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canyouhearthelight · 3 years

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The Miys, Ch. 140

And here we have the last chapter of the Food Festival! This is one part I was pretty excited to write - The Closing Costume Party. I wouldn’t have been able to get this one squared away without @baelpenrose and @charlylimph-blog... Both of you caught a few things I didn’t that kept it from making sense from a reader perspective. So thank you both, very much.

I growled softly to myself as I twisted my arms behind my back to pull on my costume. Normally, I was more than flexible enough, but the amount of leverage I needed right now just wasn’t happening unless I was willing to seriously dislocate something. Dropping my hands, I frowned as I jiggled my arms a little to work feeling back into my elbows.

“You really should have fitted this sooner than now,” Conor laughed against the back of my head as he pulled the laces tight on the blood-red corset. Getting one made while laying low and avoiding Hannah had been a nightmare, but it was going to be worth it. I just knew it.

“You just wanted to see me try this entire costume on sooner,” I joked as I felt everything fit snugly - but not too tightly - into place.

Maverick flicked a lock of my hair over my shoulder and positioned it just-so. “It’s not his fault that you couldn’t fit this over your scrubs and have it work for tonight.”

“Who wants to see a corset over scrubs?” I scrunched my nose at the thought while smoothing my sleeves and adjusting my collar. “So far so good?” I asked, slightly louder.

As a credit to their maturity regarding the matter, both men looked me over earnestly before glancing at each other. Conor finally broke the silence. “Aren’t the slits in the skirt a bit… high?” Maverick whispered in his ear, and an expression of utter comprehension glowed on his face. “Oh! That’s… Love, that’s clever.”

I grinned hard enough to cramp my jaw. “Thank you.” Despite how daring the outfit looked, there was exactly zero chance of any wardrobe malfunctions more serious than a hole in my stockings - a near-indestructible nude bodysuit under everything made sure of that.

“Your turn, now,” Maverick insisted, eliciting a groan from Conor, who he had turned toward while brandishing eyeliner.

“Isn’t it bad enough I let the two of you do this?” He gestured at his hair, which was styled within an inch of his life and would sustain an EF4 tornado with minimal loss of glitter.

“Nope,” I popped, still smiling as I sat down to put on my boots. Parvati and Hannah had envisioned tonight to be a sort of return-to-our-roots in a very feral, primitive way, complete with costumes. “We’ve been imagining since before we could cook,” Hannah had pointed out. Between that and the multiple hints that I wasn’t capable of costuming myself, I had gone a bit more over the top than I had originally planned. Hence the corset, the boots, Conor’s hair… although the leather pants the guys were wearing had been decidedly Maverick’s idea and I resisted the need to fall at his feet in gratitude.

Once we were finally costumed, we managed to arrive just-fashionably late to the last hurrah of the Festival. I don’t know who gaped harder - us at the party, or the people who managed to recognize me when they saw me leading the men in. Parvati’s incredible, winding mural was noticeably weathered and patchy, giving the overall atmosphere a post-apocalyptic feel. The only noticeable lighting came from the braziers, and deep, almost subsonic music thumped in my chest, driving my adrenaline just high enough to overwhelm my anxiety.

My nose led us over to the first stall of the night, the smell of charring meat fitting the tone. Per a previous discussion around our costumes, I did not reach for anything but instead Conor took my portion and fed it to me - his idea, this time, though Maverick had readily agreed. It was just enough to set off a few murmurs before I heard a familiar laugh cut through the air.

“Councillor Reid!” Jokul’s voice crowed, turning our heads his direction. Warmly, he clasped my hands when offered, trembling with the laughter he was trying to suppress. “This is an unexpected but pleasant surprise.”

I took a moment to take in his fur trousers and tunic, with rough metal covering vital areas. “The dirt is a nice touch,” I offered, squeezing his hands in greeting. “And Ivan! Well done, sir!”

Ivan rubbed the freshly-buzzed back of his head and grinned. “He actually already had the furs, I just made the armored parts.”

“I meant all of it,” I admonished softly, waving at his work throughout the event.

“Antique, yeah?” Conor asked, gesturing to the furs both of them were wearing.

To his credit, Jokul scoffed. “Absolutely not. Quality synthetic.”

“Don’t let Hannah find out.”

A silver brow arched high enough to impress even Tyche. “Who do you think I commissioned?”

“Clever boy.” I winked at Ivan, eliciting a grin.

In response, Ivan did a runway-twirl, his fur kilt flaring just slightly. “What do you think, Councillor? Can I pull it off?”

With the cheekiest grin my soul could ever manifest, I stared him down. “I think I am the wrong person to ask that.” Even in the dim light, I could see Jokul’s face turn bright red.

“I smell goat,” Maverick interrupted, entirely off topic and completely unabashed.

Ivan’s nose twitched. “Oh, you’re right!” Sniff, sniff. “And it’s on a spit! Let’s find it before it’s gone!”

With that, he snagged Jokul’s wrist and dragged him less like he was an easily two-hundred pound man and more like he was a kite. When I snickered, my former enemy leaned over and murmured “I like the chains, very nice touch.”

I shook the wrist that connected to Conor’s belt and whispered conspiratorially. “Your idea, really. You were so convinced I was leading the entire Ark like this…”

He had the decency to snort. “Seeing it in reality, I was a complete idiot. But it’s quite poetic, and I like it.”

“Poetic?” I asked as I tried to keep pace in the six-inch heels I had elected to wear.

“Are they chaining you down, or are you leading them by their gonads? Or, perhaps, are they saving you from yourself?” He gave a very pointed look at the delicate chains going from the shackles on my wrists to the links attached just above Maverick’s and Conor’s hips.

“Saving me, definitely.” My confession was unashamed and completely sober, the result of the primal music and smells surrounding me.

“Gods agree, someone needs to.”

I didn’t have time to argue before we arrived at the source of the enticing smell - a Jamaican barbecue vendor, who had oxtails, saltfish, and…

“Grilled goat!” Ivan crowed triumphantly. As he started handing out portions from the dancing, grinning vendor, he raised an eyebrow when he noticed that the portion he tried to hand to me was intercepted by Maverick first, and then fed to me rather than feeding myself.

“Not my idea,” I managed around an insanely delicious bite. “Swear.”

“Kink tomato,” he insisted, holding up his hands.

Conor almost choked laughing. “Not our kink either, mate. Just set dressing for the Queen over here.” Taking another bite, he winked at me.

“Ah, Conor’s idea then,” Jokul nodded sagely before erupting in the closest thing to a girlish squeal I could imagine coming from him. “Miss Harper, we’ve been looking for you!”

Shit, I thought to myself. I hadn’t thought of what Charly would say when I discussed this idea with Conor and Maverick, and I was just realizing it was a monumental oversight. Plastering a smile on my face, I turned in the direction Jokul had shouted -

Only to be confronted with what looked like a fox with antlers, a rakish Anansi, the Queen of the Dead, a blind healer, and… a walking shrine? I wasn’t sure what exactly Arthur was dressed as, but I could clearly identify a shabby tweed suit, his sword, a tome that I hoped was faux-moldy, breastplate, shin guards, along with various tchotchkes that looked like they came from high-schoolers and were a bit too beat up to be faked.

“Arthur, what are you?” I asked. Where anyone else would find it rude, I knew my bluntness would be either appreciated or ignored entirely.

“The Ghost of Classes Past.” He swept into a near-Shakespearen bow, gesturing at the bits and bobs that adorned him. “Humans protect, and we mourn those we could not to ensure they live on in memory.” The thump of the music did not change, but his costume gave it a sepulchral tone, like a dying heartbeat.

In an attempt to lighten the mood, the antlered fox bounced familiarly before looking at the Queen of the Dead. “You did a fantastic job on their costumes! They look amazing!” Her antlers were, of course, somehow illuminated from below, but damn me if I could figure out how.

Despite the fact that I knew damned well that Tyche wanted to erupt into laughter at the suggestion, she managed to, quite impressively, tamp it down to a savage smile of silver fangs and blood-red lips. Flapping a hand at myself, Conor, and Maverick, she gave her bell-like fake-laugh, fully in character. “Oh, I had nothing to do with this. Darling Sophia and her merry toys conceived it all on their own. This is the first time I’ve even seen it, darling.” She turned to me, tipping her chin down in respect. “Well done, dearest sister.” Tyche was on peak display, with kohl lining her glowing grey eyes, a black bodysuit covering her from collar to feet, fitted vest and cardigan vest, all partnered with a skirt that could be ten inches thick or ten miles of ribbon - who knew with all the darting and layers? Not me, but I was surely impressed with what looked like ten miles of black feathers flowing from her waist to her hips.

“Why, thank you, Your Majesty.” I swept my leg back in a daring curtsy, forcing Conor and Maverick to smother their laughter at Jokul and Ivan’s faces.

“Ma’am! Ma’am ma’am ma’am!” Charly demanded as she pulled me upright. “You blushed at the concept of kink night, and here I find you leading your men around by their hips!”

I tossed my hair and winked at Jokul. “They aren’t being led, they are saving me from myself.” To Charly’s credit, I did look one deep breath from embarrassment - a black dress with red trim, sliced from floor to ribs and collar to navel, over what appeared to be just fishnet stockings and cavalier boots. The only thing, visibly, retaining any sort of deceny was the corset sealing me in the dress. To go with it, I sported chunky, silver cuffs chained to both Maverick and Conor. Ducking in, I whispered, “I probably will have to be cut out of this bodysuit, no worries on me flashing anyone.”

“Ooooo… well played, madam, well played,” she cheered, twirling me around, forcing both men to pivot with me, laughing, before giving me a very concerned look. “How fucking tall are those?” This was clearly directed at my heels, which she was staring at like a shark presented with a steak.

“Six,” I admitted. “But I did pointe ballet for a little while, so… This isn’t that bad.”

Maverick ducked into the center of the circle we formed. “They’re a full size too big to allow for swelling and she has the toe boxes lined with impact foam.”

“How the hell else am I supposed to wear these things?” I asked with a glare that had him standing ramrod straight and barely restraining a laugh.

Tyche, to her credit, patted my shoulder. “While sitting. Or, if you have to stand, with a platform in the toe.”

“No shit,” I hissed, setting the mummified healer doubling over in laughter. “But I’ve done enough damage to my feet, thank you, so… there may be foot braces involved.” One of which was currently digging in just in front of my heel, which I made a mental note to pass on to the development team.

A thick, French accent set me shaking my head when it came from the very-not-French looking mummy. “Well played, Sophia. The sling and calf brace design I saw recently get approved by medical?”

I groaned as I realized that of course this was Antoine. Life and Death, forever partnered. “Yesssss,” I hissed. “Grey created the design.” I unzipped one boot down far enough to roll it below my knee, exposing braces above and below the kneecap before running further down. “The weight is distributed throughout the leg, before terminating across the front and back of the arch of the foot, to even out the pressure.”

I could almost see numbers whirling beneath the six-foot-plus candy-pink bowler hat. “That… sounds like it might actually be comfortable,” Coffey intoned. I couldn’t help but grin at the tilt of his hat and the feather arching behind him.

“More comfy than actual heels, yes,” I admitted before deflecting attention as far from me as possible. Which, considering how much weight was normally put on the ball of the foot in heels like this, wasn’t a lie…. “But we aren’t here for this! We’re here for food!”

Cheers erupted, and we set off dragging each other to what bits we had discovered. The theme of the night was firmly set around protein, grilled if possible, with wicks of smoke dancing through the flickering light along with the thump of the music. Some were spicy, others unexpectedly sweet. As I laughed, and ate, and sweated, and danced, I could freely admit that there was exactly zero percent chance that I would have imagined this in my wildest dreams. And even better? I could enjoy every second, every smell, every beat of the music. I made a point to wink at each camera I could spot, to the point that, first Tyche, and then everyone else felt the need to comically push down my thumbs-up and cover my face.

Clearly, Parvati and Hannah, who I hadn’t seen all night, were monitoring what they would later discover to be a flying pass on their final exam.

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#the miys #found family #humans are weird #science fiction #aliens #apocalypse #humans are space orcs #humans are space fae #earth is space australia #post apocalypse #post post apocalypse #original science fiction #original sci fi #original writing

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builders9 · 3 years

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Come in for all insights into Sand and its types

Sand is a granular material that is composed of finely divided rock and mineral particles. It’s outlined by size and is finer than gravel and coarser than silt. Sand may also be referred to as a textural category of soil. The textural category of soil contains over eighty-five % of sand-sized particles by mass.

WHAT IS SAND

MADE OF TYPES OF SAND

WHAT IS SAND PLANT

USES OF SAND

WHAT IS SAND MADE OF Sand is the conclusion of the many things, together with rotten rocks, organic by-products, and even percoidean poop. The meliorist biologist wrote, “In each curvilineal beach, in each grain of sand, there’s a story of the world.”Sand comes from several locations, sources, and environments. Sand forms once rocks break down from weathering and wearing over thousands and even various years. Rocks takes plenty of time to decompose, particularly quartz (silica) and spar.Starting then covering thousands of miles from the ocean, rocks slowly travel down rivers and streams, perpetually breaking down on the manner. Once they create it to the ocean, they additional erode from the constant action of waves and tides.The tan colour of most sand beaches is the result of an iron chemical compound, that tints quartz a light-weight brown, and spar, that is brown to tan in its original kind. Black sand comes from scoured volcanic material like volcanic rock, volcanic rock rocks, and different dark-coloured rocks and minerals, and is often found on beaches close to volcanic activity. Black-sand beaches are common in Hawaii, the Canaries, and therefore the Aleutians.The by-products of living things additionally play a crucial role in making sandy beaches. Bermuda’s preponderance of pleasantly pink beaches results from the perpetual decay of cellular, shelled organisms known as order Foraminifera.

TYPES OF SAND 6 types of sand used in construction:1. Concrete Sand📷Concrete sand is one of the categories of sands in India that’s made of crushed concrete. It’s a typical element of cement and asphalt mixtures. This sand is crushed within the quarry and filtered to get rid of the big rocks and big fragments. It’s a kind of coarse sand that may be mixed with cement and water and used as level base layers, patios, and walking methods. Once mixed with cement and water, it forms a solid mass that’s used to fill the voids between the coarse aggregates. It’s smaller-grained compared to crushed stone sand and hence is often used to construct softer pavements.However, it’s additionally larger than white sand and hence is often used as a filling material too. The dimensions and texture of this sand created is a perfect material for lots of functions. It provides basic stability to a building.2. Pit Sand📷Pit sand is a kind of sand that’s best to be used in the construction of buildings because of its superior binding property. It’s coarse sand that’s found 2-3 meters underneath the bottom. It’s obtained naturally from deep pits. It consists of rough, sharp, angular, and coarse grains that give glorious binding properties.Their look is red-orange because of the presence of iron-oxide. The grains of this construction sands are free from salts and thence they do not simply react with the wetness present within the atmosphere. Because of this property, they supply powerful and rigid made buildings.3. Stream Sand or Natural Sand📷River sand may is a fine quality of construction sand that’s found close to stream banks and streams. This sand is white-grey and is one of the fine hierarchic sands utilized in the development of buildings. They’re chiefly utilized in concrete and masonry work. They’ll even be used for RCC, covering, or block works. This sand consists of a swish texture and a much better form of grains. The stream or natural sand demands terribly less water. The wetness that is cornered between these sand particles serves sensible for numerous concrete functions. A medium quality stream sand consists of five to twenty percent of silt content.Since stream sand is obtained on its own hence is cheaper. These styles of sand contain oxide content in them. Therefore, it’s necessary to envision the quantity of oxide content and guarantee if it’s below 5%, before utilizing it for construction.4. M – Sand📷M-sand stands for factory-made sand and is one of the widely used sand for construction in the Asian nations. This sort of construction sand is factory-made within the factory. It will be used as a substitute for watercourse sand for concrete construction. Factory-made sand has been used ever since the demand for permanently quality sand has inflated speedily. This sort of construction sand made is ready by crushing hard granite and thus it reduces transportation prices of transferral sand from watercourse beds. It contains particles of angular nature that will increase the strength of concrete. These angular particles within the sand will increase its water demand. This water demand will be remunerated by adding cement content. Since it’s unnaturally factory-made, it contains zero silt content. There aren’t any outsized materials found in these kinds of construction sand.This is a kind of construction sand that’s simply accessible too. Since it factory-made and not natural, it will be free from any impurities and also the sizes of the sand grains will be controlled as desired that suits every purpose. Since they’re factory-made in very controlled surroundings, there’s little or no chance of adulteration of this sand and there’s higher management over the producing quality of the M-sand. The M-sand provides smart sturdiness and imparts high strength to concrete. It’s terribly economical and reduces construction defects.5. Utility sand📷Utility sand could be a style of sand utilized in construction. This sort of sand is created from top quality industrial quartz. This sort of construction sand provides glorious compaction and

smart mechanical properties because of its uniform grain shapes. It will be utilized in corrosive environments since they’re non-reactive. They contain 100% natural minerals which offer glorious sturdiness and stability to the building.6. Fill sand📷The Fill sand could be a style of sand utilized in construction, usually for filling. It’s a mixture of many grains of sand and aggregates. It consists of terribly fine rock particles that are lessened and undergone erosion. It will be primarily used as a base material for laying concrete, paving, and filling giant holes. Its glorious compaction makes it the right base material for many functions throughout the development of a building. It provides tons of benefits once utilized in wet areas to mend evacuation issues by serving as backfill around septic tanks.

WHAT IS SAND PLANT 📷The sand plant produces the crushed sand as an alternate of stream sand. We’ve got special sand creating machine like VSI device, sand screening machine like a vibratory screen. These sand crushing and screening instrumentation square measure for max productivity. Sand Plant Manufacturer additionally offers individual crushers and screens, further as key parts and carrying elements.Sand creating plant includes quartz sand creating the assembly line, building sand creating assembly line and stone material assembly line, all of that may turn out aggregates and crushed sand from sedimentary rock, granite, volcanic rock, and stream stone. All Sand Plants product square measure wide utilized in the development of hydraulic power station, artifact, highway, and concrete infrastructure.The sand plant operates as follows:Firstly, the materials attend the primary device for primary crushing. Then the materials are transferred by the belt conveyor to the secondary device for further crushing. Then the vibratory screen used to grade the materials, wherever the requirement is filled material is sent to the sand-maker, whereas the remainder comes back for an additional spherical of crushing. A part of the stones processed by the VSI device is created into the sand and become a sand product when being washed. The remaining are crushed by the sand maker into qualified sand materials of varied varieties.

USES OF SAND Followings are the common sand uses.• We will use sand to filter water, it works like an abrasive.• We will use sand to relinquish a position to our painting or wall art by combining a pair of cups of paint with a ¾ cup of sand.• People build sandpaper by gluing sand to a paper.• While bunging metal, we will combine sand with clay binder for frameworks utilized in the foundries.• Sand may be used for cleaning up oil leaks or any spill by dredging sand thereon spill. The fabric can type clumps by absorbing, and that we will quickly clean the mess.• Sand may be used as a road base that may be a protecting layer beneath all roads• Industrial sand is employed to create glass, as manufacturing plant sand, and as abrasive sand.• One artistic usage of sand is serving as a holder. We will attempt to swing some sand before running tea light-weight or any candle in an exceeding glass. It holds the candle still and refrain the candle from rolling by giving it a superb decoration.• Adds texture and aesthetic attractiveness to the house.• Sand is usually pure to handle and economically wise.• We will build a children’s pit to stay the play areas safer. It’s quite cheap furthermore.• Sand is also used in aquariums, fabricating artificial fringing reefs, and in human-made beaches• Sandy soils are ideal for growing crops, fruits and vegetables like watermelon, peaches, peanuts, etc.• Sand will light a path by filling mason jars with sand and tea light that is another cheap way to build a path glow.• We will keep a little scuttle of sand close to a charcoal grill for inundating flare-ups.• Sand may be used for cleansing slim neck receptacle by swing a touching sand and heat cleanser water within the instrumentation.• We will keep an item steady that desires repairing by victimization sand.• Sand helps to enhance resistance (and so traffic safety) in icy or snowy conditions.• We want sand within the beaches wherever tides, storms, or any style of creating mental changes to the bound crumble the primary sand.• Sand containing oxide is employed for creating shut in the car and food industry- even home merchandise for the room.• Sand may be a sturdy strand that is employed for plaster, mortar, concrete, and asphalt.• The usual bricks developed of clay solely is much weaker and lesser in weight than blocks product of clay mixed with sand

SUMMARYSand is a mixture of little grains of rock and granular materials that is especially outlined by size, being finer than gravel and coarser than silt. And ranges in size from 0.06 metric linear unit to a pair of the metric linear unit. Particles that are larger than 0.0078125 metric linear units and are smaller than 0.0625 metric linear unit area units are termed as silt.

#sand #building and construction materials

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melyaliz · 4 years

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Remember me pt 6

Master List

Fandom: My Hero Academia

Pairing: Bakugo Katsuki x OC

Notes: No idea what to say sooooo.... Enjoy?

All Masterlists @melyalizarchive

Connect with me! AO3 / Instagram / Pinterest

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-0-0-0-0-0--Bakugou--0-0-0-0-0-

During the last of their three-day stint, Kirishima had joined Bakugou to finish up a few things in their office away from home. After spending the morning in briefings both heroes were grabbing some lunch before heading back to the hotel.

The 100-degree weather that had graced the October sky had finally broken and many of the employees of the large building were outside enjoying their lunch in the shade. Just glad to get out of the cramped offices to enjoy some pleasant weather.

One of them was the Starbucks girl.

“Dude, isn’t that band you like?” Kirishima asked elbowing his best friend in the side, making Bakugou grunt with annoyance.

He had noticed her when she had come out. Holding a bag and talking to that same guy she had done the presentation with. Today she was dressed in a cute leopard print skirt and a black band tee. The words Gojira sprawled across the front, below it was a black and white image of a large whale leaping up from an ocean.

“Yeah” was the simple response as he dug into his chicken burger.

“So do you need me to go over and say hi or are you going to actually go over there and talk to her?” Kirishima asked nonchalantly as he took a bite of his food. “Or are you just going to keep checking her out like you have been all week?”

Bakugou coughed slightly, eyes wide as a rush of anger came over him. First off, there was no possible way he could have been checking at her all week seeing most of the week he had been miles away dealing with earthquake relief. And second, he was NOT checking her out!

“I don’t need your help asking a girl out!” he snapped before grabbing his plate standing up. Sometimes Kirishima’s pushy personality was so annoying. Walking over to the table the young woman was sitting at he sat down

“Nice shirt”

“Do you like Gojira?” she lit up as he spoke to her as she put her phone away. That was a good sign.

“Yes.”

“Have you seen them in concert?”

“Yes.”

She nodded, “Me too, it was probably one of the best. It was Knotfest and some guy broke his nose in the mosh pit.” she paused stumbling over her words slightly before looking at him, obviously unsure what the Japanese word would be.

“Moshpit,” he said nodding

“Oh ok, it was a lot of fun.”

“You don’t look like the kind of girl to like Metal,” Bakugou said studying her. While he had only seen her around a few times she always seemed very put together. Dressed in bright colors normally very girly looking with her purple ombre and perfect makeup. She chuckled awkwardly, putting some hair behind her ear.

“I don’t listen to it on the regular but the best concerts I have been to are Metal ones. What bands do you like?”

“The classes are a good go-to, Metallica, Iron Maiden, even Slayer, but I like Meshugah and Lamb of God too,” he said sandwich forgotten. At the time he hadn’t noticed it but he found talking to her so easy. Her questions always open-ended, giving him a reason to tell her about himself. Something later on he learned to really appreciate. She had a way of really listening to people and asking just the right questions to get what information she wanted.

“Oh Lamb of God is insane. They aren’t really as heavy but I have a soft spot for Mastodon.”

“Their drummer is pretty good.”

“Do you play drums?” she asked, cocking her head to one side, catching his comment.

“No, I just like songs with good drummers.”

“I’m here for a good drum solo” she nodded, “I always wanted to play but I’m also super uncoordinated.”

“It’s not that hard,” Bakugou said picking up his sandwich again taking a bite as if he was making some sort of point.

“How are you enjoying San Diego?” she asked following his social que and taking a bite of her salad.

“Well, I spent most of it in a pit.”

“Oh true, well at least you have a few days off, anything planned?”

He shook his head trying not to think about the fact that she had noticed him around too. Well, they did have that conversation two days ago at Starbucks.

“Well I recommend trying a California Burrito or any Mexican because you are here. Beaches are pretty, OH! Actually you and your friend should go to Hodad's, it's kind of a San Diego staple. What do you like to do?” her words coming out in a rush of excitement.

He shrugged, “I mostly work and train at home.”

“There are some nice hikes by the beaches.”

“You like the beach?”

“Yeah why?” she blinked, confused by the sharp question. Trying to think why he would be asking her that.

“You keep bringing it up.”

She giggled shrugging, “The ocean cleanses you. It’s calming. And I’m sure you need to relax after saving the world.”

“I’m not saving the world just your border.”

“Well, it's some people’s worlds you are saving.”

“I guess” he shrugged unsure what to say. She was right of course. That was his job. To save people’s lives and in a way their worlds.

Another lull and she poked at her salad taking a few bites. It was then he realized he didn’t know her name. Assuming it wasn’t Grape. But he had no idea how to ask.

“Ground Zero,” she said slowly, “Do you prefer that, or your name?”

“You can call me Bakugou.”

“Thank you” she paused for a moment, “You can call me Olive.”

“I thought it was Grape,” Bakugou said, deciding now that he knew it wasn’t Grape, he could poke a bit of fun at her name and their last encounter. However Olive seemed unphased.

“Oh yeah!” she burst out laughing shaking her head, “It’s kind of a joke between me and the Starbucks barista. Every time I go in she comes up with a new food name for me.”

“That’s stupid, why not just use your name?”

“ Why else does anyone do anything? Because it makes us laugh.”

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Olive had fallen asleep hours ago but Bakugou couldn’t seem to drift off. With her body curled up next to his was just too much. After everything they had been through, knowing how much farther they had to go. All he wanted to do was pull her to him. Kiss her. Feel her around him. Remind her how much he loved her. How he could make her feel. Show her just how much he loved her.

It was like his body on was on fire having her that close.

He couldn’t take it.

Getting up he slowly disappeared from the bedroom going into the personal gym that was on the far right end of the hallway. If he couldn’t sleep at least he could work out. Starting with a low run on the treadmill he placed his headphones in letting the music pound through his ears. Angel of Death by Slayer blasted in his ears as he took to a fast run letting his feet rush forward. Pushing, fighting through whatever burning frustration that was trying to consume him.

Control, he just wanted something he could control.

He was lifting weights when he felt her presence. Turning he saw her standing in the doorway watching him rubbing her eyes. Arms wrapped around herself, her dark hair messy from sleep. It made his heart skip at the sight. Like some stupid highschool girl.

“Why are you up?” she asked blinking owlishly at him.

“Couldn’t sleep, just go back to bed.”

Guilt was written all over her face. She was biting her top lip studying him unsure what to do. He had seen that look before. The one where she was trying to decide to just leave it or force him to open up to her.

Letting out a long sigh he sat up wiping away the sweat from his face. “Just go back to bed, I’ll be right there.”

“I… ok” she said, slowly walking back to the bed.

After a quick shower, Bakugou went back to the bedroom to find Olive sitting up fighting sleep worry still etching on her features. “Oh stop it” he chastised, rubbing his still wet hair with a towel. Throwing it into the basket he crawled up into the bed next to her. She watched him as he settled in before finally speaking.

“How… how do we normally sleep?” she asked, determination in her voice. A force of nature. He knew that voice. She wasn’t a pushy person but she was a fighter. She was stubborn in her convictions and would do whatever she could to fix something. When they would fight he would scream and yell and she would just sit there arms crossed until he was done and then ask what needed to change. What needed to be fixed.

“You are basically on top of me” he admits knowing she will know if he is lying. Not that he ever would. He wasn’t a liar, and even if he was he could never lie to her.

She giggled at that nodding. “Eliott used to say I would chase him around the bed.” she was too tired to try and cover up his name. Dance around it.

“Yeah,” Bakugou nodded, laying down on his side. “I don’t mind.” it was more of an invitation. A prayer. He wanted to feel her in his arms again. Feel her legs tangled up in his. They used to end up in the strangest positions all twisted up so in the morning he wasn’t sure where she would begin and where he would end.

Scooting up Olive curled up into his chest. Her soft smell filled him. Sweet and clean like the color pink and summertime at the beach. Sugar covered fruit and cool water. Gently he ran his callus fingertips over her arm. Enjoying the feeling of her smooth skin and for a moment he forgot she didn’t know him anymore. That it was just another late-night cuddle session that he was being (not so) begrudgingly forced into.

Bakugou woke up to his alarm going off. Letting out a soft moan he stretched, feeling his wife’s body cuddle closer to him. Her arm draped over his chest. Looking down he couldn’t help but smile running his fingers through her hair letting the dark black and rainbow colors play as they fell onto her back.

She stirred at the sound of his alarm mumbling as she reached out feeling his body under her fingers. Letting out a content sigh she pulled herself closer only to then have her hand move slowly up his torso feeling his taut stomach and abs.

Letting out a squeak she jumped away, eyes adjusting as she fully woke up. Blinking at him as if looking at a stranger in her bed.

Which, -he painfully reminded himself- he was.

“Morning,” he grumbled slowly pulling himself out of bed. She watched him for a moment pulling herself together trying to piece together reality from whatever dream she had been waking from. She had never been a morning person. Lilly had jokingly called her Zombie Olive, warning Bakugou that she wouldn’t be fully coherent until at least 2 hours after she woke up.

“Morning Katsuki,” she said hesitantly, “did you sleep ok?”

“Yeah, you?”

“I made a few mistakes,” she smiled at him, jumping out of the bed almost tripping over the sheets that were tangled around her feet. He turned fighting back a smile.

She was still there. Slowly but surely cracking open.

After doing their morning routines the couple reconvened in the kitchen. Bakugou whipping up some eggs with furikake.

“So what are your plans for today?” Olive asked, taking a bite of her food watching him as he plated his own breakfast.

“Just work, I’ll be back late”

she nodded, “I’ll probably call Lilly and then read my books,” she flashed him a toothy grin, “I need to know what ideas I have written and what I need to get back into.”

“Good luck with that,” he said “I think it was a Western.”

“Oh really?”

“You don’t talk too much about your stories but you did tell me that.”

“Do you read them?” she asked her face slightly flushed at the thought. While she was fine with strangers reading her slutty stories she had always found it hard to have people she knew read them. It was just kind of weird. Like her stories were a different person, not really Olive. Which was why she used a pen name, Delilah Flint.”

“Not really,” he wanted to add that he had the real thing. The woman behind the stories was always up for an adventure to try new things. Why would he want to read about some dirty cowboy plowing his soulmate - or whatever - when he could just do it himself?

Not that there was a lot of that going on right now though.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

The office was a bit busier than he remembered.

“Morning bro, how’s Olive?” Kirishima asked, holding up some files as Bakugou walked into their agency. Well, it was Bakugou’s agency but Kirishima shared it because they worked well together and figured why not.

“Not crying,” Bakugou said, “she seemed excited last night to read her stories since she couldn’t remember them, something about reading them for the first time.”

Kirishima chuckled, “Maybe we should have her meet Deku again, start that over again.”

Bakugou frowned at the memory. They had met at a UA reunion almost year after Bakugou and Olive had started dating. Olive had been drunk and Deku had found it hilarious to poke fun at Bakugou. Telling the first girl Bakugou had ever been interested in, about Bakugou's very angry childhood. Unfouranity for the previous number one hero he didn’t realize that Olive was a mama bear when it came to the people she loved. And even if they were in the wrong no one spoke poorly about them.

“Oh by the way.” Kirishima said, handing him some files, “We got statements from the police from the robbers. Apparently that third guy… he only spoke English.”

“What?”

“Yeah, the one who hired them only spoke English. I thought it was weird since…”

“Olive was the only one who lost her memory?”

“Her and the guards but theirs was only for a few moments.” Kirishima paused looking at the files that were slowly starting to smoke in his best friend’s hand. “Hey man… uhhh do you want me to take those?”

Bakugou felt a rage wash over him. Was this an attack on Olive? There was no way. How would someone even know she was at the mall? There had been a witness who had told the police she had helped a mother and two kids get out before running back to try to help someone else. But that was it. He had just assumed that she had run into the thieves and since they couldn’t lay their hands on her due to her quirk they used a memory wipe.

His phone dinged breaking through his thoughts. Turning he noticed that Kirishima was holding the files waving them, the edges singed slightly. Glancing down at his phone he noticed it was the very woman he was thinking about.

Olive: "Hey do you know what my computer password is?"

Bakugou: Doley11

Olive: You're the best thank you!!!

He frowned looking down at the phone then shot back another text realizing something. She didn’t know anything,

Bakugou: We have an alarm system in the apartment so don't leave I'll show you how to use it when I get back

"Ok"

Bakugou: And the stove can get tricky so call me if you need help.

Bakugou: Actually my assistant's name is Kygome.

Quickly he texted off his assistant's number

Bakugou: If you can't figure something outcall her if you can't reach me

Bakugou: But text me first

Olive looked down at her phone as the slur of texts came pouring in. From the few days, she had known Katsuki she could tell he was a man of words and less emotions (except for annoyance, he seemed to have that in spades) but… this was kind of cute. He was worried about her.

But also what had she done before to warrant this kind of worry? She was a bit of a dumbass, sure, but also-- he needed to relax.

Olive: Thank you, I'm in the computer now and lucky me I still label my password doc the same so I should be good as for everything else I'm tough I got this!

Settling in she pulled up the document titled “Dragon Dick FINAL” this looked promising. started to read.

Meanwhile, Bakugou was working with his team about maybe taking a few days off. The thought of leaving Olive alone not knowing anything starting to get to him. He needed to make sure she was safe first. He could work remotely for a few days. Besides if this guy really was after his wife he needed to make sure he kept her close.

He had already failed her once. He wasn’t going to do that again.

-GET TAGGED-

Master List

Story Tag: @0hmydeku @inumorph @it-jinxed-us @myraticm

#bakugou katsuki x oc #bakugou x you #bakugou katsuki x reader #bakugou x oc #bakugou katsuki long fic #bakugou katuski x reader #bakugou katsuki x you #bakugou katsuki fluff #my hero academy oc #My hero academia fanfic #bnah fanfic #my writing #remember me

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5-falsehoods-phonated · 4 years

Text

Overgrown Metal

Series Summary - Almost two decades ago, the fae rose up from beyond the veil with technology far surpassing the human race, quickly taking over after laying waste to nearly everything in their wake. Now eight paths cross to right the wrongs on both ends, working to uncover secrets that would have rather stayed hidden.

Chapter 3 - Keep Moving

The spacious barn creaked lazily as the sounds of swearing and hammering overflowed its weather worn walls. It had been repurposed years ago, the old owners either long dead or moved out once the forest began to take over. As it was now it had been cleared of the twisting roots and oddly growing branches that had once threatened to consume it completely, now standing in a small clearing with a house beside it sitting just as pristine. The barn, though repaired, leaned slightly to the side, braced on an extension that housed a lab of sorts with one other room branching out that acted as cold storage.

The main room itself was currently where loud banging could be heard with the occasional swear sprinkled in as the owner tried valiantly to seperate pieces of plate metal from the skull of a fallen beast, eyes vacant and jaw slack as it sat on the table surrounded by already disassembled parts of itself scattered about and repurposed to varying degrees. Jars of different colored oily substances sat on a cart nearby, with empty ones still waiting to be filled. The hammer was thrown down suddenly, its owners pointed ears twitching in irritation as he dragged a hand down his face and took a breath. Sighing loudly, Logan turned and stalked off to the other end of the room to get a crow bar off the rack in hopes that his new method would work.

As he began trying to pry between plates he felt more than heard the halting footsteps outside the barn, though who it was was clearly trying his best to be quiet. Rolling his eyes Logan slammed the crowbar in a weak spot and pulled hard enough to bend the plate and send the bar snapping back to narrowly miss his face. He scowled as sweat dripped into his eyes, rolling his shoulders and gripping the tool with a white knuckled grip.

"It truly is a wonder you haven't killed yourself yet. To think of all that education going to waste with a cracked skull in an old barn, it's almost enough to make me care to check in more."

"The only reason you come in here is because I'm the only thing within a hundred mile radius who doesn't wish you dead on sight."

"How you wound me. It's at least two hundred when I'm far enough away from the coast." Logan smirked as he heard the irritated tap of the others cane punctuating his statement.

Sighing, he placed the crowbar on the bench and turned to face the intruder, leaning against it while crossing his arms. "Hyden."

"Logan." The other greeted mutually. Though he was typically a bit more put together his thick caplet lay crookedly across his tense shoulders, arms taunt as he leaned heavily on his cane with both hands resting on the top. His long hair curled in the afternoon humidity and Logan definitely didn't miss the slight furrow of his brows, though he knew he would be loathe to admit he was in any sort of pain.

Letting out a heavier sigh Logan pushed away from the bench and gestured for the other to follow him. "Join me, I need a break anyway."

Hyden gasped. "The head scientist admitting he needs a break? Who's hand do I need to shake for downloading an once of self preservation into that thick skull?"

"I'll have you know I take breaks on a regular basis, something you clearly need to be reminded of."

"The audacity! I walk all the way here to visit a long time friend-"

"You walked?" Logan shot him a sharp glance as he held the door, gesturing the other into the old farmhouse.

Waving away the concern, Hyden continued. "I flew most of the way don't worry. I only ducked below the treeline the last few miles so I wouldn't be followed, you're welcome for the concern and forethought."

Snorting, Logan pulled out a chair and moved to collect containers of herbs and thr kettle, sighing for the fourth time as it was blatantly ignored for the refrigerator. As the kettle heated he carefully measured out the proper ingredients, glancing over every now and again to try and catch what his guest was poking at.

"Are those by any chance agarose gels?"

Walking past the fridge to put things away he caught sight of what the other was observing, humming his confirmation.

"Logan, why do you have DNA gels next to leftover chicken salad in your refrigerator?"

"The chicken salad seems irrelevant." The kettle whistled to give him an excuse to avoid the question, carefully pouring out the boiling water.

"Logan."

"Hyden." The name slipped out easily despite his annoyance, making him wonder for a brief moment if he would struggle when he was finally told his real name.

The mans cane taps were heavier than normal as he made his way over to the table and flopped down without his usual show. Giving Logan a quiet thank you he proceeded to wrap his hands around the steaming mug, frowning in concentration. "Are you trying to find them again?"

"I fail to comprehend what you could possibly-"

"Because they're trying to find you. And they're getting close."

Logan was quiet as he sat, his wrapped hands folding somewhat painfully around his own drink. Pursing his lips he avoided looking at Hyden for a long moment, nevertheless feeling his gaze attempting to pick him apart. Arranging his expression to be carefully neutral he took a drink, smiling as the other did so as well.

"Make sure to drink all of it, it'll help with pain."

"Did you even listen to what I said?!" Throwing his hands up in exasperation he fixed Logan with his best glare.

"Hard not to with that grating tone."

"Well this grating tone," he growled out. "Is telling you to get your head out of your ass and maybe make sure you're safe before telling someone else to take care of themselves."

Logan dragged a hand down his face, suddenly tired. "Where exactly do you expect me to go? I'm so close to figuring out what they're using to power those things, if I move now I won't have any access to the equipment I need, no studies will be concluded, and nearly all of my experiments will be left behind to rot! I need more time."

"Time isn't exactly a luxury here. You're being stubborn and ignorant, as usual, and if you would just listen-" he stopped short as he caught the look the other was giving him, letting out a breath of defeat and softening his tone. "It doesn't have to be today. But it does have to be soon. I'll even come with you, help you scout out a new location if you'd like. I'm sure there's plenty to be found with a little digging."

Mugs empty save for the dregs silence rang between them as they lost themselves in thought. Distantly Logan was aware of the old grandfather clock ticking, suddenly thinking what a shame it would be to leave the sound behind. He knew the other was right even before he fully decided to voice it. Instead he quietly looked over at him, the scales that freckled his face gleaming with the last rays of the evening sunlight. If they were truly leaving, they would have to be careful. Though he knew Hyden was loathe to do so he could easily shift his appearance to hide his scales. Logan wouldn't be so lucky, his slightly off colored skin and pointed ears a dead give away to what his heritage was, even if he had defected from it when the war broke out. He was obviously fae, and that would do him no favors outside of the protection of his remote location.

But he really couldn't stay. If the guard was truly zeroing in on his location he would much rather abandon his research and try to pick it up wherever he could than even think about getting caught and wondering whether he could escape before he was undoubtedly punished for his crimes against his people. He shuddered uneasily as he stood, carefully avoiding eye contact as he took the mugs to the sink and began to wash them. He stared out the window towards the treeline as he did, having to squint to make out the weak protective barrier set around the perimeter by Hyden years ago. Beyond that lay dense forest only a madman would dare trek through.

Or fae guards with strict orders.

Squaring his shoulders before they could droop in defeat he turned to face his companion with a level stare.

"Give me two days."

-------

"Two more days? I thought the town was closer than that." Virgil irritably kicked a stone into the water, splattering the bottom of Roman's pants. They huffed in response, their frustration easily matching Virgil's as they shifted the pack on their shoulders.

"I said at most two more days, it might be sooner than that. We've never really been this far out before, which is a good thing but it means guessing the distance. Pouting isn't going to make it be any closer."

"Not pouting." Virgil pouted, crossing his arms before realizing what he was doing and angrily shoving them in his hoodie pockets.

Snorting with amusement Roman shifted the pack again before grunting and heaving it up and off their shoulder, immediately sagging in relief. Their burden was lifted further as Virgil tugged it out of their grasp and shouldered it easily, walking ahead while adjusting to the weight.

"Thank you."

"You were slowing us down. Somebody's gotta make sure we stay on schedule."

Roman squawked with indignation, jogging a bit to catch up with the emos longer gait. Their mouth thinned as they thought of how to bring up a concern they'd been thinking about for a while, gripping the straps of their pack tightly in apprehension.

"Alright. Spill it." They blinked as Virgil stopped, dropping both the packs and plopping down in the dirt.

"What?"

"Being anxious is my job and right now you're forcing me into unemployment. So either talk or I'm throwing you in the river."

"You do and I'm eating the last two cans of spaghettios tonight while you get nothing but croutons."

Virgil narrowed his eyes. "I fucking dare you to go through with that threat. You do not come between a man and the last can of shitty microwave pasta."

"I have the food pack."

"And I have the flint and steel so start talking before I decide to set you on fire instead of drowning you."

Unceremoniously flopping to the ground they let out an annoyed huff while shrugging off the back pack. "Fine. I've been thinking....that with this next town..maaaaybe finding another person or two to travel with would be in our best interests?"

The last half of the thought came out rushed and nearly incomprehensible but Roman could tell Virgil had heard them clearly as his face adopted a carefully neutral expression, hands twisting tightly in his lap.

"Roman..."

"I know! I know, I definitely get it. But, it would be easier to carry supplies and we could have more! We wouldn't have to stop in towns so much-"

"Roman."

"And it might be safer! More people means more weapons means more protection right?"

"Roman."

They shut their mouth in worry at the defeated tone Virgil had adopted. He twisted his hands tighter, hesitant to continue now that he actually could.

"Am I not....do you not feel safe enough with me?"

Roman sucked in a breath as they realized how Virgil had taken their concerns, rushing to try and fix it. "It's definitely not that! I-Virgil I'm so sorry that isn't what I meant at all!"

They leaned forward and began gently detangling his fingers from each other, holding them tightly once they finally managed it. "Anx it isn't like that. I honestly worry that you aren't safe enough with me. And once our load gets heavier with trading supplies we slow down and it never seems like we're on the road long enough before what little supplies we can carry run out. It was only a thought I wanted to discuss, not an attack on your skill as a fighter."

Their eyes met Virgil's and they breathed a sigh of relief when they were met with understanding, nonetheless continuing to rub soothing circles across his knuckles until he pulled away.

"I guess..." he glanced over at the near overflowing pack of trading goods. "I guess I can see that yeah. But I don't-Roman how can we trust anyone?"

"We probably can't. But we'll look anyway and if we don't find anyone then we don't find anyone. Just, keep an open mind?"

Crossing his arms Virgil looked away to stare out at the water instead, face drawn with apprehension. After a minute he ducked his head in defeat, nodding slowly and standing up. "Yeah. We'll keep a look out. But if we do find someone and after a while they start to act shady we drop them alright? No debate."

"No debate." Roman readily agreed as they stood as well. They began walking again, the silence much less tense than it had been all afternoon. Grinning a bit, Roman smacked their lips in thought. "With that delay it might be two and a half days now."

"Oh come on!"

This work is also available on AO3!

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#false writes #sanders sides #sanders sides fic #overgrown metal #my writing

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hedwigstalons · 5 years

Text

This is a first foray into TAG so apologies for any continuity issues (a common problem in my head). A little bit of festive fun and nonsense with a rescue thrown in for good measure.

xoxoxox

**Going Out With A Bang**

Christmas has arrived and for once it looked like the whole family would be able to share in the festive meal. The world had been quiet and since December 22nd and the Tracys hoped it would grant them peace for a few days more so they could properly enjoy the holiday season.

The final arrival had been John who has returned via the space elevator late on Christmas eve. He had been reluctant to desert his post as space monitor but Eos has practically threatened to pump out all the oxygen if he hadn’t stepped through through the air lock right now. He suspected she had been conspiring with Alan; those two had been mightily absorbed on the youngest Tracys last visit up to Thunderbird Five. Now, sat with a coffee in hand, he was glad to be home even if home came with a heavy dose of gravity.

Christmas morning had been a whirlwind of activity. Alan had resembled an over-excited puppy as he dashed from one sibling to the next to wish everyone a merry Christmas. Gordon had managed to find the most hideous shirt bedecked with neon candy canes that Virgil had proclaimed to to an offense to the senses. Scott had adopted his usual role of commander and made sure everyone had eaten a proper breakfast (“No Alan, marshmallows are not breakfast”). John had tripped over the step in the lounge at least twice already. It was a typical island Christmas.

As lunch time approached the assembled group of five brothers, Kayo and Brains were glad that Scott had insisted on breakfast. Grandma has declared that there would be no barbecue this year and she would be treating them all to a traditional turkey dinner. As the allotted time approached the prospect of consuming a hot and heavy meal in tropical heat was not appealing, especially as Grandma had insisted on doing most of the cooking herself. More than one island resident was caught sneaking off to the store rooms to stock up on pre-lunch snacks until Grandma had locked the stores and declaring that she would not let them spoil their lunch. She ignored the pained glances that passed between brothers that said clearer than words that lunch would definitely be spoiled if Grandma Tracy was catering.

The smell of scorched meat and the sound or curses as a pan of vegetables boiled dry signalled that it was time to set the table. International Rescue worked as a smooth machine and laying the out the dishes for lunch was no exception. Figures interwove as plates were passed along and settings made up. As the last dish was put in place the team stepped back to admire their handiwork. Even if the food in the dishes looked a little suspect the table itself was a picture of festive cheer.

“Crackers!” exclaimed Alan, the disappointment in his voice evident for all to hear. “Didn’t we order any for this year? It’s not a proper Christmas lunch without crackers”.

“I’m sure we did. I think I spotted a box in storeroom 3. You all sit down and I’ll go and fetch them.” Gordon sped out of the dining room and down the hallway that led to the stores. He soon veered off and headed towards his own room where the box of crackers had been liberated to a few days earlier. The selection of bright foil cylinders appeared identical but he knew otherwise.

As Gordon returned to the dining room, box in hand, he was pleased to see that everyone was seated already. He walked around the perimeter of the table, carefully laying a cracker across each place setting. Conversation was in full flow and only Scott noticed that the crackers were not pulled out of the box in an entirely random order. He wondered what Gordon had planned but as he was evidently not the intended recipient of whatever prank had been prepared to was happy to sit back and watch the drama unfold. It looked like Virgil would not be so lucky.

Gordon finished his round of the table and sat back in his own seat. “Ok, crackers in a circle, right? Everyone hold out you cracker to the person on your left.”

Virgil and Alan then, thought Scott as everyone complied with the seemingly innocent instruction. Soon a chain of crackers was set up around the table.

“Five...Four...Three...Two…One...”

The klaxon sounded and the crackers were dropped back on to plates as everyone rushed through to the comms room. The light hearted atmosphere had gone and been replaced the usual rush of adrenalin that preceded a rescue.

“Go ahead, Eos” instructed Scott. The AI was pretty good at filtering out the necessary rescues from the surrounding noise of global radio chatter. She had also been instructed to reroute calls to the local emergency services or GDF for the duration of Christmas day so the fact she was intruding on their family time meant the situation must be serious.

“I have received a distress call from an oil rig. It has been damaged in a storm and the crew need to evacuate. The weather conditions preclude evacuation by helicopter. Some of the crew opted to leave by life raft but the transponder has failed and all contact with the life raft has been lost.”

“Virgil, Alan and Gordon; you all get going in Thunderbird Two. We’ll need Thunderbird Four to help with the missing life raft. I’ll take Thunderbird One and meet you there. John, you’re on comms; get full details and co-ordinates and brief us once we are airborne.”

The brothers dispersed to their respective concealed chutes that let to the Thunderbirds. John was grateful to claim his seat by the comms table; the sudden rush from the dining room had left him a little dizzy and highlighted that he was not yet acclimatised to Earth enough to take a more active role in the rescue.

Grandma, Kayo and Brains retreated to the dining room. The dishes were returned to the kitchen and would be warmed through once the boys returned, whenever that might be.

xoxoxox

As the two Thunderbirds approached the rig the weather conditions worsened. They had taken off into bright tropical skies over an azure sea. Now, several time zones and climatic regions away they were surrounded by darkness. Fierce winds buffeted their craft and the pilots could feel the strain through their control yokes. Rain lashed the cockpit screens and visibility was almost zero; flying was by instruments and instincts. The seas below churned and roiled beneath them, not that those aboard the mighty ‘birds could see that.

John had made contact with those still trapped on the rig and was now in possession of the full details and severity of the situation. Eight personnel required evacuation from the rig and a further four were lost somewhere on the unforgiving ocean. Part of the platform had failed structurally and the was at risk of collapsing into the sea. A small mercy was that the crew has managed to cap off the bore hole so any potential environmental disaster had already been averted. The drilling company would be able to make the structure safe once the storm had passed but until that happened the crew was in danger. With the first four to evacuate now lost without a trace the remaining crew were unwilling to follow their colleagues into the remaining rafts and preferred to take their changes on the unstable rig.

Eos had also been busy. Having ascertained the exact time the life raft had been launched and its last known location before the transponder had failed she had run simulations using the weather and ocean current data from the area. Her high-tech models allowed her to narrow down the search area and she was able to provide Scott with a more defined zone in which the life raft should be found.

“Approaching raft rescue zone now” Scott announced as he reached the area. “I’ll see if I can locate the life raft by scanning for life signs. Deploy Thunderbird Four then continue to rig; you should be able to evacuate those remaining using the rescue cage.”

“FAB” acknowledge Virgil.

Scott activated his scanner and started a sweep of the area. It looked like a futile task, trying to locate a small orange raft in miles of dark ocean, but he trusted in Eos’s calculations. He needed to, there wasn’t a lot else to go out out here. He knew that Gordon would also be scanning the area from Thunderbird Four and it was hopefully only a matter of time before one or other of the brothers found the missing crew.

Gordon was at least more comfortable that Scott. Underneath the surface of the ocean he was protected from the worst of the storm conditions. Other that the occasional deep swell that would shift his ‘bird slightly off course he could almost forget the tempest playing out on the surface. He was used to working in limited visibility so the darkness was no hindrance to him. He maintained radio contact with his sky-bound sibling as they scanned the rescue area, starting in opposite quadrants to maximise efficiency.

The brothers swept the area using a mix of radar and life signs scanner until “Woohoo, I win!”

“Gordo, this is not competition. Do I take it you have located the raft?”

“Sure have. Sending through the co-ordinates now. So how do you want to go about extraction?”

“The conditions are too rough for you to tow the raft. I’ll snare it with a grapple and return it to the main rig. From there we can get them aboard Thunderbird Two. It’s not going to be comfortable for them though. I want you to try and attach a communicator to the raft so I can let them know what is happening.”

“FAB”.

Attaching a communicator to the side of the raft would require a trip to the surface. A prospect Gordon wasn’t looking forward to as the swell still hadn’t abated. It would also require some careful piloting.

Gordon surfaced the submarine. His powerful lamps soon illuminated the orange box that was being tossed about on the waves. He hoped those inside had strong stomachs because it was one hell of a bumpy ride they were being subjected to. He monitored the rise and fall of both the life raft and his own craft until he was familiar with the pattern the waves were moving to. Then, at the optimal moment he fired a small cannon. A disc flew through the air and adhered itself to the side of the life raft with a dull thunk.

To those inside the raft the sound of something solid hitting the side was disconcerting. Their fear soon turned to elation as Gordon’s friendly voice was heard inside their craft.

“This is International Rescue. Please report your status. Is anybody hurt?”

“International Rescue? Thank goodness, we thought we were lost for sure.” The relief in the speaker’s voice was palpable. “We are all a bit bumped about. One head injury but no signs of concussion.”

The rescue plan was soon relayed to the crew in the raft and while they were not enamoured with the idea of being suspended below Thunderbird One they were pleased that their ordeal would soon be over.

Back at the rig Virgil and Alan were concentrating on rescuing the eight remaining crew. Virgil was holding a hover over the rig while Alan was on winch and rescue cage duty. The rig was creaking and groaning in the storm force winds and the pair knew they needed to work quickly.

Alan lowered himself and the rescue cage to the deck of the rig. The surface of the platform was exposed to the elements and the most dangerous aspect of the rescue would be stopping himself and the crew being blow off the side of the platform. For now the crew were safely holed up in one of the cabins on the surface of the rig.

Alan ensured his gravity boots were engaged and that he was attached to a safety line before he risked exiting the rescue cage. The short walk to the cabin felt like a marathon as he braced himself against the vicious gusts. The checker plate surface was slick with the rain that was still falling in torrents and even the gravity boots were struggling to get a purchase. It was with some relief that Alan reached the cabin and entered. His safely line prevented the door from being closed and he had to shout to be heard above the elements.

“So, who needs a lift home?” he grinned. He easy manner and smile instantly calming those waiting for rescue.

He was pleased to see that the crew were already kitted out in full safety gear including harnesses and helmets. This would make his job a whole lot easier and save him having to escort everyone to the rescue cage individually. He connected the safety line to an anchor point within the cabin and instructed everyone to clip in. The line acted as a guide rail and would allow everyone to traverse the deck safely between the fixed point of the cabin and the rescue cage.

Alan issued instructions on how to harness in to the safety cage. Then, one following close behind the other, the line of eight crew fought their way across the deck, gripping the safety line for support. Only once the last crew member had reached the cage did Alan release the anchor point in the cabin and begin his own return journey. Form there it was just a matter of activating the winch and they were being safely swallowed up into the belly of Thunderbird Two.

There was no chance to rest though. The evacuation from the rig had been the easy part; the real challenge would be to secure the life raft which was even now on its way to rendezvous with them, suspended from the base of Thunderbird One. Once Alan had settled the crew from the rig into the passenger bay he returned to the winch cables.

The plan was to attempt an air to air transfer. It would not be safe to transport the life raft all the way to land underneath Thunderbird One, nor was the idea of individually winching out the four trapped inside. The solution, although far from ideal, was for Alan to to attach Two’s grapple to the life raft. Scott would then disengage One’s grapple leaving Two free to winch the life raft inside the cargo area where there was plenty of space. The manoeuvrer would be challenging and not without risks.

Alan looked out of the open hatch in Thunderbird Two, grim determination on his face. Thunderbirds One and Two were being hovered expertly side by side. His two oldest brothers seemed to act in perfect unison, each acting to correct against the still-buffeting winds at the same time. The life raft was swinging wildly about on the end of its tether and Alan felt sorry for the four poor souls he knew were contained within. He took aim and fired the suction grapple but the erratic movement of the raft in the gusting winds meant his first shot missed. He recalled the grapple and tried again. The raft swung in and out of his line of sight and the whole exercise felt faintly reminiscent of a fairground game but one that had four lives as the prize rather than a misshapen stuffed toy. With a fair dose of luck on his side the second shot flew true and the suction grapple adhered firmly to the room of the raft. Scott quickly disengaged the line from Thunderbird One. Alan activated the winch mechanism and drew the raft inside the safety of the giant transporter ‘plane.

With the rig workers all safely accounted for the final task was to collect Gordon and Thunderbird Four. International Rescue would then be able to drop their grateful passengers off at the nearest airfield and head for home.

It might not have been the Christmas they hoped for but there was something about a successful rescue that lifts the mood. The International Rescue secure frequencies were soon filled with cheerful chatter between Thunderbirds One and Two and Tracy Island. Gordon attempted to lead everyone in song but soon stopped when Virgil threatened to dump him back in the ocean. The only disappointment was that Christmas day was nearly over by the time everyone had safely returned to base.

xoxoxox

It was a weary crew of operatives that gathered in the lounge again once post-flight checks had been completed and dirty uniforms discarded.

“I’m starving” groaned Scott as he kicked back and relaxed in an easy chair. “I thought Christmas was meant to be a time of eating to excess but instead I feel like we missed about four meals.”

“You’re always hungry” Virgil retorted, stretching out and taking up about three sofa spaces “but I know what you mean. I could almost contemplate Grandma’s Christmas lunch after all that. I’d go and fetch some food but I’m too comfortable now. Hey, Johnny, you fancy digging out some snacks?”

John was interrupted in making an indignant response about Virgil being perfectly capable of fetching his own snacks when their Grandmother appeared. “Welcome back, boys. I know you must be tired out after today but you need to look after yourselves. I’m not having anyone heading off to bed without a proper meal. We saved lunch so I want everyone back in the dining room in five minutes. I just need to set the table again.”

There was a collective set of groans that had more to do with facing their Grandma’s cooking in reheated form than the prospect of shifting off the sofa. However, everyone knew that if they didn’t face the meal tonight she would only wheel it out again tomorrow and Grandma’s cooking was one thing that did not improve with age.

Everyone shuffled through to the dining room to help finish setting up the meal again. Gordon gulped as he realised that everything had been reset. The crackers had been placed back in their box when the first iteration of lunch had been cleared away and Kayo was now in the process of laying a tube across each plate. He scanned the table but he had done his job too well, the crackers looked identical.

The sinking feeling deepened as Scott’s hand landed on his shoulder from behind. A low voice growled in his ear. “Well this should be interesting. Cracker roulette. I know you didn’t get those out the store room earlier, Grandma had them all locked down tighter than Fort Knox. The question is, little bro, are you feeling lucky?”

It is one thing to play a prank when the victim is carefully selected. It is quite another to have that control taken away. Pranks come with retribution and Gordon knows that each person around the table would have their revenge somehow, the unknown is the price he would be expected to pay.

Everyone returned to the seats they had vacated all those hours previously. The crackers raised to signal the start of the meal.

“Five...Four...Three...Two...One...Merry Christmas”

Except the ‘Merry Christmas’ was partially drowned out by a shout as one cracker erupted as a highly effective glitter bomb. Sparkles of red and green coated those that had been holding either end.

Uh oh.

Gordon’s chair crashed to the floor, knocked over in his haste to exit the room. He took off at a sprint but his attempt at escape was futile. The way no escaping the wrath of a now twinkling Kayo and Scott.

“Gordon Tracy, I’m going to be finding this stuff for weeks! Just you wait until I get my hands on you.”

Pranking Kayo comes at a cost. Usually a very painful cost. She caught up with him half way to the lounge and expertly tackled him to the floor. Scott arrived moments later. Between the pair of them Gordon was soon trussed up in tinsel. Scott threw him unceremoniously over his shoulder and carried the prankster back to his chair in the dining room, ensuring his younger brother got smeared on copious amounts of the glitter in the process.

There were a few sniggers as Gordon was fastened to his chair. He knew there was no point in trying to escape his tinsel bonds, Kayo had made sure the knots were firmly tied and out of reach.

Gordon tried appealed to their better nature. “Aw come on. It’s Christmas after all. You can’t let me starve while you all eat. That’s just torture.”

“Oh you’ll be eating, Gordo.” Kayo’s voice had taken on a dangerous edge. She freed his hands while making sure he was still unable to escape the chair. “You’ll sit there until you have cleared your plate like a good boy.”

Scott started heaping large portions onto Gordon’s plate, carefully selecting the most suspect looking parts of their Grandma’s cooking.

“There might even be...dessert.”

Gordon gulped and picked up his fork. The price for his prank was high and it was time to start paying.

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #scott tracy #virgil tracy #john tracy #gordon tracy #alan tracy #kayo

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dr-gloom · 6 years

Text

But Who Here Would Ever Understand

Day four of Spook Month! This was really hard to write tbh but once it turned into a vent fic it was easier

Prompt: Sweaters and Sunsets

Fandom: Sander’s Sides

Pairing: Moxiety

Words: 3,023

Summary: Patton and Virgil have both had hard days at work, so they decide to take a little walk and talk about Serious Business(tm).

Tags/Warnings: Virgil has Borderline Personality, Patton is a transmale, poor bois, hot chocolate, sweaters, sunsets

Enjoy!

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Virgil slams the front door shut, grumbling as he enters the apartment he shares with his boyfriend of four years, Patton. He’d just come home from possibly the worst day of work this year – no, not quite, don’t be dramatic. This month. – and honestly, he just wanted to punch a hole in a wall, scream into the abyss, and take a really long nap (though you’d be hard-pressed to find a day where he didn’t feel that exact feeling at least once). Patton would be home soon, but for now Virgil had the place to himself, so he paced back and forth across the living room in front of the couch, his thoughts running rampant.

He knew rationally that he should be calming himself down, that letting himself be swept up in these big mood swings wasn’t good and he wasn’t helping himself in the slightest, but that’s the thing about going from zero to eighty in two seconds; he didn’t care. His hands move up to grip his hair, his teeth grinding, his pulse racing as his feet work a groove into the carpet. He lets a frustrated, almost animalistic scream rip from his throat and he kicks the couch, his boots keeping him from hurting his toes. He falls out of step when the front door opens, startled slightly by the noise (how long has he been pacing?), Patton shuffling through the doorway and setting his messenger bag on the dining room table.

He looks up, noticing Virgil for the first time, and frowns. Without a word, he crosses the apartment and stops Virgil’s pacing by pulling him into a hug. Virgil huffs, though he’s not mad at Patton; he just needs to get all of this pent-up energy out. He hugs Patton back, resting his chin on Patton’s head. Patton speaks up, voice slightly muffled by Virgil’s hoodie. “You too, huh?” Virgil frowns at the implication of the question but nods nonetheless. Patton sighs, squeezing Virgil a little tighter. Virgil chews on his lip, a cornsnake of anger slithering in his chest. He knows whatever happened with Patton is just going to piss him off more, but not knowing is going to drive him crazy, and Patton needs to talk about his feelings.

“What happened with you?”

Patton was reluctant to answer, Virgil could feel it in the way his shoulders tensed up. Virgil taps his boyfriend’s back between his shoulder blades, and Patton forces himself to relax, refusing to let go of Virgil as he finally mumbles out, “Got misgendered a lot today.” Virgil blinks. Did he hear that right? “You got misgendered?” Patton nods. So he had heard correctly, then. “Yeah, lotta my coworkers misgendered me. It’s fine though, really, I promise!” He rushes to reassure Virgil when he feels the other tense up under his hands on his back. “Virge, baby, they were probably distracted and forgot, it happens!” Virgil shakes his head, face already set into a grimace and hands fisting in the other’s shirt. “No way, Pat. You’ve been working there for two years. There’s no way they weren’t doing it on purpose.”

When Patton only sighs in response, Virgil pulls away to resume his pacing, shoving his hands in his pockets. After a moment, he pulls them out to drag one through his hair. His hands flex, clenching and unclenching, and he shakes them out, if only to dispel some of the manic energy he’s feeling. Patton watches patiently, eyebrows knit slightly with concern.

“Honestly, how fucking hard it is to not be a fucking piece of shit?”

“Language.”

Virgil ignores him. “It’s a fucking pronoun, it’s not rocket science. Oh, you prefer male pronouns? Fuckin’ sweet, guess you’re a bro now. You prefer they/them? Okay, you can be my palhoncho, or fuck, who even cares, just use the right pronouns I’m not speaking fucking Latin. And how hard is it to just sit on a fucking horse and let it take you somewhere? Don’t fucking dig your feet into its ribs, don’t send it sprinting down the goddamn path, don’t make me have to chase you for two fucking miles! It’s common fucking sense!”

Patton has to stop Virgil pacing again, taking Virgil’s hands in his to keep them from pulling on his hair. Patton uses a hand to grip Virgil’s chin lightly and force Virgil to look at him, exaggerating his breathing. Virgil takes the hint, remembering Dr. Picani’s instructions and taking a moment to calm himself down. Once Patton was sure he was okay, he let go of Virgil’s shoulders, studying the other’s face in silence for a moment.

“C’mon, let’s go get some air.” He smiles gently at Virgil, who takes a step forward and wraps his arms around Patton instead, one hand rubbing his back softly as he kisses his temple. His hand pauses and he sighs through his nose. “Pat, you should probably take the binder off.” Patton whines, shaking his head. “I don’t want to… Besides, it hasn’t been 8 hours!” Virgil pulls back, squinting down at his boyfriend. “Like hell it hasn’t, you got dressed an hour early today, remember?”

Patton sighs and nods. “Okay… I’m putting on one of your big sweaters then. You wanna change too? You smell like horses. And poop. Actually, I’m pretty sure horses smell like poop.” Virgil laughs and nods, following Patton to their room and digging through the closet for his winter and fall clothes before handing Patton a sweater. He turns so he’s facing away from Patton, stripping out of his shirt and pants and changing into a sweater and sweat pants. “Pat, you should change into sweat pants too.”

“Oh, good idea! Okay.”

After they’ve both changed, they grab their wallets and keys and head out. They link their fingers together, Patton smiling brightly and the corners of Virgil’s mouth upturned just enough for someone to notice. They head down the stairs, Patton humming softly under his breath and Virgil pretending to be annoyed. They walk in relative silence for a while, both having a general idea of where they were going, and when they end up at the local park Virgil can feel himself relaxing further, taking Patton along the familiar path that winds along the perimeter of the park until they end up at a small hill.

Patton lets go of Virgil’s hand to run to the top, Virgil following behind at a much more carefree pace, and the two sit together, pressed against each other’s sides. The park itself is above a large portion of the city, so the two can see plenty of their home from up on the hill. There are splotches of reds, yellows, and oranges interspersed throughout the city, moving gently in the breeze and broken up by buildings (or maybe it’d be more accurate to say the buildings are broken up by the trees?). Patton rests his head on Virgil’s shoulder and Virgil wraps an arm around Patton as the two of them gaze silently over the city.

The sun starts to set not long after they get there, Virgil feeling an odd (at least, for him) sense of peace as pinks and purples bleed into the blue that had dominated the sky for so long. Clouds capture the colors and make them appear more vividly, as though an artist had been testing colors before diluting them to use them as the final product, the sunset. He looked over at Patton, taking in the other’s serene expression, the way the sunlight brightened his face, the glimmer of happiness in his eyes. Virgil’s chest hurt, a knot forming in the base of his throat, and he had to fight to keep a smile off his face. God, he loved this man so much.

Patton looks over at Virgil and his smile widens. “I love this weather, I wish it could be fall all the time!” Virgil scoffs lightly, looking away. The pain in his chest only lessens a tiny bit. “I don’t; winter is where it’s at. Constant rain, cloudy skies, biting winds and shorter days.” Patton hums. “But you like fall too.”

Virgil nods, then shrugs slightly. “Well, yeah, but it’s still hot like eighty percent of the time.”

Patton laughs. “True! But that just means you can enjoy the pool!”

“Patton.”

“What?”

“You know how I feel about public pools.”

Patton just laughs louder at that. “Yeah, I know. Maybe someday we can get a house with a real pool! One we don’t have to share with little kids.” They lapse back into silence after that. Virgil doesn’t think he’s felt this calm in a while; a few weeks at least. It’s nice, but he can’t help but worry it won’t happen again. That’s how it always was with him; he could guarantee you that he’d go into a rage or be too depressed to move, but he could never say for certain when’s the next time he’d feel content to just be. “Hey Virgil?”

Virgil blinked, startled out of his thoughts, and glanced at Patton. “Yeah, Pat?”

Patton wasn’t looking at him, eyes instead trained on the city below, as if he could see the people milling about from this distance and he was just people watching. “So you have BPD.” Virgil raises an eyebrow, waiting a moment to see if Patton will continue. When it’s obvious he’s waiting for a response, Virgil sighs softly and says, “Yes, Patton. I had it before we met and it hasn’t gone away. Your point?” He could feel himself get annoyed, and now he was getting annoyed that he was getting annoyed. God dammit.

“Well…. What’s it like? I know you tried to explain it once, but… Can you try again? I really want to understand.”

Virgil rests his elbows on his knees, leaning forward slightly and picking at his cuticles. “There’s a lot, Pat.”

“Just tell me what you know. And what you’re comfortable talking about.”

Virgil nods, pulling at the skin of his ring finger as he begins. “Well…. It’s really intense. And fast, I think. It’s like someone took the dial for emotions, cranked it to eleven, and broke it so I can’t turn it back. Everything kind of has a… physical effect? When I’m happy, it’s kind of hard to breathe, and my chest feels like it’s full of helium. When I speak, it feels like my words are people, running down my tongue and tripping over each other to get out. I get really jittery- you know what I mean, you’ve seen it.” Patton flails his hands, and Virgil nods.

“Yeah, like that. And when I’m angry, it burns. Like there’s acid in my chest and in my stomach. Everything is tense, and it feels like the only way to let the acid out is to say what I’m feeling, or just… yell. It’s… too easy to say horrible things, which kind of freaks me out. It’s like the words have no weight to them, they just fly out of my mouth. When I’m sad, my head feels full of water, or cotton. Kind of depends on the kind of sad, I think. My words get stuck in my throat, like they’re too sticky. Being anxious isn’t too different, honestly, except it’s static. And all of this is happening multiple times a day, without my control or say-so, and it’s kind of exhausting. And that’s just the emotions.”

Patton turns so he’s fully facing Virgil, who’s picking at his cuticles in earnest now, his heartrate picking up slightly. “From what I understand, there’s like… nine things we all have in common. People with BPD, I mean.” He glances at Patton quickly before staring at his hands again. “An unstable self-image, as well as an unstable image of other people and relationships….” His words catch in his throat. He thinks back to the fights they’ve had over the years, most of them because Virgil tried to break up with Patton but Patton wouldn’t let him. Even back then, Patton knew Virgil better than he knew himself, where it counted.

Patton puts a hand on Virgil’s knee, and that’s all the encouragement he needs to continue. “It tends to fluctuate between idealization and devaluation. Uh… Makes keeping people around really hard, even if you want to. Figuring out what you actually want is pretty frustrating too, honestly. It’s ironic, because it also comes with this intense fear of abandonment.” He laughs a little brokenly, picking at the skin of his finger until it’s started to bleed. “Can you imagine how many people I’ve annoyed and pissed off because I go from worshipping the ground they walk on to treating them like an annoying customer, then get clingy when they want to leave? Then there’s the compulsive behavior, which is honestly probably the most normal thing about all of this shit; everyone’s got some kind of compulsion. And when you’re not severely emotional or worrying about being alone you’re just fucking- empty. Everything’s empty, that’s your baseline. There’s no content-to-exist, happy-go-lucky, or any of that. You just exist, and you don’t know why and it feels like you can’t feel, until you inevitably blow up on someone and then you’re starting the whole thing over again.”

He looks up, the sun finally dipping below the horizon and the sky darkening into deep purples and blues. They should probably head home soon, but he doesn’t want to get up. Besides, Dr. Picani had suggested he find someone to talk to in his extremely limited circle of friends; who better than his boyfriend, who’s seen him at his worst? “Did you know uh…. There’s like, fuck, I think it’s somewhere between a fifty to seventy percent suicide rate for people with BPD? We kind of uh… self-harm. But you knew that.” He picks at the chapped skin of his bottom lip, muttering to the clouds. “I worry about that a lot. On empty days I wonder why I haven’t just done it yet, because if there’s a fifty-fifty chance it’ll happen – at least that – then what’s the point in resisting? But then I remember you.”

He looks over at Patton finally, shocked to find tears on his face. Virgil never understood where the expression “white-hot shame” came from; his shame always feels like dumping ice water on a campfire. He pulls Patton close, hugging him tightly and running his hand through the other’s hair as he shushes him softly. “No, hey, come on… Please don’t cry, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. That was fucked up, really. I’m sorry.” Patton shakes his head, pulling away so he can look Virgil in the eye.

“N-no, don’t be sorry, I’m sorry. You’ve been going through all of that alone for years and I haven’t done anything to h-help you.” Virgil frowns. “Babe, you help me every day, honest. You’ve calmed me down at least what, twice? Today alone? You give me a reason to stick around. You convinced me to start seeing Dr. Picani. You give me more happy moments, which is huge. I’d much rather be suffocating with happiness than burning with anger, trust me.” Patton smiles weakly, allowing Virgil to pull him into another hug and press a kiss to his hair.

“I love you so much… Don’t ever forget that. I know sometimes I’m really bad at showing it, but I’m working on it. Me and Picani, remember? He’s helping me. I want to love you for the rest of my life, I mean that.”

Patton nods against Virgil’s shoulder, content to just sit there hugging Virgil for as long as they both need to. That turns out to be five minutes, because it’s quickly getting dark and the temperature is dropping. Virgil stands up, pulling Patton to his feet and lacing their fingers together. “Come on, let’s go home and have some hot chocolate, okay?” Patton nods, the two of them making their way back down the trail. The sleeves of the sweater Patton is wearing are a little too long for him, covering his hands partway, but Virgil thinks it’s adorable and doesn’t comment when Patton pulls his hand away to rub his hands together to keep them warm.

When they finally get home, Patton sits on the couch tiredly and Virgil heads to the kitchen to make their hot chocolate. He sets the kettle on the stove, leaning against the counter as he waits for it to boil and thinking over everything he said. He’d been scared for the longest time that telling someone all of that would drive them away, especially Patton. It wasn’t that he thought Patton was the kind of person who heard “mental illness” and ran, but… this was a lot, especially since on of the big things was unstable relationships. It wouldn’t be fair to date someone and not tell them though. He was just glad Patton didn’t seem too put-off by it, both when they’d first met and now.

The kettle starts whistling, making Virgil jump and he shoots it a glare as he turns the burner off. He goes to get two mugs, filling each with the powder and water, mixing them before bringing both out to the living room and setting them on the coffee table. He sits next to Patton, and Patton curls into his side before grabbing his own mug and taking a tentative sip. “Thanks, Virge. I love you.”

Virgil purses his lips, his chest tight and his eyes burning. “Love you too, Pat.”

Later that night, after Patton had fallen asleep watching Frankenweenie and Virgil had carried him to bed, Virgil lay beside his sleeping boyfriend, curled up on his side and studying the other’s face. Patton looked absolutely beautiful, face calm and peaceful in his sleep, eyelashes fluttering slightly but eyes staying closed. Virgil had no idea how he got so lucky to end up with someone as amazing as Patton, but he thanked whatever deity was out there that he had. He brushed his fingers against Patton’s cheek, reveling in the warmth that chased up his fingertips.

“Thank you, Patton.”

#sanders sides #sanders sides fanfic #sanders sides fanfiction #virgil sanders #patton sanders

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nezzfiction · 6 years

Text

ENMY Ch74 - Welcome to Vacuo

Chapter Synopsis: The new arc begins! Team ENMY arrives at Vacuo on a mission to establish an alliance between Vacuo and Atlas, opening a potential path to winning the Second Great War. That said, their welcome may be anything but hospitable. What they discover in the land of the "Strongest" is anyone's guess!

Series Synopsis: Team RWBY is disbanded, and Yang must find herself new allies. For her, that might very well be yesterday’s enemies. Joining up with the likes of Emerald, Mercury, and Neo, the four will comprise Team Enemy(ENMY).

Links to read the series: Ao3 or FF.net

Or hit the jump below

Welcome to Vacuo

I survived because the fire inside me

Burned brighter than the fire around me.

From a distance, Team ENMY watched as the endless desert expanse of Vacuo grew from just above the horizon to all around them. The golden sands shined, baking in the untethered sun. Barren mountain ridges curbed the land like spined bone. And just past the continent’s beautiful shores, was a city.

Great walls erected around the continent’s capital. If the four looked closely, they could see the glimmer of Dust line the coating, as to ward away most species of Grimm. The barriers were reinforced with every manner of security possible, physical and electronic. The Kingdom spared no expense in making their home a fortress. A vast difference in technology from what lay inside.

Team ENMY’s airship passed over the wall after providing their credentials. Below them stretched the heart of the nation. The buildings were short, few taller than two stories. The roads were large and bustling with people. The vehicles that navigated through had passengers hanging off the outside exterior.

Even at such a height, Team ENMY could tell the tech the city used was outdated by most standards. Having lived in Atlas, the height of modern innovation, drove the vast technological gap with deeper realization.

Still, there was an energy that emanated from the ground that overshadowed anywhere Team ENMY had been previous. A heartbeat in this nation, like blood rushing through the settlement’s body.

“Damn,” Yang couldn’t help but utter. “I’ve heard about it, but words really don’t do it justice. I never knew a place like this existed.”

“What? Primitive buildings and people?”

“You don’t see what I see, Em.”

Yang saw the Life in All Things.

To the Spring Maiden’s specialized sight, she observed Aura overflow the streets. The sparking veins revealed in a person’s body was mimicked in the city itself. It radiated brighter and more brilliant than the sands or the sun combined. Whether it was Yang’s ever evolving Semblance, or just the nature of the Kingdom, Yang could see the city breathe. There was only one conclusion she could draw from it.

Those who resided in Vacuo—

“They’re really alive.”

“Yeah, surprised they haven’t just cooked in this weather,” Emerald sniffed.

“Seriously, Em?”

“Look, blondie. You may be born as the girl on fire, but the rest of us saner people—Neo excluded—don’t like to live our lives in a pile of sweating mess.”

“C’mon. It’s not that hot.”

“Dude, you can’t even see the city clearly with all that heat haze! Look at the squiggles, Yang! THE SQUIGGLES!”

“But look, the temp gauges aren’t reading that high.”

“That’s ‘cause they broke one mile inland. Vacuo’s crazy ass desert air broke Atlas’s newest airship sensors after one mile.”

“Oof. Well, it’s probably cooler now that we’re in the city?”

“Oh, right. Cause whatever’s inside the frying pan is so much more cooler.”

“Maybe the heat’ll do something about that sass, if we’re lucky…” Yang said under her breath.

“What was that?”

“Nothing. Hey, look! It’s the welcoming committee!”

“Oh, joy. Time to make new friends—or new enemies.”

“Pretty much the same thing, when it comes to us.”

Mercury maneuvered the airship to land in one of the larger transport hangars. Immediately upon doing so, they were surrounded. Various warriors stood at attention with weapons in hand. Although they did not aim them, they clearly wanted their arms visible to the visitors.

As Team ENMY stepped out the cargo door, Yang’s attention fell on the leader of the greeting party.

“Oh, it’s you. Of course, it had to be you.”

“Yeah. Me,” Ilia glared back. “I guess this is the part where I welcome you to Vacuo.”

“Peh!” Emerald spat after being hit with a thick wave of heat and sand.

“Welcome to Vacuo.”

“Yup. I can tell. Totally gonna love it here.”

“Hey, hey, hey! What the hell is that?!”

Behind Yang and Emerald, Neo and Mercury herded a long group of what appeared to be twenty chained prisoners. The shackles on their wrists and feet clanged loudly as they shuffled off the cargo hold door. Each of them wore gag cloths around their mouths, as well as blindfolds.

“Who the hell are they?! We weren’t told there would be more than four of you!”

“Yeah, they don’t count,” Emerald answered. “They’re just luggage.”

“We’re going to have to detain them.”

“Then, detain them,” the mint-haired girl readily answered with an uninvested tone. “They’re yours now. We were only the delivery people. Careful not to break them before your boss gets to have her word, though. No returns or store credit.”

“Who are they?”

“Vacuo’s biggest fans.”

“Who are they really?”

“Wasn’t lying, sweetie. You can stop with the four-star hospitality already. Time to take us to the big dog.”

Ilia clinched her teeth and stopped herself from responding to the barbs.

“…We have to run you through some procedures first and a customs check.”

*Sigh* “’Course you do. How bad could it possibly be?”

The team was stripped naked and thrown into an almost pitch-black room. There, they were lined up against a white wall to have their pictures taken like criminals.

“Effin’ figures!” Emerald shouted, then started looking Yang and Neo up and down. There were hickies all over their bodies in places usually hidden by clothes. “You guys are such freaks.”

“I wonder if they haze all their guests like this,” Mercury wondered.

“Probably just us. What with our sparkling personalities and Yang having banged our welcoming committee’s love of her life.”

“I never banged Blake,” Yang growled.

“Really? I swear you and the kitty cat…” Emerald stopped in her tracks after receiving Neo’s pointed stare. “Ooookay. Never mind. Least it’s cooler in here. Probably cause we’re naked. Guess, we got that goin’ for us.”

The steel door opened with a violent screech and Ilia strode in with a clipboard and some assistants.

“We’re taking some blood samples,” she said matter-of-factly. “Also, you’re each going to take one of these.”

Ilia held up a shining shard of Dust between her fingers.

“Dust?” Yang asked. “You want us to take Dust?”

“In front of us, yes. It’s procedure.”

“For what?”

“Do you wanna see Temujin or not? Or we could just have you killed. Your choice.”

“…Is it poisoned?”

“There are easier ways to dispose of you.”

Team ENMY glanced at each other and shrugged. They simultaneously dry swallowed their shards, while having their blood taken by the medical assistants. Emerald, Mercury, and Neo received a short charge of energy after downing the substance. Yang showed none whatsoever.

Ilia and the assistants paused at the odd sign.

“Yeah, I’m a bit different,” Yang told them. “What? You gonna keep me from seeing Temujin, just cause I don’t use Dust?”

There was no answer and Team ENMY instantly went on their guard. Their sixth sense told them they would be attacked at any moment. But as if to cut through the tensions, Ilia reacted to a voice on her in-ear comms.

“You sure? How certain are you? It’s not personal! It’s a fact she doesn’t react to Dust. I know what usually happens but—Fine!” Ilia motioned with her hand to ease the others. The hostile air dissipated.

“What was that all about?” Yang side-whispered to Emerald.

“Dunno. That definitely wasn’t normal. We’ll let this play out for now, but things get a little more dicey, and you guys are off the leash.”

“Looks like everything is in order,” Ilia drew their attentions. “Last things last, we need to confiscate your weapons.”

“You already have them,” Emerald placed one hand on her hip, unfazed by the fact she was still naked.

“Don’t play dumb. Those two’s prosthetics. Detach them and hand them over.”

“Um, yeah. How about, fuck you?” Mercury sneered.

“We’ll get you a wheelchair.”

“Nah. No, thank you, fuck you very much.”

Ilia silently pressured them a moment more before receiving something on her comms. She turned around and walked to the doorway.

“Follow me.”

X X X X X

Outside, on the city’s main thoroughfare, Team ENMY rode on a roofless jeep escorted by Ilia and a number of Vacuo soldiers.

The blazing sun continued to beat down on them without a single cloud to provide shade. An occasional gust of wind would scrape coarse sand across their skin. It was as if the nation itself constantly ripped away at whatever lay on the surface. Nothing was left covered or hidden. The core substance of a person’s soul down to their bones were laid bare for everyone to see.

It was a harsh, but also cleansing place.

The escort was passing through the market place, when the fresh smells of delicious meats filled the air. Mixed with it, was the scent of burning Dust and steelwork. They could hear shouts from all sides, some of laughter and others of arguments or haggling price. There was nothing empty about the city, no space unoccupied.

“Hm,” Emerald turned the apple in her hand conspicuously.

“…Where did you get that?” Ilia asked from the front seat.

“From the food cart back there. Relax, don’t get your ponytail curled more than it already is. I left payment.”

“Vacuo doesn’t work that way.”

“I know,” Emerald pulled out a shard of Dust. “We’ve done our homework. Your economy functions entirely on trade. Dust, weapons, essentials, food, even owed favors. Zero dependency on any type of universal currency, including lien.”

Emerald took a bite of the apple and felt electricity tickle her tongue.

They Dust their food?

“I see,” Ilia didn’t take her eyes off the team leader. “So, I assume you know about our Code.”

The mint-haired girl listed them off in a bored tone—

Survival of the Fittest.

Strength in Numbers.

Respect is Earned.

Honor Rewards and Service.

Eye for an Eye.

“The laws that aren’t laws,” she ended. “Even if you don’t call them that, if someone breaks them, they face some really creative consequences. We’ve read up on some of the stories.”

“Must be difficult for a thief of your reputation to contain yourself.”

“Oh, I have a reputation? Shucks, I hope it isn’t anything too aggrandizing. I’m the bashful sort.”

“Just know that people know who you are—what you are, thief. Everyone is watching and you won’t be let off with just a warning or a fine for any crimes you commit.”

“Yeah, you guys like to use a bone saw instead of a slap for wrists. But you know, there’s always a loophole for my kind, no matter what laws or codes you guys got in place.”

“And what would that be?”

“No consequences wait for those who don’t get caught.”

“……Another word, and it won’t matter whose envoy you are or what mission you’re under. I’ll cut the tongue out of your mouth to shut you up. Did your research on Vacuo tell you that?”

It did actually, Ilia Amitola—one of Temujin’s most trusted spies and lieutenants. Specialized in nighttime operations, transportation, surveillance, and counter-surveillance, Emerald thought, but stopped herself from saying aloud.

“Hey,” Yang nudged her side. “How far are you gonna push her? At this rate, you’ll get her pissed off more with you than she is with me. Not that I’m complaining.”

“Gotta test the waters, Yang. Can’t get a handle on something if you don’t push its limits.”

“Yeah, just be careful not to get something decapitated at the same time, thief. Or you and me are gonna have a lot more in common.”

“That’s what you three are for—to make sure that doesn’t happen. On a more serious note, this place is as ruthless as we’ve heard. Real cutthroat culture.”

“Sounds like a world made for us.”

“First thing I’ve had to like about Vacuo.”

The group’s car arrived at the Hanging Gardens, Vacuo’s “former” palace of governance. After the revolution, and the previous governing body was overthrown, Temujin claimed the building as her personal home.

It stood in stark contrast to the rest of the city. For one thing, it was the only structure to reach over thirty stories, which meant it could be seen from anywhere in the capital. It also possessed a lush green terrace on every floor. A world almost onto itself, when compared to the rough stone and gold sand surrounding it.

Team ENMY was led through the entrance and onto the elevator. Every level they passed, it seemed more soldiers were added to the escort. It reached the point where small crowds covered their sides and back. Their hosts exercised complete control over the direction of their movements—a tactic employed to obviously intimidate them.

“These guys sure like to flex their muscle,” Emerald hallucinated a whisper to her teammates.

Their large posse stopped before a tall door where two massive guards stood sentry on each side. Upon receiving orders on their comms and a nod from Ilia, they opened the gates to the throne.

“Alright, criminals. You know the drill. Everyone’s trying to kill us until they aren’t. Heads on a swivel and call out marks.”

Emerald’s standing order put the rest of her team on instant edge. It was an on switch they could only have developed after bearing through countless life or death situations. Their senses honed to their finest point. They reacted to everything and acted accordingly. And maybe most importantly of all, they assumed that anything bad that could happen, would happen—until it didn’t.

The moment they stepped over the precipice of the great hall, their brains went into identifying the biggest threats in the room. And to their expectation, Temujin did not disappoint.

The setting of the floor was tranquil. Vines entangled every pillar, water rushed between the ceramic tiles underneath their feet. But in vast deference to the palace’s decor, a small army populated each side of the center aisle. Every single warrior bearing menacing demeanor.

Unabashed, Emerald took the lead in striding her way to the far end of the hall. A subtle light-heartedness could be detected in her body language. Surrounded by Vacuo’s strongest and the ambassador never lost her smile.

On the other hand, Yang, Neo, and Mercury were the polar opposite. The three glared back with the same hostility they received. They knew standing their ground was vital. Every attendant present was a high-caliber fighter. Even so, the three shot-called the top threats. Among them were even a few familiar faces.

“Glynda Goodwitch, Sun Wukong, Neptune Vasilias,” Mercury whispered, as they passed them in the audience.

The four stepped deeper into the den of hardened warriors.

Taiga Fei-hung, Neo made note of a Faunus martial artist with a tiger tail whipping behind his back expectantly. Chain Nai, she spotted a warrior covered in blue ring blemishes on his skin with chains wrapped around his hands like gloves.

Yang spared a glance at the ceiling.

“Silk Charlotte, Dober Anu.”

Mercury marked the Spider Faunus hanging upside down by a thread. With her, was a figure with a canine head wrapped in bandages, which were used to suspend from the roof.

“They’re mine,” the team’s specialist flyer called out.

As they drew closer to the throne, their attentions fell on those standing on the steps leading to it.

Minerva Calico, Headmaster of Shade Academy. Temujin’s best friend and most trusted advisor.

Neo’s irises changed color in response to the viable threat. There was little doubt the woman was the second most important individual in Vacuo. Minerva seemed to pay special focus on her in return.

“And those two,” Yang narrowed her brow, “—have to be Mouse and Knives Rakis.”

On the left side of the steps, two siblings gave a trance-like stare at the Spring Maiden. Round ears poked out from the holes in their hoods. Their eyes gleamed with silver in polished black beneath their shrouds.

Cinder’s intel said they were the x-factor of Temujin’s inner circle. Capabilities, role, skill level—all unknown.

Silver eyes… Are they the same as Ruby?

Yang made a special note in her head to watch them.

And at the center, occupying the throne, was the crownless ruler of Vacuo herself—Temujin. One arm rested on the end of her missing leg. The other tapped on the handle of her cane. Her single eye pierced them like an arrow, projecting a presence similar to being held at gunpoint.

All the weapons and all the soldiers in the hall did nothing to shake Team ENMY, but this woman alone, elicited a reaction from one of them. Yang immediately grabbed Emerald’s wrist to stop her from walking any closer.

“Yang, what are you doing?”

“Trust me, Em. You don’t want to take another step.”

Emerald thought about pressing on. Showing weakness like this was not the best way to make first impressions. Neo and Mercury had roughly the same thought. But Emerald rationed if Yang cautioned it, she should listen. Her trust in her teammate dispelled any doubt as she refocused.

“Greetings and salutations!” Emerald hollered cheerfully over the twenty paces of distance. “I am Emerald Sustrai, leader of Team ENMY. We were tasked as ambassadors—”

“Why don’t you come closer?” Temujin interrupted. “This old woman can’t hear so well, you know.”

“I think I’m speaking clear enough. Sorry. It’s not like we have anything against you, but we just don’t trust you.” She briefly scanned the surroundings. “Apparently, like you don’t trust us.”

“Rather rude. Shouldn’t you be more courteous as our house guests?”

“So, you can hear me. Look, we’re already surrounded by your very, very intimidating followers.”

“Them? They’re just curious about the visitors and wanted to have a look see.”

“Sure, thing. What I’m trying to say is, your gods of death are breathing so far down our necks, I can practically smell what they ate this morning. And now, you want us to jump into our own graves too? Little much of an ask, isn’t it?

The residents of Vacuo couldn’t possibly fathom what was going on. The ones less sensitive only remarked that Team ENMY were showing cowardice by refusing to move closer. The more experienced veterans sensed there was a reason to keeping the conditional distance and prepared to leap to Temujin’s defense at the fist sign of an assassination attempt. Even Minerva didn’t understand the purpose of such precaution.

The only ones who knew the truth of this bizarre behavior were Yang, the Rakis siblings, and Temujin.

A dry-cracked smile broke across the old Faunus’s expression.

“Hahaha!” she slapped her shortened thigh. “There aren’t many who have ever spotted that. Hoho~ The Spring Maiden is as impressive as rumors say.”

Yang forced a cringing grin. A few beads of sweat fell from her forehead, not from the heat, but from the pressure Temujin exuded.

She couldn’t properly describe what she was actually seeing. Vacuo’s ruler possessed an Aura unlike anything Yang had ever bore witness to. Lightning crackled within a ring encircling her. It was like a storm raging inside a snow globe. All she could really understand was stopping her teammates from entering Temujin’s “territory” was her top priority.

“Hm…” Vacuo’s leader glanced to her left.

So, this is what the siblings were referring to. Only they and Raven have ever detected my Semblance.

“Oh, fine. You can speak from there, I suppose,” Temujin feigned a sigh, while observing the four closely. “A girl with no voice, another with no arm, and a boy with no legs. Tell me, girlie. Are you missing something as well?”

“Nope, I’m pretty whole,” Emerald replied. “‘Cept for maybe a crippling lack of empathy. But fuck other people, am I right?”

The whole chamber went tensely silent for a moment.

“Heh!” Temujin cackled. “I like you!”

“Most don’t!”

“All the emissaries these days do all this bowing and ceremony. Blah blah blah, majesty something, lord of sands and Faunus. As if they can hide the fact they hate us on the inside.”

“The Black Queen specifically ordered us NOT to do that.”

“What do you think of Vacuo?”

“I hate it. Your weather is just the worst, scenery is shit, and I haven’t seen them yet, but I hear you guys have a serious Grimm problem. Like, something about having the most recorded Nightmare-Classes between the other three Kingdoms combined?”

“Anything to your liking?”

“Food looks good. Our boy here, Merc, couldn’t stop drooling on the drive over here. Diverse culture’s a plus. You also look like you run a tight crew, real blood and fire type of lethals. Mad respect for that.”

“Hoho~ You are a gutsy little rascal.”

“Like you said, there’s no real point trying to lie to you. So, here’s me and my team. What you see is what you get. We’re here as ambassadors on behalf of the Atlas Kingdom to set up an alliance with your nation. The Black and White Queen send their regards by the way. They regret they couldn’t make it here themselves but want to someday—'specially our boss. She’s very interested in you, and after meeting you, I can kinda see why. You’re both similar.”

“Hm, the Black Queen, you say. I’ve heard quite a bit surrounding Cinder Fall. She seems as vicious as her reputation. I can only assume she was the one who sent over those ‘gifts’ without the White Queen’s knowledge.”

Emerald revealed a devious grin that was extremely Cinder-esque. Temujin was referring to the group of prisoners Team ENMY brought over from Atlas, who Ilia detained on arrival.

“I very much doubt Weiss Schnee was the type to approve sending imprisoned Crusaders as a peace offering.”

“Nope. The White Queen’s gift is the airship we came on. Top-of-the-line model, fresh from R&D, and at your complete disposal.”

Temujin massaged her chin thoughtfully.

“If your transport was your gift, how do you expect to return?”

“Eh, we’ll figure something out,” Emerald shrugged. “Plus, I heard you guys got a talented smuggler somewhere. Maybe we could hire her.”

Temujin chuckled, while spotting a fuming Ilia at the corner of her periphery.

“Is that it for your gifts, then?”

“We have more bargaining chips, but that’s only until we get to the real nitty gritty negotiations. Those were just appetizers.”

“Oh? But I swear, you’ve come to me with at least one more present, it seems.”

Emerald immediately didn’t like how Temujin phrased that sentence. Neither did the rest of her team for that matter, because they all inadvertently tightened their muscles and shortened their breath.

The old wolf Faunus released an Aura of bloodlust that was almost palpable. ENMY could hardly believe she could manifest such a threat with her age and her body being what it was. But it was displayed for them as real as any Maiden or top-class Grimm. The target of Temujin’s aggression fell solely on a single member of the team.

“I’m not sure if you’re aware—Peh! You must be!—but I have some rather unsettled business with your predecessor.” The ruler of Vacuo bore her fangs in her grin. “Little Spring Maiden.”

Yang didn’t make a move, but within her center of gravity, she was already gathering her Aura. Her crimson eyes focused on the elder verbally advancing on her. The cracks of light radiated the woman’s weakness as well as boast an overwhelming strength.

“I can smell her within you. She was the one who did this,” Temujin patted her shortened leg,” And this,” she pointed to her missing eye. “Tell me. Is it true, whosoever kills you, takes your power for their own?”

“Yeah,” Yang answered with a confidence. “But you better be ready to lose the rest of you, if you wanna try,” she challenged.

“Are you sure that’s wise? Not to mention we have you surrounded, any aggression towards me would mean a breakdown in negotiations.”

“This and that are two different things. If you can’t separate business from personal, I don’t think Cinder and Weiss need an alliance with you anyway.”

Hostilities filled the hall like a freshly broken dam. Semblances were activated on all sides of Team ENMY and were being readied to release. The weapons that were only held passively up to this point, were now clearly aimed in the direction of the four.

“This is a serious matter, youngster,” Temujin spoke deep, nothing of the playfulness she once displayed. “I’ve allowed your disrespect because it was a bit entertaining, but you’re wearing out my patience. One wrong move, one slip of the wrong word, and Vacuo may very well side with Mistral and Vale in this war. Are you aware of that?”

Yang didn’t need to, but she gave a brief pause to look to her teammates. Emerald seemed carefree as ever. Mercury never took his sights off the ceiling but wore a cheeky expression. Neo gazed right at her with a glint as sharp as glass—as if urging her partner to do it.

“I know,” Yang shrugged. “And I say, bring it on, fossil queen. I accept any and all challengers.”

The Spring Maiden took a fighting stance without giving any fuck whatsoever. Mercury and Neo followed suit. Their weapons drawn and poised with murderous intent.

The whole throne room was about to move on them, when the cracking of Temujin’s cane on the floor put a stop to the motion.

“BAHAHAHA!!! YOU KIDS ARE HILARIOUS!!!” Temujin cackled without an ounce of discretion or cordiality. “Ahahaha…! Haha…ha… You’ll have to excuse me. I haven’t laughed like that in a while. You may leave,” she made a brushing motion.

“”What.”” It was not only Yang, but Ilia, who blurted the same word.

“I won’t kill you, Yang Xiao Long—at least not today. We will postpone our discussion for later and leave it at just introductions. Personally, I want to see to these Crusader prisoners you’ve brought.”

“Fair enough,” Emerald piped up and turned on her foot. “I have no doubt you’ll find us when you want.”

“Oh, yes. Very easily.”

“WAIT!” Ilia ran in front of Temujin. “Aren’t you going to ask them about Blake?! They were the last ones to see her!”

“Enough, Ilia.”

“But, Temujin!”

“I said enough!” the elder snarled.

It was then, Ilia realized how foolish she looked.

“I’m sorr—”

Temujin reached out to pat her head.

“That is enough.” She looked past the girl on the verge of tears to Team ENMY caught between staying and going. “You may leave.”

Emerald and Yang nodded shortly before continuing to exit the room. The crowd of soldiers that once blocked them in, now made way like a parting sea. To them, Temujin’s word commanded absolute obedience. If ENMY were allowed to leave with her blessing, they were christened untouchable.

When the four were gone, the rest of the hall’s attendants dispersed, save for Temujin’s closest advisors.

“They are a good team,” Temujin assessed. “Did you notice how the one called Emerald left her guard completely open?”

“That was careless,” the blue-ringed Faunus commented with a hollow voice.

“No, it was trust. The girl left her defenses completely to the other three. It allowed her to divert her sole focus into speaking with me without any worries. Those four… what a collection of little monsters.”

“They did appear formidable as a combat unit.”

“I want them!”

“Could you please refrain from adopting the opposition—again?” Minerva scolded sternly.

“Hmph! As if you weren’t already scouting them for your school!”

“That is an entirely different matter.”

“Peh!” Temujin rested her chin on her cane for a few seconds. “Team ENMY….”

“If only those miscreants had been born in Vacuo.”

X X X X X

Even as they reached the first floor of the building, Yang showed no signs of dropping her guard. As soon as the elevator doors opened, she took point at the front of her team. After her, Emerald followed with Mercury at her side. Bringing up the rear was Neo, who continuously watched their backs and blind spots.

All eyes fell on them as the four crossed the lobby. As well as a certain familiar figure waiting by the security desk.

“Hey, Kiddo.”

“…”

Yang’s heart stopped. She took a deep breath and blinked away the tears threatening to burst.

“Dad.”

“Yeah. It’s me, sunshine,” he answered with a warm grin.

Her body went rigid. She was about to step away, but duty stayed her feet. Yang couldn’t break formation.

Just then, she received a stiff kick in the butt.

When she turned around, Yang saw Emerald rolling her eyes and gesturing her forward. As if to say, “Go say hi to your dad, idiot. We’ll wait.”

Without another second to spare, Yang dashed into her father’s arms for a tight embrace. Taiyang picked his daughter up and swung her around in pure joy.

“Oh, I knew you’d get here, Kiddo. I always knew.”

“Dad…! DAD! I have so much to tell you!”

“Hehehe! I’m sure you do.”

They both let go and wiped the tears from their eyes. Her father was exactly the way Yang remembered. Although, it seemed he did put on a bit more muscle and his skin was tanned a couple shades darker. But other than that, he was still the loving father she knew, and that went a long way.

“I have to admit, I was worried when I wasn’t allowed up there,” Taiyang massaged the back of his neck. “But it looks like you received a better welcome than I did.”

“I kinda doubt that…”

“Glynda and Minerva practically had to stop Temujin from having me executed as a spy.”

“Eesh.”

“Yeah. Your godmother tends to be more thorough than most when it comes to grudges.”

“Godmother? Wait, who are we talking about?”

“…”

“………”

“She… didn’t tell you?”

“TEMUJIN’S MY GODMOTHER?!” Yang shrieked after realizing she had heard correctly.

“Raven was really stubborn about it being her.” And then, in a quieter voice, “Despite all my objections…”

“SHE ALMOST TRIED TO KILL ME!”

“It’s possible she forgot.”

“She FORGOT I’m her goddaughter?”

“That seems entirely plausible for that senile buffoon,” a voice resounded behind them.

As the group turned, they saw Minerva and Glynda approach.

“Contrary it may be to your first impressions, it seems Temujin has taken to your group rather fondly. She has invited your leader to a discussion tomorrow.”

“Alone?” Yang cocked her head.

“Yes.”

“Fat chance.”

“Yang!” Taiyang was about to remand her, when Minerva held up her hand.

“I see bringing up the matter in front of your father has done little to dull your composure. Would you be interested in enrolling in Shade Academy?”

“Minerva…!” Glynda groaned, while shaking her head. “This is hardly the time. Besides, have I not brought your school some of the best and brightest Vale has to offer?”

“There is always room for more. In any case,” the Headmaster turned to Emerald. “Accommodations have been made for you and your team at our student dorms. Another subject our illustrious leader failed to recall during your vocal boxing match of wits.”

“Cool. Didn’t like the idea of being homeless,” Emerald replied. “Probably easier to keep an eye on us too, huh?”

“Quite so.”

The group exited the lobby to a cargo truck standing by. Team ENMY and Taiyang piled on the back, while the two Headmasters took the driver and passenger seats. On their way to the school, Yang filled her father and former Professor on the events leading up to the battle of Atlas. She also made sure to tell them about Masa, which was one of their previous concerns.

Meanwhile, although an unofficial discussion, Emerald and Minerva spoke at length about what an outline of alliance treaty terms would look like. They exchanged imaginary benefits, verbal hypothetics on what each nation had to offer the other. There was even some touched topics on strategies they could employ against Mistral and Vale.

“Of course, I feel it necessary to inform you, Temujin may very well veto any contents of our conversation on a whim,” Minerva admitted.

“Maybe, but why do I get the feeling you’re the real brains behind the logistics of this Kingdom?”

“Hmph.” The Headmaster smiled at Emerald’s subtle compliment. “You are a clever girl. With some guidance and a proper bit of tutelage, you could very well become one of the greatest minds in Remnant.”

“Does she always lay it on this thick?” the girl asked Glynda.

“Yes… Always.”

At the same time, Yang showed her father a picture on her scroll taken from the Ashen Heir’s Ball. In it, Ruby was wearing a suit while dancing with Weiss. Taiyang covered his mouth to hush his surprise and joy.

“She’s grown so much…”

“Right?”

“That’s not just the picture, right? I can’t believe how tall she is now!”

“Seriously! She’s even taller than me…! Freakin’ growth spurt. Made me have second thoughts about calling myself her big sister.”

“Guess Ruby took those genes from Qrow than Summer on that one.”

“Yeah. Now that you mention it, she’s starting to get a little of that lanky look to her.”

“We have to make sure she’s eating well!”

“Her girlfriend is the standing coregent of the wealthiest Kingdom in the world. She’s eating just fine, dad.”

“No, not enough. As soon as you guys send someone to upgrade the CCTS Tower, I’m putting a call in to Ruby. Make sure that’s included in one of the treaty terms!”

What a doting parent, Emerald and Minerva nodded, but didn’t say it out loud. Though, the CCTS Tower was one of the first things they discussed.

After some time, their vehicle was engulfed in a great shadow. The drastic change of atmosphere tricked them for a moment into thinking it was suddenly night. Not only was the sun gone, but the air became significantly cooler. Sand was no longer blowing in their faces or clogging their ears.

When ENMY turned their attentions skyward, they awed at the sight of the single enormous tree enshrouding the campus around it. The school’s buildings gathered at the base of this miracle of nature. Small rays of sunlight cascaded down in the few gaps between the leaves.

“Shade Academy,” Yang muttered. “Pretty literal.”

Minerva navigated them to the student dorms with ease. On the front quad, the team was surprised to see children playing with those who were high school age.

“Yes. Unlike the other capitals, Vacuo possesses only one central academy,” Glynda answered their question for them. “As such, grades elementary into advanced are more intermingled.”

A group of adolescents rushed to the newcomers with excitement in their eyes. A number of them especially gathered around Neo for some reason.

“Oh my gosh! Your hair is like candy! It’s so pretty!”

“I’ve never met anyone with pink eyes before!”

“Hey, hey, you’re super strong, but super small!”

“Play with us! Play with us!”

“How come you don’t talk?!”

“Whatever! Actions speak louder than words! That’s what Professor Pan always tells us!”

“YEAH! Let’s go play!”

They hopped up and down incessantly, trying to pull the girl towards an elevated circular platform. Yang was the only one to notice a certain unease in her partner. She also knew the reason why.

Neo’s childhood was anything but pleasant. One of the main contributions to her habitual change of appearance and her silent demeanor were the children that bullied her when she was young. Maybe seeing these kids dredged up bad memories. Although, a single glance, and Yang could tell these children were nothing like the bullies of Neo’s past. The petite girl must have known this as well, as she found herself about to go along with them.

Still, she hesitated. The trauma was deeply rooted. It did not loosen its grip so easily.

Suddenly, Neo felt a warm palm press against the lower of her back. She knew the touch anywhere and felt the encouragement that came with it. How simple a small gesture coming from someone so important to her could make such a difference.

“Go on,” Yang’s voice tickled Neo’s ear.

““YAY~!!!”” the children cheered as they led Neo to the platform.

In the chaotic bustling, Minerva and Emerald continued ahead, resuming their previous discussion. Playing the bodyguard, Mercury followed his partner, as Glynda also took her own part in the talks. Leaving the father and daughter alone to watch Neo from afar.

“What is that by the way?” Yang asked, pointing to the ring.

“Oh, it’s a game the students here play a lot,” Taiyang answered. “Apparently, it’s called Sumo. You try to push each other out of the ring without any weapons, punches, or kicks. Only grappling and shoves are allowed.”

“Looks fun.”

The two watched as Neo imitated the children she faced against. She mirrored their stomping feet in ritualistic manner. After placing their fists on the sand, they charged. The petite girl hoisted one of the helpless boys into the air by his belt, tossed him off the platform, and onto the grassy ground with supreme joy. Her face alight with silent laughter.

With one hand, she cockily ushered on the next challenger. In the absence of language, Neo had no trouble communicating with the children here.

Yang couldn’t help but wonder how different things would have been if she had been raised in Vacuo. This unbelievable place where there was little room for misunderstanding. This place where—

“Strength is the language,” Taiyang commented. “They have a common saying here, you know.”

“Yeah,” Yang nodded. “We’ve heard about it, but actually being here, experiencing it for myself. Only the Strongest Survive Vacuo, huh?”

“It’s a simple principle. But sometimes, simple is all you need.”

“This is where mom grew up… it explains a lot.”

“Yeah. Yes, it does.”

Taiyang fell silent with introspect. A somberness traced the edges of his smile.

“…So, Summer is alive.”

“………Yeah.”

“I had a feeling that was the case.”

Yang turned abruptly.

“You knew?!”

“I had my suspicions,” Taiyang frowned. “I looked everywhere for her, Yang. The more I searched, the more it felt like Summer didn’t want to be found. Any evidence linking to her possible whereabouts were too conveniently erased.”

“…Masa mentioned a way to find her. The Tower in Vacuo, she said. Know anything about it?”

Her father’s expression darkened.

“There is a Tower like the one at Beacon here. Professor Oobleck and Port made it there a while back. It probably has what you need from what I’ve heard. And if Masa was the one who told you, that practically makes it a guarantee.”

“So, why do you look like this isn’t a good idea?”

“Peter…said learning something changed Oobleck. A disturbing truth of some kind.”

“Is that all?”

“Yang, you haven’t known Professor Oobleck as long as I have. I’ve never seen anything shake that man, much less knowledge. He’s the most bonafide truth-seeker you’ll ever meet. But he discovered something in that Tower—and it shocked him to his core.”

Yang knitted her brow in pondering.

“I don’t look away, dad. Not ever, not anymore. It’s probably one of the few things I can really take pride in. I’ll go, whatever horrible truths I find.”

“Hm,” Taiyang braced his daughter’s shoulder. “I don’t know~ Learning Temujin was your godmother seemed to shake you pretty well.”

“Yeah, that was a curve ball. None of the intel we had included that little tidbit.”

“Just imagine what else you don’t know.”

“Speaking of which…” Yang threw her father a penetrating stare. “I wanted to know something for a while now.

Tai shrugged. “Ask it.”

“So, you and mom—okay, I’m using their names to avoid confusion—you and Raven had me.”

“Yes…?”

“Qrow and Summer had Ruby.”

“Also, yes…”

“But Raven and Summer. They were in love with each other…right? I’m right, right?”

“Oh god…….!” Tai buried his face in his hands.

“Hey, you said, ask it. Seriously, what’s the deal? How did that work?”

“I was really hoping you’d never bring that up.”

“Well?”

With a long sigh, the older Huntsman seemed to resign himself to his daughter’s questions. He unburied his hands and looked straight at her. An obvious reluctance lingered in his features.

“Things were…complicated with your mothers. Summer especially. She was a little free spirited, when it came to those kinds of things. Do you know what kind of things I’m talking about?”

“…Are we talking bisexually?”

“No. Well-Yes, and no. You know how polygamy is prohibited in Vale and Vacuo, but accepted in Mistral and Atlas?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, you’re right in thinking Raven and Summer had… affections for each other. That said, they also had feelings for Qrow and I. As a result, because of the monogamy only thing in Vale, Summer married Qrow and Raven married with me.”

“Alright…”

Tai exuded a solemnness before continuing. As if there was something he was still holding back, but wanted to get off his chest. And with a sad smile and a long exhale, he did.

“Raven and Summer…were deeply in love, Yang. Which is why they chose to marry here—in Vacuo.”

Yang wondered why that was so difficult to say, until she gave it more thought.

Raven took Summer here. This was the place she risked her life defending. Her mother made no effort in concealing her dislike of Vale, Mistral, or Atlas, much less show them any loyalty. But Yang remembered how she looked when she spoke of Vacuo. She spoke of home. This place was special.

Yang’s thoughts the, went to Temujin. Raven brought Summer here to be married before the eyes of her only parent. The person that was probably most important in her life up to that point.

And then, there was the atmosphere of this place. A fire and sand that cleansed away everything unnecessary, leaving only what was at the core intact. The Kingdom that commanded you bared your soul and be true.

Yang fully understood now why her father struggled to admit that single fact.

…

In a sense, Raven’s marriage to Summer carried a significantly deeper meaning.

“Only the Strongest Survive Vacuo,” she heard Taiyang echo. “It doesn’t refer purely to just strength, Yang. It’s all the things they are. Their minds, their spirits—their friendships.”

“…”

“And, yes. Even their love.”

“…”

Yang frowned to herself and saw the saddened visage of her father. Saddened, but now content with admission. A crucial moment had come to pass for the wizened man.

“Love is a strange thing, Yang.”

She followed his line of sight to Neo still wrestling with the children.

The petite girl had just overthrown her most recent opponent and was now flexing her bicep at her partner with mock fierceness. She never looked more beautiful or happy in Yang’s eyes, and an all-consuming heat that outrivaled Vacuo’s desert blossomed in her chest.

…

Is this what mom felt, I wonder?

Yang strode forward, answering the silly taunts Neo was throwing her way. She spoke over her shoulder before joining.

“You’re right, dad—”

“Love is a strange thing.”

#rwby #Baked Alaska #yang x neo #yang xiao long #neopolitan #emerald sustrai #mercury black #ENMY

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nancypullen · 6 years

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Searching for Home (Warning: long post about nothing)

That blog title may seem odd since I’ve been in this house since 1999. Mt. Juliet has been home because this is (mostly) where my kids grew up. Sure, they remember Barrow and Fairbanks and living the Alaskan life, but they were little guys when we moved here. Matt was 3rd grade and Tyler was just getting ready for kindergarten. As for me, prior to moving here I’d spent the bulk of my life in Alaska, some of it on Ft. Wainwright, some of it in North Pole, some of it in Barrow, and much of it in Fairbanks.

During my childhood we bounced from post to post as a military family (no complaints, I loved it), and didn’t really settle until Dad retired and I was entering high school in North Pole. We spent a period going back and forth between Ft. Wainwright , Alaska (4th,5th,6th grade, then 9-12th) and Ft. Bragg, North Carolina (K 1,2,3 then 7th and 8th grade). But when you return to a post you don’t return to the friends you once had, they’ve all moved on. You go into different housing, different schools, and make new friends. I was born in Georgia, but have no memory of the state. We lived in Louisiana and I have vague memories of it, none very good. I was more, or maybe less, fortunate than some depending on how you look at it. More fortunate because I sometimes returned to familiar areas, and as the youngest in my family I was the only one who was able to start and finish high school in one place. Less fortunate because my dad had an aversion to putting in for posts overseas - so many of my friends had the opportunity to live in Germany, Italy, Spain, and other exciting spots. When my family was military Alaska was considered comparable to overseas posts, so that’s where we went. My sister was born just as Alaska became a state in 1959. My brother was born there as well, and two years after his arrival I was born 4,284 miles away at Ft. Benning, Georgia. Our family made many trips up and down the Al-Can Highway (through Canada to Alaska) and it wasn’t paved. Three kids crammed into a station wagon that’s pulling a U-Haul (or a camper) on a washboard gravel road for 2200 miles with very little to see...someone give my mother a medal. No doubt that road and its amenities have improved, but at that time it was sparse. I spent seventeen years of my life in Alaska, I stayed well after the rest of my family had fled. By the time I was eighteen I was without parents or siblings in the state but I had Mickey. I was young and in love. My parents had moved to Florida, my sister had followed love to Rochester,New York, and my brother had joined the Army and was in Germany. Alaska is where I started married life, became a mother, and experienced so many of life’s firsts. But I don’t miss it. Fairbanks is kind of a gritty town. Not the Fairbanks that tourists see, but the town that’s there after the snow flies. Perhaps if my roots were in Sitka or Juneau or even somewhere in the Matanuska Valley I’d feel a longing to go back. Maybe not. Everything is harder there. As a mother of two little boys just the logistics of getting to the grocery store and back were a pain. Unplug and start the car (if you don’t have a garage) to warm it up. While the car is thawing, get everyone decked out in arctic gear from head to toe. Load up and slide to the store. Debate whether to leave car running and risk theft, or turn it off and do your shopping as a mad dash. Get everyone inside and unzipped so they don’t sweat to death while shopping. Rush around buying ridiculously priced food and so-so produce and check out. Dress kids again, then give them whiplash trying to pull the grocery cart across the frozen, rutted, bumpy parking lot. Unload into trunk, then sit down on hard as a rock car seat because you turned the car off and everything is frozen. Slide home on icy roads. You see where this is going. The dressing and undressing so that no one gets frostbite. The elements constantly working against you. Did I mention that it’s also midnight dark almost all day and night? Don’t get me wrong, I love winter. I love snow. But I do not love constant darkness and fifty below zero and trying to accomplish every day tasks in weather not meant for humans. Obviously, that wasn’t all winter. Lots of days hovered in the twenty to thirty below zero range. I remember my in-laws coming for a Christmas visit and my father-in-law delighting in tossing a hot cup of coffee into the air to watch it come back down in frozen crystals. Even in the brief but beautiful summers the conveniences that we take for granted here in the lower 48 weren’t available and if they were there was sticker shock. My friends in Fairbanks still complain about prices, conveniences, lack of goods,etc. They take great pride in the moose, aurora, and bone-chilling cold. I don’t want to burst their bubbles and tell them that you can get all of that in Maine, Minnesota, North Dakota, and other northern states AND get Amazon Prime and affordable household goods. You don’t have to prove anything. So where am I going with this rambling blog? I’m looking for home. Most people feel a pull toward home, a place or a state. I don’t. Well, I kind of do...but it’s more for a time and a people. I miss Weiser, Idaho where we lived for a year with my grandparents while my dad was in Korea. We also visited every chance we got, mostly when we were transferring between bases. Those were the safest, happiest, most wonderful times in my life. Grandma and Grandpa’s place was paradise. But that’s all gone now. their house and land was sold long ago and it’s now run down and the big shade trees are gone, so are Grandma’s magical gardens. If I returned to Weiser it wouldn’t be to that cinnamon scented house of love where I slept in an attic bedroom with lace curtains. I do like Idaho a lot, but it wouldn’t feel like home. I’ve mentioned before that I have a real affection for the town of Wamego in Kansas. It’s just right. Situated between Manhattan(about 15 minutes) and Topeka (about 30 minutes) and with Kansas City a bit further east (a bit over an hour) it’s a Norman Rockwell town that takes pride in a charming downtown, a good school system, and being neighborly. It’s the heartland. We’ve visited three times and Wamego always comes up when we talk about where we’d like to be. I confess, I love the prairie. Always have. The politics of Kansas are a hot mess. I don’t mean that they’re red and I’m blue, I mean that the Kansas GOP has basically bankrupted the state. I can live in a red state, though I’d love to live in a blue one, but I can’t live in a state devoid of services, money for schools, roads,etc. I’m keeping a watchful eye on their governor’s race - will they elect Laura Kelly, a woman and democrat who has been a four term state senator and fought Brownback’s destructive policies...or Kobach, Brownback’s right hand man? I met Brownback at a Wamego 4th of July parade before I knew who he was and every cell in my body screamed DANGER. You know how sometimes your gut tells you before your brain has a chance to figure things out? That. If Kansas votes Kelly, my faith will be restored. But it’s not home. We also love Keene, the town in New Hampshire that hosts the fabulous pumpkin festival. We always walk the towns we like, checking out libraries and other spots, and we always go into grocery stores and compare prices. Keene ticks all of my boxes for a sweet, interesting, walkable, smart city. Their library was beautiful! That tells you a lot about a population. If the library is active it speaks highly of a town. Property taxes were a little high in Keene, and it’s really not close to any decent airports for Mickey. Manchester’s small airport is about an hour and twenty minutes away and Boston is almost 2 hours (probably more with traffic). Granted, we’d probably be retired so maybe that’s not as big of an issue. Still, we’ll want to see family and that makes it harder for everyone involved. Keene is beautiful, and it is surrounded by New England’s best - sugar maple farms and covered bridges, and has four beautiful seasons. Keene is Mickey’s number one choice, but.....you guessed it, it’s not home. I like so many of the small towns outside of Minneapolis (and it’s a blue state!), and the state of Minnesota ranks sky high in just about every way that matters - great health care, great education system, great economy, and so on. They’re smart cookies up there. Admittedly, the biggest draw is that Matt lives up there, but there’s no guarantee he’ll stay. He’ll be off wherever the scariest diseases live. Minnesota is at the top of my list though, I really like the people there. I like coastal Maine, not so much inland Maine. Sadly their economy is in such a downward spiral that the state is in a depression with no end in sight. I think they’re ranked 47th in the nation for economic growth and their numbers are stagnant. It’s weird, Maine’s neighboring states are thriving while their governor sticks to his guns and guts the coffers. I’ve read article after article showing that the Portland area of southeast Maine is recovering and growing but rural Maine is being left behind. Businesses are closing, services are being cut, there’s no job creation, and no one seems to be taking action. Towns are shrinking and doctors, dentists, teachers, and other important services are lost. So...we could probably pick up real estate for a song, but living there might be hard for a retired person. I think I’ll just visit and eat their lobster. We could just stay put. Life in Tennessee is certainly affordable. No state income tax, though we do have a hefty sales tax (here in Wilson County we pay ten cents on a dollar). Real estate is still affordable - though again, here in Wilson County it has skyrocketed. If you don’t mine living deep, I mean deep, in Trump country where the religious hypocrisy runs high and tolerance is low - this might be your place. I didn’t pick it, but I’ve made the best of it for over twenty-five years. I reached my limit years ago, but the mister has recently started complaining about the heat so maybe we’ll get out after all. Nashville is twenty minutes and a whole world away. Maybe if we were young people living downtown we’d see a different Tennessee - Davidson County usually goes blue, a small dot in a deeply red state. Here in Mt. Juliet one of the first things people ask you is where you go to church. Two weeks ago I went to get my mammogram and the woman who took my information was very chatty. I engaged and we were yukking it up. As I left her desk to sit down and wait to be called, she said, “You are just precious, where do you go to church?” When I answered that I don’t belong to a particular church her face fell and that was the end of her friendliness. No doubt she needed to know which part of the hierarchy I belonged to...the large population of Baptists and Church of Christ followers seem to have a running battle to see who can out holy the other and who can recruit the most new members. Methodists are pretty cool and there’s even a handful of Lutherans here who won’t bother you at all. Tennessee is growing by leaps and bounds and has one of the hottest real estate markets in the country thanks to it being a retirement haven. Low prices, low taxes, low standards. Ahahahaha! We have all the services we need at our fingertips, and we can be at the beach or in the mountains in just a few hours. Definite positives. We don’t have four nice seasons though - we have an excruciating summer, a beautiful but quick fall, a gray,wet,ugly winter, and a soggy, tornado-ridden spring. Actually, I’m not complaining about spring - I love big thunderstorms and severe weather. As long as the power stays on it can thunder and lightning for days and I’m okay. So what do we do? Stay? Go? Keep looking? We both liked what we saw in a week in South Dakota. Do we look until we’re too old to move? If we could snap our fingers and just live where we’d like, we’d both go to The Netherlands. We feel at home there, pretty sad when I feel like a visitor in so many places in the U.S. My soul feels at home in Salem. I feel at home when I stand on the prairie and look at the huge sky and rolling hills. I guess it all comes back to not being FROM anywhere. In Maine, there are Mainers and outsiders. It’s very clear. In Minnesota they’re warm and welcoming, but there are customs, foods, traditions, and basic traits that make one a Minnesotan - I don’t possess any of them, though I don’t think they’d care. I’d just always feel like a visitor. I didn’t feel that in Kansas, they’re good salt of the earth people, not nosy enough to ask where you’re from or where you go to church. New Hampshire was the same way. There didn’t seem to be a divide between born here and moved here folks. I’ve been in Tennessee since ‘93 and I’m still not considered a local. I’m okay with that. Not having picked up the customs and quirks of a state or even a region, I can’t really claim a “home”. If pressed I’d probably say Alaska because that’s where I experienced everything from childhood skinned knees to birthing a baby. But I can’t say that if I stepped off a plane there tomorrow I’d take a deep breath and say, “Ahhh, home!” Moving to a new home every two to three years during my formative years made me resilient, it made me friendly. I make friends easily, but I don’t get too attached - and getting me to really open up, well...

It also gave me a good attitude toward not-so-good places. Even if you can’t find something positive, hey - you’ll only have to endure it for a couple years, right? (twenty-five years later...) It gave me the gift of curiosity and of emotional self-sufficiency. It just didn’t give me a hometown. So I’m looking, always looking. I spend hours scouring real estate and then looking up information on citydata.com and other sites. If I ever move I’ll know more about the place than the folks who already live there.

Thanks for listening to my scatter-brained ramblings today. There’s no point to any of this, really. I yearn for a place that doesn’t exist. I long for home, but I suppose it’s all in my mind - some magical place that fits and feels right. I wonder how many people actually have that. I wonder how many need it? I’ve spent a lifetime blooming where planted, and I think that’s a crucial skill. I’m certainly not knocking it. I just wonder what it feels like to be the plant who gets placed in the perfect environment for growth and health. Please don’t mistake this post for sorrow or a cry for help - it’s not. It’s really more of a thinking out loud sort of thing. Just pondering, trying to work out whether it’s safer to stay put or make a leap. Will any place be better than the last? Who knows? I do know that there are places where being authentic is easier than others. Guess I’ll just keep looking...any hints?

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newstfionline · 6 years

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Squeezing more out of taps: How Cape Town cut consumption in half

Ryan Lenora Brown, CS Monitor, April 30, 2018

CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA --Each morning, on opposite sides of this city, two women wake up thinking about water.

For both Helen Moffett and Musa Baba, entire days are choreographed around the vital resource: Where they will get it. How long the line will be. If it will be safe. How little they can manage with and still get by.

Each morning Ms. Baba, a barista, picks her way down a sandy hillside crowded with tin shacks to the communal tap she shares with about 100 of her neighbors. When it’s her turn, she fills a seven-gallon bucket, hoists it onto the top of her head, and carefully walks home, trying not to let too much slosh out into the powdery dust below. That water, after all, has a long day ahead of it. She’ll use it first to wash herself and her kids, then chuck the same water back into a bucket to scrub her floors. Finally, she’ll squeeze out the dregs from the mop, saving them to flush the toilet.

Twenty miles away, Ms. Moffett spends hours each day assembling and maintaining what she calls her “water buffet.” There’s the yellowish water she collects from a spring trickling out beneath a local construction site, jugs of well water she’s bummed from a neighbor, and the trash cans full of rainwater she keeps stashed in her backyard. Bottles and buckets stand at attention around her house, the liquid inside such a wide variety of colors that a friend once quipped that Moffett, a writer, should call her next book “50 Shades of Grey Water.”

A year ago, Baba and Moffett had almost nothing in common, and in many ways, they still live in two different universes. Moffett lives in a manicured gated community flanked by mountains. Baba’s house is two tin rooms she built herself that grip the side of a hill cluttered with other small shacks.

But these days, the two women, along with millions of others here, share a common preoccupation: how to save water. For Baba and many others, that’s been a lifelong project of necessity. But for another population of Cape Town residents, including Moffett, it’s part of a massive lifestyle pivot that has helped bring the city on the southwestern tip of South Africa back from the brink of the unthinkable.

As recently as March, Cape Town’s government was instructing residents to prepare for an imminent “Day Zero,” when taps across most of the city would be shut off indefinitely.

Following three of the driest years in the city’s recorded history, the growing water crisis earned Cape Town a dubious distinction: South Africa’s tourist hub, newspaper headlines across the world blared, was about to become the first developed city in the world to completely run out of water.

But behind the scenes, a tectonic shift was under way. As the city bartered for water with local farmers and hustled to build desalination plants, its residents simply started using less water. A lot less.

And it has worked--at least for now. In March, the city government announced that if current water use patterns held and winter rains fell normally (still a big if), there would be no Day Zero this year.

That’s because since 2016, using a combination of sticks and carrots to coax residents on board, the city has cut its water use by half. Its biggest customers now use 80 percent less. Today, every Capetonian is allowed just 13 gallons of municipal water per day--a little less than the amount it takes to flush a toilet four times. Use more, and the city reduces your pressure to a trickle, and your water bill can turn into a mortgage payment.

By comparison, during its infamous Millennium Drought of 1997 to 2009, Melbourne, Australia, also cut its water consumption by half, but it took 12 years, and at the end of it, residents were still guzzling 17 gallons a day. And between 2012 and 2016, parched California brought its home water use down 25 percent, to about 100 gallons per person per day.

Here in Cape Town, suburban residents have become connoisseurs of taking 90-second showers and then flushing their toilets with the water they collected while doing it. On popular water-saving Facebook groups, city residents debate the best way to wash their dog “off the grid” (bottled water, one woman suggests. Scrub him down with used bath water, offers another.) They swap the names of local companies that will sink a personal well in your backyard. Local police, meanwhile, receive a steady stream of tips from concerned residents who’ve seen their neighbors committing the ultimate middle-class drought crime: watering their lawns.

“There has become a real sense of urgency, even competition [among Capetonians] to see how low you can go [in using water],” says Kirsty Carden, an engineer at the University of Cape Town’s Urban Water Management Research Unit. “Yes, it’s been a crisis, but it’s also good to learn these lessons now. Cape Town isn’t the only city in the world that’s going to need them for the future.”

In South Africa--by some measures the most unequal country on earth--water restrictions have had another, less obvious effect: They have given the rich a small but rare experience of how the poor have always gotten by.

“It’s humbling, learning to think about water the way most South Africans have been doing for a long time,” Moffett says, arranging two gallon jugs of water from another local spring in the trunk of her car. “Every household chore takes three times as much thought, and three times as long.”

Plus, she says, “I can’t believe I’ve spent my life peeing into clean drinking water. What a waste.”

“We have always lived like this--nothing has changed because of the drought,” says Baba, sloshing a T-shirt in a sudsy bucket outside her house. “If now rich people can understand better what that’s like, I think that’s a good thing.”

Many of the city’s wealthiest residents have quietly begun to opt out of the city’s water system altogether. As restrictions on municipal supplies have tightened over the past several months, tens of thousands of people have gone essentially off-grid, drilling backyard wells to supply their showers and trucking in treated factory wastewater to fill their swimming pools. One luxury hotel chain recently announced it was constructing its own desalination plant.

“In the immediate future, people tapping into those alternate supplies relieves pressure on the system, so there’s great benefit for us,” says Xanthea Limberg, the Cape Town city councilor in charge of water. But in the long term, she worries, all the extra wells could drain the city’s vital aquifer, which also needs to recharge after periods of drought. Not to mention that the wealthy going off-grid could deprive the city of income it desperately needs to subsidize water access for the poor.

That divide between those with alternative sources of water and those without them is already beginning to play out in varied ways across the city.

On a recent morning, a convoy of six dirt-streaked police cars screeches to a halt in front of a public beach. Cyclists in spandex, floppy-haired teenagers on skateboards, and elderly women with fluffy white dogs turn to watch as cops pour out and march to the site of the crime--a public bathroom.

“This is where they’ve been filling up the buckets,” one of the policemen says, pointing to a still-dripping tap.

A group of homeless men here, they explain, were using municipal water to wash visitors’ cars--a violation of city water restrictions. But the culprits have made themselves scarce--and, anyway, the cops know they were unlikely to pay any fine they were issued. So they toss the contraband buckets in the back of a police van and pull away.

“These guys aren’t the city’s worst offenders by far,” explains Inspector Shane Blake. But the big malefactors have more resources to hide what they are doing. “There’s a lot of illegal water use happening, but we can’t catch them all.” So Blake and his team are largely limited to spooking the small transgressors.

“People have to get water somewhere. This guy isn’t the criminal,” one onlooker mumbles at the next stop, a shack settlement, as police hand out a $15 ticket to a man scrubbing down a taxi with water from a communal tap. “This guy is just trying to make a living.”

Across town, water trucks rumble into Cape Town’s tree-lined suburbs, carrying a precious cargo--recycled wastewater from local factories and vineyards. For a few hundred dollars, residents can pay to have their pools filled with the treated discharges, which are clean enough to swim in.

“Otherwise, this water just goes straight into the ocean,” says one owner of a water delivery company. (He asks not to be identified because past media attention has incited massive public anger against his company. Many Capetonians suspect that most private water suppliers are illegally sourcing their water from boreholes, which are allowed only for personal use.)

“Look, if you have the money, you can always buy your way--at least to some extent--out of crises, and this drought is no exception,” he says. “You can ask if that’s fair or not, but it’s not illegal.”

But Nazeer Sonday doesn’t see it that way. A farmer and activist in Philippi, a township of Cape Town, he says this crisis is about more than shifting water use off the grid.

“For me, water is a big social justice issue,” he says. “A golf course consumes 2 million liters a day, and how many liters are people wasting watering English gardens in Africa? How many liters are filling private swimming pools? Hello! Water is our shared resource, and those people are taking more than their share.”

For him, solving Cape Town’s water woes requires a different approach than just forcing people to use less water from the city system. As climate change and the extreme weather it brings close in, people need to learn to see water as finite.

“The city sees this as a supply and demand issue--as in, we have the demand, so let’s find the supply,” he says. “But we can’t go on like that forever. At some point, we have to learn how to conserve, too.”

#South Africa #cape town water crisis

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suitcasetales · 4 years

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You Have Been Excused from Jury Duty

Those were the magic words in an email I received last Tuesday. It’s not that I wouldn’t have minded serving; it would have been a nice change of pace from work. But when the two weeks of jury duty exactly matched the two weeks of vacation Janet had scheduled, I played the “I work in a hospital and am married to a nurse who sometimes takes care of people with unknown COVID status” card. I guess it worked.

The next challenge is where could we go with a paranoid and scared-of- everything dog on such short notice? We googled ourselves silly looking inside a 5-hour drive radius and settled on the Outer Banks. Friday night at midnight Janet found this condo, we booked it Saturday morning and we drove to Kitty Hawk Sunday!

It is an interesting condo. The building is ocean-front but our condo is on the side so we only have a partial ocean view. The parking deck is level one; our condo is on the second and third floors but we have to go to the third floor to enter it. (The fourth floor condos are all one level.) Steps in general are a little rough on Cokie with her weakened back hip on the side with her mangled foot so we have been taking the elevator up to the third floor. For some unknown reason, getting her on and off the elevator has been easy. We have three balconies and the bedrooms and laundry room are downstairs on the second floor with the kitchen and living area on the third floor. We try to limit going up and down the steps as she will follow our every move.

The condo building has indoor and outdoor pools and large indoor and outdoor hot tubs. (Some of the fourth floor condos also have hot tubs on their balconies.) The COVID imposed limit is 5 people!

Our booking correspondence stated the outdoor pool was closed but people (including Janet) have been in it this week. There are two nice restrooms out by the pool and a zero entry, fenced-in kiddie pool. The ramped, terraced deck between the pool and the beach, includes a gazebo. The beach itself is quite narrow here but after walking a mile south along the beach this afternoon, our part didn’t seem so narrow. There are definitely sections of the Outer Banks that are in trouble. God forbid they ever take a direct hit from a hurricane.

The dog owners have definitely discovered these condos but unfortunately so have the cat owners. Perfect for some people; not so perfect for someone like Janet who is allergic to cats! Also, the pets are supposed to be less than 50 pounds but there are plenty of big dogs here this week. We have no pillows (“cushions” for the English) for the couches, no placemats and no coasters; we presume these have been removed under their COVID protocol. There is also no vacuum and no broom so their suggestion that if your pet sheds a lot you should sweep is not possible.

But for a last-minute trip during a long and drawn out pandemic, we will take it. We have had a lovely week. Once the morning fog has dissipated, the weather has been near-perfect. We have not tried to take Cokie down on the beach here; it is just too challenging and the crashing waves too close. Instead, we have been driving somewhere to walk her and we have been on some surprisingly beautiful hikes to places we, in all the times we have been here, never knew existed. An old dog can indeed learn new tricks.

Monday morning, we hiked in Kitty Hawk Woods Reserve, managing to snake together a couple of miles weaving and winding through its narrow paths. The wind on the beach was stiff but in the protection of the Reserve, we didn’t notice it. We ate our lunch sitting on the beach but soon retreated to the hot tub.

Tuesday, we went on a long hike combining all the dog-friendly trails in the Nature Conservancy’s Nags Head Woods Preserve. (We would love to return sometime without a dog to hike the other trails and go in their Visitor Center, still closed due to COVID.)

The morning fog lingered a while but once we were headed to the beach with our lunch, the sun came out and we took a long walk on the beach up to the Avalon Pier.

Wednesday, we walked on the short and mostly boardwalk trail at Sandy Run Park in Kitty Hawk. This would be a nice and easy place for a family hike, even with a stroller. I think birders would savor all the places we hiked but at Sandy Run, the birdsong was most noticeable.

That is a lot of turtles!

The afternoon weather was absolutely perfect — 79 degrees, no wind, no flies and no one smoking nearby. We settled ourselves in our beach chairs, reading, people- and dog-watching and enjoying the piping plovers (not the best picture but posted in case you don’t know what they look like), the seagulls and the pelicans.

But because we had not had a lot of exercise and it was such a beautiful day, we decided to go for a drive south and headed down Route 12 and over the new Basnight Bridge (the old bridge was called the Bonner Bridge) that connects Bodie Island (site of the handsome Bodie Island Lighthouse and ten zillion mosquitos)....

and Oregon Inlet to Pea Island. Home to a National Wildlife Refuge, dogs are not allowed on the west side of Route 12. We stopped and parked at the end of the bridge and walked through the sand out to the ocean, passing the historic Pea Island Life Saving Station. Cokie loved walking in the sand and almost went to the waters edge but there were people there and she does not generally like people.

Since we were down that way and would not likely return, we also drove over to Manteo, one of our favorite small towns. There were not too many folks around so we were able to get Cokie to walk on the boardwalks there and through a beautiful new neighborhood just east of historic downtown. We were pleased to see the independent bookstore still exists but alas, it is no longer the Manteo Booksellers. It also probably no longer has cats in it but that is a good thing!

This morning (Thursday as I write this), we went to Jockeys Ridge State Park and hiked out to the Albemarle Sound. Parts of this hike is hard on the ol’ hips as some places the sand is hard and easy to walk on while other places, it is soft and difficult. Plus you are either weaving your way around dunes or going up and over them. At least when you get to the Sound, you can cool off in the shallow water before heading back to the parking lot. Besides the enormity of the dunes, this Park is full of live oaks and has some really nice specimens.

The morning dew was still on this cluster and it was beautiful. And below, mushrooms growing in the sand??

After lunch, Janet and I walked on the beach again but this time we went south for a mile. We could not believe how bad the beach erosion was in that section. We thought “our” beach was narrow but further down, it was really bad.

We took one final soak in the hot tub, dried off on the sunny deck, me overlooking the ocean and Janet reading her book. Not quite as warm as Wednesday, it was still a picture-perfect day at the beach.

Our last hurrah was to go and catch tonight’s sunset back on the Sound side. We even got Cokie to walk around some even though there were cyclists, walkers with strollers and people around. She probably wouldn’t do it again as she tends to have a very good memory about having been somewhere before and not wanting to do it again but hey, we are working on that. We just need more opportunities to practice.

If only I could get out of work like I got out of jury duty. Now that would be paradise.

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rememberthattime · 4 years

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Chapter 58. EuRoad Trip, pt 3

Ah, fall. Crisp air. Colorful leaves. A reprieve from the heat of summer.

To fully enjoy my favorite season, Chelsay & I continued into the third and final phase of EuRoad Trip: “Fall”, with stops in the Dolomites, Bavaria, and the German Black Forest.

The change in season wasn’t gradual for Chelsay & I: we went from summer to fall in a matter of hours. Like, the three-hour drive between the Italian Riviera and the Dolomites.

Over the course of our drive, the setting went from Mediterranean chic to the Sound of Music. We’d left pastel-colored homes along the sea to log cabins dotting the mountainside. I love this setting. Obviously, I enjoy the Mediterranean, but it’s hard to beat an alpine autumn.

The Dolomites might be the perfect destination for fall. The air is crisp and clean. The leaves are changing. Charming villages sit at the base of undulating green fields, capped by towering limestone spines. The shops have a Swiss alpine theme but not in a kitschy way – it’s authentic. This is just how they’ve always been. Timber homes surround the tiny village, with potted flowers hung from every window and balcony. When planning, I was most excited for this leg of the trip, and it was meeting my expectations before we even left the car.

Our first stop was a picnic high above the Val di Funes, a picturesque acclimation to our new alpine surroundings. Chelsay and I enjoyed some of our recent garlic truffle spread investment, while Indy frolicked and grazed about the sloped green fields.

It was pretty overcast, but we weren’t bothered: it fit the cozy, fall atmosphere. Our only worry was that the next destination, Seceda, required some level of visibility.

Seceda is a unique mountain peak. A gradually ascending green field gives way to a sheer cliff, with limestone spines looming in the background. It looks like if the Cliffs of Dover were transplanted into the Italian Alps. That said, not even Seceda’s prickly spires could pierce this cloud cover.

We took a gondola to the peak but were soon shrouded in thick fog. We couldn’t see 20 feet in front of us, let alone Seceda. Though dense, the clouds were moving quickly, so we decided to roll the dice and stick around.

It’s pretty easy to pass the time with Indy: we teased him with weird noises, laughing at his reactions. We played fetch with anything we could find. Then when Indy got tired, we pulled up Ray Harris Jr and the World War II podcast. Chelsay would forecast potential gaps in the clouds while Ray educated us on FDR’s preference between pencil or pen.

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There were a few near misses. Chelsay spotted incoming breaks in the fog, we’d frantically stir with excitement, but ultimately, each proved impervious. Still, there was hope.

After an hour, we were just starting to question whether staying was worth it. But Chelsay thought there was one more break that might work out. It was excruciating to wait, but slowly, the shy rock began to reveal itself. This was it!

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Not only did the clouds part, but blue sky began to appear and then… a burst of sun. And what’s that? A rainbow?! What an epic setting. The soft glow of sunshine against the limestone crag. Fog still rolling quickly, but abruptly halting against Seceda’s impenetrable cliffside. The clouds shot up like waves hitting the coastline.

This was one of the lasting memories from the trip, and we celebrated with a tortellini feast that evening. We’d stopped at a grocery store earlier to pick up picnic supplies – an Italian grocery store. I’ve never seen so much pasta. And it all looked so delicious that we couldn’t settle on just one: we bought two types of tortellini and three different sauces. We enjoyed our tortellini sampling from our alpine chalet while watching World War II in Color. Ray hooked us.

The next day marked our first real physical activity in at least a week – since the calanques in Cassis. We were taking the 6 mile Tre Cime pass through pretty challenging conditions. Yesterday’s quick moving clouds were stagnant and heavy today. Whenever the weather was too much, Chelsay, Indy, and I would find shelter in the ‘refugio’ huts along the path, warming up with hot chocolate.

After the hike, we stopped at Lago di Braies, a teal alpine lake set between evergreen slopes. The setting looks like a screensaver, but the real highlight was once again Indy. Without his frisbee or other toys, Chelsay and I had been using sticks for fetch throughout the trip. So now every stick Indy saw was a toy.

He’d dart along the shore trying to tempt Chelsay and I into playing with him: “Maybe masters will like this stick? Oh, here’s a big one! Will they like this? How about a wet stick?”

Eventually we gave in – I threw the stick as far into the lake as possible (owner’s tip: that burns the most energy), and he’d inevitably plunge after it. Indy once again drew an audience with everyone taking pictures of our goofy dog in the otherwise serene setting.

That was essentially our last activity in the Dolomites, but before moving on to our next destination, I want to quickly mention the phenomenal food. It’s Italy, so obviously it was delicious. But it wasn’t just pasta and breadstick – it uniquely Italian-Austrian. Ricotta pizzella (alpine pizza), truffle ravioli, venison, and every type of dumpling imaginable.

After the Dolomites, we’d turn north and head back to London, driving through Austria, Germany, Belgium, and France on the way. The main focus of this trip were the Loire Valley, Cote d’Azur, and Dolomites, so while planning, I essentially just looked for spots along the return route. Ultimately this included three destinations + one we spontaneously added along the way.

The first stop in our return journey was Neuschwanstein Castle. Yes, we’d already visited Neuschwanstein, and yes, our goal this trip was to explore new destinations. But there was a delicious currywurst place we visited the last time so Chelsay and I HAD to visit. …I guess the views are pretty magical too.

Jokes aside, Neuschwanstein is very special to me. It was the first adventure Chelsay and I embarked on after moving to London in 2015. I laugh at those two inexperienced travellers, somehow learning that Mary’s Bridge was closed only after landing in Munich. I think back to our can-do spirit to capture that Hero view anyway, and how giddy we were at our success. I think back to the Rick Steves audio tour through Munich, our white sausage breakfast and bowl of coffee, and the hot chocolate from Beluga. And yes, I think about the currywurst from Neuschwanstein.

More broadly, Germany is very special to Chelsay and I. We visited every October while in the UK: first Munich, then Berlin, and then Rothenberg. There’s something about Germany’s dense forests, and heavy ethos (fog, food, their accents, etc) that just fits fall.

So, now consider all of this history as Chelsay and I ascended the hill up to Neuschwanstein. It’s about a 30-minute walk, and I was giddy with anticipation the whole way… basically saying exactly what I just wrote above: “Remember the currywurst Chelsay!?”

Indy was similarly excited but for different reasons: we passed a few horse drawn carriages and he DID NOT like them. He ripped out of his collar and ran back down the hill.

After calming him down (aka distracting him with a stick), we continued up the hill and came to Mary’s Bridge. It was weird not hopping any fences this time.

We arrived just as the sun was setting. Keep Chelsay & I’s history with Neuschwanstein in mind as I describe the setting… Soft light draped the Castle. The sky took on a pink glow. The valley below faded into the shadows. Indy nervously trembled from the heights. It was just as magical as the first time.

As we left the Castle and made the long descent back to town, we were just as giddy as 2015. Unfortunately the currywurst restaurant wasn’t waiting for us at the bottom, so we audibled to the nearby town of Fussen and a neighborhood beerhall. It was clearly popular with a line out the door, and the currywurst had its own page in the menu under the title “Reminders of Home”.

The currywurst lived up to this place’s popularity, but I want to specifically remember how unique Chelsay and I felt in this restaurant. We were clearly the only native English speakers there. That might be the case normally, but it was especially true during Covid.

This was clearly Fussen’s beerhall – owned by the locals. The place where patrons come to relax after a hard week of making pretzels or whatever they do for work. Families were connecting and talking about Bayern Munich or the latest season of Dark. It felt comfortable, even if Chelsay and I were outsiders. It would be like if a German were dropped into a Buffalo Wild Wings.

We hit the road again the next day, but not before a brief walk around Schwansee, the lake nestled below Neuschwanstein. Obviously the Castle was the highlight from 2015, but I remembered I really enjoyed our fall walk around the lake. Also, we had to get some of Indy’s energy out before our drive. This trip’s walk felt nostalgic but was made even more fun with our newest family member.

Our next step was Beilstein, a tiny German village along the Rhine. If Chelsay & I thought Cliousclat (population: 600) or Portofino (400) were small, Beilstein only has 145 residents! It took about 15 minutes to walk the entire town, but it’s incredibly charming: like an authentic Disney village.

I’ll briefly mention this story. It’s a good thing touring Beilstein was so quick, because I needed extra time to bring Indy to the vet. Before returning to the UK, we needed a local vet to administer and provide proof for a tapeworm treatment. The closest vet was a 20 minute drive, so I plugged it into Google Maps and set off.

Well, it seems Google Maps users aren’t frequenting Dr Frank Feiden, because the app took me to an elementary school. I had zero service so couldn’t call, so I was stuck driving in circles around this children’s school… which I’m sure looked suspicious. Finally I gave up, and decided to interrupt either four teachers’ or four parents’ smoke break to see if they could help. Shockingly, they knew exactly where he was and shared the most precise instructions I’d ever received (classic German). It was a bizarre situation to find myself while on vacation, made even more bizarre when the person next to me at the vet had lived near Southlake. We bonded over our shared love of Mi Cocina. These experiences again made me feel like part of the community despite being such an obvious outsider.

Alas, just as we were starting to feel at home, it was time to return to London. Our last day of the trip. I’m now 6000 words and 10 pages into this three part EuRoad Trip post, but still plenty of stories to tell.

First, we made a short stop at Eltz Castle, a romantic palace well hidden in the Black Forest. The castle is uniquely vertical, but I’ll remember this visit for Chelsay falling on the walk down. She’ll hate me for writing this, but hopefully we can remember and laugh. Very similar to my tumble at the Sete Cidades in the Azores.

Finally, our last stop on the road trip was Dunkirk. This was the spontaneous visit I alluded to earlier. Dunkirk wasn’t initially in the plan, but after 20 hours of Ray Harris Jr telling us about Operation Dynamo, we decided we visit Dunkirk Beach for ourselves.

It was extremely windy when we visited, as Storm Alex was moving through with winds up to 60 mph. It was raining too, and the raindrops felt like bullets as we ran along The Mole. The chaos felt fitting though, as this was the location where 300,000 British and French soldiers chaotically escaped the charging Nazi army.

The Mole, a sea break that the British used as an escape dock, is well removed from the city… and hardly marked. You drive through an industrial center and park in what appears to be an employee lot. In fact, I only found The Mole because I crawled Google Satellite View searching for sea piers along Dunkirk beach – there weren’t any other articles or traveller blogs about how to visit.

But this solitude made the pier feel that much more important. This was the place where 300,000 lives were saved, providing the Brits with necessary troops to withstand the Battle of Britain. If not for Dunkirk, would the UK have fallen to Hitler? Then, could the Nazis have focused their forces solely on Russia, and the US after? It’s hard to call this retreat a victory, but the Allies escape along the very pier I was standing was vital, and the moment felt similarly significant.

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The trip from Dunkirk to London was a disaster – I’m sure it felt a bit like those soldiers on Dunkirk Beach. We again took a taxi from Calais, but the driver decided to go directly through the center of London, costing us about an hour in gridlock. Then when we arrived at the house, I found I’d lost the key in transit – brutal. It was 9:30 pm so the property manager wasn’t available. We called a locksmith, who determined the backdoor was the best lock to open. I store the gate code on my phone, but my battery had died, so I had to hop the fence to let the locksmith through.

This must have looked suspicious to our neighbors: pitch black, man jumping fence, commotion in our backyard. Sure, that’s suspicious until you consider Chelsay, Indy, and ALL OUR BAGS AND INDY’S CRATE WERE ALL STILL OUT FRONT!

Anyway, the locksmith and I are in the back. The back lock turned out to be a tough one, so he had to use a drill. He wasn’t wearing glass so a piece of metal shot into his eye. I had to remove it. Brutal.

Then a helicopter showed up. …

The neighbors had called the Hampstead Police, who sent a chopper for a potential B&E. The helicopter hovered over us for 30 seconds, before two officers arrived, batons at the ready. They realized what had happened before calling out on their walkie talkie: “Call of all units.” Were there MORE on the way!?

Anyway, we finally got in and FINALLY changed out of our wet clothes from stormy Dunkirk. All that said, we woke up the next morning and were totally fine. I made myself some coffee, and the whole thing just seemed like a bad dream. Similar to Chelsay falling at Eltz Castle, I think we can laugh about it now.

Okay, now that’s really it. The conclusion of our EuRoad Trip. 16 days. Six countries. 2500 miles. Two seasons. One crazy pup.

I know I’m wrapping this up quickly (sorry, I’m now on page 11 and nearly 7000 words in), but the past two weeks were truly special. Although we’d gone six months without any international trips, lockdown really enabled this journey.

We had plenty of vacation days. We didn’t want to fly, so we drove. This simple equation brought us to extremely charming and authentic places we never would have visited otherwise. Starting with the Beauty & the Beast phase, driving south through France’s Loire Valley, stopping at chateaus, provincial hamlets, and the charming fishing village of Cassis. Moving into the Summer Chic phase, with hot temps along the ritzy Riviera, including stops in Nice and Portofino. And finally, concluding with the Fall phase, passing through the jagged Dolomites landscape and fairy tale castles of Bavaria and the German Black Forest.

This was likely one of our last European trips, but each destination exhibited why we live abroad. New places. Exciting experiences. Escapes from the routine.

Our EuRoad Trip was another reminder of how far you can go in just a few hours.

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5-falsehoods-phonated · 4 years

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Overgrown Metal

Chapter 3: Keep Moving

Summary of fic: Almost two decades ago, the fae rose up from beyond the value with technology far surpassing the human race, quickly taking over after lating waste to nearly everything in their wake. Virgil and Roman, Society escapees and hunters run into an uncertain future while fleeing from their pasts. Remy and Remus stare their only chance straight in the face as they teeter on the edge of reluctant adventure. Emile is left his cousins engineering palace and is given the tools to change the world. Logan, a lone researcher and outcast is found by an old friend who offers him a chance of the century. Hyden (deciet), can shift into anything he so chooses, but staying true to his form as his heritage slaps him sideways proves harder than he thought. Patton mourns the loss of his son as he slowly uncovers secrets he wishes aren't related.

Or less wordy:

Eight idiots with trust issues fumble around each other and try to save the world from killer mechanical beasts and fairies that will snap your neck without taking their hands from their wine glasses.

Warnings: Violence, fight scenes, dark fantasy, apocalypse setting, some gore, blood

Warnings for this chapter: none. Though as always if you see something that should be tagged please say something.

Ships: Remy (sleep) x Remus. Brotherly Roman and Virgil. Platonic Logan and Hyden (Deciet)

"It truly is a wonder you haven't killed yourself yet. To think of all that education going to waste with a cracked skull in an old barn, it's almost enough to make me care to check in more."

"The only reason you come in here is because I'm the only thing within a hundred mile radius who doesn't wish you dead on sight."

"How you wound me. It's at least two hundred when I'm far enough away from the coast." Logan smirked as he heard the irritated tap of the others cane punctuating his statement.

Sighing, he placed the crowbar on the bench and turned to face the intruder, leaning against it while crossing his arms. "Hyden."

"Logan." The other greeted mutually. Though he was typically a bit more put together his thick caplet lay crookedly across his tense shoulders, arms taunt as he leaned heavily on his cane with both hands resting on the top. His long hair curled in the afternoon humidy and Logan definitely didn't miss the slight furrow of his brows, though he knew he would be loathe to admit he was in any sort of pain.

Letting out a heavier sigh Logan pushed away from the bench and gestured for the other to follow him. "Join me, I need a break anyway."

Hyden gasped. "The head scientist admitting he needs a break? Who's hand do I need to shake for downloading an once of self preservation into that thick skull?"

"I'll have you know I take breaks on a regular basis, something you clearly need to be reminded of."

"The audacity! I walk all the way here to visit a long time friend-"

"You walked?" Logan shot him a sharp glance as he held the door, gesturing the other into the old farmhouse.

Snorting, Logan pulled out a chair and moved to collect containers of herbs and thr kettle, sighing for the fourth time as it was blatantly ignored for the refrigerator. As the kettle heated he carefully measured out the proper ingrediants, glancing over every now and again to try and catch what his guest was poking at.

"Are those by any chance agorose gels?"

Walking past the fridge to put things away he caught sight of what the other was observing, humming his confirmation.

"Logan, why do you have DNA gels next to leftover chicken salad in your refrigerator?"

"The chicken salad seems irrelevant." The kettle whistled to give him an excuse to avoid the question, carefully pouring out the boiling water.

"Logan."

"Hyden." The name slipped out easily despite his annoyance, making him wonder for a brief moment if he would struggle when he was finally told his real name.

The mans cane taps were heavier than normal as he made his way over to the table and flopped down without his usual show. Giving Loagn a quiet thank you he proceeded to wrap his hands around the steaming mug, frowning in concentration. "Are you trying to find them again?"

"I fail to comprehend what you could possibly-"

"Because they're trying to find you. And they're getting close."

"Make sure to drink all of it, it'll help with pain."

"Did you even listen to what I said?!" Throwing his hands up in exasperation he fixed Logan with his best glare.

"Hard not to with that grating tone."

"Well this grating tone," he growled out. "Is telling you to get your head out of your ass and maybe make sure you're safe before telling someone else to take care of themselves."

Or fae guards with strict orders.

Squaring his shoulders before they could droop in defeat he turned to face his companion with a level stare.

"Give me two days."

-------

"Not pouting." Virgil pouted, crossing his arms before realizing what he was doing and angrily shoving them in his hoodie pockets.

"Thank you."

"You were slowing us down. Somebody's gotta make sure we stay on schedule."

"Alright. Spill it." They blinked as Virgil stopped, dropping both the packs and plopping down in the dirt.

"What?"

"Being anxious is my job and right now you're forcing me into unemployment. So either talk or I'm throwing you in the river."

"You do and I'm eating the last two cans of spaghettios tonight while you get nothing but croutons."

Virgil narrowed his eyes. "I fucking dare you to go through with that threat. You do not come between a man and the last can of shitty microwave pasta."

"I have the food pack."

"And I have the flint and steel so start talking before I decide to set you on fire instead of drowning you."

"Roman..."

"I know! I know, I definitely get it. But, it would be easier to carry supplies and we could have more! We wouldn't have to stop in towns so much-"

"Roman."

"And it might be safer! More people means more weapons means more protection right?"

"Roman."

They shut their mouth in worry at the defeated tone Virgil had adopted. He twisted his hands tighter, hesitant to continue now that he actually could.

"Am I not....do you not feel safe enough with me?"

Roman sucked in a breath as they realized how Virgil had taken their concerns, rushing to try and fix it. "It's definitely not that! I-Virgil I'm so sorry that isn't what I meant at all!"

Their eyes met Virgil's and they breathed a sigh of relief when they were met with understanding, nonetheless continuing to rub soothing circles across his knuckles until he pulled away.

"I guess..." he glanced over at the near overflowing pack of trading goods. "I guess I can see that yeah. But I don't-Roman how can we trust anyone?"

"We probably can't. But we'll look anyway and if we don't find anyone then we don't find anyone. Just, keep an open mind?"

"Oh come on!"

This work and others are available on AO3!

#sanders sides #thomas sanders #roman sanders #virgil sanders #logan sanders #deciet sanders #false writes #overgrown metal #janus sanders #dark fantsy #sanders sides au

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