#he 100% saved them but at the high cost of his life and their bonds

[rmorde]

The devastation on these four after the reveal of Mechamaru's betrayal... I just cannot imagine how painful that is.

Mechamaru trusted Todo and Nitta to survive but not them.

Kokichi wanted Miwa to be with him in his last moments but not them.

He protected them by underestimating them.

He set them aside by accident because its only Miwa that he felt owed an explanation.

Just... What can they do here?

[swimfaye]

Dad's Day and the Battle of the bulge

This blog post in its original form can be found here ( fiftyapples)

Reflecting on Father's Day: Remembering My Dad and Navigating the Challenges of Today's World

Introduction: Father's Day is a bittersweet occasion for me as I remember my late dad. While I miss him dearly, part of me is grateful that he doesn't have to witness the state of the world today. The pervasive ignorance in society and the loss of his job back in 2018 would have undoubtedly disappointed him. Despite the challenges, I strive to find contentment and happiness, just as he did, even though the world seems to make it increasingly difficult.

Inheriting My Dad's Gastronomy: One trait I inherited from my dad is a love for food, and unfortunately, the struggle with weight gain. My dad had embarked on the Medifast diet and successfully shed over 100 pounds in a year, but eventually, he regained the weight. The high cost of the Medifast diet and the lack of long-term studies on diabetic medication's effects further complicate the issue. It's disheartening to see the financial and health-related challenges associated with weight loss.

Exploring Alternatives: To address my own battle with weight, I began researching alternatives like the CGM Nutrisense and Medifast. However, the costs and complexities involved in utilizing these options became apparent. While a constant glucose monitor itself is affordable, the associated software platform comes at a significant price, and navigating multiple apps for recording and monitoring becomes necessary. This realization led me to explore other avenues.

Challenges with Health and Insurance: Documenting my meals using various apps has made me aware of the limitations and inaccuracies of the data they provide. Seeking medical advice and considering the use of diabetic drugs brought forth concerns about potential weight regain and the lack of long-term studies. Additionally, the prevalence of diabetes raises concerns about kidney health and the possibility of needing an organ transplant. Access to affordable healthcare and the decision-making power of insurance companies further complicate the situation.

The Cost of Losing Weight: While the focus is often on the financial costs of losing weight, the potential need for a kidney transplant highlights the larger picture. With a significant portion of organ recipients only extending their lives by a decade or so, the financial burden of such procedures becomes a reality. Health insurance companies play a deciding role in eligibility, and individuals may face insurmountable challenges when seeking life-saving treatments.

Appreciating Our Dads: Amidst these reflections, Father's Day serves as a reminder to appreciate our fathers and express our love for them. Regardless of the challenges we face, the bond we share with our dads remains strong. I cherish the memories of my dad's enjoyment of BBQ, playing with dogs, and finding contentment in the simple things. I hope that in his final days, he found the peace he longed for.

Conclusion: Father's Day stirs a mix of emotions within me as I remember my dad and observe the world around me. While I miss him dearly, I can't help but feel relieved that he doesn't have to witness the disappointments and struggles of today's society. As I navigate my own battles, particularly with weight and health, I recognize the complexities and costs involved. It is essential to appreciate our fathers and express our love for them while we still can.

(Editor's note : This blog post is generated utilizing ChatGPT if you want to see the original https://fiftyapples.blogspot.com/2023/06/happy-dads-day-battle-of-bulge-update.html post )

[eveningstar1516]

Rise of the Demon King ~ Chapter 8

Rise of the Demon King

Fic: Multi Chapter Paring: MC x Everyone (Mostly Lucifer) Type: Angst with a Happy Ending Total Word Count: 26,758 TW: Major Character Death, Reader gets stabbed with a sword through their chest so..., Abusive Parents, Past Child Abuse, Demon Hunters, Loss of Control Summary: You’ve done it. You’ve finally done it. You’ve managed to anger the demon king. Now you hold your head high as he hands down your sentence. AO3 Portal: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27065362

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Previously:

His brothers would always know whenever he went to see her as he’d always come back with a content smile on his face. Deep down, he wished that Y/N could’ve met Cynthia. They would have made great friends as they were the only 2 people who could make him smile like this. Mammon may not have been able to save Y/N, but he swore that he would protect Cynthia, no matter the cost.

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

CHAPTER 8 - The Great Pancake Debate (2261 words)

It’s been almost 6 months since you arrived in the Celestial Realm. Needless to say, you are quite certain that these last 6 months have been the craziest and stressful months of your life! When you told Simeon and Luke about you staying here, to say they were ecstatic would be an understatement. Luke jumped for joy and wouldn’t stop rambling about all the fun you were going to have. When you told them about God appointing them to help teach you about the Realm, Luke practically did a double take and it took an hour to calm him. Now you have Simeon teaching you about politics and Luke about how to use your wings and powers. On your second day there, Michael woke you up, or well came to get you as you didn’t get any sleep. Turns out, while the Devildom is constant at night, the Celestial realm is constant day and thanks to the floor to ceiling windows, there was no way for you to stop sunlight from coming in. You were introduced to the council at breakfast. Note to self, the brothers breakfasts are QUIET AND PEACEFUL compared to Archangels off duty. The first thing you saw were 2 angels passionately arguing over which pancake topping was the best, strawberries or blueberries. At some point a third angel cut in claiming chocolate chips were the best and all heaven (would you replace hell with heaven here? idk) broke loose. As for me, I just started chuckling in disbelief while making my way over to pick up a pancake of my own when the angel arguing on behalf of the strawberries saw you.

“Hey kid, what topping do you prefer, strawberries, blueberries, or chocolate chips? It’s strawberries right?”

“Actually, I prefer them plain with maple syrup. Although if Satan was the one making it, I’d go for the one with poison berries. Contrary to their name, they’re not actually poisonous and quite sweet.” All the angels present looked at me with a mix of shock and disbelief, save for Michael who just sat there eating his breakfast hoping to leave soon and get to work.

“Kid, did you say Satan?” The angel arguing on behalf of blueberries asked. “Yeah… Blond hair, teal eyes, Avatar of Wrath, Luci’s son? Ring a bell?” Turning to Michael, blueberry angel asked,

“Micheal, who are they and why are they wearing Lucifer’s old get up?” “This is Y/N. They will be staying here and taking Samael’s spot on the council until their agreement with Father ends and they return to the Devildom. Father has asked us to teach them about how our Realm operates and how to successfully fulfill Samael’s former position flawlessly, unless they want to return now and leave heaven early?” Michael turned towards you with a smirk on his face as he asked the last part.

“Very funny Mike. You and I both know I won’t do that no matter how bad you want me to.”

“What did I say about calling me that?!” Micheal’s smirk turned into something short of a snarl.

“Well, if you won’t take me seriously, neither will I. You want me to call you by your name, earn it and stop being an butt… I meant an butt… Why can’t I swear?!”

“This is the Celestial Realm Y/N. Angels don’t swear.” Michael said smugly over the rim of his cup of coffee.

“God Dang it! Argh! Fudge!. Dang it! Ya know what, forget it, my entire mood is ruined. Thanks Michael!”

“Anytime.”

Shooting Michael one last glare, I sighed and turned to the rest of the baffled angels in the room.

“Yes, what Michael said is true. Stuff happened in the Devildom which I will not get in too-”

“The demon king made Samael kill them.”

“Ok, Mike, first off, he didn’t, I ordered him too, second, I thought I said I didn’t want to talk about it. What gives you the right to tell them huh?”

“I felt like it.”

“You son of a beach.” I turned back to the rest of the angels. “Not a word about it. Anyway, due to some personal issues, I made a deal with Father to stay here on the condition that I take over Lucifer’s spot on the council until he either kicks me out or until our agreement has ended.”

“If I may, when will this agreement of yours be over?” The blueberry angel asked.

“I will be returning to the Devildom once Lord Diavolo has been crowned king and his father is 100% out of the picture. Now if you don’t mind me asking, could you introduce yourselves?” “Oh how rude of us, I’m sorry, I am Gabriel.” Gabriel had chestnut brown medium length hair, reaching shoulders. His eyes were a dull green. He wore a white turtleneck and had a light green shawl with golden tassels. He pointed to the strawberry angel. “This is Raphael and he’s Uriel.” He pointed to the chocolate chip angel. Raphael had long reddish-orange hair put up in a high ponytail. His eyes were a stormy gray. He wore a simple light gray half sleeve with an off the shoulder white cape and little decor. Uriel had short gray hair and golden eyes that almost seemed to sparkle. He wore something that reminded you of an off white scholar's robe with gray accents. “These are Saraqael, and Raguel.” He pointed to 2 of the quieter angels who didn’t participate in “the great pancake debate”. “We make up the Archangel council and we’re happy to have you Y/N.” Gabriel finished off with a smile. You were just barely able to make out a little “Not all of us” from Michael. You decided to ignore it, and then, like all the decisions you’ve ever made, it was the wrong one. Sitting back down you asked,

“So, quick question. What started The Great Pancake Topping debate?”

.

.

.

.

Breakfast ended 2 hours later with upset angels, and pancakes, everywhere…

In the Devildom. After they lost Y/N

Levi went straight to his room as soon as they got home. As soon as he closed and locked the door he went straight to Henry’s fishbowl, picked it up and sat in his bathtub, hugging the bowl as he cried. ‘Why do I feel like this?! I only like 2D characters and Ruri-chan, not 3D people. How do I miss them?... Why did they leave me? They were my player 2.’ “Well it makes sense, no one would want to stay with a worthless shut in of an otaku like me” he said to the empty room. Henry 2.0 glubbed a bubble in response. “You wouldn’t leave me, would you Henry?” *Glub* “No you wouldn’t… I miss them.” Levi stayed in his tub hugging Henry 2.0 until he fell asleep.

Present

It was another late night, Levi was bingeing a new anime ‘I fell in love with a 3D girl but I’m afraid she’ll leave me after finding out that I’m an otaku who rarely leaves their room’ . He was halfway through the 9th episode when he got a notification from Mononoke Island. One of his raid mates was stuck and needed some help. He paused his marathon to help his fellow mate and stayed up until the early hours of the morning switching between playing Mononoke and watching his anime. Stumbling into the dining room for breakfast the next morning, he was met with complete silence. Lucifer had left early, Belphie was asleep, Beel was too absorbed in eating, Satan in his book and Asmo on his phone to even notice him enter the room. Mammon was busy in the human world helping out sone witches. Levi sat down in his normal spot, taking whatever was left as he mentally prepared himself for the day. As soon as the bell rang, signaling the end of the day at RAD, still dressed in his uniform, Levi left as quickly as he could. There was an anime expo happening in the human realm right now and there was some ultra-rare limited edition Ruri-chan merch being sold there. He had gotten Lucifer’s permission to attend the expo so long as he was back by 11. Existing the portal and making his way to the expo, Levi thought about the last expo he attended with Y/N. They cosplayed as Erin and Levi from Attack on Titan and spent the entire day surrounded by fellow anime nerds. They had also booked a room at a nearby hotel. It was 3 days of bonding time for them. Entering the expo, Levi decided he would get something for them as decor for their headstone put in memory of them in the backyard of the House of Lamentation. Nearing the line for Ruri-chan merch, Levi noticed someone staring intensely at him. He decided to ignore them but keep a loose eye on them, just in case. He got to the front of the line and purchased 4 of the Ruri-chan collection kits. One for use, one for display, one to keep and sell in the future, and one for Y/N. He decided to wander around a little more to see if anything else would catch his eye while he was here. He spotted a Black Butler station and remembered the jokes he and Y/N would crack about Barbatos and Sebastian. He passed a Fate/Stay Night stand and remembered their conversations on which heroic class they would belong to. Levi would have been the perfect Lancer. He passed countless other stalls, each of them holding a memory he made with Y/N. Distracted by his trip down memory lane, Levi forgot all about the person stalking him. He went and purchased some dinner from one of the stalls before sitting down and pulling out his DDD and looked at some pictures of Y/N and him at their last expo. He didn’t look up from his phone until he felt someone sit opposite of him. Levi looked up to see some middle aged man just sitting there on his phone. He didn’t have any food, merch, or even look like someone interested in an anime expo. Feeling an uncomfortable aura emitting from this man, Levi got up and left. He took a quick look over his shoulder and saw that the man wasn’t following him. He left the expo and went down an alleyway to open up a portal back to the Devildom when he accidentally bumped into someone dropping his purchases.

“S-sorry”

“That’s quite alright.” The stranger extended a hand out to let him up. “Say, I’d love to know where you got your uniform from. No schools around here have uniforms like that one.”

Looking up, Levi saw the same man that was watching him with a twisted smile. Masking his fear, he mumbled an excuse about being in a rush and tried to dash around him. Before he could get 2 steps down the alley, the man grabbed him and pushed him further into the alleyway. Levi’s head struck the wall hard leaving him dazed for a moment.

“I didn’t think my intel about finding a RAD attendee at the expo would be true but whaddya know? Seems I caught myself a demon.”

Levi, now more aware of his surroundings, realized he was cornered by a demon hunter. Despite being in an alleyway, there were too many people around for him to do anything rash. Without missing a beat, the hunter pulled out an enchanted dagger aiming straight for Leviathan’s heart. Levi rolled and dogged last minute before colliding into someone’s chest. That person in question wrapped his arms around Levi’s chest and put their own dagger to his throat.

“I know you’re there! Come on out and I might spare your friend's life!” The hunter holding Levi yelled. When no one stepped out, the dagger held by Levi’s neck began pushing on his skin. Levi felt a flare of pain and against his better judgement, transformed. His tail wrapped around hunter 2’s leg and flipped him over while the first hunter charged at him, only to be blown to the ground as a powerful gust of wind knocked him over.

“Jeez Levi, you’re lucky I was here. Seriously, why didn’t ya do somethin’ earlier? Maybe then I wouldn’t have ta save yo ass.” Mammon stepped out from the darkness with a bored look on his face.

“Come on, Lucifer’s waiting for ya back home. LOOK OUT!” Levi turned around just in time to see Hunter number 2 taking a swing at his neck and managed to duck just in time. Mammon then charged over punching the hunter square in the face, knocking him out cold.

“T-thanks M-mammon.”

“No problem. Come on, let’s get ya back home before any more of them show up.”

Stepping through the portal, a question plagued Levi’s mind.

“Mammon, how did you know I was in trouble?”

“Some witches summoned me. I overheard them talk about some hunter group getting a tip about a possible demon being at some expo. Then I realized that it was the same one you were going to, so I decided to go there myself to make sure ya weren’t followed. I’m glad I did too.”

“Th-thank you Mammon. Really.”

“Of course, what are big brothers for. Anyway, about my payment, maybe you can forget about the money I owe ya?”

Groaning, Levi started walking faster, leaving Mammon and his whining behind as he made his way back to the safety of his room.

[chickenmcfly1]

Since you said you’re a guitarist and music major yourself, do you have any thought about Marty as a musician and his path?

omg you should not have gotten me going on this. Music and Marty are my favorite topics of ramble about and now you’re letting me ramble about both together gajagska. Anyway, here are my thoughts about Marty and his music

He started showing musical inclination when he was quite young. Grandma Sylvia (aka Trixie Trotter) would sing and play for Marty and he loved it

He expresses want to learn an instrument when he’s around 8 years old and there’s already a plunky little piano in the McFly home. By no means is it a good instrument, but George has Sylvia teach him.

Marty likes it a lot and he practices and becomes pretty proficient. Neither Lorraine or George expect much to come from it, but they’d rather have Marty playing jazz standards and Beethoven than have him setting fire to the rest of the house

After Sylvia passes a few years later, well one, Marty is absolutely destroyed because he’s not that close to anyone else in his family, but also the piano lessons stop. George and Lorraine can’t afford lessons and they don’t really care enough to encourage Marty’s musical goals

Marty keeps up with his piano playing, but around this time, at age 10, he begins to get really into Rock n Roll. The record store by his house is where Marty goes to escape his family before Doc and he becomes obsessed with all the Rock Stars and their records.

There’s a video of Jimi Hendrix explaining how to play the guitar that plays at the music store on loop, and Marty watches it over and over and over and over until he has it pretty much memorized

He mows lawn for a week and the first time he gets paid, he goes straight to the record store and buys the tape and the other guitar lessons that come with it

And Marty decides right then that he wants to be just like those rock stars. Because their music is so incredible and they’re so entertaining, and talented, and cool.

The older Marty gets, the more fascinated with all kinds of music Marty becomes. He applies himself to learning the melodies and analyzing the elements of the music with a dedication that his teachers wish he could also apply to literally anything else

He also tries his hand at writing his own music. It comes surprisingly easy because Marty’s a very emotional person, even at like 12, but he’s really scared of expressing those emotions. He’s afraid of being made fun of and rejected and judged and called weak, so he writes music, but nobody ever heard it.

By 12, Marty is begging his parents for a guitar, but they don’t want to spend the money on an instrument or lessons. Marty; however, is desperate and is willing to do literally anything to get his parents to buy him one.

Hill Valley is a small town, and the record store owner obviously had noticed how Marty comes by every single day, so he ends up giving Marty some trashy old acoustic that needs to be tossed

The guitar is probably only given to Marty because fixing it up to put it in selling condition would probably cost more that they could ever make from it, but looking at Marty, you’d think he’s just been given the best gift in the entire universe

So he watches the Jimi Hendrix tapes another 10,000 times and works his ass off and improves an enormous amount and by the time he’s 13, Marty is quite a good guitar player

In 8th grade, he’s able to save enough for another (equally crappy and equally used) guitar but this one’s electric and its the most incredible thing Marty has ever seen and he adores it

Marty’s super insecure in pretty much everything he does, and nobody feels good about themselves at age 13, but at this age, Marty really starts doubting himself way more and struggling with confidence. Music is an escape from that. Marty works so hard with his piano playing, with his singing, and especially his guitar playing, and making music is the place where he feels most comfortable in himself.

At this point, Marty’s family life is getting worse and worse, school is hard and friends are hard, but he has music and he throws himself into it 110 percent.

That all comes crashing down at Marty’s first audition. Marty auditions for Jazz band in 8th grade, and that rejection shouldn’t be a big deal because there two spots and 8th 9th and 10th graders, but Marty’s quickly rejected and it breaks it heart. This had been the one thing that was simple for Marty. There was no chaos or fighting or compilations behind it, he just did it and it made him happy, and now that’s been taken away from him too

He pretty much decides he’s giving up on music forever after that and is never playing for anyone else again, but as usual, Doc comes into Marty’s life at the perfect time.

Music is one of the first things Doc and Marty bond about. Doc tells Marty he’s welcome to play any of his records while they’re working. His music is mostly jazz and 50s stuff, and Marty absolutely falls in love with it.

After listening to more of that, Marty discovers a love for combining the classics with a new unique kinda heavy metal sound

He asks Doc about the saxophone and Doc teaches Marty quite a bit of it. Marty’s not as great at sax as he is at piano, singing, or guitar, but it’s fine because he has a duet partner now.

He and Doc play together a lot and he’s the only one that gets to hear Marty’s original music. Marty writes a bunch of jazz and rock pieces for Sax and Guitar too, and being able to play with Doc gives Marty a lot of the confidence boost he needs. Doc makes a point to always encourage and compliment Marty’s performance. And it’s not hard to do either, because Marty really does have something special.

Improvising with Marty is a wild ride. He’s able to change keys, styles, and go into mixed meter in a way that seems almost effortless and with alarming speed. Anybody with him really does have to ‘try to keep up’

Once he gets to high school, Marty tries auditioning for a few things again. To his surprise, he’s picked for a few small things. Nothing as big as he wants, but it’s better than nothing. Someone somewhere thinks Marty’s good and that’s something.

Marty also gets into a little bit or recording, mixing, and composing. [There’s a tiny electric or MIDI keyboard in his bedroom in the Polaroid from the set so I’m assuming he’s writing music for full bands and playing some parts on MIDI with a software instrument, but idek if that technology existed back then, so who knows right]

For his 15th birthday, Doc gives him the rest of the money for the guitar he’s been saving up for. It’s an Ibanez and when he plays it or the first time, it feels like the instrument was made just for him and everything is right in the world

He throws himself even more into practice after this and music goes from a hobby to the thing he wants to do with his life. Marty’s always felt lost and directionless when it comes to his future. It’s always felt like he isn’t good enough and won’t really amount to anything. His family are all nobodies, and nobody thinks Marty is capable of achieving anything. But Music gives him purpose and hope for the future.

Doc’s nonstop encouragement is what pushes Marty to finally take the first step and decide to pursue music

In sophomore year, the pinheads come together. Marty is a lot more serious about the whole thing than the others, but being in a band is cool, so they all carve out a few hours every week to rehearse. Marty pushes and pushes them and himself to be better.

He starts dating Jennifer in junior year and Marty writes a lot of songs for her. He finally gets the courage to show her one. Jennifer loves it and becomes Marty’s (second) biggest cheerleader. Any audition, rehearsal, and rare performance Marty has, she’s there. She knows how much this means to him and she takes any opportunity to encourage him

By senior year, everyone seems to know what they want to do with their life, and Marty knows with absolute clarity what he wants to do too, but he’s so scared to take the leap and go for music. He wants this so badly and it means so much to him, and someone telling him he’s not good enough to make it would absolutely destroy Marty. So he keeps these dreams close to his chest and only tells Jennifer and Doc, who convinces Marty to send an audition to the record company

Making that audition tape is the most miserable experience ever. He does over 100 takes of the same song because if it’s not absolutely perfect Marty’s entire world is going to be destroyed. The recording is never perfect (and Doc tells Marty that no recording will never be perfect enough in Marty’s eyes, and what he has done is incredible but Marty doesn’t believe it)

In the timeline where Marty breaks his hand, the second he wakes up in the hospital and sees his mangled hand and feels the way his fingers move so disjointedly, he knows he screwed up and everything is ruined

The loss of music, which was the one thing that made Marty have hope in himself, sends him spiraling and leads to the broke version of him in 2015

In the timeline where everything works out and Marty doesn’t race, he ends up sending the audition to the record company right away. Obviously, insecurity, confidence issues, and an obsessive need for validation don’t just disappear with one trip to the old west, but after time travel, he’s able to put himself out there with his music a lot more

After time travel, Marty is stuck in his own head a lot. He’s often very confused about the terms of his own existence, and existentialism aside, he’s struggling to cope with trauma bc guilt from what happened on his travels. And while Marty doesn’t care what other people think of him that much anymore, his own opinion of himself has gotten worse, if anything.

Getting over the initial thoughts of ‘you’re not good enough so why even bother’ is a whole process but he and Doc work through it, and Marty is finally able to commit himself wholly to his music.

Being on stage and performing and just playing gives Marty a reprieve from the trauma and the confusion he’s dealing with and his music gives him another safe space

As Marty starts to heal more and more he also starts auditioning more, playing more confidently, performing his own music and Doc (who moved back to the present) is his biggest cheerleader and is there at every performance

The new McFly parents really push Marty to study music at a college so he can get a college degree, and Marty ends up auditioning for college and studying Guitar Performance with an emphasis on Music Education

He writes several albums, a few become huge sensations, he is able to tour for a bit and he performs quite a lot. Once the kids are born, he stops touring as much, and once they’re older, he pretty much fully stops so he can fully focus on them.

He becomes a music teacher instead and it allows him to encourage so many other budding musicians while still staying true to his own passions

[ghostqueen156]

Fruit Basket Characters as D&D Classes Part 1

For the sake of time Tohru will be the only non-zodiac member of this list. If you want me to do other characters please request in the comments!

Tohru Honda: Life Domain Cleric

The delegated healer of the show, I can definitely see Tohru as a life domain cleric due to her desire to heal those around her. I contemplated her being a light domain cleric, but I felt that the life domain suited her more. I personally headcanon that she was originally a light cleric but became a life cleric after her mother died so she would always raise dead and revivify prepared. Her Devine patron is definitely her mom.

Stat wise I can see her having high wisdom and charisma with an average constitution and intelligence. I feel her lowest stats would be strength and dexterity due to her clumsy nature and weak strength as shown both times she hit Kyo. And ‘remove’ curse would definitely be a spell she always has prepared ;).

Stats:

Strength: 8 (-1)

Dexterity: 13 (+1)

Constitution: 14 (+2)

Intelligence: 12 (0)

Wisdom: 20 (+5)

Charisma: 18 (+4)

Kyo Sohma: Way of Mercy Monk

Was there any doubt that he’d pick a class focused on martial arts? I will admit I had trouble picking a subclass that fitted his character. So I headcanon that he was a level 2 monk up until he got to know Tohru, and then as a result of her influence and his desire to help her, he ended up choosing the Way of Mercy path. Also because he felt mega guilt for not being able to save her mom.

Stat wise he probably has a high strength and dexterity, with strength being a little higher. He’d probably have a high constitution with an average intelligence and wisdom. I’d recon his lowest stat would probably be charisma, due to his general social awkwardness, but it wouldn’t be low enough where people don’t like him. Overall fairly good stats :)

Stats:

Strength: 19 (+5)

Dexterity: 18 (+4)

Constitution: 16 (+3)

Intelligence: 14 (+2)

Wisdom: 15 (+2)

Charisma: 13 (+1)

Yuki Sohma: Way of the Cobalt Soul Monk/Transmutation Wizard

Again another tricky one to figure out, but I can definitely see him as a more intelligent fighter so I imagine he would use the ‘extract aspects’ feature of his subclass a lot. Especially against Kyo. However, I couldn’t see him as only a monk so I imagine he would multiclass into wizard due to his high intelligence score. I felt transmutation suited him the most due to his desire to change himself for the better and become more open to people.

Stat wise I feel his highest scores would be dexterity and intelligence. I personally headcanon that his strength is lower than Kyo’s but his dexterity is higher. charisma and wisdom would be his more average score with constitution being his weakest score due to his poor health.

Stats:

Strength: 13 (+1)

Dexterity: 20 (+5)

Constitution: 9 (-1)

Intelligence: 17 (+3)

Wisdom: 15 (+2)

Charisma: 12 (0)

Shigure Sohma: Mastermind Rogue

Conniving, devious and willing to do whatever it takes to get what he wants, the rogue class would definitely suit him. Due to him not liking to get his own hands dirty and general manipulative nature, I figured he would definitely be a mastermind rogue.

Out of all the characters I 100% believe he would be the type to fudge his rolls, having high stats in dexterity, charisma, intelligence and wisdom with his only average rolls being strength and constitution. Shigure probably fucked god to get good rolls in D&D along with the luck feat, min-maxing bastard.

Stats:

Strength: 14(+2)

Dexterity: 18 (+4)

Constitution: 14 (+2)

Intelligence: 19 (+5)

Wisdom: 20 (+5)

Charisma: 18 (+4)

Momiji Sohma: College of Eloquence Bard

With charisma in spades and brilliant musical skills, no other classes suits him but bard. I chose the college of eloquence for him due to it being a class that focuses more on a person’s ability to say the right thing and affect people with their words. Something which I think fits him really well. He refuses to use the modify memory spell for obvious reasons.

I feel like Momiji’s highest stats would be dexterity, charisma and wisdom. His constitution and intelligence would be fairly average with strength being his lowest stat.

Stats:

Strength: 8 (-1)

Dexterity: 18 (+4)

Constitution: 14 (+2)

Intelligence: 12 (0)

Wisdom: 18 (+4)

Charisma: 20 (+5)

Hatsuharu Sohma: Path of the Beast Barbarian

Although Haru studied martial arts along with Yuki and Kyo, I personally don’t see Haru being a monk like Kyo and Yuki. My first thought was barbarian due to his dual personalities, with one being incredibly aggressive. I chose the path of the beast for Haru due to it fitting him turning ‘black,’or into a beast in this case, when angry. Plus the idea of barbarian Haru turning into a cow when angry was too hilarious to pass up.

Haru’s highest stats would be strength, constitution and wisdom with dexterity and charisma being more average. His lowest stat would definitely be intelligence though cause let’s face it, this guy is always getting lost.

Stats:

Strength: 17 (+3)

Dexterity: 15 (+2)

Constitution: 17 (+3)

Intelligence: 12 (0)

Wisdom: 17 (+3)

Charisma: 14 (+2)

Kagura Sohma: Path of the Beserker Barbarian

Another character whom I immediately thought barbarian upon seeing them. She definitely fits this class well due to her aggressive personality. I put her as the path of the berserker due to her frenzy-like tendencies when she sees Kyo or feels incredibly passionate about something. Her and Haru are barbarian buddies.

Her highest stats would definitely be strength and dexterity, with a fairly average constitution, intelligence and wisdom. I feel like her lowest stats would be charisma.

Stats:

Strength: 20 (+5)

Dexterity: 17 (+4)

Constitution: 15 (+2)

Intelligence: 12 (0)

Wisdom: 14 (+2)

Charisma: 11 (+1)

Isuzu/Rin Sohma: Oath of Devotion Paladin

Rin was another hard one to figure out. But I eventually settled on her being a paladin due to her desire to fight against the evil of the curse and protect Haru. I feel like the oath of devotion really suits Rin due to her devotion to freeing Haru from the curse no matter the cost. If only protect from good and evil could have saved her from Akito.

I feel like her highest stats would be dexterity and wisdom, with charisma, strength and intelligence being more average. Her lowest stat would definitely be constitution though due to her tendency to get sick.

Stats:

Strength: 14 (+2)

Dexterity: 20 (+5)

Constitution: 9 (-1)

Intelligence: 13 (+1)

Wisdom: 16 (+3)

Charisma: 15 (+2)

Ayame Sohma: College of Creation Bard

This man is definitely a bard and no one can tell me otherwise. I was tossing up between college of glamour and college of creation, but I felt creation suited him more due to his love of creating fashion and incredible passion. He also wants to create a better bond with Yuki but unfortunately the mending cantrip does not work on human relationships.

His highest stat would definitely be charisma and dexterity, man is real slippery. His constitution would be pretty average along with his intelligence. Strength and wisdom are definitely his lowest stats though.

Stats:

Strength: 9 (-1)

Dexterity: 17 (+3)

Constitution: 12 (0)

Intelligence: 13 (+1)

Wisdom: 10 (0)

Charisma: 18 (+4)

Hatori Sohma: Order Domain Cleric

Due to him being the family doctor I can definitely imagine him being a cleric. I can also see him under the order domain due to him being in charge of ensuring that the curse remains a secret ergo keeping order. Modify memory is the one spell he always has prepared.

His highest stats would definitely be wisdom and intelligence, but he would have average dexterity, constitution and strength. His lowest stat would definitely be charisma though, the man is not even remotely smooth.

Stats:

Strength: 13 (+1)

Dexterity: 14 (+2)

Constitution: 15 (+2)

Intelligence: 18 (+4)

Wisdom: 20 (+5)

Charisma: 8 (-1)

[ironmandeficiency]

cody, where’s my lightsaber?

pairing: obi-wan kenobi / reader

word count: 6575

summary: you decide to introduce your dear friend to the wonders of the cannabis plant while planetside. the outcome is peak humor for your troops.

warnings: you’re smoking weed with obi-wan in this, so obviously there’s drug use.

a/n: i got high af (for the first time in a while) and decided to write something of it. i wrote like 90% of this while high and was beginning to sober up at the end. i got the title inspo from the stoner movie “dude, where’s my car?” and it made me laugh way more than it would have if i were 100% sober

disclaimer!! if you know firsthand what cannabis does from your own use of it, this isn’t anything new. if cannabis is a new concept to you, don’t take this fic’s descriptions as gospel. this was how i was taught & experienced it, but there’s a chance something may be “wrong” according to some ppl. this is NOT telling you to smoke weed if it’s illegal where you are/if you’re not of age to do so!! i’m not condoning it!! this was just something i decided to write after getting/while high.

“where exactly are we going, y/n?” obi-wan was sounding a bit impatient. you’ve been guiding him through the busy streets of coruscant for nearly twenty minutes without so much as an explanation.

“we’re almost there, obi. just have a little patience.”

“you must be mistaking me for my former padawan, i have plenty of patience.”

“could’ve fooled me, anakin- ow! don’t push me, obi!”

“that’s better.”

“you’re a heathen, you know that?”

“you’re as much of one as i, darling.”

obi-wan smirked indignantly at you as he kept walking, a hand resting on your waist protectively. he didn’t trust these streets at all, no matter how calm you were about just traipsing through them like a daisy patch. he’s seen and felt many shady and downright malicious people here and wonders what business you would have in such a place.

he was jostled slightly when you pulled him out of his thoughts and into the doors of… a caf house? was this all you wanted, to go get coffee with him? kriff, he could’ve taken you to dex’s and saved you both so much trouble (except for the suggestive looks he’d receive from dex concerning you, but he got those from a lot of people these days).

“what are we-“

“stay here until i get back. don’t let anyone else see your face or we’re both screwed. your face is too widely known to not cause trouble for us both, and my reputation here can’t save us. understand?”

obi-wan nodded his agreement but was quite perplexed. why did this place matter so much to you? he couldn’t ask you at the moment because you had disappeared with a flourish of your cloak into a back room, followed by a rodian woman who seemed to be expecting you. he didn’t want to pry and use the force to investigate because he knew you would tell him in due time. he trusted you with his life, and that trust extended to when you were at a seedy caf shop in the middle of the coruscanti slums.

you untied the small pouch of credits from your belt, being cautious to hide your lightsaber from whoever could be watching the transaction. your friend did the same with the item you were looking for, emptying a pouch from a larger pouch.

you slowly rest the credits into her palm as she hands you the smaller pouch. you opened it and brought it to your nose, inhaling the scent to ensure it was what you were expecting from her. this batch was going to be the best you’ve had in a while, you could tell just by the scent of it.

“i hope this pleases you, my friend.”

“indeed it will, torin. pleasure doing business again. may the force be with you.” with that, you returned to where obi-wan was trying his best to be inconspicuous. he was doing quite well, considering his unfamiliarity with his surroundings.

you nudge obi-wan through the force, gesturing towards the exit. he got your hint and once at your side, his hand immediately gravitated to the small of your back. it was adorable that he was so protective of you, but you’ve been coming here since you were a padawan, sneaking out of the temple and making deals in the slums for one of the greatest plants in the galaxy. there wasn’t anything you needed to be protected from here.

cannabis is highly regulated throughout the core systems to the point where what little of it was legally sold was extremely weak, thus resulting in a high demand for stronger concentrations in the black market. it’d cost most beings an arm and a leg for the quality product you buy (flesh or mechanical, no one was picky these days), but you’ve had connections to some of the best sellers for over fifteen years, and your loyalty paid off. they’d save you the best of the best because they knew you could be trusted, and that you weren’t the kind to sell them out.

you could tell that obi was a bit anxious. he didn’t know what you did when you disappeared with your rodian friend, but he had a strong suspicion that it wasn’t completely legal. “i can feel your anxiety in the force, my dear. i will explain everything once we’re back on base. in the meantime, relax. we are okay.” you sent him more reassurance through your bond and didn’t stop until you could feel his tension begin to evaporate.

he pulled you closer still, using your body as an anchor in a situation he wasn’t completely at ease in. you let him because it reminded you of your first visit to the slums you were taken on with the older padawans. you were anxious back then and still had a strong fear of the council, but with time your fellow padawans helped ease that fear into respect with the help of a routine trip to a near-hidden caf shop.

your return to base was a tad eventful. your commander biggs, marked by the violet paint of the 89th battalion, had several holopads in hand, each of them open to documents your signature was direly needed on. you sighed, bidding obi-wan farewell and returning to the duties the title of general brought you.

it was far too long until you were able to rest. after getting dinner in the mess with your men, you sent thrash off to deliver a message to commander cody, and then him to obi-wan. you avoided using your comms as much as possible during leave, they felt too professional during times where you were free to relax. there was a high chance that you didn’t even need to use your friend’s commander as a middle man because wherever cody was, there was a large chance that you’d find the general there alongside him.

that seemed to be the case when you were in your quarters, mere minutes after sending the message with your trooper. “i’m glad to see you got my message. now come in, take a seat wherever.”

“is this about our little trip today? i’ve been quite curious as to what you brought back.” you grinned at his words, excited to show him your loot.

“well then, let me show you.” you grabbed the small pouch from where it rested on your bedside table and poured some of its contents into your cupped palm, holding it towards him.

his eyes widened considerably when he processed what you were holding. “y/n, is that-“

“cannabis, my friend. yes it is. some of the best in the galaxy, as a matter of fact. came from the outer rim where there’s no limit on the strength.” this seemed to shock him and you were quick to assure him that you didn’t get the hardcore stuff. “don’t worry, it’s not mixed with anything else. i only use it to relax sometimes, and this batch is somewhat mild for my taste. i have no desire for much else.”

obi-wan wasn’t sure what to expect, but it wasn’t this. he had many questions brewing in his mind and wasted no time asking them. “why did you have me accompany you?”

“to show them you were trustworthy, in case you ever wanted to get some on your own. now you know where to find it.”

“why is your trust so valuable to them?”

“i’ve been a customer of theirs for a long time. in the beginning, i was the extra face that accompanied the older kids until they stopped going or started buying from someone else. eventually i became a solo customer and stayed loyal to them. they value and reward loyalty in their business, which is why i always get a good price.”

he took a moment to contemplate this. he was flattered to have been chosen to accompany you. one more question sprang into his head despite being unsure as to where it came from, and he spoke it with no qualms. “are you going to share?”

--------

when you had asked him whether he preferred a joint, blunt, pipe, or edible, he had a dazed look in his eye similar to when shinies see a jedi fight for the first time. you didn’t want him to feel awkward about not knowing what to do, so you decided to teach him what each method did, how long it took to take hold, etc.

as it turns out, obi-wan has never smoked cannabis in his life. 

he asked what the best thing was for a beginner, and you immediately began to roll a joint for the two of you to share. you chatted as you worked, your fingers going through the familiar motions with little thought.

your pipes had screens in them, but you didn’t want to risk obi-wan exhaling into the pipe and blowing charred chunks everywhere. edibles were a peculiar beast, since it takes longer for their effects to set in and can sometimes hit harder than a joint of the same concentration. the first time you had an edible several years ago you ate the whole thing, not knowing that the effects would be delayed compared to smoking. needless to say, you kept away from edibles for a long time after that and became finicky about them.

once the joint was made, you examined your handiwork with a smile. “this is a joint. you take the cannabis and wrap it in a special kind of paper, making sure to seal it shut so nothing falls out. then,” you searched a drawer and found your lucky lighter, flicking it on and bringing the flame to the joint resting lazily between your lips.

“you light it like so.” obi-wan watched you attentively, admiring the expert with which you took a hit off the joint, inhaling the smoke for a moment before blowing it away from you both.

“you slowly inhale from here,” you pointed to the end you didn’t light, “let the smoke stay in your lungs for a few seconds, the smoke is what gives you the feeling we’re looking for. and for future reference,” you took another hit before continuing, mildly enjoying the way obi-wan was watching your lips wrap around the joint. “never blow your smoke towards someone unless they explicitly ask you to. it’s a somewhat common practice, but i don’t enjoy it and i don’t think you would either.”

you held the joint outward to him, silently asking if he’d be comfortable with trying it right then before remembering something else he needed to know. “there’s a high chance that you’re going to cough a bit after your first couple hits. your body’s going to be unused to this, so be gentle with it. don’t expect to handle your first joint like a longtime smoker would.” you retrieved a water bottle from your small refrigerator in the kitchenette, setting it down beside him.

he took the joint from your hands, mimicking the way you held it to not look like a fool and slowly brought it to his lips. “remember, don’t let the smoke out too early or it’ll be like wasting the joint itself. since you’re new to this, try inhaling for three seconds, holding it in and counting to four before exhaling. does that make sense?”

obi-wan nodded slowly, his eyes studying the joint resting between his fingers. “if you don’t want to do this right now obi-wan, please don’t think you have to. i don’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“i know you wouldn’t pressure me into doing anything, y/n. i just never thought i’d be doing this, it’s a bit of a shock to me.”

you nodded, relieved to hear that you weren’t making him uncomfortable. “that’s completely understandable. but before you do this, i want you to know that cannabis can have a subtle effect on your control of the force.” this was where your concern held the most weight. it was stressed to you a lot when you were first experimenting with cannabis as a padawan, that you wouldn’t have as firm of a grip on the force as you did when sober. you had no idea how this would make obi-wan feel or what would happen when he relaxed his grip on the force.

“there have been times where i don’t realize i’m using the force on something until it’s pointed out to me that something’s floating that normally doesn’t. don’t be alarmed, it’s okay. i’ll be here the entire time to help you.”

obi-wan took a deep breath, letting this information sink in. he seemed to be having a debate with himself last-minute, trying to choose whether this was worth temporarily losing some of his grip on the force. he came to his decision after a moment, the determination set in his jaw almost adorable because it was about cannabis of all things. his eyes flitted to yours as he brought the joint to his lips, following your directions exactly. he inhaled to the count of three and held the smoke in for a precise four seconds before blowing it out.

“you did that perfectly, my friend. now here’s the last rule of smoking cannabis with someone: it’s puff, puff, and pass. you take two hits and give it away, then it’s the other person’s turn to do the same.” his reply came through another hit that he once again held for four seconds, blowing it out with a smile.

he passed it back to you with a light cough that eventually grew a bit too much for his liking. he looked a bit frazzled as he coughed, unsure whether this was normal. you sent him waves of calm through the force as you snatched the water bottle from where it lay, opening it for him in a hurry before extending it toward him. he accepted it gratefully and was barely pacing himself while drinking it, only doing so at your request.

“this is okay, don’t worry. you’re okay, obi. everything is okay.” you placed a hand on his back to remind him of your presence, that you weren’t going to leave his side. he leaned into your touch, letting himself relax in your now outstretched arms.

you took two more hits before letting it rest in the ashtray you kept on your bedside table. obi-wan’s eyes were on the joint you let rest after putting out, wondering why you didn’t pass it back to him. “since this is your first time and we have no idea what’s going to happen, we should take it slow. this concentration is stronger than what i had started on, and the effects it had on me were intense then. i can only imagine how the next several hours for you are going to go before they actually happen, and i don’t want you to do more than you can handle.”

“oh, that makes sense. thank you for looking out for me.”

“of course, obi. now do you want to grab some snacks from the mess and come back in here for a while before it hits you completely?”

“yeah, that sounds like a good idea.”

biggs was minding his own business in the mess when it happened. he was eating his dinner, talking to his vod’e, just taking advantage of being on leave like everyone else does. everything was ordinary & nothing was out of place, and he relished in that. the 212th and 89th battalions mingled among each other pleasantly like always. nothing could go wrong here.

“did you see that holo of kix tackling fives after he- hey, uh, biggs?” waxer’s voice cut off abruptly mid-sentence, eyes too busy staring at the roll levitating off his vod’s tray. “what’s wrong with your roll?”

when more brothers spotted the roll, the ones that were eating theirs quickly set them down. exclamations of shock and a large variety of curses were spun by nearly every man there, none of them having any idea what was going on or why their food suddenly started to float. soon enough, there were all different pieces of their dinner floating around the mess, some snatching their food back after watching the spectacle for a moment.

biggs knew what this meant. he knew exactly what was going on. “oh, no.”

“biggs, do you know what’s going on?”

“is biggs home in there? hello?” boil lightly knocked on his ori’vod’s temple until the hand was swatted away.

“tell us, biggs!”

“yeah, don’t leave us out of the loop!”

before biggs could answer the questions his brothers were throwing at him, his eyes found you hand-in-hand with general kenobi. he could see the grins plastered on your faces from halfway across the mess and he froze. was general kenobi high right along with you?

no, he couldn’t be… could he?

his question was answered by the food floating even higher when the two of you passed tables. he knew that when you were high, you had built up your ability to somewhat control the force through your haze. but with general kenobi (he still couldn’t believe general kenobi was high), it was quite obviously his first time under the influence. he ignored the questions as he watched the jetti like a hawk, your movements much less calculated and a lot more fluid and loose.

you were the one that noticed the state of the food first, stopping and nudging general kenobi and gesturing at the mess. you were giggling about it, and it was all you could do to keep the general standing as he began to laugh hysterically, finger pointing at a stray bantha steak a member of the 212th was chasing haphazardly.

“obi! obi, sshh! our men are watching, you gotta- pfft!” it was hard to keep your calm at one of the most composed men in the galaxy happily losing his shit. “obi-wan, stay calm! we gotta get our food without drawing too much attention!”

“but look at the food! it’s floating! they have no idea what to do about it!”

obi-wan started giggling like a child instead of full-on cackling, only doing a mildly better job at keeping the attention away from you both. this was completely his doing, no doubt. you turned on your holo and began to record the chaos erupting in the mess with the giggling jedi master leaning on you for support.

somehow you were able to get some food and leave the mess before it hit obi-wan too hard, you using the force to carry the trays in front of you both. when you left the mess, you heard a cacophony of thuds and splat’s echo into the hall. hey, at least the food wasn’t floating anymore.

you were helping obi-wan pace himself with his food because you knew that he’d throw it all back up if he ate too fast. he didn’t seem to understand why you were doing this, pouting when you would block his plate from him. it took a lot of strength to keep from laughing in his face but you held through with a face-numbing smile.

your comm beeped loudly, taking your attention briefly away from obi-wan.

“general-”

“biggs, we’re on leave. don’t use titles here.”

“sorry si- y/n. i’m also not going to ask for permission to speak freely because we’re on leave?” biggs ended this with a question, still unused to being so informal with those in authority.

“exactly! you’re learning quick, my friend. what can i do for ya?”

biggs sighed much like an exasperated parent before speaking. “did you get general kenobi high?”

you knew this was coming after the scene in the mess, there was no way to avoid it. but the way he said it, the incredulous tone your commander spoke with, it sent you into another fit of laughter. you nodded and laughed, not really processing the fact that biggs couldn’t see you nod because this wasn’t a holocall. he took your laughing as a confirmation of his suspicions and so did the brothers sitting beside him.

“hey y/n, do you think i could cut my bantha steak with my lightsaber?” obi-wan’s voice crackled through the commlink and nothing could have explained the unfamiliar looseness of his cadence to the men better than him being higher than the negotiator, which was exactly the case. “wait, could i cook a bantha steak with my lightsaber?”

you ignored the comm for a moment to answer obi-wan with a grin. “if you were patient enough when holding your ‘saber over the raw steak, maybe so. but if you cut your cooked steak with it, it’ll just char it beyond edibility and ruin a perfectly good steak.”

obi-wan paused to contemplate your answer, running through the scenarios in his head before being okay with your response.

“pardon?”

“sorry about that. obi-wan was just curious about the culinary abilities of his lightsaber, no worries.”

you could hear the laughter from the other side of the link and you were mildly curious about who was listening to your conversation. “who’s there with you, biggs?”

“waxer, boil, venom, cody, and myself. no one else.”

“y/n, am i swaying? i feel like i am but i’m not sure if it’s me or you.”

“okay, that’s good. just keep this between you guys and it’ll be fine. and no one is swaying, i promise.” you knew obi-wan would be mortified if the entirety of your battalions heard of this, but these five were loyal and wouldn’t speak of this outside of themselves.

“how’s the general taking it?” you picked cody’s voice out and you smiled at the concern he had for obi-wan. it was laced with humorous curiosity but you could tell he was a tad quite protective.

before you could answer, obi-wan chose to answer in a voice a smidge too loud. “hello, cody! i’m doing very well, but thank you for your concern!”

more snickering came from the comms, the five men enthralled with this new side of obi-wan. you had no clue why you didn’t invite the man to smoke with you earlier because high obi-wan was honestly the best source of entertainment you’ve had in a long time.

“biggs said that you two were the reason the food went awol in the mess earlier but didn’t explain why.” boil’s curious voice came through and you smiled at the reminder of what the men now dubbed the Floating Food Fiasco.

“cannabis has a tendency to weaken our control over the force. it’s normal for things to randomly float when a jedi’s under the influence because of that. like with the food, that was all obi-wan’s doing.”

“wait, i was the one moving the food?”

“yes dear, it was all you. now stop eating so fast. your stomach won’t be happy with you later if you keep on like that.”

obi-wan nodded as if he understood but didn’t slow down, prompting you to move his plate out of his reach. he humphed and leaned back, almost slumping in the chair. you did not want him throwing up on your watch. “y/n, is it normal to feel as though my bones are vibrating?”

this was the time to cut the conversation short. “well boys, it was good to talk to you but i’ve got to look after our dear general. contact me directly if either of us are needed, obi-wan’s clearly in no state to answer his comms.”

“will do, general.”

biggs ended the call, freeing your attention that was almost instantly caught by obi-wan reaching for his lightsaber. that wouldn’t turn out well at all. you quickly used the force to bring his lightsaber to your open hand, quickly connecting it to the extra loop on your belt. “return my lightsaber, y/n! i need to test your hypothesis about the steak!”

you sighed as you could feel him trying to get it back with the force but failing at his attempt, his lightsaber gently tapping against your thigh as it moved. “obi, you’re about to get hit really hard. it’s my responsibility to keep you from doing stupid things while high, and this is one of those things.”

obi-wan stood from his seat and was clearly having trouble standing on his own, if his leaning against the back of the chair was any indication. you got up and slowly guided him to your bed, laying him down gently. he seemed perturbed that he had to be guided there, mere feet from his former spot. it was hard for him to hide the slight panic upon realizing that he, in fact, could not stand on his own and you picked up on it.

“obi, i know you’re a little scared right now. this is something you’ve never felt and your body is telling you to lash out. but listen to me, everything is okay. i’m right here, obi, and i’m not leaving you. not now, not ever.”

he seemed to be soothed by your voice, so you kept talking as you helped him get a bit more comfortable. his boots were the first thing to come off, followed by his socks and the top layer of robes. you left his pants be but removed his shirt, softly telling him when to lift his arms and torso.

as you talked, you pressed a code into your comms to tell biggs to come to your quarters. since you didn’t know how long obi-wan was going to be in this panicked state or what he could do, you thought it best to have your commanders hold on to your lightsabers for now. biggs already had a loop for yours, and you knew for a fact that obi-wan dropped his ‘saber so many times that cody, the one who seems to always find it laying about, had been given one a long time ago.

it didn’t take long for biggs to arrive and take his leave, lightsabers in hand and holster as he left. you could feel his worry radiating off his force signature and you quickly chased it away, telling him that obi-wan was just crashing and that you weren’t going to leave his side. he seemed okay with this, leaving the room without another word.

obi hadn’t noticed the handoff through his resurfacing panic and you quickly got to work on reinforcing his mental shields, the only gap being where you sent him calm and peace. “why can’t i control my body? is this normal?” his voice was even quivering, a slight stutter beginning to form.

“this is normal for your first time, you’re okay. i’m right here with you, i’ll keep us safe. just take some deep breaths and focus on my voice, okay? you’re good, i’m not going anywhere.”

you were perched on the edge of the bed close to his head, your fingers carding through his peachy copper hair. whatever hair product he used was working wonders on his hair, it’s softness was unrivaled by anyone you knew. the ministrations seemed to calm him so that’s what you did, not letting yourself change the pattern as he occasionally pushed against your hand like a tooka. it was precious.

it took a little while, but obi-wan was on the edge of sleep and far more relaxed than he had been earlier. you were getting up when his hand grabbed for yours, tugging with what little energy he had. “i’ve just got to use the fresher, i'll only be a few feet away.” he huffed but let your hand go, clearly counting the seconds for you to get back.

you hurried as fast as you were capable of, finishing in record time because you knew obi-wan was still frazzled by this experience. “see? almost no time at all.” you returned to your spot and he grumbled something you didn’t completely understand. you looked at him in confusion until he spoke a little clearer. ah, he was asking you to hold him. yep, he’s a tooka in disguise.

you had no issue with this, knowing that some wanted physical affection/reassurance when their high hits them hard. you were among this group but it wasn’t a necessity for you like it was for other people. biggs had done this for you a few times, his presence so stable and comforting that it never took long for you to be asleep after an especially strong high.

parting the covers slightly, you got under them and pulled them over the jedi beside you. “see, obi? i’m not going anywhere. just relax, let yourself ride the high. i’ll be here the entire time. don’t worry, i’m here.” obi-wan wriggled himself into your arms and you wrapped them around him protectively, telling him through the force and with your words that you would keep him safe.

he seemed comforted by this thought and the feeling was increased tenfold by being so close to you, him glad to have someone to hold on to when he didn’t have complete control over his body. there were very few people he’d trust to protect him when he couldn’t do it himself, and he could fit the list on one hand; you, anakin, cody (and the entire 212th by proxy but that didn’t count right now), and more recently, ahsoka.

with thoughts of his loved ones in his head, he let himself relax in the haze and fall into a deep sleep unlike anything he’s had.

obi-wan came to and nearly panicked when he didn’t recognize his surroundings as his own quarters. not only did that shock him, but his body was… spasming? or were those just his bones vibrating? wait… bones weren’t supposed to do that.

he thrashed in the bed until his eyes barely caught the ashtray on the bedside table, and the events of the previous day nearly punched him in the face. he smoked cannabis! scratch that, he smoked cannabis with you! that somewhat explained the vibrating bones sensation and the way his consciousness felt like it was swimming through his head. these were your quarters, and he was sleeping in your bed.

the golden question was where you were.

his anxiety about being alone in your room spiked when he couldn’t reach out through the force to find you, his grip still too lax. obi-wan knew he had to leave at some point. if someone found him in your bed -and apparently shirtless- there would be many conclusions drawn, and there were some that could get you both in serious trouble with the council/senate (the line between the two was quite blurred these days).

he snapped himself out of his thoughts, resolving to get dressed and leave before anything bad could happen. sitting up was relatively easy if he did it slow enough, but standing? whole other game in itself. more than once he was leaning on various pieces of furniture while trying to dress himself. he was clearly still high, but it was nowhere near as strong as it was hours earlier. he continued to struggle (and trip over his feet more than once) with his robes and was relieved when given an excuse to sit down, his boots being the only thing reasonable to sit down and put on.

he gave the room a simple once-over and decided that it was fine how it was. your dinner trays from yesterday were gone and his lightsaber was-

oh, no.

“haar'chak!” obi-wan exclaimed. his lightsaber was lost in your room and he was barely able to support his own body weight, let alone do a frenzied deep search for his weapon! he realized that he had to find you before anyone else found him. you were the only one with him last night, and he guessed that you were also the only one that knew of his current state. and since he couldn’t find you with the force, he had to search for you the old-fashioned way: recon.

this wasn’t going to end well.

your comm beeped hours after getting obi-wan to sleep and you panicked for a moment, hoping to the force that he didn’t wake up. you tapped a code that told the other line to hold on a moment, and you slowly untangled yourself from obi-wan. stepping into the hallway, you quietly asked what the purpose of the comm was.

“general skywalker and commander tano have returned with the 501st, and the 104th have left. skywalker is asking for general kenobi and seems intent on finding him immediately. we’re in the hangar at the moment, but possibly not for long.”

you sighed because you knew something was going to go wrong. obi-wan can’t be sent to the field in the state he’s in, and he very well can’t tell the council the reason he can’t fight at the moment. before you could reply, anakin’s voice cracked through the link.

“y/n, your commander is clearly withholding information-”

“under my orders. thank you biggs, i will be there directly. in the meantime, please stay where you are.”

“yes, general.”

the link died and you rushed to the hangar, hoping that anakin wasn’t causing too much of a ruckus among your men.

he found you before you found him, the knight charging toward you with such speed that his robes were catching wind. he was extremely worried, his face taut with thinly-concealed distress.

“anakin, listen to me. you must take a moment to-”

“do not tell me what i must do! i haven’t been able to reach obi-wan through the force for hours! and then when i arrived to check on him at the last place he was known to be, your men blatantly lie to me! give me one reason why i shouldn’t worry!”

ahsoka’s distress paired with anakin’s fear/anger was nearly choking you through the force and you hoped that obi-wan was still asleep so he didn’t have to feel it. after sending safety to obi-wan and comfort to the padawan in front of you, you told them the truth.

“obi-wan smoked cannabis with me last night. that’s why his connection to the force was a bit off.”

“wait, he what?!”

“what’s cannabis?”

you and anakin both gave ahsoka an incredulous look, not believing that she didn't even know what cannabis was. then again, she hasn’t had the chance to spend much time in the temple and has spent even less time with fellow padawans that knew about the slums’ caf shop. you could let it slide. “it’s a popular recreational drug that i like to use occasionally. it doesn’t do anything bad, just relaxes you a bit. but for jedi, it can also weaken your control over the force which explains why obi-wan couldn’t contact you or receive your messages.”

“but obi-wan smoking cannabis? i don’t believe it for a second.” anakin’s tone was still bristly, which was to be expected. he was fiercely protective over his loved ones, and you didn’t need the force to tell you the intensity his emotions burned with.

your commander, unfortunately, took his words as a challenge. why he did, you had no idea. “with all due respect, general skywalker, are you calling her a liar?”

“biggs, stand down.” your commander stepped backward in shock at the harshness of your tone, his head downcast after the berating. you never used that tone with any of the men under your command and you regretted it almost immediately. you sent him an apology and he seemed to lighten up for a moment, so your attention turned to anakin.

“what would i gain from lying to you? if something bad actually happened to him, do you think that any member of the 212th would let me walk around here a free woman?”

“she has a point, master.”

“i also have footage from last night,” you raised your eyebrows toward ahsoka with a grin, thankful that her anxiety has died down. “wanna watch?”

obi-wan was sneaking around the base as well as expected. there were several close calls, and he knew that whoever was watching the security cameras would be plenty entertained. he paused for a moment, using the wall as a support before trying to use the force again, and this time it slightly worked. he was able to discern that he was going the completely wrong way if he wanted to find you. he didn’t have an exact location, but was able to get the general direction.

he was in the midst of pushing himself off the wall when he felt two more familiar signatures: anakin and ahsoka were nearby and anakin felt pissed. almost as quickly as he sensed his former padawan’s anger it dissipated into confusion, soon followed by humorous. okay, anakin was fine. it was time to get off this wall… or not.

he had pushed himself too hard through the force and collapsed onto the floor in exhaustion. obi-wan was conflicted: he could hope for no one to find him and wait until he was able to stand on his own before continuing his search; or he could hope for someone, anyone to find him, and live with the embarrassment of being so dependent and hope they didn’t take him to the medbay.

groaning when his head hits the wall, he tries one more time to get up (spoiler, he fails). he’s now regretting leaving your quarters because at least there, he had privacy when he was weak. he closed his eyes, resigned to nap where he sat but of course, footsteps pounding on the durasteel floors kept him from being able to do that. then the cannabis decided to show back up (in the good way), and the steady thrum of his bones vibrating brought a strange sense of calm back. he’d be fine if he just stayed here.

after showing anakin that yes, obi-wan was okay, you commed cody and told him to retrieve the general himself from your quarters and to bring him to the mess. when he got there and saw that obi-wan was gone, he immediately contacted glitch and scanner in the security department. they told him the direction the general went in, and he was off.

it felt like a lifetime before cody found his general slumped against the wall, a small smile on his face. cody could tell the general was breathing and all, but it just felt weird seeing him in this state.

“general! are you okay?”

“i’m, ah, quite well, thank you cody.”

“can you stand?”

“last i checked, no. and since then, my bones have decided to try and escape my body without consent, so i’m going to safely assume that i can’t.”

cody schooled his features because he was dangerously close to laughing in the general’s face at the way he stuttered through his words that still seemed to be semi-formal. “alright, i’m gonna take you to the mess. general y/l/n is looking for you.” the commander bent down and gingerly began to lift obi-wan, letting the jedi rest all of his weight on him.

“wait,” obi-wan instructed, cody going rigid on command. “what if i make the food float again?”

“we’ll cross that bridge when we get there, general. but for now, just focus on me. if you do the food thing again, i’ll be sure to record it for you.”

obi-wan seemed satisfied with this answer, then remembered the reason he left in the first place. “cody,” he mumbled, “where’s my lightsaber?”

[delcat177]

Before New Pokemon Snap

While this game I have waited for for 22 years loads up, before I spend the night playing, I wanna tell tale of my time with the first one.

(The player’s guide is so nostalgic!)

Yon Longe Poste

I was interested in nature photography as a kid. And by interested, I mean kinda really obsessed. My father had been a journalist and had his own interest in nature photography, so after developing some skill on a little plastic snap camera, he did one of the few bond-y things we did when I was a kid and taught me how to use his old 33mm. It was a wonderful thing with a telephoto lens that I’d carry in a case around my neck, snap the lenses back and forth as needed on my daily field ramble. 

Mom had commented on my patience with the snap deal, I would sit by the hummingbird feeder motionless for as long as it took to get shots, and a real field camera took it from the backyard to the woods. I could usually get birds and could always get some Pure Michigan nature, but I was constantly angling for animals--with 24 to 36 shots, depending on how I pooled my allowance, I spent a lot of time hunting for frogs, snakes, turtles, settling for butterflies and my dog. The one time the latter met a big touchy porcupine, I didn’t have my camera and was preoccupied with my poor be’needled boy, and when I went back, it was gone.

So, remembering a family story about how Mom had once found a porcupine chewing on the door because it was trying to get salt out of the wood, I requisitioned a piece of plywood my father promised was extra salty, took the shaker for good measure, and put it back where the needling had happened.

I haunted that spot all summer, but life isn’t as interesting as it can be, and porcupines are nocturnal. It wasn’t safe to be in the woods after dark, we had coyotes, so I took my solace in finding one day that it had, at least, been happily gnawed.

When I saw the first Nintendo Power previews of Pokemon Snap, I went “ah, yes, a blessing from the gods” and started work on a local Christmas cookie empire (different story entirely) to be ready for the release date. June was four months from my birthday and six from Christmas. I needed to be on LOCK.

And when I finally gave over my $63.59 (state tax was six cents) for this limited, low-poly, rail-ride of a game...

...I absolutely adored it like few things I have ever adored. The only thing missing was Oddish, and I was okay with that, kinda, I guess, if they had to.

I played nonstop. If I got bored with the ambience, which was rarely, I put on one of my sister’s CDs--RENT, usually.

Yes, I was listening to RENT at 12.

Until Mom heard La Vie Boheme.

At any rate, I got every last cent’s worth out of it. I filled my Pokedex. My last Pokemon, pulled from a sneak peak at a player’s guide in Wal-Mart, was Muk. I still have creepypasta/Pokegod theories about how Mewtwo was supposed to be in the game (why 63 Pokemon, not 64??). The Album, where you could save your pictures, let you write a few words on your faves, and I did my best to take funny snaps and caption them. The pun “Karp-E Diem” was used.

My skill increased. I learned how to stop the ride indefinitely at the Charmander section and played with them, throwing them apples and seeing how many consecutive heads I could bonk (I think my record was 7?). Then, with a tip in the NP letters session, I found out you could glitch the game by constantly changing direction in the kart, lagging it from moving, so that events timed to the movement went off early. This is the best way to get the most AMAZING shots of Pikachu riding Articuno without hacking, still.

It must have gone on for a year, at least, before I beat the game.

REALLY beat it.

Pokemon Snap is a limited game. Each Pokemon can have a maximum score assigned to it, a cap where it’s simply absolutely perfect in shot.

And for Mew, the highest-scoring Pokemon in the game and the only Pokemon on the last level, I was consistently getting 9900.

But that wasn’t quite right.

The thing is, Professor Oak reviews your shots and tells you exactly why you did or did not get each bonus. To get all bonuses on Mew, she needs to be in the right pose, (a sequence of item throws, easy), exactly in the center (again, easy) and exactly the right size.

The last part is worth 100 points exactly.

If I could have submitted every photo I had of Mew, I would have cleared it out easily and mindlessly. I would have gotten 10000 points, the only five-digit score in the game, somewhere in the 60 snaps I was allotted for the level. She was right in front of me, all I had to do was click-click-click.

But that’s not how the game worked, and this is where it shines. It’s also where I am very curious to see if it’s going to be the same.

Like I said, Pokemon Snap was a limited game. It’s notoriously difficult to emulate, because it uses some advanced jury-rigging of the N64′s capabilities to call and recognize a photo of a Pokemon. To streamline that, and presumably to allow for this precise experience, the player can only select one photo they took of a Pokemon to be reviewed per play.

I wasn’t just trying to catch the perfect shot.

I was trying to find it out of all the shots I took.

Over and over again, I went through the stage, snapped pictures, pored over my album, selected the single entry what I was sure was just right, went to judging. Over and over again, I heard Professor Oak go “whAt a PItY”, in sound byte form. The CDs became necessary to halt murder.

It took weeks. But one day, from sheer little-kid determination, I got my snap. I JITTERED hearing the “Just right!” byte, held my breath--

10,000 points.

The perfect score.

(This isn’t mine, of course, and also is a 9900--that foot is the real problem, so I’m glad to see I’m not alone)

It automatically saved to my best-score slot. I wish I had taken picture-pictures. I felt pride on a deep, genuine level that like my hummingbirds, I had at last gotten just the right moment, had just the right eye.

I’ve honestly been thinking a lot about my father lately. We didn’t have a great relationship when I was in the house with him, but...being a teenage “daughter” and being an adult son are two different things.

And it didn’t stop at Pokemon Snap. After being kicked out of an evangelical school, I started attending classes for high-schoolers at the community college, and Photography was my first. I ended up taking the class four times and passing it twice--I wasn’t bad at the subject, but rather had a hard time getting transportation to the college to do the course work. I had to withdraw the first and second times, pulled a C on the third, and took it one last time as I was graduating to shine up my GPA since I knew I had a reliable car and I could lock in the A.

My sister and my mom, maybe my dad all thought I might end up a wildlife photographer. I professed the interest, and unprofessed it once I started reading about how harsh locales are in that job. I suspected getting bugs up my nose in 110-degree heat wouldn’t be as fun as the idea sounded. Instead, I leaned toward my librarian interests, and now I’m sitting here developing games and writing.

If I could tell myself back then, before all of it, that photography would never make me a dime, would cost me all my allowance on film, would be one of the albatrosses of my college years, and that technology would make all of the practical experience I learned in development a moot point...

...we would both know it was worth every single moment, one moment at a time.

Hekk.

Maybe I should send Dad some photos.

so is it done installing yet

[yespleasefandomtrash]

adora contemplating that it’s okay to have wants as well as thinking about how much she loves catra, culminating in an extremely unorthodox proposal (but nonetheless one very fitting for the two of them)

~*~

Adora knew she had problems with… accepting things, as it were. On her first birthday - or what they’d decided was her birthday - as a part of the Rebellion, Glimmer and Bow had refurbished her entire wardrobe. With the help of Angella. She’d be so overwhelmed that not only was it still a struggle for her to wear most of those outfits but she’d also tried to make gifts for each one of them in return. They’d informed her, gently, that birthdays did not operate as exchanges. Their presents to her were tokens of appreciation for her existence, no strings attached and nothing required in response. 

She hadn’t believed them at the time. Or at least hadn’t understood them. How could someone appreciate her solely because she existed? In the Horde, a person had to work to prove their worth. They had to constantly show that they’d earned their positions. They had to justify that they deserved to live, because no one inherently deserved anything when there was no guarantee they’d all make it to see the next day. Then, as She-Ra, every day Adora felt like she had to prove her loyalties to the Rebellion as well as demonstrate her capabilities as a leader. She couldn’t let them down, no matter what the cost. As they learned to trust her, She-Ra’s responsibility shifted to being the savior. There was no one else in the universe who could do what She-Ra could, who held the power that She-Ra held, which meant She-Ra - Adora - had to be ready to do anything for the sake of those who could do nothing.

It was a mantra. A lifestyle drilled into Adora’s mind. Don’t ask, don’t want, and there will be nothing to lose. She should only take what she needed because anything more was unnecessary and would only be a sign of weakness. In the Horde, Shadow Weaver made sure Adora was never weak. In turn, as part of the Rebellion, Adora did the same for She-Ra. She clung to those basics, forcing herself to be content with working towards a greater purpose. Once, to be Force Captain. Then, or perhaps even now, to be She-Ra, and to do whatever it took to save all of Etheria.

You deserve love, too. Mara’s words often echoed in her mind, as if she’d only heard them yesterday and not months ago. Adora had struggled to take that advice to heart. ‘Deserve’ was too fickle of a term - maybe she did deserve love, but the rest of Etheria deserved to live and didn’t that outweigh her own selfish wants?

But she was gradually starting to understand that such concepts did not have to be mutually exclusive. She’d saved Etheria while the love of her life had saved her at the same time. She didn’t have to choose. Or maybe she had chosen, and she’d chosen both.

Adora, much like her girlfriend, had taken to meeting with Perfuma. To help her process… well, everything. She kept this fact private - not because she was embarrassed or anything of the like, but because she simply didn’t want any of her friends to worry. Glimmer was having to iron out the details of co-ruling with King Micah, Bow was helping his dads rebuild and restore their library, and Catra was working harder than anyone just to become accustomed to Bright Moon and to improve her relations with the people she’d hurt during her time at the Horde.

Perfuma’s response to these concerns had been that her problems were not lesser just because she’d convinced herself they were of smaller magnitude, because a person drowning in five feet of water and a person drowning in twenty feet of water were still both drowning, regardless of the difference in depth. They both needed to be saved, and both would need treatment afterwards to survive. In other words, it was okay if her friends worried on her behalf because her problems were as important as anyone else’s. Concern and empathy, Perfuma believed, were the core components of a strong bond between individuals.

Perfuma was undoubtedly right, but Adora kept her talks with the princess to herself all the same.

Another common topic at her sessions was her supposed ‘self-sacrificial’ tendencies. Those tendencies were connected to her difficulty in accepting her inner wants and desires, Perfuma had explained, and her obsessive need to be someone for everyone at any time. If she kept that up, she would eventually stretch herself too thin, hurting herself and perhaps even those around her.

So, with Perfuma’s help, Adora had created a new mantra to live by. She did not have to be everything for everyone. It was okay to want, to be selfish, to love and be loved. Perfuma was delighted to note her progress over the past several months, and Adora couldn’t help but feel pleased with herself, too. Which was also okay. There was no shame in pride and self-love.

In other words… Adora wouldn’t have traded the world she was in for a million new universes to explore.

“So how do you tell the difference between a star and a planet?” Catra asked, frowning up at the sky. “They all look like bright circles to me.”

Adora chuckled at her girlfriend’s blunt question. “I think stars twinkle and planets shine is how most people do it. But I can just… feel it. The difference.”

They were lying on one of the flatter rooftops of Bright Moon’s palace, resting side by side and staring up at the stars together. Catra liked being up high to get away from people, and Adora was more than happy to accompany her in being alone. They tried to climb up and stargaze every week, and while they were not always successful, it made the times they did manage to get away together even more special.

“I guess that’s She-Ra’s influence,” Catra mused. “Feeling the difference without knowing anything about stars.”

Adora laughed. “Probably so. I’ve never studied astronomy in my life, so…”

Catra snorted. “Except for the one time you fell asleep when George was trying to explain constellations to you. So yeah, definitely She-Ra.”

“I didn’t mean to fall asleep.” The conversation had actually been incredibly interesting - she’d just been exhausted from helping Glimmer with Bright Moon business all day.

George had recently provided them with a copy of a book about stars, as most of Etheria had been ecstatic about their reappearance in the sky. Adora and Catra had spent the past few nights spotting constellations amongst the stars, something Adora - or She-Ra, perhaps - apparently had a knack for. Catra preferred to make up her own, each story she invented for them more ridiculous than the next.

“Hey, is that a constellation?” Catra asked, pointing upwards and to her right at a cluster of stars that formed a vaguely humanoid shape. “Or is it coincidentally a weird pattern that looks like a person?”

Adora had to physically tear her gaze from her girlfriend, turning her head to look up at the sky. Not that the stars weren’t beautiful, but their light didn’t hold a candle to Catra, who in her opinion was a thousand times more stunning. Although she was probably biased on that front. “Yes,” she said after examining the stars Catra had pointed out to her. She actually remembered this particular constellation from George’s book, admittedly only because it was exactly on page 100. “It’s the Huntress constellation. The daughter of a Titan - the Titans were a race of people after the First Ones - sacrificed her life at her father’s hand to save her friends travelling with her. Her father intended to kill them all, and she was willing to do anything to stop him. She was able to trick her father into returning to his prison where he held up the sky, as the First Ones had condemned his fate to be, but in doing so he managed to strike a final blow across her body that ended up being fatal.”

“Parents hurting their children, huh?” Catra murmured. “I guess that’s not something new.”

Adora had been so excited that she’d remembered the story behind a constellation of her own accord that she’d forgotten how tragic this one happened to be. “The girl was actually one of She-Ra’s most loyal lieutenants.” Her own voice had dropped almost to a whisper. “When she died to save everyone, She-Ra immortalized her sacrifice in the stars.” She reached up, tracing the outstretched arm of the girl. “She’s drawing her bow - fighting to protect her friends even in death.”

Adora heard Catra’s claws scrape against the rooftop. “Why are so many of these stories so depressing?” she grumbled. “Someone is always dying to save other people. Why - why can’t a person do good things and just… die of old age or something? Can’t they still be remembered for their achievements without the sacrifice play?”

Adora knew she should have been listening more tentatively to her girlfriend’s words, as there was undoubtedly a lesson there she herself needed to take to heart, but Catra’s profile in the light of the moon was simply too mesmerizing. She couldn’t focus on anything else.

“Stop looking at me like that.” Even in the low silver light of the moon, the deep blush on Catra’s face was clear.

Adora had to bite back her laughter. “Like what?”

“Like… I’m everything.”

But she was everything. “You’re telling me I’m not allowed to admire my beautiful girlfriend?” Adora teased, rolling onto her side to better face Catra. “That’s not fair.”

“Shut up,” Catra muttered, but there was no acidity in her voice.

Adora leaned down and pressed a soft kiss to Catra’s forehead. “I wouldn’t say it if it wasn’t true.”

“Yeah, you have this terrible tendency of always telling the truth. The only person worse than you at lying is Scorpia,” Catra grumbled. But she didn’t seem to mind the kiss. “And if you’re going to kiss me, don’t you dare miss my lips on purpose.”

Mm. So Catra definitely didn’t mind the kiss. And Adora was more than happy to oblige with her girlfriend’s requests, though maybe ‘demands’ was a more accurate term. She lifted herself onto her elbows for a better vantage point before leaning down to capture Catra’s lips with her own, humming in satisfaction as her girlfriend began to purr. Maybe it was a silly conclusion to come to but kissing Catra, no, being with Catra was everything Adora wanted and more. She’d give up a thousand lifetimes just for the moment she was living.

No. No. She didn’t need to give anything up. She had what she wanted, there and now. No sacrifice needed to be made because Catra was with her, and no one could take that away from them.

Least of all herself.

“Hey,” Catra said, brow furrowing in concern. She carefully moved the both of them up into sitting positions. “Are you okay? What’s wrong? Wait, are you crying?!” Her voice got more frantic with each question, and she took one of Adora’s hands in her own. “Talk to me.”

Adora reached up with her free hand to touch her face, surprised to find it streaked with tears. She didn’t remember starting to cry. “‘Talk to me’,” she found herself repeating, warmth blossoming in her chest. “You and Perfuma have been working on healthy communication strategies, haven’t you?”

Catra flushed. “I - yeah, maybe” She shook her head. “Dammit, Adora, stop deflecting! I asked about you.”

“I…” Adora hesitated, her free hand dropping to rest on the rooftop. She sighed. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, come on,” Catra scoffed. “You think I’m buying that?”

“I don’t know,” Adora insisted, pushing the hair that had fallen free from her ponytail behind her ear. “I’m just” - she silently cursed as she felt herself getting choked up - “so happy, because I love you and I want you to always be with me and now - now there’s no war that can take us away from each other. I’m… I’m allowed to want you, and to want to be with you. Although that probably makes no sense.” She swallowed the lump in her throat, wiping her tears away with her sleeve. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to kill the mood.”

Catra’s pupils had gone wide, and after a long pause she responded by pressing a fiery kiss to her lips, an unexpected reaction but certainly not an unpleasant one. Adora wasn’t complaining. “Say that again,” Catra mumbled against Adora’s lips. “Say that you want me.”

Adora almost had to fight to break away from the kiss, panting slightly from the intensity. “I want you,” she whispered, pushing her girlfriend’s bangs out of her face. The sincerity in her voice would have normally been terrifying but with Catra she wanted nothing more than to be completely honest. “I want you to be with me for the rest of my life. I want to be selfish. I want to be the only one who gets to call you mine.” She pressed a kiss to Catra’s face between each wish, moving from her nose to her cheek to back to her lips.

Catra’s confidence had long since been replaced by a crimson blush, which Adora did not mind, as flustered was a look she always loved to see on her girlfriend. “You know,” she muttered, leaning in to press their foreheads together, “I didn’t mean for you to start reciting wedding vows to me.”

Adora couldn’t help but laugh. “You know what a wedding is?”

“Mostly. Spinnerella explained it to me.”

“I bet that was an entertaining conversation.”

“Ugh. Netossa seemed to think so.”

Adora absentmindedly stroked Catra’s hair. She’d be lying if she hadn’t thought about marriage. Not much, obviously, because she’d been fighting a war her entire life, but the idea had crossed her mind once or twice. In some ways, a ceremony felt superficial, but being able to share such a blissful moment with friends and the immortalization of a relationship that came with it…

“We should get married,” she decided.

Catra sat bolt upright, pupils wide in surprise and face red in shock. “We should what?”

“Get married,” she repeated. “I want to be with you, you want to be with me. It would be a nice way to make things official, wouldn’t it?”

“Adora, we’re like - we’re not even 20,” Catra sputtered, her ears going flat to her head as her blush deepened. “I mean, I love you more than anything, but aren’t we - aren’t we kind of young?”

Adora could feel her own face turning pink in response as her brain finally caught up with the words that had been leaving her lips. “I - I didn’t mean now!” she stammered, desperately trying to figure out how to rephrase her thoughts. “I just meant, like, eventually, when we’re way older and after we’ve travelled around the entire universe restoring magic and… stuff…” She trailed off, and for a moment they just stared at each other, both too embarrassed to speak.

Catra was the first to break, losing herself in a fit of giggles as she leaned forward to press their foreheads together again. “Of course I’ll marry you one day, dummy. Then no one will ever doubt how much you want me.”

Adora flushed, but she couldn’t stop a happy smile from dancing on her lips. “Sorry that was such a weird proposal.”

“Everything you do is weird. I’m used to it.”

Adora laughed, pressing a light kiss to the top of her girlfriend’s nose. “Good.” Then an idea occurred. A brilliant idea, if she said so herself. Which she did. “So, until then…” She unpinned the golden wing from her belt before carefully attaching it to the left side of Catra’s shirt. “Just so everyone knows how much I love you.”

“More like how possessive you are,” Catra scoffed, though she was smiling as her hand brushed over the pin. “But I guess I’m in no place to say anything about that.”

Adora pressed a chaste kiss to her girlfriend’s lips. “You definitely are not.” She kissed her again, this time catching only the corner of her mouth. “But I love you anyways. I want you. And I’ll make sure you never forget it.”

Catra began purring happily, the deep vibration only intensifying as Adora continued to pepper her face with kisses. “If this is your way of reminding me, I don’t see how I ever could.”

Adora started to laugh, but was soon cut off by Catra’s lips crashing against her own, her girlfriend pushing her down against the rooftop.

You deserve love, too.

Adora knew she would continue to struggle with Mara’s words. She knew she would continue to have difficulty grasping how love was freely given and required no sacrifice in return. But she also knew she was getting there. One day at a time.

And the best part?

Catra would always be at her side. Every step of the way.

~*~

[peak-dumbass]

Thoughts on Sons of Garmadon cuz redesigns :]

Also instead of watching all of the season and then adding my thoughts later I instead took notes while watch the season so that’s why this post is incredibly long, sorry about that :/

Anyway enjoy :>

Sorry for the accidental posting and I don’t want to rewrite everything so here’s from the original post

Lloyd reading the title of the episode also caught me off guard the first time I watched this

Basically Lloyd caught me off guard entirely the first time I watched this

Also his eyebrows are now THICC

“Still thirsty?”

...

I can see why people like Nya a lot (._.’)

Nya’s badass and f—king love her

Also the water bubbles she makes look really nice

Jay mimicking Cole is adorable

The first time we see them after a year and the first thing we see them do is argue and disturb a group of people that took a vow of silence 

I love them

“Did I call you at a bad time?” They’re in the middle of a fight with the mechanic, what do think?

Also Pixal calling Lloyd “Master Lloyd” :’/

“Whoever said fight fire with fire clearly didn’t know what they were talking about.” “Hey, you’re stealing my lines!” I love you Kai

“Who likes ice cream? I do! How was that line Kai?” I love you Zane

Them teasing Lloyd for his deeper voice and them just genuinely having family fun bonding time just fills me with such happiness that I can’t describe with words :’’’’’’’’>

Misako abandons Lloyd yet again, and she was just starting to act like a good mother in Hands of Time >:/

Jay is not understanding a single thing being said to him, but at least he’s trying 👌

Their excuse for not mentioning the royal family throughout the series is “they like their privacy”? Really? Like really? Are they expecting us to believe this bullish-t? 

Lloyd seeing Harumi for the first time: Can You Feel The Love Tonight🎶

Now Cole’s the only one who hasn’t had a crush in the series he is so gay and the writers can’t convince me otherwise

Can I just say the lighting for the inside of the place is beautiful? Cuz it is.

Also I just realized Cole’s the only ninja that isn’t wearing sleeves on his ninja suit, that’s cool👌

Since Harumi’s natural hair color is white, does that mean she’s albino?

“The maskes must never be reunited” Says the person who reunited the mask >:/ I know she’s acting good here but still

“No thank you, I actually gave up sweets. My body is a temple.” The moment I heard that for the first time I was like “WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO MY BOI?! WHO HAS HURT HIM?!”

Lloyd, stop stalking the princess, that’s illegal >:|

“Don’t worry, we’re ninja, we’re experts at this kind of thing” They proceed to loose the mask, let their main villain onto their ship, and Lloyd gets a crush on her :/

Grade A ninja-ing right there 👌👌👌

I’m on episode 2 and seeing Harumi acting nice and sweet and connecting with Lloyd and knowing that she’s faking all of it, I just feel so so so so bad for Lloyd :’<

Cole, don’t try to give Lloyd advice about girls when you aren’t even attracted to them

Ok so I procrastinated a bunch on doing this for some reason so Yee, let’s continue

I’ve only seen Mystake for 1 scene and if anything ever happens to her I’ll kill everyone in this room and myself

Oof I’m now sad and realize why everyone likes her

Ok so we all agree the tea Mystake gave Jay and Lloyd to see the drawings move is weed right? Or had weed in it?

Why is Cole hiding in a garbage bin when Zane is using a perfectly good newspaper? Also oh boy can’t wait to see Rocky DangerBuff and Snake Jaguar in action :3

The way Snake walked into the bar Jesus

and I’m trying to watch this without skipping it cuz to me the whole thing is very awkward and I can’t stand awkward stuff like this but I also heard there was glacier so I’m gonna try to watch this without yeeting my phone and burying my face in my pillow

Chloe: Snake is gorgeous and we stan

Me: I know he’s beautiful look at him, he’s amazing

He’s bad boi and baby boi at the same time and I love him

Just added Cole into a scene with the ninja when he’s actually still kidnapped by UV so noice job Ninjago HQ 👏👏👏

Zane looks so weird in the flash of Wu finding him dear god

Stop bothering him Cole, let Zane Rp as Snake for a little bit longer

DAD COLE DAD COLE DAD COLE DAD COLE DAD COLE DAD COLE

Cad is what Cole would have named the baby if it didn’t turn out to be Wu cuz Cole + Dad

Ali: "Why cad?" "Its cooler than Chad cause you take out the h for hoe"

Ali/clumsy you’re a genius

”you didn’t think it would that easy, did you?”

Guys is weird to think that UV is 100 times hotter after saying that line?

Mommy UV vs Dad Cole, Mommy UV is fighting Dad Cole for the baby

Oof I remember what’s gonna happen to Zane y’all and I’m not happy plz Mr.E stahp plz

Mr.E to the SOG after he kicks Zane’s ass: Guess who just got murdered!

“Not all men-“

Me: You’re right, Zane Ninjago would never do this

Mr.E: I’m on my way, I’m on my way, I’m on my way to kick Zane’s ass :D!

Cole is Pearl from SU confirmed, he was staring at baby Wu sleeping

Harumi: Maybe we can use this blanket at a Parachute?

Lloyd: What do this is a cartoon?!

Lloyd proceeds to do the exact thing he said wouldn’t work

Also Harumi is the best actor I’ve ever seen like seriously 10/10 👌 actor, playing with Lloyd’s heart strings like she’s been doing it for years

“How to be a heartbreaker” is Harumi’s jam and theme song

SO I WAS ADDING MY THOUGHTS ON HERE AND TUMBLR JUST DECIDED TO BE A LITTLE B-TCH AND CLOSE ON ME BEFORE I SAVED MY THOUGHTS AND NOW MY THOUGHTS ON HALF EPISODE 5 AND 6 ARE GONE OOF SO I’M JUST GONNA SAY THAT PIXAL IS HAVING SELF ESTEEM ISSUES OR SOMETHING SIMILAR AND SHE’S AMAZING AND IT’S MAKING ME SAD THAT ALL SHE SEES HERSELF AS ASSISTANCE AND NOTHING MORE

Also Lloyd falls onto a few branches and gets a hurt arm that requires a blanket while Nya was at the front of the ship with 0 protecction and was basically yeeted to the main deck while it crashed into the jungle and she doesn’t even get a break?!

I know Nya is stronger than Lloyd but GOSH DIDDLY DARN I didn’t know she was that STRONK!

Baby Wu: “Ninja never quit hehehehehe”

The ninja:

Lloyd: Confused Green Bean Noises

Harumi: kisses him on the cheek

Lloyd: •////• completely forgets what he was confused about

Harumi saved by lovestruck Lloyd and boners

Cole to Baby Wu: You took care of us, it’s only fair that we take care of you.

Me:

GOD I LOVE COLE HE’S AMAZING

Harumi and Lloyd during that one waterfall scene in Episode 6:

Also Harumi’s backstory for why she likes Garmadon and hates the ninja including Lloyd, it completely makes sense cuz she was a child that over heard that the ninja didn’t do sh-t and Garmadon saved the city so it makes sense why she hates the ninja and believes Garmadon should be Ninjago’s leader, and since it happened when she was young she didn’t think things through, she didn’t think about it from the ninja perspective and especially didn’t think about it from Lloyd’s perspective cuz she was a child, kids don’t tend to think about the other person’s perspective on things, so I think it makes sense and it’s really good 👌 also this is Ninjago’s first main female villain, all the other ones were either second in command or were in a crew that worked for a bigger villain so yeah that’s cool

“Don’t you guys have any idea what she’s doing? She’s resurrecting Garmadon! Lord Garmadon!” Yeah no sh-t Kai, the name of their gang is “Sons of Garmadon”, of course they know and of course they’re ok with it why do think they’re helping her?

“Then it’s a good thing the Quiet One isn’t a bad guy but a bad girl” It doesn’t matter that Pythor, Chen, Morro, and Garmadon had dicc, what matters is that the greater evil didn’t listen to them dipsh-t.

Harumi screams a lot, like Princess Peach/Damsel-in-distress amount of high pitch screaming and I’m surprised Lloyd or the other ninja haven’t told her to shut up at one point.

a slightly dark room suddenly turns a little bit darker

Harumi:

Lloyd: Jesus even when I was a kid I had tougher skin then you, I know this is a little hypocritical for my to say, but grow the f—k up god

Ok woah woah woah, how did Lloyd go from “I didn’t tell you about the fact that I’m part Oni, Mystake only told me and Jay” to “You’re the Quiet One” like he isn’t wrong but how did he put it together in such little amount of time?

Ok this is how the Lloyd vs Harumi fight should have gone down:

Lloyd: Give me a good reason not do destroy it right now.

Harumi: I’ll give you 2. You want to see your father again and you love me.

Lloyd: HAH! While you busy being a heterosexual b-tch I studied the blade!

Lloyd kicks Harumi’s ass and the day is saved

Am I wrong? Lloyd only met Harumi a couple of days ago, it’s like Anna from Frozen but LEGOs

“Love is an open door” is Llorumi shippers theme song

“I WANT YOU TO FEEL THE EMPTINESS THAT I FEEL”

B-TCH HAVE YOU NOT SEEN HIS F—KING CHILDHOOD HE HAS MORE TRAUMA THEN YOU WILL EVER GET YOUR F—KING LIFE TIME!!!

I KNOW SHE IS A FICTIONAL CHARACTER AND THAT SHE HASN’T SEEN HIS LIFE LIKE WE HAVE BUT DAMN IF IT ISN’T ACTIVATING MY PROTECC-LLOYD-AT-ALL-COSTS-AND-THAT-THIS-IS-TOTAL-BULLSH-T INSTINCTS

“Or we’ll have to get all ninja on you!” “What does that even mean?” “I don’t know I was improvising” Tbh that’s a mood Kai, at least to me

Lloyd: Guys, Rumi is the Quiet One!

The ninja who are currently surrounded by the SOG including Harumi: Oh really, ya don’t say?

Lloyd just got yeeted out of a waterfall so it sorta makes sense why he didn’t notice

Lloyd said I won’t let you get away with this and Harumi said YEET

They have Lloyd they have the masks and we have trouble

Baby Wu: Puppy!

that ain’t a puppy Sensei it’s a giant underwater scorpion monster

I forgot they tamed the giant underwater scorpion monster and named it Crabby, and Jay hugged one of Crabby’s claws, Jay’s favorite pet the ninja have ever had is Crabby confirmed

“So this is your true face without the mask, no wonder you covered it” Damn Lloyd is salty, LET LLOYD SAY F—K 2020

Chloe: Lloyd said "bitch u ugly" poetically

Me: Yeah, he got the saltiness from Kai and the poetic speech from Zane

“There was never anything between us”

One episode earlier

“You want your father back, and you love me”

One episode earlier

Harumi kisses Lloyd on cheek and proteccs him from the corrupted Samurai X suit

Me:

Harumi gets close to Lloyd

Me: KICK HER IN THE NONEXISTENT BALLS

Yay the most useful and totally not child abandoning character, Misako, is here and giving Lloyd information that he already knew and is being incredibly useful buy not only abandoning Lloyd for a second time in his life but also finding Baby Wu for the SOG Hooray

“Stop Rumi, this isn’t you!” B-tch you’ve only known her for a couple of days, and she has played with your heart, in dangered your friends, and tried to kill you and your friends on multiple occasions, and she nearly succeeded on killing Zane (though tbh Zane gets nearly killed every season so that isn’t a surprise)

“You were right, this isn’t me” YOU SERIOUSLY BELIEVED HE’LL FALL FOR THAT BULLSH-T AGAIN? AFTER YOU TRIED TO DROWN HIM AND HIS MOM WHILE SUMMONING HIS EVIL DAD FROM THE DEAD? HAH, B-TCH YOU THOUGHT!

“Stop. Save it for someone who cares” Yesssssss I love youuuuuuu by baby boiiiiii

Sees the arm coming out of the anvil-thing

Me: Terminator Garmadon? Also this is what happens when we complain too much, we also gotta be more specific people! We can’t ask for just Garmadon, we need to ask for Good/Sensei Garmadon or else we’ll get bullsh-t like this!

THE SCENE OF THE NINJA SINGING WEEKEND WHIP JUST PLAYED AND THE HAPPY WHOLESOME VIBES AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Also there’s no way harumi gets the resurrection spell right on the first try, like no way, impossible, like she even gets interrupted by Lloyd and the ninja at the end and then Garmadon appears after that? Like I’m not a witch/wizard myself but I’m pretty sure that’s not how spells work? You don’t just start a spell, stop before the spell is finished, and the spell still works :/

Also how the hecc did Garmadon know where to find Harumi? It was never explained, he just like punched his way into the police station and was like “Yo b-tch what’s up?”

“I can turn him once, I can turn him again” ends up getting his ass handed to him and nearly dieing for the millionth time in his life

“That sounds like a really bad idea” “And Kai knows bad ideas, he’s full of them” Oof Kai just got roasted

“Lloyd, what are you doing?” “I’m sorry, Nya. I have to confront him” OOF HE REALLY DID JUST PULL A KAI DIDN’T HE

I’m not gonna quote everything Lloyd says here cuz there’s too much but DAMN HE’S REALLY PISSED OFF AND IS REALLY DOING A KAI JESUS

I know we all wanted Sensei Garmadon back but I’m ngl this Garmadon looks really cool and gives really good evil speeches to unmotivate his opponent

OOF Y’ALL REALLY HAD TO ADD LLOYD HOLDING OUT THE PHOTO OF HIM AND GARMADON WITH LLOYD STRUGGLING SAYING “FATHER” AND THE PHOTO GOING INTO THE WIND DIDN’T Y’ALL MY HEART CAN’T TAKE THAT AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

AND I STILL HAVE TO MAKE IT THROUGH EPISODE 10 WHERE I KNOW LLOYD’S HEART IS GONNA BE RIPED OUT OF HIS CHEST AND STOMPED ON WITH A SPIKED SHOE

F—K HARUMI F—K NINJAGO HQ F—K EMPEROR GARMADON F—K THE SOG JUST LEAVE MY POOR BABY ALONE

Y’all I don’t think I can make it through the next episode f—k man

Holy f—k I forgot Emperor Garmadon reads the title card in episode 10 oof

“Not so fast!” “‘No so fast”?! You used that ages ago!” True, it sucked then and it sucks now

“My brother is coming” “How do you know?” “I know” Dang even baby Wu doesn’t tell people sh-t

“You sure you’re up for this?” “I was married to him once, I’m up for anything” Ok so you’re saying that as if you were the one that was treated badly in that relationship and not the other way around like it should be but whatever floats your boat pal

“Careful!” “Are you actually doubting my ability to closely approximate the true value of our surroundings? I’m a nindroid.” Damn Zane is pissed

COLE LITERALLY JUMPED OFF THE BOUNTY TO CATCH BABY WU NOT KNOWING JAY WAS GONNA CATCH HIM AKA HE WOULD HAVE DIED FOR BABY WU I’M SCREAMING GOD I LOVE COLE

Ok so Lloyd you are excellent at fabulous/eat-a-dicc-b-tch exits like wow 👏👏👏👏👏

Also the scene with the 4 OG ninja and Baby Wu traveling to the first realm looks really really nice ngl

All in all I really really like this season, it’s great 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏👏

[investigold]

Investments. Where to begin?

How to learn to invest from scratch? We will tell you how to understand investments and invest wisely if you have never done this before. Recently, more and more Russians are investing in stock market instruments. The myths that investments are like a gambling game, in which, sooner or later, every penny will be lost has long been dispelled. With the right risk assessment and the right amount of theoretical knowledge, you can create a balanced investment portfolio that works for you and your goals. We will tell you how to learn how to invest from scratch in our article. Why you need to invest Savings on hand make many people think about increasing them. Keeping money in a safe at home is not very profitable, because inflation can eat it. For the registration of deposits, now is also not the best moment, since the interest on them continues to fall following the key rate of the Central Bank. Naturally, under these conditions, Russians' interest in the instruments of the stock market is growing: according to the Moscow Exchange, at the moment in Russia 7 million private investors have access to the trading floor. With investments, you can: 1. protect savings from inflation; 2. get additional income; 3. Create an airbag and gain financial freedom. Before you start investing, decide on your financial goals. At this stage, it is important to prioritize and assess the value of your desires. 3 main whales of investing Typically, investments require some kind of initial savings. Payroll deductions can be a great way. By saving only 10%, in just a year you will be able to accumulate an amount sufficient to enter the stock market. At the same time, it is not necessary to wait all 12 months, because even with 1000 rubles in hand, you can already buy a government loan bond. It is false to believe that with 10-20 thousand rubles you will not be able to start investing. Just take a look at Warren Buffett, who started his investor journey with $ 115 and earned only $ 5 on his first deal. Today this person is included in the list of the richest people in the world. Here are some tips for a budding investor to follow: 1. Decide on the investment horizon. When it comes to bonds, the stock market is conventionally divided into short-term securities and long-term ones. For example, OFZs are limited to a specific validity period (3, 5, 7, and even 10 years). Shares, in turn, are considered a perpetual asset. They exist as long as the company operates and remains public. 2. Choose an investment instrument. Decide where to invest your money. The investor decides what securities he will purchase, whether he will invest money in business development, whether he will entrust his savings to a mutual fund and a management company, or simply open a deposit in a bank. 3. Focus on risks and returns. Fixed-interest securities (for example, federal loan bonds) are considered less risky instruments compared to stocks and bonds issued by enterprises. Tip: To make it easier for you to choose the right investment instrument, first of all define your risk profile. This is your type of behavior in the financial market. It takes into account your goals, desired profitability, investment horizon and acceptable risks. Depending on your attitude to risk, the risk profile can be conservative, rational or aggressive. Conservative investors prefer low-risk instruments with low returns, aggressive ones are ready to risk capital for the sake of high potential returns, and rational ones choose the golden mean. Interesting! The richest man in the world - Bill Gates - distributed his savings as follows: 20% are concentrated in the shares of their companies, the rest is invested in the shares of large US enterprises and directly in business. How to learn to invest: choosing investment instruments Newcomers, entering the stock market with $ 100 in their pocket, want to increase their capital by 2-3 times in a year. In fact, a high return on investment is only possible in the long term. If you do not have financial knowledge, take online investment courses for dummies or entrust your savings to a management company, which will form an optimal investment portfolio for a fee. Bank deposit Perhaps one of the most secure investment instruments, because in the event of bankruptcy of a financial institution, the state guarantees the payment of a deposit in the amount of up to 1.4 million rubles. The instrument's profitability is low - 3.5-6.5% per annum. For beginners who open a deposit for a significant period, it is worth choosing a tariff with capitalization. This means that the accrued interest will join the body of the contribution, increasing the base for calculating income. OFZ and corporate bonds OFZ - federal loan bonds, payments on which are guaranteed by the state. They are recognized as a low-risk asset. By purchasing such a bond at a set price, the investor seems to be lending to state-owned enterprises. After a certain period, the issuer returns the money to the creditor (payment of the par value) and pays interest for their use (coupon). The yield on OFZ is low - 5-6% per annum. Coupon income is tax deductible. Another way to generate additional income on bonds is to sell at the time of a favorable market situation. An example would be the purchase of government bonds before the start of a key rate cut by a country's central bank. Due to falling yields on new debt securities and a decrease in the cost of funding in general, the market begins to overestimate the value of the old bonds that you bought earlier. As a result, their profitability will fall and their value will rise. Thus, you will not only earn a coupon income over the life of the security, but also receive a profit from the resale. Shares of companies Stocks are considered a risky investment because it is not known whether the corporation will be profitable. Types of return on shares: 1.dividends; 2. exchange rate difference from selling at a higher rate. Unfortunately, the exchange rate and dividend yield of such securities is subject to 13% personal income tax. Want to avoid paying income tax? Then invest through an individual investment account. When storing funds in such an account, the investor has the right to a tax deduction in the amount of up to 52 thousand rubles annually. The investor is offered 2 types of accounts - "A" and "B". The first option is suitable for officially employed persons. If you do not plan to withdraw money from your account in the next 3 years, then annually you will receive the right to receive a 13% deduction from the amount up to 400 thousand rubles. Type B implies exemption from tax on income from the sale of securities. Suitable for those who are actively involved in transactions with securities or have no official income. Management Company A novice investor does not need to learn financial literacy to manage free funds. It is enough to entrust the money to the management company (MC), which will select profitable investment instruments on a paid basis. How do MCs work? You choose the management company you are interested in and conclude a trust management agreement with it. After depositing funds into a special account, the manager forms an investment portfolio that will correspond to the chosen strategy and your preferences. It should be noted that all securities are considered your property and are separated from the property of the manager, which allows you to avoid unpleasant situations. Choosing a broker It is necessary to buy and sell securities through a brokerage or individual investment account. When choosing a broker, pay attention to the following parameters: 1. license; 2. accreditation on exchanges and popular trading platforms; 3. commission (the amount of a fixed fee or a percentage of the transaction); 4. the threshold for entering the stock market. Many brokers provide clients with online trading services. You just need to select the stock market instrument you are interested in, replenish your account and generate a request to buy / sell a security. Investment strategies A strategy is a set of behavioral reactions on the exchange when trading. Be sure to determine for yourself what assets you are going to trade and what indicator you will pay attention to when making decisions. Most often, newbie investors choose a wait-and-see strategy. They buy securities at a reduced price or at par and then expect an appreciation or fixed income. In this case, the investment period can be up to 3-5 years. Consider the following points: 1. type of asset; 2. term of investment; 3. maximum losses. A portfolio investment strategy involves the purchase of various securities, which will minimize systemic risk (so-called diversification). Experienced experts recommend using 30% of savings to buy bonds, in particular OFZ, and invest the rest in shares of liquid companies (blue chips) - Gazprom, Sberbank, Surgutneftegaz, Megafon, Magnit. Tips for beginners Try not to invest everything you have in stock market instruments. Start with a bank deposit or OFZ, creating a "safety cushion", and then move on to stock trading. Financial market experts' recommendations: 1. set a loss limit and follow it when managing your portfolio; 2. diversify risks by investing in various securities of different issuers; 3. Do not believe the tricks of dishonest management companies and venture capital funds that promise to increase profits by 200% within a year; 4. always adhere to the chosen strategy, do not act impulsively, seeing that the stock price begins to fall; 5. open IIS to receive tax preferences; 6. rebalance the portfolio (for example, if one asset rises in price, sell it, and use the money received to purchase the asset that has fallen in price). Thus, you can start investing even with a small amount, and to make a profit without serious risks, it is enough to choose conservative instruments, open an IIS, or entrust the management of your savings to a management company.

[retvenkos]

hi!! congrats on 2.5k!! i was wondering if i could get a ship for atla, lok and into the spider verse (if that’s okay ofc!!) ?

i’m a 5”3 bisexual girl. i’m pretty sure i’m an enfj and i’m a leo (with an aqua moon and leo rising if that helps in any way!)

i tend to love/crave attention but i tend to be very insecure once in it (and just in general). i love meeting new people, i have a slight tendency of selfishness but i will do absolutely anything for my friends. i’m not a fan of taking a backseat in many things, including life. i like to poke fun at people but am always terrified of hurting their feelings. i also value peoples perception of me a lot.

i like to read, write, hang out with friends, learn new things, sleep, spend time with friends, photography, and going to concerts. i play basketball and work out on my own time.

hopefully that’s not too much/too little. thank you in advance and i hope you have a wonderful day/night!!

ATLA:

I ship you with Katara!

alright, so i think that katara would be a great match for you because you are both fiercely loyal and independent in life, but you also carry a softness with you that makes you feel vulnerable and insecure.

there is a bit of turbulence in both of you that would be disastrous when paired with someone incredibly turbulent (like zuko) or someone incredibly steadfast (like toph), so you both need someone who recognizes the struggles you face and gives them merit, but is also actively working for stability and peace.

you and katara would be good together because you will both do what it takes to save each other, no matter the cost. it’s good that you both have this attitude because when the other does something terrible in the name of saving everyone, you understand and don’t judge them for it. 

you’re both natural leaders with a fair amount of altruism, so you both strive to do what is best for everyone, taking charge in many situations. you are the parents of the group - making sure everyone is alright and doing what needs to be done.

if you have trouble making decisions, katara is wonderful to lean on because she always has an idea, and she’s acted like a mother for so long she has what it takes to make the decision. oftentimes you can be caught between two decisions, but by taking to katara, you can figure out what path would be best.

both of you are extroverted and love to be in the thick of things, so i imagine the two of you are a bit of thrill seekers - i have no doubt that katara would go to concerts with you and would play basketball with you (although she’s not very good and would much rather cheer you on from the stands).

i have this idea that in a modern! au the two of you met at a party or something similar - maybe you’re a friend of zuko’s and you force him to go to a party he was invited to, and you meet katara and the two of you immediately hit it off and hang out for the rest of the night.

or, both of you are photographers and in a high school! au you’re in a photography club together, and the two of you are tasked with getting pictures of some school event or another, and she drives you there, and afterwards you stop to get fast food and end up talking late into the night.

either way, the two of you are a force to be reckoned with, when you team up. you’re both supportive of each other and determined and reliable.

you are a little more tolerant than katara, so you are definitely one to talk her down, esp. when she’s holding a grudge against someone, and she trusts your judgement. you may not always get her to back down completely, but you do get her to back down just a little.

LOK:

I ship you with Asami Sato!

alright, so here is a power couple if i have ever seen one

you and asami are wicked smart with the outward confidence to change the world (while still being vulnerable to your own insecurities) and hearts big enough to want to save everyone.

both of you love learning and coming up with new ideas, so when you are together, your creativity just flows and you come up with cool, new ideas together.

you guys also have a tough side to you - neither of you will turn down a challenge, and your dedication to your friends is unparalleled. 

i see you guys as being the cool aunts - you are the voice of reason in your friend group, sure, but you also let them run wild with weird plans and interfere after the worst of the damage has been done. and it’s always like,,, you just go along with this ridiculous plan? “yep. because if we don’t, they’ll do it without us and that would be disastrous.”

okay, but i also just love the quiet moments between you two. you play pai sho together, and even though asami wins every time, you insist that at some point, you are going to win and continue to play anyway. 

i also think that asami gets pretty competitive? she loves winning, and even though she always asks you if you’re sure, she’s secretly very glad when you insist on playing (and losing).

and she’s also so supportive? she would love to read your writing or hang up your photography. she’s a proud girlfriend™ and will not hesitate to tell you how great you are. 

you, in turn, are constantly talking about how cool your girlfriend is - because have you met asami? she’s talented. she’s kind. she’s tough. she will kick you in the face, and then you’ll thank her for it.

oh, and 100%, asami will make sure that both of you find the time to sleep. both of you love having lazy weekend mornings where you stay in bed until noon, waking up when the sun filters through the windows but staying in bed, talking tiredly and laughing at each others jokes, intertwining your hands and playing footsie under the covers. you drift back off to sleep in asami’s arms, and when you finally wake up and decide to start the day, the two of you go to get brunch and then go for a drive.

and going for a  d r i v e  with asami is peak sweetness. you drive slowly through the city, hand in hand, and when you make it to the more deserted roads, asami goes fast. and spirits, you swear that she is the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen when her hair is blowing in the wind and she has that determined but thrilled smile on her face.

Into The Spider-Verse:

I ship you with Miles Morales!

first of all, both of you have big hearts and believe that you can make a difference. you also carry that same bit of doubt and insecurity, so whenever you hype the other you’re not out of touch - you just truly believe the world of each other, so you are sincere in your belief that the other is capable of anything

you guys are also artistic, and that’s a source of bonding for sure. you both find things visually beautiful and you both have a way with words, so you two often hang out and just create together. you write while he draws, and then, on the weekends, you take photos while he puts sticker around town, or when he’s doing graffiti.

you’re also wicked smart - both of you. i imagine that the two of you love to team up on projects together because you work really well together, while still having fun. miles plays music for you while you’re working on the project, and the two of you debate over what artists are better.

miles probably introduces you to a lot of music, and the two of you plan to go to concerts together, if you ever save up enough money. 

but if you are a superhero too, you definitely just put on your masks and sneak into venues and listen from the shadows. 100%, someone has caught the two of you, and so now concerts will save a spot for their friendly neighborhood heroes - they mark it off with tape and everything.

i feel like you and miles will spend a lot of time just.... chilling. hanging out, talking about whatever comes to mind. you’re lives are often going so fast - with him being spider-man and everything, so it’s good when the two of you can just hang out, sprawled out on the floor while playing video games. you bring the snacks and miles provides the entertainment, and the two of you can just be kids.

you can both be idealistic and selfless when it comes to the people you love, and while that can sometimes be a dangerous combo to have, you are both constantly saving the other after they do something recklessly noble, so you keep each other in check.

you also lean on each other a great deal. you both trust each other’s judgement more than anything, and so you often have open dialogue about the choices you have to make, and what the best course of action would be.

also, something i think is cute is that both of you like to tease, but you worry about taking it too far. so both of you will say something and be like, “but i didn’t mean it— are you alright? because it was just a joke— a pretty stupid joke, actually, i don’t know why i thought it would be funny—” and the other is like. “i promise it’s alright. yes, you’re fine i swear. i’m all good, i guarantee.” 

[angstiism]

❣❣ // Kazimir

♡   𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐒  &  𝐂𝐎𝐍𝐒   .   [   𝐀   𝐒𝐘𝐌𝐁𝐎𝐋   𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐄   ]   ♡

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐆𝐎𝐎𝐃

𝟏 .  would protect you, even if he does do it at a slow pace.  right as you’re about to get beat up,  he would stop the assailant.  however,  he would not rush in.  so,  you might have to deal with being roughed up a little or even robbed.   protecting will result in him badly injuring someone or killing them however.   if you can’t handle gore at the cost of having your life saved,  he’s not the man for you.

𝟐 .  his love language is gift giving,  so he’ll go out his way to spoil someone with a thoughtful gift.   this is due to him being very observant,  but also since he knows he isn’t going to stick around for the long run,  he likes to give them good farewell gifts.

𝟑 .  is a giving lover,  for what it’s worth.

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐀𝐃

𝟏 .  he will never stay with you or be exclusively yours.   due to his circumstances of being immortal,  he is saving himself the trouble of dealing with monogamous relationships.   heartbreak has nothing to do with it on his side since he has accepted this is forever for him until someone or something comes along and ends his life.   more-so,  he sees it as pointless and doesn’t want to be tied down to one person.   even before he was turned to a vampire,  he led a promiscuous lifestyle.

𝟐 .  emotionally unavailable.   he doesn’t feel the need to divulge in his past because he’s had one too many names  &  faked too many identities.   sharing his feelings just for the sake of doing it and to bond with someone is something he prefers not to do.   one would have to spend 100 years with him just to know a tidbit about his childhood.

𝟑 .  even if he were to come to love someone,  he would always have high expectations and compare them to his saint of a mother.

[monicalorandavis]

‘Cheer’ on Netflix is a shot of adrenaline to the heart

Cheerleader or layman, the show ‘Cheer’ on Netflix, which debuted just two days ago (Jan. 8), will make your body pulsate with nervous energy. That might dissuade you (and if you have a heart condition you should sit this one out) but this is what sports do to us. They make us cheer and scream and punch the air and, sometimes, we cry. Such is the story of ‘Cheer’. This motherfucker makes the Superbowl look like rec league racquet ball. Baby, this is high-stakes television and I want more, Netflix.

Yes, ‘Cheer’ is a sports show. But it is also the spiritual journey of the co-ed cheer team at Navarro Junior College in Corsicana, Texas. We follow the team (initially comprised of 40 members) through early practices all the way to the national championship in Daytona, Florida months later. By Daytona, the Navarro squad is whittled down to their strongest 20 athletes (though by the end, all of their finest performers have incurred the most devastating injuries and have been crushingly replaced). In every single episode the thudding of bodies to the mat remind us that cheerleading is a blood sport. These kids are putting their lives on the line for a sport that has almost zero career opportunities. Sure it has its “professional” team, touring team, and limited coaching opportunities. But those are few and far between. For almost all competitive and college cheerleaders, their career ends before they ever earn a dime from the sport they’ve devoted their entire lives (and sometimes family’s savings) to.

But to go into this show with judgments on the politics of cheer, or the politics of female-dominated sports is distracting from the artistry and dedication. Don’t let the unfairness of society at large discourage you. These athletes deserve your attention. They’ve worked their entire lives for it, in fact.

Let’s start from the beginning..

Through a feat of especially skilled storytelling (and editing), we learn about the individual members of the squad first. We endear ourselves to them one by one. Some are, obviously, more interesting than others. La’Darius has had it rough but is talented and soulful. Lexi is a rebel with tumbling skills to die for. And Jerry is a sweet, perfect angel with a heart of gold who performed at a competition the same day his mother died. By and large, you are struck by the extreme dedication of these college students. And then (right on cue), we meet their captain--

Monica Aldama, commonly referred to by the informal and simultaneously terrifying “Monica” is uttered with such reverence and fear I did not know who (or what) to expect. Surely, she’d look terrifying. She’d have mean, sharp eyes and big pageant hair. But instead, she appears slowly, patiently. Her appearance is...slight. Flat-ironed. Quiet.

Hmm...

Not a monster. Nails are manicured. Her family seems nice. Husband supportive. Things are not adding up here!

Then we watch the team practice. And oh baby, it goes from 0 to 100 real quick.

We see the impossible “pyramid” of doom and watch flyer after flyer plummet to a career-ending injury. One by one, loyal replacements step into their fallen teammates’ position, walking the plank. Some crack under the pressure while others rise. This is drama. Take note, Miss Rhimes. (Grey’s Anatomy could never!)

Through blood, sweat and tears, this crew works their asses off. They go full-out when their backs go out. They throw basket tosses in spite of labral tears. No, it’s not safe. Yes, they’re ignoring explicit medical orders. But such is the cost of excellence. Monica will not accept anything less. Neither will her athletes.

I’ll say it: Monica is an ice queen. Super competitive and smart. She’s creative and she’s a numbers cruncher. She’s added every stunt purposefully to maximize the total point potential of the routine. And her mantra is “no deductions”.

I’d posit Monica might catch some legal flack for her conduct on the show. She pushes her athletes way beyond what is kosher. One base with a rigorous extracurricular life on other competing teams blows his back out despite Monica’s warnings to skip the other team’s performance. He doesn’t listen and arrives to practice in debilitating pain, unable to walk. She makes him perform anyway. It’s hard to watch. The squad looks petrified but worried for their teammate. As he writhes in pain, the camera follows the expressions on his team members’ faces. Right on the brink of opening their mouths to speak up their eyes dart to an unconcerned Monica and they continue right back into the routine. It’s stunning. Her control over them is deep. Some kids express that the disappointment of their parents would hurt less than disappointing Monica. She is feared and revered. Sparse with language. (And even more sparse with hugs.) These kids bend over backwards to please her. And the line they all walk to serve her, in spite of injury and setback, is perhaps the strongest bond in the entire show.

Say what you will about cheerleading. These people are athletes. They deserve their things. They deserve a chance to be taken seriously. They deserve to be recognized and given the opportunities that other athletes receive. But they don’t. And even still they push on, sacrificing their bodies, social lives, grades.

I don’t want to spoil any of the major plot points of the show because each episode (and especially the finale) is a satisfying exploration of human will. Some people step up and others crumble. The only difference being their belief in themselves. It is profound and devastating. “Daytona” is perhaps the best series finale I’ve seen in a year. It is certainly the best performance from a sports team that I’ve ever seen.

Fucking hell, ‘Cheer’ is good.

[psychosistr]

Chariot’s Companions

Summary: Taking place in the Eyes of Heaven universe, Jotaro and the crusaders get sent to the coliseum alongside Giorno and his gang. What they find there is a haunting reminder of Passione’s past and a startling realization about one of the crusaders’ future.

Notes: This is the first story for my 100 Follower Giveaway, written for my little sister who has always been my biggest fan and greatest supporter in everything I do. Love you, T, happy valentines day!

Extra Note: Warning, this is a long fic with canon-typical violence for JJBA xD

Edit: Decided to start tagging my sister on the stuff I mention her in ^^” Go check her out, she’s very sweet and really intelligent, often posting stuff about Transformers and comic books: @mark-xeen

Everything seemed calmed for once on the usually busy streets of Morioh, Japan. There were a few people walking around on the main street, but not too many as it was the middle of a weekday and most people were either at work or school at this time. One of the few people walking around was a tall teenager dressed in a dark school uniform with a torn black hat and a large golden chain on the front of his jacket.

The tall boy rounded a corner behind the local convenience store and glanced around once he was out of sight of the general public. He then reached into his jacket and pulled out something rather odd: A turtle. Specifically, a turtle with an odd key embedded in its back.

The boy set the turtle down in a shaded corner behind the building before reaching down and touching its back. He was quickly sucked into the red gem embedded in the turtle’s key.

Inside of the gem was what appeared to be a hotel room. It was fairly plain with only the most basic of furniture and no bathroom, but it was still a safe enough hideout for the time being. The only downside was that it was..well..rather crowded by this point..

The boy’s name was Jotaro Kujo. He had recently found himself caught up in a series of bizarre adventures starting with the appearance of what he at first thought to be a ghost haunting him turning out to be some sort of guardian spirit called a stand that was actually protecting him. He soon became part of a world-traveling adventure to save his mother’s life when an ancient evil vampire that was an enemy of his family from over a hundred years ago stole the body of his great-great-grandfather and received a stand of his own and, in turn, caused Jotaro, his mother, and his grandfather to all manifest their stands too. On his mission to defeat the vampire, Jotaro had teamed up with others like him and his grandfather who had stands and, at the tragic cost of half of their group’s lives, they succeeded in defeating the nearly immortal vampire. Just as they thought their journey was over, though, the remaining three members found themselves caught in an entirely new adventure that involved traveling through space and time itself to stop an alternate-universe god-version of the vampire they all fought so hard to defeat and were trying to prevent him from gathering the pieces of a “holy corpse” that came from an alternate timeline and provided guidance to Jotaro’s bloodline- the Joestar family.

Along the way they gathered more allies- friends and family and other members of the Joestar bloodline, and even some alternate reality counterparts to a couple of them. The turtle they currently found themselves residing in had come from the timeline of a boy in Jotaro’s family who had a bit of an odd connection to the others- Giorno Giovanna. He was the bastard son of the vampire they were fighting, DIO Brando, who had conceived him with a woman before he had fully integrated his DNA into the body of Jotaro’s great-great-grandfather, Jonathan Joestar, resulting in a son that was part Joestar and part Brando. He was turning out to be a strong ally with a sharp mind and powerful stand.

The only thing that bothered Jotaro about Giorno and his group was that they seemed to know something about him and his friends that they had all unanimously agreed to keep quiet about. Specifically, they seemed to know something about Jotaro’s friend Jean-Pierre Polnareff. When they first met him, the group had called him “the turtle man” then quickly tried to cover it up by calling it “Italian humor”. He would have been fine if that were it, but what really bothered him was that Giorno and the others seemed to keep a cautious, almost fearful eye on Polnareff. They all seemed especially jumpy whenever he called out his stand, Silver Chariot. Narancia and Bucciarati had both flinched the first time they’d seen it come out and Giorno himself had subconsciously tightened his hand into a fist as if he was preparing to fight before forcing himself to relax.

Jotaro had no idea why they were so cautious around Polnareff and his stand. Polnareff was loud and annoying, but he was still a good man with a good heart. He was so noble that, even while under the mind-control of one of DIO’s sinister flesh buds, he’d still shown respect and consideration for his opponent- another member of their group named Mohammed Abdul- and had formed a quick but close friendship with every member of their group. Polnareff had been the only one besides Jotaro and his grandfather, Joseph Joestar, to survive the fight against DIO and his minions. As such, the three had formed a strong bond from both the fight as well as their shared grieving of their dead friends. Polnareff had sworn to Jotaro and his grandfather that, if they ever needed him, he’d come running to help them from anywhere in the world, and Jotaro knew he meant every word of what he said.

So, with all that he knew about Polnareff, it made no sense to him why Giorno and his gang would be so distrusting of him, even though they acted friendly enough on the surface. Either Polnareff was unaware of the looks the Italian group gave him, or he was just choosing not to say anything- either way, it annoyed Jotaro to have one of his only friends treated like some sort of ticking time bomb.

As Jotaro weaved through the crowded hotel-like room of the turtle’s hiding space (which was actually the doing of a stand), he found his group hanging out around one corner of the couch. His grandfather was sitting on the couch himself as he told some story, likely about one of his adventures from his youth, as usual. Polnareff was sitting on the armrest nearby, laughing loudly every now and then at a particularly funny part of the old man’s tale. Abdul (the fortune-teller that first taught Jotaro and his grandfather about stands and was the one to fight Polnareff then realize he was being controlled by DIO) was leaning against the wall beside Polnareff, listening with the occasional nod and a calm smile. Sitting on the floor facing the others was a boy about Jotaro’s age with red hair and a green school uniform, his name was Kakyoin Noriaki and he had also been controlled by DIO but had become a loyal friend after Jotaro freed him from the vampire’s control. Lastly, sleeping on the backrest of the couch by Joseph was a small black and white dog- he was a stand user named Iggy who tended to be grouchy and violent, but was still clever and had been willing to sacrifice himself to save Polnareff’s life.

Jotaro hid a small smile behind the high collar of his coat as he watched them all talking freely. While this adventure was odd and stressful, it was proving to be worth it to have their group back together again.

DIO, in his attempts to take out Jotaro and the Joestar bloodline, had used his powers to resurrect and/or control many of his family’s allies. Quite a few of the people currently in that very room had died and been brought back to life under DIO’s control as weapons against their friends. Thankfully, after using the parts of the holy corpse that they’d gathered, they had managed to break DIO’s control and save their friends from his influence.

Kakyoin, Abdul, and Iggy were all prime examples of this. It was a shock to have their friends suddenly return from beyond the grave and call them enemies, but Jotaro and the others were relieved to have them back after so much strife. Now they were all together again, fighting alongside each other and telling stories just like before. It may have been a roundabout way for it to happen, but getting his friends back had been worth the hard work he’d put in to tracking DIO’s movements.

Now, though, Jotaro was tired and needed a break before continuing the search. It was exhausting being the main one to walk around while everyone else got to rest inside the turtle-room, damn it…

Polnareff looked up at Jotaro with a grin. “Oi! Jotaro!” He waved as Jotaro took a seat beside Kakyoin on the floor. When Jotaro’s only response was a grunt that vaguely resembled a greeting, Polnareff laughed at his friend’s usual cranky demeanor. “Getting tired again already?”

“I’ve been the only one walking around for days now.” Jotaro shot back while pulling his hat down to cover his eyes, leaning back to lay on the floor and get some rest. “If one of you wants to carry the damn turtle, be my guest or shut the hell up.”

Abdul shook his head with an amused chuckle. “While we sympathize with your plight, Jotaro, I don’t think it would do much good for one of us to carry this burden- after all, none of us have any holy corpse parts and would have no direction on where to go. Perhaps you could try asking one of your relatives to take over if you need a break?”

“I’ll think about it..” Jotaro replied while settling in for a decent rest. The rest proved short-lived, though, when he felt a familiar pulsing from within his jacket after only a few minutes on the floor. “You’ve gotta be kidding me..” He grumbled while sitting up. Reaching into his jacket, Jotaro pulled out the now familiar glowing holy corpse part that had been with him throughout this particular journey. Looking around to see Giorno also holding his corpse part in his hand but no one else doing the same, Jotaro rose to his feet. “Yare yare..” He jerked his head at Giorno, motioning for him to follow. “Lets go..”

“Right.” Giorno said while rising to his feet as well, giving a quick wave to the members of his group before joining Jotaro.

The two raised their hands and were teleported back outside of the turtle.

Giorno wasn’t really one for conversation unless it was necessary, which was fine with Jotaro since he wasn’t either. He was definitely the least annoying out of his relatives, even if he did share blood with DIO. All of that meant that he didn’t really mind being around the other boy and was okay looking for the next lead from the holy corpse with him for a while-

Actually, it turned out they didn’t have far to go at all, as there was a familiar golden fissure in the ground only a couple feet away from the turtle’s resting spot. The two boys approached the portal to who knew where, but were stopped when the corpse parts physically yanked them back.

Jotaro looked down at the corpse part in his hand with a scowl. “What now?” As if in answer, it tugged him back towards the turtle ever so slightly. He noticed Giorno’s doing the same. “Yare yare..make up your mind already..”

They re-entered the turtle to the surprise of the room’s occupants, earning a few confused stares from their comrades.

Polnareff was the first to speak up, calling over to him from his spot at the couch. “Wow, that was quick! Or did you just miss us that much?” He grinned at his own teasing, enjoying the glare that Jotaro shot him.

“Shut up, Polnareff..” He grumbled as he allowed the holy corpse part to guide him. It led him over to his group and, understanding its meaning, Jotaro looked them over with a flick of his eyes. “Looks like you guys are coming with us, so get up- I literally can’t go without you.”

Polnareff grinned and jumped up to his feet. “Alright! I was getting tired of just sitting around, anyway.”

Kakyoin and Joseph stood up too, Joseph grabbing Iggy off of the back of the couch despite the growl of protest. “You’re coming too, get over it.”

Iggy’s response was another growl and an attempt at biting Joseph’s metal hand, but he calmed down after Joseph gave him a stick of gum and reluctantly allowed himself to be held as they were all transported outside of the turtle.

They were soon joined by Giorno and his gang outside, Narancia looking them over curiously. “It wants ALL of us? Wooooww, this must be a big one!”

“That can’t be good..” Fugo muttered.

Giorno joined Jotaro at the opening. “I agree with them- this is a bit strange and likely dangerous.”

Jotaro looked at the fissure in front of them seriously. “Yeah..” He didn’t like the feeling he got from this at all. At most the holy corpse usually only sent out one or two of them, never this many at a time. It made him feel uneasy but he did his best not to let it show as he stepped into the light with the others.

For a few moments, everything around him was blinding gold and he had to close his eyes until it passed. When everything finally settled down, he found himself in a familiar location.

“The Coliseum?” Trish asked from somewhere behind him while he was looking around. “Why would it bring us back here?”

He looked back at Giorno and the others, but, after doing a quick glance over them, noticed that someone who was normally very hard to miss was, in fact, missing. “Where’s Polnareff?”

After he pointed it out, everyone looked around in search of the large Frenchman.

“How..?” Abdul looked confused and worried, as Jotaro noticed he often did when it came to Polnareff. “He was right beside me when we went through..”

“It wouldn’t be the first time we’ve gotten separated going through there.” Joseph said while crossing his arms with a contemplative expression. “That’s why we had to start using the turtle in the first place- it made sure everyone stayed together..”

Kakyoin nodded in agreement. “He shouldn’t be far, though. The portals usually deposit us where and when we’re meant to be.”

“That is reassuring..” Abdul replied, though he didn’t look any less worried for Polnareff’s safety. “Still, I hope he doesn’t get into too much trouble…”

“Knowing Polnareff, that’s a pretty real possibility.” Joseph uncrossed his arms. “We’ll have to keep an eye out for him while-” Joseph stopped when he heard what sounded like metal scraping against metal nearby. “Huh? What the hell was that?”

Jotaro scowled slightly as he headed towards it. “Whatever it is, it’s probably why we’re here in the first place. We’ll look for Polnareff after we deal with it.”

While everyone was still worried about the missing Frenchman, they had more pressing matters to attend to for now- namely, finding out what brought them there in the first place.

They all rushed towards the sounds, hearing the bang of an occasional gun shot as they drew closer. When they arrived to the source, which was in the center of the coliseum, they saw three people fighting in the ancient arena.

Two were immediately recognizable as DIO’s henchmen: The lovely but conniving Mariah, and the cunning but cautious Hol Horse. Though it was very obviously them physically, there was something off about the way they were acting.

“Damn it! I can’t get off a shot like this! How the hell do you run around with all this weight?!” Mariah said while gesturing to her own top. Strangely, she was holding Hol Horse’s Emperor gun in her hand as she tried to fire it at their opponent.

Hol Horse shot her a glare as he touched the ground nearby. “Stop complaining, my chest isn’t that bad!” An electrical outlet appeared beneath his fingertips on the ground, sparking with electricity.

Mariah tried firing off another round, but the bullets seemed to have a mind of their own and flew off in random directions instead of hitting their target. “I was talkin’ about all the damn metal you keep in here! Seriously, why the hell would you walk around like this?! It’s heavy and I can’t move without somethin’ stabbin’ me!”

“I said stop complaining!” Hol Horse snapped while touching the ground to leave another outlet, effectively setting up a line of them to act as a trap. “Lord DIO wants that arrow, no matter the cost! If we fail him just because of your whining, then I’ll make sure you never get any use out of your ‘second gun’ again!”

Mariah shuddered and backed away as their target got closer. “You’re one heartless witch, y’ know that?”

Jotaro and his group were beyond confused by the verbal exchange, as well as what they were witnessing from Hol Horse and Mariah.

“What in the world is going on?” Abdul was the first to say what was on all of their minds, a look of confusion clear on his face. “I have fought against both of them in the past, and they are acting completely out of character. Not only are they behaving differently, but their stands have also switched users. How is that possible?”

Bucciarati looked at him with a worried expression. “Wait- did you just say that their stands were switched?”

Abdul nodded as he pointed to Mariah holding Emperor. “That is Hol Horse’s stand, the Emperor.” He then pointed to the electrical outlets that Hol Horse was leaving on the ground. “And that is Mariah’s stand, Bastet.”

Bucciarati looked like he was about to say something else, but his attention, as with Giorno and the others in their group, was suddenly stolen by a soft “kah” sound coming from the direction of the battle before them.

Jotaro looked at the third figure that had previously been obscured because of Mariah and Hol Horse’s angle: It appeared to be a man dressed in black- no. Upon closer inspection, it would be more accurate to say this “man” was completely black, meaning he seemed to be made of shadows. Everything on him, from his skin to his clothes to his very being was like looking at a walking, three-dimensional shadow with the only other color on it being its hollow white eyes and mouth whenever it opened it to reveal a similar whiteness. In its hand it tightly clutched a golden arrow, but it made no move to attack with it in any way.

“No..No way..!” Narancia gasped while staring at the dark figure. “It can’t be! Y-You guys said you beat him, right?!” He looked between Giorno, Bucciarati, Trish, and Mista.

“We did!” Trish confirmed, looking equally as terrified as the rest of her group (minus Fugo, who seemed a bit lost on what was going on). “Bucciarati finished him off!”

“Yeah!” Mista nodded, not taking his eyes off of the shadowy being. “We saw it disappear with our own eyes!”

Giorno looked away from the figure, glancing around as if he was searching for something. “The one from our timeline was defeated..but..there is another possibility..”

His words hung heavy in the air between him and his gang. Narancia looked around too, trying to spot something. “Wait, Giorno..you don’t mean..”

“I do.” Giorno confirmed Narancia’s fears with a serious expression. “Use Aerosmith- see if you can spot Polnareff anywhere nearby.”

Narancia nodded and summoned Aerosmith, having his stand fly high up into the air and begin circling the coliseum in a sweeping motion as it searched high and low.

“What does Polnareff have to do with this?” Jotaro asked while taking a step so he was directly in front of Giorno and looking down at him. “What exactly is that thing?”

Giorno frowned slightly before regaining his calm demeanor. “That is Polnareff’s stand: Silver Chariot Requiem.”

Everyone in Jotaro’s group, Jotaro included, were shocked by this news.

“THAT’S Silver Chariot?” Kakyoin said with a shocked expression. “How..? We’ve seen his stand hundreds of times- it looks nothing like that.”

“Not to mention it’s a fairly short-range stand.” Joseph added while looking back at the stand in question. “At most I’d call it a mid-range stand, but even that’s being generous. Polnareff should still be close enough that we could see him if that was actually Chariot.”

Giorno shook his head with a solemn expression. “You are correct, but, as I said, that is not merely Silver Chariot- that is Silver Chariot Requiem. This is Silver Chariot after it has been empowered by the arrow in its hand. Unfortunately, Polnareff is unable to control his stand when it is like this and it becomes autonomous- moving with the singular goal of protecting the arrow.”

“You guys seem to know a lot about it.” Jotaro looked down at Giorno with growing suspicion. “You fought it, didn’t you?”

“We did.” Giorno admitted while looking Jotaro dead in the eyes. “We had no choice in the matter, unfortunately- it was out of control and we needed to get the arrow from it to defeat Diavolo.”

“And what happened to Polnareff when you defeated his stand?” His eyes narrowed dangerously, looking like he might resort to violence depending on Giorno’s answer. “You guys said that Bucciarati ‘finished him off’ and that you ‘saw him disappear with your own eyes’. So, answer me..” He was practically looming over Giorno at this point. “What happened to Polnareff?”

To his credit, Giorno did not look intimidated by Jotaro’s towering figure in the slightest. “We did not hurt Polnareff.” Giorno chose his words carefully. “He asked us to stop his stand, since he was unable to. He thanked us after it was over.”

He was leaving parts out, that much was obvious. If a stand is damaged or destroyed, then the user will suffer the same injuries or die too- that was a truth that they had all come to learn over the course of their journey. To say that they defeated Polnareff’s stand to the point of it disappearing without harming Polnareff was suspicious, to say the least.

Before he had a chance to call Giorno out on it, though, their attention was drawn back to the fight. A loud gunshot was heard followed by “Mariah’s” voice yelling in pain.

“God damn it!” They looked back and saw that she had a bullet wound in her leg. “It’s no good! Emperor’s turnin’ on me when I use it!”

They then saw “Hol Horse” barely managing to dodge a spark of electricity from a nearby outlet. “Bastet isn’t listening either! We’ll fall back for now and contact Diavolo!”

The two then retreated, “Hol Horse” having to carry “Mariah” since her body was injured and unable to run.

Once they were gone, Narancia’s Aerosmith returned to him and he looked back at Giorno. “Hey, Giorno! I checked everywhere, but I didn’t see Polnareff anywhere on Aerosmith’s radar.”

Giorno brought a hand to his chin as he thought the information over. “Hm..I see..this is still a strange turn of events, but he may simply be outside of the coliseum at the moment.” He looked back towards Chariot as it continued its slow pace forward. “At any rate, we should leave Chariot alone for the time being. Its main focus is protecting the arrow, so as long as we don’t try to touch it, we should be safe.”

“……” Jotaro looked back at Chariot. He didn’t like the idea of leaving it like this, but he was more concerned with making sure that Polnareff was okay and keeping the rest of his group safe. “Fine. We’ll leave it for now- at least until we know Polnareff’s okay.” He started to walk away, following Giorno’s group since they knew the coliseum better than his own group did. He was stopped after a few steps, however, by a firm grip on his arm. “..?” He looked back over his shoulder and saw that Star Platinum had materialized behind him and was holding onto his arm while looking at Silver Chariot. “Star Platinum? What-?”

He soon saw that Star Platinum was not alone. Magician’s Red, The Fool, and Hierophant Green had also materialized and were looking at Silver Chariot Requiem alongside Star Platinum.

Before he could get the attention of the other stands’ users, he watched in stunned silence as Star Platinum opened its mouth and let out a loud cry while still looking at Silver Chariot Requiem. “ORA!!”

Everyone turned to look at Jotaro and his stand in surprise. Abdul and the others noticed their own stands out as well, him and Iggy looking as confused as Jotaro when Magician’s Red started letting out its loud screeching bird calls and The Fool began howling.

“Magician’s Red?!” Abdul tried to call back his stand, but it didn’t seem keen on obeying its master. “What?! This..This has never happened before- Magician’s Red has always listened to me!”

Iggy was barking at his stand, apparently trying to do the same as Abdul, but with the same results.

“Giorno!” Jotaro turned his head to look at the blonde. “What the hell’s going on?!”

Giorno, for once, looked completely at a loss for an explanation. “Silver Chariot Requiem has the power to control souls, as well as stands, but we’ve only ever seen that happen when one of us attempted to attack it. This..This is completely new..”

“Guys, I think we have a problem!” Trish said while pointing to the other side of the coliseum.

They looked at Silver Chariot Requiem and saw that it had actually stopped walking and was now staring directly at them with its emotionless gaze. “……” It turned so that its body was now facing the group and began walking directly towards them.

“It changed direction?!” Mista asked in a worried tone. “It’s never done that before! It’s always walked in a straight line and only turned long enough to grab the arrow! What the hell did your stands do?!”

“Don’t ask us.” Kakyoin shot back while looking at his Hierophant Green with a confused frown. “This is all as new to us as it is to you.”

“We need to get out of here.” Bucciarati said while looking towards the exit. “Silver Chariot Requiem is too dangerous to fight- any damage you try to inflict on it will be reflected back onto you. Not to mention it can regenerate as well as control both souls and stands. There is a way to defeat it, but I don’t know if it would be wise until we know where your Polnareff is..”

“Agreed.” Giorno said while using Golden Experience to open the nearest gate. “For now, our best option is still to retreat.”

They found their exit blocked, however, by a combination of thorny purple vines and green tendrils. All eyes turned to Kakyoin and Joseph, the older of the two staring at his hands in confusion as the purple vines grew from them seemingly without his consent. “What the hell?! I swear, I’m not doing this!”

“Neither am I..” Kakyoin said while looking at Hierophant Green’s lower half that had detangled into its strand-form before weaving with Hermit Purple’s vines at the exit. “It would seem our stands don’t want us to leave.”

“Damn it!” Mista swore while grabbing his gun from his pants and taking aim. “Looks like we’ve got no choice but to fight it. I’ll try hitting the things around it instead of attacking it directly- hopefully that’ll be enough to slow it down without Sex Pistols going crazy again. Fugo! Narancia! Back me up!”

The other two boys called out their stands as well. “Right!”

As the three of them began firing at the ground and objects around Silver Chariot to trip it up, Giorno looked to Bucciarati. “Bucciarati, see if you can open up a doorway with Sticky Fingers.”

“Got it.” Bucciarati said while summoning his own stand. “Sticky Fingers!” The stand appeared and went to one of the walls, forming a zipper on it and attempting to open its portal to the other side. Unfortunately, before they could make use of it, a red string of flames suddenly shot out and wrapped around Sticky Fingers. “Ah!” Bucciarati gasped when he felt the bind tightening around his stand, as well as himself.

They looked to see Magician’s Red, its arm outstretched as it used its Red Bind to keep Sticky Fingers from moving and opening the portal out of the coliseum.

“Bucciarati!” Trish summoned Spice Girl and the pink stand attempted to strike Magician’s Red, but was intercepted by The Fool and a barrier of sand. Spice Girl tried to soften the sand, but, as it was already a loose and shifty material, it did not do much good. “Damn it!”

“I’m okay, Trish!” Bucciarati got her attention, looking frustrated but otherwise unharmed. “It’s only restraining me, so don’t worry. Try creating a soft spot in the wall for us to break through. Giorno, cover her!”

They both nodded and went to their assigned tasks. When Trish rushed to one of the walls and started to soften it using Spice Girl, The Fool attempted to pursue her. Giorno and Golden Experience stood in its way, however, and proved to be a much better opponent against the animal-like stand.

The Fool howled as it tried to knock them over with a small wave of sand, but it failed due to Golden Experience’s power: Sand is technically inorganic, so, when Golden Experience touched it with its ability, it was able to convert the sand into simple green leaves and flower petals that flew away harmlessly in the breeze.

It growled and continued trying to attack the pair to get to Trish and Spice Girl, ignoring Iggy’s annoyed barking at it.

Jotaro watched the chaos around him unfurl without being able to do anything about it. Nothing was making sense here! Their stands had turned on them, they couldn’t recall them or command them in any way, Polnareff was missing, and Silver Chariot Requiem was getting closer by the second. It had been a while since he felt so powerless and he was racking his brain in an attempt to find a way out of this situation, but nothing was coming to him.

“It’s getting closer!” Mista called while stepping closer to the group with Fugo and Narancia. He looked back at them with a serious expression. “Look, I know you guys may not like to hear this, but we’re running out of time here- we need to destroy Silver Chariot Requiem!”

Abdul, who had previously been preoccupied with attempting to regain control of his stand, turned his attention instead to Mista. “No! We still do not know where Polnareff is and what will happen to him if his stand is destroyed in this state!”

Mista held up one of his hands. “Look at yourselves!” The hand he held up had started to peel apart in certain spots, revealing some sort of secondary body growing beneath it. Startled by his exclamation, Jotaro and the others looked at themselves, as well as Giorno’s group, to see that they were all starting to show similar symptoms- as if something was attempting to grow from within their bodies. “This is what Silver Chariot Requiem is capable of! It may not be doing it on purpose, but if we don’t destroy it, then we’ll be completely switched with something from another world!” He glanced over his shoulder as if he was looking for something that no one else could see. “Bucciarati found Silver Chariot Requiem’s weakness before: There’s a light that’s casting a shadow behind it in a way that anyone looking at it will always see it facing away from them. The source of the light is attached to the soul, so, if you look behind you, you should see a ball of light. If you crush it, it’ll destroy Silver Chariot Requiem and undo all of the damage it’s done.” He grabbed something from behind his shoulder and tensed in preparation to break it.

“No!!!” Abdul shouted and ran up, tackling Mista and forcing the boy to release his grip on what he was holding. “I will not allow you to harm Silver Chariot until we know that Polnareff is safe!!”

Mista struggled against Abdul’s strong grip. “If Silver Chariot’s in its Requiem form, then Polnareff’s probably dead already!”

Abdul froze, eyes widening slightly. “What..? Polnareff is..?” He shook his head. “No! His stand is still here, so he must be alive somewhere!”

“Some stands can survive after their users die! We’ve seen it happen before!” Mista managed to take advantage of Abdul’s brief moment of worry over Polnareff’s life and worked a leg in between them, using it to shove Abdul off enough that he could free himself. “Sorry! But I’m not planning on dying or turning into whatever’s taking over our bodies!” He reached behind himself and attempted to grab what he’d gotten before.

“Magician’s Red!!” Abdul shouted with anger blazing in his eyes. To everyone’s surprise, his stand finally turned to him in recognition. “Red Bind!” Abdul called out his command while pointing at Mista.

The fiery bird stand actually obeyed him and raised its unoccupied hand, firing off a second binding rope of red flames that wrapped around Mista.

“What?!” Mista struggled against the ropes that had him trapped, Sex Pistols even trying to tug them off but the tiny stands weren’t strong enough. “How the hell-?!”

Abdul stood and stared down at him with a piercing gaze, Magician’s Red moving to stand behind him as it usually did. “I was willing to give my life to save Polnareff before- I will gladly do it again. That is still his stand- it is as much a part of him as Magician’s Red is a part of me! Neither of us will allow you to harm them!” Magician’s Red echoed its user’s words with a loud shrieking-birdlike cry, flames erupting behind the pair menacingly.

“Abdul..” Jotaro watched his friend’s reaction for a moment, confused and intrigued about how Abdul seemingly regained control of Magician’s Red if it was truly being controlled by Silver Chariot Requiem.

“Ah! Hey! Stop it!” Jotaro turned his head and saw that Iggy had stopped his barking at The Fool, and had instead moved over to where Trish and Spice Girl were still working on softening a hole in the wall- the work was taking a while as the stone was very old and one wrong move could make the entire wall collapse before it had time to soften. Iggy had bitten Trish’s skirt and was pulling it in an attempt to drag her away. “Let go!” She tried pulling her skirt back from the dog’s mouth, but he kept a firm grip with his teeth. “What’s gotten into you?!”

“Grrr!” Iggy growled, barking around the fabric in his mouth. “Rrrf! Rrr! Arrf!” (Translation: “He’s right! Polnareff’s around here somewhere, we can’t just leave him!”)

Once again, everyone was surprised when The Fool suddenly dissolved into sand before reappearing behind Iggy with a protective growl. It formed a shield of sand over the area that Trish and Spice Girl had been working so hard on, stopping them from further affecting the area.

“Iggy..” Jotaro looked between the dog and the Egyptian, feeling like all the pieces were suddenly coming together. He tuned out the arguing that had started between his group and Giorno’s about what to do next and instead looked up at his own stand. Star Platinum was still watching Silver Chariot Requiem and had a firm grip on Jotaro’s arm. Looking closer at its hand as he moved, though, Jotaro saw that Star Platinum was only preventing him from moving towards the exit, not when he moved towards Silver Chariot Requiem. He then looked up to his stand’s expression- it was serious as usual, but it also looked oddly..concerned..maybe even worried as it looked at the approaching dark figure that was once its friend- “…!” Jotaro blinked as the realization finally struck him. “Shut up..” He said once, but no one could hear him over their own shouting. “EVERYONE SHUT THE HELL UP!” He yelled firmly above the roar of voices, everyone instantly doing just that as they turned to look at the teenager. Jotaro moved his arm out of Star Platinum’s hold, his stand allowing it as it read his intentions. “Our stands aren’t being controlled by Silver Chariot- they’re trying to help it.”

Kakyoin looked at his Hierophant Green with a tilt of his head. “Are you sure, Jotaro? I’ve never seen Hierophant Green behave like this before.”

Jotaro glanced over his shoulder at Kakyoin. “Have you ever argued with yourself about whether what you were doing was right or wrong? Or doubted yourself so much that you weren’t sure what you wanted?”

“Not particularly, no.” Kakyoin thought while tapping a finger to his chin. “I’m usually fairly certain of my own actions. Why?”

“Our stands are a manifestation of our will, right?” Jotaro looked back up at Star Platinum. “I didn’t always command Star Platinum- he used to move around on his own, but he still did whatever I wanted, even if I didn’t know what I wanted. He’s always done that because that’s what stands do: They move according to our will, not just our thoughts.” He looked back to Silver Chariot Requiem, the stand now only about 20 feet away. “Regardless of what it looks like, that’s still Silver Chariot. It’s still Polnareff’s stand and we don’t want to leave it or Polnareff behind..or let them get hurt.” He started to walk forward towards the stand, more layers of his skin peeling away to reveal eyes and muscles and other body parts forming underneath. “Our stands figured that out before we did- that’s why they wouldn’t let us leave.”

Joseph looked at Jotaro with a serious expression. “Jotaro…” He followed Jotaro’s lead, Hermit Purple retracting and allowing him to follow his grandson. “I hope you’re right about this.”

They were soon joined by Kakyoin, Abdul, and Iggy, each member of the group being followed by their respective stands. The closer they got, the more deformed they became, but they all ignored it in favor of reaching Silver Chariot Requiem.

When they finally reached it, their stands floated past them to gather around Silver Chariot Requiem. The Fool nudged at Chariot’s leg with its head in a typical gesture of animal affection. Hermit Purple began to very loosely wrap around Chariot’s legs as it walked, connecting with it but not hindering it in any way. Hierophant Green and Star Platinum each gave one of its shoulders a slight squeeze as it walked by them. Magician’s Red, being the last one that it passed, made a soft cooing noise and carefully grasped its free hand for a moment, nuzzling its head into Chariot’s shoulder. Chariot spared it a look that somehow felt softer than its usual blank gaze before Magician’s Red released its hand and allowed it to take the final step to Jotaro and the others.

“……” Silver Chariot Requiem stared at them with its empty white eyes for a while before raising the hand that clutched the arrow. It looked at Jotaro expectantly as it held its hand out and Jotaro understood its silent request. He held his own hand out underneath it and the stand carefully placed the arrow in his waiting palm. Once Jotaro curled his fingers around the arrow to hold onto it, the shadowy stand’s once expressionless face relaxed into a calm but tired smile. It opened its mouth and they heard a faint, raspy voice speak- it sounded like the voice they’d hear when Silver Chariot would shout “Hora hora hora!”, but breathier and without the metallic echo. “Mi..ssion..com..plete…”

It closed its eyes and its body began to dissolve into tiny sparks of white light, starting at its feet and slowly working its way up towards its head. As it disappeared, the tiny lights floated around Jotaro and the others and they all began to hear Polnareff’s voice like distant echoes through the small sparks.

“I..I’m done..I can’t go any further..”

“Chariot..you..have to complete my mission..”

“Please..this arrow..it’s..too dangerous..”

“You have to protect it..”

“Don’t let anyone else take it..”

“Jotaro..Mr.Joestar..my friends..please..get it to my friends..!”

“Get it to my friends..”

“Protect it..”

“Don’t let anyone take it..”

“My friends..”

Everyone’s bodies returned to normal as the last of the lights faded away into nothingness, the last thing they saw of Silver Chariot being its calm smile.

All of them were shocked by what they’d heard. Pain pierced them from the strength of Polnareff and Silver Chariots’ convictions. But, what shook them the most was the haunting thought of what those words really meant…

Jotaro’s head was tilted down as he led his group back over to Giorno’s gang on the sidelines, the shadow of his hat over his head obscuring his eyes and leaving only his mouth set in a hard line visible. “……” The other members of his group all had a similar look about them, their eyes hidden in shadow and faces tense with clenched fists at their sides. When they reached Giorno’s gang, Jotaro was the first one to speak. “Tell us the truth. Now.”

Giorno stepped forward for his group to speak on their behalf. “We already told you-” Giorno was suddenly knocked onto his back by Jotaro’s fist slamming into his cheek. “!!”

“Giorno!” Mista was quick to rush to Giorno’s side and check on him, kneeling down to help him sit up.

“H-Hey! What the hell was that for?!” Narancia tried to sound defensive and angry, but it came off as scared when speaking earned him a warning growl from Iggy.

“I’m tired of your bullshit.” Jotaro walked over to where he’d knocked Giorno over.

Mista tried shielding his friend with his body while looking up at Jotaro. “We didn’t lie about Polnareff! I swear!” Star Platinum grabbed Mista and held him away from Giorno while Jotaro leaned down and roughly picked the younger teen up by the front of his jacket. “Giorno!”

The other members of Giorno’s gang tried to get to him, but were blocked by Jotaro’s group, each one of them looking as angry as Jotaro about the situation.

Jotaro stood to his full height, easily lifting Giorno off the ground with one arm and scowling up at him. “You may not have lied, but you sure as hell didn’t tell the truth, either. Now..” He grit his teeth for a moment, his hand tightening in a white-knuckled grip on Giorno’s shirt before looking up at Giorno again with a hard glare. “You’re gonna tell us why we just heard what sounded like our friend’s dying thoughts!!” He gave Giorno a rough shake, his other hand clenched tightly around the arrow. “You said that you defeated Silver Chariot, but you never once said what happened to Polnareff. You know, though, don’t you? You’ve been hiding it since the first time you saw him, always looking at him like he was some sort of ticking time bomb about to go off..” He lowered Giorno just enough to barely stand on the ground- just enough that he’d be able to talk properly. “So, talk- was he your enemy?”

“No.” Giorno answered while meeting Jotaro’s hard gaze unflinchingly, even as a dark bruise began to form on his cheek from the punch he was given earlier. “It’s the opposite: Polnareff was an invaluable ally. He was the one that told us the true secret of the arrow’s power, as well as the one to finally figure out the truth about Diavolo’s identity. Without him, we never would have been able to defeat Diavolo. We were nervous about his stand because we knew how powerful and uncontrollable it could become, but we consider Polnareff our friend.”

“Then what happened to him?” Jotaro pressed on, knowing that Giorno was still withholding information. “What happened to him when Silver Chariot Requiem appeared?”

“……” Giorno glanced away, his calm expression faltering for a moment before he took in a deep breath, exhaled it slowly, then finally said the words they had all obviously been avoiding out loud. “He died.”

Magician’s Red began to spark up with flames swirling around it as Abdul narrowed his eyes at Giorno dangerously. “How?”

“Diavolo killed him for knowing the truth about his identity.” Giorno elaborated while glancing in Abdul’s direction, Jotaro’s grip preventing him from turning completely. “As a final act to prevent Diavolo from getting the arrow, he had Silver Chariot stab itself to unleash its full power. By that time, though, his body was already dead-”

“So..” Jotaro cut him off, his glare not softening at all. “What you’re telling me..is that you KNEW how Polnareff was going to die..and you didn’t bother warning him about it?”

Giorno looked as if he felt slightly guilty for half a second before he regained his calm expression. “We were concerned with how he would take the truth about what happened to him-”

Once again, Jotaro stopped Giorno with a firm punch to the cheek, managing not to stab him with the arrow in the process. “Bullshit! I told you to stop lying!!”

“Please, stop!” Trish pleaded with him. She tried moving closer, but was blocked by Kakyoin and Hierophant Green. She looked up at him beseechingly. “He’s telling the truth! We weren’t sure how he’d react to the truth, so we agreed to keep it a secret- that way he wouldn’t panic!”

Kakyoin gave her a cold glare as Hierophant Green loomed behind him like an imposing shadow. “Why don’t you just come out and say why you REALLY kept it a secret: You were afraid of what would happen to your timeline, weren’t you?” The way Trish froze up and was unable to reply right away was all the answer that they needed. “You were scared that if Polnareff knew the truth about how he died, then he wouldn’t come to Italy and you would all die instead when you lost.”

Bucciarati stepped out in front of Trish protectively, Sticky Fingers floating behind him as backup. “It was a reasonable fear to have. We lost much in our fight against Diavolo, and we stood to lose even more if we failed. The timeline as a whole could have been damaged by-”

“Get off your god-damn high-horse!” Joseph suddenly cut him off and stepped forward, jabbing a finger into Bucciarati’s chest and paying no mind to his stand at all. “The timeline’s been fucked up long before any of us even got involved! I’m going around interacting with a younger version of myself, I’ve met my grandfather and uncle when they were both younger than me, and events in my past happened weeks ahead of schedule! Hell, half the people here are supposed to be dead, just like you, but I don’t see you offing yourself to protect Jolyne’s timeline!” He glared at the young capo, his eyes showing no mercy or tolerance for Bucciarati’s words. “I stopped my best friend from running off and getting himself killed because I didn’t want my younger self to live through the same pain that I did. Yeah, sure, I was scared of how it would affect my time line- hell, if Caesar lived I may not have had the resolve needed to win against the Pillar Men and Jotaro may have never been born- but I still chose to save my friend’s life. If any one of you actually considered Polnareff a friend, you’d have done the same ages ago!”

“He’s right.” Jotaro said while glaring at Giorno. “For weeks you’ve all gotten to sit around, share a room, eat, talk, and laugh with Polnareff, all while thinking about how he’d die and not saying a damn thing about it. Now it might be too late and there’s a chance that our Polnareff is dead because you decided to keep your damn secrets and save your own asses. You might as well be accessories to his murder..” He tossed Giorno to the ground roughly before turning his back on him. “Guess you had more of your old man in you then I thought.”

Giorno had started to sit up after being tossed aside, but he froze when he heard Jotaro say those words. “……” He looked back down at the ground, saying nothing, but the way he hung his head spoke volumes to how deeply Jotaro’s words had cut him.

“Let’s go.” Jotaro said while heading towards the exit. “We’re gonna go find Polnareff. The rest of you can do whatever the hell you want, just stay out of our way.”

Kakyoin and the rest of his group followed Jotaro out of the coliseum, leaving behind Giorno’s gang to mull over what just happened.

“…” Abdul was the first to speak once they were outside of the old building. “Do you think that Polnareff..could he actually be..dead..?” He seemed uncomfortable with saying it out loud- hell, all of them were uncomfortable with the idea of it, but they all knew how close Abdul was to Polnareff and they understood his worry for the other man.

“He’ll be around here somewhere.” Jotaro replied after a minute. “One way or another, we’ll find him.” They didn’t come this far, go through all this hell to finally get their group back together, just to lose someone yet again. No matter the cost, they WOULD find Polnareff.

Iggy suddenly stopped and sniffed the air. “???” He walked away from them, sniffing along the ground. His ears perked up and he started barking. “Arf! Arf! Arf!” He looked back at the others before taking off towards the town. (Translation: “I smell something! This way!”)

Jotaro and the others trusted Iggy’s sense of smell and direction, so they followed the small dog into town. It didn’t take long for them to hear the sounds of a fight (things breaking, bodies being tossed about, etc.) coming from a vacant street.

They arrived to see a figure that Jotaro recognized from his fights alongside Giorno’s group: A man with pink hair in a mesh top by the name of Diavolo. This was the mob boss of Passione that Giorno and the others had worked so hard to defeat.

This was also the man they were told would one day kill Polnareff…

“You can’t hide forever!” Diavolo called while looking around, his back currently turned to Jotaro’s group and unaware of their presence yet. “I defeated your worthless stand when it was ten times stronger- this version is nothing against the power of my King Crimson!” He was suddenly blindsided by a wooden crate that was thrown at him from the side while he had his head turned in the opposite direction. “!!” He stumbled slightly but quickly righted himself and attempted to look at the alleyway the box came from, but it was already empty. “Come out already, you cowardly French rat!!”

“I think not, mon ami.” A familiar voice called tauntingly in a way that echoed around the area, making it impossible to pinpoint its exact location. “See, I’ve been warned about what your stand can do and what its range is, so I’m not taking any chances.” To accompany his words, a potted plant was suddenly thrown at Diavolo.

Unfortunately, Diavolo saw it coming that time and was suddenly in a different location than before, the plant now lying broken on the ground where he previously was. “Then your plan is to hide in the darkness and throw things like a child? Pathetic! At least when I fought you before, you had the decency to die like a man!”

“So sorry to disappoint you.” The voice called back. “But I’m not planning on dying today!” Jotaro and the others caught a glint of silver on a roof top before it ducked away again.

“That voice..” Abdul said quietly.

“Yeah..” Kakyoin nodded while looking around. “There’s no doubting it..”

“Looks like we got here just in time.” Jotaro started walking towards Diavolo. “Let’s lend him a hand.”

He gestured for Kakyoin to circle around and get in position at a close enough distance from Diavolo before nodding towards Polnareff’s voice while looking at his grandfather and Abdul, telling them to try finding him. They nodded and ran off quietly to their assigned positions. Meanwhile, Iggy jumped up onto Jotaro’s shoulder, already guessing what Jotaro would want from him and not complaining for once.

Once Kakyoin was in position, he called out his stand and tried using the Hierophant’s tendrils to bind Diavolo. He seemed to know what was about to happen, though, and he was up in the air above where he just was, looking as if he had disappeared and reappeared before they even had time to blink.

He looked at the trio with a scowl. “Damn it..more rats crawling out to cause trouble..”

Jotaro was the one to approach him with Iggy on his shoulder while Kakyoin stayed back, all of them glaring at Diavolo. “Normally I’d ignore something like that and give you an option to back off before using Star Platinum to beat the shit out of you.” He held up his hand that was still clutching the arrow. “But we just found out that you caused some trouble for one of our friends- so we’re gonna skip the warning and go straight to the part where you get your ass kicked!”

Iggy followed his lead perfectly and summoned The Fool behind Diavolo. The stand quickly transformed into a wall of sand that spread outward, blocking Diavolo’s main route for retreat.

Jotaro wasn’t 100% sure what Diavolo’s stand could do, but he had enough information for a vague idea: It was a powerful and close-range stand, meaning that it wouldn’t be able to touch him till he got within at least 5 meters, so he’d have to wait until the last possible moment to strike. It also seemed to have some sort of perception ability, since Diavolo was able to avoid Kakyoin’s binding attack even without being seen. His final bit of information came from what he’d heard about Diavolo’s fight with Giorno- his power was similar to DIO’s in that it affected time.

With all of that in mind, he charged forward with Star Platinum. The stand looked just as angry as its user, both clearly ready to beat the pink haired man to death for what he did to their friend. It let out a loud “ORA ORA ORA ORA!!” when it was close enough to fire off a barrage of punches.

Just as Jotaro predicted, however, the fists missed their target and the man was suddenly a few feet away. He scowled as his back hit the wall of sand behind him, his eyes searching for a way around the barrier but apparently finding none. “Damn it! I don’t have time for this!” He had his stand out now- an angry looking red spirit with a white face and an odd pink growth with a second face on its forehead. “It was a mistake coming here without Giovanna and his group- you left behind the only person ever able to defeat me.” Diavolo said with a sneer. “Without him, even five against one, you won’t be able to touch me!”

“Only five against one?” A voice called out from a distance behind the sand wall. “Wow, that crate must have hit you harder than I thought- you’ve forgotten how to count!”

Jotaro saw something silver begin to pierce through the barrier of sand right behind Diavolo. Diavolo seemed to be aware of it too and looked like he was preparing to dodge it.

Seeing his opportunity, Jotaro activated Star Platinum’s trump card. “Star Platinum: The World!!” There was that familiar, odd feeling of everything freezing around him. He didn’t take the time to dwell on it, though, since his window of opportunity was limited.

He and his stand moved quickly, closing the distance between himself and Diavolo. He grabbed onto Diavolo himself while punching him in one of the legs with Star Platinum.

Time resumed and Jotaro felt Diavolo try to move in his grasp. The silver thing was no longer piercing through the wall of sand, but was now embedded in Diavolo’s side- it was the blade from Silver Chariot’s rapier. Jotaro didn’t even see it move after he let time resume, so that meant that Diavolo must have used his stand’s own ability right after Jotaro did before he even had time to register what happened.

“!!” Diavolo looked at Jotaro, his stand, and the wound in his side with a shocked expression. “Impossible! How-?!”

Jotaro held tight while his stand prepared for a point-blank barrage. “I guess DIO didn’t tell you- he’s not the only one that can stop time.”

“ORA!!” Star Platinum cried while surging forward with a punch aimed right at Diavolo’s face.

“Jotaro! Behind you!” He heard Kakyoin call to him and saw something from the corner of his eye dodging through the tendrils of Kakyoin’s stand.

Before he had time to respond, someone tackled him from behind and grabbed him. “?!”

Surprised, he turned his head to see what looked to be an exact replica of himself grabbing him in the same way that he had grabbed Diavolo. The replica even had the same expression on its face..except..it seemed to have a digital timer on its forehead? What was going on?

The timer on the fake Jotaro’s forehead ran out and it changed shape with a clicking sound similar to a phone hanging up and a weird distorted effect around its body- like looking at the static from a TV set stuck between channels before settling on a proper signal. It revealed itself to be a stand. A humanoid one with a purple and white color scheme and eyes that reminded Jotaro of the speakers on a cassette player.

Taking advantage of Jotaro’s surprise and confusion, the stand in question used the hold it had on Jotaro to toss him away from Diavolo. “!!” The distance forced him to call back Star Platinum and release the wounded man.

“Jotaro!” Kakyoin caught him and Iggy using Hierophant Green and set them down on the ground, keeping his eyes on the duo in front of them and eyeing the new stand cautiously. “Anyone you know?”

“No.” Jotaro said while also eyeing the stand in question.

“Of course you wouldn’t recognize my Moody Blues- you haven’t been to Italy yet.” A voice said from somewhere above them.

“!!” Looking up at a nearby building, they saw someone watching them from the second floor balcony.

Seated casually on the railing and looking down at the fighters below was a man dressed in black with long white hair. He had a dark aura around him, similar to what Kakyoin and many of their other allies had while being controlled by DIO.

Diavolo glared up at the man above him while removing Silver Chariot’s rapier from his still bleeding wound. “You certainly took your time..”

“I do not work for you, Diavolo.” The man stated with a scowl on his painted lips. “The only one I answer to-” He tipped himself forward to fall off of the balcony, the purple stand- presumably his own- catching him and setting him down on the ground in front of it. “-is the one who will cleanse my past.”

“Great, one more headache to deal with..” Jotaro glared at the newcomer disdainfully.

“Jotaro!” They all heard Polnareff’s voice calling from somewhere above them. “Don’t hurt him- he’s with Bucciarati’s gang!”

Jotaro glanced up towards the other man’s voice, narrowing his eyes a bit when he couldn’t see the source up there. “How did he..?” He looked back over to Diavolo and his unwitting accomplice. “Guess it doesn’t matter right now. Think you can handle the new guy on your own?”

He didn’t need to say anything more for Kakyoin to know that Jotaro was talking to him. “His stand’s a bit odd, but nothing I can’t handle.”

“Good.” The taller teen adjusted his hat, his usual serious look on his face as he returned his focus to Diavolo. “Now, let’s try this again.”

In perfect sync, the trio of stand users went on the offensive. Kakyoin attacked the unknown stand user with Hierophant Green, attempting to wrap him up in his stand’s long limbs. With a wave of his hand, though, the stranger’s stand moved in front of him and transformed into a version of Star Platinum with a timer on its head- the imitation stand repeating the barrage of punches that the real one had attempted to use on Diavolo earlier and using the motions to knock away the green tendrils.

Meanwhile, Iggy summoned The Fool behind Diavolo again and created another wall of sand to block his possible exit. With his path blocked off, Jotaro called out Star Platinum and had him use his “Star Finger” attack in an attempt to keep some distance between them. Diavolo’s own stand appeared and, once again, he was able to dodge the attack with ease. He even avoided the spears made of sand that The Fool launched out from the wall behind him, proving too slippery for them to land a clean hit without getting closer.

Preparing himself to do just that, Jotaro noticed something out of the corner of his eye near one of the buildings, something metallic like gleaming silver- Ah.

“Yare yare daze..he always likes to put on a show, doesn’t he?” Jotaro tried to keep his face neutral, eyeing the rapier that had been tossed to the ground by Diavolo’s feet. “Oi, Iggy.” He nodded towards the abandoned blade once the dog was looking at it. “Fetch.”

“Grrrr..hmph..” The slight growl that Iggy gave, accompanied by the shift in his stance, seemed to say “I’m not your pet…but I guess I’ll play along this time.” With a bark, Iggy commanded The Fool to return to its usual form, the animal-like stand grabbing the rapier between its teeth and attempting to dash away with it.

“King Crimson!” Diavolo called his stand and the angry red faced being appeared instantly. It attempted to beat The Fool down with its speed and strength, but was surprised when its fists only broke away sand. “What?! The stand doesn’t just manipulate sand- it’s MADE of sand as well?!” Before he could do anything with his newfound revelation, The Fool moved outside of King Crimson’s range. “Damn it!” His attempts to follow it were impeded by purple vines that suddenly wrapped themselves around his feet. “?!!”

“Hey now, you weren’t thinking of leaving, were ya?” The voice of the vine-stand’s owner asked as he came into view. Joseph smirked at the crime lord, pointing back towards Jotaro. “You haven’t finished playing with my grandson yet!”

“Yare yare..” Jotaro approached Diavolo with Star Platinum at his side. “Jiji, don’t talk about this like I’m a little kid on a playdate.” In his peripheral vision, he could see Magician’s Red assisting Hierophant Green against the other stand user- the fire attacks of Abdul’s stand being much harder for Moody Blues to counter or copy and leaving it wide open for Hierophant Green to tie it up. “If we’re gonna treat it like anything, let’s make it a game.” Once he was within five meters, he had Star Platinum prepare his attack. “How about my stand’s favorite game?” The stand began to surge forward with a punch right on Jotaro’s next word. “TAG.”

“ORA!!” Star Platinum shouted as its fist swung right at Diavolo’s face.

“King Crimson!” As expected, Diavolo used his own stand’s abilities to dodge the attack and slip out of Hermit Purple’s vines. “Your attacks are useless against me! As long as I can see what’s about to happen, my King Crimson is invincible!”

“Oh yeah?” Polnareff’s voice called from above them. “I bet you won’t see THIS coming!”

“!!” Diavolo looked up towards the building, preparing for an attack from above. “You won’t hit me with that tw-”

“Star Platinum: The World!” Jotaro said quietly, activating his stand’s ability and freezing time once more. He moved quickly, getting everything in position before letting time resume.

“-ice!” Diavolo finished his sentence from earlier. As he prepared to dodge, though, he found a wall of sand quickly springing up in front of him again. “When did-?!”

“HORA HORA HORA HORA!!” A familiar cry to the crusaders sounded through the air as a silver rapier swiftly slashed and stabbed into Diavolo multiple times from behind.

“!!!!!” Diavolo gasped, soon coughing up blood from the assault. “Impossible- nothing can escape my Epitaph’s predictions!” He managed to turn his head enough to see Silver Chariot in all its gleaming glory standing behind him. “H..How..?!”

Jotaro pulled his hat down slightly as he explained everything. “Your stand lets you see into the future and jump ahead of it, right? That’s one scary ability..if it didn’t come with such a big weakness.” He looked down into Diavolo’s eyes as he said the other’s weakness aloud. “You can’t see what happens if time is paused. Your stand couldn’t predict it earlier when Star Platinum broke your leg, messing up whatever future you saw where you avoided Silver Chariot’s attack. Then, just now, you couldn’t see me bringing the others closer, throwing off whatever prediction you got before I stopped time.” Star Platinum grabbed Diavolo by his arm, the other too injured now to properly escape again. “Let this be a lesson to you and everyone else you work with..” He glared at Diavolo, looking him right in the eyes with a more intimidating energy than should have been possible for a teenager going up against a mob boss. “Don’t ever challenge us- past, present, or future.”

“ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA ORAAAA!!!” Star Platinum cried as he delivered a barrage of strikes against the pink haired man that nearly matched Silver Chariot’s earlier attack in speed and precision, all culminating in a fierce uppercut that sent Diavolo flying far into the distance and crashing through several buildings. “ORAAAA!!!!!”

“Très bien, Jotaro!” A voice laughed from behind Silver Chariot. The stand soon disappeared to reveal its owner, Jean-Pierre Polnareff, smiling at his comrades with one of his usual bright grins. “I knew you’d come up with something good in the end!”

Abdul’s face lit up with a smile nearly as bright as the Frenchman’s upon seeing him in the flesh. “Polnareff!” He ran towards the other man, leaving Kakyoin to watch with an understanding smile from where he stood beside his own stand (which had the unnamed and unconscious stand-user tied up securely).

“Abdul! Good to see you too, mon ami-” His greeting was halted when Polnareff found himself being firmly embraced by the Egyptian. “Huh? Abdul??” He looked to his companion in confusion- while he himself was undoubtedly a very physical person and had trouble understanding boundaries at times, Abdul wasn’t usually so forward unless the situation called for it (such as restraining one of them to prevent a violent altercation). “Abdul, what’s going on? I know I disappeared for a bit, but I couldn’t help it! The stupid portal spit me out over here and I tried to find you, but I couldn’t, and then that Diavolo bastard showed up, and-”

“You’re alive..” Abdul said quietly as he clutched to the tall-haired man like he might disappear if he relented his grip in any capacity. “You’re ALIVE…” He repeated, holding on just a little bit tighter.

“Eh?? Of course I’m alive.” Polnareff put one arm around his friend, leaning his head back enough to look him in the eyes. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“After we saw what happened to your stand at the coliseum, we thought something might’ve happened to you.” Joseph explained while walking closer to the rest of the group.

“My stand?” Polnareff still looked confused as he summoned said stand. “Silver Chariot’s fine, what are-?” He stopped and blinked, his eyes going wide as a thought seemingly struck him from out of the blue. “Ohhhh, I get it now!” He patted Abdul twice on the back to make him let go before running off towards one of the buildings. “I’ll be right back!”

“Yare yare, where is he going now?” Jotaro tried to sound annoyed, but, to the others who were familiar with his mannerisms by now, they could see from his posture and the slight upturn of his lips that just barely peeked out from behind his collar that he was just as relieved as the rest of them to find their missing member safe and sound. Turning his attention to Kakyoin and his knocked-out captive, Jotaro walked over to the pair. “So, what do we do with him?”

“Polnareff said he was with Giorno’s group, right?” Joseph joined his grandson in looking over their prisoner. “If that’s the case, he’s probably being controlled like the others were.”

“Which means you could fix him with your piece of the holy corpse.” Abdul suggested.

“True..” Kakyoin looked down at the man being held by his Hierophant with a mild look of disdain that wasn’t necessarily directed at their prisoner. “But it’s not like we owe them anything after what they’ve done.”

“I get where you’re coming from,” Joseph sighed, scratching his head under his hat. “But it’s not like this guy was a part of it.”

Abdul folded his arms and looked to Jotaro. “In the end, the decision is not ours to make. What do you think, Jotaro?”

Jotaro looked down at the unconscious silver haired man as he mentally weighed his options. On the one hand, Kakyoin was right- after the way Giorno and his group had kept secrets from them about Polnareff’s fate and been so willing to potentially kill him earlier, they hadn’t exactly earned any favors from Jotaro. On the other hand, though, his grandfather was also right- whoever this guy was, he hadn’t been a part of any of that and it probably wasn’t fair to punish him for what his team did when he hadn’t even been there for it.

What finally motivated his decision, though, was glancing around to his friends- to Kakyoin, Abdul, and Iggy, who’d all been lost to them at one point and brought back as puppets against their will. In the end, NO ONE deserved that.

With that in mind, Jotaro reached into his jacket, pulled out his piece of the holy corpse, and held it out towards the unconscious man. “If we don’t deal with him now, he’ll just be another pain in the ass later.” Just like usual, the corpse piece glowed and its light dispelled the darkness surrounding the stand user.

“Nhh..” The man in question slowly opened his eyes and looked around in confusion, Kakyoin recalling his stand so the man could get to his feet. “Where am I? Wait…is this…Rome..? How did I..? Ah!” He gasped, his eyes going wide as he recalled something urgent. “That’s right! I have to find Bucciarati!”

“If you’re looking for him, he’s probably still at the coliseum with Giorno and the others.” Kakyoin gestured in the general direction of the aforementioned building.

“!!” The longer haired man finally took notice of the others around him and assumed a defensive position, his stand soon appearing to further protect him. “Who are you and how do you know about Bucciarati and Giorno?”

“We’re..” Jotaro almost said friends, but stopped himself. The title didn’t feel right anymore after what had happened earlier. “On the same side as them.” That answer seemed more accurate.

“And I’m just supposed to trust that you’re telling me the truth?” The man’s defensive stance did not waver even slightly.

“If I may?” Kakyoin cleared his throat to get the suspicious man’s attention before speaking again. “We’ve been forced to spend quite a bit of time with them in a fairly small location, so I’ve picked up a few things: Bucciarati’s favorite movie is ‘The Postman’. Mista has a superstition around the number four that boarders on a phobia. Narancia’s favorite drink is orange juice and he is terrible at basic math for his age. Fugo has stabbed Narancia in the face with a fork before and they both still argue about it. Giorno enjoys music by Jeff Beck-”

“Okay, that’s enough.” The man’s posture finally relaxed. “You convinced me the moment you mentioned Bucciarati’s favorite movie- he only admits that in friendly conversations.” He allowed his stand to disappear for the time being. “My name is Abbacchio. Now, you said Bucciarati and the others were back by the coliseum?”

“That is where we last saw them, yes.” Abdul replied with a shrug. “However, that was quite some time ago.”

“Well, I can just track their movements, even if they did leave.” Abbacchio started to walk in the indicated direction right as Polnareff returned.

The Frenchman ran up to the group, panting to catch his breath while holding something behind his back. “Sorry, I just didn’t want to leave this behind!” He grinned as he began to move his hands. “You’ll never guess what I found here!” He presented the group with something that surprised them all.

“Is that…the turtle?!” Joseph stared at the creature in question with a look of disbelief.

“I thought we left it behind back in Morioh?” Abdul was just as surprised as the others for a change, having no explanation for this bizarre turn of events.

Abbacchio turned back to them when he heard their exclamations, raising an eyebrow. “Coco Jumbo? What’s he doing here if the others are at the coliseum? They wouldn’t leave him behind..”

“Long story.” Polnareff waved off the others’ questions without a second thought before holding the turtle out towards his group expectantly. “You guys have to go inside. Trust me- there’s something you’ll DEFINITELY want to see in there!”

Jotaro eyed the smiling man suspiciously but, after seeing no signs of this being some sort of prank or joke, he reluctantly moved his hand to touch the key on the turtle’s back. “Fine…but call us out if there’s trouble.”

After receiving a nod and a thumbs up from their companion, everyone but Abbacchio and Polnareff moved to touch the turtle’s key (Iggy jumping up and perching on Jotaro’s shoulder so he could be taken inside as well).

The inside of the turtle’s stand was almost exactly as it had been when they left- minus all of the people from before and a slight rearrangement to the location of certain small pieces of furniture. At first, they thought the room was completely empty, and likely would have continued to think so if the sound of the refrigerator behind them opening hadn’t caught their attention.

“Let’s see if I still remember this..” A voice they knew all too well spoke from the same area.

“!!” They turned to look at the only other occupant of the room and they stared in shock at the figure currently pulling drinks out of the fridge.

“One regular cola for Mr.Joestar.” A glass bottle of cola was set down on the coffee table in the middle of the room.

“Hey now..I haven’t gotten so old that my eyes are playing tricks on me, right?!” Joseph rubbed at his eyes to make sure what he was seeing was real, but the image did not change.

“A cherry cola for Kakyoin.” A dark red can was set next to the bottle.

“It’s not your eyes, Mr.Joestar…unless we’re all getting too old…” Kakyoin didn’t take his eyes off of the person at the fridge.

“Small coffee-flavored milk for Iggy.” A carton of the flavored milk was opened and poured into a saucer before being placed on the ground by the table.

“Arroo..?” (Translation: “Who..?”) Iggy made a confused sound before moving closer to sniff the person curiously, his eyes widening as he recognized the scent. “!!” (Translation: “You’re-!!”)

“Iced Americano for Jotaro. You probably haven’t tried this yet, but trust me- you’ll be living off of this by your second year of college.” An iced coffee bottle with the described name was placed by the other drinks on the table.

“……” Jotaro watched the person carefully, torn somewhere between confused and concerned.

“And one green tea for Abdul- sorry it’s cold, I know you prefer it hot, but I don’t have a kettle or tea leaves in here.” A can of green tea joined the other drinks on the tabletop.

Abdul tried to voice the thought they all had on their minds, but it seemed hard for him to get the words out. “You…You’re-”

“Think I’ll stick with a bottle of Perrier this time- can’t beat a classic.” The man at the fridge stood to his full height, giving the others in the room their first complete look at him.

“-Polnareff?!” Abdul finished his exclamation right as the man turned to face them.

He grinned in response to their surprised expressions. “Good to know it really was impossible for you to forget me.”

The person they saw was indeed Jean-Pierre Polnareff, but he was quite different from the one they’d left outside of the turtle: For starters, he had dark bags under his eyes that spoke of many sleepless nights and years’ worth of hardships. One eye in particular looked worse than the other, though, bearing a long scar and a cloudiness that was still recognizable even under the sheer eyepatch he wore. The damage on his face (as well as the artificial fingers he still had like the version outside), was nothing compared to what had become of his legs that were apparently cut off mid-thigh and replaced with prosthetics that, logically, should not allow him to stand at all, let alone with the ease he was demonstrating.

Jotaro was the first one to recover from the shock of seeing Polnareff’s appearance. “You’re the Polnareff that worked with Giorno’s group, aren’t you?”

Polnareff took a seat on the couch while opening his sparkling water. “You’re as sharp as ever, Jotaro- or I guess I should say ‘you’re as sharp as I remember’, huh?” He gestured to the other seats around him after taking a quick swig of his beverage. “Go on, sit, we’ve got a lot to talk about.”

After a moment of unspoken deliberation, the group grabbed their drinks (minus Iggy who sat on the floor by his milk) and sat in the various chairs around the small room. Joseph took one of the armchairs directly across from Polnareff with Jotaro taking one closer to the opposite end of the couch. Kakyoin sat on the far end of the couch next to Jotaro while Abdul opted for the spot directly beside Polnareff.

“What happened to you?” Abdul gave the (now older) man beside him a concerned frown while looking him over from head to toe. “Was this Diavolo’s doing?”

“Ah, so you’ve already heard about all of that, huh? Younger-me was pretty surprised to see all of this, so I’m guessing you just found out about it pretty recently.” Polnareff’s smile faded slightly, giving him a more somber appearance as he began to speak of his own death. “Yeah…this was what happened after my original fight with Diavolo. I survived our first encounter, but he didn’t make it easy for me. After that I went into hiding before I found out about Bucciarati’s group and met them at the coliseum to give them the arrow.”

“You mean this?” Jotaro pulled the arrow they’d received from Silver Chariot Requiem out of his jacket and tossed it over to his older friend.

Polnareff caught the arrow easily with his good hand and looked it over with a melancholy smile. “You got it..I can’t believe it..I told Chariot to make sure you got it, but I didn’t think you’d actually…” He gripped the arrow tightly in his hand, looking down at his reflection in the metal. “I went through so much to keep this thing safe…I thought we’d finally succeeded after Giorno’s group managed to defeat Diavolo…but then I found myself here in this strange alternate version of the world and I could feel Silver Chariot Requiem moving around again, even though Bucciarati already defeated it..”

“Did you really ask them to destroy your stand?” Joseph popped the top off of his cola before continuing. “Weren’t you worried about what would happen to you?”

“My body was already dead by that point…as far as I was concerned, my life was over- I’d accepted it.” Polnareff sighed, waving off the question with his free hand and a shake of his head. “When Silver Chariot first changed into its Requiem form, it ended up switching the souls of everyone in the city- Giorno’s group swapped bodies and I ended up being swapped with this turtle. It’s a bit of a letdown, being stuck in this slow body all the time, but it ended up being a blessing in disguise since it kept me from dying.” He reclined back against the couch, looking up at the red ceiling that let them see the sky outside of the room. “This will probably take some getting used to, but at least I can stick around a bit longer and help Giorno, Mista, and Trish when this is all over.” After a moment of silence that felt awkward and tense, Polnareff looked back at the others and noticed that they all had pensive looks on their faces. “What? Was it something I said?”

Seeing after a moment that no one else was going to fess up, Kakyoin reluctantly bit the bullet and did so himself. “We…may have gotten into a fight with them because of you…”

“Quoi?!” Polnareff blinked twice while looking around the room. “You-You’re serious?”

“Mhm..” Abdul nodded slightly, resting his forehead on his hands with his elbows braced on his knees. “We used our stands on them…I tied up Mista with Magician’s red…Iggy bit Trish’s skirt…Mr.Joestar yelled at Bucciarati…Jotaro punched Giorno in the face…twice…”

“WhaaaaaaaAAAT?!” Polnareff nearly fell off of the couch with a startled sound. “Why would you DO that?! You guys are supposed to be on the same side, right?!”

Joseph cleared his throat, his fingers absentmindedly toying with the cap from his cola. “We thought you- well, the younger you- was dead and the Silver Chariot Requiem in the coliseum was his.”

“……” Polnareff stared at them for a few more minutes before he threw his head back in a hysterical fit of laughter. “Mon dieu! I can’t believe you actually did that!” He wiped away the tears of joy from his eyes, looking at the embarrassed expressions everyone had on their faces with a shit-eating grin. “I can understand Iggy and Jotaro..even Mr.Joestar…but Kakyoin and Abdul, too?!” He held his sides as another bout of laughter overtook him.

Jotaro scowled, pulling his hat down over his eyes to help hide his own embarrassment. “Yare yare…you’re too noisy..”

“Sorry, I’m sorry..” Polnareff gasped for breath, trying to reign in his laughter but keeping the grin on his face. “It’s just…I missed this so much! I missed how you guys would rush to defend each other and all of the bizarre, insane situations we’d find ourselves in. I mean, really: You guys got mad at a mafia group because they knew how I died in the future- which was THEIR past- and you thought that meant the past version of me was dead because my stand- which was already defeated before- showed up in its arrow-powered form…it doesn’t get any more bizarre than that! Who else would I hear a story like that from?” He looked at everyone, the joy in his voice changing to something more tender and caring. “It’s been so long since I got to be in the same room with everyone and laugh like this.” He smiled fondly at Joseph. “Mr.Joestar’s memory’s gotten so bad that he barely remembers who I am half the time…” He smirked at Jotaro. “I still get to see Jotaro pretty often, but Mr.Big-shot-working-dad is too busy between his career and Jolyne to take breaks for very long.” His smile softened as he looked to Abdul and Kakyoin. “And…well…it’s not like I had many other friends left to go to, you know…?” He wiped a few more tears from his eyes, though they didn’t seem like the same joyous ones from before.

“Polnareff..” Abdul gently placed one hand on Polnareff’s shoulder, offering him what small amount of solace and comfort he could.

A sound somewhere between a broken laugh and a sob left the Frenchman’s mouth as he tried to smile more despite the tears that continued to fall. “When younger-me found me…when he told me about what happened at the airport and about all of you coming back to life…I…well, I didn’t THINK I would lie to myself- not about something THAT important..it’s just…I couldn’t believe it…the idea of all of us sitting together, getting to talk, enjoying each other’s company one more time…I didn’t think it would be possible!” He attempted to scrub away his tears using his arm, leaving only the broken smile on his mouth visible. “I’m sorry…I’m happy, it’s just-!”

“Yare yare…” He heard Jotaro’s voice, suddenly sounding much closer than it was a moment ago. “Just shut up already.”

Suddenly, there were multiple hands on his arms and shoulders, along with a distinctive set of tiny dog-paws on his lap.

When he lowered his arm, Polnareff was surprised to see that it was not just Jotaro who had moved closer- everyone else had as well.

They were all holding him in an embrace similar to the one he had once shared with Jotaro and Joseph at the airport when they all said goodbye. Abdul was pressed against his side with one arm wrapped around his back. Kakyoin was beside Abdul with his hand on Polnareff’s forearm. On his other side, Joseph had an arm wrapped around Polnareff’s shoulders. Iggy was standing on his lap with his hind legs while his front legs steadied him against Polnareff’s torso so he could look him in the eyes easier. Lastly, Jotaro was beside his grandfather with one hand firmly gripping Polnareff’s arm.

“…!” Polnareff’s eyes widened at the feeling of the embrace before the tears started up again. He sobbed once, crumbling within the hold of friends he never thought he would see again. “Merci...Merci d'être mes amis.”

None of them needed to know French to know what those words meant, they each just gave Polnareff their usual smiles- however big or small- to let him know that they felt the same way about him.

They all stayed in the room with the future version of Polnareff for as long as they possibly could, knowing that it may very well be the last time he got to see any of them again. When they finally left, he gave them some parting words:

“Thank you…all of you…for both our time together now, as well as the time we spent together back then. I hope younger-me knows not to take the time he has with you for granted- and that he doesn’t make the same stupid mistakes I did when I was his age! He’d better tell you guys how much he cares about each and every one of you and how much he loves the time he’s spending with you because, for me, those months we spent together were the best days of my life. Oh, and TRY to go easy on Giorno and the others, okay? I know you’re mad at them for not saying anything about me, but they lost just as many people fighting Diavolo as we did fighting DIO…so..cut them some slack, okay? For my sake? I’d appreciate it…take care, everyone- of each other, and younger-me too. And…thank you…for being my friends.”

As they exited the turtle, they found themselves back at the entrance to the coliseum. Polnareff had been waiting by the turtle and, before the others could ask what they missed, he put a finger to his lips and gestured for them to follow him.

The Crusaders entered the coliseum together, arriving just in time to see a much needed reunion…

Giorno’s group had stayed in the coliseum, sitting down for a few minutes and taking care of any bruises or scrapes they’d received during their minor scuffles with Silver Chariot Requiem as well as Jotaro’s group.

“Hold still, Giorno.” Mista had improvised an ice-pack for the swelling bruise on Giorno’s face using some cold pieces of metal (softened by Trish and Spice Girl to avoid adding unnecessary pressure) and some spare cloth.

“Thanks, Mista…” Giorno’s eyebrows twitched slightly from the sting of the cooling pack touching his bruised face, but his gloomy expression remained otherwise unchanged as he stared at his hands where they rested on his lap.

“Seriously?” The word was accompanied by the clacking of heeled shoes over dirt and rock. “I rush over here to find you, and you’re all just sitting around licking your wounds?”

“!!!!” The eyes of everyone sitting within the coliseum suddenly snapped up to the figure who had just walked in.

“N…No way..!” Mista stared with wide eyes.

“He’s..!” Trish’s eyes began to mist over with tears, her hands going to her mouth as she gasped.

Fugo looked at the others with a frown. “Hey, didn’t you guys tell me he was-?”

“He was..” Giorno’s eyes remained locked on the new comer. “But…so were Narancia and Bucciarati…”

Bucciarati initially had the same surprised reaction as the others, but his look of shock quickly melted into a relieved, teary-eyed smile. “You’re-”

“ABBACCHIO!!!!!!” Narancia cried as he sprang to his feet, practically sprinting to cover the distance between himself and the older man so that he could throw his arms around him in a bone-crushing hug.

Abbacchio nearly fell over from the force of the tackle, digging his heels into the dirt to just barely remain standing. “Oof!” He began pulling on the back of the boy’s shirt, trying to dislodge him. “Hey, Narancia, you’d better not be wiping your snotty nose on me, you little sh-!”

“You-You-You were dea-ead! We were o-only gone for a few mi-inutes, and-and-a-and when we got back, you were..you were..!!” Narancia sobbed, refusing to let go as if he were afraid Abbacchio may disappear if he did so. “We-We h-ha-a-had to leave you beh-h-hi-ind! I didn’t want t-to, but-but Bucciarati said we h-had to-o-o!”

“……” Abbacchio’s annoyed glare softened slightly and the hand that had been trying to pull the boy away instead patted him on the back. “Alright, alright, I get it..it’s fine. Bucciarati made the right call- it was too dangerous for you to stay there.”

Bucciarati was the next one to walk over, giving the ex-cop a caring look and tender smile that said far more than his mouth did. “Welcome back..Leone.”

Abbacchio returned the look with a slightly softer (well, soft for him, at least) smile of his own. “Sorry I took so long..Bruno.”

The rest of the gang steadily made their way over to their newly revived comrade, happily welcoming him back…except for Giorno.

Giorno’s eyes drifted to the coliseum’s entrance where he saw Jotaro’s group silently observing them. He made his way over to them after quietly placing the make-shift icepack on the ground. “Thank you,” He said once he was close enough, looking up at Jotaro with an expression that was slightly more open than his usual looks. “For bringing him back to us.” He looked out to where his friends were celebrating Abbacchio’s return, a soft smile on his face as he watched the older man try once again to pull Narancia (who had stopped crying as much and begun to laugh while stubbornly clinging to the longer-haired man) off of him. “He was the first casualty in our fight against Diavolo..losing him..was one of the worst things that we went through..” He returned his attention to Jotaro’s group, looking up at Jotaro himself with a slight frown. “You were right about us…we were scared of changing our timeline…we lost Abbacchio, Narancia, Bucciarati, and even Polnareff, all so we could defeat Diavolo and keep him from getting the power of the arrow…each loss broke us more and more, but they all contributed something that ultimately led to Diavolo’s defeat…after everything we lost to get that far, the thought of changing something and having to go through all of that again- to lose everyone and risk losing EVERYTHING to Diavolo with all of our sacrifices meaning NOTHING…it was terrifying to think about.” He bowed his head, no longer meeting the taller teen’s gaze. “That doesn’t excuse what we did..what we hid from Polnareff and risked putting him through..and for that, I am sorry.” His fists clenched at his sides, a barely visible tremor going through his shoulders. “With time, I hope that you may see m- see us in a different light-”

“Yare yare daze..” Jotaro’s annoyed voice cut Giorno’s apology short. “Just shut up already.”

Giorno looked back up at Jotaro with an expression that bordered on pleading. “But, I-!”

“Don’t waste time saying things that don’t need to be said.” Jotaro’s hand came down to rest firmly on Giorno’s shoulder. “We all said things we didn’t need to already…so let’s just keep moving.”

“!!” Giorno understood the unspoken sentiment all too well, and it made the slightest of smiles return to his face. “You’re right…we have far too much to do to dwell on the past.”

“Exactly. Now come on, we’ve still got work to do.” Jotaro gave the shorter boy a slight smile of his own, letting go of his shoulder and heading inside the coliseum with the rest of his friends.

There was still a lot that needed to be done. Bridges to mend. Wounds to heal. But, in the end, if there was one thing that both sides could come to an understanding on, it was the hardship of losing cherished friends and comrades due to tragic and bizarre circumstances beyond their control.

Perhaps that understanding would be enough to bring them together- just as it always seemed to bring the Joestars and their allies together in the end.

End Notes: So, this idea was one that my sister and I came up while eating at a sushi buffet one day. I love the Eyes of Heaven game and have probably played through the story at least 5 times. While we were eating, we talked about how the different stages you could fight in were different in the story mode versus the regular modes and how they had more interactive elements outside of the story mode. On that topic, we talked about how the coliseum had both Silver Chariot Requiem and Polnareff’s soul in the turtle body present, and how messed up it would be if the stardust crusaders (among other characters) could react to that sort of thing- thus this premise was born!

I also decided to add Abbacchio because he does technically appear in the picture alongside the rest of Passione in their little “Happy Ending” universe picture, but he was tragically one of the characters that got cut from the game in its early stages because, according to my sister, they couldn’t figure out what to do with him mechanics-wise. Which is a shame because I would’ve loved to see the entire gang reunited, so I added him in here for that reason alone x3

[bennyboyjones]

THE GETAWAY (Ben Hardy FanFic) Prologue

A/N: Hi! So, here is the prologue to my Ben Hardy  AU Fanfic! There are currently several chapters written, which you can find on Wattpad if you click on the link below, but I’ve decided to also upload it here as well. It might be a bit behind, but you’ll still get all the chaps eventually. 

What it is: basically, a girl from a small town who is bored of her life decides to take a trip to Nice where she runs into ben, who is also running away from some shit and some romance ensues. 

Word count: 1.6k

In this chapter: just some background to get us started. You probably don’t have to read this to understand what comes after, but it will help you understand the main character better. 

WATTPAD LINK IF YOU WANT TO READ AHEAD

Here we go:

prologue

I brushed my thumb over the twenty year old bonds clutched between my fingers. My eyes swept over the bank tellers, my weight switching back and forth from my right to my left foot. These people were taking forever; I figured it would be slow since it was a Monday morning, but apparently this was when all of the housewives did their banking. I had been next in line for the past fifteen minutes and as time went on, my nerve was steadily draining out of me. 

Last night, after a bottle of wine, I sat on the floor of my bedroom and reached under my bed for the manilla folder that held the contents of what I would consider the best six months of my life.  The folder was worn, soft, had both coffee and wine stains, and looked way too aged for something that had only come into existence a year ago. I placed my glass next to me, on the equally stained gray carpet, and pulled out endless postcards, bookmarks, pamphlets, plane tickets, museum and park and exhibit passes, and polaroids. I sifted through them, running fingers over my best friends’ smiling faces, rereading postcards to my family I had already memorized, focusing on guides to museums in Copenhagen, Paris, and London as if studying them could magically teleport me back. Instead, I was stuck here, in Rye, a small town that I was so, so bored of. 

I had lived here my entire life, and so had my parents. We went to the same elementary school and high school, we lived a thirty-second drive and a five minute walk from where my dad grew up. Everyone I had gone to school with had parents who graduated with or around the same time as mine. I felt so suffocated by sameness, by the ordinariness, and was terrified of repeating the pattern of monotony. 

When it was time to go to college, I was sure I would end up in New York City—somewhere not too far, but far enough, different enough from everything I wanted to get away from. When I was in high school, I decided that I was made to live there. For nine months out of the year, I’m a New Yorker—but during the summer I’m always back in Rye because apparently it’s financially irresponsible to take out loans to dorm over the summer and I can’t afford an apartment on a waitress’s salary, nor do I have the time to take up a second job and go to school full time, so Rye it is.

I only ever missed New York seasonally, but I missed London all the time. 

I missed living in London. I missed walking the three blocks from Queen Mary to the Co-Op to grab mushrooms, flapjacks, and a bottle of wine. I missed sitting on the Central Line at 11:30pm drunk, with Sarah and Annie on our way to our favorite club near Tottenham Court Road. I missed walking to Rinkoff’s hungover and grabbing a cronut. I missed Brick Lane on Sunday mornings. I missed a past life. 

For the past year, I’ve been saving up to get it back. When I came home last June, I worked a waitressing job at a small restaurant on our main street, as many doubles as I could—six days a week—and I refused to spend a single dime of it. I worked part time the past two semesters and saved as much as I could, but metro cards were expensive and a girl needed to eat, and also have a social life, and instead of “throwing away” my left over aid money on spring break vacations like my friends did, I hoarded that $1,231 and pretended I wasn’t bothered by the Miami Beach pictures even though I knew I was missing out. 

London was expensive, that much was clear; the only way I survived six months on $6,000 was because my financial aid paid for my housing and tuition, traveling around Europe while living in Europe is cheap, and my mom was sending me $100 a week for groceries because she was worried that all the jokes I made about not eating so I could afford to party (or financial drinking, as it’s been called) were serious (they were, and often the money that was supposed to be meant for groceries went to more fucking around—you only go abroad like that once in your entire life and I was so not going to waste it). And still, despite the weekly allowance from my mom, I still came home with $82 left in my bank account. Towards the end of the six months I was barely hanging on financially. Basically, what I’m saying is that I knew going back was going to cost me a lot of money, especially since I knew I wouldn’t have the same kind of help that I had the last time around. 

So, I saved and refused to do the math to figure out how much I would need to go back to London for at least two weeks. Well, last night, I did the math—and, oh boy, I am not going back to London until I have at least a few thousand more dollars to my name. That crushing disappointment is what led me to that manilla folder. 

The past few months, going back to Europe was all I could think about; I was graduating in December and this was my last summer to really do whatever I wanted before I had to be a real adult. Granted, I was planning on going straight into grad school, but the statement still stands. 

I took another sip of the cheap-ass red I regretted buying before grabbing my photos from Nice. I slowly went through them, and my eyes misted at the landscapes, the crooked self portraits taken on both disposables and my barely functioning digital, the photos of food, and coffees perfectly placed next to pages of my open journal. 

It was the one place that I had gone alone, in the middle of January, for only three days. It was a trip I took out of convenience (student visa issues) and I had only chosen Nice because it was both relatively cheap and small, but it ended up being my favorite place. The place I named first when people asked where I went, the place I talked about the most, and the place that meant the most to me. 

I put the photos down and opened my laptop. I opened a tab for SkyScanner, one for AirBnb, and one for TripAdvisor and started doing the math.

Flight: $1,214 (round trip)

AirBnb: $2,056

Other Expenses: $3,000

Approx. Total: $6,270

I knew how much I had in my savings and knew I had bonds somewhere from my baptism or some other religious sacrament I was forced to endure that I could cash for some extra money. I had enough for three weeks, but didn’t have much of a financial cushion should I need it. 

I downed what was left in my glass and booked my trip. I felt my hands shaking as I took them off my keyboard to rest them on my cheeks. My face was flush from both the wine and the excitement. I wiped my feet against the carpet, the nervous sweat on their bottoms making me uncomfortable. I was never one for impulsivity; I was a planner, a control freak, a perfectionist—a full blown virgo for fuck’s sake and the longer I sat there, staring at the confirmation page before me, the more nauseous I felt. I refused to let the regret set in, the doubt, and the fear. Instead, I stood up, hopped down the stairs with my empty glass in hand, and upon refilling, announced to my mom that in three weeks time, I would be on a plane to France. 

Earlier this morning, she rifled through the safe in the back of her closet in search of the bonds. When I told her about what I had done, she didn’t have much of a reply—she simply raised her glass to me and muttered a soft, “Jesus Christ”. I knew she was slightly concerned, but also excited for me and I really couldn’t have asked for a better reaction. She was a supportive mom, always, no matter how questionable her children’s choices were (and mine and my brothers’ choices were always questionable). 

Once she found them shoved into an envelope from the ‘90s, I got in the car with my younger brother and went to the bank. 

“You need to chill out. You’re going to make everyone in there nervous if you go in there all shaky and sweaty. You’re making yourself look like a criminal,” Noah said as he put his crappy car in park. 

“I’m just nervous. I know this is a stupid idea, isn’t it? I should just keep saving and go back in, like, another year when I really have the money, don’t you think?”

He rolled his eyes, “No. I think you need to do this now. It’s all you ever fucking talk about, and honestly, visiting you last year was the best thing I’ve ever done and it was the happiest I saw you. Just stop being a dumb bitch and go in there and get your money.”

Ignoring the “bitch” comment, I pushed the car door open with a loud creaking and clutched the bonds so tight they folded in my hands. 

When it was finally (finally!) my turn to be helped, I stepped up and handed the bonds over, crumpled and slightly damp with sweat, “I’d like to cash these, please.”

[alanna-artroid]

Cookies I Have From Cookie Run So Far! (And My Thoughts On Them)

Alright, I’ve gotten pretty far in Cookie Run: Oven Break, and I felt the need to share my thoughts on all the adorable cookies I’ve unlocked so far. So far, I have 50/100, so I’d say I’m making good progress. On to the list!

GingerBrave: The bravest boy. If this was a show, he’d clearly be the main character. I recently got him a little suit, so now he’s a gentleman! 

GingerBright: Sweet little lady. She looks like she’d be nice to get a coffee with or help you with homework. I definitely ship her with Brave, no doubt about it.

Strawberry Cookie: Precious baby! She’s super shy and I am compelled to protect her at all costs. Her pet is also a Tamagotchi, so she must be a gamer! Sweet!

Skater Cookie: HE WAS A SK8TER BOI! SHE SAID SEE YA LATER BOI! 

Zombie Cookie: This is one of the fastest zombies I’ve ever seen. They seem like a nice guy overall though.

Princess Cookie: Heck yes, a mischievous princess! Those are the best! I love her dress and hair bows. I bet she just pretends to get kidnapped for the lols.

Pilot Cookie: Is it just me, or is this little old man smaller than most of the other cookies? Whatever, he’s got a cute mustache and he’s adorable. Go and fly!

Vampire Cookie: As a vampire nerd, I immediately adored this guy. I will gladly give him grape juice and chill with him under the light of the moon. 

Gumball Cookie: Is this was Splatoon is like? This boi has a lot of chaotic energy and I like him.

Pistachio Cookie: I love this warrior woman so dang much. Look at that minty green hair! Her power is also SUPER helpful. She a speedy knight!

Pancake Cookie: HE’S A FLYING SQUIRREL! HE’S TOO CUTE I CAN’T EVEN! LET ME HUG THIS TINY CHILD!!!

Peppermint Cookie: Sweet baby. Good baby. My mom would probably adore this baby. (She loves mint and she’s not even a big sweets person.)

Muscle Cookie: As a lesbian, I’m not into big abs and muscles, but he’d probably be a good gym partner. Don’t mess with him is all I can say.

Cherry Cookie: Little Red Riding Hood got some bombs! I hope she and Gumball can go cause chaos on the weekends.

Hero Cookie: Precious nerdy boi with science! I saw his Island of Memories intro and his bond with Jellyco Cube is just the sweetest thing! Follow your superhero dreams, my baby!

Fairy Cookie: I didn’t know Tinkerbell was in this game! Also, I got her a bee costume and that looks super cute on her. Love her hair bun.

Werewolf Cookie: ULTIMATE FLOOF! Doggo here has a lot of angst and I worry for him. Maybe Vampire Cookie can teach him to chill? That’d be nice.

Rockstar Cookie: Oh, the songs I could sing right here. High tier rocker boy. Loving that flowing white hair. Rock on, buddy!

Soda Cookie: Go-to starter for my Breakout runs. I love him very much, he’s super cute! Let me go to the beach with this righteous dude! 

Dark Enchantress Cookie: Oooooh, she is GORGEOUS!!! I love her design~! I’ll be sure to invite her to any fancy balls I might have, as to avoid any Maleficent scenarios with this savage woman.

Moon Rabbit Cookie: My spirit animal! I love how she constantly munches while she runs. This girl is such a mood for me. Cute little bunny ears~!

Space Doughnut: Awww, look at this alien dork! Their design is very cute, and I love how their expression of >:3.

Macaron Cookie: Such a sweetie pie! Why must they all be so adorable?! She’s a little drummer girl! That is too precious! Look at her dress and hat!!!

Pink Choco Cookie: She reminds me of a show I watched when I was younger. It was about a space girl, does anyone remember it? This girl will save the day, I can tell! 

Avocado Cookie: Strong girl on the loose! My pun-loving friends would adore this cookie. And she’s a blacksmith, which is always cool.

Whipped Cream Cookie: Elegant ballerino!! He’s definitely one of my favorites! Such a beautiful boi~! I love his design so much, and he’s very useful. <3 <3 <3

Blackberry Cookie: Yeeees! Gothic girl for the win! She is SO dang pretty! I am WEAK for gothic lolitas, and she even has ghost buddies! I bet she’ll love spooky games like Luigi’s Mansion and Hollow Knight.

Lemon Cookie: Edgy boi is trying way too hard to be Shadow the Hedgehog. I mean, can you SMILE for once dude? It’ll take me a while to bond with this guy.

Salt Cookie: He strikes me as a wise old man you’d find meditating at the top of a mountain, or in his case on a boat in the ocean. I bet he has lots of knowledge to share.

Squid Ink Cookie: AWWWWW, SWEET BABY SQUID!!! Guys, I think they might be my favorite! They’re so squishy and mighty, and they need all my love and huggles!!! Don’t be sad baby, I’ll be your friend! <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

Lime Cookie: Beach girl! She’s like Lemon Cookie, but slightly nicer! I really like her hair and beach ball. Very cool girl.

Ninja Cookie: FINALLY! SOMEONE WITH MORE THAN TWO JUMPS!!! I went kind of crazy with his jumping powers at first. He’s super cool. Not sure why his pet is a ghost though.

Pomegranate Cookie: Oooh, I love Asian fashion~! Look how fancy and elegant she is! Her story concerns me, and I’m worried about her.

Angel Cookie: Good cookie, sweet cookie. Wouldn’t hurt a fly. It looks like they trust the devil boy, which is beyond kind of them. I love it when angels get along with demons. Defy angle roles!!!

Devil Cookie: Speaking of, they’re a cute little bean too! I love the naughty demon trope, and this cutie is so mischievous! Call Angel your “rival” all you want, I’m still shipping you dorks.

Roll Cake Cookie: Imagine, if you will, the world’s biggest game of Whack-A-Mole! With that hammer, this boy would win without question.

Popcorn Cookie: I’d be happy to go with this girl to the movie theater! Also, I love how she had popcorn for hair buns. She seems like she’d be up for a fun time!

Carrot Cookie: Oh my lordy, her ponytails are carrots. The artists for this game are so clever. Strong but tiny farmer, I approve.

Ion Cookie Robot: Yes! A robot! I love robots, and this cookie is no exception! Definitely one of my favorites, up there with Whipped Cream Cookie. They’re super powerful too, and REALLY useful in Breakout and Trophy runs.

Dino-Sour Cookie: Gee Dino-Sour, how come Devsisters let you have two pets? Very cool punk boy. I can see him going to Rockstar Cookie’s concert.

Plum Cookie: Aren’t plums purple though? This boy is one tough cookie! Look at his karate moves! Honestly, I thought he was a girl at first. Why must these boys be so pretty?!

Yogurt Cream Cookie: PRINCE ALI! FABULOUS HE! ALI ABABWUA~!

Alchemist Cookie: Look, it’s Twilight Sparkle! Apparently, Vampire boy is her brother? I really like her hair braids(?), I just wish she’d loosen up a bit. She seems like a nice girl.

Roguefort Cookie: Aaaah yeah, elegant thief! This cookie is the coolest! I love this aesthetic so much~! Blue cheese has never been so fancy. Just look at this charmer, stealing hearts!

Pitaya Dragon Cookie: OOOOOhohoho! THIS is what I’m TALKING about! Look at this beast, they’re GLORIOUS! They’ve probably killed a bunch of people, but They’re crazy powerful and I adore them.

Knight Cookie: This guy is SO much fun to play as! He just won’t stop, he’s too fast!!! I couldn’t stop laughing once I found out just how fast this knight could go! Somehow he controls better than Pistachio? I don’t know, I love him!

Birthday Cake Cookie: TOO PRECIOUS FOR WORDS! SHE’S SO DANG CUTE!!! Also, her “Bonus Time” changes to “Happy B Day” and I... I just can’t! She’s the sweetest thing!!! <3 <3 <3

Cocoa Cookie: Awww, look at this sweet baby! I wanna snuggle her! Her design looks so warm and comfy. I have plenty of hot chocolate to give her. <3

Raspberry Mousse Cookie: Ah yes, the pretty boy that got me into this game in the first place. Along with Squid Ink, he’s probably my favorite. There’s a reason he has the highest affection so far with me. I just adore his design, and he’s very powerful! I will ALWAYS have him ready for Breakout and Trophy Runs. Well worth all the hype. <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

Rose Cookie: Finally, we have this lovely lady. Everyone is shipping her with Raspberry, and rightfully so. She is a high-quality woman that makes gay men straight and straight girls lesbian. Look at that outfit! And those dance moves!

Aaaand that’s everybody for now! I’ll update this once I get more Cookies. So far, I like most of them a lot. Anybody got some favorites they’d like to share? I’m still new to this game, but I’m happy to hear what others have to say!

UPDATE 1: 

I went back and fixed all the gender mistakes I made. (I’m so sorry! D:) Also, I got a few more cookies! So here we go!

Walnut Cookie: Precious detective baby! The newest update is only making her cuter! Probably the shortest of the bunch, and I adore her design~! <3

Cinnamon Cookie: Super useful power so far, and they have a really cool cape! Those cards are very handy! (I promise I’ll pay attention to the genders of these cookies from now on! I don’t want to misgender anyone again!)

Sparkling Cookie: Oooh, a sparkling cider cookie! That’s honestly the only boozy thing I enjoy drinking. He is super classy and seems like the life of the party. He strikes me as a Great Gatsby kind of host.

Moonlight Cookie: OOOOOOOH~! LOOK at this GODDESS! I love the nighttime/dreamy aesthetic. This girl has Luna’s hair and a wizard’s outfit, high tier cookie!

White Choco Cookie: This game sure likes it’s knights, huh? This girl is a fine lady and apparently, she attracts all the lesbians. Can’t say I blame those girls, I do love that hairstyle. 

Spinach Cookie: Aaand the newest cookie to hit the scene, this girl! I have never met someone so dedicated to vegetables, so I have to applaud that. She’s a super sweet girl, and I hope we find who stole her precious vegetables!!!

UPDATE 2:

More Cookies! It’s been a while since I’ve updated this, so I have quite a bit to share. On to the new ones!

Mustard Cookie: Look at this punk girl! Street artist on the loose in the streets! I always admire people and characters in this style, so I’m supporting this rebel all the way!

Herb Cookie: Now THIS guy is everywhere! It seems the fandom really likes him, and I can see why. He seems like a very nice boy, with a sweet plant baby. I like the leaf hair, very cool.

Sea Fairy Cookie: I love how everything on her flows. Her hair, her dress, she’s so beautiful~! I will say though, Legendaries are SO DANG HARD to level up and get affection with! WHY?!

Cream Puff Cookie: Awwww, look at this precious baby girl~! Look at her soft hair and little dress! I almost feel bad running with the super cute ones, I don’t want them to get hurt! 

Matcha Cookie: Oooooh, all these ancient-looking cookies have the coolest designs! She’s probably insane, darkness will do that to ya, but she seems harmless so I like her!

Ice Candy Cookie: This chick could crush me like a grape and I don’t know how to feel about that. Hopefully, she’s only savage on the ice rink. I do NOT want to mess with this girl.

Cherry Blossom Cookie: Awww, look how pretty she is~! Cherry blossoms are always so lovely, and this girl embodies that. She has a PARASOL for crying out loud, I CAN’T EVEN!!

Grapefruit Cookie: This game sure likes sports, huh? She seems really cool, I love her colors! Do you think she’d play Skate 3? Hopefully, she’d get a laugh out of that game.

Pirate Cookie: This guy has been a long time coming. I’ve been curious about him since the Breakout episode. He’s pretty neat, I appreciate how he naturally comes with an extra revive.

Kumiho Cookie: Cool! A Kitsune! I love the spin on the concept of cookies. Let this marshmallow fox live out her reverse-furry dream! I’m loving her design too, look at that hair! 

Marshmallow Cookie: Oh cute! Another marching band cookie! According to her story, she and Macaron had a falling out. I hope they can reconcile and be friends again. :(

Dark Choco Cookie: WE’VE REACHED MAXIMUM EDGE! WITH OREO SHOULDER PADS!!! Interesting how he’s still trying to be a hero, which is a nice spin on the “I have evil powers so now I’m evil” trope. Here’s hoping he stays strong.

Fire Spirit Cookie: Ah yes, the classic lord of fire. A staple for any fantasy story that includes the elements. Again, it’s impossible to get the affection for these guys.

Mala Sauce Cookie: Yay! I got Pitaya’s girlfriend! I always love it when there’s a tribe/society of warriors and the WOMAN is the strongest one there. Heck yes! This warrior lady is a badass!

Firecracker Cookie: I didn’t know I was invited to a rave party! Love the neon colors on this cookie, that’s something this game really excels at.

UPDATE 3:

I’ve reached 90 cookies! I’m on the homestretch!!!

Cheesecake Cookie: OH MY LORDY LOOK HOW FANCY SHE IS! I adore her already! Fancy ladies are the best ladies!

Kiwi Cookie: This game REALLY likes sports. He looks cool, can’t complain.

Yoga Cookie: Awww, a pretzel is trying to be loose! I’ve done yoga a few times, and it is very good for your body. Nice colors, simple design, nice.

Dr. Wasabi Cookie: I’d reference some mad scientist, but I know a lot of them so we’d be here for a while. Her combi generator has been very helpful.

Tiger Lily Cookie: IT’S THE EYE OF THE TIGER IT’S THE THRILL OF THE NIGHT, RISING UP TO THE CHALLENGE OF OUR RIVALS!

Chili Pepper Cookie: Uh oh, this one’s a troublemaker! I really like her hair, it’s very bright. Secure your pockets around this chick, that’s for sure.

Millennial Tree Cookie: These cookies are too pretty, I keep thinking they’re girls! This guy is so beautiful~ truly a being of nature!

DJ Cookie: Ooooh, I love her design~. Rainbow colors will win me over every time. And look! She’s wearing a Bi Pride shirt! This girl is awesome! I like how her special power is basically tiny Guitar Hero.

Snow Sugar Cookie: Soft baby, sweet baby. Looks very cuddly. Their level was very helpful during Sandwich Cookie’s event in getting frozen jellies. Those blue bears aren’t easy to come by!

Fig Cookie: CENTAUR! I wasn’t expecting one of those here! She’s such a sweetie pie~. Since everything and anything is allowed in this game, can we get mermaids or harpies next?

Cotton Candy Cookie: PRECIOUS BABY! She’s so gosh darn cute, I can’t take it! I personally can relate to falling in love with things so easily. And there are official plushies of her now! ONE DAY I WILL BRING HER HOME!

Purple Yam Cookie: Bro needs a chill pill. Not ONCE have I seen this guy smile yet. And I thought Lemon needed to lighten up. Milk seems to care about him though, so I guess he can’t be that bad.

Milk Cookie: The softest of warriors! Look how cute he is~! I adore him! Plus he really shines in the stories. I can only assume Yam is his boyfriend or something. Am I wrong about that?

Cyborg Cookie: Hey! I saw the storybook for this one! I’m surprised I haven’t unlocked this “Aloe Cookie” yet. Are they still in this game? I can’t find them on the chart. Anyway, Cyborg is cool. Very nice design.

Mango Cookie: Newest baby! I love him, and would love to learn all about the islands from him! I’m gonna say it, I already ship him with Ananas Cookie, no questions asked.