#cause like you can tell right off the bat he very much loves jennifer and in the very begining of the book its like he loves jennifer

[this-doesnt-endd]

Okay so i bought the novelization book of back to the future and its been pretty neat so far not everything is the same as the movie obviously but there is some things that are different and I don't understand why. Cause im assuming it was written either in tandem or after the movie but also how it's going it feels like its based off a script right before the final script

[tw-anchor]

34. Guardians

Anchor

Stiles Stilinski x Original Character

Episode: 3x10; The Overlooked

Word Count: 6,474

Warning(s): Mature language, canon violence + gore, kidnapping, major injuries

Author’s Note: We’re gonna be seeing Olivia use her powers in battle! I hope you enjoy! Make sure to reblog, like, and tell me what you think!

Masterlist in Pinned Post!

Derek took one look at the bruising around Olivia's neck as she walked into his loft and ran over to her. "What happened to you?" he demanded, his eyes darting to Stiles and Scott and then back to her. He tilted her chin up in order to get a better look at the dark bruise on her neck. "Who did this?

"It was Jennifer," Scott told him. "She's the darach, she's the one killing people."

"And she took my dad," Stiles added angrily. "Yeah, and that was after she tried to kill Livvy and Lydia."

Derek's eyes widened only slightly as he looked back at Olivia. "Is it true?"

"It is," Olivia confirmed, her voice hoarse from the damage done to her neck.

Derek shook his head angrily and then sighed when Olivia winced in pain. He placed his hand on her cheek; Olivia stiffened as she felt some of the pain around her bruise disappear, and then saw it darken Derek's veins as he absorbed it.

"Thanks."

"I'm sorry, Ollie," he pulled her into a hug; he looked over her head at Stiles and added, "Sorry about your dad. Now that we know that Jennifer is the darach, we have to start planning."

"We sorta already came up with one," Stiles crossed his arms over his chest. "We figured that she would come to you and try to give you some story about tonight. The three of us will hide and when we come out, Scott will throw mistletoe on her and—"

"And we kill her," Derek finished.

"No," Scott said pointedly. "We'll tie her up or something. We need to know where Noah is."

Derek reluctantly agreed. Not long after, he and Scott heard Jennifer making her way up to the loft. Olivia, Stiles, and Scott hid behind the freestanding wall with a huge hole in it just as the loft door slid open.

"Derek?" Jennifer called, stepping into the loft. "Derek, where are you?"

"Right here," Derek walked out of the kitchen where he had hidden to be inconspicuous.

"Thank God," Jennifer sighed heavily and ran over to Derek, wrapping her arms around him. "Something happened at the recital. At the school..."

Yeah, you tried to kill me and my cousin, bitch, Olivia snarled in her head.

"...Okay, I need to tell you before you hear it," Jennifer separated from Derek to look him in the eyes. "before you hear any of it from them."

Olivia could feel Derek's tether starting to pulse angrily, trying to stay in control. She had to give her cousin props, though. He was focusing on his anger, like he usually did, and took control over it. In fact, his face didn't slip from 'concerned boyfriend' at all.

"From who?"

"Scott, Stiles, Olivia," Jennifer listed, and there's where she made her first mistake; she shouldn't have mentioned Olivia at all. Olivia had to fight to keep Derek in control, closing her eyes to concentrate. "They're gonna tell you things. Things you can't believe. You have to trust me, okay? You trust me."

Jennifer must have been more stupid than she looked. Why on earth would Derek trust her, someone he only met a month ago, over his own family. He wholeheartedly trusted Olivia—and even Stiles and Scott—and he saw the fucking bruise on Olivia's neck. Why would they lie about any of that?

Derek swallowed down his anger, his control much higher now that Olivia was helping him. "What is it?"

"Promise you'll listen to me."

"I promise."

Olivia grimaced as Jennifer smashed her lips against Derek's. The kiss didn't last long before Jennifer pulled away, looking at him suspiciously. Derek must not have responded to her kiss, which Olivia respected him greatly for.

"They're already here, aren't they?" she asked him darkly; Derek looked over to Olivia, Stiles, and Scott as they walked out of their hiding place. "So, they told you it was me? That I'm the one taking people?"

"We told him you're the one killing people," Scott spoke up, his voice firm.

"Oh, that's right," Jennifer chuckled mockingly. "Committing human sacrifices? What, cutting their throats? Yeah, I probably do it on my lunch hour. That way, I can get back to teaching high school English the rest of the day. That makes perfect sense."

"Where's my dad?" Stiles asked her, so angry and worried about his dad's kidnapping that he had tears in his eyes.

"How should I know?" Jennifer glared at Stiles before looking back at Derek. "Derek, tell me you don't believe this."

Olivia scoffed and rolled her eyes. "You're honestly the biggest idiot I've come across if you think that Derek would believe you over his family, his pack," she sneered angrily. "Where is Stiles' dad?"

Jennifer didn't even turn to Olivia while she spoke, staring up at Derek instead.

"Do you know what happened to Stiles' father?" Derek repeated Olivia's question.

"No," Jennifer answered firmly.

"Why'd you try to kill Olivia and Lydia?"

"This Olivia?" Jennifer pointed a thumb back at Olivia. "and Lydia Martin? I don't know anything about that."

"What other Olivia would I be talking about?" Derek raised his voice. "What do you know?"

"I know that these kids, for whatever misguided reason, are filling your head with an absurd story," Jennifer told him while glowering back at Olivia, Stiles, and Scott. "And one they can't prove, by the way."

Stiles angrily lunged toward her but at the last second, Olivia caught his arm, holding him back—which was very difficult because he was stronger than her. She did want to see Stiles rip Jennifer apart, but logically she knew it wouldn't be possible. Jennifer had already demonstrated her powers at the school and she had won.

"Other than bruise from the garrote you used to try to kill me, we have other proof," Olivia glared daggers at her, all the while trying to calm Stiles down. "Scott, show her."

Scott held up the large vial of powdered mistletoe that he got from Dr. Deaton. Jennifer faltered. "What is that?"

"My boss told me it's a poison and a cure," Scott explained while unscrewing the cap. "which means you can use it and it can be used against you."

Jennifer narrowed her eyes and snarled, "Mistletoe?"

Scott shoved the jar throwing, throwing out its contents. The mistletoe flew through the air, and it seemed like it was drawn to Jennifer because it mystically headed straight for her. Not a speckle of it hit the floor. Jennifer grunted and groaned at the affect the mistletoe had on her; her pretty face turned into something grotesque and scarred, like the Phantom of the Opera but much, much worse. Her groan turned into a high-pitched snarl before the mistletoe wore off and she turned back to her normal appearance.

She went to run, but Derek was faster than her. His claws appeared as he grabbed her by the neck and raised her in the air, her feet more than a foot off the floor.

"Derek, wait, wait!" she begged. "You need me!"

"What are you?" Derek's voice came out as a growl.

"The only person who can save your sister," she choked out; Olivia stiffened, wondering what she was going on about. What did Cora have to do with this? She had been injured by Aiden. "Call Peter. Call him!"

"Derek," Olivia called his name; when he looked over at her, she nodded. He couldn't kill Jennifer anyway, not when Sheriff Stilinski was out there and they had no clue where he was. "I'll call him."

Derek nodded back at her while she took out her phone and called Peter. He picked up the call quickly. "Hey, how's Cora?"

"Not good," Peter reported worriedly. "She's in and out of consciousness. She's vomiting up black blood, along with one other alarming substance..."

"Mistletoe," she assumed, glaring over at Jennifer.

"How did you know that?"

Olivia didn't answer; she hung up the call and watched as Derek, who had heard every word of the call, started squeezing Jennifer's throat. They could audibly hear the bones starting to crack.

"Derek, Derek, what are you doing?" Scott asked frantically.

"Her life," Jennifer gasped for breath. "it's in my hands."

Derek raised her higher into the air, causing Stiles to yell, "Stop, Derek, stop!"

"Stilinski, you'll never find him."

Although Olivia would love nothing more to see Derek kill Jennifer, they had to put a stop to it. Cora was sick, almost on the brink of death, and Noah was missing. "Derek, stop," she hurried over to her cousin and grabbed his free arm. "You can't kill her."

Derek snarled at Jennifer and let go of her, throwing her onto the floor.

"That's right," Jennifer said tauntingly, not even taking the opportunity to get her breathing back to normal. "You need me. All of you."

Bitch, Olivia thought before she stormed over to Jennifer. She formed a fist, reared her arm back, and swiftly brought it forward, decking Jennifer in the cheek. Surprisingly, the hit was strong enough that Jennifer's back hit the floor and a red mark appeared on her cheek.

"Shut. Up."

-

"You know, something feels wrong about this," Stiles mused quietly to Olivia and Scott as he pulled the Jeep into the hospital's parking lot. "We proved it to Derek but she still had this look like it didn't matter. You know, like it was all still going according to plan. You guys saw it, didn't you?"

Scott nodded at him while Olivia spoke up from the backseat, "Yeah, I did."

The hospital was pretty much evacuated due to the storm, so there were hardly any cars in the lot. Stiles drove up straight to the emergency entrance and parked behind Derek, who was under the overhang. The three of them got out and were immediately soaked by the downpour of rain. While Olivia and Scott hurried to the doors, Stiles grabbed something from the back of the Jeep and ran to catch up to him.

Scott eyed the bat in his hands. "What's that?"

"Well, you got claws, I got a bat!"

"What do I have?" Olivia asked him as they entered the hospital.

"You have me," at his words, Olivia shook her head fondly and nudged him with her elbow, earning herself a nudge back.

The three of them followed Derek, who had a tight grip on Jennifer, through the lobby of the emergency department. There were nurses scurrying around, packing up files and anything important for their patients to take with them to the hospital helping them out, and the last of patients' visitors leaving. They were just about to turn down the hallway and head to Cora's assigned room when Melissa ran into them.

"Scott, what are you doing here?" she asked her son worriedly. "The hospital's evacuating."

"We're here for Cora."

At Scott's answer, Melissa eyed Stiles, Olivia, Derek, and Jennifer. "What, all of you?" she paused when she saw what Stiles was holding. "Why does Stiles have my bat?"

While Stiles glanced awkwardly at the bat, Scott got his mom's attention. "Mom, just trust me on this. You need to get out of here, right now."

Melissa took a beat, realizing that something more serious than a storm was going on. "The building is supposed to be clear in thirty minutes," she told them somberly. "We've got two ambulances that are coming back. One's ten minutes out, the other's twenty. Cora needs to be on one of those. They'll be picking up in the basement garage."

Scott nodded. "Got it."

He joined the others once again and they kept walking. They made their way down the hallway and entered the elevator to head to the third floor.

"You don't have to keep me on a leash, Derek," Jennifer spoke up once the elevator doors closed. "I'm going to help."

No one spoke. Jennifer turned her head and glanced at Scott, who was giving her the evil eye, and then to Stiles, who was holding his bat threateningly while glowering at her. She rolled her eyes and faced the doors again.

The elevator dinged, the doors opened, and they walked out onto the third floor. Cora's room was the first on the right, but there was no one in there. All there was a large spot of black blood with mistletoe that Cora must have thrown up. There was little dribbles of blood, though, that trailed out of the room and down the hallway, stopping at a set of double doors.

They weren't able to take a step before they heard grunting. Then, out of nowhere, it seemed, Peter came flying head-first through the doorway, landing with a painful groan at their feet. "We got a problem," he told them, lifting his head to look down the hallway where he had come from. "Big problem."

Down the hallway, Ethan and Aiden had formed into Voltron-Wolf. They growled angrily at them and flexed their arms, showing off their combined form. Derek and Scott's wolf features popped out on command. Derek was the first one to move, growling as he raced toward the twins.

He smashed into them, head ducked down so he could hit their torso, but the twins slammed one of their elbows into his back. Derek hurriedly got out and rose to his full height, hitting a blow to their face. The twins didn't like that; they grabbed him from around the neck and started punching him in the head, over and over.

Scott took the twins' distraction as an opportunity to attack. He roared as he raced toward them, climbing up on the wall as they threw Derek to the floor, and jumping on them. While they fought, Olivia turned to Stiles.

"Get Peter and go get Cora," she told him. "I'm gonna help Derek and Scott."

"Livvy—"

"Just do it!"

While Stiles helped Peter up off of the floor, Olivia closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, bringing up her tethers to her pack in her mind. It was like a map which got better and better the more she developed her powers. Right now, her pack members' tethers were lit up around her in a circle. Scott's and Derek's were glowing brightly in gold and red, respectively, which meant that they were in their wolf forms. In between the tethers, there were two more red dots, almost on top of one another; Ethan and Aiden. Those were the lights she needed to hit.

In the middle of a circle, there was a purple sphere which represented her. She gritted her teeth and concentrated, hoping to blast the twins' dots with her purple light. Vaguely, she could hear Scott pleading with the twins and the twins responding back in their deep and almost electronic, Voltron-Wolf voice.

The purple light only got halfway to the red dots when they were on the move, running away from Scott's. She opened her eyes just as they passed her, running toward the elevator where the doors were closing with Jennifer inside.

"Ollie, let's go!"

Olivia glanced back at the twins only briefly before she ran toward Derek and Scott. The three of them caught up with Stiles and Peter, who had Cora thrown over his shoulder. Together, they all started running again, pushing through a set of doors that opened up to the morgue.

"Don't stop, don't stop!" Derek urged from the back, glancing behind him to see the twins only a couple feet behind them.

They were about to leave the morgue when Stiles stopped and held up his bat, hiding near the other set of doors where the twins would come through any second. Olivia and Scott called his name frantically, but he stubbornly stayed where he was. When the twins burst into the morgue, Stiles swung the back at them with all of his strength, only for the bat to splinter into pieces as soon as it made contact with the twins' head.

"Oh, fuck."

"Stiles, let's go!" Olivia waved him over frantically while the twins roared at him.

Stiles scurried away from them, his back basically up against the wall as he made his way toward the others. In order to distract the twins, Scott jumped up to the ceiling and grabbed one of the light caps, forcefully pulling it down so it would hit them in the head.

The lights flickered as they ran away from the alphas again, eventually turning off. Fortunately, only moments later, the generator buzzed to life and the lights blinked on.

Once their group were a few hallways away in the operating wing, they stopped in one of the rooms. Peter laid Cora, who was still unconscious, down on a table and Olivia hurried over, hovering over her cousin nervously.

Her hand shook as she reached for one of Cora's hand, hoping there was someway to help her, and Peter took it to steady her for a moment. While he did so, he asked Derek, "Where's the big guy?"

"He's not far," Derek answered, shutting the doors firmly behind him.

"What about Ms. Blake?" Stiles asked Derek; Derek could give no response and Stiles automatically knew that something was wrong. He turned to Scott for answers, who shook his head. "What do you mean? What does that mean? Like, she's gone? Scott, are you fucking kidding me?"

Olivia winced as Stiles voice rose in anger, knowing that he was taking it out on the wrong people. When Derek hissed at him to shut up, things went from bad to worse.

"Me, shut up? Me, huh?" Stiles confronted Derek, eyes glaring daggers at him as he got up in his face. "Are you telling me what to do now? When your psychotic, mass-murdering girlfriend—the second-fucking-one you've dated, by the way—has got my dad somewhere, tied up, waiting to be ritually sacrificed?"

Scott hurried over to them and tried to calm Stiles down. "Stiles, they're still out there."

"And they want her, right?" Stiles retorted. "Which means now we don't have her either, so my dad and Cora are both fucking dead!"

"Not yet, Stiles," Olivia let go of Peter's hand and walked over to Stiles, grabbing his hand tightly; Stiles only deflated a little as she turned her head back to Peter. "Is she really dying?"

Peter shook his head grimly. "She's definitely not getting any better."

"There has to be something we can do," Scott stated. "We have to help her."

The doors they entered through burst open and Jennifer dramatically walked in. "You can't," she declared. "I can save her and I can tell you where Sheriff Stilinski is but there is a pack of alphas in this hospital who want me dead. So, I'll help you but only when I'm out of here and safe. Only then."

There was only a second of silence before Derek was grabbing a cart near him and harshly knocking it to the floor so he could get at Jennifer. Scott was right there, grabbing him and pulling him back. "Derek, wait!"

"She was trying to get out!" Derek pointed at Jennifer furiously.

"I was trying to keep from getting killed," she defended herself. "You can't blame me for that."

Olivia shook her head and gritted her teeth. "If you want to make us think you're one of the good guys, then heal Cora."

Jennifer shook her head. "Not until I'm safe."

"I'd like to volunteer a different method of persuasion," Peter spoke up as he stared at her harshly. "Let's torture her.

Stiles pointed at Peter. "I'm down with that."

Cora nodded in agreement and Derek added, "Words for me."

Scott held Derek back once again as he tried to lunge at Jennifer. Only a second later, the overhead speakers squeaked on and Melissa started to speak.

"Um, can I have your attention," she sounded scared, which worried them all. "Mr. Deucalion...excuse me, just Deucalion...requests you bring the woman calling herself Jennifer Blake to the ER reception. Do this, and everyone else can leave. You have ten minutes."

The overhead system cut out and Jennifer shook her head. "He's not gonna hurt her."

Derek glowered at her. "Shut up."

"He won't!" she insisted. "Scott, you know why. Tell them it's true."

Realization dawned on Olivia, she knew what Jennifer was talking about. Earlier that night, Scott had told her that he was going to be a true alpha and that was why Deucalion wanted him in the alpha pack. He wasn't going to hurt Melissa and jeopardize having Scott on his side of this war.

Derek looked at Scott for an answer. "What does she mean?"

Scott didn't answer, so Jennifer did. "You're not the only one he wants in his pack," she told Derek. "Deucalion doesn't just want an alpha pack. He wants perfection. That means adding an Anchoram and the rarest of alphas to his ranks."

Stiles squeezed Olivia's hand tightly and Derek gave her a worried look as Peter spoke up. "A true alpha."

Stiles hadn't heard of a true alpha before. "What's that?"

"The kind that doesn't have to steal his power from another," Peter explained to him. "One that can rise by the force of his own will. Our little Scott."

"It doesn't matter," Scott said firmly, not liking the hungry way in which Peter was looking at him. "We still need to get her out of here."

Stiles pressed his lips together hesitantly. "Scott, your mom..."

"My mom said there's one more ambulance coming in twenty minutes," Scott stated, resolved in getting Cora to safety. "And I don't think we've been here that long, so if we can get down to the garage, get to the last ambulance, we can get out of here."

"The twins aren't gonna let us just walk out," Peter pointed out.

"I'll distract them."

Derek gave Scott a look of disbelief. "You mean fight them."

Scott shrugged. "Whatever I have to do."

"I'll help you."

"Um, sorry, but I'm not going anywhere without you, Derek," Jennifer interjected stubbornly.

Olivia rolled her eyes. They were helping her at the cost of not only their lives, but Melissa's life, and she had the nerve to be picky about who was going to escort her to safety. The audacity this bitch had.

"I'll do it," Peter volunteered. "But I'd prefer to be out there with an advantage."

"An advantage like what?" Stiles glanced at him. "You mean like a weapon?"

"Something better than a baseball bat."

The group—other than Cora and Jennifer, the lazy bitch—spread throughout the room to look for something that Peter could use to his advantage.

"Hey, wait," Stiles picked up some shock paddles and held them up. "What about these?"

Derek gave him a flat look. "Do you know how to use those?" Stiles shook his head. "Put them down."

At the medicine cart, Scott pulled out a huge needle full of clear medicine. "Epinephrine?"

"That's adrenaline," Olivia informed him. "That will only make them stronger."

Peter paused from his place next to Olivia at the shelves holding medical equipment. "How strong?"

"With that much, strong," Olivia told him and then paused, realizing what he was getting at. "It would help you. And with me out there with you and Scott, we might actually have a chance."

Scott nodded and passed the needle injection over to Peter while Derek protested, "You're not going out there, Ollie."

"I've forced the twins out of Voltron-Wolf once before," Olivia reminded him of the fight where they thought he and Ennis had fallen to their deaths.

"What if you get hurt?" Stiles was the one to speak then, giving her a worried look.

"I'll keep out of the way," she assured him. "We don't have time to argue about this. Peter, take the shot and let's go."

While Peter forced the huge needle into his chest, Stiles hurried over to Olivia and took her face in his hands, giving her a passionate kiss. "Be careful, please."

"I will."

"I love you."

"I love you, too."

Once the adrenaline had started its wonders and Peter was staggering from its affect on him, Derek and Stiles took Cora, with Jennifer following them, out of the other set of doors. Peter, Olivia, and Scott left through the ones they came in from and faced the twins, who were down the hallway.

"All right, boys," Peter raised his voice. "Let's rumble!"

Peter ran at them first, only to be joined by Scott in the next second. The twins easily threw Peter into the wall but then took a blow from Scott. Scott ducked as they fought back and he was fine, but then they swung again and he hit the floor. Luckily, Peter was up by that point and fighting once more.

A purple sheen fell over Olivia's eyesight as she brought up her tethers. She could see Scott immediately, his tether more orange now than gold—a hint of his upcoming true alpha status, she guessed—but Peter was a bit harder to find. As horrible as it sounded, she didn't think of Peter as pack. He was more of an absent father who came around only for his benefit or to make sarcastic comments—but, she had to give it to him, he had been around more for his family lately.

After two seconds of adjusting, she was able to find Peter, a blue dot on her map. Next to him were the red dots that represented Ethan and Aiden. She focused in on them and got to work, metaphorically blasting them with a sense of control over their wolves. They took a few hits but Olivia could still hear them fighting Scott and Peter, so she used more energy. She held up her hands in order to mock her energy spearing into them and the power she felt inside of her started to swell.

"ETHAN! AIDEN!"

Voltron-Wolf fell to the ground and within seconds, Ethan and Aiden were disjointed. Olivia and Scott took the few seconds to help Peter up from the floor and book it away from the twins. It wouldn't be long until they could control their transformation again.

"That shot didn't last very long," Peter breathed heavily, still not back to his regular werewolf strength and agility. "Those twins are really starting to piss me off."

The generator was turned off at that very moment. The hallways were pitch black and Olivia panicked because she didn't know how she was going to help Scott and Peter if she couldn't see in the dark like they could. It took a few seconds before the emergency lights came on but they eventually did.

"How they hell are we supposed to get past them, Kali, and Deucalion?" Scott breathed.

"I have no idea," Olivia answered. "It was hard enough controlling Ethan and Aiden's shift. I wouldn't be able to do it to the others. Oh, go here."

The three of them pushed into the cleaning staff's room and let Peter rest against one of the shelves. "Personally, I think if we keep letting them beat the living shit out of us, they'll tire and give up."

"Yeah, that's a great idea," Olivia gave her opinion sarcastically. "We need to get out of here before they're able to change back."

"I have an idea."

Olivia and Peter followed Scott's stare to where a laundry chute was nestled into the wall. Olivia and Scott let Peter go down the chute first. They didn't wait very long after they heard him drop into a laundry cart; Scott went first and then Olivia went soon after.

Peter groaned from their combined weight on top of him. "You couldn't have waited, like, ten seconds?"

Olivia's phone vibrated in the pocket of the hoodie she borrowed from Stiles as she tried to get out of the cart. Once she was steadily on her feet, she pulled the phone out and saw that it was Derek who had messaged her.

Derek: Jennifer and I are stuck in the elevator in between floors

Olivia frowned and texted back.

Ollie: Okay, don't move. We're on our way

Peter sighed at the look on her face. "They didn't get out, did they?"

"They stuck in the elevator," Olivia told him and Scott. "Okay, we should get Peter to Stiles and Cora so he can get some rest."

"And then we'll go find Derek and Ms. Blake," Scott nodded in agreement.

Once Peter and Scott were out of the laundry cart, they left the room, which happened to be in the basement, and made their way toward the ambulance that was still there. As they got to the door to enter into the garage, Olivia stopped them. She quietly explained that she could feel Ethan and Aiden walked around in their Voltron form. They waited until it was clear and then rushed toward the ambulance.

Olivia slapped her hand on the window in the back door and saw jump at their abrupt arrival. "Stiles," she urged. "open the door!"

Stiles hurriedly opened both of the doors and Scott asked him to help get Peter into the vehicle. Stiles reached for Peter and pulled him into the seat next to him before asking, "Where's Derek and Jennifer?"

"We have to go back for them and my mom," Scott told him.

"Okay, two problems," Stiles licked his lips nervously. "Kali's got the keys to this thing and I just saw the twins, like, thirty seconds ago."

As soon as he stopped talking, there was a loud bang that came from behind them.

"Okay, stay here," Scott ordered him before turning to Olivia. "Let's go."

Olivia and Scott took off once more, a lot more quickly than when they were dragging Peter around with them. Once they were back in the hospital, they slowed to a walk. They went up a level of stairs and started heading to the Emergency lobby to look for Melissa.

All of a sudden, Ethan and Aiden came out of nowhere. They forcefully pushed Olivia into the walls and grabbed Scott around the neck, placing him up high against the wall.

"Where is she?" they growled at them. "We're trying not to hurt you."

"Yeah, you say that but I'm pretty sure you just gave me a concussion," Olivia griped as she stumbled to her feet and leaned against the wall so she wouldn't pass out. "And you're currently choking Scott, so..."

"Yeah, try harder," Scott grunted, his hand trying to rip theirs away from his throat."

"Hey!" Melissa shouted as she sauntered on over next to Olivia with shock paddles in her hands. "I'd like to try something."

She shoved the paddles into Voltron-Wolf, making the twins' body shake the large amount of electricity making its way through their body. They fell to the floor and separated from each other.

Scott looked up at his mom in amazement, but Melissa didn't waste time to gloat about how cool she was. "Sweetheart, get up! Come on, both of you."

Olivia, who had gained her balance back, scrambled to help Scott to his feet. "That was so badass, Ms. McCall," she gushed as they all started running. "Oh, my God, you're my hero."

"Thanks, Liv, but I'm freaking out," Melissa said breathlessly.

"What did Deucalion do to you?" Scott asked worriedly. "Is he coming back for you or something?"

"No, he just let me go," Melissa told him as they slowed to a walk again. "said it was a gesture of goodwill. No other reason."

"He had to have a reason," Scott insisted. "I don't think he does anything without a reason."

"Well, if that means I should continue to be profoundly terrified, then don't worry about it. I got that covered," Melissa huffed anxiously.

Just as they were about to turn a corner, Scott stopped them. He took the lead as he cautiously inched forward—Olivia and Melissa right behind him—only to come face-to-face with a gun. Both their party and the gun owner's party relaxed; it was Isaac, Allison, and Mr. Argent.

-

"So, then, they're essentially trapped?" Mr. Argent asked as Scott finished telling him, Allison, and Isaac what exactly was going on. The six of them all walked into an exam room and hurdled around a table.

"Yeah, right," Scott confirmed.

From in between Olivia and Allison, Isaac spoke up. "But there's no way of getting them out without turning the power back on?"

"Wait, wait, wait, wait," Melissa hurriedly interjected. "if the power's back on, they're gonna hear the elevator moving, right?"

"Then they'll be on Jennifer and Derek as soon as it stops," Scott added. "We can't get int a fight with them."

"You've got us now," Mr. Argent assured them.

"It's too much of a risk," Olivia crossed her arms over her chest and bit the inside of her cheek. "They want her dead and if she dies, there's nothing that we can do for Stiles' dad or Cora."

Chris sighed and conceded her point. "I don't even think I know which teacher this is."

"She's the one with the brown hair. She's kinda hot," Isaac tried to describe Jennifer. When he got disgusted looks from the others, he backtracked. "No, it's just—just an observation."

Allison shook her head at him and faced back in front of her. Olivia saw her looking in the mirror across from them and studying her reflection intently. "I've got an idea."

Allison's idea turned into a plan, in which everyone would pitch in. It was simple; because of her likeliness to Jennifer, she would take the woman's shoes and run throughout the hospital before leaving through the emergency entrance. Mr. Argent would be waiting there for here with his gun and Allison's bow, which they would fire at the alphas when they followed her out. Olivia and Isaac would use the Argents' car and wait until the alphas passed a certain part of the hospital before going to the basement garage to get Cora, Stiles, and Peter out of there. Meanwhile, Melissa and Scott would go to the roof and turn the power back on, allowing Derek and Jennifer to exit the hospital safely.

"Okay," Olivia locked her phone after messaging Derek and slid it back into the sweater she was wearing. "Derek know about the plan and they're getting ready."

"All right," Scott nodded determinately. "let's do this."

They all took their leave, splitting up in different directions for their parts of the plan. Olivia and Isaac went back out into the storm to get into Mr. Argent's car. Isaac would be driving while Olivia would be looking at the feed on his phone to see when Ethan and Aiden would run past Allison's in the hallway.

"You ready?" Allison asked Isaac as Olivia held the camera up to his face.

"Yeah."

"You're not nervous, are you?"

Isaac sighed heavily. "Do I look nervous?"

"No, not at all," Olivia smirked at Allison's voice. It had the same tone she always used when she was lying.

Allison set her phone down in the hallway where she and Mr. Argent were currently sat up in.

"Did he look nervous?" they heard Mr. Argent asked.

"Terrified."

Isaac clicked his tongue, annoyed. "Yeah, I can still hear you very, very clearly."

"Just go as soon as you see them, okay?"

"We got it, Al," Olivia assured her. "Be careful."

"You too."

Just then, their group chat dinged with a text message from Scott. They were ready to go.

Allison started running around the first floor while Mr. Argent went to the emergency entrance. She doubled back around and not long after she passed the phone, Ethan and Aiden did as well.

"Isaac, go!"

Isaac pressed forcefully on the gas. They sped through the small parking lot by the basement entrance and into the garage, squealing to a stop right outside of the ambulance. Both of them hurried out of the vehicle and ran to help Peter, Cora, and Stiles.

"All right, come on, come on," Isaac urged them as soon as the doors opened. "Come on!"

Peter heaved Cora into his arms and ran to the car with Isaac opening the door for him. As she slipped her in, Olivia looked back at Stiles. He was reading something on the ambulance doors, a horrified look on his face.

"Stiles?" Olivia called for him.

He turned to her, almost panicked. "It's guardians, as in parents," he told her. "We gotta tell Scott."

Olivia nodded her head and then looked back at Isaac. "Go! Stiles and I are gonna go get Scott and Derek!"

Isaac nodded and slid into the driver's seat, driving away before Olivia or Stiles could take a step.

They sprinted through the hospital, passing through the emergency wing quickly. They had just turned into the hallway with the elevator when they saw Scott pause by it, staring at something. Stiles called his name but Scott took off again, entering the stairwell.

"Scott! Scott!"

Olivia paused when she saw that it was Derek in the elevator, passed out with no Jennifer in sight. Before she could think of what that meant, Stiles was grabbing her wrist and urging her to follow him up the stairs.

They made it to the roof, where Melissa was supposed to be, just in time to hear the monologue that Deucalion—who was on the roof alone, with no Melissa—had seemingly prepared.

"Guardians, Scott," he said as he gripped his seeing cane. "If you and Olivia were with me, I could have told you what it meant. I could have warned you. Let me help you two. Let's help each other. You and Olivia help me catch her and I'll help you get Ms. McCall and Sheriff Stilinski back."

Olivia glanced at Stiles, wondering if she should go with Deucalion for his and Scott's benefit. Their parents were taken by Melissa and she was willing to make a deal with the devil if it meant that her boyfriend and friend's family was safe.

Stiles shook her head at her and held her hand firmly before looking back at Scott. "Scott, don't do this," he called to his best friend. "Don't go with him."

Scott turned around to face Stiles and Olivia with tears in his eyes, absolutely devastated. "I don't know what else to do."

"No, there's got—Scott, there's got to be something else, okay?" Stiles pleaded with him, squeezing Olivia's hand tighter. "We always...we always have a plan B."

Scott shook his head. "Not this time," he declared. "I'm gonna find your dad. I promise."

"No!" Stiles shouted. "Don't do this Scott! Scott!"

But Scott had already made up his mind. He had joined the alpha pack.

(Gif is not mine)

[thecosmicjackalope]

It’s probably not gonna happen but you know what would be amazing for next episode?

Kiteman leaves without saying anything to Harley or Ivy, who are then left comforting each other about the situation. Both feel like pieces of shit and both are confused about how to move on. Days pass. Weeks pass. As the city rebuilds itself, Kiteman is nowhere to be found and there’s a wall between Harley and Ivy. Everything between them is awkward now because Harley still wants to pursue Ivy but Ivy is riddled with guilt and is still confused about her feelings for Harley and for Kiteman. The crew suffers through the tension, moving between helping them get through their shit and trying to find Kiteman. Ivy wants to find him and so does Harley, but there is still an undercurrent of jealousy from Harley because Ivy’s focused on finding Kiteman and won’t even talk to her about the future and “what happens now.”

During all this, Gotham’s abuzz with gossip about what they have seen and everyone’s taking sides (like how we all are in the comments sections). There’s a good portion of the population that are hounding Harley and Ivy about their “new relationship”, some people are spitting on Harley and calling her a home wrecker (especially Kiteman’s parents, which would kind of be a nice little way to nod at the fact that despite being assholes they do still stand by him), Ivy has people who are talking about how glad they are that she’s dumped “that loser” which fills her with even more guilt, and everyone is laughing about Kiteman, with some wondering about where he is.

The scene shifts and we find Kiteman out of his costume, grounded, without his kite, blending in with everyone around him and succeeding because no one sans Ivy has seen him without his get up. He wanders from place to place, never really going anywhere, sometimes dropping by old spots where he and Ivy had some moments together. He’s not eating, he’s sleeping too much, living like he’s already dead. He walks by a wedding venue and sees the happy couple kiss and look into each other’s eyes lovingly.

He forces himself to look away.

Eventually he wanders into THE PIT or somewhere nearby, feeling low as dirt, lost, confused. He still hasn’t said a line since the episode started. He’s hanging out in the wreckage and the waste, he sees a kite, or perhaps a little harlequin doll, or something that reminds him of what he’s lost. And he snaps, and starts stomping on it and having a breakdown when he feels a hand on his shoulder. He turns to see that it’s Bane. Expecting Bane to attack him or do worse, Kiteman - or, “just Chuck” at this point - welcomes death. Bane refuses. In fact, he sits down with Kiteman and the camera and the audio pans and fades away respectively as they begin to have a long honest talk.

Back in the city of Gotham, Harley and Ivy have one big argument with a lot of their ugliest feelings bubbling up to the surface and bursting out. Very harsh words are exchanged. They separate, leaving behind the crew, lost, confused and hurt that three people they care about are suffering so much. Ivy goes to be alone in a place she loves, maybe an old greenhouse. Harley goes to a carnival or maybe some batting cages to practice her swing. Each of them respectively are confronted by different people who have something to say - Ivy is approached by Catwoman who “had a feeing she’d be at her usual spot” and Harley is confronted by Batgirl and Batman. They all talk.

Batman talks to Harley about relationships and responsibility and knowing what you want and listening to other people, going off of his own failed romances with Talia and Catwoman respectively, possibly even acknowledging a budding relationship with Wonder Woman or Superman (or both, as, in a hilarious twist, their incident with Ivy’s pheromones lead to them questioning their relationships with each other and trying to be a poly throuple). Batman closes the convo off with saying that Harley has to face the music for the people she’s hurt, but also says that he’ll be happy to see her with someone who treats her right and encourages her to listen to her heart. Harley admits that she feel like she doesn’t deserve love and Batgirl argues that yes she does. She thanks Harley for some of her good deeds, and especially for inspiring her to stand up for the person she loves (her dad) and be his hero, the hero that Gotham needed, while Batman was out. And she closes her end of the conversation by telling Harley that no matter what she chooses, she will stand by her decision. Harley smiles and hugs her, and humorously, Batman gets dragged into the hug and hates the whole experience.

In their own space, Catwoman and Ivy talk. Ivy vents to Catwoman about everything that’s gone down and all of her feelings and guilt and confusion about it, and for once, Catwoman listens, without fuss, without sarcasm, without a word at all. When Ivy admits that she thinks it’s over between them and that maybe it was doomed from the start, Catwoman talks about her romance with Batman, how she always expected it to be doomed, caused it to self destruct and how very deeply she regrets that she let him get away and didn’t try to actually fix the problems in their relationship. She admits that she’s lonely and that she lives her life alone and that she enjoys it, but that it doesn’t come without problems. It comes with regrets. It comes with emptiness. It comes with too heavy a price sometimes. And she encourages Ivy, in her own aloof, standoffish way, that if Ivy really feels like she has something special with Kiteman and Harley, she should pursue it. She should be honest with her feelings about both.

So Ivy and Harley run into each other, and they apologize and tell each other what they want. Harley wants Ivy, and also to take responsibility for how she did Kiteman dirty and wants to mend her friendship with him. Ivy admits she loves Harley and Kiteman both and wants to talk to them both to see if they can all pursue something together, namely, if Ivy is romantically with both, and if Kiteman and Harley are okay with that.

But first they have to apologize and take responsibility for what they’ve done.

At that moment, Kiteman enters the doorway. He’s wearing his uniform, he’s got his things. Ivy and Harley are relieved to see him, but somethings wrong. They can tell something is wrong. He walks past Harley like she’s not even there and he talks to Ivy and tells her that he’s leaving Gotham for another city, somewhere where he can start over, somewhere with lots of wind to soar majestically or something or other. Ivy asks him why and he finally finally lets out all his hurt feelings. Without yelling or raising his voice, he calls her out on all her bullshit, stating that if she had just respected and loved him enough to be honest, they could have worked through it. But she didn’t. And to him, that was unforgivable. He says something along the lines of “ive been a joke to everyone around me since the day I was born. But I thought, for once, I found someone who saw me for who and what I really was. A person. When I met you, I finally thought I found my match, my partner in crime who I could spend the rest of my life with, who would be with me no matter what. But I was wrong. In the end.... I was just a joke to you too.”

Ivy is hurt by this and tries to apologize but Kiteman says he’s made up his mind and he just came by for closure and to give her a proper goodbye. Harley tries to apologize, Kiteman ignores her but does tell the others he’s out of the crew and flies off.

He takes one last look behind him, but he doesn’t look at Ivy. He looks at Harley, not with hate, or anger, but bitter disappointment and betrayal. And it’s at this point that Harley truly realizes what she’s done.

Since You’ve Been Gone by Kelly Clarkson, aka Harley and Ivy’s trademark wedding song request, starts playing in the background as a sequence starts to play. Ivy and Harley drift apart. The rest of the crew - Frank, KS, Clayface and Sy - all struggle with the loss of Kiteman. If Harley was the brains of the group, Kiteman was the heart, and without him everything feels colder. Life in Gotham goes on. Villains fight heroes. People rebuild. College kids graduate, and Joker and his new girlfriend witness the kids perform at a school play, with all of his goons in the audience cheering them on. Bane continues helping others. Nora, Jennifer and Catwoman pay their respects to Dr Frieze and leave flowers on his grave before going out to dinner together as friends (and yes, they all have Cobb Squad tattoos on their arms). Riddler still does his riddles but has started teaching a class for cardio at a local gym and is deeply enjoying it. The only job Dr Psycho can get is running and operating a Ferris wheel ride at the local carnival, which, ironically, he’s good at and he actually kind of enjoys, if only because it’s easy money. He watches as a short little girl JUST misses the height test...and uses his powers to alter the sign so she can ride, just so she doesn’t know the crushing disappointment he felt when he was a kid. (Humorously, When she inevitably falls off the Ferris wheel later, he casually catches her with his powers and sets her back down on the ground without even looking up from the porn mag he’s browsing.) Batgirl and Gordon play videogames together until something comes onto the police radio, after which they race to the roof to meet Damien and Batman waiting for them in a jet. Damien shows a flicker of jealousy towards Barbara, but there’s clear implication that the two will form a strong sibling like bond. Batman smiles at Gordon and Gordon smiles at Batman.

Gotham rebuilds. Life goes on.

But in the very last scene, as the song comes to a close, the crew disbands, and Harley and Ivy separate, with heavy hearts and too much baggage between them for anything, even their friendship. King Shark goes back to the ocean, ready to throw himself into his loveless marriage. Clayface leaves for Hollywood, ever hopeful that maybe someday he can become a true thespian. Ivy takes Frank and Harley takes Sy. As Ivy and Frank look on with teary eyes, Harley gets into her car and drives off into the sunset, and leaves Gotham city limits while crying her heart out.

And that’s how the season ends.

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Psycho Analysis: Liev Schreiber Birthday Special - Sabretooth, Kingpin, and The Storm King

(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS!)

Liev Schreiber is quite an actor, one that I think it is sadly easy to overlook despite his talent at portraying villains or other morally dubious characters. From his integral role in the Scream movies to his later numerous villainous roles, he manages to show himself as a rather skilled and versatile actor, particularly in regards to the latter; Schreiber is easily able to slip into playing a villain and deliver a fantastic performance… most of the time anyway.

The date I’m posting this on (October 4, 2019) is his birthday, so we’re going to take a look at three of his biggest villain roles to date: 

Sabretooth from X-Men Origins 

The Storm King from My Little Pony: The Movie

Kingpin from Into the Spider-Verse 

The first is a great villain trapped in an awful movie; the second is an awful villain inside a fun and enjoyable movie; and the third is a great villain in an outstanding movie.

Motivation/Goals: Sabretooth is, in short, a psychopath. The guy lives for the thrill of battle, and is never satisfied unless he has someone to kill. He’s a predator, using the numerous wars he and his half-brother Logan fought in throughout history to sate his appetite, but it was never enough. Vietnam is when he really lost it, and soon after that his relationship with Logan became tarnished, leading to their numerous conflicts throughout the film. It’s rather simple, yet it’s effective. This is what we want from Sabretooth after all, a bloodthirsty, murderous psychopath who crosses every line imaginable and who just really wants to make Logan as miserable as possible.

The Storm King is kind of approaching dominating Equestria as if it were a business venture, complete with merchandise. Beyond that, he’s a bit of a one-note evil overlord, with none of the complex motivations and characterizations of the other antagonist of the film, Tempest Shadow. He’s just here for some quick laughs and to be the final boss in the third act.

Kingpin has my favorite motivation out of the entire lot: once when he was battling with Spider-Man, his wife and child walked in, and in fear and horror they fled, driving off only to be struck by a truck and killed. Kingpin then shoveled as much money as he could and hired the likes of Doc Ock and Green Goblin to help create a giant dimensional portal all so he could be reunited with his family. It’s such a tragic motive that adds layers of depth to Kingpin, and ultimately makes him an interesting foil for Miles, who decides to continue fighting so he can live up to those he loses (Peter and his uncle) while Kingpin cannot accept his loss or his responsibility and so decides to damn everyone else in his desperate struggle to undo the damage he himself caused.

Personality: Sabretooth is easily the most simple of the villains, in that he is just a completely unrepentant monster who revels in the fact he is a vicious, remorseless killer. Normally a villain like that would be boring and generic… but this is Sabretooth. This is what we want out of him. Add in his brotherly banter with Wolverine and his single-minded desire to ruin Logan’s life at every turn, and he just ends up being a really fun and engaging take on the character, with Schreiber injecting just the right amount of soft-spoken sadism and menace to make Victor Creed pants-crappingly terrifying.

Kingpin is a sleazy, scummy mob boss. He’s another seemingly simple character, but his design really helps show what kind of guy he is without telling us. This iteration of Wilson Fisk really plays up him being a mountain of a man, with him being a hulking behemoth with a very bulky design. Despite being a normal human, he looks like the kind of guy who could kill a superhuman with his bare hands. Despite all this, he does have sympathetic  (but, and this can’t be stressed enough, not redeeming) qualities, such as his love for his family and his single-minded desire to be reunited with them. Of course, this desire is what leads to most of the troubles in the film, so he does show the dangers of that sort of careless and reckless pursuit of a goal is a bad thing, no matter how noble it seems.

Final Fate: The Storm King is the only character out of these three with a clear-cut fate, and it goes a long way to redeeming how bland the character is due to how out-of-place and dark it seems in the world of Friendship is Magic. In short, he is turned to stone, and his statue is allowed to drop to the ground, where he shatters into pieces. By all accounts, he is dead, a fate that seems to befall all terrible Friendship is Magic villains (cough Sombra cough).

Kingpin is the most open-ended, as after Miles stops him and in true Spider-Man fashion strings him up for the police. This does open up the door for Kingpin to appear again, which is a plus. The final showdown beforehand is a lot more interesting. The beatdown he gets from Miles, where Miles gets up from the pummeling that killed Peter and delivering a confident “Hey” like his uncle taught him right on Kingpin’s shoulder, sending him flying back to shut down his dimensional portal really is an  awesome moment for the film and Miles in general.

Sabretooth… it really is impossible to say. He apparently makes it out of this film alive, but Schreiber’s Sabretooth is so disconnected from the one who appears later in the timeline (mostly on the token that Schreiber’s take is actually good and memorable) that it’s impossible what to say happened to him. Further muddying the waters is the numerous canon retcons to the timeline as shown in films like Days of Future Past, which altered the timeline in baffling ways such as causing people to be born earlier than they would have been, and then there’s the deleted idea for his cameo in Logan… Really, there’s no telling what exactly Happened to Victor Creed, as the X-Men series is such an utter mess.

Best Scene: Sabretooth has a few, such as the awesome opening montage where he and his brother fight through multiple wars, but perhaps the best part is when he and Wolverine team up to kill that awful thing pretending to be Deadpool. The real Deadpool would beat them to the punch much later in Deadpool 2, but hey, at least he knew what had to be done when he had the chance.

Kingpin’s is almost definitely the scene where he kills Peter, which shows him going through a shocking amount of emotion, but there’s also the flashback to his family’s demise or even that moment on the train where he becomes a lifetime achiever in the Pontoffel Pock Awards by screwing up in every conceivable reality imaginable and disturbing an entire multiverse worth of his family in his quest to murder Miles. Few people screw up on that epic of a scale.

The Storm King… I don’t know. He’s kinda scary in his final battle? Maybe when he plays with the sun and the moon? Nothing really stands out for him super well, because quite frankly he is massively overshadowed by Tempest Shadow, who has the honor of getting the villain song of the movie. And let me be completely frank: if you are a villain in a musical, and you don’t get a song, you suck. Period.

Best Quote: For Sabretooth, it has to be this quote that really sums up who he is: “I'm not your friend. I'm an animal, who dreamed he was a man. But the dream is over. And the beast is awake. And I will come for you without mercy, because it's my nature.”

Kingpin is a little trickier, because Wilson Fisk is a man of actions, rather than words; I feel like he doesn’t have too many great quips, but he has a plethora of awesome actions. However, I DO enjoy his intro, where Schreiber just kills it with the delivery and establishes Fisk right off the bat as one hell of a crime boss: “Doo-be do. Doo-be do. Yub-yub, doo-bee do, doo-bee-do. Watch out! Here comes the Spider-Man! You like my new toy? Cost me a fortune, but hey, can't take it with you, right? You came all this way. Watch the test. It's a hell of a frickin' light show, you're gonna love this.”

For Storm King… well, this is kind of a funny line: “Here's the deal. I'm in the middle of a big rebrand here. "The Storm King" is tracking, well, as "intensely intimidating", but you know what? I need to back it up. You know what I need to back it up with? A STORM! THAT WOULD BE GREAT! You promised me magic that could control the elements, and right now, I'm holding a what? A branch. A twig. Bleh!” Kind of a reach, but I think he does have some decent comedic moments here and there, and his initial, er, phone call with Tempest is charming enough.

Final Thoughts & Score: These guys are really all over the place, but I think they really showcase Schreiber’s talents very well, as well as how to use him effectively.

Sabretooth is easily the best villain out of this bunch. While X-Men Origins: Wolverine is a terrible, bloated mess of a film, Sabretooth is one of the few redeeming factors, with Schreiber turning in a wonderfully terrifying performance as Logan’s arch-enemy. It’s frankly insulting they never had him come back to the franchise, because he was certainly far more deserving of a comeback than someone like Jennifer Lawrence. At least with Schreiber it was clear he cared about the character, which is more than can be said for whoever played the original Sabretooth (a character who is not even worth a Psycho Analysis; there’s just nothing to talk about there).

Really, the only major issues with Sabretooth are the fact that he’s in the bottom of the barrel when it comes to the X-Men franchise and the writing doesn’t do him many favors, but Schreiber is just acting his butt off to the point where it doesn’t matter, he’s selling it, he’s giving us the Sabretooth even the “better” first X-Men movie couldn’t deliver, and he seriously earns that 9/10. It should come as no shock that his take on Victor Creed is the one thing besides Ryan Reynolds fans truly love about the film.

Contrast the Storm King, who is just a depressing waste of potential. The prequel comics set him up to be something far more fascinating than what we get in the movie; he goes from a silly yet cunning overlord to a comical goober who barely gets any screentime, accomplishes half of his evil actions offscreen, and just leaves very little impression on the audience. Not helping is that he is by and large one of the biggest idiots ever seen in the Friendship is Magic franchise, backstabbing his own loyal followers for no good reason and basically playing with his hand revealed. It’s pretty telling that his henchwoman Tempest Shadow is the one who gets the villain song of the film (which, as I’ve pointed out, is a sign that he really, really sucks as a villain) and who is far more memorable, enjoyable, and interesting.

All that being said, I do appreciate the sentiment of the character, and I do like that Schreiber did it so his kids could watch something with him in it that wouldn’t make them scared out of their minds, and I don’t necessarily think Storm King is one of the most horrible villains ever or anything – he’s just boring and a waste of potential. I’d say he just barely makes it to a 3/10, and that’s mostly because he does have some amusing moments and how bad he is is offset by Tempest Shadow being such a fantastic antagonist; if she wasn’t in the movie, he’d easily be a low 2 and a lot less forgivable. That does seem kind of weird, but I think with a villain like Storm King where he’s just a simple goofball being played by a talented actor isn’t so bad as long as there’s an actual, serious antagonist. It doesn’t exactly make him any better but it keeps him from sinking to the rating of soomeone like Jared Leto’s Joker.

Kingpin is, quite simply, fantastic. I love his design, I love his motivation, I love how he just commands the scene when he walks into the room. This guy is just peak villain design, story-wise and design-wise. Some have taken umbrage with the fact that Kingpin is the one who got to kill Peter rather than a more personal foe like Norman Osborn, but frankly I like that they took a unique approach and decided to utilize a more unexpected foe of Spidey’s.

I think what’s best about Kingpin is just how they manage to make him a rather tragic and pitiable figure despite all the evil he does. Normally it would be a tall order to make the man who murders Peter Parker a tragic figure, but somehow the film manages, showing him to be a bitter, broken man desperately clinging to the tiny hope he could ever see his family again by destroying the dimensional barriers, no matter the cost. And if someone tries to tell him otherwise? Kill ‘em. Obviously this doesn’t excuse his actions, and the movie thankfully never pretends to, but I like that they made this Kingpin such a rich character in his own right, continuing the trend of Kingpin always being given a fantastic performance. Much like Sabretooth, Schreiber really earns the 9/10 with this fantastic vocal performance and just how impactful and even proactive Kingpin is in the story. He gets two major deaths to his name after all.

Liev Schreiber is such a fascinating actor, one who I think is so often overlooked and ignored. While he certainly is typecast as villains fairly often, I think it’s safe to say he excels at those kinds of roles, and he always manages to inject something unique into his roles. You wouldn’t confuse any of these three villains for each other after all.

[navpike]

it’s that time of year yet again folks! time for me to round up the lot of everything i wrote this year and throw it at you all like a proud parent! this year i managed to publish 217,613 words across 22 fics, with an untold number more unpublished (some of which belong to an original novel i started at the beginning of the year, and an autobiography i dipped my toes into as well!) let’s dive in! 

(a ** denotes some personal favorites!)

DC FICS:

Time And Again (28303 words) [batfam, bg dickwally, jayroy, superbat]:

Dick Grayson comes to live with Bruce Wayne on a Tuesday afternoon when he’s nine years old. It’s a Tuesday like any other, so Bruce settles the boy in and leaves him in Alfred’s capable hands after dinner and heads out for patrol. Gotham’s underworld does not take a day off, and therefore Batman cannot either. Dick awakes in the middle of the night and Bruce isn’t there. Alfred calms Dick down and sits with him and assures him that Bruce would have been there if he could and Dick believes him. Alfred's words can only maintain that belief for so long. Or, the one where Bruce doesn't tell Dick that he's Batman at first and things spiral out of control until people start communicating like adults.

Gold-Plated (1279 words) [batfam]:

It starts like this. Dick follows Jason into the cave, shouting at his brother’s back, while Jason roughly tugs at the release for his helmet. “I mean, I know you’re not going to stop dealing with all of your problems by shooting at them, but could you at least have the decency to not do that while I’m around? Could you at least pretend you still follow some sort of-” “Shut up!” Jason roars, whipping around to hurl his helmet at Dick’s head.

**Every Fiber of My Being (21376 words) [dickwally, batfam, bg timkon]:

As much as Dick and his siblings have argued, Bruce has never budged on his "Keeping Secrets Policy". There's not a person alive outside of the family that knows the secret identity of any of the Bats. Not even Dick's boyfriend. Dick understands the need for some secrets, knows that keeping their identities safe keeps them and their loved ones safe, but when he takes up the cowl, team dynamics aren't the only things that begin to change.

Tremble, Tremor, Shake (2118 words) [batfam]:

Tim doesn’t answer. He lurches like he’s going to go for the toilet again, but he doesn’t quite make it, instead dry heaving once, twice and then slumping against the wall again. Dick thinks that’s the end of it. He’s wrong. Tim slumps against the wall and immediately starts seizing.

**My Brain Occasionally Malfunctions (2243 words) [batfam]:

Dick was shot in the head. Such a serious injury is not without consequence. In which Dick's gunshot wound causes him to develop epilepsy and Jason has some thoughts on the fact that Dick tried to hide it from them.

Teenagers (1280 words) [dickwally]:

Dick and Wally have just found out that their twins have abilities and Damian's been training the twins behind their backs. Looks like everyone's revealing a secret tonight.

**Sign Your Life Away (23927 words)[timkon, batfam, bg dickwally, batcat, clois]:

The Wayne family is a good one, well known, well off, charitable, likable, politically unaffiliated. So when a treaty with Krypton is hinging on an arranged marriage, the Wayne boys are some of the first they approach. Tim is very, very aware that the name right underneath 'Wayne' on the UN's list is 'Luthor'. He can't allow some poor stranger to be forcibly bound to Luthor for the rest of their lives. So when they ask him, he says yes, before he can stop to think if this is actually a good idea.

MARVEL FICS:

**Project: Light (54526 words) [stucky]:

When Steve and Sam finally track down the Winter Soldier, the last thing they’re expecting is to find Bucky with a girl who’s calling him ‘Dad’. Steve doesn’t quite know how to handle that. The others know how to handle it only marginally better. Or, how to win over children and influence monsters: how Bucky’s surprise daughter helps the Avengers help Bucky find himself again, and how he finds Steve again along the way.

Always So Certain You're Fine (2252 words) [gen]:

They're grieving, sure, but they have a war to win, still, and by some miracle, they do it. Or, the Infinity War fix-it that no one asked for.

Suffer in Silence (6416 words) [thundershield]:

Five times Steve Rogers was in pain, and one time he finally wasn't.

**A Hero, Like Spiderman and Better Hawkeye (4286 words) [gen]:

If pressed to answer how he’d gotten to the top of the Avengers’ list of preferred babysitters/dog watchers, Peter’s not too sure he’d know what to say. In which MJ, Ned and Kate Bishop get roped into helping Peter babysit/dog watch, and things spiral wildly out of hand in a Starbucks.

Unexpecting (1893 words) [thruce, valsif]:

When they find themselves largely alone on Earth, tasked with preserving Asgard’s history and her people and working with Earth’s governments to settle political issues, and it seems like battle in another form, Thor and Brunnhilde find themselves seeking comfort in each other. It is harmless, (mostly) innocent fun, until they find themselves staring down at a little indicator, telling them that Brunnhilde is pregnant. In which Thor, Brunnhilde, Bruce and Sif raise a child together, and grow a little themselves in the process.

**What the Desert Will Let Him (5471 words) [samsteve]:

There’s an itch at the back of Sam's mind, that tells him to stay in DC and he thinks maybe this has something to do with The Voice and why he was thrown ass over tea kettle back into this world when he desperately didn't want to come back. In which Sam dies with his wing-man, but something sends him back to live out the rest of his life, because he's not done. There are people who need him, even if he doesn't know it yet.

**Wake Up Calls (4379 words) [gen, bg stucky]:

Bucky Barnes wakes up in Wakanda, the first time, and the second, and the third and fourth and twenty-eighth and sixty-first... Shuri starts out as an ally, and becomes a friend, and then might as well be his kid sister. Bucky and Shuri's relationship told through a few wake-up calls.

Dead Men Walking (16629 words) [gen]:

They don't always show it, but they've each got their own demons to battle. Peter keeps happening upon these battles. OR a bunch of times that Peter was there for the Avengers in a moment of need, and one time they were all there for him.

LGBTQIA(vengers) (3656 words) [stucky, natpepper]:

Steve Rogers comes out on a Tuesday afternoon. By Wednesday morning, it's hit every major news outlet. Twitter has some opinions, and Pepper Potts is taking no prisoners.

**Impact (6087 words) [winterhawk]:

Clint Barton is not born with wings. He is not a mutant, though he doubts that would have helped his case. He is an ordinary boy, until he, one day, is very suddenly not. Or: the wingfic nobody asked for, in which Clint's wings have brought him nothing but trouble until one day, they suddenly don't.

Perfect Men and Other Crimes (2069 words) [stucky]:

Bucky Barnes knows that he is lucky. He still cannot help but feel decidedly unlucky when he hears the New York Police Department’s new policy on partnering regular cops with enhanced ones. Bucky doesn’t have anything against enhanced individuals. He really doesn’t. But he is still profoundly uncomfortable around people who could snap him like a twig. Detective Steven Grant Rogers is exactly that.

Same Monster (2610 words) [gen, bg thruce]:

After returning to Earth, Bruce goes to visit his cousin when a case brings her to New York City. It doesn't go as planned. Or, the one where Jennifer Walters becomes She-Hulk, Bruce feels guilty, and Thor is a good boyfriend.

HAWAII FIVE-0 FICS

Can't Help DNA (5146 words) [mcdanno]:

The first time that Steve McGarrett and Danny Williams meet, Danny Williams is not holding a weapon. He has his hands in fists and Steve’s skin is singing in that way it does whenever he’s around someone else with the SuperGene. Steve, for his part, is pointing a gun at Danny’s chest and screaming at him which probably isn’t helping the situation, but he’s not going to admit that. He’s shouting, and then Williams is shouting and they eventually get their IDs out without Steve shooting anyone and without Danny’s Gene flaring up. It’s a win in Steve’s book.

Situational Awareness (6461 words) [mcdanno]:

Steve McGarrett has a soulmark from the moment he’s born. He has a mark that his dad covers up when he’s a baby, an ugly black thing in the shape of knuckles splayed across his cheekbone. Danny Williams gets his mark a few months after he’s born. There’s a black smear across the back of his hand and down two fingers and Danny dreams of the day his soulmate will touch him for the first time and set the mark alight with color. Steve McGarrett grows up hating his soulmark, Danny Williams dreams of the day he'll meet his soulmate. Somehow, against all odds, they find each other.

Things Unseen (15206 words) [mcdanno, bg konocat]:

Steve's known almost his whole life that his anchor was going to be one of the Kelly-Kalakaua family, the only ones strong enough to tie him to the Seen when he needed to talk to a spirit. What he did not know was how important a cop from Jersey who doesn't believe in ghosts would end up being. In which Steve and Kono are peak mlm/wlw solidarity, Danny is a wreck, Chin is tired and there are some ghosts.

[amarauder]

chapter two ❥ | original

"James Potter, come down here this instant and set me right!" came a screech from the first year girl's dormitory, which could be heard from all across Gryffindor Tower.

James Potter, who was currently daydreaming up more plans to make Y/n l/n's life at Hogwarts miserable, chuckled softly to himself as he heard Y/n scream at him.

Sirius, his best friend, frowned slightly. "Maybe you should give Y/n a break, James," he said seriously.

"No way! Torturing L/n  is way too fun to give up. Besides, she's the one who tricked me into thinking that small bottle of water was a Truth Potion! I swear that I'd get her after that."

Remus smiled and said, "Well, James, the teachers are still calling you 'Y/n and James Potter'. The name goes quite smoothly."

James colored. "I told you, the teachers are howling mad. McGonagall obviously wants revenge of some sort, and she's being nice to Snape!" All three boys shivered, and Peter, who was still sleeping, stirred awake.

"Who screamed?" he asked wearily, sitting up.

"You heard L/n," informed James, grinning at the little boy. "She wake you up? That gives me another reason to kill her."

"Not exactly," said Peter, frowning. "I thought I heard her voice—and yours—and she was singing a lullaby to a baby."

Before anyone could say another word, Sirius gleefully cried, "A ha! I told you Jamie-boy, that you and Y/n were going to get married and have a kid! Didn't I?"

James blinked. "Peter," he said, ignoring Sirius and turning to the sleepy boy, "did this dream seem—real?"

"I think so," replied Peter. "I mean, I don't know why I dreamt it, but I saw myself cowering as two men tried to kill me, but this boy—he stopped them. I was yelling, 'Remus, Sirius, have mercy, I never meant to betray Y/n and James', and the boy saved me. He looked exactly like you, James, but his eyes were like y/n's —they were e/c." He shook his head. "I don't know what kind of dream it was, but—it seemed so real."

There was silence all around the dormitory. Peter felt frightened, Remus was thoughtful, Sirius was confused, and James was bewildered at the dream. Peter...betrays him and Y/n? What madness was this?

Then the silence was shattered, again by Y/n's  voice.

"That James Potter!" she was yelling. "I'll get him one day! And the teachers call me 'Y/n Potter'. Completely mad!"

"Y/n," said Violet's voice. "Calm down. We'll all help you get revenge from James Potter. Don't worry, and come down and have some breakfast."

The girl's dormitory door burst open, and Y/n was flying out of it. She stormed right into the boy's dormitory, despite her friends' protests, and started to scream right in front of James' face.

"James Potter, you idiot, look at my hair!" she screeched.

It was a very funny sight indeed. Y/n's  hair, instead of its h/c, it was dark d/h/c and shining like gold. It would have looked very nice indeed, but it clashed horribly with Y/n's  iris-like delicate complexion. Her e/c hues  were sparkling malevolently.

"Change it back!" she demanded.

"Not unless I get a kiss," said James, pouting. The effects of these simple words were astounding. Sirius, Remus, and Peter all rolled over on their beds, laughing, while Y/n slapped James with all the strength she could muster. That sent the three boys laughing even harder, while Y/n  looked as if she were going to cry.

"If I kiss you," she said, shaking with anger. "Will you turn my hair red again?"

"Depends," replied James smugly, "but most likely."

Y/n, now blushing beet red, kissed James gently on the lips, which sent Sirius, Remus, and Peter into hysterics again. James, flushed with pleasure, waved his wand, and Y/n's hair turned h/c again.

"My God, Y/n, were you that desperate?" asked Sirius, still chortling.

"Yes," huffed Y/n, and stalked away, still red, back to her dormitory. Shouts of laughter could be heard a few seconds later, and Violet, Arabella, Jennifer, and Y/n burst out of their dormitory and into the Great Hall for breakfast. Y/n was still red from rage, but the rest of the girls were laughing.

"Hello Y/n," came an oily voice from behind them. Severus Snape was hurrying down from the steps of his dungeon common room, beaming.

"Severus," said Y/n, nodding curtly.

Snape's smile faded a little at Y/n's cool manner towards him, but he smiled pleasantly at the four girls. "So, why the laughing faces? Pleasant dreams?"

"Y/n just kissed James!" gasped Arabella, unable to conceal the information any longer. "Oh, it was hilarious!"

It was amazing how someone could change moods so fast. Snape's face twisted in anger, and he glared coldly at all of them with his empty black eyes. "Did you?" he asked, directing his question to Y/n.

"Well, Potter changed my hair into dark brown," said Y/n carefully, "so I was mad. Then, for some particular reason, he said he'd turn it back if I kissed him. And I was not to go into the Great Hall looking like a hag, so"—Y/n was now blushing to the roots of her hair—"I kissed him."

Snape frowned. "Potter likes you then?" he asked softly. "I mean, why would he have asked you otherwise?"

"Oh, probably to embarrass me in front of all my friends and his friends," replied Y/n  bitterly.

Snape, sensing Y/n's bitter tone, said brightly, "Y/n, would you—well—care to accompany me to—" He was interrupted by James, along with his friends, talking loudly on their way to the Great Hall.

"My God, Jamie-boy, are you in love?" crowed Sirius in delight.

"Nah, he just wanted to embarrass Y/n in front of us," said Remus sympathetically.

"You know, Moony, I sometimes think you're a mind-reader," said James.

"Oh no, look, there's trouble," murmured Peter, distracted, as he saw Snape with Y/n and her friends.

"Snape," said James coldly, as they approached the girls. "What are you doing here?"

"I heard Y/n kissed you here," replied Snape, his tone equally cold. "I suppose you want Y/n? Well, too bad, she's mine." The words went out of his mouth before he could stop himself.

Everyone stood there, stunned for a minute, but they started laughing the next minute.

"Oh, Snape that was a good one!" cried Sirius, slapping his knee. "Y/n—yours?" He started laughing again.

Y/n smiled wryly, but she had a temptation to burst out laughing like Sirius had done. "Since when have I been yours, Severus?" she asked coolly. "I don't remember belonging to anyone like I'm a piece of property."

Snape was beet red. "Well, what I meant Y/n, was that—" He trailed off, looking quite embarrassed, but controlled himself and strolled over to his friends.

"What have you been doing?" they heard Rosier demand.

"Torturing Potter and his fan club," came Snape's oily voice.

"Good, good. Severus, we must discuss your—er—feelings for the L/n girl..." Their voices trailed off, as James, Y/n, and their friends sat down at the Gryffindor table.

"Don't worry, Y/n, we won't tell what happened," said Violet sincerely, as she spread butter over her bread.

"Oh, won't we?" teased Sirius.

"Sirius," warned Violet in a dangerous voice.

"Oh, all right," said Sirius in a would-be disappointed voice. Then he added gleefully, "Still, I can't believe old Snape thought that you were his, Y/n! Oh, it would have been a perfect opportunity for blackmail if we didn't have a camera."

"I've got one in our dorm," said Jennifer suddenly. Then her eyes glinted mischievously.

"Oh, I have an idea! Y/n can pretend to seduce Snape and make him believe that she loves him, or something. Then we can take a picture and blackmail old Snape! What do you all think?"

"Jen, you're a genius!" breathed Violet. "What do you boys think?"

"Ingenious!" the four boys chorused.

"Hey, no one asked for my opinion!" demanded Y/n.

"Don't be such a spoilsport, Y/n, we don't need your opinion," snapped Violet good-naturedly.

"What? Why not?"

"Because we know you'd say no."

"Fine, I'll be considering, but as long as I don't have to kiss Snape. Yuck." She made a face.

"Of course you have to kiss Snape," said Jennifer practically. "That's part of seduction, right? Oh, and maybe you could be really extreme and we can lock you two into a room with a bed all night..." She grinned wickedly.

"I can't imagine a baby who looks like Snape with e/c eyes," put in Sirius.

"Ugh! You two are so disgusting! Me, sleep with Snape? You have got to be JOKING!" Y/n shook her head furiously.

"We are, N/n," reassured Violet, laughing. "We just wanted to pull your leg, that's all. You think we'd make you kiss Snape and sleep in bed with him? That's evil beyond Slytherin-evil."

"We also wanted to make Jamie jealous, too," added Sirius.

"Why would I be jealous?" asked James.

"'Cause you love Y/n too much."

"Sirius, you little—"

"Now what would eight Gryffindors such as yourselves be saying that must be loud enough to scream the Great Hall down?"

They all turned around to see Professor Hurst sneering at them. No one spoke.

"Dear, dear, L/n, I expected better from you." He tutted scoldingly, then returned to his seat at the High Table.

"Miserable bat," muttered Sirius, as he shoved sausages into his mouth.

Y/n and James were in Dumbledore's office. McGonagall, for some particular reason, had sent them there, and the two puzzled Gryffindors settled down and looked at all the strange objects in the office. A phoenix was fluttering its golden plumage, looking at them with beady eyes.

"Why were we sent here?" said James, cursing angrily.

Y/n tutted loudly. "Language, Potter. This is the headmaster's office."

"Hey—what's that?" He pointed to a crystal ball on Dumbledore's desk.

They scurried over and peered inside. It was a crystal ball, but it didn't look like the ones they saw in the pictures of thick books in Flourish and Blotts, and unlike regular crystal balls, it wasn't foggy. Instead, it was clear, and pictures were moving vividly.

As they peered closer, pictures began to form. A girl, who looked like an older version of Y/n, was running through a meadow. A handsome man much like an older James Potter was chasing after her, laughing. Then they drew in for a kiss, which went on for quite some time. The pictures blurred again, and formed a new one. An older version of the girl before was bending over a baby. It had jet-black hair that stuck in all directions, and bright e/c eyes. Then the man bent over the baby and the couple began to laugh. Then this picture disappeared as well, and a new one appeared. A boy, who looked much like James, except for the eyes, was flying on a broomstick, obviously pleased about something. Another boy and a girl were standing on what looked like the Quidditch field, cheering on the boy in the air. The boy on the ground had bright red hair, and the girl standing next to him had bushy brown hair. All three of them started laughing, having a good time. Then the picture dissolved together, and the crystal ball went blank.

"What was that?" said James aloud.

"Looks like a crystal ball," said Y/n. "Maybe it shows the future."

"Yeah, me and you kissing," said James sarcastically. "I suppose that will happen in the future."

"Must be our nightmares, then," snapped Y/n.

"I wonder who that boy was, though," said James thoughtfully. "You know, the one on the broomstick. He looked a lot like me, but he wasn't me, though. His eyes are e/c, like yours, and he had a lightning-shaped scar on his forehead."

"And the boy and girl standing weren't familiar, either," put in Y/n. "Maybe they're just people that are coming to Hogwarts later on."

"So what does that concern us for?"

"I don't know! You think I'm a Seer or something?"

Before the two could say another word, however, Dumbledore had just entered his office. He smiled at Y/n and James, and gestured them to sit down.

"Now, why have you been sent here?" he asked, still smiling.

"Er—" The two looked at each other and James admitted, "We honestly don't know. Professor McGonagall just told us to wait here for you, sir."

"I see." He looked between the nervous kids, and glanced over to where the crystal ball stood. "I think I know what it's about."

He went over and tapped the ball lightly with his wand, and it began to glow. "You see, Mr. Potter, Ms. L/n. This ball is no crystal ball. It tells the future to anyone who looks at it, even people who are not destined to be Seers. It is very rare, and—let me ask you something. What did you two see when you looked through it?"

Y/n hesitated. "Well," she began, "we first saw older versions of ourselves—er—kissing." She blushed furiously. "Then I saw my older version holding a baby, with James bending over it, laughing. Then—I saw a boy that looked like James, except he had e/c eyes like mine and a scar on his forehead. He was on a broomstick, and he and the red-head boy and brown-hair girl below him were laughing together." She frowned. "I don't know what it has to do with me."

Dumbledore's blue eyes twinkled behind his half-moon glasses. "Ah, Miss L/n. It is because that it showed the future—your destiny. The boy on the broomstick—he is your son. And he is James' son as well. But I cannot tell you anymore than this. You'll have to find out for yourselves." He ushered them gently out of his office. "Now, why don't you head off to dinner while I examine this ball more."

Still puzzled, Y/n and James went out of Dumbledore's office, when James broke into a tirade.

"I'm marrying you? And we have a son together? Am I mad?"

"Hey, I'm confused too," snapped Y/n.

"Obviously. But we'd better not mention this to anyone, Sirius will never let me hear the end of it."

"Deal," agreed Y/n.

Their friends were rushing towards them, grins plastered on their faces. "What was that about?" asked Sirius loudly. "Did Dumbledore yell at you or something."

Y/n and James exchanged nervous glances. "Er—McGonagall made some sort of mistake," lied Y/n. "Dumbledore had no idea what we were doing in his office."

"Right." You could tell that they didn't believe a single word Y/n had said.

"So Y/n," began Arabella, "did you make up with James?"

"No!" chorused the two enemies.

The rest all sighed. "So much for that," muttered Sirius.

"Hey, I tried," argued Arabella.

"I wasn't blaming you, Bells. Those two are just so stubborn sometimes!"

"Hey, it's not like we can't hear you," stated Y/n. "We're still here you know."

"I know," said Sirius, irritated. "Just leave me alone." He waved his hand casually and left for Gryffindor Tower.

"What's eating him?" wondered Jennifer as they climbed through the portrait hole.

"Maybe it's a boy thing," suggested Violet.

"Who knows."

As the four girls scrambled into their dormitory, Arabella stopped. "I think I'll go see Sirius," she said, ignoring the whistles that followed.

"Aww, I didn't know you liked Sirius, Bella. Why didn't you tell us?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," replied Arabella loftily.

Y/n rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Just tell us if any saliva is exchanged between you and dog boy."

They all giggled, leaving Arabella stomping off to the boys' dormitory. Minutes later, James entered the girls' dormitory to find three girls giggling furiously.

"What do you think is happening?" asked Y/n excitedly.

"They're probably having a kissing session," said Jennifer disgustedly.

"How romantic," said Violet dreamily.

James cleared his throat, and the girls turned around.

"What are you doing here, Potter? I didn't remember inviting you."

"I didn't think I needed an invitation," said James dryly. "Though I do think you would want news of how my best friend is doing with your best friend."

Y/n's  eyes sparkled. "All right then. I'll be civil to you, and you can tell us what's happening."

James grinned. "As Jennifer predicted, they are currently kissing"—he grinned at Y/n's delighted face, Jennifer's disgusted one, and Violet's dreamy one—"but it took quite a lot of convincing." He explained the whole story, and Violet sighed dramatically.

"That's so romantic," she sighed. "It's just like it's out of a fairy tale!"

"Violet, please," scolded Jennifer. Then she added, "We wouldn't want Y/n and James to be next."

"Not this again," groaned Y/n. "I told you guys, I hate Potter."

"Then you could marry Snape—"

"Ugh, what do you take me for? I'm not marrying that slimy, greasy hairball git!"

"You're right, Y/n Potter sounds much better," said Jennifer, trying not to laugh.

"Jennifer Dean, you've got some nerve—"

"I'll be leaving now," said James loudly. He turned to go, but then the door burst open and Arabella walked in with a dazed expression on her face.

"Ah, finally done, are you?" he said teasingly, watching Arabella's face twist in fury and horror. "Don't worry, the girls already know." He left without another word.

"You guys know?" asked Arabella, rather shakily.

"'Course we know, Y/n did a bit of coaxing," said Jennifer, grinning. "So...give us the details! Potter would never tell the more juicy parts to us."

"Tomorrow," promised Arabella, trying not to laugh. "Guys—I think I'm in love."

"At age eleven?" questioned Violet, raising her eyebrows. "I wouldn't know, but it's just a minor crush."

"Yeah, whatever."

The snow was finally melting, and spring was in the air, which meant another Quidditch match was approaching. James and Sirius, though they desperately wanted to get on the team, finally stopped pestering the Gryffindor captain and decided to try out next year. Y/n was excited and nervous as well. It would be Gryffindor against Ravenclaw, the second match of the season.

She was quite nasty to Snape as well. Though it wasn't against Slytherin House this time, Severus had been trying to keep the team players out of action along with his Slytherin gang, causing Y/n to slap him harshly one day in the corridors. Sirius had howled with laughter after that, and Snape never taunted any of the Gryffindors in front of her after the incident.

Of course, Y/n and James continued to pull pranks on each other. Y/n, furious at James for turning her hair into brown, had performed a little charm to make Deanna Jackson, the girl James always mooned about to make Y/n  jealous, to fall in love with James for a day. This had caused James into one of the worst days of his life, having the second year Gryffindor girl follow him around like a puppy. He had gotten his revenge, however, by declaring to the whole Great Hall that Y/n liked Snape, performing charms that sent shooting stars into the bewitched night sky. Y/n, who was already fuming by then, had stood up and declared that James Potter was a liar and that she hated Snape as well as all Slytherins, then storming out of the Great Hall amid the shouts of laughter heard afterwards.

On this particular day, however, Y/n seemed nervous. Her friends had demanded what was wrong, but she wouldn't say.

"Fine!" she snapped, after the fifth time they asked her. "The exams are in three months, what if I don't pass?"

Violet burst into laughter. "Are you still worrying about that, N/n? Y/n, they're ages away! If James Potter isn't worried, then you shouldn't be, since you're much cleverer than he is."

"Oh, I suppose," sighed Y/n, but she was in a lighter mood after that.

Meanwhile, James was complaining in the boys' dormitory about Deanna.

"If L/n hadn't put that charm on her, then she wouldn't be following me around!" he whined.

Sirius, who was sick of James' complaints, had said, "Oh, come on Jamie-boy, it's not like Jackson's the only girl that's fighting over you. A group of Ravenclaw girls had a catfight in the corridors because they were arguing if you liked them or not, and one of them ended up in the hospital wing with a bloody nose." He shook his head. "Honestly, James, get yourself a girl and settle down."

"I don't even like girls!" he exclaimed. "Yeah, sure Arabella, Jennifer, and Violet are my friends—sort of, but that L/n." He shuddered.

"Y/n's nice," cut in Remus, who was interested in where this conversation was going. "You should be friends with her, James, she has a side to her that you probably never expected."

"She actually studies?" suggested James.

"No. She's actually really funny, and can really help you in your times of trouble. Really, Y/n makes me laugh all the time. You guys should get together as friends, James, or else you'll be missing a lot of great times."

"I couldn't have said it better myself," agreed Sirius. James turned to Peter, and the little boy nodded, showing his assent, which made him groan loudly.

"So how come L/n  hates me so much?" he demanded of his friends.

The three boys looked at each other. Finally Remus said in his gentle voice, "Because, James, you hate her. If you two made up, I'm sure Y/n wouldn't hate you so much."

James laughed at the irony of this statement. Y/n had once threatened to tear him apart from limb to limb if he embarrassed her again. Soon their dormitory door opened and Y/n walked in, grinning. James groaned again. She must be planning a new prank, he thought to himself.

"Hey Y/n," greeted Sirius, grinning at the redhead appreciatively. James scowled.

"What do you want, L/n?" he asked.

"I just wanted to see my friends, Jamie," replied Y/n, pouting. "Is that such a crime?" She shot him a smile, which made him relax a bit.

"See Potter, I'm not so bad," she said, nodding and smirking at the black-haired boy.

"Right." James crawled onto his bed and drew the curtains so that everything was hidden from view.

"You know, Potter isn't so bad," remarked Y/n.

James couldn't believe his ears. Had Evans gone mad?

"Really?" he heard Sirius' voice say.

"Yep. Pretty cute, actually. I can actually imagine why those silly girls chase after him like wolves."

James, much to his horror, found himself grinning like a Cheshire cat. Oh, now L/n was humoring Sirius.

"You know, Y/n , James can hear you," said Remus.

"I know," he heard Y/n say. "I'm just going to see what Potter's reaction to this is –"

James panicked. What if Y/n saw him listening through his curtains intently? He quickly lay in bed and pulled out a battered old copy of Quidditch Through the Ages, and began reading. Soon Y/n,  pulled the curtains back, and disappointingly, James was reading, not paying any attention to their conversation. Or so she thought.

"Oh, hi L/n," said James, looking up from his book and speaking nonchalantly.

"Potter," she said, smirking. "Nice book?"

"Oh yeah," he replied quickly. "Very, um...interesting read."

"Is that why you're reading it upside down?" she asked, smiling sweetly. James blushed. So this was why she was grinning.

"I was experimenting," he said grumpily.

"Sure you were," said Y/n, still grinning.

"I was," said James, aggravated.

"Do you normally read books upside-down? I didn't know even wizards were capable of that."

"Oh, well—I'm special," said James proudly.

Y/n snorted. "Yeah, well, I'd better get back to my dormitory. I have to put some common sense into Violet, since she secretly 'likes' you. Ridiculous!"

"You're just jealous," said James smugly, sounding oddly like a five-year-old.

Y/n snorted. "Of what?"

James scratched his head before answer. "Er—I forgot."

Y/n laughed.

That night, she had the strangest dream.

Y/n was softly humming to a baby, which she recognized to be the same baby that she and James were laughing over in Dumbledore's crystal ball. An older version of James was standing next to her, his arms around hers, and he was whispering to a tear-streaked Y/n. They were both whispering and comforting the crying bundle in Y/n's arms, and there was a loud bang that shattered the silence. Then James' voice began to panic.

"Y/n, take Harry and go! It's him! Go! Run! I'll hold him off..." Then he stumbled into another room while Y/n rushed to the kitchen.

There was a high-pitched cackle, and then silence. All of a sudden, a scream echoed through the night, and there was a thump as something heavy hit the floor. Y/n could only guess that her husband was dead.

Then the cloaked figure who had killed James advanced towards her. He was ready to attack, to kill, as he held up his wand.

Then Y/n's voice rang out. "Please, not Harry, have mercy..."

"Stand aside, you silly girl, stand aside now..."

"Please, I'll do anything, kill me, kill me instead..."

Then Y/n was screaming like she had never screamed before, and fell to the floor with a dull thump. The cloaked figure had advanced towards the baby boy named Harry, but could not kill him. He let out a piercing scream, there was a blinding flash of light, and an eerie silence afterwards. The baby boy was still alive and fast asleep.

Y/n woke up with a start, sweat pouring down her face. Now she understood what Dumbledore had said. She and James were to die, but her son—Harry, he was to live. But what did this all mean?

"Y/n?" She heard a muffled voice, and Arabella was slipping on her school robes, looking exhausted. "Was that you screaming?"

"I screamed?" asked Y/n, confused. Arabella nodded, and Jennifer and Violet began to stir awake, too.

"What did you dream about?"

"I dreamed—I dreamed about this...wizard. He came to my house and he—he killed James. Then he killed me, but only because I wouldn't let him kill a baby boy. But he couldn't kill the baby boy, who was probably my son."

There was a nasty silence after her story. Arabella, Violet, and Jennifer were too stunned to speak. Then their dormitory door opened and James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter filed in, looking as tired as the girls. Sirius looked grumpy, while Remus and Peter were yawning. James, however, was wide-awake with round eyes.

"What are you guys doing here?" asked Arabella curiously.

"Well," said Sirius, his voice full of agitation, "I was sleeping soundly, when James here started yelling like a maniac. This woke me up out of my dreams, and then we heard one of your scream. So we came here to investigate."

"Y/n said something about a wizard coming to kill James and herself, but he couldn't kill her son," said Violet, frowning.

"That's what I dreamed about," said James, looking terrified.

Y/n choked back a sob, and Bella put her arm around her best friend. "Don't worry, N/n, it's all right..." She glared at the boys. "What do you think you're doing, scaring Y/n like this? Now, either we all send James to an insane asylum or..."

"Hey, your friend dreamt the same thing!" pointed out James angrily. "I'm not the only one who's insane!"

"Y/n's not insane!" screeched Arabella.

"What in heavens is going on here?" They slowly turned around, only to see Professor McGonagall turn up in a flowered nightgown and holding a lit up wand. She was frowning.

"Boys!" she cried. "What do you think you're doing in a girls' dormitory? Potter, Black, you two should have known better!"

The bowed their heads. Then Y/n said, "Please, Professor, J-James and I, we had a bad dream and the boys came here to see w-what was wrong." Her voice was shaky.

McGonagall looked astonished. Then she said swiftly, "Well, you all get on back to bed. Potter, Miss L/n, I would like a word with you two." She marched out of the portrait hole and near the stone gargoyle with James and y/n at her heals.

"Sherbet Lemon," she barked, and the stone gargoyle jumped to life and sprang aside. She marched into the office and Professor Dumbledore was hurrying out of the dark in his robes, looking concerned.

"Minerva," he said, frowning. "What is this?"

Professor McGonagall nodded her head to Y/n and James. "Those two—they just had a dream about you-know-what."

Dumbledore nodded, relaxing. "Very well, Minerva. You may return to bed now. I will speak to them."

When McGonagall left, Dumbledore turned to the two. "I want you to tell me exactly what your dreams were about," he said, in a gentle, but firm voice.

Y/n  and James told the headmaster exactly what they dreamt about, and Dumbledore looked thoughtful. "I knew you would dream this sooner or later," he said, smiling at their stunned faces. "You two have a long destiny together and will change the course of the world. Of course, you probably think it's perfectly ridiculous right now, seeing how much you—er—rather loathe each other. But time will come when you will understand what the right thing to do is. Now"—he glanced at the watch on his wrist—"I think it is time for you two to return to bed. And please do not mention what I have told you to anyone. It's dangerous to share secrets these days."

They both nodded and left the office, whispering to each other.

"What did Dumbledore mean, 'change the course of the word'? Dad must've known something like this would happen, that's why he told me to be nice to you in the letter."

"Letter?"

"Yeah...he sent me one just before Christmas yelling at me and telling me to be nice to 'the L/n girl'. I tried, but you're obviously not easy to get along with."

"There's no point of trying if it's impossible," snapped Y/n.

James was amazed. "Still—it's pretty bad to disobey my dad. He can be powerfully mad when...hey, who's that?"

There was a shadow moving along the walls, and Snape came out, very red in the face.

"Oh, hello," he muttered, carefully not meeting their eyes. "I was—er—taking a stroll..."

"In the middle of the night?" interrupted James. "Really, Severus, you out of all people to break school rules—" He tutted the way Y/n would when someone broke a school rule.

"I—" Snape now looked extremely uncomfortable. "You're out of bed," he said instead.

"The headmaster wanted to see us," replied Y/n  hardly. She was rather cool to Snape after the match against Ravenclaw.

"Oh, well, that—that's different, then," stumbled Snape. "W-well, I m-must be off." He ran off, not to another corridor, but to the direction of where the Slytherin common room was.

"I took care of him," said James proudly. Y/n scowled.

"I helped!"

"Yeah, well, I did most of the work."

"Arrogant pig."

"Withering flower."

"Daft—" began Y/n, but her eyes filled with tears. "I am not a withering flower!"

"Well, I'm not an arrogant pig and a daft whatever-you-were-going-to-say!"

"Yes, well, a withering flower—" She suddenly ran off to Gryffindor Tower, sobbing. James halted. What had he said wrong?

By the time he got into the common room, all three of Y/n's friends were glaring at him menacingly, their arms around a crying Y/n. When he saw his friends, they were also staring at him coldly and shaking their heads.

"Why is everyone mad?" he asked wonderingly, strolling over to where Sirius, Remus, and Peter stood.

"You called Y/n a withering flower," said Remus quietly, not looking at James.

"So? She called me an arrogant pig!"

"Yes, James." It was Sirius speaking, and he was looking serious, for a change. "You know how strong Y/n is. A withering flower would indicate that she was weak and cannot face the world. And you know how that's not true. Y/n's stronger than all of us, and can go through many hardships."

James' heart sank and he suddenly felt terrible. "Well, I didn't mean...what I meant was..." He trailed off, looking away.

Remus patted his shoulder. "I know you didn't mean any harm when you said it, James, but next time, be careful of what you say to Y/n. She's one girl you shouldn't mess with."

James gave his friend small smile. "You can say that again. I've had too much experience to mess around with her."

Sirius laughed and Remus chuckled. "You're right about that, Jamie!"

Then James walked over to where Y/n was still crying. But before he could say one word, she rushed up to the girls' dormitory, tears coursing on her cheeks.

"You should go after her and apologize," said Violet quietly, watching her friend disappear. "That was a really mean thing you said, James."

"I know," said James, his head bowed. "I—I never meant any harm..."

"Of course you didn't," said Jennifer swiftly. "Y/n's just a bit stubborn, but she'll get over it. Just watch your mouth next time, sonny." She grinned and Arabella stepped forward.

"I'm not mad," she reassured. "But I'll be happy again if you'd apologize to my best friend."

"I will," he promised, and rushed up to the girls' dormitory. Then the girls started to grin at each other excitedly.

"D'you think they'll kiss and make up?" whispered Violet.

Arabella shook her head. "Nah, I know Y/n too well, she and James will still stay enemies after James apologizes. But they'll become friends later, for sure."

"It happens when both people are as stubborn as mules," agreed Jennifer.

Back in the girl's dorm room, James was apologizing endlessly to Y/n.

"Look, y/n, I'm not forcing you to be friends with me, but I really want you to forgive me for calling you a withering flower. I was really mad at that time, and I wasn't thinking properly and...well..." Seeing that Y/n was looking away and not speaking, he tried again.

"Y/n, I think you're beautiful. I've thought that ever since we first met at King's Cross and, well, I've never told anyone. I know that Sirius would tease me to no end, and your friends would probably say 'we knew it'. So—I've kept it to myself. But now I'm telling it to you, and...can you please not tell anyone that I've said it?"

Y/n turned around, and James was astonished to see a smile plastered on her face. "Sure James. You know, you're not such a bad guy after all. When I first met you, I thought that you were the worst thing since rules, but I guess I was wrong and Remus was right. There is more to you than I've ever imagined. But we're still enemies, right?"

Y/n grinned mischievously. "Right. Much to our friends' disappointments of course."

"Naturally."

"So...let's go down to the common room."

They marched down to the common room again, where their friends were waiting eagerly.

"Did you make up?" asked Arabella, though she knew what the answer would be.

"Nope," they both replied.

"And you two would have made such a cute couple," sighed Sirius, pretending to be disappointed.

James laughed. "Come on, Sirius, we know you don't want us to be friends. When we play pranks on each other again, you'll have the pleasure of egging us both on."

"Jamie-boy, sometimes I think that you can read minds."

"Funny thing really—I was thinking that Remus can."

They all laughed. Then James went over to Y/n and said, "Enemies?"

"Enemies...for now," said Y/N, hiding a smile.

"Hey!" exclaimed Sirius suddenly. "You didn't say, 'Enemies forever'!"

"That's right, Sirius," explained Y/n, smiling. "Because James and I know we won't be enemies forever."

tags; @thecurlyhairedwinchester

a/n; go check out my rewritten version! you can find it in my masterlist!

masterlist of it’s a hate-thing original version

masterlist for rewritten version

[oblio-k]

jklsdjk i wrote another daemon au fic This Time about Sisko and Dukat’s daemons interacting.

Special

Mae padded down the hallway towards her counterpart’s quarters. People stepped aside as she passed by them, and though she was used to it since she had always been so large, it was… more obvious now. Instead of a quick glance from other members of Starfleet or Federation citizens thinking how they’d never seen a daemon of her size, now the looks were full of reverence, of wariness.

Being a Siberian tigress meant she took up a lot of room. Being the Emissary’s daemon, walking around without her counterpart close by; she couldn’t help but be frightening to those that didn’t know of her. And like her counterpart, she didn’t like being a religious figure for the Bajorans all that much.

She still wasn’t used to looking different, either. Her eyes, once a beautiful amber, were now a glowing white. Wherever she walked, golden dust rose from her steps and flickered off of her tail and the thickest patches of her fur.

For Mae, it was a relief that Benjamin had allowed her to go home when everything had gotten too much as the Bajorans got ready for a festival. It was smaller than the Gratitude Festival, but more centered on worship, which meant their attention was centered on her and Benjamin. He’d said he needed a padd she knew just as well as he that was in his office.

Entering their quarters, she shook herself and sighed. Then, she perked up. Something wasn’t right. As she looked around, she couldn’t spot anything out of the ordinary. She lowered herself, ears pricking. Before she could even begin prowling about the room to search for what she was sensing, a heavy weight dropped down on top of her with a delighted cry of, “Mae!”

She fought her immediate instinct to flip and pin down the other daemon, fought the sense of wrongness that threatened to make her do something awful, but knew that would only cause trouble for both of their counterparts. Begrudgingly, she allowed the other reason for her desire for solitude to wrap around her.

“Hello, Seera.”

With a happy hiss, Seera dangled her head in front of Mae’s, her hypnotizing blue eyes shining with mischief. Mae bared her teeth at her, but the Cardassian daemon pressed her snout against her forehead in imitation of a kiss. Mae hoped that Benjamin hadn’t been too startled by that, that he’d recognized the tight feeling going across their bond as Seera’s familiar coils and been prepared for all the affection she loved to lay on her.

“I found you! I thought you might try to avoid me-” Seera laughed, swaying back and forth. Mae looked away, not wanting to get dizzy. She’d learned the hard way that Seera could convince other daemons to do almost anything she wanted if she got them dizzy enough, with her charming words and squeezing grip. It was almost like she had some sort of power. “Or maybe you wanted to get me all to yourself?” Seera flicked her tongue, hopeful.

Mae swatted at her with a massive paw, disappointed when Seera dodged so easily. She felt the snake settle her head on top of hers, burrowing into her thick, warm fur. Mae’s ears flattened, and soon enough the tigress could feel and hear a low rumble coming from Seera.

“Don’t purr so close to my ears.”

“I’m not purring,” Seera insisted, voice smooth as silk. “I’m growling, because you tried to hit me.” Still, the rumbling continued.

With no choice but to put up with Seera being her usual clingy self, Mae went to the couch and hopped up onto it. She laid down, uncomfortable with almost three and a quarter meters of măgath wrapped around her body. It made her miss Jennifer’s daemon, how he would cuddle against her as their counterparts did the same, their bond strong and warm. More nuzzling against her fur helped her to push that out of mind.

Using force to get Seera off would only result in Benjamin getting upset with her, and her counterpart getting hurt as the măgath would hold fast like a proper constrictor crushing its prey in her desperation to stay on. The Cardassian daemon was covered in thick scales Mae doubted her claws would easily pierce, while Seera had long fangs that could sink into her with ease.

She would have to trick Seera into releasing her. “Seera.”

“Yes, Mae?”

“I know how much you enjoy my company-”

“Quite!”

“-but shouldn’t you be spending time with your counterpart’s daughter and her daemon?”

She made a cooing sound in response and shifted. Mae felt her tongue brush against her ear, making it twitch. She huffed, and Seera answered, “I already spent time with Ziyal and Zenu! They adore me, you know? Don’t tell my Master, but I almost think they prefer me!”

“Your secret is safe with me.”

Delighted to be humored, Seera tightened her coils and purred. Mae growled low in her throat, and the pressure lessened. “My Master is so busy, though. So he tells me to stay with them longer!”

“Then why aren’t you still with them?”

“Ziyal wanted to help the Bajorans decorate for their silly festival. She’s so artistic, Master and I are so proud! I wanted to help, but Nerys said I’d just get in the way. I don’t have any hands, you know. She was very nice about it, and Ziyal agreed, so I left.”

“How long will the decorating take?” Mae had a bad feeling about what Seera’s answer was going to be.

“The rest of the day… But now I get time to spend with you! And we can talk, properly.”

“About what?”

The măgath shifted until she could look directly at Mae, unwrapping one coil so she could put a small distance between them. Mae grumbled and rested her chin on her paws, closing her eyes. Seera didn’t care, and replied, “About how similar we are!”

“We aren’t similar.”

“Sure we are! Our Masters both have children around the same age who we love, and we’ve been through similar tragedies.”

“Weren’t you and your Master going to kill Ziyal and Zenu?”

“Nerys told you that story, didn’t she?” There- a slight movement of her head, the beginning of a sway. “Please understand, my Master only wanted what was best for his family on Cardassia. For Athra, Mekor, and-”

A small spark of red in Seera’s eyes had Mae rearing back and snarling. Seera gasped and ducked down to wrap around the tigress’ leg.

“Mae! Mae, what’s wrong? It wasn’t my intention to upset you, I was just trying to explain to you what really happened on-”

“I thought I saw something.”

Seera looked around, tongue flickering in and out as she breathed in the scent of everything. “There’s nobody in here but us, Mae.” The red in her eyes was gone, and the horrible feeling that had made her react so strongly was gradually fading back into the general sense of wrongness she felt from Seera and her counterpart. Seeing that Mae was still ruffled, Seera rubbed against her face, purring. “I know. I’ll tell you about how great Ziyal is doing with her painting, and then you can talk about Jake. That will make you feel better.”

She doubted it, but settled down and let Seera start talking, doing her best to ignore her once the topic became less about Ziyal and her daemon and more about the măgath’s counterpart.

“Mae, you’re not listening, you silly cub!” Seera gave her another snake kiss, and then began pecking her all over the face, rubbing against her stripes. Mae rolled over, making the other daemon hiss. She batted at her, careful not to nick her eyes with her claws. After a few moments of dodging, Seera looped around her legs and held them tight. “That’s not fair, Mae!”

“You’re holding my paws. That’s not fair.”

Seera huffed. “I don’t know why you don’t listen to me.”

“Maybe you should say something worth listening to.”

“Now that’s really not fair,” Seera complained, in typical Cardassian manner. “My Master and I listen to your Master’s federation dogma all the time.”

“We’ve had this argument before.”

Seera bobbed her head, delighted. “And wasn’t it fun?”

As Mae looked at the măgath, the thought came to mind how it was ridiculous that she could allow herself to be acting like this. To be on her back on a couch, another daemon wrapped around her that wasn’t one she was bonded to… But they both could stray so far from their counterparts, both had such strong personalities. Their similarities were startling.

Perhaps that was why she felt compelled to admit something she’d only ever discussed with Benjamin, Dax, and her daemons. She tilted her head, and Seera mirrored her, curious as to why she was so quiet. After a moment, she said, “You’re a very strange daemon, Seera.”

“Says the Emissary’s daemon. If I’m so strange, what does that make you?”

“Special.”

“Hmph! And I’m not?”

Mae got one paw free and put it over Seera’s face, making her hiss. “That’s right.”

[ramblings-daily]

A Little Too Late // Five

Fandom: Criminal Minds Words: 6,467 Warning: mention of brief assault, mention of brief blood Pairing: Luke Alvez / Penelope Garcia Characters: Penelope Garcia, Luke Alvez, Derek Morgan, Spencer Reid, Jennifer "JJ" Jareau, Emily Prentiss and David Rossi

Chapter Five [link to FF // Chapter One // Chapter Two // Chapter Three // Chapter Four] 

Friday 10:56AM

"I didn't mean to hit her," a young man said as he wrapped his arms around himself while staring at the agents. "It was dark and I swear she came out of nowhere. I called the police as soon as I did." He groaned as he ran a hand through his hair. "Is she dead?"

"She's recovering in the hospital," Emily reassured the driver. "We called you back to the scene because there are a couple of other questions that we have to ask you."

The driver furrowed his eyebrows. "Anything."

Rossi looked around the secluded desert highway. "Was there someone around after the car accident?"

"Someone around?" The driver sighed as he tried to rethink about what happened earlier. "It was just her."

"Where was she running? Where did she come from?" JJ asked.

"Uh, I was driving in this direction." He pointed toward the lane that he was on and indicated his other arm to where he saw Penelope running. "She came from there. Within seconds, I felt my car hit her and I stomped on the brakes immediately."

Luke looked at the road they were standing on and narrowed his eyes at the other intersection they have up ahead. "Are you familiar with this road?"

"I drive on it everyday from work." The driver said. "First time I've experienced a car accident like this though."

"This place is much like a desert but I'm sure there are a few houses, right?" Luke questioned.

The driver nodded his head. "Only about four houses, the market around this area isn't doing so well. I'm a real estate agent, I would know."

"Small community then." Emily concluded. "Where is the community?"

"That road right there," he nodded his head over to a road sign called Lincoln St. Only area that you can see houses for miles. Not much people live there. As far as I know, they're all senior citizens. You know old people, they love their space."

Rossi arched an eyebrow at the words senior citizen. He glanced at the others, feeling as if they should definitely take on this new lead. "Franklin Bolt was a senior citizen that lived in a pretty enclosed area."

"Let's go." Emily said.

. . .

Friday 12:10PM

Deciding that it was best if somebody took turns on watching over Penelope as the others carry on the investigation, Derek and Spencer were the lucky ones to start the first day. It's been almost eight hours since Penelope has arrived to the hospital. After surgery, she was in a brief induced coma for several hours. With the doctor's orders, none of them could come in until the nurse finished a rape kit. Knowing that a friend of theirs has to go through something like that it's extremely heart breaking. An hour or so went by and Penelope drifted off to sleep again. The doctor said that they have to give her strong medicine in order for pain to easily go away. The medicine causes heavy amount of sleep which is no problem because who knows if Penelope ever actually got to sleep the last three days.

"How do you think she is feeling?" Spencer asked as they sat in the waiting room. "Do you think she is going to be better?"

Derek tapped his fingers against the armchair as he shrugged his shoulders. "I don't know," he looked at Spencer and sighed. "The nurse hasn't come back with the results of the kit yet."

"The doctor seems certain that it'll come back with results we won't like." Spencer hated to be the words of bad luck but it's the truth. When Penelope was asleep in the room, he caught a glimpse of her from the glass window. She doesn't look okay, she doesn't even look as if she could breath. Spencer has been working with Penelope for as long as he can remember and for the first time, he had no witty remarks to save for her. Mainly because he doesn't what to say. "Do you think she wants to see us?"

"Kid, enough with the twenty questions." Derek hated being mean to Reid but right now, his mind is going crazy. Since knowing Penelope, he has never seen her like this. Sure, there was that year when she was shot by a crazy bastard. But that cannot be compared to how she is now. This situation is by far so different and raw that it's not easy to talk about. This Unsub has caused so much pain to Penelope emotionally and physically that it could scar her for life. Most victims he knows that went through what she did, they become different from their usual self. And as he sits here in the waiting room, he couldn't help but wonder if Penelope would do that. Would she start changing? Would she start approaching life without smiling or laughing anymore? The little unique antics that she used to surround herself with all the time, would that be gone?

"Agents," Derek and Spencer looked up to see a nurse at the waiting room's doorway. "She's very adamant about not wanting to see you guys. I'm sorry. I tried my best."

Derek frowned. "Did you tell her that it was Derek Morgan and Spencer Reid?"

The nurse nodded her head. "Yes. To be honest, it'll be for the best if you didn't see her right now anyway. Since she woke up, she has been under the blankets. Half the time, she's either crying or staring at the ceiling. Being alone is probably better for her health wise."

Spencer sighed. "We understand." As the nurse walked away, Spencer looked at Derek, who was clearly upset about not being about to see Penelope. "She just needs time, Morgan."

"How much time?" Derek asked. "We're her friends, the people who has her back. Does she think we'll hurt her?"

"I think she thinks everything is bad for her right now. I've been where she is emotionally before, my situation is a lot different but I can understand the feeling she has creeping on her. The fact that she doesn't want to see anyone, it is for the best. Give her time to collect her thoughts and when she's ready - I bet the first person she wants to see is you."

Derek sat back down. "Alright. Let's just keep waiting then."

. . .

Friday 12:45PM

The team halted their steps in front the last house they haven't checked out. The driver was right, this place is just a small community. Every single house that they have checked so far homes belongs to senior citizens. None of those houses called for plausible cause to go inside and search. After a couple of minutes of walking in the heat, the only house left is the most secluded one. "This is it," JJ said as she took off her sunglasses. "If this is another dead end, we'll have to wait until Garcia is willing to tell us where she was. That's counting on if she could remember."

Luke scanned the property, his eyes taking a closer look at the dirt and the surrounding areas. "Doesn't this place scream something wrong?"

Emily took a deep breath as she took off her own sunglasses. "What do you mean?"

He walked around the skid marks on the dirt, rushed and messy. "Somebody was in a rush." Luke bent down and narrowed his eyes at the tire marks. "The wheels looks as if it belongs to an SUV, at least a car with four doors." Continuing on walking around the driveway, he paused and glanced at what he saw in front of him. "Guys, there's blood. It's dry but it's still blood."

"That gives us plausible cause to check inside," Rossi said as he took out his gun from the holster. "Be alert."

Everybody took out their guns as they slowly made their way to the front door. "Federal agents!" Emily called out after pounding her fist onto the door. As she lift her hand to pound on the door once again, the door slowly opened on it's own. She looked at the others. "Let's be careful." She stepped inside the house and walked into the living room, her eyes and gun alert. "Clear!"

JJ stepped out from one of the rooms. "Clear!"

Rossi came out from the kitchen. "Clear!"

"There's an upstairs," Luke informed them as he went up the stairs. "Do you - " he hesitated as there was an odor coming from one of rooms on the second floor. "You smell that?"

JJ followed behind him and sighed. "I'm so used to that smell that it's easy to pinpoint what it is now."

Luke made his way upstairs and opened the door to the nearest bedroom. As soon as the door opened, he scoffed in disbelief. "We were right," the bedroom was an exact replica of Penelope's own bedroom. "He brought home to her."

"God, he's disturbing." Emily said as she walked in. Her eyes adverted over to the bed, the blankets and bedsheet were all on the floor. "There was a struggle."

Rossi shook his head as he walked past every single figurines and personal items of Penelope's in the room. "She's never going to want to see these again."

JJ appeared at the doorway with her hand covering her mouth. "The smell is coming from the master bedroom." Disgust was written on her face as she tied her hair into a ponytail. "It's probably the family that lived here," she cleared her throat as she struggled to say her next words. "Elderly couple with grandchildren. Looks as if they've been dead for more than a month or so."

Emily closed her eyes before she took our her phone. "We'll have to call forensic team in here." Right off the bat, the house was already a disaster when they walked in. The mess can only come from what seems like a struggle, a hard fought one.

"Guys - " JJ looked at her team with worry in her eyes. "Penelope knew he killed one person, the housekeeper in front of her. Knowing how she is as a person, if she found out that he has killed more than three people so far. Do you think she - "

Luke sighed as he interrupted. "If she would put the blame on herself?" There is no doubt that it would be exactly how Penelope would feel if she found out everything about this guy.

. . .

Friday 2:00PM

Derek couldn't believe what he just heard after the others came back from the house. "A family?" A little over three days ago, he and the team had believe that they were just dealing with a stalker turned kidnapper. As the investigation continues and more information are being discovered, they're dealing with a much smarter person than they thought. With the seven bodies that were found so far, who knows how many more are out there that was murdered by him? "He's a narcissistic serial killer on the loose who has his eyes on only Penelope." He shook his head out of frustration. "This is just great."

"There was a struggle in the house?" Spencer asked.

"Yeah," JJ answered. "Penelope definitely didn't leave without fighting."

The team turned their attention over to the doctor and nurse who were walking toward them. "Agents." He cleared his throat as he held onto a clipboard, his eyes looking at each and every single one of them. "The results from the kit finally arrived."

Emily stood up. "Yes?" It wasn't a secret that they were all nervous and fearful for the worst. Having one of their own to go through this isn't what they wished upon anyone.

"I am sorry to say this but," he paused briefly as he flipped through the clipboard. "There was obvious tearing and semen found during the kit."

Derek punched the wall. "Damn it!"

JJ immediately sat back down and cried. "Garcia..."

"Can you give us the sample of the semen?" Spencer asked. "We can ask our forensic team to run it."

"Of course," he handed him a bag and paperwork for it. "I knew that you would eventually ask me for it." The doctor could see that the agents were clearly upset and distraught over the news. "If it makes you feel better, she fought hard. It wasn't easy for her but I think it's what gave her the chance to run away."

"How do you know?" Luke asked.

The doctor closed the clipboard and sighed. "I'm no expert but one of the tearing she did have, it can only happen if...." he cleared his throat and gave Emily a brief look, hoping for her to understand. "She pushed and probably pulled hard. At that moment, she thought of that as the only answer to the situation."

Rossi scoffed. "Penelope is going to heal, right?"

"The tearing seems really severe, it'll take months for her to heal externally and internally." The doctor explained. "She'll be in constant pain and - "

"Doctor..." Everybody adverted their attention over to Penelope, who was standing by the doorway to the waiting room. "I would like to talk to you."

"Of course, Miss Garcia." The doctor walked over to her. "Is there something you need?"

Penelope briefly looked at the team, the group of people who she dearly loves and cares for but as of this moment, she didn't want to see anyone. She knew that she should go over and hug each one of them because that's what she would do. Things are different now. Glancing back over to the doctor as she wrapped her arms around herself. "Alone."

The doctor glanced between Penelope and the team. "Uh, we can go to my office." He showed the way through the hallways and over to his office. "What is it, Miss Garcia?"

"Did I get tested?" Penelope asked softly.

"Excuse me?" The doctor furrowed his eyebrows in confusion for a few seconds before he fully understood what she meant. "Ah, yes. It is our standard procedure to test victims for those diseases." He folded his hands on top of the desk. "The nurses also made sure to let you take some pills, it helps prevent any diseases from forming due to the..." he stopped talking as he knew the word would probably be hard for her to digest. "Are you alright?"

Penelope blinked her eyes as the word victim processed through her mind. "Victim." She said softly to herself. "I was a victim before."

"I'm sorry?"

She glanced up from her hands and looked straight into the doctor's eyes. "I was shot almost ten years ago. Death was literally hovering over me. My whole body went limp while I was going in and out of consciousness. That was the first time I fell into that category," she paused as she started peeling at the dry skin on her hands. "The victim category. Of course, I was only considered as a shot victim but it was still scary and upsetting to know that I worked so hard in my life to only be considered as one word to represent me. Victim." Feeling suddenly cold and tired, she clenched onto the end of the hospital gown. "Victim. I don't really like that word, doctor." She returned her gaze to him. "I was just getting used to not being called that word and then this happened. I get kidnapped, tortured, starved and...." she didn't want to say it. "I've become a victim again and I hate it so much."

"Miss Garcia, everything will get easier from this day forward." The doctor reassured her with a slight frown on his face. "You have an amazing group of people outside in the waiting room for you. You're in safe hands and nothing will happen to you again."

Penelope thought about what he said but she shook her head. "You're wrong. You want to know why you're wrong?" Seeing as how he wasn't responding to her, she continued talking. "Because I was in my safe zone when I got kidnapped. I was in my little office with my little figurines inside a building that is considered one of the safest places in the United States. It didn't matter. I still got kidnapped."

The doctor narrowed his eyes at her. "You can't let yourself get suck in this self-guilt, Miss Garcia. It won't do any good for you mentally."

"I watched a woman die in my arms because of what I said," Penelope clenched her teeth as she was started to become visibly shaky. The memory of how she died has been playing over and over in her head since it happened. Even with these clean hands in front of her right now, all she sees is the poor woman's blood all over it. Worse of all, no matter how much she looks at herself in front of the mirror, all she sees is what happened on that horrific bed in that house. "I decided to argue back with the kidnapper by being a smart ass when I should've kept my mouth shut in the first place. If I didn't open my mouth, that woman would've still been alive. She would've been home with her family, smiling and laughing. Instead, she's laying in a morgue somewhere, waiting to be buried deep under the ground. While I'm here, sitting across from you - alive." She abruptly stood up from her seat and took a deep breath as she made her way over to the door. "Nothing will ever do me any good anymore."

. . .

Monday 10:30PM

It's not a secret that it has been a rough couple of days. Three days has passed since Penelope came back but she still refuses to see the team members. With the help of the doctor and nurses, they managed to get a sketch of the Unsub from her. The routine of standing guard at the hospital was still going on and it won't end until the guy is caught. Tara Lewis and Stephen Walker eventually came back from their week long training. With extra brains and hands into the investigation, everybody became relieved but it didn't last long. The investigation has reached to the point of exhaustion and lost of hope for the members. Each lead has resulted into nothing but frustration and anger. The DNA from the semen wasn't in the system so he's either never done anything as extreme as this or he's just haven't been caught.

By the orders of the superiors, Emily has been forced to put the case into the back end of everything else. Starting tomorrow, the team will have to start working on other cases. She has tried to fought with words and evidence that the media won't let this case go down until they catch the guy. It wasn't like she didn't try but the superiors weren't having it. "I'm sorry." Emily informed the members as she exhaled deeply. "I spent four hours with them in that conference room but they just won't give in."

Rossi scoffed. "Typical higher authority trying to divert the attention away from a case that's the one in most need." He shook his head as he turned to look briefly at Penelope's hospital room. "Have you told her?"

Emily sighed. "She won't see me. I did inform the nurses on nightshift about the news and they will tell her when they go in to give her routine medicine." She looked at Derek, who has been silent since she told them. "Morgan, I tried my best."

Derek cleared his throat. "It's alright. I understand that you can't do something about it once it's out of your hands." Checking the time on his watch, he tapped his foot on the floor. "I should go home. Savannah and the baby hasn't seen me for almost a week. I'll be back in the morning for briefing on the new case."

JJ couldn't take her eyes away from Penelope's hospital room. She can't understand why Penelope wouldn't see them. At least out of everyone, can't she be willing to see her or Derek? "I should get home too," she quickly put on her jacket as she yawned. "Will needs his sleep and I can't keep staying out like this."

"I'll take you home." Derek offered as he zipped up his jacket. "See you guys tomorrow."

Rossi also bid his goodbyes with Tara and Stephen following behind him. As soon as they were gone, Emily turned to Spencer. "Where do you need to go?" Everybody's priority has been about Penelope and this case that the members has put aside some of their own personal problems. Now with Penelope safely in the hospital and the case is officially put on hold, as Unit Chief - she wants to make sure that the other members get their own things done. "If you need to go, Spencer - "

Spencer shook his head. "I can stay."

"It's not your turn to keep and stay on guard," Emily explained. "You stayed here last night with me. If you need to go home, go."

"Are you sure?" Spencer asked. "I don't want to leave Luke alone in the waiting room."

Luke shrugged his shoulders as he drew a deep breath. "Don't worry about it, Reid. You've been keeping on watch more than the rest of us." Spencer doesn't say much about personal emotions than he does with intelligence. But anyone who has seen Spencer in the last few days, they can tell that he has been on the edge of his seat lately. "She won't even see or talk to us," Luke continued. "You won't miss anything besides sleep if you stay."

Spencer nodded his head. "Okay. Call me if anything comes up."

"I'll drive you." Emily looked at Luke, a little worried about him. "How about you? Are you sure you can stay on guard yourself tonight?"

Luke chuckled as he nodded his head. "I got my jacket and a good book to keep me up."

Emily looked through the window one more time to check Penelope. "She'll be fine eventually, right?"

"I don't know." Luke didn't want to lie. He has seen the other members trying to go into the room but were immediately pushed away by the nurses when Penelope kept screaming. "She just needs time." Emily nodded her head in agreement before she waved goodbye with Spencer following behind. As soon as he was left alone in the waiting room, Luke sat down on the nearest chair and closed his eyes.

While everybody else has tried to see Penelope despite her refusal, Luke is the only one that hasn't tried. A part of him feels as if it would be useless after seeing Penelope's mental health on the first day in the waiting room. Another part of him is just fear - he's scared that she would refuse to see him like the others. But mainly, he's scared that she wouldn't be the same Penelope Garcia that he knew and grown to love be around with in the last seven months. Her laughter, her smile, her small antics as she spoke back in witty remarks - he wants to see all of that again but he knew, deep inside of him, he knew that as soon as he sees her, it wouldn't happen. That contagious smile wouldn't look the same, that sweet sound of her bright laughter wouldn't echo in his ears and those witty remarks wouldn't feel as amusing as they were before.

His thoughts were distracted when a nurse ran out from her desk and straight into Penelope's room. A hand on top of his holster, ready and alarmed - he rushed over to the doorway and watched as Penelope start screaming.

"Penelope! Everything's okay! Please calm down!" The nurse struggled to hold back Penelope as she kept screaming and kicking her legs in the air. She was having a nightmare, the same nightmare she has been having since she returned. "Penelope! Shhhhh, it's okay! Please wake up." Luke inched a step into the room, ready to help out the nurse since it seems as if she is useless but the nurse immediately looked at him. "No! You need to step back, agent! She will freak out even more if you come in here!"

"What's happening?" Luke asked, his tone filled with worry and confusion. It's his first day to stand in guard and he hasn't heard anything of Penelope having nightmares like this. "Is she okay?!" He moved aside when the doctor and another nurse rushed into the room, helping the previous nurse. "Is she okay?!" Luke repeated.

The doctor took out a syringe and pinched it into Penelope's arm. For a few seconds, Penelope was still screaming until the syringe took in effect and she calmed down. "Alright. Let her go." Once the nurses backed away, the doctor drew a deep breath and turned his attention over to Luke. "Agent, she's fine."

"Has this been happening on a regular basis?" Luke furrowed his eyebrows. The doctor nodded his head. "When her afternoon medicine dies down, she starts sleeping and have the same nightmare again. I don't know what she is seeing her sleep but we can all assume that it isn't pretty." He wiped a few drops of sweat from his face. "Health wise, she's still weak."

"What did you just give her?"

"Just something to calm her down and have her return to sleep," the doctor briefly turned to look at Penelope again. "It won't last long. She'll eventually wake up in a few minutes and do the same thing she always does."

"Screaming and kicking?"

"Sometimes. It's either a nightmare or just laying in her bed and staring at the ceiling nonstop." The doctor checked his watch. "I have another patient to check up on. Have a good night, Agent."

Luke nodded his head and stepped back when the doctor closed the door. He stepped aside and looked at Penelope through the windows. She's sleeping so soundly. Feeling tired himself, he looked down to make sure his handgun was perfectly in place of the holster. Walking back over to the waiting room, he sat back down and closed his eyes for a few seconds.

. . .

Monday 2:00AM

Luke closed the book he finished reading and stood up to relax his tense muscles. Deciding that it's best if he went to get a cup of coffee, he walked out of the waiting room - making sure to check Penelope's room on the way to see that she's fine. "Hello," he said as he walked past other nurses. "Morning."

"Coffee?" The nurse handed him a cup of coffee. "You look tired, Agent."

He briefly chuckled as he took a sip of the coffee. "I'm alright."

The nurse looked at his hands and smiled. "I don't see a ring."

He arched an eyebrow at the sudden statement. "Uh, yeah." Luke cleared his throat as he took another sip of the coffee. "I haven't been married."

"Are you dating anyone at the moment?"

Luke shook his head, noticing that this conversation is hitting the note of uncomfortableness. "No. I'm single."

The nurse giggled. "Are you interested in anyone? Do you have anyone in mind that you like?"

He opened his mouth to answer no but he stopped. Suddenly, the only images playing in his head after the question is Penelope. Her smiles in the elevator every time she teased him. Her laughter every time when she managed to get a witty remark toward him. A smile silently spread across his face, a little surprise that he would think of those moments at the moment. "I actually don't know but," he shrugged his shoulders. "I think I do have someone in mind."

A frown immediately appeared on her face. "I see."

"Sorry," Luke softly said as he placed the empty cup of coffee back on the table and turned to walk back to the waiting room. He halted his steps when he saw Penelope walking out of her own room. "Pene - " he paused and decided to just follow her. Not knowing where she is going, he kept silent as they walked through several hallways and up a couple of staircases. Checking his watch, over five minutes has passed by now. "Rooftop..." he said to himself as soon as he walked past the sign, indicating that they're about to be on the rooftop. "Penelope!"

She halted her steps. Without turning around, she sat down on the edge of the ledge on the rooftop. "I'm fine. I'm not going to jump if that's what you're worried about."

Feeling uneasy on if she's lying or not, Luke narrowed his eyes around the scenery in front of them. He didn't know that the sky would be this beautiful at two in the morning. "How....how are you feeling?" Silence went by without an answer. "Alright. You just want quiet, right?" He cleared his throat and walked over to the edge, sitting next to her on the ledge.

Penelope watched as the street lights flickered on and off below her. The sounds of cars zooming past them as it's the only time in the day where they can freely speed without worrying. The blinking stars above her, begging for a wish. She exhaled deeply and spread out her arms, letting the cold wind breeze past her.

Luke watched her carefully, the way she was acting and behaving. A small smile appeared on his face as he scanned her face. Selfishly, he's happy she's back whether she's harm or not. As long as she's back safely with the team - everything else doesn't matter. He knew that it would take time but he's willing to wait for her to be ready. For the past few days, JJ has been repeating that Penelope would return because she's strong and brave. He wants to believe that a part of that will become true but still, that part of him deep inside is telling him that everything about her will change dramatically. They just have to be willing and patient with whatever happens in the future with her behavior in the team. "You know," Penelope softly whispered as she looked up at the sky. "I didn't see the sky for three days when I was with him."

Luke blinked. "You don't have to talk, Penelope."

"When I was in that basement on the first day, I kept imagining how the sun was like or how it would feel against my skin. Was it bright that day? Was the sun extremely hot? If I were to escape, would I scorch the bottom of my feet because I didn't have my shoes or socks." She looked down at her hands, picking at the dry skin again. "Then I was trapped in a dark truck container and it was freezing. The coldness made me wish for the heat even more. I was chattering my teeth and shivering to the point of wishing I was dead. Then I kept remembering what you guys would say," she paused slightly. "how I am a strong person and I could go through this without giving up."

"Penelope...."

For the first time in four days and constant refusal to see the others, she turned her head and looked at Luke straight in the eyes. "Do you want to know how many times I wanted to give up? I counted. Thirteen times. Twice in that basement. Five times in that truck container. Three times in that motel room," she choked up with tears brimming against her eyes as the images of the dead woman replayed in her head. "And three times while that guy was....." tears slid her face and she forcibly wiped them away. "What he did to me in that bedroom, I can still feel it. Every inch of my body feels as if it's rotten. I want to scratch everything away and get rid of that feeling of him...."

Luke reached his hand to touch her shoulders but stopped himself. Not knowing if he should touch her not, he pulled back his hand and cleared his throat. "It's over."

"Is it?" Penelope questioned back in a louder voice. "Is it really over, Luke?" Her voice was starting to break and become weak as she thought about the kidnapper. "He's still out there and probably waiting for the moment to kidnap me again. You know how he works, you saw all those video footages that he had." This time, she isn't bothering on wiping the tears that were streaming on her face. Her vision became blurry because of the tears as she looked at Luke. "He's probably watching us right now. Enjoying the fact that he hasn't been caught after what he has done to me. He gets off on this, you know. He's a sick bastard who does nothing but hurt people." Penelope whimpered as she clenched her hand into a tight fist. "I heard what the nurses said the other day." She started shaking as she clenched on teeth. "Is it true? That woman in the motel room isn't the first person he killed? He killed seven people? And I stayed in that basement without knowing that a poor man was trapped in the walls?"

He sighed. The team had informed the nurses to especially not let Penelope find out about the other deaths. "I...."

"How about that house? An elderly couple with their grandchildren? They're dead." Penelope started breathing in and out heavily as she couldn't control the tears anymore. "They're dead because of me. He is doing all of this because of me."

Luke immediately shook his head. "No, don't think like that. It isn't your fault, Penelope. Repeat over me. It's not your fault."

Penelope stared at Luke's face, the way he was furrowing his eyebrows as his expression was filled with concern and frustration at the fact that he couldn't do anything to help her. "What was her name?"

"Elizabeth Miller," Luke answered. "She didn't have a family. Debts were racking up in her account and she had three jobs to keep her life going. The housekeeper job in the motel was one of them."

"She was so happy when the door opened, she didn't know that she was going to die." Penelope cried. "I hugged her and held onto her until she took her last breath."

"I know," Luke said. "You would do something like that."

"Even when she was dying, she looked at me and smiled. As if she was telling - "

Luke interrupted. "That it wasn't your fault."

Penelope looked at him. "The others?"

"Franklin Bolt. Daniel and Shelley Brooke. The grandchildren were Lillian, Frank, and Tiffany Brooke." Luke watched Penelope's face as she took in the information. "None of their death is your fault."

"He's killing them because he needed their houses and they were in the way, he needed a place to keep me trapped and alone." Penelope stared straight ahead, darkness and emptiness.

Luke didn't want to ask but he had to. "Why kill Elizabeth Miller? Was it because she caught him? Did he do something suspicious that caught her attention and he had to stop her before she ran for help?"

Penelope didn't answer right away. "It's because I opened my mouth and said something."

"What...what did you say?"

"The truth about my feelings," Penelope adverted her gaze away from the streets and back over to Luke. His deep brown eyes staring at her with such concern was killing her. She didn't know what to say. "And he didn't like it. He got angry and acted out. It was my fault. If had kept my mouth shut, Elizabeth would've still been alive. Now, he's just a serial killer walking freely."

"We will catch him." Luke promised. "I won't let this guy walk around on the streets. I won't let him hurt you anymore."

Penelope turned and looked at Luke. "Why?"

"What do you mean why?" Luke asked.

"Why do you care?" Penelope asked as she cried. "I'm not the same Penelope Garcia as before anymore. All I see is darkness and emptiness in my life repeatedly. There is no point of any of you caring about me anymore. Don't you get it? I won't be able to be the same and I will make your lives a living hell. I will be screaming in my sleep half the time with my legs kicking in the air. I won't be able to work and answer phone calls with witty laughable remarks to make your work lives easier. Why do you care? Who am I to you that would make you care like this? We're nothing but colleagues. Why would you care?!" She screamed. Before she could stop herself, she started hitting her fits on Luke's arm as she cried harder. "Stop caring about me! Everybody needs to stop caring about me! Just leave me alone!!!"

Luke didn't want to touch her, he tried his best to keep his hands away because he was scared on how she would react to anyone's touch. But as he sit and watch her struggling with her emotions, pushing him away with her fists consistently. He did the one thing that would reassure her that no one is leaving no matter how hard she tries to make them. Wrapping his arms around her shoulders, he quickly pulled her into a tight embrace. Placing his chin on the top of her head, he closed his eyes. "Everything will be okay. Everything will be okay."

Penelope tried to push him away as soon as her head was on his chest but he was too strong. After a few seconds of trying, she couldn't handle it anymore. She has tried to push everyone else away and it worked. Why is it that she can't manage to push Luke away? Why is his embrace the only one that's making her less emotional? Why can't she keep up with the strong exterior and walk away from him like the other members? Feeling helpless and emotionally tired, she slowly lift her arms and wrapped her arms around his body. "I'm so scared....." Tears leaked onto Luke's shirt as she cried harder and harder. "I'm scared that I can't go through this alone."

"You won't be alone," Luke promised. Pulling away from the embrace, he made sure that she was looking at him in the eyes as he spoke. "I will never leave you alone." Luke caressed his thumb over her face to wipe away her tears before he leaned over and  kissed the top of her head before embracing her even tighter. "I promise."

a/n: chapter five originally would’ve been updated in another day but I decided to bring another chapter for you guys (: please support it on here and fanfiction! it would truly inspire me a lot! thank you for the constant love!