#assigned to dealing with Our Superheroes Are Different people. and having one shoot up a bank with powers. and having like. 12 of them

[frogspawned]

i hate it when a story can’t commit to the bit. nothing makes me drop a book faster than a writer reneging on their own rules. like, you made it up! you can change the rules, no matter how outlandish, to serve the plot you want. and then you just do... that. it’s weak

[boop-le-snoot]

PARTY FAVOURS I CHAPTER 29

First time reader click here

Feels like this story is flopping. Is it flopping? Idk. This chapter is 100% plot and it is spooky. Cursed demon box. Helpful Stephen Strange and grumpy Wong. Hovering Bruce and Tony. Loki being a honorary Gen-Z. Found family but make it ✨superheroes✨.

"That's a lot to unpack," Peter stated once I had given him the bare bones report of the situation at hand. "Uh, are you okay?" The boy was obviously upset at my predicament, placing a supportive hand on my shoulder.

"Kinda?" I offered, making space for Wanda and Pietro who decided to join me and Peter, away from the arguing adults. The mission discussion - an absolute disaster - started as soon as Peter had walked in. Evidently experienced in such matters, the boy ignored the bickering and came over to steal me from Bruce's clutches to peacefully finish his egg sandwich in the company of his peers.

"I wanted to ask if I could see your memory of that time," Wanda meekly offered me a piece of candy. I accepted it - sugar sweet sugar, how I love thee so! The witch continued with a smile: "I think it would be helpful to see what we're dealing with, magic-wise."

"Sure," I trusted her. "Just don't scramble what's left of my sanity, please," All of us laughed at my remark as I laid down on the cold floor with my head in Wanda's lap. Her powers felt like small brain zaps, tingles that began at the front of my forehead and ran down into my spine. I followed her instructions and thought about the times I remembered, finding the box, placing it into my closet, the nightmares. I had a mild headache by the time she was done; no grudges against her - Wanda tactfully avoided my private moments and looked only at the ones containing the artifact.

"You've gotten really good," I complimented her with pure adoration.

"Thank you," She blushed, smoothing back my stray hairs. "That stuff is really strong. I don't think you should go near the box," She admitted. "And Doc should take a look at you. You have a residue left. I don't think that's good either."

"Well, fuck," I said in muted resignation.

"Press F to pay respects," Pietro joked in an attempt to lighten the atmosphere.

"Your luck is almost as bad as mine," Peter pointed out.

I scoffed. "Well, if I see any spiders around, I'll be sure to stay away in case they happen to be radioactive OsCorp runaways."

All of us laughed. Despite the grim situation, I didn't feel doomed. I was surrounded by friends and my boyfriends and my bestie who happened to be a mythical omnipotent god- welp, once again, I was getting too emotional. Once the adults were done arguing, we could start making sense of this mess and hopefully clean it up before the monster is out of the box.

"Mortals," I heard Loki scoff. The next moment, the Asgardian sat down noisily next to me, pout on full display. "This house is a nightmare."

His expression - or the accidental use of a meme - sent me completely, tension leaving my body via copious amounts of nearly hysterical laughter. Through tears and hiccups, I saw Wanda cackle with me and Peter show the meme in question to Loki, noting that he had been once sent to time-out on top of the fridge by Tony himself. Soon, all of us were laughing, much to the displeasure of the adults.

"Children, what is the issue?" Thor asked, irritated.

"We're just waiting for you to be done with arguing," I spoke before Loki could start bitching about Thor calling him a child. "Then I can show Steve and Loki where exactly have I buried the box so Stephen can take me to the healers and get this thing out of me or whatever," I pointed out the most logical plan of action.

Two long strides and the sorcerer was standing over me, boom-boom-whooshing and generally making very pretty golden patterns to appear and land on top of me. Tony and Bruce anxiously hovered behind him, both of my boys concerned and ready to mother-hen me. Ugh, so disgustingly adorable. Wanda's hand encompassed mine - she was nervous.

Stephen took a solid five-minute silence break before coming to a final conclusion. "Wong can get rid of the residual traces of the artifact's influence," The sorcerer announced curtly. "It's good you got rid of the artifact, a few more months and you would have started slipping into insanity if the magic within it was not released," He explained, slowly reaching out a hand to place it on top of my head. I wasn't sure if it was a gesture meant to bring comfort or another diagnostic test but leaned into the touch nonetheless. "Tell me, did you have any behavioral... Disturbances after...?" He trailed off.

I chewed on my lip, evaluating. "I honestly don't know. I've always been kind of an asshole," Honesty was the best policy. "Nothing seems out of order, sleepwalking aside."

"I see," Strange gave me a tight-lipped smile. "Perhaps, it was your stubborn nature that forbade the artifact from corrupting your mind completely. As evidenced by Captain Rogers, even undesirable character traits bring good into this world now and then."

That seemed a little bit hostile. I frowned, giving a questioning look to a frowning Loki.

"Speaking from experience?" Not the one to hold back upon witnessing first-grade bullshit, I withdrew from Stephen's touch, raising a sarcastic eyebrow.

Surprising everyone, the man laughed soundly, eyes crinkling at the corners. "I most certainly do," Shooting me a positively mischievous wink. I felt like I was missing something.

The room's inhabitants slowly ticked out in pairs and threes, eager to complete their assigned tasks. Loki had insisted on coming along to the sanctum with me, even almost getting up in Stephen's face, but Bruce - out of all people - managed to calm the Asgardian down, and together we convinced him his magic would be considerably more useful during the retrieval of the cursed box. Loki was worried - everyone with a pair of functional eyes could see that the spiky attitude was his way of showing he cared about me, which made my insides briefly turn to mush. I didn't expect him to take the title of my best friend so seriously and I definitely was not complaining.

Tony was the last to leave, jittery and shaky, clutching me like it was his last time seeing me, kissing me hungrily in front of everyone. The joke or two he made were weak ghosts of his usual sharp snark.

"I love you and I'll be back soon," I whispered into his ear, feeling him freeze and his fingertips dig almost painfully into my sides. Louder, I repeated: "Not planning on dying any time soon, y'all gotta chill. Let's go, doc?" I addressed the tall sorcerer who was tactfully pretending to be busy with his smartphone.

Wanda pressed a duffle bag into my hands mouthing "clean clothes" a split second before Stephen opened a portal and with a great deal of curiosity, I stepped through it, eyes immediately drawn to the dimly lit space filled with books and antiques. So many books, so many unusual trinkets. The chandelier that hung over our heads rivaled the ones I'd seen in million-dollar-homes of dad's friends.

"Follow me," Stephen extended an arm in the direction of a smaller door, "Please do not touch anything."

I walked a pace behind him, satisfying my curiosity by looking around like a child in a candy store. The air smelled different in the Sanctum, almost as familiar as Loki's magic but less frosty... Warmer. A dash of red fabric swished from somewhere towards me; I giggled. The Cloak of Levitation liked me - not nearly as much as it liked Peter though - so I brushed my fingertips along the fabric, greeting it quietly. Talking loudly in this building was out of the question. I felt like any moment, a disgruntled librarian would appear to chastise me for making noise.

"Strange," A short Asian man appeared, book in hand and looking none too happy. Guess that's the librarian... "I got your text. The room next to yours is prepared for the ritual," The man I assumed to be Wong gave me a curt nod in the way of greeting, doing a quick 180° and walking us back to a small but tastefully decorated room with a single cot in the middle. It was pleasantly warm, a small fire lit in the fireplace, willowy smoke of incense rising from a few strategically placed sticks.

"The bathroom is that way. I'm afraid you'll have to be fully nude for the procedure," Strange declared apologetically, pointing to a door hidden behind the divide.

I snorted, but of course, the weird voodoo shit would require me to be naked. Not that I was embarrassed or anything but still. Tony would have a field day. Locating a chair, I dumped my duffle bag on it, flying out of my hoodie and sweatpants in record time. My underwear and socks followed, feet unpleasantly chilly despite the carpeted floor. I ran a hand over the faint bruises on my hips, evidence of last night, fondly - either Tony or Stephen had left marks on my body and that was... It was great. I loved it, drugs or not.

I heard someone clear their throat and turned around, nearly cracking up at the way both men suddenly averted their gazes, blush riding high on their cheeks. I snorted: "I'm hot, what else is new?"

Wong shook his head, busying himself with some sort of a book; Stephen lingered, eyes fixated on the very same bruises. His tongue darted out, wetting the plush of his bottom lip, and damn, this wasn't the time to get horny. I shook my head and with that, the sorcerer caught himself too, mutely motioning me to lay down on the cot.

"Whenever you're done eye-fucking each other," Wong piped up sarcastically - wow, I liked this man already. Stephen grumbled something quiet and rude, provoking another snort from me.

I followed their instructions - shortly after the Asian man began reading - or rather singing - something in a language I didn't know, I felt myself fall into a deep sleep. Or, I thought I was falling asleep. At one point, my eyes opened to an empty room, a thin sheet covering my bare body, and a silence that made chills run down my spine.

"Stephen?" I called out. I sounded like I was underwater to my own ears. "Wong?"

I was met with silence so deafening, I had no choice but to sit up and look around. The fire was burning strong in the fireplace, several logs blackened from it as sparks flew. It took a second for me to realize it made no sound - there was no crackling. Something was very wrong, the dread was creeping up on me.

Very familiar dread.

With the sheet firmly wrapped around me, I hopped off the cot, suddenly noticing the drawings on my arms, my legs. I was covered in runes similar to the ones I had seen on the cursed box - and my memories weren't missing. As clear as day, I recalled messing around with the box, debating on opening it, taking it out of my room only to find it back on my desk in the morning, some serious Anabelle shit.

I jumped as the floorboards cracked somewhere in the house. Every logical thought I had, backed up by every horror movie I had ever watched, screamed at me to NOT go towards the creepy noise; like moth to a flame, I was drawn in and couldn't resist the unnatural urge to investigate it. On silent feet, I padded out of the room, desperately trying not to think about the lonely, dark hallways filled with strange ancient objects. My steps made no noise.

On the couch, in the main room we'd arrived, sitting lazily, was Tony. I'd recognize his hair anywhere - and the Led Zep tee, old, frayed edges and loose threads. "Tony?" I asked hopefully, trying to make sense of this...

He turned around.

It wasn't Tony. Whatever it was, it wore Tony's face, it held his brown eyes and crow's feet around them - it wasn't him. Wrong, like the lack of sound in this place, misplaced and unnatural. The doe browns didn't sparkle, lifeless, dull color of dried mud. As much as I wanted to go and bury my face in his chest, my limbs filled with lead, my whole body screaming "DANGER".

The impostor kept quiet which only solidified my suspicions. Real Tony would be running his mouth already, poking fun at my impression of a sheet ghost.

"Princess?" The... Thing asked in Tony's voice, but it fell flat and monotone.

"Whatever you are, you sure as Hell ain't Tony," I stated firmly, hoping for some answers. "What the fuck?"

Not-Tony's face changed, familiar features twisting into something sinister, the malice making me sick to my stomach. The creature stood up, causing my feet to take an involuntary step back as he advanced slowly.

"You have no choice but to submit," The Thing replied calmly. "You're not getting out of here. Not even your little Asgardian pet god can save you," Its tone was absolutely flat. I would have thought the thing was a robot if not for the obvious involvement of magic in this situation. Its words filled me with dread as thick as molten lava; unfortunately for the creature, unlocking my memories gave me enough rational balance to be acutely aware of it and therefore, able to fight it.

I could fight it. I didn't know how exactly, but I could resist it. "That's a really bold thing to say for something that... What even are you? Magical STD?" As my brain desperately focused on finding a solution to a problem I didn't know all the details of, my mouth had a mind of its own.

The creature growled, a far more primal noise than a human could make. "You don't know what you're up against, child. I am one for we are many," Suddenly, the room was filled with shadows as if someone had turned off all the lights and cranked up the moon to be the brightest it ever was. The shadows moved, oozed, motion sinister without any light to back it up.

I had no choice but to pucker up. Nobody was coming to rescue me; in fact, I always have taken pride in being a self-saving princess. Damsel in distress wasn't really my style. The hunch in my shoulders disappeared, giving way to a stubborn and stiff expectation of the upcoming altercation, hands bailed in fists.

"I mean, like Legion the demon from the Bible?" I recalled what little I knew from Wikipedia. "I mean, I'm agnostic myself, but if you feel like identifying with that, you should probably see a therapist."

The entity growled, shadows gathering around it like fabric on a string, and lunged. Paralyzed by sudden blinding, deafening fear, I turned tail and ran.

THE TAG LIST IS NOW OPEN! @another-stark-sub ​ @mostly-marvel-musings  @vozit ​ @littlegasps ​ @pilloclock ​ @shereadsinquiet @downeyreads ​ @hermione-grangers-wife ​ @individualistfem ​ @sleep-i-ness @capbrie @lillsxd @agustdowney @dee-vn @justanotherblonde23 @fanngirl19 @persephonehemingway @softie-socks @schemefrenzy @letsby @cutenessloading @romeo-the-cactus @jelly-fishy-babie @mikariell95

[isitneccessary]

BEYOOOOONDS - Kinoko Takenoko Taisenki Lyrics + Hyadain’s comments

The longest song on BEYOOOOOND1St is going to also get the longest translation post.

If you are familiar with Japanese snacks, you might know about Kinoko no Yama and Takenoko no Sato and the rivalry they have, but if you’re not, you can read about it here. In November 2019, RFRO member Takase Kurumi actually blogged about this conflict, and said that she was on team Kinoko while most of the group prefer Takenoko. Ironically, in the song, Kurumi is the leader of the Takenoko army. For a while I thought that this blog post had inspired Hyadain to write the song, but thinking about the timing, it’s also completely possible that the song came first and inspired the blog post.

Hyadain being the big deal music producer he is, he also had the opportunity to talk about this song on Musicru, a show he’s a regular on. Since I found what he said pretty entertaining, I translated it, and subtitling superhero Davidguy timed and typeset it so you can all watch and see Hyadain’s message for world peace.

Anyway, here’s the song lyrics.

きのこたけのこ大戦記  | The Mushroom Bamboo Shoot War Chronicle Lyrics & Composition: Hyadain

Original Lyrics | Romaji & Color Code

Ah, why must people fight? When we should help each other instead Even so, a battle where right and wrong cannot be assigned Is being fought right here That is…

Mushrooms! Bamboo Shoots! Mushrooms! Bamboo Shoots! Mushrooms! Bamboo Shoots! The Shroom-Shoot War Chronicle

It’s gotta be mushrooms! No way, it’s gotta be bamboo shoots! Is your head okay? That’s my line! You’re beyond understanding I almost feel sorry for you You’re too stubborn You should just admit it

Mushrooms! Bamboo Shoots! Bamboo Shots! Mushrooms! Mushrooms! Bamboo Shoots! Bamboo Shots! Mushrooms!

For the uninvolved This probably seems like it shouldn’t even matter They’d probably laugh And say that it’s a pointless battle But this is justice itself A creed that can never be dirtied

War only leads to more war, but For our truth, This is the only answer

Hatred only leads to more hatred, but There’s one thing that can break the chain Victory! Victory! Victory! Victory! Victory! On that there is no compromise

“First move, Player Ichioka. “Mushroom to G4. “Second move, Player Takase. “Bamboo shoot to F2.”

With battles taken and lost, it’s a fierce competition Oop! Let’s take a break for lunch! What’s on the menu!? “General Ichioka must be having mushrooms!” “Of course, General Takase is having bamboo shoots!”

Here, there and everywhere the battle continues Our word against theirs, both sides playing dirty Bystanders get dragged in, and it heats up even more At this point we’ve lost the original point WAR! WAR! WAR! “Wait, everyone! We shouldn’t be fighting!” “You’ve lost sight of what really matters.” “Look into your heart, and try to rethink things!”

I never hated you I just didn’t want to acknowledge your viewpoint My convictions won’t change But I’ll accept you, Mushroom/Bamboo Shoot

No, we haven’t reached complete peace And we should be sad about that But, there must be a path that allows us To live while accepting each other

Because humans can love Because we have considerate hearts It’s wrong to hurt others So, let’s join hands La La La….

“And so, the “Shroom-Shoot Ceasefire Agreement” was passed However, the two sides were still not able to completely understand each other But, dear audience, that is what humans are. That is what it means to live. We accept our differences and walk alongside each other. Long live Mushrooms! Long live Bamboo Shoots!”

[crystaljins]

Would I choose you? | 02

Characters: Jimin x Reader

Word count: 4.5K

Synopsis:  Every year the graduating class of International Academy for Superheroes and Sidekicks are allocated to their future partner. They will work with their partner for the rest of their working lives.

Jimin, the star of your academy and picked as the favourite to succeed in life, is not pleased when he is allocated to you, the school loser.

Superhero!au.

Notes: This fic was inspired by Sky High so I don’t know how it ended up so different from the actual sky high... Keep an eye out for sky high-esque features though >:)

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Despite all your bravado about proving Jimin wrong and showing the world how great a sidekick you could be, the first distress call the two of you answer after a week of living together does not go smoothly. So far, in your quest to apprehend a group of wanted criminals, Jimin has sustained a knife injury from a surprise ambush, three of the civilians you had been evacuating to safety had been kidnapped while you aided Jimin after his injury and the success of your mission currently depended on the actions of a very unreliable assistant.

“So let me get this straight,” Jimin asks hesitantly, though not unkindly. One hand is clamped firmly over the knife wound on his forearm. He seems more uncertain and in pain then angry. “You want me to leave the lives of three civilians in the hands of a rat you befriended a week ago?”

“Well, he doesn’t have hands.” You admit nervously. It’s hard to read his expression with his helmet on. You can only see his lips and his chin in his full hero gear but you can make out the sweat that beads on his upper lip. “So we’re leaving them in his claws-“

“Ok no. I’m going in.” Jimin exclaims in a pained exhale, making to push past you. You stop in front of him, extending your arms out on either side of you, blocking his advance.

“You can’t in that state! The second those creeps know we’re here they’ll shoot the civs! Just wait till Ratbert gets back from scoping out what we’re dealing with, ok? If we can get in without them noticing us we can take them down! Besides, we wouldn’t even have this problem if you’d let me evacuate the civs in the first place.” You protest, adjusting the quiver of bow and arrows on your back, the weapon assigned to you by the government based on your weapon proficiency scores. You can sense the disbelief that rolls off Jimin without even trying.

“I know, I made a mistake, but the guy was armed! I needed assistance and I thought you had gotten them all out but- wait... its name is Ratbert?” Jimin responds incredulously. Then he sighs. “Look, you know what, I don’t even care what it’s name is- how do you know we can trust a random rat? The only reason you met him was because he was chewing through some of the food in our pantry, which by the way wouldn’t have happened if you just let me set some mouse traps-“

“That’d kill them!” You protest. He nods.

“Yeah that’s kind of the point!” He cries, before remembering he needs to watch his voice. Your eyes go wide and teary and you know he can see it through your mask because he backtracks quickly, remembering your fight over this matter earlier in the week. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it- I know rats have feelings too and we could have left Ratbert’s 37 offspring without a father.” He says to placate you. You look away, blinking back the tears.

“42. His wife had another litter.”

“Another? You said he promised no more!” Jimin cries, before remembering himself. “Look, we can deal with the rat infestation later- how do you know we can trust this rat?”

Your bickering is interrupted by the sound of a scuffle near your boots- you look down to see Ratbert scurrying towards you. Instantly you reach out for him with your empathy, feeling the bond that allows you to communicate with animals click into place.

“3 blocks of cheese is so not worth this.” He squeaks indignantly, and you crouch to your feet. You feel rather than hear the words, since that is how your ability works. People had asked you how it felt to communicate with animals in the past in the hopes that they could learn it, but it isn’t like speaking the language of each species. It’s a telepathic connection through your empathy that allows them to communicate at the same level as you.

“What did you find?” You demand wordlessly. Ratbert’s nose twitches as he peers up at you with beady eyes.

“Well there’s four of them.” He answers. “They all have that weird dangerous device you told me to look out for.”

“Guns.” You correct him, reminding the rodent of the terminology you had taught him a mere half an hour ago. His whiskers twitch.

“There are three humans that look like they’re trapped. They’re wrapped in those string things you talked about but I think I can chew through them. And I could see a hole large enough for you oafs to squeeze through without detection.” He tells you. He scratches lazily behind his ear with his tiny claws. “When do I get the cheese? My wife’s got a lot of babies to feed and I lost some valuable time gathering this information for you, not to mention you want me to move out next week and that’s gonna be rough on the kids-“ 

“As soon as those civs are safe.” You promise, before turning your attention back to Jimin who has been watching the whole exchange with a morbid sort of curiosity.

“What’d it say?” He asks slowly.

“Only four. Armed with guns. There’s an entrance around the back that is covered enough that we can probably enter into and once we’re in the room I think we can disarm them. Ratbert will lead us to the hole he found. The civs were restrained with ropes apparently, but Ratbert says he can chew through them so we just have disarm the guards which I guess I can use my arrows and you can take out the other two with your powers.” You say. Jimin nods his head slowly, before glancing at the rat that sits between you. The large gash on his arm continues to ooze blood and a trickle of sweat drips off his jaw.

“Let’s just get this over with.” He gasps. 

It seems that your first mission is littered with endless obstacles, however. As it turns out, the ‘hole’ Ratbert was speaking of is a window near the roof of the building you want to break into. Scaling the side of a building is easier said then done with Jimin as injured as he is. Jimin can only stare in dismay at the distance between you and your goal while the two of you scramble for a solution.

“We could try the grappling hook feature on my utility belt?” You suggest hesitantly, while Jimin continues to stare at the window. He glances down at his own utility belt- unlike yours, it is not equipped with various gadgets. Instead, bottles containing water hang off his waist since Jimin’s powers probably have all the functionality of your utility belt when he is not injured. He deliberates for a moment before glancing at you.

“Will it hold the weight of both of us?” He questions tentatively. The government official who had briefed you on the functionalities of your utility belt certainly seemed to think so and you tell Jimin as much. He nods, glancing up with trepidation at the high window once more. “Right. Then, fire away I guess.”

You remove an arrow from the quiver strapped to your back and unravel the coiled rope concealed in the buckle of you belt. You hook the end of the rope to your arrow before firing upwards. The arrow lodges into the wood of the window frame above you. A rope now connects you to the window frame and with a quick adjustment the rope will begin to coil up, and hopefully pull you upwards in the process. 

It takes Jimin a moment to realise the implications of what he must do if he wishes to be propelled upwards alongside you. He clears his throat as he takes a hesitant step towards you.

“Today would be nice.” You hear Ratbert squeak from where he is already waiting at the window two stories above your heads. You dutifully ignore him as Jimin slides his arms around you. He is not particularly tall but he is still taller than you and at this proximity you can smell the sourness of his sweat from the exertion of hand-to-hand combat earlier. He hooks his injured arm over your shoulder and curls his finger around your belt.

You had promised yourself, earlier in the week, that you were over your silly crush. Perhaps it had been acceptable when Jimin were nothing but a handsome and well known stranger in the hallways of the academy, untouchable and distance like the models on the cover of a glossy magazine. But now he is your partner- you coworker, essentially, one who does not fully trust you yet. One you have to impress for the sake of your career and dreams, and there is no place for a schoolgirl crush in a partnership as vital as the one you now hold with him. Still, as you glance up to see his face concealed beneath the visor of his helmet in perhaps the closest proximity you ever have held with him and probably ever will, you realise that perhaps this pesky crush of yours will be more difficult to shake than you initially thought. 

Still, you are stubborn, practical thing- it is how you managed to top every exam throughout your difficult education despite such meagre powers. And so you ignore the way your heart races as Jimin clings on to you and instead deploy the mechanism. As expected, it pulls you upwards with ease and you are both able to climb through the window into the landing beside it without the detection of the four-armed criminals on the floor below. The building you’ve snuck into is an abandoned warehouse- a metal walkway wraps around the four walls of the building but leaves the expansive concrete of the first floor open to your view.

This is unfortunately the easy part- as you quickly learn, disarming four armed men without alerting the others to your presence is far more difficult than either of you could have predicted. Jimin crouches beside you and signals with his hands for you to take aim while he conjures a ball of water from his belt and freezes it into a blunt weapon. He then launches himself off the landing, disappearing soundlessly into the floor below. Taking a deep, calming breath, you aim at one of the men with your bow and arrow. 

“What are you waiting for?” Ratbert asks when he registers your hesitation. The thing is, you have no intention of maiming him or anything awful like that, but you do not see how you can disarm him at this distance without seriously injuring him.

It is your hesitation that costs you and when Jimin moves to disable the first guy, expecting you to do the same, that is when all chaos breaks loose. The other three men are quick to learn their comrade has been disarmed and dealt with. That leaves Jimin on the ground again three men armed with guns with three civs to protect. You know you’ve messed up when the first bullet goes off.

You are unsure how you survive the ensuing chaos. Everything is a whir of gunshots and the sounds of ice shattering as Jimin utilises his hydrokinetic powers to deploy far more ice shields than he can handle in his injured state. You manage to shoot the gun out of one of the guard’s hands with a blunt ended arrow, before joining the fight yourself. Ratbert uses the chaos to free the civillians from their binding but it isn’t enough. 

The criminals are forced to flee under Jimin’s relentless assault and your frantic flailing. This would have been an acceptable outcome except for the fact that the whole point of the distress call had been to apprehend them. They leave you with three injured civilians, Jimin bleeding and barely conscious, and the bitter knowledge that you have failed. For your mission was to arrest the criminals, not allow them to kidnap and injure three civillians and then escape relatively unscathed, and perhaps you would not have failed were it not for your initial hesitation.

You do not need the reminder that Jimin delivers as the two of you await the arrival of the ambulance, but that does not stop him from voicing it aloud anyway.

“So much for proving me wrong.” Is his resentful, frustrated comment. It isn’t quite drowned out by the blade of ambulance sirens in the background.

++

“Sounds to me like he’s being a bit of a jerk.” Jin offers helpfully on the phone a week later. It has been a rough week- Jimin did not take well to simultaneously being put out of commission for a while due to his injury and failing his first ever distress call. He hasn’t exactly ignored you but he hadn’t been what you would call friendly or obliging either. Just chilly. Cool and distant, like the water he can control and manipulate.

“But the mission was a bit of a disaster.” You say in Jimin’s defence, but it is half-hearted. The truth is, you are lonely and miserable and Jimin’s passive aggressive attitude hurts a lot more than it probably should. You hadn’t fooled yourself with expectations that you would get along with your hero, knowing the reputation that preceded you, but having the hope extinguished so brutally still hurts all the same. 

“So what? It’s your first mission. Everyone fails their first mission.” Jin points out. You scoff.

“Liar. I saw you in the newspaper last week for busting that bank robbery.” You counter, but it is good-natured. You’d never begrudge Jin his success no matter how bad things seem to be going for you.

“Yes, well I am exceptional and thus an exception to that rule.” Jin sniffs in response. You laugh and sigh into the phone. It has only been a couple of weeks but you miss him and your other friends and you miss your family and the only contact you’ve had with a living being in the past week is the pigeon building a nest on your windowsill and an injured robin you had nursed back to health. And while both had been nice enough, they weren’t really substitutes for human interaction.

“I wish you had been there.” You say wistfully. “If it had been you you probably could have turned the guns into potatoes or something.”

“That’s a low blow- you know I have trouble with savoury foods.” Jin gasps in mock offence. “But don’t torture yourself like that, ok? You did the best you could and next time you’ll be better. These things take time.”

“I know.” You confess dejectedly. “It’s just so hard. I’m living in a new city and my best friend lives an hour away and Jimin hates me. Maybe I should have just quit when his mum asked me to.”

“Don’t say that- it can’t all be bad! What about that pigeon you befriended that you told me about last week? Is she still nesting outside your window?” Jin asks in a last-ditch attempt to cheer you up.

“Yes.” You mumble into the phone. “She laid her eggs yesterday and is pretty nervous about them- apparently they’re her first hatchlings.”

“See! That’s exciting! And the alley cat stopped swearing at you every time you walk past, right? So not everything about this city is bad. Tell you what- a friend of mine owns a pet store in your area- why don’t you order in some grain in for Val and the three of us can have lunch together. Sound good?” Jin coaxes and you sigh. 

“I guess...” you answer. A ruckus in your living room distracts you, followed by Jimin calling your name softly in the other room. “Anyway, I have to go Jin, I think Jimin wants me for something.”

“Say no more,” Jin says cheerfully. “Gotta resolve those lover’s quarrels before they get to out of hand, after all.”

You retaliate by hanging up on him. Right as you do, you hear and alarmed cry coming from the other room. You are instantly on guard, racing into the room, prepared for an ambush. In your living room, Jimin is standing on the back of the couch, his eyes wide with alarm. You are unsure how he got up there with his arm in a sling.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” You cry. Jimin just shakes his head as words fail him for a moment longer.

“Why are there mealworms in the fridge?” He almost screeches when he recovers his voice. Your eyes go wide- you had bought them the other week to feed the robin you had been nursing. You had meant to get rid of them once she had been well enough to be released, but it had slipped your mind.

“I… well… You see, there was this bird and I-“ You say slowly. Jimin’s eyes bug out of his head and he leaps down off the back of the couch.

“Look, I know I said it was fine for you to do the whole nurturing wild animals thing, and it really is fine, but we talked about this! None of your weird animal food in the fridge and none of the rats are allowed in the eating areas!” He cries. “Is that so unreasonable?”

“Well, the rats moved out because an alley cat has started living on the fire escape so-“ You say slowly, and Jimin sighs.

“Is that why your hand is all bandaged up? Did you try and pet the feral cat?” He asks. You glance down at where you have haphazardly slapped some bandages over your wrists and arm after the alley cat got a little stroppy with you when you asked him to stop fighting other cats at weird hours because it was interrupting your sleeping schedule.

Rapidly, all the fight seems to drain out of Jimin- he sinks to the couch and squeezes both eyes shut. Defeat is written into every line of his posture and he runs the hand that is not currently in a sling through his hair.

“You know what, never mind.” He says. He blinks open one eye. “I called you in here because I just got off the phone with my mum. She has requested I take you out for dinner tonight and has offered to pay.” He says tiredly. He offers you a weak smile. “Where would you like to go?”

You frown- you are unsure why his mother is suddenly suggesting he treat you to a meal. The last contact you had was her giving you one last warning to quit outside the principal’s office. You know Jimin has had a few fights with her on the phone over the matter, and so for her to suddenly request such a thing instantly has you on edge. Still, this is the most interaction you have had with Jimin all week and you aren’t about to pass up the opportunity to get to know your partner better and hopefully move past the disastrous outcome of your first ever mission together. You would even go so far as to say that you’re excited- perhaps this is the chance for a new start you had been hoping for. It seems that Jimin is finally willing to give you the time of day- perhaps he actually wants you to be his partner? Or at the very least, perhaps you can convince him to accept you as his partner.

You aren’t particularly familiar with the area and neither is Jimin since you’ve only lived together for two weeks, and so you resort to looking up nice restaurants on Jimin’s phone. You settle on a sleek but fancy Italian restaurant that’s only two stops away on the train line. You dress in the nicest clothes you have at your disposal, and Jimin steps out of his room looking unfairly handsome in his button-down, even with one arm in a sling, and dress pants. He looks at you and smiles awkwardly- if you didn’t know any better you’d say he looks a little guilty, but what reason does he have to be guilty? You shake off the thoughts and let him lead the way.

The restaurant is fancy and way out of you price range- you are glad that Jimin’s mother is paying. The carpet is a plush, velvety red and the tables are draped with pristine white cloth. Jimin is fidgety as the two of you are seated- he keeps nervously running his fingers through his hair and tugging at the buttons on the cuffs of his sleeves. The uneasy feeling you had when he first informed you his mother was paying for your dinner returns- what exactly is it that has Jimin on edge? You realise with dread pooling at the base of your ribs that your hopeful thoughts earlier were a little foolish- Jimin had been close to ignoring you all week and his mother hated you. This was probably not the request for a fresh start and another chance to prove yourself that you had been hoping for.

You lose your appetite and are reduced to picking awkwardly at your pasta. Jimin doesn’t speak and neither do you- you both simply sit in silence. Finally, it seems Jimin has had enough for he stops idly twirling his pasta around his fork and sets it decisively beside his plate. He lays his uninjured arm neatly on the table and stares straight at you. You look away first, still on edge and unsure about the intentions behind this dinner.

“You’re probably wondering why my mother’s paying for our dinner, huh?” He inquires softly, almost gently. You do not want to betray your burning curiosity and merely respond with the slightest nod. Jimin chuckles lightly, but it is not a friendly sound- more like a nervous, pained exhale that hiccupped on the way out. When he looks at you, his eyebrows are knitted together. A thin line sits between where they meet and his gaze is troubled. “It’s no secret she wants you to quit.” He confesses. Your heart drops- so this was the motivation behind this nice dinner.

“And you?” You ask softly. Your voice trembles perhaps a little more than you would have liked. You regret your inability to conceal your emotions. Jimin dabs nervously at his mouth with a napkin, an entirely unnecessary action considering he has yet to take a bite of his dinner.

“I…” He begins softly, hesitantly. He reaches for his water and takes a long sip. Finally he gathers the courage to look at you. The look is unreadable. You are tempted to read his emotions, but something tells you that you won’t enjoy what you sense there. “I’d like for you to step down. I admittedly didn’t think it’s fair for me to get a new sidekick just using my connections. I wasn’t going to let her bully you into quitting. But… it’s just that I don’t think we work well together and I’d prefer it if you quit right now.”

For a second, you blink uncomprehendingly. Then his words sink in.

“I… you want me to quit?” You ask, your voice cracking. Jimin stares at you for a long moment, before nodding slowly.

“I think it would be best. For both of us.” He confesses. “I know that professional allocators assigned us together, but I can’t see us working well. I’ll go on the waiting list and I’m confident I’ll find a new sidekick, and I’m sure you can find an alternative career path-”

“Why?” You interrupt. It’s a little hard to hear him over the roaring in your ears but you are suddenly aware of an unfamiliar emotion. It is anger- you rarely feel angry but you are angry now. “Why should I be the one to quit? If you’re so sure we won’t work well together and the allocators were wrong, why don’t you step down? Find another career path while I get assigned a new hero? Why do I have to be the one to quit?”

Jimin blinks, as if he hadn’t considered that an option before. He looks puzzled, as if the concept is foreign to him and he never considered the possibility that he should be the one to quit if he wasn’t willing to work with you. Perhaps his confidence in his connections is why it’s never crossed his mind- if you were to quit and he went on the waiting list, lots of sidekicks would be lining up to be paired with him because of his family and his potential. But if he were to quit, you don’t stand a chance on that waiting list- he would essentially be destroying both your careers. So while it makes sense for you to be the one to quit, it does not make it any more fair or reasonable.

“What does it matter if you quit or I quit? Why are you so determined to be a sidekick anyway?” Jimin asks, a bit defensive. “Your powers aren’t exactly designed for crime-fighting. Wouldn’t it be easier to just choose a new career path? You haven’t done anything to live up to the reputation you have at the academy- why can’t you just quit and let me actually have a shot at succeeding? Is it because you have feelings for me? I’ve heard the rumours, but I didn’t think-”

Your eyes bug out of your head- you have never felt more offended in your life. You don’t know how he knows about your silly little crush but you are far more preoccupied with offence at his insinuation rather than the little details like how he knew.

“Excuse me?” You ask incredulously- you rise to your feet, too upset to remain seated. Jimin’s eyes widen when he realises that your dinner is escalating to a spectacle. “Did you really just imply I’d only want to be paired with someone like you because I have feelings to you? That I’d let something like a crush cloud my professional judgement that much? I’m in this profession because I want to help people, and if I quit now I’ll never get that chance. So no, I’m not going to quit. You’re more than welcome to quit but I’m not going to give up my dreams because you can’t see past the end of your nose and you think for some reason that you’re a gift to humanity.”

Jimin is speechless. You want to say more, you do. You want Jimin to regret his hurtful words- you want him to understand where you’re coming from. You want him to give you another chance to prove yourself. You want to push past the humiliation of having your crush exposed. You want a lot of things, but you don’t get the chance to.

Jimin’s phone begins to beep with an alert- it’s your next distress call.

[sweet-taiyaki]

Sin City Sour

Warning: Some violence, sexual themes, angst, gun violence, language

I was celebrating how I managed to smuggle in illegal drugs with my team. All of a sudden, I was approached by these men, that were armed. “Get dressed, we have to take a ride. The boss wants to meet you.” Oh, how romantic. Nothing like being blindfolded by a bag, hands zip tied, and legs strung together by rope. Unfortunately, I’m in this situation more than you think. Don’t tell the bad guys, but I’m actually a CIA agent undercover. My real name is Vincent Hawthorne and today I’m playing the part of Benito Salazar, a member of a Spanish cartel shipping an illegal drug to the States. I basically feel like an infamous citizen at this point by all the missions I’ve done. I barely even know who I am anymore.

The men tie me to a chair and remove the bag from my head. I can see my gun, my burner phone, and my speedo. There were two men on each side of me with AK-47s. They seem poorly built though. “The boss” comes out of the shadows and starts laughing. “Out of all the idiots in the world, this is the top Spanish cartel leader? ¿Cuál es tu propósito? (What is your purpose),” he asked. I stood silent. This guy seems like an amateur leader that just wants to move up in the cartel hierarchy. My job is to prevent that from happening. “Mi equipo no puede ser derrotado. Decidimos matar a cualquiera que se estorbo. (My team cannot be defeated. We decided to kill people that get in the way),” I said confidently. My Spanish is okay, well actually all the languages I’ve learned are okay. I just basically know the gist of killing people and it seems to work. His guys grip their guns. They seem pretty intimidated, or angry. I see my phone go off, Costa was the name of the contact. The boss looks at my phone. “Yo no respondería (I wouldn’t answer that),” I said. The boss answers it anyway. The first bombs go off as warnings. “Puta madre!” I bust out of the zip ties and run as I get shot at, but then I set off the second set of bombs that blow up the place. I jump into a properly timed CIA squad car as I peel away the prosthetics and got away before they could escape the building.

“Nice to see you again,” said Ivy. “Just because you are a princess that can’t break a nail, it would have been nice to have some back up,” I said to her as she rolled her eyes. Ivy was an undercover agent, but then she moved up to the head of Intelligence and Foreign Affairs, so now she’s my boss. “I’d love to sit and chat, Vince, but I have another assignment for you.” Spoiler alert, Ivy and I had a small fling when we were on an assignment together, and I think she still has feelings for me, but reading a woman is so hard. “Do you overwork me because you hate me, or you actually give a shit about these citizens? To be fair, I haven’t been called Vince in over 5 years by the amount of undercover work I’ve done.” “I put you on because you’re the best at it,” she said, “At the end of the day, you give a shit about saving the people in the end because you created a relationship with them.” Great. So, now I’m a superhero that comes and goes for people because they ask for help.

Ivy drops me off at my apartment. “See you at 7 am,” she says and drives off. I live in New York. I sleep in this crappy apartment, but the view at night overlooks the Brooklyn Bridge. You would think I’d date, but I can’t by working all over the world from bad guys.

I woke up at 6 am, showered, and stared at myself in the mirror. I almost didn’t recognize myself. The Spanish cartel mission lasted a year and I had my tattoos covered. I had a black wig, but my hair is brown. My nose and jaw were made of prosthetics and I wore brown contacts when my eyes were blue. I almost cried, but I got ready for work to meet the HBIC.

I sat down in a chair, drinking my coffee, then I was approached by this intern that seemed to be starstruck by me. This kid was almost on the verge of hyperventilating. “You’re Vince Hawthorne! I’ve heard so much about you and your work,” he said. I felt like I should play with the kid. “No, no, sir. My name is Fabio. Parli italiano,” I said. The kid seemed in shock. “Oh, I’m sorry, Fabio. I thought you were someone I read about.” Ivy stood up in front of the podium.

“Good morning, everybody. I’m sure you may have heard that the Spanish cartel has been shut down and have been taken into custody. However, we have another mission, and it’s gonna be a little different. This one will only last a month at the latest. Our citizen’s name is twenty-three-year-old, Hayley Fay. She also goes by the name of ‘Rosé’ since she strips on the side without her parents knowing. Fay lives in Las Vegas. She met a client that was acting creepy, bouncers kicked him out, found out he was one of the hitmen to kill her. The mission is to save her from harm and put an end to her creep stalker. Mr. Hawthorne will be with the citizen to keep her safe and I will organize a team to assist him in Vegas in 48 hours. Thank you.”

All the men approach me so they can go to Vegas with me. I immediately find Ivy. “Ma’am, with all due respect, please pick the right people with me. I don’t want these low life, creepy middle aged men working along side me.” She stopped in her tracks, “You really believe that I would do that to those girls, no way. I’m organizing a team strategically. You’ll find the results on your flight. Here’s your identity.” She hands me my passport and state id. Ryan Sparrow is my new name. “Thanks, I appreciate that you put in my love of Johnny Depp in there.” She smiled then said quietly “Captain” as she walked away.

I get on the plane and found out that I’m with the intern. I mean, he was younger than me, but I think the kid is 21. Of course, he sat next to me. “Vince—” “The name is Ryan. Nice to meet you kind sir.” I grabbed his hand and pull his ear to my face. “I realize that this is your first gig, but we are undercover. You reveal my identity, you die.” He was scared and intimidated. We lift off into the air and I took a nap. I woke up and the kid was still a deer in headlights. I roll my eyes, but I knew I had to do something. “Hey, kid. I’m sorry. I’m just in the mode and I don’t want any of us to get hurt.” He nodded and started to realize that this is the real deal and that people could die if he didn’t keep his mouth shut.

We land in Vegas and check in to the Cosmopolitan. My team consisted of 6 guys, we decided to take a bachelor party approach. Jake, the groom; Chase, the best man; Hunter, the little brother of groom; Dylan, childhood friend of groom; Tyler, the kid and coworker; and myself, friend of groom. We got to our rooms and we had the view of the Bellagio Fountains. “Boss, did good,” Chase said. I get a call from Ivy. “Well well well, does this remind you of when we were in Paris,” I smirked. “Enough, Vince. I have cars for everyone that is in the garage. You’ll find the keys in your room. Everything you need for the mission should be in the car. I’ll be on the first flight there if anything goes wrong.” She hung up and we made our way down to the garage to find Mustangs in different colors. The guys got all excited, but these are nothing compared to Lamborghinis. We found burner phones to keep in contact, some pistols fully loaded, earpieces, beer and liquor, and some essentials. Ivy even gifted each of us a designer suit for the occasion.

Unfortunately, I’m the only one in the group that has been to Vegas, so the guys don’t really understand the lifestyle. Tonight, we plan to let loose, so they know the ins and outs of Vegas. Hopefully, they will remember it all. We pregame with shots of liquor, then hit the strip. The guys were in awe how women would just flirt with them. I got a table at a club, which is instantly a chick magnet. The guys picked a girl to flirt with and I went to the bar. “A Boston Sour, please.” The bartender seemed surprised. “Any preference on bourbon,” she asked. “Whatever you like,” I said confidently. She smiled and made the cocktail. “It’s nice to make something that isn’t White Claw or a vodka lemonade,” she said. “Now I know what to order next.” She laughed and served another guest. I do some surveillance of the club. There seems to be a good amount of security around the club, but then I found out that there was a table across the club that had men in suits that didn’t want any women at their table unless they stepped on the dancefloor. I looked away before they could notice me. The group of men left the club. I told the team that I would follow them through the earpiece.

At this point, I sobered up and was in the mission. I followed the group of men to a strip club, which happened to be Harley’s workplace. They went inside, but I decided to take a detour by going around to the back door. Fortunately, I found Hayley before her shift started. She worked the graveyard shift, midnight to 6 am. Hayley and the dancers looked over to me. “Ms. Rosé,” I said. “Out of all the girls, you pick Rosé,” a woman said as if she was insulted. “May I have a word? Just a few seconds, no favors or anything. I just want to talk,” I offered my hand. She took it, but she was kinda nervous. I pulled her out to the alleyway. “I don’t have much time to explain, but my name is Ryan Sparrow. There is a group of gentlemen that are here to kidnap and kill you.” She immediately got scared. “How do I know that you’re not one of them,” she panicked. “I like to think of myself as the ‘superhero’ character. Usually people don’t say that they will kill you. They just do. I’m hired to protect you. Do you trust me?” Hayley looked me and she nodded. I stuck her in my car and drove off.

The last few guys from the group of men saw that I took Hayley. “Ah, shit,” I said. The men got into their SUV and chased me. Of course, they were armed. I knew my gut was right about these group of guys. I tried calling my team to help me out, but the car kept shooting at me. No one answered. I tried to lose them by going through some alleyways and difficult turns, but they didn’t seem to lose their speed. I released some small bombs to pop the tires, but not injure the people around the car. It worked and all four tires were popped. It created a small explosion, but not enough to kill them. The guys continued to shoot at my car, but I ended up losing them, for now.

I got Hayley back to the hotel. She looked around to see all the technology I had set up. She looked at me and started laughing. “So, you must really be my superhero,” she said in a flirtatious way. “Kind of. I like my job and saving lives. I just want to make the world a happier place.” Hayley leaned into me. “Well, you came to the right place. How can I be of service for you?” She stuck her fingers in my pants and ran them across my waistline and crotch. “Hayley,” I said. She stopped and looked at me in shock. “No one calls me Hayley, but my parents. Did they send you to look over me?” She started getting angry. “No, I told you that I’m here to save you. I’ve never met your parents. My job is to get rid of the bad guys so you can be safe,” I said, pretty much like a father. Dammit. “At least your parents are alive. Mine were killed in front of me and I couldn’t react because it would have blown my cover and true identity. After years of being undercover, I don’t even know who I am. I became this robot to save people because I give a shit about justice and doing the right thing. It fucking sucks that I see people die and I can’t have any emotion when all I want to do is bury myself and cry. But I wasn’t put on this Earth to cry. I knew that I wanted to help people.”

I can’t believe I just confessed that, but I knew that it would reel her in and trust me. “I never said that to anyone, and I don’t want to lose you. So please, stay with me and I’ll keep you safe here and get rid of these men out to get you.” I got up as she looked at me and I looked back to her. “You’re gonna kill them,” she asked. I chuckled. “It’s either them or you, and it won’t be you.” She got up, kissed me passionately, and wished me luck as I left the hotel room, which was kinda unexpected.

It’s around 3 am. I get down to the lobby and I found my team completely wasted. I tried to keep my head down, but they recognized me. “Hey man!” They all shouted. I grabbed everyone by the bathroom. “Guys, seriously. Don’t enter my room, the citizen is in there. She’s quite scared so please just act professional.” The intern looked at me and knew that I was serious. “Don’t worry, Ryan. I’ll make sure no one goes in your room.” I gave him a pat on the shoulder and it looked like he was gonna cry. I moved them away and continued my mission to find the group of men.

Surprisingly, I was walking through the Circus Circus casino and saw one of the guys. I stayed hidden, but followed him to the hotel room, assuming the boss would be there. I knocked out the guy I followed after he got to his floor, out of the camera view. There were two big guys chatting outside a room with double doors. A group of girls came to the floor and saw the guy I knocked out in front of them. “Sorry, my friend can’t hang,” I said. The girls laughed and I smiled and winked at one of them. They were going towards the room with the double doors. I follow them and was stopped by the two guys. They closed the door. “No men allowed, turn the other way, pretty boy.” I knocked them out and snuck my way into the room. There was a party going on with a DJ, liquor bottles everywhere and another guarded door.

The guards see me and I make my way to them. “You wouldn’t want to traumatize these women, by a blood bath, would you? Kill me in private, or even take me to your boss.” They patted me down, found my burner phone, and let me in. The boss was covered in girls. All of them were laughing, drunk. I closed the door behind me and the room went silent. “Ooooo he’s cute,” said one of the girls. The boss took out a gun and shot her. The other girls ran out in panic and the boss came up to me. “Pretty boy with the mustang, huh. You tried to save your whore,” he looked me up and down. “She is so beautiful, and out of all the women I’ve bought as my slave, I wanted her. She would have been a great showpiece in my collection.” I started to get angry, but I knew if I showed any emotion, it would blow my cover. “Actually, Mr. Barsotti, I’m a man like you. I cum in girls all day. And when I’m your age, I’m gonna be just like you, buried in women, wanting me. I’m inspired by you and thought that you could give me some tips. No hard feelings. I just want the best and I knew the girl I got was the best.” He laughed and patted my shoulders. “Atta boy, you could be my apprentice. Would you like to join the team?” I nodded and he gave me an M-15. “Do you know how to use it,” he asked me. I looked at it nervously. He pulled a gun to my head. “Well now you do, go out there and—”

I heard gunfire outside the room. I dropped the M-15 and punched Mr. Barsotti. He fell to the ground and his two bodyguards pointed their guns and me and started shooting. I took cover, but I knew they were coming closer. I escaped through the vent to the other room. I saw my team in the room. They killed the door guards and started to help the other women escape. I go back to the room with the bodyguards and fought them. One of them had a knife and managed to slash my right arm. Thankfully, I have even strength in both arms, but both of them were too strong. My face is covered in blood and they wouldn’t stop beating me until they knew I was dead. I could barely move and I knew this was probably the end. I saw them take their guns and point them at my face. I closed my eyes and I heard four guns shots.

“Ryan, Ryan” I heard faintly. I was outside the casino with police cars and an ambulance early in the morning. “Are the girls safe,” I said. “Yeah, they’re safe and Mr. Barsotti was taken into custody. We thought we lost you, man.” My arm was bandaged, and my face had some stiches, but I was okay. “I couldn’t have done it without you guys. Together we gave those women a future.” They all smiled at each other.

I decided to go back to the hotel to pack up and leave. I brought some coffee and a fruit cup for Hayley. I got in my room and she was sound asleep, knowing that she was safe. I woke her up, gave her breakfast. “You’re free, you are safe now. The boss was actually holding women hostage as his slaves and we saved them. So it’s like a double win.” She sighed in relief as she rolled out of bed. “Thank you, Ryan. Do you mind if I call you for all my stalkers? Oh my God, what happened to your arm,” she panicked. “I’m fine, I’ll escort you to your house, if that’s okay.” She nodded.

I took Hayley to her parent’s house. They hugged her as soon she opened the door. I walked back to my car when I heard a ‘wait’. “Please, may I call you,” Hayley asked me. I laughed, wrote on a piece of paper, and gave it to her. She opened it. “Seriously, 911?” I laughed and said, “I can’t always be there for you, unfortunately. I have more people to save. I hope it inspires you to save people.” She turned around to her parents and looked at me, “Thank you, Ryan.” She got back into her parent’s house. “It’s Vince,” I said softly. I drove off and left on the first flight back to New York.

I got back to work the following day. Ivy approached my team and congratulated them on their success defeating Mr. Barsotti and his cartel. “Hawthorne, see me in my office, please.” I sighed angrily. I was not ready to take on another mission. Thankfully, this last one was pretty short and sweet, but I felt another long mission ahead of me. She closed the door behind me and I let loose. “Ma’am, with all due respect, I am exhausted—” “Stop, that’s not what I called you in here.” I was confused, if it wasn’t about work, then what would I be in her office for? “Vince, you save lives, plenty of lives. And I know that what you’ve gone through is definitely not easy. I know you can’t save everybody, but you definitely make the world a better place by taking the bad people to justice. With that, I brought you in today to be yourself.” I laughed. “Be myself, what kind of advice is that?” She rolled her eyes and I know she was trying to be genuine. “We are giving you three months of paid time off. You deserve it after being my partner years ago to now. You are an incredible agent and this is my present to you so you can get back to your normal life.” I contemplated what she said and I know her intention was sincere and caring. “Thank you, Ivy.” We got up and hugged each other. “It’s good to have a friend like you,” I said as I left her office.

I celebrated with the team at a bar. We watched some sports, got a couple rounds of beers. This was me. It just felt right. I saw Ivy come into the bar with a guy and saw her join a group of their friends. I saw there was a ring on her finger, and they kissed. She looked at me and I raised my glass to her. She smiled. Dammit. I lost her.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Fic: Interconnect (ao3 link) - Chapter 5 Fandom: Flash, DC Legends of Tomorrow Pairing: Mick Rory/Leonard Snart

Summary: Fate has decided that Leonard Snart and Mick Rory are soulmates.

Yeah, okay, they’re good with that.

(for @coldwaveweek2017)

A/N: Instead of doing different fics for coldwave week, I decided to do one with multiple chapters, each based on the various days.

Chapter 5: Hurt/Comfort

—————————————————————————————–

"Just a bit longer now, Lenny," Mick says. His hands are clammy and his knuckles are white where he clutches at Len, Len notes absently. "We're almost there."

Len's not sure where they're going.

He's not sure about - well, a lot of things. Not since they put him in the room.

He feels his gut twist at the mere thought of it, the nausea rising in the back of his throat.

"Not far," Mick says encouragingly. His voice is scratchy and rough, almost like he's been shouting for a long time.

Len reaches out and touches Mick's throat.

Mick makes a small, strangled noise. "Yeah, don't worry about that," he says. "You always did worry about the damnedest things."

Len suddenly notices that his other arm is draped over Mick's shoulders, and they're walking - well, staggering - somewhere through a forest. And he's not being helpful.

"I can walk," he says, or tries. It comes out a bit slurred.

"What?"

Make that very slurred.

"I can walk," Len enunciates.

"Don't even try," Mick says immediately. "Just keep helping me."

"Where we going?"

"Somewhere safe," Mick says.

Len thinks about himself - barely walking, slurring, scarcely feeling Mick's warmth pressed by his side - and asks, "Shot?"

"What?"

"I get shot? Stabbed? What?"

Mick gives him an incredulous look.

"Shock," Len points out, defense and rationale both.

"You're bleeding pretty bad," Mick confirms. "I bandaged you up, though, a while back; you didn't notice. That ain't the issue, though, or not most of it. It was the room."

Len shudders.

"Heard about that fucking room," Mick says savagely. "They used to use that sort of thing for medical experiments. Volunteers didn't last four days in there. Anyone left in longer just broke. Made them barely human."

That sounds about right.

It was such a simple room for such horror. A simple room with nothing in it.

But that was the worst of it. The walls were carefully padded, neither firm nor soft, and deadened all noise; there was no light, no sound, no feeling, nothing.

Absolutely nothing and, worse than that, no one.

"Why," Len manages to ask.

He's a thief, yes, and even sometimes a murderer, but that - that was too much. Far too much. For anyone.

"The curse," Mick says. "Fucking neo-Salemist Doc wanted to know if we'd last longer, what with our connection."

We? Len clutches at Mick. They couldn't have gotten Mick. Len won't know how to deal with it, if they did. He'd have to kill them all. No, worse. He'd -

"He didn't get me," Mick assures him. "Just you, but it was bad enough. No objects around, nothing for you to grab onto."

That sounded terrible.

"I could talk to you, but you couldn't perceive anything but yourself in the room," Mick continues. He makes a face. "I spoke to you, but you only screamed."

"Sorry," Len says apologetically.

Mick rolls his eyes, but his face is strained. "Don't. Just - don't."

"Where are we going?" Len asks, belatedly realizing he hadn't asked.

"You're in shock, you're bleeding, you keep going in and out of consciousness, and we've had a version of this conversation three times now," Mick says sharply. "We are going to a goddamn doctor."

Len squints. They are, as far as he can tell, in the middle of nowhere, with forest all around.

"...when?"

"Oh, shut up," Mick grumbles. "It's not as far as it looks."

Good, because it looks pretty damn far.

Except, of course, Mick is right and it isn't, because when they get to the next clearing, a familiar figure in red is there.

"Oh, crap," he says when he sees Len.

Eloquent as always, Barry, Len thinks fondly. Finding out that the kid they'd met at what Len always liked to call the Group Therapy of the Cursed had grown up to be a superhero had definitely been a fun trip.

Not as much of a surprise as it should've been, of course. Barry Allen is afflicted with the most ancient of curses, after all.

'You will live in interesting times.'

Now that's a proper curse.

Of course, Len and Mick also had what people thought of as a 'proper' curse, or they did after that movie about a soulmate curse gone horribly wrong won an Oscar. That's probably why they got paired with Barry by the court therapists.

Len hadn't ever really thought much of the court-mandated therapy sessions, but Mick really liked them - he loved Sung-hui, but he had a tendency to shop around that didn't surprise anyone. After all, Mick had no choice about one of the biggest decisions in his life - namely, Len - unless he wanted to break the curse once and for all, which he obviously didn't (most of the time), so he liked some ability to choose the rest of the time.

Even Mick was surprised when they were assigned to be Barry Allen's mentors for that short time. Maybe they thought they'd be able to bond over visiting Iron Heights a lot, albeit through very different methods...?

Len abruptly realizes that Mick and Barry have been talking while he's been lost in memory.

"- yeah, of course," Barry is saying. "I'm just sorry I can't run you both at the same time."

Wait. He's going to separate them?!

Len must make some sort of distressed noise, because Mick turns to him right away. "I'll be there in under a minute," he promises. "But you need a doc, boss."

Len doesn't want to go. He knows it's childish, but...

"Please, Lenny."

Mick sounds legitimately distressed.

Sung-hui says that Len - who isn't always the best at reading emotions, and Mick, who isn't the best at showing them - should really make an effort to give in when Mick is that upset.

"Fine," Len sighs.

A heartbeat later, he's moving through lightning.

Len keeps his hands grasped tightly on Barry's shoulders and his mouth firmly shut. If he doesn't ask for Mick, he won't have to deal with no one answering. Like in the room. He's not in the room.

He's not in the room -

They're at STAR Labs, and Len's in a hospital bed, hooked up to half a dozen things.

He's not sure if it's a result of Flash speed or if he passed out, and he doesn't really want to know.

"Mick," he croaks. His throat is dry. Has he been screaming again?

"I'm here," Mick says immediately, and so he is, in the chair right by Len's bed.

“What happened?”

Mick pauses.

“I remember the woods,” Len clarifies. “And the Flash. And the room. But – before that…?”

Mick sighs and rubs at his face. “Some asshole neo-Salemists,” he says. “Doctors. Fifty percent ‘witchcraft is just unexplained science’, fifty percent ‘the Christian God when mistranslated says you shouldn’t suffer a witch to live so I won’t’ and one hundred fucking percent bullshit. They’ve been working with General Eiling, you remember him –”

Oh, boy, does Len ever remember him. He kept trying to kidnap Barry under the pretenses that he needed to be kept away from other people for their own safety, but Len broke into his office and planted bugs, and they’d figured out that Eiling was hoping that taking Barry to various troubled parts of the world would result in the ‘interesting times’ curse striking there and starting wars that Eiling hoped to benefit from.

Asshole.

Somehow Len’s unsurprised that he was willing to affiliate himself with the neo-Salemists.

“– and, anyway, you don’t want to hear the whole stupid story,” Mick says. “They got the jump on you, threatening Lisa –”

As a child, Len convinced Brittany, Lisa’s mom, to take her to a witch, even though Brittany didn’t believe in any of that. It’d been mostly lying about the odds of getting a good spell because the world felt it had to balance out Len’s never-specified-around-his-dad curse, which he’d totally made up, but maybe the world did work out that way because Lisa got the gift of grace: perfect balance, agility, and the ability to swan into a room and have everyone stare in awe.

Maybe the last one was just Lisa.

“Anyway, you paused for just long enough for them to hit you with some sort of knock-out gas –”

“I remember that,” Len says. He hadn’t been expecting them to use it on themselves and counting on their allies outside to do the collection job.

“And that’s all she wrote,” Mick concludes.

“What happened to the doc?” Len asks. He has vague memories of faces, of sterile rooms, of the room, but not much. But he knows his Mick.

“Flash got me in,” Mick says. “And I made him crispy.”

“Bet Barry didn’t like that,” Len muses.

“He saw you in the room and helped pull you out,” Mick says grimly. “He knew what it was, told me about all the studies that’d been done and what it did to people, told me exactly how illegal it was and how it gave all scientists a bad name. And then he went for a walk.”

Len’s eyebrows go up. That’s – severe.

“You were in there a week,” Mick says. “Barry says the only reason your brain is still intact is because you were aware of me in some way, thanks to the curse.”

Okay, yes, that’ll do it.

“It was just for science?” Len asks, going back to a far less disturbing subject than Central City’s superhero’s somewhat-greyer-than-most-people-think moral system.

“Not just,” Mick says. “Neo-Salemist scientist. Hates witches, but damn would he like to utilize its benefits.”

“Benefits?” Len echoes, confused.

“Wanted to figure out how to apply the curse to other people,” Mick clarifies.

“But it’s a curse.”

Len loves Mick, it’s not that he doesn’t, but never being able to escape the man for a single moment is sometimes a bit much. You can love someone and still want to shoot them in the face (albeit non-permanently).

Not that the room was better.

Mick squeezes Len's hand. "I got you," he says.

It's a meaningless statement, but it makes Len feel better anyway.

"Doc thought being able to communicate over long distances would be useful," Mick says, his voice still gentle. "Probably thought he could eliminate the bits where it's only one person, you can't pick who it is, and you can't turn it off."

Len nods. He can see the benefit, but the way they went about it...

"I'm here," Mick says again, probably in reaction to Len's face. "I got you."

Again, meaningless. Again, remarkably efficient at making Len feel better.

"So, the bleeding?" Len asks, swallowing a little in order to wet his suddenly dry throat. He's not one for overly long touchy-feely moments, and neither is Mick, who gratefully sits up straight again. "How long's that gonna take to fix?"

"It's stitched up, so a few weeks at least. Also, I called Sung-hui and she's agreed to make house calls."

"To STAR Labs?" Len asks skeptically.

"She arrived a while back," Mick says dryly. "She's already ushered Barry into a private room for one-on-one therapy. He just came out to get her a glass of water, and he looks like he got hit in the head with a two-by-four. In a good way."

Len smirks. "And are the others next on the list?"

"You know how Sung-hui is about people who feel like they can't get therapy because of their terrible law-breaking secrets," Mick replies, which Len takes as a sign that Team Flash will be finally seeing to its mental health needs from now on.

"What about the city?" Len asks, the question occurring to him. He's got a good reputation, a scary one, occasional punctuated with absences, but a long one followed by a hospital stay? The Families will capitalize on that to expand back into the areas he'd cleaned them out of. And he can't rely on the Flash for cover - Barry couldn't be seen actually allying with a crime lord, not for the crime lord side of the business, and anyway he wouldn't really strike the right vibe.

"Lisa's covered," Mick says. "And I'll be backing her, now that I know you're safe."

Len's hand clenches involuntarily. Just because he sometimes wants to shoot Mick doesn't mean he wants him to leave.

"No help for it," Mick says regretfully. "Not till Lisa's established herself, though she's on her way."

Len understands the necessity. It doesn't mean he likes it.

"In the meantime," Mick says, leaning over to grab something from the floor, "I got you something that'll help."

Len frowns. He's not sure what could possibly help. Really, he's out of the room, that ought to be enough for him. He's a grown man. He has a soulmate. He's in a hospital bed, surrounded by useful objects he can use to talk to him, his presence all around. All is well. He might be irrationally unhappy with the fact that his soulmate is leaving, but he can get over it, and at any rate, nothing will help for it.

Mick straightens up and proudly presents Len with –

Mick.

Not the living one, his stubborn, infuriating, wonderful soulmate; but rather the stupid shaggy plush animal that Len had loved the stuffing out of as a child, before he'd fully realized that Mick was Mick and not the dog. It even had the singe marks from Lewis' little lessons-by-proxy.

"You're joking," Len says, his lips twitching uncontrollably. "I thought I lost that."

"We've been raiding your dad's stashes," Mick says. "Him being dead now and all. Lisa found him, said she remembered being jealous of all the time you spent with him before your dad took him away, then she just felt bad."

He offers the plush to Len.

"I'm a grown man," Len protests. "In a public place - in front of our sometimes-enemies!"

Mick doesn't say anything, just keeps holding it out.

Len looks at that ridiculous snarl, the one that he always thought tried so hard to be ferocious but only came off as protective.

"Oh, fine," he says, and snatches Mick away from Mick, settling him comfortably into his arms.

It's not quite the same as having the living Mick in his arms, but it'll do.

Mick grins.

"I'm getting you a polar bear from the zoo," Len warns.

"The brand I got isn't being made anymore," Mick shoots back, knowing exactly what Len's referring to.

"Yeah, yeah," Len says. "Ever heard of eBay?"

Mick blinks.

Len smirks.

One terrifying arsonist-slash-supervillain carting around a polar bear plushie, coming right up.

[blacklodgemusictx]

Snowing in My Mind  by Liz Berry

A frosty tale from the Nourallah-Miller Feb 2020 Northeast Mini Tour

The thing about a blizzard is it sneaks up on you.  At least my blizzard did.

I found myself watching one play out beyond the ticking wiper blades of our rental car as I sat dumbly in the passenger seat.  

When we left Buffalo, it was just snow.  Granted snow was a sight unfamiliar to my southerner’s eyes, but at first it was sort of pleasant.  Watching it swirl down around the car as we cut through it was like seeing it on TV.  Snow on TV means Christmas.  Though Christmas was weeks in the past at this point in February, it was still sort of nice to imagine.

What did you really expect to happen?  It’s February in upstate New York.  Just the idea of February in any place so far from home where real weather is experienced should have been enough to veto this proposed trip completely.  But this was a once in a life time opportunity.  An… adventure.

Somewhere in the swirling whiteness miles and miles behind us is another car.  This one contains Rhett Miller, described somewhere in my research of him as the “founding member of the venerable Old 97's.”  Singer, songwriter, calm, capable if slightly white knuckled driver in these unfamiliar conditions.  Sitting in Rhett’s passenger seat is Salim Nourallah.  Salim has a similarly artistic resume: singer, songwriter, respected Dallas music producer.

Right now the snow doesn’t care who we are.  Right now, we’re just four Texans in varying states of bewilderment trying to get to Massachusetts.  

Shirley, Massachusetts contains the Bull Run restaurant and what - at least on paper - should be show four of the six show run Rhett and Salim are doing on this mini tour.  Of the northeast.  In February.

Up until this moment, the tour proceeded beautifully.  We started in Rochester, NY, then up to Toronto, back down to Buffalo.  Buffalo seemed to be the best show yet: the venue was a converted church owned by Ani DiFranco.  The sound was fantastic, the audience enthusiastic.  There seemed to be no place to go, but up.  We all left Buffalo, elated, wondering what exciting things the next show might hold.

The answer?  Snow.  The entire state of New York appeared to be made of it. The wind no longer swirled the fat flakes gaily around, but seemed to blow them with gale force past the windows.  The orderly ranks of passing snow plows we watched doing their work in Toronto two days before, dwindled to just a plow or two trundling intermittently in front of us.

My husband Doug is at our helm.  He’s doing a beautiful job staying calm.  He knows I’m watching him.  If his resolve starts to fray, mine goes straight out the window.

We start to watch the wrecks.  First it appears to just be the fool hardy ones:  the ones going too fast, the ones who speed up to overtake others going at more cautious, sensible speeds.  We watch the ballet as one car after another spins in an almost graceful loss of traction.  We pass the stranded semi trucks who seemed to breeze by us earlier when the snow began to quicken and thicken.  I fear the semis most.  They seemed to speed by fastest with no regard for tiny, helpless things like rented Corollas.

The funny thing about this weird, new age we all inhabit: disasters can be live streamed.  I kept updates on our new precarious position posted to my Facebook.  Oddly enough my mother watched the whole thing unfold and seemed to sense what Doug already knew:  stay cool or Liz is going to start freaking out.  She kept her comments calm and supportive.  

I stayed in touch with the car behind us.  Check in, guys.  How are you doing? Where are you at?   Salim and I have known each other for over a year.  I would call us pen pals of a sort.  Salim knows I’m afraid.  Fear is just a characteristic. One of many:  I’m tall.  I have hazel eyes.  I’m scared of everything.

Salim says if we can make it to the show in Shirley, he will try to play one of my favorite songs of his, “Don’t Be Afraid” - a song I’ve adopted as a personal happy thought since I heard it.  I’ve carried that song with me through many genuinely scary moments in the last several months and I mentally add today to the list of those moments. In fact, it’s quickly heading for number one.  With a bullet.  The only thing between us and certain disaster is this nice, warm car. This car that I didn’t get any add-ons with.  No extra crash coverage, no road side assistance.  Nothing.

Just like that it happens.  I feel the car lose traction.  We start to skid.  Doug, still perfectly calm, tells me to hold on.  All I can think is we’re about to crash a rental car 1800 miles from home and I didn’t buy the crash coverage.  What do you even do when you crash a car that’s not yours?  

We don’t whip around 180 or 360 degrees the way we watched the other floundering cars.  Doug regains control and maneuvers us to a stop deep in the left shoulder of the road.  He goes outside to inspect, the wool overcoat we found for him at a thrift store back in Rochester snaps in the wind as his cheeks quickly turn red.  He reports back, “We’re stuck.”  The snow is too deep on the shoulders.  We were mired the minute we drifted over.

I text Salim, “We slid off.  We’re stuck.”  I can’t think of anything else to do… so I live stream it.  I put our predicament live on Facebook for my friends and family to watch.  My naturally dramatic side takes over.  I’m thinking about cold, certain death… not about tow trucks and the inconvenience of perhaps missing the show tonight.  Even missing the show was a thought I wasn’t prepared to deal with as we had all of Salim’s tour merchandise - t-shirts, cds and records - in our trunk.  The second we were trusted with the merchandise, I immediately assigned myself indispensable status.  Hand to the forehead in fine, southern belle fashion, How could the show possibly go on without ALL THE TSHIRTS?!

Suddenly, a car pulls over on the shoulder of the oncoming side of traffic.  A tiny figure clad head to toe in a snowsuit, snow shovel in hand, springs out of the vehicle and makes a run for us.  I like to imagine she is some sort of snow flurry superhero who lives for days like these where she can shoot valiantly out of her car, This is it!  This is what I’ve trained for!  No thanks necessary, citizen.  I must go.  I’m needed elsewhere.

The figure immediately starts shoveling snow away from the tires.  One tire, two, three, four.  Doug reaches out a hand like he wants to help.  The figure swats him away.  

A second person pulls over to assist.  This is insanity.  We watched countless people spin out and sit by the side of the road.  No one stopped to help.  No one helped any of the other stranded drivers - at least that I saw.  Two people stopped for us?  Two people are helping us?  

I roll down the window to hear what they are doing.  The person behind is going to push us, rock us and hopefully with the added momentum we can get free and speed away back in to the flow of traffic.  The woman is watching traffic. She will scream through the window when it’s time to go, go GO!!!!  This is attempted once, twice, three times.  The wheels aren’t even spinning (we figure out later it was probably the car’s automatic traction control trying to keep us safe).  Show Shovel Lady is screaming at us.  Why aren’t we going?  As she’s scooped away the snow, she sees we don’t even have snow tires.  WE’RE JUST DUMB TOURISTS, I wail helplessly, WE DON’T KNOW ANY BETTER.  She tells us the area is expecting 20” and to just find a motel.  Give up.

Give up?  Us?  Mwahahahahaha, a tiny voice in my frantic mind laughs.  My guys need me!  I marvel briefly at the thought.  Three days ago, Rhett Miller was just a nice man, a friend of Salim we didn’t really know.  Today he and Salim are “my guys.”  What a difference a blizzard makes.  Trauma bonding, I text to Salim.  Some day back in Texas where there are no blizzards, we’ll all reminisce about that time in New York when tried not to die.  He agrees with me.

Somehow, the plan finally works and we squirt haphazardly back in to traffic. We are shaken.  How is this even happening?  What if we really crashed?  What if that happens again?  What if we aren’t so lucky next time?  Doug says he had a plan.  He would have gotten us out.  He then admits he was the cause.  He sped up to pass someone.  Just like most of the other people sitting lamely by the side of the road now. Oh, good, so we deserved that.  Awesome.

“People are inherently good,” I text Salim with a string of sob faced emojiis.  Good Samaritans helped us!  Even though Snow Shovel Samaritan peppered that assistance with more than a little invective, I could not have been more grateful.      

Back on the road, driving becomes a purgatory of grey and white.  Endless.  Morale is low.  Gas is about to be an issue.  Dammit, it would be really nice to find a bathroom too.

We are scared to stop.  Worried to become icebound again, but we try.  The first attempt is thwarted when we turn in to the Trucks side instead of the Cars area at the next available truck stop.  There was no way for us to back up or get back over.  So we sigh and pull back out.

Next gas station, Doug manages to pull us over and get the gas pumping.  I would really really love a restroom break right about now, but I can’t even see the gas station entrance through the blowing snow.  He asks me if I want to try to make a break for it.  No, just go on.  We again rejoin the crawling flow of traffic.

Albany was the goal through this ordeal.  Albany was clear. I figured if we can just make it there, we could finally see a break in the misery.  Ultimately, though as we trekked the snow continued on its path and covered Albany as well.  No other choice, we just kept going.

Then just as quickly as it began, the worst is over.  We shook the snow off our tail and somewhere near New Canaan, New York, I got my bathroom break, a packet of banana chips and a souvenir New York fridge magnet.  Back on the road once more, I saw the sky for the first time in 8 hours.

So long, blizzard, don’t talk to me, or Doug or our rented Corolla ever again.

Crossing in to Massachusetts, I was suddenly afraid it was just a respite, just a calm pocket in between storms and we were headed back in to it again, but the road never whited out again.  It was just wet and cold.

Last communique had Rhett and Salim still quite a way behind us, so we checked in to our hotel, dropped our stuff and headed for the venue.  There was parking behind the restaurant, beyond a picturesque covered bridge.  We gathered the merch suitcases and headed over the bridge.  When we walked in the back door, Salim greeted us.  I was astonished.  Somehow they made really good time after leaving the majority of the storm behind and managed to catch up with and overtake us.  He hugged me.  Today was 100 years long.  Buffalo was another century.  I was so happy to see him.  Exhausted and dazed, I almost expected to blink my eyes and suddenly be back in the car, lost in the hazy grey white again.

Salim shepherded us up some stairs, instructed us to drop our cases and go find our table.  Eat something.  We’ll worry about everything later.  

We did.  I was suddenly so thirsty.  I couldn’t stop drinking.  The waitress asked me if we needed anything else, I said water.  She pointed at a carafe already on the table.  I gulped it eagerly.  Finally, a tiny bit calm, I enjoyed some food.  Doug ate quickly and excused himself to his station where he started opening cases, removing t-shirts and arranging them to their best advantage.  I watched him across the room.  Four days in and he was already a deft hand at this.  Set up the items, put the cases out of sight, talk to any early birds who happened to wander by before the show started.  Doug hates to admit it, but he’s a natural salesman.

Calmer by the minute, dinner consumed, the lights start to dim.  There he is.  My friend Salim takes the stage.  The show begins and I know we are ok.  A moment I only hoped for hours ago, is finally at hand.  

Salim sings “Don’t Be Afraid” for his friends Liz and Doug.  He tells the audience what we went through together today.  I am grateful for the darkness because the corners of my eyes start to prick and I try not to cry.  That was a sweet thing for him to do.  I love that song.

Later, some sweet ladies, friends of Salim we met at the merch table offer to take a picture of the four of us together:  Rhett, me, Doug and Salim.  A fitting memento:  Me.  My guys.  We are blizzard proof.  I wouldn’t change a minute of that scary, amazing day for anything.    

[squipitme-blog]

Tom Holland on ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming,’ Spinoffs, and Planning for Bathroom Breaks

Spider-Man has become the Hamlet for comic book movie stars. Every actor under the age of 30 wants to put their stamp on the role.

Now it’s Tom Holland’s turn to pull on Spider-Man’s tight-fitting trunks, following in the footsteps of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. After a showy supporting turn in last year’s “Captain America: Civil War,” Holland swings onto center stage with this summer’s “Spider-Man: Homecoming.”

This time Spider-Man is going back to class. “Homecoming” will focus on the complexity of balancing completing algebra assignments in between saving the world. Holland, a 20-year-old English actor, brought a wide-eyed energy to the part in his earlier appearance in “Captain America: Civil War,” and in a backstage interview shortly before footage of “Homecoming” screened at CinemaCon, a theater owner trade show unfolding this week in Las Vegas, Holland had the same youthful enthusiasm that radiates on screen. He spoke at a dizzying pace, recounting his childhood love for the comics and the character. He told Variety about the unusual steps he took to play the teen hero, the future of the wall-crawling character, and the need to plan ahead for bathroom breaks when wearing Spidey’s signature spandex.

Were you a fan of Spider-Man before you got the role?

Fan is an understatement. I had the Spider-Man costume, I had bed sheets, toys, you name it. I’ve always had an argument with my best friend that Spider-Man was way better than Batman. I was a massive fan growing up.

What did you like about the character?

Peter Parker is probably the most relatable superhero maybe ever, because he goes through something that basically everyone has to go through. Whether it’s puberty or talking to girls or doing homework, he does it in such a human way. That’s why he’s such a beloved character, because so many people can relate to him. If you ask any kid under the age of 10 what their favorite colors are, it’s probably red and blue, so he’s got both of those checked off.

Did you reach out to Andrew Garfield or Tobey Maguire when you got the part to pick their brain about playing Spider-Man?

No. I wasn’t in touch with them. They both said some really lovely things about me online. I met Andrew at the BAFTAs the other day. It was cool. He’s such a nice guy and we had a great chat and went our separate ways.

What did you talk about?

We just talked about how fantastic he’s been doing and all the brilliant movies he’s been in lately. He talked to me about how excited I must be and how happy he was for me. It was all great.

What was it like to put on the suit for the first time?

The first time I put on the suit was, I’m not going to lie, a little bit of a disappointment. I was cast as Spider-Man very late into the process of shooting “Civil War.” They’d already been shooting on my stunt double before I had the chance to come to set, so they didn’t have time to make me a suit because these suits take weeks and weeks to make, so they just decided to tailor my stunt double’s suit to me. Now my stunt double was a good two or three inches taller than me and stockier than me, so the first time I ever tried it on it was kind of like a saggy, sad Spider-Man.

But the time I tried it on for real and it fit perfectly was one of the most surreal experiences of my life. It’s been my dream since I was a kid, and the fact that it was coming true before my own eyes was such a crazy feeling. I was just so proud of myself and delighted with how my career had gone and where I was standing.

How long does it take to get into the Spider-Man costume?

It depends. There’s different versions of the suit that we have for different means. Sometimes I have to wear a harness underneath the suit, which takes probably close to 45 minutes to put on all together. If I’m wearing no harness, it probably takes 25 minutes to put on. The tricky part is going to the bathroom. You have to sort of plan in advance. You have to be like, “Look, I think I might need the toilet in 45 minutes, so we have to take this off.” Obviously it’s a very expensive suit, so you don’t want it just swinging down around your ankles.

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With “Civil War,” “Homecoming,” and now “Infinity War,” you’ve been playing Spider-Man for years. Do the films blur into one another?

They all feel like very different movies to me. “Civil War” was such a whirlwind, and I didn’t really know what was going on. I was thrown into the deep end. “Spider-Man” was the best time of my life. I was there with my best friend. We shot in Atlanta. We shot every day and just had an absolute blast. “Avengers” was crazy, because you’re on set every day with actors I never dreamed I would work with. I’m as much a fan as anyone else.

Sony has plans to expand the Spider-Man universe with several spinoff films. Will you appear in “Venom” or “Black Cat”?

I have no idea. I haven’t read a script. I haven’t seen any sort of concept art, so that would be something I would decide on when I see material.

Did you do your own stunts?

I did as much as I was allowed. You attended Bronx High School of Science in New York City to prepare for the part. Was that your idea?

It was a joke I made to Marvel that I wanted to go to a high school undercover to experience what New York high school is really like. They took it very seriously. I went to school for three days and went undercover. I put on an American accent. My name was Ben Perkins. The problem is that Bronx School of Science is for geniuses. You can’t just join halfway through. You have to go through an extensive exam process. A lot of the students were very confused about why I was there, and I think a lot of the teachers were too. So the teachers kept testing me and asking me questions, and believe me, I am by no means a scientist. It was fun and I learned a lot about schools. One of the key characters in the movie, Flash Thompson, was largely informed by my trip. Bullies now aren’t just jocks. They’re rich kids in the nice cars with the fancy clothes. We have a snobby bully rather than a jock bully.

Why did you pick the name Ben Perkins?

That’s my acting coach. He was with me at the time in New York while we were there. I went in with another name, but somebody asked me my name, and I panicked and said Ben Perkins. So I went with it.

Did you ever tell people at the school that you were Spider-Man?

I told one person on the last day and it spread like wildfire. This girl was like, “what’s your deal?” And I said, “I’m Spider-Man.” She didn’t believe me. She just thought I was a nutter.

There’s so much secrecy surrounding the Marvel movies. Were you able to share anything with your family or friends?

You are supposed to be incredibly secretive. I’m maybe not as secretive as they would like. I recently came home from “Avengers” and you’re supposed to hand your script in once you’re finished. They only really give you the pages for that day, and I accidentally took them home and apparently there’s a big old panic at the studio, because no one could find my script and was worried that it would get out. So I put a video on Instagram burning them in my dad’s wood burner just to prove that they weren’t going anywhere.

How is this Spider-Man movie different from previous Spider-Man movies?

We definitely focus on a younger superhero. From the vast amount of superhero movies that we’ve seen, we’ve seen the soldier, the scientist, the billionaire, and now it’s time to see the kid. There’s something interesting in giving a 15-year-old incredible powers and seeing what he would do with it.

I strongly believe a 15-year-old would have the time of his life. It was important that we see Peter Parker enjoying his powers, but also using them to do good. Source : variety

  https://squipitme.com/2017/03/28/tom-holland-spider-man-homecoming-spinoffs-planning-bathroom-breaks/