#for now I'll take a break and try to read through the *checks history*

[llycaons]

I’ve made it halfway through! happy new year to me

[howtofightwrite]

Was reading through your torture tag and noticed a lot of stuff that was being said seemed to contradict things that were said on the scripttorture blog... do you have any suggestions on how to clear things up? Im not sure which things to trust

And you're asking us, because they've posted once in the last two years?

I'll admit, I have a fairly low opinion of them, and that's not directly their fault. For years, one of their fans, would regularly send some pretty incendiary asks our way. In fact, some of the less hostile ones were answered, and may be the posts you were looking at. Understandably, the ones simply accusing us of being torture apologists, demanding we redirect all our asks to their blog, or insisted that we should sit down and shut up, did not make the cut. With that in mind, please understand, I'm not going to go digging through their blog to refresh my memory, so some of this might be slightly skewed by the aforementioned deranged fan.

Look for the blog that does not constantly contradict or misrepresent their authoritative sources. Which is to say, if you actually pay attention to Shane O'Mara's work, it's basically what we've been saying all along.

If you're unfamiliar, O'Mara is a Neurologist who was (last I time I checked) working at Trinity College Dublin. He published a, frankly fascinating piece, called, Why Torture Doesn't Work, in which, he set about trying to answer why torture is an ineffective tool for intelligence gathering. O'Mara also had the misfortune of being the only expert who said anything close to the perspective Scripttorture wanted on torture.

An open secret about torture is that it is completely worthless for getting accurate information. This has been widely understood for centuries, if not millennia. O'Mara's question was, “why?”

It turns out, that the neurochemical trauma associated with torture, seriously interferes with your ability to accurately access information. For example: If you're being tortured, you can't tell your torturer where you planted the ticking bomb, because your brain literally can't access those memories.

Torture is evil. Yeah. No shit.

And, this is where ScriptTorture stops. “Torture is bad,” and Jack Bauer is an incredibly unrealistic fantasy, end of story.

Except, this is not the end of this.

Now, generally speaking, I don't blame anyone who wants to get off the ride here. Torture is an unpleasant subject, and wanting to stop at, “oh, it's evil,” is entirely reasonable... unless you want to write on the subject, or if you do political analysis and need to understand why people break out the torture implements.

More than that, this is where my academic background in political science actually comes into play. I'm not saying this as an Eagle Scout who had a couple overly enthusiastic hand to hand instructors when I was a kid. This is (part of) what I studied in college, and I have kept an eye on it since then.

If torture didn't work, you wouldn't see state-sponsored torture pop up repeatedly throughout history. It would not be one of the favorite tools of dictators and despots. However, because it does, and it is, simply saying, “it doesn't work,” isn't instructive or meaningful because it's clearly untrue. Someone is finding value in this, so it becomes important to understand what they are doing, and why they are doing it.

When you torture someone, the information they provide is basically madlibs of whatever leaked through their brain. They want the pain and stress to stop, and they'll say anything they can to make that happen. That often takes the form of what they think their torturer wants to hear. O'Mara's research does explain why they don't simply cough up the truth.

So, why do it?

Torture is a very labor intensive process. You (as an individual) can't, realistically, torture multiple victims at a time, and it is a very drawn out process. Some elements can be automated, your torturer doesn't need to be present at every moment, but they're going to spend hours, if not days, working on one victim. Worse, this is actually a technical profession. It's not like you can just pull in anyone off the street and get the results you want. (Though, technically, this doesn't seem to be as true, however, amateurs do have a shocking capacity to screw up torture. So, the point remains valid.)

The value of torture has almost nothing to do with the victim. It's about the message it sends to everyone else.

Torture is about mass coercion of the population. When you are the state (meaning, the government), and you torture someone, you are telling your citizens that you are willing to do the same to them, if they oppose you.

State-sponsored torture is specifically a tool to suppress political engagement. It is, quite literally, state-sponsored, domestic terrorism.

This even holds true in cases where the state employs torture to extract confessions from criminal suspects. The message sent into the general population is that dissent of any kind will not be tolerated, and that the state has the willingness and power to turn these tools on you if you draw their ire.

I get that this is outside of ScriptTorture's area of expertise, and in fairness, I probably would not have studied this with any intensity, if I hadn't taken multiple classes on revolutionary theory.

Torture from private organizations (which is to say, organized crime, and religious institutions, though cults and some other groups might fit this description as well), follows roughly similar patterns. These tend to do the same things, discouraging dissent, and establishing the organization as having power over the population (or community.) (The technical term would be to “establish capacity.” Which is to say, the organization's capacity to enforce its will. The same term applies to states, though in those cases, the state's capacity is often overestimated by its population. It's only when it starts to falter, for example through military defeats or serious civil unrest, that they really need the capacity boosting part of this equation.)

Zealotry or stupidity can create situations where you have a torturer (or, more likely, someone in a position of power ordering the torture) who believes that it is effectively compelling the truth from the victim. This (or amateurs) can easily lead into a distinct problem, which is that all of this has diminishing returns. Torture one person, and you send a loud, clear message. Torture ten, and all you've added to it is that you're willing to keep going. However, as you start stacking up the victims, you do start sending a new message to your enemies, that being, you're going to get to them sooner or later so it's in their best interest to respond now, mobilize and retaliate proactively, before you get to them. This means that a state which leans heavily on torture can easily instigate the civil unrest that exposes their limited capacity leading to a political death spiral. Alternately, if the state does have the capacity to put down the resulting unrest, it further reinforces their position (which does happen with depressing frequency in the real world.)

You're also going to create new enemies in the friends, family, and loved ones, of the people you tortured. This means that any organization that relies on extensive use of torture will, eventually, start tying a noose around its own neck. (Granted, there are a lot of social dynamics that I'm skimming over here, so it's not exactly as simple as “if the state tortures lots of people, it will result in increasing unrest.”)

If you want a partial citation for the above, you can (ironically) find it in a podcast interview with Shane O'Mara, when he explained why torture has been employed repeatedly through history. (Specifically I think it was episode 15 of Your Welcome, by Michael Malice. Though, I'm not 100% sure off hand.) Though that doesn't cover some of the more in depth elements I just discussed. Some of this is coming from a textbook on revolutionary theory I can't locate (it disappeared in a move a few years back.) Though that was more interested in the general structure of a state destabilizing into internecine conflict. Ironically, my preferred citation on torture, Fear up Harsh by Tony Lagouranis is mostly uninformative in this case, because his experiences were on the ground, rather than from a structural understanding of what his job was really doing. However, he does illustrate my comment about amateurs making even more of a mess, both through personal experiences with a few, and also through the eventual trajectory of the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

But of course, torture is evil... again, no shit. Was that really a question? And, I'm apparently a torture apologist for having a structural understanding of why evil people do evil things. Cool. Evil people don't do evil things because they're evil, they do them because they gain some tangible benefit from those acts, and they do not care about the consequences to anyone else. If you ask someone, “why do people do this?” and their answer is, “it's simple; they're evil,” that person is lying. They may be lying to themselves, but they are lying to you.

Why do people use torture? It's a lot more complicated, and unpleasant, than you'd expect at a simple overview.

-Starke

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[lol-jackles]

Walker review, episode 7 "Hold me now"

It's a beautiful golden morning and Cordell prepares to fix breakfast of egg and bacon for August but he's already half-way out the door. Come on Auggie, it's bacon, everybody loves bacon! Cordell puts away the egg and bacon and opt for cereal while he reads James' book on a serial killer. Cereal, serial, get it? I slay me.

Little did August know that morning would be the last time his dad would be there for him, and he'd going to wish he had stayed for breakfast.

At Ranger HQ, Cordell is leading the team search for the serial killer called the jackal who was previously dormant but now back and have killed 2 people. Cordell's first choice of suspect, a wife abuser, turned up to be a dead end but that doesn't slow him down. The following day he picks another suspect from the bottom of the least suspicious list, a former zoo keeper whose zoo was the closest site of the first victim. Nobody is on board with Cordell's theory so he's like, no problem, I'll check the defunct zoo myself. Cassie refuse to let Cordell go alone and Luna invites himself along.

The trio arrives at the creepy abandoned zoo and only the audience see the decayed corpse of an animal, a jackal with missing teeth, which is the killer's calling card. Luna and Cassie find a disturbing underground room filled with tools of the killer's trade. Cordell finds fresh tracks and chases a distant figure, who escapes after he ambushes Cordell and knocks him out. Though the killer remains free, the rangers are closer than they've ever been in years and his lair will provide much needed data for a profile.

Cordell is upset that he was so close to catching the killer and is more determined than ever to finish the job. He returns home to find Liam upset that history is repeating itself, Cordell is neglecting his family and Liam is picking up the slack. Cordell says he will make it up to his children and tells Liam to stop being so dramatic. (At this point I', convinced Ben is running the horse rescue.)

Both men are correct and there's no easy answer. A serial killer is on the loose and catching it is not a 9 to 5 job. There's an expectation that public service jobs mean some family times has to be scarified. I know a family that has 3 generations of firefighters, they never spent a single Thanksgiving and Christmas together as a family because the men are too busy putting out kitchen fires and/or fireplace fires caused by idiots. Mothers Day is the only holiday that most criminals take a break from their usual criminal activities.

Cordell goes to his study room filled with research on the jackal and it is revealed that he stole evidence from the killer's lair, a length of rope. Cordell tightly wraps the rope around his wrist as if he's trying to get into the mind of the killer and looking through his eyes. In an earlier scene, Cassie said zoo keeping isn't that much different from ranching and pointedly looks at Cordell.

Sidenote, Luna and Cassie finds the killer's note written in capitalized letters, which is the same style Luna wrote in his love note to Cassie. I really hope this is a red herring for Cassie's sake, her two previous dates literally tried to kill Cordell: for a cause and for revenge, respectively. Cassie doesn't need the third romance to turn out to be another psycho and also I need the three of them to go undercover at a Shadow Hawk convention.

Speculation #4: the Jackal is a member of the survivor network and encouraged people like Henry to blame innocent people. He knew Luna was undercover at the motel and learned his handwriting style to feed false leads to the survivor network.

Score: 9.7 out of 10.  We get to see why Cordell is the best ranger as the stakes are deepening. A point 2 deduction for the stalled necklace mystery, another point 2 deduction for Bonham and Abeline subplot about derailed retirement plans. Point 1 given back for August maturing and being a good kid.

[yanderepuck]

This is the last one from this event I swear. I kissed just about everyone but I forgot to check their lines so I had to go back and kiss don't it them for a second time

OF COURSE I'M DOING THEO. WHO WOULD I BE IF I DIDN'T DO THIS. And I already failed at my no Theo challenge. Theo is just so *goes feral*

He's not in a club himself, but on Thursdays he stays late. Why? His brother is in the art club and it gives him some time to do school work if he's still in school.

He sits in the same classroom every week. It's always unlocked and far enough from any of the other rooms that have a club going on.

He walks in and sees you sitting at one of the desks. He looks confused and starts walking over.

"What are you doing here?"

You jump, yelling a bit. He scared you. "Theo!"

He sits in the chair next to you, setting his bag on the desk. "Sorry," he kisses your cheek. "But why are you in here?" He flips the cover over your book over to see what you're reading.

"I'm having problems in history. We got on the topic of art and now we have to do a report on an artist in history."

"I could help you with that. I had to do that project last year."

You flip through the book some more, looking at the art work on each page. "What are you doing here?"

"Thanks," you sigh. "But I don't even know who I'm doing it on. I'm starting by trying to find art I even like. So maybe once I find someone you can help me."

"I always stay after on Thursdays. Vincent is in the art club and I do some work until it's over," he leans closer and kisses your cheek again. "But if you're here I don't know how well I'll concentrate," he chuckles.

"Oh stop," you giggle and turn to kiss him on the lips. He kisses you back then starts taking his things out of his bag.

"Since all you're doing is looking at pretty pictures. I'm going to work on my chemistry."

"Booring," you stick your tongue out and look back at your book. It's not all pictures. There's blurbs about the art and it's meaning as well as info on the artists and the time period.

"You'll be begging me for help next year so I need to make sure I know what I'm doing."

Theo opens his book and his notes to do his homework.

~~

Some time passes and you're getting impatient. You glance over at Theo who seems to be doing his work with no issue. You huff and lay down, resting your head in his lap.

While you get comfortable he looks down at you. "Have you decided who you are doing?"

You rest your hands on your stomach and close your eyes. "I think so. I'll make a decision later."

He holds your hand. "I'm not helping you last minute if you slack off."

"I won't."

He goes through his notes some more while he finishes some things.

After a few minutes he sets his pencil down and sits back. You open your eyes to look up at him and smile.

He's so handsome. How did you get so lucky?

"Are you done?"

"Almost. This chapter is pretty easy but he assigned a lot of homework."

You sit up and kiss him. "You should take a break if there's that much."

He kisses you back and pushes hair behind your ear. "Yeah, but I really want to get this done before I have to go.

Hmph. You were hoping for some attention from him. Theo stretches in his seat before getting back to work. You get up and go over to the window to look outside.

Theo can't help but glance over at you. He normally doesn't have an issue with concentrating, but with you walking around the room he can't help it.

He ends up holding his head in his hand staring at you, a smile on his face.

Without even finishing the problem that he is on, he gets up and walks over to you, hugging you from behind.

"What's so interesting out there, huh?"

You smile and wrap your arms over his. He holds you close, hunched over a little so his chin is on your shoulder.

"A bird is more interesting than school work."

You turn around to face him, draping your arms over his shoulders. You kiss him. He kisses back. You keep kissing him. He keeps kissing right back. Quickly the two of you have your lips glued together.

His hands set on your hips before sliding back to grab your ass. You press your body against him so that he can get his hands between you and the wall.

You moan softly as his hands squeeze you. He starts lifting up your skirt, then sliding his hand under your underwear to grab your bare ass.

You moan into his mouth and grind yourself against him.

Keeping a hand under your clothes, he puts a hand between you two. With a single finger he teases you. Almost going inside but not quite. You rock your hips to try to encourage him, to show him that you want it.

His other hand let's your ass go and slides up your back to your neck.

He takes a fist full of your hair and kisses you harder. Then he quickly tugs your hair back at the same time as pushing two fingers into you.

You moan loudly. Maybe a little too loud. Your hips rock with his fingers as they slide in and out of you.

"You're so wet for me," with your head pulled back he kisses your neck.

You pant lightly and hold onto his shirt. "T-Theo," you moan.

He kisses the side of your neck and glances out the window. Good thing you are in the second story. His fingers push deeper and spread apart, making you stretch wider.

You feel your legs shaking and lean back against the window.

"You better stay quiet if you don't want to get caught," his voice is low and slightly threatening. "If you're a good girl and stay quiet we'll be able to do this more."

He smirks at you as he adds a third finger. You bite your lip but still groan.

"Go on and move your hips. I know you want to. Fuck yourself on my fingers. Show me how I make you feel."

They let your hair go so that he can explore the rest of your body. Groping you, squeezing you, helping you rock your hips.

You wanted him. You wanted him bad. But you knew you could only have his fingers. His fingers plunge into you as you rock your hips.

His thumb starts to rub your clit. Your tell would have been louder if he didn't cover your mouth in time.

"You must like that," he rubs you while his fingers fuck you. His hand presses against you harder and he smirks. "Sounds like someone is coming."

Once he said it you could hear footsteps coming down the hall with there being barely anyone in the school any noise seemed loud.

He takes his hand off your mouth and pulls over the curtain from the window to cover the two of you. "You better stay quiet, because I'm not stopping until you cum."

He doesn't cover your mouth, instead his fingers move faster. You bite your lip and dig your nails into him.

Theo presses his forehead against yours, looking you in the eyes as he somehow manages to get his fingers deeper.

The footsteps are getting louder, they are definitely coming towards the classroom.

The footsteps stop. "Theo are you- oh. Not here."

It's Vincent. The club must have ended. He says something else, but he's walking away so you can't make it out.

You swear you were holding your breath the whole time.

"Sounds like it's time to go. You better cum soon if you want to," he teases you with his fingers thrusting in rougher.

"Ahh-hh. I'm close, I'm close," you start to rock your hips again and you feel his thumb press harder against your clit.

For a moment you think it's slipping away, but then your legs tremble and you quickly tug Theo's hair. "Theo!" You try to hold back your yell.

If it wasn't for the grip you had on his hair he would have kissed you to shut you up. His fingers stop and you pant.

He pulls his fingers out of you and puts your underwear back in place before laying your skirt flat. Theo fixes the curtain and you try getting your legs to work.

If he can do that with his fingers then what can he do with his dick?

Theo gets his books cleaned up and in his bag. He looks over at you with a smirk. "Do you need help walking, hondje?"

"I-Im fine!" You slowly walk back over to your things and put them in your bag.

"And don't forget, once you figure out who to do your project on, I'll gladly help" he leans in and kisses you, then fixes your shirt. "Let's go. I don't want to keep my broer waiting."

He puts his bag on one shoulder while you put yours on, then take his hand, leaving the classroom.

~~

Tag list~

@kissmetwicekissmedeadly @fang-and-feather @xalxtusxiao @namine-somebodies-nobody @ana-thedaydreamer @evil-quartett @ameyoruakiikemenseries @yrenesposts @tele86 @damekathearasi @lokis-laugh @candied-boys @breadmercury @aquagirl1978 @xenokiryu @nightghoul381 @vampiricpancake @lulu-the-smol-floof @tako-cafe @floydsteeth

[bellarkeselection]

Hey can I ask for a request for Damon Salvatore please. In which the reader is struggling to keep focused on her studying and Damon walks up behind her and cuddles her and helps her and say how proud he is to have her as a girlfriend/wife which ever you choose . It can be full of fluff as I’d love to see a lived up Damon sorry if this doesn’t make sense

You're My Proud College Girl

Flipping through pages of my history college textbook I sighed feeling a headache rising in my brain. I have been studying the material for hours knowing that midterms were coming up and I can't seem to remember half of what we've been taught so far. Footsteps entered the living room of the Salvatore's house but I don't bother looking up from my notes. "Hey babe, what are you still looking at those books for. I thought you would be done studying by now." He sits down beside me on the couch his hands resting on his knees just staring softly at me. Damon and I started dating before I graduated from high school. He doesn't see the point in it but since I'm human he won't compel me a job because I told him I wanted to earn it the right way and not cheat.

"I thought I was but - my mind just can't seem to remember half of this. I've been putting in the hours to study and do the reading but I just can't...maybe I'll just have to retake the class and try better." Throwing my hands up in the air laying back on the cough. The fire cracking softly in my ear as I sighed heavily wishing this wasn't so hard. I didn't realize that my high school teachers made it easy on us until I met this professor. He acted like his class was the only one when in reality I have like a couple more on top of it. "Hey now that's not how you felt last semester. So you have a hard professor do you want me to take care of him. I'll eat him or compel him. Whatever you want. I just hate to see you so frustrated when all I see is how awesome you are. I'm proud of you, Y/n." My boyfriend spoke intertwining my hand in his leaning forward and kissing my forehead where I leaned into his touch finding it comforting.

Lifting my head up from his shoulder my eyes locked onto his icy blue orbs. Even though he acts like the tough vampire guy he is sweet on me. He's spent time helping me study too when I didn't even ask him too. "What did you say, Damon?" Blinking my eyes I couldn't really grasp how he found me awesome when he was a vampire with super powers and I'm just a human. He tucks hair behind my ear smiling longingly at me. His right hand resting on my check feeling me lean into his palm. "I'm proud of you, Y/n. You're putting in a lot of effort and not just saying you can't do it. But how about you take a break from studying and we go to the grill for some food." I could've sworn he used his vampire hearing as a cheat sometimes because my stomach growled seconds after that. Nodding my head slowly he gets to his feet pulling me in for a hug. "Thank you, Damon." He squeezes me closer to his embrace with my arms around his neck. "Anything for my college girl."

Comments really appreciated ❤️

[myrmyrtheorca]

(making this post for the second time because I done goofed and posted it instead of saving it as a draft)

I'll take the occasion to thank everyone for your support for Anemone's character sheet!

...aaaand it has come to my attention that so far she's received 4 different marriage proposals, so. I'm afraid you guys will have to form a line or something

Now, onto answering your questions! I thought to group them all here as to not flood anyone's dashboard ->

@lixenn asks the following:

• Actually, astigmatism! Caligari offered her corrective surgery multiple times, but she never really followed through with it. Also, she likes to wear them for fashion and has multiple frames for any occasion.

-

• I'd say she's directly managing around 10 people. She's been selecting the researchers herself. As for the personal assistant, I have yet to assign her one, so thanks for the heads-up as always Lix. 🩵

-

• Your assumption is correct. Caligari Is a medical doctor, but his knowledge seems to be... uncomfortably vast. He taught Anemone everything needed to take the place of the late Dr. Argenti. She specializes in genetics, because it's believed that the Pallid Flame's origin lies in the genetic history of the Cavalieri.

-

• Technically no, she doesn't have one and can't get one. The academic career of a Cavalieri, no matter the field, is limited to the family's context. External professionals that choose to cooperate with the Cavalieri (for example, Argenti) are also advised to keep their public presence to the bare minimum, and are constantly kept in check. They have nothing that can officially attest their level of knowledge in public institutions - hell, some of them don't even have a birth certificate to their name.

-

• fortunately not They met during routine blood work, while Anemone was still studying to become a researcher (and before her transition). Myr commented something nice about her painted nails, she was still an awkward little nerd at the time so that gesture was really appreciated. With time, Anemone got inspired by Myr's confidence and refusal of the family's ways.

-

• She likes to practice nail art! It's not uncommon for Lidija to get a call from her asking her to come over so Anemone can let the stress out by panting Lidija's nails. Myr refuses to participate

-

@einsatzzz asks the following:

• Yes! Or at least, they try to be. Anemone is super busy with managing the whole Second Branch, so sometimes they won't see her for weeks. Also, it's kinda risky for her to be seen with Myr often, given she's seen as a troublemaker, but she tries her best to be there (even though it's a really cat Vs dog relationship). Since Myr is often not allowed in recreational spaces, they like to spend their time outside doing mostly things that Myr doesn't get to do due to her restrictions (ex. Picnics, keeping Myr's appearance in check, walks, board games that Lidija sneaks out/Myr steals from the break rooms...)

-

@ravensilversea asks the following:

• I chose to keep this one for Anemone, since I was already working on her sheet when it arrived. She's a really pragmatic person, and so typically tries to be rational about things. When she does need to wind down or stop her brain from spiraling, she likes to read books. She's really into anthropology, and...bunnies. Manuals, studies, photo books. She's always wanted to keep one, but never felt truly ready.

[preciouslandmermaid]

and i'll break all my rules for you (joel x gn!reader)

note: Reader is only 4 years younger than Joel. GN!Reader & they/them pronouns used where needed, but otherwise no other terms are used. Takes place prior to the video game & tv-show (pre-canon). 

(Not beta read, no use of Y/N). 💛 Feedback/reblogs always appreciated 💛

summary: You are paired with Joel for a smuggling run to the Massachusetts General Hospital outside of Boston. Despite Joel’s initial stoicism and penchant for antisocial behavior–you find yourself breaking all your own rules for him. 

warnings: canon-typical violence, mature language, mild hurt/comfort, mentions of drug use/addiction, a sprinkle of quiet yearning 

🍄🍄   READ ON AO3    🍄🍄

“They’re a doctor, Joel.” Tess says, “a real one.”

“Non-military?” He asks dubiously. 

You settle your hands on your hips, “I’m not a narc if that’s what you’re asking.”

Joel scoffs, “thought most of you were snatched up by FEDRA. How’d you get out?” His tone is sharp-edged and suspicious. Maybe even accusatory if you listen close. 

You bristle. This smuggler has no right prying into your past. Rule #1 of staying alive: you don’t let people get close (and most people in the QZ know how to follow that one). 

“I got lucky.”

“Joel.” Tess folds her arms across her chest, “we need them.” She gives him a weighted look. There are a thousand words in that single look. It speaks to their trust, their history, and you instinctively look away. You let Joel and Tess silently discuss your ability to run this job. 

Eventually, he bends against the category-five force of nature that is Theresa "Tess" Servopoulos and says a gruff; “Alright.”

Joel isn’t a talker. And that suits you just fine. You don’t need words to complete this job unless those words are “Look out, someone’s gonna shoot you in the face.” Although, you rather like to think you’d be quick on the trigger if someone did try and shoot your face. (Getting shot would break Rule #2 on your guide to survival). 

You make your way through the tunnels with your heart in your throat. Your sweat pools in the middle of your back. Your shirt sticks to your spine and beneath the straps of your backpack. It’s been minutes, you think, but it feels like hours. 

You’ve never been outside of the QZ.

You open your mouth to ask Joel what to expect and then snap your jaw shut. He’s not a talker and you’ll see for yourself soon enough. You remember the world before it ended. You remember movie theaters, bad karaoke, and smoke-filled restaurants. You remember brightly lit grocery stores, loud playgrounds, and quiet libraries. You thought it would never end. You thought there would always be cars, concrete, and pop music.

So much for that. You bite the inside of your check. Now we’ve got FEDRA and ration cards and a fungal infection that desires full-scale invasion. 

Joel says, “watch your head.” 

He holds a rotted plank up and you crouch beneath it. When you pass him, your nostrils twitch with the scent of his body odor, but it doesn’t smell gross. Which is surprising considering showers are a rarity and you’ve stood in line for jobs with your nose and mouth plugged to block the stench. 

The thought is quickly forgotten when you step outside for the first time in twenty years. 

You exhale, “Holy shit.” 

The world is a jungle. A cacophony of concrete and lush, vibrant wilderness. There is decay, there is destruction, you can see the iron gridwork of collapsed buildings like they’re its ribcage. But there is also beauty. The sky has never felt more open. It’s bluer, you think, than you’ve ever remembered. A shade of blue reserved for summer afternoons when you were small. The overgrowth of plant life sprawls like tiny capillaries over walls and chain link fences and through gaps in the rubble. The sunlight cuts through open rooftops and reflects rainbows off the broken windows. 

You glance sidelong at Joel. He rubs his mouth with his hand. And although he’s looking at the horizon, you doubt the view has any effect on him. You suspect he’s mentally planning your next steps.

As if to prove you right, Joel points to a narrow alleyway, “we’ll take this route.”

You shift the weight of your backpack and nod.

~~~~~~~~~~

You shimmy through narrow alleyways and climb across wooden planks. It takes several minutes before it finally hits you. You’re surrounded by silence. The QZ always contains some level of background noise whether it’s FEDRA and their trucks, or people talking, or crackling fires. You hear every step you and Joel take, every rustle of the breeze through the buildings, every shift of your clothing, every beat of your heart. You stare at the back of his head. His hair is thick and streaked thinly with silver strands. 

“Is it always like this?” You ask.

“Is it like what?”

“Like this.” You fall into step beside him and wave your arm, “this quiet.”

He glances at you. The furrowed line between his eyebrows deepens. “Could be quieter.” It’s a pointed yet passive aggressive statement. 

You bite the inside of your cheek. It’s quiet enough, you figure, to ask the question that’s been gnawing at your stomach since yesterday morning. 

You ask, “what is your problem with me?”

Joel shifts his shoulders in an almost-stretch. “I don’t have a problem with you, doc. I just…” He glances sidelong at you, then away, his scowl etches into the lined grooves of his face. “It’s odd, alright? It’s odd that a doctor doesn’t work for FEDRA.”

He sniffs. “I don’t trust it.”

I don’t trust you. That’s what he means to say, and you’re not even surprised by it. You don’t trust him either. You trust him to complete this job. You trust him to survive (with or without you). You don’t bother trying to give him explanations as to how you’ve avoided FEDRA’s grasp. Truly, it was pure, dumb luck. You fell through the cracks. An authoritative regime liked to shoot first and ask questions later and their bureaucracy was shit. FEDRA wasn’t asking folks for their resume, and it was easy enough to lie once you were in the QZ. You’d rather be a coward and survive, then a hero and get yourself killed. 

That’s why you had rule #3: Always run if shit goes sideways. 

You shrug, “There are other medical professionals hiding out in the QZ. Not everyone jumped at the chance to be a FEDRA dog.”

Joel doesn’t reply. 

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

Joel explains quietly that you’ve got to cut through the library to reach the hospital. You’re not thrilled about the enclosed space, but what can you do?

The air is rich with gray dust motes and dead fungal cells. You and Joel step quietly (so silently a librarian would be proud!) through the dilapidated shelves and collapsed aisles. The magazines on the front desk are rotted into pulp. It smells of decay and damp mold and soggy newspapers. Many of the tables and chairs are snapped in half, chewed by termites, or broken by passing survivors for kindling or weapons.

The large hole in the ceiling has allowed every element of weather to permeate the library into a tomb of dead literature. If you close your eyes, you can imagine the ink running rivers through the aisles, around fallen rubble, and spilling down the stone steps. The children’s section of the library is muted in color. All the bright stuffed animals are chewed, stuffing crawls out of their eye sockets, and vibrant plastic toys are covered in grime.

You touch a shelf in passing, letting your fingertips graze the water-logged spine, and imagine the pages crumbling within. Your heart squeezes like a vice.

Mechanical textbooks, poetry, and biographies, and books on tape and DVDs–gone. As if they never existed. And now children are taught in FEDRA schools, taught to shoot, and taught the FEDRA-version of history. 

Something snags in your chest, and you instinctively turn your face away from Joel’s so he can’t see. Your eyes prick with tears. You’ve seen bodies piled to burn, you’ve seen civilians shot down in the street, you’ve seen horrors upon horrors and lost everyone you’ve ever loved. You shouldn’t be crying over dead, lost books.

But it feels like a piece of humanity that is irrevocably lost.

The future opens like a black void, like a pit, like the mouth of hell beneath your feet. What’s the point in completing this job? You ought to just take the meager supplies you have and keep walking into the abyss. Maybe you’ll find something better or maybe you’ll be eaten–consumed–by the infected. Maybe that would be better than this. This pretense of a life worth living. It wasn’t even life. It was purely survival. Your breath stutters and you clear your throat despite the sharp, cold glass lodged inside of it. 

“Hey,” Joel’s tone mirrors that of a cowboy trying to soothe a spooked horse. “Where’d you go?” He steps in front of you, snapping his fingers and it breaks your zoned-out focus on the books. You shake your head.

“‘M fine.” Your words string together like a children’s beaded bracelet. 

“Keep your head on straight, doc.” He admonishes. “We’re almost there.”

 ~~~~~~~~~~~

Hell breaks loose in the sound of a scream. 

It doesn’t make sense that raiders should be here so close to the QZ. But, they are. Joel grabs your arm and jerks you sideways into one of the cavernous divots formed by two bookshelves that fell into one another. You crouch-walk through the make-shift tunnel with cold, stagnant water dripping onto your head and shoulders from the shelves. 

The raiders run through the library while hollering profanities at one another. Their faces are covered by gas masks or simple cloth face-masks and ski goggles. You count the footsteps and watch the elongated shadows cross over the mossy walls. It’s a small group. Hopefully they just run through and keep going. 

Joel’s breath is warm on your cheek, “there’s three,” he whispers. 

You nod minutely to signal that you’ve heard him, but you don’t trust your voice to speak. He cranes his neck to peer around the shelf and you watch the tendons shift on his dusky throat. He glances over his shoulder toward you and lifts his index finger to his lips. His dark eyes are pensive, hard, and focused. Like two chips of dark amber, like pieces of obsidian. 

You wait, listening, your body crouched and muscles stiffening. The raiders have moved to the south section of the library. You can hear them rifling through things–furniture is moved, either smashed or kicked over, and book pages flap wetly as they are tossed aside.

Joel leans close in again. So close you feel his body heat radiating from him. You smell his sweat again. Your heart threatens to break free from your ribs. 

He whispers into your ear, “this place is already picked clean which means they’re probably looking for an old stash. If we take the second floor we can sneak past ‘em.”

You carefully follow Joel’s steps. He’s drawn his revolver, but you keep your own piece holstered at your hip. Your palms are slick, and you don’t trust yourself to hold a gun properly. If these raiders see you–you’re going to run. No question about it.

Joel grimaces, his face taught in concentration, as his shoulder slowly pushes open a rusted, stairwell doorway. Every sound he makes feels like a gunshot, like a noose tightening around your throat. You glance around, paranoid and cautious, before Joel makes a quiet sound in his throat. 

You meet his eyes. He flicks them into the created narrow space of the doorway. He wants you to go first. You angle your body to the side, your chest brushes against Joel’s as you pass, and side-step through the door. The touch doesn’t even register until after you’re in the clear and even then–your mind cannot process anything beyond the potential for death, the threat of the raiders. 

Your sticky palm holds the door handle and Joel follows you into the stairwell. You muffle your relieved sigh behind your fist. You climb the stairwell like mice trying to avoid an angry housecat. The stairwell is metal and rusted, but it holds your weight and doesn’t creak too much. Joel takes the lead. 

His eyes are constantly checking you. They are brief, passing glances. You’re not sure who is more paranoid at this point–you or him. Although, it’s probably you.

You keep checking over your shoulder as if the raiders will appear like ghosts behind you. What will you do if they find you? Where can you run to in this cramped, tinnitus-dangerous stairwell? 

Your foot slips as the rusted step gives way. Just your luck, right? You swallow your gasp of alarm, your shout of terror, and your arms windmill to regain your balance.

Joel’s hand shoots out and catches you effortlessly by the wrist. He pulls you forward with surprising, wiry strength and onto the step he’s standing upon. Your cheeks burn. He releases your wrist, nods, and you keep moving.

~~~~~~~~~~~

The sun has almost fully set by the time you manage to escape the library. The sounds of the raiders on the floor below echoes in your eardrums. Joel led you through the destroyed second floor (which was arguably worse for wear than the first floor). He guided you over wooden planks, and through bookshelves, until you finally climbed out through a broken window and onto the roof.

The warm air tastes so, so sweet.

You plant your hands on your knees, breathing heavily, your sweat drips down your face and over your spine in sticky, moist rivers.

Joel taps your shoulder and signals with a tilt of his head that you need to keep going. At this rate, you’ll reach the hospital by nightfall. Not an ideal situation, but what choice do you have? You have a job to do. You can’t turn away and run back to the QZ with your tail between your legs. The job runs bigger than just you and Joel, and you steal a moment to wonder if Tess told him the details. You push the thought from your mind. There is no use in speculating about Joel and Tess’s relationship. Once the job was done you’d never work together again unless fate played its tricky hand. 

Your flashlights cut sharp, white lines through the deserted and overgrown streets. The hospital is derelict and dark. It poses like a forgotten specter over the street. Alongside the destroyed cars and police vehicle, there is an overturned and torched ambulance near the ER entrance. If you were to shine your flashlight into those cars, or the doorway, you have no doubt in your mind that you would find corpses. A chill shivers across your damp skin. You hope there are no infected inside, but it’s a risk you’ll have to take. 

You lead Joel around the side of the building and shine your flashlight up toward a broken window. Wordlessly, he situates himself near the brick wall and laces his fingers to hold your foot. You grunt in unison as Joel boosts you into the window. You awkwardly grip the window ledge, avoiding a large piece of glass, and shimmy your torso up and over. 

You land and grumble, “fuck.” Your boots crunch on scattered, broken glass. 

A quick cursory glance around the room reveals two skeletons sitting upright in their beds. Their clothes and blankets have rotted and are pocketed with moth-eaten holes. Their eye-sockets bloom with dead and ashen fungus that spreads like spidery roots across the wall behind them and stretches toward the ceiling. Their wrists and ankles are secured to the beds with thick, leather clasps. You shine your flashlight over their bodies and golden, empty bullet casings glitter on the floor. Shot dead. There’s no telling when they died–were they shot on day zero? Or did some scavenger pass through and shoot them out of fear or pity? 

You take off your coat, bundle it into your arms, and sweep away some of the glass. You pull a rope from your backpack, tying it on a metal bedpost, before you drop it to Joel. The hewn rope cuts into your palms and fingers like woven splinters as you hold it steady.

You release a silent sigh of relief when Joel crests over the window and joins you. Something akin to relief uncoils in your stomach when you see him. It’s not like you expected him to bail or anything. Joel doesn’t strike you as that kind of guy. However, being alone in the hospital, even for a few seconds…is unnerving. You are safer with him beside you. It’s not sentiment or tender, warm feelings creating that thought. It’s pure, survival-based logic.

“The stash is just across the hall.” You whisper.

Joel nods gruffly.

You pull your pistol from its holster and force your arms not to shake as you walk toward the door. It creaks. The hinges are flecked with rust. A constellation of acrid, gray dust plumes and swirls in front of your face. Your flashlight beam bounces over fallen IV poles, and wheelchairs, and gurneys. And corpses. Dozens of corpses. You listen, and breathe, and push the door infinitesimally wider. The hospital yawns and stretches and rises like an old alley cat to meet you. A hundred memories tug at your shirtsleeve and beg for your attention. You tell yourself you cannot indulge in reflection. You must focus on the task at hand. You have to survive this. 

You tentatively step across the hallway with your heart lodged in your throat. The ten or so steps it takes to cross the hall feel like a hundred. You are only aware that Joel is following because you can hear his breath. You intentionally mirror him - his inhale and exhale - and a semblance of calm radiates across your worried nerves. 

The closet winces open.

The handle of a mop barrels toward you. You inhale sharply through your nostrils. 

You catch it before it hits the floor. 

Your eyes lift to Joel’s, and he gives you a look that seems to say– “Nice one.” You cannot decide if his look is sarcastic or not. You weasel yourself into the janitor closet and push your fingers behind the plastic bottles of glass-cleaner. You bite the inside of your cheek. What if it’s gone? You don’t know what you’ll do. You don’t know what you’ll say to Tess. 

After some blind searching, your fingertips finally touch a plastic bag taped to the underside of the shelf. 

Thank fuck. 

You tuck the bag of mixed pills into your backpack. You quietly slip from the closet and dip your chin toward Joel. 

He raises both eyebrows then whispers, “is it all there?”

“I think so.”

You and Joel return to the first room. Together, you brace the door with whatever spare furniture you can find. Two chairs meant for visitors. An IV pole. Two cheap, wooden nightstands. You hate how flimsy it looks. How vulnerable. An infected could easily break through that. 

“That's all we got.” Joel says. “I ain’t risking moving the beds.”

You massage your hand over your neck, “yeah, no shit.”

“We’ll move at first light.”

“Fine.” You remove a ration from your bag. A sense of unease and doubt gnaws at your empty stomach. “Joel…?”

“Hm?” 

He looks over at you with an inquisitive, yet chagrined expression. He hears the question in your tone, maybe even wants to answer, but likely hates all this talking. Realistically, you think you and Joel have said less than 50 words to each other. You tear a corner of the ration off with your teeth. It’s chewy and gritty and too salty. 

“We’re good here, right?” You ask slowly, your voice sounding far too small for your liking, “I can’t shake the feeling that the raiders followed us.”

Joel shifts his weight. He is silent for a few seconds, his face closed off, his gaze on the fungal skeletons eternally resting in their deathbeds. 

Finally, he says; “I’ll keep watch.” He glances at you, “get some rest.”

You doubt you’ll manage anything more than a few fretful minutes, but it’s better than nothing. You don’t want to be jumpy and anxious from a lack of sleep. At this sudden thought, you try to catch Joel’s eyes again.

“What about you?”

He shrugs one shoulder, “I’ll be fine.”

His answer annoys you. You’ve spent the entire day climbing through rubble and avoiding raiders. You brought him to the hospital. You got the stash. You followed through on your end of the bargain and yet…

“You really don’t trust me huh?”

Joel snorts, “not really, no.”

Offended, you cross your arms, “have I done something specifically or is that just your general asshole attitude to everyone?” You ask, snappish. 

You know it’s hypocritical. You know it is. You can’t help it. Whether it’s adrenaline wearing off, or hunger, or tiredness that is the cause for your tone doesn’t really matter. Your skin itches with restlessness. Hasn’t Joel been paying attention? You’re not a smuggler like him. You’ve never been outside the walls! You risked your life for this job. 

Joel cuts you with his dark gaze. “It’s my attitude toward everyone, yeah.” He replies coldly. “But especially to so-called doctors who somehow aren’t dead or with FEDRA.”

You roll your eyes.

“Oh sorry!” You pat your pockets dramatically, “I don’t have my credentials on me.”

He sighs. The weight on his shoulders deepens. He pinches his brow. Your harsh flashlight illuminates his torso and face in blue-white. His flashlight emits a halo of light. The dark, spidery-fungus frames Joel like two membranous wings. For a passing moment, he appears like a martyr, a patron saint of little patience and years of quiet agony. 

“I trust Tess.” He says, “she said we needed you because you knew where this stash was…but you wouldn’t say how you knew…and you wouldn’t tell her where it was or why you needed to go. So, I’m standing here, and I’m thinking that I could’ve done this job with Tess. And if I did then we’d be back in the QZ by now.”

He continues, “you’re inexperienced, you’re jumpy, and it’s a miracle you haven’t stepped on a network yet.”

You flinch. 

“So, yeah, doc. I’m having trouble trusting you considering you haven’t done a damn thing to earn it.”

You turn away from him. You’re too old to be sulking, but dammit (and damn him!) you are. Did watching his back not count for anything? Your success in moving stealthily? The fact that you didn’t lose your fucking cool at any point?! Your nostrils flare. You won’t jump over hoops and climb mountains to earn his trust. And why should you?! He’s kept you alive at this point but the same could be said for you. You don’t expect his whole trust, not even half of it, but you expected something. A shred of trust. A scrap. 

You settle against your backpack as a pillow and zip up your coat all the way to your chin. The minutes unhurriedly pass in awkward, tense silence. 

You realize, bitterly, that you trust him. It’s not fair that he doesn’t trust you in return. A second realization crawls into your mind. And it’s somehow worse than the first. 

The fact that you trust Joel (just a little bit!) means that you’ve let him in. You care what happens to him. You want him to survive. Hell, he’s not even a friend! Yet, you don’t see him as baggage or a liability. You don’t see him as a simple asset to your own survival. And yet….and yet…he’s earned a tiny, tiny piece of your trust.

You’ve broken rule number one: don’t let people get close. You always assumed that rule functioned in a primarily receptive way. As in, other people getting close to you and not the other way around. Your eyebrows draw together in annoyance and frustration. Silence stubbornly stretches onward while Joel watches the door and you watch him.

Quietly, you admit, “I used to work here. Not during the outbreak, though. Like, years earlier.” You stubbornly close your eyes to hide Joel’s face from your view, “an ex-resident told me about the pills. She wasn’t able to…obtain…them before they fired her.”

You flick your tongue across your dry lips.

“We were friends.”

You wonder what happened to her. You wonder if she’s alive in some other QZ. You wonder if she’s clean, or if she’s happy. Finally, you wonder if she’s dead. You try to remember the color of her eyes and are met with a void. An empty lot where a memory lived and then was evicted by your mind to make room for something else.

“She asked me to get them for her…but I never did.” You clear your throat, “we stopped being friends after that.” 

Rule number one is officially and monumentally fucking broken. 

Joel is so goddamn quiet that you suddenly fear he hasn’t been listening. Your eyes snap open. Joel is looking at you–his brow furrowed, his lips gently parted. You’ve seen this expression on his face before. He’s pensive and calm. Usually, this look is reserved for when he’s planning routes of escape.  

He asks softly, “you thought she’d come back for it?”

“I don’t know.” You shrug, “she was technically banned from the hospital, but she could’ve had someone else do it or…” Your eyes trail upward to the spore-marked ceiling, “gone herself wearing a disguise or something? I don’t know.” You say while laughing weakly.

“And that’s why you wanted to come.” He guesses. 

You nod. “I knew there was a chance that I could be wrong. I didn’t want to risk anyone else for that.”

Joel’s mouth thins, “just me.”

“Yeah,” you smile, “just you.”

You sense the fragile truce between Joel and yourself. Satisfied, you close your eyes again and try to settle into a semblance of rest.  

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

Joel shakes your shoulder. Hard. Your mouth instinctively opens to groan or wince and Joel’s hand snaps over your mouth. You groggily blink at him, tugging at his coat sleeve, glaring, but Joel’s expression is pleading. His eyes are big, and sorrowful, and deep, dark brown like roasted coffee. His index finger presses to his lips. You tilt your head and try to speak against his hand. His fingers press a little harder into the meat of your cheek.

A clicking noise echoes down the hallway.

A sour taste of fear floods your senses. Your grip on Joel’s forearm tightens and your eyes widen as if they could somehow absorb all visual stimuli and discover a way out of this new mess. Joel slowly pulls his hand away from your mouth. His eyes side-glance to the window. You’re lucky you had the foresight to clean up some of the glass after your first entry.

He doesn’t need to tell you twice. You establish a new knot onto the hospital bed leg and toss the rope out of the window.

Joel jerks his chin to the blossoming, rosy dawn that spills like silk into the room. You peel your jacket from your shoulders and drape it over the broken glass on the windowsill. You’d rather not accidentally slice open an artery while there’s a clicker loose in the building. You squeeze the rope in your hands. Rule #3: Always run if shit goes sideways. You throw your leg over the ledge.

The rope pulls taunt against the bedpost. The metal scrapes against the linoleum. You and Joel share an identical ‘Oh, fuck!’ expression. 

The clicker runs through the hallways and knocks over who-knows-what along the way. Always run, always run…You freeze on the ledge. Joel moves toward you. Unthinking, unbidden, your hand drops the rope and grabs Joel by the arm. 

You pull him. The world tilts sideways. A sense of vertigo rushes through your body before the ground hits you. All air is forced from your lungs in a painful, tense wheeze. A field of twinkling white stars dance in front of your eyes. Your ribs ache. You suspect more than one of them is bruised from Joel’s weight falling onto yours. 

Did it count as breaking rule number three? You ran, but you ensured Joel’s safety as well as your own. Joel lifts you to your feet. His grip is steady and sure.

“C’mon.” He whispers urgently before pulling you with him. 

Who are you kidding? Rule number three is definitely broken. 

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

You have the shittiest luck in all of Boston. You and Joel make it nearly halfway to the library (which you are planning to go around) before a raider literally runs into you. His body collides with yours, but he’s faster on the draw with his weapon.

His heavy automatic gun swivels and points to you and Joel. 

“Hold it!” There’s a tremor of terror in his voice. You glance around. He’s alone. That’s weird. The raider is wearing a FEDRA issue body vest, camouflage pants, boots, and a visorless motorcycle helmet. His ammunition is strapped over his chest like he’s in a bad 80s action movie.

His watery brown eyes notice the backpacks, “Drop your bags! And any weapons!”

“Easy.” You say, your arms raised, “we’re just passing through. This doesn’t have to get violent.”

“You’re right!” He snaps, “it doesn’t! So, drop the fucking bags and whatever else you have!”

You’re not sure what exactly clues you into the raiders’ next move. Maybe his eyes flick to Joel for a nanosecond. Maybe, you think, he sees Joel as a bigger threat (which is rather misogynistic of him but whatever). 

Your feet move before your brain has time to catch up. 

The bullet bites into the meat of your leg and you eat a face-full of dirt and gravel. The tiny, jagged rocks burn as they scrape across your skin and rip your palms and chin. You try to pinpoint the pain radiating through your body and roll painfully onto your back. Your lungs are wheezing for air. You prod your jeans with your fingertips to find the bullet entry point. Thank God. The femoral artery and vein isn’t punctured. You’d be dead otherwise.

Your wet bloodied fingers crawl along your thigh and finally find the hole. The relief is minor compared to the pain you’re in. You dig your finger and press against the bullet hole in an agonizing, guttural cry. It feels like a clean shot, but you can’t be sure. Your rule number two (don’t get fucking shot!) has been officially broken. And you did it to save Joel. Your world goes blurry with pain and tears. The muted gray scenery takes a moment to re-focus. 

And when it does–you see Joel on top of the raider. His knuckles bloom carnation red. His chest heaves with labored, deep breaths.

“Good.” You murmur, “my risky move paid off.”

“Your risky move nearly got you killed.” He snaps before crouching beside you.

“That’s a weird way to say thank you.” You apply firm pressure to your bullet wound, “he was gonna shoot you.” Weirdly, the thought makes you want to laugh. You bite down on the hysterics bubbling inside your chest. It’s adrenaline. Your body is in shock. You tell this information to yourself like a meteorologist explaining the weather. It helps a little. 

Joel scowls. “I had it handled, doc.” His hands shake as he digs through his bag. You decide not to draw attention to it. 

Your eyebrow ticks upward toward your hairline, “were you going to glower him to death?”

“Enough.” He holds a rolled bandage in his hand, “let me see.”

“I can walk.” You start to protest and flinch when he reaches for you. “We gotta move out of here.”

“You need your hands.” Goddamn, you think, Joel is a stubborn sonofabitch. You reluctantly pull your hand away from your thigh.

“Clean through?” He asks while wrapping your thigh in gauze.

You wince. The pressure is necessary to halt the bleeding, but it still fucking hurts. “I think so. Yeah. Yeah, hopefully. ” A clean shot without any gun shrapnel or broken bones will be a miracle. 

He says, “we’ll get a better look at it later.” You look away from your wrapped leg and meet Joel’s dark gaze. He holds your stare for a beat longer than you expected. You’ve never had much time to look at him–really look at him–and you realize he’s got a handsome, weathered, and tired face. Something inside your chest flutters. 

You look away before he does. “Yeah, alright.” 

~~~~~~~~~~~

Wincing and breathing heavily, you manage to limp your way through the streets and caved-in buildings. You cling to Joel for support when needed until he finds a safe spot to rest. You help him push an old refrigerator in front of a doorway and black spots dance in front of your vision. The pain radiates through your leg like fire. Your face glistens with sweat.

But before you can topple over, Joel catches your shoulder in his familiar, steady grip. One moment he was standing on the opposite side of the fridge and the next moment he was next to you.

He murmurs, “easy now.” And guides you to sit down and extend your leg. You breathe harshly through your nostrils and squeeze your eyes shut.

“We have to stop the bleeding.”

You hear Joel’s bag unzipping, “I know.”

“There’s a kit in my bag.”

“Okay.” You hear your bag being unzipped. “I see it.” He says.

“Apply pressure and…”  You realize distantly that you’re slurring your words, “sterilize the needle…”

 “I know.”  

You feel his hands on your thigh. His palms and fingers encircle the painful space. You can feel the heat of him, the heat of his touch, his bodily warmth. Your eyelashes flutter open. Joel is so close…his head is bowed, his expression grim and focused, and a little sheen of sweat dappled his wrinkled forehead. Joel pours disinfectant onto his hands and briskly rubs them together. Your blood-soaked bandage is pulled away. 

He shines a flashlight into the pulsing, wet wound. Some of your blood has clotted around the entry point in thick, dark red clumps. Your fingers twitch. You want to clean and care for it yourself. You want to stitch it up. But, that would risk too much infection. Your hands aren’t clean. You have to trust Joel and trust that the injury won’t kill you.

“Here, bite down on this.” He says while handing you a faded, colorless cloth bandana. You shove the fabric into your mouth and bite down at the first sharp sting of the needle poking through your skin. 

You reach out and clutch Joel’s shoulder for support. Your fingertips dig into his muscles. Your arm trembles as you squeeze him. Your vision goes soft and blurry with tears. The needle bites and bites and bites until your skin is pulled together again. Your sense of time is completely distorted as you walk between worlds on the verge of passing out while crying out in pain. 

Joel mutters quietly, “don’t worry. I’ve got you, okay? I’ve got you here. You’re gonna be alright.”

You think you mumble, “I know.” but you can’t be sure. 

When Joel is finished, and the wound is wrapped, the strangest thing suddenly happens. Neither of you move. Your hand remains on his tense shoulder. His hands are applying unnecessary additional pressure to your thigh. Your ragged breath syncs to his. Your eyes burn with tears and sweat that’s dripped from your brow. 

Something magnetic draws your gaze to his. He watches you with intensity and something else–something hot and sharp and dark.  

“Are you mad at me?” You ask breathlessly. 

“You did a stupid thing.” He deadpans. 

“He was going to shoot you.” You enunciate every word.

“You don’t know that.”

“I do!” You rush out, your eyes bright from exertion, “I saw it in his face. He was going to shoot you and then me because it would’ve been easier to rob us.”

Joel replies, “he was a scared kid.”

“Fine!” You spit out, “maybe he wasn’t going to shoot us. Maybe he was just going to alert his buddies and then they’d rob us, or kill us, or capture us for their sick amusement. Either way, I don’t regret it Joel, and neither should you!”

The skin under Joel’s collar flushes red, “You got shot!”

“Yeah, well, I’m not dead!” 

Joel jerks away from you as if you’ve slapped him. His hands leave your leg, and he pulls the pocket of pills and tiny, injection vials from your bag. You scowl at his coldness, his distance. He scowls at the plastic baggie.

“I recognize some of these…”

You sigh and lean your head against the wall, “not everything in there is for pain.”

“What else is there?” He says while holding a tiny vial of morphine close to his face, “besides this I mean.”

“Antibiotics.” You say, “my friend would sell them…y’know…to people who couldn’t afford it ‘cause of the scam known as the American healthcare system.”

He nods absentmindedly while procuring some pills for you. And he passes his water bottle to you as well. You take both pills (after visually confirming that one was a low-dosage pain medication, and the other was a general antibiotic). You sit in silence while watching the tense rise and fall of Joel’s shoulder out of the corner of your eye.

You say, “I’m not sorry, Joel.”

Joel chuckles under his breath, “yeah, I know.”

He shifts his body and settles next to you with a loud, heavy sigh. His hands are smeared with your blood, the color bright like red poppies or dark like fresh cherries, depending on the angle of the light.

“We have to wait till nightfall to re-enter QZ…” He says and although there’s gruffness to his tone you think you hear warmth in it too (or its the drugs). “In the meantime, you ought to rest.”

“Mhm, yeah, alright.” 

Your head lolls sideways and your temple lands on Joel’s warm, solid shoulder. To your surprise and secret delight–he doesn’t push you away. He doesn’t relax or lean into you either. Instead, he’s more like a warm statue. But you don’t mind. You broke all your goddamn rules for him, and you can afford to be a little self-indulgent after the past two days. It won’t kill you. 

You’re going to have to establish some new rules once you return to the QZ. (And yes, rule number two should probably remain the same).

Your thoughts drift and carry you into a dreamless, gray void.

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

Joel folds his arms across his chest, unsmiling, and watching you. Turns out–you are a doctor. (Or at least, you were before the known world ended). You crouch beside a sick kid–obviously the kid is not infected, but sick with something that looks like pneumonia based on how hard the kid is trying to breathe. Their skin is glassy with sweat and every few seconds they cough like they’re going to lose a lung. 

Tess gravitates to his side. Her hands slide into the back pockets of her jeans.

She says, “I didn’t even think to consider they were getting the drugs to help other people. I figured it was just more opioids.”

Joel sniffs, “yeah.”

“Did they tell you anything?”

He frowns and shakes his head, “not much.”

“Well, they’re honest. They gave me our agreed upon cut and then some extra.” She glances sidelong at Joel, “would you work with them again?”

He watches you as you talk quietly with someone’s mother. Your expression is smooth and there’s a practiced and comfortable ease in the way you move, the way you talk. Outside the QZ, he considered you a goddamn liability. A nuisance. But, then you took a bullet for him. You dragged him out of a window to flee from a clicker. You risked your life to help these civilians (who probably don’t deserve it). You lean against your cane and walk toward him and Tess.

Joel rubs his jaw and his stubble is scratchy and rough beneath the pads of his fingers. He recalls the weight of your head on his shoulder. He recalls your eyes bright with strain, wide with fear, sparkling with amusement, and narrowed in annoyance. He wants to answer Tess’ question before you reach him. 

“Yeah,” answers Joel, “I would.”

[invisibleraven]

"It's December and you're eating ice-cream?" for Julie and any of her himbos. Plz and thank you

Julie stretched, sighing as she felt the kinks pop in her shoulder, scowling at the history paper that caused it. Too many hours slaving away over Charlemagne, but now it was done, triple proof read and saved so she could hand it in to grumpy old Mrs. Jenkins the following morning. Then the semester would be over and she could enjoy her winter break, finally.

She glanced at the clock and figured it was still the right side of midnight for a snack, creeping down the stairs and wondering if she wanted the fuss of making a grilled cheese or if a simple PB&J would suffice.

Only when she got to the kitchen she saw three familiar figures siting on the island, passing a pint of Chunky Monkey (Carlos's favourite, not hers) around, each with a sticky spoon in their grasp.

"Really guys?"

Alex, Luke, and Reggie all looked up a little guilty before jumping off the counter. "Julie!" they chorused.

"It's Decembe and you're eating ice cream?" she asked, hands on her hips, eyebrow arched in judgement.

"Hey, I'm happy enough we can eat again at all," Reggie said, scooping out another hunk of the frozen treat.

"You'd think we'd be put off eating given the whole dying of food poisoning thing, but nope!" Alex added, swiping the pint to dig out his own share, then passing it to Luke.

"Plus it's not like LA gets overly cold in December, so really any time of year is fit for ice cream," Luke concluded, draining the pint of the last of it's delicacy and tossing it into the garbage with a swish, fist pumping when it went in.

Julie rolled her eyes, and moved around them, gone were they days where she could walk through them. Sure they were still ghosts, but they were tangible now, and apparently, hungry after being denied for so long.

"Well you three are the ones explaining to Carlos where his favourite treat went when he comes looking for it after his game tomorrow," she replied, pulling out the bread and fixings for her sandwich.

"Aw, little dude won't mind," Reggie said, licking the sticky residue still lingering on his digits. "He loves us!"

"And Alex, aren't you lactose intolerant?" Julie asked.

The drummer shrugged, then paled as his stomach let out a loud gurgle. "Oh come on! I'm a ghost it shouldn't count!"

"There's Lact-Aid in the medicine cabinet," she called as Alex rushed off, wrinkling her nose at the thought of what dairy would do to his system.

"We'll replace Carlos' ice cream with some of our gig money boss, promise," Luke assured her, sending her that boyish smile of his and Julie let her annoyance melt.

"See that you do," she replied, hip checking him out of the way as she constructed her sandwich.

"Can I get one of those too?" Reggie asked, his best puppy dog eyes on display.

"Reggie you're allergic to peanuts!" Luke protested. "And I know for a fact you do not wanna go get your very expired EpiPen from Alex's fanny pack right now."

Reggie stuck his tongue out at Luke. "Julie's using sunflower butter!"

"Julie is also not making you a sandwich," she stated.

Reggie shrugged. "Fine, I'll make my own later."

Luke batted his eyes at her in an exaggerated fashion. "What about me boss? Do I get a sandwich?"

Julie rolled her eyes once more. "No. Maybe try that move on Reggie and he'll make you one. I'm taking this to my room and eating it before I hit the hay. It's a school night after all."

"Oh did you finish your paper after?" Reggie asked, opening the fridge once more, but merely to hand her the orange juice so she could pour herself a glass, receiving a nod in thanks.

"Finally," she replied. "Now it's just handing it in and a day full of teacher's putting in minimum effort until early dismissal."

"Then we can work on our new song!" Luke exclaimed.

"Or we could let Julie relax and have the girl's night she planned with Flynn," Julie piped up. "Saturday we'll do some song writing before our gig at the Toys for Tots drive."

Luke grumbled but nodded while Reggie bounced a little on his toes. "I can't wait! I've got my antlers ready and everything!"

"Dude, you know we don't have to dress up right?" Luke asked.

"Tis the season!" Reggie protested.

"You're Jewish!" Luke retorted back.

"Well yeah, but Chanukah is already over, and I celebrated the secular Christmas stuff with my dad's side of the family too," Reggie replied.

"Reggie you are more than welcome to dress up, I have a festive dress picked out, the other two Grinches can wear what they like," Julie assured him. "Now, I'm off to enjoy my snack, please keep the fridge raiding to a minimum, and one of you check on Alex in like five."

"Night Julie!" the boys chorused, and as Julie passed the bathroom she heard a weak echo of it from Alex.

Her guys might be weird, and a little self destructive Julie thought, but she loved them all the same and she couldn't wait to spend the holiday season with them-though she was gonna make sure to keep Alex far far away from the eggnog.

[writingbyricochet]

AUTHOR (RE)INTRODUCTION: @WRITINGBYRICOCHET

Having been on Writeblr for ten months and with a recent uptick of followers, I thought it was due for a refresh of my intro! Fingers crossed this one will be a bit more informative about what kind of a writer I am than my first one!

— THE AUTHOR; ♡ —

Megan, Meg, or Lucky (she/her)

20s, Taiwanese American, Eastern Time Zone

Interacts from @luckyricochet

Ask/tag game friendly

In love with history, art, and romance itself

— WRITING; ♡ —

Primarily romance, historical fiction (or historically-inspired), fantasy, fanfiction

Aspirational: Dark academia, gothic

Favorite tropes: friends to lovers, hurt/comfort, sunshine/grump pairings, mutual pining

I love prose that is moody, atmospheric, and deeply emotive in its examination of the human condition almost to the point of romanticism. Besides the universal aims of a solid plot and characters, these are the qualities I want my own work to reflect the most.

— WORKS IN PROGRESS; ♡ —

Between Heaven and Earth

low fantasy/adventure; intro post, tag, wip page

Raised as a princess and heir apparent to the Velitovan throne, Laeisa Durecane's world is suddenly turned upside down when a diplomatic mission turns deadly and her father the King and his entire delegation are killed, leaving Laesia the sole survivor. Having to now abandon peace talks that would have formalized independence for her country, Laesia is forced into exile and takes refuge in the home of a young farmer. The distant rural district she now finds herself in is a far cry from the life of privilege she once enjoyed, but she at least has plenty of time to plot exactly how she will reclaim her throne and finally liberate Velitova.

Tomorrow is a Place

low fantasy/romance; intro post, tag

Do you believe in love at first sight? It’s fine if you don’t—that’s not how it happens in this story, at least not entirely. Even though Merity first takes a shine to the boy next door in childhood, it might have stayed an unspoken crush forever if not for a fateful decision that leaves Fendley wracked by his conscious and Merity his sole confidant. 𝔄𝔪𝔬𝔯 𝔳𝔦𝔫𝔠𝔦𝔱 𝔬𝔪𝔫𝔦𝔞. (Companion work to Between Heaven and Earth)

Poco a Poco

contemporary romance; intro post, tag

Welcome to Fujiwara Academy of Music, the most prestigious music conservatory in Japan. Balancing academics, work, and an attempt to win a lucrative scholarship is hard enough, but when Rika and Masahiro end up as duet partners, Rika has one more challenge to deal with: Breaking through to the academy’s best musician. It’s just as well that she keep trying, though. After all, chamber music is considered intimate for a reason.

Where Paradise Died and Lived

historical romance/the pacific au fanfic, intro post, tag

The attack on Pearl Harbor takes place far from most Americans’ homes, but for Sophie Holland, it’s right in her backyard. The idyllic tropical isle she knows is now a war zone, where death, suspicion, and martial law are a fact of daily life. With all of America mobilized for the war effort, Sophie joins the Women’s Air Raid Defense to do her part. The job is a welcome diversion that mostly keeps her from her own self-destructive habits, but it’s 1943 now, and her demons only become harder to ignore when the heroes of Guadalcanal—including one new 1st Lieutenant—arrive in Honolulu for rest and recovery.

Other WIPs that I have not formally introduced but am working on in some capacity are here and here. Please send me an ask if you would like to be added to any tag lists!

— CODA; ♡ —

If you've made it this far, thank you for reading! I would love to make new friends and connect with writers who have similar interests, so if any of the above is your cup of tea, please interact and I'll check out your blog! Farewell for now~

[sparrow-in-boots]

this is my Bill Miles rant.

this is it. this is what you're about to read, yipee hurray! i'm about to rawdog this pustule of a man on a table, and i'm dissecting why he's such a tentative yet counterproductive evolutionary reaction to a shitty situation that ends up causing more problems than it fixes. yknow, like a pustule.

this is gonna be long and rough (honestly the innuendos just write themselves don't they), about 3.7k words long to be precise. this thing needed headings ffs. so take your time with it is what i’m saying xvx

also if you haven't already, I'd recommend checking out my previous Daniel and Lucy posts for further context as i'll bring back stuff from them in here. call it a series what the heck.

now, onto the Billiam

I could do a whole thing here where i explain and contextualize where he's coming from, and how the way he's worked for the brotherhood and later raised his son ultimately made sense from his point of view, etc etc. but i think we're all familiar with that exercise. 'Understandable' doesn't make it right or even smart, and anyone with some understanding of generational trauma and dealing with an emotionally stunted parent already knows the drill here. I'm not gonna break any new ground delving into it so i won't bother. We got bigger fish to fry here.

I will establish though, Bill is a man of action, few words and even fewer expression of emotions. I can draw a direct parallel to the Levantine brotherhood and their strict hierarchy and the ultimate authority of their grandmaster. Not mentor mind you, that's a title for later in the brotherhood's history. Al Mualim is the master, the leader, the head of the order, and his word is law and the tenets and maxim are sacred. If he tells you you should die for his will, then you will do it and gladly, because you're serving the brotherhood's higher purpose. I'm not here to argue the morals and ethics of that, just saying it like it is.

Bill may not be as strict as all that, in fact he's very much not and he couldn't if he tried (and i gotta say, i don't think he would try), but he certainly reflects that resolute certainty in the brotherhood's beliefs and what is needed to face their enemy. The templars are everywhere, they have their grasp in everything, and so you must be willing to give everything to push them back.

In his eyes, all the hardships that he put Desmond through in his youth were necessities. For the brotherhood, they are at war, and as such he saw it as an act of love and care to prepare Desmond for the worst. But he was so lost in a world of casualties and soldiers that he forgets all too often that people are, people.

Soldiers are human beings first and foremost, and to strip them of humanity may be argued as a necessity of war but it strips the brotherhood of its most fundamental goals. Human lives, human worth, humanity itself, are worth preserving and protecting in all its forms, that's the freedom they fight for. It's messy and complicated but it's beautiful and it's to be celebrated, not suppressed. To deny humanity for the sake of neat and clean order and hierarchy is what the templars want, and you can't fight that by becoming it. You fight it by opposing it. That's why Al Mualim turned, and that's why Altair had to kill him and rework the brotherhood from the ground up, even if he hadn't been twisted by the Apple. And that's why I wanna draw out the parallel between Al Mualim to Bill first.

BILL HAD A FARM EEAH EEAH YOH

In AC1 we're served a narrative that the templars and the brotherhood are not so different and they both want the same thing, "peace, in all things", but they have opposing views on how to achieve it and that's where their conflcit lies. Simple enough premise, and they do a pretty good job of showing how those two militaristic orders view the world and how to achieve their goals, and in what form those orders now exist in the modern world. Back then it made sense for the Farm to be an isolationist cult, it was a perfect mirror for the isolated Masyaf fortress and their secretive nature, but as the narrative developed in the next games, that contextualization just grew more and more flawed. The brotherhood had grown, branched out, coexisted in various time periods and cultural contexts, and it no longer made sense for them to be a remote cultish commune in the middle of nowhere.

Which leads me to believe that it was pretty much Bill's idea from the start. If you'll allow me to extrapolate some character beats, it's no secret that he's got a deep respect for the brotherhood, and I'd assume that includes Altair and Ezio given how their mentorship stirred the entire brotherhood into new eras. They are legendary figures in their history, they got statues of them in the brotherhood headquarters, it's really not subtle.

As such, one can see him trying his best to lean on their teachings, if not try to emulate them a bit. He's secretive, resolute, stubborn, all qualities we see of Altair and Ezio in the Animus and were likely exagerated over the centuries. In The Fall (comic), we see that the brotherhood had a whole secret library worth of knowledge before it was ransacked during the Great Purge, and it's not too far to assume that Bill spent some time digging through those archives in his youth. He was born in the brotherhood after all.

Grueling training, blind trust in your betters and the creed, secretiveness, emotional distance. All things we see in both the Farm and the Levantine brotherhood, a holdover from the smaller scope of AC1 that leads me to think this was a bit of Bill's bout of hero worshipping to maybe recreate the conditions that created the assassins of old. We don't know what the rest of the brotherhood thought of the Farm exactly, i can't find or recall any particular bit of lore that addresses it except from an outside perspective; all we get is Desmond's own comments on his experience based on his memories in ACR. Even when he speaks of it to others, they give no opinion of their own on the matter.

Bill might be so focused on the environment that created an assassin like Altair, that he forgets that the man then went over to rework the brotherhood to keep what happened to him from happening again. He fostered curiosity and understanding in his order, leading to many changes that carried on through the ages to the modern day. It was Altair learning to question and doubt his master, the man he'd follow blindly and without question once, that led to the survival and growth of the order. In fact, Altair puts his trust blindly in his assassins to protect him when he goes to confront Abbas, to keep him safe and help restore the order once again. Not the other way around. And when he saw that same curiosity and doubts in his son, he sought to stamp it out instead of seeing it for what it was.

Desmond left not just because he was terrified (his words not mine) of the training, the harshness, and the bland food. If we're being honest, he's found that in spades in the outside world too. No, he left because the Farm asked for blind trust and respect that was not shown to him in return. When he asked questions, they ignored or waved him away, and so as they dismissed his interest in truly understanding what was being taught, he gave them the same.

I'll give credit where it's due, he does apologize and offers a truce to Desmond. Grated, he doesn't get much of a chance to show how much he's changed exactly, especially in the minutiae of daily life with the team, and it's a rather wishy-washy apology overall. But it's something and more than most people get in real life. Desmond is gracious enough to take it and even does his best to give him a chance, which is more than most anyone would, and that says more about him than Bill.

Regardless, I want to chalk up this apology as rushed writing rather than Bill being actively manipulative by saying what Desmond would like to hear. I don't want to give the writers credit for writing some 4D chess mind game powers onto him. I'm not even a fan of the "two Bills on Lucy's emails" thing, that's just poor retcon to fit the "Lucy is a templar" plotline.

the tangent - YOU GOT MAIL

Speaking of, i wanna get into that for a moment. As far as i could dig up, we had no confirmation of why Lucy had to die besides fan theories, and then the ACR dlc dropped. It was further commented on AC3 and most importantly, several retcons that included Lucy being a sneaky templar were released in the Initiates web project. That included much of the Project Siren lore, reactions to her death among the templars, her leaving the memory core for Vidic's goons to find, and of course the retcon that she was in contact with two separate Williams. All this to say, we can't say for sure if the writers knew how they wanted to handle her cliffhanger death in ACB even when ACB itself came out. So this?

That was meant to be our introduction to Bill's character. Those are the words of a man who sent a 16yo girl into the world to fully fend for herself on her own against a corporation so powerful it's almost impossible to comprehend. And now that she's back among the community that dropped her into such a grueling situation, this is his reaction to her showing care and concern for another human being, who by the way is his own son?? Holding up all that she's suffered through over her head like compassion would invalidate all that?? I sincerely lack the words.

Well, actually Desmond said it best.

Right then, Bill really isn't better than them. He's just another cold calculating asshole who's so set on a nebulous future victory that he refuses to see the lives he's trampling on to get there. He's done it to Lucy, to Clay, to Desmond, and even to Shaun and Rebecca to an extent, and they are just the ones we know of. The Great Purge is no excuse for this behavior, that's not the time to grow apart, but closer and show sympathy and kindness to his fellow assassins. Some distant war general figure moving faceless pieces on the board is the last thing they want right then, or might even need.

We can see in this one email just how dire the situation is with how Rebecca even refuses to put a subject on the email. Opening up and being vulnerable is something to be done in quiet and secret, almost like it's a burden to show how much things are affecting you, and that's so messed up. Even in the army, you can see gallows humor and dark jokes to cope with the horrors soldiers go through, but we don't even get that amongst the team. When you approach Lucy as Desmond, it's often him showing her kindness and comfort and reassuring her through her doubts and fears, and she doesn't hesitate to share them with him and I think it has a lot to do with how they are both apart from Bill's influence. Lucy has her own cans of worms to deal with, but between her and Desmond, there's a measure of closeness and trust you don't see with the others.

I know, your boss is not exactly the person you might want to pour your heart out to, but come on! How powerful and rallying would it be to see your leader across the room and feel comfortable and safe enough to just sit together and talk?? It can't be overstated how much it matters that any movement that places itself against the current system must prove itself as... different from that system. It's the literal bare minimum here. If you say you care about humanity but you won't care for the humanity of your members, then... what are you even doing?

tangent done - BACK TO THE BIG PICTURE

I wanna take a quick step back for a bit. AC3 portrays Bill as a man who sees his actions as justified, who sees that his ends justify the means. It leads us down a doomed horseshoe theory that coupled with the deeply complicated historical time in the ancestral plotline, makes for a very murky and confusing narrative. The more you look at it, the less clear or discernible the themes get. It raises a lot of complex points but never closes or even shows where they are going with them.

Now, horseshoe theory is an erroneous concept that has been critiqued to hell and back, and to use it as a way to tie the modern and ancestral timelines in an attempt to create a "'we're all the same" theme is... the worst possible way to go about it. Doubly so when it’s often appropriated by right-wing pundits to vilify their political opponents. You can't make the protagonists ponder on how to hold hands and sing kumbaya with a death cult to avoid Armageddon while the writers are going "bUt ThEy ArE bAd ToO" because of one guy (who you're also attempting to redeem) who deems the inherent human need for connection as "being too weak". Even that is enough of a mess, but add to it the whole deconstruction of the war of independence and the sheer horror that the colonies were for the indigenous people back then and all the way up to this day... Where are the writers even going here??

We get more conversations about how allying with the templars is not a possibility than any proper address on Lucy or the entire situation that led to her turning, much less who's to blame, how can they avoid this in the future, how the protagonists even feel about all this. Just excuses for why it had to happen, there was no other way, let’s move along now, nothing to see here. In AC2 and ACB we got some neat and tidy convos that made sense to be bite-sized, concise little bits of characterization and presenting themes and concepts for the worldbuilding. But in AC3, we get convos that could have been entire cutscenes, whole dialogues amongst the characters to reckon with all that's been happening. Instead we waste cutscene time with fucking Juno and the Isu failed attempts that don't fucking matter to the story they should be focused on telling.

Which is why I want to talk about Haytham.

THE HUMAN PROBLEM

I bring him up because AC3 clearly wants to parallel his and Connor's relationship with Bill's and Desmond's. Which, personally i think it gives off the feeling that it's supposed to be a "hey it could be worse" at Desmond. I think we can agree that's a sucky attitude to have towards anyone who's suffered family trauma like Desmond did, and it also kind of diminishes the weight of the colonial era storyline. But since the game wants to talk about it, then let's talk about it.

Haytham is one more indoctrinated assassin-to-templar character, which is it's own mirror to Daniel and Lucy, but this is not about them. Haytham is cold, pragmatic, relentless and so calculating. He was warmer and kinder when he was younger, even a rather gray character, but all that is lost the longer he spends as the templar grandmaster. He did care for Connor in his own way and wanted to bring him to their side if only so that he wouldn't have to kill him, but if it came to it, he would have as we see in the game multiple times.

And as far as the game is concerned, that's also Bill. They are both two men who got worn down into their respective roles and lost sight of what's truly important. Except, we don't know that. We see it with Haytham plain as day in the prologue, but we don't know how Bill was in his younger years. We know about a few missions he took that involved the Animus project, but besides that we don't know what kind of man or even child he was. We don't even know what his dynamic with other people is, how he is with his wife, does he have family? Siblings, parents, cousins, anything? Does he even care? What about friends and colleagues? Hell, we don't even know what he's like in action, the Cairo mission happens off-screen and Desmond handles their escape with the Apple. All we see of him in AC3 is how he's an emotionally stunted bossy guy, and anything else is told, never shown.

Haytham however, gets a prologue and several missions in-game, and even a whole side novel from his point of view.

As such, I'm reluctant to extrapolate the kind of man Bill is based off of Haytham alone, because again they not only exist in very different times and contexts, but there's a severe imbalance in screentime. What I can do however, is compare their "ending" as it were.

Haytham dies by the hands of his own son. He had the chance to put his ego aside and listen to his son, maybe put his cards on the table and explain the misunderstanding about the attack on Connor's village, but he didn't. He decided to hold that information until it was the most convenient to him, and then try to use it to manipulate Connor into switching sides. He refused to put aside the grandmaster role and step up as a father, or even as a man who cared about someone else's feelings. Whatever his feelings for Ziio and his son, they came second to the templars and their goals, and that was his death sentence. To his dying breath, he held true to that mentality.

Bill however, despite apologizing, hasn't shown much of the work to change. He and the brotherhood remains stagnant and withering, and in the face of the person he's hurt the most and is still alive to make amends to, he remains distant and reticent. All the efforts to connect and deepen whatever there is between them needs to come from Desmond, and every attempt to reach out to the outside gets shut down. It's Desmond refusing to give up on him that saves his ass even! Given the state of their relationship, that fucking SUCKS.

It shouldn't be up to Desmond to fix what Bill wrecked back at the Farm, and portraying otherwise, like Desmond is the one who messed everything up, is ass backwards. The brotherhood and Bill should be bending into knots to convince him to stay and that things aren't as they were once, but Desmond decided to stay long before. Because one the templars suck, two Desmond got the proof he always had asked for as a child and three, Lucy showed him kindness and understanding. One might even go so far as to say that it was living Altair's own rebirth period is what reassured those questions he had and gave him true understanding, but Lucy gave him hope in a hopeless situation.

That's powerful not just as a narrative point but as a theme for the assassins as a whole. The games continue to portray the brotherhood as a beacon of hope against the oppression and tyranny of the templars (even for the modern days through the glyph puzzles in AC2 and ACB) but Bill, the face of the brotherhood as the de-facto mentor, is himself as a tyrant.

One would expect AC3 to show him either follow Haytham's fate or change himself to avoid it, but we're denied that kind of development. Even in the Initiates web project and subsequent games, Bill's change is kind of handwaved. He lost the will to fight and vanished but then he saw the desecration of his son he barely showed to give much of a shit for, and now he's back and Mentor again? He's awkward and trying to be approachable in Origins but he's still rather overconfident and posturing too much for his own good.

(I mean, sitting within range of Layla's blade before she's even out of the Animus? Bold fucker.)

If they truly wanted to grapple with Bill and his place and role in the story they spun us, which I assume they do since he's the one who does the intro to the AC3 game, then they should have DONE THAT. Make him face the consequences of his choices and actions, and make the team hold him responsible for it. Make him soften and change, not just give us a pitiable hug and a meek little "Son..." just before Desmond sacrifices himself. Seriously, what gives?

One of the biggest failures in AC3 is their horrid sense of narrative prioritizing with the modern timeline. They tried to close too many threads at once with not nearly enough screentime, and wasted time on needless fluff. But most importantly, I think that the games after ACB have a human problem, in that they refuse to acknowledge the humanity in the modern timeline.

Bill could have been an incredible display of change, that the templars aren't the superior mentality that can turn anyone who spends long enough around them like some brain-corroding virus. Show that the brotherhood still has a chance and that no one is above humbling themselves or beyond bettering themselves, and most of all that the brotherhood can indeed bring hope in a hopeless situation, and community and understanding can make a difference. And since they are so touchy about murder all of a sudden, also show that the assassins are capable of doing more than just killing people.

But we don’t. We don’t get any of that. We’re once again denied of any development that would make any kind of statement that would shift the status quo and make them pay attention to the modern timeline and what they’re doing with it. And worst of all, we're denied any development that would bring us closer emotionally to these characters and make us ponder our place in the world and in history. Cus god forbid the series that has “history as its playground” learn anything from it.

[my-excellent-bicycle]

Dave Gorman - "America Unchained" (2006)

Another long review of a Britcom book I recently read, so be prepared to see lots of words below:

A few months back, I decided to watch Dave Gorman's "Are You Dave Gorman" TV standup special, which aired in 2001, cause I heard it was a super-influential piece of comedy history that had such a batshit crazy premise I couldn't possibly pass it up. And turns out I didn't just enjoy it, I loved it so much that I immediately went, "I'm gonna have to check out everything else this guy has done." (I of course knew him from Taskmaster first, but his performance there wasn't nearly as entertaining as his other work).

This takes me to "America Unchained," his 2006 nonfiction book and documentary film. When browsing his site for inspiration on what project I should check out next, my rationale was, I'm an American, he did a project where he drove across America without purchasing anything from chain businesses/corporations. It was a no-brainer.

To quickly sum up the book's synopsis: Dave initially toured America in the mid-2000s, which he found to be a miserable, depressive experience. Bouncing from chain hotel to chain hotel in major cities, the constant homogeny of places he was visiting felt nauseating. To make up for this, he set out to take a proper trip through America on his own terms, by purchasing a car in California and traveling all the way to the other side of the country, without touching a single chain business. Along the way, he had his friend Stef behind the camera filming a documentary about the journey, before she dropped out halfway through due to a bad back. She was notably replaced by Andy Devonshire, who you may recognize as one of the Andys on Taskmaster. (Dave described Andy in the book as being a really busy man... in 2006. Just imagine how much busier he is now!)

About 500 pages later, I can confidently say that I loved the hell out of this book, and it gave me the strong feelings of euphoria near the end that "Are You Dave Gorman" gave me when I finished watching it. Just like that aforementioned project, "America Unchained" was a gigantic undertaking that cost lots of money, and the inspiration behind it was purely out of passion, rather than trying to get something out of it with an audience in mind.

I remember listening to Dave's appearance on the "Comedian's Comedian" podcast, where he complained that lots of large scale projects-turned-standup shows he'd seen were solely created out of a need to make something entertaining. The reason why Are You Dave Gorman worked so well, and why America Unchained also succeeds, is because the audience knows he started working on these projects because he already wanted to do them for himself. The fact Dave wanted to drive the length of America without using a chain business out of personal hubris and not because he wanted to make a specific audience happy makes the journey much easier to become invested in.

Back to the actual content of the book, though. On every page, I truly could feel the intense emotions running through Dave's head while driving through the country. As one would expect, the largest obstacle he had was finding gas stations that weren't owned by corporations. I was shocked at how lucky they got, even though their luck wasn't necessarily bountiful. Every time the journey would hit a wall, like their car breaking down several times, or the constant fear of running out of fuel, the way Dave would describe his feelings and desperation to finish the project made it hard to put the book down.

In one passage I'll never forget, Dave, a known vegetarian, was so distressed by the departure of his camerawoman Stef halfway through the project that he gave up hope, and forced himself to binge-eat meat from McDonalds and Wendy’s until he vomited, both out of disgust for the project seemingly failing and him actually hating the taste of meat. So yeah, for lack of a better term, shit got real.

But one thing I loved the most about this book was the way Dave had a genuine curiosity about the lives of strangers. Something I really liked about Are You Dave Gorman was how he didn't treat the many Dave Gormans he met purely as statistics to reach a goal, but also asked them questions about their personal lives, and gave the audience insight into who they were as people, rather than seeing them as faceless strangers. This time, he described American business owners who had their backs against the wall, existing within a sea of corporations and chained businesses. He spoke to people who survived hardships, and those who were still dealing with the harsh reality of being an independent business in this late-stage capitalistic world. In some cases, like Taylor's Fountain in Oregon (an ice cream/dessert restaurant so beautifully described I wish I could live there forever), he encountered Mom and Pop businesses on their very last legs. Oh, and the book is extremely funny too.

I won't spoil the rest of the journey though if you want to pick the book up, or watch the documentary for yourself. I just finished watching the documentary version an hour or so ago, and while I very much enjoyed it, the whole thing definitely paled into comparison with the written version. They cut out two of my favorite passages in the book: one where Dave breathtakingly ranted against the craziness of the Mormon religion while staying in Salt Lake City (including a tour of the LDS church with an actual Mormon), and another describing the rollercoaster of emotions he felt when a lovely shop owner was revealed to be an extreme homophobe. It sort of felt like watching a film adaptation of a novel you love, only in this case the novel was an expansion of the film.

Because I usually can't sit still after consuming something I enjoy, I went on Dave's website to see what he had on there, and I also had the urge to write to him. He had an email form on his website, and I typed out an entire message telling him about how much I loved the book, only to get an error message when hitting submit. I guess the form doesn't work anymore, which was a shame, but I saved the message anyway.

Hello Dave,

I recently finished reading your 2006 book "America Unchained" (and watched the documentary afterwards), and I wanted to say I loved it so much. I'm currently living in [redacted US state], so it was super fascinating to see a British comedian I enjoy trek across the country in the manner that you did. The book was super well-written, and I greatly admired the passion you had for this project. I'm also curious if you've bothered to check in on some of these businesses since the documentary and book were completed? I was relieved to see the Dog Bark Park in Idaho was still open and thriving, but perhaps lots of these unchained businesses didn't survive past the late-2000s recession. The entire project seems like an undertaking that can't possibly be accomplished today, considering how difficult it was 17 years ago.

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I loved both versions of "America Unchained," and I'm looking forward to checking out your other works when I get around to them!

Maybe I'll reach out to him on Twitter if I'm feeling brave. Honestly, if this book showed me one thing, it's that a giant bed-and-breakfast shaped like a beagle exists in Idaho, and I'm making it my life's mission to stay there before I die.

[chxrrylime]

I'm an adult (sobs), cis male reader

hmmmm, loved your last work so... how about another part to it? I wonder what would happen next (what other kinky games would kurt think of) and what would happen when the livestream officially is about to end

if you wish to have a break from kurt, then I have another suggestion for you: flayed!steve abducting you and planning to give you over to the Mind Flayer, but he ends up being possessive instead when he sees how pretty you are :))

if you want a break from all the dark topics, then a soft-dom steve who guides you through your first time sounds like a sweet deal too

hope any of these interest you! + intrigued to read your works <3

I decided to go with the second one this time around, but I'll definitely do the other two at some point, so keep an eye out! ;)

↪ 2275 words — 18+ / SMUT — tw for dub-c0n, mind control, breeding mention, mild pain play, crying, and claiming.

Content tags — cis male submissive reader / cis male dominant flayed!Steve / fingering, analingus, penetrative sex, anal sex, dirty talk.

At first, there was a line drawn—nearly visible in the abscess of his infected mind, figurative and dark but at least present. He knows something is making him sick and he’s terrified—he can’t tell anyone, he has to take care of it himself. He’s supposed to be the brave one, the one that comes out on top. He stops coming into work and no one bothers to check up on him. When he’s not haunting the streets of Hawkins at night, he sits and stares at the wall, emotionally drained and mind so numb that the line starts to blur.

It twists and coils until he can’t kid himself anymore—can’t find himself anymore—can’t look himself in the mirror and think “it’s not me doing this,” anymore. The more bodies he brings kicking and screaming down into the decrepit steelworks, the more his own thoughts intertwine with that dense swarm of take, spread, build—the more he realizes he is the sickness. 

It’s nearly 10 PM when you hear the little bell over the door ding. You heave a sigh, dropping the box you’d been trying and failing to heft onto a high shelf with a loud thunk. You call out, voice carrying from the backroom you’re in to the main part of the store, “we’re closed!”

You’re met with a heavy silence before the sound of light footsteps follows. You roll your eyes, cursing your manager's insistence on leaving the front door unlocked until the employees leave at 10:30, despite the store closing a full hour before that. It always leads to people coming in to grab last-second snacks—it was some shitty little corner antique store, but there was a cooler with drinks and a rack of candy and chips up by the register. Stoners and the stragglers of local ragers often would come by, since Melvald’s was closed at this time and the gas station down the street overcharged for everything.

It’s worse now, that you’re alone in the store. The girl you were supposed to be closing with had called out last second, and you hadn’t been able to get a hold of anyone else to cover. 

You roll your shoulders and let out another huff as you exit the stock room.

“Did you hear me—?” you start, annoyed, frowning when you find the store empty. You step onto your tiptoes to glance over some of the shelves before moving towards the front window to peer outside, leaning against the large sill. You catch movement in the reflection of the glass, eyes snapping up to see—Steve Harrington?

It’s like bullet time, as your eyes meet.

The reflection is distorted, fractured by the light and intersecting with the scenery outside, but you recognize him from school—you’d been infatuated with him after all, letting your eyes wander in the locker room showers, staring from across classrooms and cafeterias. You’d watched and overanalyzed and hoped to God maybe he was a little curious, a little adventure-seeking—would lock eyes with you one fateful night and the rest would be history. Of course, that night never came.

After Nancy Wheeler, his face lost the usual sneer and overconfident smirk he’d carry around the halls, replaced by a tired exasperation, a gentle fondness for the simple things around him—senior year had seen the new reign of the one and the only Billy Hargrove. The king is dead, long live the king, et cetera, et cetera.

Though, the reflection looking at you now, right over your shoulder, is like an ice-cold shock—that reminder of King Steve in all his glory. He looks twisted, exhausted, angry. He looks like he hasn’t slept in weeks and could still kill you with one hand. You swallow thickly.

Everything finally moves again, all catching up far too quickly as one of his big hands clamps down at the back of your neck, the other grabbing your wrist as he yanks you to face him. You cry out at the bruising grip, legs giving out as he digs his fingers into some spot at the base of your skull, an overwhelming tingling numbness rushing through your body.

You fall forward against his chest, letting out a pained gargled noise caught halfway between a gasp and a moan. The hand gripping your wrists moves to your waist, your own hands grasping at his sides to try and keep yourself from completely collapsing. The smell of copper and petrichor overwhelms you as your face presses against the crook of his neck. 

He stumbles back at the sudden weight, caught off guard by you pressing so heavily into him. The hand at the back of your neck moves up to tangle in your hair, the one at your waist moving around to grab at your ass. You moan when he yanks your head back, gazes locking. The chestnut brown of his eyes has gone an inky black, pupils indistinguishable from their irises. His face softens out, his lips slightly parted as his brow furrows.

“I’m… not…” he tries, speaking like his tongue is too big in his mouth, “fuck,” he finally breathes, eyes squeezing shut for only a moment—like he’s thinking really hard about something.

A new thought floods his brain—animal and base: take, claim, own.

His eyes snap back open, his body going rigid like a livewire as you’re suddenly pulled and pushed, manhandled and shoved against the counter—the perfect height for you to bend over at the waist, that grip in your hair pressing hard, pushing you cheek-first against the cold marble top with a thud. 

He twists one of your arms behind your back, his other hand releasing your hair and sliding down to yank at your jeans, pulling your boxers along with them, down below your ass cheeks in one fell swoop. You let out a whimpering moan, mindlessly pressing your hips back to grind against his denim-clad crotch. 

It’s like a wet dream come true—your brain too muddled with stupid horny teenager hormones and some other niggling feeling tickling at the back of your mind to overthink the circumstances—the how or the why. Especially not when you feel his hard cock pressing up against you, the hand that pulled your pants down sliding over your ass, inexplicably slick as he brushes a wet digit around your hole, circling, teasing.  

“Steve—” you gasp, “ah! Haa~” you can’t help but keen, squirming as his middle finger pushes past the tight ring of muscle. The feeling is familiar enough—you’re used to nights alone, biting your pillow as you fuck two fingers into yourself—but it’s so much more exquisite with someone else doing it—with Steve doing it. 

He leans forward, scraping his teeth against your shoulder blades, practically growling at the breathy whines and moans you make. He bites down, not hard enough to break the skin but hard enough to make you jolt, as he pushes another finger in. There’s a slight burn, too much too fast, but it only makes your cock kick where it hangs heavy between your thighs, dripping pre onto the white tiled floor.

“Such a slut… you’re so easy, aren't you?” He chides, lips hot and wet against the skin of your back. He licks a stripe down your spine, the hand gripping your wrist moving to place your arm against the counter before his palm continues down. You feel his hands spread wide against your ass cheeks and roll your head enough to peek down, nearly panting as you watch Steve kneel down behind you, eyes fixed on your fluttering hole as he spreads your cheeks apart.

“W-wha’r’ you—?” You slur, cutting off with a loud broken whine as his tongue licks over your pucker, lapping wetly before he’s pressing further forward, digging the tip of his tongue against you until your hole gives. You let out little ‘ah, ah, ah’s’ as he thrusts his tongue into you, swirling and sucking at your tight clutch. His tongue feels…long—not inhuman, not enough to be worrying—but enough for you to notice. 

Your neglected cock bobs between your legs, red and angry. You scramble to wrap a hand around it, desperate for some stimulation only for one of Steve’s hands to shoot out and crush your wrist against the side of the counter. You groan in pain as the bone grinds against the sharp edge.

“Be good or he—we’ll,” he stutters, growling frustratedly, “I’ll make this hurt,” his voice sounds off, an octave lower than what you remember before he speaks again, his tone back to normal, though hesitant—like he’s unsure, or trying to calm a wild animal backed into a corner, “you make such pretty noises, baby, you’re so beautiful, you’re, mmmfh—” he moans, pressing his mouth back against your twitching hole, wet and dripping with saliva and what you can only hope is some kind of lube.

You grip the edge of the countertop as he presses two fingers in alongside his tongue, moaning lude and loud against you like he’s the one feeling it—feeling the wet muscle sliding in and out of his hole. You mindlessly realize there’s a tickling feeling climbing up your spine. You’d be convinced something was crawling across your skin if it didn’t feel so good, feel so overwhelming and hungry—hot liquid pleasure seeping into the back of your mind.

You feel fuzzy, time becoming less linear as he licks into you. Your prick throbs, your hole aching to be stuffed full. You feel desperate, needy—completely overtaken by some alien desire to be claimed. Your mouth is moving before you can even process the words you want to say.

“Steve, Steve, please, God, please—” you moan particularly loud when his tongue pulls away, quickly replaced by a third finger, “want you—need you in me.”

You hear a low chuckle from behind you and whimper in response. His voice is dark again when he speaks, “I’m already in you,” he says simply—as if he’s idly chatting about the weather. He crooks his fingers to rub against your prostate, your hole clenching tight and cock jumping at the feeling, “see?”

“No, no~!” you whine, “please, please, Stevie. W-want your…” you moan out in frustration, biting your lip, pressing your sweaty forehead against the cool marble of the countertop in an attempt to steady your thoughts, “need your cock in me, need it so bad.”

“Yeah?” He replies breathily. You whine as he pulls his fingers out, hips wiggling back and forth in search of something to fill that suddenly empty space in you. You hear his belt clinking, the sound of fabric rustling before there's the blunt feeling of hot, unyielding flesh pressing against your dripping clutch. He lays himself over your back, cock slowly pushing into your loose hole—the both of you moaning long and drawn out—until he’s close enough to press his mouth right against your ear, panting wet, hot air, “gonna… he’s…” he stutters.

His hips buck forward, bottoming out in one swift thrust that has you crying out, tears streaming down your cheeks as you claw at the countertop.

“We’re,” he finally says, this time with conviction, “we’re going to claim you, fill you up…” he punctuates each statement with a slow but brutally hard thrust, his swollen cockhead grinding against your prostate on each push in and each drag out, “make you ours, going to… going to breed you.”

The hand on your right hip slides down, across the span of your thigh to your drooling cock. You sob in relief as he starts to stroke your prick in time with the increasing pace of his thrusts. The sound of your moans, skin against skin—his balls slapping against your taint, his hips against your ass with each harsh thrust—fills the far too humid room, the harsh store lights spreading the scene out bare.

He grunts and growls, licking up the sweat dripping down your hairline, sucking a deep purple mark right beneath your ear, pressing so close his cock barely pulls out anymore—the slight curve of it still stimulating your prostate as he grinds into you ruthlessly. 

You feel white-hot pleasure building at the base of your spine and in the pit of your stomach. Your dick throbs, his left hand sliding from your hip up, up, up to cup the front of your throat, pulling you until your back arches prettily, your neck barred. His thick cock pushes impossibly deeper at the new angle and he presses his lips to yours, swallowing your moan with a slow, deep kiss as you cry out, muffled, into his mouth, coming harder than you've ever before, viscous white ropes splattering across the countertop. 

He gives one, two, three more sharp, cruel thrusts before he’s groaning against your lips, sucking your tongue into his mouth as you pant. Your brain feels like it’s short-circuiting, like something’s crawling through you—blank and fuzzy as he fills you with his cum. It’s so much—you can feel it leaking out of you, squelching whenever his cock twitches and pulses inside your tight heat.

He breathes hot and wet against your cheek, licking a trail to your ear, pulling your earlobe between his teeth and giving a sharp tug. You feel… almost connected to him somehow, almost drawn by a magnetic pull—claimed, owned, something whispers in the back of your mind—like you couldn’t leave even if you wanted—and God knows you don’t.

“Ours,” he growls, low and breathy.

“Y-yours…” you whisper back.

[scuttle-buttle]

Chapter 11

WC: 2077

Rated: E

Chapter Tags: full on angst, discussions of emotional trauma, mild depictions of blood/gore, mentions of self h*rm & su*cide, mentions of child abuse, discussions of physical disabilities, institutionalization, some dialogue & plot canon to TV show, hurt/comfort

🧠

The rest of the conference went by much like the first day did. Both you and Laszlo bought a few books for your collections. An ease had settled over your conversations with the help of Sara and John's presence; you spoke more freely with each other. You tell yourself it is not because he's going soft on you or vice versa, but rather that you have found yourself in this imaginary bubble where you happen to get on well. It's inevitable that it will pop once you’re back at school and Laszlo will revert back to his usual callous state.

Laszlo. It still felt odd to think of him like that, rather than by his title. You couldn't lie, it gave you a sort of thrill. Even in your dreams you had only called him by his honorific. Thankfully you didn't have another dream after Friday. You couldn't escape the feeling that you'd said something incriminating in front of the man in question. So you chose to pretend it didn't happen.

Monday morning came and you headed to the train station. Once again he had secured a private cabin for the journey. This time you came prepared with a book since you had yet to replace your broken phone.

"Thank you again for inviting me to this, I really enjoyed myself. It was really nice of the department to foot my travel expenses, the hotel was really fancy. I may have helped myself to a mini-bottle or two," you joked.

"There is no need to worry about the department's finances; they were not involved."

You pause. He paid for you? Laszlo did say he would take care of the arrangements; but the four-star hotel, the private compartment train tickets, the admission to the conference, and every meal? Shit, that must have been a fortune, hundreds of dollars at least.

You don't know what to say, so you settle for an awkward "oh." A moment passes before you add "I appreciate that, um, I can pay you back. Might take some time but I can."

The professor is flippant in his reply. "There is no need, it was well spent for the research and knowledge acquired." He opens his book signaling the conversation is over.

You lick your lips. Fine then, I'll just consider it payment for emotional suffering and damages of the last eight weeks.

The first few hours of the journey were spent reading one of the new books you picked up at the convention. Occasionally you would peek over the pages at the professor. He was engrossed in his own selection; sometimes he would pause to write down a thought.

Around the seventh hour of your journey you had given up on reading anymore in favor of looking at the fields outside. The silence was comforting.

Laszlo had trouble concentrating on the book in his hand. He saw you as a conundrum. One minute you could be sociable and teasing with your comments, then next you were biting at his throat with your quick wit and fierce ideals. He decides that he wants to know what made you into who you are today. Now is as good a time as any.

His eyes on you cause a tingle up your spine but you ignore it. Laszlo breaks the silence; "may I ask a personal question?"

"You just did," you answer, still peering out of the large window. He huffed once, amused. At his following silence you face him. You raise your eyebrows to signal him to go on with his question. Curiosity grows at the thought of what he intends to ask.

"Twice now you have made implications of a traumatic past," he begins.

Bubble popped.

Interrupting, you snark "is this the part where you psychoanalyze me, doc? Because trust me, I've been through enough of that." You pick at the lint on your jeans.

Laszlo tries to choose his words more carefully the next time he speaks. "What I mean to say is, the first afternoon in the classroom where you defended that student you implied you had been witness to a trauma. You then displayed signs of anger and embarrassment before leaving prematurely. Yesterday you mentioned having entered a psychiatric facility. As an alienist I can't help but find myself curious about your experiences."

You slide your eyes to meet his from across the cabin. Your face is devoid of any emotion. "We all have our demons. Even you can't argue with that."

Your jaw clenches. Everyone had warned you. They all said he would try to worm his way into your head to figure you out. All the reviews, the gossip, everything. It was a big fat 'I told you so'. You give a pitiful laugh at the situation. "You know, everyone told me that you would pull this stunt."

He seems confused by your statement. "And what is that?"

"That you'd get inside my head and try to figure me all out or whatever. You already know I googled you beforehand, what everyone says about your methods. By now I assume you've done a little research yourself. I promise you there is nothing exciting here," you scoff and point to yourself.

"You would be correct in your assumption." You chew at your cheek as he starts. "I do know some of what happened in your past. Yet I also know that society likes to dilute the truth into something either more palatable, more entertaining, for people to consume greedily. What I want to know is what you have faced. How you have not allowed the experience to overcome you so much so that your humanity is erased like the characters I lecture on."

Eyes closing of their own volition you are thrown back in time to that night so many years ago. You didn't talk about it anymore. Bitsy knew of course, but that was the extent.

Laszlo waits. He knows this is likely to push you over the edge if your history with him means anything. Quite frankly, anyone would be tossed to their limit at his interrogation had they gone through what you had. John always told him that he needed to work on his bedside manner; that he had a habit of coming on too strong in his pursuit of learning the intricacies of the human mind. But your earlier comment about being sent to a so-called 'nuthouse' rubbed him the wrong way. It left a bad taste in his mouth. He needed to know. He needed to understand.

Laszlo can imagine the reprimand that he would receive from John and Sara for this. Just as he considers apologizing for his intrusion you open your eyes.

"She was fine. None of us suspected anything was wrong. I came home from having dinner with some… boy, and she had locked herself in the bathroom. She- she must have started over the sink and moved to sit on the side of the tub. She was hunched inside it when I got the door open. I pulled her out. Blood was… everywhere." Your voice is clinical as you explain.

"After, I shut down. So I checked myself into a psych ward a few days later when I couldn't get the feel of her blood off my hands. It's slippery, you know. And it smells. You wouldn't think so but it does." You clear your throat. "I did the therapy, took the meds they prescribed, all the standard treatments. Later I started watching true crime documentaries. I'd heard about exposure therapy so I figured the more I saw the gore, the less the image of my dead roommate would bother me. And it did help. The nightmares stopped after a while, I came back to school. I was better, just not the same.” You had watched the passing landscape as you explained. Turning to face him you speak again. “That's why those pictures didn't bother me. They weren't anything I hadn't seen before."

He contemplates you. The discovery and subsequent loss of your friend in this manner would no doubt cause lingering effects to your psyche. A stain that would forever remind you. "I offer my sincerest condolences. I do not presume to know what that would be like to experience, but I am glad you sought help afterwards. To make the choice to alleviate yourself of your own suffering where possible.”

As he says this he realizes that your anger towards the idea of being enslaved to unconscious impulse makes perfect sense. It explains why you focused so much energy on defending your belief in free will. That you have the power to choose how you carry your joy, your anger, your healing. It reminds him of how he held onto his own guilt and hurt, ignoring how it festered within him for so long. He feels as though he needs to share a piece of himself with you.

“I played piano as a child, quite well too. My mother hoped I would someday make a career of it. I vividly remember playing Mozart’s Concerto for Piano No. 20 in D Minor at a holiday party when I was seven years old. It was my favorite to play.... It requires two hands." You finally look at him. "My father...” He pauses to gather himself.

Now it is the doctor that cannot meet your eyes. As you listen you feel your confusion grow. How could he have been a talented pianist if he only had full use of his left hand? Unless..., the realization dawns on you just as he continues, his words slow.

“My father had two sides. One loving and the other brutal, the two often coexisting. It was something as trivial as putting me to bed, I recall... A game of tug of war. We were laughing…” He inhales a sharp breath. Already you can feel the tears begin to blur your vision. “I don't remember if he was drunk or if I said something that offended him. He must have pulled my arm behind my back.” Laszlo exhales shakily. “In small children, fractures can often affect…” he trails off, unable to finish. You can hear how he barely holds himself together.

Your heart aches for the broken man that sits in front of you. He never let on how much his arm bothered him, at least not within your presence. Suddenly you don’t see him as this rude, insufferable, obsessive man, but instead as someone that spends his life trying to protect himself. He projects his own anger and hurt so that he may, just for a minute, forget about his own demons. He wants to help others even when he feels he cannot bear to help himself.

But unlike you, he has to live with the physical reminder of his past every day of his life.

You stand and move to sit on his right side. Before allowing yourself to think too much of your actions, you place your hand atop his own, curling your fingers around his palm and squeezing delicately. You don’t bother wiping away the tears on your cheeks. “I’m so sorry, Laszlo;” the whisper is barely heard above the sound of the train. A second passes where you fear you have overstepped and offended him by touching the affected limb. When his thumb tightens against the backs of your fingers you know he is not. He holds you in place.

“You asked me how I kept my humanity. How does anyone really? We learn to take what we get and we carry it in a bag. Sometimes you have to drag the damn thing behind you. But eventually the weight gets less and less if you allow yourself to move forward, even if it’s still there with you all the time. I dealt with what happened years ago and it does still haunt me. It’s easier now than it was, but… I- I suppose I’ve learned from you too. Sitting in those lectures and hearing you talk. We can either let it haunt us for the rest of our lives… or we can accept it… and use the memory of our pain to help ourselves and others.”

“I’m not sure the choice is entirely in our hands.” His tone is mournful.

You turn to smile at him through your tears. His own eyes are bloodshot. “I disagree. If it weren’t, if we didn’t have the freedom to choose that, we’d all be murderers.”

Tag list

@hardlyinteresting @lorna-d-m @livvyshmiv @somethingthatsaysbubbles @greeneyedblondie44 @unbeatablecurlgirl @apparrio @marchingicenotes7 @anteroom-of-death @bruhidaniel @lemairepstuff @thehuiabird @zemosimp05 @alindeluce @iamnotthecatladynextdoor @laura-naruto-fan1998 @trelaney @boneheadduluc @i-am-dead-inside-666 @fictionlandslanddreams

[westiec]

June 17: Chengxian 💜🖤💕

childhood friends to lovers/QPPs, ace Jiang Cheng, bi & aro Wei Wuxian, modern AU

(A/N: If you're wondering about a certain other someone, he will have a wonderful, full life of his own in Suzhou in this AU but is not in this story. 💙 There are some brief mentions of offscreen ace-antagonism, not by anyone we know.)

Read on ao3

Jiang Cheng had been Wei Ying's best friend in the whole world for his entire life.

Okay. Well, not quite his entire life, but certainly since Wei Ying’s parents moved to California when he was little little, which was about as far back as Wei Ying could remember anyway. Wei Ying’s baba and Jiang Cheng’s baba had grown up in Wuhan together and been best friends when they were kids, so naturally, when Wei Ying’s family moved into the same neighborhood as the Jiangs, it made perfect sense for Wei Ying and Jiang Cheng to become best friends too.

It was Jiang Cheng who had taught Wei Ying that he didn't have to be afraid of dogs, by introducing him to Princess, Jasmine, and Lil' Love. Lil' Love lived up to her name, coming and quietly sitting in all her fluffy glory on Wei Ying’s lap every time he went over to play.

It was also Jiang Cheng who Wei Ying got drunk with for the first time. They snuck booze from the cabinet where Wei Ying’s parents kept it and laughed at the faces each other made with every shot until they stopped tasting the harsh burn, and then laughing more just because.

(Wei Ying’s mom had not laughed, not at the time, when the two teens had been sick as anything the next morning, but instead made them a gloriously greasy late breakfast and gave them lots of advice about proper hydration.

Then she told Jiang Cheng’s mom and let her scold them.)

It was Jiang Cheng who came out first, their first semester in college, when he told Wei Ying he didn't think he wanted to have sex with anyone, ever, and asked if Wei Ying thought that meant no one would ever want to date him. Wei Ying hugged him tight and told him he didn't know about everyone out there, but he knew Jiang Cheng was the best guy in the world and would be an awesome boyfriend, and he'd fight anyone who said differently.

Jiang Cheng found a group on campus for third culture LBGT kids, and Wei Ying went with him, as a supportive ally.

Which was how Wei Ying figured out that he was not just a supportive ally.

In listening to the others talk about orientation and identity and attraction and cultural expectations, Wei Ying realized that what he'd always assumed was normal—finding all kinds of people physically attractive, regardless of their gender—was actually his bisexuality. So that was kind of cool.

"So yeah, now we can be queer together!" Wei Ying said, when he excitedly shared his newfound realization with Jiang Cheng.

Jiang Cheng snorted. "Yeah, 'all' and 'nothing,'" he joked.

It was Jiang Cheng who'd helped him practice what to say to his parents when he wanted to change his major at the end of sophomore year, and Jiang Cheng who reminded him to eat and sleep and "take a fucking break, Wei Ying," those next couple semesters when he took way too many hours so he wouldn't have to rack up a whole extra year's worth of student loans to finish his new degree plan.

It was Jiang Cheng who graduated first, on a gorgeous blue-skyed sunny day in May, and Jiang Cheng who suggested Wei Ying keep living with him at his new apartment, so he wouldn't have to try to find a one-semester lease until he finished in December.

(They renewed the lease together every time.)

Jiang Cheng ribbed him playfully each time Wei Ying met someone new, but he was always there each times things fizzled out after a few months for reasons that never quite made sense to Wei Ying.

Jiang Cheng occasionally dated too, and Wei Ying was glad he never did have to fight anybody—though he did drive Jiang Cheng to the emergency room the time he came home with split knuckles from punching a guy who, "seemed to think I didn't know my own mind about certain things."

But dating sucked for everybody, right? It wasn't like Wei Ying or Jiang Cheng were in any hurry to settle down and do the whole spouse and kids thing or whatever. Wei Ying tried to imagine it and just... couldn't, though the image of Jiang Cheng with a baby was admittedly pretty cute.

~

It was not Jiang Cheng, but Jiang Yanli, a few months after she proposed to her girlfriend and they started planning their wedding, who Wei Ying finally asked, "Yanli-jie, how does a person decide someone else is their person?"

Jiang Yanli looked across the room to where Jiang Cheng was showing her soon-to-be-wife how to put side spin on a billiards ball and smiled. "I think you just know," she said. "You meet someone and you get to know them, spend time together, then one day you realize you love them and want to build the rest of your life with them."

Wei Ying wrinkled his nose. "I dunno if it works that way for me. Just some random person? I've never met anyone I can imagine wanting to live with all the time. Well, besides—huh..." he cut off suddenly and darted a look over at Jiang Yanli, who just calmly sipped her drink.

"Have you ever told him that?" she asked, after a moment where Wei Ying reassessed his entire life and dating history. "I think he might appreciate hearing it."

"I... huh. Yanli-jie, you're kinda blowing my mind here," he complained.

"I gathered," she said wryly, before fixing him with a smile that made all the hair on the back of his neck stand up. "Of course, I trust," she told him, "that I do not need to explain to you of all people how very dearly I hold my didi's happiness and well-being."

He swallowed and raised three fingers in the salute he'd used ever since the summer that—hah—he and Jiang Cheng had decided as kids that they would make their own oath of brotherhood like the heroes of their favorite show. "I, Wei Ying, swear to you that I would kick my own ass before I did anything to hurt him."

Jiang Yanli leaned over to knock her shoulder against his and nodded. "That's what I thought."

~

Turned out, dating Jiang Cheng didn't suck at all.

It felt easy in a way Wei Ying’s past dates never had, less like trying to keep up with a game whose rules everybody knew except him, more like... well, like spending time with his best friend in the whole world, but on purpose. There was also a tension in the back of Wei Ying’s mind that seemed to have lifted, though he couldn't quite pinpoint what it was that had gone.

It was Jiang Cheng who helped him figure it out.

"I think it's that now I'm able to count on this. On us," he said, when Wei Ying brought it up. "Before, whenever you went out with someone new, I wondered if this would be the time you'd find someone to fall in love with and leave me behind."

"Aww, Chengcheng! I would never!"

Jiang Cheng huffed and rolled his eyes, but his cheeks were pink. "Well, I know that now," he said, a pleased little smile breaking through his attempts at a scowl.

"As long as you're sure—" Wei Ying began, still getting used to thinking about himself with the word "aromantic." Still a so very sure that Jiang Cheng deserved to be fallen in love with.

"Hey!" Jiang Cheng cut him off. "None of that. I know you. And I know you don't see it this way, but I personally think it's pretty damn romantic that you choose to love me, on purpose."

"I simply have exquisite taste in life partners," Wei Ying sniffed, embarassed the way he always got when Jiang Cheng declared something he'd done "romantic."

"You do," Jiang Cheng agreed. "Someone told me a long time ago I was the best guy in the world and would make an awesome boyfriend, and that he would fight anyone who said differently."

Wei Ying laughed. "That's you and your sister I've promised to kick my own ass if I ever break your heart, then. Guess I'll just have to keep you forever."

"Damn right, you will," Jiang Cheng agreed, grinning smug and happy and breathtakingly beautiful. Wei Ying leaned across the couch to give him a sweet, closed-mouth kiss—the kind Jiang Cheng had shyly admitted he actually did like, a lot—and smiled too, at how lucky he'd gotten to be with his best friend in the whole world for his entire life.

🖤💜

Today's (extremely long!) thread was inspired by this WONDERFUL art of ace Jiang Cheng and bi & aro Wei Ying! Go give Midori some love on Twitter!

I spent a nonzero amount of time googling to double check when various terms and flags came into vogue, so if you're wondering, WWX & JC were in college in the early 2000s, before the ace and aro flags were designed. By the time they get themselves figured out, they can get their cute wristbands.

...which, yes, means these dingdongs spent about a solid decade living together before realizing that was what they wanted to do forever. 😉

This also means Jiang Yanli and her unnamed wife here are getting married between when California started recognizing same-sex marriages in 2008 and the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling in 2015! THIS SHIT'S RECENT!!!

Happy Pride, thank you for reading, check out more LGBTQIA+ sweetness on my #PrideMonthSnippets Masterpost!

[quillsandtypos]

Just Rest

Summary: The reader is sick but is determined to stay in school and it takes her friends to get her to go home and her boyfriend, Luke, to actually relax.

Words: 1.4k

Warnings: none except maybe a little bit of over working and tickling

...........................................

Julie wasn't really paying attention to the world around her until she noticed her two best friends having a conversation at least 18 feet apart for some reason.

"No you are not going to your next class you're going home," Flynn argued.

"Flynn, I'm fine!" you yelled back. You wouldn't have chosen to yell, especially with how your throat was feeling; but Flynn wouldn't come within 12 feet of you.

You noticed Julie approaching and saw your moment to cry for help.

"Julie please tell Fl-" you had started to say but Flynn was quicker than you.

"Please tell y/n to go home because she's sick." She proudly crossed her arms at the fact that she beat you.

Julie turned to you with her eyebrows raised both from confusion but her lips quirked up.

"Y/n are you sick?" she asked, as she walked up to you.

"No, I just have a cold," you stated; though you could feel the congestion building in your head

"You look miserable," Julie commented.

"Right?!? That's what I said!" Flynn yelled.

You scoffed and rolled your eyes, "Seriously, guys I'm fine."

Julie knew how stubborn you were but she was just as stubborn as you, and she was quick on her feet.

"If I check your forehead and it's warm, you are going home."

"Fine," you agreed.

Julie placed the back of her hand on the top of your forehead.

You mentally willed your forehead not to be warm.

She paused for a moment trying to decipher if it was warm.

"Flynn come here," Julie said.

"Oh nuh-uh I love her but I am not getting sick," Flynn quipped.

Julie bit down on a chuckle, "I'll put on hand sanitizer, I just can't tell if she's warm."

Flynn reluctantly let Julie touch her forehead before she walked over to you.

"Oh yep, you're definitely warm," she concluded.

"Okay yes, I do feel sick, but I have a math quiz next period," you admitted.

"Y/n the math quiz will be waiting for you when you get back, I swear," Flynn reassured you.

"But I need to-" you started.

"Y/n I will drag your ass out of this school; we need you on Friday for the gig so go home and rest. Please?"

To be honest you were exhausted and didn't have your usual resolve. So you agreed.

You walked into the main office, which confirmed you had a fever before driving yourself home.

When you got home you made yourself a warm cup of tea. It wasn't very good but it did make your throat feel better so it was a sacrifice you were willing to make. You changed into short sleeves and shorts in case you started getting heat flashes from your temperature. You then settled into bed to watch netflix for a bit. You couldn’t really decide what you wanted to watch but you ended up going for a baking show. After a few hours of lounging around you figured you had taken enough of a break and figured it was time to do some homework. You pulled out this week’s history homework as you started reading the chapter and answering questions. After a short while you saw that someone was trying to facetime you, you looked over to see it was Julia calling.

“Hey Jules how was school?” you asked.

“It was good. I just wanted to check up on you and see how you were doing,” she said as you watched her walk into the studio.

“I mean I’m still not feeling the best but I’ve been in my bed the past couple of hours.” You shifted the camera so you could lay down and still see your phone.

“Y/n?” Julie asked.

“Yeah?” you responded absentmindedly stoking your blanket.

“Did I just see the history homework for this week?”

You grimaced and sighed. “Would you believe me if I said no?”

Julie groaned, “Y/n first of all you are lucky I love you and secondly, do not make me send your boyfriend over there,” she threatened, in a halfway joking manner.

You saw her turn and speak and you knew that she had to be talking to one of the guys since you couldn’t see them through phones.

After a few seconds of mumbling Julie turned back around to face you. “Luke says he is more than happy to keep you company.” She tried to keep her face neutral but she had a certain amount of smugness that you couldn’t help but notice.

You looked in the general direction of where you assumed Luke to be. “It’s okay Luke, thank you, but I’m fine. I’m just going to finish this history homework and then I’ll be done,” you promised.

“Luke wants to know when that’s due,” she said, with a knowing look in her eyes.

You tightly pulled your lips in before mumbling that it was next Tuesday; suddenly you chose to become very interested with your pillows.

You didn’t see it but Julie had turned around to talk to the guys. “I didn’t want to have to do this but we need her for Friday and we can spare you today, so Luke, you’re up.”

In a second your very smug looking boyfriend was in your room. He promptly flopped onto your bed, and partially landed on top of you.

You winced slightly and a slight hiss of pain escaped your mouth, but it definitely let Julie know that he was there

“Okay great, since you are a ghost you won’t be able to catch what she has.”

“You got it Jules.” Luke agreed, but now she couldn’t hear him.

“I’m going to go practice, and Luke your job is to make sure she rests. Bye, love you two.”

“Bye love you too,” you said as she waved. You sat yourself slightly up to look at your boyfriend. You propped yourself up with your hands since you couldn’t currently move your legs since they were being layed on.

“How’s it going down there?” you asked.

“Good, your bed is really soft,” Luke commented as he buried his face into it.

You tried to pick up your homework quietly but Luke quickly caught on to what was happening and snatched it out of your hands.

“Hey!” You tried to snatch it back but Luke held it behind his back.

After several failed attempts at trying to get it back Luke cracked into a smile.

“When are you going to give up, y/l/n?” he asked, chuckling.

“When you give me my homework back, Patterson,” you retorted, trying to make another grab for your papers. As you reached up to grab it, you felt his hand tweak your side and you shot back down.

“I’m sick, so that’s not allowed.”

Luke pinned you in place with his eye contact. “Well then you are definitely not ‘allowed’ to be doing homework, especially when it’s due a week in advance.”

“But Luke-” you had started to say but Luke reached over and tasered your ribs.

You squeaked but you otherwise couldn’t move.

Luke got up to put your work back in your backpack before climbing back on top of your bed again.

He smirked over at you. “And if you try to touch it again, I will tickle you.”

You raised your hands in surrender.

“Yeah that’s what I thought,” he said as he crawled over top of you and softly kissed your forehead.

He rolled over to your side and pulled you closer into him. You were ever so thankful when you and Julie figured out you could touch them, cuddling had practically become a pastime for you and Luke.

As you drew closer to him he wrapped his arms around your midsection. He asked if he could rub your back, which you said yes to, because you could never turn it down.

Luke stoked up and down your back, ever so lightly. You layed like this for minutes, both enjoying one another’s presence.

When he hit spot in between your shoulder blade and spine that made you melt further into him, he took pity on your weakened, sick state, and choose not to comment it,

“Do you still feel like you need to do your homework now?” he teased.

“Mhmm, maybe,” you sleepily said.

“Is that so?” he asked, though it most likely rhetorical as had moved one of his hands to lightly scribble at the back of your neck.

“Adachckk! Okhahah, nohohoh!” you giggled out.

“Mhmm, I think you might need some more convincing princess,” Luke mocked.

“Nohohoh!” you screeched; but your laughter was already starting to get wheezy and you were coughing, so Luke stopped.

He pulled the blankets tighter around the two of you, and pulled you in closer. “Goodnight gorgeous,” he whispered; and placed a tender kiss on your lips. Soon enough you were a mess of tangled limbs, but you were fast asleep in Luke’s arms.

[raendown]

I return from the dead with a fic that isn't even for the Naruto fandom and I don't really have an explanation for myself.

Pairing: SamBucky Word count: 2317 Fandom: MCU Summary: Visiting Steve was always strange now that the guy was old and retired. Still, of all the things Sam expected out of today, witnessing a prime example of gay panic from the co-worker that's been mysteriously avoiding him was not one of them.

Follow the link or read it under the cut!

KO-FI and commission info under the header!

Honestly, the fact that Steve's house smelled like prunes was probably one of the funniest things that Sam had ever heard in his life. More than anything he would have loved to go back in time, to the days of reading about glorified heroes in history textbooks, and tell his fifteen year old self that Captain America, Steve Rogers, retired in a house that smelled like prunes. God, his best friend just had to throw himself in to being old the way he threw himself in to everything else.

"Is there a special reason for you visiting?" Steve's voice was more tremulous these days, less steady but no less warm. Just hearing him again after the shameful amount of weeks it had been since his last visit made Sam grin.

"Nah, just thought I'd pop in and see if you'd expired yet. Your birthday's coming up. Gonna be, what, three hundred? A thousand?"

Steve narrowed his eyes but there was fondness in them so it wasn't very scary even if he could probably still tackle Sam across the room if he wanted to. At this point it would hurt him too but he could do it. "You, young man, are-"

He looked chagrined at himself when Sam cut him off with a laugh.

"You shitting me? Did you really just call me young man? See if I ever let you live that down."

His friend grumbled but accepted the teasing as his due. That was just what he got for going back in time and doubling down on being so much older than his own best friends.

Since it had indeed been a little too long after they last saw each other there was quite a bit of catching up for them to do. Over cool glasses of sweet tea and a plate of cookies the two of them spent a pleasant couple of hours shooting the shit until Sam could almost forget the years that stretched between them now. It was jarring, sometimes, looking away from those clear blue eyes to realize all over again just how many wrinkles they were set in. Sometimes he hated it. Other times he could only smile to know that at least one of their ragtag bunch had found the peace they were looking for.

Eventually all that sweet tea went right to his bladder and Sam excused himself to use the bathroom. When he returned he took in the sight of his friend all snug under one of the blankets his late wife had knit and sighed, feeling maudlin suddenly for no good reason.

"I should probably get out of your hair," he said. "Let you get in your afternoon nap or whatever. No, stay there man, I'll clean up." His smile was easy as he snagged the dishes from their grazing and hauled it all over to the kitchen.

"You sure?" Steve's voice floated after him. "Nothing else you want to get off your chest?"

"Huh?"

Sam frowned at the cups he'd just placed in the sink, running back through his mind. They'd talked about pretty much everything he could think of.

"You didn't mention Buck once, you know. I thought the two of you were friends now."

"Ah. Yeah. So did I." The corners of his mouth twisted with a little bitterness, a little confusion. After everything they'd been through and the number of times Bucky had accepted his invitations down to Delacroix he'd thought they were well past the point of calling themselves friends. Maybe he himself felt something a little more than that but he knew better than to push.

That was probably why Bucky's sudden radio silence hurt so much though.

"Trouble in paradise?" Steve called from the other room and Sam snorted.

“Shit, I don’t know. One minute we’re fine and the next he just up and disappears on me again. I may or may not have checked a bunch of obituaries for your name just in case because I have no idea what I might have done to piss him off.” Sam pursed his lips. He’s already gone over all this with Sarah a half dozen times and in all the recounts he’d done of their last couple missions he still couldn’t find any particularly bad moment between him and his best friend. Unfortunately the sweet tea he was glaring at didn’t have any answers either so he snatched the pitcher up and moved to put it in the fridge.

“Have you tried, oh I don’t know, asking him what’s wrong?”

“You think I didn’t try that?”

Steve’s hum drifted down the hallway with a distinct note of sass. “Neither one of you is very famous for your communication.”

“Excuse you, I was a counselor. A certified veteran’s counselor. Communicating with people was literally my job until your overly buff ass came running around all ‘on your left’ and ‘everyone I know is trying to kill me’.” Sam huffed as he snapped the fridge closed. “I damn well tried to talk to him but he’s not answering my texts or my calls. Short of breaking in to his apartment I don’t really know what else you want me to do.”

Without any other excuses to keep him in the kitchen Sam heaved a sigh, knowing he couldn’t dawdle any longer. He could only get to the door by going though the living room so his choices were either run away out the back, which he would never ever hear the end of, or go back in to the living room and face Steve with his stupidly wise and knowing eyes. Seriously, let a guy live to almost two hundred and suddenly he thought he knew everything. Annoying was what it was.

He was only halfway down the hall when he heard the front door open. Sam very carefully swallowed down the jibe he’d just been about to deliver and hoped that meant what he thought it meant. Maybe Steve had finally gone vague after all and bailed in the middle of their conversation; he’d rather chase a crazy old coot down the street than talk about his feelings regarding one James Buchanan Barnes. Actually if he looked at it from the right angle then chasing an old coot down the street was pretty much his job description whenever he and his partner teamed up on missions. Sam was just glad they hadn’t been called in to one since this whole silent treatment had started because he wasn’t sure he wanted to know whether or not Bucky would still have his back even when the guy was mad at him over reasons unknown.

Two more steps and Sam froze in his tracks, eyes wide with disbelief. Bucky’s shoulders were hunched in to himself with something bridling on panic as he fit himself through the front door and kicked it shut behind himself, eyes wild and fixed on the ground between his feet, nervous energy pouring out of him in a way Sam hadn’t seen before. From his spot on the couch Steve watched his childhood friend let himself in with serene indifference.

“Didn’t know you’d be over today,” was all he said. Then he smiled benignly when Bucky let out a soft whine.

“Help,” Bucky pleaded. “I’m dying.”

Then Bucky slid down to his knees and face planted in the carpet, arms and legs splaying out wide. Steve hummed.

“You know,” he murmured, “no one ever believes me when I tell them you’re this dramatic.”

“Steve! I’m having a crisis!”

“I tell everyone you’re a drama queen and they just shake their heads at me.”

“This is important! You have to kill me, Steve. Or I’m gonna just- just-!” Bucky’s voice petered out with another extended whine muffled by the carpet that probably didn’t smell any better from that close up.

Crossing one leg over the other, Steve folded his hands in his lap with a great lack of concern for the ridiculous scene playing out before him. Sam remained frozen in the hallway, wondering if Bucky even realized he was there, but he got an answer to that almost faster than if he’d bothered to ask himself.

“What’s wrong, pal?”

“It’s Sam!” Bucky cried. His arms lifted up like wings to flail briefly before falling back to the floor in a boneless sprawl. “Please just crush my head or something. I can’t take this.”

“Ah, yes, I hear you’ve been avoiding him.”

Whatever kind of noise Bucky was trying to make, it came out sounding more like he was choking on carpet fumes. “Of course I’m avoiding him!”

“Now why on earth would you do that?”

“I want to stick my tongue in the gap between his teeth!” Bucky said, entirely unaware of the sparks that were suddenly running up Sam’s spine in the hallway. “Help me, Steve! I want to press my thumb in the little dimple on his back. He has a dimple on his back! Why!? Steve I want to hold his hand! What the fuck!”

Steve had both eyebrows up near his hairline and the most shit eating grin any human on the planet had ever worn when he turned his head to look at Sam. Frozen with his eyes on the figure currently panicking in to the floor, Sam paid him no attention. He was busy processing. After getting to know Bucky, inviting him to stay in Delacroix time and time again, the dramatics weren’t actually that much of a surprise. Obviously as they grew closer he’d gotten a number of glimpses in to who the real Bucky Barnes was under the grouchy veneer he presented to the world. Watching him starfish on the ground and whine wasn’t too far from what he’d already seen.

Hearing him say anything about his tongue in conjecture with Sam’s teeth, on the other hand, now that was a bit unexpected. More than a bit.

“I think Shuri called this ‘gay panic’ and honestly I’m in agreement,” Bucky went on mindlessly. “If I have to watch him go through one more workout and not grab his ass with both hands then I’m just going to rip both of them off. Who needs hands if I cannot grab Sam Wilson’s ass with them!?”

“You may be slightly exaggerating the situation, I feel,” Steve told him.

Bucky snorted. “I am not. I absolutely am not. Why is he so hot? And nice? I hate that. Except I don’t. Steve why is he so nice to me?”

“That might be a question you should ask him.”

“Oh yeah, sure, I’ve got lots of questions for him! Hey Sam, why are you nice to me? Hey Sam, can I lick your cheekbones? Hey Sam, how big is your cock?”

“Well. Not that I’ve ever thought to ask that myself but, alright. Go on, Sam, how big is it?”

Sam had just enough time to cross his arms over his chest and assume a very casual pose leaning against the wall beside him before Bucky’s head shot up off the carpet. If possible, his eyes were even more wild than before when he fixed them on Steve, full of the deepest betrayal. Then he very slowly dragged them sideways to see the man he’d just been panicking over. Sam gave him a very friendly smile.

“Depends on your frame of reference,” he admitted. “I’d say sizeable.”

“Nnnggggg.”

“Hi Buck.”

“Ggnnn.”

While Steve very poorly disguised a laugh behind one hand, Sam pushed off from the wall and sauntered further in to the living room. Bucky slammed his face back in to the carpet.

“Leave me here to die,” he pleaded in a very small voice. Sam tutted, reaching for the front door, only looking over his shoulder once he was halfway through it.

“Come on, Buck, can’t lick my cheekbones if you don’t get off the floor. It was a nice visit, Steve, but don’t be looking out your front curtains for a bit. I think I’ll let Bucky decide for himself what sizeable means.” He thanked god for the mercy of Steve’s house being situated out here so far from any other homes, surrounded on all sides by enough trees that you couldn’t see it from the road. A gorgeous little island of privacy. Sam was fairly sure he wasn’t the only one grateful for this, judging by the mad scrambling noises he could hear going on behind him.

Bucky’s voice garbled out something that sounded like ‘fuck you, thank you, bye forever’ and then Sam was listening to the slam of the front door barely a second before strong hands were wrapping themselves around his hips. He laughed even as Bucky’s face came in to view.

“Greatest assassin of several generations and you didn't notice my truck in the driveway?” he said.

“I may have been a bit distracted.” That was definitely a pout on Bucky’s lips.

“By being so hot for all of this”-Sam gestured vaguely down his own body-“that you literally ceased being able to function.”

He didn’t expect such easy agreement as the sheepish nod that followed his words. “Pretty much.”

Sam blinked slowly once, twice. For one long moment he considered teasing the man. Then he decided that their time was much better spent doing things they’d both obviously been wanting to do while assuming they would never get the chance.

“I was promised a tongue in my teeth. Are you gonna get to that any time soon or am I gonna sit here and pine some more for something I apparently could have had all along?”

Bucky keened piteously. Then he surged forward to follow through on his own promises and Sam really hoped that Steve had taken his words to heart about the curtains. The man was way too old to be seeing all the ways they were about to defile the side of this truck.