#anyways guys I really love frederick chase

[jew-flexive]

frederick chase, legacy

thinking about frederick chase, who grew up in a family that knew about all the things everyone else couldn’t see, not because those things touched them, but because they used to. thinking about frederick chase, who’s a little too strong, sometimes, who’s a little too quick, sometimes, who has a strange aura of power that he didn’t earn but his great-great-great-grandfather did. thinking about frederick chase, who wants to be normal, who is almost normal, who is almost able to ignore the things that have too many eyes and razor sharp teeth and kill children in alleyways--but not him, never him, he doesn’t show up on their radar, not anymore. thinking about frederick chase, who is dizzingly, maddeningly grateful for his own cosmic insignificance because he knows what happens to heroes. 

thinking about frederick chase, nerdy and goofy and gangly and too smart for his own good, but more or less a normal guy once he moves out of his parents’ house. thinking about frederick chase, who graduates summa cum laude studying heroics of the human kind and gets his pick of grad schools and flirts with another TA at three am while they both pretend to grade papers and ignore their research. thinking about frederick chase, who falls in love with gray eyes and sly grins and stubborn pride and shows that by arguing and teasing and fiddling with his glasses and showing off, just a little, just to make her laugh.

thinking about frederick chase, who takes her home to meet his family, only for his sister to gasp and his father to drop his wine glass and his mother to bite her lip and his brother to watch with wide, jealous eyes. thinking about frederick chase, whose blood is almost all red, whose life is almost all safe, whose legacy is almost all forgotten, it’s been so long, who’d almost escaped completely, whose feelings of betrayal are sharp, vicious things. thinking about frederick chase, confronting a goddess, terror and anger making his voice shake, and what that must have looked like, a mortal lecturing the divine, how that must have made athena wonder and plot and plan. 

thinking about frederick chase, who wakes up exactly one year before he has to present his dissertation to a baby on his doorstep with his hair and her eyes who he knows just by looking at her is doomed, doomed, doomed. thinking about frederick chase, who lives off of coffee and ramen and hasn’t showered in a week and still isn’t even twenty-eight, who never wanted any of this, who was never asked if he did, who feels violated and alone and afraid. thinking about frederick chase, who tries to give the baby back because he knows what happens to kids in alleyways when the monsters (or the gods) are hungry and knows he’s not enough to protect her, who’s told he has no choice but to try. 

thinking about frederick chase, who keeps his daughter because none of this is her fault and gods forbid athena take any responsibility for the life she created without his consent, who names her annabeth for favor and oathkeeping and grace, who raises her the best he can even though he’s convinced he’ll outlive her, his clever little miracle child who represents every single one of his parents’ warnings and all the ambitions his brother’s ever sought. thinking about frederick chase, who reads to her and braids her hair and puts her in a playpen with a box of legos while he teaches his classes and comes back to find her building temples and shrines and skyscrapers with her chubby toddler hands. thinking about frederick chase, who knows his daughter is smarter and more powerful than him, who knows exactly what all that wit and strength is meant to protect her from and how little either will matter, in the end. 

thinking about frederick chase, who has every member of his family stolen from him before annabeth steals herself away. thinking about frederick chase, who never once blames her for it, who wants her safe, even if it that means being far, far away from him. thinking about frederick chase, who messes up and says the wrong thing and forgets, sometimes, that for all her cleverness, his daughter isn’t a mind reader and needs to be told that she is precious, that she is cherished, that she is everything he’s ever been afraid to lose. thinking about frederick chase, who doesn’t know how to raise a demigod, only how to mourn one, so he fails, and fails, and fails, no matter how hard he tries, no matter how deeply he loves.  

thinking about frederick chase, who, when given the chance, shows his adoration by brainstorming new building ideas and telling old college stories and making midnight breakfasts and shooting at titans with celestial bronze bullets. thinking about frederick chase, who grows and shifts and tries to see his daughter in real time, not only in those last moments he knows are coming, when she’s that kid in the alleyway and he’s not enough, never enough to stop the monsters from coming for her. thinking about frederick chase, who never once makes his peace with it, but works for the rest of his life to earn his own peace with her.

[phykios]

Five Times Percy Jackson Cheated At School (And One Time Someone Cheated Him) [read on ao3]

thank you as always to @darkmagyk for inspo and beta-ing 💙💙💙 and thank you to @arosnowflake for the homer idea!

1)

Percy squints at the paper prompt again, tilting his head, as if the new angle will extract some hidden information. It doesn’t change. The font is the special dyslexia-friendly one used by most departments at NRU, so he isn’t misreading it, either.

Your final will be an 8-10pp (TNR, 12pt, double-spaced) research paper expanding on one of the topics discussed in our class so far, or an alternate idea of your choosing, to be submitted in writing by May 7 with footnotes and bibliography. By 10am on the Wednesday before the Thursday class you will submit online a 750-word essay (word count does not include footnotes) on the research thread you have pursued that week (no written assignments due Week 6 or Week 12). 

Percy might hate college.

“Your neck bothering you again?” Annabeth asks, coming up behind him, her hands already on his shoulders. She’s sweaty, dressed in workout clothes, having just come back in from a jog. 

“My neck is fine,” he says. “Just preemptively freaking out over my Roman history final.”

He tilts his head back over the top of his chair, staring into the upside down, prettily frowning face of his girlfriend, and it does nothing to improve his mood.

“How bad is it?”

“Eight to ten pages,” Percy says, “not including footnotes.”

“Ouch.”

“And,” he grimaces, “it’s a topic of our choosing.”

Her mouth twists in sympathy. “Sucks.”

“Yep.”

“Anything I can do to help?” She squeezes his shoulders lightly, an open invitation. 

He shakes his head, stretching his arms back to grab her waist. “Promise not to break up with me when you catch me crying at 4AM over it.”

“Promise.” And she seals it with a kiss, bending down to reach him. “Dad wants to know if you’re free on the 16th.” 

“The 16th?” He wracks his brain. He’s pretty sure it doesn’t conflict with sailing, or Greek Club, or the monthly intra-pantheon relations council meeting that Chiron and Clarisse both guilted him into joining. “Pretty sure. Why?”

“Dinner--Charlotte’s out of town that weekend.”

“Sounds good.”

“Great, I’ll let him know. Now,” and she grins, “are you going to stare at that computer all day, or do you want to come and take a shower with me?”

Percy slams the computer shut. 

He doesn’t think about his paper topic for a while after that.

***

To his great dismay, Percy gets to her dad’s house first on the 16th. Drama in writing group 🙄 she texts him as he gets to the door, be there asap.

Great. Alone in the house with his girlfriend’s dad. Taking a deep breath, he knocks on the door. 

Not a minute later, Dr. Chase opens it. Last time they went to visit, Percy and Annabeth had ended up waiting outside for almost a quarter of an hour. “Oh, Percy,” he says, fumbling his flight helmet off his head. “Goodness, I thought I’d lost track of time again. Come in, come in.”

“Thanks,” Percy says, stepping inside and shedding his jacket. “Annabeth’s running late, but she said she’d be here soon.”

He frowns, looking so much like Annabeth that it throws Percy for several loops. “Well, that’s alright,” he says. “I’m sure we can entertain ourselves well enough until she gets here.”

“Yeah,” Percy chuckles, uneasy.

Several seconds pass. 

“Oh!” starts Dr. Chase. “Right, yes. Come in. Would you like something to drink?”

Spoiler alert: it doesn’t get much better.

A few minutes of staggered conversation later, it becomes eminently clear why they need Annabeth between them. It’s not the awkward small talk that doesn’t go anywhere (“How’s school going for you?” “It’s okay.” “Good, that’s good to hear.”) or the fact that Dr. Chase doesn’t really grasp how to relate to younger kids (“Have you heard of this website called ‘Vine’?”), but more that it’s just painfully obvious that the two of them don’t really know where they stand with each other. 

Now, he knows that Frederick Chase doesn’t hate him. Objectively, he’s aware of the fact that, if it weren’t for him, Annabeth never would have reconnected with her father in the first place, and he kind of owes him for that. Also, Percy knows that he’s a pretty chill guy--a little scatterbrained, but chill. 

That doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to make a good impression, though. Or that Dr. Chase thinks that Percy is smart enough for his daughter. Because, like, Percy isn’t smart enough for Annabeth--that much is obvious. Dr. Chase was courted by Athena. Percy barely made it out of high school calculus.

“Would you…” Dr. Chase hedges, plucking off his glasses and giving them a quick wipe with his shirtsleeve. “Would you like to see some of my current research?”

“Uh… sure. I’d love to.” 

At the very least, hopefully Dr. Chase will talk enough for the both of them, eating up time until Annabeth gets here.

A new spring in his step, Dr. Chase leads Percy to his study, where he’s got a setup worthy of Cabin Six: on his desk is a massive map of the Mediterranean, littered with miniatures of tanks, planes, and ships. Ringing the room are wall-hangings, depicting different types of planes, half of their structure in x-rays like people in an anatomy textbook, sandwiching the giant viking sword which hangs directly behind his chair. Every inch of floor space is occupied with a pile of books, some serving as additional desk space for mugs, notepads, spare toy soldiers, and, in one case, what looks like the leftovers of a handful of celestial bronze spearheads, melted down into shiny, useless nuggets. 

“You know I primarily study aviation,” Dr. Chase is saying, tidying up as he walks around the room, “but my colleagues and I are collaborating on an interdisciplinary re-evaluation of the entire North African theatre in World War II. It’s fascinating stuff; until very recently, they used to call it the ‘war without hate,’ given the lack of partisan roundups and, ah, ethnic clashes that you see in Europe--absolute garbage, of course. As if there weren’t civilians caught up in the fighting, too!” He chuckles, pleased at his own joke. Percy forces a laugh out of himself. “Anyway, with my prior experience studying the invasion of Sicily, I was brought on to assist in piecing the timeline together, working backwards from 1943.”

“Cool,” says Percy, filling the natural gap of conversation.

“Extremely! Operation Husky was a terrific endeavor of airborne, amphibious, and land-based combat.”

Percy nods. Amphibious? “Uh-huh.”

“Though, I must admit, I am having a little trouble retracing some of the ships.” Peering over his map, he leans down, fiddling with one of the ships. “You see this one here? The Palmer?”

Stepping up to the desk, Percy crouches down so the little toy ship is at eye level.

“Well, based on official records, the Palmer was supposed to have arrived at the rendezvous point at the same time as all the other ships, but ended up delayed by two days, and I can’t… quite…” He moves the ship again, frowning. “Figure out… why…” 

“Where were they sailing through?” Percy asks. 

Dr. Chase points to the map. “From Alexandria to Malta.” 

“They probably just hit a bad couple of currents,” Percy says, standing up. 

Tilting his head, Dr. Chase peers at him. “How do you mean?”

“If you’re going through the Cretan Passage, you’re going to hit all kinds of West-East currents which will push you backwards.” Snatching up a pencil from a nearby book stack, Percy lightly sketches on top of the map, tracing along the North African coast. “There are tons of overlapping currents in this area that push boats around in circles, especially around Sicily. That’s one of the reasons why so many historians figure that Homer was referring to the Strait of Messina when Odysseus goes through Scylla and Charybdis, here.” And he circles the strait, with a confident flourish.

When he pulls back, Dr. Chase is staring at him.

Percy blinks. “Um… sorry I drew on your map.”

“You--I have been trying to figure that out for weeks.”

He coughs, shrugging his shoulders. “Sorry.”

But Dr. Chase just laughs. “You can make it up to me by helping me with these next.” Clearing crumbs off of southern France, he bends over, pencil in hand. “So, say you were trying to get from Marseilles to Tunis…” 

Forty-five minutes later, still embroiled in battle recreations of the Mediterranean theatre, they don’t hear Annabeth letting herself in with her key, not even registering her presence until Dr. Chase, grasping for a notebook, spots her leaning against the doorway. “Don’t stop on my account.”

“Oh, Annabeth, dear! I’m sorry,” says Dr. Chase, going over to give her a hug. “We didn’t hear you come in.”

“I can see that,” she says. “What are you guys doing?”

“Percy here has been assisting me with naval movements,” he says, proudly.

Lacing her fingers with his, Annabeth steps over to Percy, studying their battle map. “Really?”

“Oh yes, he’s been phenomenally helpful.”

She kisses his cheek, pleased. “Look at you, Mr. ‘Phenomenally Helpful.’”

“It was pretty fun,” he admits, warm all over.

“I’d bet. Although, I guess this means we should probably order in for dinner…?”

Rubbing at the back of his neck, Dr. Chase smiles. “Yes, I suppose we should. Does pizza sound all right to you two?”

“Let me take care of it,” she says, slipping from Percy’s side. “You guys looked like you were in the middle of something. Extra olives, dad?”

“Don’t forget--”

“And anchovies, Percy, I know.” She rolls her eyes, taking out her phone.

Rather than the three of them move into the kitchen, Annabeth ends up bringing the pizza in with her, because of course she has opinions she’d like to share about the Allies’ naval movements. 

“You know, Percy,” says Dr. Chase, “I must say, you have a real knack for this kind of thing. Have you thought about what you might major in yet?”

Ah, the million drachmae question. “Not yet,” he says, fiddling with a pencil. “I figured I’d get through my gen eds first and then see which one I hated the least.” 

“I think you should consider majoring in history.”

Percy’s head snaps up. “History?”

“Specifically maritime history, I suppose. Your predisposition to sailing and ocean currents would be a huge asset to your research.”

“But--wouldn’t history have, like, a metric ton of required reading? I’m not really sure that’s my area.” He has a daughter with dyslexia and ADHD; surely he’d understand Percy’s hesitation.

But he just shakes his head. “Graduate programs these days are very favorable towards interdisciplinary methodology, I sincerely doubt you’d have to barricade yourself in the library. And recently there’s been a significant push to make the field more accessible to students with disabilities, including things like digitization, screen reading for people with vision impairments, and even restructuring programs all together so that students no longer have to memorize the Encyclopedia Britannica in order to pass their general exams.”

“That’s really nice of you to say, Dr. Chase,” Percy says, “But history class isn’t like talking over naval movements with you.” He thought back to the paper that had lowkey been haunting his dreams. “Like, in my classical history survey, I can’t just… talk about currents and battle plans. I have to come up with a topic on my own, and then write about that.” 

“Surely something involving Roman naval movements would be well within your skill set. You have a second sense about these things,” he chuckles, “clearly.”

Percy glances towards Annabeth, hoping she’ll back him up, but she looks thoughtful. Considering. Like she’s actually thinking about her dad’s proposal. “I can’t just choose something in naval history.”

“Why not?”

“Because… it's too easy?” 

If it was anything like his afternoon with Dr. Chase, it might even be fun. And school isn’t supposed to be fun. 

He repeats that thought to Annabeth as they drive home. “School isn’t supposed to be fun.” 

“No,” Annabeth agrees, “but I don’t know… I like my intro art history class way better than anything we ever did in high school because I actually care about it. Maybe if you write about stuff you’re good at, like my dad suggested, you’ll like it more.” 

The idea follows him all the way to bed, where he’s still mulling it over at 2 in the morning. Before he can chicken out, he grabs his phone, shooting off a quick email to his professor with his potential paper topic, then rolls over, eventually falling asleep.

By morning, he has a response. 

Sounds good! Looking forward to it.

***

With shaking hands, Percy calls his mom. “Yes?” 

“Hey mom.”

“Percy?” He hears her perk up, almost visualizing her sitting up in her chair. “What’s wrong, sweetie?”

Mom instincts. They can always tell when something is different. His heart throbs in his chest. “Nothing’s wrong,” he says, smiling stretching across his face. “It’s just--I got my paper back.” 

Percy had ended up writing his paper about the Roman navy movements in the Battle of the Aegates in 241 BC. It was probably the most fun he’s ever had on a school assignment, or at least the most fun he’d ever had writing a paper. 

“And?” She sounds expectant, hopeful. His mom has always had such faith in him, even with thirteen years of schooling to prove her otherwise. 

He looks back at his email, just to make sure he’s reading it right. “I got an A.”

She gasps. He can hear the scrape of the chair as she stands up. “Percy, that’s wonderful!” 

“Thank you.”

“An A!”

He smiles into his fist, inordinately pleased. “Thank you.”

“Oh, sweetheart, I am so happy for you!”

“Thanks, mom.”

“I’m so proud of you, Percy.” Her voice is soft now, like twilights on the beach with blue marshmallows. “I know how hard you’ve worked for this. You should be very proud, too.”

“I am.” And he is, weirdly enough. “I just can’t believe it.”

“I can.” His mom must be grinning, her eyes sparkling. “I always knew you could do it.”

“Sally?” He hears in the background, muffled. “Is that Percy?”

“Paul, Percy got an A on his Roman history paper!”

A second voice crowds its way in, equally excited. “An A? That’s great, kiddo! Congratulations.”

Why can’t he stop smiling? “Thanks.”

“I bet that feels pretty good, doesn’t it?”

“It does.”

“Well, it is very well-deserved,” says Paul. “That was some great work you did. I could tell how passionate you were about your topic just from your first sentence.”

“Thank you.” Maybe he should be worried about all this praise going to his head, but damn, is it nice. “Listen, I have to go get started on dinner, but I just wanted to give you a call.”

“Of course,” says his mom. “I want to hear from you more, okay? Tell me more good news! Like when are you and Annabeth going to--”

“I’m working on it, okay?” says Percy, smiling even more broadly. “I’ll keep you posted, promise.”

She laughs, tinny and happy. “You’d better. Congratulations again, sweetheart.”

“Thanks mom. Love you.”

“Love you, too.” 

And he hangs up, puts his phone down on the table, tilts his head back, and sighs, full, happy, a release. 

Maybe college won’t be so bad after all. 

2)

“You don’t have to do this,” Frank says, hushed. “All you have to do is walk away.”

Five Greek Fire bombs, cloudy yellow, are lined up on the table in front of him, neatly laid out in front of five twenties. From the side, Frank stares him down, surrounded by an army of morbidly curious Romans. Someone turned off the music and turned on the lights a while ago, stopping the party in its tracks, every eye on Percy and his opponent. Figures, his first college party all year and he causes a scene. 

Percy grips the edge of the table. “He insulted the Mets,” he says for the millionth time. “I can’t let that shit stand.”

Frank sighs. “Annabeth?” he asks, hoping to stop this nonsense.

Turning to his side, Percy sees his girlfriend, two drinks in, her cheeks lightly flushed, but solid as she stands beside him, supporting him. Her eyes are hard, fierce, the warrior gaze of Athena all but leaping out of her. “Do it,” she says. 

William, the sour-faced Roman legacy of Juventus, scowls. “A hundred bucks on the table. Sixty seconds. No throwing them back up.”

“Deal.”

“Frank,” Annabeth calls. “Start the clock.”

He sighs. “You guys are idiots.”

“Frank!”

“Okay, okay.” He holds out his phone, thumb primed, hovering over the screen. “On your marks, in three… two… one…” 

He hits zero, and Percy grabs a shot glass. Squeezing his eyes shut, he brings it to his lips, and throws it back.

It’s… not what he expected.

The tequila is awful--no getting around that. Even to Percy’s untrained taste buds, having really only ever had some of Gabe’s sour beer (under duress) and some of the Demeter cabin’s strawberry wine (on his eighteenth birthday, a celebration for actually getting to graduate high school), he can tell it’s cheap, rank, unrefined shit, like he’s drinking straight toilet cleaner. But the garum, the weird Roman condiment that the shot is mixed with, the one that Percy had never heard of before, it’s… it almost tastes like the fish sauce that comes with the pork and rice noodles from the Vietnamese place down the corner of his mom’s apartment, only less… fishy? Yeah. Less fishy.

It’s a weird taste. It’s not bad, by any means, it just--straight up, it just tastes like saltwater. Like the sea. 

And, well. Percy can handle the sea.

He looks at William, and grins. “You are so fucked.”

The assembled Romans cheer, spectators at a gladiator show, as Percy knocks back the rest of the Greek Fire bombs, one after another, clearing them all in under thirty seconds. Annabeth swipes up the cash, shrieking as she throws her arms around Percy. William wanders off, red-faced and glaring, as whoever turned the music off before flips it back on, the night, and the party, saved.

Silly Percy. He should have known what was coming next.

Thirty minutes later, he is well and truly wasted.

“You’re, like, really pretty,” he shouts at Annabeth over the loud music.

She snorts, grinning at him. “Thanks.”

“Seriously,” he slurs, tipping forward on his feet. “You could be a model.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Remember when we were fourteen,” he yells, bracing himself against the wall, “and you got kidnapped by that monster?” Slightly soberer but still a little flushed, she bites her lip, nodding. “Well, I followed the rescue party--I told you that, that I snuck out of camp to follow the rescue party? Right?” 

“You did.”

He takes a sip of water, running his tongue around the inside of his mouth. Feels goofy as fuck. “We got hijacked by Aphrodite halfway through, and when I saw her, I thought--I thought, ‘Holy shit, she looks a little like Annabeth.’”

Her brows shoot up, smile pulling at her lips. “Really?”

He nods. “Totally! But you’re way, way p--” 

Still smiling, she silences him with a kiss, the lingering taste of hard cider on her tongue. “I appreciate it,” she murmurs, grinning, “but you probably shouldn’t say that out loud.”

“Gross.”

From out of nowhere, like he always does, the weasley little shit, Nico di Angelo is suddenly in their space, looking surly and emo as ever, red solo cup in his left hand. “Nico!” Percy crows, grabbing for him and missing. “How’s my favorite cousin?!”

Ducking his wildly swinging limbs, Nico grimaces in the way that Percy has to come to recognize as his attempt at a smile. “Better’n you,” he says, a little wobbly. “What’s up with him?” he directs towards Annabeth.

“Greek Fire bombs. Five.”

“You’re a psychopath.”

“What!” Percy pouts. “He insulted the Mets.”

“Aren’t you s’posed to be, like…” Nico snaps his fingers, words momentarily escaping him. “A--representation… person? For the Greeks?”

Percy waves his hand, hitting the wall. “Fuck that. The Greeks can handle themselves. The Mets are sacred!”

“Are you with anyone?” Annabeth asks, momentarily taking up Percy’s usual role of concerned parent friend while he is drunk off his ass. Theoi, he loves this girl so much. 

Nico shakes his head. “No, but Will and I are staying with--”

A thought suddenly blooms in Percy’s tequila-soaked brain. “Nico!” He shouts.

“What?” he hisses, glaring.

Percy pushes himself off of the wall, outstretched arms managing to box Nico in, falling on his shoulders and trapping him. He’s still a short, skinny little shit, the fuck, when are his Big Three genes going to kick in? “I need to talk to you about the thing.”

“The what?”

“The thing! The--the,” then he leans in, scream-whispering over the pounding bassline. “The thing.”

“That doesn’t help.”

“You know, it’s…” Percy licks his lips, language escaping him for a hot second. “Round. Metal. Jewelry thing.”

A beat, then Nico’s eyes widen. “Oh, that thing.”

“Yes, that thing!” Pulling back, he pulls Nico towards him, slinging an arm over his shoulders in a half-headlock. Annabeth watches, bemused, lips pursed as she tries not to smile. “I need to borrow Nico for a sec,” he says, words spilling out of him. “Back soon. Later. Soon.”

Her eyes crinkle, grey sparkling. She’s so fucking pretty. “Drink your water.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Then together, like some three-legged beast, the two boys lurch away deeper into the party, Nico leading them towards the kitchen. “Where’re you taking me?” Percy slurs. “‘M I being kidnapped again?”

“If I’m helping you plan out this stupid proposal,” he grumbles, pouring himself more vodka, “then I need to be less sober.”

***

Some mistakes may have been made.

“Where’s Annabeth?” Percy mumbles, looking back towards the house. The party is still raging, someone’s muffled Spotify playlist making a real racket, the greatest hits of ABBA still bouncing around his skull.

“Simp.” Nico, swaying a little, tries to stand up from his kneeling position, only to fall heavily back down on his knees. “She’s right where you left her.”

Discussing Percy's proposal plan had led to more drinking. More drinking had led to the two of them discussing their shared preference for blondes. (“Malcolm is pretty cute,” Nico admitted, flushing, and Percy almost screamed, “Isn’t he?! Sometimes I think about Annabeth with short hair looking like Malcolm and I almost start crying because she’d be so cute!”) Which then led to even more drinking. Which then led to general bitching about their lives, about Percy's hard-ass classics professor Dr. Bauer who he actually really liked but just pushed him so hard and expected so much of him, and Nico's half-brother Zagreus who was causing some family drama by picking fights with Hades all the time and also hooking up with both Thanatos AND the fury Megaera, which, ew, which then led to Percy inhaling his drink, nearly choking to death on unspecified college punch, Nico laughing at him all the while, as he had the most incredible idea.

"Nico!" He shouted, crushing the red solo cup. "Can you resurrect Homer for me?"

Nico gaped, staring. "What."

"Seriously! I need to ask him something for my paper."

"Percy." Nico gazed at him, all the power of the Ghost King boring into his soul, deep and haunting. Percy stifled a burp. "You're a fucking genius."

Which is how they found themselves around a shallow hole they had dug in the backyard, a large bottle of Pepsi originally intended as a mixer pilfered from the kitchen along with two slices of pepperoni pizza dumped on the grass beside them.

"Maybe we shouldn't do this," he says, uneasy even through his drunken haze.

"It was your idea!"

"I don't have good ideas."

“Fuck you, I’m doing it.” With all the force of a tiny, angry kitten, he snatches up the Pepsi bottle, wrestling with the twist cap for a good ten seconds. “I wanna give that bitch a piece of my mind for making me cry in school.”

Percy looks at him sideways. “Hector killing Patroclus got you, too?”

He snorts. “Fuck no. Achilles didn’t pay his dues to the dead.”

“Seriously?”

The cap pops off, and Nico tips the bottle over, dumping flat, lukewarm soda into the shallow hole. “It’s the ultimate dishonor!”

Freak. Percy would die for the kid.

“Let the dead taste again,” Nico mutters. “Let them rise and take this offering. Let them remember.”

“You’re so weird.”

“Says the guy who’s related to both horses and water.”

“I’m not related to water, I just control it.” 

The dirt turns black, dead soil mixed with sticky sugar water. Nico drops in the pizza, and begins to chant, that same ancient Greek that Percy heard in a dream once, talking of death and memories and returning from the grave or whatever. It’s still creepy as shit. 

Despite the warm California night, the air thickens with chilly fog. Silence, impenetrable, surrounds them, blocking out the noises of the party. From the earth, blueish, vaguely person-shaped figures begin to form, like thunderous clouds before a storm. “Which one is Homer?” he asks, hushed.

“Shh!” Nico hisses. 

Like little wells of gravity, the fog begins to coalesce. On one of them, Percy can almost make out, like, fingers. “Um, Mr. Homer? Sir?”

The figure doesn’t say anything. It lowers its mouth, drinking the soda out of the dirt. When it raises its head, Percy can see it more clearly, curly hair and milky white eyes and a straight nose. It--he?--seems a little more solid than your average run-of-the-mill ghost.

Nico frowns, eyes closed, concentrating. “What’s your name?” he mumbles. 

That mouth opens, soundlessly, jaw working on nothing.

“Speak.”

It--there’s a sound, like hissing, only it’s not coming from the mouth, Percy thinks. It sounds like it’s coming from the earth. “Nico?” he asks. “You good?”

The ghost opens its mouth again, moaning, raising its hands. Weakly, unsteadily, it stumbles forward on feeble legs, tripping over the shallow hole in the dirt.

“Nico?” he asks again, a little more forcefully. “What’s going on, dude?”

Nico blinks, slowly, mouth hanging open a little. “Uh.”

The… thing… raises itself up on its hands? He guesses, and knees, crawling its way over towards them.

Now, Percy may be drunk off his ass, but he has seen enough movies to know exactly what the fuck is up.

Moving with a speed he didn’t quite think was possible right about now, he grabs Nico’s wrist, and pulls him up, dragging him along as he lurches towards the house. “Percy…” Nico moans, stumbling over a rock. “I think I fucked up.”

“You think?” Percy wrenches the door open, tossing Nico inside, before following in after, throwing himself against the door. 

Nico groans, throwing his arms over his face. “Dio santo, my head.”

“Forget your head,” he says, “did we just raise a Homer zombie?!”

Panting, Nico stares up at him, sprawled on the floor of the house. “Oops.”

Percy thunks his head against the door. He does not have nearly enough mental capacity to deal with this right now.

But, he thinks ruefully, at least it’s just one. Even drunk, he’s pretty sure he can handle one zombie.

Nico’s eyes widen. 

Percy stares. “What.”

“I didn’t stop the ritual.”

His stomach goes cold.

Turning around slowly, he pulls aside the little curtain on the window. “What?” Nico asks. “What do you see?”

Percy can’t speak, mouth dry.

Slithering up behind, Nico peers over his shoulder. “That’s… not great.”

“Nico,” Percy says, eyeing the horde which slowly shambles closer, half-decayed bodies in togas bumping into each other, almost identical to the drunk college students inside, as the song changes, once again, to ‘Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight).’ “Please go get Frank and Annabeth.”

The following Monday, an announcement is sent out to the entire campus: Per new department guidelines, students may not utilize the ambassador of Pluto to interview the dead for academic purposes.

3)

Percy attempts to flatten his hair. He readjusts his shirt. He almost wipes his sweaty palms on his pants, before he realizes what he’s doing, and clenches them instead, nails digging into his palms. He turns to Annabeth. “Do I look okay?”

“Ooh, ‘Mapping Funerary Monuments in the Periphery of Imperial Rome.’”

“Annabeth.”

She looks up from her brochure. “Relax, seaweed brain, you look fine. You look better than most people here.”

“That’s because I bring down the average age of presenters by about thirty years,” he hisses, eyes darting about at the milling mass of attendees, all packed into the hotel ballroom. 

Dr. Bauer had alternately convinced/pressured/guilttripped him into attending this year’s annual conference for the Society of Classical Studies to talk about the research he’d been doing with her. This year, the conference was held in San Francisco, so at the very least Percy didn’t have to spend five hours stressing about his poster presentation while simultaneously up in the air. But now that he’s here, in the ballroom, surrounded by strangers who know way more about this subject than he does, who are actually smart and probably never nearly flunked out of school or got kicked out or--

“Hey.” Annabeth takes his hand. “I know that look. You deserve to be here just as much as any of them.”

“Do I? I feel like any moment someone is going to come over and throw me out for trespassing.” He vaguely recalls something similar happening to him as a kid after he had ducked into the lobby of a semi-nice hotel to dodge what he had thought, at the time, was just a weird stalker, but had later realized had only had one eye. In any case, the hotel security guard had practically picked him up by the scruff of his neck, tossing him back out into the street. 

“That’s just your imposter syndrome talking,” she reassures him. “No one is going to throw you out.”

He sure as shit hopes so. It would be a shame to have done all this work for nothing. 

Glancing back at his poster, Percy can’t help but feel… good. Accomplished. Proud. About a school assignment, of all things. 

His poster traces the development of the prow from the Greek penteconter, to the Roman liburna, and finally to the Byzantine dromon, looking at artistic depictions in history. Percy had picked the topic himself, spending hours in the library reading, writing, and hand-drawing cross-sections of the ships on the poster board when the images he had gotten from the Cambridge University library had been too small. It had been grueling, frustrating work, but fun, too. And not nearly as much reading as he had feared.

Dr. Chase proofread it for him. Dr. Bauer signed off on it. And Annabeth had taken one look at it, smiled, then kissed his cheek.

That was the best compliment he had gotten.

Though now he’s kind of torn between showing it off and hiding it away before one of these attendees figures out that he doesn’t belong.

He rocks back and forth and his feet, pursing his lips, randomly clicking his tongue. Annabeth nudges him. “Your ADHD is showing.”

That’s when, finally, one of the attendees steps up to his poster. He certainly has the look of a professor, in a black cable knit sweater with grey, curly hair and a receding hairline, thin, rimless glasses perched on his nose. He squints at Percy’s poster, rubbing his chin with one hand. “Interesting,” he murmurs, in a thick German accent. “Very interesting. This is yours?”

“Um.” He glances at Annabeth, who is frowning at the brochure, silently sounding out words that she can’t read. “Yep. All mine.”

“Very interesting.” He leans in closer, tilting his head. “So you agree with Pryor and Jeffreys about the skeleton-first construction, then?”

Percy blinks. Pryor and Jeffreys had written The Age of the Dromon, arguing that the ram, which had been a key feature of Roman liburnians, had gone away in ancient ship construction because of developments in how they built the hull. Right. “Yes,” he says. “The skeleton-first construction is a lot stronger than the, um,” shit, what was the name for this, Leo had only told him about a million times--oh! “Mortise-and-tenon!” He nearly shrieks. “The mortise-and-tenon method. It, um, it wears out a lot more quickly than the frame, so… yeah.” He clears his throat.

He nods. “Very interesting.” 

Percy stares. Can this guy say anything else? 

“This is very well done, young man.”

Oh. “Thank you,” he says. 

“Who are you working with?” 

“Um, June Bauer?” He winces at the accidental question. 

He frowns. “I’m not familiar with her work. Where does she teach?” 

What a loaded question. “Uh… New Rome University.”

“I’m sorry?”

“It’s--she used to teach at Northwestern, if that helps. Um, retired,” Percy says.

The frown stays, but at least he doesn’t ask any more questions. “Hmm. Well, this is excellent research, nonetheless. I look forward to reading your dissertation.” Then, distracted by something else, he wanders off, chin still attached to his hand. 

“Who was that?” Annabeth asks. 

Percy shrugs. “Beats me. Also, what’s a dissertation?”

“It’s like a senior thesis, but, like, five hundred pages long.”

Five hundred?! “Fuck me.” 

“Maybe later,” Annabeth smirks. “It looks like you’ve got company.”

Sure enough, a smallish group of four people are approaching, led by Dr. Chase, making a beeline straight for them. “Here we are,” Dr. Chase says, gesturing. “This is the project I was telling you about. Percy, would you mind going over your poster for us?”

“No problem, Dr. C,” says Percy, smiling his least-grimace-y smile. 

As one, the adults all turn to look at him, faces politely blank, expectant.

Percy swallows. “So,” he begins, “um, this research is about the development of ship construction in the Roman empire…”

He trips up on some of the words, and at one point, he sees Dr. Chase squint in the way that usually means that Percy is speaking too fast, but all in all, he doesn’t totally fall flat on his face. His audience looks engaged, nodding along as Percy moves from point to point, and no one accuses him of being a giant fraud, which is pretty nice. 

At one point, Percy turns to the poster to indicate a specific point on his ship diagrams. When he turns back, his audience has suddenly multiplied, four people turning into a whole goddamn crowd. Each person gives him their undivided attention almost unblinking.

His mouth goes dry. “Um…” 

Dr. Chase, bless him, saves his ass once again. “Would mind starting again from the beginning, Percy?” he asks, a little bemused himself at the amount of people that had suddenly appeared. 

Silence stretches on for a moment, the muffled noise of the rest of the conference like a dull roar in his ear. 

Annabeth, behind him, coughs. 

“S-sure. No problem.” 

Swallowing, he closes his eyes, breathing in through his nose. Why, oh why did he let Dr. Bauer talk him into doing this again?

He pictures the tides of Long Island Sound, gentle and rocking, unhurried and unbothered, tries to match his breathing to them. When he opens his eyes, unfortunately, the crowd hasn’t disappeared. Everyone is still staring at him. 

But Annabeth stands next to her dad, flashing him a big smile and two huge thumbs up.

Percy relaxes. He’s got this.

“Okay,” he says. “So, about the middle of the first millennium CE, ship construction went through a couple of major developments…”

This time goes much, much more smoothly. He’s not sure what it is--though it’s probably Annabeth, her face fixed in a gentle smile as she watches him speak. Gods, what did he do in a past life to deserve someone as amazing as his girlfriend? 

That’s the only reason he can do this. Hell, that’s the only reason he even thought to do this. If he didn’t have Annabeth there, encouraging him, cheering him on, he never would have had the confidence to put himself out there like this. She’s there to pick him up when he doubts himself, there to listen when he can’t explain himself, there to give him feedback when he needs to practice. 

She makes him feel so strong. She makes him feel like he can take on the world--or at the very least, that he can impress a handful of academics.

And they certainly seem impressed with his talk so far. 

“Excuse me,” says a nasally, pinched looking older British guy, face lined as though he lived his life in a state of perpetual squinting. “I find your conclusions to be suspect--wouldn’t the frame method be more susceptible to breaking than the mortise-and-tenon?”

Well, most of them, anyway.

Percy shakes his head. “You’d think, but no. If you look at the study by Steffy, you’ll see that the three-finned ram from the Athlit wreck was designed specifically to break the mortise-and-tenon hull by causing the planks to flex, so that they’d dislodge the joinerys right next to them. A blow like that can cause the wood to split right down the middle.” A blow like that had sunk Sherman Yang’s ship when they tested it out on the lake at camp last summer, the naiads practically hurling him out of the water so quickly Percy didn’t even have to dive in to save him.

“How were you able to do these strength tests?” asks another listener, an older woman with a thick Hungarian accent.

“Hands-on battle simulations,” Percy replies, easily. “We took our models and tested them in as accurate a simulation as we could make.”

“And how big were these models?” 

Percy holds his hands apart, a vague, entirely inaccurate estimate. “About thirty meters, give or take.”

Her eyes widen. “How on earth did you get your hands on such a large ship?”

Percy freezes. “Uh.”

Oh, shit.

He had forgotten--most people didn’t have dads who could summon shipwrecks from the bottom of the sea, dropping them off at Camp Half-Blood with nothing but a sand dollar and one or two exhausted, pissed off hippocampi who had had to drag them all the way there.

“Um,” he stammers, licking his lips, thinking fast--c’mon, Percy, think! “I…” He swallows, panicking. “I… b… built one.”

In the corner of his eye, Annabeth facepalms.

Simultaneously, every mouth in the crowd drops--in shock, outrage, and even excitement. “You built one?!” the woman yelps. 

Oops. “I had help,” Percy says, quickly. 

Annabeth adds a second hand to her facepalm.

“Where?” The first man asks, his bushy brows flying above the rim of his glasses.

“At my… summer camp…” 

Dr. Chase sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“I mean,” Percy chuckles, shrugging his shoulders, trying not to sweat too obviously, “it was either that or lanyards, am I right?”

Dr. Chase, thank Athena, raises his hand, ready to step in. “What Percy means to say, I believe,” he says, attempting to draw their attention, “is that--”

“That’s amazing!” says another woman, probably a grad student attendee based on the fact that she’s wearing jeans. “Do you have pictures?”

Oh this is not good. “Um, not--not on me, but--”

“I do.” Annabeth takes out her phone, holding it up to the person next to her.

Percy blinks. “You do?” He doesn’t remember her taking any pictures.

She shoots him a look, two parts exasperated and one part “shut up and let me handle this,” with just a dash of fondness in the mix. Pointedly, she looks at him, eyebrows raised, indicating that he should continue.

Oh. She’s using Mist. And he needs to keep their attention on him so that they buy it. “Right,” he says, clearing his throat. “Any more questions?” 

His audience placated for now, passing around Annabeth’s phone, he manages to finish up his presentation. After fielding a few more questions, people start to peel off, distracted by other posters and presenters in the ballroom. When everyone has finally wandered away, Dr. Chase comes up and pats Percy’s shoulder awkwardly. “Nice work,” he says, and he seems like he means it. “A little touch-and-go there for a while, hm?”

“A little.”

He chuckles. “Still, you should be proud. I don’t know how many undergraduates would be able to handle that kind of pressure.”

“I mean,” Percy says, shrugging a shoulder, “it’s about on par with leading an army. Maybe a little less.” Honestly, maybe even a little more stressful. If a monster had decided to attack the convention center and interrupt his presentation, he probably would have been relieved.

He’d been worried for a moment that he’d undone all those years of work in making Annabeth’s dad like him. And that he’d be charged with some sort of academic fraud, for the whole “I have a boat” thing without proof. Thank the gods for Annabeth, as always.

She’s looking at him now through narrowed eyes. She at least can’t be surprised--that was far from the dumbest thing she’s ever seen him do. At least his “I spent most of my time at magic greek mythology summer camp” covers are normally better than hers. As someone who spent his formative years in the real world, he’s usually pretty good at keeping the demigod thing under wraps. 

“Come on,” she says, grabbing his hand. She pulls him off, through the dispersing crowd, lacing their fingers together, sweet and intimate, out of the hall and then down another one, and through a smaller corridor. Bringing them up to a little door, with a shake of her wrist, she pulls out her Estruscan keyring bracelet. About several of the keys have found themselves used in various misadventures, vanishing once their purpose is fulfilled, but her favorite key is still there. And, just like a clever child of Hermes, it can pick just about any lock. 

Inside is just an empty room, a little staging area surrounded by tiered desks going up, no more or less remarkable than any of the other conference rooms they’d visited before. 

“What--?” His question is cut off by Annabeth’s mouth on his. 

Surprising, but definitely not unwelcome.

It's a while before they separate again. “You’re so good at this,” she tells him, unbuttoning his shirt.

He runs his hands along the lines of her flanks. “I’ve had a lot of practice,” he grins. He’d practice kissing her all day long if he could. 

She smiles, shaking her head. “No, not this,” though she does lean in for another kiss, pulling at his lower lip with her teeth. “I know you’re good at this.” They break away, Percy pulling her shirt over her head, Annabeth shucking off his. “But history. Presenting.” She runs a finger over his chest, kissing his cheek, headed towards the sensitive spot on his jaw. “Gods, you’re so smart.” 

Something about the praise vibrates through his chest. She doesn’t sound surprised, or anything, just--turned on.

“You had all those crusty academics eating out of your hand. Just, so impressed by you, knowing you know way more than they do about naval history. When you were explaining the--” Her compliment is cut off with a moan, as he leans down and starts sucking on her throat. Her blouse has a high neck, so he feels no guilt for using his teeth.  

“Watching you today, gods.” Her breath is labored as his fingers play at the waistline of her skirt. “And then thinking of you defending your dissertation.” He bites at her jugular, and she lets out a long, deep moan. 

“I don’t know what that means.” Do academics fight each other? Like, with weapons? He’s pretty sure he can take most of the people he met today. 

“It means you get to show off how smart you are,” Annabeth says, grasping his shoulders, pulling him in for another kiss. “I was born the day my dad defended his. Gods, it's going to be amazing to watch you go.” She yanks his belt out of his pants, tossing it to the floor. 

They miss the panel on recent translation efforts. But Percy can’t say he minds one bit. 

And when Annabeth presents him with a positive pregnancy test two months later, Percy definitely knows he made the right decision. 

4) 

He almost doesn’t realize he’s having a dream-vision at first.

It has been literal years since he’s had a demigod dream. Hell, it’s been a long while since he’s had a dream, period--being a new dad to a one-and-a-half-year-old saps too much of his energy to even think about dreaming. Once Junie is put to bed, when he’s out, he is fucking out, and he does not have the brainpower to spare to manifest any messed up subconscious fears.

Which is why when he blinks open his eyes, taking in the too-bright colors of the Parthenon and the gleaming shine of the bronze statues which are somehow all looking at him--also, you know, how the Parthenon is complete, standing as it did thousands of years ago, and not crumbled into ruins--he knows, immediately, he is being contacted by a god.

And only one god in particular would bring him to Athens.

Without even checking, he heaves himself up off the ground, folding into a kneel. “My lady Athena,” he says, “can I ask for what quest you’ve brought me here?”

“Impertinent as ever, Percy Jackson,” rumbles the goddess, but Percy doesn’t think he can sense any ill will towards him. He hopes, anyway. “Perhaps I have summoned you here for a social visit.”

“Perhaps,” he says, choosing his next words as carefully as possible. “But I assume you have too much to worry about to randomly check up on your daughter’s boyfriend.”

He lifts his head, catching her expression--stoic as always, but maybe with just the barest hint of a smile. “You assume correctly. You have become, contrary to my initial expectations, very wise in the time that I have known you.”

“Thank you.” He knows better than to do anything but accept the compliment for what it is.

“I have observed your work as a scholar in recent years, and I must say that I am surprised, yet pleased, that you have chosen to pursue such a path. I had not thought you to be suited for a world of old men and dusty papers.”

He grits his teeth. Don’t rise to the bait, don’t rise to the bait, don’t rise to the bait--

“I understand, as well, that though you and my daughter have,” and here her careful composition cracks, just the slightest, the tiny lift of her lips falling, “made a child together.”

Percy swallows. He figured, you know, in the abstract, that Athena would know about Junie, but hearing her say it out loud is… well, he’s just glad that Dr. Chase has always liked him. “Yes, my lady.”

“It is customary in your time to marry prior to childbirth, is it not?”

“It is.” Oh, fuck, is she going to smite him for that? “I--that is to say, we, Annabeth and I, we, um, we definitely want to get married, but, Annabeth kind of…” 

He trails off. He can’t tell Athena, goddess of war, that his daughter pissed off the queen of heaven! And if he does, he definitely can’t imply that it was because she was being too stubborn!

“I know well of my daughter’s history with my father’s wife,” Athena says, smoothly. “I come to you now with an offer of peace.”

Percy straightens his back. Peace?

Raising one graceful arm, Athena turns, indicating the structure behind her. “Look upon my temple,” she intones. The white marble shines even more powerfully against the blue and red paint, intricate scenes and figures ringing the top of the columns. “In the time of Pericles, it was built to commemorate the victory of Hellas over the armies of Xerxes the Great. It was to be the shining beacon of our world, a triumph of our power and influence over the race of men.”

The race of men might have had something to say about that, he thinks to himself.

“But it was not to be,” Athena says, mournfully. “As our influence waned, so too did our temple, until its might was all but forgotten.” 

Before his eyes, the paint fades away, ceilings and columns collapsing, the destruction of the Parthenon playing out in front of him. 

“Some two hundred years ago,” she says, her voice taking on a darker, more dangerous tone, “a grave insult was paid to the ruins of my ancient sanctuary.” Like curtains falling on a stage, darkness swallowed up the structure, swift and impenetrable. “Many treasures were taken from my temple, stolen, by foolish, greedy men, spirited away far to the north, where they have languished in unworthy hands.”

He narrows his eyes. She can’t possibly be talking about--

Athena turns back to him, her eyes blazing, somehow twice as tall. “Retrieve my treasures,” she commands, war personified, “return the prizes of Athens to their rightful place, and I shall give you my support against my father’s wife.”

“You…” Percy leans back on his haunches, staring dumbfounded up at the goddess. “You don’t happen to mean the Parthenon Marbles, do you?”

“Yes.”

“The ones in the British Museum.”

“The same,” she says, imperious as ever.

Fantastic. “Welp,” Percy says, slapping his thighs, scrambling up. “Thanks for the offer, but I’ll have to decline. Nice seeing you, by the way. I’ll tell Annabeth you stopped by.”

Her sharp gazes pierces him, full of fury. “You dare to refuse my support?”

He snorts. “When it means trying to get the UK to give the marbles back, absolutely. Do you know how stubborn they are about this?”

Lightning flashes behind her, nearly blinding him. “You will regret this,” Athena says, dark and foreboding. “You may have your father’s goodwill, but the queen of Olympus is clever and cunning, her displeasure swift and merciless.”

But Percy still shakes his head. “When Annabeth and I get married,” and it’s definitely a ‘when,’ it’s just a matter of when precisely, like after Junie can sleep through the night maybe, “I’d rather take my chances with Hera than try and untangle that particular can of olives.”

A growl, and a snap of her fingers, and Athena disappears.

With a start, Percy wakes up. Junie had gotten her chubby little hands around his nose, and had decided to pull.

“Ow, ow, Junie, hey,” he squawks, attempting to dislodge her grip from his face. “Hey, I’m awake, it’s okay.”

She laughs, illegally adorable, her grey eyes sparkling, squeezing harder. 

“Okay, okay,” he laughs along with her. “You got my nose, you win.”

As if she were waiting for him to admit defeat, she lets go, clapping her pudgy toddler hands together. 

“That’s right,” he picks her up, raising her above his head. “Barely sixteen months old and you already know how to take me down, don’t you? Just like your mommy.”

She smiles, waving her little fists.

Gods he loves this little monster.

Junie really is the best parts of both of them. She’s got her daddy’s hair but her mommy’s brain, quick and sharp and painfully adorable. She’s already learning to read Greek, Annabeth sitting her in her lap and sounding out vowels together, Annabeth taking her finger and tracing it over the letter shapes. This kid absorbs information like a sponge, which Percy can only assume is the natural conclusion of taking a son of Poseidon and a daughter of Athena and mixing their DNA together. 

Thinking about his dream, he frowns. “What do you think, Junie,” he asks his toddler. “Should I take her up on her offer?”

The baby says nothing.

“I mean,” he tilts his head, “Greece has been trying to get the marbles back for two hundred years. UNESCO has top lawyers on this. What does Athena think I can do?”

Junie blinks at him.

“On the other hand, I do really love your mom,” he admits, “and I really want to marry her. You’d like that, right? To have your parents be married?”

There’s no way she can understand what he’s saying, but she moves her head like she’s nodding. Or maybe she does understand. She is Annabeth’s daughter after all. 

Percy sighs. Dammit.

Time for a new project, he guesses.

***

Several months, a college graduation, and one relocation to Boston later, Percy growls, hurling his pencil at the wall. Mother fucker. Fuck the British Museum, fuck his tiny laptop screen, and fuck the Italian prick who decided to have the least ADHD-friendly handwriting of all time. 

Why the hell is he doing this again? Like, seriously. Why in all of Hades is he, an inexperienced, snot-nosed, first year master’s student deciding to tackle the return of the fucking Parthenon marbles of all things. Like, what is wrong with him? 

Roughly scrubbing his fingers through his hair, Percy stands up. He has to go for a walk, clear his head, or he might actually explode. 

Then he catches a glimpse of the photo pinned to the fridge.

Percy’s mom had taken it, a candid of Percy and Annabeth and Junie on a sunny day in Central Park. There, in perfect 1080p, Junie is laughing, at what he can’t even remember, her pudgy fists yanking on Percy’s hair, while her mother and the love of his life does nothing to extricate Percy from her grip, her face screwed up so hard she had tears in her eyes. 

Percy had talked a lot of shit to the goddess of war’s face, but truth be told… Hera still terrifies him a little. Which, he assumes, was her goal all along, but it would be nice to marry Annabeth without fear of something going terribly wrong--or, gods forbid, something happening to Junie. That simply was not a risk he was willing to take. Percy is content to spend the rest of his days as Annabeth’s life-partner and roommate, if it means that the queen of the heavens won’t have a reason to take out her issues on his children.

Even if the engagement ring in the back of the pantry is gathering dust. 

Sunlight, wan but warm, falls in from the window, landing perfectly on his pile of open books. “I know, I know,” he growls, speaking to the air, rubbing his face so it doesn’t get stuck in a permanent glare. “I just--I just need a few minutes, okay? Let me go down the block and get a coffee or something. Two minutes, Lady Athena.”

The light fades. Percy takes that as an acquiescence, angrily scribbling a note. He’s not sure when Annabeth and Junie will be back, but even angry as he is, he doesn’t want to worry them.

Snatching up his jacket, he slams the door shut, stomping out of his apartment building and down the streets of Boston. He must be accidentally doing his wolf stare, because people are practically flinging themselves out of his path as he hurtles down the sidewalk. Literally--some girl is walking her husky, and the poor dog actually whimpers, cowering as Percy rounds the corner. 

Coming to a stop, Percy slaps his hands over his face, drawing in a deep, shuddering breath. 

He might be in over his head a little.

Sighing, he looks to his right. He’s standing outside of a Starbucks. 

Percy doesn’t drink coffee, Annabeth does. And he knows exactly how much of a coffee snob his girlfriend is. Starbucks? Overpriced, overrated, over-sweetened garbage.

He pushes the door open, sliding up to the counter. “I’ll take a… iced mocha, I guess,” he says. “Large.”

“No problem,” chirps the barista. “I’ll have that out for you in a minute.”

“Thanks,” he mumbles.

One thing Starbucks does have going for it, though, are really good napkins for doodling.

Slumping down in his uncomfortable metal chair, elbows resting on the hard, faux-wood table, Percy takes out his pen, and doodles aimlessly on the brown napkins. No, not that pen. Just because it can write doesn’t mean that Percy wants to risk slicing his face open every time he has a stray idea. Completely out of the blue, Annabeth had gotten him a nice set of pens, and ever since then, Percy always keeps one on him. Now, if he could just remember to use the little notebook she had gotten him, too.

Percy is not an artist by any stretch of the imagination. He doesn’t have an image in mind, just lets his pen move, drawing endless chains of triangles and stars, nebulous shapes which form themselves into Greek letters. After he catches himself writing γλαυκῶπις for the eighth time in a row, he sighs, dropping his pen, and picks up the cup, taking a sip.

Yuck. At least the chocolate outweighs the coffee taste a little.

Gods, and their cups are always, like, drenched from condensation--not that Percy can feel it, but there’s practically a whole other drink on the outside of the plastic, dripping all over Percy’s pile of doodle napkins. That must be why they give out so many.

Grumbling, he mops up the mess, ink smudged into a blue-brown slurry.

He stops. 

He squints at one of his doodles. 

Not that anyone else could tell, but Percy had apparently been trying to recreate the signature of Ottoman sultan Selim III, the guy who had supposedly authorized the Earl of Elgin to take the Parthenon Marbles. Percy had been staring at copies of his signature all damn day, trying to tell if it had been forged or copied, but classical Arabic was just so far beyond anything he could even begin to wrap his head around. It was gorgeous work, but even looking at it made Percy’s eyes swim.

This particular doodle is not his best attempt. It looks nothing like the signature. It’s smudged, blotchy, but in a way that’s… weirdly familiar. 

Snatching the napkin up, Percy bolts from the Starbucks, leaving his mocha behind.

Taking the steps of his apartment building two at a time, he bursts into his kitchen. His set up is exactly how he left it, books spread out all over the table, laptop shut and laid askew, the dry, half-eaten remains of his morning muffin on a plate on top of his encyclopedia of illuminated manuscripts--except for one book, the one on Ottoman history of the nineteenth century. It’s been opened, its pages facing the door, in the exact opposite direction of all the other books. 

“Hello?” he calls into the apartment. “Anyone home?”

No response. 

Percy approaches the table. 

From the pages, Selim III stares at him, his portrait rendered in black and white, sitting just above a figure of his signature, his tughra. 

Percy picks up the book, squinting. 

The signature is crisp, clean, a work of art all by itself. 

He looks at his napkin drawing. Blurry and smudged.

Opening his laptop, he pulls up the scans of the documents in the British museum, zooms in on the letter’s seal.

Blurry and smudged.

Percy stares. 

It… can’t be that simple, can it?

In a daze, he fires an email off to his new grad advisor. Hopefully he won’t mind Percy sticking his nose in where he doesn’t belong. Hey Dr. T--was looking at the Parthenon marbles docs in the BM (don’t ask) and I noticed this weird smudge on the tughra. Lazy scribe, maybe?

And he closes his computer.

Later that night, while he puts Junie to bed, he gets a response. not sure. sent it to a colleague for a closer look. 

He can’t even be bothered to really think about it though, not with Junie looking up at him with Annabeth’s eyes, and asking for another book. “Alright, kiddo,” he acquiesces, settling in beside her. All her story books are in ancient Greek, and at age two, she’s starting to recognize the letters. “Which one are you thinking?” 

“Daw-fins, daddy,” she says, smiling.

“Dolphins, eh? Getting Mr. D on your side early, I see. As smart as mommy.” He leans down and kisses her forehead before he starts to read her the story of the sailors and their sudden dolphin madness. 

***

“Huh,” Percy says to himself a few weeks later, as he and Annabeth are chilling on the couch, watching some Netflix.

His advisor has forwarded him an article from the BBC (New evidence suggests Elgin documents to be forgeries) with an accompanying note: Amazing catch! 

“What is it?” Annabeth asks, nudging him with her elbow--a feat, since she also has an armful of a squirmy Junie to deal with.

“Update in the Parthenon marbles thing.”

That gets her attention. Anything Parthenon-related does. “Really?”

He shows her his phone.

Her eyes go wide as saucers. “Damn.”

“Yep.” He doesn’t realize he’s smiling until he feels his lips pulling at the sides of his mouth. 

“My mom is probably your biggest fan right now.”

He starts. “What did you say?”

Turning back to the TV, she still manages to cast him a weird look. “I said, my mom will probably love you for this.”

A beat, then Percy practically somersaults over the couch, darting into the kitchen. Wrenching open the pantry door, he shoves his hand behind their collection of flours, fingers grasping for--

“If you’re looking for any more sacrificial cookies,” Annabeth calls after him, “we burned them all when Junie got a cold.”

“Remind me to make some more,” says Percy, pulling out his prize. It’s a little dusty, streaks of flour clinging to the blue velvet. “I have a feeling we’ll need them.”

“Oh yeah?” She chuckles. “What, did Olympus put in a special order?” 

Percy slides back down next to her, ring hidden in his closed fist. “Can I have the baby for a sec?”

Eyes fixed to the screen, Annabeth passes her over. Junie’s hands automatically reach for his nose, ready to grab, but Percy places the ring in her grasp instead, kissing her forehead. “Hey, babe?” he asks Annabeth, handing her back. “I think our daughter has something for you.”

Annabeth takes her without a second glance. 

Then she does take a second glance.

Ring closed in her pudgy toddler fist, Junie holds it out to her.

Annabeth gapes. 

“So,” Percy says, wrapping an arm around her shoulder, “quick confession: I wasn’t just working on the marbles for fun.”

Annabeth just stares. Junie babbles.

“Your mom told me that if I helped get the marbles back, she’d back us against Hera if we ever got married. So…” He trails off, waiting for her response. As close as he is, he can see the tears start to well up in her eyes--a good sign. “Shall we?” he prompts.

“Oh thank all the gods.” Annabeth is crying, because she's Annabeth. And because she's Annabeth, she also wastes no time in transferring Junie to her other side, and holding out her hand so Percy can slide the ring on her finger. “I was so worried I'd have to have Chase on my Masters’ diploma, too.”

5)

Percy is making sauce when his phone lights up. He hits speaker. “Hey.”

“Hey man,” comes the tinny voice of Magnus. “Sorry I missed your call earlier.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Percy says, “I figured you were dying or something.”

Magnus’ eye roll is almost palpable. “Very funny. What’s up?”

Bringing the spoon to his lips, he blows on it, taking a taste, before reaching for the salt. Needs way more. “Do you happen to have any Varangian guards in Hotel Valhalla?”

“Varangian guards? Uh, maybe. Probably. Why?”

“I’m doing a thing on the attempted reconquest of Sicily,” he says, lowering the heat a little to a simmer, “and I’m having some trouble piecing together the Battle of Montemaggiore. Know anyone who was in it?” 

Magnus hums. “I’ll ask around. Anyone in particular you’re looking for?”

Rifling through their little spice cabinet, he makes a mental note to get a new thing of hot sauce, tipping the rest of it into the pot. “If you have anyone who fought under Harald Hardrada, that would be great.”

“Hardrada? I’m pretty sure he lives on the fifth floor.”

Percy nearly drops the bottle. “No shit?”

“Big dude, long mustache, writes poetry?”

“Yes!” He picks up the phone, grinning from ear to ear. “Do you think I could come up and talk to him sometime?”

“Sure, but I thought you were doing something on Homer’s identity?”

He groans. “Backburnered for now until she stops driving me crazy.” No matter how many times Percy tells her, he can’t just drop the “Homer was actually an Egyptian woman” bomb without some serious evidence backing that up. And forgery is not one of his strong suits. Hence the need for a different topic for the time being.

“Has everyone ever told you your life is weird?”

“No, why do you ask?”

His phone suddenly vibrates, shocking him so badly he nearly drops it into the saucepan. Almost home, texts the love of his life, a shot of serotonin directly into his bloodstream. V hungry

“Sorry, Magnus, but I gotta run. Thanks for your help.”

“No problem. Say hi to my cousin for me.”

“Can do.”

“And make sure you pick a date soon! Sam needs to know so she can schedule her flight home.”

“Soon as I can.” You know, when his brain isn’t melting from grading undergrad papers. And making sure Annabeth and Junie are fed. And that Annabeth doesn’t lose herself in graduate school. And finding Junie a new preschool after she destroyed a classroom last month because of a monster. His toddler is a badass. But he’s a little worried she’s gonna follow Mommy and Daddy’s example as far as school goes. 

Sometimes, he thinks that their wedding just won’t ever happen. With Athena on board, he figured it would happen sooner or later, but time just… keeps getting away from them. Which isn’t the end of the world. A lifetime at Annabeth’s side is all he really needs, Mrs. Jackson or no. But he’s seen the silver fabric she weaved for her wedding dress. It would be a shame for all that hard work to go to waste.

And, yeah, he wants to see his little Junie dancing down the aisle flinging seaweed before her mother. He wants his mom to cry a little and he wants all his friends to be there to celebrate with them. Is that so much to ask? 

Speaking of his two favorite girls--”We’re home!” Annabeth calls from the hallway. “Junie, go say hi to daddy!”

Her bare feet slapping against the floor, his daughter comes toddling in, making a beeline for him. “Hey, kiddo,” Percy says, scooping her up. “How’s my best girl?”

“She’s just fine, thanks,” Annabeth says, setting her work bag down on the table. “Tell me I don’t have to wait for dinner--Margie kept me for the entirety of my lunch break, and I am starving.” 

“Just gotta make a salad and we should be good to go.” But he makes no move to finish chopping vegetables, entirely too enraptured with the way Junie smiles when Percy sticks his tongue out at her. “Let me guess,” he says. “Does my best girl want some olives?”

“Peas,” Junie says. 

“Oh, you want peas instead?”

She giggles, waving her arms. “Elaia, daddy!”

“Fine,” and he kisses her nose. “Extra olives for you.”

“Chip off the old block,” Annabeth says.

Handing her back to her mother, Percy sighs. “When am I going to get a kid who likes anchovies?”

“I’m doing my best here, okay?”

***

Hardrada is… not what he expected.

“Reputation isn’t that bad.” Hardrada is saying. “The production isn’t what it should be, but lots of her lyrics are still on point.” 

“The production ruins it,” Percy insists. “And as a follow up to 1989? It's just bad.” 

“And what about Lover?”

“What about Lover?”

“You can’t argue with the genius of that one.”

“It is terribly inconsistent,” Percy shoots back. “Yeah, ‘The Archer’ and ‘Daylight’ and ‘Miss Americana’ are sublime, but ‘ME!’? Come on!”

“Are you one of those people who thinks she peaked at Red?”

“Red is a bop from start to finish,” Percy fires back. “But she definitely peaked at folklore.”

“Thinking she peaked at folklore is just pedestrian when ‘tis the damn season’ exists!” Hardrada yells, drawing his axe, which is then promptly flung over Percy’s head. 

As the only mortal in a room full of armed, excitable, undead Taylor Swift stans, Percy beats a hasty exit, Magnus and Jason covering him as he flees, because they’re just so thoughtful like that. Percy’s pretty sure he saw Magnus take an arrow to the knee, going down in a heap, before he shuts the door to the hotel, finding himself in a Forever 21. 

Looking over his notes later as he gets back to his apartment in the North End, he frowns. They had spent… approximately twenty minutes talking about Sicily before getting solidly off track. Who knew an eleventh century viking would have such intense feelings about pop music? 

And now he’s singing “seven” to himself as he unlocks the apartment door, because it's a good song, and because it made him think of Annabeth. And he always wants to think of Annabeth. 

“Hey, babe,” he calls into the apartment, toeing off his shoes. “I’m back!”

He gets no response.

Percy looks up, confused. “Annabeth?”

“In the bathroom,” he hears, faintly. 

“Everything okay?”

“Yep! Totally fine!” she says, unconvincingly. 

“Alright,” he calls back. “Let me know if you need something.”

Moving Junie’s toys out of the way, he drops down onto the couch, grabbing his laptop. Hopefully he can make some sort of sense of the… notes… that he got from Hardrada. Though he’s probably going to have to trek out to Beacon Hill again, which, while not really out of his way, does mean he has to hike a bit from the Park Street station through the Commons, which makes him super sweaty and out of breath. It’s just embarrassing, walking into a hotel full of the greatest warriors of Valhalla, and Percy can barely handle a hill. 

However, he’s not so out of practice that he can’t sense Annabeth coming up behind him. “You good?”

“What do you think about getting married by the end of the month?”

“Sure,” he says, pecking at his computer. Damn autocorrect ruining all the Norse names. He keeps forgetting to download the right language package he needs. “But I thought you wanted to wait until after you turned in your portfolio?”

“Well… I might not be able to fit in my dress if we wait much longer.”

That gets his attention.

Percy turns around, slowly. Annabeth is grinning, holding a thin little piece of plastic with a circle on the end. She wiggles it. 

“Is that…?”

“Yep.”

“Oh.”

Her smile falls. “Are you mad?”

“What? No!” Percy slides his computer off his lap, twisting around to face her, up on his knees. “No, no, not at all. I’m not mad.” She slings her arms around his neck, pregnancy test warm against his skin. “I just…” 

Eyes warm, she looks into his, unafraid. “What is it?”

“It’s…” It’s silly, is what it is. But this is Annabeth. If he can’t tell her, who can he tell? “I just feel bad that I’ve gotten you pregnant twice before getting married.”

“Well, at least I’m not nineteen this time,” she says, raising an eyebrow. “But maybe we wouldn’t have this problem if you weren’t such a horndog.”

Percy snorts. “Me? What about you, Annabeth ‘3 AM anal before my first lecture’ Chase.”

“Jackson,” she corrects.

“Huh?”

“It’s Annabeth ‘3 AM anal before your first lecture’ Jackson.”

Grinning, he presses his mouth to hers. After all this time, she still smells like lemons, her lips soft and warm. “Not yet it’s not.”

“Then let’s make it happen.”

And, well, Percy can’t think of a better plan.

+1

Jamie hisses. “Fuuuuuck,” she whispers, the sound dropping like a stone in the dead lecture hall. “Goddamn shit fuck ass.”

And the worst part is, she’d actually spent a lot of time preparing for her Latin midterm. She’d made flashcards, she’d drilled noun endings, she’d even slept with the textbook under her pillow for fuck’s sake. 

Typical--the moment she sits down to take the test, it all goes out the window. 

“Legistne carmen longum de Troiano,” she reads under her breath, as though saying it out loud will unlock some hidden secrets of the cosmos. 

Nope. Nothing. The multiple choices remain as inscrutable as ever.

“Psst.” 

Jamie looks up. 

There’s a four year old staring at her. 

“Hi,” Jamie says. 

“Hi,” says the four year old. Junie, her name is, she thinks. 

Mr. Jackson, Jamie’s Latin TA, will bring his kids to class with him sometimes--his wife works full time, and Jamie guesses that they can’t afford a babysitter. She’s a cute kid, quiet, usually sitting in the corner of the lecture hall, drawing or even knitting, sometimes with her little sister playing with toy ships next to her. 

Now, she’s still staring at her. “What’s up?” Jamie asks.

“Bello,” says Junie.

Jamie blinks. “Sorry?”

“Legistne carmen longum de bello Troiano.” 

She squints down at her test sheet, attempting to visualize her flash cards. That’s… “Bello” is the right answer.

The fuck? The fucking four year old can speak Latin? “Thanks,” she whispers. 

Junie beams at her.

Darting her eyes to the front of the lecture hall, Jamie spies her professor, Buck, completely conked out at his desk, his chest rising and falling with his snores. Percy is nowhere to be seen, his laptop open at his chair. “What’s the next one?” Jamie turns her paper so that Junie can see better.

“Pluto Proserpinam infelicem cepit,” she announces, perfectly accented.

Jamie points to the one after that.

“Rex qui pontem fecit erat Ancus Martius.”

“Awesome.” 

The door to the lecture hall opens. Jamie whips around in her seat, startled, and sees her TA, walking down the steps. From the corner of her eye, Junie disappears, booking it to her dad, who scoops her up without missing a beat. “Hey kiddo,” he murmurs, smiling crookedly. “Were you bothering my students?” Then he glances at Jamie. “Sorry about that--hope she wasn’t too annoying.”

But Jamie shakes her head. “It’s fine.” Dammit. 

Still smiling, Percy makes his way back down to his seat. Junie grins at her over his shoulder, her arms wrapped tightly around her dad’s neck.

At the beginning of the semester, Professor Buck had droned on and on about Mr. Jackson, about how he was one of the best up-and-coming classics scholars in the world, how he could have had his pick of PhD programs, and how NYU was lucky to have him. He got first pick of assistantships this semester, apparently, but had volunteered to teach Latin 1001, and they should all be grateful, because he had done some beautiful new translation of Virgil for his Master’s thesis, and they were all going to learn a lot from him. 

Turning back to her exam, Jamie snorts. Of course a guy like that would have a kid who could speak perfect Latin. 

She really should have just stuck with German instead. 

[vaguewriting]

vague fic fragment #4

solangelo rwrb au

Will was seventeen when his mom became the president of the United States, and there were some things that he hated.

He hated moving out of his childhood home in Texas, even if it was incredibly cool that he got to live in the White House. He hated having to transfer schools for his last semester of high school (and had begged Naomi for the months leading up to her inauguration to let him finish school online). (She didn’t go for it.) He hated that they’d all been too busy with campaigning and then packing and then moving, and that when Will finally got his driver’s license, it said DC instead of Austin.

But everything else, well. That was all really cool. 

When they moved into the White House, back when Will felt like he had more reasons to feel bummed out than anything, he made himself a list. He liked making lists. They helped him relax, and they helped remind him of what was important - homework that was due the next day, or cities that they were visiting along the campaign trail. During the first year of his mother’s presidency, he made a new list. A list of every good and awesome and okay thing there was about being the First Son of the United States. 

First and foremost, Naomi had made history. In 2016, a female Democrat from the great state of Texas reached over 300 votes by the electoral college, and she had done it all without a husband by her side. And Will wasn’t going to let himself be upset about moving schools while his mother made history.

And point one, subsection A, there were now a good handful of states separating them from Will’s father.

His two best friends - Annabeth and Magnus Chase, daughter and nephew-turned-adopted-son of Vice President Frederick Chase. Annabeth had been helping her father’s campaign since she was old enough to speak, and had been crucial to Naomi’s ascent to the White House. Magnus had always been there to share his weed whenever Will got anxious. (The media had dubbed the three of them The White House Trio because they’d been so active in their parents’ campaign.) (Sometimes The Golden Trio, but that was usually more mocking.)

The three of them had all become something of minor celebrities. Sure, they were no Kardashians, but they got invited to events. The only event that Will could remember attending that wasn’t entirely political was his junior prom. 

They traveled - all over the world! Will was pretty sure he had no reason to tag along to some of the places that his mom went, but he’d barely left Texas before the campaign started. 

He got to meet so many amazing people. There were doctors who cured cancer and lawyers who fought for justice and so many people out in the world that wanted to help. Will had gotten teary eyed on more than one flight back to DC after some visits to different youth shelters across the country. 

Oh, and did he mention the plane? The private jet that he got to fly in? He’d never flown before, and he knew that Air Force One had definitely gotten him spoiled for air travel ever again.

He was going to meet royalty. 

His newest addition to the list was scribbled out in a rush after his mother announced that they would be attending the Olympics in Rio - and Will got to choose which events they got to see! (Well, some of them.) (Okay, he got to pick one, because they were only going to be there for a day or two.)

His choice was clear to him in an instant. He knew from some light social media stalking - he was a teenager who was suddenly famous, he didn’t know how things worked yet - that there was supposed to be a special guest at the soccer fields. And he knew exactly who that special guest would be. 

The Prince of England.

He had always known for as long as he could remember - for as long as he’d known what royalty was - that there was a prince about his age. There had been a girl in Will’s third grade class who had once told him that she was going to marry the prince and become a princess, and then someday, a queen. Well, Will didn’t want to rule a country. He was just on the hunt for a new friend.

And how cool would it be to have the Prince of England as a friend?

Suck it, Molly, Will couldn’t help but think as he, Annabeth, and Magnus wandered around the VIP area at the soccer fields. They were so high up above the stands that he didn’t understand how anybody could see anything that was happening in the game, but he figured it didn’t matter, since he wasn’t there to watch, anyway. He was there to search. 

“You know, chances of finding him here are ridiculously low,” Annabeth pointed out, not for the first time, as they started another lap around the stadium. “A prince is going to have a huge security detail, even bigger than ours, and everyone in this section is so surrounded by buff guys in suits that--” 

“And girls,” Magnus cut in.

“What?” 

“Guys and girls,” Magnus told her. “Or, sorry, women. Half of our security team is female, you can’t generalize like that.” 

Annabeth elbowed him and rolled her eyes. “Oh, whatever. You knew what I meant. And the point I was trying to make is that--” She cut herself off when she walked straight into Will’s unmoving form. “Will?” 

“That’s him,” Will whispered, eyes glued on a boy his age, standing beside a single bodyguard. 

Prince Nico was shorter than Will by a few inches, and was wearing a well-tailored black suit, as always. He tended to look like he was either on his way to a funeral, or on coming back from one. He stood with perfect posture, his pale hands clasped behind his back, though the way he held himself made Will think he wanted to lean over the rail to get a closer look at the game. Will knew he’d be here somewhere. Nico loved soccer. 

“I’m gonna go say hi,” Will mumbled, ignoring Magnus’s, “Maybe you shouldn’t--” because he was already walking. 

His first word to Nico was, “Um,” and then, “Hi, um, Your Highness.” 

Nico looked unimpressed. There was a pout to his lips and a coolness to his eyes that he never showed to the camera. (No, not coolness. Coldness.) 

“I’m Will,” he continued, unable to stop the words now that they’d already started, and he held out a hand. Nico didn’t take it. “Um. Will Solace, I’m the--” 

“I know who you are,” Nico told him. His voice was quiet, yet held commanding authority. Will wondered if that was something he’d learned alongside table manners and perfect posture. That authority in his voice was giving off a vibe of quit bothering me.

While Nico had clearly trained his tongue well, Will had never learned how to shut up. “You do?” he asked with a bright, genuine smile - he still hadn’t perfected a fake smile for the cameras - and looking at it seemed to cause Nico pain. “That’s… That’s crazy! I mean, I’m, like, a total nobody compared to you. Anyway, it’s nice to meet you! Can I hang around and watch the game with you?” 

Nico’s head turned back toward the field below, and Will took that as a yes, until he heard a whisper from beside him, voice accented in that way that nobody’s but Nico’s was: “Can you get rid of him?” 

Will’s heart plummeted. 

Thankfully, he didn’t get the opportunity to react (though he wouldn’t have minded a chance to apologize) before Annabeth was tugging on his arm. Above the thoughts suddenly swirling in his head, he thought he heard Annabeth saying, “Sorry, Your Highness, he didn’t mean to intrude,” before he was dragged away. 

They started back around the stadium, returning to their starting point - something of a suite that had been reserved for the US president and her guests. 

As he flopped down onto an empty couch, Will added one more item to the list of things he hated: Nico di Angelo.

[bailey-reaper]

RYOMA = KAZUMA YES!!! Just imagining them fighting over Ryuu like that is hilarious (like they did in Izumo lmao) would that make Iris = Elise? 👀

GRUMPY CHROM BAROK LMFAO that's something I want to see XD or maybe Lucina Barok and Chrom Klint, even though it doesn't really fit the fact they're actually brothers but it can be solved with a little bending 👀 and Lissa = Iris, YES PLEASE!!

BUT DAMN KLINT = EMMERYN THANKS I DIDN'T NEED MY HEART ANYWAY 😭😭

I can see Dimitri = Barok and it's both so good and so sad 😭😭 would that make Kazuma = Felix? and Seteth = Barok? Just imagining Barok riding a wyvern, damnnn 😍 and him having a similar relationship with Iris to that of Seteth and Flayn?? Count me in 😭

And Barok trying to bring Klint back?? Again, thanks, I didn't need my heart anyway 😭😭😭😭

Although, it's probably just because of his appearance, I can see him being in a role similar to Hubert too.

As for sacred stones, ngl, the first thing that came to mind was Seth = Barok even though you're talking about lords, why does he fit so many paladin characters? I want to see him riding a horse now XD but the idea of him and Klint being in the twins' role is soooooooo good. And the Stronghart part would be a great spin considering the events of game.

But now that you mentioned Stronghart, I can see him as Arvis from Genealogy but I won't go into the details since idk if you played it.

And Ryuu does fit the main units really well, especially Corrin, considering how he grew into his role as a lawyer.

Also, I know you didn't mention it but consider, Pegasus Knight Susato 😍

Aaah this has gotten too long, sorry for rambling too much, I just got excited talking about FE 😅

Fire Emblem AU

No need to apologise at all, anon, it's a delight to be able to talk FE! (I'll put my answers / thoughts under a cut!)

SO hilarious, especially given what little sasslords Barok and Kazuma are. They're probably just throwing insults at each other, more barbed than any arrow, and Ryū is just "Please... stop it... you're both embarrassing me...". Also YES! Iris would be such a perfect Elise! I can't decide who Susato would be, Sakura or Azura maybe...?

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

Grumpy Chrom-Barok feels meme-worthy... Not to mention, it's probably all a ruse and he's just a big softie trying to save face (not least of all when he's around his brother). Barok as Lucina is a really interesting idea, too!

Even if the relationships between Chrom / Lucina and Klint / Barok are different in the two games, the hero-worship is absolutely the same! (Also same... Klimmeryn hurts my heart so much)

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

Right? Barok-Dimitri is very relatable and accurate. They have the same angst -- and YES that would absolutely mean Felix = Kazuma! And omg Barok riding a Wyvern would be amazing! (I bet he spoils that damned dragonling rotten) And the way he'd dote on Flayn-Iris would be so cute!

I really could see Barok doing Rhea-levels of devotion, but that doesn't mean it won't rip my heart out every time I think about it... all the sadder if Klint just wants his little brother to move on rather than continuing to wallow in the past...

OMG I can totally see the parallels with Hubert (does that mean Klint = Edelgard, then?? I mean... colour pallet-wise it fits, and messed up sense of doing the 'right thing' is also there....). Barok dutifully serving his brother's aims of a better world feels very on-brand tbh...

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

I think you're right, Barok does have some paladin vibes going on! Plus he'd look magnificent atop a horse -- and he would absolutely chase after Klint -Erika in order to protect him from harm / tank e v e r y t h i n g. (I have a soft spot for Seth, he's my favourite of the paladin powerhouses you start an FE game with; tho Frederick with his 'pick a god and pray' line will always be a decent second. I love the idea of such a mardy butler!)

I feel like no matter the game, Stronghart is absolutely some sort of negative force (whether the mastermind behind it all, or the one being manipulated). I tend to lean toward the idea that he is the mastermind, and perhaps others within his sphere of influence are the 'bad guys' while he waits at the back for his chance to shine...

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

And, yes! I have played Genealogy, but a long time ago. I can totally see the parallels, especially if his ambitions are picked up from Klint and he wants to create a better world for the sake of making his brother proud –– even if he has lost his way along the line / is being used by others...

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

Ryū absolutely fits the protag role of basically every Fire Emblem game, he's so earnest and driven with a strong sense of principle and wanting to do the right thing; I absolutely think he'd be a great Corrin (while bemoaning how ridiculous things have gotten) and I feel sorry for him that he's constantly being thrown into the middle of world-threatening situations! XD

OMG!!! Susato as a pegasus knight would be SO GOOD!! She could wield a naginita instead of a spear like the FE Fates knights did on the Hoshido side!

[tangled-the-series-forever]

Rapunzel and the Lost Lagoon

As soon as I heard about this book, I put it on my birthday wishlist. But alas, my birthday had come and gone. No Lost Lagoon. Apparently my mom didn’t see it on the wishlist, so that’s why. Flash forward to Christmas Day and I held the book in my hands, which were trembling with excitement. Not really, but you get the idea. I had been waiting to devour this book for months on end and I did. So without further ado, I will present to you this handy-dandy post that encapsulates my thoughts on Lost Lagoon before, during, and after reading. I thought it would be fun to record my expectations and compare them to what I discovered. If you’ve read Lost Lagoon, what did you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts! ❤️

Before Reading

honestly, I’m not quite sure what to expect. All I know is that there’s a lot of moments between Raps and Cass and I am ready for them!

maybe it explains how Cass came to be Raps’ lady-in-waiting? (I hope so because I’ve always wondered this...)

I think I’ll like the book as a whole (I’m hoping I’ll love it)

I’m guessing that it is cute, funny, serious, and adventurous all in one

maybe we’ll learn more about Cass?

will Raps tell Cass about her life in the tower?

what will be the ratio of lighthearted to serious moments? Am I more likely to laugh or cry? Probably both 😅😂😂

this book’s design is absolutely gorgeous! 😍😍😍 I literally just stared at it for a while beginning to read it

During Reading

Rapunzel’s hair hasn’t grown back yet? Oh, it’s her first week in Corona. Okay...

“Something was missing. I was hoping painting would help me find whatever that was, or at least help me end the afternoon on a happy note.” (is this relatable or what? I know not to chase after the elusive beast referred to as happiness, but I do often strive to end the day on a good note because I feel like Satan wins if I don’t)

Friedborg is Arianna’s lady-in-waiting? That makes more sense now. I always feel bad not knowing much about her or her background. I hope she makes some appearances in the book (no sooner did I type this than I look down and skim the scene where she teaches Raps how to sit. Crazy, right?)

Eugene referring to Rapunzel as “my girl” (so sweet 🥰)

“Eugene’s warm brown eyes and mischievous smile are irresistible from any angle” (she’s head over heels, ya’ll 😂💕😂)

first look at Cass 🥰 That’s my girl! Not only does she want to be part of the guard, but she wants to succeed her father as Captain! Go after your dreams, girl! I support you ❤️

“I’d rather shovel sheep dung than mend clothes and gossip.” Mood 😂😂

she recently discovered a hidden spot by using maps of an ancient underground tunnel system? How cool!

okay, but Cass’ animosity towards Raps is fair. And the fact that she refers to her as “that girl”? Priceless

names of nearby nations? Like, yes please!

the irony of Cass piquing Raps’ interest in her by leaving as soon as she can after throwing the shot put 😅😂😂

Cass worrying she got herself in trouble by practicing shot put. Poor thing!

the angst Cass feels towards her dad because he wants her to be a lady-in-waiting when she clearly doesn’t... so relatable (it’s tough when a parent’s expectations and our own dreams/desires don’t match)

I didn’t realize Cass created the maps herself! She’s so determined to prove herself to her dad, it hurts 😭😭

I wonder if the pools in Yultadore are what make up the lost lagoon...

“Her enthusiasm was so shiny and bright I had to squint” (I totally understand this)

pretty boy Eugene and his quips 😂😂

Cass trying to keep her distance from Raps by calling her “Princess” and firmly saying “Goodbye” before shutting and locking the door behind her

So that’s how Cass and Eugene met... okay, cool. Nothing too crazy or weird. I don’t know what I expected but it’s nice to know how their battle of wits began

I’m noticing a pattern in the words used to describe Cass: knowledgeable, brave, etc. I think that’s cool because I feel like her pessimism gets a lot more attention in the series. It’s nice to acknowledge her other qualities as well.

Arianna chose Cass to be Raps’ lady-in-waiting. I always wondered how she got the position. I’m loving how many little things this book is explaining 🥰

Also, just noticed the bird illustrations on the page of every new chapter. I wonder if there’s a pattern...

OWL!!! 😍😍 he literally “senses her distress”. I wish we got to hear about how they met

I wanted to cry for Cass. Poor thing just wants to follow her dreams. I like the way the finality of the decision was described. It’s so tragic 💔

“When Cassandra saw him [Eugene], her face clouded over like a stormy afternoon” 😂😂 I love how Cass doesn’t try to hide her feelings about people. It’s true that she keeps personal things close to her chest, but not when it comes to what she thinks of others. Honesty is the best policy, right?

I love how Cass continuously prompts Raps to keep reading the poem. She’s like, “Yeah, yeah, just get to the good stuff” 😂

about that poem... maybe it’s from Herz Der Sonne’s perspective. Could the “truth sealed in precious stones” be a reference to Zhan Tiri’s disciples and how they were trapped within stones? And what about the three gems? What’s the emerald tapestry supposed to be? Does it reference Saporia? I HAVE TOO MANY UNANSWERED QUESTIONS

“A few times I thought I heard some rustling behind me, but I kept going” (me: yeah, Raps is definitely following her) 😂

me when I realize the “emerald tapestry” is grass: 🙃

why is Cass so fearful around water? Did someone try to drown her? someone please tell me who is responsible so I can PUNCH THEM IN THE FACE 😅🤣

painfully ironic how Rapunzel can swim despite being locked in a tower all her life and Cass can’t

Raps nonchalantly offering to teach Cass how to swim just warms my heart 🥰❤️

okay, so Cass is responsible for her fear of water. That’s almost worse because it invites shame and self-hatred, which makes it more difficult to push against that fear or overcome it 😔

the importance of Raps agreeing to help Cass even after realizing she doesn’t want to be her lady-in-waiting is HUGE. This is something I feel like should have happened throughout Season 1 but never did (Raps supporting Cass and trusting that she has a good reason for things even if she doesn’t understand)

“But now I have to teach you which fork to eat your waffles with and stuff” 😂

the first time they call each other Cass and Raps 🥰😍🥰😍

woah, I didn’t expect there to be a time jump. I should have known because I kept wondering why they would depict Rapunzel with her blonde hair on the cover if this takes place before it comes back. Anyways...

I forgot to take notes as I read the majority of part 2. I’m currently a chapter or two away from part 3 and all I have to say is that something bad is about to happen. I can feel it. Dahlia’s definitely shady and so is Marco. I suspected Marie earlier but now I’m not sure. She wasn’t obvious until she was but now she’s not again so maybe she is guilty after all? Either way, Raps is making dumb decisions and I’m over here yelling at her to get her life together before she gets killed or kidnapped (whichever comes first, I guess) 😅🙃

Cass is absolutely roasting Rapunzel and I am here for it! Don’t mind me just munching away on my popcorn over here 🍿

Cass said she’s finally gonna leave Corona so I bet Raps will fess up and tell her that Dahlia’s been helping her with the painting for Cass so Cass will let her guard down and think Dahlia’s okay after all. But... she won’t be and they’re gonna realize she was the bad guy after all 😎

didn’t think Cass would get attacked 😅 also, the fact that she is highly skilled and powerful yet trips and twists her ankle is such a mood. Like, that’s literally me in a nutshell. She is beauty, she is grace, and she falls flat on her face 🤣🤣 while I’m here, I’m guessing Marco is her attacker because he probably has a rough voice

Okay, so I guess Dahlia really is innocent then... idk, I still think she could be up to something

I WAS RIGHT!

Marco’s the bad guy and things just escalated quickly cause now he’s got a knife against Cass’ throat 😳😬😵

so Dahlia’s innocent after all... I thought she or Marie might be working with Marco but I guess not (kinda disappointed to be honest)

okay so this Dahlia chick is exasperatingly hilarious 😂😂 she legit took part of Raps’ bookcase to use for an art piece. Like, who does that?

“Pascal shook his head, totally fed up” me too bud, me too 🤣

After Reading

so I did get to see how Cass and Raps first met (also how she first met Eugene as well)

I like how they combined their talents and passions at the end to create the map painting

There were a bunch of lines that made me laugh, although there were just as many that hit me like a knife to the chest (pretty much anything angsty from Cass’ POV) so I like how it made me feel all the feels (I felt like an investigator trying to figure out who the bad guy was and that was a blast 😆)

overall it was pretty good. I did feel like the characters were off (Arianna seemed like she swapped personalities with Frederick at times and Eugene apologized for joking Cass- as if!), but other than that I enjoyed it. There were a bunch of new characters being introduced so it was somewhat hard to tell who was bad and who wasn’t but I guessed correctly in the end. I was hoping there would be more than one bad guy but oh well.

I’m glad I read it because now I know a few extra things about Corona and its surrounding countries (plus I can finally read through all the Lost Lagoon related tumblr posts I saved for later... I was waiting until I read the book and here I am!)

If anyone needs me, I’ll be going through LL tumblr posts. I should definitely be sleeping but that’s not important 😅😂😂

[johannesviii]

Top 10 Personal Favorite Hit Songs from 2006

17 to 18 years old. First to second university year, studying History. Another slightly chaotic year, to be honest.

It’s yet another great year for hits, even if 2005 and 2007 are both even better.

Disclaimers:

Keep in mind I’m using both the year-end top 100 lists from the US and from France while making these top 10 things. There’s songs in English that charted in my country way higher than they did in their home countries, or even earlier or later, so that might get surprising at times.

Of course there will be stuff in French. We suck. I know. It’s my list. Deal with it.

My musical tastes have always been terrible and I’m not a critic, just a listener and an idiot.

I have sound to color synesthesia which justifies nothing but might explain why I have trouble describing some songs in other terms than visual ones.

At this point it was beginning to be clear that my mother wanted me out of the appartment as quickly as possible so staying at home was becoming more and more unpleasant. I basically spent most of my day outside or at the library when I wasn’t in class, then ate dinner and slept at home. I had a few friends at university but was very unpopular (by the start of the second year, my nickname was “the hobo”, mostly because I was always wearing the same old black coat and bad jeans, but also because I liked to fish for coins under vending machines cause I had next to no money). I also had a brief but extremely bad relationship that year, which ended with me punching the dude back after he punched me between two classes near the end of the year.

While making these lists I found a tape labelled “spring 2006″ and nothing else. I think it’s one of the last tapes I ever made.

After listening to it, it contained:

Mr Brightside (The Killers) (who’s surprised?)

Crazy, by Seal, but sung by a woman. No idea who that is. (Edit: Alanis Morissette! thank you purplecyborgnewt)

Alice & June (Indochine)

You And Me (Lifehouse)

A couple of seconds of Precious, Depeche Mode

Oui (Zazie)

Precious (Depeche Mode) again. A radio host states it’s the n°15 favorite song on Europe 2 that week, whichever week that was.

City of Blinding Lights (U2)

Nolwenn Ohwo (Nolwenn Leroy)

Fragment of Song to Say Goodbye (Placebo), then the entire song.

The ending of Talk (Coldplay), followed by another fragment of Talk

Juste Après (Fredericks, Goldman & Jones)

Talk (Coldplay), this time in its entirety (I can still smell the frustration more than 13 years away)

Broken (Seether)

Enjoy the Silence 2004 (Depeche Mode)

Fragment of Missing (Evanescence), followed by nearly the entire song

Jeune et Con (Saez)

A bit of a radio show I found funny

An obscure remix of Sans Contrefaçon (Mylène Farmer).

So yeah, I stopped making tapes around that time. I also only bought two cd singles that year.

Just like the previous year, some of my favorite albums from that year have exactly zero singles elligible for this list. They are Alice & June by Indochine, and Meds by Placebo. The worst part? One of the best songs on Indochine’s album is a goddamn duet with Brian Molko from Placebo. It’s called Pink Water and it’s great. Please listen to it if you don’t know it yet. What can I say, I’m a weak and simple person, I hear a duet between two singers I adore, and I die instantly.

Anyway. Meds is kind of underrated as far as Placebo’s discography goes and I’m especially fond of Infrared, which was one of the songs of the year for me. Indochine’s Alice & June, meanwhile, is a concept double album about two girls making a suicide pact. It’s a bit of a mess and it’s not as tight as Paradize was but it’s still really, really good for the most part. The first eponymous single should have been elligible. But it isn’t. I’m sad.

On to the honorable mentions!

So Sick (Ne-Yo) - Usually this kind of music just sounds bland to me, but that one was really pleasant.

Miracle (Cascada) - Not as good as Everytime we touch. Still a lot of fun.

Smack That (Akon) - This shouldn’t be this catchy.

Pump It (Black Eyed Peas) - Same here.

Living On Video (Pakito) - I only just now realised this was a cover. What the hell.

SOS (Rihanna) - Not her best song. Still good.

L’Amour N’est Rien (Mylène Farmer) - Really funny lyrics, meh song.

World Hold On (Bob Sinclar) - Stay tuned for more.

Hips Don’t Lie (Shakira) - Song of the summer, whether you liked it or not. Fortunately, I liked it a lot.

Chasing Cars (Snow Patrol) - Very pleasant.

SexyBack (Justin Timberlake) - That beat is just incredible.

Call Me When You’re Sober (Evanescence) - I remember Rock Mag finishing their KarmaCode (Lacuna Coil) review with “We hope Evanescence’s next album will be fantastic, because this is their most serious rival yet.” And nope, Evanescence’s album wasn’t nearly as good as KarmaCode. But this song still made the year-end list, while nothing from Lacuna Coil ever crossed over. Our Truth SHOULD have been a huge hit. It had a ton of crossover appeal. One of the biggest musical tragedies of the year right there. Oh well, the Evanescence single is still good though.

Say It Right (Nelly Furtado & Timbaland) - The last cut from the list, and when you’ll see what replaced it, you are going to hate me.

And now, the top ten.

10 - Everytime We Touch (Cascada)

US: #31 / FR: #5

This kicked Nelly Furtado off the list.

I am not sorry, just so you know.

9 - Ridin’ (Chamillionaire)

US: #8 / FR: Not on the list

This is a song about respecting the law and driving at a reasonable speed and cops being mad because they can’t do anything against you. He’s a gangster, just... not doing anything illegal at the moment. I absolutely adore that concept. This is the best.

8 - Crazy (Gnarls Barkley)

US: #7 / FR: #29

I’ve never met someone who disliked this song, and for that reason I have nothing to say about it. It’s just one of these tunes, like Hey Ya, which are too perfect to argue or say anything constructive about them.

7 - Temperature (Sean Paul)

US: #2 / FR: #48

Half of this top ten 10 is made of absolute bangers with untouchable beats and you know what, I really miss that time, mostly because the current charts are morose and depressed (for good reasons, but still). This is no Get Busy, but come on, who can say we need less Sean Paul in our lives? Not me that’s for sure.

By the way, one of the very first videos I saw on (the very new at the time) youtube was a misheard lyrics version of this song. I think you all know which one it is, the original has been deleted but it was reuploaded several times since then.

6 - Rock This Party (Bob Sinclar & Cutee B)

US: Not on the list / FR: #19

You really can’t go wrong with this “Everybody dance now” sample, and this is one seriously kickass song, and yet another banger on a list already full of them. Also, this was possibly the best music video of the entire year, featuring three kids trying to imitate music videos from just about every popular genre. Check it out if you’ve never seen it, it will make your day.

5 - Marly-Gomont (Kamini)

US: Not on the list / FR: #1

Possibly the most unexpected hit song of the decade in my country. Basically, this guy made a rap song about the tiny rural village he was living in, and a funny music video shot on a 100€ budget to show to his friends and family. And it was well written. And it was hilarious, while still being insightful. And it became a viral sensation. And it charted! And suddenly it became the biggest hit of the year.

If you’ve never heard it, here it is. There was no translation available for it on lyricstranslate, so I made an account just to translate it myself. You’re welcome. Please give it a try. It’s great. It was a hit for a good reason, and I promise you the music video is funny even if you don’t speak the language.

4 - Slipping Away/Crier la Vie (Mylène Farmer & Moby)

US: Not on the list / FR: #15

So, uh, earlier in this post I said “What can I say, I’m a weak and simple person, I hear a duet between two singers I adore, and I die instantly.”

This is a duet between Mylène Farmer and Moby, based on a song from Hotel, which, if you recall, I listened to on a loop the previous year.

My poor heart didn’t need this. What did I do to deserve this. What a blessing.

3 - Over My Head (Cablecar) (The Fray)

US: #13 / FR: Not on the list

This was my #1 at some point. Then I realised the version I kept listening to was a punk rock version by A Day To Remember from Punk Goes Pop, and that I had nearly forgotten what the original sounded like. So I listened to it, and it’s still very, very nice, but it’s not quite the same.

I still bought the album, though.

2 - Nolwenn Ohwo (Nolwenn Leroy)

US: Not on the list / FR: #43

I had completely (and I do mean completely) forgotten about this song until I started to check the French year-end top 100 to make this list. Erased from my mind entirely by some sort of MiB neuralyser. And I was like “hang on, wasn’t this a good song? This rings a bell. I used to love it, didn’t I?” (and sure enough, it’s on that 2006 tape I found). So I wrote it down for the honorable mentions, just in case.

Before making the definitive list, I put the song on, and I felt like the critic in Ratatouille having a flashback.

Holy. Shit.

I remembered ALL the lyrics. While listening to it, in under three minutes I successively put it in the 6th spot, then the 4th, and when it ended, it was #2 on the list. I downloaded it and put it back on my mp3 player and on my playlists. I’ve listened to it about 30 times in the past week. It’s so great. How did I ever forget this song existed. I feel so alive.

I never cared about this singer, but this is written by Laurent Voulzy, who’s music I actually love, and he’s firing on all cylinders here. Just listen to it. Please.

It could have easily topped the list if it wasn’t for the most useful and helpful song in the entire year.

1 - Pas le Temps (Faf Larage)

US: Not on the list / FR: #2

I never watched a single episode of Prison Break. This was the French version of the opening song. I don’t even know what happens in the series. I don’t really care.

I. Adore. This song. It’s yet another #1 that helped me a lot.

The beat is untouchable and this rap is actual poetry. Not even remotely kidding. Here’s a part of one of the verses.

Aussi loin que la lumière semble s'éteindre (As far as the light seems to flicker) Seule une étincelle au fond de moi peut l'atteindre (Only the spark hidden inside of me can reach it) (...) Les dés sont jetés, rien n'est joué (the dice is tossed, the game is set) Même le sort retient son souffle piégé dans ce sablier (even fate holds its breath, trapped in this hourglass) J'ai décidé de ne pas être prisonnier (I decided I wouldn’t be a prisoner) J'n'ai que ma vie à offrir si jamais j'échouais (I only have my life to offer if I ever fail) Pas le choix faut y'aller (No choice, let’s go)

The line “pas le choix, faut y aller” (no choice, let’s go) keeps being repeated in the entire song and it’s so, SO motivational. As I said before, 2006 was not as bad as 2003 but it was still a difficult year - at the end of it, I was an adult with no money, very little hope for the future, no diploma yet apart from the highschool one, still trying to NOT become a ball of anger because of a couple of assholes in class, all of this with dysphoria and a mother who wanted to kick me out as soon as possible. And I wanted to win, and punch the world, and say here I come, I’m alive, I survived, better watch out.

Si je dois exceller, tout donner, prendre c'que j'peux (If I need to be the best, give everything, take whatever I can) Si le monde m'appartient restez pas au milieu (If the world is mine, don’t stay in my way) Et si le sort est contre moi c'est tant pis (And if fate is against me, too bad) On fait des plans pour s'en sortir, écoute (We’re making plans to survive, listen) Pas le choix faut y'aller (No choice, let’s go)

This song defined the entire year for me. This was my fight song. Everytime I wanted to give up, it was there to give me a very simple reminder.

No choice. Let’s go.

Next up: here it is, at last, the absolute best hit song of the decade

[atopearth]

Shall we Date? Lost Alice Part 20 - Wayne Blouse Route

I’m most interested in Wayne for this story arc so let’s hope he’s not disappointing! Anyway, it’s off to a good start, heroine seems to trust him because she knows that he’s got the power to resort to violence (after knocking out the two guys that tried to get into Alice’s residence) but he chose to politely ask if he could speak to her about arranging for her to reside with King Theophilus. I do feel the respect haha. Lmao I didn’t think Wayne was the type to distract the enemy (Gil wants Alice) with random lies like she’s actually his fiancee and not Alice and then taking advantage of Gil’s momentary shock lol. It was so nice when the heroine convinced Wayne to sit down with them for teatime since she didn’t want this weird ranking business since she doesn’t think she should compare to a king, and they should all just have fun lol.

Lmao when she went to walk around town with Wayne and then realised she had no money, so she asked if she could get a job at the castle hahahaa. It was so cute when Wayne laughed at that, and then bought her a music box to thank her for making him laugh🤣 Gotta agree with the heroine that Maryanne and Wayne are a good looking pair of siblings haha! So glad that Theo and the red king guy saved Wayne and Maryanne from that Earl that was mistreating them, I guess that’s why Wayne is absolutely obedient towards Theo even if he doesn’t want him to be like that. It’s so nice to see Wayne play the piano, and it’s so cool that the song she wants to record for that music box he bought for her is him playing the piano~ I can’t believe Wayne actually lied at the party that Theo wanted to see her, just so she could rest from having to speak to so many random people! With the fact that his duty is to be a butler and have absolute obedience to Theo, it’s really sweet to see that the heroine is important enough to make him worry about her and even lie to protect her. I found it very sweet. Seeing all the royals etc praise Wayne’s piano playing was nice~ even better when Maryanne took photos of Wayne and then she even took photos of the heroine to give to Wayne later haha, such a great sister!

Oh, so like Frederick, Eugene operates through dreams. He’s been allocated to watch over and examine the dreams of the people in Wonderland and prevent the dangerous ones from affecting the real world. And yet for some reason, he’s gone into dream mode himself now and can’t wake up? And now he’s become the guy that’s a danger and affecting Wonderland, kinda ironic huh… It’s to the point that it can even change Wonderland itself into a dream? Hmm can’t the Spinner of Tales do something about it if he’s the one allocating these annoying roles lol. But yeah, I loved how Maryanne knew of Wayne’s feelings, and I agree with her, the only time Wayne really feels human is when he is with the heroine or when he plays the piano, you can really tell that he thinks for himself during those times instead of thinking of how he should act as a butler. I also found it really cute that both Wayne and the heroine wanted a photo of the other from Maryanne, and that was also a part of how they confessed their feelings for each other, really cute~ Lmao when the heroine asked Wayne if she was cute and he said she was, and that he never thought to mention it because he thought it was so obvious hahaha, that’s so adorably sweet.

I’m not sure I really understand what Eugene hopes to achieve by having Wonderland consumed as a dream? So, if they dream, they don’t need to be forced to do their roles anymore? That doesn’t solve the problem, and can they really dream forever anyway? Even if they can dream, their bodies would be vulnerable? I guess it was a crucial question for the heroine to ask Wayne - how he felt about life now, did he really want to continue being a butler or did he actually want to become a pianist. He answered in a typical fashion, but I think it was fitting that he prefers the way he is now as the person that came to love her and as the person she came to love too. He wouldn’t be the kinda stoic but genuine guy if not for it~ I guess I never really thought about it from the heroine’s perspective. I guess, she’s right. Just as dreams that come true are important, dreams that don’t come true are important as well because they allow you to overcome the sadness and become who you are now, you can grow stronger by getting past it all and acknowledging that even if that dream didn’t come true, you can still enjoy being you.

I’m not sure if this arc is just weak or they’re saving everything for Eugene’s route to properly solve, but the heroine figuring out things for herself and saying a few words to Eugene stopped him from continuing to cause his dream to consume Wonderland but he still refuses to wake up was just…so superficial? Like, there’s nothing about this arc that is appealing? Nothing about it makes me really worried or concerned, nothing makes me feel anything about it. Like, the Another Alice arc was weak as well, but the idea of Allen having to carry that role etc was something I could feel for, whereas for Eugene, I’m nearly done with two routes but I feel nothing for him or this arc, so yeah frankly this plot is really boring. But anyway, it was quite cute how Wayne proposed to her in a normal kneel down with ring way~ He just came to her world and he’s already doing these things haha. The heroine is right, a lot of people are forced to give up on their dreams for many reasons, but that isn’t the end of their lives, a lot of people have found things more important than their dreams or even found new dreams they want to chase after instead. There are a lot of things in life and sometimes if we get too fixated on one thing, it’ll make us think we won’t like any other things.

Overall, Wayne’s route was pretty nice. I definitely liked it more than Theo’s haha. I guess to me, it felt very calming? It was slow paced but surprisingly not boring (in terms of the relationship) and I think they bonded very naturally by spending time together and encouraging each other with their stories and principles as a person. I enjoyed it because it felt very soothing haha. Plot was shoved to the side as usual but I think they did kinda integrate it with the idea of dreams and Wayne not fulfilling his yet being satisfied with his current life because even if he couldn’t fulfill it, he enjoyed his life as it was and liked his current job. It may not have been his dream, but he enjoyed it and he could still play the piano whenever he wanted to. To him, I guess being happy was more important?

[screamingatanemptyroom]

Erin/Gerald Arc 2 Part 18

Getting close to the end of Arc 2! Finishing up the competition today, there will be one part after this to wrap things up. Erin gets to fight with someone she’s fought before. 

Master post linked here. 

“Would you like to tell me exactly what in the world you fools were thinking?!!”

Aunt Elsinore was smiling, but no one in the group was fooled. After looking around desperately for someone else to be the one to talk, Erin swallowed uncomfortably and cleared her throat, trying to explain.

“We- We were trying to protect the country…”

“Oh. That’s great.” Elsinore leaned forward, her smile never wavering. “And why, pray tell, did you not leave that to the army of this country? You know, the one’s whose job it is to do that?!!”

Gerald grabbed Erin’s hand in support. “It wasn’t that simple. Sionelle had diverted the nation’s armed forces to the capital with these terrorist attacks, and struck a weak point in my country’s border. They would have never been able to get there in time to react.”

“So instead you all decided to simply take on an army by yourselves…”

“I thought…” Erin ran her hand through her hair, hesitating. “I thought my father might be there, in which case no amount of soldiers would have been enough to help me.”

“…” Elsinore’s smile faded. “Can Erin and I be alone?”

Erin shook her head. “I explained to them everything on the way back. You can speak in front of them.”

“You trust them?” Her voice was incredulous.

“Yes.”

“Yeah, we don’t get it either.” Frederick butted in. “But don’t worry, we’ve got her back.”

“You want me to speak freely in front of them? Fine.” 

Elsinore’s voice grew cold. “You’re a fool, Erin. You could have ruined everything. We have spent YEARS planning this, you stupid girl! Years of preparation, since you were thirteen, all for our revenge. What have you suffered for all these years if not for the chance to strike at your father?!”

“I didn’t…”

“You didn’t think, that’s what you didn’t do. You revealed your powers in such a public way! What if he realizes how strong you are? We lose the advantage of surprise.” She shook her head. “You risked everything for this country, that’s not even your home.”

“It’s Gerald’s home.” Erin met her gaze without flinching.

“… Not that I’m not loving the family drama here. But why is surprise so important?” Frederick spread out his hands, looking confused. “I just saw Erin take down an ARMY. Without breaking a sweat. She has to be the most powerful person in the world. Why are you guys so scared of one man?”

Elsinore’s gaze was haunted, as was Erin’s. “You say that only because you have never seen that man in action. I will give you this warning once, because you are Erin’s friend: NEVER underestimate him. He will kill you, and everyone you love, before you even knew he was there.”

“He’s level 5 in three different abilities, level 4 in two more.” Erin spoke quietly, staring down at her hands. “But he also has years of experience, he’s able to bring out his powers to the absolute limit. My only chance is to catch him by surprise.”

“…” An uncomfortable silence fell on the group as they all considered the implications of those words.

Knock. Knock.

Everyone startled, looked up at the door, hands moving towards weapons. Shaking his head, Gerald cautiously opened it, smiling in recognition.

“Hi there.”

Several servants stepped into the room, carrying platters of food. The one in front, a serious looking gentleman, bowed and said:

“We’ve brought some food for the St. Julienne’s Academy team, as you missed the dinner in the main dining hall.”

Gerald nodded. “Thank you, you can set it down there.”

They did as instructed and as a group turned to leave. One, a younger woman, hesitated and looked at the group with a solemn look. “Even though you lost badly today, we’re still cheering for you for the competition tomorrow.” Glancing briefly at Gerald and blushing, she then turned and left the room.

“Looks you have a fan.” Frederick teased, sitting down and grabbing a plate of food.

Gerald shrugged. “She’s free to cheer for our team if she wants.”

“That’s not what i…” Frederick was interrupted by Olivia, who stretched her hand out, shaking her head.

“Don’t bother. His brain is too occupied with Erin to understand teasing.”

“Takes all the fun out of it!”

“Tell me about it.”

The group settled down, grabbing food and starting to eat.

“By the way, when that girl said we ‘lost badly’ today…?” Erin paused in her meal, thinking. “Didn’t they just forfeit us when we didn’t show up?”

Elsinore shrugged. “Unlike some people, I considered the implications of your team not showing up to the competition. Especially important when I know now that you were off fighting a war…” She sighed loudly. “I figured you all were up to something though, and I didn’t want someone realizing that your team was gone at the same time and putting two and two together.”

Gerald winced, pausing as he reached for piece of bread. “Good point.”

“Yeah, didn’t think of that, when you were off chasing your foolish girlfriend, did you, boy?” Elsinore snorted. “So I created an illusion of your team hiding in the woods the entire competition. When they couldn’t avoid a fight, I made them surrender. You got last place, but at least most people shouldn’t realize the truth.”

Erin hung her head. “Thanks.”

“What are aunts for?”

Frederick raised his hand. “Can I adopt you as my aunt? You seem like a cool, powerful person to have around.”

Elsinore lifted an eyebrow. “I don’t remember having a sarcastic little asshole like you as a nephew.”

“Don’t lie, you love me!”

Elsinore rolled her eyes and sighed to the heavens. “…Anyways… interestingly enough, Gerald’s performance in tomorrow’s individual magic fight competition will determine whether or not we win.”

Erin was shocked. “Really? We still have a chance?”

“The scores are currently us and the Sionelle military academy tied at 7 points, Royal academy at 6 points, and Merion at 4.”

Matthias spoke up, still staring down at his plate, his quiet voice surprising the room. He typically stayed silent in the background. “Why is Gerald the one participating?”

Frederick nodded. “Yeah! I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I agree with the pasty stalker! Erin can take down a freaking army! I think she’s the best choice to fight the military academy guys.”

“Thanks guys.” Erin grinned, setting down the half eaten sandwich and lifting a silver amulet from around her neck. “But I’m back to being restricted, and even if I’ve improved in magical combat, I’d rather not stand out too much in front of my father abilities-wise.”

“Fair, but what about…”

CRASH!

The room went silent. Gerald, his face pale, had stood up, and shoved all of the plates off the table shattering them on the floor.

“Don’t eat anymore!” He looked around, his eyes panicked, grabbing the food from the plate on Erin’s lap and throwing it at well.

“Gerald… what?”

“It’s poisoned.” He whispered his response, but it was as if he had shouted it into the stunned silence.

“How…?”

“Everyone’s abilities are now at level one.” He shook his head, angry. “I should have known sooner.”

Olivia winced, dumping her plate from her lap. “Is there a poison that can even do that?”

“It’s rare.” Gerald’s eyes were angry. “The Royal family has access to it.” He started moving towards the door.

“Where are you going?”

“To talk to the servants who delivered the food.” Gerald kept walking. “and track down the source of all this.”

Frederick followed. “I’m coming too.”

“I don’t need you.”

“Yes you do. You’re much too nice.”

With that, the two boys disappeared out of the room, leaving the group to stare at each other in stunned silence.

They returned after a few hours, their faces grim.

Gerald sat next to Erin, leaning forward and holding his head in his hands with a sigh.

“Richard.”

“I know, shocking right?” Frederick sank into a chair as well, clearly exhausted. “The evil traitor younger brother was behind it. Who would have guessed.”

“We should have denounced him as a traitor as soon as we returned.” Erin gently rubbed Gerald’s back, looking at him with a concerned expression.

“I thought about it, but I was hoping to have proof before going to my parents…” Gerald shook his head sadly. “Fortunately, he was getting desperate with this one. He sent poisoned food to both us and the Sionelle Military Academy team.”

“Did they…?”

“They didn’t touch it.” Frederick laughed ruefully. “Apparently they’ve only eaten their own rations since they’ve been here. Suspicious bastards.”

“Wish we’d been less trusting.” Erin looked over at Frederick, curious. “So he was desperate?”

“Yeah, he bribed the servants into bringing the food he had poisoned to us. Didn’t cover his tracks well at all.” He snorted. “Apparently didn’t even consider the fact that servants might betray him, despite taking the money.”

“How’d you get them to talk?”

Gerald’s face turned pale. “Don’t ask.”

Frederick laughed softly, but didn’t comment further.

“So, Richard has been caught?”

“Caught and punished, the whole Royal Academy team is disqualified.”

“Are they going to cancel or delay the final event?” Olivia’s voice was hopeful, but her smile quickly fell off as Gerald shook his head.

“The ships leave the day after tomorrow. The poison lasts for 24 hrs. There’s just no time.”

“So… the military academy wins then? Even if the Merion Academy beats them, they don’t have enough points to win the whole competition!”

“But… weren’t they involved in the whole invading the country thing?” Erin shook her head in disbelief.

Gerald looked angry. “Even with our testimonies and those of the men from the fort that Olivia saved, the incoming troops never identified themselves as Sionelle soldiers, and were not wearing their country’s uniforms. Their diplomat is insisting that those invading troops were unrelated mercenaries. Besides,” He gave a half-hearted grin. “Even if we could prove it was Sionelle that invaded, it doesn’t mean the military academy was involved.”

“So they win?”

“I’m afraid so…”

A solemn silence settled over the room.

“Wait!” Matthias stood up suddenly, a strange expression on his face. “This poison temporarily drops your level to level one, correct?”

Gerald nodded. “Yes.”

“What about people who were already restricted before they took it?”

“…”

Frederick’s eyes widened. “Ice boy might have a point!” He turned to Erin. “Take off your amulet!”

Nodding thoughtfully, Erin slipped the amulet off her neck, dropping it onto the table.

“…”

Gerald grinned. “You’re at level 3 now.”

“Level 3?” Erin looked over at Elsinore. “Think it will be enough?”

“Hmph! They think they poisoning us is enough to keep us down?”

Elsinore’s grin was vicious.

“Tear them apart, Erin.”

 The next morning, Erin stood out by the arena floor, nervously waiting for her fight to start. Frederick and Gerald stood on either side of her, keeping an eye out to make sure no one else interfered prior to the actual event.

 “Well, it’s official. Merion Academy bowed out of the fight.” Gerald placed a hesitant arm around Erin’s shoulders, trying to comfort her.

“What? Why?”

“No matter if they won or not, they couldn’t score higher than either our team or the military academy. So this competition is only going to consist of one fight.”

“At least that’s simple enough.” Erin looked up just in time to see the military academy students file in on their side of the Arena, followed by her father. One of the students stepped forward, stretching, obviously preparing to be her opponent in the fight. Recognizing him, Erin groaned.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s Walter.”

Frederick raised an eyebrow. “Who?”

“He’s a military academy student. One of my father’s prodigies. We’ve fought before… it didn’t end so well for me.”

“I hate to keep bringing this up, but once again… didn’t you just defeat an entire army?” Frederick chuckled. “Why is one student such a big deal?”

“My abilities are restricted, remember? Plus he’s very powerful, at least a level 4 water, wind and physical enhancement ability, plus a mental reinforcement variant that allows him to ignore pain.”

Gerald looked over at Frederick with a quizzical expression. “Besides, when you faced him in the physical competition, you surrendered immediately!”

Frederick rolled his eyes. “It was obviously a strategy.”

“To do what? Obviously not to win.”

“To live.” Thinking about this, he patted Erin on the shoulder. “Good luck.”

With that, both contestants were called to the center of the ring. Walter recognized her with a smile. The expression was excited, predatory. He remained silent, as he always had in front of her.

Erin restrained her fear, pushing away the memory of her ribs cracking underneath his attacks and watched him carefully. Slowly, the world around them faded, as she focused not on the crowds, not the competition, but the fight in front of her. Previously, he had been fast, strong, and never hesitated no matter what damage she inflicted on him. Standing before her dangerous opponent, Erin smiled.

She was going to win.

She kept the memory of their previous fight carefully in the back of her mind. Remembering the pain, the anger, the frustration. Her father’s smile as he told her that she was useless except to be engaged to the man of his choosing. A rage slowly built within her, but she kept it beneath the surface, controlled. It was going to be her tool, her secret weapon.

The official stood between them, laying out the rules. All magic allowed. No lethal attacks. Waving his hand, the fight was begun.

The two circled around each other carefully, watching each movement. She remembered his ruthlessness in his attacks last time, how his expression never wavered no matter how much she hurt him, and her smile grew cold.

Walter lost patience first.

Activating physical enhancement and wind spells, he crossed the distance between them in an instant. He reached out, intending to grab her arm, to twist it behind her as he had last time.

But Erin was ready. Instead of ducking below, she moved forward, activating her own magic to try match his speed. Jumping over his outstretched arm, she kicked him in the face with all her might. She felt his nose crumple beneath her boot, his whole body thrown to the ground with the force of her blow.

Walter stood up, blood streaming from his nostrils, but for the first time since Erin met him, he wasn’t smiling.

His eyes were wide, panicked, as a hand reached up to cup his nose. He stared at the blood incredulously, as if confused.

Erin didn’t take the lapse in attention for granted. She set herself on fire, leaning forward to tackle him as she increased the flames intensity to the extent of her restrained magic. His skin blistered beneath her burning hands, and he threw himself backwards, coating himself with water with a shriek of pain.

The earth beneath him cracked with her magic, and already off balance, he tripped, falling to the ground. Before he could recover, Erin leapt forward, landing with a crunch on his left ankle. He screamed with pain, reaching for her, but before he could, wind magic sealed his lungs. She grasped him with a burning hand, seeing the pain and fear in his eyes, and said one word:

“Yield.”

“…” He hesitated, stubborn, but the magical flames licked at his skin, charring it, and finally he could stand it no longer. He nodded silently, and tapped out.

Hatred filled his eyes, but Erin simply smiled and walked away, nodding to the cheers of the crowd that filled the arena.

In the end, despite his power, it had been all too easy to defeat him. After all, he relied on the strength of his variant mental reinforcement magic, his inability to feel pain.

And feeding her powers with her rage, she had used illusion magic to trick his mind into remembering just what pain felt like.

After that, he never stood a chance.

She grinned at the crowd, raising her hand in a victorious gesture and looked around. Gerald and Frederick were high fiving eachother, looking pleased. Olivia and Matthias were jumping up and down, screaming excitedly. Even Catherine and Maddie were there cheering her on, their own voices contributing to the din. But all the noise, all the excitement, faded into nothing as she looked across the arena at an all too familiar face who was quietly studying her.

Her father.

He didn’t look angry, despite the defeat of his prodigy. Didn’t look confused, upset, or even disappointed.

He was smiling.

[hazyheel]

NJPW Destruction in Kobe 2019 Review

The Destruction tour has come to a close for the year, and the biggest show of the tour went out with a bang. I normally criticize the New Japan B shows for not having a super entertaining undercard, but I can definitely say that this undercard was quite good. On top of that, we saw a rather surprising face that some older fans may recognize (although I didn’t). The two headliners were also very entertaining as I’m sure you’d expect. Here is my full review of Destruction in Kobe.

Alex Coughlin, Manabu Nakanishi, & Michael Richards vs. Yota Tsuji, Yuji Nagata & Yuya Uemura: Nagata and Nakanishi started things off and they layed into each other with strikes and kicks, with Nagata nearly taking Nakanishi down, only for Nakanishi to push him back into his own corner. The two then tagged out. Richards and Uemura then faced off, and dueled in various holds on the mat. The two then tried for some shoulder tackles, before Uemura transitioned into strikes. Coughlin then tagged in and started to strike away at Uemura. Uemura fought his way out of the pressure from the opponents, even slamming Nakanishi before tagging out to Nagata again. Nakanishi quickly took control and nearly got the pin before Tsuji defiantly broke it up. Tsuji’s distraction got Nakanishi an exploder, and then he got the hot tag, but completely whiffed on a dropkick and got destroyed by Coughlin. The two exchanged strikes and chops in the middle of the ring, with Coughlin coming out on top. Coughlin dropped Tsuji with a huge chop and locked in a Boston Crab. Tsuji quickly made the ropes, and got a spear to start to fight back. Tsuji nearly got the win with a huge slam, but the opposing team broke it up. Tsuji then swung Coughlin around a bit before locking in the Boston Crab for an intense sequence that ended in the submission victory for Tsuji.

Grade: C+. These types of matches are usually hit or miss for me, with this one being largely boring but kinda fun in the end. It really highlighted Tsuji, who got a bit win after having a disappointing run in the Young Lion Cup. I love Tsuji, he is actually awesome. But other than that, I didn’t care much about this. Fine action though. 

Clark Connors vs. Ren Narita in the 2019 Young Lion Cup: Narita started out with an ankle lock, and kept Connors on the mat. Connors transitioned into a triangle, only for Narita to stack him up for a near fall, and the two broke up. The two continued to lock up over and over, but neither man really got the advantage early on. The two then started to chop the living crap out of each other, with Narita actually being able to keep up with the stronger Connors. Connors then brought the match back to the mat, and started to work over the arm and shoulder, only for Narita to power out of it. Narita constantly seemed to one up Connors every time he tried for some offense, which clearly frustrated the the LA Dojo student. Connors then unleashed a vicious series of strikes and chops, only to ear an overhead belly to belly for a near fall. Narita followed it up with a huge slap, but ate a spear as he came off the ropes for a followup. Connors then locked in a brutal looking Boston Crab for a long time, before Narita was forced to tap out. Connors: 8, Narita: 10. 

Grade: B+. These two are great. I cannot stress enough how much potential that these two have. They are absolutely brutal with the way they hit each other, they showed some great technical wrestling, and both looked like they had incredible power. The two both looked awesome, and although Narita was eliminated from winning the tournament here, he still was extremely impressive. Even the way he was reluctantly tapping out showed how good he was. Both of these guys will be big, and I can’t wait to see how big they get. 

Narita also is headed out on his excursion, and is going to train alongside Shibata in the LA Dojo. We will still see him on the Fighting Spirit Unleashed tour, but he’ll probably only pop up when they venture into the US. Good Luck Narita, you will be a great wrestler. 

Karl Fredericks vs. Shota Umino in the 2019 Young Lion Cup: With Narita eliminated, this was essentially the final match for the 2019 Young Lion Cup. Unless they tied here, the winner would win the whole shebang. They started out with some fast paced grappling as they traded holds and escapes until Fredericks was able to lock in a headlock and force Umino to the mat. Fredericks tried a test of strength with Umino, but Umino immediately put him on the mat. Umino was in control for a while, even enduring chop after chop from Fredericks and putting him down with one of his own. Fredericks took control with a crossbody, and then showed some of his flashy “high flying,” which I put in quotes because it is a limited by the Young Lion offense. Umino started to bleed from the nose as the match went on, and Umino started to work over the shoulder as much as he could. Umino then hit a missile dropkick for a near fall, forcing Fredericks to expose his shoulder so Umino could grab another armbar. Fredericks broke out, but Umino then nailed a German suplex for yet another near fall. He went to hit the ropes, but Fredericks grabbed the tights and absolutely folded Umino up with a back drop suplex. He then nailed a spinebuster, before locking in a high angle single leg Boston crab for what I thought was a shocking win. Fredericks: 12, Umino: 10.

After the match, Fredericks held the cup high, and although Umino tried to crawl towards him, Fredericks did not show the respect to Umino. Umino was extremely frustrated, and pounded the mat before walking to the back. 

Grade: B. A strong B, but they didn’t keep up that level of intensity that they started with. Both guys are once again great, and have a very clear future as stars. I was bummed out that Umino didn’t win, but Fredericks is also a great wrestler, and looks like he will be ready to go on excursion pretty soon too. There aren’t too many Young Lions right now, and just about half of them look like they can leave for excursion any day now. Lots of talent in this class, which makes it all the more impressive that Fredericks won this New Japan Cup. Good stuff, and I’m excited to see more of these guys. 

Umino is headed out on excursion as well, and unfortunately he won’t be going to AEW alongside Moxley, like I’d hoped. He will be headed into RevPro, joining a couple other Young Lions that are on excursion. Good luck Umino, I can’t wait to hear about all the great things that you will do. You were my favorite Young Lion in this class, and you have all the potential in the world. Do great things. 

Bad Luck Fale, Chase Owens, & Yujiro Takahashi vs. Tomoaki Honma, Togi Makabe & Toa Henare: Pieter was out to corner Takahashi, and I was happy to see her back. Not because she is hot (she is though), but because she completes the Tokyo Pimp gimmick. Takahashi and Henare started things out, with the faces quickly taking control. Honma tagged in quickly and hit a Kokeshi. The heels then took control as Owens pulled Honma to the outside to beat him down. The heels then took control for a while, beating down Honma. At one point, Honma tried to slam Fale, but he couldn’t do it, so Fale just fell on him for a near fall. Right afterwards, Honma tagged out to Makabe, who fought brutally with Fale. They traded tackles and lariats, and Makabe actually put Fale down. Fale returned the favor soon after, and the two tagged out. Owens and Henare went in, and picked up the pace. They both ran the ropes, and Takahashi kicked Henare in the back to distract him, but Henare kept control anyway. Fale then ran in, and all three faces gave him lariats and put him out on the floor. Owens and Henare continued their duel. with Owens hitting Jewel Heist, for a near fall, followed by a knee to the chin, and then a package piledriver for the win. 

Grade: D+. I really wasn’t into this match. I’m a fan of Owens and Henare, but the other guys never really did it for me. The match was largely slow and plodding, without too many high spots or intensity. Kokeshi did make me happy though. Other than that, I didn’t really like this. 

Minoru Suzuki, DOUKI, Yoshinobu Kanemaru & Zack Sabre Jr vs. Jushin Thunder Liger, Tiger Mask IV, Rocky Romero & Hiroshi Tanahashi: before the match, Liger ran out down the ramp and ambushed Suzuki. The rest of Suzuki-gun ran down to help, but they were quickly grabbed by the rest of Liger’s team. Liger and Suzuki started to brawl in the ring, and Suzuki introduced both a chair and a table into things. The two continued to fight, and Suzuki nailed an unprotected chair shot right to the head. Suzuki then locked in a sleeper hold, but Liger nailed a low blow. Liger then tored his mask off to reveal a whole bunch of face paint, signifying Kushin Liger, the much more violent form of the legend that we all know and love. He spit mist into both Suzuki’s eyes and then the refs. He then grabbed a spike, and went to straight up stab Suzuki with it, but Suzuki dodged it and he drove it straight through the table in the corner. The match was called a DQ for Suzuki-gun, and Liger continued to brawl into the back. 

Grade: B+. Well, I’m super into this. I didn’t know what Kushin Liger was before this show, so I had to do some research, but this is an awesome way to build to the Suzuki vs. Liger singles match. He looks scary as all hell, but super badass. I’ve never seen the very honorable Liger act like this, so it was totally badass to see. I’m so into this, but I hope that if Liger does actually win the feud, then he does it as his face persona rather than a tweener. But still, this was cool as hell.

SHO, Tomohiro Ishii, Will Opsreay, YOH & YOSHI-HASHI vs. El Phantasmo, KENTA, Tama Tonga, Taiji Ishimori & Tonga Loa: CHAOS vs. BULLET CLUB. Lots of rivalries and moving parts in this match. Phantasmo has a match with Ospreay, Roppongi 3k recently beat the Guerrillas, and Hashi and Ishii both hate Kenta with a passion. Jado cornered the Bullet Club here, with his trusty Kendo stick. Ishii and Loa started things off with some shoulder tackles and strikes. only for Tama to kick Ishii in the back as he ran the ropes, only for Hashi to return the favor by doing the same to Tonga. Everyone then started to brawl, and the heels worked over Hashi a bit. As Kenta and Hashi fought, the two exchanged strikes, and Hashi actually countered a vertical suplex into one of his own. Opsreay and Phatnasmo then fought for some high speed flying. Ishimori quickly got involved as well, with Ospreay able to fight them both off, even nailing ELP with a stundog millionaire, followed by a Robinson special. Ospreay then went for the Os Cutter, but Phantasmo nailed a reverse rana and tagged out. The Guerrillas tried to take him down as well, but Ospreay outwrestled both of them and tagged Yoh. Yoh then fought both of the tag champions off with high knees. ELP and Ishimori then ran in to give Roppongi 3k stereo superkicks, and then gave Ishii a double superkick as he came in. They started to attack Ishii, but Ishii gave ELP a shoulder tackle, and then held Ishimori in place for a Pip Pip Cheerio from Ospreay into a German suplex. Ospreay then irish whipped ELP into Ishii’s powerslam, followed by a twisting splash off of Ishii’s back to ELP. Ospreay didn’t stop there, as he gave Ishimori a Sauske special to the outside. Back in the ring, Loa took Ishii down with a spear, and then Tama aided Loa to hit Guerrilla Warfare, only for Hashi to break it up. Kenta ran in and started to trade strikes with Hashi, as The Guerrillas tried to hit Yoh with Magic Killer, but Sho broke it up. They then beat down Sho, and went to give him a Magic Killer, but Sho kicked Tama away, right into a rollup from Yoh, who scored another win!

After the match, Bullet Club  beat down the Chaos members a bit, mostly the Guerrillas attacking Roppongi 3k. Loa nailed Apeshit on Yoh, as Tama attacked them with a kendo stick.

Grade: B+. I think this was a really really strong 10 man tag, but it didn’t quite break into A territory. Close, but not quite. Ishii and Ospreay shined with those awesome combinations. ELP was being a perfect dick, while we saw some interesting brawling between Hashi and Kenta. I am not a huge fan of the way they have booked Ishimori’s personality to basically become Phantasmo jr, that is irritating, but the action was really awesome and fun to watch. Lots of potential matches set up here. 

BUSHI, EVIL & SANADA vs. Robby Eagles, Kota Ibushi & Kazuchika Okada: Okada and Sanada started things off, and the crowd immediately broke into dueling chants. Red Shoes of course tried to measure the reaction, saying that it was too close to call. They started with a tie up, and Okada actually gave the clean break when I didn’t think he would. The two scrambled for position and Sanada kicked Okada to the outside. The then faked the suicide dive, but flipped over the top rope, before he slingshot back in the ring. They both tagged out, and Eagles and Bushi started to face off with some agile combat. Bushi quickly took control, and LIJ started to beat down Eagles. Eagles eventually was able to fight out, unleashing a combination of strikes before giving Ibushi the hot tag. Ibushi took everyone down with kicks, and looked smooth doing it. Evil quickly fought back into the match with his raw power. The two traded huge kicks and strikes, and they each put each other down with a discus forearm and a high kick. They tagged Sanada and Okada in, and they had some fast paced fighting. Okada then tried for the tombstone, but Sanada countered out of it, using the O’Connor roll into a Skull End, only for Ibushi to immediately break it up. Sanada then went for the Moonsault, but Okada dodged and hit a neckbreaker. Eagles then came in, and started to attack the leg as he unleashed a flurry of offense. At one point, he swept Sanada’s leg in the corner, before hitting double knees for a near fall. LIJ had to work together to fight him off, with Ibushi eventually breaking up a pin. He and Evil fought a bit with both men going for their finish, but Evil ended up hitting a huge German suplex. Sanada then countered Eagle’s turbo backback into a Skull End. Okada broke it up with a dropkick (after missing on his first try), so Sanada threw him out of the ring, and Bushi followed up with a suicide dive. Sanada locked in the skull end again, and Eagles had to tap. 

After the match, Ibushi and Evil squared up a bit, as did Sanada and Okada. Okada then tried to dropkick Sanada, who avoided three of the attempts. Evil then slapped Ibushi, and the two traded strikes a bit before Ibushi just walked away. 

Grade: B. This was a really fun and exciting match. Everyone played their roll well, and showed the intensity in both of the main feuds. Ibushi and Evil are violent and intense, while Okada and Sanada was a feud of respect and sportsmanship. I’m pretty sure that the dropkick stuff at the end was just a joke considering that he missed the first attempt, and he wanted to make a joke about it. These are two matches that I’m certainly looking forward to. Unfortunately, no Hiromu Takahashi appearance here. Bushi is gonna need a partner for the Super Jr. Tag League, so hopefully he comes back soon. 

Hirooki Goto vs. Shingo Takagi: This match of course stemmed from Takagi’s win during the G1, which prevented Goto from moving onto the finals, so things were very intense right off the bat. The two started with some tough striking right away, with Takagi actually near hitting several off his big moves right off the bat, but neither could get anything solid. The two then started with some tests of strength and Goto actually forced Takagi to his knees for a while in the early going, giving him advantage. The two then brawled on the outside, which was definitely Takagi’s environment. He threw the more experienced man all around ringside and ended things with a DDT into the floor. He brought the match back in the ring, and hit several knees before a vertical suplex for a near fall. The two then started to trade chops back and forth, and Takagi actually won the exchange. Goto returned fire with a couple strikes of his own, and a discus lariat to take control. Goto then locked in a sleeper hold, but Takagi broke out with a reverse Noshigami, followed by a sliding lariat and a proper Noshigami for a near fall. The two then fought on the top rope, and delivered headbutts and strikes back and forth, until Takagi hit a superplex. Goto hit the mat and immediately no sold it, hitting Takagi with a high angle German suplex. Takagi no sold that, and then hit a Saito suplex, and both men were down. They then collided with several huge lariats, but neither guy would go down. Takagi went for his combination of punches, but Goto caught him with a pair of lariats before the last hit, and scored a near fall. Goto then went for a Yoshigaroshi, but Takagi countered out of it and hit Made in Japan for a near fall of his own. He then went for a Pumping Bomber, but Goto dodged it, only to be hit by another, but again Goto kicked out.  The two continued to fight, with Goto hitting a Yoshigaroshi, followed by the reverse GTR, but again, Takagi kicked out! Goto started to fire away at Takagi’s chest, but Takagi then caught one, and hung Goto up in the ropes for a rope hung GTR of his own, followed by a Pumping Bomber for a huge kickout. They then both went for their finishers, with Goto ending up hitting a Shoutenkai, but neither man could get up. Goto followed up with a vicious PK, and then tried for the GTR, but Takagi tried to fight out of it. The two then traded headbutts a bit, but Goto nailed a vicious Yoshigaroshi, followed by the GTR for the win.

Grade: A-. This was a phenomenal match right here. These two put it all on the line, and went to war with some of the hardest strikes that I’ve ever seen in New Japan. I love me a hard hitting slugfest in New Japan, and these guys certainly delivered. It looks like they are building Goto up a bit now, so he will probably be getting a push towards something in the future. And that is something that I will definitely look forward to. Takagi continues to prove that he belongs in the heavyweight division, but he isn’t quite ready for a huge push just yet. But he will be, and that’ll be an awesome run. Match of the night. Also, no Hiromu. 

Tetsuya Naito vs. Jay White for the IWGP Intercontinental Championship: Gedo was in White’s corner for this match, most likely with his Brass Knuckles as well. White retreated to the outside right as the match started, similar to his strategy in the G1. Naito then did the same after White got in the ring. The two were playing some mind games as they danced around each other, with Naito refusing to lock up. When they did, Naito tried for several tricky pins, none of which worked, but he also dodged all of White’s offense, which angered the young man. Naito then took control, after goding white to follow him out of the ring, and then attacking him as they both got back in. The two brawled a bit on the outside, with White putting Naito over the barricade, and Naito barely made it back in. White continued to beat Naito down, taunting him as he did. At one point, White went a little too far, and Naito grabbed his hair and used it for a swinging neckbreaker. Naito then returned the taunts, locking in a full nelson with his legs and the slapping White in the head as he applied pressure. Naito put White in the corner, and repeatedly smashed him with forearms and spit on him. White tried for the three amigos, but only needed two before he tied Naito up in the middle rope and gave him a European uppercut, followed by a hangman’s DDT. Naito started to swing a bit wildly, but White countered with a flatliner, followed by a German suplex. As White beat Naito down, he and Gedo yelled at him to smile, keeping up the disingenuous friendship that has dominated their feud. White started to play with Naito a bit, and right when he let his guard down, Naito caught White with a dropkick as he ran the ropes. Naito then nailed his hangman’s neckbreaker on the knee, followed by a super rana and a Gloria for a near fall. Naito then hit a variation of his combo in the corner, sweeping White’s leg on the apron and then hitting the slingshot dropkick. White then immediately countered back by slamming Naito’s face into the canvas. White then went for a piledriver on the apron, with Naito countering with a back body drop, only for White to then grab him off the apron and nailing a powerbomb on the apron, followed by a uranagi in the ring for a near fall. White then went for the Kiwi Crusher, but Naito countered into a high angle DDT. He then forced white into the corner, but White then pulled Red Shoes down with him into the corner as Gedo slid in and hit Naito in the back with a chair. White followed up with a Kiwi Crusher, but Naito still kicked out. White went for the Bladerunner, but when Naito put up a fight, White threw him back down and stomped on his face a bit. He picked Naito back up, and Naito nailed an Ensiguri, but when he went for Destino, White just fell on his back. Gedo got up on the apron to distract Naito, but Naito grabbed White and kicked off Gedo for a tornado DDT. He went for Destino, but White countered out of it, so Naito nailed German instead. Destino attempt again, but White countered and hit a sleeper suplex this time. White went for another Bladerunner, but Naito countered, so he hit another Sleeper suplex. White tried again, but Naito countered this time with a Dragon Suplex. Naito then went for a Destino again, eventually hitting it but really slowing down because White caught him in it. White was able to kick out, and stopped another Destino attempt, only to eat a rolling kick and a hard slap. Naito then tried for a brainbuster, but White countered with a Bladerunner out of nowhere for the win. 

After the match, White got on the mic and yelled at the fans for leaving, before yelling at them in Spanish. He told Naito to smile, and ran down everyone in Bullet Club, before saying Bullet Club for life. As he was talking, Hirooki Goto walked down the ramp and nailed him with a forearm right away. He handed the belt to Gedo, and White walked away with it, screaming that Goto is not next. Goto then issued the challenge. 

Grade: A-. I thought this was a great match. A lot of back and forth, and a lot of great looking striking, and some awesome mind games. I thought that the closing stretch had a bit too much of the finisher counters, but it was intense and built them up a lot. Even though it started off slow, it built throughout the match and they pulled of a great main event. Also, no Hiromu. 

Overall Grade: B

Pros: Connors vs. Narita; Umino vs. Fredericks; Kushin Liger; 10 man tag; chaos vs. lij; goto vs. takagi; naito vs. white

Cons: bullet club vs. main unit; no hiromu

[reuska]

Reuska’s FEH headcanon time no.1

Dang, I’ve decided I will still drop some hc intel time to time. n_n

Since Silas is coming tomorrow (and I hope he comes home soon), let me tell you something about Reuska’s personal guards.

The base for this idea was nothing else but self-indulgent stuff. I like Fred. I love Seth. I love Silas. Fred has been in FEH ever since its release. Green, axe. Perfect. The other two... somehow I always expected Seth to be sword (his red hair perhaps xD). It fits to him and he’s portrayed with a sword in that hot, training ingame art. And I hoped Silas would be lance. That would make the trio perfectly balanced. Hey, and that’s exactly what happened! (But I somehow never expected otherwise.)

Besides that, I backed this choice with my earliest lords (on my current main - I had one before that) which were, taddaah, Chrom, Corrin and Eirika. What a nice coincidence.

These three are also the first three lords Reuska summons (in fact, I don’t neccessarily plan for her to summon more, I don’t want to get the roster spammed with royals plus there is a tweak about how her summoning works which doesn’t allow her to get Marth for example.

Anyway, the three royals join the command of the Order of course, so they attend its planning sessions. And since Reuska is completely useless on the battlefield (but she must be close to the heroes to keep her contract up - preventing Veronica from applying hers) they decide to assign their personal knights to guard her.

(Note: Okay, Reuska is considered useless at the time, they will eventually discover some interesting benfits of both her coming from Earth and being connected with Geir. But with her own abilities she will always remain a useless, squishy target.)

Reuska is well aware of her uselesness, dealing with a severe inferiority complex and at the same time doing her best to hide it so she doesn’t humiliate herself even more. So she’s grumpy most of the time. She’s really not happy about this assignement because it puts her (as a burden) in a constant presence of some very skilled (and handsome) guys.

Luckily for her, Silas is an easygoing sweetheart, she stops feeling uneasy in his presence very soon. They talk a lot even though it is not exactly a natural conversation coming from shared hobbies. But he’s easy to talk to so she asks him questions about his past and training and Nohr and everything ans he’s happy to answer. He’s the friend of the group.

Fred and Seth are very “this is duty not fun” at first - and Reuska has no problems reading some “I would really prefer to be by my lord’s side” emotions hidden beneath that (adding to her feeling useless). She used to dream about handsome knights etc. but being protected JUST because of her randomly earned status of Summoner instead of who she really is... that’s not what she had in mind.

However, since they spend a lot of time together (Reuska and Silas chatting while the other two remain in a rather awkward silence), Fred eventually comes out with his butler skills. He cooks, first of all. Besides that, Reuska still hasn’t got used to chilly evenings and nights in Zenith, sleeping outside etc. She gets cold often which Fred can’t stand seeing so he knits a sweater for her. Which triggers a genuine gratitude and admiration on Reuska’s side because “Wow, Frederick, is there something you can’t do?!” (and a silent “Wow, this guy would be a better wife than me T__T”) and that’s the kind of appreciation he really is not used to so he warms up to Reuska through this. When she learns there would be a ball in her honor in the capital, it is Fred she sprints to with “FRED, PLEASE TEACH ME TO DANCE!”. He’s the daddy of the group.

So while the remaining three get along eventually, Seth remains silent, serious and duty-focused. He’s practical about his assignement and comes with a plan to train Reuska to be at least A LITTLE self-sufficient on a battlefield. He decides to train her in swordsmanship because sword is the easiest to carry of the three main weapons. But not only he finds out about Reuska’s total lack of stamina and physical flexibility (which she tries to hide hard) but they also discover another, much more serious problem going on with her: staffs don’t work on her. That’s a show stopper. Every stupid training injury would heal for weeks and thus make her even more vulnerable in case of emergency. So even though Reuska would really love to become more useful, everyone in command agrees that it is a no.

So Seth at least teaches her to ride a horse which she didn’t know either and the whole group is mounted so she always had to ride with one of them (mostly Silas). He picks Flake for her, a filly so docile that you could dance on her back, shooting fireworks, she would remain calm.

Reuska eventually grows confident enough in Seth’s presence that she starts asking similar questions to those she asked Silas and Fred. But Seth is not a talkative person plus he still keeps chasing her away with his “You ought not grow closer to me, blah bah”. But Reuska is a good debater and she can sometimes come up with good questions, questions Seth can’t resist to answer. It is a tough work but she eventually digs out enough info to make a more personal picture of him. Seth, in exchange, does warm up to her in his specific way. She becomes a representation of why he stays sane with all the blood on his hands. A reminder of why he does what he does. So civilians like Reuska could remain in their sweet ignorance and innocence when it comes to brutality. So when, much, much later, the circumstances force Reuska to stab a blue mage (I don’t like blue mages, yea), causing her a mandatory PTSD, Seth is one of those who take it the worst, seeing it as his personal failure.

[dumbledearme]

chapter three—bow to the sea

read Child of Land and Sea here 

Act I — Storm At Sea

Part III — A journey to bless, a princess to be. Under the sun, and under the sea...

Anthony, who seemed to be in a better mood, counseled Andy (actually told; he was rather bossy) to talk to the Oracle. Who or what that was, Andy wasn't sure she wanted to find out. "What if I wanted to leave? To go back home?"

He frowned. "Don't you get it? You are home. This is the only safe place on earth for kids like us."

"You mean mentally disturbed kids? Because that's how I'm feeling."

"I mean not human. Not totally human, anyway. Half-human."

"Half-human and half-what?"

"I think you know."

"I certainly do not," she denied. Deep in her heart, she knew what he was going to say. But somehow she needed him to be the one saying it.

"God," said Anthony, "Half-god. Your father isn't dead. He's one of the Olympians."

Andy let out a nervous giggle. Anthony remained serious as stone. "That's crazy," she forced it out.

"Is it though? What's the most common thing gods did in the old stories? They ran around falling in love with humans and having kids with them. Do you think they've changed in the last few millennia?"

"But..." Andy's heart was beating fast, "if all the kids here are half-gods—"

"Demigods," he said, amused.

"Then who's your dad?"

His left hand tightened into a fist. "Frederick Chase," he said.

"Um. I don't know that god," Andy joked. He didn't like that. "Alright. Who's your mom, then?"

"Cabin six," he said. "Athena. Goddess of wisdom and battle."

Andy had to contain herself. This was going way too deep. "Okay. And... my dad?"

"Undetermined," he said, yet again. "No one knows. The only way to know for sure, is if he sends you a sign claiming you as his daughter. Sometimes it happens."

"You mean, sometimes it doesn't?"

Anthony looked up to the sky. "The gods are busy. They have a lot of kids and they don't always... Well, sometimes they don't care, really," he said, bitterly.

Andy wondered about all the kids stuck in cabin eleven. "So I'm stuck here. For the rest of my life?"

"It depends. Some campers only stay for the summer. Depends on who your father is. For some of us, it's too dangerous outside. We're year-rounders. In the mortal world, we attract monsters. They sense us."

"But they can't get in here?"

"Not unless they're intentionally summoned by somebody inside."

"Who would do that?"

"Anyone. Good practical jokes."

"Yes. Nice sense of humor. So... you're a year-rounder?"

Anthony nodded. From under the collar of his T-shirt, he pulled a leather necklace with seven clay beads of different colors. It was just like Luke's, except Anthony's also had a big gold ring strung on it, a college ring. "I've been here since I was nine," he said. "Every August, on the last day of summer session, you get a bead for surviving another year. I've been here longer than most of the counselors, and they're all in college."

"Why did you come so young?"

He twisted the ring on his necklace. "None of your business."

It felt like a slap on the face. Andy had, for a second, forgotten they weren't friends. "Right. So can I just leave if I want to?"

"Not without Mr. D or Chiron's permission. And they won't give it to you until the end of the summer, unless..."

"Unless what?"

"You were granted a quest. But that hardly ever happens. The last time..." His voice trailed off. "There is something wrong. Something pretty major. But Chiron won't tell me what it is. The last time I was in Olympus, everything seemed so normal, but now—"

"You've been to Olympus?"

"Some of us year-rounders—me, Luke, Clarisse, and some of the others—we took a field trip during winter solstice. That's when the gods have their big annual council. Right after we visited, the weather got weird, as if the gods had started fighting. A couple of times since, I've overheard satyrs talking. The best I can figure out is that something important was stolen. And if it isn't returned by summer solstice, there's going to be trouble." Andy remembered the talk she overheard between Grover and Chiron while he still was Mr. Brunner. "When you came... I was hoping... I mean, Athena can get along with just about anybody, except for Ares. And, of course, Poseidon. But I thought we could work together. I thought you might know something," and he glanced at Andy hopefully.

She shook her head.

"I've got to get a quest," Anthony muttered to himself. "If they would just tell me what's wrong..."

Later that day, Andy sat on the ground at cabin eleven, watching the other campers and wondering who their parents were, who her father was. Then, the hot counselor, Luke, came over. "Found you a sleeping bag," he said. "And here, I stole you some toiletries from the camp store."

"Oh, thank you. That's about the nicest thing anybody ever did for me," she confessed with a shy smile.

"No prob," he smiled too. Luke sat next to Andy and, as their arms touched, she tried not to blush too obviously. "Rough first day?"

"I don't belong here," she said. "I don't even believe in all this nonsense."

"Trust me, we all start that way. Once you start believing in them? It doesn't get any better." The bitterness in his voice reminded her of Anthony.

"So you're dad is Hermes?" The question seemed bizarre in her lips.

"Yeah," he confirmed, looking down at his own boots.

"The wing-footed messenger guy?"

"That's him. Messengers. Medicine. Travelers. Merchants. Thieves. Anybody who uses roads."

"You ever met him?"

"Once." Andy waited wondering if he would want to share more. Apparently, he didn't. "Don't worry about it, Andy," he said her name with a easygoing smile. "The campers here, they're mostly good people. After all, we're extended family. We take care of each other." He seemed to understand how lost she felt which was surprising since Andy barely understood it herself.

"Anthony said I should talk to some... Oracle? What is that about?"

Luke shook his head. "I hate prophecies," he muttered as if that explained everything.

"What do you mean?"

His face twitched. "Let's just say I messed up things for everybody else. The last two years, ever since my trip to the Garden of the Hesperides went sour, Chiron hasn't allowed any more quests. Tony's been dying to get out there in the world. But Chiron said he already knew his fate. He'd had a prophecy from the Oracle. He wouldn't tell him the whole thing, but he said Tony wasn't destined to go on a quest yet. He had to wait until... somebody special came to camp."

"Somebody special?"

"Don't worry about it, beautiful," he said and Andy almost forgot how to breathe. "Anthony is obsessed. He wants to think that every new camper who comes is the omen he's been waiting for. I'd sooner have him forget it."

At dinnertime Andy had to burn offerings to the gods. She was so hungry it was a true sacrifice having to throw part of the food into the fire, but she did it anyway, asking in return that her father, whoever he was, gave her a sign. But no such luck.

The next few days, Andy settled into a routine that felt almost normal, except for the satyrs, the nymphs and the centaur. They made her try everything until she found something she was good at. But Andy wasn't very good at anything that required brute force. She was tiny and her body was made out of baby fat, no muscles.

Archery? Terrible. Foot racing? No good. Wrestling? Awful. Though she was fairly good at canoeing, probably the most useless skill around.

After some time, she started to understand the bitterness that seemed to take over most of the campers. Okay, maybe gods had important things to do. But was it that hard to call once in awhile? To thunder? Anything? Where was her father? Why didn't he care?

That afternoon, Andy had her first sword-fighting lesson. Turned out she didn't suck at that. The only problem, she couldn't find a blade that felt right in her hands. They were too heavy, too long. Luke tried his best to help her, but he agreed none of the swords fit her. They fought together. Luke told her he would be her partner because it was her first time, but Andy chose to believe that maybe he just liked her. Weirder things were happening to her lately.

But if the boy did fancy her, he had a weird way of showing because he attacked her mercilessly.

With every swipe, she got a little more battered and bruised. By the time he called a break, Andy was soaked in sweat. She grabbed a bottle of water and poured it over her head. Instantly, she felt better. Strength she didn't know she had surged into her arms. The sword didn't feel so awkward in her hands.

The second round began.

Luke came after her and she somehow kept him from hitting her. She saw his attacks coming. She countered. There was a change in Luke's eyes and he started to press her harder. The sword was getting heavy again. Before he could disarm her, she thought, wouldn't it be neat if I could disarm him?

Her blade hit the base of Luke's and Andy twisted, putting her whole weight into a downward thrust. Luke's sword fell to the ground. The tip of Andy's blade was an inch from his undefended (hot) chest. The other campers were silent. Andy lowered her sword.

"Sorry," she smiled weakly. "Carried away..."

For a moment, he was too shocked to say anything. "Sorry?" His scarred face broke into a grin. "By the gods, Andy, why are you sorry? That was beautiful. I wonder what you can do with a balanced sword..."

Andy found Grover sitting in the sand, watching the waves. They hadn't spoken in three days. Andy sat beside him and nudged his satyr leg. "So... your career's still on tracks?"

Grover glanced at her nervously. "Chiron told you? That I want a searcher's license?"

"No. In fact, I have no idea what that is. He said you had big plans and that you needed some kind of credit... Did you get it?"

Grover looked down at the sand. "Mr. D suspended judgment. He said I hadn't failed or succeeded with you yet, so our fates were still tied together. If you got a quest and I went along to protect you, and we both came back alive, then maybe he'd consider the job complete."

"Well, that ain't so bad!"

"Blaa-ha-ha!" Was the sound he made. "The chances of you getting a quest... And even if you did, why would you want me along?"

"I'd want you along," she assured him. Grover didn't say anything else so Andy asked him about the four empty cabins.

"Number eight, the silver one, is Artemis'. She vowed to be a maiden forever. The cabin is honorary."

"What about the three big ones?"

Grover tensed. "One of them is Hera's. Also honorary. She's the goddess of marriage so, of course, she wouldn't go around having affairs with mortals. That's her husband's job. The Big Three, the sons of Kronos—Zeus, Poseidon and Hades—after the great battle with the Titans, they took over the world from their dad and drew lots to decide who got what."

"Zeus got the sky," Andy remembered. "Poseidon the sea. Hades the Underworld."

"Uh-huh."

"But Hades doesn't have a cabin here..."

"No," Grover shuddered. "He doesn't have a throne on Olympus, either. He sort of does his own thing down in the Underworld."

"Okay. Family's black sheep. Got it. But... Zeus and Poseidon... they both had like a bazillion kids in the myths. Why are their cabins empty?"

Grover shifted his hooves uncomfortably. "About sixty years ago, after World War II, the Big Three agreed they wouldn't sire any more heroes. Their children were just too powerful. They were affecting the course of human events, causing too much carnage. World War II, you know, that was basically a fight between the sons of Zeus and Poseidon on one side, and the sons of Hades on the other. After it, Zeus and Poseidon, made Hades swear an oath with them: no more affairs with mortal women. They all swore on the River Styx."

Thunder boomed.

"The most serious oath you can make?" Andy guessed, glancing at the sky. "And did they keep their word?"

Grover's face darkened. "Seventeen years ago, Zeus fell off the wagon. There was this TV starlet—he couldn't help himself. When their child was born, Thalia, well... the River Styx is serious about promises. Zeus himself got off easy because he's immortal, but he brought a terrible fate on his daughter."

"But... that isn't fair at all! It wasn't her fault, she didn't ask to be born!"

Grover hesitated. "Andy... Children of the Big Three have powers greater than other half-bloods. They have a strong aura, a scent that attracts monsters. When Hades found out about the girl, he wasn't too happy with Zeus breaking the oath. He let the worst monsters out of Tartarus to torment Thalia. A... satyr was assigned to be her keeper when she was ten, but... there was nothing he could do, I guess. He tried to escort her here with a couple of other half-bloods she'd befriended. They almost made it. They got all the way to the top of the hill." He pointed across the valley, to a pine tree near where Andy had fought the Minotaur. "All three Kindly Ones were after them, along with a horde of hell-hounds. They were about to be overrun when Thalia told her satyr to take the other two to safety while she held off the monsters. She was wounded and tired, and she didn't want to live like a hunted animal. The satyr didn't want to leave her, but he couldn't change her mind, and he had to protect the others. So Thalia made her final stand alone, at the top of that hill. As she died, Zeus took pity on her. He turned her into that pine tree. Her spirit still helps protect the borders of the valley. That's why the hill is called Half-Blood Hill."

Andy stared at the pine tree in the distance. The more she was part of this world, the more afraid of it she got.

Capture the flag wasn't fun at all. They all gathered in the pavilion where Clarisse and Anthony faced each other. Luke told Andy that Ares and Athena often led the teams. He also told her they were supposed to steal the flag from Ares. But Athena had only made alliances with Hermes and Apollo, the two biggest cabins. The rest was against them.

To Andy's surprise, the campers actually armed themselves for the game. Anthony told her to watch Clarisse's spear and not let it touch her. And then he commanded her to stay by the creek, patrolling or whatever. At the time, it seemed like an easy enough job.

Andy stood by the creek alone for quite some time. She even thought she was missing all the fun. That is, until Clarisse showed up with four other Ares' sons. They charged across the stream. They attacked Andy, who defended herself pretty well at first. But soon they surrounded her and Clarisse hit her with the spear. Immediately, she understood Anthony's warning. The stupid thing was electric. It hurt so much it numbed her.

Laughing, Clarisse said, "Give the rat a haircut." One of the boys grabbed Andy by the hair, but she managed to hit his nose with the back of her head. Then there was the pain again. Another shock and she was on the ground again. "The flag is that way," she managed to say, but Clarisse wasn't interested. This was what she wanted: to beat the crap out of the new girl.

Two of them came at her and Andy backed away toward the creek. One of the boys slashed his sword across Andy's arm, leaving a good-size cut. Seeing her own blood made her dizzy. The boy pushed her into the creek and Andy landed with a splash.

They all laughed.

But then the water—the blessed water—woke up her senses and Andy was able to stand again. Clarisse and the others came forward. With her new strength, Andy fought and disarmed two of them before breaking Clarisse's spear in two. Andy smacked her between the eyes and Clarisse stumbled back.

Then there was yelling and Andy's team showed up cheering. They had won somehow. The game was over.

Suddenly, Anthony's voice said, "Not bad, newbie," into Andy's ear, but as she turned she couldn't find him. "Where did you learn to fight like that?" The air shimmered and he materialized, holding a Yankees baseball cap.

Andy felt angry. "You set me up," she accused. "You put me here because you knew Clarisse would come after me, while you sent Luke around the flank. You had it all figured it out!"

Anthony shrugged. "Athena always has a plan."

"Right. And me dying doesn't matter as long as your plan works fine."

"I came as fast as I could," he sort of apologized. "I was about to jump in, but... You didn't need any help." Then he noticed Andy's arm. "How—" Andy looked at it. The blood was gone.

Where the huge cut had been, there was a long white scratch, and even that was fading. It disappeared before their very eyes. Anthony was thinking hard. "Step out of the water," he said and pulled Andy. The moment her feet touched the ground she lost her strength and would'd fallen if Anthony hadn't caught her.

"Oh, Styx," he cursed.

Andy heard everyone gasping and tried to apologize. "I don't know why—" But then she noticed they were looking not at her, but at something above her head. Andy looked up and saw a hologram of green light, spinning and gleaming: a trident.

"It is determined," said Chiron, who Andy hadn't noticed so far.

Around her, campers started kneeling, even the Ares cabin. Anthony remained beside her, and thank the gods for that because he was all that was keeping her vertical.

"Earthshaker, Stormbringer, Father of Horses," Chiron boasted. "Hail, Andromeda Jackson, Daughter of the Sea God."

[your-dietician]

15 years ago, 'Rock Star: Supernova' rocked reality television

New Post has been published on https://tattlepress.com/entertainment/15-years-ago-rock-star-supernova-rocked-reality-television/

15 years ago, 'Rock Star: Supernova' rocked reality television

Gillby Clarke, ‘Rock Star: Supernova’ winmer Lukas Rossi, Tommy Lee, and Jason Newsted in 2006. (Photo: Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images)

Before David Cook became the first rock winner of American Idol or Adam Lambert made TV history with his game-changing, Jeff Buckley-esque “Ring of Fire” cover, there was CBS’s Rock Star: Supernova — a search for the lead singer for a new supergroup comprising Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee, ex-Metallica bassist Jason Newsted, and ex-Guns N’ Roses guitarist Gilby Clarke. (Lambert even credited Rock Star: Supernova runner-up Dilana’s “Ring of Fire” performance as an inspiration for his Idol arrangement.) 

The Dave Navarro-cohosted talent show, which premiered 15 years ago on July 5, 2006, was an “anti-Idol” of course, featuring covers of songs by Nirvana, the Verve, Hole, Radiohead, the Killers, Dramarama, Pink Floyd, R.E.M., Depeche Mode, the Kinks, Living Colour, Failure, Franz Ferdinand, the Police, Talking Heads, Cheap Trick, Bob Dylan, Soul Asylum, Stone Temple Pilots, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie, and even the actual Jeff Buckley — at a time when that was unheard-of on all other singing competitions.

“It was real. It wasn’t like karaoke with somebody up there just singing some dumb s***. It was real music,” Lee tells Yahoo Entertainment. “I really think [Rock Star: Supernova executive producer] Mark Burnett was way ahead of his time in wanting to deliver that kind of thing to prime-time America. Like, ‘Here’s some real s***. These guys are going to look for a singer. They’re going to make a record. They’re going to go on tour.’ … It totally was ahead of its time.”

The blueprint for Rock Star: Supernova was arguably created a year earlier with Rock Star: INXS, a questionable and somewhat distasteful reality show set up by Burnett and the surviving members of Australian pop-rock band INXS to replace late INXS frontman Michael Hutchence. (Another future American Idol rock trailblazer, Chris Daughtry, actually unsuccessfully auditioned for that show.) Canadian glam-rocker Lukas Rossi eventually won Rock Star: Supernova after performing his self-penned original power ballad “Headspin” on the finale (which, again, was not typical for reality shows of the era), but he tells Yahoo Entertainment/SiriusXM Volume that when his friend suggested he try out for Burnett’s new Rock Star spinoff, he balked — because initially, Rock Star Season 2 was going to be a search for the replacement singer of another big, established rock group, not for the singer of a brand-new band.

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“My life seemed pretty grim at that point. I was in Montreal, going from friends’ to friends’ houses and trying to get my band, Rise Electric, off the ground. I was literally in minus-40-degree weather, living in an abandoned bowling alley and covering myself up with newspaper just to keep warm. I got a call out of the blue from a friend of mine, [EMI Music Publishing executive] Barb Sedun, and she was like, ‘Hey, there’s this show and they’re looking for a singer.’ And she mentioned another band. I was like, ‘I can’t replace that singer! That’s just not right!’ … It was Van Halen — that’s what she said to me. And I was like, ‘Absolutely not. I don’t want to pretend to be their new singer.’ I mean, I love Van Halen, but that’s just not my persona. I’d be lying to the fans and their fans and to myself.”

Rossi was homeless and destitute after leaving his home base of Toronto following a breakup with a cheating girlfriend, and he had focused all his energy on the fledgling Rise Electric. “I put all my eggs into one basket, because I’m a firm believer. My daddy used to say, ‘Whaddya got for plan B, after all this music s***?’ And I’m like, ‘If you need a plan B, that means your plan A is pretty s***ty, dude.’ So, I didn’t have a plan B. Or a plan C.” Still, Rossi admits that he was tempted to try out for what he believed was going to be Rock Star: Van Halen. “It was a hard freakin’ pill to swallow, because I was frickin’ broke, dude. I had nothing.”

However, a week later Sedun phoned Rossi again to let him know that Rock Star had changed direction, and its second season would instead center on a new hard-rock supergroup featuring A-list musicians, with superstar producer Butch Walker set to record their album. “I was like, ‘Hell yeah, dude! That’s what I was like!’” When Rossi had no way of affording a trip to the nearest audition city, Vancouver, Canada, Sedun footed the bill. “She’s like, ‘I’ll pay for you to get there. Just go and kick ass. I know you can do this. I believe in you.’ I packed up my backpack — I had all my belongings in a backpack — and I went there, terrified.”

Rossi confesses that he “drank a few too many pints” before he tried out with “Headspin” (which he’d written just a week earlier) and Live’s “Lightning Crashes,” and he initially thought he’d ruined his chances. “I was so nervous. I walk in, and there’s this dark room. It’s like really weird, like this little stage lit up with one light and the rest is this empty theater,” he recalls. “And then halfway through that I hear, ‘Why are you sweating so much?’ I was like, ‘Who said that?’ I’m looking around, and then I see Jason Newsted through the darkness. And I said, ‘Oh, hey, dude. I just had a couple of pints and it’s hot as s*** in here. That light above me is hot, dude!’”

Apparently the skunk-haired Rossi’s rock ‘n’ roll attitude — which likely would not have impressed the stuffier powers-that-be on, say, Idol or America’s Got Talent in 2006 — was an asset on Rock Star: Supernova. “There was a chuckle in the darkness,” Rossi remembers. Moments after he left that audition and started walking down the street with his guitar case in hand, a casting agent from the show chased him down and invited him to return the next day. And even later, when Rossi got on the show and botched his live, televised performance of Hole’s “Celebrity Skin” — when his “brain took a big dookie” and he forgot the words — that rawness and authenticity worked in his favor. “When you take your life too seriously, man, that only goes so far. That’s, like, a real person. [Rock musicians] trip over things once in a while. We do things wrong. You have to be yourself,” Rossi shrugs. 

Unfortunately, the Rossi-fronted band that formed after the show’s finale was not nearly as successful as the show itself. First, there was a branding issue when the new group, which was supposed to be called Supernova, had to officially change its name to the clunkier Rock Star Supernova (minus the TV series title’s colon), after an established Orange County pop-punk trio named Supernova sued and was granted an injunction. (One key piece of evidence was a Myspace message from Butch Walker noting that Burnett Productions, CBS, Lee, Newsted, and Clarke had been informed that another Supernova already existed, but they had proceeded anyway.) 

The hastily renamed Rock Star Supernova’s surprisingly solid, Walker-produced self-titled album, which included “Headspin” as a single and featured Rossi’s writing credits on four other cuts, debuted at No. 4 in Rossi’s native Canada, where it eventually went platinum. (Check out two circa-2006 performances by the band at Yahoo’s studio below.) But in the U.S., the album stalled at No. 101 on the Billboard 200 and received virtually no radio airplay. It was likely that the reality-television stigma hurt Rock Star Supernova’s chances of being taken seriously in the hard rock world, despite the project’s A-list pedigree.

“I think a lot of people think it’s baggage, like it is not ‘authentic’ or whatever, like it’s the ‘Hollywood TV version’ of something,” Walker, who also appeared as a guest judge on the show, tells Yahoo Entertainment/SiriusXM Volume. “But that being said, I mean, that’s what people sign up for when they watch.”

“We toured everywhere, all the way to Australia and back, but I’m a firm believer that timing is everything, you know?” muses Rossi. “And honestly, I don’t know, because I went out there every single night and gave it my all, dude. Me and Tommy were hungry, but maybe the rest of them — I’m not gonna mention people — but maybe somebody wanted Dilana to win instead of me. We’ll just leave it at that.”

Dilana, who toured as Rock Star Supernova’s opening act in 2007, was actually happy and relieved to place second on the show, as she ultimately didn’t think she was the right fit for the supergroup’s music. “I wanted to get as far as I could, but after I heard their first original, I was kind of bummed,” she confesses to Yahoo Entertainment. “That was exactly when I knew: ‘I don’t want to be the singer in this band.’ I’m not dissing them — I mean, they’re great songs, and Butch Walker is a fantastic, amazing, creative artist — but they’re just not me. They picked me to be the first [contestant] to sing an original on the show, and it was a challenge for me. After that, I knew there was no way I would be in this band, singing this material. And I made the mistake by actually informing some people about it the night before the finale.

“Someone posed the question, ‘What are you going to say [if you win]? What’s your little speech going to be?’ And, I said, ‘Well, if I win it, I’m going to decline it,’” Dilana continues. “Everyone knew it was either Lukas or I, so I said, ‘Lukas, you’re going to get it.’ And I think they were videotaping us at that point. So, I have a sneaky suspicion that somehow the producers got word to the band, and maybe they decided to make sure that I didn’t get picked. … Maybe they told the band and the band was like, ‘We’re not going to get humiliated like that.’ But, maybe the TV people were like, ‘Oh, this would be great television!’ Who knows what happened? But everyone also knew that Lukas was definitely Tommy’s favorite from day one, so it worked out perfectly for me. I didn’t have to embarrass anybody, I didn’t have to get kind of nervous if I had won, and I got exactly what I wanted. I wanted the exposure, and that’s what I got.”

“There was a lot of people involved. There were a lot of cooks in the kitchen. Everybody had their own manager. I mean, you can just see how that’s going to go,” sighs Walker. “There were a lot of people trying to get squeezed through the same rathole with all of their ideas. But they were all great people. I really enjoyed the experience, and Mark Burnett is awesome.”

Rossi was disappointed when Rock Star Supernova lasted only one album/touring cycle, but like Dilana, he used the exposure to further his solo career, and he and Lee remain buddies to this day. (“He’s the best dude. He’s like my tall, skinny daddy. I love that dude,” Rossi gushes.) Most recently, Rossi sang two tracks on Lee’s 2020 solo album Andro, the original “You Dancy” and a cover of Prince’s “When You Were Mine.” And Rock Star: Supernova changed Rossi’s life in a more important and lasting way: Shortly after the show, Lee and Navarro fixed him up with their friend, former adult film actress Kendra Jade. “We met up at Barney’s Beanery and literally spent the next two whole weeks in bed. It was mental,” Rossi laughingly recalls of their first date. Lukas and Kendra eloped in 2007; adopted a son, Bryden, in 2015; and now happily reside in Nashville. 

“The music was secondary [to the Rock Star: Supernova experience]. Everybody I’ve met through that whole journey was so awesome,” Rossi adds. “Like I was telling you, I was on the street, I had nothing, and all of a sudden I get thrown into meeting all these wonderful people. … We were all there to do what we love most. Plus, we got to have free drinks and be on television and make a bunch of wonderful, wonderful fans. I mean, God, it was the best time of my life.”

Tommy Lee and Lukas Rossi (Photo: Jordan Strauss/WireImage)

“That’s all it ever was to be — it was a great experience,” says Lee. Rossi does wish that Burnett had continued focusing on rock ‘n’ roll reality shows instead of moving on to the more mainstream and less rockin’ NBC show The Voice (“Why? That’s like McDonald’s cutting off their Big Macs,” he quips), but Lee does believe that Rock Star: Supernova changed music television 15 years ago, attesting: “I think it paved the way for a lot of the shows that are here today, definitely.”

Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:

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This above Lukas Rossi and Butch Walker interviews are taken from their appearances on the SiriusXM show “Volume West.” Full audio of those conversations are available via the SiriusXM app.

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[fmlfpl]

Lineup Lamentations - GW5

Our Transfers, Captains, and Starting 11s for the week!

—

WALSH ON WILDCARD

TRANSFERS:

OUT: wildcard

IN: wildcard

Sucks to not have a fun WC pod...but couldn't let that get in the way of keeping my diabolical team for this gameweek.

Waking up on Friday and seeing the news around town the writing was on the wall. A couple hours later and the team sort of picked itself. Obviously this weekend has a high likelihood of being a complete mess after the IB and so I tried to choose players with the medium/long term in mind.

GK:

Ryan (cry)

Sticking with Ryan here and trying to do that thing where I just keep the GK instead of fuck off after being bad to chase points from someone who is "better" only to see Ryan start to bank points.

Not keen on shooting myself in the foot here, and although Brighton aren't set up to defend and park...what team with a 4.5 gk does?

DEF:

Lamptea (cry)

Cheap defense incoming.

Doubling up on defense against my team...vomit. Surely this won't come off, but the small boy attacks a lot as long as he figures out how to stay fit is a decent shout for attacking points in any game he starts. Whether he is still standing past 60...another question entirely. Feels like good value, though, and a solid attacking defender so glad to be in on the party if not a little late to it after he's risen twice.

Dallas (WOL)

Not the biggest feels for cleans from Leeds basically ever but he's another good attacking fullback kinda quasi OOP guy with good underlying stats so we'll give him a shot. Don't really know shit about anything with who has a good defense yet so trying to just spread it around and see what sticks. Rotate them and play fixtures. At least he's fun and it'll be more fun to own a Leeds player from now on watching their games. Ayling was in consideration but Dallas seems a bit better stats and shit so just going with that.

Konsa (lei)

Great fixture, amazing actual unreal fixture so clean prob good here. I was looking at Targett but I hate him and he doesn't attack so Konsa seemed a better shout from pod partner when we were discussing it. Having a share of Villa defense seems good as they look good and he's pretty dangerous on set pieces. Another cheap rotational cog who will go in and out of the xi.

MID:

Pulisic (SOU)

Biggest punt in the xi the American is back in. Playing around and talking to pod partner solidified just as a pick that could be a big gainer for me on WC here. We know what he does and now that he is allegedly fit he should go back to shitting points as per. Direct and always in dangerous positions with ridiculous stats he performs like a double digit player not like an 8.3m one. Hoping he can be good in spite of Franklin. Seems like a good fixture for him getting to attack Soton's left side....let's go.

Salah & Mane (eve)

Mo remains and is joined by friend Mane. Pretty straightforward here - Mane looked really good every game so far and Mo is Mo. In a season with many questions and few answers, this is a dead cert. Great players on the best team. Dunno what in hell will happen against Everton but this isn't a short term play.

Son (WHU)

Not completely over the moon in love with this pick but it is.....obvious. Son always performs in FPL no matter who the manager is or what the situation of life is. When he's fit, he gets points. Obviously he's not gonna score 4 and hit triple returns often, but he's just a great player. Being utilized sorta kinda OOP to boot, adding Bale soon will only make them better. At 9m he seems a safe pair of hands.

Sterling (ARS)

Notice a theme here? 5 known quantities and huge dongers in midfield. I know I'm missing out on some value picks in the 6-7m range, but I feel fine with that. City are a bit upside down world at the moment but Raz is still Raz. Can hat on any given week, just like the other four midfielders in my team currently. I still back Pep to get them right and Raz can score goals even when they're wrong. A steady great guy who I know what I'll get.

FWD:

Calvert-Lewin (LIV)

DCL stays. Obvious monster, great guy. Tough fixture but whatevs. Everton going well and fortunate to have only one game per week with Europe starting up this week. Should keep being good.

Brewster (FUL)

There's certainly a chance he doesn't start but I'll run that risk. As you all know I'm big on Brewster as a starter and structured my WC team as such. If he falls on his face after a month or so I'll just double swap him out with one of my mids for a couple of new friends. If not and he looks like he'll tick, then I can keep my massive huge midfield and it'll be so great and fun.

BENCH:

Steele, Walker-Peters, Fredericks, Davis

KWP and Fredericks make up the rest of my defensive five rotation.

KWP is kinda playing wing and Fredericks was looking good with good attacking stats and such. West Ham look good so having a piece there seems good for the long term...and I'm a little bit sorta kinda nervous about Masuaku long term keeping his place.

Soton are a good team, and so just feels fine-ish to get him. I was looking at Ward...but fuck me Joel Ward like. If I had a better idea who was starting CB for us I probably would've gone there as KWP is by far my least favorite of the five I am on but I can see that he's a reasonable FPL pick and good rotational piece.

I should be able to find 3 from these 5 each week without too much of an issue, so we'll see how it goes. I honestly can't remember the last time I did this....maybe 3 or 4 years ago. Throwback to the old days of 5x4.5 defense here we go.

Davis is just a ded guy out there at 4.4m last on the bench. Not too big of a deal to carry a blank player to me and he is low key the only other fit striker on the Villa books so if something happens to Watkins...you never know.

CAP:

Pulisic (SOU)

Time to punt.

Pod partner gave me the courage and in a week where there is no standout that I like why not punt and have fun? I've got myself covered with the other guys, mostly, anyways so we'll see how it goes. Hopefully he starts :D

—

ALON

TRANSFERS:

OUT: De Bruyne

IN: Grealish

Short term plan is turning Kev, Foden, and VVD to Jack (done), Mo, and another semi-premium defender I feel confident holding long term maybe Semedo or something like that.

I was thinking of prepping for a Werner to Kun move but I don’t see that as being just one week away so I might have time there before jumping on Kun.

I really wanted to have 2 FT next week after this clusterfuck week followed by UCL so here I am... Jack has a fantastic fixture Leicester are really a fucked up mess with all their injuries and Jack / Villa are flying. His move to LW and the upgrades throughout the team really has me buzzing for him as a FPL asset. Following it.

GK:

Martinez (lei)

Great fixture. Leicester are an aforementioned fucking disaster right now and very injured and Villa are looking great. Very cleanable come on you Villains.

DEF:

Lamptey (cry)

Good clean fixture but the young boy is still knocked and I’m worried about his health. Come on Tariq really need to trust you going forwards.

van Dijk and Alexander-Arnold (eve)

Not expecting a clean here but also could be a grindy 0-0. Ancelotti has done well vs. the reds last couple years so I don’t feel great about it but also still VVD and Trent are the best so... ya know... not all bad.

MID:

Sterling and Foden (ARS)

Kev out in theory makes Foden more likely to start? I can hope at least...

Raz is great I’m not worried about him, and while Arsenal are doing better defensively it’s still a big ask to shut this City side down. Though no Kev and no #9 is troublesome for City.

Grealish (lei)

My thoughts are above in the transfer section but yeah Jack is putting up humongous superstar numbers and looking it too up there at LW. Keep it up Jack. Could be a guy I keep all season.

Rodriguez (LIV)

Obviously really tough matchup but Hamez is just unbelievable so you set and forget him. Also a lot better to be at Goodison instead of Anfield so I could see Everton getting something and if they do then that usually goes through Hamez.

FWD:

Calvert-Lewin (LIV)

DCL is great doesn’t really require words at this point.

Wood (wba)

Wood to Brewster was definitely in my thoughts this week but I think you cannot ever transfer out an attacker playing against West Brom or Fulham this season that’s just pure blasphemy.

Werner (SOU)

Two weeks of not following shit definitely made me feel better about owning Timo then before. Chelsea are getting their superstar wingers back soon and they’ll be way too much firepower for most teams in the league to handle. On paper this should be a great fixture for pace in behind Southampton’s really shitty defenders and high line. Come on Timo.

CAP:

Werner (SOU)

Cap gave me a headache this week and it came down to a coinflip between Jack and Timo.

I honestly think Jack is probably a little more likely to get any return like an assist or even a clean point+assist type of little ding dong but I think Timo is more likely to haul points in what could be a very back and forth high scoring match.

Brace+ type of haul is what I’m gunning for with my cap soooo yeah here we go. Sorry to the guy who asked on Friday My Life about capping Timo... Here I am.

[sweetest-thief]

Confess: Worst thing you've done post-Shepherds. Killing enemies on a battlefield doesn't count.

Gaius turned grim almost immediately. “First thing, Jigsaw. This does NOT leave this room, okay?” He sighed, looking away slightly. “You said killing enemies on the battlefield don’t count… But what if it wasn’t on the battlefield?”

“It was my turn to patrol camp with Sourpuss, when we got accosted by brigands. Fred took down most of ‘em, but it was up to me to chase down one slippery fellow who got away. I tracked ‘im down and managed to wound him pretty badly. But that’s when he cracked.”

A sigh as he ran his fingers through his hair with the memory of it all. “He… confessed that he an his buddies were actually hired by the Grimleal to come and try to sabotage our camp late at night. The plan was to wait until most of us were asleep, take out whoever had sentry duty, and then slit our throats. Guess they just didn’t expect to have to deal with someone like Frederick, hah.”

“Anyways, he told me he surrendered and would be willing to exchange any information he knew for his life. He fed me some nice bullshit about how he’d heard what a fair and kind leader Chrom was, and told me that he was just a father trying to support his kid the only way he knew how. He said he wasn’t really a bad person – just someone who’d ended up on the wrong side. He begged me for another chance.”

“But I… didn’t give it to him,” he admitted quietly. “I tried to press him for information – any I could possibly glean – and when he refused, asking for a private audience with Chrom, I cut him down where he stood. It sounds terrible… Killing a defenseless person who’d already given up and was begging to be taken prisoner. Hell, it WAS terrible. But I did it anyway. And I’d do it again.”

“Chrom is… an amazing person. I honestly love him like a brother. His ability to connect with people is outmatched, as is his capacity for trust. But it’s those sorts of personality traits that get great men like him killed. Just look at ME. I was roaming with the dastards who wanted to off his sister, but it hardly took any convincing at all for him to welcome me to his side. Gods, imagine if I’d been a turncoat all along? I know he’s aware of the risk of intrinsically trusting people like that, but no amount of persuading would ever get him to change.”

“All I could think about as that guy spilled his guts in front of me was the sort of information he could relay back to enemy forces if we let him go. Chrom’s such a saint… I got a free pass on trying to off his sister because of my fucking sweet tooth. If this man came with his pretty little sob story, talking about his fucking daughter who was the only way he could remember his dead wife, there’d be no talking him out of letting the guy go. I couldn’t risk it. So I did what had to be done. And Frederick… He didn’t even ask about him once I came back alone. He’s seen the world at its most inhospitable, too. He knows what it’s like.”

A sigh as the man looked back up at the ceiling. “… Sometimes, though… I do wonder… if he was telling the truth. If I made a huge mistake just out of fear. If that little girl misses her papa.”

He lapsed into a brief silence, before shaking his head. “But at the end of the day… it doesn’t matter. What’s one man’s conscience compared to world peace? It was worth it, if it meant keeping him safe.”

[chaospenelope]

While They Were Gone

The World Beyond

The house didn't look any different after they left sooner than expected. The yard was free of any cars or large toys but it was mostly unchanged. It felt sad all the same. The FazBear kids would find themselves glancing at it every time they came home as did their friends. They weren't necessarily upset, they just expected something that wasn't there anymore. The twins called their cousins as often as they could, but since the parents were busy pulling double shifts until new staff was hired there hadn't been any planned visits just yet. As summer neared it's halfway point it slowed down enough for a two day trip. "I can't wait to see Faye, Victor, and Amelia again." Spring cheered as she hopped into her seat in very the back of the eight seated minivan. She pulled her stuffed dog, into a backpack and put that onto her lap. "Why are you bringing that thing with us?" Philip asked as he went into the passenger seat in front of them. "Because I wanna..." Her brother rolled his eyes but didn't ask her about it further. He had bigger problems than bothering his little sister. William and Robert sat on either side of him. "Wait a minute, who said I was going to be in the middle seat?" "Cuz your butt's the only one skinny enough to fit in the middle seat. Unless you wanna trade with Chelsea." He motioned toward the oldest sister who was crawling in the seat next to the twins. Philip looked at his mother in the front passenger seat whose shrug told him she wasn't going to help. "Did you remember to bring an extra set of clothes?" FredBear asked his little cub as he made sure the twins were buckled in properly. "Yes Papa." "Frederick?" "Yes, dad." "Alright, let's get outta here." He said as he closed the door. He pulled himself into the driver seat and started the van's engine.

"You have all your things?" Neda stood in the doorway of her daughter's now bare room. All that remained was light blue painted walls, dark blue ceilings with white specks where glow in the dark stars used to be and white carpet. "Yeah. Dad and the movers took the boxes." Penelope tucked her notebook into her black backpack before slinging it onto her shoulder. "Kind of strange seeing it this empty." She felt a conflicting mix of nostalgia, sadness, and joy as she looked at the shell of a house. "You're not actually going to miss this place, are you mom?" "I know the neighbors weren't the best, but this was our home. There were a lot of memories here. As much as I'm happy to leave there's still some things I'll miss." "Yeah, I've had this room a long time. I'll probably miss...Mm. I, can't really think of anything. The closet is nice?" "Your bedroom in the new house has a closet. And, to be honest, a better view." Her mother noted as she looked out the window through a parallel window at a woman who quickly acted like she wasn't just watching them. "What else is at the new house?" "Well, there's two bathrooms, a kitchen, three bedrooms, two stories, three if you count the attic, an office for your father, and hm...What am I forgetting? The living room? Oh, It's completely surrounded by woods." Her daughter perked up as she expected. The small cub loved to climb. "You ready to go?" Phineas walked up to the girls. The large black furred bear carried his son's green Hulk backpack. The boy lazily Leaned against the wall behind him. "The truck already left." "I am!" The little cub jumped up and ran to up to him. "Can't wait to see our new home!" Her father let out chuckle as he looked at his wife. "Told her about the trees, didn't you?" "She asked what the house was like." She said with a smirk, but it faded when she noticed the time on her husband's watch. "We better get going, we don't want the movers to be stuck there without a way to get in. If we make them wait too long they might just leave everything in the yard."

"Are we there yet?" The fox asked in a bored monotone. "Philip, are you serious?" William glared at his brother. "I expected that sort of thing from Spring, not you." "What?" The golden cub looked up from her game. "We're here." The new building was smaller than the last. Around it's yard was a well kept metal fence. The driveway was only wide enough for one car with the other in the garage. There was a stone path leading to a porch with bench swing hanging from the roof. "You're here early!" Faye's voice was a bit muffled by the window. She ran to the door to let them in. "Mom is out getting some light bulbs and dad is in the kitchen. Do you want me to go get him?" "That's alright Faye." FredBear grinned giving her a pat on the head. He headed to the back of the house. The inside was very welcoming. Mangle did a great job placing furniture and choosing colors that made the place feel comfortable and pleasing to the eye. Victor bolted out of his bedroom as the rest of the family settled down in the living room. "There you are guys! C'mon, lets go play outside! There's a swing and slide out there!" "Can we Mama?" "If Teddy says it's safe." "Can I watch TV instead?" Amelia asked shyly. Faye nodded and sat her up on the couch next to Plushy revealing her prosthetic hand. Then followed her cousins and brother. "Don't stick your paws through the fence again Victor." Theodore warned his son as the four kids pitter-pattered across the kitchen to the back door. "C'mon! We can play tag!" The fox poked Freddy. "You're it! No tail grabs!" Then ran off giggling like a madman. "Hey!" He shouted with his own giggles. The two girls split in different directions but he had a vendetta, bolting straight for his cousin. He ducked under the slide in an attempt to cut him off. Victor made a leaping dodge as he bolted back the other side. Frederick knew he couldn't catch up to him in a long distance run so he used in a full sprint. He was inches away when he reached out in a frantic grab. His paw latched on his shoulder as he cried 'it'. Then he quickly grabbed the ladder of the play set to hoist himself up. Victor was about to chase him but saw his sister. She fled once he noticed her. He followed her across the yard swerving around as she made sharp corners just before hitting the fence. He cut her off just at the small freshly planted garden huddled against the back of the house, or he would, if she hadn't tripped on someone. "Are you OK Faye?" Goldie asked as she stood up to offer her hand. Freddy ran up to them with the same amount of concern. "Yeah, I landed on the soft soil." She brushed the dirt off of her white fur and pink shirt. "What were you doing anyway Spring?" "I found a bug!" She knelt back down and pointed at her find. There was wriggling worm pulsating around the moist earth and a pair of pill bugs curled into balls at their presence. "Look, there's more now!" "There's another worm, or is it just the other end?" Freddy asked as he too became invested in the insects. "Guys! You have bugs at your house!" Victor crossed his arms and watched SpringBear pick up a roly poly. She examined it closely, and gently pushing it on it's side. "I love Rollie bugs. They're so cute." She got up and carefully ran to the backdoor still cradling the invertebrate. She ran inside after wiping her paws on the mat. "Papa!" She held her cupped hands up so the large yellow bear could see her new friend. "I found a Rollie bug! Can I keep him please? I'll fed him leaves and give him water everyday." He smiled and patted her head. "I'm not sure that's a good idea Honey Bear. He might miss his family and friends if you take him home. You can always visit him here." "Oh...OK." She hesitantly returned outside where Freddy and Faye were watching the worms race out the dirt. Victor was sitting against the fence pulling up blades of grass. She placed the critter on a bush's leaf. "I'll check on you later, ok Bailey?" "Hurry Goldie! The race is almost over." She huddled up to the patch of dirt that was the center of attention. The two bugs writhed and slithered into the soft ground. The cubs started to cheer them on giving them the names Tube and Segments. It was a close match but Segments had all five of his hearts in the race. "Can we play now?" Victor asked. Then hopped up when a spark of inspiration hit him. "Let's be superheroes!"

The dirt road widened to a clearing with two houses in the middle. The large moving truck was closed and the engine started up. Most of it's contents were placed roughly where they were assigned. "Hey, we might actually get this done before tonight." Neda happily admitted as she finished pushing the drier in place." "We should probably work on the beds next, just in case we lose track of time." "Right, I wish we didn't have to take the bed frames apart..." Their daughter poked her head into the room. "I put all the dishes in the cabinet, can I go outside?" "Sorry Penny, but I need to be able to see you if you want to play outside and your father and I still need to make sure we don't have to roll out the inflatable tonight...But we can have our lunch break under the trees." The breeze gently rustled the leafy branches. The sticks and leaves crunched under their paws as they selected a spot to spread out the freshly unpacked blanket. There was a faint, distant scuttle of life as they sat down. "Such a beautiful day today." Phineas looked up at the sun trickling through the gaps in shade. "Nice weather for a picnic. Bet it'll be even lovelier at night. You could look out the window and see the whole galaxy." Neda opened the shopping bag and passed out the containers of take out. "So how do you cubs like the house so far?" "It's big." "I really like the color of my room. One of my windows is still facing another window. It was covered with a blue curtain. Who lives next to us?" "We haven't really seen them yet. They weren't here when we looked at the house. As long as we stay on our side of the fence we should be fine." Penelope wasn't too sure but at least it was only one side of the house instead of surrounding them. She tried to push the thought away as she ate her lasagna. "The food's good." Nade added, not too sure if there was much else he needed to like this place. "There are a lot of nice places in town; a theater, some restaurants, an arcade. We're not too far from the city either." "Sounds great mom. Can I look around? I'm full." "You can play around the woods where we can see you, but when your mother and I have to go back inside you go in the back yard and stay in the fence, alright?" "Sure thing dad!" She put her leftovers back in the bag. After wiping her muzzle on a napkin she bolted for the foliage. She picked out a big, wide tree with low branches right at the edge of the forest. "Don't go up too high!" "I won't!" Penelope jumped up to grab a strong branch. She latched her arms around it. Then lifted her lower body to secure her legs around it. She pulled herself to the top of the branch and carefully stood up. Carefully walked to the trunk and pulled herself on a higher one. She held tightly on another as she looked at the view until she moved few branches and realized three of them were perfectly positioned to rest on. She noticed something scratched into the bark of the tree. It appeared as if it were supposed to be letters cut in crudely. She could make out a V but the rest of the bark was pulled off. It seemed like another person wanted to erase the mark. She pondered the scribble for a moment, wondering which house this person lived in when they did it and if they were still here.

[talietikasero]

I went in aware of the (possible) retcons and shit but I watched the whole thing anyway. It’s some ungodly hour way past when I should’ve slept and here’s what I thought. I’m trying to be fair here when I give GG Strive’s story a 6.8/10

Visuals: This game is beautiful. 12/10

Voice cast: I enjoyed the dub. Not as much of a corny anime dub like Sign was, but the returning cast improved from that game -- or at least I thought so. 8.75/10

Soundtrack: One word: Incredible. The duo of Naoki and Aisha on vocals for all character themes -- ok they're only a duet on Ramlethal's [Necessary Discrepancy] but you know what I meant -- was a perfect choice. My favorite themes from when I played the second open beta back in mid-May were Giovanna's [Trigger] and Potemkin's [Armor-Clad Faith], but Leo's [Hellfire] really grew on me the most. 15/10

Game itself: Arcade mode was a fun challenge because I’m an idiot who did all 15 but I got really tired of fighting Nago over and over again. I’m not that great so I’m not worrying about getting the “Messiah Will Not Come” trophy where you fight him but he’s got an infinite blood gauge. Survival gives a good chunk of the lifebar back without making it too easy -- and the “mysterious challenger” at stage 10 being a shadowy Sol with neon red was an okay way to signal a checkpoint. 9/10 I’m not doing online any time soon because I don’t have a wired connection but I hear it’s ass and the tower placement is a complete lie.

Anywho, now on to the real post:

For a finale, the story was... slightly below average. But I’ll be honest here, I kinda had high expectations because of the hype from the past two (?) years, five if you count the total time between Rev2 and Strive's release dates.

The last time I was this critical of a sequel’s story was the gap between Borderlands 2 and 3, which was seven years. I'm going off on a tangent here but I'll sum it up so if you're not familiar with Borderlands you'll have an idea of what I'm taking about. In Borderlands: the Pre-Sequel, the Watcher (Eridian? that saved Athena from execution after telling Lilith and company of her adventures on Elpis with Nisha, Wilhelm, Timothy, Aurelia, and Claptrap) warned "Now's not the time for bickering, Vault Hunters. War is coming, and you will need all the Vault Hunters you can get". BL3 rolls around and there was no big war. Instead, we got a poorly delivered dumpster fire of a main campaign that spanned five planets and the main villains were some bratty livestreamer Sirens that run a planet wide cult. Seriously? The cast was poorly handled there too but I'll stop here.

In the case of comparison to another fighting game’s story, the game that comes to mind is Tekken 7 because if they aren’t a Mishima or Kazama or someone else in that fucked up family that’s plot relevant, they were given a shitty one-fight episode. Sure Nina and Claudio were in the main story mode but that's the thing: they were just there. The returning (dlc) series veterans, such as Anna, Lei, Marduk, and all the way to Zafina plus the newcomers Leroy, Lidia, Fahkumram, and Kunimitsu II weren't given much aside from a brief story snippet. Dare I say it but SFV did their new seasons newcomers and returning fighters justice as they all got episodes of their own. You read that right. Street Fighter V was better to its cast than Tekken 7 and Guilty Gear -Strive-.

Unlike the Xrd games, watching the story does not get you any money. The only difference I saw right after was that the Strive correlation chart updated. For what it’s worth, they could’ve done something like DBFZ’s story clearance unlocking a new character, or do an alternate costume where the outfit Frederick wears in the ending (and upon further inspection is the very same one he wore in the flashback) is useable in fights (it’d be hilarious but a good detail added in if you were to select that option but the name plate doesn’t display “Sol” lmao). If Ky has a palette that puts him in an open button white shirt, jeans, and what look like work boots, then let me play in the ending's lab coat, tanktop, and jeans dammit.

I kept track of how many of the playable cast showed up and played some part. Everyone except Ramlethal, May, and Faust appeared in the story -- these three were reduced to credit image cameos >:( Ram’s seen with Elphelt and Sin, while Ky and Dizzy are in the background. May’s with her crew, and Faust is in the desert somewhere or some shit with Chronus.

But even if they did show up, nobody else except like five people did jack shit. Giovanna, bless her heart, was absent for a long period then showed up to fight Nagoriyuki (who eventually sided with the good guys) but got her ass beat after he faked surrender. Potemkin helped but spent most of his time cruising at high speed trying to get to the White House. Ky and Jack-O didn’t arrive until the end either. Axl -- or should I say Will -- finally got to see Megumi again at the cost of I-No’s defeat. The dude got his girlfriend back at the loss of someone he considered a friend but the delivery felt forced as it was confirmed as she was dying -- wasn't part of her character that she has no recollection of a past? Her suddenly remembering a past boyfriend and being able to describe his appearance didn't really make much sense.

Chipp and Anji were in that comical highway chase scene, but then Anji's just wherever while Chipp's in the Pentagon control room. I get that someone had to stay behind and watch from the other side -- this role landing with Leo as he, Millia, and Zato were overseeing commentating on events from the castle’s war room like Brock and Misty during Ash's battles in the OG season of the Pokemon anime, while Daryl was at the G4 conference and Ky was on his way to the fight -- but the pacing and usage of the cast in this story was a mess. Yeah sure it has most of the GG cast in this installment's playable roster present but it didn't feel like a GG story -- really it felt like the live action Resident Evil movies where the source material's characters are sprinkled in, acting more as a "here ya go they're here don't expect much!" type thing.

Honestly, a step down from Rev because at least everyone in that arc were somewhat present with maybe one or two exceptions? Hell, even though they were added as dlc or in Rev2, Dizzy, Haehyun, Baiken, and Answer were in the main story. Being hopeful here when I say that I hope we see more of Goldlewis or get to play as him because his design is badass and so is his coffin flail weapon. On the side of fairness though, I have a feeling this isn’t exactly what Ishiwatari intended (this is unlikely but it's probably Katano's directing? Whatever in any case)? The general reaction I saw from others who’ve watched the story was that the subplots were half baked and the plot as a whole was pretty rushed. Happy Chaos / the Original as the main villain was Calypso Twins from Borderlands 3 level cringe and every time HC appeared on screen I wanted to mute it. There is the bonus story coming later this year, along with the dlc slots, so ehh? The interactions between Colin and Frederick were one of my personal favorite points even if this did turn into “Neon Genesis White House Down”.

“Brown bears don’t give birth to pandas.“

I’m sure like the others who actually paid attention to the story from the end of Xrd to Strive, my main question was this:

After the Justice / Jack-O fusion -- recall the “newly revived” Aria had purely red hair and Jack-O’s halo disappeared. During the mid-credits of Revelator, former friends turned sworn enemies turned frenemies Asuka and Frederick pretty much have one last declaration of war against each other, with Sin, I-No, and Raven as their witnesses -- Asuka even said “take good care of Aria”. Naturally from all of that, she’s not Jack-O anymore, right? Wrong. According to the game, what's inside of Jack-O is only a fragment / shard of Aria mixed in with Jack-O's projected personality (I think). How did they go from "let's do the fusion and guaranteed she'll return" to "yeah nah she ain't comin' back bro"

Xrd Revelator: "Pull this off successfully and Aria will fully revive as a human."

Strive: "Nah bruh. We lied. It just turned Jack-O human and what's inside her is only an unstable shard of Aria -- not the whole thing."

Back to the “final battle”, they don’t fight, rather Asuka removed the Flame of Corruption from Frederick's body (and somehow he got a haircut too). So really what was the fight in Rev2′s [After Story - A] for? Did he get nearly the life beaten out of him from Ky fighting dirty and left that crater in the park for nothing? Seems that way. Asuka lives on the moon and he's got a radio show now because (*bong rip*) that makes sense.

I’ll admit it’s a little cute that the feelings are mutual between Jack-O and Frederick -- he sees her as herself and not just a genetic copy but they expect us to think in the three weeks they've known each other that "oh shit I'm in love with this person" is believable -- and they live in the woods near a presumably 200+ year old space shuttle complete with the launchpad but come on now. That's some Russo Brothers level writing right there -- y'all remember Avengers: Endgame and how when he went across space and time to return the Infinity Stones, Steve Rogers threw everything away just so he could go back to his original era? The now depowered-so-he's-human-again Frederick Bulsara (the ex-gear and world's savior x times over formerly known as Sol Badguy) living in isolation away from his newfound family and friends gives off the same vibe. Especially after that one and only flashback where it's Aria's birthday and he was going to propose but the ring wasn't ready in time so he had that "error" to show instead.