#but its her first big crisis (that shes conscious for). and the second there’s a bit of relief all the emotions hit at once

[nurseydexunsolved]

have a note for fun lil moments as i watch 9-1-1. just got to season 3

[pooma-education]

Qualities Of Effective Teachers

Johnson P. J, The UN Educationist

Principal - GD Goenka Public School, Srinagar

In the making of a good school, qualities of an effective teacher, an efficiently organized classroom, the best teaching-learning process, and so forth are major concerns for all schools. When we talk about an effective or successful school, the role of three stakeholders needs to be considered, and how they function in the teaching-learning process.

First of all, teachers are the great catalysts in the learning process. Are all qualified teachers skilled? If skilled teachers do not have the basic required teaching training, what can be done? How can those a minor ratio of such unmotivated teachers create an effective teaching and learning environment in a school? Once a person has decided to be a teacher, the first requirement is that such a person has the real aptitude for teaching or, in other terms, facilitating learning in students. They must acquire the skills to play a passive role in the active learning pursuits of students. They must train students to make the right inquiries of learning and inculcate in them the culture of leading by self. With the passive role of teachers in the learning process, a teacher has to facilitate and ensure the minimum level of learning for all. A group of students will go beyond, and the sky is the limit for such learners facilitated within the time frame.

When an effective teacher evolves in the classroom, he or she has the biggest challenge of handling the same textbook and the curriculum for the manifold types of students at hand. The biggest skill for such a teacher is understanding the differentiated teaching techniques. Such genuine teachers understand the learning styles of their children. They know how they are intellectually, socially, emotionally, and physically different. This awareness is a complex but divine duty of the teacher. Right training and motivation are needed for teachers to become effective.

Teaching is not a simple task like reading the textbook aloud. Or if a person realizes that, after acquiring qualifications in engineering or medicine, teaching in a school is his or her passion. The motivation for this passion could be the comfort of less time needed per day in teaching work, fewer working days, or the feeling that teaching is easy work. If a person could not make a good career decision and wasted many years studying for pursuing a career unrelated to teaching, how will such a person mold the individuals for tomorrow? Why did such a person not try to be a teacher in engineering or in medicine? Quality is the result of conscious efforts. The quality of a school requires strenuous efforts by its stakeholders. Motivation is a big word in this pursuit.

The second stakeholder of a school is the learner or student who was called "vidhyarthi." The first condition in a student to justify that title is his humility and desire for seeking knowledge. This is history. Today, from the age of three years, a child has to start schooling as per the National Education Policy (NEP). But a child is exposed to strong addictive audio-visual tools right from a few months of birth. Children are born into technology, born through technology, and in some cases because of technology. For such children, should the same old classroom setup give any motivation? Will the same age-old classroom setup and the style of teaching be acceptable for the modern learner? Information is available at the fingertips of modern students. It is a fact that the majority of students come to school out of the fear of coercion. They are not allowed to stay home. An action research in this matter will be worth an idea. Do the students like the same age-old style of disciplining? Will the children like to maintain themselves the same way as the old generation wanted?

The society has a crisis of the huge rift created by technology between the new generation and their immediate previous generation. Today's children are the first generation in the exploding technology growth. They are the product of a technological revolution. This breakthrough technology was not even a result of gradual evolution. The frightening fact is that the modern generation itself is struggling to cope with the exponential growth of the technologies. Very often, the big capturing attraction it offers steals even young minds towards the adult ways. The young learners need independence in everything except for physical sustenance and financial support. The awareness of rights is at the forefront, but knowledge of duties needs to be cultivated.

It is time to reflect upon the reasons for the general dislike for learning in the vast majority of students. First of all, we teachers have to evolve with the new technology breakthrough. Only when the teachers adapt themselves to the new needs of students according to the present times can we, as teachers, motivate the new learners. Teachers need to evolve. We must not forget that there are certain unchangeable areas in human life. The need for good food, the role of parents, the need for language, the priority of self-effort, the role of teachers, the importance of motivation for performance, etc., are some of these. But our big challenge is to keep our young learners motivated. Hence the qualities of an effective teacher, good discipline, and a good classroom need to be redefined. Society is in a transition stage, but the perpetual values stay forever.

By looks, 'he' was not handsome, but even the youth loved him so dearly; by style, he was not an eloquent speaker, but even school children keenly listened to him; he was not a trained teacher, but even scholars waited for his sessions; he was not a saint, but people adored him. When he died in the middle of a session he was teaching, the whole nation cried. And he was the one and only APJ Abdul Kalam. Our eyes must be open, and we must realize that the value of genuine teachers will never be lost. A true nation will always salute the genuine teachers.

The third stakeholder about whom I would like to discuss in making a good school is the parents. Should teaching be left in the hands of parents? Many parents discharge this duty through tuition teachers. Why should students be left to the mercy of pressures from all quarters? Many parents have confusion about their role in the academic growth of their children. Since parents pay for education in modern schools, education is thought of as a product they buy by paying. The parent-teacher relationship is toppled as a customer and seller relationship in the eyes of many parents. This attitude percolates into the hearts of their children too. This is the reason why, at least in a few classrooms, students go to the extent of looking down upon teachers.

Let education be traditional, modern, or ancient, the importance of addressing the needs of the affective domain of students is the primary function of families and parents. Physical care, loving support, and moral correction are the primary duties of parents. If a healthy support exists between the parents and the teachers, no student can neglect the needs that come forth from their affective domain.

A good school is where a non-threatening, loving environment is present before the intellectual and psychomotor developments are addressed. An unexpected kindness and love will be deeply engraved in individuals in comparison to the intellectual advancements and psychomotor growth they achieved through their parents and teachers. Making a good school is a collective effort.

[sneakerdoodle]

"(Not) Alone", Chapter 2

Rated: K

Get some uhhhhhh friend times, winter outfits, background gays and existential crisis! Alternative summary:

"Miriam is like you're gonna' rummage through the contents of my heart? okay. what's in your drawers"

- @buttercup-bug <3 big thanks to them for their support and consultation too!!!!

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General warnings: states potentially resembling a panic attack; moderately graphic metaphors, including mentions of drowning; familial tension

- This time I see where I'm flying, at least, - Miriam mutters, seemingly to herself.

Kiwi, fiddling with the strap of the bag hanging behind them, thinks back to Miriam's first and latest visit to Chismest. The flight there is hard to remember through the blur of pain they were in, but they can vaguely recall their friend complaining about the smog through coughing fits, as well as the jerking movements of the broom as she would aggressively rub her watering eyes.

Now, the skies above Chismest are clear, and the frosted trees below are sparkling in the sunlight. It is quieter, too, without the incessant thud of machines that would vibrate through the atmosphere in a low vague hum.

- Still too hecking cold, - Miriam grumbles and clenches her fists harder around the broom to get the blood flowing.

Bard readily leans closer in, sharing whatever body heat they can. Their cheek smooshes against Miriam's back, and the next words come out slightly muffled.

- You must be glad we're packed! Want me to get your cape?

Miriam shakes her head emphatically.

- Nope, thanks, no bag-rummaging in the air.

Kiwi nods slowly, looking past their dangling feet, down below, to the town's edge.

Miriam brings the broom to a bit of a rushed stop, and it hovers in the air, gently swaying up and down. Bard straightens, pulling away.

- Well, we're here. Where to? - Miriam's head is turned as she examines Bard's face, questioningly and with a hint of suspicion.

- Down! - he chirps nonchalantly. Miriam rolls her eyes.

- Thanks. Great tip. It's too early to go to the Observatory, so down where?

Bard contemplates, sinking a bit into their shoulders, and watches the town below. It's changed, a lot. The streets are lighter, and the people are moving through them at a much more of a leisurely pace. There seems to be no shame about being out and about during daytime, no one is in a hurry to get from one place to another. From somewhere below, they can even hear what sounds like faint, soft music.

Bard smiles timidly, entertaining the thought of actually having a good time in their hometown.

- Let's go on a tour!

They land at the outskirts, and Miriam shivers instinctively as the snow crunches under her foot. Bard immediately dives into the bag Saphy has lovingly packed for the two and pulls out a warm woven cape and a wide magenta scarf, presenting them to Miriam with a shining smile. She takes them from their hands, begrudgingly, as if having a body capable of getting cold is something to be self-conscious about. As soon as the cape rests on her shoulders, however, her expression softens into one of comfort and quiet content.

Bard follows her example and wraps a similar long shawl around their own shoulders. It's soothing, both with its warmth and weight, and they close their eyes for a second, sitting with the calm. A long hand-knitted striped scarf follows, and Kiwi feels the most equipped for the cold they can possibly be.

The bag is still heavy on their shoulder. They reach in and pull out a warm and pointy winter hat – and can almost hear Miriam's defenses coming right up. She looks at them with a determined frown, fight-ready.

- No.

- Aw, come on, Miriam! - they try not to smile too widely. - You should stay warm!!

Miriam stares at them in ferocious defiance, unblinking, for a good ten seconds. With a groan, she finally caves in, snatches the hat out of their hands and puts it on. Her face goes red with embarrassment, and she promptly looks away and pulls the scarf over her mouth.

Pulled on in a hurry, the hat sits on Miriam's head slightly sideways, with ruffled hair sticking out from under it and getting in the girl's face. She puts one messy lock away in a jerky motion, tucking it under an ear flap before crossing her arms and looking down at her feet. Bard watches in unconcealed endeared amusement.

- How come you don't get one, - Miriam blurts out, in a tone that implies that she does not expect much of an answer. With an annoyed sigh, she grabs Bard by the sleeve and heads towards the town.

- Not a word to Saphy.

Walking through the streets of Chismest is... strange, almost overwhelming. The town is unexpectedly loud, with the voices of its residents bouncing from one corner to another, sounding from the windows that used to barely ever open. The distant sounds of music Bard heard from up on the broom are closer now, creating an uncharacteristically melodic ambiance. And the weirdest of all, there is so much variety.

Beth's diner is inviting people in to try Katya's new pastry recipe. The Gift House is no more, replaced by a general store. Tanya stands in front of it, fixing a sign that reads: “Next island fruit shipment: TUESDAY, 12 PM”. She notices the two guests and waves at them before going back inside.

Johann is standing in front of the ex-factory building, frowning at the timetable of various workshops, community meetings and the Astronomy Board sessions, apparently figuring out a scheduling issue with Elmer: the lesson on identifying local plants seems to be encroaching onto the public presentation of his newest potential enterprise.

Miriam lingers under the very lantern she would spend her time by back when she and Bard visited Chismest together for the first time. She looks at the large building that used to house the endless deafening machines. It is still slightly shocking in how it looms over the rest of Chismest.

- ...Weird, - Miriam says after a while. Bard hums noncommittally. Miriam looks at them, impatient for a more engaged response. - Very weird, right? I'd only been there for a week, and it still freaks me out to be around this... thing. How are they all just, getting on with it???

Bard is quiet for a moment, unsure whether anything they have to say is worth voicing, but Miriam's gaze is insistent, so they give it a try.

- They're taking it back?.. I think... it's always been their town, and now they can sort of... take it back for themselves?

Put into words, the thought surprises them. They reflect on it for a moment. Is that the reason they still aren't keen on coming back, even after hearing all about the wonderful transformations Chismest has gone through? Maybe it's never been their town, they way it has been for all its other victims, all these other people that were hurt by it but never left. Has it.. always been a question of belonging? Not one of finding a better life?..

She is pulled back out of her thoughts by Miriam's skeptical hum. The girl shifts her weight from foot to foot uncomfortably a couple of times before asking, unsure:

- Do you... wanna go in?..

Kiwi hurriedly shakes her head, and Miriam lets out a sigh of relief.

- Yeah. Me neither.

They continue on their way, approaching the Clocktower Pub, which appears to be the source of music tinting the town views a subtle but cheerful color. In front of the pub, a group of people is gathered in front of a samovar in a seemingly passionate discussion. Among them, Bard recognizes Elara. Like everyone else around her, she is holding a steaming mug.

Boris splashes some of his tea as he swings his arm to make a point.

- Zere is enough coal, no? Nothing iz broken, so why fix?

Elara wrinkles her nose and shakes her head, still calm, but more ardent than Bard remembers her. Before she gets to make her defense, Miles chimes in with a tired groan.

- Yeah, well, the Lights are right there every year, so why the hell not.

- But ze expenses...

- Why not think of it as an investment... - Elara starts, before noticing the two visitors approaching the group. She blinks in surprise behind her glasses. - Oh! You're here already.

Kiwi smiles awkwardly while Miriam waves her hand, then demonstratively hugs her shoulders. The next moment, a mug of tea lands in her palms, expeditiously passed from hands to hands from where the samovar is sitting on a large wooden table. Miriam looks down at it in surprise, startled into her special sort of quietness, processing the simple and natural act of kindness.

- We arrived early! - Bard replies, smiling gratefully at Miles who hands them another mug. - Just walking around for now!

Elara nods slowly.

- This place has changed a lot, hasn't it?

Bard pulls their lips into a smile. For a moment their gaze lingers on Elara, thoughtful. It's so different, seeing her as a part of the community, freely sharing her practical solutions, engaging openly rather than conducting interventions from the margins. She fits right in.

- Well, Winston will be waiting for you in the evening. I hope to stop by as well.

She turns to Miriam, who's been quietly sipping her tea and looking at the group from over her mug.

- You're going to need to have a night's rest before heading back, aren't you? You are welcome to stay at the Observatory, if you would like.

Miriam chokes on the tea and coughs, her cheeks growing pink.

- Oh, - she croaks out, - no, I'm good. Uh. Thanks.

Elara nods.

- Well, let us know. Now, if you excuse me...

She turns back to the group, where Miles' eye rolls are starting to get dangerously expressive.

Miram finishes her tea in a bit of a hurry, circles around the gathering to place the mug on the table and slips away, seeming slightly overwhelmed by the hospitable treatment. Bard follows, waving goodbye to Elara and the rest.

They catch up to Miriam and look around absentmindedly, eyes gliding over the fronts of multi-storey buildings. Ahead, they catch a smudge of orange and red – and slow down. Miriam slows her pace, too, and follows his eyes to where flowers growing in front of the window of his childhood home are nodding their colorful heads to the faint music.

Miriam stops with a quiet sigh.

- Are you sure about it all? - she asks, with the emphasis that is only natural, considering she has already had to ask this question at least thrice.

Bard tears their eyes away from the flowers and turns to her. They take a few seconds, then nod.

- Yeah 🎶, - they sing, low and quiet, and fidget with their hands for a second before continuing: - Just... for a bit there, can you...

- ...Yeah. - Miriam rocks back on her heels for a moment, gearing herself up, then steps towards Kiwi and takes them by the hand. Her expression is nervous and awkward, but she musters a small reassuring squeeze. Bard feels slightly less alone. - Come on.

Bard's hand sits firmly in Miriam's as they sigh before knocking on the door; Miriam does not let go once they are already inside, either, waved in by Kiwi's Mom.

- Sit down, now! - Mom coos in her customary enthusiasm. - I will brew you some tea. Are you and your friend hungry, muffin? - before Kiwi can mumble anything vague in response, she continues: - I have the lunch all ready! Too bad your father is on one of his walks. - Mom shakes her head with that signature vocal laugh. - What a restless man he is!

Bard's sigh of relief is so resounding that for a moment, they are scared Mom will notice. Luckily, she seems too busy rummaging through the cabinets. They look at Miriam, reassured, and loosen their fingers. Miriam's hold persists, however. She gives them a serious, meaningful look, an “I'm here, okay? So don't be stupid” that she can't quite express with her words. Only then, she lets go, but does not break eye contact. Bard's gaze drops down to their feet as they take a second to internalize the sentiment. When they look back up, their smile is timid and grateful.

- Are you hungry? - they ask in a dramatic whisper. Miriam shrugs, then shakes her head. - Thanks, - Kiwi says to Mom, voice slightly strained, - I think we'll just... hang around!

- Nonsense! - she titters in response, turning around with a tray already holding a tea set. - At least have some tea with your old momma!

Bard gives Miriam an apologetic look. She seems downright agonized at the thought of forcing more hot beverages down her throat so soon.

The tea break is the appropriate amount of awkward. Mom asks Miriam about the life in Delphi and the everyday routines of an average witch household, and Miriam grumbles her replies while doing her best drinking impression. The ruse is up once Mom goes to pour everyone another round and discovers Miriam's cup about as full as it was at the start. After having a proper laugh about “that curious friend of yours, muffin”, she finally dismisses the two of them, saying it is time for her to take care of some chores.

Bard plops down on their bed and sighs. They look at Miriam with a sorry little smile. She is standing in the door, looking around the room with a perplexed expression.

- I've never been here before, - she notes, mistrustfully, somehow.

- Oh! I guess you haven't! - Bard looks around the bare walls and minimal furniture. It's not much.

Miriam seems to arrive at the same conclusion.

- Doesn't seem like you, - she says, poking a bouquet of dried flowers.

- There used to be more, - Kiwi mumbles absentmindedly, resting their chin on their hand. - Miriam!! - they gasp with a jump as their friend throws one of the drawers of the bedside table open. Miram stumbles backwards, startled.

- Yeesh, sorry. I thought you weren't one for personal boundaries??

Bard sits with this fair observation for a moment, processing their own hypocrisy.

- W... well--

- I'm not pushing or anything, - Miriam grumbles, - just... surprised you're familiar with the concept.

Bard shrugs and hums an awkward inconclusive sound. They look over to the open drawer and shuffle closer to it to see what is inside. Miriam pointedly looks at the wall in a demonstration of her respect for Kiwi's personal space.

At the bottom of the drawer, there is a handful of crayons and an old notebook. They pick it up and leaf through it, an array of colorful drawings flickering in a quick succession. All the bright fantasies of their childhood are momentarily revived before them. A small smile tugs at the corners of Bard's mouth.

They linger on one page and giggle, then open the notebook wide and hold it in front of them, demonstrating. Miriam looks over and arches her brow.

- What am I looking at exactly?

- Me!, - Bard helpfully supplies. - As a witch 🎶.

And that is exactly what the drawing depicts. A younger version of them, with a different hairstyle, in a pose resembling an overexcited starfish, clad in dramatic dark robes and a pointy hat with a big glowing star on it.

Miriam stares for a good few seconds.

-....why.

- Because witches are cool!! - Kiwi exclaims, without a shred of sarcasm. The skeptic look on Miriam's face deepens. She squints at the drawing.

- Is... - she snorts, - ...is your hair pink?

Bard cracks up again, and Miriam shortly follows, the two dissolving into a duet of giggles.

Kiwi pats the space next to them, and his friend joins, looking over his shoulder at the series of doodles detailing Witch-Bard's magical adventures.

Hours pass effortlessly, in joint reminiscing, daydreaming and doodling.

***

- ...and once you're all set and sure of where it's pointing relatively to, uh, the Anchor, you use the finder to, well, find things!

Winston pauses his slightly nervous chirping and looks at his audience comprised of Miriam, struck into overwhelmed silence, and Bard, who is otherwise occupied.

- Did... did you get any of that? - Winston inquires with the same frantic smile.

Noticing the break in the background noise of thorough astronomical instructions, Bard finally looks up from giving Berry all of the most loving pets in the world – to see Miriam looking at them in quiet despair. Reading the look of blissful unawareness on her friend's face, she sighs.

- Can't you, like... write it all down or something??

Winston nods hurriedly, already on his way to the desk. From the looks of it, he has pretty much moved into the observatory full time, and happily. Bard watches him stick his hands into the pockets of the labcoat and make it flap against his legs, for about the tenth time in the past hour. They wonder why an astronomer would need a labcoat. Do they have to get one too?

Miriam walks over to Kiwi and watches glumly as they scratch Berry behind her ear.

- Aren't you excited? - Bard asks, noting the moody energy. Miriam hums in uncertainty.

- Just... - she gives another annoyed sigh and kicks the floor with the pointy toe of her boot. - Nothing. - She crosses her arms and averts her eyes, then finally shares in a low, muffled voice: - ...hate feeling stupid.

Bard looks up, blinking in surprise.

- You're not!! You know so many awesome things, Miriam!

She stands there silently for a few seconds, before crouching next to them. Bard readily scooches over.

Miriam slowly, nervously extends her hand towards Berry. Their four-legged friend sniffs the tips of Miriam's fingers before lovingly sticking her nose into the girl's palm and wagging her tail. Miriam exhales in relief and gives Berry a few slow, focused pets.

- Thanks. - There is another pause as she struggles with the words for a bit. - We're... gonna try together, yeah?

Bard flashes an enthusiastic smile.

- Yeah! 🎶

- ...Okay, - Miriam does not look away from the dog, who is leaning into the touch with half-lidded eyes. - Then… don't make me figure it all out on my own, - she continues in a more casual grumble. - Don't hang around here for too long.

Bard nods slowly, turning away from Miriam, back to where Berry has dissolved into a euphoric puddle.

- I... won't.

Winston returns with a small stack of papers scribbled over with a frantic hand and awkwardly shoves them in Miriam's vague direction. She just barely manages to get back up on her feet and not lose balance as the paper tumbles into her arms. Winston hurriedly withdraws, slapping his arms along his body, and laughs nervously as Miriam disgruntledly tries to keep the pages from raining all over the floor.

- Uhm, - Winston fiddles with his hands and avoids Bard's eyes when she looks up, questioning. - Is it... just you?.. I mean, joining the project...

- There are many!! - Kiwi rests their chin in their hand, thinking back to Delphi and recounting everyone who seemed excited about the arrival of the telescope. - Ryan and Mitzi, so Dani as well, Lena, Fredrick, Whit...

- Shockingly, - Miriam mutters from where she is still fussing with the instructions, trying to fit them into the overpacked bag. Bard shoots her a scandalized look, a trained non-verbal substitute for “Miriam, be nice!!”.

Winston marks each mentioned name with a nod, a wide thin-lipped smile on his face.

- I... don't know who any of these people are, - he concludes, finally, before turning away and marching back over to his desk. There seems to be a glimmer of genuine joy in his embarrassment, however. Bard thinks back to Elara's letter, inviting them to become a part of the mapping initiative.

“I would be proud to take credit for the project, were it actually mine. Winston is, undoubtedly, the heart of the operation. I told him his conception of it was outstanding - he seemed equally hopeful and horrified. I think he'd take great pleasure in that: making this sort of connection with so many new people. Finding... cohorts, if you will”.

Once the last final glare of sunshine dissipates completely, Winston invites his guests over to the observation deck, the telescope in tow. Kiwi and Miriam fumble with the stand under his fretful watch, but manage to fix the apparatus in place without breaking anything. Winston points out the Anchor star, once again, and fixes the telescope on it.

- Try the finder first, then--

- Yeah, yeah, - Miriam hurries to interrupt, and Bard catches the familiar notes of embarrassment in her voice. They gently bump their shoulder against hers in silent support. Miriam draws a steadying breath. - ...I think we got it. Uh, thanks.

She looks over at Bard, quietly tilting her head towards the telescope in invitation. They light up and step towards it, holding their breath. The most beautiful colors bloom in their mind, inspired by all the magical stellar landscapes pictured on the walls of the observatory. What will be the first shade of the whole rest of the Universe that they will see?

Bard puts their eye straight to the eyepiece (Winston whimpers somewhere out of view, forcibly choking the word ''finder'' back). They squint, trying to make anything out in the blur.

- Well?? - Miriam asks, antsy.

- Iiiii don't see anything! - Bard replies, hoping their disappointment is not too apparent in how hollow their usual casual tone comes out.

From the sounds of it, Winston is on the verge of unraveling as he is trying desperately to let the two figure things out on their own.

Miriam groans.

- Stupid overcomplicated glass tubes... Let me... - she steps towards the telescope cautiously, like it is a wild animal, and stares at it for a while. Then reaches for one of the lenses lined up at the end and moves it out of the way with an unsteady hand, looking deeply unsure and skeptical.

- Try now?..

Bard puts their eye back to the glass, trying really hard to not get their hopes up.

- Miriam, - they utter under their breath, - come look.

Through the lens of the telescope, they are seeing another world. It is distant, silent, seemingly unmoving. And yet, in the swirling pattern of stardust, they sense a spiraling dance, sweeping their soul away with it.

Pure, awe-struck exhilaration rises in their chest, all but bringing them to tears in a sudden crescendo – when suddenly, they feel their heart drop, endlessly, like it is hurtling through the dark suffocation of space surrounding the twirling stars.

The arms of the spiral galaxy, its overpowering gravity, remind them of the dark pull of the black hole at the end of time. And no matter how hard they try not to think about it, they know exactly what lies on the other side.

Bard all but jumps away from the telescope and stumbles backwards, instinctively throwing their hands up in front of them in a protective gesture. The familiar despair laps at her heart, and suddenly she feels so hopeless she could cry.

- Kiwi??

Bard blinks a couple of times and turns to Miriam, who is giving them the most concerned look they have ever gotten from her. Winston is hovering behind her, not even trying to conceal his panic.

Miriam steps towards them gingerly.

- Are you okay??

Kiwi draws a breath and tries to straighten himself up.

- I, uh... - they look at their feet, struggling to find any words that would sound at all plausible. But this time, they can hardly even convince themself to brush the overwhelming feeling off as unimportant, as their trained impulse commands.

Miriam takes another step and reaches for them, then freezes. She throws a quick self-conscious glance at Winston, one breath away from shriveling up. Winston seems to take it as a hint.

- Umm, I'll!!.. - he fumbles with his hands for a second before sharply turning around and marching over to the exit without another word, to descend back into the observatory.

Miriam remains frozen in place, stubbornly inspecting the patch of grate floor beneath her feet, until Winston's steps fade away; then throws her head up, looking at Kiwi with a concerned frown.

- What was that??

Bard looks down at the floor, uncertain, as if the needed words were scattered all around it in a chaotic pattern.

Miriam opens her mouth, seemingly preparing to speak again, but no words follow. She stops trying to catch Kiwi's eyes and lowers her own, crossing her arms.

Bard looks up to see her face overshadowed by a disheartened, lonely, distant expression, and feels a tug at their heart. Perhaps... Perhaps it's worth trying to talk about.

They lower themself to the floor, back leaning against the dome, and sigh shakily.

- Do you... do you ever get... scared?..

Miriam looks up, still lost, but apprehensively open.

- Like... in general?

Kiwi looks at their hands resting on top of the knees for a moment, trying to figure out what they are attempting to share.

- Of... the world, I think. Or... the universe... - they cross their arms and hold their shoulders. - How it's... really big.

Miriam's posture loosens and softens. She sits down next to Kiwi, hugging her knees, and looks at them expectantly.

Bard goes on.

- It's alright if there are a lot of people, - they're not sure this makes sense, but it's hard to talk about as it is, so they just let themself continue, - 'cause then together, you are something big enough? But if it's just you..., - they feel their mouth go dry and their body tense up with adrenaline, the vivid, unraveling sensations of the recent nights creeping up from the back of their mind. They swallow, hard, and grip their shoulders.

Miriam is silent for a good while.

- ...It's not, though, is it? Just you?..

Kiwi looks over to see her staring in front of herself with a concentrated, contemplative frown. Her words are coming out labored and strained, like she is unhappy with having to actually say them out loud.

Miriam's head sinks into her shoulders, just slightly, and her fists clench, before she speaks again, sounding almost fearful to assume:

- We're figuring it out together?..

Bard feels a crack at their heart, stinging and painful, breaking them away from the deep cold despair that's been filling it with steady certainty. They never meant to imply that Miriam's friendship is anything other than cherished, and comforting in every possible way.

- We are! - their smile comes out pensive, but somehow rejuvenating still, just like the fresh crack in their chest. He leans against Miriam's shoulder. - It's just.. - they take a second, trying to nail down the core of the overwhelming feeling that's been haunting them for the last couple of weeks, - what if we weren't?..

It's surprisingly hard to articulate what exactly is making Kiwi freeze with terror every night. This weird incessant pull, somewhere out of life, as if some part of them is trailing behind, threatening to bring them down with it, to drown them. Like some immeasurable weight their limbs are getting too numb to carry, slowing them down, making their legs give off, while everything else effortlessly speeds forward. They cannot find any context or explanation for it – not one they are ready to face, anyway. All they have is this overwhelming, overpowering, incomprehensible fear. What if they get left behind?

Miriam sits with the idea, silently. Her expression is difficult to read, but for a moment, Kiwi seems to catch a glisten in her eyes, and feels immeasurably guilty. They don't get to express their concern, though, before Miriam speaks up again.

- I... do get scared, - she takes a deeper breath, - of... being alone. Again. But I'm not. - The last words come out almost stubborn, like Miriam is arguing with a naysayer. - Things are changing, right?.. It... doesn't have to be the same.

Kiwi holds that thought: “Doesn't have to be the same”. They try to take comfort in it. A distant, neglected part of their heart aches and squirms at it, like a disturbed wound.

Doesn't matter. This can change. Everything else is.

The two sit in silence for a while, shoulder to shoulder, each rocked by their own waves of chilling thoughts. But – Bard has to remind themself – not alone. They are not alone.

- The stars are really cool, - they say quietly, with a small, meek smile. Miriam looks at them, glum and questioning. - You should try the telescope!

- ...Nah, - their friend replies after a moment of contemplation. - Whatever. - She rocks back and forth a couple of times in uncertainty before carefully suggesting: - ...Wanna go back inside?

Bard nods slowly.

- Maybe... in a moment?

Miriam wordlessly settles back in. Kiwi closes their eyes and leans heavier into the touch, focusing fully on the warmth of their friend's arm against their own, holding onto that feeling with everything they have.

They bring the telescope inside with them, already dismantled, and pack it into layers upon layers of protective wrapping with Winston's help. It is then hoisted up on Miriam's broom as she floats a couple of feet above ground, testing out if it would be possible to carry the instrument on her own.

Miriam slowly lowers the telescope to the ground and hops off.

- Should be fine?? - she says nervously, which does not at all reassure the sweaty and frantic novice astronomer. Winston gives her a shaky smile, nonetheless.

- Great! - he croaks out and rushes to change the subject. - Um!! If you're not in a hurry, Peter is coming over soon?? I thought it... might be good... - he trails off, looking at his guests in a silent plea to interpret the rest of the sentence on their own.

Bard and Miriam exchange glances. Bard certainly is not itching to go back to their Mom's... parents', home, and his friend does not seem to, either. Kiwi looks back at Winston and nods excitedly.

- Sounds great!! 🎶

Peter shows up about half an hour later, bringing his balalaika and, quite unexpectedly, a fruit basket. As Kiwi tries to process the dissonance between his ever-melancholic demeanor and the colorful bow on the basket's handle, Peter seems to be processing the presence of anyone but Winston at their meeting place. It doesn't take him too long, though. He silently hands Winston the gift, then turns to greet the two ex-co-saboteurs.

He shares a mutually awkward but overall amicable handshake with Miriam, then moves on to Bard and startles them once again, by putting a hand on their shoulder and sighing meaningfully.

- It is good to not be the only person of musical nature around here, - he shares. - I'm sure you are familiar with the longing.

- Sure! - Kiwi chirps out with a smile, not even trying to parse this.

The four of them settle down at the center of the large domed room, right on the floor, and Berry excitedly joins them, curling up between Winston and Miriam. The group passes the fruit basket around and shares the news from the last couple of months.

- Chismest is a changed place, - Peter shares solemnly while pulling apart a peeled orange. - People are no longer weighed down by the chains of numbing, thankless labour. We are finding joy in communal connection and personal power, once again. The need for manufacturable happiness substitutes is no more.

- Cool! - Bard looks at the small fuzzy kiwi fruit in their palms and considers the implications of eating it. - Langtree is sort of haunted now!

Winston produces a vague high-pitched sound in reaction to that, like a choking questioning laugh.

- Well, there were ghosts there before, - Bard readily elaborates, - because they were worried about their families before the... – a cold wave of terror washes over their heart, once again, at the thought of the end of their old universe, and they gulp, as subtly as they can, -...the world almost ending. And they did return to the Spirit World, at the end, but we can contact them through the songs they've left behind! And some of them just visit on their own. Mary always follows Woody around, so I guess... it's Woody who is sort of haunted now?

The room is silent, for a bit. Miriam absentmindedly nods along to the familiar story while picking berries out of her hand, and Winston and Peter are processing the mound of new information. At last, Peter nods wistfully.

- The world is healing at large, - he pronounces, chewing on an orange slice. - People are finding more ways to forge unbreakable bonds with those they meet and those they've lost. It fills me with great hope. I had to express it in a song, - he throws a somber, mournful look around the room, - it is in B major.

Peter strikes the first chord on his balalaika and closes his eyes, swaying slowly back and forth. Kiwi feels the familiar fizzy excitement of a life performance bubble up in her chest – along with a slight prick of jealousy: he never did get around to learning any instrument.

Peter continues his playing, the sound climbing up and up, reaching for some beautiful, exhilarating future that now, for the first time in many long years, seems to be just around the corner. The energy is moving and contagious, the waving melody pushing Kiwi's heart closer and closer to this sensation of unbounded hopeful anticipation with every strike against the strings.

Peter starts harmonizing, his melancholic voice blending with the movement of the music in paradoxical, enchanting ways. Winston joins in, his voice high and nervous, but bustling with genuine restless joy. For a while, it is just the two of them, singing their hopes and prayers for what tomorrow brings. They share a glance and smile at each other, a brief, shy moment.

Miriam, who's been nodding off for a while, is swaying softly to the rise and fall of the symphony with her eyes closed, hugging her knees. Then, there is a soft, unexpected sound as she quietly joins the harmonies, her voice gentle and raspy, as if she is simply muttering in her sleep. There is a small, hesitating smile on her face, lurking behind the hair falling in front of it, but visible enough from where Kiwi is sitting.

Miriam opens her eyes, leaving them half-lidded; her voice grows slightly louder. She looks over at Bard – and stops, the now so familiar confused, vaguely concerned frown setting in.

The sudden interruption on her part draws the attention of the other two, and now the whole room is looking at where Bard is sitting, back straight, extremely tense and hyper-aware of not having sung a single note.

There is a moment of deafening, unnerving silence as Peter stops playing.

Kiwi feels short of air.

They must look really pathetic, because the next moment, the music picks up again, mercifully, although without the same sort of blissful absorption. Winston and Peter return to singing between the two of them, as if conjuring an invisible screen for Miriam and Bard to communicate on the other side of. Miriam continues looking at Kiwi, concern growing deeper, grumpier.

Bard casts their eyes down and takes a shaky breath.

There is shuffling next to them, and suddenly they feel Miriam's hand on their own. They meet her questioning look once again, but she promptly averts her eyes, already feeling awkward. Instead, she squeezes their palm harder, passing on a bit of a reassurance.

They sit in silence for a while, one hand holding another firmly, until the song passes the bridge and returns to the final repetition of the chorus. Bard looks up at Miriam, and she looks at them. They find silent agreement in each other's eyes, and just as the first note of the chorus is about to break, they draw a synchronized breath and join in.

Bard's voice is quiet and unsure, and so is Miriam's, and there is comfort in that. It feels like mutual acknowledgment of something Kiwi isn't quite ready to put into words. And it's different from the high-spirited call of the song, but it belongs. And with every note shared in a low-key, tentative voice between the two, Bard feels a bit more secure.

The melody draws the two of them in once again, gradually and insistently, and at the end of the chorus, their voices sound firmer, brighter, conceiving of the same reassuring promise. The final note rings in the air, and the company shares a moment of sweet, comfortable, inspired silence. Then, without a word, Peter strikes the strings again.

The second time around, all four of them sing from start to end. Kiwi gives Miriam a grateful, timid smile. They settle into a comfortable volume, audible but private enough. There is still a slight tremor to it, and from time to time, it tumbles down, missing the high upbeat note. But Bard tries to find relief in the comfortable unity the group is sharing, and the others seem willing to accommodate. Through all the self-consciousness and hesitation, and the deep underlying fear of what it means to struggle with something so natural, Bard tries to focus on the swelling of the music, and lets it carry them wherever it wishes.

The door to the Observatory opens in the middle of the song, letting in the cold night air and Elara, looking tired but distinctly happy. She lingers at the entrance, taking the sound in, then slips past the group into her room, as quietly as she can - but leaves the door just slightly ajar.

Here and now, everything is alright.

***

It's like being dragged on a hook wedged deep into your heart. Your tired, aching heart, endlessly bleeding out into the nothingness around you.

The world is twirling in a symphony of color and sound, somewhere else, somewhere ahead, somewhere that exists. Somewhere with space to soar through in its triumphant spiraling dance.

It is a state you can never reach again. You are expulsed, empty, broken. The world chose light and movement. It chose to leave you far behind. The weight of you was never significant enough to make it reconsider its trajectory.

You were never significant enough to stay around for.

It's a cruel joke, to still sense it, constantly, hurled through space and time you are left on the outside of. The proverbial hook sits firmly in your beating flesh. Every turn of the unfathomable planet indulging in its endless dance out of sight, out of any conception to your lost, isolated mind, is another tug on your pulsing wound. Each of them reminds you of the life that goes on without you.

The elusive, torturous link drags you along, like an endless drawing punishment. You resent it for leading you on. Why keep any illusion of connection when you have already been severed, irredeemably, tossed aside like a rotten part threatening the whole? Why tether you to the existence that is no longer yours, if not to take sick pleasure in giving you false hope, and watch you agonize over every movement of the vital dance far beyond?

Life is malicious. It did not simply choose to leave you behind. It decided to never let you forget.

You're not giving it the satisfaction of making you hope. It will have to learn that you were never foolish enough to believe, even for a moment, that you are not alone.

***

Kiwi wakes up with a start and bolts upwards, hand at their chest, gripping the fabric of their pajamas. They are short of breath. Again.

Desperately wading through the panic flooding their brain, they attempt a breath, waiting for the tightness in their chest to soften and recede, bit by bit, letting her steady her heartbeat. Once they can fill their lungs again, they breathe in, deep, and pull their knees up to their chest to hide their face in.

The panic fades, leaving them one on one with the dull, isolating desperation. It sits at the center of their being, patient, waiting for them to turn their attention to it. And Kiwi tries his very best not to, but it's there, time after time.

They look up to where Miriam is asleep on the opposite end of the couch, her knees tucked up to her torso. She looks grumpy, even now – perhaps because Bard had straightened their legs in their sleep, again, not leaving her with much space to get comfortable. Or it might be the blanket that has fallen to the floor, leaving her open to the chilly atmosphere of a Chismest night.

Kiwi slides off the couch, as lightly and quietly as she can, and walks over to the fuzzy woven quilt. They pick it up and hold it in their hands for a moment. It's about as old as them, and worn, and the hastily mended patches look glaringly out of place even in the heavily dispersed light. Bard covers Miriam, as slowly and gently as possible, and hopes the threadbare blanket is enough to keep her warm.

They shrivel and hug themself, staying still for a moment, in the dark and quiet. Or... partial quiet. From their, parents', room, they can hear the quiet cooing that immediately transports them to their childhood, and the many sleepless nights spent with Mom peacefully dozing behind the closed door. Tonight, she is joined by deep, mighty sighs and an occasional cough, uncannily close to jingling chimes. Kiwi isn't sure they will be able to fall asleep again, with the new addition disrupting the more familiar ambiance.

She looks over her shoulder, to the window, behind which the colorful flowers are gently bobbing their heads in the quiet wind. That is familiar, at least. A splotch of color in the dark northern night, as she stands alone, barefoot, cold, feeling inexplicably lonely.

Bard leans into the familiar sensation of rough floorboards under their soles as they quietly make their way to the window. He climbs up onto the chair pushed against it and gently presses his hand against the frame. It opens, letting a gust of crisp fresh air in. Bard takes a deep breath, hoping the night chill sobers them up, soothes them, yanks them out of this quicksand of weird, confusing feelings.

The night tastes so disorientingly different. Breathing is easier than it has ever been around these parts, with the once ever-present tint of soot gone and all but forgotten. The air is pure and sweet, and the flowers blooming in it are shining brighter than ever.

Bard looks at them with distant eyes, feeling herself sink deeper into the sand. Their defiant colors used to be a source of greatest comfort. The many nights spent at the window, leaning onto the ceiling and looking out, endlessly waiting, passed easier with the company of the resilient blooms, still joyful and bright in this cold, suffocating place. When the flowers responded to Kiwi's song with a play of color, a new nightly routine took root. Bard barely thought about the wait, anymore. It was about the shimmering petals, the glow in the dark night saturated with smog, and the promise of greener pastures somewhere far away. It was a promise of a different place, full of sun and nature and song, where the world would respond to the melody of their heart.

Chismest is that place, now. Its own brand of it, and definitely falling behind Langtree when it came to daytime hours, but renewed, and welcoming, and singing. A redeemed and reclaimed environment, no longer poisoning all life it gives home to. And the flowers at their Mother's windowsill seem to celebrate that with every fiber, unfolding proudly and happily to drink in the fresh clean air. The world has changed for the better, and they healed alongside it, naturally, as its inalienable part.

...Can Bard still do the same?

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. Just a simple song. One sweet song to share with their long-term friends, to join in on the celebration.

Bard exhales a note, low and soft as to not wake Miriam up, feeling around for the melody they sang not so long ago: Peter's new piece. Just as earlier, they are stumbling over the notes, which feel clumsy and wrong in their chest, like a puzzle piece that is being forced into a misshapen hole. But perhaps, that is okay, Bard reassures themself. It doesn't have to be perfect. It has always been enough to just sing from their heart.

They open one eye, fearfully, their face scrunched up into an apprehensive cringe.

The color does not shift even a shade. Notes fall flat onto the petals, not one of them moved even in the slightest.

Bard lets the song die away once their breath is exhausted. They look at the flowers, endlessly lost, searching for any hint of an answer. What had to even happen to take something so natural away from them? What could they possibly have lost?..

Something scary crawls up to the forefront of his mind, replacing the vaguely panicked confusion with a feeling of cold doom. He could try singing differently. He could sound the notes that have been ringing in his ear the past weeks.

Kiwi breathes deep. Singing the song would mean... something. Something big. It almost feels like on the other side of it, they might stop recognizing themself. But... if this is the only one they have left--

Over on the couch, Miriam grumbles in her sleep and fusses under the blanket, disturbed by the cold night air. Kiwi hurriedly pushes the window shut. Their friend settles a few seconds later, burrowing deeper under the warm cover.

Bard sighs and throws one final dejected glance at the unresponsive flowers on the other side of the glass. They curl up in the chair and hold themself tight for the rest of the night.

[bluebellwriting]

Date Night

Saru x chubby!Reader

Summary: You are a medical officer on the USS Discovery and you haven’t had a date night with your boyfriend in over a month (takes place season 2, post-Obol for Charon)

You knew something was wrong when Tracey came over to your work station with a sympathetic smile. She was clutching a PADD to her chest and her footsteps were purposeful but lacked their normal sense of urgency. She watched quietly as you healed a cut on Linus’ hand and laughed at a few of the Saurian’s jokes, waiting for you to have a moment alone because she knew how angry you were about to get. 

Once you had sent Linus off with a wave and a warning to be more careful, Tracey wordlessly hands you the PADD and prepares herself for the aftermath.

You met Saru on your first day on the USS Discovery. He had made it a point to meet every member of the crew over which he would be second in command. It was sweet, professional, considering Captain Lorca never gave two shits about anyone who wasn’t his bridge crew. You were busy setting up your work station in the med bay when you saw him meander his way over to you. He was tall, but compared to you he was a giant, and you had to tilt your head up just to make eye contact with those stunning eyes. He gave you a slight smile, introduced himself, and asked some practiced questions about your position, your history in Starfleet, etc. After you had given your answers and were suitably smitten with his kind eyes and giant, gentle hands, he had moved on to introduce himself to Hugh before you could make that vital first personal connection. You had tried not to look too heartbroken, of course, he was just being polite and was eager to meet everyone on the ship. You never even got a chance to ask him anything about himself, you were just assuming that he would be perfect boyfriend material. How stupid of you. 

But you kept running into each other in the halls and the cafeteria. It seems you made quite an impression on the Kelpien because he always chose take his meals by your side and, on the extremely rare occasions where he took a day off, he would try to align his breaks with yours. You tried not to get too excited, really, but he ended being just as tender and darling as you had expected after that first meeting. 

And apparently he thought you were just as enthralling, because after all that business with traveling to another universe and ending a war was said and done, he had nervously approached you about joining him for some shore leave in Paris.

“I would love to, my friend,” you had said.

“Oh,” he had mumbled.

“Something wrong?”

“I was hoping we would be going as... more than friends.” It was sweet and corny and you’re pretty sure he got the line from Tilly. But you were elated that you could finally call the Kelpien yours.

But you haven’t had a date night in over a month. Your shifts haven’t been lining up lately. You always seem to have nightly rounds and he is always working during the day, taking nights off at your aggressive insistence. It’s certainly not appropriate for either of you to take some shore leave during an inter-galactic crisis. But... your days off haven’t lined up in months either, which is what you find strange. You tried to line them up with his, but at some point in the last month he just decided not to take any days off at all. It was strange. And hurtful.

At first you had been angry about it, particularly at Pike for keeping you away from each other and working your boyfriend to the bone. But in the last two weeks your self-conscious mind started to wander... Maybe he was avoiding you. He was practically a co-captain at this point so he had to have some control over the scheduling. And it’s not like you were dating him for the special. treatment but, you wanted special treatment. You just wanted to spend one night cuddled with your boyfriend, talking to him in person instead of over your PADD or communicators. But the universe didn’t seem to want that for you.

Or maybe he didn’t want that for you.

Tracey had expected you to vent angrily to her about how much you missed your boyfriend, like you had every other time. But this time you just sadly shook your head and went back to work. 

“I’m sorry, (Y/N),” she says after a while, trying to coax something, anything from you.

“It’s alright.”

“I’m sure it’s just a run of bad luck, Starfleet bureaucracy and all that--”

“Tracey he is Starfleet bureaucracy.” You take a deep breath, trying to reign in your emotions. “Do you think... Do you think he’s avoiding me?”

“Oh, (Y/N), no. Why would you think that?”

“I just... I don’t know. I just feel like I’m not a priority for him anymore. I’ve tried to rearrange my shifts for him but now he’s just not taking breaks altogether. Do you think I’ve done something wrong?” Tracey gives you a sympathetic look but her eyes tell you that she’s at a loss.

“Let’s get a snack.”

“It’s not my break yet--” She grabs your hand and pulls you out of med bay. 

Tracey plops a hot fudge sundae in front of you. You quietly pick up a spoon and do your very best not to cry into your ice cream. During your walk to the cafeteria you had quietly told her more about how you were feeling. How much you missed cuddling with him, how you missed spending nights in his quarters surrounded by plants because your bed was too small for him, how you just missed him. 

“He’s a better cuddler than you’d think,” you sadly giggle. Tracey smiles hopefully, but you continue to sniffle and stir your fudge. 

“I don’t know, Trace. Maybe... Maybe he’s just bored with me and he’s too nice to tell me.”

“Oh (Y/N), I’m sure that’s not it.”

“Yeah, well, it’s something. He used to bend over backwards to spend time with me and now it’s like I have a plague.” You look down at yourself then back at the sundae then back at your thicker legs and chubby stomach.

“(Y/N) stop,” Tracey knows what you’re thinking before you can even vocalize it. “You’re beautiful. It has nothing to do with that.”

“He used to think so too,” you mumbled. “Y’know, this all started after his vahar’ai. Maybe that changed the way he thinks about me?” You look up at her with watery, helpless eyes. “I just don’t know,” you cry out right at the moment the doors slide open and in walks in the man of hour. The minute he walked in, arms swaying and uniform perfectly pressed -- God, he looked great in that uniform, no stop, you’re mad at him -- he spotted you. He beamed his “I’m happy to see you but also I’m at work” smile and strolled over, not yet noticing the red rings around your eyes.

“Good afternoon, Dr. Pollard. (Y/N),” your name is said with such tenderness that you almost forget about your earlier anger and sadness. It’s horrible. You’re in so deep you might as well have drowned in him.

“Good afternoon, commander,” Tracey says. You open your mouth to respond but the words vanish from your throat and are replaced by a thick, heavy knot. No, no, you should be angry. You should be furious. The man you love and was certain loved you back has been ignoring you and that is not going to fly.

You stand up and maneuver your way out of the cafeteria quickly, before the sobs threatening to leak past lips finally emerge. You miss the completely devastated look on Saru’s face, the way his arms fall meekly to his sides and just dangle there, the wrecked look in his eyes.

You had expected Saru to give you some time alone before coming to find you. But as soon as the doors to your quarters had closed there was a loud banging on them. Not the gentle tone of the doorbell. A banging. Followed by Saru calling out to you. You sniff but tell the computer to open the doors because you’re not quite ready to look at him yet. 

Saru has other plans.

As soon as he is inside and the doors have closed, he is crouched in front of your sniffling form sitting on the bed. Saru very rarely rests on his knees, he likes to be able rise up and run at a moment’s notice. That was the old Saru, the fear-fueled Saru, your Saru. But you are a little flattered that this is so important to him that he is willing to risk being vulnerable on his knees before you.

“My darling.” His hands reach out to touch you but you shake your head and he stills. His eyes look lost.

“(Y/N), what happened? What can I do?” You furiously wipe at your eyes but the tears keep coming. Between your sniffling you barely begin to air what has been bothering you this last month.

“I just... I just miss you. And I never get to see you, you’re always so busy and you never take any breaks or days off just for us to be together. And I just... I want to know what happened? If I did something to make you so unhappy, if you’re mad at me or disgusted by me or--” Saru is a kind man but he is not always so outwardly emotional. Emotions make you vulnerable, susceptible for predators to feed upon your every weakness. It too weeks for Saru to fully grow accustomed to the idea that you did not need him to be the big-strong-Kelpien, that you would love some affection and genuineness from him. He is still shy when it comes to initiating kisses and hugs with you, but not today. 

Before you can continue, he has is mouth over yours, trying to pore all the adoration and reverence he has for you into it. One of his hands comes up gentle hold your thigh while the other cups the back of your head just under the neck, just where your ganglia would have been had you been Kelpien. He loves having a hand there when you’re cuddling and there have even been a few instances where his hand made its way up to that spot while the ship was in danger. You have yet to verify your theory, but you assume it must be a custom from home, a way of saying, you’re safe with me. 

When you final separate you are at a loss for words, in part because you are out of breath and also because you don’t quite know what to say. Saru watches your face carefully, scanning your lost eyes for any sign of hatred or abhorrence towards him.

“How could you think that--” he starts to ask.

“How could I think that? Seriously?” You scooch away from him slightly. “You have been ignoring me, you only message me once or twice a day at this point. This is the first time I’ve actually seen you in weeks.” You cross your arms and scowl at him, effectively quelling any possibility for a kiss like that to reoccur -- even though it did knock your socks off.

“I... I...”

“So have you been ignoring me? Or am I crazy and has this all been in my mind and are you about to leave me because of my craziness?”

“I would not leave you for that.” He gives you a small, weak smile. “And... I’m ashamed to admit it but I have been avoiding you.” Your scowl falls, you can’t keep it up any more. A pathetic sob leaves you and your hand flies up to cover your mouth. 

Saru looks down in shame, unable to look at you in this state. It’s unbearable for him to see you like this, to know that he is the cause, that he had promised to protect you from pain and suffering.

“(Y/N) please, you have to know that it has nothing to do with you.” He desperately wants to hold you, rub circles into your back, sit you on his lap and curl around you.

“Then what is it?” You snap. His eyes are beginning to fill with tears as a hand goes to the back of his neck.

“I’m afraid,” he whimpers. Your eyes widen and you fight with your need to go to and comfort him.

“Of what?”

“I have been going through some changes,” he pauses to gage your reaction, “You know that. But I have been feeling things I have never felt before. I... I’m more aggressive, more argumentative. I broke a PADD a few days ago because I was annoyed, I didn’t even realize I was doing it.” He avoids your eyes, embarrassed. You hang onto every word.

“I’m becoming a new person. And I was worried that this new person,” he gestures to himself, “Is not someone you want to be with.” Oh. Oh. Oh, Saru.

“I did not mean to worry you or to make you feel as though I don’t love you because I do.” You let him grab your hands and he grips them tightly as if they are his tether to the mortal world. “I love you so, so much. I could not bear the thought of losing you or hurting you or--” It’s your turn to catch him in a kiss. He breathes a long sigh of release through his nose as your lips mold perfectly to his. Your hands wriggle their way out of his and cup his head, a privilege reserved only for you. After a few moments you pull away but your hands remain in place. He holds your right hand to him and leans in, grateful that you are still here, that you still love him.

“Why didn’t you just talk to me?” You give him a weak smile.

“I just needed to know what was going on,” he sighs. “I needed to know that I was safe for you to be around, that I had a handle on myself.”

“Well the next time you need to, you come to me,” you command and give his face a slight pat. “You scared me.” 

Guilt and more tears flood his eyes in an instant. He lurches forward and wraps his arms around you, something he has wanted to do the moment he entered your quarters. You lean your head against his shoulder and a hand comes up to rest behind your neck. His other arm wraps around your waist and gives it a comforting squeeze. He starts to whisper small devotions of love and promises to never keep you in the dark again. You melt against him, loving how secure his long arms make you feel. Tentatively, you move one of your own hands from between your bodies and up to the back of his head. Your fingers grace over the skin at the base of his skull where his neck meets it, gaging his reaction. When he continues to whisper and cuddle, you rest your entire palm there. He stills for a moment but it feels like forever as you wait. Will he push you away? Will he lecture you on the basics of Kelpien etiquette?

He pulls you tighter against him. Really, he’s squeezing you. And nuzzling his nose against the top of your head which is new and delightful and perfect.

“I’m going to request a day off each week,” he whispers.

“Really,” you say in mock disbelief. “A whole day?”

“For you, I would take entire years off.”

[oh-for-fic-sake]

Day At The Races

You find yourself competing with Bruce on the track.

Masterlist 

Warnings: Innuendo's, Swearing

A/n have some fluff, hope you enjoyxx

(Not my gif)

Day At The Races

Taglist @125bluemachine125

You took a deep breath as Bruce parked the car in the school parking lot there was tonnes of people walking around all making there way to the field where the days festivities were being held. You leaned back looking at him smiling lightly

"Sweets its fine there isn't any press here its families only." he pulled up a hand placing a kiss to it then your wrist and arm tugging you close trailing kisses along your arm until he placed a kiss on your cheek making you giggle when he nuzzled you rubbing his light scruff on your cheek.

"Hey no beard burn!"

"First time I've heard that seriously tho today will be fine"

"I know but its the first time we've been out since going public.... people are going to watch and judge especially after the other articles..." he sighed running his thumb across your hand he understood he really did the media had blown up about your relationship as expected but some had gone beyond, many had nice things to say but a few had been critical saying that you was the billionaires answer to a midlife crisis and that you'd be out of the picture, soon enough others followed making articles base solely around your age gap calling you a gold digger a whore without saying the word Bruce as promised had his legal team taking them to court on your behalf for slander. Hell one had made you cry as it was so nasty saying vile things interviews with 'child hood friends' who you hadn't even remembered crawled out of the wood work fabricating stories of raunchy sexual escapades and such claiming you was a high paid 'anything goes' escort and that's how you really met Bruce, it had made him so angry he didn't even bother to go to court he bought the magazine outright and stopped the printing sacking half of the company as well as the ceo and editorial managers. 

"Just remember I'm with you. I love you and I've got your back we're a team sweets"

"I love you to" you both leaned in kissing each other you got butterflies in your chest as you both pulled away exiting the car you walked around to bruce he took your hand in his locking the car and led you down towards You eyed the people around you, they were watching you judging you. some scoffed you hear whispers from some people about what you were waering, you looked down you didnt think you looked bad. Bruce like you in these leggings well by the way he had pounced on you when you slid them on grabbing and squeezing your ass in them you assumed he had, they were a false matte black leather look you top was a baggy plain whit on the front on the back was a big patch of a cat saying dont be a pussy... probably not the best choice but you felt cute.

You noticed others women eyeing Bruce it was rare for him to be seen out not in a suit or some variation of it ,receiving looks from many of the mothers and older sisters of the students. Not that you could blame them he was in a tight fit black tee and tasteful dark sweats he had come dressed for the dreaded parents race...You never were one for a man in sweats but damn if he didn't look mouthwatering.. if only they were a tad lower, he caught you looking smirking at you then lifted a thumb to the corner of your mouth.

"Your drooling there sweets hold still." you slapped his hand away 

"I was not!" he laughed using the opportunity to grasp your offending hand kissing your palm before holding it tight walking to the desk informing them of your arrival as bruce signed you both in you saw many women glaring at you. You pulled back a little from him he noticed giving your hand a squeeze then moved to hold your hip pulling you to walk beside him.

"Ignore them they are just jealous.... an ass like yours would cost them a lot of money." you squeaked as he pinched your bottom.... he seemed obsessed with it today, you was tankful as his antics were taking your mind off of the glances you was receiving.Bruce quickly navigated the crowds with you arriving at the booths made for parents to sign up to participate in some events he grabed a pen and began filling in for the parents races. Each pupil had a number the parents would get a corresponding number to pin to themselves for the race gaining points for their children adding to their total's helping them to win prizes. He passed the pen to you once filling everything in, you bit your lip writing down your name for the mothers race for Jack freezing you hovered the pen above damien's name bruce smiled leaning down he kissed your ear lightly before speaking quietly in your ear so close you could feel his breath.

"You'd run for him?" you nodded still debating if it was a good idea, it was your first semi public apperance you didnt want to rock the boat. 

"Yes... I want to but....It could cause an uproar people could make assumptions." he stood behind you still holding your hip in one hand the other coverd your hand holding the pen making a tick mark beside his sons name kissing the back of your neck.

"Fuck them you want to run the mothers race for my son do it... and I'll run the dads for Jack."he said letting you put down your name before taking back the pen doing the same for jack.

"and I hope to meet you in the winners race."

"Something tells me you'd throw it just to see my ass" he grunted at you

"Nope I always win these things I wouldn't throw them for anything and besides I don't have to throw a race to look at it, I'll look at it when I damn well please, as is my right" you chuckled at him shaking your head

"What ever you say boss man" before being interupted by someone clearing there throat. You both turned to see a barbie who had obviously rearranged herself pulling the tops of her expensive tits out of the yoga top hanging out obscenely trying to gain his attention. You rolled your eyes as a blonde came up behind you both a sultry look fluttering her eyelashes at your man.

"Can I please?" she said motioning to the pen in Bruce's hand her eye scanning him from head to toe licking his lips. He smiled politely handing it to her you scowled at her.

"Of course come on love" he said leading you away you looked down a little. 

"Dont let it get to you sweets. They will try, they will always try love"

"I know dosent mean I have to like it tho....Its just hard and I'm trying to behave for your sake. I cant exactly call her out and smack the shit out of her" he grunted twitching in his sweats rearranging himself 

"Not if you don't want to be caught being railed on the field no"

"Bruce! are you always thinking about sex? seriously were in a school"

you shouted laughing pushing him lightly as he laughed pulling you back ton him placing you in front as he walked resting his chin on your shoulder whispering huskily into your ear.

"Well this is where me met.... its on my list"

"No!. Do not even go there with your stupid fucking list"

"Don't knock the list...You could have one if you want...I'm sure we could find a way to sneak away for five minutes or so, we could try Mr Kolemans office"

"Oh? and when do you ever finish in five minutes?" he shrugged sending you cheeky look

"Just because I haven't doesn't mean I cant" you shook you head rolling your eyes at him. You quickly noticed the blond from earlier was sticking close the the both of you, Bruce had noticed but kept quiet ignoring her as you made your way across to the boys events. You grunted as she tailed you all the way down the field even as you both sat on the grass you sat between Bruce's legs he pulled you close making a point to touch and hold you. She was always trying to be in sight of Bruce twirling her hair and fluttering her eyes at one point bending over in front of him wiggling her boney ass. You seethed knowing what she was doing but unable say anything.

"You know...You could say something...I really wouldn't mind..Quite the opposite I would enjoy having you get all territorial just a quick snap? growl? anything?" you rolled your eyes as he began grinding against you making sure you felt just how much he would enjoy it

"Bruce behave youself!!"you slapped his thigh making him grunt and hiss leaning forward capturing your ear between his teeth suckling your lobe

"Go oonn you know you want to, do it for me?" he continued kissing down your neck you flushed as she scoffed as Bruce sucked a new mark onto your neck. You would not start a cat fight over Bruce, not that you didn't want to fight for him just that you didn't need to. He was yours. But it didn't mean you wasn't self conscious as the slim woman tried to gain his attention. Tho he made himself quite clear with his little display just who it was he desired. You shook your head trying to rise above her pettiness. Spotting the boys you waved then pointed them out to Bruce who was now satisfied with his fresh mark pulled away with a soft kiss. Jack and Damien sat across from you, Jack waved back then nudged Damien who smiled nodding to you. First was the throwing events then we moved to the jumps. 

"Whats Damien doing?"

"He is doing high jump he is band from long jump."

"What? why?"

"He... clears the sand.... by quite a bit so he cant do it now, the others cant compete with him"

"That doesn't sound fair being banned for being good at it" he sighed.

"And he was holding back"

"Wow so he's and agile little bugger then"

"Heh you have no idea" you both watched the kids participate in their events moving across the field. Throughout the day you saw a pattern Damien was top across the board. In every single event he did. The boy didn't even break a sweat as he was leaving all of the others in the dust, you got the distinct feeling he was holding back. Especially as you saw Bruce motion for him to slow down.

"Bruce what the fuck! your sons a beast how the fuck can he do that im pretty sure he just broke a world record?" you cried as he won the hurdles a good 50 seconds before Jack came in second place. you pulled out your phone to do a google search on hurdle world records Bruce sighed running a hand across the back of his neck.

"...Well he likes fitness and sports I may have updated the manor's gym for him" you snapped your head to him.

"Hang on whoa a gym? where the hell have you hid a gym?" he faltered which was unlike him before quickly snapping out of it stuttering.

"Err well it's-its at the back in the old part,its not fully finished I don't want you going in there it has potentially dangerous equipment in there, professional stuff you need to be taught how to use them." you nodded unconvinced before hearing an anouncement.

"All parents participating in the parental race please come and collect your numbers" Bruce stood helping you up. You both walked to the table collecting the numbers 345 jack 352 for Damien pinning them to your tee shirts ,the fathers race was first you pulled Bruce in for a sweet kiss which he promptly tried deepening wrapping himself aroung you you giggle pulling back as he moved to kiss down your neck, you glowed red as the other parents watch out right some of the women were scoffing. You cupped his face.

"Good luck babe kick ass" he smiled kissing your lips again

"You to" he said before taking position on the start line you was awestruck as you watched him dominate the race, what ever Bruce had said about Damien in the gym was bullshit, it was genetics, pure dna it had to be as Bruce quickly made his way out front and stayed there he was miles away from the others you cheered as he made it across the finish line. Smiled Standing tall as the other runners crouched over panting some heaving there faces purple. You took your place on the starting line noting that blondy was in the line up doing some bullshit yoga stretches drawing attention to herself, although you was on the larger side than  the other women you was confident. In school you had been on the track team, not only that this was Gotham being able to run was a survival skill that most of these women didn't need to master in their gilded castles. You crouched looking down the track taking a slow breath flexing the muscles in your legs warming them with extra blood flow as the others got in position. The teacher counted down and you were off you stayed near the back pacing yourself letting the others wear themselves out before going in for the win, as predicted the others all took off in a full sprint loosing steam quickly. Half way down the track you took it up a notch sprinting slowly building up to full speed passing the women one by one hearing the curses and gasps as you took the lead even then you pushed on breaking away further and further finally crossing the finish line Bruce high fived you.

"Where the hell did that come from?"

"Track team, you never start with sprinting." he shook his head now the top three of each would race one another you noticed with glee that blondy hadn't made it through, she maybe skinny but you were fitter and you couldn't help being smug. You all lined up looking to Bruce you don't care about beat the others just him but you had no hope in winning against him outright so would have to try some underhanded tactics smiling slyly.

"Hey babe?" you bent over a little wiggling your ass he glanced at you wetting his lips eyeing your bent over form as the teacher to position starting to count down. 

"Yeah"

"Is it obvious I'm not wearing anything underneath these?" you said pulling on your leggings he gasped standing up quickly turning to look at your ass.

"You what?!" you laughed running as the race began Bruce missing the call swore quickly following a few seconds you as you took a healthy lead the others now tired from the previous race, you glanced behind you seeing him quickly gaining on you, not even in his lane he'd merged into yours and he looked determined but his eyes were glued to you ass,

"Just you wait!" he shouted out to you squealing you pushed harder trying to stay ahead of him laughing unable to stop yourself from tucking your ass below you as you heard his heavy steps just behind you fully expecting him to grab you.

"No! Bruce! I'm sorry!" you shouted as he was practically on top of you as you crossed the finish line

"Sorry?! you get your ass here!!" but you didn't stop dodging him for a few more moments, in that moment you didn't care about the damn race you screamed as he finally caught you around the waist lifting you up crushing you against him.

"That was really a really dirty trick woman" he said you laughed he placed you down in front him your back to him then smoothed his hands across your ass raking his fingers up and down before giving you a quick spank you flushed knowing full well no matter how discreet he was trying to be someone was bound to have seen that.

"You little tease!" he growled once he felt the the seam of your underwear he moved hugging you from behind pulling you back grinding into your ass lightly. 

"Just you wait until I get you to the car" you mewled at the threat rubbing back against him feeling his significant bulge pressing insistently at your ass 

"Is that a promise Mr Wayne?" he groaned into your neck. Turning you saw that you had indeed come first gaining both boys extra points.

"Ha I won!!" you laughed

"Yes you won, but at what cost?" you froze turning to look at him wide eyed 

"Cost? what do you mean cost? Bruce?" he just laughed pulling away from you as he waved over at the boys both of them shrinking into their shoulders at the public display you'd given everyone. He walked over to the table to hand in his numbers you followed at a safe distance

"Bruce? What cost? hey! don't ignore me!" He did tho chuckling to himself deciding to let your mind dwell on what could be in store for you. 

[sw-daydreamer]

Why The End of Rey and Kylo Ren's Story Is So Disappointing

Darkness rises, and light to meet it.

(Another article deconstructing the why of the unsatisfying ending with a REYLO focus / source below)

With the Star Wars sequel trilogy now concluded with The Rise of Skywalker, fans everywhere now know how Rey and Kylo Ren’s story comes to a close. Those who have long shipped "Reylo" and yearned to see "Bendemption" finally saw it happen, but the film doesn't quite do the work to earn those moments, and forcing these issues highlights how profound the thematic disconnect between TROS and its predecessors. What started out as a compelling dynamic between protagonist and antagonist in the The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi was unfortunately derailed in the last act, delivering an unsatisfying conclusion to Rey and Kylo Ren's relationship.

A Knight and a Scavenger

(...)

They spend all of The Force Awakens and most of The Last Jedi being enemies, and as presented on paper in all three films, there’s simply not enough build-up to sell the romance that the final film wants to go for. Not even The Rise of Skywalker fully commits to this concept, because the first half of the film is so focused on Rey’s struggle with her burgeoning Dark Side power, and her big team-up with Ben at the end is cut short because the movie also wants to get to the “all the Jedi live in you” finale, which Ben has nothing to do with. Perhaps moving towards a romance in Episode IX was always the plan, but the way it’s realized here, what’s supposed to be their heartfelt final moments together are lacking the emotional weight they needed.

A Shattered Alliance

(...)

The Force connection they share is exploited further in The Rise of Skywalker, but rather than being used to explore their dynamic, it’s used more for the sake of spectacle. Consider how small moments of physical exchange in TLJ (some drops of water materializing on Kylo’s hand) are replaced with lightsaber duels happening in multiple locations. Cool? Sure. But the deeper meaning of why this bond was even established feels subdued here, particularly when Rey and Kylo destroy Vader’s helmet, not in a conscious cooperative act, but accidentally mid-battle. The thematic coherence of this aspect of their relationship feels lost in the chaos of the film’s frantic plotting and roller coaster pacing.

A Broken Promise

But with two major plot turns, The Rise of Skywalker tries to get Rey and Kylo back on the path towards not just reconciliation, but romance.

The first is the reveal that Rey is Palpatine’s granddaughter, which once again sends Rey into an existential crisis about her parentage, but this time saddling her with the same issue Kylo had: a grandparent on the Dark Side. Now her bloodline does matter, and it's no coincidence that Kylo is the one who reveals this information to her. After all, he is a tragic example of how the weight of an important lineage can turn someone to the Dark Side -- and now Rey is being crushed by it. While the attempt to create another mirror between the two makes sense in theory, it comes at the cost of being completely divorced from Rey’s character journey in the last two films. The shape of her own destiny she forged across the trilogy, the idea that her origins don’t need to define her capabilities, is destroyed. Becoming the Light Side’s new hero despite “having no place in this story” was powerful. Revealing that she did have a place in it all along feels like a shortcut to ensure Rey has another connection to Kylo rather than a natural evolution.

The second is Kylo’s rushed redemption arc, which makes no sense in the context it appears in. After Rey and Kylo's duel on the Death Star wreckage, a defeated Kylo gets another chance to turn to the Light with some help from the memory of his father, and this time he takes it. However, nothing that has happened to Ben in the previous movies or this one indicates that this would turn him. His opinion of his father hasn’t changed in any way since he murdered him, and his mother reaching out to him through the Force sadly falls flat given that they haven’t shared any scenes across the whole trilogy. Rey says she wanted to “take Ben’s hand” after healing him, and while that is an effective call-back to TLJ that could possibly get him to reconsider his morality, it also feels like a small piece of what should’ve been a larger arc across the movie. Instead, everything related to Ben’s turn has been shoved into this one scene. It’s not enough to communicate why, after all the horrific things he’s done, now is the moment he is redeemed. Rather than getting us invested in an ending that felt thematically connected to the previous films or even coherent on its own terms, The Rise of Skywalker shuffles its pieces to get where it wants to go without justifying how it gets there. Ben joins Rey in her duel with Palpatine, running in with his father’s blaster, and all of his darkness is simply washed away. The idea of their connection being based on how they were representations of the Light and Dark Sides, how one came from nothing to become the last hope for the Light while the other was born from the Skywalker legacy and still turned to the Dark, is tossed aside. After such a strong first two acts, Rey and Kylo deserved a better conclusion, one that truly solidified the emotional bond these two characters were supposed to share. (...)

------------------------>

read the full article, link below, 

I don’t agree with everything the author says, but I  find it interesting that  Reylo, now that it has happened is deemed worthy of a greater effort at story telling, compared to where we stood a few years ago. Obviously it does not change anything to the final movie now.

SOURCE : ign.com/articles/2020/01/03/why-the-end-of-rey-and-kylo-rens-story-is-so-disappointing

[captainchrisfics]

Gaps Between Us

About: Chris Evans and a first person pov narrator have an age gap, sparking a controversy in the public eye, some tension among the MCU cast, and quite a bit of trouble in paradise. Thankfully, RDJ is always there to save the day.

Word Count: 3, 418

Requested By: Anonymous

A/N: Please feel free to submit reqs! My inbox ran dry and I’m always up for some inspiration :)

“Evans, quit hogging the bread!” Jeremy Renner called from the other end of the table. It was quite a stretch to accommodate so many people, almost the MCU’s entire cast was present. Nobody could turn down a dinner invitation from Robert Downey Jr. including Chris and I. We sat together, close to the rest of the original Avengers, even though I was a newer addition to the franchise. Being included at a table of thirty or so of the biggest names in my field was immensely inspiring, the kind of awe-struck moment that made me feel like I was a part of something so much bigger than myself. Robert’s after filming dinners were often like that. 

Chris laughed as he picked up a roll, chucking it to his friend like a football. “If you hit the chandelier, I would’ve hit you harder,” RDJ chastised, shooting my boyfriend a playful side eye. Chris laughed harder as he waved a dismissive hand at Downey, insisting he didn’t need diamonds hanging from his temporary home’s ceiling anyway.

He slung an arm around my shoulders, stretching his fingers to grasp the side of my chair. “You aren’t gonna defend my honor, babe?” Chris asked me with faux disappointment and a cocked eyebrow. 

I rolled my eyes and reached for my glass, taking a slow sip before responding, “No, you deserved that one.” I didn’t take my eyes off Chris as his face contorted with an incredulous expression and I reached behind his back to high-five RDJ whose hand was already waiting for mine. 

“Wise move,” Robert quipped. Chris shook his head before returning to his plate, letting the Iron Man actor win this fight. “I learn from the best,” I countered, shooting RDJ a wink from across Chris’s lap. Over the course of this last film, the older actor and I had developed one of the closest relationships I’d ever had with a co-worker, second maybe only to my boyfriend. RDJ managed to take me under his wing and somehow I’d found a way to keep tagging along. We understood each other in a unique way, almost like we operated on the same wavelength, which was invaluable around someone as charismatic and unpredictable as Chris Evans, as much as I love him.

“You’re gonna regret that later,” Chris promised under his breath, a gruff tone only I heard. I kicked him under the table, insisting that it was all in good fun. “So,” Brie Larson said as she joined the group, dropped her plate from the make-shift buffet on the table next to mine and pulled out the chair beside me. “I’m sorry to talk shop, but I’ve got to tell you, I loved your work during the funeral scene today,” she professed, squeezing my hand with sincerity. Scarlett, who sat opposite of me, nodded in agreement as she added between bites, “Not to date myself, but I don’t think there’s a lot of actors your age who could pull off subtle, intense emotion like that.” 

I blushed, staring down at my plate to avoid all of the eyes I felt on me. “Oh, thank you... I appreciate that, but I  was just doing my job,” I shrugged. I was the youngest at the table by far, which could definitely be intimidating at times. Knowing my colleagues turned friends respected me and what I did just as much as I admired their work meant more than I could properly thank them for. “You all set a standard I only hope to match,” I added, squeezing Brie’s hand back.

“No, no, don’t bullshit these hacks,” Robert interjected. “I mean, sure, she was convincingly grieving my loss of life. But I expected more from the rest of you. Where were the theatrics? The professions of love now lost? The waterworks?” He shot pointed looks around the table at everyone who was present for Tony Stark’s funeral. Everyone laughed as Gwenyth Paltrow raised her hands in defense as she jokingly protested, “I had a little girl to be strong for.” “Really though, you did so great today,” Chris brought the conversation back to me as he paused devouring his meal to place a kiss on my temple. Down the table, someone groaned in objection to the PDA, which sent a heavy stone to the pit of my stomach. I felt Chris grow tense as well, always more self-conscious of our relationship than I was.

Our age difference made everything that much more difficult. It gave the media access to more insults to throw in their click-bait titles, contributed to the intense scrutiny the public eye had to offer in our line of work, and was always in the back of our minds. Not because we felt like there was anything wrong with it, but because other people did. If you asked any gossip site reader, Chris was in the midst of a mid-life crisis and I was a gold digger looking to capitalize on his vulnerability. Never mind that we were both perfectly of-age adults or that the same people used to praise our friendship all over the internet before they found out it was a little bit more.

“Relax Mackie,” Sebastian Stan teased from that end of the group, around where the groan came from. Seb had a teasing tone, shoving our friend’s shoulder jovially. Especially with them being some of the closest people to Chris on set, I’d gotten to know Anthony and Seb pretty well. Enough to know that they were only kidding, but that they sometimes didn’t know when to stop. I knew Chris inside and out though so when his ears perked up and his head followed the noise, previously furrowed brow raising as if to dare them to continue, I could tell you there would be trouble. “Her age isn’t on the clock anyway. That’s the thing, right?” Stan teased.

Chris smiled wryly with downcast eyes, watching as he spun his glass. Mackie laughed harder, the force of which threw him back in his chair as he prodded Sebastian’s chest in praise. “Just barely,” he shot back between breaths. The two chuckled one last time before the joke died down and they joined the rest of the cast in other topics of conversation. Chris didn’t seem to realize though, with the way he sat so tensely still like he’d draw more negative attention if he moved a single muscle.

I didn’t know the kind of pressure a few years could add until it burdened my chest every time a reporter brought it up on the red carpet, tugged down my soaring heart whenever we held hands in public and I caught people staring, weighed heavy on my mind when I noticed Chris grow as uncomfortable as he was now. All because of a little peck and a murmur that probably lost its original meaning among the translation of our anxieties.

Around us, the conversation amongst the original Avengers shifted to what everyone’s next projects would be now that Endgame’s filming was coming to a close. Chris, usually the most boisterous of the bunch, sat quietly as he shoved broccoli about his plate. His arm that had been wrapped around me sagged back to his side. His leg bounced rapidly like a revving engine, ready to run. I reached to squeeze his hand as a sign of comfort, that I was here and happy to be, knowing that the thought his nerves spiraling rapidly out of control in his head was never a good thing. As soon as my fingers brushed his, Chris pulled away so harshly he shot up from his seat, jostling the table unintentionally and grabbing everyone’s attention.

“I’m uh…” he scratched the back of his neck, skittish eyes bouncing between everyone staring at him. “Gonna go grab a beer. Anyone want anything?” Chris recovered, smooth enough not to raise suspicion if you weren’t within range of the anxious energy radiating from him. Soon, he stepped away from the table with everyone’s requests and escaped to the kitchen, leaving an empty chair in his wake. My eyes dropped to meet Robert’s across the space Chris had been occupying, just as wide with worry as I imagined mine were with eyebrows nearly through the roof. 

“I’ll make sure Chris doesn’t fuck up that tall order,” RDJ said with an effortless nonchalance I envied, clasping his hands together as he stood. He turned to me with peaked eyebrows as he added, “Why don’t you join us, kid? Takes a few actors to screw in a lightbulb.” I accepted Robert’s outstretched hand and trailed behind him, following Chris’s footsteps until we found him bent over the kitchen island, fingers gripping the quartz so hard his knuckles were white. “Why does it have to be such a big fucking deal, huh?” he spit cynically. Chris’s face scrunched up with furrowed brows and a tight lip as his eyes, firey with misplaced rage, burned holes through Downey. “Seriously, please enlighten me. Why does everyone else who isn’t a part of this relationship give such a massive shit about it?” His voice stayed quiet as to not raise the others’ suspicion, but by the strained veins in his neck and steely look in his eye held his anger instead. 

“In and out, buddy,” Robert said as he clasped a hand on Chris’s shoulder. “You know those bozos didn’t mean anything by it.” Chris snapped that it wasn’t about that, that this was much bigger than them, and I knew he was right. “That’s the problem,” he growled. “Nobody means anything by it, they’re just trying to get clicks on their articles or attention on Twitter or laughs at our expense without stopping to think the kind of shitty strain it puts us through.” Chris slammed the beer he’d grabbed on the countertop hard enough that, if it’d been opened, it would’ve created another mess for us to clean up. He was turning red and I could almost hear the tea kettle coming to a boil in his stomach, the steam ready to burst from his ears. I don’t think I’d ever seen Chris so mad.

I stayed glued to the entryway, holding my own hand behind my back as I rolled from my heels to my toes. I watched Chris nervously, not exactly sure what to do or how to help. Really I was the cause of the problem. How could I possibly offer a solution? And then, as much as I hated myself for even thinking it, the only way to fix this occurred to me. 

“We could split up, you know,” I proposed so quietly I hoped that between Chris’s angry ragged breath and Robert’s attempts at rationalizing with him they wouldn’t hear me. But they did. Their eyes snapped to me as Chris’s face fell, his eyebrows furrowed and his mouth hung open, all softened by sadness. RDJ threw up his hands, shooting me a look with wide eyes and tight lips as if to say he already had enough to deal with sans me joining Chris on the ledge he was trying to talk him down from.

“Don’t say stupid things like that,” Chris scolded with a shake of his head. His shoulders sagged from their previous position taught with anger as he slipped into a state of confused heartache. He could deny it all he wanted to, but that was the only way I saw out.

“Well, I certainly don’t want to but...” I bit my lip, searching for the courage to continue with Chris giving me pleading puppy dog eyes worse than Dodger’s. “But this is just too much. All of it, all of the articles and speculation and hurtful things being thrown our way because of our relationship, it’s overwhelming.” Even when he was puffed up with rage before, I felt smaller now. Measly compared to the giant bumbling toward me as he shoved past Downey, wrapping huge arms around me like a shield, though I wasn’t sure who he was trying to protect at this point. 

“You’ve got enough on your mind with your career, any relationship is a lot. Let alone one with our age gap. I know how much you hate the things people say. I just... I think we need to quit while we’re ahead and end on good terms before you start hating me, too. And if it’s what’ll make you happy then-” I spoke into his chest though I was sure he could hear me loud and clear, words suddenly snowballing out of me, gaining strength as the momentum grew with every tumbling syllable. I had to spit them out before I couldn’t. Before I changed my mind and picked what was selfish instead of best for Chris’s sake. And then he cut me off.

“Darling, I told you to stop talking nonsense. You make me happier than anything,” Chris was quiet with calm now, his angry energy redirected to dragging me back to earth when I felt so far away from him. “I could never ever even imagine a world where I felt anything less than love for you,” he paused to press a long kiss onto the top of my head before speaking again. “Let alone because of some stupid rumors and the opinions of people who don’t matter to me a fraction as much as you do.”

I melted into Chris, relishing in the way he radiated the excitement of an entire football stadium just when their home team scored the winning touchdown. How he smelled of deodorant I didn’t think anyone else wore and the liberating, fresh air of the mountains when you’re the only one there and something I still couldn’t identify anywhere else that wasn’t in his embrace. It was just Chris. And the way his beard scratched my skin as he nuzzled into the crook of my neck, the fact that I didn’t mind was so uniquely Chris as well. In fact, I’d miss it. He pressed gentle kisses into my collarbone as he rested his forehead on my shoulder, little wishes that I’d take back what I’d said. I was ready to push him away and tell him that this had to be it when it occurred to me just how much I’d miss him, but I couldn’t keep putting Chris through all of this stress just for me.

“I mean it,” I asserted though it was half-hearted, tears buried finally rising to the surface. I knew I had an ocean of them waiting inside of me, tossing and turning with my tumultuous emotions, but I had to stop the tide from rising. At least until Chris wasn’t around anymore. “We need to break-“

“No,” Robert finally cut in, dropping a gentle hand on one of each of our shoulders. “No, you don’t. Don’t say the b-word,” he repeated like he was trying to ease us out of a trance. Pity laced the soft circles he rubbed our backs. I turned to look at him, keeping an ear to Chris’s chest to prolong the comfort I found in the steady thump of his heartbeat. “The second you allow the public eye’s gaze to start changing your relationship is the second you lose yourself to this job. I can’t stand by and allow you two to lose each other too,” Downey continued, though his soft eyes stayed on me. 

Then he turned to Chris with a harder look of determination, really trying to drive his point home. “Anyone who knows you at all, Evans, knows that you’ve been looking for something like this for a long time.” I felt Chris’s grip tighten around my waist, not nearly ready to let me go any time soon. I knew Robert was right. Even though I hadn’t known Chris for all that long, we got along better than I did with anyone else before. It was like we’d known each other forever even when it’d only been a few weeks and I figured, with Chris’s age and his eagerness to settle down, he’d been waiting even longer than that. “Don’t let it slip away because of other people’s opinions.” Chris nodded against my shoulder, still holding me close as if I’d run off, which I guess I tried to. “If you can’t follow your heart and tell anyone else who has something to say about it to fuck right off thank you very much, then I don’t know who could,” Robert finished with a confident smile. I thought it was funny, like he was trying to make it rub off on my boyfriend. 

Chris nodded, hesitantly at first and then faster with more assuredness as what his friend said sunk in. “Now, get it together and realize that you’ve got a solid foundation with each other. I’ll be damned if you let it crumble over Mackie and Sebastian being dumbasses.”  Robert smirked at us, his usual sly spark returning to his eye. “Start thinking with these a little more,” he paused to poke Chris’s chest just above his heart. “And using these a little less,” Robert said as he tapped my temple. 

Chris stretched an arm around Downey, pulling both of us right to his side. “Thanks,” he breathed out, almost like a sigh of relief. “Don’t know what we’d do without you,” I told Robert, patting his shoulder with gratitude. “Yeah, yeah,” he brushed us off, pulling away from Chris’s embrace as well. “Tell me how much you love me later.” He took a few steps toward the fridge and started pulling out cans of almost everything under the sun, somehow miraculously remembering what everyone ordered when Chris wasn’t even paying attention despite being the one who asked. “We better get all these drinks out there before there’s a riot,” he said, grabbing as many as he could and sliding the rest to Chris and I. “Or worse,” Robert paused dramatically, shoving the fridge closed with his hip. “More jokes.” With that, he turned and left Chris and I standing alone in the kitchen. 

Chris rolled his eyes as he turned to me, reaching for my hand. He played with my fingers for a second, watching our hands as they pressed against each other one digit at a time, before locking them together. “You know I love you a whole lot more than how mad I am at everyone else,” he said with more sincerity than I thought he could muster. It seemed to be all the honesty the world had to offer. I grinned a smile that stretched so far it made my cheeks hurt even more than the blush burned as I nodded and said with just as much integrity, “And I love you even more than that.”

Chris reached to wipe the remainder of my tears with his thumb as he shook his head and drew in a tight breath, feigning contention. “I don’t know about that. It’s like, so much for someone who was about to end things a minute ago,” he joked. Chris gathered so many drinks in his arms there weren’t any left for me to carry. 

I stretched to flick his ear anyway, all but stomping my foot in protest. “I love you a hell of a lot, Evans. So much I was about to end things for your own good,” I argued with a pointed look even though it was pointless. He already knew my heart hadn’t been in it, the problem was that I’d been listening to my head just like Downey said.

He jostled the cans so they all sat in one arm before slipping his free hand into the back pocket of my jeans. “Let’s go show the world just how much then,” Chris laughed as he bent down to press a kiss into my temple, happy to still be by each other’s sides as we joined the rest of the Marvel cast.

Tags: @patzammit , @thegetawaywriter , @coffeebooksandfandom , @captainsteveevans , @intrepidandabitcrazy , @super100012

[irinapaleolog]

With the Star Wars sequel trilogy now concluded with The Rise of Skywalker, fans everywhere now know how Rey and Kylo Ren’s story comes to a close. Those who have long shipped "Reylo" and yearned to see "Bendemption" finally saw it happen, but the film doesn't quite do the work to earn those moments, and forcing these issues highlights how profound the thematic disconnect between TROS and its predecessors. What started out as a compelling dynamic between protagonist and antagonist in the The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi was unfortunately derailed in the last act, delivering an unsatisfying conclusion to Rey and Kylo Ren's relationship.

A Knight and a Scavenger

Even before we learn exactly how they will be connected, The Force Awakens portrays Rey and Kylo as diametrically opposed. Both are introduced wearing masks, yet Rey’s lasts for barely a minute while Kylo doesn’t take his off until two thirds through. Rey is a scavenger on a backwater planet, scraping by on her own skills to survive, while Kylo is a major leader in an autocratic military organization about to achieve dominance in the galaxy, a position he secured via his connection to his grandfather, Darth Vader. Setting aside how we now know the story ends, as initially presented in TFA, Rey is from nowhere and Kylo is our heir apparent to the Skywalker name.

We understand by the midpoint of the movie that Kylo has a familial connection to all three of the Original Trilogy heroes, and yet he has inherited none of their heroism. Rey, meanwhile, has everything to gain from selling BB-8 and doesn’t, and within seconds of learning his importance to the Resistance is ready to put herself on the line for it. Rey looks to Han Solo as a potential father figure; Kylo cuts him down because he’s his actual father. Their opposing views are even literalized by the massive canyon that tears them apart after their duel in the snow. But there is something that does connect their characters in this film beyond their strength in the Force: their fascination with mythic iconography. Rey, a starry-eyed collector of Star Wars memorabilia (she lives in an AT-AT!), and Kylo, a vindictive child who prays to the burnt husk of Vader’s helmet. Both of them are children of the OT’s legacy, but one pulled to the Light, the other drawn to the Dark.

They spend all of The Force Awakens and most of The Last Jedi being enemies, and as presented on paper in all three films, there’s simply not enough build-up to sell the romance that the final film wants to go for. Not even The Rise of Skywalker fully commits to this concept, because the first half of the film is so focused on Rey’s struggle with her burgeoning Dark Side power, and her big team-up with Ben at the end is cut short because the movie also wants to get to the “all the Jedi live in you” finale, which Ben has nothing to do with. Perhaps moving towards a romance in Episode IX was always the plan, but the way it’s realized here, what’s supposed to be their heartfelt final moments together are lacking the emotional weight they needed.

A Shattered Alliance

Before we ever hear the term “Force Dyad” from Palpatine, The Last Jedi effectively communicates that Rey and Kylo are intrinsically linked just as much as they are fundamentally opposed. The connection Snoke forges between their minds through the Force gives us some of the film’s best scenes, and it’s understandable why they are drawn to each other after Rey’s journey into the Dark Side cave. After learning what might have been the worst possible answer to the driving question of her own existence, Rey lays her cards on the table. “I’ve never felt so alone.” Her emotional vulnerability is conducive to her reaching out to Kylo, a man who feels just as dejected by his origin story as she does by hers, and to mistakenly believing that she can turn him to the Light just as much as he hopes to seduce her to the Dark.

This tension (of multiple varieties) explodes in the throne room, with a lightsaber battle against the Praetorian Guards that glistens with passion and rage. The Light and the Dark, for a dazzling moment, unified in purpose. Yet when the battle ends, both of them believed they’ve won the other to their side. Rey begs for Kylo to tell the First Order to stop firing at the Resistance shuttles, and Kylo asks her to take his hand and help him rule the galaxy. Neither of them have changed. They are still opposing forces, and they once again pull apart, literally tearing the Skywalker saber in two during their struggle. Rey accepts her place as the last Jedi, while Kylo doubles down on his darkness by assuming the mantle of Supreme Leader. At the end of the film, even though they briefly united, they end with Rey closing the door on him. If anything, The Last Jedi reinforces their disparate nature rather than subverting it.

The Force connection they share is exploited further in The Rise of Skywalker, but rather than being used to explore their dynamic, it’s used more for the sake of spectacle. Consider how small moments of physical exchange in TLJ (some drops of water materializing on Kylo’s hand) are replaced with lightsaber duels happening in multiple locations. Cool? Sure. But the deeper meaning of why this bond was even established feels subdued here, particularly when Rey and Kylo destroy Vader’s helmet, not in a conscious cooperative act, but accidentally mid-battle. The thematic coherence of this aspect of their relationship feels lost in the chaos of the film’s frantic plotting and roller coaster pacing. A Broken Promise But with two major plot turns, The Rise of Skywalker tries to get Rey and Kylo back on the path towards not just reconciliation, but romance.

The first is the reveal that Rey is Palpatine’s granddaughter, which once again sends Rey into an existential crisis about her parentage, but this time saddling her with the same issue Kylo had: a grandparent on the Dark Side. Now her bloodline does matter, and it's no coincidence that Kylo is the one who reveals this information to her. After all, he is a tragic example of how the weight of an important lineage can turn someone to the Dark Side -- and now Rey is being crushed by it. While the attempt to create another mirror between the two makes sense in theory, it comes at the cost of being completely divorced from Rey’s character journey in the last two films. The shape of her own destiny she forged across the trilogy, the idea that her origins don’t need to define her capabilities, is destroyed. Becoming the Light Side’s new hero despite “having no place in this story” was powerful. Revealing that she did have a place in it all along feels like a shortcut to ensure Rey has another connection to Kylo rather than a natural evolution.

The second is Kylo’s rushed redemption arc, which makes no sense in the context it appears in. After Rey and Kylo's duel on the Death Star wreckage, a defeated Kylo gets another chance to turn to the Light with some help from the memory of his father, and this time he takes it. However, nothing that has happened to Ben in the previous movies or this one indicates that this would turn him. His opinion of his father hasn’t changed in any way since he murdered him, and his mother reaching out to him through the Force sadly falls flat given that they haven’t shared any scenes across the whole trilogy. Rey says she wanted to “take Ben’s hand” after healing him, and while that is an effective call-back to TLJ that could possibly get him to reconsider his morality, it also feels like a small piece of what should’ve been a larger arc across the movie. Instead, everything related to Ben’s turn has been shoved into this one scene. It’s not enough to communicate why, after all the horrific things he’s done, now is the moment he is redeemed.

Rather than getting us invested in an ending that felt thematically connected to the previous films or even coherent on its own terms, The Rise of Skywalker shuffles its pieces to get where it wants to go without justifying how it gets there. Ben joins Rey in her duel with Palpatine, running in with his father’s blaster, and all of his darkness is simply washed away. The idea of their connection being based on how they were representations of the Light and Dark Sides, how one came from nothing to become the last hope for the Light while the other was born from the Skywalker legacy and still turned to the Dark, is tossed aside. After such a strong first two acts, Rey and Kylo deserved a better conclusion, one that truly solidified the emotional bond these two characters were supposed to share.

Midway through TROS, Rey says “People keep telling me they know me. I’m afraid no one does.”

Maybe she was right.

[snowbellewells]

Face to Face in the Broad Daylight /// Chapter Seven

Hello Everyone!  I feel truly awful to have left you hanging on my @cssns​ werewolf sequel for so long.  I’m hoping that all of you who were enjoying it haven’t completely forgotten what was happening. Anyway, finally I come bearing an update that ties up a lot of the story threads, and after this there is only the happy epilogue left!  I never meant to string it out like this, but you should have the last installment by next week!

Thanks once more to my artist @branlovestowrite​ for the beautiful fic cover!

I’m including the story summary and link to it from the start on AO3, especially because it has been a while and readers might need to refresh their memories on where we left off!

Summary: Here we have a sequel to my werewolf, alternate season two and beyond fic from last year’s CSSNS. You probably want to read that story "Run to Me (in the Dead of Night)" first, or it might be a bit confusing in places. This second story in the same universe partially exists just because I wanted to revisit these couples and enjoy a bit more of their fluffy happily ever afters. However, we may also see them get into some new surprises and challenges, and of course we need to see if Rumplestiltskin is still under control or back to his usual scheming and plotting....

From the beginning on AO3

~ chapter seven: what once was mine

“Emma! Help her, please!” Graham’s frantic voice pulled Emma back to focus on the present crisis. He was crouched at his love’s side, gathering her tiny form as close to him from off the cold, bare ground as possible - clearly torn between brushing her hair from her slack face, trying to watch for further danger, and being sure some help was coming all at once.

Emma was almost startled to see her boss and friend in his familiar human form, all wiry limbs and curly hair once more instead of the russet wolf he had been when placing himself between Morgana and the woman he loved; the woman carrying his unborn child. Instead of noting when he had switched back to the genial sheriff she knew, all her focus, all her attention and power, had been trained on the huge flash and buzz and humming pull of energy both to and from the villainous beings before her. For a truly frightening, paralyzing stretch all of the gathered magic of Rumplestiltskin, and each and every Dark One who had come before, had been contained within Morgana, forcing all of them to shield their eyes and stumble back at the sheer wall of power surging outward from where the sorceress had stood, suddenly seeming to tower over them, her long shadow stretching out to encompass every visible inch of ground in view. With sickening clarity, Emma had known as their adversary tranformed before them that this double cross had been Morgana’s intention all the time. While she might once have been Gold’s ally and pupil, she had intended to take his power for herself rather than helping him be rid of the dagger. And she had so very nearly succeeded that the horrifying vision of a monstrous, unstoppable witch harnessing her own powers and those of every Dark One who had come before her, reigning over the fabled kingdom of Camelot and their own world with a iron fist of cruelty, destruction, and terror had been all too real in Emma’s mind’s eye. She could see castles crumbling, kingdoms bowing, and ordinary people enslaved to Morgana’s twisted will with no hope of release. 

Now however, beyond her knowledge or understanding - she hadn’t even had time to try - the evil sorceress was gone, vanquished with a roar of fruitless rage and flash of light. There had barely been time for her stunned eyes to take in the smoky dark cloud of sinister residue swirling into the thick tome where Belle had embedded the dagger, blinking in staggered disbelief, before Graham’s panicked voice and the librarian’s harsh gasps for breath jerked her back to the present. 

Emma wasn’t slow on the uptake, now that her focus was on the remaining crisis rather than their foe. It was clear Belle had been sent into a frighteningly early labor; her body in intense physical distress as a result. But, as much as Emma did possess magic and anxiously desired to help, she had no idea what to do. A wave of helplessness and panic swamped her momentarily, before she surfaced again, realizing exactly what she could manage.

Reaching a hand to rest on Graham’s forearm, trembling with fear for his beloved, she drew his worried eyes to her serious gaze, willing her certainty to infuse him with some sort of confidence in their course. “Hey, hey… Graham,” she pressed seriously, making sure she had his understandably torn focus, coaxing him back. “Are you with me? Listen, okay? I don’t know a whole lot about delivering babies - magically or otherwise - but I do know that Belle ought to be in a hospital, not out here lying on the cold ground. Let me transport us there, and you’ll be in clean surroundings with people who know what they’re doing, alright?”

The sheriff gave her a curt nod of either agreement, understanding, or both, but she could see the dark cloud of worry and self-recrimination gathering on his brow. Though he was clearly bracing himself for her proposed magical travel, and making his best effort to shield and cushion Belle at the same time, Emma could read his fearful churning thoughts almost as plainly as if he had spoken them aloud. Babies, yes, Storybrooke’s small hospital and capable staff had probably managed the births of many just fine, but a human-werewolf hybrid pup? It had been anybody’s guess what that delivery would look like anyway - and that was before the situation had become even more difficult.

Still, Emma knew better than to let the pressure and panic overwhelm her again. She was determined to help them all she could. One task at a time; it was the only way she was going to get anywhere.

Crouching next to her boss, Emma clutched Belle’s clammy, quivering hand, thinking just how tiny her bookworm friend’s petite frame really was. She couldn’t help another nervous flutter of the heart wondering how big the baby was already with its accelerated gestation, and praying Belle wouldn’t be torn apart by something she had wished and hoped for so fervently; that she should live and thrive in. Belle would be such a wonderful mom, and she deserved her chance. She deserved so much happiness after all that she had weathered; Emma figured she had survived enough herself to know.

Thankfully, though it was light, she felt Belle manage to press her fingers in return, once more centering her in the present and what she needed to do first. The grip was tenuous, but as their sprightly little librarian squeezed Emma’s hand in return - still fighting and hanging in there every step of the way, Emma felt hope rekindle that Belle would battle through. With that, she tightened her other hand’s hold on Graham, willing herself not to tremble and broadcast her fears to him any more than she could help. Relief flooded through her as she felt Killian’s large, solid hand rest on her back, linking them and letting her know he was with her, wordlessly soothing and strong. She was going to need him once they arrived at the hospital, Belle was wheeled away, and the rest of the delivery was out of her hands. She didn’t really know how to do anything more, but the waiting, the flagging adrenaline, and coming down from all they had just seen - she knew that she would be a mess if he weren’t there. And she was thankful all over again that he seemed - as always - to simply know and understand that, just as he always had. They were made for each other in a way she’d never even believed in enough to realize what she’d been missing. But she wouldn’t ever want to do without him again.

Remembering what little she had figured out about her magic for certain (and it wasn’t much, with the only magical experts in town evil or the Blue Fairy - whom her mother trusted implicitly, but who strangely unnerved Emma - Emma had been attempting to teach herself as best she could) Emma forced herself to slow her breathing, close her eyes, feel for those she wished to protect, and picture nothing beyond where she intended them to go. Pushing that gathered swell of energy outwards, she sooned sensed dizzying movement beyond her closed eyelids. And when she opened her eyes, they had made it - all of them - in one piece, to Storybrooke General.

They had barely landed and gained their bearings when medical personal rushed toward them, their need clear from the agonizing wails now leaving Belle’s mouth all too clearly. Soon a whole phalanx of nurses and orderlies were whisking her off on a stretcher, Graham clutching her hand and keeping pace beside it until they forced him to let go and stay behind. Emma and Killian could only watch as he trudged back to where they stood in the open reception area.  There was nothing else for them to do but wait...

~~~**~~~**~~~**~~~

Back in the lakeside clearing - suddenly empty and eerily, starkly, silent -  a single person remained, barely standing on his own two feet in shock. The man’s breath rasped weakly from all-too-human lungs, in a way it had not done for centuries. Rumplestiltskin was frozen, shocked and surprised; a state that had become completely foreign after ages of premonition and foreknowledge made surprises rare indeed. The twisted, maimed and spindly legs which magic had made immaterial all these years were barely holding his weight, and he sunk slowly to crouch on the rocky ground at the water’s edge.

The events of the last hour were still sinking in it seemed. Some corner of his brain was already crying out in horror; the rest of his senses struggling to catch up and comprehend his utter ruin. He had become so reliant upon - so addicted - to the immense powers of all the Dark Ones within his puny frame, that the weight of his vulnerability, weakness, and fear seemed near to crushing as the long-forgotten feebleness crept back into his conscious like monstrous shadows across the floor.

Rumple made to stand up again, but found his limbs quivering and drained. Without thinking, he flourished the hand that would summon him his heavy, gold-topped cane, but nothing happened. No cane appeared, not a trace of magic raced through his fingers… only emptiness remained. 

It was then that the full consequence of his devious grasping and false alliance struck home within his breast. Morgana had double-crossed him; he could see now in clear hindsight that it had been her intention from the start to siphon the forces of the Darkness into her own being to at last wreak her own revenge on her half-sibling and claim Camelot for herself - a frighteningly magnificent dark Queen. He had been blinded by his need for vengeance, his believed invulnerability, and not seen the deal that had brought downfall until it was too late. She had paid with her freedom and her very being, now trapped  - for all time, as far as he knew - within the book by Belle’s saving action. Yet, the swift retribution on the one who had betrayed him was cold comfort in the wake of his own punishment.

Rumplestiltskin, the poor village spinner still at heart, was once more what he had vowed never to be again: a crawling, weak, pathetic coward, left to his own pitiful devices to be trampled beneath the heels of those stronger than himself. The fact that Hook and his other adversaries, along with the woman he had once loved, were gone as well, rather than staying to torment him, gave little peace. He was not sure he could even drag himself back to his shop and in from the elements - nor what the point would be in doing so.

It was an interminable amount of time before he could even gain enough support from a stout tree trunk nearby to pull himself to stand. Stooped and wavering, Rumple broke off a large enough branch to use as a sort of crutch and help him hobble forward before collapsing with panted breath on a large rock. Did he even wish to return? Or should he wait for some wild animal or new threat to put him out of his torment and misery at last?

A howl of desperate rage escaped his lips as he let his head fall back in exhausted defeat. The fact that he was finally reaping what ages of his own crooked dealings and treachery had sown was not lost on the former Dark One, but it made the collapse all the more bitter to swallow. He might have even felt the sting of true regret as he began to hobble from the forest… but it was too little, and much too late.

~~~**~~~**~~~**~~~

Somewhere in the halls of Storybrooke’s hospital, as Whale and the rest of his most capable personnel fought for the life of both the tenacious young town librarian and her first child, Belle floated hazily beyond awareness of what was happening around her. Though the moments preceding her descent into unconsciousness had been fraught with fear and horror - the deep desire to prove her worth, to stop her maniacal former love’s quest to destroy all those she held dear - she was ignorant of all that worry and trauma now. It was a fitful state, far from the bliss of perfect rest, but she was no longer aware enough to be troubled by the many cares and concerns which had been weighing on her.

Unfortunately, she was also oblivious to the fact that she was very much in labor. She and Graham’s little one was on its way whether she was awake to push or not, whether it was time or not, and whether or not her body was ready or capable of delivering it safely. As she continued to lie helpless and unaware on the operating table, it became clear that an emergency Caesearean section was the only way to go - and immediately at that.

Whale was snapping out orders with a speed and fervency that most of his staff had never yet witnessed; generally seeing minor falls, broken arms or legs, and stubborn coughs and colds as their main health issues in Storybrooke’s sleepy environment. The fact that in another realm and long-gone life he had been a brilliant and pioneering scientist as well as an accomplished physician - if also an eccentric and a bit disturbed - became more abundantly clear as he continued to fight for the woman on their table, her life in their hands.

Graham, for his part, was going nearly mad outside in the hall where he had been forced to wait with the rest of their friends and family. His rapid pacing and clutching at clumps of his hair, even more curling and unruly than normal from his distraught mistreatment, was nearly enough to make Killian wince and try to warn his new friend to calm down. However, the other wolf managed to bite his tongue and hold the words back. For one thing, such a suggestion would almost certainly be useless. Clearly the sheriff couldn’t relax until they knew that Belle was out of danger. Not only that, but Killian felt it was not his place to tell others how to handle grief or strife (he had never been a very good model of it himself) and beside that simple truth, it would be incredibly hypocritical of him, seeing as how if it were Emma lying where Belle was, fighting to survive bringing a pup of his into the world, and he were in Graham’s place, he would be faring no better, and quite possibly even worse.

Time seemed to trickle by at first, as if the clock in the waiting room were taunting them, the two hands moving at a crawl, just when they most needed them to hurry along. Eventually, Snow, who had arrived with David and Henry in the midst of their wait, accompanied by Ruby, who had already been at the hospital to report on the diner to a recovering and once again tart and no-nonsense Granny Lucas,  to help her carry, went down to the hospital cafeteria to fetch some sort of breakfast for them all. David sat in the chair in the corner, looking resolutely calm, as if he could will things to fall into the proper place simply by projecting assured confidence with enough certainty. He couldn’t very well do much else, as his grandson had fallen asleep sometime around two a.m. and Henry’s dark mop of brown hair was still resting on his shoulder gaining what sleep he could. No one wished to take peaceful rest away from the preteen, whom they still wanted to shield from the worst if possible. No matter how helpful and mature he tried to be, he was still a kid with a child’s innocence and already more involved than they would have preferred.

Yet, as slowly as the minutes had seemed to crawl all through the long night and early morning, just as the stars were beginning to fade in the sky outside the large windows at one end of the waiting room, those minutes also appeared to jolt into motion and rush forward once more when Dr. Whale at last entered the room and made his way toward them. Emma genuinely felt as if her heart was crowding up into her windpipe, stoppering her ability to breathe and pounding against the roof of her mouth. The notorious physician looked exhausted; his shoulders bowed and dark circles beneath his eyes; he seemed disheveled, his hair stood even more wildly on end than usual, as if pulled at or run through in anxiety and frustration so many times it could no longer lie still, and the residue of blood and other materials Emma didn’t even want to consider too closely stained a swath at the front of his scrubs.

He came to a stop before Graham, and Emma tried to mentally prepare herself for whatever his report might be. Watching Graham as closely as she was, she could see that though he was mastering a sort of stoic, calm patience as he stood to receive news of Belle’s condition, his body swayed the tiniest bit - as if the awful words he might hear could knock him off his feet, never to rise as tall and straight again. His whole world rested on what the doctor was about to say, and as steady as he might appear, everyone else in the room with him knew it.

“Sheriff Humbert,” Whale spoke up solidly, reaching out a hand to shake Graham’s, “you’re the proud father of twins. Fraternals - a boy and a girl.”

He paused briefly as the other man’s face positively lit up - joy, relief, pride, anxiousness and love all coming together in his expression as it transformed from the frozen mask of worry and fear it had held for the past several hours. The sheriff returned Whale’s hand clasp, shaking enthusiastically for several seconds before looking over his shoulder at Killian and Emma, and then to David on his other side. “Twins…” he repeated in a stunned sort of awe. “Can you believe that?”

Whale nodded in rather unnecessary confirmation, not seeming at all surprised by Graham’s excitement, nor his immense relief. “I’m sorry it took me so long to get out here with the news, but I wanted to make absolutely certain that Ms. French’s vitals had stabilized and that she was resting comfortably,” he continued seriously, giving Emma a nod of acknowledgement over Graham’s shoulder. “We’re honestly very lucky you had Miss Swan with you, to get her here quickly without allowing any more precious time to pass than it did, nor for Belle to exert herself any more than she had to for the delivery. As it was, those two bundles of joy took almost all she had. It was a lot of strain on such a small frame - and in such a wildly shortened timespan. I had feared I wouldn’t be able to give this promising an update, but she seems to be rebounding better than I could have expected. She’ll need to be careful to allow her body time to heal, take things slowly…”

By that point, Graham was nodding along in agreement with such attentiveness that Whale grinned crookedly; the expression both a bit unnerving and knowing, but which was nevertheless part of his eccentric charm. He chuckled easily and concluded, “But I think I can count on you, Sheriff Humbert, to make sure she does just that.”

Without wasting more time, he gave a few cautions and warnings, and assured Graham that he was free to go and see both his offspring and his partner, as long as he didn’t agitate or overexcite Belle.  It seemed that the feisty woman who had completely captured their Huntsman’s heart needed more rest than she even now wanted to admit. Shaking his head with the sort of amused and doting affection that was clearly going to become habit if they were to spend the rest of their lives together, Graham fervently thanked Whale for all he had done - shaking the doctor’s hand once more, so enthusiastically that the other man’s teeth clacked against each other loudly. Then he took off down the hall toward the elevators at a trot, too anxious to see his little ones and to reach the side of his lady love once again to be able to hold himself back.

Whale shrugged to Emma and Killian, a sort of ‘I expected as much’ expression on his face, and they grinned in return, largely just relieved to know for certain that the worst was over. Offering their own thanks as well as the sheriff’s, Whale nodded to each in turn and then spun on his heel to go back to his other patients and chores.

As his wiry form disappeared around a corner at the end of the hall, Emma at last released the tense breath she had still been holding. It was almost as if she had needed to know that Belle would pull through and there was nothing more she could - or should - have done differently before she could completely relax. Looking up into Killian’s clear blue eyes as she leaned into his side, Emma could see his affection clearly - and drew even more assurance and strength from him. For once, they had gotten the best possible outcome instead of their worst case scenario, as often struck them in the dealings with villains and magic that Storybrooke seemed to instigate. Everyone was going to be fine, and Emma couldn’t be happier - even if she did feel like she needed to hibernate for a month to regain the adrenaline now vacating her body and recover from the fear and shock that had gripped them all from the moment they arrived at the standoff until Whale affirmed that the crisis was over.

“Come, my brave lass,” Killian murmured gently into the downy-fine hair at her brow bone, gathering her closer still and taking the weight she let him bear as she leaned on him more fully. “Let’s go home.”

Emma nodded blearily, already feeling hazy and half-asleep. They paused momentarily to make sure that David and Snow had Henry with them and would bring him by later. All three seemed determined to see Belle and the new arrivals before they left the premises. Emma was excited too - as she knew Kilian was - but they could wait until tomorrow. Right now, she was practically sleepwalking and not functioning well enough to string together congratulations which would make sense. She wanted to transport them instantaneously to her bedroom, but was afraid she might make a mistake in her current state.

Instead, she focused on merely putting one foot in front of the other and let Killian steer her forward, out the doors of the hospital entrance and into the grey pre-dawn light.

Tagging a few who may enjoy: @kmomof4​ @jennjenn615​ @therooksshiningknight​ @laschatzi​  @spartanguard​ @gingerchangeling​ @resident-of-storybrooke​ @winterbaby89​ @hollyethecurious​ @darkcolinodonorgasm​ @ilovemesomekillianjones​ @revanmeetra87​ @teamhook​  @tiganasummertree​ @whimsicallyenchantedrose​ @searchingwardrobes​ @lfh1226-linda​ @linda8084​ @branlovestowrite​

[impalementation]

Not sure if you’ve talked about it before because I couldn’t find anything from tags but, what’s your opinion on Faith in each season and her dynamic with Buffy?

I’ve gotten a couple different asks in this vein! Sorry for taking so long to answer them, this response got out of hand. Consider this my official thoughts on Faith. Putting it under a cut because it got long.

I think Faith is a crucial addition to the show. Admittedly, she isn’t someone I spend a ton of time thinking about, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t interesting or important. I like Faith for two reasons: first, for how she affects Buffy, and second, for how she ends up transcending the role of “someone who affects Buffy.”  

Regarding the first, a lot’s been said about what a classic foil she is, as well as how she’s an example of doppelgänger-type anxiety. Faith is someone that, simply by existing, makes Buffy conscious (even possessive) about her identity, in ways she’s never been before.

Which is one of the big themes of season three: Buffy’s relationship to identity, especially slaying as an identity, and slaying as a symbol of identity. In Anne Buffy abandons her slayerness, abandons her life and name, and fights a villain that literally takes away its victims’ personhood (“Who are you?” “No one.”). She loses her powers in Helpless. Her slayerness makes her an object of social retribution in Gingerbread, and a hunted animal in Homecoming. In Lovers Walk she toys with the idea that she could leave Sunnydale and have an identity that doesn’t have to do with killing demons.

And then you have Faith, a slayer who is presented as an alternate version of/path for Buffy. When Kendra was introduced, the show didn’t do much to emphasize what she and Buffy had in common; if anything, the show emphasized the ways they were different. Kendra was more rulebound, less social, and had accepted the idea of being a slayer a long time ago. Whereas Faith regularly plays up her and Buffy’s similarities: “We’re slayers, girlfriend. The chosen two.”, “You know it could be you.” Buffy herself admits that “it could be me.” I think it’s pretty deliberate that Buffy in The Wish has a jaded, Faith-like swagger. Or that the season features the concept of alternate-universe selves in general.

(That said. Despite the fact that I don’t see Buffy and Kendra as foils to the degree that Buffy and Faith are, I do think season three features Faith for much the same reason that What’s My Line introduced Kendra: both are about being at a crossroads of identity. Buffy in The Wish is a bit like Kendra too.)

I posted before about how seasons three and four introduce the idea of Buffy making choices about who she wants to be, rather than choices about who lives and dies. And how Faith is central to that. Faith makes Buffy aware of choice by (a) being a slayer, meaning that unlike any other character, she’s under the same constraints that Buffy is, (b) openly having desire for things (food, sex, slaying), © making different choices than Buffy, and (d) tempting Buffy to use her powers non-heroically, whether in the Bad Girls sense, or by forcing Buffy to potentially kill her in Graduation Day. Also, by encroaching upon things that Buffy considers “hers”, like her friends, lovers, or family, Faith clarifies for Buffy that she even considers anything “hers” at all. In other words, she makes Buffy notice both her identity as it is, and her identity as it could be.

But for all that Faith has nice symbolic and dramatic reasons to exist, what I actually really like about the way the show uses Faith is that she becomes a character in her own right. It ties into the show’s existentialist themes in a really effective way. I know, I get tired of myself as soon as I bring up the existentialist stuff, but I don’t think it can be understated how existentialist Buffy is. It’s why Buffy is a vampire slayer specifically, even though most of the time she isn’t even fighting vampires. She’s a vampire slayer because vampires are the opposite of existentialism. They’re nihilism. They’re thieves of agency, identity, and life. By virtue of lacking souls, they are incapable of moral choice. They don’t age, they don’t mature. They’re the opposite of “growing up.” They fill the open-ended eternity of their existence with destruction and death.

(You might point to Spike and Darla as exceptions to this vampire symbolism, but I genuinely don’t think they are. Both characters realize that their vampiric nature causes harm to those they love, and this realization leads both characters to self-destruct. Darla by staking herself, and Spike by getting a soul…which also results in his death a season later. Them achieving the ability to make a true moral choice leads directly to them ceasing to exist as soulless vampires.)

To bring this back to Faith, I see something vampiric in the concept of a doppelgänger or foil, the idea of this empty vessel that takes your identity because they have none of their own. Someone whose identity exists only as a reflection of someone else’s. A grasping, black hole of self.

The problem is, a real person can’t be a foil. That’s a literary construct. In real life, seeing yourself as a reflection or extension of someone else just means that you’re afraid of creating your own identity. Maybe for good, understandable reasons, and maybe not. Who Are You? is one of my favorite episodes because it makes this problem explicit. It turns Faith from an abstract foil figure into someone who literally steals Buffy’s identity, and is shown to not have a solid sense of self. I posted earlier about the similarities between Anne and Who Are You?, but I like those similarities not just because they create thematic continuity around identity-related ideas. I like them because there’s this kind of awful, tragic irony to the fact that even Faith’s identity crisis episode uses pieces from Buffy’s arc.

Speaking of using pieces from Buffy’s arc, I also love the way that Buffy’s role in Who Are You? mirrors Faith’s role in season three. Just as Faith threw Buffy’s identity into relief, Buffy now throws Faith’s identity into relief. Being Buffy frees Faith to act in ways she wouldn’t ordinarily let herself, and being treated as Buffy forces Faith to confront whether she actually does or doesn’t want to be treated in those ways. You might say that by fully confronting the ways that she sees herself in terms of Buffy, Faith is able to start moving beyond it. The episode is basically an exorcism of Faith’s foil-ness.

Unfortunately I can’t speak very well to Faith’s arc on Angel since I haven’t seen most of it. Just Five By Five and parts of Sanctuary. But there are a lot of things I like about Faith’s return in season seven. I love that in her introduction she asks whether she’s “the good slayer now”, and when she and Buffy talk in End of Days she tries to pull a “maybe we couldn’t exist at the same time” thing. Because she’s literally talking about herself like she’s a literary device. But by this point she’s also developed enough that it’s only semi-serious; she’s quick to accept Buffy’s point that no, her choices were her own.

I think it’s perfect that season seven includes Faith, because season seven involves Buffy once again grappling with choice, and what it means for her to be the slayer. I think it’s perfect that Faith gets the opportunity to finally understand Buffy’s loneliness, and that the two of them are able to commiserate about being “hot chicks with superpowers.” Because it’s them finally getting to have their slayerness just be something that they have in common. Instead of this big complicated identity thing. It foreshadows Chosen, and the way that being a slayer goes from being something that isolates Buffy, to something that Buffy can share with people. I also really like the reversal of the fact that in Empty Places Faith isn’t the one who wants to take Buffy’s leadership away from her. She no longer wants to take Buffy’s role or Buffy’s friends. Instead it’s everyone else that is determined to perpetuate the idea that only one of them can be in charge, or that Buffy can be replaced. It fits with the way that the season frames isolation as not just a personal problem, but also a social and systemic problem. Even though Faith has grown past many of her issues, that doesn’t mean that the people around her have, or that the fundamentally, systemically solitary nature of being a slayer has changed. See also: Andrew mythologizing Faith’s background, and Caleb calling her the “Cain to [Buffy’s] Abel.” Of course it would be an avatar of the First that tries to get Faith to see herself as an archetype again.

Other things I like: The fact that Faith reveals to Spike that she was in Buffy’s body, because it’s yet another case of her finally owning up to being herself, instead of a reflection of Buffy. The fact that when the night out goes badly in Empty Places, it’s not because of anything that Faith did (that night), the way it was in Bad Girls. The fact that Buffy hands Faith a blade as an expression of trust in Chosen, a reversal of gutting her with a blade in Graduation Day.

Overall I just think it’s a really cool statement on identity that the character who was introduced to give Buffy identity issues, then has to go on her own search for identity. No one in Buffy is exempt from the project of self-creation, least of all the vampires and the doppelgängers. But it’s especially appropriate that Faith go on that journey because she’s a slayer, and slaying is arguably a metaphor for existential striving. It would be weird if she didn’t grow, really. She’s the rare case of the female redemption arc, especially a redemption arc that doesn’t involve her becoming less violent or sexual (or dead) afterwards. Just less unethical about it. She gets to play that role in a more-or-less gender-neutral way, the same way Buffy gets to be a hero in a more-or-less gender-neutral way. Buffy and Faith both start out as archetypes, and both end up humanized in a way that transcends and complicates those archetypes. 

[Your ask didn’t mention Buffy/Faith, but a couple others did, so: as far as Buffy/Faith goes, my feelings are the same as most Buffy pairings, which is that I don’t personally have any investment in it, but I can certainly see the appeal. It sounds like a fun thing to ship. I would’ve been totally on board from a story/character perspective if the show had ever tried to make them non-subtextual. Partly because I’d be on board with anything, as long as it was interesting. But also because I can see it making a lot of storytelling sense, given that Faith’s whole job is to shake up Buffy’s sense of identity.]

[philalethistry]

WELP my birthday month was a bit of a rollercoaster ride. I thought about the cons of posting this but I’d like to record it, so that future me can look back and, depending on how the future goes, either feel validated or be glad that this is over. Warning: discussion of crappy mental health.

TL;DR Breakdown results in will to live and fuck current events I have a recliner

I’m going to start with today, Sept. 1, and work back, for reasons.

Today I drove to a furniture thrift store. This doesn’t sound like much, but I A. hate driving, especially to new places, B. am already in a pretty anxious state, and C. I got lost because the road I wanted to turn on wasn’t marked, nor looked like a road rather than an alley, and so I somehow spent two hours trying to find one store. (At one point I had to stop and get something to eat because I had started shaking. The cashier watched me struggle to free two bills from my wallet and then declined the change I owed her to avoid making me retrieve that too. I wonder if she thought I was high...)

The important thing about what I did today, is I went out to find the store, and even when I did not find the store and ended up circling back to my street, instead of going home and having a sandwich and watching Youtube, I turned around again. I know it’s partially because of this video’s explanation of why one gets more nervous trying to do something a second time after procrastinating or running away from it, as I’d always pin the anxiety on my guilt, instead of a fear instinct which is more managable. But I’m going to give dopamine where dopamine is due and also say that my eventual victory was partially because of the newfound strength I have in the aftermath of the freak mental storm that enveloped the start of August.

I know that no one is doing “””okay””” right now, because of Everything, and that is nicely validating, because I am not okay either. But it’s dissonant, because I’d often follow the lead of neurotypicals and high-functioning depressives and anxious people when I’m in a bad way. If THEY say things aren’t as hopeless as I think they are, they probably aren’t! While that helped, it also downplayed my brain issues, and now that everyone has the same opinions on the State of Things, I realized I didn’t have any idea of how to confront the bad shit on my own, and neither does anyone else.

I’m technically still quarantining by refraining from making a lot of trips out and from getting a job, and so the murky pea-soup fogs of the future unsettle me. I was pretty chipper for the larger part of quarantine, as an introvert. Then one day, the thought suddenly occurred to me of the sheer amount of time I’ve spent in quarantine, how COVID isn’t receding from Arizona, how I had to quit the first job I’d gotten in the face of anxiety and depression, of how much of my future rests on the coming election, and most of all of how I have no idea what my future holds, of where I’ll be five or ten years down the line. “In the same place” and “Somewhere else” seem equally intimidating.

And then hormones struck.

I’ve had bad depressive episodes; I’ve had bad days of anxiety; I’ve had bad PMS; and then I’ve simply indulged unhealthy negativity. All of these, combined, made for a surreal and frightening experience. Emphasis on surreal. Also, contextually, emphasis on frightening, obviously. There were many feelings. Emphasis on everything.

My mental space may be a mess but I’ve never been too concerned with dwelling on life and death, even when faced with the latter. It’s never been a point of any interest to me; in the face of mortality I’m pretty good at giving importance to the present moment and to my internal values, like “science cool,” “mocha good” and “drawing fun.” In fact since childhood (third grade. Is this a normal third grader thing??) I’ve been a fan of cheerful nihilism, IE “There isn’t a secret meaning to the universe therefore I can give it any meaning I can make! Anything is possible, things are great!” I didn’t really grasp the concept behind existential dread, it sounded like something that happened to movie characters when the writers didn’t know how else to portray angst. Oh boy, do I have a new emotion I won’t be able to forget. My natural disaster of a brain supplied me, among everything I was already experiencing, three (3!!!) different categories of existential crisis. I had to look it up. And the weird thing about this Satan’s asscrack of an episode, is that while I’m prone to spiraling rumination, normally I can distract myself, because it’s still just me, thinking unhelpful thoughts. This time, these thoughts, the shittiest thoughts I’ve ever had the displeasure of producing, were automatic. I was not getting stuck pondering one bad topic; everything I saw became, in real time, entangled in the web of thought pattern in the most natural way. And it was LOUD.

Have you ever thought, “I’ll sit on the couch, the couch is comfy. The couch did not exist until a few years ago, its lack of existence had no impact on anything in any meaningful way, and when it turns to dust it will be forgotten.” Because I myself had a teensy bit of an inkling that maybe that ain’t normal. The thing is, I knew I was only feeling this way because, well, I Was Feeling That Way, it’s just the mood; but being stuck in isolation, and with everyone else also troubled by issues of the past, the present and the future, knowing that didn’t help.

I can remain in a depressive / anxious state for a little while, but the actual peaks only last at most a couple of hours. This was Mt. Everrest AND it lasted a week and a half. I was at the end of my rope a day in and had no idea what to do about it, so I tried to do everything. The physical present felt empty, so I tried to fill it with media, literature, art, walks, family time. Problem is, “anhedonia” - a symptom of depression where you don’t get dopamine boosts from activities - cuts pleasure out of these things, so nothing held my interest, let alone made me feel motivated or remotely better. Another symptom of depression, weirdly enough, is the feeling of disgust - I wasn’t conscious of this symptom until it was magnified. I felt completely and utterly repulsed by everything around me. I first thought it was the clutter, then the way the furniture was arranged, then I thought I’d been inside too long so I took walks in the neighborhood when nobody was out. The confusion came when I disliked the trees, grass, and fresh air too - I had to Google my feelings to find out what the heck was going on.

Which brings me to my bedroom. My room is littered with memorabalia, I’m sentimental so I have little shrines of items from the past and of things I value. Some childhood toys and a handful of old trinkets, shelves dedicated to Pokemon and Neil Gaiman’s work, some references to Chicago and Polish heritage. My unhappiness with the situations of the present, while strengthened to an totally unnecessary degree, weren’t all inaccurate - and in combination with anhedonia and disgust, and the way I’d integrated this memorabalia into my sense of self even though they aren’t really relevant to me anymore, I found that I really really didn’t like my past or reminders of it. In a shocking unpredicted turn of tables, I no longer wanted to uphold who I once was, because it isn’t who I am now, and it’s not who I want to be.

And the revulsion of the past and the uncertain emptiness of the present culminates in a future that I feared, another emotion booted up to eleven. There was a big need to make my future and remake myself. The only places left comfort could be found were ones I hadn’t yet looked. At the same time I became sad in a powerful but vague way and desperately lonely - this part was definitely all the feral hormones - and I became obsessed, for a little while, with making sure that, when quarantine ends, I would get my social life in order. I preemptively joined groups and clubs in my local area online, which I’m still going to make good on later but maybe not to the all-encompassing extent I had in my mind at the time. Also, career hunting. (Also also, to combat a lack of control, I wanted to get my own place - but with the economy like That, and my ass like This, big alone time while also being very poor and probably overworked is not the best of ideas.)

So. The freak episode ended. And I knew. Both during. And afterwards. That I Do Not Want That to Happen Again. To put it lightly. So now I’m trying to find an antidepressant that works for me. I’ve been medicated for three weeks now. Lower anxiety, not many mood swings, but still anhedonia, and the aftertaste of existential dread which will forever haunt me. I’m completely overhauling my bedroom, because it was messy anyway and has basically looked the same since forever which can’t be good for my mental health. So there’s going to be new bedsheets (chocolate), new curtains to kill sunlight because while I enjoy it outdoors it makes the room feel exposed since the window is groundlevel and faces the street, a whole ass recliner thrifted for only 20 bucks(!) to go in a brand new study corner along with a nice aggressively patterned brown rug, and finally the grody offwhite walls will be repainted a warm inviting brown that was named “spiced cinnamon.” No matter what happens, I look forward to spending the winter in the study, invoking a cozy comfort the Danes call “hygge,” and hopefully building my gallery or participating in my interests, including fandom, in another way. And, once my budget allows it, getting some fucking therapy, what the fuck.

[yasbxxgie]

Reggae Britannia (BBC Four, 2/11/11)

385 Willesden High Road is tucked away behind a row of dilapidated 19th century houses, its entrance obscured by high locked gates and a walled yard. But 385 is a treasure trove of reggae history. It's called Theorem, Music Village, and it's where we're recording several artist interviews for Reggae Britannia. As we arrive, there's a band in the studio rehearsing a romantic Lovers Rock number, there's a man up a rickety ladder painting the walls and another mopping up from an all night dance in the 'functions room' with its damp lino and garish red felt walls. T-Jae, the tall soft-spoken proprietor of what was once called BBMC (the Brent Black Music Cooperative) helps us with our camera gear. He's got coffee brewing in the kitchen beside an open can of condensed milk. Before T-Jae's time this was a leisure centre filled with rattle of pinball machines and the click of snooker balls - now replaced by the drum 'n bass of reggae rhythms leaking from the studio.

We're here to interview Dave Barker, one half of the Dave and Ansell Collins vocal duo who set the teenage mods alight, back in 1971, performing a novelty number called 'Double Barrel'. Dave's a quietly spoken man with a hint of a stammer. He tells us how, when he first came to this country (and he stayed here ever after) he peered out through the window of his BOAC plane as it banked over the smoking chimneys of the snow-covered houses below and wondered 'how come they have so many bakeries in England?' On the drive from the airport he was shocked at seeing white men digging the road and taking out garbage: 'Wow man, that was strange, you didn't see those things in Jamaica'. Nor dogs wearing winter vests, nor steak and kidney pies, nor that little sparrow he spied pecking the top off a milk bottle. He can't help himself: Dave sings a refrain from Matt Munro's 'Born Free' and segues into 'Summer Holiday'.

Dave arrived in the U.K exactly ten years before Theorem opened its doors to top British and Jamaican reggae artists passing through. Today, there's the legendary Max Romeo sitting on bench in the winter sunshine, his grey locks neatly tucked into a woolly beret. In 1969, Max brought his wicked song 'Wet Dream' to Britain and its risqué lyrics - which got it banned in clubs and on the BBC - made it an anthem for skinheads in dance halls all across Britain. He sings a few lines, diffidently explaining how it caused an 'upstir' among the rebellious youth of the time. He's a little ashamed of it now because, by the mid 70s, Max had embraced the wisdom of Rastafari. That was when he wrote and recorded some of reggae's most powerful and memorable music in the Black Ark studio of Lee Scratch Perry: 'War In A Babylon' and 'Chase The Devil'. When those songs arrived here, first as pre-releases and then remixed by Island Records, they inspired our fledgling roots reggae bands and then the punks and then Bob Marley too. Max intones a few lines from 'Chase The Devil', an ironic, cautionary tale that has been covered or sampled by dozens of musicians - including Jay-Z in 'The Black Album' - and was featured in the video-game Grand Theft Auto.

'I'm gonna put on an iron shirt and chase Satan out of earth' he sings. 'I'm gonna send him to outer space to find another race'. Max explains: 'The devil is the negative within the psyche. Chasing the devil means chasing the negative out of your mind.' There are people wandering in and out while he speaks; musicians carrying drums and guitars into this studio that's cold as a morgue, or dropping off an amp or a heavyweight speaker, or they've come to pay their respects to the master, with a hug or a high-five.

T-Jae comes sauntering by with a piece of carpet under his arm to help our sound recordist dampen the 'live' acoustic of the room (yes, we still have a sound recordist on our crew) and he tells me that among the band members in the studio today is none other than Bigga Morrison. Bigga's not a front man like Max, but a keyboard virtuoso and music director of renown. Reggae royalty. The band take a another break for a smoke in the yard and Bigga, immaculate in pin-striped suit and brogues, describes growing up in this country as a second generation West Indian: 'My parents had experienced troubles and threats on the streets, back in the '50s, with the Teddy Boys and such, but they wouldn't discuss those things because they wanted to keep you free from the pressures. But as we grew up, we took our message and our fight onto the streets with the roots and culture music we played in bands like Steel Pulse and Aswad.'

Later during the interview, I asked Bigga to show us how the British reggae producers, back in the early 1970s, added violins to the Jamaican imports to make them sound 'more classical'. Unfortunately, he's lost his glasses and so can't read the score. Tee Jay's on hand to send for a replacement pair. Bigga fills in time by playing us a delightful new track by his band the Skatronics, but when the glasses arrive, they're all wrong for Bigga. He wears them anyway, and peers astigmatically at the music for 'Young Gifted And Black' which is layered in symphonic-style strings. Bigga (educated at Trinity College of Music) explains how Jamaican reggae gradually transformed into a British musical experience, first through the dub sounds and conscious lyrics of hardworking roots groups like Aswad and then by the bands that went platinum: the 2 Tone crowd, UB40 and The Police. Bigga's being called back to rehearsals now, so we break for a late lunch. It's a choice of The New Golden Duck Chinese Take Away or the Caribbean place half a mile up the road. We do the walk and settle for salt fish and akee. Or rather, the others do. I choose the goat curry on plantains and soon regret it.

Back in Theorem, Bigga's at the keyboards and a couple of pretty female vocalists are delivering more saccharine Lovers Rock. And that's where we see Big Youth, in among them, gyrating his hips to the pounding bass and chugging upbeat of the guitar. He's chaperoned by a petite Italian lady from an artists' agency called Roots Rockers. She's Trish, and she's exhausted because they've only just returned from a nightmare flight from Spain. Trish is a miracle of calm and efficiency in the maelstrom of the struggling reggae business and it's clear all the artists adore her. Trish has offered us the opportunity to interview Big Youth, the toaster who excited British reggae fans with his revolutionary, rasta-inspired lyrics in the mid '70s. He's on top form today, his wiry body twisting and swaying in the interview chair as he sings lines from 'Hit The Road Jack', telling me how the great Ray Charles called him up one Christmas-time to admit that Big Youth's version was just 'the best'. 'Big Youth stole the scene,' he concludes. Modesty isn't one of Big Youth's virtues. But I can vouch for his status, and integrity. I first met him inside Randy's Record shop in Kingston Jamaica back in '77. He was checking out the sales of his album - visiting these record stores was about the only way an artist could tell how many were selling. He was as big a name as Marley at the time, and revered both on the island and over here. We met again - by chance - in Lagos, Nigeria, when he was on the run from some unscrupulous promoter. He's older and greyer now, but with no loss of energy, showmanship or sharp humour. And the red, gold and green implants in his front teeth are still there.

The filming days at Theorem haven't only been productive for our ninety minute programme, they've also been enormous fun. Maybe it's the familiarity and affection the artists have for this building, or maybe it's what they call 'the spirits' of the house: a combination of all those sounds and experiences imbedded in the cracking plaster walls, the creaky floorboards which once the feet of hallowed artists trod, or the reverberating bass you can hear down Theorem's honeycomb of corridors.

We'll be back here later in the week to interview the fiery, bubbly Lovers Rock singer Sylvia Tella, from Manchester; and Tippa Irie who came to fame DJing for the Saxon sound system, and maybe Dennis Bovell, the multi-talented producer/song writer and bass player, who did so much to anglicise reggae music in this country. Oh, and Trish says Dennis Alcapone's coming by, the dapper, bowler-hatted vocalist who brought a whole new style of toasting to these shores with songs like 'Guns Don't Argue': 'Don't call me Scarface, my name is Capone, C-A-P-O-N-E!'

For him, we'll haul our equipment boxes down the dark corridors of Theorem (we never could find the light switches, thriftily hidden away in recesses above door frames). Because we'll place him in a room, behind the studio, which is every reggae fan's dream, an Aladdin's cave of antique tape machines and mixers, and an expansive crimson casting couch. The wood-trim Rainderk desk dates from the early '70s when Reggae first exploded onto our pop charts with songs like 'Young Gifted And Black', bringing an upbeat musical thrill not just to those of Caribbean origin and the packs of skinheads who followed them around the country, but to the whole nation. This mixing desk was donated by Pete Townshend of The Who. It has made history since, recording reggae artists like The Wailers, Gregory Isaacs, Aswad, Janet Kay, Maxi Priest ... and so many more.

The traffic's slow on Willesden High Road as we leave the studios and T- Jae waves us into the evening gridlock and shuts the gates. Back-in-the-day, Theorem would be filling up with dreadlocked musicians and their natty entourage, ready for another all night session. Sometimes it still does, but with the proliferation of cheap home studios and a music industry in crisis, it's a whole lot quieter now. No sessions tonight. Just the rattling pipes, the whispering corridors, the vacant studio and the ghosts of British reggae history.

[reallylonglies]

Taylor Swift - Demon Hunter : Part 4

Blake was exhausted. She had work. She had kids to chase around. She had a husband. She didn’t have time to pass messages between a demon and a lightning rod like they were in a really messed up fifth grade class. 

She stomped down the stairs to Taylor’s gym. It was quiet there when Taylor was touring and she needed some time to get a little work done. She found a semi-comfortable seat and began to leaf through a script she’d been sent. It was quiet and cool in the gym, and the script was actually good enough that she found herself engrossed. An hour passed before she realised she wasn’t alone. 

There was a faint hum in the air and a warm, spiced scent. She slipped the script into her bag, took off her earrings and readied herself for a fight. Only two people had the combination code for the door, but all that meant was that whatever was in here definitely wasn’t a person. Tucking her hair into a neat ponytail, she called into the darkness.

“You can come out now, she’s not here. Just little old me,” her voice echoed, the comfortable cool of the gym had become spine-tingling chill. She felt the air moving around her. 

“A breeze in a basement,” she muttered to herself, “Happy Tuesday to me.” 

Suddenly, it was in front of her. She sensed it before she saw it. Every inch of her body told her to run and never look back. From experience, she knew that this was the most important time to stay completely still and focussed. The discomfort she was feeling began to take shape in front of her. Despite her thudding heart, she found herself rolling her eyes at the over-dramatic process of manifestation. She really didn’t have time for this shit, even if it was scaring the living daylights out of her. She needed those living daylights to get through the rest of her busy life. 

After a minute or so of overdramatic swirling, the spirit manifested in front of her. She’d never seen anything like it. Except she had, she’d seen something exactly like it, but she’d never seen that thing manifest in front of her. Taylor usually just entered the room through a door, not as a swirling cloud of vapour.

“If you’re trying to convince me you’re my friend, you’ve already made several mistakes,” she said, sounding nonchalant is second nature when you’ve spent as many years in teen dramas as Blake had. 

“I’m not trying to trick you,” it said, it’s voice was not right either. Taylor had a human voice, this was a low growl with a rasping quality that made Blake want to dive for a packet of vocal zones. 

“What do you want?” Blake asked, slowly moving her hand up her back, between her shoulder blades. She grasped the handle of the small dagger she kept there, and silently thanked Gal Gadot for inspiring this little trick. 

With unseeing eyes, the spirit tilted its head at her. The eyes roamed up and down Blake’s whole body as if they had never been set on a human being before. 

“She took my friend, put her in a song,” the figure circled Blake, Blake concealed the dagger behind her wrist. 

“What are you doing?” she asked it as it passed behind her, when it stood in front of her, she took a sharp breath. 

“Learning,” the word escaped from Blake’s lips in Blake’s voice. Staring in horror at the uncanny figure before her, the real Blake stifled a scream. She slashed with the dagger at the demon, who dodged, then looked down at her own right hand. It revealed its identical dagger. The stifled scream became a roar of frustration. Blake threw herself into battle for the first time in over a decade. 

*****

I don’t attend awards ceremonies as a rule. There’s enough awful people there, I don’t need to add any more malice to the mix. I once had to find one of my old apprentices at the Oscars, the stench in that room… it was like garbage, emotional garbage. Everyone in there has so much hanging on a little golden statue. And people mock me for my crucifix intolerance. 

I sensed almost instantly that something bad had happened to Blake. I don’t know what gave it away. Was it something she said? Something she did? The fact that she had obviously been replaced by a powerful fallen angel out for vengeance? 

One of those things definitely set my alarm bells ringing when I went to her with a message for Taylor. Fallen angels are honestly the worst because if you bump into one unprepared they can do a lot of damage. They can stop you manifesting, give you a headache or in this case they can force you to possess the husband of a good friend against your will. 

She gestured to him, cowering gently in a corner. 

“Get in,” she said, she’d really nailed the voice. 

I have to tell you inhabiting a human host is gross enough but this guy had only recently been exorcised and whatever slovenly spirit he’d been possessed by did not clean up after itself. Anxieties everywhere. Nightmares left unfinished. The guy even left an existential crisis just lying around for me to trip up on. What a hack.  

We so rarely talk about what it feels like to possess someone, allow me to describe it. It’s a little like tapping into a phone line except the phone line is the person’s physical presence in the mortal dimension. Unfortunately, the host is still using the phone line so you get a live feed of all their thoughts, and this guy was a big thinker. A lot going on in his mind. Gave me a migraine almost instantly. 

Walking the red carpet, I saw Taylor at a distance. Unfortunately there was no way for me to signal to her in front of that many photographers. I didn’t want to risk the exposure of the entire demon realm over something so small as a potential apocalypse. Also, any time that a person is working hard to perform the act of “being myself” it is actually surprisingly difficult for an incumbent Demon to take over. They’re too conscious of everything, all their boundaries are up. It’s sticky and gross and I hate it. 

Fallen angels love, love having their pictures taken. Ever seen those old-timey exorcism pictures? All that ectoplasm shit? Fallen angels, they love to showboat. As soon as they get in front of a camera they have to show off. If you look at any pictures of Blake from this awards ceremony, you might be able to see the image warping a little at the edges, or get a chill when you look at her eyes. 

So anyway, the red carpet probably was simultaneously the best and worst place to attract Taylor’s attention. Demon Blake was distracted having her picture taken. Great. Stupid human host Ryan was on his best “being myself” behaviour. Not great. 

As luck would have it, my host needed the bathroom. Admittedly, I had spent the entire afternoon making him thirsty in the hope that this would give me the out I needed. Slipping through the crowd, he passed Taylor and I pushed myself to the top of his psyche so that she couldn’t fail to hear my tune blaring out over the shouts of journalists and photographers. 

Her eye met Ryan’s and she filled with fiery rage. I fist bumped, there was no way she could ignore this. 

She stormed into the bathroom while my host was washing his hands. Another insignificant human squealed at her, she swore at him and he left in a panic. It wasn’t classy. I loved it. 

“You,” she fixed me with her hardest stare, “get out.” 

“You’re blocking the door. I’m also really not sure you’re meant to be in here. This is the men’s room and you’re not a men,” Ryan’s babbling continued until he looked in the mirror above the sink and saw my face beaming back at him, “Oh God, not again, how does this keep happening to me? Do I have a possess me sign on my back?” 

He was still chattering as I drifted gently away from his feeble human body and manifested next to him.

“Wait why is he wearing a tux, do demons wear tuxes?” he asked. 

“No,” I said, “It’s a special occasion I wanted to look nice. Do you always wear a tux, dumbass?” 

“No,” he asked, “Why do you look like John Mulaney?”

“It’s a passing resemblance, why do you look like Picasso’s biggest mistake?” 

Taylor interrupted our vocal sparring by aggressively grabbing me by my bowtie. I had manifested too solidly for that not to hurt. 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she asked, twisting the bowtie tighter. 

I made some garbled gasping sounds, she relented and loosened her grip. 

“Blake… fallen angel… very bad… big event… tonnes of demons…” partly I was getting my breath back, partly I preferred talking in bullet points. 

“How many?” she asked, taking a series of silver rings out of her garter and slipping them onto her fingers. 

“Sevent…” I deliberately mumbled the second half of the word. 

“Seventeen? That’s not so many,” she shrugged, I made a guilty face “Oh, seventy, that’s many, a lot of many. Is there anyone we can call?” 

Zendaya was out on a film shoot somewhere. Aniston was retired. Dunst had a lifetime ban because of the Bettany fiasco. I racked my brains. 

The door opened. Two figures in black suits appeared. 

“Miss Swift, pleased to meet you, we’ve heard a lot about you,” the one that spoke had a gentle accent and dreamy eyes, the other one was Keanu Reeves. 

“It seems you have a bit of a situation on your hands,” Reeves answered, “How can we be of service?” 

Taylor looked taken aback. I looked taken aback. Ryan looked deeply confused. 

“What the hell is going on? Why is Neo here with this tennis player? Are we giving Golden Globes to tennis players now?” these were all logical questions. 

“This must be confusing for you,” with perfectly applied pressure from his palm, Reeves gently put Ryan to sleep. The other guy caught the body and slid it under the sink, where they kept the hand towels and soap refills. Watching these two work together, stirred a memory in me, something from an impossibly long time ago. 

“Holy shit,” I said, “You’re Reeves and Federer.”

“Who else would we be?” Federer asked as he arranged some hand towels under Ryan’s head to make him more comfortable. 

“Wait, the Reeves and Federer?” Taylor chimed in, “I thought they were from like, the 18th century.”

“We are,” they answered in unison. 

Reeves and Federer: immortal vampires. I couldn’t believe they were still around, which in hindsight felt particularly foolish. They were immortal vampires, of course they were still around. 

“Alright,” Taylor and I didn’t have time to fangirl the way I wanted to over these two absolute heroes of the dark world, “I have a plan for this but it’s going to take a lot of work. What weapons are we working with?” 

Reeves and Federer opened their jackets. I gasped audibly. 

“What do you need?”

******

Blake woke in the gym, her hands were tied to a leg press machine. She rolled her eyes, and without even flinching, dislocated her thumb to break out of her bonds. She sighed, popped her thumb back in and straightened her dress. 

“Fallen angels,” she muttered, collecting her handbag, “Amateurs.” 

*****

Demon Blake waited for the ceremony to begin before starting her big show. The sound system began to crackle and pop like a nervous bowl of rice krispies. The host apologised for technical difficulties. The technical team shook their heads in confusion. 

The lights went out. A room full of expensive people gasped expensively in shock. 

“Silence,” a voice throbbed from the center of the room. Blake had risen to her feat and was glowing blue in the darkness, “Stand.” 

A bunch of bozos in suits stood up. Taylor sighed, we were concealed behind a thick velvet curtain. 

“There are so many,” she whispered, “Reeves and Federer had better remember the plan. Are you ready for it?” 

“I was hewn ready,” I replied. It was a lie, if I was physically capable of wetting myself I would have done. 

“Ew, that’s gross,” she answered as we watched Demon Blake rise into the centre of the room. I get telepathic when I get nervous. 

There was a shuffling sound behind us, Taylor turned, instantly ready for a fight. Blake, the real one, not the floating ball of demonic rage, appeared from the shadows. 

“Hey,” she smiled, “What did I miss?” 

“Oh, nothing, just that your demon twin is trying to take over the world,” Taylor answered as Blake rummaged in her handbag and changed her heels for comfortable pumps. 

“So, just another Tuesday then,” she answered, “Where do you want me?” 

“The tech desk, I need you to raise the curtain when Reeves and Federer give the signal,” Taylor kept her eyes pinned on demon Blake, who was now floating through the audience monologuing about mortals heeding her will or something. Typical fallen angel garbage, these guys are 80% propaganda.

“Wait,” Blake paused on her way to the tech desk which was hidden at the back of the room, “The Reeves and Federer? I thought they were a myth.” 

“Yeah, me too. Now it makes sense that John Wick looks so fighting fit at fifty,” Taylor gestured that Blake should hurry, the possessed hordes were beginning to bar the doors. 

Just as the tension in the room mounted to a peak, there was a loud shout from a balcony above the stage. 

“Hey, crazy demon!” the words were less than poetry, but they sounded so good in a swiss accent, “Possess this!”

He threw what looked like, but certainly wasn’t a tennis ball into the air, jumped and served. The point blank blow knocked demon Blake out of the air, she crashed dramatically into a table surrounded by influential aged filmmakers.

It occurred to me suddenly that I had no idea where he’d been hiding that tennis racket.

Taylor was still biding her time, she made her way towards the center of the stage, behind the curtain. 

Reeves had made his way to the middle of the room, gently bringing protective posessees to their knees on the way. It was good that he was used to hurting people without actually hurting people, that was working in our favour. 

Demon Blake saw him coming and aimed a bolt of lightning squarely at his chest. He dodged it, letting Quentin Tarantino take the hit. Boy howdy he was going to have a headache when he woke up. 

Federer had climbed athletically down from the balcony and was approaching Demon Blake from behind, apologising courteously as he elbowed his way through the crowd. 

Reeves cricked his neck as Demon Blake moved towards him, real fire blazing in her eyes. 

I’ve rarely engaged in hand to hand combat with a fallen angel. In fact, I would go so far as to say I have never in fact engaged in hand to hand combat with a fallen angel. It’s risky, and hard, plus in high stress situations I have a habit of turning into a cloud of greasy smoke so it’s difficult to keep up with the “hand to hand” thing. With that for context, let me tell you that I was impressed with how long Reeves held out. 

First she came for him with a left hook. 

He caught her fist in his and forced her backwards. 

She burst into flames and he was almost incinerated. 

Stumbling backwards, he pulled a chair out from under a possessed Jude Law and shattered it. 

He struck out with a chair leg and clocked her across the face. 

At this point she lost control and contorted briefly into her true shape, horns, wings and all. 

Taylor motioned to me to move to the orchestra pit. My part of the plan was, though I say myself, a big challenge. I was being very brave. Landing in the pit I centred myself and extended a telepathic field across all of the musicians. 

Just as I got the last flautist under control, I heard Reeves and Federer give the signal. It was meant to be “now” but it came as a slightly garbled scream somewhere in the vicinity of now. 

Luckily Blake got the message and the curtain on the stage rose. I connected myself with Taylor, a conduit for her to control the orchestra. She let out a single, incredible note. Demon Blake turned, dropping both Reeves and Federer to the floor. 

“You,” the Demon floated towards Taylor at an alarming pace. 

Taylor replied with a low hum, the orchestra started up, perfectly in tune under her control. 

“You hid my friend in that stupid song,” the demon had dropped its Blake disguise in its fury. Fallen angels, not pretty. Would not recommend this as a Halloween costume. 

Taylor started the song, the orchestra was building with her. I’d never heard this one before, it was incredible. 

The angel was uncomfortable, its tune was hiding under the verses, woven tightly into the chorus, but it fought back. Blue lightning flew out of its hands towards Taylor. She dodged, rolled and didn’t miss a line of her song. 

The Angel looked upwards as it began to weaken under the intensity of the music. Taylor nodded at me, as we had planned, I extended the telepathic field to include everyone in the room. Hundreds of voices raised in unison and the fallen angel writhed and glowed with pale fire. 

Reeves and Federer gazed up at the demon, Blake’s eyes were fixed on Taylor as she fought her greatest battle. In an explosion of fire and fury the fallen angel dissolved. The song came to an end, Taylor fell to her knees on the stage. Silence fell across the room, followed by a low whooshing sound as if a gale was blowing through the building. Seventy demons evacuated their influential hosts, eager to escape the wrath of the most powerful lightning rod they had ever seen. 

More silence, then Reeves clapping, Federer joining him, Blake whooping - the whole room erupted with applause. 

She stood, shakily. Smiled the same smile she had on her face the first time she vanquished a level five fire demon, and bowed.

As the applause died down, and I began gently wiping the memories of everyone in attendance. Taylor had a sudden flash of memory, she turned to Federer, who was folding napkins and straightening cutlery. 

“Did you leave Ryan locked in an under-sink cupboard?” 

“Oh, shit, yes,” he looked at Blake with panic in his eye. She was tucking into a tray of canapes. 

“Leave him there, it’ll be good for him,” she said, through a mouthful of salmon puffs, “I’ll get him out in an hour.” 

[k-thequeen-writings]

Fandom Quest ch 13

                                      F.E.A.R.; Face Everything and Rise

Standing in front of her house in the real world, Katy was confused, and surprised, that this is where it would happen. The hot summer breeze blew her hair and the sound of the water fountain on the front porch filled her ears as she walked up the driveway toward the side door of the home.

Passing by the windows of the dining room, she couldn’t help but want to look inside for any clues of life. Instead, she was being looked at by her reflection. She immediately stopped and stared at the woman in the glass who seemed to be an opposite version of herself; pure white hair, her skin as pale as snow, irises a piercing golden yellow - similar to whiskey in sunlight, and scleras as black as night.

“Hey, Katy-Bug,” the reflection cooed. Her voice echoed as she crossed her arms and a smirk graced her face. “About damn time you came. Although, at this point, I doubt you can do it.”

Katy snarled, eyes darkening as she stepped closer to the glass. It was obvious at this point that she wasn’t back in the real world, and that her spell had worked. “Don’t fucking call me that. It’s reserved for my mother alone.”

Her reflection put on a mock-hurt look. “Oh! That’s right, mommy’s girl. Sorry to make you all butt-hurt.”

“Who are you?”

“Awe, no small talk?” the woman asked, giving Katy a pouty lip. “Well, technically I’m the spirit, or embodiment, of your powers. But you can call me Vex, little bug.”

Katy took a deep breath at the nickname, shaking her head a bit. “So I’m fighting you, I’m assuming?”

Vex laughed, a wicked sound really, and the sky turned from day to night. The wind howled through the trees and the only thing Katy could see was the glow of Vex’s eyes. “Not yet,” she whispered with glee, glaring at Katy with a spiked tooth grin. “I haven’t had my fun yet!” Vex exclaimed, shattering the glass as she jumped out of it, tackling Katy to the ground and digging her nails, or claws if you will, into her shoulders.

Instead of instantly hitting the ground, Katy fell through the ground and into a void, Vex nowhere to be seen. She shouted for help, but no one could hear her through the cold pit that seemed never-ending. Of course, there was no one to hear her either. Gathering her composure, Katy squeezed her eyes shut and took a deep breath before the wind was knocked out of her as she suddenly landed on the ground.

She groaned from the impact, rolling over on her side to prop herself up. The smell of the air was a familiar scent, and one she didn’t particularly wish to smell again. Quickly lifting her head up, she looked around to see that she was in the arena on Olympus, the same place she had first lost control.

“Why am I here, Vex?” Katy called as she stumbled to her feet, looking around for the woman. Finally, Katy's eyes landed on her as she spotted her sitting on the balcony in front of Zeus’ chair, her arms and legs crossed.

“For your challenge, of course! Isn’t that why you’re here?” Vex glared down at Katy, her eyes still glowing. This was her domain, and Katy should tread lightly.

It was now Katy’s turn to cross her arms, matching the woman’s gaze, “It is.” Vex smirked once again, snapping her fingers to have Dean Winchester appear in the arena looking confused. “Dean?” She questioned, walking over to him, also confused as to what Vex had planned.

“Katy? What the hell am I doing in an arena?” he asked, walking towards her, the two meeting in the center.

“Don’t ask me! I didn’t bring you here,” she shrugged looking up to where Vex was just a moment ago to ask for clarity, but she was gone. “Not this shit again,” she mumbled, looking around for the woman.

“Now comes the fun part,” a whisper echoed around the arena before Katy felt a strong pain in her chest.

Yelling from the pain, Katy clutched her chest and fell to one knee, trying to catch her breath again. It hurt so much... Where did it come from?

“Katy! Are you alright?” Dean asked in a worried tone, placing a hand on her shoulder. “Do we need to get you to a doctor?” What doctor could aid them in a crisis like this? He still wasn't completely sure where they were. And to think someone could injure someone like Katy... He didn't know what they were dealing with!

Katy tried to speak and it wasn’t her words that escaped her, but Vex’s. “No, but you’re gonna need more than a doctor.” Katy wasn’t in control of herself, yet she was conscious of what was going on.

Within seconds, Dean was thrown across the arena and into the wall, leaving a crack in the stone and breaking a few of his bones, blood falling from his mouth as the wind was knocked out of him. He coughed out a breath and shook his head. Why was she acting like this?

“No!” Katy screamed, but the sound didn’t leave her head. Dean coughed again and Vex, using Katy's body, slowly walked closer to him as her nails grew to talons.

“K-Katy… Please don’t…” Dean begged, hissing from the pain as he tried to stand but couldn’t find the strength. The fear in his eyes stung Katy and she knew she couldn’t do anything to stop it.

Without a word, Katy picked him up by the neck and thrust her arm into his chest, piercing his heart. She pulled her hand out moments later, dropping his body to the floor. Katy’s screams echoed inside her mind as she fell to her knees, desperately trying to stop the bleeding. It didn't help. Tears threatened to spill over.

“You killed him!” she screamed, looking around for Vex.

The wretched woman was leaning against the wall, right next to the two. “Oh, he wasn’t as important as some of the others, so it’s no big deal,” Vex shrugged, nudging Dean's body with her foot.

Katy growled, quickly jumping to her feet and grabbing Vex’s neck, “Don’t you dare do, or say that again, do you hear me?” Her grip tightened, but the woman was unfazed and actually laughed.

“My dear, you should be the one you’re angry at. It was you, after all, who killed him. And Sam is next.” Katy quickly pulled away, feeling the pain her chest again after Vex had disappeared. “If you can manage to not kill them, little bug, you can fight me for the true prize.”

Sam had now appeared in the arena, having an almost identical reaction as Dean. “Katy? You look a little pale. Are you alright?” he asked, moving some hair away from her face so he could feel her forehead. He didn't see Dean lying only a few feet away and she was glad.

"No! No, no, no! Don’t make me do this!" Katy begged, her words heard only by herself and Vex.

“Then control it!” Vex snapped just as Katy had grabbed Sam’s arm, twisted it behind his back, and snapped it at the elbow, the limp bending in an unnatural position as he screamed in pain.

He shouted in pain. “What the hell?” he yelled, stumbling to his feet and rushing away from her in fear of another injury.

“You always run! I’m tired of it!” she snarled aloud, teleporting to the other side of Sam with her blade in hand and now bloody. Inside her mind, she whimpered.

It took only a moment for everything to kick in. Sam’s shriek of pain as he fell to the ground, his legs now cut off from the knee down.

"I’m so sorry!" Katy screamed, tears streaming from her face as she watched what was happening. There was nothing she could do.

“Katy, please listen to me!”

“Quiet!” she snapped, digging her sword into his head, killing him almost instantly.

Sam's body slumped to the ground and she stared listlessly at him. On the inside, she was thrashing and screaming. It was too much! Screams then escaped her mouth as she fell to her knees, mentally and physically exhausted.

Loki and Kate in Othos, who stood watch over her and made sure the spell went smoothly, jumped at the screams coming from Katy as she levitated close to the ground in a meditating position. The look on her face showed pain as tears came down her face and her body slightly shook.

“Kate! What’s happening? Is this supposed to happen?” Loki questioned. He wanted to rush to her aid, but he knew if he moved from his current spot, it would put her in even more danger. For all he knew, he could make things worse! Which was the last thing he wanted.

The two stood in circles connected to a bigger one in the center, where Katy was. Weird, intricate symbols were decorating Kate, Loki, and Katy’s skin, as well as inside the circles. The sun was starting to rise on day two of three.

“Don’t ask me! I’m not the one who knows magic!” Kate replied. She mainly kept her cool, but she was very worried about her friend.

Loki slowly turned his head and glared at the woman, dumbfounded by her answer. “You mean to say that you’re assisting me in a life-threatening ritual, and you are not trained in magic?” he yelled, groaning in frustration.

“No! I’m not, okay? Katy taught me what I needed to know to help her, and that’s it!”

The two continued to argue for another hour about their situation and Katy. Then they went quiet for a few hours, striking up a conversation the longer they stood together.

As the sun started to set on day two, Katy let out another scream and her body began to shake again, lowering closer to the ground. Her veins started to become visible and they blackened, starting at her hands and working its way through her body. As it progressed the two became even more worried for her. She wasn’t making progress, and if she didn’t complete the task, she’d die.

In her mind, at the center of her being, Katy was having the toughest time of her life. Her friends were dying… and she was the one killing them. All the people she's met across the universes and had a connection with… gone. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see a shirtless man, a woman with black hair and a blue military uniform, a redheaded female in a black skintight suit, and so many others. Her friends, they were all dead. She felt her stomach roll and had she eaten anything, or could puke at all, she would have.

Vex sighed. “Wow, Katy. Kate too? You must not have cared for her as much as you thought you did,” Vex tisked as she spoke, shaking her head at Katy who was kneeling on the ground, body shaking and covered in blood.

Katy snapped her head around. “Enough! I’m tired of these games, Vex!”

Vex growled, appearing in front of Katy and grabbing her neck. Her eyes glowed again as she spoke in a dark tone. “Don’t kill him, and you won’t have to kill your own mother. I’ll make sure she's the most brutal of them all.” With that comment, Vex disappeared again to reveal Loki a few feet away. Katy had gotten used to the pain in her chest now. It was the emotional pain that hurt more.

“Iro? Where are we?” he asked.

Without a response, Katy had teleported to him and grabbed him by the neck, lifting him into the air. This was all too familiar. Katy screamed and hollered, but nothing was heard.

Loki gasped for air, his face starting to turn purple from lack of oxygen as he desperately tried to make her let go. “Put… me down…” he wheezed, eyes starting to bulge.

“Enough!” Katy screamed once more, now hearing the words through her ears and not just in her head as she let go of Loki, quickly teleporting to the other side of the arena and sliding down against the wall. “I won’t do that to him… I’m doing this shit for him! I refuse to hurt him,” Katy spoke, breathing heavily as she stared down at her lap.

A clapping sounded and she flinched slightly. “Good job! You pass round one of two,” Vex smirked, standing above Katy with her arms crossed.

When Katy looked up, Loki was gone. She looked higher and matched Vex’s gaze, “What’s round two?” Her voice sounded emotionless, yet pained and resigned.

“You have to fight me,” she responded, the sky turning to day again as she prepared the arena for the fight. “Without your powers, though. You can have me when you earn me, got it?”

Katy gulped, groaning as she pulled herself back up to her feet. “Deal.”

In Othos, there were two minutes until noon, and Katy still wasn’t done. Kate and Loki’s worry growing by the second.

One minute.

20 seconds.

“God dammit!” Kate yelled, rushing towards the tree close by with the first aid kit. As soon as she left, the three felt a pain in their chest, and Katy fell limp to the ground, her body convulsing. 

“By Odin’s beard!” Loki exclaimed, quickly getting to Katy’s side, hoping just being there would help.

Kate rushed over and kneeled down. “Hold her still so I can give her these meds,” she explained, opening the bottle of medication and pouring ten pills into her hand.

“Wait!” Loki grabbed her wrist in alarm, keeping her hand away from Katy. “That will kill her.” That wasn't going to happen, not on his watch.

The woman rolled her eyes. “She’s a god, Loki. I doubt she’ll overdose.”

Loki stared at her intensely. Then gave her a nod, holding Katy down as Kate shoved pills down her throat followed by water to wash the dry capsules down. Only moments passed before she had stopped convulsing and the black veins started to disappear. Although, as the pills started to take effect, Katy’s hair turned pure white instead of its usual blonde. The pair shared a worried look.

10 agonizing minutes passed before Katy gasped, jumping into a sitting position and breathing heavily. Then she puked. Looking between Loki and Kate who both shared a sigh of relief, Katy pulled them both into a hug, a few tears falling down her face.

“I did it... Just barely, but I did it,” Katy whispered, finally letting go of the two.

Loki felt himself relax and sigh in relief. “Good to hear, but might I ask why the color change?” he asked, gesturing to her hair.

Katy responded by looking confused before pulling a lock of hair over her shoulder to investigate. The color startled her. Worried she might not actually be awake, she quickly got off the ground and ran towards the cars.

“Katy!” the two called, chasing after her.

It was a long-distance sprint to reach them and when she finally did, she looked in the mirror to see that she was, indeed, herself. Katy letting out her own sigh of relief. She was okay. She was awake. There was no reason to panic.

“Are you alright? What happened in there?” Kate questioned, reaching the woman first.

“I’m fine, not telling, and we need to get on to the next task.” Katy took a deep breath to calm her nerves, glancing over to Loki who looked worried. “Something the matter?”

“Yes. You just completed a three-day spell, and almost died in the process. Are you sure you’re up for something else?”

Katy took a breath, replying with a nod. “Yes, I’m sure. Now, we all need to get going. Kate, ride with us.” Katy told her friends, quickly hopping in the driver's seat. Without hesitation, her friends joined her in the vehicle before Katy sped down the path towards the military base.

“Woah!” Kate exclaimed, holding onto the handle above the door; more commonly known as the ‘oh shit!’ handle. “Katy, slow down!”

“No can do.” Her eyes never left the road.

Loki sat in the passenger seat, also holding onto the handle but his attention was fixated on her. Why had her hair turned white? Why didn’t she change it back? What exactly happened in there to cause those reactions from her? Too many questions jumbled in his head and too little time to have them answered. But he couldn’t deny he was glad she was conscious once more.

Within minutes, the group arrived at the military base, all three jumping out and running inside, Katy in the lead. Katy was panting a little, all three exhausted from lack of nutrients. “Kate, I need you to prepare the troops and have Loki help you.”

“What about you?” Kate asked as the made their way down the halls towards the lab.

Scientists and soldiers alike moved out of their way as the trio steamrolled past them.

“I have friends to recruit and a spell to learn,” Katy replied when they reached the doors of the lab, all three having to catch their breath. “Be sure to get some food. It’s not healthy to skip that many meals.” Katy told them, a worried look in her eyes.

Loki narrowed his eyes at the girl. “And you?” He had a feeling he already knew the answer and he wasn’t sure if he liked it.

Katy hesitated, pulling some of her newly colored hair behind her ear. “I’ll eat, don’t worry.” She was lying. He knew she was. “See you two in about an hour. Make sure you’re prepared as well,” she gave them a small grin before rushing in through the lab doors, making Kyoya jump and turn around to face her. “Kyoya! The big one ready?”

A surprised look crossed his face but he nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. When I come back, be sure to close the small portal get the big one up and running.”

“You got it,” Kyoya responded, typing in the coordinates for Katy’s destination. “Alright, we’re stable.”

Katy nodded, giving him a half-hearted salute as a response before she jumped through the portal.

After Katy had left, Kate sighed, slightly frustrated with the god. “Alright, Loki. Katy had something made for you. It’s in the safe at the castle, down in the basement,” Kate explained as she dug around her pocket for a piece of paper with a code on it, handing it to Loki. Before he could grab it, she pulled away a little, “Please don’t take anything that isn’t yours.”

A grin snuck onto Loki’s face. She obviously knew about his skill set. “I won’t.” With that, Kate handed him the paper. “I’ll return shortly.”

While he was gone, Kate sounded the alarm, causing the entire base to burst into a frenzy of scattered soldiers going to their designated positions and loading onto the helicarriers Katy had their engineers build. While they were loading, Kate rushed towards the dragons ‘lairs’ to get them loaded as well. Hestia’s assistance in the task would be invaluable.

In Magnolia, the home of the Fairy Tail guild, Katy rushed through the doors and as the doors hit the walls everyone’s attention turned to her.

“Iro? Is everything alright?” Makarov asked, standing on the bar in the process. “What happened to your hair? It’s white.”

Katy chuckled a little, trying to catch her breath yet again. “It’s a long story,” she stated, taking one deep breath before continuing. “No, everything isn’t alright.” That comment caused everyone to go quiet, waiting for her to continue. “I need you to teach me fairy law so I can save everyone.”

The guild’s silence was deafening. “You’re kidding, right?”

“I’m a hundred percent serious right now. If I can’t cast that spell, there’s a chance that everyone, not just in my universe, will die. I don’t want that to happen, even if it kills me.”

“Iro… you know what can happen when you use that spell without years of training…”

“My god!” she groaned as she ran a hand through her hair, frustrated by the delay. “I do! I just need you to teach me. I’ll worry about the consequences later.”

Makarov hesitated, looking around at all the guild members in the hope of seeing some kind of reaction. There was none and he sighed and nodded. “Alright. I’ll teach you.” Katy nodded in relief, thanking the man. “However, if this is something that could threaten my children here, then we’re going to help.”

Katy was quiet, staring wide-eyed at him. Was he serious? “You do know what that means, yes?”

“Of course we do!” Natsu, the pink-haired hot head interrupted, bumping his fists together with a grin on his face. “This will be a great fight, Iro! Just let us help.”

Katy couldn’t help but grin at his comment, giving in to their stubbornness.

Back in Othos, Loki had just gotten to the safe and gone inside, looking for his items that were said to be there. He ignored the various trinkets doodle-bobs in favor of finding what was his. Down on the bottom, there was a chest with his name on it. “Whatever could you be?” he mumbled, pulling the heavy box out from under the shelf. When he opened it, on the very top was a new helmet with his signature horns. He pulled the helmet out and set it to the side. Next were duel daggers. They were much longer than what he had used on Asgard, but were a little smaller than swords. The two were meant to go on his back when not in use. Attached to them was a note.

For the fighter who doesn’t use shitty butter knives as weapons.

~Iro

Another grin crept on his face and a chuckle escaped his lips as he read her words. Taking out the weapons, he pulled out the outfit. It was a black skin-tight suit of flexible armor, decorated in emerald green and gold with a green cape attached. He was grateful for the new attire, not even bothering to leave the safe before changing into it. The suit fit him perfectly and was very comfortable. The design reminded him of both his most recent attire during Ragnarok, and his attire back in New York years prior.

After he had changed, he hurried out of the safe to return to the base and assist Kate in preparations. “Need any more help?” he asked the woman who was now also in her own suit of armor. Unknown to him it was the very armor she’d used to take back the kingdom from Vortigern.

Kate whistled, looking him up and down before chuckling. “Well, I see why Katy wanted you to wear that.” Kate grinned at the confused look on Loki’s face. “I’m fine right now. We’re just waiting for Katy to come back.”

Loki nodded, staying quiet as the two walked towards the helicarriers. He knew there was an army, but he had no idea they were so prepared for what was to come. How long had Katy known about this? Perhaps she was a seer like the witches his mother had been raised by.

As the two were walking up the ramp of the main helicarrier, they heard Katy’s voice coming from behind. Loki was the first to turn around, spotting the white-haired girl headed their way. She was now also wearing a skin-tight suit that was identical to Loki’s, but with no cape. Her signature sword was on her hip and her hair was tied back into a ponytail. A pink tint creeping onto his cheeks as he watched her.

“Hey! So you found your suit,” Katy smiled, almost skipping into the carrier. “Does it fit okay?”

It took a moment for Loki to answer. After shaking his head, he cleared his throat, “Oh, yes I did. Thank you.”

Katy nodded. Within seconds, her eyes had darkened with determination and she blew a whistle, signaling the carriers to close the bay doors and lift into the air and through the portal. Walking over to the side of the carrier, she pressed a button to speak to Kyoya over the comm system, “Send us through. Don’t forget the guild hall is joining, so have them enter with the ground unit.”

“Yes, Ma’am. Sending you through.” Kyoya intoned. He muted his device and reached over to flick a few switches and press a few buttons before giving orders to those on standby.

Just outside the barriers of Wakanda, T’Challa’s army, and all the other Avengers were already in the heat of the battle. Thor, Rocket, and Groot were already there. The aliens swarming their position were starting to overcome them. It was a difficult battle.

“Are you okay?” Wanda asked, worry laced in her voice as she rushed up to Vision who currently was leaning up against a log, hand on his wounds. The man groaned in pain, the Infinity Stone in his forehead glowing and pulsing, sensing the others close by. “What is it?” she asked again.

Vision looked around, eyes wide before returning his gaze to his beloved. “He’s here,” he whispered, horror lacing his voice. They’d run out of time.

Leaves blew from the trees as the wind howled and the ground rumbled, drawing Steve’s attention. “Everyone, on my position. We have incoming.”

“What the hell?” Natasha mumbled. She looked around for the source and couldn’t spot their enemy. Where was he?

A crack of lightning broke the sound barrier and those who could turned to stare at the two portals opening up; one in the air and the other on the ground. The Othos ground team was the first to join the battle. It wasn’t just the military letting out a battle cry, but also the Fairy Tail guild. As everyone traveled through the portals, Katy had given them a pep talk, striking up the cheers for blood.

“We are going to strike down our enemy who dares threaten our existence!” she’d said. “Thanos and his army will not take our loved ones away!” Cheers and yells had rung throughout the helicarriers and the vehicles moving on the ground. “Today is not the day we lose to some genocide maniac. For us! For Othos! For the world!”

A cacophony of yells and cheers sounded all around her and she grinned. Not bad for her first battle cry. She looked down at the forest and grinned. Katy reached over and pressed a few buttons on the display next to her, tapping into the comms of the Wakandan assault below.

“Any know who these guys are?” Steve asked.

“They are not Wakandan,” T’Challa responded immediately.

“Miss me?” A familiar voice spoke through everyone's earpieces, causing a smile to appear on Steve and Natasha’s faces. “I brought some friends. Leave Thanos to me. You are not to intervene under any circumstances.” Katy’s voice was stern and demanding, something new to the group.

Steve chuckled at the answer, replying with a, “Yes, ma'am.”

As the bay door opened (the helicarrier still moving to the landing position), Katy walked up to edge, eyes stone-cold with anger and determination as she glared down to the spot in which Thanos would shortly appear. Loki stood only a few feet behind her, studying her and waiting for her to say something. Anything.

“Katy? My orders?”

Katy shook her head, snapping out of her daze and looking over to Loki, staring at him for what seemed like ages. Just do it, said her inner voice that sounded suspiciously like Shia LaBeouf.

“Ya know, Loki,” she began, walking towards him. “I do feel safe with you. And I do have feelings.”

As she reached him, she grabbed his suit and pulled him into a kiss. Her eyes squeezed shut and she felt his mouth move against her, causing warmth to spread through her. Loki was shocked and froze when she kissed him. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to bring her closer or get away and he didn’t have the chance to think it through before Katy pulled away, leaving the dumbfounded god in her wake.

“Your only order is not to die. Or I’ll kill you.” She grinned, walking back over to the edge, and standing with her back towards the opening. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and let herself fall off, falling through the sky with Hestia hot on her heels to catch her rider.

As Loki watched her leave, he heard a long whistle behind him. Knowing exactly who it was, he sighed in frustration, turning to look at Kate who had a smirk on her face. He pointe a single finger at her. “Not a word, Winchester.”

Bruce, in the HulkBuster, turned at the sound of a portal opening. Instead of Katy’s team coming through as he’d hoped, it was Thanos who emerged from the gray smoke and blue electrical surges. “Cap,” he said, “that’s him.”

Steve took a breath, activating his Wakandan shield once again. “Get Vision and everyone else out of harm's way. I’ll distract him,” Steve commanded, keeping his eyes on Thanos. “Go!”

Bruce hesitated, but when he was yelled at, he rushed over to Wanda and Vision, picking them both up and running in the opposite direction, “Everyone run!” Bruce called. The group took his advice and set off, Steve following close behind him.

As Steve was throwing the first punch, he was tackled by Katy, and Thanos was picked up and distanced a few feet away by Hestia before she flew off again towards safety.

Steve looked up at the god in shock. “Katy?” She had looked different from what he had remembered. Her hair had been bleached white, her eyes looked much like a color wheel, and it seemed as if she was much younger, a little heavier set too.

“I fucking told you to run!” she snarled, jumping to her feet and pushing him away in the direction of the others. “I’ll handle this.”

He gave her a doubtful look, worried that she’d get hurt. She was only one person. How was she supposed to handle him on her own? Goddess or not, Thanos had most of the Infinity Stones. “Don’t die, Katy.”

She didn’t respond, standing only with her back towards him and a sword gripped so tight in her hand it made her knuckles turn white. He hesitated a moment longer before he took off after his comrades.

“Iro,” Thanos sighed in frustration, clenching his fists as he walked up to the small goddess. “I’ve heard much about you from rumor, and I must admit I did not foresee you joining this battle against me.”

Katy only grinned, twirling her sword around as she walked closer to him, “Oh, I’m not just joining the battle. I’m ending it, and you, right here.”

With that, the small talk was over and they charged one another. When her sword met his gauntlet, the metals causing a spark and setting the nearby trees on fire, and the sound ringing across the sky. It could be heard all throughout Wakanda. Some soldiers without an alien stopped to ponder what the sound was before resuming the battle.

Next, Katy blocked his next attack and got behind him, slicing across his back and causing him to hiss from the pain. Only moments passed and Katy had missed, giving him the opportunity to strike her across the face, sending her rolling a few feet away. The woman groaned in pain, slowly pushing herself up onto one knee and wiping the blood away from her mouth as she looked to Thanos.

“Now, for the last piece,” Thanos hummed, attempting to create a portal to go and get Vision. When the attempt failed, the titan furrowed his eyebrows and turned his hand over, seeing that the space stone was missing. He then snapped his head over towards Katy.

Once Katy had his attention, she chuckled. Then she pulled down one of her lower eyelids and stuck out her tongue in a mocking manner. But there on her tongue, was the Space Stone. Thanos scowled and marched forward only for Katy to swallow the Stone. Her eyes began to glow and morph into an electric blue that matched the power of the Tesseract.

“You’re more troublesome than that Asgardian!” He picked her up by the throat, Katy wheezing as his grip began to tighten. “I’ll dig the Stone from your corpse if I have to.” He began to dig his fingers into Katy’s abdomen, her screams echoing through the trees.

“Katy!” There was no reply other than screaming. “I’m coming! Hang on,” Loki called to her.

He stood upon the saddle on Hestia’s back before grabbing the cable attached and jumping off. Branches smacked him on the way down and Hestia kept on going. He came upon her position just in time to see Thanos lift her off the ground and throw her into a large boulder, a resounding crack echoing in his ears.

Katy gasped and blood fell from her mouth as she impacted the large rock, a crack forming from top to bottom before she went limp, lying face down on the ground. Loki snarled and let go of the cable. He slid on the ground, blades drawn and sliced along Thanos’ calves. Thanos groaned in pain and turned around to punch him.

Katy’s ears were ringing and she could barely hear the sound of Loki’s blades colliding with Thanos’ gauntlet in the background. Pushing herself up a little, she looked over to see what was happening but her vision was too blurry for her to make it out. Groaning from the pain, she struggled, but managed to pull herself up on her feet, standing in a position to keep herself steady. “Thanos!” she shouted, causing both parties to stop and look towards her. “The only god here is me. And this? This is where the sun shines on us again.”

Loki gave her a curious look and Thanos scowled. Then the woman clapped her hands together, a burst of energy flowing outward in every direction. Loki gasped and covered his eyes, and as the force continued outwards, so did everyone else.

When the light dissipated, all of the enemies, on earth and in space, had turned gray; falling limp to the ground. Katy and the others were standing, but Katy was frozen like a statue, eyes staring sightlessly at the ground. Her hair was a jumbled mess, strands falling around her face, from the ponytail they’d once been contained in.

“Katy, you did it!”

Finally, she had dropped her arms, looking over in Loki’s direction, but it was as if she was looking through him rather than at him. Her eyes were almost lifeless and blood dripped from them like she had been crying the red liquid. The smile of relief on the trickster’s face was instantly replaced by a look of concern.

Somehow, the woman who could barely manage to stand started walking - no, stumbling - toward the place she knew everyone else was gathered, seemingly in some trance. “I… I need to help,” she mumbled. “I need to help… my people.”

Loki took a few hesitant steps forward. “Katy? Talk to me.”

She groaned in pain, grabbing the right side of her head as pain erupted and smearing the blood. “They’re in pain, I hear their cries,” she mumbled again, Loki gently touching her shoulder. “Get away!” she screamed, pushing him away and almost losing her balance.

“Iro!” Loki tried again, the girl gasped and stared straight ahead, eyes wide. She was frozen in place once again, but only for a moment before coughing up a lot of blood, along with the Space Stone before collapsing to the ground. “Iro!”

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The horrible sound kept ringing in Katy’s ears, driving her to the point of madness. It was all she heard and boy was it annoying.

“For crying out loud, someone stop that god awful noise before I kill myself.”

There was a soft scoff next to her, the man shaking his head a bit. “We just saved you after your last attempt. Could you please refrain from that?”

The quiet voice of the raven-haired Asgardian made her grin at the comfort she felt from it. Before long, his words finally clicked in her head. Eyes wide, she turned her head to look at him. The emerald eyes normally filled with mischief and curiosity were currently dark and tired, and the bags under his eyes didn’t compliment them one bit. His eyes were fixated on hers.

“Loki?” Katy was surprised that he was here and it made her happy to see his face first, even if he did look like shit.

“Good morning, Katy. How are you feeling?” He stood from his chair and walked over to her bed, sitting next to her legs on the bed. His movements were sluggish and stiff, almost like he had just woken up from a nap.

“I feel fine, thank you,” she gave him a grin, trying to sit up but groaning from the internal pain. On the outside, she seemed fine. The inside was where most of the damage was.

“Here, let me help.” Loki stood once more, placing one hand on her back and taking her hand with the other, pulling her up as gently as he could. Though she still groaned and winced. Once she was successfully up, he placed some pillows behind her to lean on. “Better?” he asked, sitting back down after she nodded.

The longer she was awake, the more she remembered from the most recent events. Although the one memory that kept bouncing around was what had happened on the helicarrier. The thought made her face turn red and her attention snapped to her lap, an awkward silence hanging in the air as she could feel his eyes still fixated on her.

“Thank you for stepping in, Loki,” she finally spoke, looking up at him with a small grin.

What she was hoping would happen, did, in fact, go according to plan. Loki grinned, shaking his head a little at her words. “No need to thank me, Katy. I had my reasons.” When he finished talking, he cursed himself in his head, turning to look at the door. The awkward silence falling over them again.

Katy sighed, looking out the window as she tried to come up with something to talk about. “Did Stark-” she was cut off by Loki’s cold hands cupping her face and pulling her into his lips.

She gasped slightly into the kiss, the action taking her by surprise. It didn’t take her more than a moment to relax into his touch, closing her eyes as she returned the kiss and feeling how their lips moved in sync. Though his lips were cold, they were also soft and somehow made her feel warm inside. Time seemed to slow and she wished the moment would last forever.

When he pulled away, they rested their foreheads on one another, both letting out a breath they didn’t even know they were holding. He dropped one hand to support himself as he leaned closer to her, his right hand still cupping her face as his thumbed gently rubbed her cheek. “Please worry about yourself for once,” he whispered, pulling away only far enough to look into her eyes again, their faces mere inches apart.

Katy scoffed, the smile appearing on her face again as she directed her eyes to her lap once more, but she didn’t retreat from his touch. “Loki… It’s not in my nature to put myself first, it never has been.” Her voice was small, like she had made herself vulnerable with him.

“Well, maybe you should take a lesson or two from me, min skjebne.” The two chuckled at his response, Loki kissing her once more before there was a knock on the door and the two pulled away. Loki stood with his arms behind his back. When the door opened, it was Stark’s face that popped in first.

“May we come in?” The door was only cracked, but Katy figured she knew who would be coming in.

“Yeah, you don’t have to ask for permission, Tony,” Katy chuckled, adjusting a little more with another groan, causing Loki’s attention to go back to her, worried she might need help again. But he was dismissed with a shake of her head.

Tony, Stephen, and both Peters walked through the door. While the others went towards Katy to talk with her, Quill stayed by the door with his arms crossed, not wanting any part of the conversation. His actions earned a glare from the god at the end of her bed. It was then that she realized that Loki wasn’t only there to wait for her to wake up. He was acting as a guard, which she found adorable.

“How are you, Tony? Shouldn’t you be in bed?” Katy asked in a worried tone, glancing over at Loki and then back to the others, giving them all a smile.

He shook his head. “We’re fine, Katy. And we came to thank you for doing what you did. I don’t know what would have happened if you didn’t.”

“But you did, didn’t you?” Stephen asked, crossing his arms. He had heard stories about her, but wasn’t sure what to expect or think when meeting the woman. “How, exactly?”

Katy’s smile faded as she looked over to Stephen, hesitating to answer. “That’s complicated. But the short answer is that I’m a goddess.” Exactly when, or how, could she tell them that in another universe they were only fictional characters? It wouldn't go over well with any of them. Well, she thought consideringly, perhaps Parker and Stephen would be fine with it.

“If you knew what was going to happen, why didn’t you step in earlier before Gamora was murdered?” Quill spoke up, earning glares from both Tony and Loki.

“I wasn’t able-”

“No!” he barked, grinding his teeth. “You weren’t able to? More like you didn’t. So why didn’t you step in earlier and save her? Why don’t you bring her back now if you’re this all-powerful goddess, Katy! We counted on you! She trusted you!” He was now closer to the group, almost like he was going to hit her or grab her shirt and shake her like a ragdoll from being blinded by his emotions.

She honestly couldn't blame him. Losing a loved one often sent people into rages that would normally never happen. Katy knew she'd be no better than Quill. In fact, she'd done the exact same thing when she threatened Zeus. Rage, devastation, terror… she knew he was feeling it all.

“That’s enough, Quill!” Tony raised his voice as Loki had put a hand on Quill’s chest, holding him away from Katy. “She did what she could to save us, Peter. She’s strong but she can only do so much.”

Quill shook his head. “You saw the scene she made! If she was able to kill all of those aliens single-handedly, why couldn’t she bring back one person? That’s all I’m asking here! Is that too much to ask?” he demanded, throwing his hands in the air as he scoffed at her reasoning.

“Okay - you’re leaving,” Loki interrupted, grabbing Quill and dragging him out of the room, the man protesting the whole way out.

The door slammed behind them and the room was silent, an awkward aura hanging over the group as they listened to Quill and Loki arguing, Loki defending Katy in the conversation.

“So,” Tony coughed, finally breaking the ice in the room and drawing Katy’s attention. “When’s the wedding?” A smirk spread across his face as Katy’s heated up. He found it funny when she was flustered.

She looked away. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Oh shut up, Katy," he groaned. "You’ve had a thing for him since New York. Plus, Kate told us about the little scene you caused on the helicarrier before you did a leap of faith off the bay door.” Her face only grew to a brighter shade of red the more he spoke, Katy fidgeting with her fingers. Before she could respond, they all jumped as Loki yelled at Quill outside the room.

“For Christ’s sake,” Katy groaned in frustration and pain as she pushed herself up off the bed, Peter and Stephen trying to get her to lay back down, but to no avail as she pushed herself by with a hand on her abdomen and a hand on the wall to balance herself. With Parker opening the door for her, she made her way out of the room with her weight against the wall.

“Enough!” she interrupted the two, Loki quickly moving to help her stand and telling her that she needed to go back to bed, which she ignored. “I’m sorry I couldn’t help Quill, I really am. When I’m healed, I’ll see what I can do to bring her back.”

“When you’re healed?” Quill scoffed again. “She’s been dead for almost two weeks already! I doubt she can be brought back at all! You should have done it when you had a chance.” He mumbled the last comment, crossing his arms and turning his back towards her. It was obvious Loki was pissed, judging by his grip tightening on her.

All of a sudden, a wave of dizziness hit Katy, the rise in blood pressure probably being the cause. Adjusting a little, she gripped onto Loki, quietly calling his name before she had passed out again, Quill also rushing to help. Despite his anger, she was still a friend and he did worry for her.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

After another week in the hospital, Katy was told she could return to her daily work but to take it easy. Of course, she said she would, but no one actually knew how much she would listen. Who was going to stop her when she wanted a latte that didn't come from the disgusting cafeteria? Certainly not them.

When she had a moment of peace, finally sneaking away from Loki for a solid five minutes, she called for Chuck, hoping he’d take her to his little bar. Her wish was granted when she found herself standing next to the man.

Chuck stopped his typing and looked up at her, slipping off his reading glasses and setting them on the booth’s table, gesturing for Katy to sit as he did so. “What now, Katy? I was in the middle of working on my autobiography.”

“Good to see you too, Chucky,” Katy said as she gave a grin, sliding into the seat across from him and resting her elbows on the table. 

“Please don’t call me Chucky, you know I hate those movies.”

“I have a request. I doubt you’ll say yes, but I wanted to ask.”

He didn’t respond, but only gestured for her to continue. “You want me to bring someone back to life?” he raised his eyebrows, surprised that she was actually asking this. Even with Seraphim and Alkestis, she didn’t ask to have them brought back. What was different this time?

“Yes. In exchange for my illusions, if you’ll allow it, that is.” Luckily, spending all that time with Sam gave her time to practice his famous puppy dog eyes that always worked on Dean. Why not try them on God and see if he would be weak to it as well?

Chuck groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose as he sighed. “I like how you know that using your powers won’t work on me, so you’re using your eyes,” he chuckled, shaking his head at her.

Katy let down the act, a smile appearing on her face. “Like it? I learned it from Sammy, figured it was worth a shot to try.” She laughed, leaning back in the seat as a serious look appeared on her face again. “I mean it though, my request. If you’ll allow it, it would mean a lot to me.”

He was quiet for a moment, typing a couple of words on his computer. “Alright, I’ll do it.” He snapped his fingers, giving Katy a smile. “You can no longer cast illusions, this is your permanent appearance. Your friend is alive and back with her group. Happy?”

Katy squealed, quickly getting up and going to give him a tight hug. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

“Yeah yeah!” He gently pushed her, chuckling slightly “go on, you have stuff to do.” Chuck snapped his fingers once more and Katy was back at the base in her office, Loki rushing into the room only moments after.

“Katy! I’ve been looking all over for you. Are you alright? Any pain?” Loki rushed up to her, cupping her face and looking her over for any injuries. The only thing visible was her signature scar.

“I’m fine, Loki,” she chuckled, giving him a small peck before pulling away. "I brought Gamora back.”

Loki only crossed his arms, raising an eyebrow at her. “What did you do?” he asked, a suspicious tone in his voice.

Katy chuckled awkwardly, rubbing the back of her neck and looking away from him. “I gave up my Illusions…”

“You what?” Loki shouted, sighing after. “Katy, those were important to you.”

“Yeah, I know. But Chuck let me keep the main illusion, I just can’t take it down anymore. This is how I’ll always look now.”

Loki’s eyes slightly darkened as a small smirk spread across his lips. “I’m not complaining, min skjebne.” His voice was deep and lustful, making Katy laugh a little.

“Not yet, my love.” She gently flicked his forehead before walking out to take care of some tasks. During her few weeks of absence, the stacks of paperwork were piling high. There were still many long nights ahead of her, but they were no problem.

~*~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Well, that was a killer chapter. Sorry (not sorry) Minecraftian! :p

~ K-The-Queen

Not compared to a few others I've worked on. I was just stubborn and didn't feel like editing.

~ Minecraftian1213

[lovehaswonangelnumbers]

New Post has been published on https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/gemini-new-moon-june-2019-seeding-one-of-the-most-important-lunar-cycles-of-this-game-changing-year/

Gemini New Moon, June 2019 ~ Seeding One of the Most Important Lunar Cycles of This Game Changing Year

FCGCT Commentary: We are moving from the mind, to the Heart… not the balancing of the two. The mind conflicts with the Heart, and is the cause for imbalance, pain, fear, suffering and more. It is the Heart and Brain which work in harmony together. The mind… the ego, blocks the Heart, as it Edges God Out. It is the Heart and Brain which work in harmony to allow Balanced Harmonics, your Divine Blueprint. Let go of the mind, and solely flow from the Heart, connected to the Unified Heart in Unity Consciousness.

Gemini New Moon, June 2019 ~ Seeding One of the Most Important Lunar Cycles of This Game Changing Year

By Marcia Sisterstar

Hello, Beautiful,

We’re on the home stretch now to tomorrow morning’s creation mystery. Within and around you, it will be hidden from sight. And it will carry the potential to shift everything. 

Each year of your life, the early summer Gemini New Moon brings a whole new way to see. This year, it’s power-packed and transformational. “Critical and catalytic” are the words astrologer Nick Anthony Fiorenza used to describe the lunar cycle now being seeded, within and around you. He’s right: the coming weeks are among the most important of 2019, our year of preparation — via transformation– for a shift unlike anything we have ever experienced.

Clues to our next infusion of transformative power literally saturate the chart for the New Moon — as they do every cosmic map, including the one of your own life. How could it be otherwise? The very essence of the Great Mystery you and I are woven into is mind-blowing, reality-bending transformational power, showing up in ever-new forms.. 

   The big magic’s latest live-stream to your own fertile and creative deep heart came alive this morning when Luna entered Gemini, 23 hours before she conjoins our Star tomorrow morning at 6:02 am EDT (that’s 10:02 GMT, and 3:02 am PDT). That first, potent degree of the sign of the Twins is where the brightest of the seven stars we call the Pleiades calls home. Her name is Alcyone, and the lore that links her to the power that transforms sorrow into bliss — the ecstatic bliss of the goddess — is so ancient it predates the patriarchy. 

From the moment the Dark Moon aligned with Alcyone, she began pouring those star codes into your emotional and intuitive intelligence. They’re the very same celestial frequencies that have been guiding your perception for the last 12 days,since Mercury conjoined the Sun on May 21 — and transformed himself (and the frequencies you use to perceive reality) from Evening Star to Morning Star. And now they’re going deeper, traveling the pathways of dream, intuition, and cellular knowing that connect you to the heart of all Universes. 

In the sky around you, our Messenger planet is now shining in the evening sky after sunset, as he will until July 8, when he’ll turn retrograde just days after our next new moon — a total solar eclipse. Mercury is not only reminding you that he’s now a Wisdom Star. He’s inviting you to join him in seeing through the eyes of wisdom.

For no other eyes except those of wisdom, MotherGod, are adequate to truly, deeply see the possibilities of these times.  And the timeless and ever-new wisdom of the Cosmos is pouring over us, throughout the lunar cycle beginning now int he same place that everything does. Every galaxy and every human being, every poem and every star, in fact, “all serious daring,” as the 20th-century writer Eudora Welty put it, “begins within.”

Tomorrow, the Messenger who’s been so recently transformed by Alcyone will guide the Sun and the Moon — and you too — to the luminous mystery where the ancient and ever-new wisdom of the Big Magic can transform your life as well.

But the Moon isn’t waiting til tomorrow. She’s already downloading the codes into your deep heart. She’s been doing it all day. 

If this sounds like a fairy tale, there’s a reason. The astrology of Now is the astrology of a fairy tale, the most spectacular one ever, unfolding within your own life and the world that holds it. Like every fairy tale, it’s full of very real menace and danger, pitting both heroine and hero against forces far beyond their power as they’ve always known it — and pushing them into an unexpected encounter with a different, utterly transformative kind of power to, one they’re connected to not through their minds but their hearts and souls. The turning point comes, as it always does, at the brink of doom. That’s usually what it takes to remember who we are — and what we’re part of — and tap a greater wisdom.

We’re gearing up, MotherGod, for the biggest magic of our lives. It’s right around the corner. Its impetus is sheer necessity. Its raw material is your current limitation and the illusion that you’re helpless.

In this potent dark moon field, the Sun is squaring Nessus, and breaking new ground for us all to see the patterns of abuse and domination on which the reign of domination in our world depends. In the sign of the Twins, our solar system’s great heart is reminding us that there is always another perspective, showing us a bigger truth. We have the power to transform the imprint Nessus has made on our lives, rather than let it shut us down.

Meanwhile, Venus is opposing Ceto, the sea monster. Here too, her power — which is also your, the power of what and why and how you love — can relate consciously to the monsters that live in the vast and often turbulent sea of human emotion. Anyone who’s spent half a day with a baby or a small child (not to mention our own selves) knows how quickly fear and rage can become monstrous, and how quickly they can be soothed, transforming. The power to transform our reality, beginning with the perception that we are powerless, is always with us.  

Tomorrow’s new moon is a magical gathering of Sun and Moon and a cosmic entoruage. They include the asteroid Magdalena and her Divine Feminine frequencies, the edge-dweller Altjira and the codes of the Australian aboriginal god of the Dreamtime, and the most newly named of the reality-changing planets orbiting in our solar system’s outermost, transformational edge — the first to be named for an African goddes, Gǃkúnǁ’hòmdímà, also known as Aardvark Girl, who often appears as either an elephant or a python.  

Mercury, ruler of the New Moon, opposes the Galactic Center, inviting us to bring our hearts into a more conscious and co-creative realtionship with the Mystery that made us, through the power of our alignment with what we know, in the depths of our hearts and our souls, to be true about life, and about ourselves.  When a planet aligns with the Galactic Center, it becomes a pathway for a power that our consensus thinking can’t begin to explain, a power described by words like miracle.

In the days to come, that’s a power we’ll want to be connected with:

June 4, Mercury (who’s out of bounds until June 17, and guiding the Sun until the June 21 Cancer Solstice) leads us through another perceptual shift when he enters the Moon’s sign of Cancer, where our evolutionary GPS is showing us the path to the good future — through our emotions, our intuition, and our commitment to all that is young, and new, tender and vulnerable within and around us. It’s time to bring the left brain and the right into harmony, and activate our whole-brain intelligence. 

June 8, Venus enters Gemini, a sign that she rules in esoteric astrology. With our desires and values will be guided by Mercury as he listens to the Moon, we have the opportunity to respond to life from a new and deeper level of personal integration.

June 9, the tension between what we really want and how we’re going after it intensifies as Venus semi-squares Mars and the Sun squares Neptune. We’re at a crisis point and our current level of inspiration is inadequate to the task. What needs to be dropped? What resistance needs to be pushed through? It’s time to let go of whatever disconnects us from Source. 

June 10, it’s time to connect to inspiration that’s true and real can we hold a space for wisdom and for grace that’s bigger than the challenges we face. When the Sun, still squaring Neptune, squares the Moon as well, and simultaneously opposes Jupiter, a very powerful and extremely tense mutable grand cross will form, giving us little choice but to tap in and ride the power of our purpose. 

June 11, we won’t be let off the hook until we’re motivated by our potential for breakthrough and let ourseves fall in love with our evolutionary destiny. The Sun’s semi-square to Uranus and Venus’ semi-square the Nodes will make sure of it. 

June 12, we get a double dose of duality — a deep and total look at how we embrace the other as co-creator or as adversary — as Venus opposes Ceres and the Sun opposes Varda, and Mars conjuncts the Moon’s North Node. 

June 14-15 (depending on your time zone), Mars trines Neptune, supporting you in taking action that is more deeply inspired, and opposes Saturn, confronting you with the necessity to be persistent, grounded, and willing to become wise. As Mercury conjoins the North Node, you can begin to see what that means.

June 16, the day before a Sagittarius full moon conjunct the supermassive transformational vortex that holds our galaxy together, the Cosmos pulls out the stops. The Sun trines Haumea, whose codes birth and rebirth the world, and conjuncts Chaos’ codes of the fertile, primal creation ground. Mercury trines Neptune, bringing a big wave of inspiration into our hearts, and confronts the reality of outworn structures as our Messenger simultaneously opposes Saturn. Jupiter perfects the second square in his long and powerful wrestling with Neptune that is pulling apart illusions so that we can hold a bigger space, for inspiration that is real and true. Venus squares Orcus, and we feel the values that are too small for who we vowed to be in coming here. As Mars as Pluto, we may feel ourselves wrestling with the angel who promised our soul to help us become the ones we came here to be. 

Only deep and simultaneous connection to the two poles of our being — the vibrant drumming heart of the Earth Mother, fed by the energy from throughout the cosmos she brings in through her magnetic poles, and the luminous mystery of the heart of hte Universe — can support you in remaining grounded and inspired in the days, weeks, and months ahead, MotherGod. Putting your bare feet on the Earth’s surface — every day if possible, for at least 30 minutes — can be reality-changing, bringing you into direct contact with the frequencies of the Mystery that made you, and me, and everything in the Universe.  

In fact, that’s a potent way to prepare for tomorrow morning’s sacred marriage of Sun and Moon — consciously connect to Earth and Cosmos. Let yourself feel the creative energies of both course from the heart of the earth through your feet to each of your chakras. Breathe those life-giving codes in deeply. Hold them in your heart and then slowly, slowly exhale through your crown chakra, all the way to the heart of the Universe. Breathe back in, across the starfields. Bring the cosmic creation frequencies into your own field, through your crown and into your heart. Hold the Universe there before letting the cosmic breath drop down, all the way through your feet to the heart of the Earth.  After you’ve established a rhythm, send both your dreams and your fears to both the Earth Mother and the Cosmci Heart — and receive the transformational codes of their response, as deeply as you can. 

Make no mistake, MotherGod. The dangers surrounding us are real. And so is our connection to the Mystery and its legions of allies, messengers, guides, guardians, and angels.  When we choose to change the game, we begin to discover how close they are, in every moment. We realize anew that the Universe is within us.

May you be blessed beyond measure as you move through the extraordinary days ahead.  With all the love, and star blessings,

Marcia (aka Star Sister)

~~~~~~~~~

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[dcarevu]

DCAU #20: Prophecy of Doom

“You gave him ten million dollars, sir? And to think I was fretting over the electric bill…”

Hey, guys, so lemme tell you about the craziest thing that just happened to me. There I was, dressed in my cloak at the DCAU brotherhood meeting. And the leader of the brotherhood, Nospoilerz, looked right at me and said, “You! Young man! You are in graAaAve danger! I see disappointment! I see pain! I see misery and woe!” I left the place scoffing to myself, not believing one word of it. But then I turned on Prophecy of Doom and I realized that this guy actually may have known what he was talking about.

Episode: 19 Robin: No Writers: Sean Catherine Derek (teleplay), Dennis Marks (Story) Director: Frank Paur Animator: Akom Airdate: October 6, 1992 Grade: D

Am I being too generous with that D? Because this is definitely my second-least favorite episode so far. It’s another Sean Catherine Derek/AKOM “classic” from season 1, and this just goes to show that sometimes reading the episode credits is all you need to do… Sigh… Bruce Timm himself has made certain remarks about both of these creative forces, citing AKOM as a subpar studio, and Sean Catherine Derek as a writer that would always try to throw in a big message, but could never really make it work in practice. We saw this in The Forgotten with the subject of homelessness, and we see it here again with the fortune teller who is actually just scamming people out of all their money. Yeah, she didn’t write the story of this one, only the script and such, but her fingerprints are all over the place when you break out the powder. Unless you’re a really good writer, a half-hour Batman show is just not a good way to get some of your important, socially-conscious messages across to the public. Who exactly wants to see that? Eric Radomski and Bruce Timm were going for a grim, crime-noir. Sean was pushing for a recycling bin and a god damn dog to be in the show, guys. I think recycling is as important as the next guy. And boy do I love a cute pupper. But this says a lot. Boy. Don’t you just wish that we got a whole episode about why we should should recycle? Just imagine how that woulda turned out.

We would see some of the “big, real world statements” taken on much later with Static Shock, and from what I understand, it often worked quite well. But this was after a lot of DCAU establishment. It also was a very different show than Batman TAS. Not to mention, well, Sean Catherine Derek wasn’t involved with Static Shock at all. I wish her no ill will, and I hope she’s happy writing for whoever she writes for nowadays, but the sooner these episodes we’re looking at leave her behind, the better. Reportedly, she clashed a lot with Bruce and Eric when it came to their visions for Batman the Animated Series, so overall I would say that she just was not meant to be part of this team, or wasn’t flexible enough to write stories that would suit this show.

I didn’t think he was legit until he showed me his kickass flyers!

Nostromos is the one-off villain of this episode, and I’m certainly not gonna be anxiously awaiting his return for a future episode. He’s a guy who supposedly has magic powers and the ability to read fortunes, but as we can tell from spending less than five minutes with him, he’s a big fraud. In this episode, it makes for some confusion as far as how we’re supposed to see and react to him. Mysterio from Marvel did this concept wayyy better because Mysterio was more frightening than this guy. At least back when I was a kid he was (yeah, I get it, he’s got a big bowl on his head)! With Nostromos, we, the audience, along with Bruce Wayne, are skeptical of him from the beginning, and the way he carries himself makes it really hard to feel threatened by him at all.

Top 10 DCAU guyliner material

“The vibrations are right for prophecy.” This guy offers a translation to a completely lost Bruce Wayne

“You are merely the eye trying to view itself!” explains Nostromos. Now this guy looks just as confused as Bruce is. 

Even after we come to the conclusion that he likely was responsible for the sinking of the gambling cruise ship. He’s just so silly and his plan is so uninteresting. And then we see that the other people involved in Nostromos’ brotherhood (a big group of rich/important people) are eating up every word that he spews out, and we get music cues and other moments that almost seem to try and make us take him seriously. It makes the people in this episode seem like absolute dimwitted fools, and how all of them managed to finesse their way to the top of the money tree with that kind of gullibility is beyond me. The tone is really mixed. And it continues to stay mixed throughout the entire episode. It’s just weird to see Batman, the strong creature of the night who always saves the day (not literally, saving the day at night sounds bonkers), be in any sort of danger, but then see everyone else being idiots and that the villain is just a big joke.

“You!!!” This was a pretty poor-looking shot, especially when you see it in movement. 

Bruce’s glass mysteriously shatters.

And what is Nostromos’ plan? Well, his main one is to basically convince the brotherhood that an economic crisis is right around the corner in order to get them to give him all of their money. Is that not the least creative place you could go with a crazy cult in a Batman episode? The least they could have done was made it so that Nostromos wants to kill Bruce for a specific, personal reason or something. Things do get a little bit crazier eventually, but in a way that’s almost as dull as everything else. Nostromos ties Ethan Clark’s (a friend of Bruce in this episode) daughter to this giant solar system display, where she is in danger of being crushed if another planet happens to collide with her.

Seems to me like he could have made things a little simpler if he had just threatened to shoot her.     

This sequence just doesn’t visually suck me in, nor did it with Char. She thought it could have looked a lot better, especially when it’s such a preposterous idea. The episode needs to do something for me to fall under the spell of the suspension of disbelief. It has been said that Akom just didn’t have the chops to animate this the way it was asked for. And trust me, I believe that. It hasn’t taken me long to understand the impact of Akom on Batman the Animated Series. But in my mind…even with proper transition from the storyboards to full motion, is this really a scene that I would have been asking for? Did I really want a conclusion where Batman jumps around on moving papier-mâché planets gone awry?

This is pretty much the best we got, folks

So yes, I do in fact agree with Char, this scene could have looked a lot better. But I also have to ask the writers whether or not this was even a good idea in the first place. And Nostromos causes the planets to spin all over the place, past their normal speeds, by beating on the control panel and breaking it. Why does whamming on a piece of technology not usually just shut off the technology? It always sends it off on a deadly rampage. By the end, Batman escapes, saving Clark’s daughter. And Nostromos gets caught by a stray planet from the spinning display as it lands on top of him.

Nostromos and his crazy plot are much like how Red Claw ended up being a few episodes back. Has potential, then does nothing worth remembering with it. Y’know, this episode also feels like a 70’s Scooby Doo episode. The villain seems like a Scooby Doo villain, has a Scooby Doo villain-esque plan, and even gets caught like one of Fred’s traps. And y’know how usually Fred’s traps are completely over the top, but ultimately the animation and everything keeps it pretty underwhelming? That was the whole climax to this one. It’s like Batman was Scooby Doo, wrecking the bad guy’s plan and managing to trap them. I really wish everyone on the Batman TAS team had known better by this point when it comes to what type of show they should have been writing. Clearly some of them were in on it, but not some of those stubborn ones. I get that it’s still season one, but this episodes wastes time. Instead, we could have gotten something much better in its pace. But these writers were here taking up staff slots, not trying their hardest to produce a really good Batman show. They were too focused on only pushing hard enough to create a typical Saturday morning cartoon show, or a show that displayed a moral, and it’s like, another show could be used for things like that. I think when Paul Dini or Alan Burnett wrote their episodes, they made it so damn evident that they were pouring their hearts into the scripts, and were actually trying to make something good, something they they would have wanted to see. They were giving the best to Batman that they could. This show was airing before I was born. And even if it were brand new, it wouldn’t make any sense to hold a grudge or anything on some of these earlier writers. The ones who didn’t utilize the potential of a Batman show like this. Because what these writers did was make the good episodes seem even better. Not every episode may have been ground-breaking in this series. But even with those which weren’t quite up to snuff, with those which didn’t elevate the animation landscape, we still got so many episodes that did, and they are why the cartoon is remembered as being so important, so influential, and so gosh-darned entertaining. Them, and Batman going, “Psyyyyychic energiiiees, Alfred”. I could listen to that on repeat.

One of our establishing shots of the episode, use for a prelude which ultimately doesn’t end up being all that significant for the story. But at least the jazz was nice!

I don’t believe that we ever actually get any confirmation as to whether or not Nostromos planted this. I’m surprised an episode like this didn’t take the extra step to spell it out for us.

Uh oh, don’t let the fish drown!

Ethan and Lisa Clark. Wonder if they’ll appear past this episode.

Total Scooby Doo villain vibes.

Here are the mugshots 

These keyboard sound effects, though. Let’s get some official Batman TAS ASMR.

Batman flees the falling elevator, not falling victim to Nostromos’ plot

This was a pretty shitty fight scene.

Were you even trying to avoid that swing, Batman? He even gave you some time to react before he swung!

This was a decent shot.

Kevin Conroy’s acting was a lot of fun here. He put a tremble into Bruce’s voice that we all know is Bruce faking, but that’s only because we know better!

The most disturbing moment of Batman TAS so far. This damn smile. Especially with the way his eyes move. And you’re telling me that Bruce couldn’t hold in this smile? It’s not like he saw the camera and knew we were watching. They shoulda had him wink right at us while they were at it.

Maybe the bit that saved this episode from an F

Or maybe it was specifically this ass shot. And you say you watch Batman for the plot.

This is the shot our climax ends on. Just take it in.

This one was harder to write for some reason. Could have something to do with the fact that I’m staying in some friends’ living room and sleeping on their couch with another person over spring break. Not to mention, I have to do a lot of this typing on the floor. But I hope it gave something worth reading regardless! Here’s to a smoother review for next time. They can’t all be winners. Much like the episodes themselves. 

Char’s grade: C

Next time: Feat of Clay (Part 1) Full episode list here!