#but if the fourth party i suspected may have been involved WAS involved

[colognedecigarette]

ugh. okay. i've ranted about this in my journal less than five minutes ago but apparently my thirst to fucking yell at the clouds won't be satiated until i've put it somewhere public.

look. i love Seo Soojin and think her removal from the group was as unfair as the next stan, but the way people talk about the conclusion of the case really drives me mad. i see a lot of "she was proven innocent by her lawyer" and a lot more of "it was a false accusation" but going by the last statement from her attorney that i read, i feel like there's a lot more going on than that.

first thing's first, i don't know how it is in different countries or different justice system, but as far as am aware "proving" anything isn't a lawyer's job. first and foremost their job is to represent their client; specifically in cases such as Soojin's, it's to represent their client through a legal dispute/investigation. if there's anything related to "proofs" to their job, then that would be to collect evidences and statements. but to determine whether someone is innocent or guilty isn't within their rights.

her lawyer can't "prove" her innocence. all they could do was to collect and present the evidences that may -- hopefully -- get her an innocent verdict, but that verdict wasn't theirs to make.

now with that said, again, going by the last statement released that i read last year, i'd say Soojin's lawyer did a pretty good job collecting those evidences that may point towards her innocence. from what i remember:

they had statement(s) from the school staff as witness claiming that there were no records of the bullying Soojin was accused of;

the only record of bullying related to Soojin that they had instead pointed at her as the victim, not the bully; and

when questioned about it, the accuser/her team failed to present any evidence to support their claim of Soojin bullying her that wasn't simply hearsay (i.e. she said/she said situation)

also included in the statement though more like a quote, the accuser had also apparently admitted that "she wasn't sure (anymore)" whether Soojin really was part of the group that she'd claimed to have bullied her or not.

so all of these do point towards the conclusion that Soojin didn't do what the accuser said she did. at the very least, it opened the door for further investigation of the claim and, therefore, the case. at this point, based on the statement, Soojin's team had successfully submitted their own evidence to counter the accuser's claim to the police, while the accuser's team had not.

the proper course of action after this was supposed to be for the police to: 1) investigate the evidence submitted by Soojin/her team to determine its truth and 2) press the accuser/her team to finally submit their evidence to backup their claim as well as counter Soojin's. in my country, to my knowledge at least, if the accuser fails to fulfil point no.2 while point no.1 leads to a definitive yes, then the case would be dropped as false allegations and that opens the door for a counter-suit under defamation.

but, quoted in the statement, a member of the force instead claimed that there was not enough leads/evidence to investigate the case further. it was treated as though both parties failed to submit evidence to support their positions and claims, when as stated: Soojin did not fail, the accuser did.

it's hard not to look at all of this with at least a little bit of a side-eye. the case didn't seem like it was dropped because there was simply not enough going ons to continue pursuing it, it instead seemed like it was dropped because thus far at that point, Soojin may come out on top.

the case was not dropped because she was legally proven to be innocent, but because the evidence gathered favoured towards her innocence and the cops were not interested in pursuing that.

the more that i think about the inconclusive conclusion of the case, the more i can only think of one word. it's what people in my country call kongkalikong; the whole tail end of this case just stinks of corruption. this isn't "just" a false allegation. it feels far more insidious than that.

so ... no, Soojin's lawyers didn't "prove" that she was innocent, they just gathered and presented the evidence that could have cleared her of the accusations had the justice system worked properly. and, no, it wasn't a "false allegation" legally because the people who were supposed to investigate and determine that were not interested in doing their job.

in conclusion: the whole case is mad fucked. its ""conclusion"" even more so. if you're going to talk about it, don't just talk about the lawyers and the accuser. there's a whole third, maybe even fourth party, that you're forgetting to include.

[illionoisprelawland-blog]

The Post-Roe Realities Of The Fourth Amendment

By Elizabeth Ugan, University of Chicago Class of 2024

August 11, 2022

With states beginning to respond to the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, many have categorized the situation as a return to a pre-1973 life in which the same arguments for and against constitutionally protected abortion rights have reemerged. However, despite the fact that national legislation reflects a pre-Roe world, there are important distinctions to make between how anti-abortion laws were enforced then and the possibilities for their enforcement now. The rise in technology, especially mobile smartphones, has opened the door for data tracking and other forms of overlooked surveillance to be employed to gain information from users about plans for or involvement in receiving an abortion. Between the already personal nature of abortions and the controversial protections of cell phone data, the issue of abortion can be viewed as a matter of privacy that calls for a reevaluation of how the fourth amendment is interpreted in modern times.

The number of uses that cell phones have today and their almost inextricable places in our lives may become one of the most heavily relied upon sources of evidence for abortion prosecutions. For instance, some women use apps to keep track of menstrual cycles and related health concerns, something ordinary that has suddenly become so potentially incriminating that Berkeley Law Professor Catherine Crump has suggested women delete them.[i] Apps like these store data that could be accessed to confirm suspicions regarding irregularity in women’s cycles and identify the exact age of a fetus should the woman be investigated for having or attempting to have an illicit abortion. Another facet of data tracking that women now have to worry about is a relatively new development in virtual warrants that the government has used previously to extract data from tech companies like Google. A geofence allows the government to request that tracking data be handed over for the sake of an investigation; most notably, it has been used to determine the owners of cell phones congregated at a certain place at a certain time, as was done during investigation of the January 6 riot.[ii] With this tool, abortion prosecutors could identify if a woman under investigation was at an abortion clinic at a certain time.

Other sources like search history, navigation tools, and even location triangulation that have been applied to tracking criminal suspects in the past can now be refocused on the issue of prosecuting those seeking abortions.[iii] In combination with some of the more stringent anti-abortion laws like Texas’s aiding and abetting law passed in 2021, these tracking techniques can also be applied to those complicit in helping a woman obtain abortion, including those responsible for arranging an appointment or driving her to a clinic.

The fourth amendment, securing citizens’ rights against unreasonable searches and seizures, has undergone substantial interpretation in the past few decades as police investigations have begun involving cell phones. As it stands, the fourth amendment requires law enforcement to obtain a warrant before retrieving cell phone data. Derived from the case Carpenter v. US, Supreme Court justices held that accessing cell phone data constitutes a search because of the deeply personal nature of the information that can be accessed and the necessity that people have for phones.[iv] Furthermore, the reasonable expectation of privacy people have extends to information that is shared with a third party, which law enforcement would have to approach to retrieve cell-site location. With geofence warrants and keyword warrants (warrants that can be issued to Google to share data on people who have searched certain keywords), the law exists to allow law enforcement to quickly obtain information on possible suspects seeking abortions.[v]

The place where digital warrants may run into obstacles is in the act of obtaining the warrant. In order to get a warrant issued, law enforcement officers must demonstrate that a person has probable cause to commit a crime. Because of the relative novelty of this kind of warrant and the fact that it has not yet been used to prosecute women seeking abortions, there is a chance that courts will not find the probable cause presented as deserving of a warrant, or they may invalidate a charge because the probable cause was not properly demonstrated and therefore the warrant was falsely issued and the search illegal.

There are already motions in place to hone in on this practice and prevent it from becoming the major threat to those seeking abortions and digital privacy in general. Shortly after the leaked draft opinion of Dobbs, 42 Democrat members of congress sent a letter to the CEO of Google asking that location data not be unnecessarily saved to prevent law enforcement from accessing it.[vi] Google later released a statement on July 1 announcing that it would no longer save data that reported people visiting private places, including abortions and fertility clinics.[vii] With these actions, the pushback against forms of surveillance that could shape the new abortion conflict might force it into a battle for privacy and the laws that define that it.

______________________________________________________________

[i] https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/cellphone-data-collection-tracking-apps-will-help-abortion-related-prosecutions/

[ii] https://www.politico.com/news/2022/07/18/google-data-states-track-abortions-00045906

[iii] https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/cellphone-data-collection-tracking-apps-will-help-abortion-related-prosecutions/

[iv] https://www.oyez.org/cases/2017/16-402

[v] https://www.npr.org/2022/07/11/1110391316/google-data-abortion-prosecutions

[vi] https://www.lawfareblog.com/impotence-fourth-amendment-post-roe-world

[vii] https://www.npr.org/2022/07/11/1110391316/google-data-abortion-prosecutions

[fictionadventurer]

I love your imaginary book rec idea! Pick any or all that spark your interest - no pressure, and skip if none stand out to you.

"Mercator Must Walk the Plank" (Nautical comedy)

"The Wings of Hermes" - (1930's literary mystery)

"Cardinal's Map" (Literary fiction that people argue about whether it should be classed as fantasy)

"The Fourth Postscript" (Epistolatory fantasy)

"The Most Fascinating Lady of the Season" (Coming-of-Age)

Mercator Must Walk the Plank by E.G. Delaford

After reading a few too many tales of high seas adventure, Victorian gentleman John Quackenbush is inspired to purchase a ship and go in search of treasure. His ship is a wreck, his crew is inept, and he's not exactly sure how one reads a map, but the intrepid traveler remains undaunted, even as they battle storms, shipwrecks, and pirates, and often find themselves sailing in entirely the wrong ocean. After they rescue a sensible young woman from a shipwreck, she takes it upon herself to rein in the captain's flights of fancy and get them all safely home, but the Quack is not so easily controlled. He will have his adventure, and those on the ship can either join in the quest--or walk the plank.

The Wings of Hermes by Elizabeth Tern

Oxford don Joseph Quill prefers to remain safely ensconced in his books, but when he is called upon to authenticate a supposed piece of ancient Greek statuary, he suddenly finds himself at the center of a deadly web of intrigue that involves murder, theft, and letters that threaten vengeance from the gods of Greece themselves. Multiple shadowy parties are willing to kill for this statue, and if Quill doesn't uncover them soon, he may just be the next victim ushered into the afterlife.

Cardinal's Map by Dorothy Cannes

Miranda Zimmer, a nihilistic grad student, gets a summer job serving as secretary for John Cardinal, a reclusive old man who has not left his New York estate in decades. Miranda helps Cardinal to compile his magnum opus, an intricate portal fantasy about a man's quest to save a kingdom and find his long-lost love. Miranda becomes enchanted by the story--especially the intricate map of the world that Cardinal has been drawing for years-- and the man, whose zeal for the world gives her a new appreciation for life. Yet Miranda starts to suspect that for Cardinal, this book is not fiction--it's memory. Whether it's madness or metaphor, Cardinal is writing this tale as the chronicle of his life, the map meant to help him reconnect with the woman he once lost. Is Cardinal mourning his wife or planning a rescue? Can Miranda keep him grounded in the here-and-now, or is he doomed to be lost in the wilderness of his past?

The Fourth Postscript by A.B. Wright

Tellor, a young man seeking his fortune, dreams of finding the mythical city in the sky. Amnesh, an elven king, agrees to fund his journey, so long as Tellor sends back regular letters chronicling the adventure. As the journey progresses, Tellor sends updates about the wonders and terrors of his quest, while the king sends advice meant to help him get back home in one piece. Soon, a strong friendship binds the two men, and when Tellor's letters suddenly cease, Amnesh is driven to undertake a quest of his own.

The Most Fascinating Lady of the Season by Charlotte Irvin

Julia Blythe, a sheltered rector's daughter, is invited to stay with her uncle--a baronet--as a companion to her cousin Eliza, newly orphaned and returned from years living abroad. Eliza's life on the continent has given her wild habits, as well as beauty and charm that enchant the men around them. As Julia is dragged along in Eliza's orbit, the girls develop a friendship, even as Julia struggles to reconcile Eliza's wild ways with the more sedate morals of her childhood. But when scandal strikes, Julia and Eliza may both lose everything, including the men they were beginning to love.

[ghostofskywalker]

A Star-Spangled Birthday

Words: 913

Summary: Your husband never wanted anything for his birthday. Now, you and Bucky work together to give him a little surprise.

Steve Rogers Masterlist 

Your alarm went off in the dead of the night, but it wasn’t a mistake. Shutting it off as quickly as you could, you turned to make sure it hadn’t woken your husband.  Once you were sure you were safe, you got out of bed and tiptoed out of the room, closing the door quietly behind you. You made it two steps down the hallway when you noticed footsteps behind you, and you turned around to see who it was. “Everything good?” Bucky whispered.  

“He’s still sound asleep,” you responded.

It wasn’t that Steve hated his birthday, he just never really wanted to celebrate it. This year though, you were hell bent on making sure that he didn’t spend his birthday like any other day. The Avengers never really celebrated the Fourth of July (and you’ve been called out on random missions during years prior) and you suspected that if it wasn’t public knowledge, Steve would have never admitted to you when his birthday was.

Your plan with Bucky wasn’t elaborate, but it did involve some sneaking around, because if Steve knew that you were trying to throw him a party it wouldn’t work. You spent the last month talking to all the other Avengers on the down-low, and they all agreed to help out in your plans to celebrate Steve’s birthday. But since you and Bucky were the ones in charge, you had to be up a lot earlier than the others.

It started with a cake, one you had only a few hours to bake and decorate, because you had to have it in Tony’s secret fridge by the time Steve woke up.  You and Bucky split off in the kitchen as he went off to go decorate the roof of the compound, where you were going to have dinner that evening. You had found paper plates and napkins that all had his World War II recruitment poster on them, and you had bought them in an instant (after you stopped laughing in the middle of the store). You had also found other “Captain America” themed party decor, so you picked up plastic cups and paper lanterns that were both patterned with his shield.

You didn’t have that much time, so a box cake mix would have to do. You kept a careful eye on the clock as you stirred the ingredients, and you asked FRIDAY to alert you if Steve left your bedroom, even if it was to go to the bathroom. Thankfully, the universe seemed to be on your side this morning because the cakes were already coming out of the oven and Steve was still apparently sleeping soundly.

Bucky came back into the kitchen as you had just put the first layer of frosting on the cake. “Everything looks good so far,” he said. “How are you doing?”

“Once the cake firms up a little I’ll do the writing and other decorations,” you said. “But we don’t want the cake to melt before we give it to him.”

“It’s an ice cream cake?”

“No, but normally you’re supposed to let a cake cool completely before you frost it. I cooled it down in the fridge a little before I put this layer of frosting on, but I’m still nervous.”

“Don’t worry,” Bucky said. “We’re still ahead of schedule, everything is going to be fine.”

“What if he doesn’t like it?” you asked. You had been thinking that the entire time, and you were unable to quell your worries.

“Y/N, I promise that he’ll like it, okay?” Bucky said, coming over to you to give you a hug. “He may be a little embarrassed that the plates have his face on it, but other than that he’s going to love it.”

“Really?”

“Really. He may act like he doesn’t want anyone to celebrate his birthday, but I know him. He’s going to love it just as much as he loves you.”

That was all the reassurance you needed, and soon the rest of the party duties were complete. Bucky volunteered to make breakfast (so the smell of pancakes and bacon can overtake the smell of cake and frosting) and you decided to sneak back up to your room. After you changed back into your pajamas, you slipped back into bed next to your husband and closed your eyes.

When it was finally time to wake him up, you leaned over and placed a kiss on Steve’s cheek. “Happy birthday my dear,” you said as he opened his eyes. “How old are you now?”

He knew you knew the answer to your question, but he decided to humor you. “103,” he said. “And you have that look on your face. You’re planning something.”

“I’m not planning anything! You told me not to!”

“I know you, so I don’t believe that.”

‘Fine,” you said, heaving a sigh. “Bucky’s downstairs making breakfast for us. That was supposed to be your surprise, but you’re no fun sometimes.”

“Nothing else?”

“Nothing else.” You knew that was a lie, but you could deal with the consequences of that later.  

He seemed convinced. “Alright.”

You leaned in as he sat up more and placed a soft kiss on your lips. He placed his arms around you and deepened the kiss. “I love you, Steve Rogers,” you said when you broke apart.

“And I love you. Even if you’re lying to me about planning something for my birthday.”

“Now why would I do that?”

-  the end -

[shepherds-of-haven]

So I follow MANY interactive fiction blogs and I just have to say that you're my favorite by a long shot because I just love answers that you give in response to hypothetical scenarios and AU's for your characters. Like you actually put in effort and give well-thought out answers, so I thank you for that. As for AU's I have one of my own if you don't mind please. What would be the RO's for a murder mystery a la Cluedo? Bonus points that they can't leave the mansion for extra chaos. Thank you!

Ah, thank you so much for your kind words! 💖 I'm lucky to be a part of such a great community of talented creatives and kind, genuinely awesome people! Interacting with readers is such a pleasure, even if I do fall behind on messages and such I'm so sorry

I'm in North America, so I was genuinely like "what on Earth is Cluedo" gkljglfdjgd only because it's called Clue where I'm from! But I, uh, never played it, so I'm just going to go off of my knowledge from Knives Out 😂

SETTING: a Southern Gothic mansion in an undisclosed location, owned by a woman only referred to in jest as The Autarch by her adopted children. It is a stately manor, richly furnished and glittering with wealth, though imposing and dark-windowed during storms.

CONTEXT: a powerful and wealthy tycoon referred to only as "The Autarch" or "The Iron Lady" was once feared across the country for her ruthless business dealings and formidable empire. In her middle age, a mysterious experience and the sudden death of her husband caused her to have a change of heart, abruptly abandoning her empire to her only son and devoting her life to adopting six orphan children. However, stopping her business dealings did not completely change her personality: she was a hard, unforgiving woman, and her relationships to her children (now all grown) can be described as "strained" at best.

In her declining age, the lonely Autarch in her high mansion somehow came to befriend a psychic by the name of Mimir of the Silver Eye. Only the servants were witness to what was said between them, and even then, they never had the full story. The most that anyone knew was that the Autarch began to express more interest in resuming her business activities again, to the disconcertion of her only biological son, Enik, who had helmed the empire on his own for the last twenty years. Meanwhile, Mimir moved into the mansion to keep her older friend company, and to help advise her on matters both business and personal.

One stormy night, the Autarch calls all 7 of her children back home in order to discuss matters of great importance, including her decisions about her will. Some came eagerly, and others with great reluctance--there were arguments had that were years in coming, and there were private talks between siblings who hadn't interacted in years. But the matter that the Autarch was keen to discuss was postponed: the storm knocked out the power in the mansion, and all turned into bed, sleeping fitfully in rooms they'd abandoned decades earlier.

They never discovered why the Autarch had called them to their old haunting grounds, either, for in the morning, she was found with a knife buried in her heart.

CHARACTERS:

- Riel Syndran. A world-famous private detective and consultant famed across the world for his ability to solve any mystery, no matter how old or tangled. He is known for being comfortable with ruthlessly manipulating interrogation subjects and suspects in order to extract the truth and solve his case no matter what; this obsession and willingness to massage the rules--although he claims the truth is his only goal, above all other things--is what makes him unsuitable for conventional police work, but his results speak for themselves. He arrives on the mansion's doorstep mere minutes after the Autarch is found murdered and is claimed to have been hired by an anonymous party, casting suspicion on his timing and the pre-planned nature of the death. His signature move is being recognized by various people as "the detective who solved the Apple Killer case" (or some other famous case of his) and replying in irritable tones that it was actually "the Orange Killer case, but you were close". He abhors smoking and has doctorates in body language analysis and psychology, as well as a law degree, and is gifted with a photographic memory. He picks invisible lint off of his sleeves while he thinks.

- Blade Bronwyn. An FBI agent (think Agent Cooper in Twin Peaks) who has been in the town of Old Haven investigating a string of serial killings across the country. He hears about the murder of the Autarch from the local police and arrives at the manor a mere hour after they were alerted, keen to investigate the murder as part of his ongoing case. He plays the straight man to Riel's more eccentric detection methods, and is seen more as a serious, by-the-books rule-follower determined to get answers. The suspects in the manor find him to be emotionally-insensitive, blunt, and grim-faced. He has a better sense of smell and sight than Riel does, as well as more combat experience, and is the only person in the manor acknowledged to be carrying a weapon. He takes his coffee black and very strong.

- Enik Goldenson. The Autarch's only biological child and the oldest. He was granted full control of her holdings and business empire when she retired in order to focus on raising her new family. He has made his disdain of his adopted siblings very clear, not least because he resents having to share his future inheritance with them. He has historically been a bully and cruel towards his mother. Rumor had it that he was once studying to become a priest. He has avoided returning to the mansion ever since Trouble knocked his lights out at fourteen years of age. He was once briefly engaged to fellow heiress Lavinet Naveen, who eventually spurned him, finding him "repulsive." He has the most bad blood among anyone in the family and is considered one of the prime suspects in the Autarch's murder, as it was possible that she may planned to cut him out of the will. Blade places his suspect status as RED while Riel believes he is at an ORANGE: Enik may be far too clever to kill his own mother under such suspicious and bloody circumstances.

- Trouble Alder. The first of the Autarch's adopted children, he was once an urchin running a street-fighting racket on the streets of New Haven. He was nicknamed Trouble for his surly temper and quick ability to get into fights and settle things with his fists, necessitating being sent off to a military boarding school in an effort to curb his violent tendencies as a teenager. He is extremely protective of his other adopted siblings, and while he resented the Autarch in his youth, he has begrudgingly come to respect her more for taking him in as an adult. He now works as a decorated sniper in the military and is working to earn his pilot's wings. The revelation that he kept military weapons in his room casts suspicion on him as a murder suspect, though Riel quickly dismisses him as not being a good enough liar to get away with it.

- Tallys Ironwood. The second of the Autarch's adopted children, she made her hatred of the old woman very well known, and had an even poorer relationship with her than Enik did. Tallys's parents were victims in an accident caused by one of the Autarch's manufacturing plants, and she has always felt that her subsequent adoption was mere lip service to atonement for the Autarch, while she would have rather stayed with her more impoverished aunts and uncles. She ran away multiple times in her youth and has not spoken to the Autarch since she was 18. Her overt hatred and reluctance in coming back to the mansion casts suspicion on her as a murder suspect. She has a degree in plant science and works as an environmental activist, particularly targeting products and campaigns by Enik's company, creating unspeakable friction between them.

- Ayla Aescar. The third of the Autarch's adopted children, nothing is known about her biological parents. She was adopted from a neighboring country and has since returned to it as an adult, making an effort to reconnect with her origins and culture. Her relationship with "the old woman," as she calls her, was more neutral, though it comes out that the Autarch frequently bailed her out in secret whenever Ayla ran into trouble, such as trespassing on Jalis government grounds. Nominally, she works as a photographer for a travel magazine, but secretly, she is an investigative photojournalist looking into various covert practices by the Jalis government. This brings up a question of whether the Autarch's killing was political, and whether it was actually meant for Ayla.

- Chase Trinaeste. The fourth of the Autarch's adopted children, it's joked that he was intended to replace Trouble when he was sent off to boarding school due to having a more charming personality and sweeter face. However, he ended up being the most troublesome one of the bunch, having multiple run-ins with the law from a young age and displaying various tendencies towards larceny, grand theft auto, and more. He had no shame about stealing and pawning off valuables from the mansion and was a well-known skirt-chaser, leading to constant stress in their household about what he was getting up to when he snuck out of the house at night. At eighteen, he disappeared from the mansion, and no one has heard from him in the intervening years since. He completely ducks any questions from Riel or Blade about what he does for a living, leading most to conclude that he has gotten himself deeper entrenched in the criminal underworld. This has cast obvious suspicion on him and his involvement in the murder, as he was known to steal from the Autarch herself. He seems to feel some measure of loyalty and possibly remorse towards his adopted siblings, but hides it well under a polished veneer of charm and casual swagger.

- Briony Stormbreaker. The fifth of the Autarch's adopted children In a dramatic fashion, she was discovered as a young child swept away in a huge flood caused by a storm, with no ability to communicate (or seemingly remember) anything about where she could have lived or who her family was. She was subsequently adopted by the Autarch and is one of the few who had a fairly good relationship with her, always expressing gratitude for giving her a home and family (though this brought her into conflict with siblings like Tallys, as she usually tried to defend the Autarch when she wasn't there to speak for herself). She was the sibling who always tried to unite the others, and their constant arguments and conflicts constantly broke her heart. She was an easily-upset child who tended to be babied by Trouble and Chase, but after constantly bullying from Croelle and Enik, she toughened up and began taking martial arts classes, abruptly displaying her own ferocious temper and violent streak as well as unusually powerful physical strength. She currently works as a passionate public prosecutor. She was heard conversing with the Autarch privately with raised voices, on the night of the murder, and is known to sleepwalk during violent storms. She even had a phase with an imaginary, sword-shaped friend as a child, as well as repeatedly claimed that she's seen ghosts in the manor. This perceived paranoia has led some to wonder whether she could have harmed the Autarch in her sleep. As Riel says, "It's always the nice ones." Blade: "Not in my experience." Riel: "Not in mine, either, but in some continuity, it must be true."

- Croelle. The last of the Autarch's adopted children. He was by far the most anti-social and troubled part of the family, refusing to speak to those he deemed beneath him and breaking Trouble's arm in a disturbing display of dominance as youths. Unlike Enik, his cruelty is more ruthless and matter-of-fact, the way an animal might treat another animal, rather than pointed and manipulative. Regardless, he was a terror to all of the other siblings, and he was eventually thrown in juvenile detention (and later prison) for killing members of a gang, seemingly in self-defense. However, he never cared to divulge the full details of the story, and has been serving his sentence ever since. No one besides the Autarch knew that he was coming until they arrived at the manor. Croelle claims that he and the Autarch had been exchanging letters for the last few years, and that he has begrudgingly allowed her back into his life, which was why she decided to invite him to this gathering upon his release from prison. However, there is currently no evidence that any such letters exist. As an adult, he is currently quieter and more mellow and has shown no particular proclivity towards violence, but there is always a sense of danger lurking in his eye regardless. His social skills have not improved by much. He is considered one of the absolute top suspects for the old woman's murder. His feelings on his adopted siblings or really anything are extremely unknown. He keeps asking everyone about free will, which annoys everyone except Riel.

- Shery Acquell. A longtime maid for the Autarch and one of her closest friends and confidantes. She alone has been caring for the Autarch in her declining health, ensuring that she has been receiving the proper medical care and dietary attentions, and even reading her books in the evenings. Their closeness has led some to speculate that the Autarch may have bequeathed a part of her inheritance to the maid, or that perhaps Shery was motivated to ingratiate herself to the Autarch to attain said inheritance. She was the last person to see the Autarch before her death, knows something about what transpired between her and Mimir, and ultimately reluctantly admits that she believes in the ghosts that Briony has seen, too.

- Halek Prince. The manor's live-in chef. He is one of the few non-family members staying in the mansion the night of the murder, and suspicion is cast on him when his cooking seemingly gives Ayla, Briony, and Red an allergy attack, leading some to posit attempts at poisoning. Mimir claims to have seen him in places where he shouldn't be or even couldn't be, and he is generally someone viewed as a good suspect for the murder. Riel thinks something else is going on here.

- Red Antiqua. Ayla's journalist partner who accompanied her to the mansion, partly to serve as a buffer for the family awkwardness and partly because he was curious to learn more about the reclusive Autarch. Nominally, he is a travel writer, but secretly, he is working as the same kind of investigative journalist that she is. His secret photographs of the manor prove to be a key piece of evidence in uncovering the murder suspect. He is forced to be confined to the manor, the same as everyone else, to prevent information leaks or runaways. He uncovers a secret doorway in his room and is too curious not to duck into it...

- Caine Tavadon. The son of the manor's groundskeeper, he is often seen with his dog, peeping into the windows of the manor because he's incorrigibly nosy. His witness statements lead Blade and Riel to key footprints on the grounds. He claims to have seen a strange figure staring down at him from the windows of the mansion before.

- Prihine Naveen. Enik's current fiancee, she accompanied him on this odious visit to his mother's manor and is a witness in the proceedings. Although they can barely tolerate each other, their shared ambitions for wealth and power keep them together as a polite though distant couple. A file in the Autarch's study reveals that she has been watching Prihine for some time and discovered that she was having a secret affair. The file indicates that she planned to tell Enik face-to-face, leading others to speculate that Prihine may have murdered the old woman in order to preserve her engagement. Enik remarks that there was a period of time where Prihine was not in bed.

- Lavinet Naveen. Prihine's older cousin, and Enik's ex-fiancee. They've technically known each other since they were children and were schoolmates at the same prestigious institution. The Autarch and Lavinet's father initially had designs to marry the two to forge a powerful alliance between their business empires. However, Lavinet quickly backed out of the engagement, finally admitting that she couldn't stand Enik and would never marry him. Although this has generally caused relations between the two families to become frosty, she has strangely remained on good terms with the Autarch herself, who always admired Lavinet's chutzpah and steely will. (This was just another reason for Enik to hate his own mother.) Lavinet was free to come and go to the manor as she pleased, and dropped in on the Autarch once every few months, as her family's manor is nearby. She only recently discovered that her own cousin, Prihine, is now engaged to her ex, and rushed over on the night of the murder in order to dissuade Prihine from the marriage or convince the Autarch to put a stop to it. This led to a four-way argument (between Lavinet, Prihine, Enik, and his mother) of epic proportions, meaning that Lavinet is not clear on suspicions of murder, either.

- Mimir. The psychic who somehow came into contact with the Autarch and began to convert her to the ways of the supernatural. She has been the Autarch's closest friend and confidant for months, even going so far as to move into the mansion. Many point out the obvious designs on the Autarch's inheritance and possible sinister intentions for taking advantage of the older woman, especially since no one but Shery knows what Mimir has actually advised the Autarch to do. However, Riel points out that there has been no traceable financial irregularities when it comes to Mimir; the Autarch doesn't seem to have paid her for her services, only providing Mimir with food and a roof over her head. The psychic speaks in extremely cryptic tones and lapses into trance-like states. Riel in particular scorns her for her supposedly psychic abilities, insisting that she is a fraud, until she comments on aspects of his past that no one could possibly know, shaking him. She is a prime suspect for the murder until it's discovered that Mimir insists on being locked into a windowless room, only being released by Shery in the morning, to protect herself from the ghosts that haunt the grounds...

[vanilla-vivillon]

do you have any lantsov family headcanons?

love you! <3

Okay okay okay I’m so excited for this!!! (Btw we’re going to be going with the Pyotr for the King to not get him confused with Darkles)

Pyotr wasn’t super involved in the toddlerhood of Vasily or Nikolai

But Tatiana was

Watching her sons grow up was the only thing she had left

Being married off to Pyotr when she was 19 was horrible

She hated him

Hated the way he touched her

Loathed the way he would tear off her corset

But when she had Vasily it felt like something finally made sense

She had something

Tatiana was no longer in a strange country with a despicable man all alone

She had a baby

Tatiana insisted Vasily sleep in the room next to hers and Pyotr

She would sing him Fjerdan lullabies

And feed him the best of the best foods

Vasily was Tatiana’s everything

Alrhough Tatiana loved Vasily

She didn’t want any other kids

She didn’t want the king anywhere near her

So when the king started taking a fancy to the staff

Tatiana thought

Better them then me

But then Magnus came along

Magnus Opjer was the Fjerdan Ambassdor

A handsome fellow

He was all broad shoulders blond hair and a cheeky grin

He made her laugh

Something Tatiana found she couldn’t do in her life often

On one evening with the King off to some dukes house to party

Tatiana invited Magnus over to drink the wine her brother sent her

One thing led to the other

And three weeks later a healer was telling her the aches she’d been feeling was because she was pregnant again

At first she wanted to terminate the pregnancy

If The King found out the baby wasn’t his he was going to kill her

But the more time went on the more the queen knew she wouldn’t be able to go through with it

Consequences be damned Tatiana was going to give birth

When she eventually told the public she was expecting no one suspected a thing

She picked out the name Nikolai for her second son

His Royal highness Prince Nikolai Lantsov, Duke of Udova, long May he live.

Kolya

Tatiana wrote to Magnus Opjer two weeks after Nikolai was born

The labor was quite dangerous and she only survived because of the grisha

My Dearest Magnus,

Nikolai was born on August fourth

He and i are alright. I know you would just adore him. He has that mischievous twinkle that you have. Oh how I long for you to be with me. If it wasn’t for this blasted country we could truly be together. Pyotr grows more and more bored every day. And him being bored meant he would want me to entertain him. I loath him Magnus, truly! How I ache for your touch. I’ve been hearing rumors your resigning. Tell me it isn’t true Magnus please! Nikolai deserves something better then the germ that Pyotr is.

Your darling, Tatiana

Magnus later confirmed it was true, that he was resigning

Logically Tatiana knew that this was to keep her and Kolya safe

But she still hated it

But the world didn’t care for the feelings of lost Fjerdan girls

“Nikolai you must stop your tomfoolery this instant!” Tatiana yelled at Her son

Now seven he seemed to be greater work then Vasily ever required

“But Mother it’s not tomfoolery, it’s science!” Nikolai smartly replied

“Nikolai there is a hole in the roof!”

“I just wanted to see if I can build a bomb. Turns out I can!”

Nikolai had been traumatizing the staff for weeks

Her favorite chef had quit

And enough was enough

“Nikolai you’ve really upset me” Tatiana said voice showing her fatigue

Nikolais brows furrowed

“I’m sorry Mother” Nikolai apologized

“If your sorry you’ll stop with this”

Some nannies came and took Nikolai back to bed

Walking away Tatiana felt that familiar ache

It was late

And Pyotr was waiting for her in there room

Opening the door she saw him sitting on the bed

It never ends does it? Tatiana numbly thought willing herself to walk over to the king

Placing her crown on the dresser

She already knew the answer

Im actually really proud of this! I had no real direction but kinda ran with the prompt. I’m not sure if this is exactly what you were looking for but hey, I did it.

I made this very Tatiana centric because I think her story was quite interesting. Less family then I would like because there not, like, a happy family, lol

My ask box is open and I take any Grishaverse requests. I do any ships no matter how crack they are.

Thank you @pastelpepmint for the prompt!!! Love you to babe ♥️

[taexual]

i’d love you to stay but that’s simply insane // JJK (1)

        jungkook is an uncontrollable lead vocalist of the campus band, and you’re a goal-oriented top student that’s known his rich and complicated family since childhood. you don’t want anything to do with each other, until each other is exactly what you want to do.

pairing: jeon jungkook x reader

genre: college au

warnings: strong language, accidents caused by drunk driving (DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, DRIVE WHILE DRUNK OR AGREE TO RIDE WITH SOMEONE WHO’S DRUNK!!!)

words: 4.4k

                       chapter one.

The music coming from the stage was deafening and headache-inducing but the ambience of the club itself was absolutely energizing, and you kept switching between regretting the decision to come here, and thanking your roommate for convincing you to. Glancing at the girl next to you – she’d already finished her fourth drink and you weren’t sure if she realized it because she seemed to be hypnotized by what she was seeing on stage – you smiled even despite knowing that you’d be stuck helping her battle a killer hangover tomorrow.

“It’s crazy,” Inna said suddenly as if having read your thoughts, “isn’t it? I mean, they’re driving the whole club insane, look at them!”

You did look but not at the band on stage. The second floor of the club provided you with a great view of the first floor and the sight of your heavily intoxicated and barely legal peers dancing so close to the stage, they were nearly on top of it already, distracted you – it always amused you to see the duality of the top students in your class.

“Yeah,” you said. “But Parental Advisory brings the insanity with them wherever they go. I saw some people who brought actual posters to the club.”

“Shit, I should have thought of that,” Inna said, hitting herself on the temple with her palm in disappointment.

“I don’t even get it,” you started and your roommate was already groaning. Even drunk, she could recognize the tone of your voice when you were about to complain. “I mean—”

“Come on, you said you wouldn’t complain!” she whined.

“I said no such thing,” you disagreed, “and I’m not complaining, anyway. I’m just saying how they’re nothing special. Everyone’s only listening to them because they’re the only band on campus.”

Inna looked like she wanted to argue – like she’s done a million times before – but then she decided to let it slide and finish her drink instead.

“You’re only saying that,” she pointed out then, the straw of her cocktail still in her mouth, “because you have a weird prejudice against their lead vocalist.”

You raised your eyebrows with a skeptical scoff. “Jungkook? I don’t have anything against him. I just think he’s an overrated, arrogant asshole.”

Your roommate glanced at the stage again, seemingly losing herself in the performance for a minute, before she agreed to give you the benefit of the doubt, even though she always suspected that there was something more there – she knew you and Jungkook had history and she felt like your open dislike for him was concealing your deeper feelings.

“He may be arrogant,” she said just as Jungkook tossed the towel he’d used to wipe the sweat on his forehead off into the crowd, “but that’s just because he’s aware of how good he is.”

“Or maybe it’s because his dad owns a successful business,” you said, “and he’s just an entitled heir.”

“Sure, that could be a factor. But being an heir wouldn’t make those girls so devoted to him,” she was only half-joking as both of your gazes immediately fell to the side of the stage where a group of girls was already waiting for the performance to be over.

“There’s always a crowd of girls wherever he goes,” Inna continued, her eyes glistening. She chuckled then, “and, let me tell you, word is, they’re never disappointed.”

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes even despite having heard the rumors on campus as well. It wasn’t that the members of Parental Advisory slept around – or maybe they did but they weren’t ones to brag about it – but they knew what to give their audience to make them satisfied. That included their shows on stage and their parties back at their shared house – a notorious place already, known all over campus as the only spot where a party could stay alive and burning all throughout the weekend.

“Do you think his groupies leave reviews?” you slipped into sarcasm without meaning to. “Do they rate his performance on and off the stage out of five stars?”

“No, are you seriou—okay, that’s enough for me. I’m going to get another drink,” Inna stood up, choosing to focus her energy into having a good time rather than trying to get you to see the band from her point of view.

You debated stopping her -- she’s already had more drinks than she could handle -- but the determination in her eyes as she turned around and crossed the room towards the bar stopped you. You didn’t dare to interrupt a woman on a mission.

Finishing your own drink as you waited for her to come back, you took this time to focus on the atmosphere of the club. Despite the fact that Parental Advisory was, obviously, not one of your favorite bands, they did play good music – even if you could already feel a headache creeping in – and, there was no denying, they definitely knew how to put on a show.

You watched Jungkook lean into the crowd with his mic stand, his white shirt almost see-through from his sweat – and everyone who was close enough to touch him went wild. It was almost as if he ignited wildfires inside of them with his eyes – just one look and everyone around him dropped all of their inhibitions and started to live.

You knew of the effect he had on people even before he joined the band as you found yourself reminiscing about all the times you’d listened to Jungkook play a very strained version of Für Elise on his grandfather’s old piano. He’d always look at you after he finished playing and the glitter in his eyes made you feel as though you’ve just listened to the most harmonious melody in the world, even if his family’s cat wouldn’t stop hissing, begging him to stop and get away from the piano.

Somehow, listening to Parental Advisory – even though they favored alternative music and stayed clear of Beethoven – always brought back the memories of Jungkook at the piano. It softened you until you started to understand why every person at the club was completely at his will, responding to his every gesture, and, for a little while, you could relate to them as you followed Jungkook on stage with your eyes.

You didn’t like these memories – they lowered your walls against your will – so you were glad to get distracted by Inna as she plopped back down on her seat next to you, a new drink in her hand.

“Man,” she said and then took a sip, “if I’d brought a poster too, maybe we could have gone to the after party.”

Of course she wanted to go to their after party. When it came to Parental Advisory, after parties were basically a part of their performance, so she couldn’t just leave in the middle of it.

“You can still go even if you don’t have a poster,” you said, already coming up with a plan of how you were going to get home after the final song ended. “It’s not like their parties are exclusive.”

“Well, they sort of are,” Inna said. “It’s different when you just show up to the party. The people who matter arrive with the band. And they usually invite some of the girls with the posters backstage after the show.”

“The people who matter,” you repeated with disgust, “I hope you realize how pretentious that sounds. You’re not a loser if you don’t roll up to the party with the band.”

“It’s—okay, maybe it’s a little pretentious,” she said. “But I’d still like to be a part of that crew. Or, at least, arrive with someone.”

She wasn’t trying to conceal her wistful tone and even if she was, she probably wouldn’t have been very successful, because her wish to get a glimpse into the inside world of Parental Advisory was obvious in her eyes as she watched the band play out the final chords on stage.

Despite dragging you to gigs like this nearly every weekend, Inna was, all things considered, a good friend and you felt like you owed her this one thing because tonight really wasn’t as torturous for you as you may have made it seem.

You still couldn’t help but sigh before speaking to let her know how difficult saying this was for you (all so she wouldn’t expect you to do this every time you went out, really), “I suppose we can go to the party together. I’ll make sure you don’t feel like a loser.”

Her whole face lit up as she turned to you. “Do you mean it? Because I’m too drunk to recognize it if you’re mocking me right now.”

“I mean it,” you said sincerely. “If you don’t mind arriving with me instead of the band.”

“Oh, who cares, the band will be inside,” she dismissed her previous stance immediately, “thank you! I’ll make sure to repay you by getting you a clean cup of beer so as not to repeat my last mistake.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, frowning as you tried to resist the memory of Inna’s last mistake that involved accidentally making a cocktail of beer and tequila and then leaving you to fend for your life as you battled a hangover that seemed to last the whole week.

“Let’s not go there,” you said, “I’ll get my own drinks this time. Or, actually, maybe I’ll stay sober. One of us has to.”

Inna chuckled. “Good! I think it’s a little too late for me to do that.”

As it turned out, your roommate wasn’t the only one who got drunk way before the after-party started, because, by the time you returned to campus and reached the large building Parental Advisory lived in – courtesy of their rich parents, of course – everyone there was already wasted and in the middle of a very intense game of how-many-stupid-things-can-I-do-in-one-night. The guy who dived head-first from the roof into the jacuzzi in the backyard – no clothes on him whatsoever – must have been winning.

“Did you see that?” Inna laughed, her eyes lighting up like a child’s in the presence of candy. “There’s a reason why people won’t shut up about the parties here.”

“Hmm,” you looked around, more concerned about the girl from your Philosophy class who was attempting to do a keg stand all by herself. “But how do they not have accidents here? Everyone’s drunk out of their—”

“Oh my God, there they are!” your roommate squealed as she stopped walking suddenly and you automatically bumped into her. She turned to you, completely unbothered by the fact that you’d made her spill half of her drink. “Do you want to say hi to Jungkook?”

You lifted your gaze until you saw the four members of the band make their way towards the kitchen – which was, conveniently, directly behind you –  and then scoffed.

“Not at all,” you said as the group approached. “But even if I did, watch how he successfully ignores me.”

But your expectations weren’t met as Jungkook – still mid-laugh about something someone had said to him – stopped right in front of you.

“Oh!” he looked surprised to see you, but not nearly as surprised as you felt when he stopped to talk to you. Inna had stopped breathing as she watched you from the side and, frankly, you thought your lungs had given out, too. “Nice to see you here. Having fun?”

You hadn’t talked to Jungkook in seven years at least – a lucky number, one would think – and now that he was suddenly addressing you again, you weren’t sure if you’d ever learned how to talk at all.

“Sure,” you ended up saying because what else was there to say? “I like what you’ve done with the place. Before the party started, I mean.”

He laughed, giving the space that was once his living room – but was now a dance-floor with a couch that was nearly tipped over by some couple that was making out on it – a good look and then turning to you again.

“Thanks,” he said. “My mom took care of it.”

“Of course,” you let it slip. Acting like you didn’t know him was obviously not going to work because you did know him, and you knew very well that his mother was an interior designer because she was the one that designed your parents’ house, too. “Hope she’s doing well.”

“She is,” Jungkook said but it sounded a lot like the automatic response you’d given him before – “sure, I’m having fun at this party” – and he realized that as he cleared his throat, “she, uh, she’s still in touch with your mom, I guess, yeah?”

“Well, they’re best friends,” you said. Once again, your mouth opened before you could control yourself and every single word came out sounding overly sarcastic and borderline snotty. It was like you were trying to live up to his arrogant nature while he was pretending to be humble. “Anyway, it’s, uh, good to see you, I guess. I’m going to—”

Your eyes were already on Inna – who was no longer as amused by Jungkook as she had been moments ago, and was currently ogling Taehyung, another Parental Advisory member, who was talking to someone a few feet away from her – and you were already in the middle of taking a step past Jungkook and towards her, when he suddenly grabbed your forearm, stopping you.

The act – or, his touch, to be precise – shocked you so much that you turned to him with parted lips but weren’t able to express your surprise out loud.

“Wait, you guess?” Jungkook asked, sounding oddly amused. “So, it’s not really good to see me, then?”

For a moment, you didn’t understand what he was saying at all – because you weren’t thinking what you were saying when you spoke to him – but then you realized and pulled your arm out of his grasp.

“I’ve made small-talk with at least a dozen people I didn’t know before tonight,” you said, “it’s been good to see them all.”

“You know me, though,” he insisted, grinning now. It was like he listened to the sarcasm in your voice but deliberately chose not to hear it.

Still not really sure why he was talking to you now of all times – you’ve been going to the same classes for three years now and there have definitely been opportunities for you two to interact but you both ignored all of them – you figured he was just bored. Doing the same thing every Friday night – performing and then going home to get drunk with strangers who basically worshiped him – was bound to get tiring after a while and maybe he was looking for new ways to entertain himself.

“I knew you,” you clarified, not wanting to become his newest form of entertainment.

He shrugged, seemingly unfazed by the seven years you’d spent not talking. “You still do.”

You scoffed and were clearly about to disagree, so he jumped in before you could.

“We can always catch up,” he said with a nod towards the kitchen. “Let’s get a drink.”

“Why?” you asked. You couldn’t help it, this was too weird.

“Why not?” he countered, ever the opportunist. You didn’t reply. “What’s with the frown? Do you still plan everything out in advance? Should I make an appointment with your secretary before you can agree to get drinks with me?”

You felt the frown he’d mention deepen as your skeptical expression turned into a full-on scowl. You didn’t appreciate being mocked.

“You should,” you said. “But, fair warning, I’m booked until graduation.”

You were already turning to walk away – and noticed that Inna had disappeared – but, once again, Jungkook pulled you right back in by speaking louder.

“Aw, that’s disappointing,” he said in a way that made him sound more excited than disappointed. “Won’t you make an exception for an old friend? You used to.”

You felt goosebumps rise on your skin as he said this but didn’t even attempt to defend yourself. He had always been the exception to everything in your life – no matter how busy with homework you were, no matter how many school events the student council needed your approval for, you always made time for him – and, somehow, that came back to bite you in the ass.

“I haven’t talked to you since we finished middle school,” you said, purposefully not sticking to the day in discussion for too long or Jungkook would have undoubtedly used that against you, too, “lots of things changed. I only make exceptions for the people who matter now.”

Jungkook – who was absolutely going to discuss your middle school graduation in great detail if you’d stopped talking after you mentioned it – grabbed his chest and threw his head back dramatically.

“Ouch,” he fake-moaned, “that’s really cold, you know. I’m just trying to reconnect with you.”

“I think you have more important matters at hand,” you said, finally finding an excuse to walk away – it came in the form of three girls who had appeared by his side, evidently too tired to be waiting for his attention from across the room.

He hadn’t even noticed them at first – which was surprising, considering how strong the scent of their combined perfumes was – but, as soon as he turned his head to finally look at them, you walked away.

Instead of being annoyed by your abrupt exit, however, Jungkook seemed to grow even more amused. This was the first time you’d left him hanging – things really have changed.

“I’ll call you!” he called out across the living room but you didn’t turn back so he assumed you didn’t hear. Sighing, he turned back to the girls by his side. Taking the one closest to him by her hand, he pointed towards the kitchen. “Ladies.”

When you finally turned around to look at him – because you did hear what he’d said – he was already guiding the group of girls into the kitchen and filling their cups. An unexpected sense of disappointment settled in your chest but you tried to shake it off.

He was the one who decided it’d be better if the two of you stopped being friends at the beginning of ninth grade. It couldn’t have taken him seven years to change his mind.

A loud commotion outside distracted you from the conversation you’d been having with someone who, apparently, lived in a dorm room across the hall from yours – funny how you haven’t even seen each other before tonight – and you both turned to look out of the window.

“What the fuck was that?” you heard Yoongi, another one of Jungkook’s bandmates, ask himself, as he hurried past you. “Is that fucker fighting again?”

Your heart rate picked up as you realized that the “fucker” in question must have been Jungkook. Thinking rationally, you knew you had no reason to go out there and check what was going on, and yet the possibility that Jungkook was in a fight – and not for the first time, apparently! – was enough to send you right after Yoongi, until the two of you stopped in the backyard, both looking around to see what was causing the loud noise.

“Do you see him?” Yoongi asked you, too drunk – and too busy looking after his lead vocalist – to question why you were outside with him when everyone else settled on watching the scene play out through the windows of the house.

“Why do you think it’s him—oh. Yeah, I see him,” you pointed to a black car parked at the far end of the backyard – clearly, the car belonged to one of the members – and Yoongi saw Jungkook as soon as he turned to look.

Frankly, it was hard not to see Jungkook because he was being unceremoniously thrown on the hood of the vehicle by a guy that was about twice his size. And yet Jungkook seemed so much more aggressive than him as he pushed himself off the car and attacked.

“Fuck,” Yoongi muttered briefly before breaking into a sprint. “Jungkook! Shit, get the fuck away from him. What the fuck do you think you’re doing?!”

Profanities continued to spill from his mouth as he attempted to break the fight up. You found yourself running to catch up with them – which was a blessing for Yoongi because he struggled to hold the other guy back when Jungkook kept throwing himself at him – but you didn’t dare to intervene just yet.

“What are you doing?” you demanded – no one paid any attention – and then cleared your throat before trying again, louder, “Jungkook!”

Still, the boy was far too focused on his opponent – who was being cradled by a huffing Yoongi – so you had no choice but to step in – literally – and place both hands on Jungkook’s chest, pushing him back into the car roughly.

Taken off guard, he stumbled and fell on his back, landing on the hood of the car yet again and nearly taking you with him as he had angrily grabbed your wrists before he fell. He was seemingly ready to push them away before he looked into your eyes.

“Fuck,” he exhaled as soon as your gazes met, his grip on your wrists softening but not disappearing as he held your hands against his chest that moved up and down, his heart beating rapidly under your fingertips.

After waiting until his heart rate slowed down just slightly, you pulled your hands out of his and stepped away so he could stand up from the car.

“What the hell happened?” you asked. You could feel yourself start to shake but it wasn’t due to the chilly evening air.

“He’s being a dumbass again, that’s what happened,” Yoongi snarled, pushing the guy he’d been holding back off of himself and glaring at him and Jungkook both. “You need to get your shit together, man. I’m sick of looking after your sorry ass.”

The last part was directed at Jungkook who groaned, pulling the sleeves of his hoodie down. The guy he’d been fighting spat on the ground, gave him one last frustrated look, and returned to the party. Jungkook looked like he was going to yell something at him but Yoongi cursed loudly and gave up right then and there, turning around towards the house.

“I don’t need you to look after me!” Jungkook yelled after Yoongi, who pretended not to hear him as he walked away, and then – much to your surprise – the younger boy threw the driver’s door of the car open.

Confused and seriously concerned, you watched Yoongi leave before turning back to look at Jungkook. “W-what are you—”

“Just go!” he snapped at you as he got into the car.

“You can’t drive!” you protested in panic, grabbing the door before he could close it.

“I can do whatever the fuck I want,” Jungkook snarled, looking at you with a fire so prominent in his eyes that you ended up letting go of the car door out of sheer surprise. You’d never seen him like this before.

And then, as you turned away from him for just one second, searching for Yoongi – surely, he’d come back to stop him – Jungkook started the engine of the car.

You swore under your breath, knocking on the window of the car but it brought no response from him. “Jungkook! You can’t—”

He said something and you automatically stopped pounding on his window to listen. The engine of the car was drowning out his words and you expected him to lower his window and repeat what he’d said, but Jungkook used the moment when you took an unconscious step away from the car, and pushed the pedal.

You swore loudly as you watched him drive away, running your hands through your hair in desperation. For the next minute, you watched the car maneuver around the front yard clumsily and then drive down the main street. When he disappeared from your field of vision, you pulled your phone out from your back pocket but you didn’t know who to call.

Looking around again, you realized that Yoongi had gone back inside, and suddenly, you weren’t sure what would be faster, calling the police so they’d be on the look-out for a drunk lunatic behind the wheel or finding the rest of the Parental Advisory members so they could hopefully find a better solution.

But before you could reach a decision – it all seemed to happen in a split-second, honestly – you heard a loud crash. With your heart immediately falling down to your stomach and then plummeting all the way down to your feet, you ran across the yard and towards the main street, hoping – praying – that the sound was unrelated to Jungkook.

And yet, as soon as you stopped on the sidewalk and looked down the road, you saw the same black car right there, next to where the road split into an intersection. It had been forced to stop by a lonely lamp post, the view of which was partially blocked by a large tree trunk, but even so, you could tell that Jungkook had slammed the car right into it.

Struggling to breathe, you listened to people pour out of the house. They seemed to be much more alarmed than they’d been when they first heard someone fighting.

You didn’t think you could move.

“Call an ambulance,” you whispered, your eyes glued to the smoke that was coming out in dark, angry swirls from underneath the totaled hood of Jungkook’s car. “Someone needs to call the ambulance!”

Your own phone was lit up with the number of the police that you’d dialed mere seconds ago but you couldn’t find the control in your fingers to press call. Then, you heard cursing and realized that the people from the party weren’t going to help. They didn’t even consider helping.

They were running away. Escaping from the accident which seemed to them like the perfect reason for expulsion from university. They no longer wanted to be a part of the special club that got to arrive to Parental Advisory parties with the members of the band themselves. 

Inhaling deeply, you realized that no one else was going to do this for you, so you finally managed to pull yourself back together again.

You pressed your phone to your ear and with each beep of the dial tone, you cursed the Parental Advisory parties more and more – they were an accident waiting to happen. An accident so awful, it could erase seven years of silence as you hoped Jungkook would be able to talk to you again. 

keep reading | masterlist

[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

The Answer

Requested by: anonymous (“Congrats on reaching over 2.5k followers! I was wondering if I could request something with Joe trying to talk the reader out of doing something stupid, but in a funny way?”)

Summary: When Valentine’s Day turns unexpectedly stressful, your favorite coworker Joe Mazzello is there to offer moral support. I may have gotten a little carried away with this one, but it’s all in the spirit of the holiday! 😂 I hope you enjoy it. 💗

Warnings: Language. 

Word Count: 2.2k. 

You can find all my writing here!

Oh my god, this man is about to ask me to marry him.

You are suddenly aware of every immaterial detail, because this is the sort of night you’re supposed to remember forever. This is the sort of night, the sort of story, you’ll be retelling all your life: to parents, to friends, to overly-chatty hairstylists, to coworkers, to children, to grandchildren. The music is slow, sophisticated, French. The dress you’re wearing is lavender and just a stitch too tight in the ribs. The tablecloth is white, the flowers in the centerpiece ruby-red roses. The candlelight bathes Ryan’s face in hot, flickering gold. And he’s smiling, broadly, artfully, like he knows something you don’t. Like maybe he always will.

You’re trying to follow what he’s talking about, but you can’t. It’s some meandering summation of your last two years together: meeting at your mutual friend Sarah’s New Year’s Eve party, numbers tapped into each other’s iPhones, sushi and green tea, browsing through book stores, murky movie theaters and hands entwining on shared armrests, Fourth of July picnics where you socialized gamely with one another’s extended families, kisses that started out light and fleeting in the chilly lobbies of restaurants like this one and turned into hours spent in the rustling shadows of your bedroom. And although the details sometimes evade you, the arc of Ryan’s story is clear: that the journey was perfectly linear, every piece in place, every want and ritual accounted for. That the time has come for the inevitable conclusion.

He reaches across the table to take your hands in his. The last of your beef bourguignon lays unclaimed and forgotten in its bowl. Your appetite has vanished entirely.

“Pierre,” Ryan tells the moustached waiter, grinning triumphantly. “Could you bring out dessert now, please?”

You hear your chair squeal as you bolt to your feet. Your ankles wobble as you balance on your strappy, rather painful silver heels, the ones Ryan likes so much. “I’ll be right back,” you announce. You flash him a reassuring, innocent smile. You gesture apologetically to the wine and water glasses, like it’s all their fault. The perfect fall guys. How dare they interrupt this magical evening.

Ryan suspects nothing. Or—worse, far far worse—he doesn’t care. “Sure, baby. Take your time.”

You zigzag, rather unsteadily, around the restaurant tables—all those other nameless candle-lit couples reminiscing and giggling and feeding each other spoonfuls of quivering chocolate mousse—and crash through the restroom door. There are two college-aged girls touching up their makeup, stark and bone-white under the florescent lights, and they peer quizzically over at you. You take shelter in the nearest stall and lock the door.

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.” You stare at the wall, waiting for a sign. There’s an artsy black-and-white picture of the Eiffel Tower hanging there. Another trivial detail to one day tell your grandchildren about. “Oh my god,” you moan again.

You root through your purse, pull out your iPhone, and find Joe Mazzello in your contacts. You’ve never called him before; you have his number solely in case of work-related emergencies. But your fingers are moving swiftly, almost autonomically; and time is rolling irrevocably forward like a freight train.

“This is clearly a pocket dial,” Joe says as soon as he answers. “There’s no way you’re thinking about me and my subpar sandwich-making abilities on Valentine’s Day.” He’s right about his sandwich skills; they’re honestly abysmal. He’s the worst employee at Quiznos. He always spills the honey mustard everywhere. You, on the other hand, take great pride in your consistently neat, uniform application of condiments. But, nevertheless, Joe is your favorite coworker. Your favorite coworker by a margin that ships could sail through like a drawbridge.

“Help,” you croak.

“Uh...?” Joe’s voice changes. He’s not exactly serious yet—you’re not really sure what a serious Joe Mazzello would even sound like—but he’s definitely apprehensive. “Are you locked in a trunk somewhere...?”

“Wait, no, sorry. I’m not being kidnapped. I’m at L’amour Vrai.”

“Oh, nice!” But he doesn’t sound that thrilled about it. “With Ryan, I’m assuming.”

“Yeah, therein lies the problem.”

Joe is confounded. “...Did he forget to bring you a massive teddy bear and a heart-shaped box of Ferrero Rocher, or...?”

“I think he’s going to ask me to marry him,” you say in a rush, breathlessly. “He’s been rambling about our relationship and being weird and sentimental all through dinner and I think dessert is going to be, like, a giant bowl of chocolate mousse with a ring hidden in the bottom or something and now I’m hiding in the bathroom.”

“And you don’t even like chocolate mousse,” Joe notes.

“That’s not really the point, but yeah, true.”

“So what are you going to do?”

You don’t have an answer. You don’t even have threads of thoughts that could be woven into words. Because no matter how seamless and fated Ryan’s story of your relationship sounds, you feel that something is missing. You’ve always felt that way. And you’ve waited—patiently, undemandingly, faithfully—for that one last piece of surety to drop out of the sky and click into place for the past seven-hundred and forty-four days. You’ve waited for indelible magnetism, for that sensation of free-falling, for love; you’ve waited until you started to suspect those things didn’t exist at all except in fiction. But sometimes, just recently, you think you might be catching glimpses of them: in how Joe sends you a clandestine smirk when a customer is agonizing over whether they want cheddar or swiss, in how he invents new combinations of fountain drinks for you to taste and rank on a highly scientific ten-point scale (Cherry Coke-Dr. Pepper is the current champion at 8.5/10), in how he complains incessantly about having to close but will wipe down the same counter fifteen times while you count the money in the register so you don’t have to lock up alone. And those transitory glimpses are enough to show you exactly what a lifetime with Ryan would mean living without.

“You don’t want to say yes,” Joe realizes quietly. “You wouldn’t be freaking out and hyperventilating in the bathroom if you did.”

“I don’t think I can say no.”

Joe snorts. “Lady, this isn’t the sixteenth century. You’re not being traded to this guy for some cows or a military alliance or a duchy in Germany. You can always say no.”

“But we’re in the middle of this fancy restaurant and he’s got the staff in on it, and everyone is going to stare when he asks me, they’ll probably start clapping and making TikToks and I’m going to look like a total bitch if I don’t say yes.”

“Well, yeah,” Joe says, a little darkly. “That was probably the plan. To put you in a position where you felt like you didn’t have a choice.” And you recall that Joe doesn’t seem to like Ryan very much, hasn’t said a single nice thing about him in the six months that have passed since Joe joined the illustrious Quiznos team.

“Maybe I should say yes and then after tonight never speak to him again.”

“You’re...gonna ghost your fiancé? You legitimately think that’s a better plan?”

“Maybe.”

“It’s only going to get harder to back out as this thing picks up momentum. The families will get involved. There will be dress fittings, venue shopping, cake tasting...oh, wait, actually, don’t back out until after the cake tasting. And invite me.”

“I could fake my own death. Or enlist in the Peace Corps. I’ve always wanted to see Mongolia.”

“But then you’d have to give up your promising career in sandwich making.”

“They might have Quiznos in Mongolia.” You sigh, defeated. “I’m really sorry. I shouldn’t be bothering you with this. I’m definitely ruining your Valentine’s Day.”

“There’s not much to ruin, honestly. I’m re-watching Tiger King and eating my weight in Skittles.”

Oh, right; Joe and his girlfriend Julie broke up last week. And come to think of it, despite the fact that you don’t have any identifiable reason to feel this way, you’ve never really liked Julie either. “I’ll gladly trade you.”

“I mean, sure, I fucking love chocolate mousse. My apartment is only three blocks away. I can hurry over there and put on your dress and heels and earrings or whatever you’re wearing, but I feel like Ryan might catch on.”

You laugh, your first real, involuntary, jolting laugh of the day. “Genius. Let’s do it.”

“You can say no,” Joe tells you, seriously now. This, as it turns out, is what a serious Joe Mazzello sounds like: warm, concerned, measured, his typically frenetic energy temporarily wrangled. “If he asks you to marry him and you want to say no, you can say no.”

“Okay,” you reply, taking a deep breath, resolved.

“Okay?”

“Yeah. Okay. I’ll say no.”

“Cool.” Joe sounds pleased; proud, even.

“Alright. I’m gonna go. Thanks, Joe. Seriously. Thank you so much.”

“No problem. You can mop up my next honey mustard spill as a show of gratitude.”

“Deal,” you say with a smile, and then you hang up.

Waiting for you back at the table is the moustached waiter cheerfully playing a violin, Ryan’s luminous grin, and a glass chalice full of chocolate mousse. Jesus christ. Chocolate fucking mousse.

Ryan motions for you to take a bite. You obediently sit down, pick up your spoon with a quaking hand, dip it into the center of the chocolate mousse...and lift out a diamond ring. You unleash a gasp of horror that Ryan mistakes for—or, perhaps, is determined to believe is—elation.

Ryan plucks the ring off your spoon, wipes it clean with a red cloth napkin, and slips out of his chair to kneel at your feet. Blood is pounding frantically in your ears. Your courage has evaporated. Your legs feel numb, jellylike, boneless. How the hell are you going to walk out of here after you say no? How the hell are you going to say no at all?

Ryan is reciting some generic, Hallmark-card speech. The other restaurant patrons are beaming, clapping, already assuming your answer. Ryan asks you the question. Your trembling hand is now resting at the base of your flushed throat like a noose. Your words are ghosts.

“I...” you sputter. “I...um...”

“Go ahead,” Ryan says, nodding, smooth and undaunted. And suddenly you know that Joe was right; every single part of this was planned. Ryan turns to the crowd. “Aw, folks, give her a hand, she’s shy!”

And as they cheer and whistle encouragingly, as Ryan waits for your acquiescence, as your hope for those things you’ve only caught glimpses of begins to wither like autumn leaves, someone steps between you and Ryan and fills up the hollow, hungry space left by your silence. It’s Joe.

“No no no,” he tells Ryan. His voice is ostensibly matter-of-fact and yet formidable. “She’s not shy. She’s just trying to figure out her answer. And she doesn’t need some random strangers in a French restaurant to help her out with that.” Joe looks at you and raises his eyebrows. “Go ahead. Whenever you’re ready.”

“What the...?!” Ryan exclaims, his eyes shifting from you to Joe. The other patrons are extremely bewildered. The waiter’s violin playing screeches to a halt.

“No,” you say, your courage flooding back in, a slow smile igniting across your face.

Ryan doesn’t understand. “No...?”

“No. My answer is no. The past two years have been nice, but this is over now. I’m not right for you, Ryan. You’re not right for me either. And I think you know that. So goodbye.”

You stand, sling your purse over your shoulder, and follow Joe out of L’amour Vrai; but not before you yank off your silver high heels and leave them there on the restaurant floor. The other guests are in scandalized uproar now. Ryan is still kneeling, furious and in shock. Outside it is bitingly cold and your breath turns to fog in the night air; the chilly concrete sidewalk soothes the aching soles of your feet.

Joe is ecstatic, his eyes gleaming under the streetlights as you walk together. “That was incredible! Did you see his face?! He totally thought he was going to be able to bully you into saying yes and you were not having it, you are a beast my dear, I hope some of those people put you on TikTok, I hope you get TikTok famous for being freaking awesome, then you can get rich and buy a mansion and let me live in the pool house and I’ll never have to work or suffer another honey-mustard-related catastrophe again—”

“Joe.” You stop him abruptly, resting a palm against his chest, gazing up at him beneath the cold stars. And after a moment he understands, and he kisses you. You catch more than a glimpse of those beautiful things you’d feared might not exist. They light up like the goddamn Eiffel Tower.

“I’ve wanted that for six months,” Joe says as he pulls away, softly, shakily, smiling almost shyly.

“Yeah,” you reply. “I think I have too.”

Joe takes your face in his hands and kisses you again. He tastes like heat and harmony and laughter and Skittles; but more than all of that, he tastes like love.

[classic80sand90smovieloves2]

Meeting and Dating Shavonne Wright

(My crappy gif)(Requested by anonymous/The ask had three separate requests in it so I’ll respond to it later when I’m ready to start writing the others)

- You met Shavonne in school. The two of you had a class at the end of the day together but you didn’t talk to each other until halfway through the year when she saved your ass in the school bathroom. 

- It was around fourth period when you just so happened to enter the bathroom after she did. She was leaning against the sink smoking and not paying any attention to you when you made your way into a stall. It was there that you found out that “that time of the month” came early and you were completely unprepared. 

- You cursed quietly, panicking while rifling through your bag for a second time. You could hear her let out a short laugh in response to your outburst before she finally spoke. 

“You alright in there?” The question was joking more than anything.

- You winced at the idea but swallowed your pride, asking if she had a pad or something that you could use. 

“Oh shit, girl. ...Yeah, give me a minute.” She answered quietly. You could hear her heels clicking against the floor as she made her way over to the stall, her hand appearing over the top of the door to hand you one. 

- You thanked her and finished up, hoping that she would leave before you got out but you had no such luck. You shyly exited the stall, flashing her a small smile as you went to wash your hands. 

- She nodded at you while taking a drag from her cigarette, brushing off your second thank you as you finally left the bathroom. You let out a breath once you got into the hallway, figuring that was that and she’d forget about it by the time your class with her came around. 

- So the end of the day came around and you made your way into your final class; study hall though your “teacher” let you do whatever you wanted within reason. 

- Shavonne came in a few minutes after you had and, for the first time, seemed to notice that you shared the class together. She hesitated for a moment before making her way over and asking if you were “alright now”, offering you a Midol as she took a seat. 

- The two of you talked on and off for the rest of the period; you blamed it more on the fact that she didn’t really have any friends in that class rather than her actual interest in you. But you’d soon be proven wrong.

- She began to sit with you nearly every day after that, your conversations moving past awkward small talk and the length at which you spoke getting longer and longer. Shavonne actually found herself trying to get to that class faster so that she could see you sooner, something she later realized was a bit odd for just two friends, especially when it came to her. 

- After about a month of talking, the two of you began to walk out of class together, still making conversation as you made your way through the halls. It was there that she finally asked if you’d like to hang out after school. 

- You agreed and soon found yourself sitting on her bedroom floor as she rifled through her records, trying to find a good album to listen to. She asked you what you thought of Don while her back was turned to you and you honestly answered: you didn’t know him very well but he seemed like a jerk, harmless but an ass. 

- To your surprise, she agreed and told you that she was planning on breaking things off for good, hesitantly admitting that she liked someone new anyways. You started to prod just a little bit.

“They’re... well you know....” You don’t piece two and two together as she begins to subtly describe you. “Just... cute, you know?”

“I’ve never heard you call anyone cute before.” You chuckled slightly. 

“Sexy. Is that better?” She teasingly corrected herself. “But they’re more cute. Like a puppy or cat or something. I don’t know she’s just different.”

Your heart skipped a beat, wondering if you heard her correctly. “She?”

“Huh?” She asked but you knew she was faking it, her voice high and nervous. 

“You said ‘she’.” You replied tentatively, unsure of if it was your place to intrude. 

“Alright, so it’s a she.” She muttered defensively, knowing she couldn’t play off her fumble.

“Alright.” You said and moved on to another subject of conversation.

- The two of you had your first kiss the same night she confessed that she had feelings for you. She’d dragged you out with her late one night, convincing you to come by admitting that she’d broken up with Don and “just wanted some company”. 

- You were sat next to her on a field of grass, swatting mosquitoes from your legs while she smoked when she finally told you that you were the one she’d been talking about. You went silent for a long moment before you told her that you liked her too, letting her lean closer and closer until her lips brushed against yours; testing the waters before she pulled you into a real kiss. 

- It’s certainly a new experience but one you wouldn’t trade for the world. 

- Lots of pda. She’s a touchy person in general so no one really suspects anything when she’s hanging all over you. She constantly has her arm around your waist/shoulder or her hand in yours. 

- Quick, frenzied kisses. She’ll desperately attack your lips for a minute then pull away like nothing happened the next.

- She likes when you lay your head on her lap but; depending on her mood, she’ll either play with your hair or put things in it until you notice. Even though she messes with you, she doesn’t want you to pull away. 

- She’s a tease. She doesn’t like serious talk, instead she prefers to gossip and  try and get a reaction out of you, usually a nice one. 

- Tv dates. 

- Slumber parties, you have one; at least, once a week. You usually make whole days out of them, heading over to her house right after school and staying there until late the next morning. 

- You know that picture of the two girls where one of them is putting makeup on the other while straddling their waist. That’s the two of you; you can decide who’s who. 

- Bathroom smoking breaks. You tend to light her cigarettes for her since she rarely remembers her own. 

- She literally has everything else you could need in her bag besides a lighter. Hair ties, tampons/pads, gum, breath mints, chapstick, tissues, pepper spray, spare money, band aids, etc. 

- Playing dumb games to pass the time, especially during your free periods. 

- She likes to be tall but she really isn’t. She’s constantly wearing heels and gets annoyed when you tease her about her height. 

- On the same note~ She’s actually really insecure. She may not act like it on the outside but she’s always secretly trying to do things that make her look more “appealing”, skinnier, prettier, etc. 

- You occasionally help her get dressed because she insists on wearing the tightest pants that she can force on and ridiculously hard to clasp necklaces. 

- She can usually score some beers for the two of you from unsuspecting guys who think with the head that’s off their shoulders; if you like to drink, that is. 

- She likes being helpful, at least when it somewhat benefits her. She’ll come help you with whatever you’re doing as long as it either involves her or you spending more time with her. 

- She calls you “girlie”, it’s her version of a pet name, sort of ingenious since she can call you it in public without turning heads. 

- Drive through restaurant dates.

- Wandering around and seeing where the night takes the two of you. 

- Rollerskating dates.

- Matching nail polish.

- Bumping each other’s hips teasingly.

- Brushing her hair behind her ear for her. There always seems to be an annoying strand in her face.

- She likes to think of herself as being above “kiddie stuff” but she’s a sucker for little childish trinkets and stuffed animals. She’ll tease you for getting her something like a teddy bear but you bet your ass it’ll be sitting on her bed the next time you visit.

- She gets spooked easily and whenever she does, she has a habit of looking to and trying to latch on to you. You’re sort of used as a stress ball and a meat shield at the same time.

- Comforting hugs, she always seems to know when you need one and she’ll take one whenever you want to give her one. 

- She turns into a little teddy bear when the two of you get to her house after school. Her shoes come off, she shrinks and then she turns soft. She refuses to be the little spoon, she’ll koala bear your back before she allows you to be the big spoon. 

- She’s a clothing stealer; a beautiful, persistent thief that vexes you. Looking for a particular shirt? You’ll find it soon enough... with your girlfriend inside of it.

- Jodi is incredibly and adorably supportive while Kaye is most certainly a borderline lesbian herself. They’re most likely the only ones who know about the two of you.

- Her shoes in one of your hands and her hand in the other. It’s a common thing after a late night of partying since she insists on wearing heels every time she goes out.

- Special handshakes.

- Photobooth pictures. She’s got them pinned on her headboard and hidden in her pillows.

- She likes leading the way when the two of you walk together but always makes sure that you’re close behind, not wanting to leave you somewhere or let you stray too far away. 

- Being really comfortable with each other. The two of you can talk about whatever you want without ever having to feel embarrassed.You’re also the only one whose secrets she actually keeps.

- She’s a real one; at least when it comes to you. Pimple on your back? She’s got it. Bled through your pants? She’ll get you another pair. Puking in the bathroom? She’ll hold your hair. It’s girl code baby and she’s mastered it. 

- Shavonne’s never been jealous; actually jealous, of anyone, mainly because she’s never been in an extremely serious relationship. But with you? She certainly has a mean streak when it comes to dealing with people she deems as being too close to you.

- It’s a little hard for her to decide when she should and shouldn’t get jealous since she’s sort of new to the whole “being gay” thing. Should she be jealous of guys that flirt with you or only girls who seem to like you more than friends? She isn’t sure.

- She tries her best to deal with her jealousy on her own time and to not let you know about it. She’s sort of embarrassed since she considers herself a pretty sought after girl. She doesn’t think she should ever feel like there’s competition when she’s the one you’re with. But like I said: she’s secretly insecure and that affects how she feels more than she cares to admit.

- She’s very protective of you, insulting whoever is rude to you or tries to make you the butt of a joke. People learn very quickly that being mean/inconsiderate to you gets them on her shit list. 

- She always has a comeback no matter the situation. Teasing her? She has one. Fighting with each other? She has one. You’d think she has a book full of them somewhere. 

- She never stays mad at you for very long. She likes to think that she can hold a grudge but when it really comes down to it, she tries to smooth things over pretty much as soon as she can. 

- She sings “love you~” more than she says it seriously but the feeling and intent is still there. You think it’s cute anyway. 

- She doesn’t have anything against her hometown so she wouldn’t mind sticking around for a while. Maybe the two of you can rent/buy a house together; be ambiguously gay roommates that all the old ladies either look at weird or openly admire your “friendship”.

[sagurus]

04. caged

Prompt was: Running out of time: caged.

Using @whumptober2020‘s prompt today.

The original idea behind this is credited to @magpythe; I don’t believe he’s posted any of his writing for this au himself yet, but it’s inspired entirely from a scenario that he started, and then we talked about collaboratively. For some context, this takes place in a world much like our own in terms of scientific rules, except there are magical/supernatural beings (vampires, werewolves, shinigami, kitsune, etc) living among us as well. This was a well-kept secret from the general populace bc those magical beings didn’t want to deal with the backlash, but alas this facade couldn’t last. Humans aren’t handling their new understanding of the world very well :’)

Anyway, onto the story.

----------

Eighteen hours, fifty-seven minutes, and counting.

The cell was minimalistic and austere. Plain walls behind and beside him. Metal bars before him, looking out at a vacant wall. The opposite side of the holding area. His cell was one of about five in the short hallway, all lined against one side of it, with a door on either end. Each cell was a little under two metres wide and three deep. Saguru’s own cell was the second from the right.

Insofar as he could tell, he was the only one in this particular holding area. In the nineteen hours he had spent here, the only sounds he heard beyond his own breathing were those of officers. It would seem that most non-human individuals who displayed the clinically-induced violent reaction were swiftly neutralized without extenuating circumstances to protect them. He was lucky, he thought bitterly, that nepotism could guarantee him the civility of a holding cell rather than more immediate measures. For other, less fortunate individuals, Saguru imagined that containing them was seen as risky. Or a waste of resources better dedicated to human criminals who had willingly broken the law, rather than innocent non-human civilians forced into a hopeless situation.

How long they intended to hold him here, though, he didn’t know. For all he knew, it could be indefinite. Or he could be released tomorrow. Or meet some more final fate. The seconds ticked by.

Nineteen hours, five minutes. By his calculation, it was almost noon, assuming his timekeeping wasn’t too faulty without the aid of his pocket watch.

The heavy, industrial door fell open and then closed again, sounding out a dulled thud. Footsteps clicked against linoleum tile. Saguru estimated at least three officers, until he belatedly managed to pick out a fourth, much lighter set of steps. Someone slight. A child? He dearly hoped it wasn’t a child’s footsteps he was hearing. There was something strange about them, too. Something about the way that these steps struck and slided across the tile, making them sound…sharp?

The cluster came near enough he could just make out the line of one of the officer’s uniforms. He stayed seated on his cot, listening. He couldn’t see the majority of the group from here, let alone make out whether the owner of the smaller footsteps had, indeed, been a child. There was a solemn air as the door to the cell neighboring his own. Small footsteps padded inside. The cell door shut. A woman’s voice, strained and tense (not with fear—guilt? Stress?) said, “Someone will bring your dinner around seven.”

A beat, something like hesitation hovering in the air, and then the officers’ steps (all three sets) retreating down the hall. Saguru held his breath, waiting for the officers to be out of the holding area entirely.

Once they were gone, he continued to wait, listening in for any activity from his new neighbor.

Saguru’s own arrival into this situation had been a rather unexpected one for all parties involved. The issue was this: the world was rapidly becoming aware of the existence of supernaturally-inclined beings existing among them in society—generally referred to as youkai in Japan. Sensationalized media ensured that this was not well-received, but at the very least most inhuman individuals still managed to keep the truth under wraps and continue to assimilate. Until scientific innovation introduced a drug which garnered no reaction from virtually all humans, but revealed any magically obscured, glamoured, or otherwise concealed features that these other beings possessed. It also bore a few potential unfortunate side effects for some youkai. The most common of these was an uncontrollable violence, pushing the recipient into a dangerous frenzy. In other, rarer cases, the drug had even killed some. The kicker here was that Hakuba labs was a major proponent for the creation of the drug and helped pioneer it. Once the drug left clinical trials, it was determined that it needed to be administered to as much of the populace of Japan as possible, in order to catalog human and youkai population.

Hakuba Takahiro and his ex-wife, Rosalin Caldwell, were both humans. As far as anyone had been aware, Hakuba Saguru was also human. Saguru himself had never doubted this.

That didn’t explain the flurry of flame, the way he had tried to surge out his seat, the loss of sense or understanding, vision gone red in outrage. They had barely managed to restrain him. His father had almost been struck with the explosive fire, before Saguru had somehow managed to extinguish it.

On principle, Saguru had been opposed to the usage of the drug; frankly, the ethical implications were horrifying even without the potential for dangerous side-effects geared specifically toward one party of people. Nevermind the fact there were not yet any laws to protect youkai, nor any clear delineation of a plan to accommodate for them a place in society. He had considered refusing to participate in receiving it and thus being complicit in the cause, but his father had left him little room for argument.

Needless to say, it had all gone very badly. So far, Saguru had not been informed at all about what was being discussed with regards to his fate.

Hell, he still didn’t even understand why it had happened.

In the cell beside Saguru’s, his new neighbor seemed to be getting acquainted with the room. Those strange, precise footsteps seemed to walk its inner perimeter. A few moments later, he heard the sound of the cot squeaking and settling.

Breathing, even and measured, but in a forced way. A restrained way. Holding something in.

Saguru couldn’t think of a single thing he could say to improve the situation. He decided he would wait until he heard some indication that the other would even want conversation.

Hours of mutual silence later, the heavy door opened and shut again. Heavy footfalls approaching from down the hallway. Saguru guessed that it was probably for dinner.

“Who would have thought Beika city’s murder magnet really was a shinigami after all?” the officer observed with an amusement that Saguru found chilling. It seemed to be directed at the neighboring cell, as the officer hadn’t reached Saguru yet.

Beika city’s murder magnet… Dawning horror. There was only one person Saguru could think of who matched that morbid description.

Meanwhile, the officer was met with tense silence. After apparently handing off the food, he moved onto Saguru. Saguru started at him icily. He was silent, privately daring the man to breathe a word in his direction. The officer, this time, was equally silent.

Once the officer was gone, Saguru set his food aside. He didn’t have any appetite to speak of, right now. Instead, he needed to know. “Edogawa-kun, is that you?”

The response was a startled, stammered, “Haku—Hakuba nii-san?” Alarm colored his voice. Clearly, he was just as distressed to find someone familiar here.

Saguru’s heart sank. “Yes, indeed, it’s me.”

“What are you doing here?” Edogawa demanded.

Saguru laid back on the cot, exhaled long and slow. “I suppose I’m not human,” he said simply. “Believe me, it was a surprise to me, too.” He paused, and then ventured, “Are you unhurt?”

He tried to imagine what Edogawa must look like, now. The officer had called him a shinigami, but Saguru wasn’t entirely clear on what, visually, that entailed. Bat wings came to mind. He thought back to the strange sound of the boy’s footsteps. How much of his anatomy had been forced to change to its truer form because of the injection?

“More or less,” was Edogawa’s noncommittal response.

Saguru was still trying to get his head around the fact that the police had put a seven-year-old in a holding cell. Youkai or not, this was a child. What did they intend to do with him?

This had all been much easier when all Saguru had to worry about was his own fate.

Edogawa Conan, as it turned out, made a perfectly good neighbor, and even a pleasant conversation partner. The sheer amount of boredom that came with sitting in a cell with nothing to do for hours that stretched into days was almost enough to forget the horror of their situation. Either way, the only real escape—from the horror or the boredom—was to fill the space with conversation.

Fortunately, there was plenty to talk about. Old cases, literature, trading favorite Sherlock Holmes stories. The situation at hand. It was difficult not to discuss the problem they were in together, as they were both people who couldn’t help but try to study a problem from all angles in order to try to solve it. But inevitably the direction of those conversations turned dark too quickly for Saguru’s comfort. It wouldn’t do either of them any good to focus on the ways things could go wrong.

“Hey, Hakuba,” Edogawa said one day, apparently forgetting to use the honorific (or simply electing to drop it, there being very little bandwidth for Edogawa’s more childish act). “What are you, anyway?”

It was a blunt question, but over the past handful of days, they had mutually elected not to worry too much over politeness. Saguru faltered, before saying honestly, “I haven’t the slightest idea. I suspect one of my parents may not be biologically related to me, and whoever the other contributing party was, was some variety of youkai.” Yesterday, Saguru had been granted a visit by a scientist, who had studied him like a specimen and taken a variety of samples, all while Saguru remained restrained for the scientist’s safety. Never mind the fact that the more alarming skill he (apparently) possessed was manifesting fire without the use of any tools, so he wasn’t sure what good restraining him would do to anybody. Regardless, the examination had gone by without incident, and Saguru suspected that there had been some kind of DNA test conducted, although he had no confirmation as to the results.

Edogawa made a noise of consideration, lapsed into silence, then started again. “Did you change?” He asked, almost delicately.

“I don’t think I did,” Saguru told him. “As far as I can tell, visually everything is still the same as it had been. Admittedly, I haven’t seen my reflection since some time before the incident, so I can’t say with one hundred percent certainty.”

Quiet, again, and Saguru wondered if he should ask if Edogawa had changed, then decided against it. The other boy could tell him if he’d like, but otherwise Saguru didn’t want Edogawa to trouble him with it.

“So, they found out you were youkai because…”

“Because I had—an outburst, yes.” Understatement of the century.

Saguru could hear the grimace in Edogawa’s voice when he asked, “—Was everybody alright?”

“I—” Saguru recalled the violence of his reaction, the flames licking out and nearly making contact in a dangerous way with his father as well as one of the nurses. He recalled the feeling of a vicious snarl contorting his expression and the way he’d surged against the precautionary restraints.

He recalled going perfectly still as soon as he’d regained a handle on himself. The doctor approaching him with a new syringe, and the distant thought, Is he giving me a sedative or is he euthanising me? The foreign, turbulent rage churning inside of him until he’d gone under thanks to the shot (sedative, it turned out).

“Nobody got hurt,” Saguru assured him after a too-long silence. “It was—frightening. But nobody was hurt.”

“—I hurt a nurse,” Edogawa said, and his voice was the sort of stony that belied the great effort of holding in his emotions. “It could have been a lot worse, but I still hurt somebody. Really badly.”

“You can’t fault yourself for it,” Saguru said immediately, sternly. “It speaks volumes about your sense of accountability and responsibility, that you feel guilty for it, but it wasn’t your fault that it happened.”

“If you say so.”

It was their seventh day like this. Still, Saguru received no news any time he asked a passing officer for updates.

Earlier today, Hattori Heiji had visited, apparently to discreetly provide Edogawa some contraband (such as books). Edogawa had kindly requested that Hattori pass one of those books to Saguru. The other detective had been frankly shocked to realize he was here, and despite their usual animosity, the other boy had seemed mostly genuinely concerned for him. When Saguru asked if there was anything Hattori could tell him about the situation, it had been a definite negative. Apparently his situation was being kept well out of the hands of the media, at least for now. Saguru could only imagine his father must have told the school that he was on some sort of vacation, or had accepted a case which required him to head overseas again. Nobody would be worried about him, then.

Now, the visit was over and they had lapsed into silence while they, for the moment, privately entertained themselves. Rather than read, Saguru had tucked the book away for later, and was instead practicing what little exercise he could to keep his body active. Right now it was warm-up stretches. He desperately ached to go on a run.

At some point, Edogawa cut into the silence.

“What do you think is going to happen, Hakuba?” and then, hastily added, “—nii-san.” He sounded pensive, uncertain. He didn’t sound afraid, but Saguru thought that he might be anyway.

“I don’t know,” he murmured, opting for honesty rather than false hope. “It’s been a week and we’re still here. I don’t know what anyone’s plan for us is.”

“Yeah…” Edogawa trailed off, deep in thought. Saguru wondered if it would have been better to say that he was sure things would wind up working out. The problem was, he wasn’t sure. He had been under the impression that he would be placed under holding until they worked out the best circumstance to harness or otherwise stifle his apparent abilities, and then return him to something like normal life, but with a tight leash.

But now it had been seven days, with no developments, and Saguru was beginning to wonder if this was all much more dire than he had thought.

They both went quiet again, only for Edogawa to speak up just as abruptly as he had before. “—I need to tell you something.”

Puzzled, Saguru went still. “Proceed.”

“It’s pretty unbelievable, so I need you to bear with me. Okay?”

Edogawa seemed to do a lot of things that fell quite near the ‘unbelievable’ category, in Saguru’s experience. Much like Kuroba tended to, although they had different styles in the ways they defied reality. “I’ll do my best to keep an open mind,” he assured Edogawa.

“My name isn’t really Edogawa Conan,” he began.

And the sky was blue, and Kaitou KID was Kuroba Kaito. “Mm.”

“It’s actually Kudou Shin’ichi, and I’m really seventeen, not seven.”

So this is what Edogawa meant when he said it was unbelievable. He couldn’t help but wonder if Edogawa was engaging in a delusion to cope with the frankly traumatic situation they had found themselves in. “Is that so?” he inquired, honoring his promise to keep an open mind. Edogawa was right, though. This was difficult to believe.

Edogawa made an irritated sound, like he could tell Saguru didn’t believe him. “I don’t know what’s going to happen to us, and almost no one knows. I want you to know. I—a year and a half ago, I went with Ran to Tropical Land, and worked that case with the roller coaster beheading.”

Saguru recalled the news reports of that case all too well. Truly, it had been a particularly gruesome case, so he was eternally gratefully it hadn’t been him on the scene.

“There were these suspicious men there, and after I solved the case I left Ran so I could tail them and figure out what they were up to. But one of them surprised me from behind, knocked me out, and gave me this—drug,” allegedly-Kudou-Shin’ichi explained. “It was supposed to kill me via apoptosis, but instead it… de-aged me. ”

It was certainly a lot to process. It felt a little bit like the plot of a bad science fiction. But he spoke with urgency, and he was clearly being genuine. Although Saguru was still inclined to lean toward delusion, he decided to consider his way through the facts he had from his limited research into the whereabouts of Kudou Shin’ichi. It was true that the same day Kudou disappeared, Mouri Ran had wound up taking in Edogawa Conan. It would explain the strange amount of knowledge and understanding Edogawa possessed, especially in terms of investigating crime scenes and solving cases. It also clarified anachronistic errors—moments when Edogawa would say he’d seen something when it was first released, even though it should have come out well before his birth date.

After analyzing the facts, Saguru realized there was nothing (beyond his own understanding of scientific development) that disproved the claim. None of the facts he had specifically proved it either, though. He didn’t know the other detective well enough to quiz Edogawa in order to prove it for himself, either.

He thought back to their previous conversation. They didn’t know, really, what would become of them here. If they would make it out of here. Perhaps this was a delusion, but if so, Saguru didn’t think it would do any good to deny the other that. It certainly wouldn’t change anything for the better in the short term.

Saguru resolved that he would take the other boy at his word, and, should he have the means and opportunity if they got out of this, he’d pursue it more critically then.

“—I see,” he said, nodding slowly although Kudou couldn’t see him. “It is good to have gotten to know you, then, Kudou-kun. I’m sorry it wasn’t under better circumstances.”

When the other boy next spoke, it was obvious to Saguru that something coiled very tightly had unwound. The relief was nearly palpable. “It’s good to meet you too, Hakuba-kun. Here’s to hoping we make it out of this so that we can keep getting to know each other.”

They could only hope. “I’ll do my best to remain optimistic,” Saguru murmured in agreement.

[kyber-heart]

Feeling a touch nostalgic today...

So I’m gonna self indulgently prattle on about my very first Legacy of SWTOR OCs

I first started playing the game in earnest in mid 2015 after I graduated High School. I had been feeling very depressed and unsure of my path going forward. Thus I reverted back on things that made me happy as a child and preteen. Most prominently, Star Wars. I had known about the existance of SWTOR for years even prior to it’s release as I followed it’s development because of it’s connection to KOTOR. I was very skeptical of it being an Online game at the time, and when I first tried it in 2012, I wasn’t impressed. In 2015 though, I dared to give it another shot and I’m glad I did. It spawned perhaps some of my favourite moments of the last 5 years, introduced me to some amazing friends, and even this year allowed me to make new friends here on tumblr dot hell 

So cookbook recipe anecdote out of the way, let’s discuss the OCs. My very first Legacy was called The Furcifer Legacy. Furcifer meaning “Rogue” in Latin, I don’t speak Latin, I’m just a try-hard. Being F2P at the time, I only had two characters for most of 2015, and they were these two:

Reyal Bradack

Reyal came first. He was a Gunslinger Smuggler and admittedly a somewhat self insert. His name came from a “What is your star wars name” meme (you know the ones that are like “The first two letters of your surname + first three of your forename”) He was a child slave after his father ran out on his mom shortly after Rey’s birth, his mom sold him to the Hutts on Nal Hutta to repay a drugs debt. As a teen he managed to escape on to a Smuggling freighter. The smuggler captain took pity on the teen and took him as an adoptive son. The Smugglers were members of The Black Sun and Rey was introduced to a life of crime. He met his future Husband who was one of the Crew Members, a Chiss named Nalin. His life got thrown into disarray in 10 ATC when The Hero of Tython and Coruscant Security Force raided The Black Sun headquarters and began killing and making arrests. His husband and adopted Mother died from an explosion, he and the other member of the crew, Zoee, were taken into custody and given a choice, serve the Republic or life imprisonment. Both chose the former and were made to help with the ground work for the liberation of Balmorra. It was here on Balmorra that Rey would make a shocking discovery...

Atzethel “Zeth” Rist 

My second ever character, and for a long time, my main character. A Jedi Shadow Consular, he has gone through many iterations (which I may share someday). Zeth is the younger half-brother to Reyal. Both share the same father. At some point, the “Furcifer” patriarch found himself on Alderaan, in the employment of The Rist family. Despite dying under mysterious circumstances, he conceived a child with Lady Tharra Rist. Zeth was born with an unusually volatile connection to The Force, he was taken only days after The Treaty of Coruscant to be trained on board a Jedi Praxeum ship. The boy excelled due to his strange connect, however it caused him to be irrationally dangerous and as such, was ostracized by his peers and a topic of contention for his masters. He was taken under the wing of a Jedi Master, Nede Vaa, a togruta who sought to teach him patience and direct his urges. She was successful and trained him in the arts of The Jedi Shadows, hunting down and destroying The Sith from within. He and his Master were assigned to help lay the foundations for the Liberation of Balmorra. He discovered his brother Reyal on Balmorra, and after their mission was completed, requested to join his brother, though he kept his relationship to Reyal a secret. Begrudgingly accepting his request, Zeth worked with Reyal in uncovering several other Imperial threats and securing alliances with The Republic and certain criminal syndicates. During the Battle of Corellia, Zeth met another member of his family that surprised even Reyal to see.

Drrunn’al’inrokini “Nalin Bradack”

The first extra character I made upon subscribing, was a Chiss bounty hunter. He became a member of the smuggling crew, and Rey’s husband. While it was suspected that he was killed on Coruscant, he narrowly escaped with his life. He wandered the Underworld for a couple years after his ‘death’ believing that Rey and the rest of the crew had died. He eventually came across a mercenary, Loyabe Lealta, who claimed to have met a Reyal Bradack on Balmorra. The pair began searching for Reyal, eventually tracking him to Corellia. What should have been a joyous reunion was cut short when Reyal was hit with a poison dart by Loyabe intended for Zeth. Loyabe revealed her true self as an Imperial spy that had tried to hunt down the brothers for their involvement in the liberation of Balmorra. Before they could get another info out of her, Loyabe died from a posion capsule encased in her teeth. After racing to save Rey’s life, the family decided to return to Alderaan to rest and meet Tharra Rist, Rey’s step mother. The intent to reunite the family once and for all. But the peace wasn’t to be found.

Rhia Kriari 

A Dark Jedi, was waiting for them on Alderaan. She revealed herself to Zeth during a party at the Rist estate for the homecoming of Lord Atzethel Rist. She revealed to him that Loyabe was only one of a number of Imperial spies and assassins that were sent after people like them. Rhia revealed that she and him were born with the same midichlorian anomaly and that another of the children like them, was a Darth by the name of Attroxus who sought to convert or kill the others. She explained that the midichlorian anomaly was the result of a Sith experiment on infusing non-force sensitives with force imbued DNA in the hopes of creating Sith Soldiers. The experiment was discovered by The Dark Council and was shut down, however some of the test subjects managed to escape, including her mother and Zeth and Rey’s father. The experiment did not succeed however, as the altered DNA became unstable, mutating within it’s hosts and killing them violently with explosive bursts of force energy. Exactly the type of mysterious circumstances that Zeth’s father had died under. She convinced Zeth to help her find the other children before Attroxus could. Reyal, Zoee and Nalin agreed to help as well. The five found the other two children, Blanna Gira and Jaysen Karn. During their search, she and Zeth became closer and inevitably began an affair.

Jaysen Karn 

A plucky and optimistic Jedi Knight Ace, he was the first child to be tracked down. Found on Corellia as the last skirmishes of the battle raged. Zeth found him engaged with a Sith Lord named Lord Neystaa. Having been found by this Sith Pureblood assassin and offered to join Darth Attroxus or die. Jaysen, Zeth and Rhia were able to drive Neystaa away. Concerned by what he had heard, Jaysen requested permission to aid the Jedi Shadow Zeth in his mission to uncover the truth behind this new cult. Now with back up from another Jedi Knight, the search became slightly easier as it allowed them to quickly reach their next destination, Alpheridies.

Blanna Gira 

A Miraluka from Alpheridies, is another of the children from the experiment. Zeth and Rhia found her on Alpheridies where see lived and served among The Luka Sene, a group of cultural teachers and guides, acting as a seer and healer. The Sene’s devotees obey only the light side of the force. These teachings helped Blanna to keep her underlying darker urges at bay, though she wouldn’t confess to it, she struggled with this greatly. As she was not a fighter and had taken an oath of pacifism, she had no experience with weaponry and combat, thus Zeth began to train her in lightsaber combat, enough to defend herself if needs be. Though hesitant to go, she had received a vision of Attroxus and knew the danger he presented. She also received a vision of Zeth’s master, Nede Vaa in danger on The Fourth Moon of Yavin. Concerned, Gira informed Zeth, and the group headed for Yavin 4, right into a trap.

Lord Neystaa 

Darth Attroxus’s personal assassin, more machine than flesh. She was one of a pair of twins. She and her brother, Greveron were stationed on Balmorra at the end of the cold war. Zeth had killed Greveron during a battle to disable the planet’s early warning systems. The Brothers had teamed up to take Neystaa out of the fight as well with Zeth pushing her into an adjacent hallway, while Reyal tossed a grenade at her. Badly injured and barely holding on to life, Neystaa was recovered and outfitted with cybernetic replacements for her lost limbs and organs. She was made to be the perfect killing machine. Attroxus offered her a chance at revenge for herself and her brother and she jumped at the chance. After an unsuccessful duel on Corellia, Neystaa set a trap for Zeth’s Master, Nede Vaa, on Yavin 4. The Force User group arrived in time to see Neystaa slay Master Vaa, sending Zeth into a fit of rage. Uncoordinated and less adept in some cases (such as Blanna), Neystaa was able to hold her own. She succeeded in destroying Zeth’s double-bladed lightsaber and toss aside Jaysen, Blanna and Rhia. Seeing Rhia get injured was the final straw for Zeth who managed to take one of Neystaa’s twin sabers and over powered her with heavy crushing blows. Zeth was victorious in defeating her but rather than show mercy, he violently killed her instead. The group used Neystaa’s ship to track the co-ordinates of Attroxus’s ship. Though Zeth was disgusted with himself, they still had a mission to do.

Darth Attroxus

Born a slave of The Empire, Attroxus demonstrated a strong affinity for the Force at a young age. He was taken to the Academy on Korriban at age 7 where he faced extraordinary hard ship due to his race. In spite of the torment, Attroxus was able to rise to become one of the most promising students. He knew within himself that he was more powerful that the other acolytes and considered him better than them. He rationalized that they picked upon his race because it was the only way to put him down. If he was human, he thought, he would have been on the fast track to a lord. Upon completing his final trial, Attroxus returned to the Academy to discover that he had been passed over for the opportunity to become an apprentice. Enraged, he murdered the overseer and his fellow acolyte. The Lord whom wished to take the student, found Attroxus amusing and took him as an apprentice in place of the murdered on. Eventually, Attroxus began to eclipse his master in power and killed him, at which point, he assumed the title of Lord of The Sith for himself. Attroxus became interested in his power. He knew he was more powerful than the average Sith, and began delving into his parentage. He came across information about the experiments and became obsessed with them. However, power comes with a price. From giving into the Dark Side of The Force for so long, his mutated DNA became stronger and threatened to consume his body just as the original experiment subjects. It instilled in him a goal, to find the others like him. To perfect the experiment process, and rise to his rightful place as Emperor. His plans would not come to fruition. The Furcifer strike team was able to land on his Ship and while the force users set out to find Attroxus, Reyal, Nalin and Zoee began to disable the ship and plant explosives at key areas. All The Force Users engaged in a duel however Attroxus quickly realized that he was outmatched and began to feed his power-hungry cells for more power. It gave him the advantage however, in trying, he lost control of his power as his body began to deteriorate rapidly. The Furcifers managed to escape as the bridge exploded in a blast of energy, killing Attroxus.

[imagineswelcome]

Beauty and the Beast

Joker (Heath Ledger) x reader

Events take place during the 2nd Nolan movie, The Dark Knight.

Prompt : You meet the Joker, he kidnappes and you end up to take part of almost all his crimes. How did you come to that?

You’re Y/N L/N, a famous physicist in Gotham. You work for the Wayne Compagny on sustainable energy sources, you have a great job, a great flat in Gotham and basically a great life !

You wake up as every morning but you realise you already have receive a letter. You are invited to a party at the Wayne penthouse, yes, the billionaire burn his house to crisp, who does that ? Anyway. The party is a found raising for Harvey Dent. The name seams to ring a bell but you’re not sure.  But the party is this evening, you reaaaally need to do some shopping, fortunatly it’s Saturday and you’re not working. You go to your favorite shop and you find a black dress which seems to be made for you. It perfectly suits you and you look incredible. You already know that it will match perfectly your Louboutin heels you offered yourself for Christmas. You will be stunning even if you are not a billionnaire as probably all of the other guests.

The time has come. Party time. You don’t know what you expected but definitely not that : you’re « talking » with an annoying billionnaire who isn’t even listening to you and believe that the earth might be flat. As a physicist you have loads of strong points to prove him wrong but he is a rich white man who don’t care about what you have in your head since he likes what he sees. An helicopter sound saves you from this terrible conversation. It seems that Brune Wayne is really a drama queen, you believed he is brilliant but never thought he would be the kind to be late and showing off with three top-models. After a very little speech on Harvey Dent, the party start again, this time you rush to the barman to enjoy a well-deserved drink. This man was such a pain. You were enjoying your free drinks when a gunshot was heard. The terrorist from the TV has come out of the elevator and is asking for Harvey Dent. You don’t know why but you wanted to see the man, the Joker, with your own eyes so you come closer to the scene. Harvey Dent girlfriend has the courage to come to the Joker and to tell him that Dent isn’t here. But he starts to come closer to her with a knife. You don’t know why, maybe you has a sorority instinct, but you call out for the Joker, he turns back to you and Rachel kicks him. And everything went so fast. Batman was here and starts to fight the Joker men but the Joker grabs Rachel and throws her out of the window. Batman jumps to safe her. But if Batman just jumps, who stays to protect you ? Once the Batman jumped, the Joker comes directly for you. You are paralized, all the courage you had just vanished. He grabs your arm and says « You come with me, beautiful. » You try to fight but there is no way for you to escape the Joker and his men push you in the elevator and in their van. You’re being kidnapped, of course you left your phone on the bar and you have no way to call for help. After a long enough moment, the van stops. Someone opens the back door and you hear : « Hi. I’m the Joker. Nice to meet you Y/N. Very nice indeed. I’m following your work at Wayne Enterprises and I can say that I’m, uhm, very impressed to have you here with me. » You were expecting everything but that. The Joker is a fan of physic ? Moreover a fan of you ? You must have look surprised because he adds «  Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you. I just want to talk to you. Let’s have dinner. » And you find yourself answering ackwardly « uhm, ok. »

And you actually spend a really good evening, the Joker is a gentleman, he likes quantum physic and to make jokes (as his name made you guess). But it seems to be too good to be true. He is a killer and as charming as he wants to be with you, he kidnapped you. He told you you needed to stay at his place for a few days, that he can’t bring you back just now. People will think you’re part of the plan but he doesn’t want you to get involved in all the chaos. He shows you an incredibly cosy bedroom, there were several outfits in the closet. Not that bad for a kidnapping. You spend three days in this mansion/warehouse : it was a warehouse, at least you believed since you never saw the outside but the inside was a mansion with staircase and rooms. It was simple decoration but the place in itself was curious in the good way. You could discover it even if there were guards at every entrance to prevent you from any kind of escape. Every evening you had dinner with the Joker, he never talked to you about his evil plans, never screamed at you. He was nice but it was wrong.

The fourth day, a bodyguard came to you and told you to go on a truck but like a big big truck, the ones that usually have huge cargots inside. The Joker was at the back with an arsenal and something that looked like a bazooka. You were on the passenger sit. The Joker told you that he had something to do before bringing you home. You understand that it is definitely something dangerous and illegal probably involving murder and explosion. Great. You’re in the same car as a murdering psychopath. You don’t seem to have been kidnapped. You hope that the GCPD will not think that you are an accomplice or something like that.

But it was only the beginning of your problems, the Joker just shot an officer so he can drive through a closed road and he is now targetting a GCPD van with the bazooka. Oh lord. Is it the Batman outside ? Damn. An helicopter just fell on the ground. This is chaos. Batman is charging the truck you’re in now. Did he miss ? Oh god, he did n…

You blacked out for a little and wake up, you seem to have been thrown through the windscreen. Every muscles and bones of your body hurt. Several pieces of glass have cut you. You try to stand up and you see the Batman on the ground, lying like a dead man on his back with the Joker on him. Suddently you feel someone grabbing your arms on your back. « You’re under arrest, you fucking cop killer ». He pushes you against the reversed truck and handcuff you. You’re incapable of saying something, everything hurts.

Once in the GCPD department, the not-so-kind officer take your prints and your belongings and threw you into an interrogation room. You try to explain several time that you really need to see a doctor, you are in so much pain but they aren’t listening to you. The female police officer in charge of your interrogation comes closer to you and press her finger on an open wound you have on you arm. « Now you talk. Tell me everything you know. » It hurts to much. Maybe the only way to make them call the doctor is to force them to make you see a doctor. Because they don’t care about what you have to say. The female officer is still close to you, since you’re sitting on a chair with only handcuff on you wrists, you rise up and block her neck with your handcuffs. « I. Want. A. Doctor. », you run out of the room with the officer as your hostage and head for a big place where there are a lot of people. They probably can get you a doctor. They are celebrating something or what ? Is it applause that you’re hearing ? You scream out of despair « I need to see a doctor ! » They all turn out to you and start reaching their guns. You repeat with a softer tone « I’m really injured, all of my body hurts, I really need to see a doctor, please. It was the only way for you to hear me. She wasn’t trying to help me, she hurted me even more. » As you were explaining the situation, you saw that the Joker was in the room too, behind bars. And his gaze was full of compassion and a bit of anger but it wasn’t because of you. It was because of the police-men. An officer with a mustache and glasses start to talk « It’s ok Miss, let her go, we will help you ». « I won’t let her go before I see the medic in this very room. I don’t believe you » was your answer. The officer order to bring the medic here. And you finally let the woman go. The medic bring you into a cell for more privacy and also because you were a suspect and you will probably not get out of the GCPD any time soon. The medic was actually pretty kind to you, he diagnosed a broken forearm, four broken ribs and several contusions all around your body but there may be more, he couldn’t tell exactly how broken you were without a radiography. He took care of your wounds and left you to sleep. He told you that you’ll go to the hospital tomorrow and that you should rest now. You almost instantly fell asleep.

You have been waken up by an explosion. You try to see something through the little window of your door but everything was dark. You sit on your bed, listening to everything, trying to understand what happened. A little after that, you heard footsteps and a key in the hole of your door. When the door opened, you realise that it is the Joker. You start with visible confusion « How… did you… ? » The Joker cut you « We don’t have much time. Come ». The Joker wasn’t alone, an other prisonner with handcuffs and several of this complices were there too.

The Joker let his men go with the prisonner and ask you how you were. You told him what the medic said. « You’re going to see my doctor » he said. With a stolen police car, you were now heading to where the Joker lived in town and see another doctor who, this time, could do some bandages for your broken arm.

The Joker actually lives in a mansion. Maybe he is a guy of simple taste but when he can, he choses comfort. He brings you food, clean clothes and show you a room where you can rest. You took a shower and inspect you body. You never have been this injured before. And you promess yourself that you will never be this injured expect if you chose to be in a dangerous situation. Noone will ever hurt you again. You’ll not let them. Even if they are the police. Even if they are supposed to do the good. What’s good ? Does this word still have a sense in this world ? The Joker is a bad guy but he was good to you, he respected you, was interrested in what you had to say, listened to you while the « good » policemen did not. The Joker may be a mad man but he could be very kind, and funny, and he sometimes makes sense. Deep sense. When he talks about the established order and all the hypocrisis of the world.

After all this thoughts, you decide to sleep and you sleeped for a whole day. Your body and your soul needed it. When you wake up, your first reflex is to turn on the TV to check the news. The Joker has blown up an hospital. But it was actually an empty hospital. Everyone has been evacuated before the explosion.

It was dark outside. You dressed up and went downstairs to find something to eat. You were starving. You were surprised to discover that you were alone in this house, no one was there to guard you, no one was here to stop you from getting outside. Incredible. You were free. Again ! And you made another promess to yourself, you’ll be free forever. When you arrived in the kitchen, you saw a note on the table. It was from the Joker :

« Dear Y/N,

I am sorry for all the trouble I caused you. I truly am. Tonight is the final act. We’ll probably never see each over again but I had a great time talking with. You are a truly amazing person. Never let anyone make you think you are not. You are capable of everything you want to accomplish.

Love.

J »

But. But. But you don’t want not to see him again. You realise that you actually care for him, that you want to know him, to talk to him. As a friend first but maybe you are ready for more.

You turn on the TV with the hope to find where the Joker is and to join him. And it worked. He is filmed fighting Batman. He’ll never win. You know it and you know he knows it. He must have an ace in the hole. You check on the internet where this tower is and it is very close from this house. You run  in the house to find where the arsenal is. There must be one. It has to. And you found it. There are all sort of guns and accessories. You check the infos again. The Joker is in the air upside down with one feet tied. You have to rescue him. Even if that means that you become a criminal. You want to do it therefore you have to. You’re looking for a huge safety net of something like that. The thing that is used in circus. He must have one. You are incredibly lucky because he actually does. You take it and walk as fast as you can to put it just under the Joker since this is pretty heavy. The SWAT is helping the hostages and arresting the accomplices. They don’t notice that you were installing a big net. You have also bring with you a kind of sniper. You never shot anything with a weapon like that but you have so notion of how to use a gun. You’re an american afterall and even with a broken arm you can use a weapon. After one missed shot, you manage to cut the wire which was holding the Joker. His fall seems to be eternal laugh. But the net does its job and you save him. You help him to get out. He seems surprised to see you. « Thank you Y/N. I am impressed. But for now take my hand and run.»

So you do and you both disappear in the darkness of Gotham small streets.

GIF not mine, credit to the owner.

[themuzzleofnemesis]

4–Memory of the Battlefield; Scene 4

The Muzzle of Nemesis, pages 158-168

I was blindfolded, so I didn’t know where I was currently walking to.

“—Here, get in.”

I heard the voice of the man who had captured me, and a door being opened.

I was brought in and made to sit somewhere.

And then the blindfold was finally taken off.

“…”

It was an inhospitable, narrow room.

In front of me was a square black desk, and a simple wooden chair.

I remembered seeing this scene before.

Yes—it was just like the interrogation room in the prison.

The man sat in the opposite chair and glowered at my face.

“…I can still scarcely believe it. That a girl like you killed my big brother.”

The man’s name—was Gammon Octo.

He was the one Shakuson…Or rather, Nyoze Octo, had sent a letter to.

His younger brother.

.

--I had left the apartment complex where I’d been living the day after I had killed Shakuson.

That was to flee from two different figures. One was the police, and the other…was Postman.

I needed to disappear before he came back to retrieve the gun.

I still hadn’t reached a conclusion on whether I would live or die, but at the very least I no longer wished to be involved with the organization.

There was no issue with my having betrayed them. Someone may come to kill me—but I wouldn’t die anyhow.

The war was still ongoing, so it was a bit tricky to leave the country. Only, wanting to get at least a little ways away from Elphegort where I was born and raised, I decided to head south in the opposite direction.

Eventually I arrived at a town named Retasan. According to what I heard from an innkeeper, the town took its name from a country that had existed in the ancient era.

It was a dismal town. Apparently they were constantly being subjected to the threat of these monsters called “dead soldiers”, and so there were burned corpses piled high on every street corner.

A town of corpses—I thought at the very least that it would be suitable as the location of my demise. Even so, I passed three days at an inn there, still unable to make up my mind.

And then, the morning of the fourth day. Several men suddenly came to my room and surrounded me.

I was struck by one of the men before I even had a chance to struggle. …Immediately afterward he put some drugged cloth over my mouth and nose, and I lost consciousness.

.

--The very man who had struck me was Gammon sitting before me now. I had heard that fact while in the car transporting me here.

“You look like him, after all. Your brother.”

I first gave my honest impression.

“That’s because we’re siblings. Still…It’s not to the degree we used to be.”

“What do you mean?”

“My brother had some plastic surgery done on his face after he escaped prison. Before that we looked so alike that people would think we were twins.”

“I see…So then—What do you intend to do with me?”

If he planned to kill me, he would have done so at the inn.

Maybe he’d tried to do so while I was unconscious. –But I didn’t appear to have any wounds that would suggest such on my body.

“…Frankly I can’t decide. Though it is true that I wanted to try talking to you first.”

“If that’s all, I wish you’d politely given me an invitation instead.”

“You, an assassin? Give me a break.”

Silence descended on us for a moment.

Gammon was first to open his mouth.

“—What business did you have in the town of Retasan? Was there a new target there?”

“…I didn’t really have a reason. I’ve quit being an assassin.”

“And you…expect me to believe you? So soon after killing my brother—”

“I don’t care whether you believe me or not.”

“…Well, whatever. Then let me ask a different question. What do you think—of the organization you were a part of?”

“In two words: ‘They’re shit’. The only thing I can tell you is that they were the lowest of the low.”

“Then why did you work for them?”

“They would have killed me otherwise.”

Gammon looked surprised at that. “You? That’s hard to imagine. The head of the organization is your father, isn’t he?”

“…I had no idea that Gallerian Marlon was my father. …Is that really true, in the first place? You’re sure you’re not mistaken--?”

“Just to check, what is your mother’s name?”

“…Kayo. Kayo Sudou.”

“Then there’s no mistake. Kayo and Gallerian once had an illicit affair. After she learned she was pregnant with you she left him—This is what’s written in the secret documents we stole from the Dark Star Bureau.”

“And you’re sure those documents are legitimate?”

“Bruno Zero was the one who wrote them. I can’t imagine he’d go to the trouble of writing false documents to keep in his own desk.”

“Bruno…”

Then that meant he’d known all of it.

That was why he had saved me from prison—Looking at it that way, it lent credence to the claim.

But if that was the case, why had he hired me on as an assassin?

…Had he been ordered to by Gallerian?

Given Bruno’s loyalty to “Master”, I couldn’t think of anything else.

“…You look confused, Nemesis. It’s true then…You—didn’t know.” Gammon blew out a soft sigh. “If you really do hate the organization, then—I have a proposition for you.”

“No way.”

“Hold on…At least hear me out first.”

“I’m not becoming one of your allies.”

“We’re just talking....Though, well, I suppose you’re not wrong.”

Upon seeing Gammon’s flummoxed expression, I was reminded just a little bit of Shakuson.

Anytime I said anything selfish like that, he would…make that face.

“It’s the Tasan Party, right? The people you work for—"

“Yes, a political party of Elphegort. Currently…our objectives are to stop the war that’s occurring all over the world, and to take down the man responsible for it, Dark Star Bureau director Gallerian Marlon.”

“If they’re a political party, that makes you a politician.”

“Well, I suppose it does.”

“I didn’t go to school. I can’t follow along with difficult conversations about things like politics. I can’t imagine I would do well as a politician myself.”

“You don’t need to think of it as being that hard. Look at the people around you—I’ve heard you were once in a delinquent group in Aceid.”

“So you’ve looked up that much. Then—you know that I sank the S.S. Titanis, don’t you? I’m an ex-convict.”

“Strictly speaking you were never actually charged with that crime. Your death was faked before judgment was passed on you.”

“It’s not just that. I killed many people as an assassin after that.”

Yes…Shakuson too, with my own hands.

“You haven’t been arrested for any of that either. You aren’t even on the list of suspects the police have put up.”

“—Wait a second. If that’s true how did you guys know I was an assassin?”

“…Nyoze. My brother realized that you were the culprit behind this string of cases. And yet he never made a move to arrest you.”

“That was…because he was going to use me—”

“Do you really think that’s all it was?”

“…”

I didn’t know.

Back then—when I had pointed the gun at him, Shakuson had never showed any sign of resistance.

As though he had accepted being killed by me--

"—Let’s get back on topic. Did you never sense anything was wrong when you were in Aceid?”

“…I’d always thought that it wasn’t fair. That Elphe people were pushed into the slums, hardly able to get any work—”

“Right now we are working to change this unequal world of ours every day. I think—doing the right thing has nothing to do with whether or not you’ve had an education.”

“…”

“And sometimes there are situations when you need violence to carry out justice. If you say politics are difficult for you, then we can help you study in that field. There’s nothing for you to be ashamed of. I myself got into the Tasan Party by banking on my career as a soldier.”

…Hm, so that’s how it was.

In the end, this man—simply intended to make me kill people again.

“The answer is still no. Didn’t I tell you I quit being an assassin?”

“There’s a difference between killing to fulfill someone’s wishes and killing to protect someone. –Why did you sink the S.S. Titanis?”

“That was…to protect my friends—”

“Then, even if the whole world would blame you for that—I applaud such an action.”

“Are you…really a politician? What about the fact that this all happened in the first place because Zeus was trying to steal gold?”

“Midas Touch was no saint. Neither was Bindi Freezis, the man who manipulated all of you.”

Bindi Freezis…The man who had gone by the name of “Kandi” to us—I had only learned his true name after being put in my prison cell.

“Are you saying it was alright to kill him because he was evil?”

“I think so. …Perhaps I’m mistaken on my morality of the world society we live in. But the world’s never really going to get better just by yelling about love and peace.”

“…Well, I suppose that’s true.”

“What I think we ought to prioritize more than anything else—is justice! As long as we have that, our world can become a utopia…And I’m prepared for there to be sacrifices to achieve that.”

As I watched Gammon give his passionate speech, I felt a little bit like smiling.

It wasn’t that I was mocking him. It was pleasant to see a man who held no doubts about his own beliefs—I was envious.

“—I take back what I said earlier.”

“…? What about?”

“You and him are nothing alike. Shakuson would have never said something like that.”

“My brother was…not a worldly man. That was probably why he chose to be killed by you.”

“…”

“He must have thought that if you didn’t, you’d be erased by that organization.”

“…You mean…”

To save me—Shakuson had chosen to die.

“It’s true that when I learned you were Gallerian’s daughter, I suggested to Nyoze that he ought to use that to his advantage.”

“Yes…That’s what you wrote in your letter.”

“So you saw that…Then do you know of the reply that Nyoze wrote back to me?”

“I…don’t.”

“My brother rejected my suggestion. –And then he said this: ‘Even if Nemesis does kill me, please don’t hold any ill will towards her. No matter what you have to do, I want you to help her’.”

I quickly forced myself not to start crying.

Shakuson truly had—loved me, after all.

Even just knowing that was enough.

“Nemesis. If you do reject my offer—what will you do now?”

“…”

“I won’t let you die. That was Nyoze’s last wish.”

“But—”

“Don’t run away. Fight! Certainly, you made mistakes in your past. But—dying isn’t the way to atone for that.”

“Then…what are you saying I should do!?”

“Get angry! Your friends in Zeus, Nyoze…Do it for all the people you’ve lost! Why did they have to die? All of it—it’s because of that brute Gallerian, who turned even his own daughter into an assassin!”

Angry…huh.

I had never even met Gallerian. Even being told to get “angry” at him—

Frankly, nothing came up.

But…Gammon and Mr. Ziz both.

They told me to live.

To not run away.

“…Alright, Gammon. I’ll join you, for now.”

“I see. Whether I welcome that or not—it all depends on what you do next.”

Perhaps I should be grateful to him for saying even just that much to the girl who had killed his brother.

“There’s a lot you’ll need to explain to me. First regarding Gallerian. I only know what I’ve seen in the news on what kind of person he is.”

“Very well. I’ll become your tutor.”

“Though I hate studying.”

“That’s fine. I’ll make it simple, so even a child could understand—but before that, you must be hungry.”

“Yeah. A little.”

“First let’s get a bite to eat. The food they have at the Tasan Party headquarters mess hall is top notch!”

Gammon stood and opened the door.

<<prev------directory------next>>

[doof-doofblog]

"Will You Marry Me?"

Tuesday 8th December 2020

Hello again folks! I'm back with another blog post following this week's drama. I wanted to do a blog yesterday but with the news of Dame Barbara Windsor's passing, it felt only right that I wrote a blog about her instead. However, I'm now back to review on this weeks episodes, there is so much to talk about.

There seemed to be a lot happening, the police are still searching high and low for Ian's attacker. There are about 4 or 5 main things I want to mention. Firstly, Tina - After not being able to sleep the night before, her day only gets worse by getting arrested for suspicion of attempted murder. As she's being arrested, she calls out her innocence to Shirley and Kathy. As being put into the police car, Kathy sees from across the Square and runs over to question why she did it, as she thought they were friends, why would Tina attempt to ruin their friendship by attacking her son?! While she's at the police station giving her statement, she informs them that she and Ian did have an altercation, but it was at the Beale household and not the pub. But the interesting thing she then happens to mention, that possibly the only person who would be able to give her alibi would be a pizza boy. She explains that when she returned to Gray's house, she was in the house alone, but a pizza boy called but he was delivering to the wrong house. If Tina or the police would be able to find this unknown pizza boy, that would potentially put a stop to her being a suspect. Personally, I don't think Tina was Ian's attacker, as a viewer I completely believe her story, it sounds reasonable, I believe she was no where near the Vic, yes she and Ian did have a row and a bit of punch up at the house, but Ian was alive and breathing when she left the household. I feel I can simply scratch Tina off the suspect list, it wasn't her.

The second thing I'd like to mention is Stuart. On the Square, he watches as Tina is arrested, but you can clearly see the fear in his eyes. I do feel he's hiding something, but what? What was he burning at the allotment? Blood-stained clothing maybe?! We know since Ian's attack, Rainie has gone missing. Stuart is completely worried sick about his wife. Where on Earth could she have gone? Stuart almost desperately seeking help, approaches Callum and informs him that he's going out of his mind as he can't get in touch with his wife. I feel for Stuart and Rainie, right now. I really do. Do I think that he or Rainie attacked Ian? Honestly, I do think Rainie is a person of interest - as the way she must be feeling, emotionally and mentally - initially, blaming Ian for ruining their chances of having a baby. She's basically grieving for the child that she may never have, and grief makes people do things without thinking. What if that grief turned to anger and she felt she just had to lash out to that one person who lost her the one thing she's always longed for. It's most definitely a motive. We saw her walking speedily through the Square on the night of the attack, what if she had left the Vic and was briskly walking to make her escape - what if she's gone on the run. She has gone missing and it would make sense, I think. Until we know where Rainie disappeared to, I feel she could be the one who attacked Ian.

Thirdly, after Stuart approaches Callum for asking help of finding his wife, interestingly he drops the bomb that Ben could've been the who attacked Ian. Of course, Callum is quick to defend his boyfriend. But I guess you could say that Stuart is doing the same thing for Rainie, they both want their partners to be the innocent party. Later on in the episode, it's clear that what Stuart said to Callum is playing on his mind. Ben is at home when Callum comes home and instantly he wants to know why Ben has been avoiding him over the past 2 days. Since Ian's attack, Callum informs Ben that he hasn't responded to any of his calls or texts and he keeps leaving the room when Callum walks in. Ben claims that he's had a lot on his mind as his brother has just been attacked, which is understandable. But deep down, Callum can't help but wonder whether his boyfriend had something to do with it, he asks him out straight. But Ben denies his involvement in the attack, he acknowledges that he was raging with his brother after finding out that he was the one who grassed him up to the police, he admits he wanted to hurt his brother, but never acted upon it. But however we did see Ben leaving the pub on the night in question, so the big question is - What was he doing there? Maybe having a confrontation with Ian? I do think that Ben could also be a suspect, until we know for sure what he was doing in the pub. I think he could also be the one who attacked Ian. Interestingly, before Callum even speaks to Stuart or Ben, his first visit is to question the Panesar family. He appears to be asking Suki of her movements of the night of Ian's attack. She informs Callum that she was at Ruby's club the whole night, but when she left and walked past the pub, she reveals she saw nothing and no one. However, was she at the pub whilst Kheerat went to the pub and help his Mum plan an attack on Ian? Who knows? Suki and Kheerat are both looking pretty shifty, even if he states that he was at a business meeting. I'm unsure about these two, what about you guys? Do you have an opinion on Suki and Kheerat?!

Fourth, the return of Kat and Kush. After a couple of days on the run, they return to the Square to grab a few belongings and finally get their money they're owed from Phil. Whilst Kat goes off to visit Phil, Kush looks after the children. Phil is alone in the house, it looks as if he's getting himself ready to go court regarding his divorce with Sharon. He's stunned to see Kat walk into his house, regardless of there being police dotted about the Square. Kat demands that enough is enough and he pays them their share of the money, Phil finally sees to reason and hands over a wad of cash from his safe, it's enough to get them away from the Square and start a new life. Meanwhile, back at the Slater household, Kush is looking after the children, after catching them unwrapping Arthur's birthday presents, he decides to give Tommy a very important job. Unfortunately we're not too sure what that job may be? Look after everybody maybe? As later on in the episode, we see Kush is hovering around the police station, as discreetly as possible. From a distance he sees Jack and calls him over, Jack is surprised to see him. Kush asks if he voluntarily gives himself up to the police, could there be a chance that he'll be released on bail? His only concern is being able to see his son, Arthur for his birthday and for Christmas. Jack urges Kush to do the right thing, and if he gives himself up, they might be able to sort something out for him. I'm surprised that Kush actually chose to go to the police, this may ruin Kat's plan of starting a new life together with the children in France. She's going to be devastated when she finds out what Kush has done! I do hope that he will be let off on bail and will be able to see Arthur.

Finally, during the police search, Bobby and Peter are at home. Bobby seems to be reliving the moment he found the blood on the living room floor, he feels as if he's slowly going back to the night Lucy passed away. He explains to his brother that he can't bare going back to the dark place he once was. Peter tries his absolute best to console his young brother, but suddenly the police turn up at the household, informing them and Kathy that they want to search the house, as due to Tina's statement, there could be traces of blood at the house. The brothers look surprised, however with Bobby scrubbing the blood he found, could he done for tampering with evidence? Or because he cleaned the blood, could the police look to him and question why he was so frantic to get rid of his Father's blood? Whilst all this is happening at home, Ian is lying in his hospital bed with Sharon sat by his side. He's convinced himself that due to the pain he's feeling, this will be the end for him, he claims he has nothing now his sons hate him. Sharon tries her absolute best to console her friend and inform him that what he's saying is absolute nonsense. She tells him that the boys do love him and would be lost without their Dad, but Ian can't seem to believe the words she's saying. As she leaves him to get some rest, Ash approaches Ian and he wants to know exactly what's happening to him, he wants to know whether he'll pull through or not - it's then that Ash informs him that CT scan showed that he has a bleed on the brain, which will be the cause of his head pains. However, they do need to do some more tests to see whether there's any lasting damage. This seems to really distraught Ian, he knows that it's not looking good. When Sharon finally returns, he informs her that he wants to make sure that she's looked after and provided for, he speaks about their friendship they've had through-out the years and how they've always been there for each other. Sharon states that her friend is talking stupid but he seems completely and utterly convinced that this will be the end for him. He then informs her that deep down, he has always loved her, regardless of her not feeling the same way about him. He states that he's going to give her the full ownership of the Vic and - here's the big bombshell, he wants to make sure that she and Albie are looked after and provided for, with that he asks the big question and asks for her hand in marriage!

I am a little surprised, but I can kind of understand why he'd ask her that. BUT can I just mention, is he allowed to marry Sharon? Did he ever properly divorce Jane? I simply cannot remember, can you guys?! Even though Jane hasn't been in the soap for a couple of years now, but did she and Ian ever have a divorce? Maybe it was done off-screen or something?! Something is telling me that Sharon is just as surprised as us. I'm really intrigued to find out what happens next! There appears to be so many twists and turns in this current storyline, some people are acting shifty and yet some are claiming their innocence. What do you guys think? Do you have a hunch as to who Ian's attacker could be? I'd love to hear your thoughts! Please feel free to leave me a comment or a message, leaving your thoughts and opinions, I'll always write back! Thanks again everyone! xXx

[ensemblehq]

ACT I, SCENE V:  STATEMENT FROM BIRNAM POLICE

last week, detectives interviewed fifteen theatre students at the alderidge school of arts, all of whom worked closely with orson hobbs. these interviews revealed several previously unknown facts which are informing our investigation into mr. hobbs murder going forward.

first, we can confirm that prior to mr. hobbs’ house being vandalised, he hosted an unofficial after party for an unknown number of fourth year theatre students. the identity of students who attended the party is currently unknown, but we suspect it was the majority of the year. 

second, mr. hobbs was a difficult, controversial individual who was known to have antagonistic relationships with several of his students. we also have cause to believe that mr. hobbs may have regularly consumed illegal drugs. during our interviews, we discovered that mr. hobbs also had inappropriate relationships with his students, which included at least one romantic affair with a fourth year theatre student, whom we are not naming for privacy reasons.

third, we continue to be unable to verify whether the individual who vandalized mr. hobbs’ house is the same individual, or individuals, who murdered him.

finally, the department has identified five people of interest through the interviews, all of whom were mentioned by their peers. these individuals are mathias knight, josephine flores, madeline le, chandler rosen and hudson williams. we currently have no evidence that these individuals were involved in mr. hobbs’ death, but believe they may have additional information that is of value.

summary of information:

hi all! anything stated below is currently known by the police, but is not known in character. we’ve included this short summary to give the group an idea of what went down in the interviews and to facilitate plotting ooc and ic! we’re reaching a point in the overall plot at which things can start to go a variety of different ways, so if this gives you any larger ideas for your character-- whether you want them to become more of a suspect, come forward with new information, anything really-- please come talk to us about it and hopefully we can incorporate. 

if you think something should be added below or have any questions, please let us know!

HELEN accidentally confirmed that an after party to the official after party was held at orson’s house the night he was murdered.

SAFFI, HARRY, JULIAN, JASON, MATHIAS and JONAH all alluded to orson’s challenging nature/personality and his status as a polarising figure among alderidge students.

GRACE mentioned that orson was known to cross boundaries with his students. NATE and JOSIE confirmed that orson was having an affair with chandler.

ZAHRA stated that josie and mathias were two of orson’s favourites, and NATE referred to them as orson’s “lapdogs.”

NATE suggested that orson regularly consumed drugs and that this is well known by alderidge and its students.

CHANDLER suggested that mathias was involved with orson’s murder, stating that he had anger problems and could have been mad about his casting in last semester’s play. ZAHRA suggested that mathias and josie may have been responsible for vandalising orson’s house, suggesting they were both displeased with their parts in last semester’s play. ZAHRA also noted that their whereabouts after the party (the first one) were unknown. NATE suggested that josie and mathias might have additional information about orson’s murder and also noted that he did not see them at the party either. MATHIAS confirmed that he and josie left the party early, but did not explain further.

ZAHRA informed the police that orson planned to expel mads from the program and suggested that she felt better off with him gone. MADS stated that on the night of orson’s death, she turned in at 12am, but HARRY contradicted this by revealing that the two of them saw each other around 4am.   

whilst noting that several students had cause to vandalise orson’s house, JASON singled out hudson, stating that he was mad at orson for pairing the two together.

[sanoiro]

Lucifer 5x06 - BluBallz - Spoilers & Speculation

Warning! There is always the possibility that certain scenes might have been mixed up under their non-respective episodes.

Written By: Jen Graham Imada Directed By: Richard Speight Jr.

Jen Graham Imada has written/co-written the episodes:

3x07 - Off The Record

3x15 - High School Poppycock

3x25 - Boo Normal

4x07 - Devil Is as Devil Does

Cast: Tom Ellis as Lucifer, Lauren German as Chloe, DB Woodside as Amenadiel, Lesley-Ann Brandt as Maze, Kevin Alejandro as Dan, Scarlett Estevez as Trixie, Rachael Harris as Linda Martin and Aimee Garcia as Ella.

Season 4 Recurring Characters: None Officially Announced Guest Cast:

Andrew Steven Hernandez...Dax

Alexandra Hoover...Belinda Roberts

Alveraz Ricardez...Raul Blanco

Behind The Scenes Videos:

Locations

LUX

Marina Del Ray (Different scenes day & night)

WB Jungle Backlot & Neighbourhood Area

Precinct

Linda’s House

Penthouse

Imada, as you can tell, knows how to reach us at that point where we believe that everything is up to be resolved and for Deckerstar to begin only to be halted mid-way. What you shouldn’t forget is that in 3x25 - Boo Normal this writer introduced us to Azrael and who knows it might be time for Ray Ray to make an appearance again although that’s an extremely wild speculation so treat it perhaps as a wishful thought than anything else. 

Okay so, the sixth episode of Season 5 is called Bluballz and many may have hinted yet another unsuccessful Deckerstar ‘moment’ yet it is clearly also connected to the case so it is possible to carry a dual meaning. 

First, some had mentioned that it might be a drug and in an episode where a rave happens, it’s true that it would have been a plausible explanation. The other explanation is the crime scene blue led balls. Unfortunately if swallowed they can be toxic but a bts says something about shooting so at the moment no matter of how the title is connected to the episode let’s keep in mind that A) Lucifer & Chloe were not lucky in 5x05 and B) that it’s directly related to the death of this episode’s victim.

As we have several locations to explore I believe for 5x06we need to start from the case and then how the story is progressing through that murder case.

We do know 4 things about the case. 

First, we have the rave at night where the murder happens in the wee hours. 

Second, almost before the sun is up Ella, Lucifer and Chloe are on the scene asking questions. 

^As you can see there is some stiffness in both of their bodies and as we know that Ellis and Lauren can act that in a very good way I would assume that they are keeping their distance or they are perplexed. 

^if you see the video she does not meet and hold his gaze. 

Third, for some reason, LUX is used for a rave party either as a sting operation or most probably because Lucifer decided to step in and help. The other possibility is that the rave at the end happens after the case has been closed but as they were shooting for days and almost 16h per day I would say it most probably be placed in the middle of the episode.

Fourth, the arrest happens back to the Marina Del Ray where everything started so the story of that case comes in a full circle, yet we do not really care about the case itself but how it relates to our main story.

We have to note that in the bts we have Chloe and Lucifer seem a bit distant during their questioning on the murder scene. Chloe is uncomfortable as is Lucifer and Lucifer is almost too afraid to approach her in my opinion while she does not really hold his gaze. Whatever happened in 5x05 didn’t work on the contrary added a slight tension in Deckerstar. Nothing major in my opinion but it is enough for Chloe to need her space and her friends.

^Prencinct scenes in between! 

Now we do know that the questioning also led Chloe and Lucifer (Lucifer had his Vette there) at a house at the WB lot yet what is more interesting for me is that they were close to the Jungle Backlot. It’s where the show “The Cabin” was shot in 4x02 but the vegetation is so good that it can be used for other projects as well. For example, if you go to the tour they will always mention that it was used for Jurassic Park :)

The reason why I’m so interested in the Jungle is because in a bts I saw some props that made me wonder if they were just there because they didn’t have any other space to put them or they mixed shots from the Jungle backlot and the stages. As the camera is turned to that golden object I would be wary and add it in my “They are still searching” speculation. For what you may ask but all I can tell you is that everything is connected. Unfortunately, their quest may turn an unexpected factor to the mix. If my speculation is correct then the “Our Mojo” also involves Charlie.

Now DB has been very excited with these episodes as I have as well mainly because it seems that Amenadiel is back in the very core of the series as he was in S1 while Charlie is growing and with crawling and teething other things come up as well. Perhaps wings, or powers. Perhaps… both.

^Linda’s house shooting Kevin is probably the one on the left side. 

The scene though showed that it involved Amenadiel, Lucifer, Dan, Linda and Maze. Maze, as you may have noticed as a character, has remained quite elusive in the bts and the role it plays in this season but Charlie’s existence might be the key there or perhaps the 5x04 is. We shall see!

Speaking of Charlie we had him in a wonderful lion top and there have been some scenes at Linda’s house. Now while the girls are busy at LUX which we will talk about in a bit, the boys or more specifically Amenadiel and Dan have some scenes together. Perhaps the reason for the bracelet was not Lucifer’s idea but Amenadiel’s and as such you should be prepared on Dan knowing early on that something is off if not the whole truth.

Now one of the photos that make me wonder is the bts with their director and writer where Kevin has a weird doll on how left shoulder. Somehow it seems that time is running out and that makes sense as like with every other midseason finale or season finale the 3rd episode from the end gives us the route the next will follow. It sets the foundations if you like. Think of 1x11, 2x11, 2x16 or 3x08 & 3x22… The same happens in 4x08. There is always a chain of events that lead to the end and 5x06 will be no different.

We do know we have some Penthouse scenes due to Rafferty and Graham but the content of these is a bit unclear. During a tour the couch was a bit roughed up with the cushions displaced and all that but we simply have no idea why or what will happen there. Also the book we saw in 5x03 during the Clarkson interview it’s still there on the coffee table so I would once again place my money on that one.

^ I bet you didn't know that we have a new closet as it seems or even a bathroom as this may be either a towel hunger and to the left the shower curtain or an outfit hanger. I would bet on the bathroom set as for a hanger it seems a bit tall. ;) So... a shower scene is coming our way? Who knows... 

Edit: I was thinking about this and I now believe it’s an outfit valet it’s just that the wall is drilled on is also a hidden door to the penthouse set... 

Moving on we get to what caught our eye on this episode the Ladies Night Out. It’s the third time we see them getting together and this time they are determined to have fun. The theme seems to be dress as crazy as you can something that is supported by Maze’s choice who perhaps consider Ella a lunatic so she decides to dress like her… I do wonder if they they just went and took everything from Ella’s closet to be honest… Although the net stocking might have been too much for Ella so no idea.

Yet what would drive Chloe and the girls to go out? I expect that Linda needs a break from motherhood even for one night while Maze explores another side of her. As many may suspect I suppose she is growing a soul there somewhere so keep an eye on her. Now Ella was always quirky if you remember the wigs in S3 so do not see anything wrong there but why Chloe?

Episode 5x05 must have left Chloe with a lot to think about herself. Whether she finds out about her miracle status or not she seems to be in her own path of self awareness and as we have seen the only time she takes rush decisions of that kind is because of Lucifer. So whatever happened in 5x05 as been interrupted but I do expect that by the end of 5x06 she will have reached a decision once again but the timing will not be perfect in 5x07 as more problems arise.

I should also mention that the setting of this episode does suggest that whatever Amenadiel, Lucifer and Kevin are up to is probably not known by Chloe and possibly by the rest of the leads aside perhaps Maze and even that is a big if. The reason of perhaps excluding Maze is because of a tangible connection that may aid or disrupt their plans yet that’s once again a speculation, yes based on actual spoilers but still a speculation on how an act will affect the rest of that plot. It is also why I connect in this episode Amenadiel with the Jungle set as well as with that set prop.

And finishing 5x06 it is funny as by the end of it a new set of problems will have begun and that includes of course a new threat. One supernatural in nature and the other as mundane as Earth killers come.

^Last but not least up to 5x06 the Hell set was still standing so they have plans for it... For which episode we simply do not know but always keep it as a Joker card and you never know in which round it will drop... 

^I do love Rafferty!