#he is hysterical in his attempt to prove what i can only assume is his worth as a father figure

[prettyboykatsuki]

arthur morgan is so eldest daughter coded GOD

[oldgooddaysoldgooddays]

282

On Sunday C arrives on a sugar high from an entire Easter egg and a midday Tango. Part of friendship is accepting someone at either end of their crash diet. Last time we spoke he left me hanging on news of a sex dream about V and suspicions the new girl he’s seeing might not be sane. He elaborates on the latter, how the woman will respond to a text by saying “you are overstepping a boundary” and then send a text later in the week asking to go to dinner. After dinner she will say “I don’t trust you”, and “you need to stop gaslighting me”

It is hard, I say to C, thoughtfully re-lighting my cigarette, to prove you are not gaslighting someone once that particular gauntlet has been laid down. Not wanting to believe my best friend is romantically toxic, I find myself betraying my own gender and assuming that perhaps this woman just recently learned phrases like “gaslighting” and “love-bombing”. We have all been guilty of using the terms as synonyms for the more mundane acts of simply having opposing points of view, or of expressing affection early on in a relationship. It does, however, cross my mind that C, while endlessly loving and respectful of me throughout our 15 year friendship, could be kind of a nightmare to date. It is something I will never know for sure, since dating C would be like incest

“And then on Thursday”, C continues, “we are ordering food and she says we need to stop seeing each other, and when I leave it will be Goodbye Forever”. C says he told her that if it’s going to be Goodbye Forever he might rather order something cheaper. I laugh hysterically at this detail because I understand C’s logic so clearly. After all, when D ditched me in my hotel room I attempted to stem the flow of hurt by sending him a PayPal invoice created on my phone for the room service bill. Sometimes finance is the only controllable facet of an ugly scene

“Then the next day she asks me out again, like nothing happened. And when I text her back she says I’m overstepping her boundaries again”, says C. At dinner she tries to lure C back to her place, despite his early morning the following day, by flirting with the waiter to make him jealous. “Protest behaviour”, I say with authority, having once skimmed an attachment style book. C asks what my verdict is, whether he should continue seeing her. I say why not. I try to inhabit this woman’s mind, tune in to my supposedly innate feminine empathy, but I can’t. I like to think when I'm in something I don't send these kinds of mixed signals, but instead one long clear signal of disdain. Usually I just run and hide, or am ran and hidden from. The only thing I've ever felt I've had in common with C's romantic partners is that I sometimes cry hysterically after intercourse. C slept one such crier recently, who demanded sex during his refractory period and then tearfully swirled his penis around like a helicopter blade until he became aroused again. When he tells me this I ask him several times for reassurance that he liked it, and vow to try the stressful move the next time the opportunity arises

I move our chairs twice around the yard so I can get the sun on my face. The day feels like the first of spring. I ask C which Tate brother he would let marry his fictional daughter. We both reluctantly agree on Andrew, since Tristan has all the same awful attributes but marinated in an inferiority complex. I bike west after we part and think about how much of my life has been unofficial research to understand men. Later R texts me a photo of a greetings card sent to him by his semi-estranged dad. It says “SON, you are a good man”. If it wasn’t so clearly laced with pain this would be one of the funniest things I’d ever seen. This year is the first in a few that I have considered sending my own father a birthday text. I workshop a handful of potential missives. “Happy birthday. You’ve really fucked this one up”, “HB Daddy…if that is in fact your real name”, “hope you’re drowning in side-pussy on this special day”, “best wishes, Aries king”, “DAD, you are a bad man”

[dragon-kazansky]

Dangerous | Helmut Zemo

AU! Race car driver Zemo 😎

Gender neutral reader

Collage by @realremyd

I AM ONCE AGAIN SORRY

[Masterlist]

[Previous chapter] - [Next chapter]

Part 9

When Zemo got to the bar, there was no one there. He had gone inside looking for you, had asked all the staff when he couldn't see you there. He began to panic when they told him you had left a while ago.

Rushing back outside, he looked left and right rapidly. He saw no one. He got back into his car and drove. He would drive all night if he had to. He just had to find you.

He kept trying to call you, but you wouldn't pick up. At some point you turned your phone off, which just made him worry all the more.

Pietro Maximoff.

He hadn't heard that name in years. What happened back then had always hung over him like a dark cloud, but it had been so long since anyone had ever said that name to him.

He had to explain. You needed to know what happened. If Zemo lost you, what would be the point? How could he race without his lucky charm? He couldn't let this get between you both.

He felt horrible lying to you. There was so much he hadn't told you, but he had never wanted you to find out like this. He should have been honest from the start.

Zemo could only imagine what you were thinking. What must you think of him now?

How long had been driving? He had no idea. He hadn't found you yet. It was becoming harder and harder to keep up his facade. He wanted to yell, scream, punch something.

Everything was falling apart.

The only place he hadn't checked was home. He had no idea how you would have got there, the walk being too far, but it's all he had left.

He makes the drive back.

His grip on the steering wheel was tight. He was full of worry, anger, regret.

He pulls up to the house, but all the lights are off and there is no sign of life. He has the key for the door, there's no way you have got in. He looks down the path to the garage, it looks undisturbed. The garage is locked up tight.

You're not here.

His phone rings.

Zemo scrambles for the device, nearly dropping it from how bad his hands had begun to shake. He looks at the screen, but is left disappointed. It's not you.

James Barnes

He answers it.

"Whatever it is better be important. I have urgent business to attend to." Zemo is surprised by how level he can keep his voice right now.

"I'd say this is important."

"Well, what is it?"

"I bumped into Y/N on my way home. It's only because of Sam I was able to recognize them."

"Where are they?" He asks, almost urgently.

"On the last train home for the night. Zemo, what the Hell happened? They were hysterically upset. I swear I'll kick your ass if you did something stupid."

"It wasn't something I did. Were they alone?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Y/N had gone to meet someone. A wicked young woman who I may run over if I see her," he hisses down the phone.

"I didn't see anyone else."

"I have to go."

Zemo hangs up. He has to go to you, but first, he has to meet with Stark. The only way that nasty little woman could have known about that incident is if Stark had told her.

Tony Stark had been there that day.

Zemo gets into his car and he drives. He drives like a man on a mission. He doesn't care how late it is, Tony Stark will see him tonight.

If Zemo loses you, he will never forgive himself. He will never forgive Tony Stark.

He will never race again.

The lights are on at Stark's homebase. Zemo spends a few minutes parked outside looking at the window. The curtains were drawn, but movement could be seen vaguely behind them.

He gets out and marches up to the door. He knocks harshly.

In the seconds before the opening of the door, many thoughts flashed through Zemo's mind. He had no idea what would happen here tonight, all he did know was that Tony Stark was a cruel man who wanted to ruin everything good in his life.

Zemo had been beyond lucky they even let him race again after what happened.

The door opens. Stark stands there.

The way he looks at Zemo, it pisses him off. He stands with his chin up, head held high, looking down at Zemo. He knows why the Baron is here. He had anticipated his visit.

"What a surprise," Tony says, no emotion to his voice.

"What have you done?'

"What I had to." Tony walks away, leaving the door open. He walks over to his alcohol cabinet and pours himself a drink. Zemo steps inside, glaring daggers at the man. His hands clenched into fists as he grinds his jaw.

"That was six years ago."

"It still happened."

"You know it wasn't my fault."

Tony stands, drink in hand, looking at his rival. Here was a man who had been broken once before, and stands broken again. Stark did you a favour. Zemo wouldn't be here now if you had gone back to him after that, so he can only assume you left.

"You are the reason that kid is dead. Everyone knows it."

Zemo shakes his head.

"You are the reason people see me as a murderer. I did nothing to you. That, out there, is competition. We play the game by the rules and we play fair. At least, we're suppose to. I do not like your dirty tricks, Stark."

Tony doesn't move. He stands there, still.

"I was lucky they even let me race again, but even luckier when Y/N came into my life. You are taking away everything I hold dear, piece by piece. You are ruining me."

"You ruined yourself when you took up racing," Tony says, coldly.

"You just can't let it go, can you? You don't like that I am better than you."

Tony doesn't reply.

Zemo takes slow, careful steps toward Tony. His eyes, glazed with tears, do not look away from his gaze. He only stops when he is directly in front of him.

"If I lose Y/N, you will never hear the end of this. You're cruelty knows no bounds, Stark. I fell so very sorry for Miss Potts. How can she be so fond of a man like you who turns careers and flaunts around with other women. Does your little bird know you are a heartless bastard?"

"You don't scare me, Zemo."

"Not yet, I don't."

Zemo grabs the glass from Stark's hand, throws it at the wall behind him, and then marches away.

He has to see you.

By the time he reaches your town, it's about one on the morning. Though there is the chance you're sleeping, he is here and he will takes his chances.

He knocks on your door.

There are no sounds, no sign of movement, but there is a light which he can see under your door.

You're home.

"Y/N." His accent is heavier than usual, wavered by emotion. He leans up against the door, ear pressed against it.

You're there.

He knows you're there, listening.

"I'm sorry," he says, "I'm sorry I didn't tell you about me. Pietro Maximoff died in a terrible accident. His car malfunctioned. It was an accident that turned into a case because someone decided to ruin my career."

He waited, wanted to see if you would say anything.

You didn't.

"I have raced before. I won on my first race. I won again, the second. A racing star, they called me. That was the first time Tony Stark had lost. Suddenly, he had competition. Real competition. Before, he would leave everyone in the dust, winning over and over again. Then I showed up. After my second win, he had my car checked. He was furious because it was legal. He assumed I had altered it against the rules because there was no way his cars would lose. Then that happened."

He hears you move. You're right behind the door.

"Pietro Maximoff was a crazy good driver. Apparently he was awed by me. I told him if he crossed the line that day, I would tutor him. We made a deal. However, his car malfunctioned after the third turn. He drove head first into the barrier, full speed. His car caught fire. He was alone. It took too long for the team to reach him. He died on impact, they say. He was dead whether they got to him or not."

He sighs, hand resting up against the door.

"I did not tamper with his car. I did not kill that boy. Tony Stark made them believe I did with no evidence to prove it. I was found not guilty of attempted murder, but I was disqualified from racing up until I finally made an appeal. This season is my first racing season in 6 years."

He waits.

He hears shuffling, but nothing else.

"You have to believe me. If I lose you too... i have nothing left."

Nothing.

You don't say anything. The door does not open. He steps back in defeat. He doesn't know what else he can do, what else he can say.

Except, "If you still hold feelings for me, then please be at the next race. If you come, I'll know you'll forgive me. I know you'll still love me. If you don't, then I will never bother you again. I'll know that I have ruined everything and I will live with that regret until the day I die."

He takes a deep breath and steps away further.

"I love you. I want you to know that. I love you."

You cry silently as you listen to him walk away. It's not until you're sure he has gone when you let your cries out.

On your coffee table sat your laptop. As soon as you got home, you had been researching what had happened that day.

There was no evidence.

Just articles and speculation.

The fact that you even believed for a moment he had killed a young man like that made you sick. How horrible of a person could you be?

Helmut deserved someone better than that.

He has spent so many years living with a tragic accident over him, and you hadn't even talked to him about it.

You felt awful.

You spent most of the night heartbroken. Sleep eventually paid you a visit, but it was hardly restful. You just woke up in pain.

Race day was coming fast.

What were you going to do?

@ajeff855 @moonstuffsteve @sky-writes-stuff @lieutenantn @lostghostgirl94 @friday18eo @yaskna @my-blood-is-maple-syrup @gingerwriter97 @lunamooney2406 @wilder-fangirl @nectav @whovianayesha @thesuitkovian @cathrin2405 @deathtothepatriarchy @belle82devart @dxrksxul06 @killeromanoff @alex-the-nb @latenightartist-author @hb8301 @goddessofmischief03 @xxidontwikeitxx @themeanestlittlewitch @scuttle-buttle @fillechatoyante @lucky-luck-lucky @zemosimp420 @avengersofmischief @breadsquash

[madmansan]

28 days

Fantasy au - Demon!San x F!Reader

Trigger Warnings

Blades, scars, gore, violence, blood, swearing, death, murder, kidnapping, slight mentions of suicide.

Day 2

.

Your eyes slowly opened as the blazing sun rises above the walls of the Labyrinth. You shuffled slightly, trying to stretch out your limbs, when you heard voices behind you, and instantly retracted them, hoping it just seemed like you were moving in your sleep.

"The child you took yesterday. The one from Aldbarrow. That's her sister." That was San's voice, but the other was completely unfamiliar.

"You're going against your duty, San." The other voice belonged to someone more soft-spoken. It was cold, sinister and, despite the aggravation in their words, very calm.

"I'm aware of that, your majesty." San responded. Your majesty? You stayed completely still. You thanked the Gods that they hadn't realised you were awake. "She was so confident I almost felt bad for her, so I gave her a chance, but she most likely won't make it."

"I think it's a dumb idea." Another voice piped up. This one was slightly higher, and a lot closer to you. "You could have just stuck to your job, but you can't even do that, can you?" He let out a gentle laugh, his voice a lot closer than before. Slowly, you opened one of your eyes to see him leaning against the tree in front of you. He was just as beautiful as San, with a jawline so sharp you were sure it could do some lethal damage. "Although," he laughed to himself, "it's not like we haven't seen you do it before."

"Shut it, Wooyoung! Not everyone's job is as simple as kissing the ass of the king." San said, the more vicious tone he took completely paralleled his usual teasing one. The demon against the tree, the one you assumed was Wooyoung, laughed loudly at San, and flicked his longer black hair out of his face.

"That's enough." The Demon King took control of the two bickering boys, masterfully, yet his calm tone never strayed. "San. If she's yours and you want to play this little game with her then go ahead. But don't you dare let her step foot near the castle. Do everything you can to prevent it."

"I will, your majesty." San said, his voice a lot lower than before.

They weren't going to kill you. Not now anyway. You could only assume it was because of the demon's etiquette San had told you about. However, if he was going to start trying even harder to stop you from getting to the castle, you were going to have to be more resilient.

Footsteps moved towards you, and you watched as Wooyoung turned to join the Demon King. The two of them walked ahead of you, towards the wall and you could only catch a glimpse of the King's huge hooded robe before he disappeared in a cloud of dark smoke, followed swiftly by Wooyoung. It gently floated to the ground before fading away, leaving you and San alone in the clearing once more.

                                      ❁

You lay "asleep" for a little while longer, making your act more believable.

After slowly opening your eyes, you stretched your limbs and sighed satisfactorily. San sat against the tree trunk by your legs, staring blankly at the wall. You wanted to tell him you heard everything, but you didn't know what he would do if you did. You decided not to risk it.

You sat up and shuffled next to him. "Encounter many demons last night?" You asked, leaning forward to face him. Of course you knew he had met the king and the other one, but he surely had to have seen more whilst you were asleep. You didn't ask this just out of curiosity, you may just find out what you're up against in here.

He didn't take his eyes off the wall, but he did respond. "No. There was a mob of humans at the entrance, so they were all gathered there. Being the main guard, I did have to leave you for a moment to go and see what was going on. I saw a huge crowd with torches, guns and daggers. One called out for you and Roslyn." Your eyes widened. It was stupid of you to think they wouldn't come for you.

You moved yourself across the floor so that you were now facing him. His gaze only drifted to you for a moment before returning to the wall. "She said she was your mother." He let out a muffled giggle that eventually turned into hysterical laughter. "And here I was thinking no one cared about you! Your whole village came out to find you!" His laughter continued when he noticed how quiet you had become.

The whole village had come out to look for you. The. Whole. Village.

The whole village that said you were the reason for Roslyn's disappearance. The friend that stopped you from saving her. The mother that blamed you, hated you, and didn't want to believe you even existed. They all came for you.

You couldn't help but wonder if Hongjoong had joined them.

"She was looking for Roslyn not me." You said, bluntly. You knew she wasn't looking for you. She may have tried to stop you from entering the Labyrinth before, but after her outburst you could hardly say she still cared about you.

His laughter began to fade being replaced with confusion. "You seem so sure of that? Do you not like her or something?"

You didn't know how to answer. You hated her for blaming you, for ripping up your work and ignoring your grief. But you didn't hate her, you couldn't hate her. She was still your mother.

"It's complicated." You mumbled, looking away from him.

"How so?" San's tone was less condescending. He sounded genuinely interested.

"She blamed me for Roslyn's disappearance. She blamed me for it when it wasn't my fault at all. I was just as heartbroken as her but she didn't care."

"Aha!" San cheered, a smirk crawling onto his face. "So that's why you're here! You're trying to prove her wrong! Die a hero and she'll respect you again." He sighed with a triumphant smile, "I knew no one in their right mind would enter here just to save someone they thought was dead."

"That's not true!" You said in protest. "I was going to enter the Labyrinth whether Roslyn had gone in or not! I always wanted to see what it was like. I'm writing a book, remember?" Fury bubbled inside you at his cockiness. "And, by the way, if I was so keen to die, do you think I would have made this deal?! Do you think I would have come this far?!" San nodded his head in thought, contemplating your argument. You took a deep breath in an attempt to calm your rage, "I know no one in their right mind would do this. But I'm not in my right mind, I never have been. I was desperate to enter the Labyrinth, my mother called me crazy. I wanted to save Roslyn and my best friend told me to give up; to stop being an idiot." You sighed, "I'm here because I felt guilty and I was confident enough in myself to save Roslyn. I'm not giving up. Not now. Not ever. It's all for her sake."

Your shoulders slumped, your eyes suddenly finding the floor the most interesting thing to stare at as they filled with tears. A gentle hand was placed on top of yours and you looked up to be met with the softened gaze of San.

"Wow.", he said, "You really are bat-shit crazy." He smiled at you, but it wasn't teasing or evil, it was tender and comforting.

He stood up abruptly and pulled you up at the same time with complete ease. "Alright then, my lovely heroine, you lead the way."

His grin had returned to his usual flirty one, but the memory of that moment you shared didn't fade. His gentle hand on yours, the sympathy in his dark eyes and the welcoming smile all remained inside your head as a symbol of hope in the death trap that you had found yourself in.

                                       ❁

You prepared yourself for the next leg of your journey, the image of San smiling genuinely through your tear-blurred vision not leaving your head for a second.

He stood at the entrance to the clearing, as you searched through your bag, making sure he hadn't stolen anything from you. Especially your dagger.

Several impatient huffs left him. "Oh look! Is that the blood moon rising!"

You rolled your eyes at his petty sarcasm. "You can't be too sure." You smiled to yourself, "Especially when it comes to you." You lifted your gaze to see his sharp glare before returning it to your bag, a proud smirk on your face.

That's when you spotted the food you gathered before leaving for the Labyrinth. "Huh?" Eating hadn't crossed your mind since you entered, you hadn't even felt hungry. "San." he looked over at you, "Why don't I feel hungry?"

He closed his eyes with a sigh, resting his head against the wall, "Haven't I told you enough about demons? Are you not satisfied?"

You shook your head with a wide smile, "A few random facts aren't going to make a very informative book."

He sighed again, "Without your knowledge, and without even sensing it, you are already under my control." You raised a brow and cocked your head, prompting him to explain further. "No matter how much you say you're not interested in me or how much you think you're in control, you're lying. It's human nature to be completely and utterly submissive to us, to the point where we are the only thing that can nourish you." Your cheeks started to heat up with embarrassment, which, much to your disdain, made San grin from ear-to-ear. "I take away your hunger, I take away your thirst, I stop you from getting ill. I stop you from dying from anything that isn't me. Remarkable, don't you think?" It was his turn to cock his head, waiting for your answer.

"Remarkable indeed, if not slightly disturbing." You said, suddenly very uncomfortable with not being able to feel normal human feelings.

San gently laughed, "I think it's rather romantic."

You looked at him like he was crazy, but he only smirked, his eyes half-open and still managing to stare right into your soul.

You sighed heavily, turning around to find the tree gone and in its place two doors. You walked up to them to inspect their intricate details. One was a deep red, with spirals that curved around the golden door handle and around the edges. The other was made out of a rotting wood, the mossy green paint hardly there as most of it had chipped off.

You tried the handle of the red door but it wouldn't open. You tried again with the green door but it had the same result. "What?! They must be here for a reason? Why can't I open them?" You tried to use the handles of both doors again but neither of them opened.

"Aaah! Those doors? You have to knock to open them." San said over your shoulder. You whipped you head around at him with a questioning glance before returning your focus to the doors. You knocked gently on the red one but it didn't open. You turned back to San as you gestured to the door with a face that said 'See? Didn't work.' "Well, you have to knock harder than that! You think demons are that polite? No. We command doors open with our knocks."

You huffed, turning back to the doors once more. You made a tight fist and slammed it down on the door three times, before it flung up, a freezing cold wind rushing from behind you and down the long, dark corridor in front of you. You placed your hands up to the door frame to stop yourself from being pulled into its depths.

The wind faded as it wailed further down the hall, leaving you breathless and shivering. You swallowed hard and turned to the other door, knocking harshly and then leaping to the side to avoid another onslaught of wind. However, you were surprisingly met by welcoming birdsong.

You looked up to San who looked at you slightly bored and you cleared your throat, moving back in front of the doors.

On the other side of the red door was a dark, thin hallway, with a leaking roof. The small broken windows on the one side reflected a white light onto the wooden floorboards below. The cold chill returned as you stared into its unending passageway.

You slowly pulled your eyes away and looked into the other door. It opened to a beautiful forest, the trees taller than the Labyrinth walls, a stream gently running through them, the calming birdsong. It all felt too inviting. Far too inviting.

You looked back to San, "It's a trick, isn't it?" You asked.

He shrugged, "All I know is that if you enter through one of the door ways, you won't be able to come out again."

You looked back to the doors, eyeing each one cautiously. "But, I'm guessing both lead to the castle, right?"

San was silent for a moment before he piped up. "Depends on how you look at it. For example, one way could lead you straight to the castle and the other could throw you off track for a bit but then it's up to you to get to the castle. But if what you're trying to say is that they both lead somewhere in the Labyrinth then, yes, they're both still within the Labyrinth walls, and will most likely, I suppose, lead you to the castle."

You sighed, "You made that far more complicated then it needed to be." You didn't have to look at him to know he wore a prideful smirk. "Okay, so it's a battle of wits. That's fine. I can do that."

San scoffed, but you paid him no mind. "Okay. The spooky corridor seems to be the one that people would most likely avoid, but then that would surely seem too obvious, so that means that the spooky corridor would be the right choice, but then again that could be a double bluff....ugh!!! This is so irritating!" You groaned, giving up quicker than you had hoped.

San started laughing at you as you slumped to the floor. "Y/n, you're overthinking it."

You stood up again and looked at both doors, "Can you give me a hint?"

San rubbed his chin, humming in thought. He walked up to you and placed an arm over your shoulder, "What will I get from helping you?"

Now, it was your turn to think. "Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Nothing."

San laughed, taking his arm off your shoulder and walking up to the doors. He leaned against the wall inbetween, "Take a look at them, and decide which one you think is safer. As simple as that."

"As simple as that?"

"As simple as that."

You thought for a moment. If he was trying to stop you from getting to the castle before, he would be trying a lot harder now. After his run in with the king he is going to try and throw you off track at every chance he can get. You were sure of it.

Nevertheless, he did say that both ways would inevitably lead to the castle, one taking a lot longer than the other, but that wasn't really that big of a concern. You were only on day two after all.

"Very well." You strode up to the green door, looking into the gentle forest environment that lay beyond it. "I'm going in here."

Before you could step inside, San grabbed your wrist. "Are you sure you want to choose this one?" He leaned in closer to your ear and whispered, "You might just regret it."

You shoved him away with your free arm, "I'm going. This is the door I have chosen. Feel free to follow me. I won't be bothered if you don't."

He let out a small frustrated huff, as he followed in behind you.

You admired your surroundings, it was just as beautiful as it seemed from the other side of the door. Your happiness soon faded when you turned around to see that the door had disappeared. Leaving San laughing to himself so hard it echoed through the surrounding trees and off into the wilderness that lay ahead.

"I can't believe you actually chose this door!" His statement was followed by more laughing, "The other way would have taken you straight to the castle in under two hours! Now look who's the idiot!"

Were you annoyed? Yes. Extremely so. Were you going to let him know that? Not a chance.

You smiled, "Oh well, we'll have to go this way then. Come on." You started to walk away, humming to yourself, but it was soon interrupted.

"What?!" San roared from behind you. You let out a small laugh to yourself. "Are you seriously not annoyed?!" He yelled at your back.

"Should I be?" You shouted back over your shoulder.

"Of course you should be!" He stomped up next you and stared you right in the eyes. "I tricked you! Outsmarted you! Why are you not angry?"

"You didn't trick me. I made the decision. That was my bad. I'm not gonna be angry at you. Besides, I'll still get to the castle. Might take me a bit longer, but it's best not to dwell on it." His jaw dropped in utter disbelief, and, with a slight surge of confidence, you placed your finger under his chin and closed his mouth for him.

You walked away giggling to yourself, as he swiftly followed behind you, mumbling curses and mimicking your previous comments.

                                       ❁

You had been walking in the forest for a couple hours, whenever you tried to ask San something he just ignored you. Which wasn't necessarily a bad thing. If anything it was quite relaxing.

The stream rushed passed as a gentle breeze rustled the branches above. Little balls of light with lacy wings darted passed you, and inbetween the trees. You longed to know what they were, but you knew San wouldn't tell you in his tantrum state.

You looked over your shoulder at him, and he quickly looked away from you, rather flustered. You smirked and looked back in front of you, catching the shimmering stream in the corner of your eye. You knew it would be best if you didn't irritate him further, but there was something so entertaining about it.

You placed your bag down on the ground by the stream and sat against a tree close by. You reached into your bag and grabbed some of the food, unwrapping the cloth and taking a bite. You weren't hungry, you actually felt very full, but you still forced yourself to eat it. You were rejecting San's power over you.

"What the hell are you doing?" San finally said, glaring down at you with deadly eyes. You only saw it through the corner of yours, refusing to give the attention he seeks.

"Finally talking, are we?" You replied calmly.

San sat down in front of you and you further craned your neck to watch the stream instead of him. "I'm eating whilst admiring the stream. Is that such a problem?"

"No. But why are you eating?" He muttered, trying to cover the rage that was building up inside.

"A girl has to eat, has she not?"

Suddenly your eyes were pulled away from the stream by San's forceful grip on your jaw.

"Spit it out." He said, punctuating every word. His eyes were darker than you had ever seen them, "Spit it out!" He yelled, but you unconsciously swallowed it, no one had ever yelled at you like that and your heart beat started to race.

He threw you to the floor, leaving you a shaking, spluttering mess. He breathed deeply, "How dare you mock my power?" He crouched down by your head, before grabbing a fistful of hair and pulling your face up to meet his. "Why won't you just submit to me?!" He moved closer, "Huh?!"

You had to get to the castle, that's why you couldn't submit. Wait, why am I going to the castle again? Your eyes widened, and you only managed to slip out a small 'Roslyn' before he dropped you to the floor again. You clutched at the grass underneath your palms at the thought of her. She was slaving away to a powerful demon, whilst you were just messing with one. You hated to admit it but you were having fun and getting him angry was making you feel certain feelings for him that you had only felt briefly with Hongjoong, except this time it was in overdrive. You had submitted to San but not in the way he expected. It had happened again. You had forgotten about Roslyn, but you weren't even in a trance this time.

No more games. Roslyn was all that mattered, and you had forgotten about her all because you wanted to tease a demon. You should have been at the castle straight away. You shouldn't have played San's pathetic games. You shouldn't have forgotten that all he sees you as is food, and not a potential love interest. You were appalled, but only with yourself. Fighting against his demon nature and his starvation must be so hard. Where has your compassion gone, you fool.

"I'm sorry, San." You whimpered from the floor, as tears started to roll down your cheeks. "I'm really sorry. I forgot all about Roslyn. I just wanted to mess with you since it was so fun seeing you get worked up. Yet, you still held back from eating me even when you could have." You clutched your hair desperately trying to cope with your realisation. "I never even thanked you for making this deal! I'm just as weak as all the other humans. I'm sorry for thinking I was better than you. I'm really not. Not at all."

"No. You're not." San replied calmly. You unclenched your hands and steadied your sobbing slightly, looking up at him the same time he looked down at you. He sat on the grass next to you and motioned for you to get up with his head. Your arms pushed you enough to sit up without the support of the them, but your shame made it hard to look at him. "However, you're not like other humans. Not at all." Your eyes widened and you cautiously raised them to his. "The amount of people that come to the gates from other villages and instantly submit to me is practically uncountable. They don't try to strike up a deal or fight back. Sure, it's nice, but it does get boring. Y/n," he placed a hand on your jaw and gently caressed the new bruises with his thumb, "I haven't met anyone who has made me feel so angry and threatened before. You were so determined, and no matter how much it pissed me off that you stabbed me, I couldn't deny that I was impressed." He took his hand from your face. "That's why I made this deal. I gave you this chance and best be sure that I'm gonna keep my end of it, having been starved and all. So, don't you dare give up now."

"Thank you, San. And, once again, I'm sorry." He nodded his head, but he wasn't being rude. It was more of a "no problem" nod than an "as you should" nod.

You sat in a heavy silence for a moment, the air so tense, it was almost suffocating. You felt the need to break it, but San's hand flying up into the air stopped you. He caught one of the little flying orbs by the wings.

"Heal her." He commanded, letting go of the wings and letting it flutter around your head. The pain in your jaw eased as you watched it zoom off into the woods once more. "Don't think I did that because I like you. I just knew you wouldn't stop complaining about it if I didn't heal it."

"What was that?" You ignored him, eyes trained on the pathway it left on, and mouth wide open.

San followed where you looked before returning his gaze to you. "One of the many types of forest sprites. Those ones heal." He laughed gently, "Let me guess? Remarkable?"

"Quite so." You said, in awe of the lack of pain you felt.

In the reflection of the stream, you saw a red blob surfacing. You looked up to see that the moon was entering the sky.

You stood up immediately, "What?! How can that be possible?!"

San joined you, squinting at the new blood moon growing larger over the tree line. "Huh. Looks like it's becoming night."

How could the day have gone by so fast? You looked at him completely perplexed but your face soon dropped when you saw how scared San looked like he had just seen some sort of untold horror. You grabbed his shoulders and made him face you. "San. Why is it night?"

He looked up at you, "I-I think we should find you somewhere to stay." He started heading off and you quickly caught up.

"San, you can't just say that. You have to tell me why the day has just vanished." You yelled, but it didn't seize his walking. "San!"

"The Demon King knows you're here. Of course he does. But he doesn't want that. So he's pushing forward the days so that you have less time to get to the castle. Or ... at least that's what I think."

You sighed, still pushing your legs to their limit to catch up with his pace. "Surely that would be a good thing for you?-"

"No." He sharply cut you off, stopping in his tracks. "If the King knows where you are then all the other demons are going to know where you are, and that means that we're gonna have quite a few guests tonight and I'm not dealing with that. So you better start moving your ass or I'm gonna start dragging you."

You quickened your pace rushing after him.

                                       ❁

It wasn't long before you stumbled upon a small wooden cabin in the middle of some larger trees. The sun was setting fast and you instinctively ran up the creaky staircase to get to the door.

San almost materialized in front of you. "No. Not this one." He whispered.

You stared at him in utter bewilderment, "You have to be the most confusing person I have ever met!" He shushed you with a finger on your lips.

"Quiet. She'll hear you." He said quietly, but this time with more emphasis.

You slapped his hand away, "So first you wanted me to find a place to stay. No. To hide. And now you're telling me I can't when there is a perfectly good place right here."

"No, y/n, you can't go in there! I won't be able to protect you!"

"That's enough. This my best shot at surviving right now. So, I'm entering!" You gestured to the right with your head, "Move." He did.

You knocked on the door, the shrill of the night time bugs echoing through the trees. It was darker than the first night, only a few beams of deep red penetrating the canopy.

You looked out in to the black wilderness. Demons could be watching you right now and you would have no idea.

The door opened gently. On the other side stood a small old woman, her long messy hair was tied in a loose ponytail that draped down her back, which was clad in a tattered knitted cloak.

"Good evening, ma'am. I'm ever so sorry to intrude, but me and my fri-" you looked over to see that San had gone and you quickly looked back to the old woman, "uh ... I need somewhere to stay for the night." She eyed you with caution and you knew you would have to find a way to convince her. "I have demons after me and need to escape."

She opened the door a bit more and stood slightly taller, "And how do you know that I am not a demon?"

"Hope, ma'am." you said, "Only hope."

"Very well," she said, "And how am I to trust you?"

"You are just going to have to, ma'am. I have no way to prove myself, so if you don't trust me I won't force you."

She smiled, and opened the door fully allowing you to enter.

Inside the room was a bed with ragged sheets, a wooden table with a single chair, and a large expanse of cupboards hanging open on broken hinges.

Inside them were varying bottles full of different coloured liquids and other types of herbs and spices. There was no sign of real food, which meant that she was still affected by the demons within the forest. That, or she fed off humans. No. She wouldn't have questioned me intensely if she was. She's obviously scared. Best make a good impression.

"So, how long have you been in the Labyrinth." You asked her as she fumbled with some of the things in her cupboards.

"About seventy years." She said, quickly turning around to face you. "What about you?"

"Two days. How on Earth did you survive all that time here?" She looked worried, and she went back to fixing the jars and bottles. "Why did the demons not kill you?"

She was silent, you thought you had pried too far, when she slowly looked over her left shoulder. The shoulder that held a bite mark that you hadn't noticed before.

"There are many weird wonders in this world, and I have been subject to many. But the worst has been that boy."

Your interest was definitely peaked, but you tried hard to suppress it, and covered it with a more sympathetic look.

She continued, "I entered the Labyrinth in hopes of dying. I had no friends, and my family hated me. There was more to it than just that, but I'll keep it short. I wanted nothing more than to get rid of that suffering. But that boy ... he knew. He knew I wanted to die and so he ... "

You placed a hand on top of hers, "Take your time. You don't have to tell me if you don't wan-"

"No!" She yelled, slapping your hand off of hers. "That boy took a bite out of my soul that I will never retrieve. He took my humanity and my small chance of happiness. This-" she pointed to the bite mark, "This converted me into one of them. However, I did not obtain their abilities, only their thirst. He banished me to the woods, knowing that no human would ever get this far, for me to quench that thirst, or-" she pulled the dagger from your bag, "to end my suffering."

She placed the handle of the dagger in your hand and the blade to her neck. You looked at her horrified. You couldn't kill someone, not even if they were begging for it.

"No way! I can't just kill you!" You yelled, trying to pull the blade away.

She held your arm firmly, causing you to stumble back into the cupboards and a jar to fall down and smash on top of your hand that lay on the desk below. You pulled your hand away and fell to the floor. There were shards of glass sticking out at jagged angles from your skin, your blood covering the rest of it.

You looked up at the old woman to see her staring at your hand, her eyes turning from her warm hazel to a bright red.

She pounced on to you, pinning you to the floor. Panic rushed through you body as she tried to reach for your bleeding hand, her jaw dislocating so she could gape her mouth even wider.

You stared into her eyes and saw her plee, her desire to die, and the pain she was going through by not having control over her actions. It was unbearable.

You grabbed the dagger and stabbed it right into her neck, watching as she fell backward choking and spluttering on the blood that gargled in her throat. Tears fell from her eyes as a peacful smile graced her face. She dropped to the floor, completely lifeless, but the joy she felt was still present in her eyes.

"What have I done?" You whispered, completely horrified. "Please, forgive me."

A slow clap sounded from behind you, and you swiftly turned to see the demon from the clearing. Wooyoung.

"What a spectacle! I think I might just shed a tear." His laugh echoed around the small cabin and you stiffened with fear.

Your breaths quickened as he took slow steps towards you, crouching down and taking a good look at your face.

"You're such a pretty thing, I'm so annoyed San got to you first."

San. Where was he?

You swallowed, "Where is he?" You asked, pulling your face away from Wooyoung's as he inched closer.

"He ran away as soon as you entered the cabin. Couldn't bare to face her again." Your heart started racing. Was San the boy that made her suffer like this? "Or should I say isn't allowed to."

You took a heavy breath, the whole situation hurtling you into an almost unbearable state of fear.

"You know, if I knew any better, I'd say you actually like him." He teased, his body never stopping from following you along the floor, trying to get as close as possible, only to have you shuffle away.

"Well, do you?" You asked, feeling quite perturbed by his baseless assumption.

"Do I what, baby?"

"Know better?" He laughed at that, moving in closer and smirking when you tried to move back and were met with the wall.

"I sometimes wonder what it would be like to have a human attracted to me by my demon charm. However, since I hardly ever get to see any, save the children the Demon King enslaves, I've never got to experience it."

He moved in closer to your face, his lips grazing yours. You looked away, "Why don't you see them often? Don't you work at the gates?" You knew he didn't from the conversation he had with San in the clearing, but he couldn't know that.

"I did, but the King was so impressed by the state I put that old hag in that he invited me to join his royal guard." He said, grabbing your chin, making him face you again. You were oddly relieved that San wasn't the one that ruined the lady's life. "Come on, baby. San is a weak guy. I'm so much better than him."

His lips came in contact with yours for only a second before a familar voice, and one you have been waiting for, piped up from the doorway.

"Wooyoung." His head whipped around and you could only move your eyes to see San as your jaw was still in his grip. "I don't remember giving you permission to have a taste of my girl." Wooyoung laughed, standing up and walking over to him.

San stood only slightly taller than Wooyoung, his demeanour powerful and raging. "I'm glad you could join us, Sannie!" He grabbed his cheek and San quickly slapped it away.

"I'm sure you wouldn't like the King to find out that you forgot about our little demon rule?" San said, his eyes narrowing with a sharpness you hadn't seen before.

"The etiquette? It's more of a guideline, don't you think?"

"No, I don't. I don't think the King does either." San's voice lowered, "I also don't think he'd like the fact that you said that."

Wooyoung laughed again but it soon faded when he noticed that San's seriousness was unchanging. "He wouldn't believe you, San." He teased him, but he remained unphased.

"Of course. Why would the King believe the all seeing guardian of the gates, hmm?" Wooyoung's confidence started to falter and San's teasing smirk disappeared, "Get out."

He didn't need to be told twice, as he barged past San's broad shoulder to leave the cabin.

You sat in silence, watching as San crouched down to the old lady's body. He placed a hand on her shoulder and smiled, "May you rest in peace, you will suffer no more."

You moved your body up next to his, "Wooyoung said you knew her." San didn't take his eyes off of the body.

"I lost my job in the royal guard because of her. I said that Wooyoung should have just eaten her, and let her die. I suppose I thought it was too cruel. But my opinion went against the King's and I was forced into Wooyoung's previous job. I'm sorry I left you, there was a charm placed on this cabin that made sure I couldn't enter. They knew I would go and kill her. Didn't mean that I couldn't see her, of course. All the pain, the teasing of other demons. I even tried to bring her parts of my kills to try and nourish her, but they always faded to nothing outside. But, hey I tried, right?" He let out a sad laugh, before looking at you. "You probably think I'm soft now, and you would be right." He looked at the ground shamefully.

"Don't say it like it's a bad thing. I think that's a beautiful trait. I love people like that."

You took his hand and placed it in yours. You didn't know what you were doing, but comforting him just felt right in that moment. "You did the right thing, San."

"So did you. Thank you, y/n."

He looked down and noticed the blood still dripping from your hands. "I'll heal that. Then, I'll clean this up and you should rest."

Your eyes followed him as he went into the cupboard and grabbed one of the bottles, opening it and pouring it onto your hand. The blood cleared up and the glass came loose falling to the floor. The scars, however, still remained.

San took your hands in his and lifted you from the ground. Your legs felt slightly weak and you took hold of his arms firmly.

He placed you gently down on the bed before heading to the lady on the floor. He picked her up and left the room, only to return later without her. He looked different though, his skin wasn't as pale, his eyes less dark. He looked almost human.

When he went to go and clean the blood and glass off the floor, he had returned back to his normal look.

Whether it was just your mind tricking you or not. San definitely wasn't as evil as you thought. His personality shifts so drastically, yet his softer side seems more genuine. You couldn't wrap your head around it.

"Let's not make it a habit to stare at me before you go to sleep. It makes me feel too exposed." He said, stoically, turning back to his work.

You managed a small apology, relaxing back into the bed more.

You let your eyelids fall closed, but sleep didn't seem to take you as quickly this time. There was far too much to recover from. Physically and mentally. You don't understand anything well enough to overcome it. However, there is one thing you know for certain.

This Labyrinth is going to make you lose your mind.

.

To be continued

.

Author's note: HOLY LORD! This chapter is very long, so thanks for sticking with it to get here! Thank you very much for reading! ❤❤

[happyandticklish]

Unusual Interrogations

Notes: For the ask by @ticklish-sidekick who requested villain/hero tickles with Percy Jackson. It gets a little angsty at the end, fair warning. I hope it lives up to expectations! :)

Summary: Luke kidnaps Percy for information and uses unorthodox methods to acquire it. 

When Percy first opened his eyes, he found blank walls staring back at him, grays and white blending in and out of each other. Some of the walls were peeling, and as he glanced down he could see the remains of debris covering the ground, indicating some kind of ongoing construction.

It took him a second to realize he was in a warehouse. It took him an even longer second to realize he was still in boxers, his preferred apparel each night. He shivered, wishing he could somehow cover himself. Unfortunately, it seemed as though his arms and legs were tied securely to either side of one of the many supporting beams in the building, stretching his exposed body out.

He tried to think back on his most recent memories. The last thing he remembered was going to bed the previous night, safe and secure at Camp Half-Blood. How he got here was a mystery.

He struggled for a moment, attempting to somehow wriggle his way out of the bonds, but whoever had tied him here certainly knew their way around a knot. He exhaled in frustration. He didn’t have Riptide either, as the pen/sword was stored securely in the front pockets of his jeans, thrown haphazardly on his cabin floor. Not that a sword would have been much use anyways, with his hands out of commission as they were.

“Hello?” he called out warily. “Who’s there? Is this some kind of prank? Ha, ha, very funny. Tie the great Percy Jackson up, see what happens. Well, you’ve had your fun now, I think it’s time you let me go.”

“This is no prank.”

Percy startled as a figure emerged from behind him, stalking around the pole slowly to face him. A scar ran jagged down his features, and a shock of blonde hair crested his forehead. Percy frowned. “Wait. Luke?”

A smirk tugged up the corners of his lips, and Luke spread his arms wide in welcome. “Bingo.” He glanced down in amusement. “Nice underwear by the way. Is that… Nemo print?”

Percy flushed, bristling at the comment. He had almost forgotten about those. He wished now that he had chosen to wear something more dignified, but admittedly nobody really prepares for a kidnapping. “It’s for all ages. Look, forget about that, what’s going on? Where are we?”

“Do you like it?” Luke asked, surveying their surroundings. “Very roomy, spacious. This building has been ongoing construction for years now. I believe it’s supposed to be a law firm, but the plans for it fell apart and now I have the place all to myself. It took a while to find somewhere we wouldn’t be interrupted, but I pulled through—as always.”

Wouldn’t be interrupted. The words sent a chill down Percy’s spine. Despite his apprehensions, he didn’t want it to seem like Luke was getting to him, so he tilted his chin up and spat, “What are you gonna do to me, then? Torture me? Kill me?”

Luke shrugged, calmly approaching him until they were inches apart. “No, no, no. I can’t kill you, remember? You have that pesky curse that prevents me from doing so. What I want is information. I know you and your little camp is planning and attack, and I want to know what it is.”

“I’m not gonna tell you that!” Percy exclaimed indignantly. “You’re crazy!”

“Obviously you’re not,” Luke agreed dryly. “I figured you weren’t going to just hand over top secret plans willingly. But—” Luke placed hands on either side of him—“I have ways of making people talk.”

“So you… are gonna torture me?” Percy confirmed hesitantly.

“In a way,” Luke agreed. “See, I figured normal torture wouldn’t be enough. Anyone can hold out against pain—it just takes endurance. No, what I’m going to do to you is much worse. The kind of torture that needles away at your sanity slowly, an itch you just can’t scratch no matter how much you want to. The kind of torture that has left grown men begging for mercy within seconds. Do you know what it is?”

Percy slowly shook his head, feeling almost hypnotized by Luke’s words.

Luke curled his fingers in slightly on either side of Percy, smirking at his sharp inhale. “Tell me Jackson... are you ticklish?”

Instantly, nerves flooded Percy’s stomach at those three words, words that had foretold his doom many times in the past though usually he was at free to at least defend himself. He scoffed, though the sound came out more nervous and giggly than he had intended. “Really? Tickling? This is your hardened torture method?”

“You never answered the question,” Luke reminded him, his fingers ever so slowly wiggling against his sides, though it had the effect of making Percy want to crawl out of his own skin. “Are. You. Ticklish?”

Percy tried to answer but the second he opened his mouth a volley of laughter attempted to escape and he slammed it close again. His lips tugged up into an unwilling smile, and he squirmed underneath Luke’s touch.

“No answer?” Luke asked, raising an eyebrow. “I guess I’ll have to assume that’s a yes.”

Percy shook his head rapidly, his smile growing wider with the other’s words.

“You’re not?” Luke preformed a rapid squeeze attack on his sides and Percy shrieked, breaking into a fit of hysterical giggles. “What was that then?”

“I-I’m nahahahat!” Percy insisted, squeezing his eyes shut and trying to somehow block out the sensations. “Iihihit dohohohoesn’t tihihickle a-ahahat ahahall!”

“You’re not a very convincing liar, Jackson.” Luke gave him a brief break, letting the other breathe for a moment. “You know, I almost feel bad for you. If you’re that ticklish after only a couple seconds of this, I can’t imagine how you’re going to last an hour.”

Percy’s eyes bugged out of his head. There was no possible way he could last another couple minutes like this, let alone an hour. “A-An hour?” he repeated nervously, desperately hoping maybe he had just heard him wrong.

“Or longer,” Luke mused, running a finger slowly up his sides and watching him flinch away. “Maybe days. However long this takes, really. It all depends on how quickly you break.”

He had to be bluffing. There was no way Luke would risk keeping him that long; his friends would eventually come to his rescue and his entire plot would be unveiled. It would be ludicrous to keep him longer than a day. Still, as Luke’s finger made its slow path up his side, just brushing against his armpits before darting down again and sending shudders down his spine, Percy couldn’t help but doubt his own assessment. His friends wouldn’t notice he was missing till morning at least. That gave him hours in which to suffer under the assault of the torturous sensations.

“C-C’mon,” Percy stammered, panic writhing sudden and quick through his stomach. “You don’t need to do this, really—”

“So we know your sides are ticklish,” Luke interrupted, ignoring his protests. He traced his fingertips lightly over the spot as he spoke, sending the other into a round of reluctant giggles. “But I wonder if there’s somewhere else that would get a better reaction out of you? Do you want to volunteer any information? No? I guess I’ll explore on my own.... Maybe this soft little belly of yours is ticklish?”

“Ihihit’s nahahat sohoft—ahAHAhaha, nohoho!” Percy’s laughter jumped an octave and quickly shot through his own denial. Quick, nimble fingers scratched gently against the skin, a delicate tickle that was quickly driving though his inhibitions. He jerked on his arms, but the bonds held as tight as before and no matter how much he squirmed and writhed to get away from the touch, he found himself ultimately helpless to stop it. “Nahahat thehehe stohohomahahach!”

“Hot spot, is it?” Luke taunted. “You know it’s strange—in all the time I knew you I never realized how ticklish you were.”

“B-Behehecause yohohou wehehere ahahalways t-trying toho k-kihihill mehehe!”

“It seems so silly now. All my past trouble could have been solved if I had just tried tickling you instead of trying to kill you.”

“I-Ihihi wohohould hahahave preheherred ihihit!”

“Oh?” Luke’s eyebrows shot up on his forehead and he leaned, a shark’s grin glittering on his teeth. “Is that a confession, Jackson? Do you actually enjoy this torture?”

Percy’s eyes widened as he realized the connotations of his statement and he desperately tried to backtrack. “N-Nohoho, Ihihi juhuhust—ehehe, ahaha, Ihihi juhust—fuhuhu—nohoho—Ihihi dihihidn’t mehehean—pfft, aha, lehehet mehehe ahahanswer!”

“Gladly,” Luke agreed, changing his gentle touch into a series of rapid pokes that made Percy jump.

“T-Thehen stahahap tihihihickling mehehehe, ahaha, nohohohoho!”

“Ah, see, I’m afraid I can’t help you there,” Luke informed him sympathetically. “See, that’s the thing about torture—it doesn’t exactly end when you want it to. But feel free to talk. All you have to do is resist a little bit of tickling. Should be easy for the famed demigod, hmm?”

Percy, quite possibly, was going to kill him. At the very least slap him. Certainly give him a stern talking to or write a note to his mother. All of those options were proving rather difficult at the moment however. “Fuhuhuhuhuck, ahaha, shihihit!”

“Such strong language,” Luke noted. “Feeling anymore like talking?”

Percy squeaked at each poke of his finger, shouting out obscene phrases that in the normal light of day he would never dare utter, but otherwise refused to answer.

“Still holding out?” Luke said, shaking his head in disappointment. “You know, you’re only hurting yourself with this petty resistance. Sooner or later you’re bound to give in; it’s only a matter of time. It does make me wonder though—is your upper body really the best place to tickle you?”

Luke momentarily stopped his attack, circling around the pole to the other side. Percy allowed his eyes to flutter open once more, breathing heavily. His relief was short-lived however, as soon as he realized where Luke was headed. “No,” he ordered, a giggly panic lacing his words. “No, absolutely not, no fair, not the feet, c’mon, please!”

Luke kneeled down by his feet, slowly sliding one and then the other sock off. As the cold air whistling through the ware house hit his skin, a shiver of anticipation coursed its way through Percy’s limbs. Goosebumps scattered down his flesh and he curled his toes preemptively.

“Just to clarify, not your feet?” Luke repeated, grasping one of his feet in a firm grip that left the sole completely exposed.  

“Yes,” Percy agreed, squirming in his hands. “Please, I can’t handle it, you don’t understand—pfah!”

The involuntary noise left him before he could stop it as one nail dragged slowly down the length of his foot. A slow smile made its way over his features and he stiffened, letting out a soft, “No. No, this isn’t f-fahair.”

“It’s perfectly fair,” Luke contradicted, keeping up the light teasing. For the moment, anyways. “I want information and you’re keeping it from me. Sometimes you have to resort to drastic measures to get what you want.”

Percy stammered out a response that was lost as Luke’s pace changed from a single finger into many spidering down his arch and onto the ball of his foot. He squeaked, giggling uncontrollably as his foot shook in the other’s grasp. “Nohoho, stahahahap!”

“Are you gonna tell me what I need to know?”

“Thihihis ihihihis sohohoho uhuhunfahahair!” Percy repeated instead through babbling laughter, clenching and unclenching his toes as he fought to somehow control his reactions. “Thihihis ihihihis—thihihis ihihis—gahahaha!”

“I’m hardly even touching you,” Luke informed him, amusement dancing through his words. “Is this a bad spot?”

Shakily, Percy managed to flip him the middle finger.

“Ooh, bad move,” Luke said, clucking his tongue in disappointment. “I think you’re forgetting the power dynamic here. Maybe this will help you remember.”

Without preamble, Luke raked his nails quickly up and down his foot, digging into the skin in a way that made Percy near lose his mind. He jerked forward, arching against his bonds though he knew it was useless now. He squeaked and snorted at each and every touch of Luke’s fingers, the ticklish torment racking his body. “Nohohoho, gahaha, ehehe, stahahap! Thihihihis ihihihis sohohoho ehehevil!”

“It is, isn’t it?”

“Y-Yohohohou’re ehehenjoying thihihis tohohoo muhuhuhuch!”

“Maybe,” Luke admitted. “I have to admit it is sort of fun to get back at you, for wrecking my plans so many times now. Do you know how many times I’ve been scolded for your interference? This is kind of therapeutic in a way.”

“Ihihihihi hahahahad tohoho!” Percy protested, struggling to get out coherent sentences as the intense tickling on his feet drove him slowly insane. “Y-Yohohou wehehere, ahaha, shihihit—ehehe, uhuhum—nohohoho—yohohou hahahahad tohoho behehe stohohohopped!”

Luke’s smile dropped a little, a dark shadow crossing over his eyes. “I did what had to be done. No one asked you to get involved.”

There was something about his tone that made Percy want to inquire further, but he found that speech was quickly becoming impossible. The upper body tickling had been bad but ultimately bearable. This was something else. It was hell. It was torture. It was exhilarating.

He had no idea how to feel about that.

In an attempt to distract the other from the earlier course of their conversation, Luke decided to switch up tactics. He momentarily stopped his attack and Percy sagged against the rope, breathing in much needed breaths. A silly grin was plastered to his features, and even the slight breeze wafting through the building seemed to tickle. There were shuffling sounds from behind him as Luke reached into a bag of supplies Percy hadn’t noticed from his vantage point. Unseen by the other, Luke pulled out a bottle of skincare oil and a simple hairbrush—both seemingly harmless from the outsider’s perspective. Unfortunately for his bound captive, the objects were far more intimidating than they appeared at first glance.

Percy frowned when he first felt the cool oil being applied to his feet, flinching a little when Luke’s finger pressed in to rub it into the skin. “What is that? Is this a massage now? Because I would much prefer that.”

“That would be nice, wouldn’t it? No, this is something much better.” Luke smoothed the oil out, gently sliding it in-between his toes. Percy twitched and giggled throughout the process. “Not many people know about this method, strangely. But trust me, it’s very effective.”

Though Percy couldn’t imagine how simple oil could make things worse than they already were, a crawling anxiety spread throughout him regardless. He tried to plead once more, in the hopes that maybe this time it would be somewhat effective. “Why are you doing this? Aren’t there better ways of getting the information?”

“Maybe,” Luke conceded. “But this method seemed easiest. You’d be surprised by the number of people who will talk under the influence of a mere feather.”

“Even you?” Percy challenged.

A hot pink tinged the ends of Luke’s ears, though the sight was invisible to Percy. “That is for me to know and you to never find out. Besides, I’m not the one tied up am I?”

It was an obvious lie, but Luke was right in that there was little the other could do about it in his situation. “Well what is your ingenious method then?” Percy said instead, a sarcastic lilt to his voice as he attempted to brave through his fear. “Because I hate to break it to you Luke, simply smearing oil over my feet isn’t going to—shihIHIHIHIT!”

The expletive broke from Percy suddenly as hard bristles were dragged back and forth quickly over his soles. It was a new and rough and intensely, unbearably ticklish in a way Percy hadn’t known could exist before. “AhAHAHAHahaha, whaHAHAHAhat thehe HEHEHELL?!”

“Isn’t going to what?” Luke inquired, raising an eyebrow. “Isn’t going to tickle? Is that what you were going to say? Tell me Jackson—does this tickle?”

He dragged the brush over the ball of his foot and Percy went ballistic with laughter, shrieking and twisting like a madman in an effort to somehow, someway, get that damned brush away from his foot.

Thus far, he was entirely unsuccessful.

“OHOHO MIHIHI GOHOHOD!” Percy exclaimed, throwing his head back in ticklish agony. “THAHAHAHAT’S SOHOHOHO BAHAHAHAD! PlehEHHEHEhehease STAHAHahahAHAHAP!”

“Are you gonna give me the information?”

“IHIHI CAHAHAHAHAN’T!”

“Sure you can, it’s very simple,” Luke assured him. “Just tell me your attack strategy and the brush goes right back in my bag where it’ll stay for the rest of your future. But first I need you to talk, okay? Do you think you could do that for me?”

“PLEHEHEHEASE! IHIHIHIT TIHIHIHIHIHICKLES!” Percy choked on uncontrollable giggly shrieks, every swipe of the hairbrush sending him into a whole new level of hell. Every inch of him pleaded with himself to just talk already, to make it stop even for just a moment. The only thing that made him resist was the thought of everyone back at camp currently asleep in their beds. He thought about what would happen if he let Luke win, if he had to face each and every one of their disappointed faces. So he held out. Despite the fact that he had never experienced tickling like this and each second that ticked by felt like an eternity, he held out.

“Percy,” Luke said, a bit of hesitation creeping into his voice. “Are  you going to tell me or not?”

Percy could only laugh in response.

“Because I could keep doing this,” Luke insisted, narrowing his eyes. “Hours of just this, just this hair brush on your feet. Is that what you want?”

Percy threw his head back, eyes shut in helpless mirth.

Luke was getting irritated by this point, the other’s reluctance to speak bothering him for reasons he couldn’t explain to himself. “You would rather endure this—” to emphasize his point he started attacking the other foot with spider tickles and sending Percy into hysterics—“than rat out your friends?”

Percy squealed and writhed, the tickling to such an intense degree at this point that he hardly allowed himself to even focus on the words coming out of Luke’s mouth.

“Fine then!”

With a flourish, the tickling stopped as Luke dropped his hands, sitting back in annoyance. Leftover giggles spilled from Percy’s lips, his feet tingling from phantom sensations. A strange euphoria clouded his brain, similar to that of staying up for days on end or winning a battle. His nerves were exhausted, his mind rattled, and he couldn’t erase the stupid smile from his face no matter how hard he tried.

Luke shoved the bottle and the brush into his bag, which he slung over his shoulder jerkily. He grabbed a knife from his pocket, resolutely and suddenly cutting the ropes holding Percy. The boy dropped to the ground, his legs feeling like jelly and unable to support his sudden weight. Percy threw a confused glance up at the other, managing a frown. “What are you—”

“Don’t tell anyone about this,” Luke snapped, holding the knife out to him threateningly. Percy’s eyes widened at the weapon, though he was too exhausted to try to move out of the way at all. Luke looked like he was going to say something else, but after a moment he just closed his mouth into a firm line and stalked off, the assumption that Percy was not to follow him.

Percy slowly made his way to his feet, his legs shaking underneath him. He made his way through the ware house cautiously, though at this point he was too tired to care much about anything. As he exited the building, sunlight blinded him and he realized it was probably early morning by this point.

For a moment he considered what would happen if he told the others about what had happened to him that night. In the end though, he decided that it would be better, for him at least, if no one ever knew about the events of that night.

With a sigh, he raised his hand to call a taxi and resolutely made his way back to Long Island Sound.

[speechlessxx]

Mailing Back The Memories

(Chris Evans x Reader)

Summary: In which the reader reminisces on what was…  

Warnings: self-serve fic, breakup, emotions, slight nudity (but SFW)

Word Count: 2.6k

I hope you guys enjoy!

Your newly purchased bed – that was a full instead of the queen that you grew accustomed to sleeping in – felt too big. Your apartment felt emptier now that his things had been packed up into boxes (that you put off mailing). You never realized how much of his things essentially became yours when he left them behind. He’d always say “keep ‘em, what’s mine is yours” when you brought them up.

You remembered when you came home to your apartment for the first time without him. His jacket that was hung on a kitchen chair welcomed you. Photographs framed were hung on the wall. Polaroids strung through twine like the Pinterest posts you copied. Your cabinets and fridge stored his favorite foods and snacks – that soon became your favorites when your relationship transformed from a fling to a promising future. Even your queen-sized mattress had a Chris-sized impression.

For the first few months, you wallowed in your sorrows. No one could blame you. The relationship was strong, healthy. Neither you nor Chris brought in any toxic traits that nipped at your bond as time went on. Your bond was strong and it felt unbreakable. Communication was effective. Emotions were pure. The intention was to end up at the altar although the question was never officially asked – but everyone knew that’s where you both wanted to go with each other.

None of your friends or family wanted to ask about what led to the relationship’s demise. They were curious, but no one wanted to pry. It wasn’t their business after all. Of course, there were assumptions, but no one truly believed infidelity or toxicity was the cause of the breakup. You and Chris loved each other – anyone could tell just by the way you both would look at one another.

But in truth, every good thing comes to an end. The phone calls became shorter. The getaways were always interrupted. The prying eye of the public wasn’t an issue in your relationship’s earlier days, but when they poked and prodded at your insecurities, it just became too much. When the “I love you”’s felt clipped and forced, you both had to admit something was off. The fire that glowed bright between you slowly faded. And as much as both of you tried to reignite it, the damage was done. And like perfect matches, the relationship had burned out.

It hurt to live in your own apartment, to be surrounded by the memories – his clothes in your dresser and closet, his cologne in your sheets. Hell, even your body didn’t feel like yours. You could still feel his hands on your waist, his lips on yours. Your heart still called out his name on those lonely nights.

But eventually, you found the courage or a faux sense of it – whatever could get you by. With shaky hands, you cleaned up your apartment. You scrubbed at the tiles of the bathroom until they gleamed. You wiped down the wooden floors until they sparkled in the sunlight. You took out the photos in the frames that reminded you of a happier time. The frames were now empty, hanging pictureless on your walls. The twine of Polaroids was taken down completely. The snapshots stored away in a shoebox under the bed. You bought a new mattress – telling yourself you were due for a new one anyway. You opted for a smaller bed, so that it wouldn’t feel as empty (not that it worked. You still felt alone).

You even packed everything that was his into those boxes that sat dauntingly in the corner of your apartment. And although you could fake the confidence – you could tell your friends and family you were doing fine, you could post on Instagram and tweet about new beginnings – you just couldn’t mail back the memories.

It felt like you were closing the door on Chris forever by giving back the pieces of him that you still had.

Like his Red Sox baseball cap –

You laughed and gently slapped the visor of the cap down after Chris made an attempt at a stupid joke. “Hey, hey! Watch it I’m driving!” He retaliated, letting go of your hand to fix the hat. “I’ve already got speeding tickets to pay off. I can’t get into an accident, especially with you in the car.”

You reached over and took his hand in yours, fiddling with his fingers. “You know the hat is a really stupid disguise, right?” You asked. You had the urge to flip the cap off just to annoy him but decided against it, knowing he’d overreact.

“That’s why I’ve got sunglasses,” he said.

“That you don’t wear?”

“There’s no sun.” He clicked his tongue. “I could get you the same hat. We can match!”

You scoffed. “I prefer the Yankees.” You honestly didn’t. You just liked to push his buttons.

He gasped with mock offense. “I think I should just pull over and tell you to walk home.”  He pushed your hand away. You burst out laughing and he couldn’t help but join your hysterics.

Chris looked over at you. The moonlight was hitting you in a way that made your skin gleam. Your head was thrown back as you laughed, and your eyes squinted from your smiles. You didn’t realize he was still staring at you when you had calmed down. You looked forward and gasped. “Chris, red light!”

His head snapped back towards the road as he passed up the streetlight that glowed the angry color. Thankfully, there were no cars or pedestrians. No one but you and Chris (and maybe the street camera) witnessed it.

“I’m gonna pretend you never said that because I love you.” He told you.

“I’m gonna pretend you didn’t run the red because I love you … and the Yankees.”

“Ignoring you.”

Or the Montblanc timepiece you bought him for his birthday that he left the very last time he was over –

“You didn’t have to!” He shook his head as he stared down at the watch in awe. “Seriously, babe!”

“No, no! I wanted to get this for you!” You beamed and kissed his cheek.

It was a simple watch. A chestnut brown leather band with gold hardware. It was simple, versatile. Something he could wear on his day to day or for formal events.

“Look on the back!” You urged as he unboxed the watch.

He shook his head and gave you a look of disbelief. He wasn’t into overly flashy things and he didn’t like to put down thousands of dollars on material goods – like a watch. (He owned the same sweatshirt in 2 different colors). Chris loved to spoil his loved ones – he loved to spoil you – but he didn’t know how to react when the tables were turned and he was on the receiving end of expensive gifts.

On the back of the watch, was a small engraving. The man at the store told you that they didn’t do message engravings – “only names and initials,” he told you – but you insisted even when he said that the message would barely be seen.

I love you forever and a day.

It was a stupid, cheesy saying that Chris drunkenly confessed to you one night over the phone back when you two were barely serious. As the relationship heated up, it became a catchphrase, sometimes an apology, a promise. Words that meant the world to both of you.

He began to tear up. You gasped and wrapped your arms around his broad shoulders. “Chris, baby, noo! Don’t cry!” You pleaded. “I didn’t think you’d cry!”

He put down the watch and turned his body towards you so that he can engulf you in his arms. You felt wet tears on the skin of your neck where his head took shelter in. You shushed him and robbed the back of his head, soothingly as he cried. You loved how emotional Chris was. He was never afraid to be vulnerable in front of you.

“I love you.” He murmured.

“I love you, baby… Forever and a day.”

Or the painting of you he painted which you had hung over your bed –

“Stay still, (Y/N)!” Chris scolded.

You groaned. “I’ve been posing for the last 2 hours. Are you done, yet?”

“Painting takes time.” He told you. “Stay where you are!”

“The sun’s going down, Christopher.”

Chris had mentioned that he wanted to be a painter when he was younger. You teasingly asked if he was any good – you knew he was (he was good at almost everything). Of course, he never backed down from a challenge.

You regretted saying yes to becoming his personal art model. You didn’t realize you were signing up to sit on an uncomfortable stool nearly stark naked for hours on end. Your arms were aching from holding up the thin scarf that teasingly covered your breasts and draped over your front. Your bottom was sore from sitting on the wooden stool. “I’m getting tired,” you whined. “Couldn’t we just take pictures?”

“No, you wanted to know if I was any good, and besides, painting you in only a scarf is much more intimate.”

“But pictures are intimate, too!” You argued. You had several explicit, teasingly explicit, intimate Polaroids stashed away in your room to prove that. “Plus, I feel like you’re making a Picasso-esque painting and I’m going to be very offended when I take a look.”

“I’m almost done.” He laughed. “And you’re not going to be offended. I promise.” You gave him a playful glare. He seemed a little too confident.

“So, if you’re almost done, can I put on clothes now?” You muttered.

Chris laughed as he glanced up at you from his canvas that was propped up on an easel. He looked you up and down then licked his lips before smirking. “I think I prefer you like this.”

“Perv.”

“Only for you, babe,” he winked before picking up his paintbrush again. He swiped for a few more minutes despite your complaints before dramatically throwing his hands up in the air. “Magnifique!” He exclaimed in – what you assumed to be – a fake French accent. “Come look!”

You hesitantly got up from the stool. Your legs had fallen asleep several times throughout the two hours you were sitting. You covered yourself as best as you could with the sheer scarf – not that Chris minded the view. You made your way over and gasped when you looked over your boyfriend’s shoulder.

Saying that it was “magnifique” was an understatement. No words could describe the artwork in front of you. In fact, you weren’t even sure if Chris had painted you or if Chris painted it at all. He could’ve just bought a painting and had you sit naked in front of him for two hours.

“You did this?” You gaped.

“Duh.” He laughed. “I need to add a few finishing touches. A couple shading here and there. But it’s done. And my poor baby,” he pulled you over to sit on his paint covered lap, “was getting sore and tired.” He kissed your shoulder. “You like?”

“I love!” You said. “I don’t even look like that!”

He scoffed. “Yeah, you do. You’re a goddess.” He kissed the part of your neck where it met with your shoulder. “You should model for me more often.”

“I think I just might. It’ll boost my ego.” You joked. “I love it, Chris, really.”

“I love you.”

The boxes were full of memories. Memories you couldn’t just ship off. You couldn’t just let them go.

But months after the breakup and several encouraging speeches from your friends, you finally caved. With a nervous sigh and shaky hands, you put the shipping labels on the boxes. You weren’t sure if you should’ve added a letter – a piece of closure for you and maybe for him – but you decided against it. You weren’t sure if you could write down how you felt without breaking down again and backing out of sending them off.

You needed to do this. If not for him but for you.

-=+=-

When the packages arrived, he was very confused. Who sent him boxes? Did he order anything and just forgot? But when he read the labels, his heart sunk. Your name and address printed in small letters on the corner of the label.

He slowly went through the things. The memories unfolding before him as he unpacked. The baseball cap he thought he had lost, the watch he was desperately looking for days ago to wear for a red carpet (it brought him a sense of comfort. It soothed his anxiety knowing he had a part of you with him during big events – during anything really.), the painting of the goddess that ruled over his heart – and still did.

It hurt him thinking that you spent months probably packing away things he had left in your apartment. It hurt him thinking about you crying as you rediscovered each item again. It hurt him staring at the watch that boldly read the promise you both swore to keep.

Dodger, as if sensing his dad’s anxiousness, nestled against his leg. He looked up at Chris with sad eyes and nudged his leg as if to tell him it’s okay, dad, don’t be sad.

“I should call her, huh, bud?” Chris asked his dog. It’s been months. Months since the relationship ended, since the story was over. The pain should’ve dulled by now – for both of you. But it was still there. A sharp, ache that raged in your hearts.

Chris fumbled with his phone. His finger hovered above the telephone icon with mobile written underneath it. Your contact picture smiled brightly up at him.

Don’t do it. Your picture said to him. Let us heal.

Chris sighed and locked his phone, shoving it into his pocket. He wasn’t sure if he should shoot you a text and thank you for his things back. He wasn’t sure if he should call you and ask for a second chance – would you even want a second chance?

But instead, Chris decided to do the same.

In the next few days, he packed up each and every one of your items that you left in his house. Toothbrush, hairbrush, clothes, Polaroids that you took of him, of you, of both of you. Everything. He shipped them off with a letter thanking you for sending his things back, telling you that if you ever needed him that he was one phone call or text away. He thanked you for your time together, telling you that it was, truthfully, the best time of his life. He ended it with an I love you forever and a day although he wasn’t sure if he should’ve – if you would’ve wanted to be reminded of your sacred promise to each other.

When he shipped it off, he felt as if his home was hollow. He didn’t realize how much of you he still kept around. But he took a deep breath and nodded to himself. It needed to be done.

Chris walked back up to his bedroom. But he didn’t send everything away… He wasn’t ready to shut the door on forever and a day just yet. He pulled the top drawer of his dresser open and pulled out the scarf from the painting. He inhaled. Your perfume was still strong. It still smelled like you – like happier times. He couldn’t let go of every part of you – not yet.

Similarly, you kept one of his sweatshirts. It was an old one that he slept in. It was years old – you often joked it was older than you. You sometimes slept in it. It still carried his scent. A part of Chris you still kept. Similarly, you weren’t dead set on goodbye either. Perhaps – and you hoped – that this was just a see you later.

But nevertheless, this was a new chapter – for both of you. And if the story were to bring you back together, then you would both welcome that. And if not, you’d welcome that, too.

[introvertguide]

Chinatown (1974); AFI #21

The next movie that we reviewed was a very dark example of neo-noir film directed by Roman Polanski, Chinatown (1974). This film was a throwback to very dark crime thrillers that reflected the outlook of a Great Depression followed by world war. Polanski was experiencing a very dark period since he had just moved to America to get married and immediately lost his wife and unborn son in a horrific murder. The film was well received by critics and audiences, but it could not stand against the award winning juggernaut which was The Godfather Part 2. Polanski’s film was nominated for 11 Academy awards but only took one home for best original screenplay, a category that didn’t include The Godfather Part 2. It is hard to describe how incredibly down beat this film is without spoiling too early, so let me give the breakdown with the standard warning:

SPOILER ALERT!!! THIS IS A MURDER MYSTERY SO THE PLOT IS ABOUT TO BE WELL SPOILED!!! IF YOU WANT TO SEE THE FILM FIRST, NOW IS THE TIME TO STEP AWAY!!! COME BACK AFTER YOU SEE THE FILM!!!

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In 1937, a woman identifying herself as Evelyn Mulwray hires private investigator J. J. "Jake" Gittes (Jack Nicholson) to follow her husband, Hollis Mulwray, the chief engineer at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. Gittes tails him, hears him publicly refuse to create a new reservoir that would be unsafe, and shoots photographs of him with a young woman, which are published on the front page of the following day's paper. Back at his office, Gittes is confronted by a woman who informs him she is the real Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) and that he can expect a lawsuit.

Realizing he was set up, Gittes assumes that Hollis Mulwray is the real target. Before he can question him, Lieutenant Lou Escobar fishes Mr. Mulwray, drowned, from a reservoir. Under retainer to Mrs. Mulwray, Gittes investigates with suspicions of murder and notices that although there is a drought, huge quantities of water are being released from the reservoir every night. Gittes is warned off by Water Department Security Chief Claude Mulvihill and a henchman (Roman Polanski) who slashes one of Gittes' nostrils. Back at his office, Gittes receives a call from Ida Sessions, who identifies herself as the imposter Mrs. Mulwray. She is afraid to identify her employer but tells Gittes to check the day's obituaries.

Gittes learns that Mulwray was once the business partner of Evelyn's wealthy father, Noah Cross (John Huston). Over lunch at his personal club, Cross warns Gittes that he does not understand the forces at work, and offers to double Gittes' fee to search for Mulwray's missing mistress. At the hall of records, Gittes discovers that much of the Northwest Valley has recently changed ownership. Investigating the valley, he is attacked by angry landowners who believe he is an agent of the water department attempting to force them out by sabotaging their water supply.

Gittes deduces that the water department is drying up the land so it can be bought at a reduced price and that Mulwray was murdered when he discovered the plan. He discovers that a recently deceased retirement home resident is one of the valley's new landowners and seemingly purchased the property a week after his death. Gittes and Evelyn bluff their way into the home and confirm that the real-estate deals were surreptitiously completed in the names of several of the home's residents. Their visit is interrupted by the suspicious retirement-home director, who has called Mulvihill.

After fleeing Mulvihill and his thugs, Gittes and Evelyn hide at Evelyn's house and sleep together. During the night, Evelyn gets a phone call and must leave suddenly; she warns Gittes that her father is dangerous. Gittes follows Evelyn's car to a house, where he spies her through the windows comforting Mulwray's mistress, Katherine. He accuses Evelyn of holding the woman against her will, but she says Katherine is her sister.

The next day, an anonymous call draws Gittes to Ida Sessions' apartment, where he finds her murdered and Escobar waiting for Gittes' arrival. Escobar tells him the coroner's report found salt water in Mulwray's lungs, indicating that he did not drown in the fresh water of the reservoir. Escobar suspects Evelyn of the murder and tells Gittes to produce her quickly. At Evelyn's mansion, Gittes finds her servants packing her things. He realizes her garden pond is salt water and discovers a pair of bifocals in it. He confronts Evelyn about Katherine, whom Evelyn now claims is her daughter. After Gittes slaps her (a lot), she tells him that Katherine is her sister and her daughter; her father raped her when she was 15. She says that the glasses are not Mulwray's, as he did not wear bifocals.

Gittes arranges for the women to flee to Mexico and instructs Evelyn to meet him at her butler's home in Chinatown. He summons Cross to the Mulwray home to settle their deal. Cross admits his intention to annex the Northwest Valley into the City of Los Angeles, then irrigate and develop it. Gittes accuses Cross of murdering Mulwray. Cross has Mulvihill take the bifocals at gunpoint, and they force Gittes to drive them to the women. When they reach the Chinatown address, the police are already there and detain Gittes. When Cross approaches Katherine, Evelyn shoots him in the arm and starts to drive away with Katherine. The police open fire, killing Evelyn. Cross clutches Katherine and leads her away, while Escobar orders Gittes released. Lawrence Walsh, one of Gittes' associates, tells him: "Forget it, Jake. It's Chinatown."

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I really cannot emphasize how much of a bummer ending this film has. It is right up there (down there) with Sophie’s Choice. A man who pays to dump water so that he can purchase cheap farm land, kills his partner who threatens to tell, and rapes his own 15-year-old daughter is the antagonist. In the end, he is released to take custody of his young granddaughter without punishment after the police shoot the daughter that he raped. The investigator who tried to help and solved the mystery is left with no say and a slit nostril for his troubles. Polanski later said in interviews that he wanted to emphasize the futility of trying to find justice in Los Angeles. Both his life and this movie really proved that as a fact. It is funny that the screenwriter who won the academy award wanted Cross to die and Evelyn to live, but Polanski insisted and the dark tone is what pushed the award in their favor.

There was some discussion about finding an actor that was willing to be the lead with a bandaged face or prosthetic injury for most of the movie. It was still all about face time and dialogue, so most lead actors didn’t want to cover up their face. Nicholson was not actually known for his good looks as much as other actors, so he was more willing to take on the role. Actually, it was Nicholson who wanted to work on a project with Polanski and suggested the script in the first place. Also, Nicholson really connected with Polanski at the time and was not afraid to play dark roles. Jon Huston was not as keen on the heavy pedophile incest role since he had a lovely young daughter of his own (actress Angelica Huston). It turned out to be a good choice for all the actors involved.

Something that came up during the viewing with my housemates was reactions to the scene when Jack Nicholson is slapping Faye Dunaway when she is admitting that the girl she visits is both her sister and her daughter. She keeps alternating between “she’s my sister” and “she’s my daughter” and each statement is punctuated with a slap in the face by Jack Nicholson. It is supposed to be deeply serious and a major reveal in the movie, but we were laughing so hard at the absurdity. It was truly unrealistic and more of a trope of film noir than anything else (slapping a hysterical woman). It truly was a throwback to 40s and 50s style Hollywood and some of the standards of film story telling at that time were a bit silly. 

I have reviewed this move in more ways than I thought because I realized on this viewing that the video game L.A. Noir borrows very heavily from this film. So many aspects, from the locations to the situations to the soundtrack, were all put into the video game. I have spent many hours of my life playing through that game a number of times and I am shocked each time. I am curious if Rockstar Games had to pay any money to Roman Polanski for such a close similarity to the film? I tried to look it up but didn’t find anything, so probably not. 

So should this film by on the AFI to 100? For sure. It is an Old Hollywood story about even older Hollywood. It stands out as one of the darkest endings that I have ever experienced. It has major star power and surrounded by amazing stories of Hollywood. Would I recommend it? I sure would. It is a great trip around old Hollywood with some of America’s greatest actors. I think just as interesting is the story of Roman Polanski (who I did an article on as well) and why his head space was so dark during the production of this film. Definitely worth a watch and a background deep dive.

[fontofmercy-archived2]

TROS spat in the face of every single abused child who was looking to this fairytale for hope. The sequel trilogy wasn’t about a farm boy looking for adventure or even an abused child falling to villainy, it was about three abused children from the different class systems all rising out of trauma and dysfunction. This was our fairytale, our story, and JJ Abrams perverted it into abuse apologist propaganda in a pathetically desperate attempt to appease the most hateful groups of fans who never understood or appreciated the story to begin with (which is why the story had to be butchered in order to appease them).

1.) Rey

Rey’s parents selling her for profit into slavery was portrayed as a good, loving thing. Child trafficking was literally portrayed as excusable, and even loving, in this children’s film. Just let that sink in for a second.

What is the message there? If your parents did something horrible that caused you years of trauma and torment, you should just not lose faith in them because they may have had a good reason (even if you have no evidence of that). Maybe a space wizard who has been dead for decades forced them to traffic you. This scene makes me want to vomit. This is how a children’s fairytale portrayed parents who sell their children into trafficking:

There is no excuse for this. Rey’s parentage was solved. Her identity crisis was over. This wasn’t needed except to force this abuse apologist message. Oh, and of course to feed the sexist fanboys a bit of eugenics to make them stop whining about how a woman could possibly be important and powerful.

TLJ was about Rey discovering her identity and letting go of her unhealthy, irrational dependency on parents who she never knew, who sold her to an abuser and left her to half-starve alone in a desert. TROS decided to give her a new identity crisis out of literally nowhere just so they could erase all that “You are not your parents, even if your parents don’t love you and/or aren’t special, you are still special and still deserving of love. You can find belonging ahead of you.” stuff with dynastic “Actually, your blood family does entirely define your identity and you should always assume they’re right even when all evidence points otherwise, just ignore your own trauma and blame it on a dead space wizard.”

The whole Rey Palpatine thing left a very bad taste in my mouth. Not just because it’s fucking stupid and something Reddit would write, but because Rey was horrible in TROS. She acted like she was possessed by Palpatine, she stabbed Ben (who she cares for and always had compassion for) to kill while he was distracted. She suddenly acted like she didn’t care about anyone around her. She just overall acted unrecognizable from the warm, loving, empathetic woman we saw in TFA and TLJ. The message here is clearly that because she has this “bad blood”, Rey can’t have an identity for herself. The only thing that saves her is taking on the identity of the good guys, she never finds her own. All the traits she’s had up until now don’t matter, who she actually is doesn’t matter. All that matters is what man’s blood runs through her veins. All Rey is is someone’s granddaughter, because if she wasn’t, then she’d really be nobody.

And thus, JJ Abrams decided that “Anyone can be special, even nobodies. Your worth is not defined by your class or your background.” was a stupid message and instead it should be pure eugenic “You’re only special if you have important people blood/name. Your identity is entirely your (male) family, not your own. No silly woman could have power of her own!”

Rey taking on the name of Skywalker is an utterly shallow attempt to fix the fact that they took every bit of Rey’s real identity from her, took half her soul (Ben is her dyad, two that are one), and then left her alone on a desert planet as if to say that her “true self” is the abused child she once was and that she can’t actually escape that. The moral of this fairytale was “You don’t need friends or love, as long as you have a glow stick (material possessions) and a super duper special name that makes you important (which you weren’t before, you were nobody).”

Not to mention that Rey basically named herself after Luke, no one else she knew actually used that name. And Luke didn’t do anything to deserve that, he rejected her at every single opportunity and only did the bare minimum to help her after being berated into it. Han was her surrogate father and the first person to offer her a life outside of Jakku. Leia was her loving mentor and pseudo-mother. Ben was the love of her life who has always been there for her when she needed someone to confide it, someone to see her true self and tell her she wasn’t alone. Luke was nothing but some cranky old guy who made her feel awful about herself and never accepted her (not to mention telling her she was inherently dangerous and also trying to murder her soulmate when he was a child which the real Rey was furious about).

2.) Finn

Finn’s character has not been given much in terms of development. For the most part, he’s been reduced to “Rey’s friend” and then “Finn’s friend”, with a little moment in there where he got to be with Rose and have his own identity but TROS of course decided to reward racist bullies and cut out Rose instead of giving the rest of the fans a satisfying story.

In TROS though, the one thing that Finn actually did that was heroic by himself, his character defining moment of turning from The First Order, was credited to the force and described like it wasn’t a choice at all. Which brings up a lot of questions and, as Han would say, “That’s not how the force works!”. It was so entirely unneeded to take that from Finn, but they gave up all of Rose’s potential screentime to do it.

There’s also the moment when Poe, our alleged hero, so hilariously (i.e callously) compares himself being a criminal to Rey being a scavenger and Finn being a stormtrooper. Completely ignoring the fact that they had no choice in that, as if their trauma doesn’t matter at all. It’s a small moment, but it was very insensitive and highlights how much the writers Did Not Care or even understand their main characters’ experiences.

3.) Ben

I don’t even know where to start with Ben Solo. His ending was the one that broke me as a person, I had so many hysterical sobbing fits over it that my loved ones were actually getting tired of it and it genuinely put me in a really bad place with my depression that I’m only just not getting out of.

Ben Solo’s story in TFA and TLJ was abuse victim’s epic, it was the story of a boy who was tortured and groomed from the time he was in his mother’s womb. A man who never knew a life without abuse. Ben Solo was described as a pure beam of light in his mother’s womb who was ensnared and tainted by a predatory force bigger and stronger than himself that he could not escape.

The feeling of being tainted and corrupted is common in abuse victims, and the fact that TROS told every single abused child out there “Yes, you really are tainted and corrupted. You do deserve to die before experiencing more than a moment of happiness and safety.” is something that I’ve yet to get over. It still infuriates me, it still breaks my heart. Ben’s entire arc up until this point has been about how he is still worthy of love.

And no, this isn’t me woobifying; it’s in the text of the films and the canon novels that Ben worked for his redemption, that he earned it. Ben fought Snoke from the time he was a child, but Ben was only a child and Snoke was too powerful, too relentless in his cruelty for him to withstand. The one and only person in the entire galaxy who had the training and the knowledge to protect Ben was his uncle, who chose to try to murder him in his sleep instead of protecting him. Ben was left with nowhere to turn except to his abuser. And even then, we see him struggle every single day to try and force himself to be this evil person that he never was. Ben was light itself who was convinced he was darkness through abuse and manipulation.

Then, when Ben found the first person who he could feel and connect with through the force, even though Snoke and Luke had abused and betrayed him - Ben still took the chance to reach out to Rey and be vulnerable with her. While interrogating an enemy, he took off his mask and revealed himself (something we only see him to for his father and when Snoke forces him to maliciously). In the middle of a war, under the thumb of the monster who has tortured him since forever, Ben was able hold Rey’s hand and tell her she wasn’t alone. He was still able to be kind. And because of that kindness, that connection, Ben found the courage to finally destroy his abuser and free himself.

Ben freed himself, and he did it out of compassion for and a need to protect Rey, not out of wrath or vengeance. If Ben were truly a creature of wrath, he would have killed Snoke before, but it was only when he had to see and hear and feel his soulmate be tortured by his own abuser that he found that courage. And yes, he did take Snoke’s place at first because that was the only way he knew how to protect himself. In his experience, people without power get hurt and that’s it. But even then, Ben was able to muster yet more strength to shed the armor that was Kylo Ren and stand with Rey unarmored against the very thing that has abused and tortured him since before he was born.

That took so much bravery and love and selflessness for Ben to stand there as himself, ready to fight his abuse and trauma head-on as Ben Solo. For him to admit he was hurt for the first time in the series. For him to crawl up a cliff with a badly broken leg out of love. For him to willingly give his very life force out of pure love. All of these things are incredible for Ben to have been able to do after all he had been through, these are more than deserving of reward. But TROS punished Ben for doing everything right, they proved that abusers always win in the end. Ben was going to survive until the last few edits. Everything we see was literally leading up to him surviving. This was Ben’s redemption, this was supposed to be him fighting for his new beginning and taking his first steps into the happiness and safety he earned, and should have had as a child, not a pointless struggle before succumbing to death:

But TROS told us, told traumatized and neurodivergent children who saw themselves in Ben, that it wasn’t good enough. That love isn’t good enough. That doing the right thing deserves to be punished. That children tainted by violence and abuse and darkness don’t deserve love and healing even when they earn redemption, even when they do everything in their power to do the right thing and be brave. The hopelessness of that is what broke me as a person. That is not what Star Wars is about. Star Wars is about redemption and love and hope; TROS was about cruelty covered up with a thin sheet of materialism and confused, poor storytelling.

[sophiemsmsmsmgallery]

I’ll tell you who SOPHIE was - she provided me with the soundtrack to my existence.

SOPHIE - a futuristic goddess, an ingenious music producer, ethereal visionary, a trans icon.... just an icon generally speaking - tragically passed away at the age of 34 in Athens, Greece after falling off a rooftop whilst attempting to capture a picture of the full moon. Her gut wrenching death brought me to tears. This is the first time a famous person’s death has affected me so deeply. Her bold, hyperkinetic approach to producing musical art was so impeccable and refreshing considering so much of modern day’s music tends to sound incredibly predictable. Whilst alive, visionary SOPHIE generated a following of intensely adoring, dedicated fans. Honestly, don’t EVER mess with a SOPHIE fan. Trust me!

She worked with the biggest popstars, rappers, K Pop groups, rappers and upcoming artists but still remained so humble despite her enormous talent. However, she hadn’t reached household name status during her life. Sadly, many people only had heard of SOPHIE after her tragic and unexpected death. This motivated me to write a piece dedicated to this beautiful and timeless mastermind. I do acknowledge that its been exceptionally challenging to summarise how SOPHIE impacted my life onto only a few pieces of paper. However, its the least I can do. Therefore, I present to all of you my written tribute which shall focus on how her extraordinary music has featured during key moments of my lifetime and expanded my initially narrow knowledge of beauty, gender and identity like never before.

Let’s commence this written tribute by travelling back in time to when I had just turned 15. During that time period, my disposition was extremely introverted. In all honesty, like almost all teenagers suffering the displeasing side effects of bloody puberty, I was barely approachable. I adopted the entire persona of a full time punk kid wearing a thick leather jacket whilst applying extremely heavy kohl eyeliner and dying my hair jet black - which looked devastating. I would also scribble quotes associated with the punk ideology and act like some pretentious snob towards anything that was unrelated to punk, industrial or rap music. That was the most rebellion I exuded at the time (trying not to feel complete despair as much as possible for my former teenage self)

That captious mentality caused by teenage angst was erased the minute I listened to a snippet of the musical force of nature named ‘BIPP’ by SOPHIE on a Swiss MTV sponsored advert. The high pitched vocals singing ‘However you’re feeling, I can make you feel better’ provided by Marcella and overall catchy, hyperkinetic production mesmerised me like there’s no tomorrow. Nothing had captivated my imagination like the timeless ‘BIPP’ did so I typed aggressively and rapidly into the Google search engine straight away. I had to know who the mastermind lurking behind this masterpiece was. I had to know of the mastermind who provided me with this pivotal musical epiphany. Then the capitalised name ‘SOPHIE’ popped up right in front of my eyes.  

After listening to ‘BIPP’ in its entirety on repeat, I instantly began to read up on SOPHIE and stumbled upon her 2013 interview on BBC Radio 1 with SOPHIE where she concealed her identity by having her 5 year old niece respond to the host’s questions instead of herself. At the time, I assumed Sophie had implemented a voice changer to project the voice of an infant. SOPHIE’s dry humoured response, namely ,,I’ve got a cough!’’ to the host’s bewilderment over the child sounding voice stood out for me. Earlier in her career, SOPHIE’s anonymity prompted much speculation in the music industry and press. I always perceived this bizarre, hysterical act of Sophie’s as a ‘two middle fingers up’ to our environment fuelled by mainstream culture, especially how so many people obsess over notable figure’s personal business and public image instead of their artistic accomplishments far too often. This has to be the ultimate moment my own curiosity for Sophie’s ingenious musical productivity became insatiable. Later on, I would await the 2015 McDonalds commercial anxiously to have my ears blessed with her gratifying track ,Lemonade’ over and over. The synthesised sounds that fizz like pop rocks. Nabihah’s crisp vocals which repeat ‘Candy boys, c - c - candy boys’. The overall ear worm appeal of the track. Flawless!

In the meantime, I discovered that Sophie happened to be a very well known affiliate of the divisive,unique PC Music label based in London, England. During the time period, I was - to be quite frank - not an avid bubblegum bass or hyper-pop listener in the slightest. I worshipped bands such as The Clash, Dead Kennedys, Rammstein,Tool, The KLF and additionally adored rap music ranging from N.W.A to Eminem. They totally divert  from the hyperkinetic, exaggerated take on the pop genre embraced by the PC Music label. However, my teenage idols and SOPHIE objectively share something fundamental in common - Through their trailblazing musical output, they push every single barrier possible and deconstruct what constitutes as ,normal’ in modern day society. Even just after releasing her first full length album ‘Product’, SOPHIE embodied a bold form of rebellion against society’s conventionality and unforgiving temperament by incorporating lyrics alluding to a mostly genderless nature and sexual fetishes eg BDSM. As an extremely naive, self conscious teenager, all of this completely perplexed but intrigued me. Any glimpse of art connected with an attitude of non conformity resonated with me in practically seconds and continues to even at 22.

This longing for anything unorthodox traces back to my own childhood.  To explain some details about my background, I grew up in a rather small, very conservative village in Switzerland from the age of 9. Even uttering anything LGBT related would illicit responses ranging from loud gasps to shocked faces at my high school. As a non Swiss resident, the educational setting demonstrated to be more than challenging at times. One incident that stands out to me especially is when a classmate ranted about his disapproval of non Swiss inhabitants receiving Swiss pass and then continued with yelling ‘All my family voted for the SVP kick all of (you fucking foreign scum) out!’.Just to clarify, the SVP is the largest party in Switzerland and leans very far right politically.   As you can presume, I was utterly distraught by this disconcerting interaction and confess to losing any fragment of self confidence remaining in that moment. Luckily the Swiss MTV channel existed, which was far more on trend with the times and embraced marginalised communities. I will forever cherish Swiss MTV introducing me to SOPHIE’s impeccable, lawless music and being a form of escapism in my bedroom from the racist, homophobic climate prevailing in my village.

At the age of 17, Graduation finally arrived at the door which was an absolute relief. A few hours later, the celebration party took place in a secluded barn and my boyfriend immersed himself into the role as DJ for the night. Towards the end, he sneakily included Product era classics including ‘Vyzee’ and ‘Hard’. I could barely contain my excitement. We all almost choked on the horrendous party smoke, spilt our cheap beer on each other’s outfits and chanted ‘Shake it up and make it fizz!’ and ‘I get so hard.’ Ironically, I believe my Swiss colleagues didn’t exactly recognise the discernible sexual connotations exhibited throughout the song which causes me to giggle ever so slightly looking back. However, it felt liberating hearing SOPHIE’s fiercely electronic, transparent music and seeing my classmates enjoying it - especially as all you would hear on most music outlets there was either dreary Indie or Luka Haenni - the Swiss equivalent to Justin Bieber. That’s the most I’m able to recollect from that peculiar night - aside from a trampoline burning to the ground due to someone placing a candle on it. After all that jazz, a thrillingly new chapter for myself - and even for SOPHIE - would unfold.

At 17, I returned to my place of birth, England, and enrolled at Sixth Form in the South to complete my A Levels. I initially felt extremely elated to move back to England and finally entering the era of adulthood in my life. However, the atmosphere at Sixth Form and in the South of England seemed ... so unfamiliar to me which was heartbreaking. My mind had totally adjusted to a Swiss and my mind endured unsettling feelings of anxiety during the entire first year at British college. However, SOPHIE’s music once again presented itself as a form of therapy for me. She released the ethereal, stunning ballad ‘It’s Okay To Cry’ during this time period. After watching its music video and deciphering the lyrics I realised... Oh my goodness, SOPHIE just came out as a transgender woman! I recall being touched by the exquisite, idiosyncratic song featuring 80s style synthesised arrangements. SOPHIE’S bravery mesmerised me. I knew in that moment, Sophie would revolutionise the music industry, especially the habitat of music production dominated by cisgender, heterosexual men. She proved my initial predictions right - and on many occasions.

The day after SOPHIE released ‘Its Okay To Cry’, I overheard an energetic conversation carried out by a few of fellow openly gay and trans classmates who I’m still acquainted with to this day. They couldn’t contain their excitement about SOPHIE.

Despite the crippling anxiety having affected me so severely at that point, I intervened and expressed my admiration for everything SOPHIE. I felt blessed attending a sixth form alongside gay, non binary, trans classmates who took pride in their identity and sexuality. It put my mind at ease being surrounded in a more progressive environment compared to the intolerant ambience pervading my village in Switzerland. SOPHIE’s music had connected me with such a progressive, solicitous and just simply amazing group of friends. They agreed with me that SOPHIE’s courageous move will impact the music world in such a striking manner and encourage more LGBT people to pursue their goals no matter how extravagant, especially an acclaimed music producer igniting the music industry like SOPHIE. Then all of a sudden they mentioned the track ‘Yeah Right’ and how it blew their mind away due to SOPHIE’s ‘badass as hell instrumentals.’ With all the shame in the world, I confessed I hadn’t heard it yet. Their facial expressions conveyed so much disappointment. One of my classmates quickly plugged their Bluetooth speaker into his laptop and then pressed the play button. From a personal perspective, ‘Yeah Right’ featuring Vince Staples and Kendrick Lamar perfectly stands out to me despite SOPHIE’s extensive and majestic discography to her name.

I contemplate the masterpiece as a pivotal moment in rap music history. Even during 2017,  Sophie began exhibiting red lipstick, latex gloves, tight clothing corresponding  to a more feminine image which totally distances from the aggressively macho image attached to the rap industry. From the moment Vince Staples commences with his lyrically cutting verses to Kendrick Lamar proceeding with his gripping and more than memorable cameo - I realised that a 3 minute long but significant moment music history in general simply named ‘Yeah Right’, had occurred. Her production on the track astonishes me due to its avant grade and timeless edge. To me, it is a masterpiece that echoes the the extremely distant future of music. I reckon we’ll be dancing to ‘Yeah Right’ at the club in 2137. For 4 consecutive years, ‘Yeah Right’ has been reigning champion of most listened to song on my Spotify account and can express with all certainty... it’s my all time favourite song. In all honesty, it cured me of my severe feelings of apprehension and anxiety at Sixth Form.

After regaining my confidence and FINALLY passing the dreaded driving test - after failing three times in a row - the first song I blasted on my speakers in my cheap, run down car was ‘Yeah Right’ and rather fittingly, Sophie’s live version of the officially unreleased ‘Burn Rubber’ whilst driving to university I was about to attend. I genuinely cried all the lyrics to the song whilst driving on the mundane roads of Southern England and FINALLY felt like a free, independent adult. Even during brief chapters of my life such as passing my driving test, SOPHIE made a crucial and ravishing appearance.

The last three years of my life have played out in a rather turbulent style. Towards the middle of 2018, the year unravelled in a fashion that I certainly hadn’t anticipated. I’ll summarise it to the best of my ability even thought it is extremely difficult to. My longtime best friend, the closest person to me, sadly died to long term chronic illness. I couldn’t articulate my utter grief into words and sadly still struggle to this day. It was a sudden blow to the heart which couldn’t be paralleled to anything else I’ve felt in my short lifetime. A month prior to her untimely passing, SOPHIE had released her acclaimed, gallant debut album ‘Oil Of Every Person’s Un Insides.’ Although OOEPUI is a extravagant, historic work of art, I shall describe how the tracks ‘Is it Cold In the Water’ and ‘Faceshopping’ impacted me.

I perceive ‘Is It Cold In The Water?  as a hauntingly riveting piece of music, with vocals sung Cecile Believe that send shivers down my spine. The lyrics ‘Earth shaking, I feel alone’ encapsulated on a personal level how I couldn’t envision an existence without my best friend by my side mocking my naturally deep, monotone voice, her showing me a piece of clothing she had just designed herself as she was an aspiring designer and hurting with laughter whilst impersonating certain celebrities.  My raging anger against the world intensified. I placed my formerly devoted belief in a higher existence under the microscope - a belief system that I unfortunately haven’t revisited ever since. ,Is It cold in the water’ epitomises the dilemma and hardship of entering unknown depths without any inkling of what overcoming the ‘cold water’ and how its aftermath would materialise, metaphorically speaking. I realised I had to place my feet in the cold water in order to heal and adjust to coping with my best friend’s death despite how petrifying the concept as such seemed at the time.

And then there’s the outstanding ‘Faceshopping.’ I’ll confess... when I originally listened to this track, I was rather, dare I say, baffled afterwards. The experimentally electronic provided by Sophie galvanised me as usual. However, as a cisgender woman who has dated men right up to the present moment, I was initially under the very ill informed assumption that I couldn’t identify with a lot of the album’s content produced by an trans woman. That display of shambolic ignorance was quickly put to rest when I analysed the lyrics of ‘Faceshopping’ with an open eye. It clicked that the song could symbolise more than one meaning. It examines the age of the internet and the lengths modern day go to in order to pass as beautiful, especially in the name of personal branding. Furthermore, the powerful track demonstrates SOPHIE’s mesmerisingly fervent opposition against what traditional values regard as beauty which is unquestionably ingenious. I feel the lyric ‘My shop is the face I front’ denotes a person’s individual freedom of complementing their psychical appearance - whether through simply makeup or plastic surgery - and evolving their true gender identity shouldn’t be shunned. As someone who has been extremely self conscious about my appearance since the tender age of 12 caused by several factors eg bullying at school, ‘Faceshopping’ uplifted my spirits and enlightened me that no influence other than my personal self shall control how I beautify my own body.

Skipping to 2020, the world has been transformed to a severe extent due to the Coronavirus infecting and heartbreakingly taking millions of people’s lives. With this almost dystopian nightmare occurring, I felt extremely poorly - physically speaking -  which had been affecting me since October of the same year. Ultimately I was rushed into hospital in December. After countless physical evaluations and days passing by whilst lying in a lonesome hospital bed, my doctor informed me that due to the severity of my current condition, the likelihood of permanent infertility is extremely high. The news put me into a state of shock. After my doctor left the room, the tears couldn’t stop streaming down my face. I had always envisioned raising my own children. Forgive me for the hyperbolic language but in that moment I felt defeated.

With the prospect of my womanhood being affected forever, I put my headphones to shut out the continuous ambulance sirens blaring outside. I pressed Shuffle Play on my SoundCloud and the first song that appeared was SOPHIE’s ‘Heav3n Suspended Livestream’ version of ‘My Forever’. Cecile Believe reiterating ‘Everbody’s got to own their body’ so ethereally, and the song as a whole proved to be therapeutic in the moment. After pressing the repeat button 20 times - at the very least - I had ANOTHER epiphany: no establishment should dictate what constitutes as femininity or womanhood. Even in the modern day society, childless people continue to be stigmatised, often branded as ‘selfish’ or ‘undesirable’ in many communities. I applaud the progress we’ve made in terms of tackling stereotypes associated with infertility. However, more work still needs to be carried out on this matter.  Although it’s only my individual interpretation of the song given the circumstances of my poorly health at the time, the lyrics reassured me that everybody’s - without a doubt -  GOT to own their body. Gosh that sounds so rhetorical!

After this pivotal awakening, I was rushed into surgery which lasted about two hours. The next day - feeling extremely lethargic - I woke up to the fantastic news that the doctors saved my physical health from infertility. I will always be so grateful for their treatment of me and my painful condition. Two weeks into recuperation post surgery, I had no choice but to exercise to boost my mental state caused by inactivity and to get my blood circulation going. As a lifelong, passionate dancer I conceptualised and performed a dance routine to SOPHIE’s club inspired, sublime ‘Take Me To Dubai’. - in front of my cracked bedroom mirror, ironically. Still, dancing again and no physical illness bringing me down felt like a individual rebirth. I was anticipating how 2021 would spell out for me - despite Covid 19 still permeating globally. 2021 finally arrived and not even a full month into the ‘glorious new year’, SOPHIE died.

I recall waking up to numerous messages and notifications capitalising the words: SOPHIE HAS DIED!’. In all honesty ... I froze. It didn’t register for about an hour. Afterwards, I couldn’t disguise the heartbreak and shock that SOPHIE was no longer with us - especially given the cause of her death. It’s been two weeks and I’ll acknowledge that I haven’t overcome the sentiment of anger and upset yet because of her untimely passing .The soundtrack to my existence is gone.

Whether SOPHIE’s musical stylings resonate with you or not, you can’t underestimate her fearless disposition and overwhelming talent. She inspired so many fans to embrace their true identity even when their environment was striving to silence them. She challenged our establishment’s shallow interpretation of beauty, gender and identity. Despite coming out as an trans woman and transphobia still being prevalent globally, SOPHIE didn’t let this form of prejudice stand in her way of achieving her dreams. Her revolutionary mark she left on the industry shall never be underemphasised by so many of us.

SOPHIE,

Thank you for everything. I will never ever forget you,

ROBS.

[dwellordream]

On the other side of Daenerys VI, we see Dany for the first time confident enough to speak directly with Drogo about claiming the Iron Throne for their son, but Drogo has little interest in this.

Dany believes he will not hear of it out of fear of the sea, as she has been led to believe by Jorah, but I think it’s very likely Drogo also just sees no point or profit in a quest to seat his son on the throne when he could simply rule Drogo’s massive khalasar after him, enjoying extraordinary wealth and power here in the Dothraki Sea.

Dany affectionately calls Drogo her sun-and-stars for the first time here, but despite Drogo’s newfound interest in her beyond just sex, they still know next to nothing about one another. Dany doesn’t know anything about Drogo’s childhood, his family, his interests beyond conquest and hunting, because he hasn’t shared any of it with her.

It’s pretty clear that while Daenerys might no longer be terrified of him, and he has some new respect for her courage, this is still far from a marriage of equals or a love match. Drogo’s respect for Dany seems purely rooted in the fact that she is bearing his son; one can imagine what his response might be were she to wind up giving birth to a daughter instead.

Despite feeling more comfortable within Dothraki culture, Dany expressed a desire to return to Westeros, as if she needs to take on the promise Viserys made to her so many times and give to Rhaego what her brother could not give to her. She fears for her future after Drogo’s death, serving in the dosh khaleen with the other elders, having never so much as seen Westeros, nevermind put her son on the throne.

We see again the pressure Dany feels to always put on a strong face in Drogo’s presence, as that is the only way to keep his respect. She only rides in a palanquin due to his absence off hunting.

She again reflects on her future on the way to the market, wishing she could be content with life as a khaleesi, but for the first time refers to herself as a dragon, not just blood of the dragon, and reminds herself it is her duty to not let the Targaryen dynasty die out here in Vaes Dothrak, forgotten like all the stolen monuments of gods and heroes she is passing by.

Traders who come to Vaes Dothrak must give the dosh khaleen salt, silver, and seed, which I assume the dosh khaleen organize for planting and farming via the slaves, since the Dothraki themselves do not farm or herd.

Dany differentiates between the Eastern and Western markets by claiming that the Western Market smells of home, specifically the Free Cities, which is ironic since she was just reminding herself that Westeros should be her true home.

She tells Jorah she loved best to play in bazaars as a child, though she and Viserys usually did not have the money to spend on treats or trinkets; rather, she loved the atmosphere and people. At heart, Dany really seems pretty extroverted and people oriented, often feeling lonely with just her thoughts and worries.

Jorah leaves abruptly to speak with the Merchant Captain, which is 100% just a cover for him reporting back to his spymaster.

Dany getting her handmaids and guards to try sausages with her is a really cute scene, though she is disappointed to learn they’re just more horsemeat.

Dany also shows the reader how the Dothraki trade here; she wants a feathered cloak so she takes it and gives something of equal value in return, a silver medallion. She also gets perfumes that remind her of Braavos, and a fertility charm for Doreah, who really wanted it, though she thinks she must now also get some gifts for Irri and Jhiqui too.

We also hear that Dany’s skin is ‘sun browned’ in thos chapter; clearly Targaryens can and do tan quite a bit in the sun.

The first warning signs with the wineseller is his insistence that Dany try a different, specific wine after he realizes who she is. Dany agrees, knowing Drogo’s fondness for high end wines.

Then enters Jorah, who’s had a change of heart; he’s been spying on Dany for months, but while he could have easily let her and Drogo both be poisoned, then make his escape in the chaos, he now proves the wineseller is trying to kill her by commanding him to taste his own wine.

Jorah claims he had a suspicion due to a letter from Illyrio; Dany is panicked and terrified at the thought of losing not just her life but her child’s, reminding the stirring fetus inside her that he is the blood of the dragon and must not fear- but she could be easily saying the same thing to herself, being all of 14.

Jorah informs Dany that Robert is offering a lordship and lands to whoever kills her, her brother, and her child; she hysterically jokes that Robert owes Drogo a lordship for Viserys’ death. For the first time she thinks of someone besides her as having ‘woken the dragon’- Robert.

She feels the sudden urge to heat up the eggs, and does so with the brazier, then chastises herself when nothing happens.

Drogo returns in a very good mood, calling Dany ‘moon of my life’ (probably a reference to the Dothraki moon goddess) for the first time, and is shocked to hear of the attempt on Dany’s life, rewarding Jorah and Jhogo with horses, and publicly vows to conquer Westeros and take the Iron Throne for Rhaego.

The wineseller, we learn, is sentenced to a slow, painful death by exhaustion/dehydration or trampling, being chained on Drogo’s command to Dany’s horse as she rides.

[breakingsomething]

Dawn Station - Pilot

Basic summary: Video game developer Jack Mcloughlin is finally releasing a new game after a ten year hiatus.

Content warnings: Murder, dismemberment, body horror

It comes as a shock to everyone, including you, when Jack Mcloughlin announces the release of a new game at the start of the second week of October.

There are several reasons why this is such a big deal. One: Jack Mcloughlin has been making games since he was twenty seven, and has released only five of them in the thirty years he's been doing it. Two: Jack Mcloughlin is world renowned for his fantastic horror games, all done in wildly different styles, but still notably his own. Three: Jack Mcloughlin has not, up til now, so much as mentioned working on a new game. The only social media site he's fully active on is Twitter - which you check regularly for any updates - and before the release of his last game, Ehrmann Lab, he had left a series of cryptic clues for two months leading up to the announcement. Those had been probably the most fun two months you'd ever had in your life, and even helped you make new friends. But this time around, there is no warning. The trailer is dropped at Purina Expo, one of the biggest American gaming conventions of the year. You were incredibly lucky to be able to snag tickets. Usually, this convention is where the hottest games that would be coming out the following year would be announced, trailers would be played, and developers would discuss - so everyone there on October 10th is shocked to not only be the first to see the trailer, but to hear from the man himself. Jack Mcloughlin takes the stage, gleefully announcing the release of Dawn Station on October 31st this year.

Now, the release of a new game from Septic Games - Mcloughlin's own software company, which he founded after his second game's release - is a big enough deal. But this… this is something else. Mcloughlin explains it before the reveal of the trailer, and you listen with great excitement.

"Dawn Station," says the man, practically bouncing across the stage with glee and shouting into his mic with a hoarse Irish accent. "is a feat of modern gaming. Now, I understand that when you play games, it can get boring to replay them later on after you've finished, because - well, you know how it goes! You know all the twists and turns, all the jumpscares, all the fights, all the spooks. But what if I told you that there was a way you could play where things were different each time?"

Behind the man, on a large screen, an image comes up. This is the first promo image for the new game to be shown to the people. The image is of a tilted hallway in what looks like a complex, broken down space station, overgrown with unusual plants that glow and spark. In the centre of the image is an astronaut. His helmet is on the floor, blood soaked. His face is half in shadow. All that can be seen is curly olive hair and neon green eyes - two on his face, and one embedded in his neck. The suit itself is torn, ripped open with a mouth and a dripping tongue where the being's stomach should be. A torch is on the ground behind him, attempting to cast light on the room. The words "Dawn Station" come up in solid, bright green font next to the being's face.

"This is Dawn Station!" cries the developer, over the many excited murmurs of the crowd. "The first ever virtual reality game with a fully developed artificial intelligence antagonist! An antagonist who learns from the players movements and choices, who grows and changes based off of what you do. You control the game, now more than ever! He's clever, he's learning, he knows where you are, and his objective is to kill the player - introducing... Alien X, otherwise known as… the Anti!"

Everyone cheers. Mcloughlin steps aside, a beam splitting his pale face, and allows the room to darken, and the trailer to play.

You're in awe. The trailer shows that you play as a character named Drew Oliver, an astronaut in their mid twenties who's aboard the Dawn Space Station, which has fallen to the planet you seemed to have been monitoring - the Othohiri 5RM. The game seems to revolve around attempting to explore the little bits of the planet that you can while repairing the ship and dealing with your descent into madness, all the while being chased down by the Alien X, a shapeshifting monstrosity who's eager to end your life before you can finish your goals. After watching it… well, everyone is absolutely blown away, especially you. This is unlike anything Mcloughlin had ever produced, especially to this scale. It's no wonder he hadn't produced a game in ten years if this was what he had been working on. You're practically vibrating with excitement at the breathtakingly beautiful scenery and realistic yet perfectly stylistic graphics, and the 8D sound design that seems to echo from all around you. It's incredible. The second you get back to your hotel room that night, you're one of the first to preorder the game.

Your week at the convention ends, and you go back home, counting down the days to the game's release. However, even more exciting things are happening. On Twitter, a few of your favourite youtubers are acting rather cryptic. KrisDoesGAMEZ and rrroadblock, two streamers you like, retweet Mcloughlin's announcement tweet with eye emojis and promises of the game being good. DUSSST, visualthursday and BroAverage make their own posts about it. PeachCheerio and TheSkinnerr upload short update videos promising exciting things to come.

On October 15th, it happens - ten youtubers each upload an early access demo of Dawn Station, having been chosen and given the code to play it by Mcloughlin himself. You don't watch the videos because you want to play the game yourself with no spoilers, but from what you've seen, it's fucking amazing. Critics are already calling it the game of the decade. The internet is thriving, and a few people have already cosplayed Drew, the main character. Your best friend uploads a joking cosplay of the Anti and walks around town with it on. He gets over a thousand likes and teases you about being too good for you now that he's internet famous. You're living for all of this.

On October 16th, youtuber PeachCheerio is murdered in his own home.

Everyone is shocked, rightfully. Here is a man who had streamed just the day before, chatting with his members and looking at Dawn Station memes on Twitch. Today, he was discovered by his girlfriend in his own home. Leaked police reports tell you that the man, whose real name was Ronald Murphy, had been messily dismembered, his organs removed, half of them missing. You're in shock. He was one of your favourite streamers, and maybe it's silly to mourn someone you've never met, but you're deeply, deeply saddened by the news.

However, it doesn't stop there. The very next day, youtuber DUSSST - or Louise Greendale - is found the same way Ronald had been. Louise's girlfriend apparently called the police in hysterics before panic tweeting about the incident. The posts were taken down an hour later. The screenshots of what she'd said trend of Twitter and Tumblr anyway.

This is when the conspiracy theories arrive. Two youtubers dead in two days, both brutally taken apart and missing organs? Some people mock the theorists for it. Who had even said Louise had been killed the same way as Ronald, anyway? That is, until more apparent police reports are leaked revealing the details of Louise's death. The internet goes wild. The Los Angeles police department posts a video begging whoever's causing the leaks to stop, to think about the families of the deceased. All this does is prove that they're true. This video, too, is later taken down.

You log off in disgust. Some people have no fucking shame.

Things heat up the next day, on October 18th, when user rrroadblock, or Aryan Jha, dies as well. The death is covered up for the first few hours afterwards, but eventually is leaked in the same manner as the last two murders. This time, the theorists are no longer labeled as crazy. In fact, everyone's getting in on this mystery now. Three popular youtubers dead now, each found in bloody states in their own homes, three days apart? No one knows what's happening, but that doesn't stop people from guessing. And while you refuse to involve yourself in any of this, you also find yourself wondering who or what - not what, of course it's not a what, that's just ridiculous - who is killing all of these people.

Day four. The internet is silent, waiting. And yes, sure enough, youtuber KrisDoesGAMEZ, or Kris Velvet, is dead.

This time, someone realizes something that makes everyone pause. Each of the dead youtubers are all the ones who were given the free demo of Dawn Station, and are even dying in the order that they played it in. Everyone goes insane. Even you're suspicious - of what, exactly, you don't know, because why would someone murder someone else so brutally over a video game? Despite that, this can't be a coincidence. People place bets on whether youtuber ducksontheroof, or Donna Campbell, is going to be the next one to be found dead. Donna herself makes a statement on her Instagram, expressing disgust at all the people who were spreading such information around. She then deactivated all her socials apart from her YouTube. The people who had been making bets were shamed, and you have to log off yet again. This is getting to be too much.

You stay offline until nearly four pm the next day. Your friend calls you up to give you the news, but you already know what they're going to say. Let me guess, you start, voice flat and tired. Donna Campbell's dead.

They confirm it. You don't know what to say.

Her family put out a statement asking people not to theorize about her death. People do it anyway. Reports state that the remaining five youtubers who had played Dawn Station, along with, surprisingly, Jack Mcloughlin himself, had been taken into police custody. For protection, you assume. Once again, the internet goes insane. This proves their theories about the game connecting all the deaths, and a silent dread and buzz of twisted excitement hangs over everyone. You're just disgusted. People are treating this like some kind of murder mystery game, like this isn't real, actual lives.

Two days pass without news. At the end of the second day, there's yet another leak. Youtubers Doomandgloom - Persephone Henry - and TheSkinnerr - Rodney Pratt - are dead. You're just numb. You're just so fucking numb.

This reveal, of course, inspires yet another debate. If the youtubers had been under police protection, how had they died? Had the police seen anything? Why hadn't the leak said anything about it? Who was killing all these people in so little time, how hadn't they been caught? Had, really, no one seen anything at all?

There are now three youtubers left who'd played the game. Hothothotstanley, or Stanley McIver, visualthursday, or Khia Herrera, and BroAverage, or Chase Brody. You met Stanley McIver, once, at a convention in London three years ago. You have a picture on your memory board of you standing in the convention hall, him with his arm around your shoulder, you with a grin and sparkle in your eye. You can see the picture from your bed. You turn away from it.

However, the next day is a surprise to everyone. A video is uploaded to someone's Twitter - a full, uncensored video of the murder of Stanley McIver inside the government safe house he and the others had seemingly been kept in. The video is immediately taken down and the Twitter deleted, but everyone has seen it. Including you. The video is… horrifying. Of course it is. Why did you watch it? But you do manage to see who it is that killed him. Everyone on the internet does. And this - this video, that's maybe five minutes long - is enough to make everyone go silent.

The killer looks exactly like the Anti from Dawn Station.

No one knows quite what to make of this.

Even less so when Jack Mcloughlin dies the next day.

He's murdered. Same way as all the rest of them, in police custody. Now this is enough to shock everyone into mourning silence. Only a few pricks are left, and their accounts, channels and blogs are swiftly deactivated. Nine deaths in nine days. Nine deaths. Nine. Jack Mcloughlin.

The next day, Khia Herrera - well, you know.

Chase Brody is the last one left alive. You never watched his channel that much - he's really into horror, and is known for his Walking Dead playthrough and his Undertale Genocide run - but you still already feel a strange sense of loss. A sort of emptiness. Something churns in your stomach that you don't understand. There's a lot that you don't understand.

The release of Dawn Station is cancelled.

You spend the night at a friend's house, and just bawl for hours. You shouldn't be so upset, you shouldn't! You never knew any of these people! But fuck, there's something about seeing all these people who you'd been watching online for so long, who have given you so many happy days, so many laughs and inside jokes… just die. How had this happened? Who was it who was doing this?

Your friend sadly suggests it's some sick Jack Mcloughlin hater who decided it'd be fun to cosplay as his newest character and kill people to scare everyone. But while you outwardly agree, you internally know it's not true. Because every time you watch that video, every time you watch Stanley die - and you watch it a lot, just trying to make yourself feel something, even if it's just sick - you can tell the person isn't human. You know that's ridiculous, of course. But there's something about its eyes. Its face. It glances up at the camera and makes eye contact, and grins with too many white, jagged teeth, like an anglerfish. The eye in its throat sees you too. It glows. You shudder every time, watching it shake with glitches and laughter.

You're scared. You feel sick and dizzy and you lock your doors out of fear. You stay inside and open Tumblr, Twitter and Instagram again.

Poor Chase Brody, says the internet. They're already mourning. Already accepted his death. Poor, poor Chase Brody.

You hope he's ok, wherever he is.

[angelsswirl]

Vellichor

The One With Maya's Confession

Notes: If I don't write Vellichor chapters on slap happy whims at 3 am then who am i? Back to Jisoo next chapter! Only 4 (?) more chapters left in this series.😱 Also no one said anything so I assume we like the new format.

Rating: T+

Word Cnt: 1.5k

"They said, 'All teenagers scare the livin' shit out of me'. They could care less as long as someone'll bleed."

Lia eyed Maya oddly, she was letting Lia win at Mario Kart and she never let Lia win at Mario Kart. It was a sort of unspoken agreement they had. Maya won Mario Kart games on the Switch and Lia won FIFA games on the Playstation. It was the only way they could justify purchasing both high-end consoles.

If you asked Lia, she'd tell you that her and Maya had been forced into friendship almost like some sort of medieval betrothal. Their parents were best friends (though that was kind of hard to tell with the way Jisoo and Irene talked to each other) and they were the firsts born, so in their minds it was only natural that their offspring be besties too.

And sure, 19 years later it had worked out for the better. They really were best friends. They told each other everything (within reason).

When Lia had lost her virginity to the Cheerleading captain her junior year, she had practically called Maya before it was even actually over.

And when Maya had gotten peer-pressured by Ryland and Jesse to go to her first house party, then proceeded to get drunk like there was no tomorrow, she called Lia to come pick her up in fear that her mother would definitely murder her. Okay, she called Lia to come get Ryland and Jesse too, but it was mainly about her!

So, Lia knew that look on Maya's face. That look that said I have something I desperately need to get off my chest. That look that said listen and don't comment when I'm done. And it was serving to irritate her that Maya was holding out on her for so long.

"Just say it." Lia murmured just as a blue shell upended her go-kart.

Maya pursed her lips. She listened for their parents. Jisoo and Irene were busy in the bathroom of Lia's and Maya's apartment attempting to fix something they definitely did not know how to fix. She heard Irene curse and knew they would be in there for at least 45 more minutes.

"Hey uh, would you be mad if I slept with your sister?" Maya mumbled, she scratched at her chin awkwardly.

"No, but Taylor would probably beat your ass. And I'd just watch because you'd deserve it and it would be funny." Lia audibly giggled as she imagined the sight.

"...Not Ryland."

Lia's go-kart slowly came to a stop on the screen. And suddenly, Maya was winning again as she desperately pressed accelerate as if she would be able to physically drive away from this conversation.

Lia turned her head toward Maya slowly, "Peyton? My baby sister? My kid fucking sister, Peyton Kim? Who is a baby and a child and evil and younger than you? And - and a kid? That Peyton?! My baby sister?!" 

Both of them are losing at Mario Kart now.

"She's only a year younger than me. She turns 18 literally next week! Why are you so mad?" Maya claimed exasperated.

If Lia knew Maya's "We Need to Talk" look, then Maya definitely knew Lia's "Take a Five Second Headstart" look.

Maya stupidly doesn't take her headstart.

She isn't exactly surprised when Lia tackles her to the carpeted floor. She is surprised by her urge to fight back. She had never really been a fighter, but this feels different. This feels like she's fighting for her omega, which is stupid and out of left field and Peyton isn't even her omega, but she just can't help herself when her fist flies in the direction of Lia's temple.

It missed of course. Like she said, she's never been much of a fighter.

"Maya." Her mother's growl is enough to get her to stop squirming underneath Lia. She mewled and cowered a fair bit. She may be an adult but her mother's growl was literally never not going to terrify her.

Jisoo does the same thing to Lia, but she's just so mad and pent up and everything seems to be falling apart around her that she completely disregarded it.

Jisoo had to more or less put her in a headlock and yank her away from Maya to get her to relax.

"What the hell are you two fighting about?" Jisoo asked as she put Lia on the couch.

"Yeah, Maya what are we fighting about?"

"..."

"That's what I thought." Lia shook her head. She shrugged her mother off of her and hurried out of the front door.

Lia drove around for what felt like a good two hours before coming to a stop in front of a semi-familiar house.

She walked to the front door and knocked hesitantly.

Wendy opened the door with a surprised smile, "Oh, hey Lia. What are you doing here?"

What a great question.

"I-I-I don't know?"

Wendy's eyebrows furrow before she steps to the side. Inviting Lia in silently. Lia doesn't know how to express her gratitude without saying it.

Even though she should be, considering how often he does it at games and practice, she isn't expecting for the small ball of pent up boy energy to come flying at her legs in an attempt at a hug.

"Uh, hey kid." Lia patted him on the back awkwardly. Luckily, he doesn't seem to sense anything is off.

"Do you want anything to drink?" Wendy asked. And Lia could only blink in answer. Wendy was so nice and pretty and considerate and gorgeous. And Lia isn't sure what she ever could have done to deserve to bask in this woman's presence.

"Um, a glass of water would be nice." And Lia didn't plan on drinking it, but she didn't want to be rude. Wendy nodded and gestured for her to sit on the couch in the meantime. And Lia did without question.

Immediately, Kyle seemed to be bored with her presence and went back to doing whatever it was kids his age do when their parents aren't looking.

Wendy handed a glass of water to Lia and sat next to her on the couch.

"Do you want to talk?"

Lia counted the number of ice cubes in her glass exactly six times before speaking.

"I think my life is falling apart." Lia said, counting the ice cubes once more.

Wendy raised an eyebrow at the statement, "How so?"

"Oh. Easy! For starters, my parents haven't spoken to each other in a week and a half. My career was ripped away from me. And I think I just lost my best friend. Somehow, I can't help but feel like it's all my fault." Yes, she originally wasn't going to drink any of the water, but now she feels like she needs to down a few gulps after that revelation.

"Well, those first two things I can almost guarantee aren't your fault. Your parents problems are not yours. And by the way you've talked about them before, I think they'll be alright. Eventually. Also, you had no way of knowing you were going to get sick. Now as far as the last one, I'm going to need more information to explain it away."

"She slept with my sister and like any great alpha big sister, I attempted to kill her."

Lia frowned as Wendy started to laugh hysterically.

"Please don't laugh after I call myself a great alpha."

Wendy swiped at a stray tear, "Sorry but that's hilarious. You got mad at your best friend for sleeping with your sister? The sister who you said yourself has had a crush on said friend since she could walk? You're mad about the inevitable?"

"But-but she's my baby sister!"

"She's not your baby sister. She's your younger sister. Who is pretty much an adult and can make decisions for herself."

"But-"

"No. You've known both of them your entire life. You know that if they decide to date that your sister will be fine. And if something goes wrong, which I'm sure it won't. Maya definitely knows now that Peyton has an older sister that is willing to go to jail to protect her. On that note, I'm sure Ryland's mate knows that too."

"So, what you're saying is that one was my fault?"

Wendy rolled her eyes, "That's not the only thing, but sure."

Lia's nose scrunched up.

"What's this really about, Lia?"

"...I just feel like things are moving without me. Like I've got very little control over what's happening to me."

"That's not true. I'm sure you have the best control. Over a bunch of things that are meant to be controlled by you."

"You're just being nice."

"Maybe. But I'm also right. In fact, I'll prove it to you. Kyle has a boy scout meeting soon. You should stay over."

Lia thinks her throat just closed up. Despite, the fact that she cannot breathe, she manages to push out a response without any hesitation.

"Okay."

[seamistan]

if it is not selfish of me to ask, i would like pregnancy headcanons and also parenting headcanons bc i’m SCREAMING 🥺

SO this took about 2/3 days to think and plan out and I even got really excited and even did research efjknefjkfsdnkbsdf

this ended up being more about the actual pregnancy BUT I will totally write more specific to Parents!seamista if anyone wanted me to  🥺

(Putting this under a read more because it’s long as hell snfldfnk)

Okay so from where I last left off in this post, Salineas is now expecting an unexpected heir! 

At this point, It’s like I wanna say around ~2/3ish months into everything since I assume she would have found out at around 5 weeks, so they’re at the very end of the first trimester (12 weeks) anyway, Mermista is still nauseous as all hell but for whatever reason I don’t think she’s not going into full vomiting territory and again, big suffering. However, at this point Sea Hawk has taken a leave from adventuring to be there with his girl to support her in whatever she needs- including helping out with some royal duties. Now normally, Mermista would never ever trust him with this level of responsibility but at certain points she just feels so shitty and tired there is literally no other choice but to give the responsibility to someone who’s not her. So sometimes Sea Hawk settles some disputes between citizens and opens a few rebuilt buildings, and attends princess council meetings with Mermista on the other side of one of bow’s tablets. (unrelated, but I found out that the theorized cause of morning sickness would be the body’s reaction to Hcg and since Sea Hawk is (assumed) fully etherian and mermista is like, not I would think she’d have a more adverse reaction to it asjdbjaddansd but again, she’s not like violently throwing up -I think because of her connection to her runestone protecting her from it being as bad as it could be)  

Also, Mermista gets real bad mood swings early into the whole endeavor (they eventually go away when the nausea does). Poor Sea Hawk even temporarily stops singing shanties to keep her spirits from dampening. Upon realizing that she made him stop singing she bursts into tears, only to later be soothed by a shanty about how lovely her hair is. Go Figure. To cope with the mood swings, Sea Hawk suggests she pick up knitting again since she loved it so much whenever she first tried it. She’d dropped it whenever the war with Horde prime began since it was so hard to find yarn and to care about generally anything else other than the impending doom. So, mermista picks up knitting again, and holy shit,,, she loves it. Something about just checking out for a while and just concentrating on every stitch and being able to make something beautiful is just. everything she wanted. So throughout the entire 9 months she’s just dropping off random baby blankets, clothes, socks, even a little knitted Sea-Ra doll and a knit Dragon’s Daughter replica into the basket she keeps next to their bed. She even attempts to knit Sea Hawk a bandanna for shits and giggles but he ends up loving it and wears it around Salineas despite the sweltering heat of the summer. Towards the end of it, she gets really complex and knits some beautiful little sweaters that whenever Sea Hawk shows them off to everyone (swift wind and bow) they kind of shyly ask if they can have one. And that’s how the Best Friend squad ends up with matching sweaters.

So in my last post I kinda just said that the doctors/midwife/etc equivalent was the sorcerers on Mystacor and you know what? I stand by that lmao. Anyway so either they have to go up to Mystacor every week or they have a sorcerer come to live in Salineas for the whole pregnancy, either way they use ~magic~ to basically do an ultrasound (again, I literally cannot decide if there’s doctors on etheria??? I don’t know but this is what I’m going with) So anyway. Both of them collectively lose their minds and completely ugly cry whenever they both see the child ™  for the first time, but then evemtually Mermista kinda accepts it and is (mostly) okay whenever they see the baby, but Sea Hawk cries every. Single. Time. It kinda drives Mermista a little mad but it’s so sweet that she can’t get actually upset.  After all, these appointments and all the little things they do to prepare are what he has to really remember they’re bringing a whole new little life onto Etheria. 

 Something neither of them really expected is the fact that Mermista gets horrible pregnancy brain around 5 months and from then on. It’s never really super debilitating, but for her, and her usual sharp wit and ability to see whatever’s coming next, it gets real annoying real fast. It’s mostly just her forgetting little stuff, like her next appointment with the sorcerer, or when there’s a meeting scheduled, or whenever she has plans with her friends. The worst of it was when it completely slipped her mind that she had a major meeting with the rebuild salineas group and she had to the next week pretending she knew what was going on with all of that. She eventually figures it out, and she and Sea Hawk end up forming a system- the system being that Sea Hawk is with her during all meetings, appointments and important conversation, and he reminds all of the staff when she has a major appointment. However, she still has trouble concentrating and remembering stuff like where she left her trident (next to the bed) and where her earrings went (Sea Hawk actually took those)

Around 7 or 8 months in the princesses (mostly Glimmer’s idea)  throw her a surprise baby shower to not only congratulate her on the baby but to also for the work she had been doing to rebuild and maintain Salineas. They receive so many lovely gifts, but none as lovely as the gift from Sea Hawk himself- He commissioned an absolutely lovely crib decorated with pearls, shells and sea glass and painted with all of Mermista’s favorite Sea Flowers, and little boats with mermaids swimming next to them. And In the middle, in first ones’ writing it read simply “Adventure”. Upon seeing it, Mermista cried for about 20 minutes. and then got upset with him for keeping the shower a secret, realized how sweet it was; then cried again. 

Well into her second trimester, and close to the third, Mermista is still on her feet after recovering from the initial nausea of it all and running around to meetings, appointments, and all over the kingdom. Sea Hawk, while he had been trying his best not to be over-protective of her due to her condition, really couldn’t ignore when Mermista collapses on the way to Sea Elf village. When he discovers so and confronts her about it, she confesses that she knows she had been absolutely overdoing it for weeks now, but really really wanted to prove that she could still do all of her princess duties. Not really for anyone else, the war had pretty much proved to everyone how capable she is, but  mostly for herself. Sea Hawk has a long talk with her that he hopes she knows how capable she is, how brave and wonderful and a fantastic leader she has been; but taking care of herself and their child has to come first. Grudgingly, Mermista tells him she had a hard time admitting to herself overdoing it for her meant overdoing it for both of them. They agree that Sea Hawk would become her proxy once again.

Whenever she has to deliver, Sea Hawk is the picture of support. No shanties, drama or anything but pure warmth and empathy. He’s stoic and calm and attentive to everything going on. Mermista actually ends up being the one in (mild) hysterics suddenly completely realizing again that she’s going to be a mother and crying and freaking out about it. It takes Sea Hawk looking sternly into her eyes and reminding her that she’s literally the coolest and most wonderful person ever and also is the great and mighty Sea-Ra. Nothing could keep her absolutely being fantastic at this too. Wasn’t this the most epic adventure they’d ever go on? 

and here’s some one sentence hc’s I couldn’t figure out how to fit in here sdjkjksdn;

-They don’t find out the sex beforehand they want to be surprised

- Whenever Mermista goes into her knitting habit, Sea Hawk picks up sewing again, as he had when he was younger and sews toys and clothing for the little one, while Mermista knits. between the two of them, the baby’s wardrobe is almost completely handmade. 

- When the due date gets close, Sea Hawk is literally walking on air. Cheery, excited absolutely lovestruck and exhilirated to be so close to being a father. 

- In the delivery room, before her freak out, she quietly asks sea hawk if he could tell her some stories of his escapades to distract her whenever the pain gets to be too much to bear. He obliges, and recalls their first time meeting, their first battle together, and loads of other sweet stories that almost drive her to tears again (god, she’s so excited to not cry every 2 minutes)

- Spinnerella and Netossa, and even Micah give their baby some hand me down toys and clothing. It’s the sweetest gesture. 

safbjkbsdfkbjsdf this is so long if you read all the way down here thank you so much 

[thoughtfullyyoungduck]

Walk in the woods

Summary: Richie and Eddie take a walk in the woods 

A/n: this is mostly just fluff, let me know what you think!

warnings: a sex joke Richie’s makes 

A twig snaps under Richie’s boot, the only audible sound in the otherwise eerily silent woods. Eddie’s been trailing him for a while now, yet he manages to avoid any crunch or chomp that could possibly disturb the peace.  

The sun burns merciless on Richie’s back, sweat dripping down his body in a disgusting amount and turning his shirt soggy and clam. He tries to slow his breathing down to a respectable speed for the distance they’ve persevered, but he rasps and splutters despite his attempts. A chuckle rises from behind him, followed by a hand to steer Richie up the small hill next on their obstacle course.

‘Come on old man, out of breath already?’ Eddie asks, the smirk on his face clear from the tone of his voice.

‘No,’ Richie lies, pushing through the muscle cramps that tingle up his legs and gaining momentum thanks to Eddie’s encouragement.

Once he sets foot on the even platform of the hill, he cries out victoriously at the picknick bench that looks highly attractive to Richie’s body and mind alike.

Eddie shoves him a bit further up. ‘Dude, at least take one more step so I can rest too.’

Richie laughs, facing Eddie and surrendering his hands, a teeth showing smile plastered on his face and bending down to fit his lips against Eddie’s softer once.

The kiss is slow, languid and everything Richie and Eddie’s personality is not, and Richie loses his mind every single time they do this. The second their lips attach Richie’s entire being still, in a way it never is and Richie assumed it could never be. His colleagues say it’s their honeymoon faze, but Richie disagrees. He’s waited for Eddie for so long, he doesn’t think he’ll ever stop being this grateful to have him.

He pokes his tongue out slightly, fishing to take the kiss a step further, but Eddie intercepts and detaches. In a way, it’s a good thing, if the tongue makes an appearance, they’re occupied for a long time.

‘You reek’, Eddie complains, scrunching his nose up like a toddler, the edges of his limps trembling in effort of not smiling.

‘You smell like sunscreen’, Richie hits back, his hand pinching Eddie’s left cheek. ‘It’s cute.’

‘It’s not cute’, Eddie says in his best rendition of Richie failing horribly, while slapping Richie hand away. ‘It’s to be safe. Sunscreen can prevent Basel cell carcinoma A.K.A cancer from forming, and that’s something I would like to avoid.’

Richie laughs heartily, relenting on the cheek pinching and sliding his hands down Eddie’s arms to link their hands together.

‘Break time?’ Richie pleads leading them to the bench so he can catch his breath. The kissing hasn’t done him any good, and if he has to walk another ten minutes he might pass out.

‘Fine, lazy ass. Five minutes, then we leave.’

Richie cheers with his arm held up, walking towards the seat with more vigor than he walked the entire way here.

‘Eds, I’m hurt. We can’t all be living work out machines.’ Richie argues, praying for a light breeze to blow and cool him down.

‘I sport once a week Rich. Don’t overreact.’

‘Me? Never. I’ll leave that up to your mom.’

He catches the goody bag Eddie dragged with him a tad before it hits his face, guffawing. In the bag are two plastic water bottles, and an apple, brought along with the sole purpose if either of them pass out, the glucose will amp the blood sugar, according to Eddie.

Richie tosses a water bottle to Eddie and takes one out for himself, slurping three fourth down in one gulp.

‘Richie’, Eddie warns, ‘If you drink it all you won’t have any left for later’, so Richie conserves the rest for a future time. Tilting his head towards the sun, Richie squeezes his eyes shut and fidgets with his fingers on the table, tapping out a song stuck in his head for the past few days.

The walk is Eddie’s idea of quality time, a sort of date to explore they neighborhood they moved into, and Richie jumped on the opportunity to see Eddie in a small short, without considering that he himself had to hike as well.

‘My face is melting off’, Richie complains, burying his head between his arms to hide in the shade, miscalculating how hot it would be.

‘It is hot,’ Eddie agrees, observing Richie and his struggles with an affectionate pat on the arms. The sunscreen is applied in such a think layer that Richie can scent it from a far away distance, but it honestly adds to Eddie’s charm.

The sunscreen gives him a blast from the past, Richie and Eddie in the quarry in the middle of summer attacking each other with sunscreen sprays, because Eddie’s smart and knew Richie would never apply it if he didn’t trick him into it.

‘hey’, Eddie says out of nowhere, ‘I love you’, Eddie confides, his posture open and accepting of touch, not bothered in the slightest by the sweat soaked man in front of him, which proves his love to him more than any words ever could.  

Richie gazes up at Eddie with love struck eyes behind his thick, coke bottled glasses, littered with finger prints and dust particles that by Eddie’s standpoint make it impossible to see through. It may be the glasses, but Eddie swears tears are forming before Richie blinks them away.

‘Oh Eds, I love my spaghetti too.’

‘And the moment is broken’, Eddie deadpans, scanning the woods for any sign of anyone else hiking the trail.

‘We’re all alone Eds. What do you say, you wanna christen this place to be ours? Like those couples in the wrong turn movies do? Right before they’re killed off by hillbilly’s.’

‘Shut the fuck up Richie. Are you trying to inspire Pennywise to kill us in another way?’ Dramatically, Richie flings himself across the table his long spider limbs seizing Eddie around his shoulder and head and swaying them back and forth.

‘Why how dare you accuse me of something so vile? that's a load of old codswallop, Knackered or not, I will defend your honor my good fellow.’ Richie says in a British accent that is very much improved from the days when he used it as a child, but sounds very chocked now.  

‘Alright, I believe you, now get off of me.’ Eddie swats him away, sinking back in his seat. It’s a sneer he should have refrained from making, Richie is still pretty agitated about what happened in the sewer now more than two years ago.

Eddie’s guilt swallows him whole, his concern growing stronger and stronger each passing moment Richie is without speech. He keeps his head down and stares at the floor, seemingly processing Eddie’s words, but then his head tilts up and he smirks .

Eddie is too late to see why the smirk is there, and he gets blasted in the face with a stream of water, part of it in his mouth, and part dripping down his hair. Richie laughs hysterically, too loud for the tranquil space they’re in.

‘Basterd,’ Eddie swears, diving in for his own bottle and streaming his, way fuller, water all over his boyfriend and his clothes.

‘Hey, no fair, all my water is gone.’

Eddie flips him the bird roughly, continuing to hose Richie down with a large beam on his face. When his water bottle empties, Eddie tosses it back in his carry-on, tired but satisfied with how the walk has gone.

‘You ready to go again old man?’ Eddie only process his words when they’ve already left him, and by then it’s too late.

‘I’m always ready to go again with you Eddie Spagheddie.’

‘Don’t fucking call me that. Let’s go.’

Richie nods, chuckling, stretching to prepare and hissing as his bones crack. He smiles angelic, Eddie whipping around to stare at him at the sound. ‘Nothing happened.’

Eddie rolls his eyes but doesn’t comment anything, a small favor he’ll be sure to cash in later.

‘You know Eds, I really like his.’ Richie slots their hands together, swinging their hands wildly in between them.  

‘Oh so you’re saying you wanna do this again?’

‘I wouldn’t push it Eds.’

[kittinoir]

Phantoms Ch. 5

Read on Ao3 here

‘Dreading’ might have been too strong a word, but suffice it to say Ladybug was not looking forward to the meeting she had five minutes to get to at the top of Montparnasse tower. The meeting she had set up.

But she and Chat Noir had set up sparring times with the whole team, and there was no avoiding it. Besides, Luka deserved better than that.

It wasn’t like they would be alone; Queen Bee and Felix - or, ‘Koira’, as he called himself behind the mask of the dog Miraculous - would be there as well, but she couldn’t quite bring herself to count on them for support.

But Luka wouldn’t make her grovel, Ladybug reminded herself as she finally unslung her yoyo and struck out for the nearest building. Though if she was being honest, that was what made it so hard. He’d never held her feelings against her, even when she’d been lying to both of them about the truth of them. He’d only ever encouraged her to be true to her heart. He hadn’t even seemed surprised really when she hadn’t been able to commit to a relationship with him.

No, he wouldn’t blame her. 

But she knew she would still be hurting him. And he deserved the truth - all of it - after he’d been so patient and generous with her.

As luck would have it, she was the last one to arrive. Viperion and Koira were already sparring. Queen Bee was leaning against the beam of one of the billboards, examining her fingers as though she could see her nails through the fabric of her suit.

“Finally,” Queen Bee said, straightening. “Some of us have appointments to keep, Ladybug.”

“Sorry to keep you waiting, your highness,” Ladybug shot back, but she knew the rebuke was deserved. Showing up late might be a tried and true tactic to avoiding awkward conversations, but it did have its drawbacks. 

“Not yet, but you will be,” Queen Bee promised, releasing her yoyo. “I’ve been practicing.”

Later. She would talk to Luka later. But she would talk to him, tonight. She might not be able to pursue Adrien, but she wouldn’t leave any loose ends. Just because she couldn’t be happy didn’t mean no one else could be.

“Show me what you got,” Ladybug challenged with a grin. She immediately went on the offensive, but Queen Bee quickly dodged before launching an attack of her own. Before she knew it, Ladybug was giving ground. Queen Bee had been practicing. Ladybug had been expecting a direct approach, but she was agile instead, finding openings in her guards she hadn’t realized were there. 

“You have been busy,”  Ladybug admitted as Queen Bee landed another hit that would have left a bruise had it not been the Miraculous. 

“You, too,” Queen bee grunted, lunging. “Unless you were late on purpose…?”

Ladybug stumbled. “How did you…?”

Queen Bee flashed a triumphant smile; she’d only been guessing. But she’d been right.

“I see more than people think I do,” Queen Bee said by way of explanation as she dodge a kick. “How else do you think I manage to push so many buttons. People don’t just leave their insecurities on the surface, you know.”

Ladybug pursed her lips but didn’t say anything. She wasn’t going to take the bait a second time. 

“Come on,” Queen Bee said as she blocked another of Ladybug’s attacks. “I know we haven’t been the best of friends. Or friends at all. But seriously, we’re on the same team now. I know I can’t prove it, but I’m a different person now. You can trust me.”

Ladybug couldn’t help it - she laughed. Of course Chloé would think it was about her. Some things stayed the same no matter what, she guessed. But she did trust Chloé, even if the other girl didn’t know it. 

“It’s not you,” Ladybug murmured, rolling through another attack. 

“Oh.” The flicker of hurt in Queen Bee’s eyes faded. “Is it Fe- Koira? He’s not that bad, once you get to know him.”

Ok, she was not doing this. Not with Chloé. And not with Luka less than ten feet away.

“And have you been getting to know him?” Ladybug teased.

“You didn’t think I got this good just by practicing with Hawk Moth’s rabble, did you?” Queen Bee countered with a grin.

‘Hawk Moth’s Rabble’ of course meaning the absolutely horrifying senti-monsters’ and only slightly less terrifying akuma’s that had been popping up almost twice a day for a week now and giving them all nightmares. Still, she wasn’t wrong: Queen Bee had been more or less trouncing them. By the time she’d been arriving, Ladybug had had little else to do other than purify the butterfly or the akuma. She couldn’t help but be proud of Chloé’s progress, but she saw some of Chat Noir’s recklessness in her. Part of her suspected Queen Bee was attempting to make up for past sins. She just wished there was some way to tell her the debt was more than paid - and that Chloé was the kind of person that would accept help.

“Don’t tell me he’s been coming here every night to train with you,” Ladybug said, blocking another attack.

“Not every night,” Queen Bee said with a kick. “Just…a few times a week.”

“He comes to Paris a few times a week?”

“Max helps out with the travel sometimes,” Queen Bee explained. “And the Astro Hound upgrade helps the rest of the time.”

“Those ingredients aren’t exactly easy to come by, you know,” Ladybug couldn’t help but remark, although in truth they’d been easier to come by than ever since the team had formed. Tears of happiness abounded at their team meetings; they now had a nearly endless supply, weirdly but none-the-less stored at the Grand Palais in a private fridge that featured a lock only Chloé had the key to.

“It’s not like we’re just hanging out,” Queen Bee protested as she landed a hit, then another. “But if you really think it’s a problem, we’ll stop.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Ladybug said. “It’s just…an adjustment. A little notice would have been nice. But it’s definitely worth it; you’ve improved a lot.”

“That’s quite a compliment, coming from you,” Queen Bee panted, flashing an almost-smile.

And that was quite a compliment, coming from the daughter of the mayor. 

“So it’s Luke, then.”

Ladybug stumbled, but thankfully, Koira and Viperion didn’t stop their sparring. 

“Luka,” Ladybug corrected quietly. And then she gave up altogether. “Yes.”

“You’re avoiding him?” Queen Bee said, her nose wrinkling. “Why? He’s like, the nicest person on the whole team, and you gave a Miraculous to Rose. Has he even been akumatized?”

“Yes,” Ladybug snapped, going back on the offense. He’d almost won, too. Or at least made her sweat. And the things he’d said …

“It’s not like Ladybug to avoid unpleasant things,” Queen Bee said when she didn’t elaborate.

“It’s not like Queen Bee to care so much,” Ladybug shot back. She instantly regretted it, but Queen Bee seemed to let the barb roll right off her.

“You’ve got this,” Queen Bee said quietly, almost as though she didn’t want anyone else to hear her being nice. “Whatever it is…well, I don’t know him very well, but you’ll handle it like you’ve been handling Hawk Moth for the past two years.”

Poorly?” Ladybug couldn’t help but say sardonically. 

“Fearlessly,” Queen Bee countered. “Now enough of your wallowing - go deal with this!”

And just like that, Queen Bee stepped aside, sending Ladybug careening towards Koira and Viperion. It was only her Miraculous-honed reflexes that kept her from crashing into Adrien’s moody cousin. 

“Time for patrol,” Queen Bee chirped, snugging her yoyo around her waist. “Coming, Koira?”

“You weren’t as horrible as you usually are,” was all Koira said to Queen Bee by way of greeting. He tipped his head to Ladybug as he passed, eyes glittering behind the grey mask. No matter what facade he wore, his eyes always gave him away. Adrien didn’t have a calculating bone in his body.

Ladybug gave him a curt nod back, not sure where she stood with him. On the one hand, Felix had helped them, and done so when he hadn’t had to. On the other hand, he’d manipulated her and drawn out Adrien’s suffering in the wake of her disappearance much longer than he’d had to. Suffering she had caused. She supposed she couldn’t blame him too much.

“You looked good,” Ladybug said as Koira and Queen Bee leapt from the roof. “Not that I was looking. I mean, you were good. Your fighting’s improved. Not that it was bad, of course, I just - ”

“I get it.”

The awkward torrent in Ladybug’s head instantly dried up. “You…get it?”

Viperion nodded, a soft, if sad, smile on his lips. “I get it. This thing between you and… well. It’s the kind of thing people write songs about. I could always see it, I just didn’t realize it was so…epic.”

Ladybug swallowed a hysterical laugh. Epic tragedy, maybe. 

“I’m sorry,” Ladybug offered. “For using you like that.”

“You never used me,” Viperion said, his grin widening in what she could only assume was amusement. “You only did what I asked you to do. I can’t be mad that you didn’t choose me in the end, though I won’t pretend I’m not disappointed.” He frowned. “I hope you weren’t waiting to clear the air with me before…”

Ladybug blushed as she caught his meaning. “No! No. I mean, I did want to clear the air with you, but that’s not…it’s complicated.”

“It doesn’t seem very complicated from where I’m standing,” Viperion said. “You deserve to be happy, too, you know. We both do.”

“I don’t think happiness is in my future,” Ladybug admitted. She’d never told anyone abut the future she’d adverted, about the piercing blue eyes that haunted her, but Viperion was tilting his head in that familiar way, and the truth came tumbling out - a least, a version of it. “If I act on my feelings, it will lead to the destruction of Paris - of the entire world.”

Viperion laughed. “You don’t really - ”

“I’ve seen it,” Ladybug insisted, squeezing her eyes shut as her fingers curled into fists. Visions of that horrible day flashed behind her eyelids and she opened her eyes again just so she wouldn’t have to see them. As though seeing them almost every night wasn’t enough. “I’ve seen it. I’ve stopped it.”

Viperion’s eyes suddenly widened with understanding. “It has to do with a Miraculous, doesn’t it?”

Ladybug nodded, unable to trust her voice and unsure of what else she might say.

“But you’ve already changed the future, haven’t you?” Viperion said as he laid a hand on her shoulder. “You fixed it. The future is different now.”

“The love Adrien and I share will destroy the world,” Ladybug said, unable to meet his eyes. “That’s what he said. If I do this, I’ll only have delayed the outcome.”

“Ladybug, I - ”

“It’s fine,” Ladybug said, straightening and stepping out from under Viperion’s hand. “I didn’t come here to complain. I came to…to…”

Viperion quirked an eyebrow. “Clear the air?”

“Yes,” Ladybug said, “To clear the air. Don’t worry about the rest of it. I’m sure it’ll all work out.”

“Me, too,” Viperion said, but his conviction didn’t meet his eyes. 

“Great job today,” Ladybug said, backing up. “And good luck on patrol tomorrow. You know how to reach me.”

Ladybug loosed her yoyo and prepared to head for home, but Viperion’s voice stopped her one more time.

“Does he know?” 

Ladybug paused, one foot on the ledge of the roof. “No.”

“You should tell him.”

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

Ladybug suppressed a shudder. “Because if he knows, he’ll try to convince me we can avert it. And if he does that… I’ll let him.”

[razorblade180]

Twin Snowflakes pt 20: Choice Words

“All right everybody, I wanna see some hustle!” Harriet shouted at her students playing basketball. She blew her whistle loudly to get them going for the fourth time. Veronica had learned after the first blow to really dial back her senses if she wanted to avoid ringing in her ears. “Your coach really loves that thing.” Veronica looked down from the bleachers to see Summer stretching on the floor. To no surprise, the girl was pretty flexible, able to get her chest to the floor with her legs spread out into a v-shape. “Make sure to really get around your hips, knees, and lower back. I could tell your body was tight the day I took your measurements.”

Summer looked at the girl annoyed. “I don’t need a peanut gallery. I know how to stretch.” She stood and bent over backwards slowly. The sight of Veronica glaring at her made Summer turn the other way. She wasn’t expecting Valerie to be checking her out. “What the- how long have you been here!?” Valerie started stretching out both arms and wrists. “Well I would’ve been here sooner if I wasn’t waiting for you outside the locker room. You hate going in by your…” Valerie’s attention shifted up towards the bleachers where Veronica sat. “Self… What the hell are you doing here? Come to start trouble?” Valerie cracked her knuckle.

Veronica gave the longest eye roll of her life. “Please don’t make me embarrass you in front of a crowd.” A threat that prompted Summer to point at her while nudging Valerie away in vain. It had been two seconds and Summer was already playing babysitter. She was gonna nip this in the bud right now to avoid an oncoming headache. “No, stop talking to each other. Just shut up. Veronica you’re already on thin ice so don’t antagonize people unless you want actual problems to occur that will involve you being kicked out” Veronica’s attitude got a bit more bored and vexed. “Yeah yeah….” She groaned, annoyed by her situation. “Hard to stay quiet when a loud mouth is just begging to be put in their place.” Summer closed her eyes. Why’d she have to say something like? Valerie moves right past Summer. She wasn’t gonna let that slide. “By all means, what am I asking for?” Her tone was ripe with anger.

Veronica stood up and walked down to get right in the taller girl’s face. “Valerie, you are absolutely stupid. Childish in its purest form; a girl so self absorbed in the opinions of others yet utterly blind to that fact to the point it’s crippling. And for what? Ego? Some distorted sense of pride? It’s pathetic and insulting. I don’t understand why Nicholas is in love with a person like you.” Valerie’s hand swiftly rose half way up to Veronica’s face before Veronica grabbed her wrist. “Don’t ask for something then get made when you can’t handle it. Don’t get triggered by my mention of him if he’s nothing more than a friend. I would think you’d be desperate for him to look at someone that isn’t you.”

“I’d never want that person to be as cold and cruel as you.” Valerie bit back, harshly. “You’re the definition of self absorbed and ego. I can’t even name one time you’ve considered other’s feelings when it didn’t benefit you; besides Nick obviously. You treat Summer like shit.” Summer scrunched her face up as if she had just been called to the front of the class. Why did she have to be the example? Yes, Veronica walked all over and nothing about it ever felt nice, but she didn’t want to be a point of tension. Not right now at least. Veronica burrowed her eyes into her very soul, expecting an answer. “Well? Just gonna let this copper top speak for you?”

Copper top, now Summer knew Veronica was pissed. She wasn’t the person to insult appearance. “I mean you are pretty terrible. That’s putting it mildly. It’s like you always have a thorn stuck in your side, or itching to fight.” Valerie crossed her arms. “Behind that pretty face isn’t anything to brag about. Not even a brain from what I can tell; don’t act like you know. If someone has to watch you so badly then go hassle Nick instead of us. He has patience for it.” Veronica was at a loss for words. She couldn’t help but let out the tiniest chuckle. “Do you not know? Nick didn’t tell you?” Valerie looked at Summer puzzled. “Nick isn’t here Valerie. He’s been sick in bed since the fight yesterday.” Valerie’s face only got more shocked. “Wait, did you know about the fight?” Valerie shook her head. “Nick was in a fight yesterday!? I saw him right before I had to change. We-” Valerie’s words got stuck in her throat. She told Nick that she wanted space, to leave her alone. Did that upset him? No, he’s not the type to lash out. Nick didn’t tell her to honor her request. That idiot! Valerie bit her lip in frustration. She looked at the two girls in front of her. Summer looked concerned while Veronica was enjoying Valerie’s shocked expression. “Gee, it’s shocking Nick didn’t tell you. Can’t imagine why. Well, no I can. What was I saying about pride and being childish? Not sure of what you did but I bet it involves those two things.” Valerie had finally reached her limit with Veronica.”Fuck-”

“Well well well, look what the cat dragged in.”Jordan called out, annoyed by the sight of all three girls. She walked past them with disgust in her eyes and a group of girls in cheerleading uniforms behind her. Suddenly the argument taking place seemed secondary. “Was that attempt at being funny, or racist?” Veronica had to know.”Whatever one you want, fleabag.” That one was easier to figure out. Unlike with Valerie, Veronica did nothing but take a deep breath. Summer had other ideas. “Wanna try saying that for the whole class to hear!?” She shouted with ease. Harriet immediately caught wind of the forming chaos and blew her whistle. “Jordan, hurry up and get your butt over here before I make the cheer team do drills until you can backflip in their sleep!” Jordan picked up the pace.”Fine, nothing of value over here anyways..” she mumbled.

“That takes care of her!” Summer slouched. That plan actually worked! She raised her voice to someone and they didn’t get the chance to do the same. It would’ve been a proud moment if Veronica wasn’t looking at her like she had been the racist. “What? I’m paying you back for yesterday is all. Why are you upset!?” Veronica flicked Summer in the forehead. “Stop assuming. You caught me off guard is all. That bitch is a cheerleader? She definitely has the attitude.” Valerie did her best to hold her tongue on that statement. “Jordan is the leader of the team. Nobody performs as good as her,unfortunately. That alone inflates her ego.” Veronica carefully watched the group of girls get in formation and start doing their routine; specifically watching the way Jordan jumped into a split after doing a handspring. Was that really it? Her posture was good but that landing was far too heavy. She was gonna injure her ankle if she wasn’t careful. Veronica could do way better. In fact….”Hey?” She called out to Summer and Valerie with petty intent. “Want me to deflate her a little?”

xxxx

“Jordan hurt her ankle?” Nick said, clearing space in the messy guest room. “And now you’re taking her spot for the tournament?” Veronica snickered freely. I told her not to attempt an aerial after a back handspring that followed a cartwheel, but she had to prove she was better. Too bad she didn’t have anything to help with balance.” The happy wave of her tail picked up a deck of cards. Veronica opened the box and started shuffling just for the hell of it. This always calmed her mind for some reason. It was a perfect eye graber, displaying how nimble her fingers were and skill in sleight of hand. “So yeah, productive day. Valerie and argued for a moment. Sorry.” Nick nodded, “Nobody threw a punch. I’ll take what I can get.’ He reached for a single card and pulled a joker. The trickster looked like a hysterical skeleton with a sword through him. Nick failed to see what was so amusing. He gave the card back and focused on Veronica’s shuffling. It would be his job to find that card again. “How’d the office conversation go? Must’ve been fine if you’re embarrassing students.”

“Yeah. Your principal is a good man. All I have to do is have a council member by me at all times. Between you and Eliza, it’s basically a slap on the wrist.” Veronica cut the deck in half and started shuffling them separate. The chance of Nick finding that joker was nonexistent unless he caught on to her trick. Every third card her finger grazed was turned intangible and went through five cards before she stopped using her semblance. Finally she held twenty six cards in each hand. “If you can’t find the joker then you go back to bed when I’m done with your measurements.” Those were high stakes. Why couldn’t somebody let him do work!? “And if I find the joker?” Veronica smiled, “I’m at your mercy. You can decide whatever you want me to do.” He didn’t know why but that made him blush. He’d never abuse such power, yet it almost seemed like she expected him to say something outlandish. Veronica waved her hands. “Eliminate half of the deck. You’ll either increase your odds, or make them zero.” Now the pressure was really on. He eliminated the left deck and Veronica fanned out the right. So far so good. The joker was in the spot she always put it, thirteenth card out of the twenty six. She was corny like that. Only her parents and Ruby had ever found the joker when it was the target. All the cards had a reason for their placement. Most people just don’t pay attention through various rounds. Nick finally reached out and picked the tenth card unfortunately, grabbing the ace. “Awww, oh well.” Nick said. “I thought I had this in the bag.”

Veronica picked up all the cards and started grabbing measuring tape. Next was putting her hair in a ponytail and putting on glasses. She barely wore them around others. Being a faunus that couldn’t see in the dark was lame enough. Needing glasses to sew just felt like an extra blow to her fragile faunus pride. “Better luck next time. Anyways, let’s get down to business. Take your jacket off plea-” she had forgotten Nicholas was only wearing a tank top underneath. An audible gulp came from her as she stood in front of him with her tools. Nick spread his arms out for her to start measuring. “Ready.” He said, not realizing Veronica was gawking a little. Her hands studied his shoulders and chest. They had gotten broader. She could tell he’s been putting his all into his training, yet nobody would guess that with the typical close he wore. Slight tension around his right torso intrigued her. Veronica pressed her hands against it to find out that it was actually a little tender. If she remembered correctly, the Paladin had struck this side. Both hands felt their way done to his waistline. It was hard to ignore that his tank top stopped a little about it, revealing a little skin. Veronica’s mind was on autopilot. Half was expecting him to provide helpful advice and get an idea of what to add to his garb. The other half was turned off, logically that is. It was too busy admiring his body. Any designs for him were usually done with previous numbers. Veronica usually doesn’t get the chance to be this close; this intimacy with her clients was always the best way to make something. That’s why she always asks permission to touch them beforehand. Nick realized she had forgotten that rule this time around, but didn’t think he should bring it up. A blush cams across his face. Being looked at like this was a little...intense. Then, Veronica started purring lightly.

Nicholas wasn’t made for this kind of pressure. It was too much! Recent confessions only added to it. Veronica wasn’t looking at him. Veronica was looking at him. “Ummm, Vee?” He said nervously, hoping it was loud enough. Thankfully it was. She snapped out of her daze to meet a blushing boy looking right into her eyes. The overwhelming feeling of insecurity and anxiety was crystal clear in his eyes. Veronica’s face began turning red as her hands left the warmth of his body. She had gotten swept in the moment, choosing to break their gaze by looking away. “Sorry…” her voice now meek, losing any of the commanding confidence it once had.

“It’s okay…” he muttered, unsure of this situation. “I was a caught off guard is all. That kind of attention is pretty new to me.” Veronica went back to taking his measurements appropriately. “New? Girls throw themselves at you all the time. Don’t tell me you hadn’t noticed?” Nick shook his head. “It’s not the same. They throw themselves at me because of what they can get. Status, money, fame; another guy can have those and they’ll move on. Not like I’m bringing anything else to the table.” His voice trailed off. “Physically, what’s to be desired?” It wasn’t meant to be so somber but it was. To Nick, he was nothing more than a runt. An average looking one at that. If a guy had half the money he had and bulky or tall then they were way better off. It’s only natural to want the best choice. “It’s rude to talk about yourself like that.” Veronica said, her tone a bit more stern and upset than before. “Especially in front of someone who thinks you’re handsome and doesn’t care about what’s in your wallet.” She picked up a pen and paper to write down measurements. Nick assumed he could relax his body for the time being. “Thanks. Telling Summer something like that might boost her spirit.”

Veronica chuckled to herself. “Isn’t that her therapist’s job? Not much of a good one if he’s not doing that.” She put the pen down, annoyed by the thought of him. “Yet my parents keep bringing up the magic man himself. Says he’s a good listener if I need anything.” Nick was sorely confused by her attitude. Oscar is great! “What’s wrong with Dr.Os?” He couldn’t fathom anybody not liking a guy like him. Oscar was such a good man! Veronica didn’t seem to share that opinion however. “I just don’t believe listening to a person’s problems for an hour or two for a week does much. Therapy sounds like a big ploy and his smile is a bait.”

“Huh, well that’s an interesting viewpoint to say the least.” Nick wasn’t aware she had such strong feelings about it. “Well it’s a ploy with some benefits. He’s definitely helped me a bunch.” Veronica looked at Nicholas smile softly as he started running his hand through his hair. “Wait, you’ve gone to therapy?” She asked. He’s never mentioned such a thing. “Of course, when I was younger that is. I had a whole schedule along with Summer. Still check in from time to time.” He sounded embarrassed about that last part. “Seeing your family hospitalized for an incident you caused us heavy stuff, especially when you’re a kid. The only thing more daunting is seeing that person’s face become twisted as they try to kill you. Don’t tell Summer, but Shiva has done more than a little to unnerve me.” He laughed, playing off the severity of it to ease himself. It was clear by the frown Veronica wore that she felt sad for him. “What’s with the face? I’m fine, talking about it isn’t a problem for-” Nick was interrupted as two hands were raised in front of his face. “Ten minutes.” Veronica said with a commanding presence. Nick split her hands apart to see her absolute confidence stare at him. “If you ever feel like you need to decompress or rant like there’s no tomorrow, then come to me. Speak your truth unapologetically for ten minutes and I won’t hold or mention any of it. Deal?”

This was surely a change in attitude. The girl was just talking about how a couple of hours isn’t enough time and here she is offering ten minutes. It was so strange. So spontaneous, yet generous. It was so….Veronica. Nick couldn’t help but appreciate the gesture. He clicked his teeth, “only if you do the same with me. I think you’ll find having someone listen to your problems is precious no matter the length of time.” The offer was expected. “Typical Nicholas, taking an act of kindness to help someone else. Learn to be greedy once and a while. Deal.” She removed her hands until Nick held onto them. Veronica’s brain started frying. He was getting closer, leaning closer. “Nick?” She said quickly. His face seemed so calm as he got close enough for Veronica to feel the warmth of his body and breath invade her space. Her own face became hot. She didn’t know what to do! Nick had completely caught her off guard. Was this a dream? Veronica hoped not or else that meant she still might be in school, or worse, that day hadn’t started. “Calm yourself Veronica! You wanted this for years! Just calm yourself and-” Nick’s head suddenly fell down and rested around her shoulder and chest gently. Veronica looked down at him. “Huh…?” She brought her hand to his face to look at him. Not only was it flushed but it was burning hot! His fever went back up! “Nick! Your fever!” He only grumbled, tired and willing to comply with what came next. “Maybe I overdid it a little. Help me back to my bed?” He might’ve asked but it was more of an obligation. His eyes closed seconds later as he drifted off to sleep. Veronica could only remain still, overwhelmed by her own assumptions. A few seconds later and she would’ve stolen a kiss by mistake. Life truly was cruel for teasing her like that. The girl stood up to support his body and started walking. At least he was light. “Can’t believe this. Why is life like this!?” She cried out internally.

xxxx

Long hallways were a dumb idea. Putting Nick to bed would’ve been done sooner if his family didn’t live in a modern day castle. Walking back to her room was worse, now she was alone with nothing to think about but him. She was glad he passed out after all the measuring was finished though. Proper progress could finally start with his outfit. Hopefully he won’t be too sick. Adding a dust of some kind to energize his body or keep him comfortable might be a good idea. Speaking of dust, Veronica knew it was a must for Summer. The way Nick talked about Shiva made Veronica’s skin tense up. Her single encounter with the woman, if you could call her that, was actually unnerving. “It might be best to tell Summer about that after all. Along with asking questions about Shiva in general. My design won’t be any good if it unleashes a frozen hell. Then I’ll really deserve some nasty looks.”

To think time away from Menagerie would be more complex than staying. The only difference was Veronica was now dealing with other people’s problems. A welcome change in her opinion. She kept walking and came across Summer, who was just about to enter her room again. A white guitar with a paw print on it was in the girl’s hand. “Oh yeah, you did have a dog.” Veronica said aloud. Summer finally noticed her. “Huh? Oh this? Yeah, named this beauty Dolt. Just like him.” She strummed a few cords to give a beautiful sound that filled the hall. How such talent could exist within a person like Summer was beyond Veronica’s comprehension.

“So, you tell Nick about my little water works moment?” Veronica looked at the girl as if she had just spoken gibberish. “I don’t care what you do in the privacy of your own room. That is, unless it deals with that strange dust you’re hiding behind your mirror.” Summer’s heart immediately stops. Veronica points to her own nose and crinkles it. “It was only for an instant but I definitely smelled a painfully potent dust when I entered your room. Actually… it was the same sent as Shiva’s” Veronica admitted, watching Summer get even paler. “Y-You saw- when could you have possibly-” Summer couldn’t keep her head in order. Her body began to shake as her mouth became dry. The beating in her heart began to sound like thunder in her eardrums while her chest felt tight. “I was asleep wasn’t I? What did she do!? Who did she- is she why you want me drinking milk!?” Summer shouted, tears welling up and freezing the moment they ran down her cheeks. “What stunt are you trying to pull!? Don’t listen to her! I shouldn’t have listened to you! All you-”

Veronica pressed her hands hard against Summer’s face. The stinging sensation reddened the twin's face and brought attention to the composed look of acquaintance. “ You need to calm yourself.” Veronica said sternly. She inhaled then exhaled repeatedly for Summer to imitate. The shear cold of Summer’s own skin made Veronica’s hands feel numb. Along with the unpleasant smell of peppermint, it was clear to tell that Summer had been losing herself in the panic. Forget musical talent, Veronica couldn’t figure out how a person like her was still alive. That panic attack looked like it was gonna be the final nail in a coffin. Veronica took Summer’s hand and pulled her inside of her questionably hot room. “Summer, relax…”

Summer tried her best. She bit her bottom lip and took one deep inhale through her nose then out of her mouth. “Okay, okay…” her voice trembled, regaining composure. “I’m alright. Just give me a second.” Summer walks to her bed and lays flat on her back. A light layer of sweat ran down her forehead. Things will be okay. Answers, calming down, and a plan. Then she’ll be okay. “When did you see her?”

“The night I got here. Apparently you passed out without turning on your heater or anything. I bumped into her in the kitchen trying to eat, mainly dairy.” That last part didn’t sit well with Summer. Her eyes narrowed from Veronica’s words. “Don’t look at me like that. I was gonna force dairy into your diet anyways because of our arrangement. If anybody seems to be dancing with danger then it’s you.” Veronica took a good whiff of her surroundings. The scent led her to Summer’s vanity mirror. She reached behind it carefully until her fingers ran across two small vials and grabbed them. The dust glowed a beautiful light cyan color. A few seconds into holding them and Veronica started feeling the cold go through her, making her put it down. She had Never felt dust that was constantly active in any form. “Where the heck did you get this?”

“Penny’s lab. I, I stole it…” Summer mumbled. Guilt didn’t begin to describe how she felt about going through with it. “That stuff made Shiva appear so maybe it can unmake her. Nick and I secretly go out sometimes for me to practice controlling her. Not alone typically. If I learn to use her powers-”

“You’re gonna kill yourselves…” Veronica interjected, her voice colder than the dust. “Give me a break. You’d drag your brother into a situation like that? And I do mean drag, because the only reason he’s going alone with it is because you’re his precious little sister. Ugh, it makes me sick; do you ever get tired of being a burden?” Those words cut a little too close to the heart. Of course she was. All Summer ever thinks about is being on her own. The girl rose up to retaliate in anger, only to be shoved back down with ease. Her entire body was trembling again. “What? More water-”

“Fuck off Veronica.” Summer said through clenched teeth. Her forearm covered her weeping eyes. “What makes you think you can just say whatever the hell you want; of course you wouldn’t understand.” Summer refused to lay down and got up again right in front of Veronica. “It must be nice to be so perfect and unbothered by everything. Do me a favor and stay out of my business.” Blue clashed with lilac silently. How many times have they been at odds like this? More than Veronica cared to count. She could remember how many times Summer looked this angry. Everything about her was shaky, including her clenched fist.

“Relieving tension or contemplating swinging hitting me?” Summer didn’t answer. Not even she could trust her response. As angry as she was, Veronica wasn’t the one she wanted to let it out on. “Can’t decide? Guess I’ll choose for you.” Veronica walked away, opening the door to leave. “Tomorrow, seven o’clock, the both of us are going down to Mantle’s forest. Bring one of those stupid viles with you.” Summer finally stopped tensing up. “What…?”

“You’re brother is still sick and won’t be getting better dealing with you pulling stunts like this. Since you clearly aren’t going to change your mind I guess I’ll fill in. Don’t oversleep, and for your sake, bring your sword. Punches aren’t your style.” Veronica left on that note. She immediately went through the ground and went searching for her. Perfect and unbothered? Yeah right. That couldn’t be further from the truth. She found her mother watching a movie in what was probably a theater room. Yang heard the girl barge in. “Hey sweetie. Wanna w-”

“Get your boxing gloves.” Veronica said quickly. She barely understood what she said herself. “I need to vent, badly.” Yang could see the girl’s eyes burn with emotion. The movie was out on pause and Yang stood up. “Okay. Give me your best shot and let’s mix things up too. I’ll meet you in the garden in five minutes.” Veronica nods and walks off. Yang didn’t know what put her daughter in such a foul mood but Yang was determined to find out. But before any of that she needed to call Blake. A lot has happened the last couple of days that she would no doubt want to know. “Hey Bl-”

“VERONICA STARTED A FIGHT!?” Yang went pale. Looks like Blake already knew about a few things. This would definitely take more than ten minutes.

Part 19