#chicago seemed like a dream but it’s kind of terrifying.

[friendorflo]

Wont be here for long, just dropping off these peaches for both of you! Hope everything works out soon for you both. Enjoy the peaches! —😎

Oh……. thank you. really thank you i wasn’t expecting it i guess. that’s really sweet. he loves peaches. hey be careful out there ok? this world is so fucked up.

[readingforsanity]

The Paleontologist | Luke Dumas | Published 2023 | *SPOILERS*

A haunted paleontologist returns to the museum where his sister was abducted years earlier and is faced with a terrifying and murderous spirit in this chilling novel from the author of A History of Fear - perfect for fans of Simone St. James and Katy Hays.

Curator of paleontology Dr. Simon Nealy never expected to return to his Pennsylvania hometown, let alone the Hawthorne Museum of Natural History. Hee was just a boy when his six-year-old sister, Morgan, was abducted from the museum under his watch, and the guily has haunted Simon ever since. After a recent break-up and the death of the aunt who raised him, Simon feels drawn back to the place where Morgan vanished, in search of the bones they never found.

But from the moment he arrives, things aren't what he expected. The Hawthorne is a crumbling ruin, still closed amid the ongoing pandemic, and plummeting toward financial catastrophe. Worse, Simon begins seeing and hearing things he can't explain. Strange animal sounds. Bloody footprints that no living creature could have left. A prehistoric killer looming in the shadows of the museum. Terrified he's losing his grasp on reality, Simon turns to the handwritten research diaries of his predecessor and uncovers a blood-soaked mystery 150 million years in the making that could be the answer to everything.

Are these the ravings of a madman? Or is there something supernatural at play? And what does this have to do with Morgan's disappearance?

Another atmospheric mystery from Luke Dumas, The Paleontologist is a ghost story unlike any other that will haunt you long after you turn the final page.

Amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, Simon Nealy, a 31-year-old paleontologist from Chicago, returns to his hometown in PA after leaving his dream job at the Field Museum and taking up a new one at a smaller, lesser-known natural history museum called the Hawthorne. He can't explain why he is returning to a place that brought him both joy and turmoil as a child, but it felt like the right thing to do.

Some twenty years ago, Simon's younger sister, Morgan, was taken from the museum and despite search efforts, she was never found and has been presumed dead for years. Simon has dealt with the guilt that followed for many years, as he had been with her that day, though he had gone off to the dinosaur exhibit instead of staying with her in her preferred exhibit.

After their mother relapsed into drugs after Morgan's disappearance, Simon went to live with his aunt, his mother's sister, in Naperville, a suburb of Chicago, where he remained until he returned to PA.

Now that he is back, he feels ready to end the mystery that is Morgan. He feels that she has been calling to him. And in the beginning, things seem to be going well. With the museum closed and under it's own duress due to the lack of finances coming in due to the pandemic, Simon has a bit of time to look into what needs to be done.

During his search in the basement of the museum, he finds the remains of a large dinosaur, some still covered in the sediment it was taken from, and others having been uncovered from the dirt. He is told by his superiors that this is "Theo", an unknown dinosaur that Simon's predecessor, Dr. Albert Mueller had uncovered during a dig in Colorado, and what he had been working on until the idea was scrapped and Theo's remains were put into storage, albeit the incorrect kind of storage, as pieces of his remains ended up becoming waterlogged due to a leak.

Simon begins working on uncovering the rest of the dinosaur and will begin to design a new exhibit for him, with hopes that this new dinosaur, officially a Ceratosaurus, will bring in tons of money once he is unveiled.

However, Simon begins to wonder if the man before him was into something a bit more sinister than just working with the bones of a long-since dead animal. Simon has located Mueller's personal diaries which depict his initial findings on the new dinosaur, but then begin to take on a more sinister tone. He reveals that he has begun seeing things that aren't there, more specifically dead animals with pink-eyes, along with hearing things. And like Mueller, Simon does too.

He believes the scenes playing out before him are that of Theo's past, giving him a glimpse into what has occurred to the poor dinosaur in the final moments of its life. As a result, areas of the museum are often found to be demolished the next day, furthermore depleting the musem's already diminished finances.

However, with the help of Evie Mitchell, the museum's biggest donor of funds, Theo's exhibit is well on its way. With the plan to open the exhibit on the night of their HIMA gala on September 4th, Simon hires someone to build the exhibit.

During his research, Simon believes that Mueller is the one who took his sister from the museusm exhibit. He tries to explain this to the police, but at the time of Morgan's disappearance, he had an alibi, along with others within the paleontology department at the museum. The police won't listen. Despite things moving quickly with Theo's exhibit, Simon can think of nothing else.

Simon finds an email inside Mueller's employee file, where a young woman who also worked at the museum accused him of wrongdoing. On the day of the fateful visit, Mueller had told this young woman named Violet to inform him of when the sibling pair arrived at the museum. Assuming that the two children were relatives of Mueller's, she obliged, but felt increasingly weird about it, especially after Morgan went missing. She reported this to her superiors, but nothing was ever done about it at the time. Simon does learn that an investigation was brought forth, but the Board of Directors of the museum decided that Mueller had done nothing wrong, and that they would continue operations as normal.

Simon understands now that some type of cover up happened, and that he is now more convinced than ever that Mueller is to blame for Morgan's disappearance. When his mother, Joelle, having tested positive for COVID and is now in the hospital, confirms that it was the "Bone Man" that had given her the tickets to the museum that day for the children, he knew his suspicions were correct.

Fran, a PR person from the museum, drives Simon to Mueller's home, but is told that he longer resides there and the new tenants give Simon the information on where they can now locate the elderly former scientist. Simon is shocked, as the address is the home of a man he had met while visiting the outside of his former home. An elderly, gay potter, Zander Steyn is taking care of Mueller and identifies himself as the Bone Man.

Having hailed from South Africa, coming to the US when he was younger, he couldn't return home after his mother's death due to a car accident. He remained in the US, taking a job at the Hawthorne, working in the anthropology department. He worked closely with Mueller, doing work on Theo as well. In order to feel closer to his mother, he took up pottery, eventually making pieces out of bone. At first, it was only that of animals, before eventually turning into human bones.

He had briefly dated Simon's mother, up until her addiction overcame her. But, he was going to abduct both Simon and Morgan, but only Morgan was there when Mueller went to bring her downstairs to the basement, Simon having either left shortly before or arriving shortly after she had been abducted. The bone china tea set that they're having tea out of is that of Morgan's bones.

Zander has now drugged Simon in hopes of having that same feeling again that he had gotten with Morgan, with reconnecting with his mother, but Simon returns to consciousness the next day, finding himself in Fran's apartment, where he is told that Mueller had brought himself downstairs and ultimately saved his life, despite Fran hitting Zander over the head and knocking him unconscious. Mueller died in her arms, but not before explaining that Morgan's remains are still at the museum.

Simon, calling upon his ex-boyfirend Kai, an expert in human remains, they ultimately identify an exhibit in the museum to be that of a young child, between 5-7 years old and they are later identified to be Morgan.

With one mystery out of the way, now Simon has to work on finding Theo's sibling, after having found a juvenile dinosaur bone with Theo's prior to his erection in the museum. Simon, along with Evie and a few others, go back to Colorado where they found Theo in order to find him. During the search, they find a Stegosaurus skeleton. On the final days of the search, they do ultimately find the smaller juveline Ceratosaurus, believed to be Theo's sibling.

More than a year later, the juvenile and Stegosaurus are added to the exhibit along with Theo, showing the scientific world that the once-believed to be solitary animals had family bonds. Simon believes that Theo died trying to protect his younger sister, who was also abducted by a marine dinosaur, and when attempting to save her, also perished and that was how the three dinosaurs remains were able to be found together.

Simon is now healing, and has returned to his home at the museum, allowing Morgan, and Theo, to finally rest.

[hlupdate]

“NEW YORK, ARE you feeling well and emotionally stable?” Harry Styles asked on the opening weekend of his historic 15-night stand at Madison Square Garden. When the entire crowd roared “Noooo,” he replied, “Good!” We can’t say he didn’t warn us. He kicked off his NYC Love on Tour residency with a riotous two-night celebration of mega-pop rapture at its most ecstatic. “Please feel free to do whatever you want to do in this room tonight,” Harry told the fans on Night Two. “Within reason.” It was a perfect intro, because the concept of “within reason” does not exist anywhere in the Harry cosmology—he couldn’t even say it with a straight face. Let’s just say this man is not doing wonders for the city’s emotional stability right now. 

Styles is trying a new mode of touring, celebrating his blockbuster Harry’s House with extended residencies in New York, Austin, Chicago and L.A. As he told Rolling Stone’s Brittany Spanos in our brand new cover story, it’s a way to perform without the energy-sucking strains of travel. You can tell Harry’s in town, by the trail of feathers and sequins for blocks around—a touch of glam in the dog days of summer. NYC in August is usually a place people are desperate to escape, but he makes it seem like the most romantic destination on the planet.

Harry’s residency starts almost exactly 8 years after the first time I saw him onstage with One Direction, August 2014 at MetLife Stadium. It’s unmistakable how so much has changed about this guy, but not the weirdest thing—his pure devotion to Too Much All The Time. He thrives on an absurd drive to give his energy away, to bombard every corner of the room with the joy he gets from music, no matter how huge that room might be. As he sings in the show-opener “Daydreaming,” he wants to give you something to dream about. And he does, from the tubular-bells synth groove of “As It Was” to the destructo-punk headbang of “Kiwi.”

He took the stage to jazz pianist Bill Evans’ “Peace Piece,” which (as he told Rolling Stone in 2019) was his longtime wake-up ritual. The music was overlaid with the voice of Buddhist scholar Alan Watts, saying, “This sensation of being a separate lonely individual is a hallucination.” Watts is talking about the soul breaking free of “our phony feeling that we are something lonely locked up in a bag of skin.” But it’s also a perfect description of live music at its best: a room full of strangers from different cultures, countries, generations, breaking free to become part of something vast and strange and slightly scary. And a Harry show IS live music at its best.

One of the coolest fan signs in the pit: “Pose if you can see this.” Guess he saw it? Because this vixen never stopped wiggling, twirling, swooshing down the catwalk, giving high kicks like a Rockette with the rent due. This set is almost all uptempo bangers, mostly from Harry’s House. He’s going for a festively manic vibe, so you don’t mind him leaving out the ballads. (No “Falling,” “Cherry,” “Fine Line,” not even “Lights Up.”) It’s a super-emotional show, even without the sad songs, because the will to uplift never quits. The mood was summed up in the great moment where his guitar boogie “Cinema” crashes into “Music For A Sushi Restaurant,” linked by the horn fanfare from the Village People’s “Y.M.C.A.” 

When he debuted these songs live in May, at his NYC One Night Only extravaganza, his excitement was off the rails—he ended the show by doing “As It Was” twice, a totally unexpected and unplanned move, because he just didn’t want it to end. (At his very first NYC show, in 2017, it was “Kiwi” he did twice.) As he says in the Rolling Stone cover story, that moment was startling even for him. As he said, “I kind of felt like, ‘All right, I’ve seen how crazy it can get.’ And I think there was something about it where I was … not terrified, but I just needed a minute. Because I wasn’t sure what it was. Just that the energy felt insane.” That’s how this show feels all the way through.

It’s his first time at the Garden since his HarryWeen blow-out last October. He’s back to performing in the round, or as he elegantly put it, “I’m gonna be in the middle of you all night!” This stage set means he has to cover more space, but nobody loves covering space like he does. He explained, “Sometimes we’re gonna be face-to-face, eye-to-eye, window-to-soul. If I’m not facing you, you’ll be looking ass to face. If you have a preference, face or ass, let me know.” He gallantly promised to distribute his ass evenly, saying, “I can assure you there is plenty to go around. Which leads me to the introduction to this very sad song.” (Who else could get away with using an ass-to-face disclaimer as a lead-in to a ballad as heart-wrenching as “Matilda”? This man only.)

As always, he took special joy in roasting all the dads in the audience. On Night 2, he announced a new innovation. “It’s called Golf Dad Cam,” he said. “We’re gonna find the golf dads. Its like Kiss Cam, except nobody wants to kiss them, because they’re golf dads!” He found 30 victims to mortify on the video screen, then proclaimed, “At the end of these shows, they’re gonna erect a banner in Madison Square Garden in honor of the golf dads. Thank you from the bottom of my heart to the bottom of your tucked-in polo-shirt hearts.” 

(Note: Can you imagine if Harry played the Super Bowl halftime show? It would take hours because he’d have 70,000 golf dads in the house, and he’d need to make fun of every single one of them. They’d have to cancel the damn game.)

On Night 1, a fan held up a sign asking for advice: her ex just texted her after seven years. Harry took her phone to call the ex, Josh. (“It’s ALWAYS Josh, isn’t it?”) When Josh immediately hung up on him, Harry told her, “I wish you all the happiness. Just not with Josh. There’s someone else out there who will treat you with respect and love you for who you are. Never Josh!” At the end of the show, he told the crowd, “Make some noise for Josh, whatever kind of noise you want to make.”

Harry’s House was made in pandemic isolation, so it’s a trip to hear how the songs open up live. The album’s most ethereally beautiful moments—“Daylight,” “Keep Driving,” the peerless “Satellite”—turn into full-blown glitz-rockers, thanks to his all-star band: guitar god Mitch Rowland, drum guru Sarah Jones, percussion master Pauli Lovejoy,  keyboardist Ny Oh, bassist Elin Sandberg, keyboardist Yaffra, and a jazzy four-piece horn section. On Sunday night, he busted out “Medicine,” really treating the microphone like a gentleman. At one point he paused so he could point out to Mitch and Sarah a t-shirt in the crowd that said “Bitch for Mitch.” (A category that pretty much included us all.) 

He ended with the rock & roll mosh-pit raunch of “Kiwi,” a song that never fails to make strong buildings quiver in terror—both nights, it turned the floor of Madison Square Garden into Jell-O. Has anyone ever made a “Kiwi” supercut of Harry’s faces at the line “such an actress”? He gives a different actress every night, and it’s always an Oscar-worthy star turn. You also gotta love how he always says “get home safe” right before dropping “Kiwi” on our heads—it’s like telling someone “have a nice day” before setting them on fire.

“Grapejuice” isn’t in the set, probably because of its tonsil-trashing high notes, but maybe it’ll be the “To Be So Lonely” of this tour—the fan fave that sneaks into the show by popular demand. On Night 1, he teased an instrumental snippet while introducing the band—just a little edging. FWIW, when Paul McCartney hit the road this summer for his Got Back tour, he surprised fans by busting out the slightly similar Wings groove “Let ‘Em In.” Could this mean that Sir Paul is a “Grapejuice” head himself?

Harry slowed it down for his two most soulful ballads: “Sign of the Times” and the new “Matilda.” They feel spiritually linked—two poetic songs about trauma, grief, and rebirth. “Sign of the Times” is a communal anthem that gets mightier the more strangers you sing it with—in a way, that’s what the song is about. (I thought I already loved that song in 2017, but it’s built to be lived with over the years.) Yet “Matilda” is so intimate, it’s still disorienting to hear it in a crowded room. It’s a song designed for fans to access their most private selves, in a public, supportive space. Some spent “Matilda” having a meditative moment to themselves. Others let it all hang out, like the weepy group hug in front of me, with eight chosen sisters singing together. But everybody became part of the story. It’s the kind of moment Harry lives to generate. 

He’d be the first to say that the audience creates these moments, and he just shows up to be part of it. But either way, the New York shows were a nonstop rush of those moments. You spend a couple of hours in this environment, and the outside world looks a little brighter when you leave, because you take that feeling with you. It’s a revelation that enthusiasm is everything.  Somehow, a 15-night stand of Harry Styles seems like it could never be enough.

Set List:

“Daydreaming”

“Golden”

“Adore You”

“Daylight”

“Keep Driving”

“Matilda”

“Little Freak”

“Satellite”

“Cinema”

“Music for a Sushi Restaurant”

“Treat People With Kindness”

“What Makes You Beautiful”

“Late Night Talking”

“Watermelon Sugar”

“Love of My Life”

Encore:

“Sign of the Times”

“Medicine” (Sunday only)

“As It Was”

“Kiwi”

[princesshalfdemon]

anyways if it seems like i’ve been thinking about religion more based on some of my points

a few months ago there was a really bad tornado warning. i’ve lived in chicago my whole life. i go through 3-4 tornado warnings every year. one time when i was little (and now this COULD have been a dream or something bc i don’t remember details) i think ia ctually did see a tornado.

a really bad tornado warning happened while i was at work at the clinic. let me be clear: we do  not have basements in the clinic, and it go so bad so quick there was no way to feasibly safely get anywhere else. i was fucking terrified. on discord i literally. sent several messages to those very close of me because i genuinely, sincerely though that was... a really good chance at being it. if a tornado actually had hit the clinic directly? realistically? that’s game over. clocking out. it wasn’t a long life but i could say it was a good one.

nothing happened and it was the biggest sigh of relief i ever had but it DID have me questioning my religious beliefs. i’ve always been agnostic- i don’t know if there’s one God, a million gods, or none- but i think there’s... something in us that lives after death. something that can’t be explained by science. i think there’s too much things in the world that can’t be explained by science for that to be the case. and i also accept i could be wrong and that’s clocks out.

i had thought about going to church again. i then learned my childhood church was a mega church and the pastor might’ve tried to hire a hitman. i THEN learned that very close by there’s this really nice pro LGBT methodist church. a church i drive by almost every day that’s always flying an LGBT (and now ukranian) flag visibly. and i went ot their website... and it looked really nice. i really thought about going that weekend. i chose not to. saturday is one of my only days i can really spend the night with my friends... that’s important to me. marston actually showed me this one really cool pro lgbt preacher on youtube who’s content i might watch but

idk

i’m some kind of agnostic heavily leaning on Christian. idk what i’ll be in the future. i can say that i don’t intend for that to be a very consistent thing. like, i’m an anime blogger mostly that rbs anime titties. worst case scenario, maybe i follow a few more religious blogs i trust and occasionally rb something inbetween. i’m nmto changing my things entire content fo rthis...

just

you know. it’s something important to me, you know? something that events in my life (most notably being a near-death experience) are making me consider re-exploring. either nothing changes, or i can have a bit more peace of mind about my life and religion in general is all. it’s my blog and i don’t... appreciate asks like that about an aspect of my life i’m exploring again. ty for understanding

[chloebeale]

NOW OR NEVER — (THE BECHLOE KISS)

PAIRING: Bechloe. RATING: T. A/N: It’s 3:30 am and my eyes are blurring, but how could I resist?

BECHLOE KISS / headcanon post

***

Beca doesn’t want her.

It has been years now. Years of longing looks and lingering stares, of dainty fingers brushing against gently trembling hands in the cool evening air. Years of Chloe wanting Beca, of desperate pining and of so painfully, so achingly just wanting her. There is something of a sad finality in accepting, as she watches Beca with glossy, tear-stung eyes, crowded by people and ready to start her new life—the life Chloe knows she truly, truly does deserve—the idea of Beca leaving, of taking these next steps away from the Bellas, away from Chloe.

No matter how soul-destroying that realization may be, though, Chloe is filled with a bittersweet feeling all in all. Chloe is so happy for Beca, she is so ridiculously happy, so overwhelmingly proud of her. But letting go of those years, of those real and raw feelings, it is just...it’s really freaking hard.

And Chloe knows that it is unfair of her to retreat to Chicago right now. As she moves through the crowds of people with a specific purpose, in search of the one person she knows will be able to take her mind off of everything even if only for a brief moment, she knows that it is so, so unfair, because he wants her, and she doesn’t want him. She just wants… Well, she just wants the distraction.

She realizes, as she rounds the corner to the familiar sight of a smiling Chicago, that he will be all too happy to provide that for her. And that is unfair, too.

Despite her sadness, despite that sense of loss plummeting into her stomach, despite everything, Chloe’s own smile is a genuine one as she picks up the pace of her footsteps, hand outstretching to rest on the back of Chicago’s neck in an effort to pull him closer.

He doesn’t question her, he leans in just as easily as she does, and for half a second, Chloe gets to just… she just gets to forget.

***

Adrenaline. It is adrenaline that is keeping Beca going right now.

It was adrenaline up on that stage, as she belted out that song to a packed out stadium of people, and it is adrenaline coursing through her body now, as she excuses herself from the Bellas’ squeals of excited celebration, knowing exactly where she wants to go.

Beca had seen it, she had seen that look of quiet sadness glistening in the most familiar eyes as their gazes had met through the crowd. And Beca knows what all of this entails, she knows that signing with DJ Khaled is going to mean a lot of huge, terrifying changes, but there is one thing she refuses to leave behind, one person she simply will not do this without.

She just needs to tell her. She needs to find her, and she needs to tell her.

Of course, as Beca rounds the corner to a quieter section, she doesn’t necessarily bank on exactly what she finds there.

To say that her heart doesn’t drop would be a lie. Beca has seen Chloe kissing people before, she has seen her with other people, and she has seen the very distinct way Chicago has stared every time Chloe has entered a room throughout this entire trip.

This time, however, that natural pang in her chest seems to subside quickly, it seems to be overtaken by a new rush of adrenaline, and as she stares blankly at the scene before her, notes the sight of Theo approaching in her peripheral vision, Beca decides to do something about it.

Theo doesn’t get the chance to speak. He opens his mouth to do so (that dude is always talking), but Beca doesn’t let him proceed. Instead, she rides that same wave of adrenaline, and presses her hand to his abdomen to effectively push him away.

“I’ve gotta go show this guy how it’s done,” she murmurs, and whether it is to Theo or simply to herself, a brief pep talk of some kind, Beca doesn’t know.

All she knows is that her feet carry her forward with a confidence she barely even recognizes, until she can reach out and grasp Chloe by the arm.

And suddenly, she realizes, it truly is now or never.

***

It catches Chloe off guard at first, the feeling of a hand tugging at her wrist. Fortunately, despite the level of passion she is attempting to display, she is absolutely not feeling this current kiss, she doesn’t care for the man whose lips are pressed firmly to her own. It proves easy for her to pull away, startled eyes widening slightly at the sight of Beca Mitchell, confident and beautiful, pulling her in.

It is like something from a dream—a dream Chloe has had many, many times before—the way Beca lifts her hands to Chloe’s cheeks. Chloe doesn’t even get to question her, doesn’t get to ask her what she is doing, before she feels soft lips pushing against her own, feels her lids fluttering shut and her body giving in to the sensation of Beca Mitchell kissing her, of something she has wanted for so, so long now.

Instinctively, Chloe’s hands rise to the back of Beca’s head, long fingers grasping at her neatly styled hair. And she cannot believe this is actually happening, cannot believe she is actually, finally kissing Beca Mitchell. No—Beca is kissing her.

Although she registers the sound of another voice (Theo’s, perhaps?), Chloe doesn’t take it in. She can’t really think of anything, nothing other than this very moment, this long overdue act of desperate passion, of years of pent up, desperate longing. As much as she doesn’t want to ruin it, doesn’t want to stop it, she needs a second to really take it in.

“What are you…” Chloe begins in a soft, disbelieving voice as she pulls just slightly back. Her hands refuse to move, they refuse to loosen their grip on the back of Beca’s hair, almost like she is afraid of her coming to her senses and making a hasty retreat. She expects the sight of Beca’s gaze, less scared than she would’ve ever imagined, to be something of a reality check, but it isn’t. There is no terrified moment of realization, no fear nor apprehension. It is simply them, the two of them staring at one another in the most natural, most comfortable way. Chloe’s voice softens, corners of her lips arching upward just slightly, and she whispers in a quiet, genuine tone meant only for Beca, “Bec, Do you know how long I’ve waited for you to do that?”

Although Beca licks her lips, almost like she is about to say something, it seems that she opts to hold back, to use her actions as her voice right now instead. A soft hand reaches around to tuck a loose auburn curl behind Chloe’s ear, and the gentle grin on Beca’s lips, the one Chloe’s gaze darts directly to, speaks volumes. She has every answer she needs as Beca leans back in, and Chloe does nothing to stop her.

A hand drops to her side, before her palm is settling beneath Beca’s thigh. Chloe lifts it to move her impossibly closer, and soon she is melting into this perfect, blissful moment with Beca Mitchell, a moment to far surpass any of her fantasies.

Maybe, she finally realizes, just maybe, Beca does want her, after all.

[crystalstar8]

Knights of the Night (ch 12)

Chapter 12

Ch 1, ch 2, ch 3, ch 4, ch 5, ch 6, ch 7, ch 8, ch 9, ch 10, ch 11, ch 12

https://archiveofourown.org/works/29139240/chapters/71536491

pairing: Jungkook x oc

genre: vampire au, college au, twilight, romance

word count: 1,568

warnings: blood (obviously), kidnapping, child kidnapping, needles, France

notes: vampires, vampire au, college, college au, so many twilight references, blood, needles, kidnapping, children, homelessness, dance, ballet, flashbacks, romance, slow burn, probably no smut, idk yet tho, France, French things, attempted genocide, inaccurate French history, bisexual main character, @strawberriewithchocolate-blog @mozy-j  @daechwitad-2​ @zobadak​​

summary: Catalina starts college in a small town all the way across the country. She doesn’t know anyone and isn’t exactly looking for friends. She just wants to focus on dance. But when she meets fellow dance major, Jimin, and adventurous, fellow freshman, Jungkook, Catalina ends up discovering a whole new side to the small college town; one that is dangerous but oh so enticing…

tw: graphic depictions of violence, death, mentions of suicide, possession

                “Where to start?” he asked. “I was…the son of a king. My life was pretty strict but I had this group of friends. We were all scholars, but when we met in secret, we liked to play with things like witchcraft and necromancy. We wanted to summon something, I don’t even remember what we wanted to summon, maybe someone who had power to give us something. Anyway, we planned it for a long time, and then we went to the woods and did this elaborate ritual. We made a human sacrifice, a woman who served in the palace. I remember her, she was terrified. I didn’t feel bad about it though. I was… cold and apathetic back then, but I still remember her face. After we slit her throat and drained her blood, we set fire to her and all the other ingredients. And then a woman came from…”

               Yoongi narrowed his eyes and looked to the ceiling, as if struggling to remember.

               “She came from the woods? Or…No, she was standing in our circle. But I think she came from the woods. She was a demon. Her eyes were bright and hard to look at, and the way her body moved seemed unnatural.”

               “She was probably just some kind of witch,” said Namjoon. “Demons aren’t real.”

               “I know what witches are like, my friends and I were witches,” said Yoongi. “She was definitely not human. Not a vampire either. She was not like anything I’ve ever encountered since – I’m getting off track, we’re not having this conversation, Joon-ah!”

               Namjoon chuckled and held up his hands. “Fine, fine.”

               “Anyway, she asked who our leader was and they all pointed to me,” Yoongi continued. “Then she asked me what I wanted, or what I most desired, or something like that. I said I wanted eternal life. She just smiled and said that my wish was granted. A day or so later, I started feeling this thirst, this painful, painful thirst. I tried everything, then I realized what I wanted. I started taking blood from the servants in the palace, and my family hid me from the public. They all hid my secret because I needed to take the throne when my father died. But my family was scared because they thought it was a curse. That it might be bad for the kingdom once I took over. I didn’t even really care about taking the throne anymore, or maybe humanity in general stopped being interesting to me, but whatever it was, I left my city and started travelling and living on my own. I might have been trying to find the demon again, I knew she was still wandering around, but it took me several years to find her. It was when I came back to my city and found out that she had taken over the body of my sister, killing the rest of my family and taking the throne. I knew it was her because her eyes were the same and she moved the way she did in the woods that day, but it was unnerving to see it on my sister’s body. It was… difficult to see my family the way they were. She had left them in the palace to rot. There was no staff, just her. I never felt close with my family, but I was alone without them.

               “I asked her what she did to me and she told me that she gave me a great gift, that she gave me eternal life. I told her to take it back but she just laughed. I ran away again and was living in the wilderness for years, feeding off of travelers. I was just wandering for so long and it was miserable. I wanted to die, but nothing I tried would work. A few years passed and then I went over to America for a change of scenery. Then I met Namjoon and Taehyung and I moved in. I even checked on my old palace to see if my stuff was still there. It was, so I had it shipped here. I’d say it’s still in pretty good shape after all this time.”

               “And by ‘a few years’, he means one thousand years,” said Hoseok. “When were you born? Two-hundred B.C.?”

               Yoongi shrugged. “I have no idea. Something like that.”

               Despite how disturbed Catalina was by his story, she found it incredibly fascinating. Yoongi must have seen the disturbed faces of the humans in the room because he sat up and said, “I’m not like that anymore. These guys taught me humanity and empathy or whatever.”

               “Okay, Hoseok. Your turn,” Jimin said with a grin.

               “Me? I already told you everything there is to know!” he said. “Born in the 70s, turned in the 90s, I was a broke college student, but then I had to drop out.”

               “This is all we know too,” said Namjoon with a wave of his hand. “He doesn’t like talking about it.”

               “Yeah, we can talk about something else,” said Hoseok. “Like, you guys. What do you all plan on doing after school?”

               “I want to work L.A.,” said Jimin. “I want to dance in movies and music videos. Maybe be a choreographer for stuff like that.”

               “Ooohh,” Hoseok exclaimed. “That would a lot of fun! I would do that.”

               “We can both dance in L.A.!” said Jimin.

               “Gukkie, what about you? What do you want to do after you graduate?” Catalina asked.

               “I have no idea,” he said, laughing. “I like film, but I’ve already changed my major three times, so who knows what will happen with that.”

               “What were your previous majors?” she asked.

               “Dance, fine arts, political science, and now film,” he said, listing them off of his fingers. Catalina’s eyebrows raised.

               “Political science?” she asked.

               “Heh, yeah, it was too hard though,” he said. “I don’t like school enough for something like that. I kept failing my classes that semester. What about you? Do you have plans after school?”

               Jungkook played with the end of her braid as he asked.

               “Um, long term plans, I don’t really know,” said Catalina. “But my dream is to perform in a ballet in France. I hope I can go there and audition after I graduate.”

               “You will, you’re really good,” said Jungkook. Catalina blushed and looked away before she did something crazy, like jumping him in front of everyone.

               “Thank you,” she said.

               “Why did you come all the way out here for college though?” Jimin asked. “You have huge schools in Michigan, and really good performing arts schools in Chicago.”

               “Ah, I think I just needed a change,” said Catalina. “I needed to get away. I miss my mom, but I didn’t like my friends there, I didn’t like my town, and ever since I came out as bisexual, my mom had been acting weird-“

               “No wonder you, Jungkook and Jimin all get along!” Jin interrupted. “Birds of a feather!”

               “Whoa, Jin! So, we’re just outing everyone now?” Jungkook exclaimed. Jimin sighed and rolled his eyes.

               “It’s fine, I already knew about you,” Catalina said, patting Jungkook’s thigh.

               “I never told you though,” he said.

               “Jungkook, what was the first thing you noticed about Namjoon?” Catalina asked.

              Jungkook blushed and said, “Thighs.”

              Catalina raised an eyebrow. Namjoon looked up with wide eyes.

              “Plus, I know you knew it was gonna rain during the baseball game. That’s why you had everyone wear white shirts,” said Catalina.

               “That was for you too,” he said with a smirk.

               “It was definitely for both of us,” said Catalina, making him laugh. “I appreciate it though.”            

               “I know,” he said, slipping an arm around her waist. “I saw the way you were looking at me.”

               “Okay, I’m about to puke,” said Jimin. “Jimmy K, hurry up and talk about yourself before these two get out of hand.”

               Jimmy K chuckled and said, “Well, I’m working on my Masters in Astrophysics, and after grad school, I hope to work for NASA.”

               “Jungkook said you were a ‘former bad boy’?” Catalina asked, laughing. “What did that mean?”

               “During high school, I used to cause a lot of trouble in this town I guess,” said Jimmy K. “The police chief was my arch nemesis, but now I work with him.”

               “Wow, so cool,” Catalina said, sighing dreamily. Jungkook snorted beside her. Jimmy K threw her a wink.

               “I already know what Jin is gonna do after college so no need to share-“ Jungkook began.

               “Jungkook, you brat! I know what you’re gonna say!” Jin said, pointing a finger at him.

               “What?”

               “You were gonna say that I’m gonna be a housewife and stay-at-home mom,” Jin said.

               “Hey, you said it, not me,” said Jungkook. Jin took off his slipper, got up, walked over, and swatted Jungkook over the head with it. Jungkook leapt to his feet and chased after him.

               “He’s getting his teacher’s license,” said Jimmy K.

               “You want to be a teacher?” Namjoon asked. Jin shoved Jungkook off of him and sat back down. Jungkook dropped back into his spot next to Catalina.

               “Yeah, I want to teach elementary,” said Jin.

               “Oh god, good luck,” Yoongi mumbled.

               “Well, you better hurry up,” said Jungkook. “Your youth is fading away quickly.”

               Jin grabbed a nearby pillow and threw it at him. Jungkook retaliated and soon, the whole room erupted into a pillow fight.

[agentofscifi]

Super Genius Marinette Ch. 2

I hand the taxi driver a few American bills as payment just after he sets down my bags on the sidewalk. I was right in front of the Avengers building, which had a small collection of reporters outside of it. The man smiles as he pops back into his car. I give him a small wave as he drives off. Swinging my backpack over my shoulders and I take both of my bags by the handle, wheeling up to the door. The reporters, for some reason, didn’t seem to notice me until I was typing my password into the keypad by the door.  

“Ma’am? Who might you be and what business do you have with the Avengers? Are you with the other children who have been seen entering this building?” A darked haired woman is holding a mic out to me, her cameraman fixating on my face.  

I shrug as the door opens up on its own. “There will be a press conference later this summer to answer all of your questions. That is all I will say for now.”  

I wheel my bags through the door, leaving behind the small gaggle, who were still attempting to ask my questions. A few of the workers on the bottom floors look at me weirdly as I pull my bags into the main elevator.   

“Hello FRIDAY, how are you?”  

“Very well, Ms. Stark. Your father is located on the communal floor, would you like to go there first, or visit your floor?”  

“The communal floor, please.”  

“Of course.”  

I pull up my sunglasses from my face and quickly pull out my phone. I sent a quick text to my parents back in Paris that I arrived at the tower. As The elevator dings at the floor, I tuck my phone back into my back pocket and grab both of my bags. I walk out the door into the general floor, high heels clicking on the tiles. Several heads whip around and look at me from the couches.  

“Crap.” One of the men, Clint Barton, groans. “Tony, your security sucks! There’s another Captain America fangirl up here?  

I raise an eyebrow. “Ok, first of all, I am not a Captain fangirl. He puts up a good fight, but he needs some serious wardrobe help.” Said man flushes at my words. “Secondly, the security is fine here, I helped set it up. Thirdly,” I look up at the ceiling. “Friday?”  

“Yes?”  

“Where is my Dad?”  

“Right here, my little genius!” My father practically runs me over as he goes to hug me.   

The people at the couches stare. “You have a kid?   

I pear over my father’s shoulder. The collection of Avengers were all staring at us with gobsmacked expressions. “Yes, he does. Who’s asking?”  

One of the guys sticks his arm up. “Sam Wilson. When did this happen?”  

“14 years and 364 days ago.”   

Sam Wilson stares at me with wide eyes, “So, you’re 15 tomorrow?”  

“Yup.”  

“Are you French?” Steve Rodgers decided to pop into the conversation at this point.   

“Yes, well not technically. Dad,” I gesture to my father, “is American. My Mom is from China, she moved to France to study baking. She married my Papa who’s ½ French. I did grow up in Paris, however.” Rodgers nods.  

Thor puts a large hand up. “Does this mean the other younglings here are your children too?”  

Dad sighs. “No. I’m mentoring them. Mari is my only child.”  

“And we were never told because?” Clint Barton is still looking between my Dad and I.  

I shrug. “I wanted a normal childhood. Being the daughter of Tony Stark would have made my childhood crazy. This was before Ironman and the Avengers became a thing.”  

Clint nods in agreement. “Fair enough. Why are you here now then?”  

“My little genius,” My father kisses my cheek. “Is starting MIT in the Fall!”  

“Oh, God. She’s a mini you!” I easily recognize Bucky Barnes from his signature metal arm.   

“But with better fashion sense!” I give all of them a winning smile.  

“Can we come back to Captain America needing fashion help.” The Black Widow is grinning from her place next to the couch.  

The Avengers all look at me with expectant gazes. Barnes looked all too happy at the topic. I simply shrug. “You look like America's 4 year old daughter after she’s finally allowed to pick out her own clothing. You were practically glowing, that outfit was so bright. It’s like you were asking for the enemy to notice you. Get a stylist!”  

Steve Rogers’ face starts to turn red. “It worked back in the 40’s during the war.”  

“No, honey, it didn’t.” Bucky and Sam are starting to laugh behind their hands. “People just loved you more than they disliked the suit.”  

Rodgers’ face is a deep red right now. “It’s an iconic antique.”  

“Then put it in a museum and leave it there.” Bucky finally snaps and roars with laughter. Sam isn’t far behind as he lands on the floor to roll around.  

“I’m sorry, who is the tiny french girl who’s verbally beating up Steve?” Bruce Banner is standing by the elevator with the most confused expression on his face.  

“Tony’s daughter, apparently.” Clint shrugs.  

“And Tony has had a daughter for how long?”  

“15 years.” I give Banner a bright smile. “I’ve read several of your papers. Your gamma radiation and nuclear physics work is amazing, but I preferred the stuff on Biochemistry. I have some ideas I was hoping you take a look at.”  

Bruce blinks a few times. “I-15 years-What kind of ideas?”  

“Bacta patches. I want to see if I can make them real. I’ve written out some formulas, but haven’t been able to really talk to anyone about them yet or test them out.”   

“Uhh...Sure. Bacta patches, like from Star Wars?”  

“Yup.”  

“Tony, your daughter is a fashionista and a nerd. I’ve only ever heard of such rare creatures.” Bucky was no longer laughing at Steve, but still looked too happy.   

“Technically, I’m a fashion designer.”  

“Tony, you daughter is a fashion designer and a nerd.”  

“Who has an IQ of 265!” My Father is smiling down at me, pride filling his eyes.  

A glass drops and shatters across the floor. “Holy shit!” is whispered from someone in the room.  

My Father ignores all of this. “Well, I’m going to introduce Mari to the rest of the kids. Carry on!”  

I give a small wave to the stunned adults. “Bye! It was nice to meet all of you! I’ll speak to you later Doctor Banner.”   

My Father pushes me into the elevator, leaving several flabbergasted Avengers. I raise an eyebrow as the elevator moves down a few levels. “You didn’t tell them about me.”  

He snorts. “And miss that interaction. That was so much better than I could ever have ever dreamed.”  

The door dings open and I’m suddenly in a smaller version of the top floor living room. There were 9 teenagers sitting around a coffee table, a variety of bags scattered around the couches and loveseats. All of the heads look up at me when I come in.  

The oldest male swears in english. “Damn it Stark, how many of us are you going to kidnap?”  

I raise an eyebrow and turn my head up. “Kidnap?”  

My father gasps dramatically. “Kidnap? I did not kidnap! Your parents practically threw you at me once I showed up.”  

One of the other boys snorts. “Aunt May is still angry about Germany. She said if you showed up at our house again, she’d throw you out the window.”  

My father shrugs. “Your Aunt is a terrifying force of nature.”  

A blonde girl rolls her eyes and walks up to me. A hand shoots out. “Gwen Stacy, I’m from New York and I’m 17.”   

I take her hand. “A pleasure.”  

The oldest boy sticks his hand in the air. “Harley Keener, Tennessee. Also 17.”  

The boy with a terrifying aunt gives me a small wave. “Peter Parker, Queens. 16.”  

Brown haired latina woman gives me a nod. “Anya Corazon. I’m from Brooklyn. 16, as well.”  

The last guy briefly looks up from the computer in his lap to give me a smile. “Ned Leeds. I’m from New York and I’m 16, too.”  

The girl next to him does even look up as she waves. “MJ. New York. 17. Nice shoes.”  

I glance down. “Thanks.”  

MJ nods, still looking at my computer. She nudges the guy on the floor next to her foot.  He pulls off his headphones and gives me a wave. “Oh, hey! Miles Morales. Brooklyn native. Freshly 16.”  

A girl about my age looks up from the small project in her hand. “Riri Willaims, Chicago. 15.”  

Lastly was a girl who looked even younger than me. She waves from her seat on the floor by Riri. “Peni Parker, no relation to Peter Parker. I’m from New York. I’m 14, but will be 15 in two months.”  

I wave back. “Hi, I’m Marinette Dupain-Cheng-Stark. I’m from Paris and I turn 15 tomorrow.”  

Harley chokes on the drink he’d just swallowed. “I’m sorry, Stark?”  

I nod. “Tony’s my Dad. We’ve just kept it on the downlow so I could have a normal childhood.”  

Everyone one is looking at me. I simply shrug it off. “So, you guys are all going to the International Technology Showcase in D.C. this summer, right?”  

There’s several nods. “Yup.” Peni gives me a wide smile. “We’ve all got stuff to showcase. What about you?”  

“I’ve got my showcase pieces.”  

My Father claps me on my shoulder. “Ok, now that you are all here,  can give you guys a tour.”  

Ned shuts his computer and Riri sets the components in her hands down on the coffee table. I set my backpack on the ground as my father guides us to a door on the right. He flips on a switch to reveal a large game room, complete with several large TV’s and game consoles. “This is the Game Room.”  

He walks across the main living room and flips on another light. A huge kitchen with a large table sits in this room. “Kitchen and dining room are here.”  

He points up. “Bedrooms are on the next two level. Boys on the next floor, girls above them. All of the rooms have labels and there is a central living space where the stairs and elevator dump you out. The floor below us is a training room. The two floors below that are labs. Engineering labs on the upper floor and a Biochem lab on the floor below. We expect to see you all at some point, so don’t live in isolation.” Dad walks back over to the elevator. “Have fun, just don’t blow up the building.” We all watch him wave as the elevator door closes.  

It’s silent as everyone looks at each other awkwardly. I roll my eyes after a few seconds. “So, Star Wars marathon? Who’s in?”  

Ned and Peter immediately stick their hands up, to the amusement of Gwen and MJ. Riri nods. “I’m up for anything. What are we doing for dinner?”  

Miles shrugs. “I don’t know how to cook.”  

I roll my eyes. “I’ll order pizza. How does a Deluxe, Margarita, and a Meat Lover’s sound.”  

“You getting drinks?” Harley raises an eyebrow.  

“A couple two liters, some normal breadsticks and some of those dessert pizzas that look like someone dumped a whole bag of sugar and icing on top.” I get a nod from Harley.  

Anya nods. “I don't know what you all are going to do over the next hour, but I’m moving in. Pizza and movies in an hour or so?”  

I pull out my phone and start to put in the order. “Should work. I don’t know about you all, but I am putting on sweatpants.” I grab my bag from the floor and handle of my suitcase as I make my way to the elevator.   

Peter starts to pull out his wallet. “How much do we own you?”  

I shake my head. “Nothing.”  

Peter shakes his head. “That doesn’t seem fair.”  

I raise an eyebrow. “My Dad is a billionaire. He paid for a quart of strawberries with a Jaeger-LeCoultre watch. He can buy us pizza.”  

“A Jaeger-LeCoultre watch, serious?” Riri looks absolutely annoyed.  

“Stark just gave a bunch of teenagers 6 floors all for ourselves with no supervision.” Harley snorts. “He doesn’t seem to think everything through.”  

“He has FRIDAY watching us.” I press the confirmation button on the Pizza. “Pizza will be here in 45. But, ya. My Dad has FRIDAY and KAREN keeping an eye on all of us.”  

Harley gets a look in his eye. “We have babysitting monitors!” A scary smile graces his lips. “I say we revolt!”  

Gwen face palms, but it’s too late. MJ, Peter, Riri, Peni and Miles all look too excited. Frankly, so was I. “Anyone know a lawyer?” Riri is grinning now too.  

Peter sticks his hand up. “Mathew Murdock.”  

Anya seems to be getting excited too. “So, what are we rebelling?”  

“Baby monitor protocols!”   

Gwen rolls her eyes, but caves. “We need more than that!”  

I bite my lip. “We also need time. We need our own AI.”  

“How are we adding in our own AI to the tower?” Ned has his computer under his arm as we enter the elevator.   

“I helped design the security for this building. Once we have our own AI, I add them to the tower’s system. Once we’ve done that I’ll take FRIDAY out of our 6 floors and add in our AI.”  

Silence for a second as the elevator doors close. “Can you keep Tony out of our floors?” Peni is practically vibrating.  

“I can keep everyone off our floors.”  

Harley throws his arms into the air. “We revolt at dawn!”  

“After the Star Wars Marathon!” Peter and Ned have thrown their arms into the air too. Peni joins in with Miles and soon several teens are cheering in this tiny elevator.   

I blink a few times and van’t help the smile that forms onto my face. How did my dad find these crazy teenagers?  

Before ~~~~~ Next

[fenweak]

As requested! This rec list features Kazer Kid Fics -- Jonny and Patrick both with kids and babies AND as kids and babies, with a small dash of de-aging and a spoonful of mpreg. 

⭐ for my personal faves

My Other Rec Lists 🍭 Rec me a fic? 🍭

The Ones Where They Have Kids

No Capes by sorrylatenew ⭐ - j/p as parents; implied mpreg

Husbands. Dads. Retired superheroes.

The Reeducation of Misters Kane and Toews + timestamp by jezziejay - single dad Patrick, teacher Jonny  ⭐

In which Kaner sort of has a kid, and Mr. Toews doesn't know which of them is the bigger brat.

AU featuring teacher!Jon and hockey-player!Kaner. With bonus 'Hawks characters, love notes, pasta jewelry, Be Better Pizzas, pirouettes, a sprinke of angst and guest appearance by Derek Jeter.

trust your intuition (it's just like goin' fishin') by poeelektra - 1988 as parents

They’re on the periphery of the Home Wares section of Target, heading with purposeful stride toward Sporting Goods, when Gabe declares that he wants a doll for his “Been Good” toy.

Every Little Thing He Does (is magic) by jezziejay - single dad Patrick

Jonny Toews is a bewitching man who moves into a mysterious mansion in a small town. Soon, he opens Bell, Book & Candle, a curiosity shop full of candles, lotions, etc., and is enthralling the children of local police chief (Patrick Kane), who believe he is a witch (but not a bad one.) But not everyone in town is appreciative of their quirky new neighbor, and it may take a little bit of magic for him to truly become part of the community.

Under Cover by heartstrings - 1988 as parents

"Just get in the fucking blanket fort, Kaner."

Feels Like Family To Me + prequels by exmanhater - 1988 as parents

Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane plan, create, and obtain their family.

living next door to alice series by cinderlily - 1988 as parents

"It started with a phone call."Patrick and Jonny are suddenly given the opportunity to be parents. This is how they stumble through it.

some say love is a burning thing podfic by exmanhater - 1988 as parents

If anyone had told Johnny upon entering the NHL that thirteen years later he'd not only have a kid with Patrick Kane, but would be getting ready to go on a 'date night,’ he'd have said they must be smoking some pretty good shit.And then he'd have to wait a decade to eat his words.

In the Middle of the Night - 1988 as parents

Gone are the days when it took a cold, wet washcloth on his face to wake him up. Or: Five times Pat and Jonny's daughter wakes them up, plus one time they wake her up.

so show me family - single dad Patrick

Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family. Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one. ~Jane Howard

Fill It Up With Love by Frosting50 - single dad Pat; implied mpreg

So Pat’s senior year doesn’t turn out exactly like he’d planned. He still gets his degree in accounting, but he also gets a little girl named Emma. She’s all fat pink cheeks, curly brown hair, and blue eyes. She might have Ryan’s chin, but she’s all Pat’s. And the first time she falls asleep on his chest, chubby hand curled around his thumb, skin so soft and sweet he damn-near feels bowled over with how much he loves her. He didn’t know he could love anyone so much; it makes his heart feel too big for his chest, and he knows that he’ll spend the rest of his life trying to give her the world.

peas & carrots by altri_uccelli - 1988 as parents

Unapologetic Halloween fluff, or: Jonny forgets what day it is, but Kaner's on it.

Can You Lyft Me Up? by Mullsandmutts - single dad Patrick

Even high profile athletes like Chicago Blackhawks Captain Jonathan Toews are forced to utilize paid transportation from time to time. An accidental "share my ride" selection on an app results in a life-altering ride with an mouthy Russian driver (Artemi), an unfairly attractive single father (Patrick Kane) and his adorable sassy (and color-matching-challenged) preschool daughter (introducing Molly Donna Patricia Amelia Kane aka Mo). Jonathan refuses to feel too sketch when he negotiates a plan with the driver to "accidentally" have more shared rides with his new friends. When Mo has a traumatic incident at day camp, Patrick's heart is broken and Jonny enlists the help of Temi and the ever-meddling Patrick Sharp to get smiles back on both Kane faces. Jonathan finds himself more and more drawn to Patrick but Patrick's fears of being a good enough parent for Mo and meeting all of her needs could keep them apart. Will Temi, the Sharp family and a trio of nosy aunts in Buffalo be enough to help Jonathan and Patrick realize what they could have together or will Patrick's stubbornness and Jonathan's fear of ruining their friendship keep them apart? Stay tuned to find out ....

Three by Linsky - i won’t spoil it 

Patrick doesn’t think he’s a pervert. But how would he know? Maybe a pervert is just a thing you are, and it doesn’t feel any different from being a normal person, until you do something perverted. Maybe that’s him.After all, he does have two names on his wrist.

All Your Memories by toewsandconfused - 1988 as parents; amnesiafic

Pat went to sleep a bachelor in the Trump Towers and woke up next to Jonny in the suburbs with three kids calling him Daddy. Struggling to figure out his new reality Patrick had ruled out dream, was banking on delusion because even though it meant he was losing his mind, it seemed safer than some kind of late-onset amnesia. He didn’t want to face that idea that this really was his life; that Jonny was his, that those beautiful kids were his, and he couldn’t remember any of it. The idea that the memories of their life together could be lost forever was too terrifying to deal with. Losing his mind was preferable to losing his memories.

Chelsea, Chelsea I Believe by empathapathique - single dad Pat ⭐

Patrick meets a girl his rookie year.

Don't Let Go by aohatsu - 1988 as adoptive parents

“So you were already with the boy you saved when the fire started?”Patrick pauses, but shakes his head. “No, there was an explosion—I don’t really know what it was, but then it was just me and Tigre, and it’s like, in a situation like that, you don’t really think? You just do. So I grabbed the kid and went through the fire escape. It’s not like I decided I wanted to save anybody, it was just the only option.”

Always Be My Baby by juliusschmidt - single dad Patrick

The thing is, you don’t just grow up once.

as careless as you are certain - single dad Patrick 

March through August, 2015.

the one with the baby yentas series by forochel

Tazer has a son and Kaner is his son's kindergarten teacher.

It's the Magic of Risking Everything by conformityissuicide - single dad Jonny

When Jonny is thirteen he meets a small kid from Buffalo at a hockey tournament.

Then he has a gay crisis, a baby girl, and gets drafted 3rd overall by an Original Six franchise.

When he meets Patrick Kane again at prospect camp he doesn’t feel anything but excitement.

And then it all goes to hell.

"of gifts and fireflies" by huntersandangels - single dad Jon

Patrick Kane hasn’t lived a charmed life despite money flowing through his veins. The journey he is currently on, though paved with good intentions, proves to be a harder challenge than he could ever be ready for. The people he meets along the way give him a much more valued gift than his grandfather could ever dream of giving him. 

I'm gonna love you til my lungs give out by arenadomatthews - 1988 as parents

“Papa, Dad, you guys are retiring today?” Bryan asks, looking up at his parents.“Yeah buddy, we are. Are you gonna behave while Dad and I are doing our press conference?” Patrick asks.

“Duh, Dad. I'm not a baby anymore,” he scoffs.

“He's right, Pat. He's our big boy now,” Jonny adds.

“Yeah, I'm going into 4th grade,” Bryan boasts pridefully.Patrick and Jonathan are finally announcing their retirement after 20 NHL seasons. However, their retirement ceremony will come with a twist: they'll be publicly coming out and revealing their family

Your Daddy's Aim Is True by thefourthvine; podfic by isweedan - cup wish baby! ⭐

patch it up by gasmsinc - 1988 as parents

Jonny stares at his daughter for a long moment. She stares back, eyes unwavering. She has Kaner’s baby blues, but at five she’s already mastered Jonny’s dead on the inside stare. Her kindergarten teacher claims she uses the unwavering look to bully other students into doing what she wants, and it’s something they should work on at home, but Jonny’s baby is a natural born leader, and he’s not going to get in her way of becoming the president, or, better yet, the supreme ruler of the universe.

Your patch,” says Jonny.

Baby, It's Hot Outside by toewsyourheart - single dad Pat 

 Jonny goes for a popsicle and gets a little bit more than he bargained for.

Take All That's Left - divorced single dad Pat

It’s been 6 years now, and he’s grown to enjoy the city since signing with the Rangers to follow Anna, who’d found a job in Brooklyn.

But Chicago; Chicago was Patrick’s first love, all his important firsts – it’s all been hers, and having to leave had been heartbreaking. Too many memories from Chicago were heartbreaking, and yet he always yearned for the city, always felt more comfortable walking her streets than any other place in the world. No other place quite felt like home the way Chicago did.

Isn’t She Lovely by windsthatwhisper + podfic by kanetcews (lavenderharry) - wish baby!

It's nine in the morning when Pat and Jonny stumble down the stairs, sluggish with sleep.

There’s a baby carrier on the kitchen island.

Jonny blinks, blinks again, then turns to get a cup of coffee.

Recreation, Entertainment, Art, or Sport by trademarkgiggle

of course jonathan toews can juggle

so show me family series by peeks, tazer - teacher Pat

“Just admit you like him.”

“Shut up, Sharpy,” Patrick says, before he rolls his eyes and tries to ignore the smirk widening on Sharpy’s lips. “Don’t you have your kids’ parents to bother?”

“No, my last kid left a couple minutes ago, so I’m totally here to watch you and Jonathan Toews make heart eyes at each other,” Sharpy laughs, waltzing into Patrick’s classroom. He immediately makes his way to see Sadie, who greets her dad with a hug.

(In which Patrick Kane is terrible at feelings but luckily, Patrick Sharp is a total bro.)

The Ones Where They’re With Kids

In My Blood and In My Bones + Nothing Sweet or Gentle by fourfreedoms ⭐

Patrick’s not really into dudes—he’s done that whole thing a couple of times—that’s rock-n-roll after all, but god, when Jonathan smiles, he looks really good.Johnny is a nanny. Patrick's a musician. They fall in love. Inspired by the movie What Maisie Knew.

the kids are alright

Patrick works at the sporting goods store Jonny takes his peewee team to for equipment.

given to us as free-flying souls by Mayhem10

Jonathan had never really considered himself particularly good with kids. He didn’t avoid them or anything and it’s not like they burst into tears when they saw his face, but he never was exactly sure what to do with them, these little people running around at waist height. It just wasn’t his area.So, of course, Patrick was basically the child whisperer.

(or five times Jonathan saw Patrick with kids and one time Patrick saw him)

Hide Your Face So The World Will Never Find You (Paper Faces On Parade) by huntersandangels

Jonathan Toews, farm owner and guardian of his nephew, is in desperate need of capable farm hands. Patrick Kane certainly does not fit the description but when a mutual friend confides in him that Patrick has lost everything he owned and is in serious need himself and offers Jonathan money to hire him, how can he say no?

Patrick Kane loves statistics and spending his money on thoroughly planned ‘adventures’ for his friends when he’s not partying away the rest of his fortune. If he wins the bet he can continue to plot freely but if he loses his extra curriculum activities have to stop. He agrees to go on an ‘adventure’ himself and settles in the Toews Farm posing as a farm hand. But as the time goes by, the less pretend it feels-and the more he enjoys Jonathan and Etienne’s company and the quite life in the farm; to the point where he’s not sure whether he wants to win the bet or lose...

Baby, You're the One by jezziejay ⭐

6k words of Jonathan Toews having feelings about babies. And feelings about Kaner. And feelings about putting a baby in Kaner.

The Ones Where They Are Kids

The Cat and the Fiddle series by james - childhood soulmates!

When Donna's son is four, he creates an imaginary friend.

i want to know what you know by sointimate - childhood sweethearts

Patrick is six years old and he's about to do the scariest thing he's ever done in his whole life.

Colorblind by july_v ⭐

Jon is five when he meets Patrick. It's also the time he begins to understand colors as more than an abstract concept.

How to become a man  series+ coda by liketheroad, mockturtletale

In which Kaner gets spontaneously de-aged into a six-year-old, and he and Tazer both have a lot of growing up to do.

Romper Room by james - de-aged 1988

Sharpie doesn't really think this should be part of his duty as alternate captain. Luckily, none of this is his fault. A.K.A., the one where Kaner and Johnny are five.

you ruined everything in the best way by thisissirius + podfic by exmanhater .⭐ - de-aged Saader

Kaner's looking down at the kid, though, frowning. He crouches down. "Hey, kid, where are your parents?

"The kid's bottom lip juts out and starts wobbling. Fuck, that means he's going to start crying, right?

"Oh shi—oot, kid, don't cry," Kaner says. "I mean, if you don't know where they are, we can find 'em?"

"Kaner," Sharpy presses. "That's Saad."

don't worry about your body - de-aged Jonny

No one said anything. Everyone stared at each other then down at the tiny human being that was standing where Jonny had been. Kaner felt his mouth go entirely dry, and his stomach drop out from underneath him.

What the fuck, man.

Can You Picture It? by RemyJane

In which Kaner turns into a baby and everyone besides Jonny seems to understand. Includes excessive cuddling, ridiculously adorable baby-Kaner, and feelings. Jonny eventually figures everything out.

Never Getting That Shirt Back by ice_hot_13 - de-aged Pat

Patrick is de-aged into a toddler, and when he's with Jonny, he isn't a holy terror.

Je T'aime by banks99 (Nodiggity15) - de-aged Jonny

“He won’t take a bath. He’s arguing with me. It’s like he didn’t even change at all.” Kaner’s not pouting, fuck you very much.

MPREG

I Got a Love (That Keeps Me Waiting) by svmadelyn ⭐ -mpreg!pat

There's a lot of different ways this summary could go, like:Patrick Kane gets more than a gold medal in Sochi.

Or, the classic: It's too late to pull out now.Or: Patrick Kane continues to thrive in high pressure situations.Or: Patrick Kane gets knocked up, goes to White Castle, and finds love, not necessarily in that order.

But, ultimately, all that really matters is this: Patrick Kane is keeping his baby.

private passions and secret storms (all the secrets series) by CoffeeKristin, Frosting50  - mpreg!pat

Jonny’s life is good - great even. He loves Patrick and their kids, and even if they don’t always have time for each other, he wouldn’t trade it for anything. But when Jeff Carter comes into his life, Jonny’s world gets turned upside down. It’s going to take everything he’s got to convince Patrick to give him a second - maybe even a third - chance.

Patrick’s blindsided by Jonny’s betrayal and putting his family back together is a lot harder than he expected when their past comes back to haunt them.Can love conquer all?

Forever & Always, My Baby You'll Be by windsthatwhisper - mpreg!jonny

Jonny and Pat's life is a cycle of curse words, late night feedings, and five minute handjobs in the hallway closet.

Aka, I wanted some 1988 w/ a baby feels so I wrote this blurb of a thing in about seven minutes.

efficacy by thirteentorafters - mpreg!patrick

“You,” Patrick says, jabbing a finger angrily at Jonny. “Are gonna fucking help me, dickface.”

Opening his mouth to ask what the hell is going on; Jonny’s eyes drop to Patrick’s stomach. Jonny is acquainted with Patrick’s naked body and the last time they met, Patrick wasn’t fat. Or paunchy. Except that doesn’t look like usual fat. “Oh fuck.”

“Yeah, ‘oh fuck’,” Patrick says, imitating Jonny’s tone. “You knocked me up, asshole. What are you gonna do about it?”

Forever & Always, My Baby You'll Be by windsthatwhisper - mpreg!jonny

Jonny and Pat's life is a cycle of curse words, late night feedings, and five minute handjobs in the hallway closet.

Looked So Fine (I Just Had To Speak) by svmadelyn - !!!! ⭐

Patrick Kane’s talking penis maintains a ‘to do’ list. It is as follows:1. Jonathan Toews

Phone Tag by hawkeytime (jayyloo) - mpreg!Jonny

"Hi mom. Sorry I couldn’t catch you, so I guess I’ll just, uh.. leave a message. See, the thing is… my super-potent sperm may or may not have managed to knock Jonny up. Okay bye."

"Yes, hello, is this Hockey Canada? I just want it written on the record, today, June 31, 2015, that my incredibly improbable unborn child with Jonathan Toews will be playing for America. Yes, I’ll hold.

"Or: Pat accidentally knocks Jonny up. A saga told in a series of voicemails

A Royal Baby - mpreg!Pat

A cough from the doorway cuts Seabs off mid sentence. Duncs is standing watching them, a particularly somber expression on his face. "Jonny, I'm sorry to interrupt but you have a visitor that you'll want to go see right away.""Now really isn't a good time," Jonny tells him, not even putting down his fork."Trust me Your Highness," Duncs says, "This will be worth it."

[Patrick and Jonathan think their time brief time together at the Olympics is all they can ever have. Patrick's ensuing pregnancy proves otherwise.]

sun sweet berries of the earth series by gasmsinc - mpreg!Pat; a/b/o

There is a spirit living in Patrick State Park.“Listen,” says Jonny. “I didn’t mean to step on your crown.”The spirit’s bottom lip wobbles.

Tame the Roads That Can't Be Tamed by Linsky - mpreg!Pat; a/b/o

Patrick’s flown a million times. He’s never gotten airsick before. Even on last year’s epic flight to Denver, when they hit massive turbulence and half the team was groaning over barf bags, Patrick’s stomach was fine. And maybe he’s sick, sure—but why doesn’t he feel sick the rest of the time? Why is it only mornings and—

Oh.

Oh, no.

Oh fucking no.

(Or: In which it is difficult to be a wolf in the NHL, especially when you're not that good at condoms.)

Carve His Name With Pride ⭐  - mpreg!Jonny

Jonny leaves behind a home, a house, and a hockey career the month after he learns that he’s pregnant.

Eyass - mpreg!Jonny

"I dunno," Kaner tells him. "Whatever you need, man. You’re having a baby! That’s a lot of work. I want to be here for you."

Somehow, in the dozens of conversations he’s had with teammates and friends and family in the past few days, no one has said those exact words to Jonny: “you’re having a baby”. He has to comb his fingers through his hair and take a deep, steadying breath to compose himself.

Kaner notices and smiles at him; a crooked, beautiful thing. “It’s pretty amazing, isn’t it?”

Heartburn and Survival by dedougal  - mpreg!Jonny

They were in Canada when Jonny found out he was pregnant. Afterwards, Jonny used that as a point in his bulleted list of arguments about why Jack should represent Canada but, to be entirely truthful, finding out in Canada - finding out anywhere - was pretty disastrous.

Three Cups and a Pup by Miss_Psychotic, nommedeplume  - mpreg!Patrick

The Story of Alpha Jonny and Omega Kaner getting their shit together and learning how to be Adulting Adults (Finally)

Chips and Cribs by whatislife - mpreg!Jonny

“What do you mean there are no chips,” Jonny asks from where he is standing by the island, hand resting on his stomach. “Weren’t they on the list? Did you not buy them?”(Patrick just wants to sleep.)

[dream-girls-evil]

Ratched: Episode 8 Reactions

Three Months Later

It’s here! The finale!!! I did watch this while slightly intoxicated

Pinecone people aren’t creepy, nope, not at all

....Shrunken Apple, however

Literally who let Louise work here (I know it’s Betsy but still)

“Louise, I love and pity you, but you terrify the patients”

Ooh Louise and Betsy aren’t on the same page about Edmund anymore—and therefore probably about Mildred as well

Ooh Mildred and Gwen 😍

Oh honey. Chemo is no fun 😞

Ahhh the classic lesbian pose! No for real, historically pictures of women posed with one sitting and the other kneeling or one standing and the other sitting, that kind of thing, was used to signify that a book or magazine or what have you was about a lesbian relationship

Well, it seems like Mildred’s come to terms with not being able to save Edmund, but does Edmund know that?

Oop and Mildred is imagining dying in Mexico. Romantic?

Aw Mildred. So hopeful. I really hope Gwen is okay.

Ah I was right it seems that Mildred doesn’t work at Lucia anymore

Betsy found a woman doctor yay!!!

Betsy really coming through with comforting Mildred! Still the must unexpected alliance

Her tune changes a little when Mildred isn’t around, but I still don’t think she really believes in execution, and she can feel sympathy for Mildred’s pain without forgiving Edmund for his crimes

What if Edmund just like, made a dashing getaway on horseback? No?

Is Mildred gonna be here watching the execution?

Ugh this asshole governor—OH the electric chair...this is going to be much more painful than an injection. Mildred’s going to panic and realize she has to figure out something to save Edmund?

Oh my god he’s on fire. This is horrible.

Ew can they kill him? The way he thinks it’s okay to talk about their bodies is disgusting.

Okay so Mildred is still not arguing for a stay of execution, just for going back to the injection.

Gwen putting her arm behind Mildred’s back and touching her hand is so sweet but like be careful

The LOOK Mildred gives him

The close ups on this guy’s mouth make me so uncomfortable

Gwen check yourself.

Aaand he knows.

Dude that is FAR from the only reason she wouldn’t sleep with you.

Oh good so at least he’s not a homophobe (insert eye roll here)

Lmao Betsy I really don’t think they’re here to talk about catered lunches

Is Mildred gonna try to kill him herself? Ah Yep.

Angels of mercy 🙃

I do not think this is going to go smoothly. Edmund’s going to get away, isn’t he? And he’s going to HATE Mildred. Maybe he already hates her for not being able to save him from this.

Haha he thinks there’s rat poison in the food. That would be far too simple.

Suddenly Edmund is just a little kid talking about animals

The Escape

Charlotte Wells!!!

Not Charlotte Wells. Technically.

...no. Don’t tell me.

Y E P omg they’re really saying she absorbed Dr Hanover as another personality after killing him?

Does Betsy even know Hanover is dead? Did Mildred ever tell her?

Omg wonder if Charlotte is gonna help Edmund escape. I mean, that was Hanover’s plan with Charlotte—spirit her away so that he could cure her and prove himself.

Nothing bad better happen to Huck. Like they’re trusting him to help with Edmund and now help with Charlotte WHO JUST FOUND A GUN.

Oh man that’s how Huck got his burns

Okay maybe reminding her of Harold isn’t the best idea. The man was murdered right in front of her.

NOOOO NOT HUCK

SECRET DOOR?! FUCK!!!

Why do people say “you’re gonna have to shoot me”? That’s like...a really good way to get shot.

YEEEP I WAS RIGHT SHE’S GONNA TAKE EDMUND

Do NOT shoot Betsy do NOT.

I love how Edmund still believes Mildred has a plan to save him.

Fuuuuck Betsy don’t tell him!!!

Fuck. I was right. He knows Mildred was going to kill him, and he’s going to hate her for it.

Fuck Mildred’s going to show up to Lucia and see that all of this has happened!!!

Lol what if she actually passed their car it would be like the meme

Omg she DID

1950

...and now suddenly it’s 1950???

Gwen!!! Well she’s got her hair back so I’m guessing she’s in remission

Edmund hasn’t killed again? Doubtful. He probably just changed his MO.

BETSY

I’m glad she’s cool with the lesbians

Good on Betsy for moving with the times and realizing her old treatments were bad

What is Mildred looking at?? Please don’t say Edmund. Is she just lost in thought or is she always on edge like this? Waiting to him to appear out of the shadows and take everything from her?

“It’s so nice to be rid of them” “Who?” “Men!” I LOVE IT

Fuck fuck fuck she’s going back to the house on her own. She’s gonna find something or he’s going to appear. She feels herself being watched. He’s there, isn’t he?

KNIFE OH NO

Good she has a gun, but this whole thing is definitely not going to get wrapped up that easy. It’s going to be a cliffhanger or otherwise drawn out.

CHARLOTTE FUCK

Bathing in blood okay Dandy

Fuuuck no bullets NO!!!

Omfg a DREAM?!?! I hate everything. That was too stressful.

Ahhh another pretty nightgown for Mildred!

I love Gwen comforting her. This is definitely a routine.

I love Betsy, she’s delightful.

Fuck I bet there’s actually gonna be something in the newspaper this time.

Multiple murder in Chicago.

Seven nurses. Yep that’s Edmund.

How long is this telephone cord?!

Someone she knows sold her out. But who knows she there except for Betsy?? Please don’t say it’s Betsy.

Ooh she’s coming for YOU, Edmund.

LOUISE GODDAMNIT

Thoughts and Theories

Well that was a ride!!! Honestly, nothing too unexpected, but that’s not a bad thing! A few plot twists are always good, but I hate stories where literally nothing is predictable, because then it’s just confusing. A good story should give you enough hints that by the end you can figure out how the pieces go together. Charlotte showing back up was a surprise, but as soon as she did, I could see where things were gonna go. Still raging about their portrayal of DID tho. And now we have the lead into next season! I still can’t believe it was Louise. She’s so kooky that it should be funny but man is she insufferable.

So now we’ve got the set up for next season: a cat and mouse game between Mildred and Edmund. Plus whoever they’ve got in tow. I highly doubt Edmund will keep Charlotte and Louise around for long, but Mildred has Gwen, and that’s worrying. Either she’s going to get left behind for safety or she’s going to get roped into this chase and something terrible will probably happen to her. There’s just really no good ending to this love story, considering we know who Mildred ends up being. Honestly, best case scenario is that Gwen leaves of her own volition because she can’t be okay with knowing there will probably be casualties in Mildred’s feud and that Mildred will consider them justified. But who knows? The last episode did redeem their relationship for me a bit though. It’s clear that there were definitely talks and negotiations during these past two years about Mildred’s past and how they communicate. I just wish we could have seen them.

Honestly, the thing that worries me most about this is that I have no idea how we’re going to end up getting to Cuckoo’s Nest from here. How and why will she end up back at Lucia after all of this? What will happen to Betsy and Gwen that they’re not with her anymore by the time she does? How is this personal fight with Edmund going to translate into her being someone who is really a product of an institutional problem? I actually have an essay in progress on the last point, which in summary is that I really don’t think they will be able to bridge that gap successfully or are even really trying to.

Final notes: I love Betsy Bucket and hope you enjoyed my reactions!

[yinyangswings]

Same anon who requested headcanons is MC being the WQ’s daughter. Maybe nothing older than mid teens? Sorry if that’s not specific enough...

Sure thing Anon!! Here you go! there is more in the read more!

General

The WQ sent her child at a very young age to Chicago. Not out motherly love, but as a backup in case she fell during battle. Very few people knew she had a child, so it was rather easy

In her eyes she’s nothing more than a pawn to use for later

MC was found abandoned with apparently no memory of her parents, as all she said was her mother was a queen.

She was raised in a foster family with a lot of foster siblings going in and out of the house. Due to the mass amount of kids, she learned to take care of herself.

Sophie is someone who lives nearby and becomes friendly with her, even with the age difference.

She was returning back from school when she was struck by lightning.

She’s around 10 years old

When she looks around in the Fantasy Realm, she realizes that this is like in her dreams that she’s had for years.

Obviously there is no romance.

August Falke 

August just stares at this tiny girl that looks so much like the WQ it’s not even funny...but she’s a child.

She’s younger than Heloise for Gods’ sake!

She may be far too young to be the WQ, but there can’t be any denials of her sudden appearance in the village, nor can there be any denials of who she looks like. He takes her to the castle, but isn’t as angry or mean about it.

The first night, she just breaks down and starts crying. She tries to be as quiet as possible, because she doesn’t want to piss August off, because he’s already annoyed that she chose him to stick with. August’s shield breaks a little, because all he can see is one of his sisters crying. While he doesn’t relent, he does comfort her a little and that helps her get to sleep.

Alain kidnapping her sends him into big-brother-panic-mode. Like he wants to go after them right away, and barely stops himself. It’s really Reiner who makes him stop so they can make a plan. And when they do rescue her, he barely lets her go when they make their escape.

The second attempt pisses him the hell off. He starts her training on the sword for defense.

While she runs away after the Ice Crystal incident, she doesn’t actually start heading to the WQ castle. She’s actually snatched by some of the WQ soldiers. She has to play the part of the WQ, and states that she was cursed in a child’s body.

How she manages that, she has no idea. She’s sure that August and the others aren’t going to come for her. It plays out pretty similarly to what happens, though she does explain she never intended to go too far.

She’s honestly thrown when she meets August’s mother and sister. Asta becomes protective of her in an instant and treats her like one of her own children. It’s actually pretty overwhelming for MC, because while the foster home was alright...it wasn’t exactly the most caring of places.

She breaks down because of it.

When August takes her to the Falke Inn he almost considers leaving her there, but ultimately decides to take her to the capital.  

She panics when she’s sent back to Chicago because she has no way of knowing how to get back. The first person she thinks to look for is Sophie, and she realizes the foster home didn’t even notice she was gone for a week. Sophie agrees to help her back

When she does, she works on getting August better

When WQ curses her, it stuns August and infuriates him. He knew the WQ was evil. It’s not a surprise. But the fact that she cursed her own daughter, a child to die a slow and painful death just flabbergasts him.

Returning her to Chicago, he initially wants to leave her there, until he sees how her foster family is, and decides he can’t do that to her.

He decides to take her as his squire

Saerys 

He has mixed feelings about this girl.

Her mother destroyed his people, mass genocide. But in all likelihood she was an infant, or a young child at that point. For all he knows, she might not have even been in this world when WQ destroyed the demon race.

MC is really quiet around him for a long time. It’s not until Solaire corners him that he learns she’s quiet around him because she’s scared he hates her for what her mother did to his people.

She wouldn’t blame him if he did.

It takes a little while for him to come around to her, but he does get protective of her. 

Turbo mode initially attacks her, but stops just before actually hurting her.

She still chases after him when he runs away, before she decides to go to WQ's castle to see if she can find some answers. And boy does she.

She’s stunned by the fact that her mother decided she would use her as a holder for her soul. She knew her mother didn’t love her...but still. 

Saerys is not pleased when he learns of this.

It’s bad enough her crazed climb for power killed his race, but to use her own child in this just proves how mad she is.

They’re both protective of each other for different reasons. Saerys begins to train her in self-defense.

MC nearly dying cuts her mother’s connection to her. But there is no soul splitting.

Saerys becomes like a big brother to MC

The demon souls eventually see her as their youngling, which is kind of...weird...to Saerys and MC but as long as they don’t try to kill her Saerys puts up with it

Altea Bellerose 

She’s stunned to see the girl. She’s so young. That means that she had to have been born at least right before all this madness had started or at the beginning.

It’s unsettling to her. She was young when she entered the war against WQ, but this is...this is wrong. 

She does several non-invasive spells to see if this isn’t a trick to get Reiner’s guard down.

Afterwards, MC follows her around, confused but still trusting her. 

She’s really curious about magic. Not like she can do it, but it’s still cool looking to watch. Altea smiles and doesn’t mind letting the girl watch.

She decides if the girl does develop magical abilities like her mother, she’ll teach her how to control them.

She’ll be more accepting than her parents were, that’s a fact.

Speaking of meeting her parents...it’s...a bit awkward. Because hoo boy, the parents automatically think the girl is somehow Altea’s biological daughter and the screaming gets really loud. MC’s confused, Altea’s embarrassed. It’s all in all...very awkward.

At least Lionel likes MC

Reiner Wolfson 

To say he’s stunned when Altea brings the 10 year old girl into his study is an understatement. She looks absolutely terrified, but is trying to not fully panic.

It doesn’t take him long to basically adopt her, much to her surprise. The retainers aren’t as surprised, though some of them object a little due to the worry of this being a trick by WQ.

MC has a bit of difficulty getting used to him. It’s not like her foster father was exactly attentive. He had to work. So it throws her when Reiner actually asks her questions about herself and her interests. 

Eventually she starts to let her guard down, still unsure what is going on, but finding that Reiner is actually pretty fatherly. Better than her foster father and probably better than her actual father. 

Ryland is very much protective of her and is like an older brother to MC. 

She doesn’t remember her own dad, barely remembers her mother (which is probably a good thing), and the foster parents were...well they were there. Having someone actually take an interest in her and listen to her is a new concept.

Reiner is protective of her. It doesn’t matter that she’s the WQ’s daughter, although it is worrying. She’s a child. She’s not her mother. And he intends to make sure she never becomes like her mother.

In Chicago, MC runs into Reiner as she’s getting off a subway and nearly falls because of a hurrying business man. Reiner catches her before she hurts herself.

He’s a little alarmed at how protective he is of a girl he’s never apparently met. He’s a college professor, and he’s sure he would recognize a ten year old in his classes

His alarm shifts when he drops her off at the foster home. They hadn’t even realized she was gone for a few hours (which is actually longer). Leaving her there seems more of a danger and it hurts Reiner for some inexplicable reason

Reiner winds up going to the courts and asking to foster her. This breaks the curse on him.

He doesn’t fully adopt her in Chicago, because that takes too much time and they don’t have that time. He formally adopts her in the Fantasy Realm

Which winds up making her a defacto princess when Reiner is declared King

Which opens up a completely different can of very large worms. She’s the WQ’s daughter. Someone who coveted the throne...what if that had been her plan

MC doesn’t really care about a crown or a throne, and makes it very clear on that. She doesn’t want to be like her mother. 

And the retainers/Reiner make it very clear to not go near that topic or go after MC because things will happen to them if they attack the girl. Bad things. Like really, really bad things.

Defeating her mother hurts, and losing Ishara hurts because that was the closest person she had to a motherly figure. She begins to heal, just like the land

Iseul Idreis 

He...really doesn’t know what to say or do. In his very long life, he’s never come across something like this. 

He doesn’t want the responsibility of the girl, knowing full well what the implications of this. Reluctantly he accepts Reiner’s order.

Slowly she and he bond, and he treats her like an annoying little sister.

Meeting his mother is nerve-wracking to say the least. She doesn’t have the greatest luck with meeting mothers, hers included.

Ishara however is incredibly sympathetic to the girl and is protective of her. Also...a sort of grandchild

Iseul blushes at that and is very embarrassed. MC didn’t hear so she has no idea what was said and Iseul refuses to explain why his sisters are cackling and he looks about ready to jump off a cliff.

Speaking of cliffs…

MC blames herself for his perceived death and withdraws from a lot of people. Ishara is there to comfort her.

Iseul has a whole lot of explaining and bribing MC with sweets to get her to forgive him for that

Ishara and Iseul plan on having her drink from the well when she’s a little older

Helena Klein 

Helena knew of MC prior to this, though not in big detail. Whenever she asked WQ, she was greeted with pain and punishment.

She stops asking after a certain point

When MC arrives, of course Helena initially thinks she’s the WQ just aged down. MC tells her over and over again she isn’t. 

Eventually Helena believes her and realizes she’s the child that the WQ had refused to talk about.

She also realizes the girl is in far more danger now

That is her primary reason for escaping with the girl. If the WQ comes back...the girl will probably not survive

MC is incredibly protective of Helena, especially when she finds out what her mother did to her.

She feels guilty for looking like her mother, because Helena doesn’t deserve seeing a mirror of her mother. Helena is quick to assure her that she doesn’t fear her.

It’s strange for Helena to be in the Human realm. She doesn’t complain, especially when she sees MC seeming to come out of her shell.

Losing Alain breaks something in Helena and MC switches roles from being a child to being the adult and comforting Helena

It’s strange, but she does it

When Helena is in Chicago, and forgets everything MC asks Sophie to watch over her because she’s too old to be in the foster home and she doesn’t have anywhere to go.

When she finally remembers, she is pissed at where MC is. Basically drags MC away.

When they return to Chicago after everything, Helena plans on adopting MC so she can be raised right. It doesn’t matter what she has to do to make it work. She will.

Alain Richter 

He remembers finding out WQ was pregnant. He doesn’t know who the father was, though he had an inkling it was someone from the high King’s council.

He doesn’t like to think that there is a chance the child could have been his. 

WQ told him that she had been killed, which added to his loyalty to her and hatred to the others because they killed an innocent child

When he sees MC, he just knows who she is. And realizes what the WQ had done.

He’s far more protective of her. MC starts seeing him as a fatherly figure.

It throws him that’s for sure. The woman he loved, and swore loyalty to is gone, but the child, her child is there.

He swears loyalty to her and protects her the best he can.

Something in him snaps when WQ orders him to kill off MC. The lie she told him about MC years before comes back and he realizes that she will do to ensure she will win

When he reaches the Human Realm, he doesn’t fight. He doesn’t even really care if he’s executed for his crimes. His only request is that she's protected. She wasn’t involved with the crimes that he did for the WQ.

That throws Reiner and the retainers off as they look at this girl who is trying to be as small as possible.

He’s surprised when Reiner allows them to stay, just without weapons and he can still watch over MC.

He begins training her in self-defense.

Her mother comes to reclaim her daughter, something that terrifies Alain. Reiner protecting the girl makes Alain realize she would always be safer there than with her mother

The Libra thing is so much a magical girl anime that it isn’t even funny to MC, but she manages to do it.

Alain decides to adopt her.

He couldn’t save her mother...but he won’t fail the girl.

[missytearex]

I can’t believe the first month of 2020 is nearly over. Time flies when you’re reading good fic I guess. Here’s this month’s list. Under 10k fics are under the cut. Remember to leave kudos and comments. 💕

After Dark, After Light by @becomeawendybird --- [fic post]

larry | 71k | explicit

Harry Styles is the laird of Clan Edwards who is just trying to keep his clan afloat when they get word that the Mackenzies have been cutting a swath through the Midlands and beyond, and their sights are set on the northern Highlands next. In an attempt to garner extra protection for his clan, Harry sets out to mend his father's past wrongs and ally with their neighbors to the west, Clan Sutherland.

Louis Tomlinson is the mysterious commander of the Sutherland army sent back with Harry on orders from his laird to help shore up Clan Edwards' defenses. As the winter draws nearer by the day, the two are thrown together to prepare for the invasion that they expect as soon as the ground thaws.

If You're Out There (I'll Find You Somehow) by @jacaranda-bloom --- [fic post]

larry | 55k | explicit

Harry looks so intensely into Louis’ eyes it’s as though he’s reaching in and touching his very soul. “I never thought… I never… I’ve been searching for so long, Louis, but I never gave up. I couldn’t stop, wouldn’t stop trying,” Harry says, bottom lip trembling as he strokes the backs of Louis’ knuckles. “I just knew that if you were out there, I’d find you somehow.”

OR the story of how one man’s love changed the world.

Listen To Your Heart by @chloehl10 --- [fic post]

larry | 35k | explicit

Louis has always been comfortable being Harry’s one and only. When Harry starts to branch out, Louis has a hard time letting him go.

Harry is very lucky to have someone who listens to what he has to say, despite the fact that he’s deaf. He’s finally feeling like he’s coming into himself, but Louis seems bothered by his newfound confidence.

Sisterwives by @jaerie --- [fic post]

larry | 32k | explicit

This was it, the moment Louis had been waiting for his entire life. Giddy excitement bubbled up as he held hands and stared up at his soon-to-be alpha and husband and grinned. The ceremony was small and simple, but Louis didn’t mind. Fresh flowers pinned into his hair and a brand new outfit was all he needed to feel special in front of their few witnesses. It was just some members of his family and a few of the church elders in attendance as was customary for any marriage beyond the first wife within the faith.

First wives were the ones to have elaborate weddings with the whole community involved. An alpha’s first wedding was a celebration of an their coming of age, his first steps into fulfilling God’s prophecy. There were many glories for an omega that came with being a first wife but also many responsibilities. Louis had never aspired to be a first wife or even a second. He wasn’t experienced enough to be the leader of an alpha’s many wives and children and he didn’t think he’d be up to the task.

Louis was just fine in the position he was stepping into as the seventh.

Or Louis thinks he's getting everything he's ever dreamed of. Harry helps him find what makes him truly happy.

From the Start by @allwaswell16 --- [fic post]

larry | 32k | explicit

Louis has no idea that one act of kindness will cause his life to spiral out of control. But that's what happens when his new friend fake proposes to him and a video of it goes viral.

Access Economics by @bitter-leaf --- [fic post]

nouis | 25k | explicit

When Louis moves to a new city for a new job with a big economics firm, he’s charmed by Niall, his colleague and new housemate. However, when things turn physical and feelings get involved, they find themselves in a risky game of supply and demand.

But Now Together, We're Alone by @becomeawendybird --- [fic post]

larry | 22k | mature

It's a stroke of good luck when Harry Styles, a man who grew up on the small island of Martinique, is offered the position of tutor to the Dauphin and his sister.

When he arrives at the palace, he is dragged into a world of opulence, courtiers, whispers in the shadows, and illicit affairs. But he is also introduced to the king, the most intriguing man he's ever met.

Caught By the Sun by @metal-eye

larry | 19k | mature

Harry and Louis meet every summer at the lake.

Can't Forget You by @writsgrimmyblog --- [fic post]

tomlinshaw | 13k | explicit

Nick wakes up in hospital and discovers he's lost several years of memories, including getting together—and breaking up—with Louis Tomlinson, the owner of the local café that Nick's being trying to pull for ages.

As he tries to work out what went wrong, Nick falls in love with Louis all over again.

Just Want To Be Loved By You by @londonfoginacup --- [fic post]

larry | 11k | teen and up

Harry loves Liam like a brother. Liam loves Zayn. Zayn comes with Louis. Louis doesn't trust anyone, and Harry is terrified of hybrids.

Weekend Rockstars by @clumsykisses --- [fic post]

tomlinshaw | 10k | teen and up

Told backwards in time, we see Nick and Louis get married after going through a difficult time, then we see Louis serving time for dealing cocaine, and finally we see how the two met. So it's an angst sandwich.

Strangers In The Night by @kingsofeverything --- [fic post]

larry | 9k | explicit

Louis never thought he’d meet his soulmate. Harry never thought he’d meet a vampire.

To Fall Down At Your Door by @magicalrocketships --- [fic post]

tomlinshaw | 9k | teen and up

Nick has failed to pay attention in any of the meetings leading up to him filming a documentary in the Scottish Highlands, mostly because he's just been dumped and he's in the middle of some very important wallowing. This does not entirely explain what Louis Tomlinson is doing there filming in the Highlands with him, and it absolutely does not explain why the world's press seems to think that they've just got married without telling anyone.

He's fairly certain none of this is actually his fault, but it doesn't change the fact that everything has suddenly got a little bit weird.

if we can make it through december by @march-z5 --- [fic post]

larry | 9k | explicit

Louis runs into his ex at a holiday party, who talks loudly about Louis being single to embarrass him. Harry saves the day by kissing Louis’s cheek and pretending to be his significant other even though Louis has never met him before... has he?

Meet Me Underneath The Mistletoe by @evilovesyou --- [fic post]

larry | 8k | general audiences

Louis flies out to Chicago for business just before Christmas... His flight home is cancelled because of a snow storm and he ends up going to his colleague Niall's Christmas party where he meets the most gorgeous man he's ever seen. And if they end up under the mistletoe within less than an hour then that's nobody's business but theirs.

We're Driving in Your Fast Car by @sadaveniren --- [fic post]

larry | 6k | explicit

Louis and Harry are car thieves about to pull off a million dollar job

lettuce be together by @zarrycats --- [fic post]

ziall | 5k | teen and up

“Do you go because you like the food or because of the sandwich boy?” Harry asks, grinning at Zayn like he already knows the answer.

Zayn takes a bite of his sandwich to avoid answering. He does enjoy the food. He’s always been impartial to sandwiches but they’re growing on him a bit. Subway might not be the moan-inducing establishment that Trevor made it out to be, but it’s good. And Niall working there and being cute and pretty and nice is simply the cherry on top of everything else.

Maybe Zayn does have a crush on him, a little bit, but it’s harmless. It’s not like Zayn’s going to dive across the counter and beg Niall to take him right there next to the shredded lettuce, so what does it matter?

We Had a Good Thing (Going) by @phd-mama --- [fic post]

larry | 4k | teen and up

Sometimes things fall apart.

Sure Feels Good To Love Someone by @loveislarryislove --- [fic post]

larry | 4k | general audiences

“You thinkin’ of adopting today?”

Louis shakes his head. “No, not today I’m afraid,” he says. “We’ve always said we wouldn’t get a dog until-”

He stops, suddenly, clarity hitting him like ice water to the face. They’ve been together for nearly four years now, living together for two. Why shouldn’t “until” become “now”?

“Until?”

Louis shakes his head, looking down at the puppy in his lap. It seems to have curled itself even tighter, but one dark eye is peering up at Louis, soft and warm. His heart pounds.

“Until now, apparently,” he says.

Niall’s face breaks into a wide grin. “Good choice,” he says. “You’re picking the white one, I presume?”

Louis smiles down at the bundle of fur in his lap. “He’s picked me, mostly,” he says. “But I suppose it’s mutual.”

Thank You (To the One Who Let Him Get Away) by @fallinglikethis --- [fic post]

larry | 3k | not rated

Louis' soulmark says "Will You Marry Me?". In all scenarios where Louis has imagined hearing those words, he never could have dreamed it would go like this.

your eyes are like starlight now by @farfromthstars --- [fic post]

ziall | 2k | not rated

drunk friends, a forced christmas duet and one touch is all it takes.

Angel in the Snow by @warpedtourniall --- [fic post]

ziall | 1k | teen and up

For a big city, New York is a small town.

The Stupid Striptease One by @jiksax

gryles | 1k | mature

Harry takes his clothes off and accidentally says the wrong thing.

[anotheronechicagobog]

Volomag and Vodka Part 4

written by @anotheronechicagobog​

A/N: OA has boarded USS Upstead with the rest of us

Warnings: swearing, mention of Jay being shot, jealousy

The army was a turbulent part of Jay’s life. He didn’t have fond memories, but he had fond relationships. Such as Mouse. He had more who just didn’t live in or near Chicago so he didn’t get to see them often. The only time he really saw them was at reunions, both official and unofficial. This time it was an unofficial reunion. One of the other snipers was getting married and invited everyone (who was still alive, Jay thought bitterly).

Jay strolled into Molly’s with Will and Nat the evening before the wedding, eyes scanning for Hailey. When he found her his stomach dropped. He spotted her at a table near the back with a man. Jay moved of his own account, a terrified buzz consuming his form, when he got to the table he recognized him instantly. OA from his unit in the Rangers, and Hailey’s temporary partner in the FBI. Hailey going off and working in New York for three months was the most traumatic thing Jay had gone through in a long time. The only thing that got him through the insomnia, nightmares, food aversion, anxiety, encompassing fear, and panic attacks was the knowledge that the most important person in his life was working with someone who he had personally trained with and knew that said important person was safe. Now though, seeing Hailey laugh at something someone else, some other man, summoned the green-eyed monster. He made it to the table with his jealousy choking him. “Hi-hi guys, what’s up?”

Hailey beamed at him, skin radiant, eyes glowing. “Jay! We were just talking about Chicago pizza, help me prove to this New Yorker that deep dish is best.”

He chuckled softly, taking the seat beside her. “You don’t need my help with that Hails, you have the knowledge and ability to win this argument.” OA scoffed and rolled his eyes, when he froze while looking at Jay briefly and then a smug smirk rolled out on his face. OA turned back to Hailey, leaning across the table thus bringing him closer to the blonde. “Has good ol’ Halstead told you about McGarrett’s wedding tomorrow?”

“Yes he has.”

“Has he asked you to be his date? And if he hasn’t, are you free tomorrow?” Jay’s body went cold as if a vat of liquid nitrogen had been dumped on him. His heart hammered in his chest so hard he could hear it in his ears. He hadn’t asked her to go with him, he hadn’t realized that he was irrevocably, inescapably, inexorably in love with her. He had RSVP’d as attending with a guest, intending for it to be Will who had informed him that he couldn’t come, but Jay just couldn’t bring himself to let the lucky couple know. He was waiting, and while he didn’t know why for a long time, he did now. He’d spent the last two hours with Will and Nat telling him to swallow his fear and ask her to be his date. All of the pep talks flew out of his head. The confidence left his body. OA’s eyed darted over to Jay’s devastated form and guilt briefly flashed in his eyes. “Uh, Jay hasn’t asked me, and I’m not busy tomorrow, but I don’t think we have that kind of relationship-”

“Don’t worry about it Chicago, I was just messing with our favourite Irishman.”

“Right, Jay close your mouth or you’ll catch flies, I am going to get more drinks and order some spicy fries. Jay, you want anything?”

“... Uh, how about a beer and can you place an order of those spicy chicken bites for me?”

“Sure thing, I’ll be right back.”

Hailey skipped over to Stella at the bar and left the men to themselves. “You’re in love with her.” It was a statement, not a question. OA and Jay knew each other well. They had served together. Bonded in the field and in the barracks. Learned each other’s ticks. OA spent seven reunions with Jay and Mouse listening to Jay ramble on and on about Erin. Had been sitting beside him when he decided to propose. So he knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that Jay felt more for Hailey than he ever had for Erin. He also knew that Hailey was in love with Jay, but wouldn’t be the first one to act on it. It would have to be Jay, but he was scarred too. Yes, OA was attracted Hailey and would love to explore the possibility of a romantic relationship with her if given the opportunity, but this wasn’t it. She was too in love with Jay and he was too in love with her, this was their time. “I- uh- look- shouldn’t... I think she’s interested in... No. Not- not me. I-”

“Ask her out or I will.” Jay sat there for a few moments, seriously contemplating OA’s words. He couldn’t ask out Hailey just because someone else might, no one, least of all Hailey, deserved that. But he thought about it. He trusted her with his entire being, they took care of each other when they were sick, fell asleep together often, had movie nights, game nights, had meals together, confided in each other, and laughed with one another. His life would be empty without her, something that had been proved when she was sent to New York. He couldn’t live without her, he knew that, but he wanted more. He wanted to kiss her, hold her hand, live with her, marry her, have kids with her. But he knew that all he dreamed about with her needed to start with a date. Or a marriage pact, but that seemed an unlikely and strange senario. Jay nodded, OA raised his brow. “I will.”

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

OA had driven Hailey over in his rental car, so Jay offered to drive her home when they all needed to leave for the night. Jay was grateful that neither of them had more than two drinks, he couldn’t imagine doing this when Hailey wasn’t sober. Jay climbed out of his truck when he pulled up in front of her house. Hailey smiled, excited that Jay was staying the night again, she always slept better when he was with her. She was confused, however, when he suddenly stopped on her small porch. “Jay?”

“I have been oblivious. And afraid, for so long.”

“About?”

“You.” Hailey sucked in a breath, heart pulsing, her hopes rising. “I am in love with you, there’s no other way to explain or describe the way I feel about you. And I’m happy about it. That the person that I’m in love with is you. And the relationship that I have with you is the one I cherish the most. At the same time, though, I want more. I want to be your boyfriend, then your fiance, then your husband, and then the father of your children. I want it all, with you. And- and I know that I am taking a huge risk, that you probably don’t feel the same way, and that’s okay. But I can’t keep burying this anymore, I am irretrievably in love with you and I have never been more thankful for anything in my entire life.”

Jay had poured his heart out, and it was met with Hailey’s heavy breathing. Jay’s eyes searched hers. He reached out and held her shoulders. The sensation, even through her light blue t-shirt, made her shiver. Jay’s achingly small voice triggered Hailey to finally respond the way she had desperately wanted to the second Rojas confronted her in the hospital waiting room. With her two hands she grabbed the neck of his navy t-shirt and the collar of the plaid shirt overtop. The kiss was all-encompassing. Warm, sparkling, and like a puzzle piece fitting perfectly in both of their souls. “I love you too. Unconditionally.” This lead to more, eager, delighted kissing. When the parted Jay raised his hands from her waist to her face, taking in every detail. “Sooooo... Do you have a guest for the wedding tomorrow?”

“I do if you say yes.”

“Of course yes.”

Jay was going to send OA a muffin basket.

[owlsoldwritingcorner]

The Ghost (Part 2)

Pairing :Wrench x Reader

AO3 Link

Summary:

“So. You a big fan of hackers?”

“I guess you can say that. ” You may not be able to make a coherent string of codes but you know that vague code speak means: He’s in the group.

Note: 

Here's the look reader has in this chapter!

(The helmet and biker suit is the main canonical look reader has cuz it's important to the fic, underneath you can insert your own look)

Chapter 2: Fresh Air and Graffiti

You woke up to the smell of your grandmother’s cooking, checking your phone revealed it was 8 in the damn morning. God you weren’t ready for the strong smells so early in the morning. Looks like Ripley wasn’t either considering she was already away and giving you her big ole puppy eyes that just scream “Walk time? Walk time!”.

Such a sweetie.

“Let’s get you some breakfast first before we can think of any w-a-l-k-i-e-s, alrighty?” Oh gosh, she gave you a little nod and a gentle ruff, you’re gonna get killed by the cuteness of a pup. Not by any of those burly men with guns that you’re so used to on the job, and obviously, you welcome this kind of death with open arms.

Getting up, you cleaned yourself up from the rest of your grogginess and went to the kitchen to fill up Ripley’s food bowl but not before taking a puff of your daily asthma medicine.

Gah… The smell of dried fish was getting more and more prominent now. The dried fish your grandma makes for the conge tastes so good but god it smells like the ocean flooded the house and dried up.

“Mom! Did you really have to make that fish so early in the morning?” Looks like your aunt was up and at ‘em too now. Strong smells always did make her grumpier.

“ It takes so long to fully seep and cook this fish so I should just cook it now! ” Your aunt looked as if she was going to pop a blood vessel already.

“Mom. Now the whole house smells like fish. You could have made it tomorrow or even later today!” You just sighed as your aunt and grandma argued, you really didn’t want a headache so early in the morning…

Ripley was done eating her breakfast so it was time to go for some walkies. Maybe Ripley will make some friends in this neighborhood? You brought out some body spray for yourself to put on once you’re out of the house, your emergency inhaler, then finally you put the pit-bull on her leash. Hopefully a walk around will ease your headache a bit.

So far so good.

It was sunny and surprisingly nice out, your little pup was letting out some energy and you got some fresh air. You finally arrived at a small dog park, certainly not the park Clara told you about. That hideout is about 20 more minutes away from where you’re currently at.

You sat at one of the benches to give your feet some rest, your little pit-bull laid down next to you on the bench, her head on your lap and wanting you to pet her as you two relaxed. You smiled before slowly starting to go into a daze, your eyelids drooped a bit from the nice temperature and your little friend snored away on your lap before your mind finally started to dream away as you stared into space.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Run.

You needed to run.

You have to get out of here.

Opaque silhouettes slithered after you, their limbs contorting as they ran on all fours, letting out whaling cries as if trying to coax you into stopping. Its grotesque body leaving mucus in its wake.

But it didn’t work.

It only made you run faster.

Faster and faster until--

You choked.

The air was knocked out of you as one of the silhouette’s slimy, long arms grabbed one of your legs causing you to fall forward. You tried to crawl away, your nails scratching the concrete below to no avail. You looked behind you to see the mass of disgusting limbs catching up to you, still holding onto your captive leg.

As you continue to try to get away from the creature, you see another silhouette step in front of you and kneel down, and outstretched as if saying “Here. Let me help you up”. This one was different from the ones trying to chase you, they weren’t contorted or slimy nor did they have any extra limbs on their body.

You were so close to reaching for that gentle hand when--

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Excuse me?” You woke up from your daydream by that new voice trying to get your attention. Looking up, you see a man (probably just a couple years older than you) wearing dark lensed glasses and had a light moustache and a soul patch. You also noted the shirt he wore.

Dedsec.

You wanted to snort. The Chicago branch would instantly kick that person out for wearing something so blatant. They’d hate seeing their name with a face.

“Hey, uh, sorry for intruding, I just wanted to pet your dog. Don’t really see many Pitbulls in this neighborhood.” You raised an eyebrow, most people would be terrified of Ripley and cross the street from you two (Granted, she is a big dog with large scars and cropped ears, you can’t fully blame them for being intimidated.) But you gave the man a little nod, he seemed nice enough.

“Sure, she’d love the attention.” The man immediately went to work, giving Ripley little scratches behind her ears, cooing as she gave him some kisses.

“What’s her name?”

“Ripley.”

“As in Ellen Louise Ripley ?”

“Yep. They’re both super tough, so, I just named her accordingly.” You mumbled, god it’s been so long since you had social interaction with a new human. The man just chuckled.

“I can tell, she definitely looks like she been through some stuff.”

You let out a little hum, “She was rescued from one of those dog fighting rings.” He nodded.

“Poor girl. Looks like she’s in better hands now though.” You chuckled as you scratched behind Ripley’s cropped ears, your eyes wandered back to the man’s Dedsec shirt. Honestly you can’t tell if he’s just a big fan or actually part of the group.

“So. You a big fan of hackers?”

“I guess you can say that. You into what Dedsec has to say?” You may not be able to make a coherent string of codes but you know that vague code speak means: He’s in the group.

“They have some good points. Highlighting vulnerabilities and weaknesses in the CTOS systems, showcasing how Blume truly acts. It’s like embarrassing the prom king on stage, I’m all for that.” The man raised his eyebrows and chuckled.

“You seem to have your share of Dedsec knowledge.”

“I’m from Chicago, they’re a pretty big deal there too. Dunno about here.”

“That explains it. Heard they released some pretty big blackmail over there.” You gave the man a nonchalant hum. Dedsec’s blackmail, huh? Aiden did most of the work though…

“I heard that too.”

Checking the time it was already almost 12 pm, that fuckin online college got you on a damn leash. Plus, you were getting pretty hungry, you did skip out on breakfast in favor of feeding Ripley.

“Well, I need to be on my way now. Hope you have a nice day.”

“Oh, you too. I’m Marcus by the way. I have a feeling I might see you again.” Well that sounds only mildly ominous, but, certainly not the worst you’ve heard. The taller man reached out his hand for a handshake, to which you reluctantly shook and gave Marcus your name.

“It was nice meeting you, Marcus.”

You nudged Ripley a bit to let her know you two were heading home now only for her to whine a bit but obliging. Yeah, you don’t wanna smell like fish again but… You really needed to at least finish the week’s assignments. You gave Marcus a final goodbye wave as you walked home with your dog by your side.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You flopped onto your bed in defeat.

Why the fuck did this online school have to give you so much work every week? Well, you managed to do a few weeks worth of work and should be free earlier for Dedsec work.

Speaking of, it’s almost time to meet your new “coworkers”. It's time to suit up.

Donning your binder, biker’s helmet and suit, you made sure to test out the helmet’s voice modulator and check for any kinks. Afterwards, it was time for some real clothes! The skin tight biker suit feels pretty breezy despite you not being actually naked. At least the binder makes you look like a super buff guy, not to mention the boots give you some extra height. You really need those 3 extra inches…

Let’s see…

Pastel week? Or maybe something vintage? Or perhaps some fall colors would be nice! Sweaters always feel nice. But, it has been a while since you’ve done a punk week…

Well! It’s been decided!

Finally, you were ready for work. Giving Ripley a final forehead kiss and head pat, you headed for your destination.

Weird that a notorious hacker group put one of their hideouts in a nerdy tabletop shop. Then again, it doesn’t raise a lot of suspicion on the outside. Looking around, you see a bunch of people rolling their 20 sided dice on the tables. You always did want to play Dungeons and Dragons, never had the time to read up on it though. You walked towards the back, ignoring any wandering eyes. But no one really spoke up against you being there, they looked too scared to even try if they actually wanted to.

Aha. There was the entrance. You pushed in the pass-code Clara gave you and viola! You’re in. You took in the appearance of the entrance down the hackerspace. The graffiti is quite a look. Most of the Dedsec graffiti back home were mostly on CTOS ads or other signposts, this is a stark contrast from those dark hacker rooms in Chicago. But, you certainly didn’t mind it. Actually heading into the space itself revealed it looked more like a hacker’s man cave or hangout spot than a big name hacker group meet up room. Dedsec’s name was graffitied around every inch of the room, the table in the middle was filled with snacks, beers, and some computer equipment, and there were some really old rage comics memes near the 3d printer area.

Looks like you’re the first person here though. You sat at the sofa area, crossing your legs. God, the spaces back home needs a sofa like this instead of those rackety pull out chairs. Just as you were getting used to the appearance of… Everything. The sound of the sliding door and footsteps catches your ears. Guess it was introduction time.

Turning around and facing the first person you got to the space first, you were greeted with a familiar face.

“You guys should have seen Mr. Weak Chin’s face in perso--” The man locked eyes with you as you gave him a little wave.

Marcus. Your instincts had always been pretty on point.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” His hand was hidden behind him, probably reaching for a weapon to prepare himself from any surprise attacks. You only raise your hands to tell him you don’t mean any harm. Just as you were going to let him know why you’re here, the rest of the crew came down. Marcus wasn’t the only familiar face around here.

Your hidden eyes gazed into familiar digital Xs.

[lets-talk-appella]

Roman Holiday

Bechloe Week 2019 -- Soulmates

Summary: Three years after the events of Pitch Perfect 3, Beca and Chloe meet again on a long-haul flight to Rome.

Word Count: 9k

Rating: G

AO3 and FFN

For @acabellas, who read it first.

Beca shoves her bag into the overhead with a muffled curse. She’d told herself to pack light, but apparently, she hadn’t listened. 

“Do you need help with that, ma’am?”

Beca glances over, making quick eye contact with the overly-perky blonde flight attendant (really, just that simple sentence had been coated with enough false sugar to rot Beca’s teeth) before returning her attention to stowing her carry-on. 

“No, I’m good, thanks,” she grumbles, then puffs out a breath when her bag finally slides into place and stays. 

The attendant walks away, and Beca plops down into her first-class seat, barely taking the time to appreciate the enormous, clearly-able-to-turn-into-a-somewhat-comfortable-bed window seat and the large TV screen in front of her as she reaches for her headphones. She settles back into the cushy seat, places the headphones over her ears, starts the first track, and closes her eyes with a sigh. She’s looking forward to listening to some demos and then maybe watching a movie before passing out on the overnight flight to Rome. 

On second thought, Beca thinks as she starts to doze off almost as soon as her eyes are closed, maybe she’ll skip the movie and just sleep. Sleep would be good.

And, who knows, if the seat to her right remains empty, maybe she can stretch out even more on that.

With that hope in mind, Beca lets herself drift off to the sound of her music, which perfectly muffles the commotion of hordes of other people—vacationers, mostly—boarding the flight.

Unfortunately, not ten minutes later, she’s pulled back to consciousness by that same annoying, overly-sweet voice that somehow manages to pierce through her otherwise relatively sound-proof headphones. Rather than opening her eyes to acknowledge the annoyance, she keeps them closed and hopes the flight attendant will leave soon. 

However, that isn’t the case.

“I’m sorry, but as the plane is at capacity, we can’t move your seat,” the attendant apologizes extremely loudly, apparently speaking to another passenger. “The best we could do is move you to business class, but as you paid for first class—”

“No, it’s—it’s fine,” comes a softer, almost contrite voice that Beca finds herself straining her ears to listen to. “Thanks for trying.”

Someone has kicked Beca in the stomach. That’s the only explanation for the horrible pang that rocks her gut at the sound of that voice. 

Before she can stop herself—she realizes too late that she should feign sleep for the entire flight—her eyes open, first finding the irksome flight attendant, then sliding past her and onto the person she’d been speaking to.

And she looks directly into Chloe Beale’s face for the first time in three years.

There’s a moment, a single half-second, where Beca thinks—hopes—that this is some kind of fever dream brought on by exhaustion, years of failed repression, and expired turkey in her airport sandwich. But her hope is almost immediately crushed, demolished, absolutely obliterated by the simple fact that she can see the trace of laugh lines that had formed around Chloe’s eyes and maybe the slightest hint of lighter streaking in her hair, pulled up into a messy bun. Beca knows herself well enough to know that she isn’t dreaming; she doesn’t dream in that much detail.

She can see a similar struggle of some kind going on behind Chloe’s eyes, can tell by the way her brows furrow just slightly and lips part only a hair in surprise; to anyone else, the signs might not have been noticeable, but Beca can tell. Chloe isn’t happy to see her. 

Time resumes in the next beat of Beca’s heart—though for a moment, she’d thought it might have stopped—and Chloe’s face pales. “H—” she starts, then has to pause and clear her throat. “Hi, Bec.”

It’s automatic and so, so easy for Beca to say, “Hey, Chlo,” as if it’s been mere hours since they’ve seen each other.

Then, Beca stares at Chloe and Chloe stares at Beca and no one makes the first move until the sugary flight attendant (Beca had almost forgotten she was even there) clears her throat pointedly. “Yes, well, seeing as you have elected to keep your seat, I suggest you take it,” she says, gesturing to the seat to Beca’s immediate right even as she starts walking away. “We will be taking off shortly.” 

Chloe’s eyes slide closed and her lips tighten, but then she nods and lifts a large pink duffle to hoist up to the overhead. Beca’s ears ring as Chloe gets settled, and she takes off her headphones automatically even though she knows they aren’t the cause. Her mind races, full of panic and guilt and disbelief and anger—because what are the odds of this happening now, today, when she’s had no time to prepare the words she knows she needs to say but were never intended to leave her lips.

She’s startled when Chloe’s knee bumps hers as she sits. She thinks Chloe even apologizes for the minimal contact but Beca doesn’t hear her, too busy shifting away and doing her very best to make herself small while also fighting back the torrent of memories threatening to overtake her.

Chloe looks a little older, a little more strained (which is probably to be expected after three years—Beca knows she’s certainly looked better), but still so familiar, still so Chloe that being this close to her pierces Beca like a knife. 

God, the last time she and Chloe touched—Christ, even the last time she saw Chloe in person… 

It’s unfortunate and a shame and absolutely beyond painful that one of Beca’s freshest, most recent memories of Chloe is how gorgeous she looked while kissing Chicago Walp.

Beca puts her headphones back on.

Leaning against the wall of the plane, she pretends to be staring out the window while in fact seeing nothing and doing her best to think of nothing. A feat in which she is only semi-successful.

Their flight is going to last nearly nine hours; it seems like it takes even longer than that for the plane to finally leave the gate and begin its roll down the tarmac. Even then, it’s almost twenty minutes before the real takeoff begins and the plane, along with its 375 passengers, hurls itself forward with a roar.

The takeoff—and the ten minutes immediately following as the plane builds altitude—isn’t smooth.

It’s pretty much the exact opposite of smooth.

Beca doesn’t mind a little turbulence, but she has to admit this seems excessive for a plane of this size. She can hear her bag and Chloe’s sliding around in the overhead, and a particularly hard jump of the plane almost makes her smack her head against the window. After that, she takes her headphones off so they don’t become damaged.

At the next heavy jostle, Chloe lets out a sharp gasp and Beca reflexively glances over. Chloe’s knuckles are white from her grip on the armrests and she’s tense as a board, ramrod straight in her seat. Her jaw is clenched, chin tilted down, and her eyes are squeezed tightly closed.

Beca grimaces; she remembers holding Chloe’s hand during the rocky sections of their flights as Bellas. Or, more specifically, she remembers Chloe’s grip nearly shattering all the delicate bones in her own hand. Beca hadn’t minded, though. Not really. All that mattered was that it made Chloe feel better.

She knows it isn’t her place anymore.

She wonders if Chloe has ever flown with Chicago, and if he ever let Chloe squeeze his hand to death.

Beca clears her throat. “So. Rome, huh?”

Chloe’s eyes fly open and she glances over sharply but doesn’t reply. If anything, she seems to draw in on herself even more, looking away just as quickly.

It’s a clear signal for Beca to stop talking now, please. And maybe she really should. Maybe she should stick with her original plan of music, movies, sleep, and—most importantly—seclusion, because there’s a reason they haven’t seen each other in three years and, going into the flight, Beca had had no intention of changing that. She had no real reason to.

But she can’t just sit in silence when Chloe is right there and is obviously terrified. She just can’t. So, with a promise to herself to cease any and all conversation once the turbulence has passed, Beca leans in.

“I’m not gonna bite, you know,” she shrugs, hoping she seems more relaxed than she really is. “And it’s a long flight, so…”

Chloe glances over again, but this time, she doesn’t look away. Her posture doesn’t budge—Beca wouldn’t be surprised if there were finger indents left on Chloe’s armrest—but she does seem to at least consider the fact that Beca is talking to her.

“Yeah,” she eventually says, her voice clipped. “Rome.”

“No layover?” Beca prods, for no reason at all other than she’s worried about potential damage to Chloe’s spine from being that wound up.

“Nope, just—just Rome.”

“Oh, nice. Uh, me too. Rome.”

And then Beca’s completely out of ideas for conversation topics. She settles for bobbing her head, a move that, in accordance with a poorly-timed jostle of the plane, actually does cause her to whack her head against the window. Despite the sharp pain, she pretends not to notice in the hopes that Chloe didn’t, either. It doesn’t quite seem to work, though, because a corner of Chloe’s mouth quirks up and—thankfully—her posture seems to relax just slightly.

“You’re not too busy being a superstar?” Chloe asks, only the barest hint of teasing leaking into her tone.

Beca’s brain stalls for an instant as she processes the fact that Chloe’s actually engaging in conversation. “Superstars get vacations, too,” she shrugs once her brain defrosts.

Chloe’s hands relax on the armrests, color flooding her knuckles again. “I suppose. They don’t get private jets?” 

Beca can’t stop herself from smiling just a little, thinking about how incredulous Theo had been when she’d turned down his offer for just that. “I wanted something more low profile.”

As soon as she finishes her sentence, the flight levels, reaching an altitude that doesn’t attempt to knock Beca’s teeth out. The noise level of the engine drops as Beca pops her ears, and she realizes she had basically been shouting at Chloe to be heard. 

The turbulence (hopefully) finished for the moment, Beca settles back into her seat as Chloe moves her hands to her own lap, folding them with a soft sigh. If Beca kept the promise she’d made to herself, she would put on her headphones again and block out Chloe for the rest of the flight. It would maybe be for the best, thinking long-term.

But, as in the case of her overpacking, Beca doesn’t listen to herself.

“So—”

“Um—”

They start speaking in unison, and it’s so awkward and this entire situation is so uncomfortable and unexpected that it makes Beca laugh, and just like that, she can’t quite remember why it was she’d made an internal vow of silence to begin with.

After all, it is going to be a long flight.

“You go first,” Beca suggests.

“Oh, okay,” Chloe says, pushing a strand of hair that had escaped from her bun behind her ear. “H—How have you been?” she asks, her voice light and casual.

“Uh, good. Yeah. Busy.” Beca winces, slightly irritated by her own urge to stop talking. She’s given countless interviews on national television—it should be the easiest thing in the world to talk to Chloe. (She knows why it isn’t.) “The last few years were crazy, uh, tours and albums, and… well, we wrapped up this tour last week, and, you know, I’m taking some rest now before I start on the next album. Theo has been kinda… he’s fine, really, but. A vacation would be good,” she finishes with a huff. 

She thinks that’s a decent amount of information, a coverage of the surface-level details Chloe should be privy to. It answers Chloe’s question, in a way, without detailing how truly exhausted she has been, how much this latest tour drained her of energy and happiness and how uncertain she is about her future with the label because she had never really wanted to sing, only produce, and her answer doesn’t even hint—doesn’t reveal so much as a single trace—of how honest-to-God lonely she is and how she puts out so much music in such a short time simply because she never wants to go home to her huge, magnificent, outstandingly empty house at the end of the day.

Chloe doesn’t need to know about any of that.

Chloe smiles. “That’s your third album?”

“Yep, third,” Beca nods. “It’s kinda crazy actually. Three albums in three years is kinda a lot.”

Oops. She wasn’t supposed to let that slip. She shifts in her seat, but if Chloe picks up on anything strange (Beca’s glaring need for rest, for instance), she doesn’t say. No; instead, she leans forward, all huge eyes and excited smile and practically oozes enthusiasm as she assures Beca, “They’re really good though! You’re doing amazing.”

Thrown by the sincerity shining from Chloe’s eyes, Beca stammers, “Th—thanks, that’s really—you listened to my albums?”

“Of course I did,” Chloe shakes her head, as though shocked that Beca would question that. “We all did.” 

She’s telling the truth. Beca knows because Chloe’s tells—eyes begging Beca to believe her, lips parted and ready to fling another compliment, her upper body leaned toward Beca in earnest—are all in place. Chloe doesn’t lie about music, and certainly not about Beca’s. She never has.

Beca has to look away; her eyes drop to her hands, which fiddle with one another in her lap. “Yeah, I… thanks.”

She doesn’t need to clarify the “we all” part of Chloe’s statement. Beca has been better about keeping in contact with some of the Bellas than she was with Chloe, but still. She hasn’t seen most of them in quite some time. The most recent was Amy, and that had been before her five-month world tour.

Saving Beca from further awkwardness, the drink cart prattles up the aisle ahead of them, stopping first next to a businessman in a full suit. Unfortunately, the same sickly sweet flight attendant from before is one of the women distributing the drinks. 

Beca groans softly in annoyance.

“Problem?” Chloe asks, following her line of sight.

“Just. That flight attendant is so fake-nice. You know?”

Chloe grins back at her playfully. “Maybe you’re too real-grumpy.”

“Whatever,” Beca huffs. “She’s paid to be nice to us. I want to know what she’s really thinking.”

“Well, Bec, she does have to deal with a ton of rude, smelly strangers on a flight.”

“Speak for yourself. I showered this morning.”

Looking surprised by Beca’s teasing, Chloe opens her mouth to fire right back, only for the drink cart to pull up next to her. The sugar-soaked voice asks for her drink order, and Beca’s.

They both come away from the encounter with glasses of white wine, complementary for first-class passengers. Beca sips hers, savoring the flavor as well as the feeling of it starting to roll through her limbs, calming her, and overall doing her best to avoid accidentally spilling it anywhere. 

“So, how are you?” she asks after a moment, glancing over at Chloe. She isn’t sure how much she wants to hear, in all honesty, but it seems rude not to ask, and for whatever reason, she desperately wants the conversation to keep going.

“Oh, good, yeah,” Chloe replies, then stops. 

It’s weird. Beca vaguely wonders if this is an episode of The Twilight Zone and they’d somehow flown into another dimension where Chloe stops speaking after only three relatively useless words.

So, Beca prods. “Vet school is still…?”

“Yeah, I graduate in December. A semester early, actually,” Chloe admits with a shrug and a pleased-looking smile.

“Dude, congrats! That’s a huge deal!”

“Thanks! It was because I did that internship, actually. I had a lot of the hours required, so. Early graduation.”

“Nice, nice, that’s… yeah. Great job.”

“Thanks,” Chloe repeats, then looks down with what might be a little shyness, or simply a desire to end the conversation.

Once again, Beca isn’t sure what to say. She knows she should ask more, like about Chloe’s classes, or maybe even use Chloe’s old internship as some kind of conversational spring-board to jump into reminiscing about the years spent living together in New York, but she doesn’t quite want to take a stroll down memory lane after all this time.

And Beca can’t ask about Chicago. She can’t. 

So, she pretends to look out the window for several minutes, the silence hanging between them becoming steadily more uncomfortable as time passes. Beca has no idea if Chloe has dozed off or has started reading or what because she doesn’t want to look away from all the interesting… shapeless white mist outside, which is growing steadily darker as the plane carries them toward Europe and a different time zone.

It gets to the point where Beca is relieved to hear that increasingly-familiar-and-annoyingly sweet voice of the flight attendant, accompanied by the rattle of a rapidly approaching food cart.

“Sushi, chicken, or pasta?” the woman asks. “We also have a menu if you would prefer something else.”

“Uh, sushi’s fine,” Beca mumbles, accepting the tray of it from the attendant.

Chloe orders pasta, and takes the tray with a “Thank you.” She stares down at the plate for a moment as Beca eats, long enough that Beca starts to become concerned that there’s something wrong with it—maybe it’s grotesquely overcooked or contains an errant used Band-Aid—but then Chloe looks over at her, surprise written across her face.

“So… this is really nice, wow.”

Beca stops chewing. “Hmm?”

“The food. The wine. The… everything,” Chloe says with a grand gesture around the first-class cabin.

“Oh.” Beca swallows the bite of sushi and glances around the cabin. It is certainly nice, though nothing that she hasn’t experienced before. Her (Theo’s) private jet is really much nicer, excessively so. “Yeah, I suppose it is,” she says slowly, wondering for the first time why it’s Chloe sitting next to her rather than some snobby, stiff CEO with money to toss out the window. “Hey, why are you flying—”

“Are these mushrooms any good, you think?” Chloe muses as she peers suspiciously down at her pasta, poking her fork at the limp gray fungus mixed into the sauce. 

Beca looks over her shoulder at the mushrooms. “They look okay,” she says with a shrug. “Gotta be safer than anything I’d make.”

Chloe pauses her prodding to grin at Beca. “You were a decent chef,” she says, the pitch of her voice raising rather obviously. Her eyes flick away and she takes a massive bite of her pasta. She always has been a bad liar. 

Beca raises an eyebrow and tilts her head skeptically. She had tried cooking for Chloe and Amy a few times when they’d lived together in New York, yielding less than ideal results.

Chloe’s nose wrinkles guilty. “Okay, you weren’t great.”

“Chloe.” Beca stares. “I had the fire department come twice!”

“Yeah, okay, but the little sad face you made after was so cute.”

“Mmph.” Beca rolls her eyes, trying to ignore the tingling heat rising in her neck at Chloe calling her “cute.” She highly doubts that anyone at the fire department would have called her “cute” after almost burning down the apartment complex twice. “Still not as bad as the time Amy almost got arrested for assault when she punched the mailman.”

Chloe laughs, a real, full laugh that makes her eyes shine and brightens the air around her. At the sight of it—of Chloe’s sincere happiness—something trickles within Beca’s chest and clicks in her mind and it’s suddenly so wonderfully, unexpectedly, stupidly easy to sit next to Chloe again.

“God, what was it?” Chloe asks, her lips still twitching in amusement even as she continued eating her dinner. “He surprised her or something?”

Beca shakes her head with a smile she knows is bigger than the situation really warrants. “No, remember, she thought he was Bumper in disguise and she was mad at him.”

“Right, yeah. Those two were really… something.”

“May I take your trash?” 

Beca looks up and directly into the eyes of her least favorite flight attendant. She’s steering a cart full of dirty dishes and trash and looking pointedly at their empty dinner plates.

“Uh…”

“Totes!” Chloe says happily, reaching for Beca’s plate to stack it on top of her own and hand them to the flight attendant. “Thanks!”

A moment later, the cart rattles away, and Beca’s eyes flick to the TV screen in front of her seat as she considers what to say now. The interruption had thrown off the progress they’d made—despite the ease with which she and Chloe seem to be able to fall into conversation again, three years is still a long time.

She glances at Chloe from the corner of her eye; she’s examining her nails, something she only does when she doesn’t know what to do or say next. 

It’s probably a bad idea, but… “So, do you want to watch a movie or something?” Beca asks.

Chloe looks up, eyebrows lifted. “Beca Mitchell wants to watch a movie?”

“Shut up,” Beca groans. She thought she’d heard the last of that a long time ago, but apparently not. “You know I like movies. Just not boring ones.”

Chloe bumps her shoulder against Beca’s teasingly. “Okay, well, you pick a non-boring movie and we can watch it together.”

“Uh… right,” Beca mumbles, trying to scoot farther away from Chloe without her noticing. Yeah, the movie thing was her idea, but Chloe touching her brought back too many memories of Hood Nights and choreography and competition celebrations and—Beca swallows. 

Chicago, Chicago, Chicago. She can’t forget that large, camouflage-wearing detail.

She taps the screen in front of her, waking it and wincing at its brightness. She turns it down, noticing that around them, several people have closed their window shades and have reclined, likely preparing to sleep for the majority of the rest of the flight.

Chloe, though, doesn’t look tired. And Beca is far too wound up to do anything other than search for the movie she had in mind. She makes the selection, ignoring Chloe’s look of deep skepticism, and pulls out a pair of earbuds, giving the left to Chloe and keeping the right for herself. Before Chloe has a chance to protest at her movie choice, Beca starts Booksmart, one of her favorites.

Less than two hours later, as the end credits roll, Chloe takes out her earbud with an expression that Beca can only describe as a mix of pity and regret.

“Good, huh?” she asks quietly, mindful of the few people dozing around them.

“Why is that on here?” Chloe replies after a moment.

Beca rolls her eyes. “It’s a cinematic masterpiece, Chloe.”

Chloe wrinkles her nose and lifts her shoulders. “I… it’s kinda lame.” 

“What?” Beca gasps, deadly serious. “You’re kinda lame. You laughed during it!”

“Yeah, I did…” Chloe says carefully. “Some parts were good, and I liked, uh, the crazy girl.”

“Gigi.”

“Her,” Chloe nods. “But... the whole thing with the strawberries and the—the dolls? I dunno, that was kinda unnecessary.”

“Okay, yeah,” Beca admits. “But—”

“And that girl in the bathroom was so rude to Amy, like really, I didn’t like her at all.”

“I mean, fine, but the rest of it—”

“Was lame?”

“Was hilarious.”

Chloe purses her lips. “Mmm…”

Beca slaps her hand down on the wide armrest between herself and Chloe. “That’s it!” she says forcefully, and is rewarded with wide blue eyes and a slackened jaw. “Get off this plane!” She lets the corner of her mouth quirk upward just enough for Chloe’s expression to relax and a soft smile to light her face.

“What, am I supposed to just jump out?” Chloe fires back.

“Yep. See ya!” Beca gives a mock wave. “Don’t forget a parachute.”

“Shush,” Chloe says, and then time slows down. Beca can see it coming as if in slow motion, can track the exact movement of Chloe’s hand as it rises from her lap, arching through the air, then falling, falling to rest perfectly on top of her own. Chloe’s skin is soft and warm, but Beca feels as though she’s just plunged her entire arm into a bucket of ice water. It shocks her enough that she pulls away before her brain catches up, her body’s reflexive protective mechanisms taking over.

Hurt flares across Chloe’s face for an instant before her expression goes blank, but it still hits Beca like a truck when she snatches her own hand back as well. Shame rises in Beca’s neck—which is stupid because she has no reason to feel bad about this, about needing space, about protecting herself from the unexpected and… not entirely unwelcome touch. (She wants more than anything to put her hand back under Chloe’s.) But still.

At this point, she’s sitting next to a stranger, and her body knows that even if her brain refuses to believe it.

Which...

“So, you tried to change seats.” The words that leave Beca’s mouth surprise her just as much as they surprise Chloe, who pales and doesn’t quite meet Beca’s eyes.

“What?”

Beca half wants to take it back, but she knows Chloe heard her the first time. “Earlier,” she forces out. “When you got on. You... tried to change seats.” It comes out as more of a question, made worse by the way she lifts one shoulder.

Chloe’s eyebrows draw together and she looks down at her lap, twirling her thumb ring. Beca notices for the first time that there’s no wedding ring (the thought that she could have been sitting next to Chloe Walp rather than Chloe Beale turns her stomach), but before that information really sinks in, Chloe whispers, “Yeah, I… I did.”

Beca nods, lets that sit in the air before taking a breath. “I don’t blame you, you know. I probably would have done the same thing.”

“Beca…”

“I get it. Three years—”

“Three years...” Chloe cuts her off with a shaky breath. “Three years is a really long time. You just—you vanished. You know?” One of Chloe’s hands runs through her hair roughly. “After we knew you for seven years, Bec, you just—you signed with Khaled, and then you vanished.”

“Not completely,” Beca shrugs uncomfortably.

“No, not completely,” Chloe concedes with a single nod. “We got your cards, and Amy and Aubrey and Stacie always said you’d talked to them, but… you didn’t call me.”

“I did once.”

She did, about two months after she and the Bellas had their huge hug-a-thon on stage in front of hundreds of members of the U.S. Armed Forces. She’d called Chloe from her contemporary, freshly-painted, excessively huge studio office in L.A. She called because Chloe was still in New York but living alone since Amy and her newfound millions had moved out of that cramped apartment three days after Beca had, and Beca had known how lonely Chloe would be. So, shoving aside thoughts of a certain soldier with a stupid name, Beca had called. Only for Chloe to talk all about Chicago, telling her all the dates he’d taken her on when she’d stayed in Europe an extra two weeks to be with him, and how he calls as often as he can and how he writes to her and how it’s just like old time love stories and how he did this and that and on and on and on.

Beca hadn’t really felt the need to call after that.

“Yeah,” Chloe says, likely remembering that call. Her eyebrows draw together, but she doesn’t say anything else.

“I mean… you didn’t call me, either,” Beca mutters, glancing out her window at the now black sky.  

“I… no. I didn’t.”

“It’s both of us, Chlo.”

“What happened?” Chloe asks, looking for all the world as if she has no possible clue as to why they’d let their friendship grow stale.

Beca almost wants to laugh at her. Or maybe scream. Instead, she says, “We got busy. Things just changed. It happens.”

“But we always said—”

“What can I get you ladies to drink?” 

Beca could hug the flight attendant. Neither she nor Chloe orders anything to drink, but the interruption still ends the line of conversation that Beca had been trying so hard to avoid for the past three years. 

Deciding that an uncomfortable silence is the best option at the moment, Beca uses her screen to check how much time remains in their flight: about four hours. Unease rolls through her stomach. She just isn’t sure if it’s because the number is too big or too small. She reaches to close the tab on the screen, wanting to power it off. 

“I missed you, you know.” 

It’s soft, barely a whisper, and clearly said so that Beca could easily ignore it if she wanted to. Beca pauses, her hand hovering in front of the screen. Slowly, her fingers curl, rolling inward to her palm, forming a tight fist that she lets fall to her lap. She really shouldn’t—but then she looks over and Chloe’s watching her, her face open and honest and so unassuming that Beca knows she could never say another word back in response and Chloe wouldn’t blame her.

“I missed you, too,” she says instead, and Chloe swallows. 

“Don’t… let’s not do that again. Promise?”

“I…” Beca doesn’t want to make a promise that she’ll inevitably have to break (she can’t bear seeing Chloe with anyone that isn’t her) and she knows how selfish that makes her, but she also can’t bear finding out whether Chloe’s disappointment looks the same as it had years ago. She clears her throat. “Promise,” she says, and if Chloe knows she’s lying, it doesn’t show.

Instead, Chloe smiles and takes a breath. “So, what are these other people doing in first class? Are they all famous singers, too?”

“Oh, um,” Beca has to take a moment to catch up to the change in topic.

“That guy is a master animal trainer,” Chloe whispers with conviction, pointing subtly to the man seated in front of Beca, wearing a suit. “He’s headed to Rome to meet a caravan of lions being transported to a nearby zoo, where they’ll perform tricks for the kids.”

“Mmm.”

“And the woman in the gray sweater? You see her?” 

Beca follows Chloe’s gaze diagonally across the aisle to a row ahead of them, where an older woman wearing a gray turtleneck leans heavily against her window, mouth hanging wide as she sleeps through the duration of their flight. She looks so peaceful that Beca’s actually mildly concerned until she sees the steady movement of the woman’s shoulders as she breathes.

“She’s an assassin.”

Beca snorts loudly enough to make the man in front of her jolt in his sleep.

“Quiet!” Chloe chastises, though her own twitching lips betray her. “She’s only stopping in Rome for five hours, during which she has to arrange the deaths of three high-profile members of the French government.”

Across the aisle, the woman twitches and begins to snore softly. 

Beca hums and plays along. “Why are three high-profile members of the French government in Rome?”

“Because they thought they’d be safe there. Little did they know that The Black Widow—”

“Is that her?”

“Yes. Little did they know that The Black Widow has been tracking their every movement and is going to take them down.”

“Clearly they were wrong about the safety thing.”

Chloe nods seriously.

Beca makes a show of looking over at the snoring woman. “Well, someone should tell The Black Widow that the guy in front of her was once a knife-thrower in a circus.”

The beaming smile of delighted surprise that Chloe sends her more than makes up for any residual awkwardness from their earlier conversation. 

It’s easy. It’s so easy for Beca to lose herself talking to Chloe like this. In fact, she’s 98.3% positive that even if it had been more than three years since they’d seen one another—if it had been five, ten, twenty, even fifty years—they’d still be able to talk like this. Because it’s Chloe. She’s always been able to be like this with Chloe. She could talk like this with Chloe all night.

But. Maybe it’s not a good idea.

Next to her, Chloe stifles a yawn into the back of her hand, but seems to shake herself out of it, trying to stay awake, presumably to continue talking. And if Chloe wants to stay up, that’s fine with Beca.

In search of their next conversation topic, Beca reaches for one of the magazines in front of her, hoping to find some article in there they can talk about or make fun of. She pulls one out of the slot and is horrified to see her own face—in a somewhat unflattering photo—gracing the cover of one of those trashy tabloids.

“Oh god,” she mutters, trying to shove away the magazine before Chloe can see it, but before she can, it’s snatched out of her hand.

“Did you plant this?” Chloe asks as she scrutinizes the cover and headline, which Beca hadn’t had a chance to read.

“I didn’t, I swear!”

Chloe only grins in that teasing way she has. Her eyes drop to the cover and she reads aloud, “‘Pop star Beca Mitchell seen leaving grocery store in a rage: Her secret war with record label over diet.’”

Beca huffs and rolls her eyes. “That’s the best they could do?”

Chloe gasps sharply and she clutches the tabloid to her chest in mock scandal. “You mean these rags don’t always report the truth? No. Way.”

With another eye roll, Beca plucks the magazine from Chloe’s hands and stuffs it back in the slot it came from. “Honestly, I’m still amazed that they can get away with this. It’s false reporting.”

“Come on, at least some have to be true,” Chloe insists, batting her eyes (rather unnecessarily, in Beca’s opinion).

“Well…”

“I mean, not all of the ones about you dating having to be true, but some, right?”

Beca shrugs, trying to look as unassuming as she can while wondering why, of all the ridiculous things the tabloids had written about her, Chloe would choose to ask about that.

“Oh come on, there’s no way you’re single,” Chloe insists with maybe too much enthusiasm, her voice a tad brighter, somehow, than it is normally. “There’s no way!”

“I—uh… first of all, I am single,” Beca says slowly, her eyes flicking to the back of the seat in front of her even as her neck warms. “But not all of the rumors were false, no.”

“Which ones?”

“Um—did you know these seats, like, recline into beds?” Beca asks quickly. “Here, let me…” she fumbles for the button on the side of her seat, pushing back with enough enthusiasm she’s surprised she doesn’t launch herself to the back of the plane. Her seat smoothly reclines into what is basically a soft, slightly-smaller-than-twin-sized bed, and she lies back, staring at the ceiling of the cabin.

Of course, she should have known better—maybe should have faked a bathroom emergency or something instead—because approximately one-sixteenth of a second later, Chloe is reclining in her own seat-bed right next to her and poking her in the shoulder.

“Which rumors are true, then?” Chloe asks persistently. “I’m not leaving until you tell me, so.”

And that doesn’t help anything at all because Beca’s traitorous mind immediately flings itself to a dorm shower, bright eyes, perfect pitch, and rising steam. She shuts that down as well as she can, turning her neck to meet those same bright eyes, sparkling with amusement and maybe something else that Beca can’t identify.

Beca sighs dramatically and flops her arm over her eyes. “Um… I’m definitely not having an affair with Liam Hemsworth,” she says, sliding her arm to her forehead to peek at Chloe. 

“Oh, I knew that one was fake,” Chloe dismisses with a wave. “You wouldn’t do that to Miley.”

Beca pauses. “Right.”

“But other ones?”

Beca really doesn’t know why Chloe’s so invested in this.

“I… fine,” she mutters, flopping her hands down to her stomach and lacing her fingers together. “I did go on a date with Kristen Stewart.” She looks sideways, trying to gauge Chloe’s reaction. 

Chloe’s eyebrows raise, but she doesn’t look nearly as surprised as Beca had expected. Maybe a slight downturn of the mouth, but that could mean anything; maybe she just doesn’t like supernatural romance movies or something. Before Beca has a chance to decipher the look, Chloe’s plowing on.

“How was that?” she asks, fully rolling to her side facing Beca and sliding a hand under her head to act as a cushion. 

Mirroring her, Beca also rolls to her side. “It was good! She’s really great.”

“And pretty.”

“Yeah, and pretty. But I think we were better as friends, you know?”

“Yeah, I… that’s a trend.”

“Hm?”

“Any other girls?”

“Um, not really.” Beca raises a hand to her nose, rubbing it absentmindedly. “With the albums, you know, my label kinda… Well, Theo thought it might be better for my ‘image’—she uses her hands to make air quotes—“or whatever to not really date until I’m more established. And to date more guys than girls,” she adds.

Chloe frowns. “That’s not… it’s your life.”

Beca can’t stop herself from laughing. “Not really. Not when I’m signed to a label.”

Chloe’s frown deepens, but she doesn’t say anything. Beca could kick herself; she really hadn’t meant to say anything like that. Before she can make up for it, though, Chloe leans forward.

“So, do you… prefer girls?” she asks, her eyes flicking away and back. “You never really said.”

Beca swallows. “Oh, I… is it a problem?”

Chloe’s eyes fly wide and her hand flutters toward Beca as if to rest on her arm. “Bec, of course not! I mean, you know I dabble in the lady pond.” She says this at normal volume and with no trace of shyness. Beca kind of admires her for it. “Come on, it’s totally fine.”

Beca nods, smiling to herself a little. “I tried telling you guys first, you know.”

“Hm?”

Beca lets herself smile properly now as she remembers a European stage filled with all of her best friends. “Come on, Chlo,” she urges gently. “I sang ‘Freedom ‘90.’”

“Oh, right...” Chloe breathes, her eyes again flicking away as she bites her lower lip.

Beca’s stomach drops as she remembers what else happened that night. She thinks Chloe might be remembering, too, now, as her eyes take on some faraway place and time. Beca blinks and behind her eyelids she sees it all again, the way Chloe had strutted to Chicago, pulled him into a kiss that had made the earth crumble from beneath Beca’s feet.

She knows Chloe’s thinking of that, too. She can see it in the way she won’t make eye contact and her teeth toy with her lip.

Reality crashes into Beca, stealing the breath from her lungs and making her feel like the biggest idiot on the face of the planet. She knew this was a bad idea, knew she should never have talked to Chloe like this, because when they leave this plane, it’s going to hurt more than ever.

She might as well kick-start the ending now.

“So,” she starts, not recognizing the sound of her own voice. “How’s, um, Chicago? Are—-are you meeting him in Rome, or…”

A shadow crosses Chloe’s face and she shifts, rolling onto her back again to stare at the ceiling. When she still doesn’t answer, Beca begins to worry that she’d somehow put her foot in her mouth. 

“Chlo, I—”

“Do you believe in soulmates?” Chloe breathes, still watching the ceiling. 

Oh. 

Beca rolls to her back as well, unable to look at Chloe directly. She doesn’t want to hear about how Chicago is Chloe’s “soulmate” or whatever is about to happen. She doesn’t want to hear about the white picket fence house and their eventual two-point-five kids or how they’ll renew their wedding vows every ten years or something ridiculously cheesy like that. She doesn’t want to hear how Chloe is going to dedicate her life to a man who absolutely does not deserve her—though, Beca can’t be sure because she never really even talked to him—and doesn’t want to hear how he’s her “better half” or whatever the hell goes with having a soulmate. 

Beca wants to throw herself out of the plane, sans parachute, for being the one to even ask about Chicago in the first place.

“I… don’t know,” she says eventually, risking a glance over.

Chloe’s lips press together and she takes a deep breath through her nose. Beca looks back at the ceiling, unable to face Chloe’s disappointment. 

“Well, I do,” Chloe says. “I think there can be different kinds of soulmates.” She pushes herself back on her side facing Beca, but Beca doesn’t move. “I think anyone you connect with—boyfriend, girlfriend, family, friends—anyone who just gets you, and you get them, I think that’s a soulmate. And I think you can have more than one soulmate.”

“You think so? More than one?” Beca asks, feeling Chloe’s eyes on the side of her face.

“I hope so. Not sure though. Maybe you only get one soulmate of each kind, you know? But you can have multiple kinds.”

Beca tries her hardest to control her expression. She clears her suddenly dry throat and asks the ceiling, “What... happens if you think someone is your soulmate, like you really, really think so, and then… they’re not?”

Chloe takes another deep breath, one that Beca can hear is jagged around the edges. “Which kind of soulmate are we talking? Because maybe they’re just—maybe they’re just not the kind you thought they were.”

Beca can’t find her voice. She must have lost it somewhere along the line, it having fallen from her throat to bounce around the inside of the plane and slip out a crack in a door seal to disperse among the clouds. 

It’s so quiet in the plane, save for the humming white noise of the engine, that Beca’s sure Chloe could hear how hard her heart was beating if only she listened closely enough. 

“You know?” Chloe prompts, sounding so small and needy that it snatches Beca’s voice right out of the air to shove it back into place in her throat.

“So, Chicago is your… soulmate.”

Even as Beca’s heart clenches around the word, Chloe starts to laugh, a surprised bubbling noise that makes Beca finally turn to her in shock. 

Chloe shakes her head and stops laughing, though a smile still graces her face. “Oh, sorry, I didn’t mean to… no. Chicago isn’t my soulmate. We broke up eight months ago.”

Oh.

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” Chloe sighs. “To answer your question, I’m going to Rome, alone, on a first-class plane ticket because I’m treating myself, Beca. I… this was a long time coming.”

Beca’s heart is in her throat now, she’s sure. She knows she’s probably supposed to say something like, “I’m sorry,” in response to the news about Chicago, but she can’t quite manage to lie to Chloe yet again.

Chloe’s eyes drop. “I thought Chicago was my soulmate. I told myself he was. I needed him to be.”

Beca wants to ask the question that dangles there on the tip of her tongue, but she’s too afraid. Afraid of the answer, afraid she knows what Chloe is going to say, afraid that it’s too late. Afraid that she’s wrong.

She feels the moment fading, knows that with every passing second the window gets smaller and smaller, until before long, it’s going to close entirely and she’ll spend the rest of her life wishing she’d said something, wishing she’d had the courage to ask the question and hear the answer that will change everything.

She knows she’ll never forgive herself if she doesn’t say something, so she takes a breath that churns her stomach and opens her mouth.

Chloe snores softly, nothing more than a nasally inhale, but her eyes are closed and she looks more relaxed in sleep than Beca can remember her looking in a long time.

Her window of opportunity closes with a bang and Beca settles back and closes her eyes, mentally berating herself, hoping against hope that all of this had just been a horrible nightmare from which she won’t ever recover.

She is so, so stupid for doing this to herself.

*****************

The next time Beca opens her eyes, the cabin is brightly lit, a result of both the interior lights and unfiltered sunlight streaming through the one or two windows with shades lifted partway. A blueberry muffin, a slice of banana bread, and a Styrofoam cup of black coffee rest on her tray, the airplane’s offered breakfast. 

Frowning at the items, she wonders if the flight attendant had just placed them there or if someone had ordered—Beca whips her face to the side so quickly it makes her neck crack. The seat next to her is upright and empty. 

Beca fumbles for the lever on the side of her own seat, sitting up and pushing the recliner back to seat form. Her eyes roam the cabin, searching, both hoping and dreading that everything had actually been a result of her imagination. Then, at the front of the cabin, a light near the ceiling flickers off, and Chloe steps out of the restroom, looking exhausted.

Relief tinged with pain rolls through Beca; trying to hide her reaction, she rubs her eyes then focuses on unwrapping the muffin.

“Morning,” Chloe says lightly as she sits down. “So those restrooms are still really tiny.”

“They are,” Beca agrees around a yawn. She hates changing time zones like this. A glance at her watch tells her she got about two hours of sleep. “Did you order this stuff for me?” she asks, gesturing to her breakfast.

Chloe nods. “I hope that’s okay? The cart went by and I didn’t want you to miss the breakfast.”

“It’s good. Thanks.”

“Totes. Um, I think they said before I went to the bathroom that we would be landing in, like, twenty minutes or so, so…”

“Right.” The breakfast on her tray doesn’t seem so appealing anymore. Still, she picks at it, even if it’s just something to do with her hands. Chloe reaches for one of the magazines in front of them and starts to read. Thankfully, Beca isn’t on the cover of this one.

Beca takes a sip of her coffee. Chloe turns a page. Beca finishes off the muffin and starts on the bread. Chloe raises a hand to rub at her cheek as she reads. 

Beca’s mind races, but is simultaneously quiet. It’s a weird state, and she blames it on the lack of sleep, time change, and the presence of Chloe. She knows she could—maybe should—say something about Chloe’s whole “soulmate” thing, but now in the relative daylight, it seems too far away to bring up again.

So, they sit in silence, listening to the engine noises grow louder as their altitude drops. Beca pops her ears several times, the plane rocks back and forth unsteadily (Chloe takes several deep breaths and grips the armrests), and, after only a few moments where Beca is positive the plane is going to crash, they touch down on the tarmac with a small bump and the sudden slowing brought on by strong brakes.

Next to her, Chloe relaxes with a sigh. 

Beca pushes her window shade up and looks out at what she can see of the Leonardo da Vinci International Airport, trying to shove down the rising unease in her stomach.

She knew this would happen. She did this to herself, which probably makes her some sort of sick masochist who gets off on things like falling in love for the second time with the same person only to have her walk away without a backward glance. Again, for the second time. 

Beca’s problem isn’t that she never loved Chloe back (she likes to think Chloe was in love with her, too, once). Her problem is that she absolutely, totally, utterly sucks at the timing of these things.

The plane comes to a stop that jerks Beca to the present. The stale air fills with the metallic clink of unbuckling seat belts and melodic chimes as people check their phones and take them off airplane mode.

Beside her, Chloe unbuckles and stands with a stretch, reaching into the overhead bin.

Panic rises inside Beca’s chest, making her fumble with her own seat belt before finally undoing and standing with screaming, sore muscles, having to bend her neck awkwardly to avoid bumping her head on the overhead. 

“Well, uh, have fun in Rome,” she says, rubbing at the back of her neck.

“Thanks, you too.” Chloe gets her bag down and rests it on the seat, sparing Beca a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Stay in touch?”

“For sure.” Liar.

The falsely-sugary flight attendant opens the door, and immediately passengers in first-class begin to walk out. Chloe’s eyes flick to the queue, then back to Beca.

“Bye, then,” she says, too brightly.

“Bye.”

With only a second’s hesitation—one that might even have been a figment of Beca’s hopeful imagination—Chloe picks up her duffle bag and takes her place in line. She takes a step forward, and Beca reaches out to catch her shoulder. 

“Wait, Chlo—” Chloe stops instantly, her eyes wide and maybe a little hopeful. Behind her, the line stalls. “Why were you talking about soulmates?” Beca asks in a rush, desperation driving her voice to a higher pitch than normal. 

Chloe’s eyes flick to the growing line behind her, many heads peering around to see what the hold-up is. Her mouth opens, then closes again.

“Please,” Beca whispers, her grip on Chloe’s arm never loosening. “Please.”

Chloe’s eyes finally meet hers. Beca’s stunned to see they’re swimming. “I was trying to tell you,” Chloe breathes. “Chicago wasn’t my soulmate because I’d already found mine wandering around an Activities Fair.” 

Surely, the plane can’t have landed. It was impossible for the plane to have landed, because Beca’s still 30,000 feet in the air and falling, falling fast, the floor having dropped out from under her feet.

She recoils, reclaiming her arm, shaking her head, because she’d heard wrong, she had to have, or she’d misunderstood, because there’s no possible way Chloe had said those words.

Beca doesn’t get a chance to ask her to repeat it, though, because as soon as she takes her hand from Chloe’s arm, Chloe’s moving, walking down the aisle to exit the plane and leave Beca behind. Immediately, the passengers that had formed a line behind her press forward, filling the aisle and lengthening the distance between her and Beca by the second. 

Beca doesn’t blame her one bit. If their positions were reversed and she had been the one to drop a confession like that, she’d be running away as fast as she could, too. 

She has to catch up. 

“Chloe, wait!” she calls, but either Chloe doesn’t hear her or purposefully ignores her, because Beca is forced to watch the back of her head as she rounds the corner of the aisle ahead to step out of the plane.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit…” Beca chants under her breath. She shoves her way into the aisle, ignoring the sounds of protest emitted by the passengers that had technically been in line—which, they’d totally butted in front of her to begin with, rude—and whirls, snatching her back from the overhead. It takes everything in her not to rush forward and send people stumbling, shoving her way out of the plane, but she knows that would more than likely just get her in trouble with customs or something.

So she’s forced to wait, to inch her way forward with the rest of them, while knowing that with every moment that passes, Chloe is only getting farther and farther away.

“Come on, come on, come on…”

With one last parting wave and a “Thank you for choosing us,” from Beca’s least-favorite flight attendant, Beca’s free, bursting forward from the plane with so much enthusiasm she almost topples over and into the tunnel connecting the plane and their gate. 

“Chloe!” she calls out desperately, but there’s no sign of her. 

Beca hates cardio. 

She might make an exception, though, just this once. With more agility than she knew she still had in her exhausted body, Beca surges forward, her bag clutched close to her chest, and ducks and weaves around other passengers, trying desperately to get to the end of the tunnel and to Chloe. She’d chase her through the entire airport and across all of Rome if she had to. 

She stalls behind a slow-moving couple, tottering along as if this connecting tunnel is their favorite place on earth. “Move!” she shouts at the back of their heads, and the man starts and flings himself to the side, creating enough space for Beca to squeeze through and then she’s running again and there’s the end of the tunnel and now she’s at the gate and—and there’s the red hair.

“CHLOE!” she nearly screams it, and by some miracle, Chloe stops and whirls, her eyes flying wide when Beca doesn’t stop, only runs to her and throws her bag to the ground and reaches forward, her hands cupping Chloe’s cheeks and pulling her into a kiss that Beca knows will change everything.

There’s a beat where Chloe doesn’t respond and fear explodes in Beca’s mind.

But then Chloe’s arms wrap around her waist and the lips under Beca’s soften until Chloe’s kissing her back, and the fear is replaced by exaltation so strong that Beca can’t be sure it doesn’t lift her off her feet.

Minutes, hours, days later, they finally separate, and Beca’s eyes flutter open to take in Chloe’s flushed cheeks, swollen lips, and gleaming eyes.

“I…” Beca has to take a deep breath. “Is that what you meant?”

Chloe’s face breaks into a huge smile and she nods frantically. “Yes, I—yes, I meant you.”

“Good,” Beca smiles. She doesn’t think she’ll ever stop smiling now. “Because I—you—the whole thing—you’re my, uh, you know—”

Chloe stops her babbling by pressing a quick kiss to her lips, one that still makes Beca’s knees weaken. “I know,” she says, then laughs. “So, you ran up that tunnel, huh?”

“Yep, and I’d do it again,” Beca says proudly, standing as tall as she can.

Chloe’s eyes sparkle. “You know you would have caught up with me at customs, right? Or baggage claim? You didn’t have to run.”

Beca blinks. “Uh.”

“It’s okay,” Chloe grins, lacing their fingers together. “I’m glad you did.”

[chicagocityofclans]

Samantha “Sam” Whitney → Claire Holt → Rat Shifter

→ Basic Information

Age: 27

Gender: Female

Sexuality: Straight

Born or Made: Born

Birthday: December 25

Zodiac Sign: Capricorn

Religion: Deism

→ Her Personality From the time she joined the Chicago pack, Sam had a mission. She wanted to rise past the expectations put on her at birth and never go back home. Despite this being the driving force of her ambition, Samantha has spoken about her past to only Nick, Ray and Jax. She doesn’t want to be seen as a victim in any possible way. Sam was disciplined from the first day, trying incredibly hard in school, being promoted from NERVOUS after only a year and ultimately becoming a prized member of BOND a year after that. Her biggest concern is maintaining her status in BOND and eventually becoming a higher ranking member of the pack, most likely in the liaison position.

She can be cold and at times selfish in her viewpoint of the world. As a person who has worked her hardest to succeed, those who get in the way drive her insane. Sam gives her all 100% of the time, and gets frustrated with those who don’t. She is terrified of being let down, and rarely if ever, allows herself to rely on other people. All of these things lead to her often being on her own in London, with only the occasional team up with Jax Idris or more recently, Neaera Jayweed.

→ Her Personal Facts

Occupation: Full Time BOND member

Scars: A bullet scar that is healing from her final overseas mission before Chicago.

Tattoos:  None

Two Likes: Leather Jackets and Street Food

Two Dislikes: Loud Tourists and Relaxing in human form in front of strangers

Two Fears: Heights and Being let down

Two Hobbies: Shooting and Urban Exploration

Three Positive Traits: Patient, Committed, Unflappable

Three Negative Traits: Workaholic, Emotionally Detached, Secretive

→ Her Connections

Parent Names:

Sean Whitney (Father): Her father had big plans to use her in an effort to move ahead in their pack. When she overhead him, she packed her bags and left Columbus as fast as she could. She headed to the second closest big city she could get to.

Eloise Whitney (Mother): Sam’s mother is everything she never wants to be. Dependent on her mate for everything, whiney, and incapable of handling any kind of stress. She got out of there before anything else of Eloise influenced her.

Sibling Names:

None

Children Names:

None

Romantic Connections:

Jax Idris (Interest): She’s harbored feelings for Jax since they’d trained together. Their personalities just click, and he’s always been someone she’s felt more comfortable letting her guard down around. They were often paired up with one another at the beginning of their time in BOND, but as time progressed Jax was repeatedly put on SKIN missions, rather than BOND ones. In 2015, Sam was tapped to become the lead in London and was permanently relocated over there. She thought about telling him then how she felt, but thought there was no point; overseas relationships are hard and she knew he’d never be stationed permanently away from Chicago. He’d call with random updates, usually regarding tales of his victories or the newest update on the pack. Right after she’d first left, he sent her  the most incredible video of GOLD larping, and it helped some of the homesickness she felt. They kept in touch, and Sam would drop most things when she saw him calling. She hopes this new assignment for her may allow their feelings to be addressed.

Platonic Connections:

Nick Hamelin (Boss): Sam answers directly to Nick and tries her hardest to be a good soldier in an effort to be promoted. It often seems like she’s the only one who thinks of Nick in this manner. She sees the close relationships that he has formed with other pack members and BOND members and is trying to form a connection with him now that she’s in Chicago.

Neaera Jayweed (Best Friend): Neaera is one of the few rats Sam had contact with in London. They formed a close friendship as Sam introduced her to the ways things were run in the Hamelin Clan. She’s the first woman that Sam has felt comfortable opening up to and has shared things she didn’t expect to.

Dakota English (Friend): Dakota took her on her first overseas mission. She taught her a good amount of what she, as a female spy, might have to go through that Ray and Nick just wouldn’t get. Sam has taken to hanging around her and West when she’s not on duty.

West Freeman (Friend): Sam likes West, but also thinks he’s a bit of a train wreck. When he’s good, he’s good. One of the best of younger team members in fact, but his self destruct mode has gotten them into arguments especially when he deviates from a plan in a mission.

Conrad Kale (Friends): Conrad and Sam initially hated each other due to Sam thinking he was competition. Eventually she began taking the olive branches he handed to her and they became friends. She and Conrad have spoken at length about his fears of being third, and her desire to become someone important in the pack.

Jim Montgomery (Needs): Jim has a pulse on the leadership and members of each team. She’s predicting that it may be a while before she is sent back to London, and wants to get ahead in one of the local teams. She’s hoping Jim may give her some guidance on which one to choose.

Hostile Connections:

Ray Hamelin (Annoyed with): Ray was supposed to be teaching Sam to take over as pack liaison, but then he went back home, lost whatever edge he had and now he’s brought her home for recon. It’s hard to see Chicago as anything but a set back towards her goal.

Pets:

None

→ History Samantha Whitney grew up in a small farm town near Columbus, Ohio. Her father strived to push and get ahead, instilling in her at a young age that the only way to progress in life is to take what you need and make yourself useful to the man in charge. Sam saw her father struggle for years to win their Alpha’s favor, to succeed around her 16th birthday. It was that Summer that she heard what he had offered to “get ahead” and she ran that very night. Stealing and pawning jewelry and prized family possessions to get to Chicago.

When finally reaching Chicago, Sam wasn’t exactly sure what she was expecting, but it wasn’t what she found. A high tech, massive infrastructure of rats, that Columbus could only dream of. When she finally got a chance to talk to Nick and Ray she feared they would send her back home, with her tail between her legs, fortunately her story checked out and they let her stay. She threw herself into her studies and training in order to catch up with the other kids. She met Jax Idris and Conrad Kale in her training, and fought to be as competitive as the boys. While she initially froze them out and focused on honing her skills, she eventually softened and became friends with the two of them. Jax helped her get over her fear of heights and she and Conrad bonded over their dysfunctional parents. Conrad moved onto RED while she and Jax trained again to enter BOND. They grew closer and Sam began to realize her feelings were more than just friendly. She struggled between wanting to say something and not wanting to lose the opportunity that BOND offered her. She ended up shoving those feelings down and aced all the tests required for BOND.

After graduating from the program, she and Jax both went on missions, with Ray soon assigning her to permanently relocate to London. He trained her personally to become the main connection there before leaving for an emergency at home. Sam honed her skills and became the major liaison between Chicago and the UK. She expanded business ventures there and discovered crucial information about a possible coup in Europe. It was only after this that she found out what had called Ray home. Ben Ehrlich had died and someone needed to be third. She’d assumed it was Ray before Conrad called and told her the news. He mentioned that Ray was taking it the hardest and that he wasn’t planning on leaving Chicago to go back out to BOND. Sam kept things afloat until she received a call from Ray that she needed to come home and to clean out her apartment.

→ The Present Samantha was tapped to be one of the BOND agents to infiltrate the hordes newcomers to Chicago. She didn’t know what would be expected from it, and hasn’t found much action since she’s been back. She misses the fast cars, guns, and espionage from overseas and worries at just how long this position may be in place. She’s trying to talk Ray into letting her join a team secretly, just to get a little action in her day. After that failed to work, her new target is Jim in hopes he’d tell her which may soon have an opening in leadership.

Sam is partially excited about the chance to form a connection to the pack. It has always been about pushing forward and succeeding for her, and never about making relationships. She’s noticed how awkward she is with Nick and almost everyone not on BOND. She is hoping to become more integrated and even make friends. A part of her wonders if it might be the opportunity to put things out in the open with Jax and see where it may take them.

[ladyhistorypod]

Episode 2: Lady Pirates? I’m Hooked

Sources:

Ching Shih

History vs Women: The Defiant Lives That They Don’t Want You To Know

History Erased Ssn 1 Ep 3: Ching Shih the Pirate Queen

Atlas Obscura

Further Reading: Rejected Princesses

Anne Bonny

National Parks Service

Smithsonian Magazine

Crime Museum

The Way of the Pirates

Anne Bonny Pirate

Rare Irish Stuff

Mariners Museum

Gráinne Ní Máille / Grace O’Malley

National Archives (UK)

History Ireland

Women’s Museum of Ireland

Anne Chambers – THE biographer of Grace O’Malley

The Irish Post

Royal Museums Greenwich

Grace O’Malley Whiskey / Gin (drink responsibly!)

Further Reading: Granuaile: The Life and Times of Grace O'Malley c.1530-1603

Click below for the transcript!

Alana: Lexi in the last episode you called me out for wanting to be a Chicago improver as if that's not also your dream. As if that is not also your goal.

Lexi: Oh, it was projection. Yeah it was– it was me projecting onto you. 

Alana: Yeah clearly like both of us that's the goal that's what we're doing.

Lexi: I'm mirroring myself off of you.  Like that's what's happening here yeah. Psychology.

Alana: I also, like, I don't just want to be a Chicago improver I want to be like– I wanna podcast like the wife of a jaded youtuber because I want to be Katherine Green.

Lexi: Okay that makes sense that that would be the goal for you.

Alana: The best of the Green brothers, Katherine Green.

Lexi: Yeah the best Green brother there is out there so…

Alana: It’s true. I mean, Sarah is great too but like Katherine's the best of the Green brothers Lexi: She's the best. The best there is.

Haley: Is that Hank's wife?

Alana: Katherine is Hank's wife yeah and then Sarah is John's wife.

Haley: Which one has kids? Hank?

Alana: They both do.

Haley: I thought it was only one of them.

Alana: No, Hank has a son. He's almost four now. Hank has a son who's almost four and then John has a son and a daughter. The daughter is six–

Haley: You know way too much of their life.

Alana: –and the son is ten.

Lexi: You’re… You’re a little stan.

Alana: I am a stan. Well because I've been following them since like 2012 like I remember when this child was born.

Lexi: That's true that's kind of how I feel about Rhett and Link. I kind of like know their whole life by proxy like I remember their kids being born but I don't I don't know them.

Haley: See I kind of feel that way with like the Duggar family but it's also that like my friends and I were just obsessed with the Duggars in like 2012.

Alana: No exactly. Also like I met John and Hank. They signed my copy of Paper Towns when I went to VidCon.

Lexi: That makes it real. 

Haley: Once you get like an autograph you know that person. Like Kara Cooney with her autographing my like– I think it was the woman's book not the like specific…

Alana: Not the Hatchepsut one?

Haley: Yeah it was the one that was like the women who changed the world or something and then she put like my name in hieroglyphs.

Lexi: Oh my god that’s so cute!

Alana: That’s so cool!

Haley: Yeah I fangirled so hard and then it was I made my mom go cause it was National Geographic doing it for like my small town, so I got two tickets, we were in the front row, I was taking notes, my mom called me a nerd. But afterwards and granted this was like right after I graduated so I was coming off the high of having an archaeology degree AKA really scared I wouldn’t find a job and dealing with my family.

Alana: What an interesting way to describe a high.

Lexi: Well I mean, I don't know if you’d get it unless you’ve felt it but we've all felt it. So, maybe dear listeners will be like I graduated college knowing I'd get a job and I'm not an archaeologist. (laughing)

Haley: No like I had grad school but still like there is this feeling that (laughing) I did a really, really poor choice. Like in the line it was all kids and then me fangirling and all these kids were like fangirling for the fact that this is like an Egyptologist not Kara Cooney as like the woman she is. (laughing)

Lexi: And I mean archaeologists are just nerds with Egypt books who didn’t grow up.

Haley: Exactly.

Alana: That’s true.

Haley: And she was just talking to me and she's like “oh like you seem to know about this” like I guess like I gave that impression it was like “yeah I actually just graduated from GW with an archaeology degree” and she– oh my god this is like, I've never felt– this was the peak of my life besides elementary school this was my peak she goes “Hey everyone we have an actual archaeologist here”

Alana: Oh my god!

Lexi: Oh my god!

Alana: Oh my god!

Speaker 1: And like I was at the somewhat back of the line and all these kids who are saying that like they love Indiana Jones they want to be archaeologists and she's like “we have another real archaeologist she just finished her degree” and I turned to my mom, winked, and said “can you tell that louder so she can hear? She had to pay for the degree.

(Alana laughing)

Haley: Also like that led into Kara Cooney just being like, because so many people were asking her why how or how she became an Egyptologist and her first response she was like “I was privileged like I had the privilege to get a great education.”

Lexi: That is such a good answer.

Alana: That’s such a good answer.

Lexi: I'm gonna steal that.

Alana: That’s amazing.

Lexi: I’m gonna plagiarize that answer.

Haley: I already have. I like, I know I very much know. You know even like with history and doing this podcast we can easily be doing some other like paying job but like we're taking the three hours to do this we have that privilege to do it. I love it. I'm gonna ride that train cuz I know once I graduate in December it’s not gonna be there.

[INTRO MUSIC]

Alana: Hello and welcome to Lady History; the good the bad and the ugly ladies you missed in history class. I am virtually here with Lexi. Lexi, do you remember the last time you dined in at a restaurant?

Lexi: Oh goodness. With you, I think?

Alana: Yeah

Lexi: Six months ago?

Alana: It was March 9th 2020 and it was all three of us at Tonic.

Lexi: That’s right! 

Alana: That third person is also in this Zoom meeting, of course, Haley is here too. Haley do you remember what you ordered at that meal?

Haley: We definitely split some tots cuz I made you, and then I got the like zazzy mac and cheese. It had some bread crumbs that's all I remember.

Alana: It did have some bread crumbs. I don't remember what I ordered. I do remember that I had two margaritas and they were expensive because I forgot to ask for bottom shelf tequila.

(Lexi laughing)

Haley: It was great because I like– I was the first person to look at the receipt and I said oh no no no. Cuz it was like Patron put as two separate shots so she had to pay for the margarita mix and the tequila separately. 

Alana: And I'm Alana and I've forgotten how to spell my own name on multiple occasions.

Haley: I am terrified of birds, it's not a good thing.

Lexi: So if you lived on a pirate ship… 

Haley: I couldn't.

Lexi: Okay. So if you lived on a pirate ship– you couldn’t live on a pirate ship, but if you did the bird would be the worst part?

Haley: Yeah.

Lexi: But you know who knows how to take care of birds?

Alana: Who?

Lexi: Pirates. That's probably not true, they probably treated them like– real poopy. But honestly I don't even know if that is the is that myth true?

Haley: I was about to ask that!

Lexi: Do parrots– my pirate did definitely not have a parrot there was no mention of a parrot.

Alana: No mention of a parrot for me either.

Haley: That was. Yeah.

Lexi: Wait what if my whole life is a lie because fun fact about me I have a parrot named Sergeant and a Portuguese water dog named Captain and my whole life is based around the nautical-ness and you can't see but in this room I have these paddles which is like a form of sorority art– long story we won't get into it– and they all have nautical themed paintings of my pets and if parrots and pirates don’t really go together, I'm stressed.

Haley: So okay, I have a theory on like why this is like a theme. Because they traveled all through like the Caribbean islands where those birds were just like flapping around so I think they're like “oh new exotic toys? swell.” So like they saw them and maybe like obviously took some back because like so many pirates just took things from where they like landed–

Lexi: That’s true.

Haley: And just like took over other ships. That's where I think it came from because nowhere in like my research– because I talk about like one, two pirates in mine– and doing like other research with like pirates in general no where was like “there was a parrot named Coconut on the ship.”

(Lexi and Alana laughing)

Lexi: Well they might have like taken them and sold them.

Haley: Yeah that's like.

Lexi: That seems more pirate-y to me.

Haley: Yeah that’s true.

Lexi: In my personal pirate opinion.

Haley: I also used to think Christopher Columbus was a pirate but that's a whole other story.

Lexi: I mean–

Haley: It’s close enough.

Lexi: I mean…

Alana: I mean…

Lexi: I mean… 

Haley: Maybe like small Haley was on to something but I definitely remember thinking like explorers were pirates at some point. Like a wire was crossed in my education.

Alana: I think small Haley was onto something. Maybe that crossed wire put you onto something.

Haley: There's so many moments of like me remembering my childhood where I came up with something that was like inherently wrong but like now looking back on it I was like nah I was fucking genius.

(Alana laughing)

Haley: I knew my stuff.

Lexi: Arrrre ya ready ladies?

Haley: Yes.

Lexi: Oh, the answer–

Alana: I wasn’t allowed to watch Spongebob as a kid and that’s a personality trait.

Lexi: The answer was “aye aye, captain” and neither of you got it. Let’s try again.

Alana: I wasn’t allowed to watch Spongebob as a kid!

Lexi: Let’s just try it one more time. Arrrrre ya ready ladies?

Haley: (laughing) Aye aye captain!

Alana: I don’t know

Lexi: Okay, well anyway… I will be talking about Ching Shih, whose name I'm trying very hard to say correctly but I may be messing up. I actually called upon my former roommate who is my lifelong friend who– she is Chinese so I asked her “how do you say this” and she sent me a recording of how it’s said but it was one of those recordings you can only listen to one time and then it goes away forever. So my best interpretation is [Chung Shih]. But it's actually spelled C. H. I. N. G. which–

Alana: I was gonna say–

Lexi: shows you how complicated Chinese language is. But technically the pronunciation I got from a person who speaks Cantonese is [Chung She] so… do with that what you will. I do speak Korean which is completely unrelated and in no way useful in this situation. Cantonese is not in my wheelhouse… no I don't speak Asian. Thank you. Okay so–

(Alana laughing)

Lexi: I actually picked her because when I asked my brother to… my brother one of his, like, side dreams is to become a filmmaker but he doesn't really want to do it because someone in the family has to make money with their career choice. So when I ask him like what historical story he would make into a movie if you had like a big budget news a famous director he said he would make a biopic about Ching Shih because by virtue of being a woman and a pirate her story is both empowering and naturally full of a diverse cast of characters so you wouldn't have to force diversity into the story. It's a historical story that has a really diverse cast so I thought that was really insightful of him so he just got really really interested in Ching Shih and also another preface: getting information on Ching Shih is pretty difficult and a lot of the information we have about our life comes from speculation and oral history because she was a criminal so it's not like people really recorded a lot of the things she did and she was a woman so it's not like China at the time she was alive people really cared what women were doing, unfortunately. So I will do my best to rely on like recorded oral traditions and some primary text sources, not like speculation in this description but inherently by virtue of her story there is a little stuff that's like open to interpretation up in the air. Do with that what you will check out she was basically a queen of pirates, and records of Ching Shih's birth and childhood do not exist. All we know is that directly before she became a pirate she was working at a Cantonese brothel in southeastern China and in 1801 her life changed forever when she married a man named [Chung Yi] who was the commander of a group of pirates called the Red Flag Fleet. This is like the most notorious group of pirates in China at the time, and the legend says that he sought Ching Shih as a bride because of her cunning nature and her skills wielding power over like wealthy, powerful men, which she had learned while working as a prostitute in a brothel which I think is a pretty interesting... interesting way of looking at that job. I think a lot of times people look down on that job but her husband wanted her because of the skills she obtained in that job. And after marrying a pirate overlord, Ching Shih realizes that a pirate's life was for her (Lexi making rimshot noise). So she's starting to–

Alana: I liked that joke. That was- amazing.

Lexi: Thank you, thank you, pause for laughter.

(All laughing)

Lexi: Thank you. I'll be here... all day because I'm in my house and we're stuck at home. So, yeah, she started to get involved in the family business, she really liked the pirating. And maritime trade was, like, super popular at the time. People were calling it like that the Maritime Silk Road, so it was a very big time for maritime trade in this early 1800s in East Asia. And, so it was really common for pirate families to span generations, so, like, a grandfather, father, and son or like you know a mother and son would have many pirates that they rule over together. But she was the biggest pirate family. Her family was the biggest pirate family. And with her help, her husband's pirate empire got like really huge, with some accounts suggesting that they commanded upwards of eighty thousand pirates though some sources do differ on this exact number I've seen as low as forty thousand as high as a hundred thousand but eighty thousand–

Alana (audibly sarcastic): Forty thousand that so few. That’s not really impressive.

Lexi: I mean, would you like a comparison to stick to really stick it home?

Alana:  Yeah sure.

Lexi: The notorious pirate you may have heard of, Blackbeard? We’ve heard of Blackbeard? Haley: Definitely like twenty.

Lexi: Three hundred. So just like for scale, for comparison… Ching Shih had a lot of pirates. And in 1807 her husband suddenly and unexpectedly died. One written record suggests that he was murdered, another one says that he had an STD. So we're not totally sure which one but he died and he had no blood heir, the two of them had not had a child yet. But he did have an adoptive son who was also his lover, which at first I was like wait that's really weird but apparently in this era in Chinese history if you wanted to like give power to someone to like take over your family business you would adopt them legally as your child even if they were an adult. So he had this male lover he wanted to give the business to so he adopted the male lover as a son. But basically everyone's assuming that this guy, this adopted son, is going to take over the family business and he will become the the pirate emperor, if you will. But at this point Ching Shih is like not ready to give up her power. She is in control, she's in charge, she wants to stay in charge of the pirates so she decides to take up her favorite old method of getting what she wants: seduction. And she starts hooking up with her husband’s son-lover and then marries him. So, through her skills of manipulation and seduction, she maintains her position as a leader of this massive pirate brigade. And oral tradition suggests that many nations’ navies fell victim to her pirate fleet, including the Portuguese, British, and Chinese navies. All of them lost naval ships to Ching Shih. The Chinese government realize that Ching Shih was a big threat, that she was so powerful there was no way they would ever defeat her fleet by force. So they decided to reach an agreement with her, almost like a treaty, but not a treaty since it wasn't between two nations it was with a criminal. So they offered her immunity or like the ability to not get charged or punished if she agreed to stop pirating, but she was not gonna go down without a fight. So she accepted only if the Chinese government would allow her to keep all of the loot that she'd already acquired. So she's agreed to stop pirating, but not to give back anything that she had acquired while pirating. So she ended up this really rich woman who opened a brothel in South China and just chilled for the rest of her life. And the really crazy thing about Ching Shih is her lasting legacy. Even though most people never heard of her she's actually been referenced a lot in pop culture. She was mentioned in two Assassin’s Creed spin-off games and she inspired a character in the Pirates of the Caribbean series Madame [Chung]. They also featured her in Rejected Princesses which is a book about like famous women from history who could be princesses but don't fit the traditional role of what a princess is. So I thought that was really cool, and I would love to see an edgy movie about her life and her history. That's Ching Shih.

Haley: I love that. I feel like I knew her name when I saw you putting it on the spreadsheet, like I– I was like oh I know that from somewhere like I feel like I knew her story.

Alana: I love that I think that's cool.

Haley: Alright, so you know how I did Amelia Earhart last week, we don't know what happened with her death? Same train. Or same boat, if you will.

(Alana and Lexi laughing)

Haley: We just– I'm gonna do Anne Bonny who's like a famous pirate. She's a famous Irish pirate. And I only knew this because when I started dating Robert who's hundred percent Irish I was like oh let me just Google some like famous Irish people think it's like as a joke like slip it into conversation and she came up and I just always, kinda thought about her. I also thought about her but also she comes up as more of a legend type of thing like for some parts of the story there are parts where I was like this doesn't seem real and other parts like this is fact. I also have a great pirate joke if I could tingle your taste buds with it.

Lexi: Go for it.

Haley: What does a dyslexic pirate say?

Alana: Rrraaaa? I don’t know

Lexi: I see what you were trying to do.

Alana: Thank you. What do they say?

Haley: ARRRRG. No, wait... I read it wrong

(Alana & Lexi laughing)

Haley: It’s GRAA. I’m a little dyslexic to begin with and I have some trouble reading and I just f-ed my own joke. This is one of those jokes that you uhh have in your brain. I saw it on a t-shirt when I was like in Florida, years and years back and it’s always and it has always been in my brain for that long. Alright! So let’s get hooked for this golden age of piracy. Uh. She was born and like raised in Ireland and we are going to talk about Ireland a little, but she was more active in the Caribbean.I couldn’t find, Lexi, what you were talking about with your gal about inspiration for some of the pirates in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. She's known as like a pirate well known in the active pirate Caribbean circle but I couldn't find of her influence in like in modern. Maybe I just like wasn't looking in the right places. But she was born like the late 1600s and we're already off to a rocky start with her story because she was born to an attorney William Cormac who had an affair with the family maid, Mary Brennan and because of this whole affair William's wife left him. So like immediately there's just some family struggle Mary gave birth to Anne and it was kind of like a weird situation where William acknowledged and as his daughter but in a secretive sort of sense like Mary and Anne lived removed from the family. William would visit and he became fond of her but also didn't want her to be like here’s my daughter and like out in society as his daughter so to avoid any scandal he was like a-ha I'm gonna dress Anne up as a boy and introduce her as like the child of a relative. All my friends in the town and like my attorney friends won't know she's my child and also they’ll think she's a boy. But she's like still a relative of mine. Like that's why we look so similar. So already that's just opening up a whole can of worms of identity and just family issues. Lexi is giving me a face. Yeah no it's a lot. And this is great, for one of the sources, quote “when Anne's true gender” (nervous laughter) and parentage was discovered, William and Mary were like okay we can't be in Ireland anymore like let's peace and I believe they're in like the town of County Cork. Robert informed me is not where he's from, he's from Limerick and got real mad that I confused the two. 

(Alana laughing)

Haley: But we peaced from Ireland, and now our story is going to Charleston, South Carolina or what is now Charleston, South Carolina. It was like known as the Carolinas area. And Mary died somewhat soon after and 1711. Anne was going through her angsty teen years. Instead of listening to that good emo music, she turned into quote “a fierce and courageous temper.”

Alana: Me too.

Haley: But like, hold up, because I don’t think you like, murdered people. Like she–

Alana: That’s true. I was gonna be like “you don’t know that” but also I shouldn’t implicate myself for murder on a podcast. I did not kill anybody.

Haley: No no no. She reportedly murdered with the many articles and sources called a servant girl with a case knife which I'm not a hundred percent sure what a case knife is. I tried googling it but all the knives looked different to me. And beating - this is kind of like honestly this part I'm not I don't have so much problems with -  beating half to death a dude who tried to rape her. Like that was self defense like I don't know why that being slipped in.

Alana: Yeah, good. Amazing.

Haley: I guess she got that power of “cool I can do some damage I can defend myself” because she later turned into a pirate. But we're not there yet. We’re at the part where William is just not a fan of how his daughter's acting. It was more not out of sense of protecting her, but more protecting his reputation because along with this fierce and courageous temper there were rumors of her sleeping around with the fishermen and like the other quote unquote drunks in the different bars and taverns that they had that you just go to. He said it was like bad for business. And he's not an attorney anymore; he owns a plantation. I didn't find out like what the plantation was where it was blah blah bla. But that's not important, we're here for Anne. Anne married a small time pirate which honestly is like a fancy name for poor sailor in this area, named James Bonny. Honestly I couldn't figure out whether he was a pirate already or like a small time pirate or a sailor because like from all the sources I read that mentioned him like he's real small potatoes in her life story. He was on a boat, loved the fish, maybe had a pirate friend, a bird, a parrot. But he's definitely the source of her leading into the piracy gang. Her father disapproved of James immediately and basically disowned her in the sense of like kicking her out of the house and was like, no if you’re going to live like this, then I’m not helping you, trying to instil that fatherly sense. And this is another great quote. From the National Park Service so the literal sentence after this whole kicking out situation - “Anne may have burned her father’s plantation in retaliation (she was known for her temper.)”

(Alana giggling)

Haley: I tried, this is where I tried to like Google the plantation and everything. I couldn't find anything concrete of like, this plantation and this burning, but like she could’ve burned down her father’s plantation.

Alana: Maybe that’s why you can't find anything about it, because it burned down.

Haley: Honestly, good point. So sometime between 1714 and 1718 Anne and James moved around like the Bahamas area and at this maybe it's still called this but at the time it was known as like the Republic of Pirates, so it's like the collection of the Bahama islands and you just sail around it. And it was like this sanctuary for English pirates so it's kind of under English law but really it's small defenseless islands with more pirate ships they couldn’t take over. And they kind of like lived– like I couldn't find out like what I think it was like Nassau but that's like the modern name for the Bahama island. But I couldn't find out like exactly where they landed or if they just landed a cluster of islands. They kind of just like lived in that area. James did whatever James did. But Anne hung out at the local taverns. I want to be a regular at a bar one day. And that's where she met John “Calico Jack” Rackham and the fun nickname of Calico Jack was from the colorful pants he wore. He was the captain of a ship or boat called “Revenge” and every time I saw the name “Revenge” it was all in caps like bolded, just like you gotta know this boat’s named “Revenge.” Anne realized that she wanted to be with Calico Jack and not James but James refused to get a divorce. He was like no, we’re married, death do us part, blah blah blah. Anne was just like “nah.” Jumped ship from that marriage.

(Alana laughing) 

Haley: And joined Calico Jack as a crew member aboard the “Revenge.” And over the next years, they were active in and around like Jamaica doing what pirates do; capturing other vessels, taking their riches or like spoils, collecting all the booty. This vessel or one of these vessels included another female pirate, Mary Read, and she basically infiltrated the pirate ships, infiltrated the ranks of the pirate ships by dressing as a man. I don't know if like– they have like this– I like– I imagined Anne like walking on the ship, bumping into Mary, and being like “No. You're a woman dressed up as a man, I know this” and then Mary being like “whoa, you’re a woman too? No way.” Like having some sort of like face to face, heart to heart because they became like best friends.

Alana: Were they gal pals? Were they best– best friends? Were they roommates? Were they gal pals?

Haley: I don’t know, they were definitely gal pals and they definitely got into some mischief together. I. E. in October of 1720 ish Calico Jack and his crew were captured by a ship called “King's Ship.” It was like under the commissioner like under the government of like Jamaica. So, a pirate hunter, Jonathan Barnett, was kind of like “Ah, you guys are coming with me, you’re pirates, that's a big no no.” So during this capture most of the men were just like hiding at the bottom of the ship in the barracks or something and it was Anne and Mary who are like kicking butt on the top deck. Like many of the sources made a point to stress that like it was Anne and Mary really kicking some butt and everyone else was hiding during this like siege. In accordance with English common law, Anne and Mary were like given a stay of execution because like once they're captured it’s like y'all are going to be hanged. Like we don't have a jail system up and running yet. Execution. Only way to go. But since they were pregnant, or claiming to be pregnant, we don't super know, they were allowed to live until the children were born. If they said that they were pregnant, that’s another few few months to live.

Alana: We love prioritizing a fetus over a living woman.

Haley: Yeah.

Alana: We love that. That’s gonna be a big old slash S from me, kids.

Haley: Yeah. Now we get to the point where there's no official record but I'm– I'm gonna speculate that there's no official record for a lot of this. Like not so scholarly sources nonetheless, oral tradition is still a thing. We’ll listen to it, we'll speak about it. We get to the point where like they're both in prison but Read– uh, Mary Read dies of the fever. So like she doesn't last to like give birth, somehow get out of the get out of it saying there was a fetus inside me I don't know why this fetus isn't growing. And then for Anne, at least, some people say that you just like died in prison and like eventually was like hanged. Others say that she escaped from prison and went on to just be a pirate again, master of disguise, she loved doing what she wanted to do I guess. But the real like meat and potatoes of the legend is that her father paid for her ransom to get back to the Carolinas. And so after she gave birth, she was actually pregnant with Calico Jack’s child. They never mentioned Calico Jack and I'm assuming since he was a dude he was just executed because like he couldn't give birth to some, like, to a child. So he died and she basically was like “I'm gonna move on, I have this child I'm in the Carolinas again” and met another guy named Joseph and they had like ten kids. Raised those ten kids, and she died like a respectable woman at age 88. That's like literally where it leaves off. Went back to the Carolinas, her dad paid ransom. And there's more about like the dad paying ransom than any of the other accounts.

Alana: Wow.

Haley: That's our pirate Anne.

Alana: So, I told some of my internet friends about this theme. I didn't say who we were doing because that's spoilers. But one of them asked if we were gonna talk about the lady pirate who would fight dressed like a man, and then right before she killed people would like, pull out one of her tits. Is that this person?

Haley: I think that's Mary. I think that's Mary. I think that's her buddy.

Alana: I was gonna say– I feel like it was one of them.

Haley: I didn't read any of that for Anne.

Alana: I also, like so the source for that I remember seeing is literally from Tumblr, and I take my Tumblr history lessons with more salt than the Dead Sea.

Lexi: Oh. Oh, yeah that is the only way. that is the only way to take the Tumblr history lessons.

Haley: More salt than– that’s awesome. I want that on a t-shirt.

(Alana laughing)

Haley: Yeah she has her own website Anne Bonny pirate dot com which I like perused at.

Lexi: Which is like a fifty year old man in Florida who learned how to code…

Haley: And that is really where I got like the legend stuff because like National Park Service literally put we don't know what happened to her and I wanted to sprinkle in some mystery.

Lexi: Put a little spice.

Haley: Yeah, but like, Smithsonian Mag did a piece on her, there's like another blog of– called “Rare Irish Stuff.” All the museum stuff, National Park Service, was coming from here is what she did in the early stages of life and here's what she did as a pirate, all the blogs are like this is the legend of her death.

Lexi: Alright, Alana?

Alana: Okay. My turn. I'm so excited for this, I'm so glad that like it wasn't my idea to do this one second, like someone else was like “can we do pirates second” I was like I was going to ask to do pirates second! Okay. So I'm also talking about an Irish pirate but, like, a hundred and fifty years before Anne Bonny. I'm talking about Gráinne Ní Máille [Grawinya ni Mawila] or Grace O’Malley. Shout out to Susan Johnston for that pronunciation help. Love her. Miss her. Doctor Johnston I hope you're listening and I miss you and stay safe. Anyway Gráinne is born circa 1530 ce ish somewhere near… Some sources say Clare Island, some say Achill Island. Either way those are islands in Clew Bay, which is Northwestern Ireland. Her parents Owen and Margaret– or Maeve in Irish– Ní Máille… that one’s cute because we'll see later but like she names her first son and her daughter after them. Gráinne has like a leg up when it comes to pirating, because her family made their living at sea, instead of other families in that area other clans in that area were mostly farming. So already she was on the water. There is a legend– a lot of her stuff is legend– but there is a legend that as a child she wanted to go travel or maybe it was a trading expedition to Spain with her father but her father was like “no no no. Your hair is gonna get tangled in the ropes you can come with us.” So she cut off all of her hair. And this is how she gets the nickname Gráinne Mhaol [woil] and Mhaol means the bald. Like it means short haired or bald. And she's like so cool and so badass that– she does have an older half brother named Donál– but Gráinne inherits her father's land and his title instead of the brother. I am trying to do the Irish names just because I feel like that's more… 

Haley: Look you’re so ahead of me. I asked Robert. I should have asked Susan Johnston. 

Alana: You should’ve asked Susan Johnston. I– so, lowkey, Lexi you can decide whether or not to keep this in. I wanted to ask Johnston because I wanted to like lowkey find a way to tell her we were doing a podcast without being like “we're doing a podcast!” so I wanted to ask for help so I wasn't just like bragging.

Haley: See I thought, like, living with a person from Ireland, like hundred percent Irish would be helpful.

Alana: I love Susan Johnston. She's worked in Ireland for like years and years and years and she never adopts an Irish accent by accident except when she says the word Ireland. I don't know if you guys have noticed this.

Haley: I notice that. I love her.

Alana: She says Ireland in an Irish accent. It’s the best thing in the world. Anyway. So. She is fifteen or sixteen ish, gets married to a man named Donál O’Flaherty in 1546. They have three children; Owen, Maeve, and it's anglicized to Morrough but it's like Murchadh [Merchai] which sounds like a Hebrew name to me. Seemingly, part of her dowry was three galleys and twenty ships. And the reason that that's probably part of her dowry is based on Irish law she would get them back at a dissolution of the marriage. Which we'll get to why the marriage was dissolved. So the fact that like she was able to keep them after the marriage ended makes it seem like maybe like they came with her into this marriage and so they were part of the dowry. Poor Mr O'Flaherty was hot tempered and feuding with the neighboring clans just for S’s and G’s, shits and grins, just cuz. And in 1564 he is mortally wounded in a territorial skirmish and Gráinne takes back his castle. Another legend says that it was originally known as Cock’s Castle and became later known as Hen's Castle because she took it back, which is fun. So that is why the marriage dissolved, because he died. Three years after he dies– he died in 1564– she gets remarried to someone named Richard Bourke in 1567. He's known as Richard na-Iarrain which means iron, so his nickname is Iron Dick. Multiple of my sources called him that which is fun.

(Haley laughing)

Alana: They just called him like Iron Dick Bourke and I was like okay. I guess this is happening. Supposedly she divorced him in 1568. He came home from something and his clothes and his stuff was packed outside their room and she was like “we're not married anymore!” But Ireland– I don't know if you knew this– remember how last episode I was like “Russia is cold”? Ireland is Catholic. So a divorce was not gonna fly. So it was either like he pissed her off and she was like you're going to sleep on the couch for whatever or like they just kept pretending but they weren't friends or actually in love and they just kept pretending to be married. He died in 1583 of natural causes. Gráinne, who had taken a break from being a pirate and a rebel, which we’ll get to in a sec, goes back to that. Having, like, being a single woman again. So here are some of her pirate-y things. Her ships were not great for open ocean so her piracy or the way that she was being a pirate was short distance raids from her little strongholds in northwest Ireland and they would like levy tolls on passing ships and if they didn't pay… bad things. Bad things would happen. An English lord once referred to her as “The nurse of all rebellions in this province for forty years.” She gave birth to her youngest son and her only child with Iron Dick whose name is Theobold, or Tibbot, or Tiobóid on a ship on the way back from something, and the next day they were attacked by Algerian pirates. The legend around it says that they attacked within an hour. And so she just wrapped up this child and put it down and was like “okay we're gonna go kill these Algerian pirates now.” There's also a legend of her at Howth Castle which is in Dublin. The story goes that she was denied entrance because the family was at dinner. She thought this was super rude so she kidnapped the grandson of the Earl and returns him in exchange for the promise that the family would always have an open chair for her at their dinner table. She's like Irish Elijah. There's an empty seat for her, always. Between husbands, she took a lover Hugh de Lacy. And he– they were like pirating it up together and he was killed by some people they were raiding and so Gráinne got revenge on the castle called Doona Castle. And she gets the nickname– she's got all these nicknames, but this one I think is my favorite. It's Dark Lady of Doona, which I'm a big fan of. I really like that one. She has this like archnemesis– Professor Johnston, Dr Johnston called Elizabeth I Gráinne’s number one enemy, which, kind of, but I think this guy is her number one archenemy. Richard Bingham, who is a Lord in her county.In County Mayo, is the English Lord because England is like encroaching upon Ireland, which is a long running thing throughout history. This Lord, who was being basically like the English governor in Ireland, captured her and almost hung her but Gráinne’s son-in-law, whose name is also Richard Burke, and I'm not sure how that happened. This is a different Richard Burke though because his nickname is Devil’s Hook. But he intervened and saved her from the gallows. And at one point she got home from– she'd been like doing this not quite a cold war because it definitely got hot at some times. She's been doing this like butting heads with Richard Bingham. And her son, Murchadh or Murray or Murrough or whatever, had sided with Bingham, so Gráinne destroyed his land and burned his castle down. Motherly love, man. So we are going to now talk about Gráinne and Elizabeth I who met for the first time in 1593. So Elizabeth is concerned about Ireland. Her father Henry VIII was the first person to call himself King of Ireland, or like in a while, was the first king of England to call himself king of Ireland as well. so there's some like tension between their families. So Ireland is still Catholic, even though famously, at this point, England has not been Catholic. And it's got all these green pastures like they could very easily rise up against her. And they have this relationship with Spain, and Spain and England are not friends. But Gráinne has a problem as well. Her lands have been taken by Richard Bingham, her oldest son Owen was killed, and Tibbot, that one, her youngest son was captured by Bingham. And so Gráinne petitions for an audience to plead her case, and she's granted it. This meeting does not go great. Gráinne refuses to bow– a lot of this is legend– refuses to bow because she's also queen, and so queens shouldn't bow to other queens. supposedly she brought a dagger into their meeting but it was confiscated. The meeting was supposedly conducted in Latin because it was quote “the only language they shared.” I don't think it was the only language they shared because Gráinne petitioned in English, and probably– was like a noble Irish woman– and probably also spoke English, probably spoke some Spanish. I think she spoke both English and Irish perfectly well, but I love the idea that she goes to Elizabeth and is like “we're not going to conduct this in your language” because Elizabeth probably didn't speak that much Irish, she was like “I could do this but I'm gonna put you out. You’re gonna– I am the underdog here, I am asking for help but we're going to do this on my terms.”

Haley: When you say “Irish” are you saying Gaelic or is this like another– I'm thinking of like…

Alana: Irish Gaelic.

Haley: Okay I'm thinking of Johnston's Celts class where she had the whole… Irish…

Alana: Yeah. This is Irish specific. Irish Gaelic.

Haley: Okay cool.

Alana: So supposedly at one point Gráinne sneezed, and one of Elizabeth's ladies in waiting gave her a handkerchief and so Gráinne blew her nose and then she threw the handkerchief in the fire, to a scandalized response. People were like “you should– this is a very expensive and beautiful gift and you should have kept it.” And Gráinne says “no. In Ireland that's a dirty frigging rag, and we should dispose of it.” So, like, that's another one of these things that I'm like– I don't, I really don't, like I think it's rude to like, call out other cultures on being gross but like… She just called your culture gross like what a badass. So they came to this agreement that Gráinne would stop openly rebelling against the Crown in exchange for the release of her son the return of her lands and Richard Bingham would be removed from his seat of power. Took too long. In Gráinne’s opinion, took too long. Her son was released, but the rest of it took too long so she started back up doing that rebel thing. All of that rebelling against the crown… We love it, we love to see it. And she died of natural causes in 1603 ish, again not really calendars, so she’s approximately seventy three, which is a pretty nice old age considering her lifestyle. I do wanna talk a little bit about Gráinne now. She is an icon of Irish history for standing up to England which really… Something that… So I was in Ireland, I don't know if you knew this about me, but I spent a month in Ireland. And I was there for Fourth of July. I said like the one Irish guy who was on the deck with us, Paul– shout out Paul– I said you know the main message of the Fourth of July is “England get fucked” and I feel like the Irish could get behind that. So that's why Gráinne is really like she's everywhere… to the point that there is a Grace O'Malley whiskey and gin company that will ship in– anywhere in the US. I do think they are Ireland based but they will ship in the US. Each bottle is forty dollars and you have free shipping on two bottles. This is– they're not sponsoring me. I'm telling you two this in case you wanna get me a gift, or if someone who's listening wants to DM me, and get me a gift, I would be willing to try it. I looked at my liquor store and they did not have it but I did look at my liquor store.

Haley: I think I've had it before. It's good gin if I'm thinking of the label correctly. It’s good

Alana: I can send you a picture of it.

Haley: I love gin. Gin’s like my drink of choice.

Alana: The tagline is like “Believe in Grace” and I'm like “cool!” Love that. Love to see it. Anyway. So I'm really– I was really excited about this one. I think she's a really cool person, a lot of fun.

Lexi: You know what I think is interesting? All of our ladies, if legend holds correctly, like if the popular legend holds correctly, did not die in their crazy rebellious lifestyles they just died as old ladies living their life.

Haley: Yeah.

Lexi: So you know people always talk about taking risks and stuff, why not do it? Because you’ll probably just die an old lady anyway.

Alana: You will probably die an old lady anyway. That's true. I love this episode. this was so much fun. I love this podcast.

Lexi: Alright, you ready for an outro

Alana: Yeah.

Lexi: You can find this podcast on Twitter and Instagram at LadyHistoryPod. Our show notes and a transcript of this episode will be on lady history pod dot tumblr dot com. If you like the show, leave us a review or tell your friends, and if you don't like the show, keep it yourself.

Alana: Our logo is by Alexia Ibarra, you can find her on Instagram and Twitter at LexiBDraws. Our theme music is by me, GarageBand, and Amelia Earhart. Lexi is doing the editing. You will not see us, and we will not see you, but you will hear us. Next time on Lady History.

[OUTRO MUSIC]

Haley: Next week, on Lady History we're gonna be talking about women of legend. Are they real? Are they not? What's up with their stories? We don't know, you don’t know, but we’ll all find out together.

Haley: Kara Cooney I love you.

Alana: Some quick corrections to last week’s episode: Ginger Rogers was Fred Astaire’s dance partner, not Grace Kelley. Also, my mom was the one who was almost eight when they were stopped at the airport in Israel. My uncle was five.