his playful smirk now showing concern as he let go of his grip. He began to follow her to her room, walking a few steps behind. “Is everything okay? Do you need me to go with you?”

           “I don’t think the Batclan will want an Atlantean in Gotham. No offense,” She smirked at him, looking him up and down. She pressed down the hall further, “But no, it’s not that kind of emergency. I’m an asshole and forgot Tim’s birthday.”

           “You are an asshole.” He teased, stopping behind her when they reached her door. He laughed, raising his hands up in surrender and protection when she turned around to smack him. “Hey, I’m not the one who eats their boyfriend’s kind.”

           “I said I was sorry about that!” Halley snapped, giving him a playful push before opening her door. She didn’t bother to close it, knowing he’d just follow her in anyway. “I told you I would be more mindful; I ordered Thai food tonight, no fish.” She pointed out, laughing at the incident that happened when Kori bought them all home sushi a few nights ago. The Aqualad was less than thrilled about her choice and even less than thrilled when Halley openly dug into roll after roll in front of him. “Also, you aren’t my boyfriend last time I checked.”

           He watched her as she moved to her closet, pulling out a Superman backpack and throwing random articles of clothing into it. His face flashed from frisky to almost jealous, her words throwing him off as he had already assumed they were a thing. They’d met years ago when they were teenagers and Garth would be lying if he said he hadn’t gotten a crush on her back then. But he had only been with the Titans for one mission back then and quickly went back to Atlantis. When he was offered a full time spot on their roster he was excited when he found out Halley would be joining them for a few months.

           It took some time but the pair hit it off, Halley at first reluctantly agreeing to go on a date with him but eventually growing to like the Atlantean. She had only just started dating a few months prior and it was all so new to her but it was somewhat comfortable with Garth. She wouldn’t say that she was falling in love, she was far from it. But she did feel something towards him unlike other’s she dated; she wasn’t bored. It wasn’t as awkward as it was with civilians who knew nothing about her nightlife and it was nice to talk to someone outside of the family who had shared life experiences. She also found herself not constantly comparing everything about him to Jason or holding him to the unreasonably high standards she had to match him.

           “Well I haven’t gotten around to asking you yet.” He shrugged but kept a firm face, wanting to show that he was seriously thinking about asking her.

           “Oh,” Halley said, placing the last thing she needed in her bag. She zipped it up, trying to shove away her sudden nervousness. She hadn’t thought about getting that committed to someone yet. But as she bit her lip, she looked up at him unable to stop herself from speaking. Giving him a sly look, she spoke “Well, when I get back maybe you can get around to it if you want.”

           “I’ll have to make a note of it,” Garth smirked at her, crossing his arms against his chest. “For now let me at least bring you to the airport,” He offered, his eyes followed her as she walked around him and grabbed her phone charger of the plug in the wall and a book from her nightstand.

           “Do mermaids know how to drive?” She teased him before heading out the door.

           “Wow, you really are an asshole.” He teased right back as he followed her back into the hallway, leading the way down to the garage.

[cyoza]

vulnerable

i finished my presentation for uni earlier than expected and was inspired by the prompt from @dickkorysource so I wrote this semi short one shot (?) for the monthly (?) prompt

i think this is like an AU because I think I set it somewhere after Trigon but there’s no more trouble or anything and the team just gets to be a family i guess. also dk being open about a future with someone is the most vulnerable you cant be with someone for me so that’s where this came from 

i hope it’s enjoyable, thanks! 

- 

To say it was a dreary day would be an understatement - but Kory didn’t mind. She lay on the sofa listening on as the rain pattered on the glass of the sun room, the droplets reflecting the grey sky above them. The sweet earthy scent of the patchouli and vanilla candle swept up her nostrils as she inhaled a deep breath, tucking herself tighter into the fuzzy grey blanket and feeling more content than she’d felt in a long time. She had the day off work, the kids were still at school and she had nothing to worry about for once. So she continued to lay on the sofa, absorbing the peaceful silence whilst she still could. It wasn’t long, however, before she heard the familiar turn of the key in the front door causing her heart to flutter. 

Dick was home. Early, for that matter. 

‘Kory?’ He called, voice searching out for her. 

‘I’m in here - the sunroom.’ She responded, sitting up but keeping the blanket wrapped firmly around her. 

Dick appeared in front of her moments later, a soft smile developing on his face as he took in her position of the couch. He was still in the usual suit he wore for work, bar the wool peacoat he’d taken with him that morning. Kory would be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy his work attire. The way the crisp button up, rolled up at the elbows, emphasised his toned torso. The way his grey trousers seemed to cup his backside and streamline down his muscular thighs. She envied his colleagues who got to ogle him for 6 hours a day but revelled in knowing that she was the one who he was coming home to everyday. 

‘How was your day?’ She asked, shuffling over to make space for him. 

‘Good, actually. Captain put me with a couple of troubled kids, reminded me of when I first met Rachel.’ He replied with a light chuckle before plopping himself on the seat next to her and winding an arm around her shoulders. 

‘Oh no. I hope you didn’t adopt any of them, did you?’ She inquired hesitantly, only half joking. She honestly wouldn’t be surprised if they had yet another adolescent, troubled delinquent running around the apartment. 

‘No.’ He admitted with a humorous snort. ‘It just felt nice to help them, you know? It’ll always remind me of when I was that kid. It makes me feel good to know that I can be there for them in a way no one was for me when I was that age. As someone who understands what they’re going through. I mean, I had Bruce but we all know how his parenting style works.’ He quipped, prompting a snicker from her. 

‘Well, I have all the faith in the world that you made at least some difference to those kids life. In fact, I’d stake my life on it.’ She stated. 

‘Hey, no more staking your life. I think we’ve both had enough near death situations to last a lifetime.’ He admonished, clenching her shoulder tighter. 

Kory let out yet another quiet giggle and shuffled herself closer to him, lifting the blanket to wrap it around him too so she could settle her head on his chest. It wasn’t long before Kory lay with her feet under her and her head on Dick’s chest, tracing random shapes across it. But her relaxed mood had dissipated some with the thoughts now running relay in her mind. So she cleared her throat and got ready to vocalise them. 

‘Hey, Dick? Can I ask you a question?’ She queried, voice quiet and nervous which caused Dick to tense up slightly. Probably due to how out of character it was for her to be as such. 

‘Sure.’ He said anyway, as if she couldn’t feel his heart lurch into double speed. 

‘Do you ever think about having your own kids? Of course, Rachel, Gar and Jason - as big a pain in the ass he is- will always be family. But do you ever imagine a chubby faced cherub of your own?’  She lifted her head to look up at him, eyes filled with trepidation. 

It was a moment before he answered, his gaze drifting away in thought before making its way back to her. 

‘I have but only in passing. And that’s not because I don’t want that with you, Kory. I just don’t know if I’m cut out for the whole father thing. I would love to have a fiery, curly haired, chubby faced toddler running around here. To see you swelling up with our child and deal with whatever ridiculous cravings you’re sure to have. But I’m not sure I know how to do that - I don’t know if I’m cut out for it.’ He confessed, running a hand through her hair as if to soothe his own nerves. 

‘So you have thought about it? Having kids...with me?’ She asked, insecurity laced through. 

‘Of course, who else? Kory, I love you. I know we haven’t known each other for long but you’re it for me. I can’t imagine spending the rest of my life with anyone else and in that is having kids. I want them, I just could never really imagine myself as a father.’ He admitted. 

Oh, the irony. 

‘Dick, you do realise that you’ve become the father of three children in the space of less than a year and are doing a stellar job of it. Give yourself some credit. Please.’ She assured. 

‘Yeah, well easier said than done. But you make it a little easier. And I’m sorry that I’ve made you doubt us but I want this. And if you want more kids, then I definitely want them with you. Without a doubt.’ He sore, pulling her even closer to him. 

Kory felt her heart swell with his sincere words and let her mind wonder. She let herself think about them both picking a name, going back and forth from Tameranian and English names. Imagined him panicking as her contractions started and water broke a few hours later. Pictured them cradling the dark haired bundle in their arms as Rachel, Gar and Jason floated around them, each waiting to hold the baby. Visualised as they grew up with their Auntie Rachel, playing with their Uncle Gar as he transformed into various cuddly animals and training with Uncle Jason as soon as they were old enough. 

Kory allowed her head to fill to the brim with the future and her heart to do the same. 

[bookdragonlibrary]

Third Tuesday YJ appreciation

1-3 ; 4-6 ; 7-9 ; 10-13 ; 14-16 ; 17 ; 18 ; 19 ; 20 ; 21 ; 22 ; 23 ; 24-26

—————————— Early Warning

- Star Girl is back.

- We didn’t see their mission in Chicago :(

- “The Outsiders are bigger than the Big League.” Seriously? So Gar has reach his goal to inspire people.

- We’re 21 December. Will we have a Christmas episode? 

- Santiago de Cuba. Is this the whole city name or it’s just to specify is the Santiago located in Cuba, because you know USA have a lot of countries which names already existed in other countries, so it’s confusing...

- Mother of Goat xD

- 04.31 is indeed too early to go to school...

- “You mean I’m Gabrielle’s corpse brought back to life by the energy of a dead motherbox.” Violet, you need to chill. It’s really sad you see yourself this way :( 

-  What do you mean she’s dying? She has better superhealing than a speedster!

- I like that the first thing she does is healing herself. 

- Months left? Well, all her previous dead must have been painful... But I’m sure Jace had misinterpreted what she saw. Maybe Violet has a high metabolism like a speedster with a fast regeneration of her cells so maybe they would discover this later by her aging slowly. 

- Her mentor? Who could that be? Was they the person she called in the 15th episode?

- Wait to tell them? How is this supposed to be a good idea? One secret is enough of a burden.

- A funeral? Who’s funeral? :’( 

- They are up against who to make Zatanna worry? Maybe she would bring Traci with her *finger crossed*

- What is this big pink cloud? It’s up to no good...

- Klarion? Of course Zatanna would be worried! The Team never succeeded to win against him! It was always Dr Fate.

- So he was the one who chose Project Rutabaga name? It’s difficult to understand which only one side of the conversation, more difficult than with Jaime and Scarab actually.

- “Stop to ruin my fun, Teekl.” He’s indeed the Witch Boy with that pouting xD How old is he to still be considerated as a child?

- I didn’t know human can have a reddish brown skin. Where is she from? 

- It’s me or he’s dumb not remember what he’s supposed to do?

- No need to explain it to us, I’m pretty sure we all understood as we are now in an adult plateforme...

- So the teen could speak? I thought she was mute. Because of trauma maybe?

- Change of eye and hair color plus... gills? She can’t breathe? Can’t she be like Kaldur and has a double breathing system? :( 

- So that’s where the mark in the forehead comes from... So he already sent teen in to Granny before. How could he forget if it’s not the first time he does it?

- So now she’s a red gaz and... does it where the big cloud comes from? 

- That monster looks like the one in FMA. So the Light is trying to create a mix of metateen with different powers combined for one super powers soldier? We already saw of terrified it could be with Amazo in season 1...

- So the minidrones come indeed from Blue right? 

- RIP  minidrone :(

- “We saw so pretty weird days.” Does he speak about the Reach? :( 

- The way Gar said funeral shows he’s so used to it...

- Joan is dead?! So quickly? From what? Aging?

- Virgil is so cool with blue eyes!

- “Outsiders away!” “Dude, that catchphrase, need work.” You mean “Outisiders go!” right? it was an easter egg right?

- Klarion seriously didn’t recognise them? Or never be against them? 

- “Flesh Monster” I know you are sadistic demon, but it was really disrespectful :( 

- Gar is so clever to attack Teekl! Mouse to elephant, the two opposites! 

- Klarion, we really don’t need your explanations, everyone had seen season 1... (why are you watching season 3?)

- No don’t use a bazooka on those kids! :( Yeah Geo-force! o/

- “No, not in the house.” New Team catchphrase?

- Did he just killed Beast Boy? Desintegrated him? It’s not possible! :’( Not another funeral! 

- Yes he’s alive! Stop with the fake deaths! 

- No Cassie! :( Did anyone how the monster become huge with Wonder Girl addition? She’s really strong!

- Virgil horrified to see his BF like that :( 

- Yeah! They are free! Except for the girl who still can’t breathe. 

- We need to bring Zatanna to Granny’s place so she could free the other teens. 

- Klarion is still busy with a hornet? Seriously?

- They are in Tower of Fate? So the balance between order and chaos are unbalanced in the place of power of one of them?

- “Still in the Tower? *meow* Dang it!” It shouldn’t be that funny! xD

- Virgil, you’re hanging out with Ed and Jaime, your Spanish should be better than this... 

- Yep, the girl still can’t breathe! :( Gar save her! :D She said “Thank you!” :3

- “Where is Violet?” Probably not well after learning she’s dying... 

- Tara’s struggle with English vocabulary (especially oral expressions) feels so real!

- We’re going to see Harper? :D 

- Is that guns and alchohol? Seriously? Is that beer or stronger alchohol? --’ Violet doesn’t seem at ease....

-  It’s cool Harper ask about the alchohol being allowed for Muslims. She’s the first one in the serie to ask VIolet about Islam. You can’t learn about it if you don’t ask to people :) But maybe Violet isn’t the best to ask as she probably doesn’t know much. Wait, does she know about alchohol by the way? 

- “I’m not a Muslim.” Is Violet rejecting everything about herself because she’s dying? Or is alchohol a way to cope with the big new? Or is she rejecting everything about Gabrielle’s identity because of the murder or Brion’s parents?

-  She doesn’t want to talk to Brion and doesn’t like the taste :/ 

- What? 

- “I have a boyfriend.” She clearly doesn’t need this to her emotions... And she sounds surprised? Is this a reminder or a news for Harper? It’s like 2 months she’s dating Brion so she should have told Harper right? 

- “So do I.” The bi cheating trope, really? I HC a lot of characters as bi or pan and it’s not the first rep I wished... And it could have been handled better. Like Harper not kissing her a second time after she said no (I have a boyfriend so I’m not available for kissing someone else, if it wasn’t clear for everyone...). Harper not having a boyfriend but a crush on Violet for a long time, for example? Because the kiss seem to mean nothing to Harper, just a funny thing to do... You know, because bi people can’t stay in a relationship and get bored... --’

- How Violet could be so good at firing? Thanks to her training with Artemis? Motherbox senses? 

- Wait, they are in Mount Justice beach, isn’t it private? How a cop could be there in the middle of nowhere or almost? Why didn’t she show up when Dick were firing with an ever bigger gun? It doesn’t make any sense! Or it’s just plot convenient...

- Violet’s hesitation really show how much she became self destructive because “I’m dying so why not? I have nothing to loose” kind of logic...

- Why they made the General so heartless? :( The cliche of the male soldier who is heartless and the female soldier who cannot do her mission properly because of love/mother instinct...

- I need to check YJ comics because I’m sure I can find some of them in it. *check* Ok I just found Serpenteen...

- Colonel Ramon Bracuda. So he’s indeed a Colonel xD

- Tara and Artemis! 

- The slap at the end was unnecessary, Slade. She was already down... è.é

- Artemis is so good as a mentor! She understood what Tara had been through!

- Tara is surprised and afraid Artemis discovered she was trained. Maybe Artemis will be the one who understands she’s a mole and try to reason her. (Like she tried with her sister...)

- I love how Artemis shows her she can relate to her trauma and reassure her she won’t do the same.

- Tara’s smile again!

- Police station. Right. 

- So Harper’s father is an alcoholic? That would explain why Harper want to forget about her life too... And where she found the bottle. Did she try to take the bottles away and wanted to try it instead?  

- A whole day waiting? That parental abusive!

- I’m not sure Violet truly understood what happened to be honest... It’s a lot in a day! She’s sure having a bad one :( 

- Guess it was an animated error last episode: Wendy still has her collar :( 

- Of course Kaldur will find a solution for the girl :) 

- Virgil, awkward... When he said “excuse” and then close his eyes because he realises it wasn’t the best word choice and Bart reassuring he understood he meant no harm :3 I love the Team dynamic :)

- With Ed, I’m never sure he’s looking at Bart or Wendy...

- “I want in.” In the hug? Of course he’s talking about the Outsiders xD Wait, what?! Doesn’t it seem out of character?

- Even Virgil  didn’t seem to know. 

- So Ed went to the funerals to support/confort Bart?

- So he talked to Bart and Jaime first? Ouch for Virgil... 

- So half of the Runaways in the Outsiders. When do we get to see Tye and Asami? They should have been there in episode 16! Are they ok? Are they kidnapped again? :( 

- “The kids here just don’t know you.” Yet! Come on, Ed, you could have invited all the Runaways, the first abducted metateens so the kids could relate to someone who go through the trauma. Virgil should be known in the Center! He is one of their own already! And that should have been Virgil’s character motivation to be part of the Outsiders and not the skin color... Black characters are more than just black they’re humans, you know? Where are the writers who wrote the other POC characters in the previous seasons? Anyway, the reason to do this for the kid would have been unnecessary if it was written properly with this character arc for Virgil because Ed was fine as a peer councelor to show to the kids there are other ways to use your powers than fighting bas guys, the living example for Paula’s point. 

- So great everyone supports Ed’s decision. 

- Yeah Virgil, his dad would totally freak out...

- Wendy is so small compared to the others! She seems to be 12. And Ed seems to have a big brother reaction who wants to be praised by the little sister ^^

- The comments said “The Outsiders are the best” in Spanish, no idea for the second one and “The Outsiders are unbeatable” in French :)

- “the Outsiders are bigger than the JL.” *Kaldur raises an eyebrow* priceless xD

- Klarion is still trapped in the Tower and it’s still so funny xD 

[tessatechaitea]

New Titans #112

Don't you worry your pretty little head about Red Star's right leg.

I keep trying to organize my life so that I can read more actual books (as opposed to comic books which I'm not judging. I'm just differentiating) without having to sacrifice any of the other things I enjoy doing. What that generally means is that I wind up reading about ten pages every morning before going to bed (I work nights!). Which realistically means I need to do improve my time management if I'm going to be serious about reading. I have managed to read the first "book" of Alan Moore's Jerusalem but it's taken me a fucking long time to do it. I thought it would take me a long time because I was expecting a difficult read but I'm finding it enjoyable. Plus by the time I've finished, I'm fairly certain I'll be able to navigate Northampton with ease. I'm also wondering if all the descriptions of the characters' movements through the city are an encoded treasure map! Or, being that Alan Moore wrote it, it's more likely a spell to summon some sex demons. While organizing (and by organizing, I mean the main definition of organizing: moving shit around in a way that makes you feel like you're accomplishing something but really you're just engaging in an activity to forget about your mortality for awhile. Plus you can generally get some really fucking good dusting done), I managed to place all of the books from various book shelves that I have yet to finish reading (or that I simply want to reread) on the top shelf of the row of bookcases in my office. Jerusalem is first on that list followed by some books by high school friends (Rogue's Curse by Jason Beymer and Soy Rakelson's children's books that I'm willing to bet everything I own as well as my life and my mother's life on that they're black and white morality tales with a super conservative and possibly Ayn Randian view of the world). After that is There Is No Year which Doom Bunny gave me because it's supposedly a terrible book that I'm not sure he even finished and which I wanted to make fun of (but, hey, maybe I'll love it!) and the rest: Inside the Yellow Submarine, Trixie Belden Mystery-Quiz Book #1, Don Quixote, Gravity's Rainbow, Lost in the Funhouse (reread!), A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, And the Ass Saw the Angel (by Nick Cave!), King's The Wind Through the Keyhole (A Dark Tower book!), Crime and Punishment, Hey Nostradamus!, The Best of H.P. Lovecraft, The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren, The Boomer Bible (re-re-re-re-re-re-re-re-read), Six Volumes of The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night (finished with one and a half volumes after owning this set for twenty five years!), The Holy Bible (currently reading for my Patreon), The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry (Second Edition) (because I need poetic context for the 20th century!), Only Revolutions, The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick, and The Familiar (currently just book one but there's going to be like nine hundred of them, so maybe I won't even bother!). Oh, and I just added We Learn Nothing (reread) and I Wrote This Book Because I Love You, both by Tim Kreider. I'll probably start with those because funny essays are easier to get through than anything by Dostoevsky, Danielewski, Pynchon, Cervantes, Barth, Joyce, or Sakelson! I mean Rakelson! Oh man. Rakelson would have a stroke if he knew I listed his name with all those postmodern authors! Not that they're all postmodern. You can figure out which ones are and aren't on your own. I'm busy reading New Titans #112 which must be good since Starfire is naked on the cover. Okay, almost naked. She is wearing a dickie and a belt. I know a lot of you just skipped that big paragraph while thinking, "Oh, la dee da! What a fancy book reader you are! Fucking virtue signaler! Or whatever the term for listing or showing off your reading list full of classic literary texts is! Seems like virtue signaler works well enough! Better even than what idiotic fuck nuggets use it for on Twitter anyway!" But maybe you missed the part about how those are books I haven't been able to get through yet! I've owned some of these books for over a decade! And I didn't even put The Collected Works of Gertrude Stein on this shelf because do I need to be reminded that I used that book more as an address book than something to read? Although I carried it with me everywhere I went for a year or two (which is why it's full of phone numbers and addresses!). And I really did want to read it. I didn't carry it around so people could think, "Look at him with that book! Who the fuck is Gertrude Stein? What a ponce!" Although to be fair, I did leave off a few books on my "to-read" shelf! But it wasn't because they weren't smart enough sounding! It's because they were comic books and also pornography and also also fucking hilarious.

One of my friends in the state department who learns a brand new language every four years or so bonded with me over Oglaf last time he visited. He was all, "I'm glad I know somebody I can share my love of Oglaf with and not be looked at like a completely demented perv!" Although I do look at him like he's a completely demented perv, I didn't need to admit it to his face!

I embrace my delusion that readers merely skipped "one" paragraph of my comic book "reviews"! This issue is called "A New Home" and my brain continued to add to that title with "o-erotic Journey." Mostly because of this panel:

Fairly certain "bamming" a baby is illegal, even in space.

The Titans (and I use that term loosely since the characters encompassed by that shorthand are Changeling, Red Star, Pantha, Baby, and Starfire) have been stranded on The Terraist's space station. That name probably could use a hyphen so you don't first read it as terRAIST twelve times thinking "What the fuck does that mean?" before your brain finally sees the God-awful pun and you give up, finally letting go of that last gossamer thread that's been connecting you to the reality you just discovered doesn't fucking matter. How can there be any meaning to existence when an editor greenlights the name "Terraist"? I'm sure Wolfman's pitch contained at least two dozen "Get it?!"s. Anyway, maybe most readers never even noticed, shrugging their shoulders at every single moment in which a comic book doesn't make sense because at least Starfire is practically naked throughout the last few issues! I have a theory that most people don't really absorb much of what they're reading in comic books. They tend to just love a character for some magic reason and stick with loving that character no matter what terrible writer winds up writing them. And at that point, they just ignore plot holes and inconsistencies and terrible dialogue and whatever the fuck Ann Nocenti does with her typewriter. They simply go star-eyed and gape lovingly at the drawn images of Dick Grayson's throbbing buttocks. That was a hypothetical sentence and not a memoir. Here's a panel with evidence that might lead to proof of my theory if I could actually interview anybody who read this comic book in 1994 and ask them, "Did you even notice this panel?" To which they would all probably respond, "No, I was distracted by the opposite page where you can see tons of Starfire's side-boob and I think one of her outer labia." Um, anyway, the panel I mentioned:

Damn, Marv. Beyond the Forest was nearly fifty years old at the time this comic came out.

To be fair to Wolfman and Changeling, I did an Internet search on "Whatta dump" (and, yes, I spelled it differently than Marv did) and the first hit was video of the scene where Bette Davis says the line. What's odd is that she delivers it flatter and straighter than anything I would have expected out of Bette Davis's eyes...I mean mouth. Gar's rendition of it is terrible! The way Bette says it, I would never think to spell it any way but "What a dump." But that's not the point! The point is how is "What a dump!" a immortal words?! Granted, you're probably now thinking to yourself, "Well, how did X and Y and Z become oft-quoted movie lines?!" (where X and Y and Z are actual phrases from movies and not just letters. But I'm not psychic so how should I know what terrible oft-quoted movie lines you were thinking of? Mine would have been "Seven schools in seven states and the only different is my locker combination" or "William H. Bonny. You are not a god?" "Why don't you pull the trigger and find out?" or "Ziggy Piggy! Ziggy Piggy! Ziggy Piggy! Ziggy Piggy!") I suppose one can't help what phrases the zeitgeist picks up on. According to the YouTube video of Bette Davis, "What a dump" is Bette's famous bitchy line from that movie I'd never heard of. I guess I just haven't traveled in the right circles! Although I have heard the phrase "What a dump!" Has everybody in the world been quoting Bette Davis all this time and I just didn't know it?! Was this movie the first time that phrase was ever uttered?! To think I could have known all of this if I hadn't been distracted by Starfire's side-boob and — I'm fairly certain — one of her outer labia. To shut Gar up, Starfire admits that she doesn't remember any of them and then she punches Pantha in her vagina.

Starfire punching Pantha in the vagina is funnier than anything that Pantha has said in the last forty issues.

After punching Pantha in the vagina, Starfire knees Red Star in the balls for no reason. Unless the reason is that she's been wanting to do that for a long time and her pretend amnesia allows her this moment! I suppose I'd fake amnesia too to get away from being a Titan. I've been joking about seeing Starfire's outer labia but is this it? Is that one of those things?

Is my boner proof that it's her labia or is my boner proof that I'm a comic book reading virgin nerd?

I can't wait for everybody to message me telling me how that can't be her outer labia because that's not where it would be and anyway this photographic proof I'm sending you is what one looks like! Then I can actually them and say, "Well, you can't know that for sure! She's an alien and maybe her outer labia is fully engorged due to Pantha back-fucking her!" Also I'd really enjoy some of that photographic evidence!

This is not what I would do with those photographs.

Garfield turns into another monster because he can't do birds and rhinos anymore. He lies on top of Starfire and then reveals something that destroys every moment in DC canon where Garfield turned into a rhino to knock some hugely muscled bad guy on their ass. He tells Red Star, "Hey, I may be big and ugly but my mass doesn't change! I'm not as strong as she is!" Well fuck me! The whole concept of Beast Boy has been based on a huge lie! Or at least scientific principles that make the character utterly worthless. Why the fuck would he ever change into a huge beast if his mass doesn't change? Wouldn't he always change into something small and fast to be most effective?! This revelation is one of those moments where DC tries to make their universe more logical but only winds up fucking up the entire multiverse. Red Star and Changeling knock Starfire unconscious and then tie her up which probably isn't totally rapey at all, even if the artist draws it that way.

Yep. Everything is just fine here! Move along.

Meanwhile on Earth, Arsenal, Aqualad, and Flash consider a proposal from the United States government to get the Titans to work for them. They consider it over a couple waters at a local strip club named Ding Dong Daddy's." I mean, the comic book calls it a "retro club" but everybody either gets a private lap dance or laid. It's hard to tell what Marv Wolfman was going for with this scene. Proof that the young cool Titan men fuck? Proof that women are only to provide relief for men's sexual desires? Proof that Aqualad should maybe think twice before saying "Hey guys! We came together!" when women are throwing their vaginas at them?

How long does Aqualad think a lap dance takes?

Back in space while the reader was away, Red Star and Changeling have managed to put a gag on Starfire and tie her legs together. That makes things less rapey, right? If not, I'm sure Marv will improve the situation in a sensitive and professional manner!

Oh come on!

Starfire remembers everything while Changeling whines about how he didn't get to kiss Starfire while she was tied up and scared and beaten and suffering from amnesia. Poor kid! Maybe next time! After regaining her memory, Starfire says, "X'hal! That was dick I saw in South America!" and I snicker like a twelve year old. The first decision Starfire makes after regaining her memory is that she and Dick should get their marriage annulled, if it even took which I'm pretty sure it didn't. If you were a fan of reading the letters pages, whoever the letter answer person was constantly kept pointing out that they couldn't be married because the priest blew up before he could say they were man and wife. But now Wolfman provides more evidence like how no paper work was filed and nobody signed anything (although don't you sign the papers before the ceremony?) Anyway, they're not married and probably never will be if the last twenty five years of reading comic books has taught me anything!

Snicker!

Baby has an idea to use The Terraist's satellite as their new headquarters and the government is all, "Okay! But you have to work with us on a minimum number of yearly missions!" And Roy Harper is all, "That number is zero!" And the government is all, "Yes sir! What a deal! We will pay you a salary, give you the satellite, and get nothing in return! Let's shake on it!"

Who the fuck is wearing The Flash's costume?! First appearance of New 52 Wally West?

The epilogue reveals Raven needs to rape the Titans so that they'll all give birth to Trigon's children. So it should be a fun few final issues before either this comic book was cancelled or I finally recovered my sanity and simply stopped buying it. New Titans #112 Rating: B. It was all kinds of stupid but I enjoyed making fun of it!

[shadowsong26fic]

Another Random AU Because Why Not

A couple months ago, I outlined a Heralds of Valdemar crossover/fusion/AU (which I’ve done some more Pondering on since then because it’s fun/hilarious). And then I did the Rabbit Hole AU, which was even more hilarious/fun.

Anyway, now that I’ve plugged my previous crack AUs, as you do, I have decided to outline another one! And for Reasons, it’s #10 on my List of Things I’ll Never Actually Write.

::ahem::

Without further ado, I present to you: Bail Organa Unfucks the Timeline

So, point the first (and this is an important one): Bail doesn’t know how he died.

I mean, he kiiiiiiiinda does? Like, the thought occurs (once he has a second to think, which takes a while, as we’ll see shortly). He knows what happened to Jedha, and possibly to Scarrif (which I can’t spell). But at the same time, there’s this sort of denial aspect to it. Like--even Tarkin would never.

(Also, he didn’t actually see the Death Star. He was not near a window/on the wrong side of the planet/something.)

So, he decides he had a stroke or something.

Point the second (also important): That whole ‘inform the Senate that all aboard were killed’ message? Never reached him. Because a) Alderaan had no actual Senator in place on Coruscant/Imperial Center/whatever the cool kids are calling it these days at the time to hear said message, and b) the Senate was dissolved like five minutes later so whichever of his friends drew the short straw on that one got a wee bit distracted.

All clear? Good! On to the fun stuff.

So, one minute, Bail is in his study, going over maps or supply routes or other war-preparation-y things with a trusted aide, and the next, he’s back on Christophsis.

More specifically, he is being tackled to one side by someone yelling “GET DOWN, SIR” just as something explodes over his head.

Which leads to: wait why is a stormtrooper tackling me wait how did a stormtrooper get into my study wait that helmet is twenty years out of date wait how did I get outside wait why is the sky the wrong color WAIT WHY IS THE SKY ON FIRE

Bail needs a minute.

And a drink.

(Why is he even on Christophsis while the sky is on fire? Is there actual canon explaining this? Do I care? ...probably not.)

In the interests of not, y’know, dying, Bail decides to just run with it for a while, until he has some breathing room and can figure out wtf is going on.

Bail is a very smart man.

Eventually, he gets his five minutes and comes to the conclusion that nope, this is not a dream, I am apparently back in the past, the War is in its early days. I can, quite possibly, fix things. Stop Palpatine. Save the Republic/Galaxy.

This seems like an excellent plan.

(NB: He is aware that doing this means losing his daughter--or at least his relationship with her/her as he raised her. And a part of him will always wish that...a part of him will always mourn her, and that world/life he lost. But this is the one thing that is worth that sacrifice. Plus, if he missed this chance, the Leia he raised would never forgive him. So a part of him is doing this for her. Giving her the galaxy she deserves, despite how much it costs him.)

The question then becomes...well, how?

He eventually decides to focus his work on the Senate, and try to limit Palpatine’s expansion/power/ascent as much--and as subtly--as he can.

Subtly because, well, he would very much like to not get caught and killed.

Not getting killed also seems like an excellent plan.

Also, pretty much no one is on to Palps yet. I mean, yeah, there are people side-eyeing him a little bit for holding on to/accumulating power the way he does, but what Chancellor hasn’t been accused of such things? And it’s not...it’s not like it will be two and a half/three years from now. And Bail cannot afford to alienate allies he will need later, depending on how successful he is/how long this takes.

Bail has been doing this for a while. He is not taking his success for granted. He is covering all his bases, just in case.

Fortunately, Bail has twenty years of running an underground resistance under his belt. This? This, he can do.

There are other problems too, of course. Like...the War is an actual thing that still needs to be resolved. But there’s not much Bail can personally do about it, not while Palpatine and Dooku are, between the two of them, derailing any attempts at negotiation. Apart from, of course, careful Senate maneuvering to remove Palps from power.

(He’ll figure out a way to deal with Dooku/Grievous/Etc. later. One problem at a time.)

Next question--who does he read in on all of this?

Breha, of course--she is his wife, and his partner. He needs her beside/behind him. Plus, it’s not exactly fair to her, to keep her in the dark about this. She’ll be expecting the husband she knows to come home to her, not a man made...let’s say incredibly cautious by twenty years of, essentially, espionage. To say nothing of the fact that he raised a child, and they’re still--trying. There’s a lot of emotional baggage there, too. They’ll make it work, somehow, he knows they will--but she needs to know. She deserves the truth from him, no matter how hard it is for him to explain/how hard it is for her to hear.

(Look, I have a lot of FEELINGS about Bail and Breha’s relationship. Even though I kind of ship him and Obi-Wan [for which I mostly blame Reprise, despite the fact that said fic doesn’t actually ship them], if I ever wrote something with the two of them together [as I might in this fic, and sort of am in one other though that one it may never actually come up on page], it would be with Breha’s full knowledge and consent. ...end random tangent, sorry.)

As for everyone else...he decides to wait and see, feeling people out as likely possibilities. Just like he and Mon did for twenty years, building the Alliance. Only this time, the barometer is more “who will believe me” as opposed to “who won’t betray me.”

(He’s aware that Obi-Wan and Padme should be pretty high up on that list but--hell, where does he even start?)

(He decides to shelve that problem for now. He’ll tell them when the time is right. ...hopefully, he’ll know when that time arrives.)

And now, the moment I’m sure you’ve been waiting for--how do we approach the whole Darth Vader issue?

You thought I’d forgotten about it, didn’t you.

(I didn’t.)

(Neither did Bail)

Okay, so, the problem, as he sees it, is that he’s...not exactly in a position to intervene.

He had no real personal connection with Anakin the first time around.

Sure, they worked together on occasion, and their relationship was certainly cordial when they did, and of course they had a mutual friend or two, but all their interactions were fairly distant/professional.

Besides, while he can extrapolate/guess a fair amount of what happened (and, more important, how/why it happened), he has no actual knowledge/frame of reference for how accurate his guesses are. (Because, LBR, even Obi-Wan might not know the full story, though he’s at least guessed almost all of it, and even if he did, he wasn’t exactly talking about it in the five minutes they were working out what to do with the twins, etc.) And if he’s wrong, he might well make things worse.

The second problem is that he has no idea how he’ll feel about/react to meeting Anakin again, given that basically the only real context he has here is the future he lived and is now trying to avert. He figures there’s two ways its likely to go:

Option one, nightmare scenario: He meets General Skywalker, and all he sees is Vader. This is...nooooot exactly very productive/conducive to him getting done what he needs to get done. In this case, Bail will avoid him as much as possible, and try to find a way to tip off Padme and/or Obi-Wan.

Option two, acceptable scenario: He meets General Skywalker, and there is a total disconnect between the person he is now and the monster he could become (did become? might become? time travel is weird). In this case, Bail will keep things more or less as they were last time; and focus on derailing Palpatine and fixing the problems in the Senate, and hope that that makes a difference.

And he’ll try to find a way to tip off Obi-Wan and/or Padme. Bail ain’t stupid.

Of course, there are two major factors here that Bail hasn’t considered.

For starters, he’d forgotten how young Anakin was.

True, some of the other Jedi Generals weren’t all that much older (to say nothing of the Padawan Commanders), and he knows there were too-young soldiers in the Alliance, too, but at the same time...

It hadn’t stuck out to him all that much the first time--maybe because it, unfortunately, wasn’t unusual/was just How Things Worked, and his personal context had been of course different, as he’d been significantly younger himself. But, despite that and the continued youth of the Rebellion... Look, dropping back into the GAR now, and seeing this twenty-year-old kid put in these situations is another thing entirely when one is on the far side of sixty (mentally, at least) and all too recently had a child his age.

ON A RELATED NOTE, major factor the second: Bail hadn’t realized just how much like Leia Anakin was.

So, when they finally do meet, Bail starts noticing all kinds of little details--a certain insouciant little smirk, a particular defiant lift to his chin, a familiar inability (equal parts endearing, alarming, and incredibly frustrating) to keep from mouthing off...

So...all of this basically means that, when Bail encounters Anakin, every instinctive Papa Wolf fiber of his being says, “This is my child now. Fight me.”

(well, not so much “fight me.”)

(Bail isn’t really a “fight me” sort of dude.)

(But you get the point.)

So now, Bail has to add ‘bond with Anakin Skywalker and help keep him sane’ to his increasingly-daunting to-do list.

This actually turns out to be...not as difficult as he expected?

(the first half, anyway)

Because, yeah, there’s a bit of a shaky start because Anakin Does Not Like politicians

(unless they’re from Naboo)

(and their name starts with Pa)

But once he works his way past that, it’s--Anakin likes having friends, he wants to like people, and he wants people to like him. Making Friends not his superpower, like it is with Luke, but it’s actually pretty easy to win his affection and respect, if you just reach out to him a little.

(thinking of that one meta post that was going around a couple days ago, about the bit with Ki-Adi Mundi at the Second Battle of Geonosis, talking about how--you know Another Friend in the Order, and then Obi-Wan says it’s a rare thing and look at how it wasn’t actually that hard for Mundi and--anyway, that sort of thing, y’know?)

So, Bail reaches out, and makes friends.

(Good Lord, he thinks, does this kid need a dad. Obi-Wan was that, and did very well, for a while at least, but he’s too thoroughly made the transition to ‘brother’ since the war started and Anakin was Knighted to fill that need.)

(You know what else he needs? is the next thought, as Anakin runs off into unnecessary danger AGAIN. A goddamn leash.)

So, we’re still pretty early in the War, and things start to shift a little bit.

Only a little bit, and fairly subtle. Bail is, after all, used to playing a long game with limited resources and everything to lose.

He worries, sometimes, that he’s moving too slowly in the Senate, but it’s such a delicate balance, if he upsets it...

But he is making progress. ...glacial, minuscule progress, but the galaxy is on a somewhat better path this time around. Palpatine finds things just a little bit harder this time around. Maybe that’ll be enough, and all the little changes will add up. That’s what Bail’s hoping for.

Unfortunately, this is Palpatine, and he has backup plans for his backup plans, and is course-correcting rather nicely.

Fortunately, that means Bail isn’t quite annoying enough to get offed.

Bail is also gradually working people into his network. Mon and Bel Iblis, to start; a few others. He decides against telling anyone he’s from the future. Compartmentalizing is better. Safer.

He involves Padme, too, of course; while he’s still not quite ready/able to approach telling her the full truth (though he knows he can’t get away with half-measures like he can with the others), her support is invaluable. He’s keeping track of what she notices and when, with regard to Palpatine’s machinations. While she is starting to waver a little, she still mostly trusts her former adviser; and Bail knows that she’ll have to decide not to on her own. All he can do is nudge her in the right direction, when he has the opportunity to do so.

He’s also gathering evidence, so that when he finally makes a bold, public strike, he’ll be able to back it up and the Republic will survive the blow to morale and the power vacuum that will inevitably ensue.

Anakin, actually, becomes a bigger change. Because while Bail has become an expert in slow, subtle progress that you don’t notice until it punches you in the face five years later, Anakin is....not.

Also, this is, like, the best year of his life. Even in the original timeline. He has a job he’s good at, he has his wife, he has his brother, he has his sister, he (at least thinks) he has a father figure in Palpatine...

And this time, he also has Bail.

Which means a confidant outside the Order, who is Not Palptaine. Who is, in fact, a very good counterweight for Palpatine because they’re both playing on the same emotional needs.

But Bail, of course, actually genuinely has Anakin’s best interests at heart.

So, Palpatine is starting to notice that Anakin is...worryingly stable. That will never do.

So, he pushes a little bit harder than he did, this early on, in the other timeline.

Not enough to make Anakin notice, of course.

(Smart as he is, Anakin is also really really dumb about some things)

But enough that when someone finally points out that, hey, Palpatine is sort of sketchy, he won’t be quite as resistant to the notion.

Because he feels--unsettled, more often than not, after meeting with Palpatine. And he tells himself it’s just because of the problems the Chancellor is pointing out to him. He convinces himself that’s all, but each time--it’s maybe just a tiny bit harder to believe.

(Strangely enough, although sometimes he and Senator Organa talk about similar things--his issues with the Council, etc.--he never leaves those conversations feeling like this...)

All of this comes to a head--oh, we’ll say about a year later.

Not much has really changed (at least in the parts of the story we, the audience, see) other than Bail is a little more integrated/involved with Our Heroes than in canon. Basically, it’s not just Padme he follows down to the docks with a sidearm to keep her from getting herself killed.

(Side note: he also would very much like to take Ahsoka home and just keep her. BAIL ORGANA IS ADOPTING ALL OF THESE KIDS AND KEEPING THEM SAFE FROM PALPATINE AND HIS SCHEMES, OKAY.)

Anyway. Bail eventually comes forward and tells Anakin--pretty much everything.

This occurs under suitably melodramatic circumstances--i.e., Anakin was playing security/escort for something Bail was doing, and they crash and are stranded together for a few days, or something. Because while Bail is like the chillest dude ever, Anakin attracts more than enough Drama to make up for that.

He’s like a Melodrama Magnet.

Also, them being stranded means Anakin can’t ragequit the conversation, losing all the ground Bail has gained over the last year.

This covers a lot of ground--even though Bail tries to stick to just what he knows is true.

But this is damning enough.

But Anakin needs to know.

“I’m doing this,” he says, “for our daughter.”

“Our daughter,” Anakin repeats.

And then Bail tells him about her. All the things he’s wanted to say this whole year but couldn’t--because it would hurt Breha too much, and who else could he confide in about the daughter he lost?

BASICALLY ALL OF THE LEIA FEELS BECAUSE HER DADS. JUST. HER DADS.

It is a long, difficult conversation, but Anakin--Anakin is not yet so unstable that he won’t listen. And Bail is his friend, someone he trusts. And he--knows there is darkness in him, he remembers what he did in the wake of his mother’s death, and he knows the truth of what Bail is telling him.

“It’s not you,” Bail says. “Not yet. And it doesn’t have to be. We can fix this, before it goes too far. I can’t solve these problems for you, but I can help. I want to help.”

(And he finds a way to shut down that insecure voice in the back of Anakin’s head that doubts Bail’s friendship for a minute there, because he can see those wheels turning, and he knows Anakin well enough by now to guess at those particular cracks in his psyche.)

(Quick note: I did say that this Bail tells Anakin almost everything--but he does leave Luke out of the conversation. As I mentioned before, he’s too cautious not to hedge his bets.)

Another thing Bail does not do is he does not--specifically implicate Palpatine, because he doesn’t know how far Anakin has drifted away from the Chancellor’s influence and doesn’t want to risk a denial-induced overcompensation reaction, where he falls even deeper under the Sith Lord’s shadow.

(but Anakin, while being kind of dumb, is also a very smart man. And he knows that the list of people who have that level of influence on both him and galactic politics as a whole is a very short one.)

They come out of this with the whole--idea, that Bail genuinely trusts Anakin’s abilities, and trusts him to help and do the right thing, and Anakin can come to him for help/perspective when it all gets to be too much, emotionally speaking, without worrying about disappointing him to the point where Bail will abandon him/not want to be his friend anymore.

(Because Bail has seen the worst he could possibly be. As long as Anakin doesn’t go that far...)

After a day or so, they get picked up from wherever they were stranded. Probably by Obi-Wan, who can tell that Something Important happened. But Anakin is being quiet, and Bail deftly changes the subject.

And then they get back to Coruscant, and a different kind of hell breaks loose.

Because Bail made a very slight, but very important miscalculation--Anakin and Leia are a lot alike, in how they approach problems, in how they view the world, in that they both operate from a fairly black-and-white way of thinking--there’s another meta post I’ve read I’m going to reference, talking about how Anakin and Leia are Justice, while Luke and Padme are Mercy.

But Leia has the advantage of a stable childhood. And a certain amount of common sense. These temper those instincts, and help her rein herself in until the time is right. Anakin...not so much.

So, Anakin, once he’s through with his preliminary debrief at the Temple, goes to confront Palpatine, about everything Bail told him, and everything he figured out from there.

(He manages to protect Bail through this, and everything that will come after--he had a vision, he tells his false friend; so convincingly that even Darth Sidious believes.)

Some time later, Bail gets a call from Obi-Wan.

“Have you heard from Anakin? I can’t reach him. Neither can Ahsoka, and he usually doesn’t duck her calls. You’re his friend, I thought, perhaps...”

Bail has a Bad Feeling(tm) about this.

Because Padme hasn’t heard from him, either.

“He’s probably racing,” Obi-Wan says, but the doubt shines clear in his voice. “He’ll be back soon, I’m sure...”

Bail takes a deep breath, because here’s another incredibly difficult conversation he’s been putting off for a year.

It’s time to read Obi-Wan--and Padme--in. On everything, just like he did with Anakin.

...that’s about as far as I have planned out in detail. But there will be a Rescue Mission, and Palpatine will end up Very Very Dead, and life will be--good. The Republic will stabilize, and Bail and Padme and Mon and their allies will fix the problems that Palpatine found and exacerbated there. And the Order will survive and adapt, becoming a little more flexible as it moves forward into a new golden age.

And while a part of Bail still mourns the good parts of his other life, he and Breha will eventually adopt another little girl, as they discussed; and Anakin will practically be his son anyway; and he will watch Leia grow up again, in a peaceful galaxy, the one she has always deserved, and he will be very pleased with what he accomplished.

[mindfulrunner]

#54: daring greatly: mississauga race report

the seed: rebellious child

I have a sassy, rebellious, high-energy toddler and I am still at heart a sassy, rebellious, high-strung child. I signed up for the Mississauga full as an act of rebellion. He was sick, and I was covered in snot and tired out of my gourd, but I did it anyway.

I thought: f*** it. I tempted fate.

Even though I have a rebellious streak, I fear and respect the marathon, and situations and circumstances I fear and respect tend to bring out the best in me. So that f*** it was also a tiny prayer: may I dig, dig, dig. May I get the most out of myself. Inspired by the openness of Shalane Flanagan and Gwen Jorgensen, I also put out my ambitious, challenging, yet within reach goal: to PB and break 3:07.

training: the limiting factor

Training this cycle went well overall, except for a major limiting factor: illness. Elliot picked up virus after virus at daycare, and I seemed to get every single one, except they lasted twice as long for me, and instead of taking off sick days to rest and take care of myself, I took them off to take care of him. Between January and May, I was sick with three upper respiratory tract infections (URTI) the flu (first time getting this in many years), and 3 GI viruses (at least one of the GI bugs was food poisoning, I think). In previous cycles, I got URTIs a couple of times that lingered, I assume because I chose to train through them, as long as I didn’t have a fever and my energy levels were OK. This year, the first of these infections struck just one week after seeing my naturopathic doctor at the end of January and telling her my immunity was great. Figures.

I was sick, or caring for Elliot, pretty much all of February, and I was intensely frustrated. At the same time, I was wrapping up a huge 5-month project at work that was overdue, and trying to maintain some fitness, mostly by running easy. Typically, I would feel OK after easy runs, but then the day after a harder effort like a long run or workout, I’d feel worse, and ease off again. On two occasions I took longer stretches off – 3 or 4 days— but had a hard time taking a full week off, which is what I probably should’ve done. My issue was I have zero faith in my immune system, and didn’t quite believe I’d get totally better with that amount of time off, since even when I’m not training colds and infections often last well over a week. In February, I averaged just 60k a week, ran only one proper long run of 28k, and 3 workouts total. In my last marathon cycle, I averaged 100+, hit all my long runs and workouts.

I raced the Chilly half sick at the beginning of March, another questionable life choice, and somehow ran a PB. It felt very hard from 6k on, which was early for me to push, and it was the first time in a long time I questioned my ability to complete a race. I coughed for a good five minutes straight at the end uncontrollably. In that moment, I really regretted what I had just done and had no joy in the PB, assuming I would get pneumonia or something, and screw over my work and family even more. Going into it, I wasn’t even sure I was going to race, but when I began to pick up the pace, I got competitive, wanted the PB, and somehow performed beyond my fitness and circumstances. Getting 100% out of myself on race day, despite only having 70-80% in my training, became my focus going into the marathon. I also figured if I could run 90 minutes on pretty bad training, the equivalent of a 3:09 marathon, I had a very good shot of PBing and, on a good day, maybe even running in the low 3s.

I got lucky and oddly enough actually felt better after racing Chilly. In March I averaged 94k per week, and in April I averaged 94k again. However, I only ran 7 weeks over 80k, and 6 of those were over 90k. In the last marathon cycle, I ran 12 weeks over 90k. So my overall build was not, for me, high-mileage. Workouts went OK. I ran marathon pace tempos between 4:21 and 4:25 pace. 4:21 felt too hard and 4:23 began to feel like the sweet spot. I had some craptacular long runs and workouts, and I noticed that these were occurring during the high-hormone, mid-luteal phase of my menstrual cycle. That started to psych me out, as the marathon fell on the same day. For more info, check this out:

pre-race: zero chill workin’ mom

The week before the marathon, a colleague abruptly went on vacation, which added an unexpected amount of stress to my workweek. Jeff was on days, which meant I was responsible for both pick-ups and drop-offs to daycare, which was also a little challenging, since Elliot seemed to be going through a period of separation anxiety again: he literally wouldn’t let go of my hand at daycare, and it broke my heart to pry his little fingers off one by one. Major mom guilt.

Taking over my colleague’s duties meant I was responsible for a project with a noon deadline the Monday after the race. F*** THAT, I thought. I worked my butt off to get it finished up as best as I could by Friday, putting in a 13-hour day, and dealing with Elliot, who was still not doing great: really fussy and clingy. I did not even have the time or presence of mind to properly track my carbs that day, although I think I got in around 500g.

After an awful night in terms of sleep, stress, and— OK I’ll admit it— a piss-poor attitude on Friday, I was super grumpy and lazed around all day Saturday. Jeff brought Elliot in to the walk-in and it turned out he had a nasty ear infection, poor dude, so I was concerned about him as well and cancelled the post-race party at our house.  We called in reinforcements, and my mom agreed to come in the morning to watch him, so Jeff could still come to the race.

It was only at 5pm that I properly started getting my head into the race. I realized all my gels and nutrition contained caffeine, so I zipped to the Runner’s Shop for some non-caffeinated ones and also picked up a sweet pair of Goodr sunglasses since I wasn’t totally sure where my normal running ones were. Then I returned home and got my bag and clothes ready with Elliot. Instead of being in bed by 9 as I should’ve, I made a pace cheat sheet with my goal 5, 10, 15, half, 25, and 30k times, as well as directions for the final really tricky with a bunch of twists and turns. I wrote out the directions moreso to ease my anxiety about the course, which I practiced running the previous week. I don’t think I fell asleep until late, maybe midnight, and was up at 4:40 to scarf down my oats.

execute: PB or bust

My goal was to PB. I didn’t care if I blew up. And I was a bit greedy. I wanted to run 3:03-3:04. I wanted to be well within striking distance of a fall sub-3. I wanted to prove this was my distance, this is where I shine. No plan B.

the race: hello glycogen depletion my old friend

Morning of, the temperatures were looking a bit warmer than expected, so I got a little nervous. And as with the Ottawa Marathon, I couldn’t properly go to the bathroom which was so weird. I wonder if carb loading messes up my digestion?

My teammate picked me up and we drove the short 30 minutes to the finish line to take the shuttle to the start. We missed our exit, and I ended up not really listening to my pre-race visualization and jams properly. At the start, I changed and immediately lined up for the bathroom and again tried to go but couldn’t. I very briefly warmed up, just 1k with a few strides, before searching for my teammates, Jake and Gar, who were going to run a similar pace. The plan was to start out at 4:23, but Gar was quicker after a few kms, so Jake and I let him go. Neither Jake or I felt great from the outset. We both had a shin issue that migrated into a hip issue, and I my calf started to cramp at 5k. However, I stayed calm, if not positive, knowing that marathons are long and these things can majorly shift. I especially tried to take the downhills in a controlled way to avoid slapping and aggravating my shin again.

As usual, the GPS watch just provided a guesstimate. This guesswork does tend to add some mystery and suspense into the effort, as I’m never totally sure if I’m hitting my goal, even if the numbers say I am, and I usually try a bit harder just in case. However, feeling that Gar was a very controlled pacer, and wondering why he’d gone ahead when he’d only wanted 3:05, I grew concerned we were running too slow. Between 8-14 k there were a few faster kilometres: 4:15, 4:17, etc. At 14k, I pulled out my sheet with the split times and some older women spectating chirped, “You don’t need a map, honey”, but the sheet told me that we were running well under our goal pace, that Gar was fast, and not to worry about him and just do our own thing. 

From that point on, Jake and I took turns leading until about 24-25k when I was officially slowing and starting to feel pretty crappy and let him go.

I don’t fully remember why I was slowing, if it was just overall discomfort or a negative mindset, or if my calf or hip were bothering me more. But I remember consciously letting him go, yet wanting to keep him in sight, and beginning to feel like the race was slipping from my control. I remember too, trying to quiet the needling thought: this is too early to feel so bad. I must’ve quieted most of my thoughts successfully, because I don’t really remember much about the next hour of the race. Maybe I lost focus? Or maybe I was incredibly focused on just hanging on. I don’t remember.

Something I struggled with that I could have controlled, maybe because I was distracted by what my teammates were doing and not running my own race, was fueling. I didn’t have a written plan, didn’t take the little baby bottles (literally baby bottles, ha ha!) of Maurten Jeff handed me, and didn’t take Gatorade at every station as I did at Ottawa. I think I took 4 gels total. I began to bonk around 34, 35k pretty hard. My watch was mostly in the low 4:30s, whereas I had wanted it in the low 4:20s. Around 35k, my heart rate also dropped according to Garmin? I’m still wondering if this was a fluke.

It was suit of armor hard, like in my first marathon. But I was reassured by the fact I was breathing pretty well, which to me signified it was still a manageable, if intense, effort. Not dead yet. I don’t think I took in any fuel after 37k, which again was silly, but I finally took one of the little bottles Jeff handed to me just prior to that. After 37, the effort to take Gatorade or a gel at that point seemed overwhelming. I need to learn to mentally prepare to work with this feeling and override it.

Luckily, during this period of bonking and serious effort, I did focus mentally, since I had women around me I was competing with. One woman in blue was wearing headphones and had very strong surges; we ran alongside each other for parts beginning at about 34k. We eventually caught up to a woman in black, who looked strong and was being paced by 2 male runners. I took their encouragement to her as my own “You’re doing great” and “Now’s the time to push if you have anything left” and we played cat and mouse a bit. I took the tangents straight, a bit aggressively, elbows a little out. 

Because the course was so twisty, I did not have the finish line in sight until the last 100m or so, although I could hear the crowds. Finally, with about 20m-50m to go, my competitor in black, who I later learned was named Karoline, had a huge kick but I somehow responded (despite apparently not using my arms at all!) and caught her at the line and came 4th woman by 1/10 of a second. My teammates were pleased I put on a funny show at the end. 

I had snuck under my PB of 3:07:36 by 50 seconds, running 3:06:46. It was a satisfying result, looking back, but I still somehow felt I’d messed up the race and felt a bit deflated, if not disappointed. Immediately after I felt terrible and needed my puffer in my bag, so I just focused on getting that instead of soaking in the accomplishment as much. 

Next time, I will be more grateful. PBs are PBs, and they don’t come forever.

But there are things to improve: higher mileage. Immunity. Fuelling. Form.

after: and when it was bad it was horrid

After the race: I. Was. Trashed. Possibly worse than after my first full. My calves and quads were dead, my lips were blue for a good hour despite wearing multiple layers, my cough was bad, and my old groin injury had somehow resurfaced. I was a GD mess. I was in pain standing and walking, but afraid to sit and cramp up.

Nothing looked more appealing than a woman, probably late 50s, laying on the grass with her legs up and feet on the trash can. I laid next to her and we chatted and both had the sillies and shared some jokes and stories. She asked my time and I asked hers. She was late to running, and expressed joy at discovering it later in life. She asked me “how’s your mind”? And I said, “Fine. I think. But you know. I shouldn’t drive” and we both cracked up laughing. She had a beautiful laugh. It was probably my favourite moment in the race besides…

BESDIES MY TEAMMATES ABSOLUTELY CRUSHING IT. Jake, Heidi, Martina, and others had absolutely mind-blowing races. I was elated for them.

Walking to the truck wasn’t possible, so after I picked up my age category prize (4th overall, 1st in age group), we walked a little until Jeff got the truck and drove back to get me. Congratulatory texts and posts started streaming in. The satisfaction of the accomplishment moreso came to me secondhand.

gone gone beyond gone.

During the race, the heart sutra surfaced. Gate (pronounced: gah-eh), gate, paragate para sam gate, bodhi svaha! 

 I first learned it after I listened to Michael Stone’s podcast during a cold, wintery sidewalk run in the suburbs at my parents’ house. In the podcast, Michael said it’s a very good sutra to say after someone has died; for me it comes up in the blank part of a run that’s just effort, where I’m struggling to settle back into it and just accept. Instead I cling to it for distraction, for something to hold on to. One last clinging thing. I also just like the rhythm of it. It’s like counting to eight again and again in a run, but better.

We chanted it at Spirit Loft and at Downward Dog after Michael died in his memory. 

Sometimes it arises out of nowhere, which was what happened in the race. Michael translated it as: gone, gone, beyond gone, across the other shores (the tone of “across to the other shores” is a bit celebratory because of the “svaha!” like a bit of a hooray thrown in).

After the result on the car ride home, I squirmed and fished around, looking to find what was gone, struggling to settle in my accomplishment, in the extreme effort of crossing to the other shore. 

I texted my brother, and Jeff previously texted my mom. Fourth woman sounds kinda cool, and it’s the type of thing non-runners usually find more interesting than running a certain time. Maybe what I needed was the validation. I scrolled through the congratulatory messages I received, searching there too. Trying to find the hooray on the other shore, the bit of joy. But I couldn’t.

The truth is I always feel a peach pit in my throat and ache in my chest after a race since my dad died. A text was never sufficient for the depth and breadth of his enthusiasm for my running. He would want a phone call with a detailed play-by-play. He would’ve looked up the result. He probably would’ve been there, cheering, telling me to kick butt. He would have gasped with amazement and interest that I’d outkicked someone at the line with an “Em-chen! You’re kiddin’!” and a big WOW, and would’ve called me “fast twitch” in the next few emails or texts he sent me.

I didn’t make the mistake of trying to search for my dad in my mom. They are different. I am growing. I didn’t begrudge her for not being him. The night before the race, she told Jeff that after my dad ran his first marathon, she let him know she wouldn’t support him running them anymore. I asked her about it when we got home from the race, curious but also already knowing why. She said, “It’s too extreme, the training takes too much time, you get too thin. My friends were asking what was wrong with him, he got to 145 lbs. 10ks, those are fine. But I said, with three little kids, we wouldn’t come to your races. You could do it on your own time. But we won’t support it.”

At one time I would’ve seen a jab in these words, a pin to deflate my victory balloons, which were already pretty sad and deflated. But now I frame it as touching: a mother’s concern, her sharp attention, even though I am grown up now, noticing and worrying about the lines in my face, the cough that won’t go away, the apparent lack of rest and pleasure in my life, the strange seriousness and intensity of my hobbies.

I sent her a text thanking her again for her help with Elliot and explaining, “I know running isn’t the most pleasant/healthiest hobby but for me it is very exciting to discovery athleticism, teammates, and a sport I have some skill at. Really really appreciative of your help.” She responded, “You are welcome. Glad you were happy with results. My bias will always be for optimal health. Which everyone perceives differently.”

My dad perceived optimal health differently than her, too. He sprinted the last part of his easy runs with his running mates, racing for fun. He always beat Rob, and mostly beat Sean. He ate the burger and the chips. He sometimes had the extra drink. He got chippy in the corners at hockey and didn’t control his emotions very well at all when fishing or playing golf. From the outside, his leisure time sometimes looked stressful. He had a rebellious streak, too. And he savoured the juices of life.

shore up

I am my father and my mother. I am the rebellious, intense child, but also the patient, steadfast mother. I don’t want to run reckless. I try and do things that impact Elliot the least: lunch runs, run commutes, 5:00am runs while he is sleeping. I don’t want to compromise my long-term health in a serious way, or my connections with Jeff and Elliot. I don’t think I am. 

But I can’t deny I’m curious. I’m hungry. I’m keenly interested in limits. I want to be a student of limits. There is a spark here, there is a flame. I’m protective of it. I want to tend to it.

As a teenager and in my twenties, I shrank myself to accommodate my parents’ expectations. Risk-taking was out of sight, never in the open. The dark parts of my personality were hidden away the best that I could and came out in sulking and silence. My seriousness and intensity came out in academics, the secret crushes I had, and maybe our political and philosophical arguments around the dinner table, but I didn’t express it openly in my hobbies. I wrote but always in secret. I wrote with expletives, experimentally, raw and weird and my mom came across my blog once, the F bombs and all, and was shocked and disturbed, and never again followed any of us on social media. I published a poem but later requested it be removed from a website, ashamed of my rawness. I hemmed up all my raw edges.

But my goal this year is to neither puff myself up, press on foolishly headlong into bad decisions, stubborn and imagining myself so alone, nor shrink into the background resentfully, obediently, and only do-- on the surface-- what’s normal or expected or desired from others. 

Neither puff up nor shrink. But also ask: why not me? 

I see no reason I can’t achieve big goals.

I see no reason I can’t go sub-3. 

I say this neither puffed up with ego, or shriveled with shame about the intensity of my own interests, the extremeness of my personality that befuddles and perhaps annoys others, even those I love the most.

So many of the skills I have as a runner– equanimity, understanding and maintaining boundaries, mental toughness, a desire to research, detachment, a deeper spiritual faith or purpose underlying my actions, the deeply joyful appreciation of nature on the trails and recreational paths– all of these things come from my mother. 

But some skills come from my dad, too: taking corners aggressively with elbows out, the cycling between anxiety and excitement, the runner’s high, the chicken-leg calves, the competitive show-boat streak, the hacking cough, the imagination running wild late at night or at work with fantasies of fast finishes and faster times and unimaginable improvement. 

The fascination with something like the heart sutra appearing unannounced at the end of a hard effort? Well, that one is the best. And that one is both of them.

I am a blend of the two, one measured and questioning, one seeking and a little recklessly enthusiastic.

And I am so much more: a mother, a partner, a sister, a teammate, a spiritual seeker.

Why not me?