#he saw the two almost identical jades and went

[hellosweetie99]

Wei “I want the bitchy one” Wuxian

[sk8termikey]

Chapter 26 of 21 Questions

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Lily and Alex were finishing getting ready when their doorbell rang. They were supposed to spend the day with Jade and Lucas as they would finally tell their friends everything that had happened with the Sturniolo triplets since the girls first went to a show. After exchanging hellos, the four friends went inside Lucas’s car as he would drive everyone to an Italian restaurant they liked to go to. Once there and sitting in their usual booth with drinks, it was time for Alex and Lily to tell their story.

From the first meeting in Atlanta to the last in Fort Lauderdale, a lot had happened in between. While Jade was still shocked that Alex went on stage and managed to make her favourite triplet win the Orlando show, Lucas was praising Matt’s courage and brain for eventually leading to the actual friendship that was now happening with Lily. The two listeners were searching for every single detail in the story and kept asking questions, mostly regarding Matt and Lily obviously. When the discussion then came to the little time the triplets had spent in Spring Hill, the mood also shifted. Lily was clearly missing Matt a lot although she wished not to – she blamed it on attachment issues with a nervous laugh – and admitted her doubts about their relationship. The girl was afraid that Matt would eventually regret what he did and end up ghosting her, as it had been his initial thought months ago. Lily’s friends assured her that it wouldn’t happen and Alex started listing the proof that Matt valued Lily as much as she did him.

“Bro literally made this whole scenario up because he was afraid that you wouldn't want to meet him if you knew the truth about his identity,” Alex sternly reminded as she started counting on her fingers between each sentence. “He got you to meet his family and friends at the same time as him. He put us in the same fucking hotel where he was staying and even offered to pay for the room. He accepted to come spend two days in a stranger’s house – and bro drove us there for a while. Do I keep going with the vlog and how he was always looking at you to make sure you’re ok?”

“We get it, thanks.” Lily was now looking away in embarrassment as she found her pizza very interesting right now. She knew that she shouldn’t discard Matt’s efforts that he had made from the beginning but the ‘what ifs’ in her head didn’t want to leave. “I think we covered everything now though.”

“I wanna come back on something,” Lucas chimed in as a detail caught his attention. “May I?” When the girls nodded, he couldn’t help the smirk on his face as he looked at Lily. “You, Lily, let an almost complete stranger drive your precious car when it took me more than a year to get that privilege?”

“Bro stop”, Lily mumbled in reply. She hated him for pointing that out as she remembered Alex doing the same when it happened. “He’s a designated driver just like me, I had to trust him. And also, I was fucking exhausted so it was nice to just be in a car and chill.”

“I don’t blame you to be honest,” Jade chimed in. “Half of us have their licence so you and Lucas don’t really have much choice when it comes to driving – I swear Alex and I will get it one day. And I watched a couple of their videos, you must have had a great view from the passenger seat.”

As Jade winked at Lily before innocently taking a slice of pizza, Alex and Lucas snickered. Lily then laughed with them as she admitted that she wasn’t one to turn a blind eye when the occasion of having a handsome guy driving next to you arose. The atmosphere then went back to a more light-hearted one and the rest of the lunch was spent filled with smiles.

~~~

Four days had passed since Lily last saw Matt. Such a pathetic state I was in, the girl cringed at herself. Based on a brief exchange by text, Lily knew that Matt hadn’t changed his mind regarding their friendship and thanks to her friends two days ago, she had managed to bury those doubts deep in the back of her head. Reading back their quick conversation, Lily hesitated before starting to write a message.

Matt🍂

Hey there, landed safely in bos

Hope you’re doing well and not missing us too much :)

Ttyl

Glad to know!

And ofc ye we are devastated😔

You’ll survive, we’re not that far away

True true

For now i’ll have to survive the interrogation ab our crazy meeting so

Same here i think

We’ll have to complain more after it happens

We def will!

Seen

This was on Thursday evening. They had spoken a second time on Friday as Matt had replied to a funny Instagram story that Lily had posted about her cat Bernard. Getting herself out of daydreaming, she eventually finished typing her message – after deleting and rewriting it three times – and sent it.

Matt🍂

Hey Matt, how’s it going?

Lily hey

Gimme 5min and I’m all yours

She was surprised at how quick he had replied and couldn’t help but smile at the thought that maybe he was about to text her as well. Only two minutes had passed before Lily was surprise once again as her phone was showing her that she was getting an incoming from Matt🍂. Tapping on the green phone icon, Lily brought her phone to her ear.

“Hello Matthew, pleasant surprise.”

“Hey Lily”, Matt replied with a weird exhale. “Sorry, I just got home.”

“No problem, do your thing bro.”

“Just need to change quickly so I’m putting you on speaker but I’m still here. Catch me up on your life meanwhile”

“Don’t worry, take your time.” Lily could hear Matt rummaging through his clothes and almost laughed at the way he was probably making a mess. “And I’m all good to be honest, had the wonderful experience of being questioned like a suspected murderer but it went well.”

“Sounds wonderful”, Matt sarcastically answered. “Hope you’ve only said good things about me, because I did for you.”

“Of course!” Lily scoffed, feigned to be offended. “Who do you take me for? I’ve put you on a pedestal, but Alex was the one to call out your creepy plan.”

“Damn her.” Matt shook his head with a smile, although Lily couldn’t see him. “Can’t say she’s wrong though but it worked out well so…”

“That it did”, the girl agreed. “Tell me about your weekend, how’s your family? And Nate?”

“Everyone’s good, it’s nice to get some rest and be home.” Matt’s grateful tone made Lily smile as she knew from the triplets’ videos how much he loved being in Boston.

“When are you back in LA?” Lily asked. Although an innocent question, they both knew it was a way to ask when they’d be even further away from each other.

“Somewhere during the week,” Matt thought for a bit. “Gonna have to ask Nick for the exact time though but we’ll definitely be back there before the weekend.”

“Any plans already made? Except for all the videos y’all have to make.”

“To be honest, yes,” Matt sighed. He was happy to get back into a routine but he knew the next weeks were about to be busy. “We’ll start filming again soon, especially the podcasts. But the first thing on the agenda is just a concert with Madi.”

“Oh that’s nice, who are y’all seeing?”

“Travis Scott, you like him?”

“I can’t really say because I haven’t listened to him properly like–” Lily scrolled through her Spotify to see if she knew some of his songs. “I only listen to one song from Chris’s Playlist: NO BYSTANDERS. Haven’t checked anything else to be honest.”

“That’s a good one”, Matt approved. “Might send you a live clip if you want.”

“Please do”, Lily gladly accepted the offer. “Do you often go to concerts? I remember talking about mine but I can’t recall if you did the same.”

“That’s because we don’t go very often,” Matt chuckled as he reassured the girl that her memory wasn’t faulty. “Apart from Tril or Skies, this is one of the very few we’re doing without knowing the artists beforehand.”

“You saw Skies? That’s so cool!”

“You didn’t know?” Matt sounded confused.

“Was I supposed to?” Lily felt confused too. “Oh my god, have I forgotten? I’m sorry, I swear I pay attention to what you say the rest of the time!”

“No, no it’s not you. Have you been on Instagram or TikTok?”

“Hmm not since yesterday I think”, Lily replied as she went to check the first of the two applications before letting out a gasp. “You went on the fucking stage?!”

“Yeah”, Matt said with a small laugh at Lily’s shock. “Thought you knew and that’s where you were going with the conversation.”

“I had no idea bro. You and Chris look so happy damn, I’m truly glad for y’all.”

Replaying some videos, Lily was truly enjoying watching her two friends enjoying this experience. The smiles on Chris’s and Matt’s faces were enough to make one appear on her face as well. Lily was just silently looking at more videos, which led Matt to wonder about her not talking anymore.

“You good?” Matt asked after a couple of minutes of not hearing anything. “You’re unusually quiet.”

“Sorry,” Lily apologised by instinct. “I’m just so happy for you, it seems to have been great.”

“It was”, Matt confirmed. “Pros of Chris befriending him, we’re seeing him again in LA when we’re back.”

“Sounds amazing! Only the two of you again or?”

“Nick will come this time”, Matt replied as who else was going to be here. “Madison and her boyfriend too, plus a couple of mutual friends with Skies I think as well.”

“Madison?” Lily repeated as she didn’t know why Matt was using her full name. “Madi, you mean?”

“Madison Beer,” Matt clarified.

To say Lily was shocked was an understatement. She remembered that the triplets had filmed a podcast with the singer Madison Beer, but she hadn’t thought about them actually hanging out together after their collaboration.

“I am so jealous right now”, Lily admitted. “Y’all are so famous actually.”

“More like we’re friends with famous people though,” Matt denied. He and his brothers didn’t like to think of themselves as celebrities, more as lucky people who eventually managed to be around actual celebrities.

“You’re on the right path though”, Lily countered as she believed that the triplets could achieve so much more than they already had and would be even more successful as time would pass. “I entered your life early enough not to be a gold digger.”

“Please don’t joke about that, I’d feel terrible.” Matt didn’t want to be too dramatic so he let out a small laugh along with Lily's, but he really hoped deep down that this situation would never happen to his friend.

“Sorry, but for now it’s not happening so no worries.” Although he couldn’t see her, Lily was smiling at Matt being concerned about her. “I’ll stay in the dark and be the mysterious five-star baker that appeared once in a vlog.”

“That’s perfect.”

A comfortable silence then took place. Matt and Lily simply basked in the peaceful quiet between them before the girl found a new subject of discussion:

“By the way”, she started. “Have y’all seen the comments on the vlog we did together? I swear they’ve been cracking me and Alex up for the entire weekend.”

This is something Matt hadn’t expected to talk with Lily as he was now hoping that she hadn’t read anything that she didn’t like. However, given that Lily was introducing the matter with a positive tone, Matt felt glad even though he could probably guess that it was the comments he hadn’t liked very much when reading them.

“Can you believe people are shipping me and Chris? For literally thirty seconds!”

While Lily was chuckling at the ridiculous thought of her being with the youngest triplet, Matt had no choice but to lightly laugh with her, although a bitter feeling rose in him.

“That’s insane yeah…”

Although Matt thought he was hiding his annoyance, Lily immediately picked up on it and was confused about it. Was she imagining it? Were the triplets mad that people had commented about that? Lily knew that they were sometimes cases of Matt and Chris randomly being shipped with people – it had unfortunately happened with Madison Beer when they released their podcast with her – so she was now scared that this was going to be a problem for her friendship with the triplets.

“Is Chris mad?” Lily quietly asked, afraid of the answer she would get. “I’m sorry, I should have toned down my attitude but I just felt comfortable with y’all. I swear I didn’t want to create any issue–”

“Lily stop”, Matt quickly interrupted as he was surprised at Lily’s thought process. “No one’s mad about anything, don’t worry.”

“You’re sure?” She couldn’t help but want to confirm.

“Yes, I am. Chris and Nick actually found those comments hilarious, I’m just silly grumpy me so no worries.”

“M’kay, I’ll trust you on this one and let it slide.”

Although Lily knew that something more might be going on, she didn’t pry for more information and Matt was glad that he didn’t have to explain his stupid jealousy. Lily wasn’t one to force people to tell her everything and if Matt had anything to say to her, she knew that he would. Communication was a key element of their friendship, but small matters like that fortunately didn’t need full transparency.

After this small discussion, Matt and Lily kept talking about their plans to come as Lily was trying to get information on future video topics that the triplets would film. Matt just told her that videos regarding Halloween were going to be posted during the week but this was all Lily could have for now as Matt didn’t want to spoil her. They then hung up when Alex called Lily for dinner and promised each other to call again soon, even if their respective lives would get busy. 

Thank you for reading. Votes and comments are always appreciated if you like this story :) The story is co-written w @/little_grapejuice on wattpad

[innerpalaces]

THE PRINCESS WEI YANG - 180 PART 1

CHAPTER 180: The Death of Yuan Yu

Yuan Yu came out of the house angrily, without even asking Princess Yongning if she would go back with him. When Li Wei Yang personally escorted Princess Yongning out of the mansion, Grand Prince Yan was already gone. Princess Yongning smiled mockingly and said, "I went out of my way to help you this time, so don't let me down."

Li Wei Yang smiled and said: "Princess, when have I ever let you down?"

Princess Yongning stared at her, breathed a sigh of relief, and then said thoughtfully: "The move you made today was really too risky."

Li Wei Yang's smile was normal. Of course she knew it was a risk, but in Yuexi, Yuan Yu or anyone might reveal her identity. At that time, it would be too difficult for her to think of ways to cover up for herself. Taking the initiative in everything and turning passivity into offensive is the way to protect yourself. Of course, although this does eliminate the trouble of being recognized, it will also bring about some side effects. For example, Empress Pei must know everything by now and will target her. But, so what? Only when she has a firm footing can she talk about revenge. She cannot hide from people all her life. She must be accepted by everyone in the Guo family before she can take the next step.

Princess Yongning got on the carriage and did not forget to warn: "Don't forget our agreement."

Li Wei Yang laughed and said: "Of course not. It's just that you have to do everything I say."

A strange smile appeared on Yongning's face: "Naturally." Then, she ordered the coachman to hurry back to Prince Yan's Mansion.

After seeing off Princess Yongning, Li Wei Yang was about to return to the banquet, but she saw Guo Cheng leaning on the door, looking at her with a half-smile. Li Wei Yang smiled slightly: "Third brother didn't go to see off the guests, but came here?"

He just looked at her with a faint smile. This sister had too many secrets. First she was familiar with Princess Yongning, and then she was accused by Yuan Yu, and now she has become the adopted daughter of the Empress Dowager of Dali and the adopted daughter of Prime Minister Li. Such an identity is really shocking. Originally, he thought that she was just an ordinary woman brought here by his father to please his mother, but it seemed that he was wrong. Not only was he wrong, but his father was also wrong. The girl he found must not have a simple purpose in entering the Guo family.

At this moment, her eyes were deep and bottomless, as if it were a dark night. The pressure at that moment was almost suffocating. He couldn't help but wonder, why did this girl come to Yuexi?

She obviously already has the status of a princess of Dali, but she abandoned everything and came here. Not only that, she is already eighteen years old this year... The customs of Yuexi and Dali are different. The aristocratic women of Yuexi are very proud. The more noble the family, the more picky they are. It is not surprising that they usually start looking for the right husband at this age. But as far as he knew, in Dali, women started looking for a marriage at the age of fifteen. Only girls who were too poor to afford a dowry or had various hidden diseases did not get married until they were eighteen. So, the girl in front of him, which category does she belong to?

He stared at her like this, but she didn't panic. Under the sun, her skin was as transparent as white jade. This girl is a beauty, but not the typical kind of stunning beauty. But when she looks at you quietly, you will have a very subtle feeling.

Seeing her, Guo Cheng thought of other girls in his family, such as his two cousins ​​from his second aunt's family. Guo Zhen was carefully trained by Princess Chen Liu since she was a child, so she treated the two girls in the same way. She hired the most strict matrons from the palace to train his two cousins ​​from a very young age, requiring them to smile without showing their teeth, conduct themselves without showing off, so even though Han Lin is soft and graceful, and Han Qin is lively, their manners have become very standard after years of training. At least that's what Guo Cheng thought in the past, but Li Wei Yang, who was walking beside him, walked slowly, and her skirt didn't flutter at all. He had to believe what Princess Yongning said at the banquet. This sister was indeed a daughter raised in the strictest aristocratic family. No, I'm afraid it's more than that. Her every move and gesture shows nobility and education, and she also carries a natural aristocratic manner, which is even more perfect than his two cousins.

"Are you really the Princess Anping?" Guo Cheng asked involuntarily.

Li Wei Yang turned her head and a smile suddenly appeared on her face. This smile was like light, which immediately illuminated her face: "Didn't Princess Yongning make it very clear today? Didn't third brother hear it?"

Guo Cheng sighed deeply and said: "Yes, I heard it, but I find it unbelievable. Originally from a noble and prominent family, why did you give up everything and leave Dali? There must be some reason for this."

Li Wei Yang stopped and said in a very ordinary tone: "Third brother, you are a very smart person, so naturally you can't avoid asking me this question. You are right, if I leave Dali, I will not have the title of Princess Anping. I have given up the glory and wealth of the Li family, but there was no place for me in the Li family."

Guo Cheng looked at her in surprise, not understanding why she said that. What do you mean there is no place for her?

Li Wei Yang did not shy away from his gaze: "There are some things that Princess Yongning will not say and dares not say. I am an unpopular person in the Li family. Because I was born in February, I have always been hated by my father, because I am concubine born, I was rejected by my legitimate sister and the legal madam. Because I am disobedient and unwilling to be a stepping stone for the Li family, and I am even more unwilling to be used according to the legal madam's instructions, they made things difficult for me everywhere."

"Did you come to Yuexi just because of this?" Guo Cheng guessed.

Li Wei Yang smiled and said: "No. Now the legal madam and my sister...all the people who opposed me are dead." With this kind of thing, with a little investigation, the truth can be found out.

Guo Cheng looked at Li Wei Yang in surprise. What did she mean? What does it mean that all the people who opposed her are dead? Is she telling him in disguise that she is not a soft-hearted person? Doesn't she know that saying this makes her look scary? What if he got defensive or tried to drive her out of the Guo family? Didn't she consider the consequences...

Li Wei Yang didn't care what he thought. She just stated the facts: "If people don't harm a tiger, a tiger will not harm people. I will not tolerate them. Therefore, they ended up where they are now. They are all to blame for their actions and their end has nothing to do with others. But not everyone thinks so. My behavior is seen as mean and unforgiving, so I am neither accepted by the Li family nor welcomed by other wealthy families. This is my biggest reason to be here."

Guo Cheng laughed and said, "Is this an explanation?"

Li Wei Yang nodded and said: "I have given you a reasonable explanation. As for whether you believe it or not, it is not a question for me to think about."

A smile flashed across Guo Cheng's lips, but he still said: "I like honest people. If you choose to lie to me today and say nonsense about finding an aunt, I will find a way to drive you out tomorrow. Because I will not allow anyone who harms my mother to exist. But if you tell the truth like this, I can also make it clear - as long as your purpose is not harmful to the Guo family, I will acknowledge you as my sister."

Li Wei Yang just smiled, blinked, and said: "Whether you acknowledge it or not, it has no effect on me, and I don't care. If you don't believe it, you can try to drive me away -"

Guo Cheng was speechless for a moment. This girl was really cunning. She had clearly spotted his weak point. His mother protected her wholeheartedly. If he wanted to drive her away, he'd probably have his skin peeled off by his mother alive. She is clearly confident! Not only is she smart, she is simply cunning! Just as he was about to speak, he saw Madam Guo hurry over, grab Li Wei Yang's hand, and said: "Jia'er, where have you gone? Mother is looking for you everywhere."

Look, he was clearly standing nearby, but his mother actually turned a blind eye. He almost wondered if he was picked up from outside. No, not only him, but probably his other four brothers were also picked up by his mother, so in his mother's heart her head will always only be his little sister, and he will be completely transparent - this transparency lasted for twenty years. Guo Cheng shook his head and sighed.

Sure enough, Madam Guo seemed to not be able to see him at all, and only talked to Li Wei Yang: "There were many people at the banquet just now, so I forgot to tell you that I asked the people in the house to recruit some new maids yesterday, and some of them are very bright and clever——"

"Mother, there are seven or eight maids in my sister's yard just waiting for her to eat. There are more than twenty people including those who serve tea and water. The yard is not that big. If there are more, they will be piled on the roof." Guo Cheng felt sour in his heart, his words were also sour, and his tone was even more sour.

Madam Guo was stunned for a moment, then noticed him, and said: "Why are you standing here and not seeing off the guests?!"

Guo Cheng looked at his mother, smiled apologetically and said, "Mother, aren't I having a heart-to-heart talk with my sister?"

Madam Guo shooed him away like a fly and said, "Okay, okay, the guests are about to go back. You go and see them off. Your sister and I also want to check out the maids in her yard."

Li Wei Yang quickly said: "Mother, He Ye and Lian Yue are very good, there's no need to add more people."

Madam Guo shook her head and said: "What's so good? Those two are a bit stupid. They are not as good as Zhao Yue next to you. However, Zhao Yue is not much better. She has rough hands and feet. Last time I saw her turn around and destroy a whole set of tea sets. This girl has some martial arts background, so she will stay with you to protect you. I will choose another maid to serve you."

Li Wei Yang laughed. Zhao Yue was originally a swordsman, so it was really inappropriate for her to serve tea and pour water. In the past three days, she always got into trouble, which made Madam Guo anxious. She glanced at Guo Cheng and said with a smile: "Mother, there are indeed a lot of people in the yard. We really can't fit in..."

Madam Guo said, "Yes, it's too much." Guo Cheng just breathed a sigh of relief when he heard Madam Guo clap her hands and say with a smile, "But that's not a problem. I'll expand your yard another day."

"Mother, my sister's yard is already the largest in the whole family except for grandmother. Even your courtyard is not as good as hers. How else do you want to expand it? People will really laugh at you if this news spreads." Even if a wealthy family digs a hole for a well they have to pay attention to the rules. Li Wei Yang is a junior, but the courtyard she lives in is the largest and most gorgeous. His mother also moved the things in the small warehouse into it like running water, which made Guo Cheng, a grown man, feel sour in his heart.

Just as Guo Cheng was about to continue protesting, he heard Madam Guo say: "Your sister's yard is closest to yours, so we'll demolish the plum blossom forest in front of your yard! This is a good idea. After the plum blossom forest is demolished, half of it will be given to your sister for the back garden and half of it will be used to build four or five new residences for the maids."

The more Madam Guo talked, the happier she became, her eyes were shining, and she obviously thought this idea was extremely wonderful.

"Mother, that Plum Blossom Forest is where my fourth brother and I practice martial arts and play chess!" Their sister is the treasure in her heart. They used to stand aside, but now even the place where they stand has to be moved out for this sister's maid. It was simply——Guo Cheng coughed softly.

Madam Guo glanced at him angrily: "Don't you go out to practice and play chess when you have nothing to do? Do you ever stay in your yard? How old are you, are you still fighting with your sister? Aren't you ashamed?"

Guo Cheng's heart broke when he heard the words ashamed. He looked at Madam Guo hurt and said: "Mother, I originally thought that I was not your biological child, but now it seems that not only am I not your biological child, but that you picked me up from the house of your sworn enemy and raised me!"

Madam Guo glanced at him, raised her hand and flicked his forehead, saying: "You are still talking nonsense! You are the most thoughtful among you five brothers, don't talk nonsense to me, go back and clean up your plum blossom forest immediately!"

Guo Cheng opened his eyes wide and looked at Madam Guo, then looked at Li Wei Yang who was smiling, and thought, 'You clearly did this on purpose to demonstrate to me that your position in mother's heart is extremely important!' Now he begins to understand that Li Wei Yang is not only a powerful character, but also surprisingly vindictive and cannot be offended easily.

Li Wei Yang didn't seem to notice his glare, but smiled and said: "Mother, it's really not good to mobilize people like this. I don't need so many maids, and I don't need such a big yard, so you  really don't need to bother anymore."

Madam Guo stretched out her hand to smooth the wind-blown hair at her temples, and said with a smile: "Silly girl, this is not a big effort. It can take as short as three to five days, or as long as half a month. I will ask skilled craftsmen to renovate your garden, a;right? What flowers do you like? Oh, no, just build a flower house and put all the flowers you like in it, so you can enjoy them when you want to see them!"

Guo Cheng laughed and said, "Mother, you are too partial."

Li Wei Yang glanced at Guo Cheng and didn't say much. She just held Madam Guo's hand and said, "Mother, I don't want to expand the yard. Not only am I afraid of stirring up trouble, but more importantly, I like the quiet. If there are too many maids the coming and going of people is always troublesome, and it is difficult for me to read a book quietly."

Madam Guo was stunned and said, "Really? It's not that you're just afraid of the trouble?"

Li Wei Yang shook her head solemnly and said: "It's really not."

Madam Guo thought for a moment, then turned her gaze to Guo Cheng and said, "Okay then, just keep your plum blossom forest." She said in a giving tone, "But..."

Guo Cheng was almost speechless and said quickly: "Mom! I have to go. Don't ever think about it again!" Madam Guo was about to speak, but she saw that Guo Cheng seemed to have wind beneath his feet and ran away as if fleeing for their lives.

Madam Guo was surprised and said: "What...what is wrong with him? I haven't said anything yet!"

Li Wei Yang said slowly: "Probably, it's because the third brother can't bear to part with his plum blossom forest."

Madam Guo was surprised. She saw her son disappear without a trace in a short time. She really couldn't understand it. She murmured: "Among the five children, in fact, your third brother was the most honest one when he was young. But I can't figure it out. He was obviously so cute when he was a child, but why is he so cunning when he grows up?"

Li Wei Yang looked at Madam Guo's soft face and sighed in her heart. A child will grow up. He will experience many things during his growth, but if you don't pay attention, you will miss such stories. Madam Guo has been struggling to find her lost daughter and let her sons take care of themselves, so that's why she was wondering like this now... Her heart softened slightly, and she couldn't help but squeeze Madam Guo's hand.

These hands, so gentle and firm, are the kind of hands only a mother would have.

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[lupically]

#FFF8EA | XIAO. 

genre | fluff

word count | 2233

warning | mention of falling off a moutain​

note | i just have some ideas for xiao...

"the yaksha is fond of you."

madame ping was no stranger to you. the kind old lady roaming around yujing terrace, often seen admiring flowers or brewing a cup of hot tea, was someone you come across every afternoon after school when you head to the censor to make a wish to rex lapis.

the conversation you two have had always been brief, mainly because you were always in a hurry to get to work. she never minded your urgency, blissfully talking about how fast-paced and active young people these days are, and simply being happy that you even stopped to let her hand you some glazed lilies from time to time.

interestingly, though, she stopped giving you glazed lilies after a while and began handing you some pretty qingxin instead.

you never questioned it. it was just flowers. you could live without being gifted only one kind of them for the rest of your life. but after today's incident—after the burning down of your school located just outside the city, as well as what madame ping told you with hearty laughter laced in her voice, you were starting to think the switch to qingxin meant something.

"the yaksha is fond of you."

you tightened your hands around the weak strap of your school bag, made out of bamboo after lots of trials and errors, and you tilted your head with increasingly furrowing brows.

"pardon me, the what is fond of me?"

"the yaksha, my dear."

you stared at her. the corner of your lips was quirking up in confused twitches, and she could see that you were fiddling uncomfortably on your spot because you truly have no idea what she was talking about. it was not because of the history of the yaksha that might have made you feel jittery and out of place, you simply had no idea!

madame ping smiled even harder at your innocent oblivion then. how could you have such ample knowledge of rex lapis and the adepti, but nothing about the yaksha? especially the one with his mark, a jade green glow surrounding you like fireflies, all over your aura?

maybe that was why xiao chose you.

or, at least, it was one of the reasons why he liked you.

it was because you knew nothing of him. you never think about him, you never talk about him, and you would never suspect the string of random good luck and trails of safe travels that have been following you around.

while it must be tearing him down on the inside; the fact that he wasn't being able to approach the one person who made his good deeds a choice rather than an order. it must be plaguing his mind and patience every day.

but, even then, your surprising lack of information about his identity does save him the pressure of being chased down by you.

it saves him the problem of being even further attached to you. it was already pressing on his breaking point when he went out of his way to watch over you, leaving trails of his magic over your mortal soul to keep you safe when he was busy. any further interaction would be disastrous.

logically, he knew he would fall for you, so he was doing preventive measures. he has to keep his chest sealed so his heart wouldn't jump toward you involuntarily; he has to keep his chest sealed so you couldn't see all the mess inside.

"oh, sweet child," madame ping cooed as she walked toward you. she whispered to herself, "you're being protected by an adeptus and you don't even know."

she brought up a qingxin from her pocket, the petals slightly wrinkled from the confined space. she tucked it carefully in the pocket of your shirt before patting the bloomed flower, almost as if she was reminiscing.

"this is his flower," she said.

you hummed, looking down at it. "this is his favorite flower?"

"i'm not sure about his favorite flower, but this is his flower," she replied casually.

you pursed your lips together. well, at least now you knew the qingxin did have something to do with the... yaksha... or whatever.

"madame ping... may i ask–"

"you can find him at qingyun peak," she cut you off calmly. "during the lantern festival. he is always there during the festival. it was for the quiet, he said, that old man."

you shut your mouth, surprised that she knew what you wanted to ask. "uh... qingyun peak... is kind of... a big place..."

"you will find him if he wants to see you," she said. "you can speak his name–xiao. he might not show himself to you, but if you have something to say, he's likely there to listen."

qingyun peak. the lantern festival. the yaksha.

right.

that was how you found yourself bearing the freezing night cold with just a thin shirt and a ragged fabric wrapped and tied around your torso, your hands hurting from grabbing sharp edges and rough rocks, and your anxiety increasing with every jump that not only would the almond tofu in your bag fall, but you would as well.

as opposed to watching xinyan play for the lantern festival, being warm and cozy from the warm city lights and the tasty street food, and maybe even letting go of a lantern yourself after making a wish, you were here. you were alone, climbing mountains for a chance.

all for a random boy madame ping told you about! someone who was supposedly fond of you—if this xiao guy was so fond of you, he would have shown himself the first three times you called his name at the bottom of the mountain!

"fond of me–what a joke," you said through gritted teeth as you hoisted yourself up on a small ledge. "i'm going to kick his ass so hard when i find him."

you let yourself pant for a minute, regaining your stamina as you groggily accessed the higher peaks above you. your eyes squinted in dismay, but something inside you—the curiosity for the truth, as well as the longing for a friend, also the anger for playful revenge—urged you to keep going.

"he better eats the almond tofu i made," you muttered to yourself as you moved closer to the mountain. "i even picked some flowers... for him."

jump after jump, you were close to making it to the second ledge when suddenly, a slime jumped and appeared above you. it looked surprised, mirroring your expression, and as it prepared itself to attack you after seeing your hands move, it stopped when it saw you fumble about in the air before you began to fall further away from itself.

you had let yourself go. out of surprise, and an instinct to grab a weapon, your hands moved away from the edge and you fell.

your mind raced as the wind hit your face, your falling body heavy against the current that desperately tried to take you up from the ledge you just climbed up from. you would surely die from the impact if you drop. even without dropping down to the bottom, you would still suffer from a painful death.

was there something to do? how did this happen, you were doing fine! what should you do, what could you do? you were falling already—what was there to do now? anything, something?

"i–archons–" you heaved with the cold air, your lungs squeezing inside you with fear as tears began to drip out of your eyes.

anything? anybody?

xiao?

"you can speak his name. he might not show himself to you, but if you have something to say, he's likely there to listen."

"xi–" your voice broke for a millisecond when you could see the green grass approaching quickly. you squeezed your eyes shut, and your voice was louder than you have ever allowed it to be.

you called his name, loud and clear.

the first thing you felt was a lightning strike. you opened your eyes at the electric feeling to find a flash of green. it was bright, close and bright, in a way that was blinding. but then the tail broke into gentle fragments as a pair of arms circled your body to catch you from the fall.

one arm went around your waist, the other hand securely tightened itself around the back of your neck to keep it from breaking from the impact of his fast landing.

xiao growled under his breath when his feet struck the ground in a heavy blow. he pushed your head to his shoulder, shielding your face away from the soil that bounced upward as a result.

quietness ensued after a moment of calm. you took the moment to access the situation—you were fine. someone, likely xiao, saved you from the fall. you were fine.

he dropped onto the ground, sitting on the cold grass with your body pressed close to his, when he heard that you began to sob from the accident.

despite feeling awkward and unsure, he kept quiet and let you vent out the post-accident fear so you could slowly bring in the relief that you were still alive. but his quietness was unwelcomed when you suddenly curled your fist and hit him across the shoulder.

"screw you! why didn't you just answer me when i–when i was at the bottom of the moun–mountain! screw you!"

you blamed him and you hit his shoulder repeatedly. your weak fist was nothing compared to the pain he has endured in the past, but your cries cut through him like glass in the most seamless pattern when he realized he was part of the reason why you had to go through that traumatic experience.

if he had just jumped down from the peak when he heard you the first time, this would not have happened.

xiao looked at the empty spot before him. his golden eyes glowed with a softness that has long fallen into the abyss, forever gone and forever abandoned. but he brought it back out now because he cares about you, and he is, ultimately, attached to you, and he loves you.

"you're right," he said, holding you close to him. "i'm sorry."

ever since you discreetly left the almond tofu on the roof of the wangshu inn, your shy figure hunched over in an apologizing manner because you were told that you were giving food to an important, albeit weird, guest, and your blissfully ignorant words of encouragement as you told him to go out and explore the world, to give it a chance so he could find people he would like.

ever since then, he has loved you, in fragile and discreet ways, in unwavering and patient ways, in protective and caring ways.

"i love you, i'm sorry."

you stopped sobbing almost immediately, and he was afraid he might have said the wrong thing.

wasn't it what he was supposed to do? verr told him to speak his mind once. just be truthful with his feelings and nothing could go wrong. was he not supposed to show his affection blatantly, as he would his complaints and opinions?

"that... that is going a little too fast for me, xiao," you joked. "let's settle with appreciating each other for now."

he heard you laugh, causing the weight of his heart to drop, like finding lights in a fog, like seeing the lanterns in the night sky and realizing that there are more people alive with you than you think.

"thank you, for saving me," you said kindly then, your fist long stopped hitting him and was now patting his shoulder.

"always."

“but burning my school down is not the best approach for... whatever it was you were trying to help me with.”

xiao blinked in confusion, then realization hit him. he almost forgot about that! he was, shockingly, dwelling in the prideful fact that because he literally destroyed the building, you would be free of school for the day, and therefore not having to face all the hardships inside the walls he could not venture past. he thought it was the best thing to do, second to beating up everyone, which he politely opposed to.

“i am not sorry about that,” he muttered. “it was what i thought was best.”

he could feel you grin in his embrace. your laughter reverberated in the air, making his magic glow around you both. it was like nothing he has felt before. he wanted to stay like this—in this position where you were engulfed by him, where he could surround you with himself instead of the fireflies of green he has left behind, where he was with you in a way it was entire, in a way he could feel your beating heart against his own.

you are pressing onto his breaking point.

you are going to open him up, see him whole, and renovate his insides to your will. you are going to take his heart from his chest, breaking through his ribcage made feeble from his sheer affection for you, and claim it as your own. you are going to make him love, like sharp knives, like soft breaths, like tragic past, like warm blood, you are going to make him love.

you are pressing onto his breaking point.

and xiao lets you.

because you will be worth the tragedy, you will be worth everything.

[minzart]

hahaha for the bad beggining au, lol i think both kalim and jamil would instantly be yandere towards yuu, like imagine yuu accidentally saves kalim at the right moment and place, but surprise yuu doesn't know about kalim being rich or his identity, and kalim starts to obssess over yuu, but with jamil under kalim's orders, the best option for him to use snake's whisper to find out about yuu's origin and learning the true reason of their predicament, and jamil projecting his issues on to them thus making him a yandere to yuu bc of how they never asked to have this happened to them, viper family being servants to the al-asims and yuu's forced servanthood to NRC, lol jamil being a manipulative and obsessive yandere and kalim being a delussional and obsessive yandere go burr

Brain goes brrrr indeed~

Yuu at this point is well aware of unique magics, and overblots, they have scars and a "job" at Sam's store, being able to buy little tickets to themselfs at least, and blankets, many blankets

After Leona's overblot most of their fisical bullies got scared and don't interact so much at plain sight, the streets are finaly being used by Yuu

After Azul's overblot they got many presents, a "compensation" for their trouble, Yuu sold most of them and asked Azul to cut the crap and leave them alone, they don't need those presents, they know very well that he would just use those for guilting them at some point

Those were the most drastical changes that Yuu noticed, the others were more... subtle, for them at least, Leona bumps into them often, and seems to prefers stiking near them when they have a task to clean some places, it's just silence and staring... much staring

The Leech twins always make time to bother Yuu at some point, mostly Floyd and his squeezes, when Jade tags along he usualy wears a knowing smirk, Yuu got used to their presence and refuses to put an effort to seems entertaining enough to them, Floyd quickly gets bored and that can end two ways, he gets aggressive or he just walks away, if Jade is there he stops his brother, if he isn't... well... at some rare occasions he just picks Yuu and throws them at mostro louge work or something...

Azul refuses to meet Yuu face to face after his overblot, he's fuming that Yuu is the one in charge of bringing him homework and sending reports to the headmaster, tho he does wish to see them at the lounge after he recovers, their presence wasn't that much of a bother...

That was just a quick summary of how things were going to Yuu, now, in canon Yuu met Kalim and Jamil at chapter 4, but we say fuck it, so it's almost winter break

You see, Yuu isn't a heroe, Yuu doesn't have the time nor mindset to help others at any given point, a student stumble over and his books falls? They just walk pass, if they can't clean room 5 by the next lunch break Crowley will lecture them gain, a student lost something? If they don't know were it is they don't stop to help the guy, they are just the silent and mysterious handyman of NRC

However... unbeknown to Yuu... they have a name, because Yuu may not help, but they are efficient and thick skinned now

One day a potion was clearly going to blown in Crewel's class, that day Yuu just happens to be Crewel's helper of the day, this wasn't the first time, and honestly be a teachers helper is way more interesting and less tiring than being the handyman, so Yuu listened, Yuu knew how Crewel organized the ingredients, Yuu separated the piles of corrected tests and read some right answers, and Yuu is too tired to clean the mess this is going to cause, so what do they do? They fix it

Crewel noticed almost too late, he shielded the students and Yuu, in the last moment, threw the right ingredients and started to mix them FAST, slowly the potion stabilizes and everything is fine.... except that teh students are in awe, this is the "useless and magicless handyman" they aren't suposed to know how to fix potions

In the other day Yuu saw a curse that went terribly wrong, it transformed a poor student in a giant beast, the student it was pursing threw them at said monster and Yuu knew they couldn't escape so what did they do? They made eye contact with the beast and stood in the hallway

Yuu realy didn't cared if they would die... but destiny said not today, the beast almost knocked the human, but it stoped at the last minute and stared at Yuu... Crowley arrived to a crowd of students filming and murmuring rumors, who's the new kid? Is that their unique magic? They saved that student, what is going on?

Yuu collapsed once the beast was under control, that was terrifying....

Yuu awoke at night time in the infirmary, they decide to head to Ramshackle

Meanwhile Kalim was held until midnight to a extra class with Trein, he realy didn't understand one thing that was being said din those books.... he realy should have waited for Jamil to pick him up, NRC at night is scary....

_____________________

Everything had happened so fast, one second they met a friendly boy the other said boys is being kidnapped right in front of their eyes, and against all odds Yuu pursued them

They jump, and dive, and turn, and scale walls, the kidnappers are so quick almost too quick, but Yuu knows this grounds, Yuu can make a pretty good guess to were the bastard is running to so they make a leap of fate, taking the nearest shortcut adrenaline plumping their veins they run and run and jump

Kalim can't feel his legs, he doesn't understands were he is, but he knows what is happening, it has happened before... he hopes Jamil can get to him before his parents get the tiresome notice of another kidna- he's thrown in the ground, no, he isn't thrown, his captor feel

The boy feel worried hands turning him, they are kind and panicked, the face of the stranger he met mere moments ago, did they... did they come to help him? Realy? Why?

He still can't respond properly, but he knows he's in their back now, and they are running to somewhere... to Scarabia

_________________________

Jamil was the only one that wasn't surprised by the attention skills of the mysterious handyman, no, he better than anyone always suspected the magicless human to be more than they let on, because he himself is in a similar position, don't be seen, don't be heard and let others think less of you so you don't get in trouble

He may have been planing interacting with them if he had any free time, it would be better if he could engage someone like him in his plan, or dispose of someone who could ruin it, he just didn't plan to it occur now and in this circumstances

A frightened strangers with a knocked out Kalim is their back enters in full speed in the main hall, they look terrified, Jamil's first instinct if to get to Kalim, he fakes confusion about who they are, but is a good host, after putting Kalim in bed he interacts with them, he learns about the captors, the run, the incidents and even gets some inside information about the overblots that are occurring in the school

It's very useful and he judges he made a great first impression, but nothing prepared him for Yuu's coments:

Yuu: Jamil Viper... oh! The guy with the unique taste for grades?

Jamil: what do you mean by that?

Yuu: I mean, I saw your tests, and I hear the teachers too, they say you have plenty of potential, but refuses to give it you all, but judging by your results it's realy weird, you are very precise with your answers and even more careful with your error, almost as if you know the right answer but doesn't wants a hight grade? I dunno it can be only my imagination too...

Jamil: ... you are... very attentive for someone who isn't even a student

Yuu: it gets boring being always confused, so I just overthink everything and try to understand were I am, doesn't seem like Crowley can get me home anytime soon anyway...

Jamil: so the mirror can't get you home?

Yuu: nope! Am stuck here as long as the headmaster desires I guess, your "useless handyman" as they call

Jamil frowns at that, "useless"? Maybe in magic but not at all useless, no, Yuu just proves to be in a very similar situation to Jamil, he sympathizes with them, but can't do much about it either, maybe they can be of a better use, yes, they met Kalim but they don't seem to know who Kalim is, or why he almost got kidnapped

It's a interesting evening, they don't know much about this world, very reclusive about their routine,but slowly they open, and soon enough they are playing games while Kalim recovers, Jamil doesn't notice that he let's loose

Yuu: I knew you were smarter than you let on

Jamil: ha, you don't even know this game, how can you possibly know what a good player looks like?

Yuu: because I lied and because your eyes shine like a pro when you are focusing on winning

Kalim awakens the next day and starts bumbling about the stranger that saved his life and how he wishes to meet them again, while Jamil wants to know more about Yuu, they little chat and game last night left him craving for a rerun... but that can wait a little bit more...

It's a sparkle that culminates in chapter 4, Kalim falls like a brick, he wants to be with them so bad, he wants to hold them and shower them in jewelry and them to pay attention to him, he wants those caring gestures again, he wants to fell safe,a nd he knows they want to fell safe again, he can provide that! He knows he can

Jamil falls slowly by the way Yuu treats him, Yuu sees through his bullshit and it infuriated and intrigues him, he empathizes with them and honestly hopes for a better future for them, he wishes he could do more to help them, he can't do anything for now, but he knows who can... he hates sharing, but is it sharing if he can make them fall for him first?

[lokifantasies]

Home Sweet Home

Summary: You and Loki bring the three new babies home. Emmy wants Frigga to move in.

Character(s): Loki & family

Read the Mischievous Life series here!

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Today, you, Loki, and the twins came home. However, to the surprise of everyone else, another little one came as well.

Thor and Frigga, who had agreed to watch the little ones at home, were in shock when they saw the mixed half Asian, half African American little girl in your arms while Loki carried the two newborn twins in their car seats.

"Well, well!" Frigga announced – coming up to meet the babies as Loki sets the twins on the coffee table. "You went with two, and you came back with three, huh?"

Loki grinned and let out a chuckle. "That's what I said," he smiled towards his mother – taking the baby girl from your arms, so he could show her off. "Her name is Olivia Rose."

"Olivia," Frigga smiled – holding the little girl's small hand in hers. "She's absolutely precious."

"I convinced them to adopt her, grandma," Jade proudly greeted from the front door – carrying your backpacks in for you and Loki.

"Yeah, you're one hell of a saleswoman," you chuckled – letting your daughter by while she took the bags to your room.

Thor looked down at the twins in amazement, and Loki smiled at his brother's reaction.

"At least they're not identical," Thor joked. "What're their names?"

Loki smiled towards you, and you nodded – giving him the okay to reveal the babies' names. "Zielony Matthew Lokison and Lokaia Rebel Lokisdottir."

"Finally, brother!" Thor laughed. "It took you long enough to name on after yourself!"

You chuckled and sat down on the sofa next to the older god. "Your brother was determined," you poked fun at Loki – earning a sarcastic tongue stick out from your lover. "She's a little trickster, though," you continued. "She hid behind Zielony for most of the pregnancy!"

"That's definitely a Loki thing," Thor agreed. "I want to hold them, but they're sleeping so soundly."

Frigga smiled and let out a small hum. "They're absolutely precious," she complimented as she pulled you into a hug. "You and Loki make some beautiful children."

"Alright, mother," Loki embarrassingly cut in to hug his mother. "Hey, love," he said – getting your attention. "Do you think it would be alright to invite them to stay for a few days?"

"Of course!" you excitedly agreed.

Loki grinned and kissed you deeply before turning to his mother and brother. "Mother – brother – how would the two of you like to stay for a few days?"

Frigga smiled and Thor clapped his hands together. "That would be lovely," Frigga smiled – answering for her and the older son.

Suddenly, the quiet reunion was interrupted by the pounding of small feet coming down the stairs – three pairs of small feet.

"Mommy! Daddy! Mommy! The babies!" Ivy excitedly squealed as she ran into the living room with her older twin and Kaiser in tow.

"Shhhh!" you, Loki, Frigga, and Thor shush her almost instantly – causing the almost- nine-year-old to halt and her siblings to run into her back – falling to the ground.

The little collision brought a laugh from your lips – using your hand to cover it to keep the silence for your sleeping babies.

"Come here, love," Loki softly called out to the three kids. He crouched down in front of the coffee table and pulled the three into a huddle. "Listen up," he softly began in a whisper – you, Frigga, and Thor standing by and watching the adorable confrontation. "There are three sleeping babies here, alright? So, mommy and -,"

"Wait! Three?!" Emmy said with shock. "But I thought mommy was only having -,"

"Listen here, sweetie," Loki cut her off. "There was baby at the hospital who was all alone. Sissy told mommy and myself about about her, and we decided to bring her home with us."

"Woah," Kaiser said in amazement – his voice drawn out as he tries to look at Olivia, who was still sleeping in your arms. "She's cute!"

Loki chuckled and pulled the three kids into a hug. "Please try to be quiet for the babies, okay? They need all the rest they can get, so they can grow up big and strong like you guys."

"Okay, daddy," Ivy whispers to her dad – the others nodding immediately after. "We'll be quiet. Pawmise."

Loki smiled and stood up – walking over to sit with Frigga on the sofa – pulling you down into his lap with him.

"So," the god began at a normal voice level. "How were they?"

Frigga and Thor looked to each other before Frigga gently held her son's forearm.

"Loki," she smiled, "it was like taking care of three of you."

You chuckled and kissed your lover on the cheek – seeing his face scrunch up at his mother's words.

"Hey, gramma," Emmy said – getting your, Loki, and Frigga's attention.

Frigga bent down and picked the eight-year-old up and sat her on her lap – holding her by wrapping her hands around her waist.

"What is it, my sweet Emerald?" she smiled at Emmy.

"Can you move in with us?" the older twin innocently asked – a big smile growing on Frigga's face. "Pleeeease?"

Frigga laughed. "Oh, sweetie, I would love to, but that's not up to me. That's up to your mommy and daddy."

Emmy turned her attention to you and Loki – her pleading puppy dog eyes begging for approval. "Pleeeease mommy," she pleaded – clasping her hands together like prayer hands.

"Daddy, pleeease can gramma move in?"

You and Loki look silently back and forth at each other – your silent communication being your own way of speaking. Loki cocked his head to the right and raised his eyebrows, and you exhaled a deep breath.

"Let mommy and daddy talk about it, okay?" you responded to the pleading twin. "Gramma's going to be here for a few more days, so we'll decide soon."

[soulmate-game]

I was feeling angsty. Read at your own risk, there is very little comfort in this and a whole shit ton of hurt. Probably a bunch of emotional triggers, so seriously be careful guys.

—*—*—*—*—*

Liquid pain ran down her arm like poison, the slash in it burning hot and spreading it’s agony like an invisible waterfall inside her flesh. But she did not grip her bicep where the wound had been inflicted, her gaze blank as she forced herself to hide her turmoil behind glass eyes. Her brother’s snarling face was only inches in front of her own, his katana moving from her arm to her throat.

“Useless! To think we share any blood relation is humiliating!” He growled at her. She did not move, did not emote. Her blades fans, the weapon she was loved most, lay half-opened on the ground beside her. Abandoned. But she knew Damian’s sword would not kill her. Blood family was a bond that was not to be severed by murder unless ordered by Ra’s or justified by the murdered family member in question betraying the League. She had done nothing to betray the Shadows, and Ra’s would not waste time and energy, or the breath it would require, to order her death. Just as he would not waste the precious waters of the Pit to bring her back again. She would not die today, and she knew it.

Sure enough, it was only a few more insults in various languages before Damian Al-Ghul stepped back and scowled down at the blood on his blade. Her blood. “If you don’t even have the stomach for real combat, you do not belong here,” he spat.

“That is where we agree, Grandson,” Ra’s sharp voice echoed through the room, his beady eyes never once bothering to glance at his granddaughter. “Maria, you are hereby stripped of the name Al-Ghul. Banishment from the League is the only mercy you shall be granted for your dishonor on our blood. Be useful and use whatever is left of your mistake of a life to stay out of the League’s way. Shall I, Damian, or your mother ever see your face again, your burial will follow shortly after. Am I understood?”

“Yes Gr— yes, Ra’s Al-Ghul.”

—*—*—*—*—*

Maria Al-Ghul was seven years old when she was disowned and sent away from the League of Shadows without so much as a penny to her name. She was only allowed to take the change of clothes she carried, and one small backpack’s worth of items. Her mother— Talia— had watched vigilantly as she packed those items, assuring that Maria did not take anything of worth.

The girl traveled by foot, too small to get away with driving a vehicle. Unless she could manage to steal a motorbike— she knew how to adjust the seats and pedals on most models to accommodate her size. But she was far too far away from civilization for that.

She knew that most of the League expected her to die in the jungles that surrounded the temple. After all, there were ninjas scattered throughout it with strict orders to kill anyone who was not one of them. And Maria now fit that description.

But if there was one thing Maria knew better than anything else, it was how to hide. How to hide feelings, intentions, involuntary movements, or her whole body in almost any setting. She covered herself in mud, matted her hair with dirt and took off her shoes. Barefoot was always quieter, and her feet would be more sensitive to any change in terrain. She would have to move more slowly and be on the lookout for traps, ground litter that could harm her, or dangerous wildlife, but she would be much harder to track.

It took her a month, but she made it to her first Tibetan city alive and decently healthy. She begged for food for a day before snatching a child’s outfit off of some hanging laundry lines and stealing the first decent vehicle she found. It was an old moped, but it beat walking and was already built small. She made it work.

That was how she spent the majority of the next year. She traveled from town to town, stealing what she needed until she could earn money normally. She used that money to buy herself a fake identity, even if she had to use the skills she had hoped to never need again in order to afford it.

Marinette Shiwang was born when she was already eight years old.

It was only a year after her new identity was created when she bumped into a woman in a street market. That was nothing new, those places could get crowded. But when Marinette looked up and saw valuable bracelets and necklaces of gold and jade, she knew she needed at least one. The money she would get for it would have her living comfortably for a short while. So Marinette’s theft-experienced fingers darted out and unclasped one bracelet in a fluid movement. It took less than a second. She barely had the piece of jewelry in her hand before she started to take off, hoping to lose herself in the crowd.

But a small hand clamped around her shoulder, a sturdy thumb pressing against a very vulnerable spot right at the back of Marinette’s neck, at the base of her skull. A clear threat from somebody with experience.

The sweet voice that followed didn’t match the gesture at all.

“Oh, I need that back dear. It was a gift from my husband, you understand.”

Marinette did. She cared about survival more. The small girl twisted, knocking the hand away from her before it could do damage and darting down a side street. The woman followed. It took three hours, but Marinette decided she had finally lost her pursuer before slumping down in the tiny, closet-sized bedroom of her cheap apartment. Her eyes closed for only a second before the window opened, and the smell of newly-baked sesame buns filtered through.

It was the woman and a much taller, much more masculine man. He was practically a giant, reminding Marinette of a certain member of the League that she used to know. They were both smiling.

“My wife figured you would be more open to an exchange than just giving up the bracelet for free,” the man’s voice was deep and inviting. “You can eat as many buns as your stomach can handle, if you give it back.”

Marinette accepted. Mostly because of her fear for people who could track her to her home so easily, when she had been certain she had not been followed. The League has tuned her senses well, there was no way the couple had been close enough to see her when she made it to her apartment. Yet they were still there somehow. Then, it also had to do with the promise of food, and the heavenly smell of the food itself. And then, lastly, Marinette was tired. She didn’t like stealing, it was just a necessity. She would not hurt these people over a mere bracelet that she wished she didn’t have to take in the first place.

Useless, she thought. So much of a bleeding heart that she just gave up what could have paid for two months rent. Too soft to even protect herself. The Al-Ghuls has been right. She was a waste of space and time.

Marinette was ten years old when she became a Dupain-Cheng. Somehow, that strange, dangerous couple had become her new family. Not even she knew how. But she was grateful— they took her back to Paris with them and she didn’t have to worry about rent, or food, or money anymore.

She vowed, that day that she received her spacious attic bedroom, that she would repay them. She would make herself useful, for the first time in her life. She would stay out of their way, be the perfect most unobtrusive daughter ever. She would help in the bakery, keep a smile on her face so that they never doubted that they were doing a good job. So that they never wasted time worrying about her. She smiled, and laughed, and became successful for them. Competent and reliable even though her memories would sink into her dreams every day and make it near impossible to drag herself out of bed in the mornings.

And then, when Marinette Dupain-Cheng was thirteen, she was given a pair of magical earrings and a tiny fairy-god. And Tikki was thorough, at least. Diligent in her explanation. Marinette listened to every word, dread seeping in as she doubted her ability to carry out such an important task. Save a city? Defeat someone much more experienced and magically powerful than her?

Useless little Maria could never. Slightly less useless Marinette could never.

She was only ever meant to play a support role. Stay on the background and make everyone else shine, without ever succeeding in anything worth noting. That was who she was.

But then Tikki gave her the Warning. The catch that came with the Ladybug abilities, and Marinette felt the long-rusted determination in her begin to fire up again. Maybe she could be Ladybug. Maybe she could be useful, at least this once. At least for just this one scenario. She could fight and win the war against Hawkmoth, and that achievement alone could make her happy. Let her die knowing she did something worthwhile.

—*—*—*—*—*

Damian Wayne was seventeen when he and his family found out about the Paris Situation, and immediately went over to offer help. Damian Wayne was seventeen when he watched Ladybug stumble at the sight of him, and immediately run away. But the two of them were twins, and though twin telepathy might be a myth they always did have a certain instinct when it came to one another.

Damian Wayne was Seventeen when he said, aloud on the top of a random Parisian building and surrounded by his family—

“My sister is Ladybug.”

Damian didn’t wait for their reactions, having entirely forgotten about the existence of his father and brothers, before taking off after his spotted sibling.

—*—*—*—*—*

“I knew you were alive.”

In hindsight, those probably weren’t the best words for him to say when Maria clearly thought he was still an assassin.

Damian watched as Marinette spun to face him, her face so much more expressive than he remembered. He could actually see the resignation in the slump in her shoulders, he could feel the fear in her bluebell eyes. The eyes she was lucky enough to get from their father while he was cursed with their mother’s green irises. He used to envy that about her, especially after joining the BatClan. But now he only felt comfort when he looked into her eyes. Comfort that she was different than him, and always had been. In the best of ways.

He watched as his sister was enveloped by a bright flash of pink light, detransforming right in front of him. And without the mask, it was impossible to ignore the relation between them. She had their father’s eyes and nose where he had their mother’s, but other than that they were almost carbon copies of one another. Her blue-black hair was pulled back into twin braids though, something he noted distantly as oddly fitting. They suited her, he thought.

But all those thoughts instantly turned to dust as she dropped to her knees in front of him, head bowed in complete submission.

“Tom and Sabine are innocent,” she told him. “They adopted me out of nothing but goodwill, and they have been nothing but good to me. I never told them a single word about my origin, I swear it on our blood. They think I am just an orphan that was abandoned in Hong Kong—“

“Maria—“

“—so please, don’t harm them. I’m begging you. And there is no need for you to waste energy killing me. You are welcome to stay in Paris as long as no harm comes to Tom and Sabine, but just wait and watch. I know who Hawkmoth is, and our final plan is almost ready. I’ll have him taken down by next week. Just— wait until then, please. My death will take care of itself afterwards, but Paris deserves to be free, and killing me now will set this entire war against Hawkmoth back by at least a year. And I also need that time to pick my successor—“

“Maria! I am not here to kill you!” Damian had to yell to get her to stop babbling and begging. She froze, but didn’t dare to sit up or even raise her head. So Damian took the initiative and sat down on the ground with her, though he kept his distance so that he didn’t scare her too badly. He couldn’t blame her for her reaction, it had been ten years since they had seen one another and their parting hadn’t exactly been pleasant.

But he had changed a lot since then, matured a lot.

“I am completely disconnected from the League,” he admitted. Of the blurry memories he had of her, he did remember that being blunt was the best way to handle information with her. Beating around the bush had always done nothing but make her exceptionally nervous and jittery. Sure enough, his admission was enough to make her look up at him with disbelieving eyes. He risked a small grin. “I didn’t come in my old uniform, did I?” He gestured to himself in the bright Robin colors. Sure enough, Marinette’s rapid blinking proved his theory that she hadn’t even registered his clothing at all to be true. She had run as soon as she recognized his face.

But Marinette did not speak. She sat up a little, still eyeing him cautiously. But her silence helped him finally realize where they were— where she had led him.

The sounds of traffic and other big city noises were all muted, as if muffled by several layers of cloth. Shadows fell over them abundantly, and they were surrounded by dilapidated concrete walls.

She had brought him to an abandoned area far from any activity, where a body would take ages to find. She had then disarmed herself of her only weapon, her magic suit, and had gotten on the ground in total submission.

She had purposely given him the perfect setting to kill her, where there would be no witnesses and plenty of time before her body would be found for him to escape. That realization hit Damian square the chest, leaving him breathless for a moment.

“I am not here to kill anybody,” he reiterated, his voice noticeably much gentler than before. “Not you, not you adoptive parents, nobody. I left the league when I was eleven. Mother—“ he took a breath, but Maria deserved to know. “— she cloned me. Her clone killed me. He no longer exists, but that is of no consequence. She killed me, she and Grandfather disowned me when I made it clear I was not returning. Father— our father,” he was insistent as he leaned forward, not continuing until she met his gaze. “You remember who our father is, right? Bruce Wayne? Mother had dropped me off to be raised with him when I was ten, but of course it was all just one of her plots. It was her miscalculation though, because I ended up growing close to them. To Father and his adopted children. You would get along with Gra— with Dick, the best I think. Although T— Jason would also be a prime contender as your favorite brother, I think. He shares your love of motor bikes, if that hasn’t changed?” She just stared at him, clearly confused and experiencing a lot of feelings at once. He stayed silent for a moment to allow her to sort through them a little.

“I’m Robin now,” he made his voice quieter, but still easy for her to hear. “I’m a member of the Bats. I’m sure they would all welcome you, if you chose to meet them. Though be warned, they can be quite in—“

“Why are you doing this?” Marinette’s voice was barely above a whisper, Damian almost didn’t hear her. But he did, and fell silent. He watched as his sister licked her lips and tried to find the right words to say. “If what you say is true… you have a perfectly good family. Brothers, Father, a comfortable life. Why follow me then? Why offer me… any of that?”

Damian frowned. He didn’t remember Maria being so gloomy, but then again she had been raised to never show her emotions. Maybe, after years away from the temple like him, her true feelings were just easier for him to see now. Closer to the surface.

“I want to get to know you— to get to know my sister, again,” he told her. “Don’t tell them, but Father and the others have taught me to appreciate family. The way I treated you when we were children was not right, and though it was heavily influenced by Mother and Grandfather, I want to make up for it nonetheless. Maybe we can get to know the new us, together?”

Marinette’s eyes went wide with disbelief, but then she clenched her jaw and shook her head.

“We can’t.”

“... right, I understand if you do not forgive me. I didn’t even consider—“

“It isn’t that,” Marinette was quick to correct him. “When I said that my death will handle itself, I mean it, Damian. The Ladybug… the earrings that give me my powers, come with a price,” she absently ran her fingertips over the unassuming black studs in her ears. “If a Ladybug uses the miraculous for more than three years, the powers of Creation will demand to be balanced. Already, the Miraculous is powering itself on nothing but my life force now. Once I defeat Hawkmoth, there will be no need for Ladybug anymore. The moment I take the earrings off, they will cease keeping me alive.”

Damian’s face fell. No— no, that wasn’t right. He was finally able to find her, finally able to apologize and try to fix his past mistakes. This couldn’t be how the reunion went. This couldn’t—

“Not even the Lazarus Pits can bring me back from a Miraculous death,” Marinette went on. “So you and your family should go. You don’t need to be here when I—“ Marinette paused, gasping. “Damian, why are you crying?! Stop that!” Her voice became desperate, Marinette crawling over to him as quickly as she could and wiping away his tears as if they were something terrifying. Damian wasn’t sobbing or making any noise, it was just a silent stream of tears running down both cheeks as he stared at her wordlessly.

“I…” he finally managed to choke out. “I wanted to make up for everything. I wanted for us to be twins again, together.”

Marinette paused, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. “I know a magic user who can erase your memories of me,” she offered. “But you don’t have to feel guilty for anything. You never said anything that wasn’t true.”

Damian’s green eyes widened. He had said nothing but cruel things to her, that last year they spent together as children. Did she really believe all of that? Did he and their childhood really affect her self worth this severely and irreversibly?

“Maria—“

“My name is Marinette, actually,” she corrected him with a small smile. “I’m not Maria Al-Ghul anymore. Marinette Dupain-Cheng is actually useful, Damian. I can actually do things right— I’m doing something right right now. Beating Hawkmoth will be the first worthwhile thing I’ve ever done, don’t you see? Once it’s all over, I will have brought honor back to our blood. I’ll have proved to you that I really am your twin, that I wasn’t a mistake. That I was born for a reason,” Marinette’s eyes got dreamy even as Damian just felt like he was impaled again, this time by a spike of ice rather than a sword. “And I’ll be able to die before I ruin it. It’s a perfect scenario.”

“A perfect scenario implies that nothing important is going to be lost,” Damian breathed. Marinette just blinked.

“Yeah, I know. That’s the plan. Defeat Hawkmoth, save Paris, and nobody dies.”

“But you’re going to die!” He growled. Marinette leaned back, bewildered by his violent reaction.

“Yeah, but it’s not like I actually matter. Nobody needs me. Tom and Sabine might be hurt for a while, but they will recover just fine. And it’s not like I have friends or any—“

“Stop worrying about other people, damnit!” Damian surged forward, grabbing her shoulders hard enough to bruise and shaking her a little. “Even back then! Even when we were seven, you threw down your blades because you were more worried about hurting me than you were about how Grandfather would react, even though you knew he would be tempted to kill you for what he thought was cowardice! You never put yourself first, and it’s finally starting to piss me off!”

“Damian—“

“No, listen to me!” He shook her again, his tear stained cheeks only making his glare all the more potent as he stared right into her eyes. “You are alive, and your life matters! You were never worthless or useless, you just didn’t fit what our abusive situation wanted of you. They wanted a cold hearted killer, a tool they could use, and you were always too warm hearted and clever to fit either of those goals. But I did, I was the killer they were looking for and the pawn they wanted. If anything, that makes you better than I ever was! I was too young and naive to see it back then, but I’m trying to make up for it now. You are my sister, whether you go by Maria or Marinette, Al-Ghul or Wayne or Dupain-Cheng, I don’t give a damn! And so help me, even if I have to surgically attach those earrings to your skin, I am not letting you die before you gain at least a modicum of respect for yourself. Do you understand me?”

A wet sniffle met his ears, and he pulled Marinette in for a hug. She returned it weakly, sniveling and sobbing into his cape.

“D-d-Damian?”

“Yes, Shaqiqa?”

Another sniffle.

“I-is it really o-okay for me to stay with you?”

“Of course.”

“I-is… is it really oka-ay for… for me to live?”

Damian’s arms tightened around her. “Always. Always, always.”

Marinette buried her face into his shoulder, taking a deep shuddering breath.

“Th-then… I wanna try.”

—*—*—*—*—*

Not sorry. Ha 😎

[ibijau]

Futures Past pt18 / on AO3

Nie Huaisang returns to the Cloud Recesses, and meets the people he's meant to befriend

Much to his surprise, Nie Huaisang realised upon returning to the Cloud Recesses that he had missed the place. Or rather, he had missed the friends who lived there.

All winter, Su She and him had exchanged letters, mostly to complain about every single thing that bothered them. When they finally met again in person, they were quite happy to do more of the same. They also discussed all the things they might do for fun that year. 

Su She, at long last, had risen in rank and been given more freedom than he used to have. He would have less classes to attend since he was now trusted to take charge of his own training to some degree, he would join more Night Hunts, he had been given a new jade token that allowed him to leave the Cloud Recesses at any time of the day as long as curfew was respected, and he would even be included among those juniors who patrolled to enforce the respect of the rules.

All this made Nie Huaisang so happy for his friend, that he did not realise at first all the implications this had regarding the amount of time they would get to spend together. Su She would be very busy in the future, but he promised he would do everything possible to still make time for his best friend, and Nie Huaisang easily believed him.

The other joy to be found in returning to the Cloud Recesses was not immediate. By the time Nie Huaisang had arrived there, Lan Xichen had not yet returned from a Night Hunt he’d gone on with Nie Mingjue. That was hardly a surprise. These two were usually far too serious in all things, but when they went Night Hunting together, they always stayed a little longer than really necessary. Nie Huaisang usually found that greatly amusing, and never missed a chance to tease his brother about skirting his duties. They seemed to have taken a particularly long time on this occasion, but since Nie Mingjue had complained a few times that he hadn't seen his friend in such a long while, it was not so odd. Nie Huaisang would have mocked his brother so much if he'd seen him before leaving home. 

Since he didn’t have a chance to do it that time, he instead teased Lan Xichen when he finally came home, on the same day most of the guest disciples were set to arrive, on the eve of the lectures' start. Of course if Nie Huaisang had been a good and dutiful person, he would have gone to the main gate to see those other guest disciples, and maybe try to strike a friendship with them as early as possible. But between trying to catch a glimpse of the boring friends his future self wanted him to make, and dropping by Lan Xichen’s house to see the friend he actually liked, the choice had been easily made.

Lan Xichen offered him tea and smiled when accused of dodging his responsibilities, but less warmly than Nie Huaisang had expected. In fact, he found that the older boy looked rather more tired than he should have been, and more nervous as well. He tried to ask about that, but Lan Xichen refused to dwell on the subject.

“There is just a lot to do, and you are right that I was gone longer than I should have,” Lan Xichen said. “Especially since Wangji is in seclusion… he was supposed to come out of it today, but I saw him earlier and convinced him to continue meditating alone for at least another month. There will be many energetic people among our guests this year, and I doubt he will enjoy their company too much.”

Nie Huaisang, who had found the Cloud Recesses even more fun without the constant threat of Lan Wangji being around to enforce the rule, could only nod. He didn't mind waiting a month to set in movement his older self's orders.

“And this had nothing at all with you wishing to have a little peace without your brother constantly enforcing the rules, does it?” he teased.

“I am nowhere near as rebellious as you seem to have decided,” Lan Xichen replied with an indulgent smile. “Though I suppose Lan Wangji does take a stricter approach to them than I do. I’m sure in time, he’ll learn that they are meant to be a guidance, not a restriction.”

“And that he should let his brother eat candies sometimes.”

Lan Xichen smiled, trying to hide a chuckle. That was enough to comfort Nie Huaisang. As long as he still enjoyed his jokes, Lan Xichen could not be doing badly. And after that the conversation soon moved on to music, giving Nie Huaisang a great chance to show off how hard he had worked all winter. By the time Nie Huaisang had to leave, Lan Xichen appeared in good spirits again, for which he congratulated himself.

-

When morning came, Nie Huaisang got up as early as he could manage after falling back on his old habits during winter, and headed toward the lecture hall with the other Nie disciples. There were a number of other boys assembled at the door, all waiting for the teacher to arrive. 

Among those, the ones dressed in purple attracted Nie Huaisang’s attention the most. He recognised Jiang Cheng of course, with Meng Yao next to him whose attitude seemed more that of a babysitter than a fellow disciple, perhaps because of that other boy standing near them who had a mischievous smile on his lips. Then, behind them, there were two other boys dressed in Jiang purple, plain and quite forgettable. Perhaps Wei Wuxian wasn’t there after all, or perhaps he had already entered the class to study on his own, as befitted someone who was destined to fall for Lan Wangji.

Even if that person was absent, Nie Huaisang decided he should go greet Jiang Cheng and Meng Yao at least, since he already knew them. But before he had taken even one step in their direction, he heard someone call out for him.

“You are Nie gongzi, right?” a haughty boy asked.

He was dressed in that shade of yellow that only the Jins ever thought pleasant, and his face bore a passing resemblance with Jin Zixun’s, except with much nicer features, and a far colder expression. All of this made it rather easy to guess his identity, even if they had never met.

“And you must be Jin gongzi,” Nie Huaisang replied with a polite nod. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure is mine,” Jin Zixuan said, returning the nod. “Since you are my cousin’s friend, I hope we can become better acquainted.”

Nie Huaisang gaped at the other boy.

“I’m what?”

“He’s too proud to use the word, but I know Zixun. He wrote about you several times last year, and he told me you helped him pass his exams.”

That this would be anywhere near enough to be considered a friend said a lot about Jin Zixun’s overall popularity. Nie Huaisang himself, who wasn’t exactly rich in friends, wouldn’t have used the word to talk about Jin Zixun, but he still felt flattered. In fact, he wondered if the acquaintance might be worth sustaining. Surely Nie Huaisang could try to write to Jin Zixun perhaps? He’d promised he would write to Xue Yang already, to give him a chance to practice reading and writing without the pressure of a classroom. If he was writing anyway, one more letter could be easy to fit into his very full schedule. Jin Zixun was a prick, but on occasions he'd been almost tolerable, so he wouldn't be the worst friend Nie Huaisang could make.

“He also said you became friends because he broke your nose,” Jin Zixuan added, his tone dripping judgement at the idea that anyone could ever put up with something like that.

Nie Huaisang self-consciously raised a hand to touch his nose, before quickly dropping it to his side, embarrassed by this habit he’d picked up.

“It’s a little more complicated than that,” he grumbled. “But I guess I did help him pass. And, well… if you want to be friends, I have no issues with that.”

“We’ll see about it,” Jin Zixuan retorted, before turning around and returning to his own group, as if it might dirty him to spend too much time with people who weren’t Jins.

Jin Zixuan was lucky to have such a pretty face and to be so rich, because it certainly wasn’t his personality which would make him friends, Nie Huaisang thought. He was at least as annoying as Jin Zixun, even though it was in a different manner.

He must not have been the only one to have that impression. When he turned his attention back toward the Jiang disciples, all of them save for Meng Yao were glaring in the direction of Jin Zixuan. Worse still, when their eyes wandered toward Nie Huaisang, it was clear that mere association with Jin Zixuan had instantly branded him as unpleasant to them. That was odd, though. Everyone knew that there was an engagement between Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli, so surely there should have existed, if not friendship, then at least some degree of cordiality between disciples of their two sects. 

Nie Huaisang feared what starting with a disadvantage might do to the mission forced upon him, when already he wasn’t the best at making friends. But his eyes then met Meng Yao’s who, after whispering something to Jiang Cheng, walked toward Nie Huaisang and even bowed to him with far more deference than anyone had ever bothered to show before.

“Nie-gongzi, I am glad we meet again,” Meng Yao said. “I never had a chance to thank you before for your help that day.”

“I hardly did anything at all!” Nie Huaisang protested, waving his hands in embarrassment. “In fact, you were even hurt by my fault that time!”

“And yet I must insist in expressing my gratitude. If not for you and Lan gongzi standing up for me, I would not have been given a chance to become a cultivator, which has been my greatest dream since childhood. For this, I am in your debt.”

Nie Huaisang blushed a little. “Really, it was nothing. Any decent person would have done the same! And with a potential like yours, it was only natural that someone would take you as a student someday! How’s Yunmeng treating you? Are they nice to you? You can tell me if they’re not, and I’ll tell my da-ge, and he’ll tell them to be nice. But it’s Yunmeng, of course they’re probably nice, right?”

His rambling surprised Meng Yao, who appeared a little unsure how to answer. Probably he’d expected the young master of a great sect to be a little more eloquent than that, the way Lan Xichen was, or even Jiang Cheng. But it was difficult to keep cool in front of the boy who would have become the man who had killed Nie Mingjue.

How could that have even happened? Even after months in Lotus Piers, Meng Yao remained shorter than Nie Huaisang, and barely any heavier. How could someone like that…

“I think we’re treating him fine,” Jiang Cheng said in a dry voice as he joined them. “Though your concern commends you, Nie gongzi.”

Nie Huaisang jumped in surprise, and quickly bowed to him.

“Of course I didn’t mean to imply… and, well, he’s here to study, so clearly he is well treated, and your father must be quite impressed with him,” Nie Huaisang said, fidgeting with his sleeve. “I’m quite glad that things worked out so well!”

That other Jiang boy, the tall and handsome one, also joined them and threw an arm around Meng Yao’s shoulders to pull him close.

“It’s not Jiang-shushu who’s impressed with Meng Yao, it’s Yu-furen,” the boy said with a bright grin. “She’s the one who said he should come, because we’re less stupid when he’s with us.”

“She said you’re less stupid,” Jiang Cheng scoffed. “Don’t drag me down with you.”

“Yu-furen also thinks that having Meng Yao with us means that stupid peacock will keep his distances,” the other boy continued, unbothered by that interruption. “She’s really so scared that we’ll start an argument with him.”

“You would!”

“Only if he insults Shijie! Which he would, because he’s nothing but a self-important…”

“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Cheng hissed. “Can you not shut up just for a moment?”

The boy just laughed, while Nie Huaisang stared.

Surely there had to have been a mistake. That couldn’t be Wei Wuxian. There was simply no way that Lan Wangji would ever become even a little attracted to a person such as this, who was bold enough to insult Jin Zixuan within earshot, who was so careless regarding Meng Yao’s obvious discomfort at having the connection mentioned. Sure Wei Wuxian wasn’t half bad looking, but with a personality like that, Lan Wangji would only try to murder him, not kiss him.

“You know, if the teacher isn’t here yet, we can probably leave,” Wei Wuxian said. “That’s what we’d do at home. Let’s ditch the lesson and go have fun!”

Oh, Lan Wangji was so going to murder him when they met. Surely Nie Huaisang’s future self had to be mistaken about those two. 

“Hey, Wei-xiong, you shouldn’t say things like that,” Nie Huaisang advised. “There’s some people that might punish you if they heard you talk like this!”

“Sure, but the point is that the teacher isn’t here, so I have nothing to fear. Come on, Nie-xiong, it’s your second year here, right? Surely you’d rather run off to have fun with us than sit through some boring lectures again!”

As a matter of fact, Nie Huaisang very much wanted that. Considering how badly his studies went the year before, he had no reasons to think he would do any better that year either, so having fun would be a great use of his time. But that would upset Nie Mingjue, who didn't need that. And it might also disappoint Lan Xichen, which would be the worst thing ever. Having discovered that he enjoyed being praised, and how willing to do just that Lan Xichen was, Nie Huaisang didn't want to risk upsetting his friend. 

"When I say there's people you shouldn't make angry, I don't mean just Lan Qiren," Nie Huaisang warned. "He's mostly manageable, if you just avoid talking back and cry a little when he gets angry. But his nephew Lan Wangji is a real terror, and they've put him in charge of overseeing punishment for the juniors. You're lucky he's in seclusion at the moment, because just for speaking of skipping classes, he'd have your skin. He takes rules very seriously!"

"The teacher's nephew, uh," Wei Wuxian said with an odd smile. 

"You're thinking something unwise," Meng Yao accused. 

"Please don't go bother that guy as soon as he leaves his seclusion," Jiang Cheng warned. "Mother will murder you if you disgrace our sect!" 

Wei Wuxian's grin only grew wider, to the great anxiety of the other three. 

"That nephew, he wouldn't happen to be a very handsome boy?" Wei Wuxian asked. "About my size, very handsome…" 

"His brother looks much better," Nie Huaisang interjected without thinking. "Lan Wangji always looks so crossed… but he has a fine enough face, yes."

"And a silver sword that gives off a cold impression?" 

"Did you already meet him?" Nie Huaisang asked. 

"Yes, last night." 

"Last night?" Jiang Cheng repeated. "How… there's a curfew in place here! Are you already breaking rules?" 

Without a shred of regret or shame, Wei Wuxian started telling the story of his escape to buy wine, his attempt to return in secret, and his fight with Lan Wangji. Upon hearing that tale Jiang Cheng was furious, Meng Yao was worried, and Nie Huaisang so delighted he had to cover his mouth with both hands not to laugh. 

Lan Wangji losing his temper! Lan Wangji getting in a fight, and not even winning it! Lan Wangji failing to punish a criminal! It was the funniest Nie Huaisang had ever heard, and he couldn't wait to share all of it with Su She who would surely be just as entertained. 

This Wei Wuxian was a much more interesting person than anticipated, and Nie Huaisang could see himself becoming quite fond of him, even though he'd been determined to dislike him before. But that had been when he thought that his future self and Lan Wangji approved of him, two people whose opinion he didn't value much. 

"Wei-xiong, you are so dead," Nie Huaisang cheerfully announced when the other had finished his story. "It's going to be a matter of pride now, he's going to have his eye on you for the entire time you'll be here!" 

And for more than that, if Nie Huaisang’s future self was to be believed. That old prick didn't seem the sort to prank others, but it was also difficult to imagine Lan Wangji falling in love with someone like Wei Wuxian. People said that opposite attracted, but there were limits. Then again, it would be immensely funny if these two did become a couple. If it happened, Nie Huaisang might laugh to death. 

"That Lan Zhan is probably too busy to bother with me," Wei Wuxian claimed. "And it's not like he comes to the lectures, right? So I'm not worried in the least. Besides, I'm more than his match in a fight!"

The arrival of Lan Qiren, who seemed in as bad a humour as Nie Huaisang had ever seen him, cut short that conversation, though Wei Wuxian still looked quite sure of himself as they all entered the classroom. He only deflated a little when they all noticed that there already was a student sitting there, a Lan boy who only looked up from the scroll he was reading to glare at Wei Wuxian. In turn, Wei Wuxian did appear a little startled, having clearly not expected that his new nemesis would be there.

It took Nie Huaisang all of his self control not to laugh at this situation.

The plot to help Lan Wangji find a cultivation partner had held little joy when he had believed Wei Wuxian to be the second Jade's equal in temper. But discovering that Wei Wuxian was a wild spirit, sure to drive Lan Wangji mad with annoyance and to distract him from his duties, delighted Nie Huaisang. It was the funniest thing in the world.

It was the stuff of great romances, something which might blossom into a love story people would talk about for ages. Two people of opposite temper, of opposite values even, learning to see each other’s worth… it would be quite fun to watch that unfold, and even more amusing to give it a push here and there.

Helping the romance of others was the closest to living his own that Nie Huaisang was likely to get, so he’d have to content himself with that.

His lack of appealing skills made it unlikely he’d ever provoke the sort of strong sentiment already at play between Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji. But even a more talented nature would not have changed his delicate position as his brother's heir. Until his brother married and had children, Nie Huaisang knew it would be unwise of him to flirt with anyone of his own choosing, not when the Nie clan might someday require him to make a good match. The only reason he wasn’t already engaged to anyone, he suspected, was because there weren’t many girls of the right age among the greater sects, and because his brother disliked the idea of using him as a political tool unless absolutely necessary.

It was not easy, being next in line to inherit a sect, and Nie Huaisang was quite happy that he wasn’t in love with anyone at all. He only wished a little to be like Wei Wuxian, as a servant's son, free to live as he pleased as long as he did not bring any scandal for his sect. And it was lucky that Lan Wangji's status was not quite as dire as Nie Huaisang’s, not when he had a brother who was more likely to get married than Nie Mingjue, and even a relatively young uncle who could well have children of his own if needed. 

Lucky them indeed, but Nie Huaisang was determined not to envy them.

He’d just have his share of fun watching them… and maybe he’d see if Lan Xichen could be convinced to help too, just so they’d have another thing to laugh about together.

[thepapergirlandthespiegelman]

Castlevania Season 4: I’m not mad, just disappointed

Season 4 is poorly written fanfiction, which is...better than a lot of things could be, I guess.

Spoilers below the cut.

Content warning: trauma, sexual assault, psychological manipulation

The Gods Have Had a Change of Heart

Or, “Season 3 Blocked and Ignored”

Season 3 felt like the fabric of the universe had been twisted just to inflict additional pain. Season 4 overcompensates in the other direction; trauma evaporates, and good things happen for no other reason than to make our favorite characters happy.

The Season 3 finale left two characters in particular totally devastated: Alucard and Hector. Alucard is violently betrayed in a horrifying sexual assault by the first two people he’s spoken to since Trevor and Sypha left. He ends up killing them in self-defense and puts their bodies on stakes outside the castle, alluding to his father’s habit of doing so and potentially hinting at a turn toward evil. Hector is seduced by Lenore and then enslaved using a magic ring.

Yet at the start of Season 4, it’s as if these things never happened. Alucard is troubled, but not totally devastated, certainly not evil. Taka and Sumi are referenced in exactly one conversation with new character, Greta, in which she says the rather tactless throwaway line, “I had a boyfriend and girlfriend at the same time once. But they never tried to kill me.” Hector is nominally imprisoned, but immediately seems highly agentic, perhaps even more so than before. He studies, lays traps, and makes secret plans with other people. Furthermore, his relationship with Lenore is completely transformed. From falling to his knees in abject horror and despair at being enslaved, he suddenly switches to light banter, in what is apparently a basically okay, mutually enjoyed romantic/sexual relationship. Manipulative, selfish Lenore is now a sympathetic character struggling to reconcile her own role and feelings with Carmilla’s plans.

The events of season 3 happened, remaining canon in the most basic, literal sense. But the emotional weight attached to them has disappeared into thin air.

Not gonna lie, I did breathe a sigh of relief when I saw that Alucard and Hector were okay. I’m soft-hearted! I don’t like seeing characters I like suffer! I mean, conflict is important, and I can deal with (or even enjoy in a certain sense) seeing characters suffer if it makes sense and serves a narrative purpose. But as far as I can tell, the season 3 finale was nothing more than lurid, meaningless violence. I probably wouldn’t have continued watching the show if it devolved into nothing more than finding novel ways to torture the characters.

Still, it doesn’t feel quite right to pretend like nothing happened either. Or, really, not that nothing happened, but that those things didn’t matter, didn’t hurt, didn’t leave lasting scars. That’s...almost kind of worse.

But, I thought, I can sort of forgive this sudden shift in the stars, given that there may have been some sort of change in creative direction relating to Ellis’ decreased involvement with the show.* Plus, season 3 was insanity. It’s not like it was full of great writing choices, so if we quietly ignore some of them, maybe that’s for the best.

*I only later learned that Netflix actually chose to continue with Ellis’ season 4 scripts. It is not lost on me that maybe Ellis doesn’t know how to write about the lasting effects of traumatic sexual experiences or how power dynamics can make a sexual relationship problematic because he doesn’t understand that those things exist.

Characters Being Nobody and Nothing Happening

Pretty Pictures, Not Much Else

Unfortunately, the disconnect between seasons 3 and 4 isn’t the only problem with this season. Although I felt that season 4 was a bit less boring than season 3 (I particularly enjoyed some of the earlier episodes of season 4), it suffers from the same basic problems of Characters Being Nobody and Nothing Happening.

None of the characters experience any significant development, let alone any sort of coherent arc. Sypha has changed slightly, becoming more rough and jaded. I did really like the scene where she talks about becoming the kind of person who says “shit.” I think it really speaks to how entering into a relationship with someone means taking on aspects of their lifestyle, and how that can change you in ways that you can’t predict and therefore can’t exactly “agree” to. Sometimes those changes are good, sometimes they’re bad, sometimes they’re neutral, and sometimes it’s difficult to know. But you have to accept that you’re sacrificing some aspects of the person that you could have been if you chose to live completely independently, or with someone else.

Trevor really hasn’t changed since season 1 when he first decided to take up the mantle of hero again. Likewise with Alucard. Hector and Lenore change, as previously noted, but that change is sudden, jarring, and occurs completely off screen in between seasons 3 and 4. Carmilla dies as exactly as she lived: bitter, angry, and violent. Saint Germain just kind of...gets fucked over in a nonsensical subplot, which is its own whole can of worms.

We also get several new characters in season 4, none of whom have developed personalities or motives, nor do they develop any of those things over the course of the season: Greta, Zamfir, Varney, Ratko.

And nobody. Does. Anything.

Trevor and Sypha spend the entire season trying to explore and aid Targoviste, which comes to absolutely nothing. They’re unable to help anyone, Zamfir dies, and they end up just jumping through a magic portal to the actually relevant subplot in the finale. Carmilla literally does little more than draw maps until she’s ultimately killed. Hector plays a minor role in Saint Germain’s extraction of Dracula from Hell; otherwise, he and Lenore basically just exchange banter. Saint Germain does sort of do some stuff? But it’s often unclear how he’s made his connections, who the people who are helping him are, or what exactly he’s doing in terms of his magic beyond “whatever it takes to get back to his lover.”

Sure, there are fight scenes, but they feel meaningless. There’s no context, no stakes. There’s also a LOT of dialogue, and it is. Not well written. Exposition is embarrassingly clumsy at times, and the philosophical musings are cliche at best, muddled and confusing at worst. There’s just not all that much going on.

That is, except for Isaac. But more on him in a second.

What Kind of Show Is This?

When the plot line adapted from Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse ended with season 2, the show struggled to establish a new identity.

Despite nominally dealing with themes like whether humanity is inherently good or evil and how to cope with wrongdoing and loss, seasons 1 and 2 ultimately boiled down to a pretty generic action-adventure/fantasy plot with found family/power of friendship elements. Main characters Trevor, Sypha, and Alucard don’t really wrestle with big philosophical questions or suffer any major defeats. They know that they have to take down Dracula for the good of the world, and they work together as a team to do it, with a little character development relating to their various backstories sprinkled in.

Then season 3 happened, and things got weird. The trio is broken up for what feels like a pretty trivial reason—Alucard has to protect the castle and Belmont hold, I guess? And the result of that decision is that the dynamics for the three main characters are completely unbalanced.

Ellis openly admits that he basically went feral with the writing of season 3, and it shows. The messaging in seasons 1 and 2 was cliche, but consistent. The message of season 3? Anyone’s guess.

Season 4 reversed the darkening of tone from season 3, but shares its inability to pick a story and tell it.

Isaac is the Main Character

Always has been.

While I can’t say that his character or arc are perfect, I can say that he actually has a character and an arc. He starts off motivated by his fierce loyalty to Dracula, then has to struggle to find his purpose once Dracula is gone. He goes from subservient to agentic. He goes from fully endorsing the genocide of humanity and not caring about his own life to seeing some worth in humans and genuinely wanting to live. He has an interesting moment that deepens our understanding of what night creatures are, while also serving as an exploration of the meaning of one’s fundamental nature. Most importantly, these changes happen naturally over the course of the show. They never feel forced or out of the blue, and while I feel like even more could have been done with Isaac’s character, there’s a lot to appreciate about what is there.

If there’s any thread holding Castlevania as a single, coherent work together, it’s Isaac. Not only is his character the best executed and the most coherent over the course of the show, his character explores themes that are larger than himself and relevant to the show as a whole, like those mentioned earlier: misanthropy versus a belief in the value of humanity; the ability to go beyond one’s “nature” or initial circumstances; and how to respond to being wronged or losing something important to you. Exploring the individual lives of characters is great, but really good writing usually requires going beyond that to reflect on broader questions and ideas. Isaac is the only character here that serves that larger purpose.

Sorry...I Just Don’t Buy It

The season 4 finale is crazy, although in a different way from season 3′s.

Varney being Death makes no sense on several different levels. I’m not going to spend a lot of time picking that particular plot twist apart, but I will talk about why I think it doesn’t work at the largest scale, and how I think season 4 might have been done better.

Last minute twists with zero foreshadowing are rarely a good idea, and this is no exception. Why introduce this “Death” entity at the last minute to be the most important battle of the season? The finale of the entire show, even? Besides the lack of logic or emotional buildup, this robs the show of the opportunity to make use of the antagonists that it already has. Since Dracula died, Carmilla has been the obvious choice for a new big bad. Why hasn’t she done more?

Season 4 feels crowded with characters and plot lines that amount to nothing. Why not bring some of these characters together? If Carmilla is the main antagonist, how come she never meets any of the protagonists (except Hector, who is a pretty minor player in this ecosystem) or even affects them in any way?

Season 4 feels like maybe it was trying to make something out of season 3 and the model that it presented, but it ultimately fails to do so. The writers throw the trio back together at the end anyway, so why not have them rejoin sooner and work together? Maybe Sypha and Trevor’s past experience with Saint Germain could have helped Alucard and Greta piece together what he was plotting sooner, rather than all four of them being completely blindsided by it in the penultimate episode. (Sypha and Trevor know that someone is trying to resurrect Dracula, but they fail to find out any actual detail about the plans, despite their supposed attempts.) Have characters actually do stuff, figure stuff out, advance the plot!

Likewise, maybe Carmilla becomes aware of Saint Germain’s scheming, sees it as a threat, and tries to take him down. Maybe she tries to get involved and somehow use alchemy or the Infinite Corridor to her own benefit. What does it look like when power-hungry Carmilla, who wants to rule the world, finds out there’s an entire multiverse out there? That could easily set her up to be a foil to Saint Germain, causing him to realize that what he’s doing is wrong.

What actually ended up happening in the show feels disjointed and often empty. In particular, most of the events that happen in the last two episodes just don’t really work for me. I didn’t like Trevor suddenly sacrificing himself to this random, new, super powerful enemy, or how the gems and dagger that he found just happened to be the perfect weapon to kill this new enemy, or how he inexplicably returns from the dead.

This kind of thing is what I mean when I say that this season feels like fanfiction. Trevor comes back from the dead for no discernible reason other than that it would really suck if he died. Greta as a character seems to literally only exist to be Alucard’s girlfriend and support him so that he doesn’t have to continue to be alone and potentially turn evil. Alucard’s trauma from Taka and Sumi and Hector’s trauma from Lenore are both conveniently erased. Even Dracula and Lisa are resurrected somehow and get their happy ending. And it’s like, I guess I prefer deus ex machina to the opposite (Does that have a name? When everything is going well but then something terrible happens for no reason other than to make things worse for the characters?), but they’re both bad writing.

God. This isn’t even getting into what happened with the Council of Sisters. And I don’t even really like those characters, but that doesn’t mean I want to see their characters handled poorly.

I’m not sorry that I watched until the end, but I can’t in good faith recommend the show as a whole. If you’ve yet to watch Castlevania, just stop at the end of season 2. While there are some shining moments in seasons 3 and 4 (4 more than 3), it’s just really not worth it.

[kaihatemail]

Episode 41 script vs episode

Dan recently sent out emails to the international donators that got an episode script. Of course I got episode 41 because,,, y’know,, There are quite a few differences in the script that I wanted to talk about. However, I wasn’t sure if it was legal to show it. In the end I’ve decided to just describe the differences. 

(Please note that the script I was sent was the 2nd revision. There was most likely at least one more revision, so the stuff I’m talking about is obviously stuff that was taken out in the final copy).

A lot of the differences from the script and final episode are mostly slight quote changes, which I don’t think is big enough to note each one. However, small differences in the actual events include,

Skylor wearing a “maroon dress that exposes her Anacondrai tattoo,” at the beginning ceremony. It could be this dress that Tommy showed in Skylor concept art.

An exchange between Kai and Jay that didn’t make it through to the final episode. 

MASTER CHEN: Zugu, leave the red one. I want a word with him.

Before the chain gang is led out, they unshackle Kai.

KAI (whispers to Jay): I’ll figure a way out of this.

JAY: No offense, Kai, but you don’t have power; I don’t trust you. I trust Lloyd, he’s the Green Ninja. You’re always just getting us into more trouble.

KAI (offended): Fine. Then I’ll find him.

(Jay is literally why Kai is insecure LMAOOO)

Chope’s name was initially Chope-Chope, apparently

Chen is described to be acting like a cat during his fight against Lloyd lol

In the episode, Clouse pulls a lever that releases poison ontop of Lloyd, which Kai shields him from using Lloyd’s element from the staff of elements. In this script, Kai actually shields himself, because he was apparently the one under it??

The roto jet comes into the room from under Kai, which is what separates him from the staff

 There were two (imo) big differences that was super interesting to read, and what I think really makes buying this script worth it.

While Chen is showing him around the relic hallway, Kai grabs a jade blade and plans to attack Chen with it, but gets distracted when he brings up his parents. He drops the blade in front of Nya later on to show that he hadn’t actually betrayed the team (Which was too far for her to reach anyways…). Nya gets the blade when the roto jet group saves her and Garmadon, and is actually the one to break the staff of elements after Kai is separated from it.

Kai’s plan with the staff was to get it before Lloyd’s power was taken. However, Eyezor saw that he was trying to get closer to it, and held onto him. That’s when Skylor stood next to Chen. Skylor initially wasn’t meant to be involved at all! Kai telling Lloyd that he, “Had it all under control… well, almost,” was referring to his initial plan failing.

And, of course, the corruption scene itself. I’ve always wanted to find out how this scene was written, and actually reading it didn’t meet a lot of my expectations. Not in a bad way! There’s a few things to note.

The script doesn’t say that his eyes went red. After noting that Kai “seems to be enjoying it (the power) a little too much,” a darkness is described to slowly fall over him. The script describes his corrupted voice as “possessed-like” and says that Kai almost seems as if he’s displaying split personalities.

Because the script doesn’t say that his eyes went red, normal and corrupted Kai are differentiated by caps lock. When normal Kai is talking, the script is in lowercase and italics. When it’s corrupted Kai, everything is in capitals.

This part of the script is identical to the episode, besides from a small line from normal Kai that I assume got cut out in the final script. In the episode, red-eyed Kai yells at Lloyd saying, “No one is taking my staff! You had all the power, now it’s my turn!” In the script, however, Kai goes back to normal between the two lines and says,

“Just, a little longer –”

This BLEW MY MIND.

He lashed out at Lloyd for saying they had to get the staff away from him, then said he just wanted it, the power, for a little longer, before irrationally yelling at Lloyd again. It wasn’t until Kai started verbally attacking Lloyd personally that he realized that, hey, maybe having this staff isn’t a good idea.

Something about that is so cool and ties a connection to normal and corrupted Kai. If Lloyd hadn’t said that they had to get the staff away from him, then there’s a chance Kai wouldn’t have targeted Lloyd. And if the reason Kai started fighting back the staff was because he was targeting Lloyd, then there’d be no reason for him to want to let go of the staff, and he could’ve, maybe, been fully corrupted.

Am I reading too into this? Yes. I don’t even know if my wording makes sense. Regardless, this script was a very interesting read, and I’m happy to have received it.

[stiltonbasket]

Hi!! Could I perhaps request LQR baby-sitting A-Yu and A-Lan for the renouncement verse? Thanks, love you <333

(brief author’s note: please please reblog if you can, since that’s how we get prompts for future chapters!)

Lan Qiren’s nephews keep overworking themselves. 

This wouldn’t be a bad thing if they hadn’t been doing it for the last several years, but it’s beginning to wear on them. Xichen’s eyes are always red and swollen from writing letters by candlelight, and Lan Qiren doesn’t remember the last time he saw Wangji without trade reports in his arms and spit-up milk on his robes, so he finally puts his foot down and decides to give all three of them a break in early autumn. 

“Xichen, go take a soak in the hot springs,” he orders, sweeping into the hanshi and shoving everything on Lan Xichen’s desk up one of his sleeves. “Now.”

Lan Xichen is so exhausted that he tries to paint a line of calligraphy onto the expensive wood of his writing table. “Shufu?” 

“You heard me,” Lan Qiren scolds. “Go on! I’ll finish the petition forms by tomorrow.” 

Somewhat bewildered, Lan Xichen ambles out through the hanshi’s back door and splashes into the hot spring, leaving Lan Qiren to march down to the jingshi and confiscate all of Wangji’s trade contracts. He also confiscates baby A-Lan, who is lying in Lan Wangji’s lap and trying to eat his jade pendant. 

“What are you doing?” Wangji asks, watching him tug the rest of his letters out of Wei Ying’s hands and stuff those up his sleeves, too. “Uncle?” 

“You and Wei Ying need a rest,” he announces. “I am taking your work to the meishi, and I am also taking your children. Do not come to fetch them until sunset.” 

And with that, he straps Wei Shuilan to his chest and takes Lan Yu by the hand, bundling them off to his own residence before their parents have time to do much more than blink at him in confusion. 

“Huh,” Wei Wuxian says, after he leaves. “I think your uncle has a point, actually. Let’s go to bed, Lan Zhan.”

__

When Lan Qiren gets back to the meishi, he settles A-Lan down for a nap and gives Xiao-Yu a snack and some silver puzzle rings to improve his hand-eye coordination. “It almost reminds me of the old days,” he sighs, as Shuilan kicks her chubby little feet before falling asleep with her thumb in her mouth. “Even if Wangji never went down for naps without a fuss.” 

Lan Qiren was nineteen when he became acting sect leader, and he was also nineteen when he received custody of Xichen: not coincidentally, because the clan hoped that taking charge of the sect would prevent him from raising his nephew and allow one of them to take over his care instead. But Lan Qiren was nothing if not stubborn, so Lan Huan went with him everywhere—to meetings, discussion conferences, and even the odd wedding now and then, and was generally such an amiable baby that he adjusted to his uncle’s fraught travelling schedule without a fuss. In fact, the first time Lan Huan met Jiang Yanli had been during a week-long cultivation event at Lotus Pier, yawning in a sling on Lan Qiren’s back while Jiang Yanli napped on Jiang Fengmian’s chest, and Jiang Fengmian had even mentioned the possibility of a betrothal between the two babies when they were older. 

“My wife wants to contract an engagement between Xiao-Li and a son born to her sworn sister, but Jin-zongzhu and Jin-furen have not yet had a child,” Jiang-zongzhu had sighed, letting his daughter’s little fingers wrap around his. He looked heartbroken at the mere thought of parting from her, Lan Qiren remembers—which was probably why he named her yan li, to hate separation, because Jiang Yanli’s premature birth nearly stole her away from her parents the moment she entered the world. 

“Lanling is closer to Gusu than Yunmeng,” Lan Qiren pointed out. Yunmeng Jiang would make an excellent alliance by marriage, and he was fairly certain at the time that Jiang Yanli would grow up to resemble her mild-mannered father rather than her hot-tempered mother. He was right, of course, since Jiang-guniang took after Jiang Fengmian in both looks and character, but contracting a betrothal with her for Xichen would have done both of them a disservice—because Xichen could never have loved her as she would have wanted to be loved, and he could never have given her children, either. 

“Shugong?” a little voice says at Lan Qiren’s elbow, distracting him from the possibility of a world where Lan Huan married Jiang Yanli and crippled Lanling Jin’s influence after the Sunshot Campaign. “Xiao-Yu is done with the puzzle. I have another one?”

“Already?” Lan Qiren asks. This is yet another trait Xiaohui inherited from Wei Wuxian despite not being related to him, and Lan Qiren feels his heart swell with pride at his great-nephew’s intelligence. “Then you may play with the wooden blocks on that shelf, and see how high you can build your tower without letting it fall over.”

Xiao-Yu settles down on the hearthrug to stack up the fine-carved building blocks, and Lan Qiren goes through his nephew’s papers in peace for another hour before A-Lan wakes up from her nap and wails for her milk at the top of her lungs. 

“Do not cry,” Lan Qiren soothes, securing the child in her swaddle before heating a bottle with a warming talisman. “Here is your supper, and your xiongzhang is there on the mat.”

He has to keep A-Lan in his arms after that, since his tiny great-niece is so used to being held that putting her down would break her little heart; and Lan Qiren would rather die than let go of her, because he dearly misses holding his nephews, and not so long ago he was certain he would never have the chance to hold a baby again. 

And then, as if cuddling A-Lan to his chest wasn’t wonderful enough, Xiao-Yu pulls one of Wangji’s old picture books out of Lan Qiren’s storage trunk and runs over to sit in his lap, pushing the trade contracts aside and replacing them with the fable of the magic lotus lantern.

“Shugong, read to Xiao-Yu?” the little boy begs, snuggling into Lan Qiren’s overgown next to his cooing baby sister. “A-Die likes this story best.”

Of course he does, Lan Qiren thinks, as he flips the cover open and starts to read. The tale of the magic lotus lantern was written about a child whose mother was stolen away from him, taken back to the heavens by force when her godly brother discovered the magic lantern that illuminated her way to the mortal world—and for a while Wangji believed that his mother was like the immortal Sanshengmu, who loved a human man and had a child with him before returning to the realm she came from. Sanshengmu’s story ended with her being reunited with her husband and son, and the little Wangji never gave up hope that his own mother might come back in much the same way, even after he was old enough to stop believing in fairy stories. 

“Why did they fight?” Xiao-Yu asks, leaning closer to see the picture of the goddess’s lover with his brush and scroll. “That’s against the rules!”

“Sometimes people who love one another fight because they cannot understand their feelings,” Lan Qiren tells him, tapping the point of his soft button nose. “So it was with Sanshengmu and Liu Yanchang-gongzi, and when he awoke, she revealed her true identity, and explained why she sent a rainstorm to plague him after she read his poem. 

“Both apologized profusely. Days went by, and Liu Yanchang finally recovered. By then the goddess and the scholar had fallen deeply in love, and marriage naturally ensued. Encouraged by Goddess Sanshengmu, Liu Yanchang continued with his journey to the capital to take the imperial examination, and months later, the goddess gave birth to their son, whom she named Chenxiang.

“At the same time, the goddess’s celestial family had learned about her marriage to an earthly man. Her brother, known as Divine Erlang, found his unruly sister and demanded that she renounce her new family and return with him to their heavenly home, but Sanshengmu refused, and battled him with the power of her magical lotus lantern…”

__

“I want to paint a portrait of this,” Wei Wuxian whispers, when he and Lan Zhan creep into the meishi after sunset to find Lan Qiren fast asleep on the floor, with A-Lan snoozing on his chest and Xiao-Yu curled up in the crook of his arm. “They’re so sweet, Lan Zhan!”

“Mm,” Lan Zhan murmurs, his eyes softening as he looks at the open book on his uncle’s desk. Lan Qiren clearly just finished reading it before he fell asleep, because the book is open to the very last picture; a color painting of a goddess embracing a youth and an older man with a lotus-shaped lantern hanging at the crook of her elbow. “Bring a blanket and a pillow, Wei Ying. We should let them sleep.”

(Lan Qiren often finds himself toting his little great-nephew and niece around the Cloud Recesses after that, and Xiao-Yu’s favorite place to play in his parents’ absence is always the house where his shugong lives.)

[galahadwilder]

Future Perfect

This is my @mlsecretsanta fic for @crispypata! Crispy asked for DJWifi and Bunnyx, so I delivered.

*

It’s been a long week, and Alya is grateful for some alone time. While it’s always nice to have the others around, there’s an unstated pleasure in being the only one of her friends awake this early. Nino and Marinette are always asleep until very shortly before class, and Adrien may be awake, but his driver won’t be here for at least another twenty minutes. That’s a precious twenty minutes away from her sisters, away from anybody else. A precious twenty minutes of quiet.

Normally she’d spend this time updating the Ladyblog, moderating comments, writing posts, but after last night’s battle she just… she needs some time. Time to herself.

She’s shaking, just a little. She’s not even touching her phone. For the first time in a while, she’s actually reading a physical comic book—specifically, The Mighty Majestia Issue #48. Her first comic. A gift from her father when she was a little girl. It used to make her feel better when things were going bad. She needs that, a little bit, today. The feel of the paper under her fingertips.

It wasn’t her first near-death experience—she’s had a lot of those since Hawkmoth appeared in Paris. But Ladybug almost hadn’t made it last night. Alya had gone running after the Akuma, like usual, and…

A body flops down next to her on the bench. The warmth and weight of it—she glances to the side, and meets the familiar warm eyes of Nino.

“You okay?” he asks, laying his hand on top of the comic. “You haven’t read this since before we met.”

Alya nods. “Last night was bad,” she says.

Nino nods. “Yeah,” he responds. “Yeah it was.”

He doesn’t say anything else.

Alya is rarely the most perceptive person—more passionate than perceptive, honestly, though not for lack of trying (she tries really hard, it’s just… hard to tell what other people aren’t saying sometimes)—but she cares, and Nino is at school forty minutes before he’s usually awake and he seems unusually tense. She closes her comic. “Babe?”

Nino sighs, looking down as he picks at a hangnail on his thumb. “I can’t keep watching you die, Als.”

Alya’s heart judders. “You’re not okay, then.”

He shakes his head. “I mean Rena Rouge is one thing. I know you can protect yourself, and Ladybug is right there if things go bad. But every time I see you chase after a giant baby with no protection but that sexy plaid shirt...”

“I have a responsibility, Nino!” she says.

“I know,” Nino says quietly. “I can’t really ask you to stop, either.”

Alya swallows. “Are you... breaking up with me?”

Nino looks at her for a moment, then snorts. “Hell no.” He reaches up to Alya’s cheek, brushing her hair away from her ear. “You ain’t getting away from me that easy, girl.”

Alya relaxes, leaning into his palm. “Attaboy,” she says.

Nino grimaces. “I might… need a day or two to process, though.” He swallows. “I’m sorry.”

Alya’s heart falls. “You’re sure.” It’s not a question—Nino doesn’t make decisions half-cocked the way she does. He thinks, and considers, and once his choice is made, he sticks to it. That surety—that stability—is one of the reasons she loves him. Even if right now it’s hurting her.

“I’m sure,” he says. “Just… I need a few days after. You know.” He hangs his head. “Seeing you die again.”

Oh, God, Alya wants to slap him. And maybe a year ago she would have. But today-Alya is not last-year-Alya, and, instead, she just drops her head a little. “It was a bad one, wasn’t it,” she says.

*

Alya trudges out of class, dragging her feet. It’s been a difficult day, to say the least, and Marinette—bless her—may be trying to help, but there’s not all that much to do.

“We could go to my place and stuff ourselves with Beignets,” Marinette offers, with her characteristic hyperenergetic movement. “I know you love the Majestia movie?”

Alya shakes her head. “I relax a bit better when I move,” she says. She looks at the basketball hoops. “Can you stick around for…” She catches a hint of green out of the corner of her eye—a familiar shade, one that she’s seen quite a lot. She blinks. “For a few…” She turns her head, and there—staring down at her from the roof of the school—is Carapace. “Uh.”

Marinette follows her gaze. “What are you—”

Carapace’s head jerks as he seems to realize that he’s been spotted, and he leaps down out of sight.

“What is he doing?” Alya murmurs.

Marinette’s iron fingers wrap around her bicep. “Alya,” she hisses, “that’s not Carapace.”

“What do you mean?” Alya says, turning her head, just in time to catch a glimpse of Nino—as Nino, not as Carapace—walking out of the locker room on the opposite side of the school from where Carapace disappeared. It’s too soon, too fast—there’s no way he could’ve come around the school that quickly.

“Excuse me,” she says, bolting towards her boyfriend. She grabs his arm and yanks him away from Adrien.

“Babe... what?” he says, looking at her like she just grew a second head.

“I just saw Carapace on the roof,” she hisses.

His eyes widen behind his glasses.

*

They didn’t really discuss it, at least not verbally, but they both pretty easily came to the decision that whoever this is, stealing their identities is not something this person gets to get away with. They don’t even talk it through before they’ve agreed to chase this imposter down.

“You’re sure he went this way?” Nino asks as they charge off down the street toward where Alya had last seen the false Carapace.

“Yes, I’m—!” Alya starts to snap, before she catches herself and—stopping her headlong charge by pressing a palm into a nearby wall—breathes in. “Sorry, sorry.” She glances at him. “Pretty sure, yeah.”

“God, I wish I had my shield,” Nino mutters. He grabs her hand and meets her eyes with his characteristic Nino Soft Look. “If this ends up being a bad one, please take cover?”

Alya grimaces. “The Akuma is using your face, Babe,” she says.

“Please.” His voice is calm and soft.

Alya thinks about how distraught he was this morning, how little she wants to do that to him again. “I’ll—I’ll try.”

Nino smiles. “That’s really all I can ask, isn’t it.”

Alya smiles, tugging him along. “You knew I was crazy when I asked you out,” she says, building carefully building back up to a run.

Nino snorts, vaulting over a street barrier. “That I did.”

*

It takes barely a minute before they reach the spot where the false Carapace must’ve gone, leaving them looking down wide avenues packed with people—none of whom are wearing a green hood.

“We lost him,” Nino says, puffing.

“I mean,” Alya gasps, “duh.” She leans onto her knees. “He’s got—powers, and we—we have, what—about eight—months of parkour training?”

A familiar whizz-crack comes from above, as a spotted red figure drops down in front of them. “Alya!” Ladybug says, glancing confusedly at Nino. “Did you see where Carapace went?”

“Nope,” Alya says. She leans in toward Ladybug, carefully eyeing the other people who are watching the exchange. “Definitely an Akuma, then?” she whispers, quietly enough that nobody else is alarmed.

“Maybe?” Ladybug whispers back. “Or a Sentimonster, or. Well. One other thing.”

Alya’s eyebrows narrow. “What other thing?”

Ladybug shakes her head. “Probably not important,” she says. She straightens and backs away, whipping her yo-yo in rapid circles. “Everyone stay calm and quietly evacuate the area,” she says in a clear, authoritative voice. “Calmly, please! Everything is under control.”

There’s a growing undercurrent of panic in the crowd at Ladybug’s words, but there’s a force behind her last sentence, a reassurance, that passes calm through the crowd like a ripple. Much to Alya’s surprise, there’s no stampede, no rush to flee. Everyone actually listens, beginning to carefully file away, emptying out the street.

“Any chance we could get our Miraculi?” Nino asks. “I don’t like this.”

Ladybug glances over her shoulder at him. “Not until Chat gets here,” she says. “I can’t just leave the Akuma without anyone containing it.”

A black blur drops out of the sky, rolling and springing to his feet next to Ladybug. “Good thing I’m here, then!” Chat says, leaning his elbow onto her shoulder.

Ladybug rolls her eyes. “Always so dramatic,” she says, turning to her partner. “Can you hold down the fort for a few while I grab backup?”

Chat eyes Alya and Nino. “So long as the Ladyblogger doesn’t get herself killed, yes.”

*

There’s still been no sighting of the fake Carapace by the time Ladybug returns carrying the bracelet and the necklace. Chat has been running across the rooftops, spying into alleyways, but hasn’t seen scale nor shell of him.

“Alya Césaire and Nino Lahiffe,” Ladybug intones, holding the two Miraculi aloft. “I’m trusting you with the Miraculous of the Fox and Turtle.” She purses her lip. “I’m going to ask you to switch, though. I don’t want us mixing up our Carapi.”

Alya grimaces, but Nino just nods. “Makes sense,” he says, taking the necklace and draping it around his neck. It sparks, and a tiny fox spirals out from it. “Trixx, Let’s Pounce!” Nino calls.

He flashes orange, sparks running across his whole body, and suddenly Nino is gone, replaced by an orange-clad superhero. He still has Carapace’s hood, peaked down over his forehead, with ears poking through holes in the top. Leggings are tucked into combat boots, black gloves cuffed over white-and-orange sleeves. He looks down at his arms, twisting his hands to look at both sides. “Hmm,” he says. “Pretty cool.”

“What should we call you?” Ladybug says.

Nino meets Alya’s eyes. “What about… Reynard?” he says.

“Reynard it is,” Ladybug says. She turns to Alya, handing her the jade bracelet. “You ready?”

“Always,” Alya says, sliding the bracelet onto her wrist. “Wayzz, Shell On!”

She feels her hair lift into a high ponytail as her glasses meld to her face into a domino mask. Unlike the Rena Rouge transformation, which slims her down, she feels herself bulking up. Armor plates slam into place around her chest, shoulders, and thighs. Everything feels heavier, but also stronger, more stable.

Reynard whistles. “Damn, babe,” he says. “Green looks good on you.”

Tortue Verte grins. “You expected anything else?” she ask. She absently lifts the shield. “Damn, this thing is heavy,” she says, looking at Reynard. “How do you even lift it?”

“Practice,” Reynard says, twirling the flute. “This is really light!”

“It’s basically bamboo,” Tortue replies, slinging the shield onto her back. “You ready?”

Reynard sheathes the flute on his own back. “Let’s take this guy down.”

*

Tortue Verte’s super jump is a lot like Rena Rouge’s—though, given the balance between her being slightly stronger with the Turtle and also being heavier, it’s a little weird to balance. She gets more distance but less height with each jump, and since her brain keeps expecting Rena’s jump arc, she keeps misjudging where she’s landing.

She lands hard on the side of her foot, twisting her ankle and stumbling shoulder-first into a chimney with a yelp. Her ankle is struck by stabbing pain, and she immediately collapses onto her side. She lies there on the roof, huffing, feeling desperate and foolish. This is not what she was hoping for.

She carefully drags herself up the chimney into a sitting position, carefully pulling the shield from her back and dialing Reynard.

“Hey babe,” he says, his orange-hooded face filling the screen. “You good?”

She shakes her head. “Landed bad,” she says. “I think I twisted my ankle.”

Reynard’s eyes widen behind his goggles. “Where are you?” he says. “I’ll be there in a—”

“Babe!” she interrupts. “Akuma. I’ll be fine up here.”

“Are you sure?”

She nods. “I’m sure,” she says. “Give that fake hell.” She hangs up, then collapses backward against the chimney with a gasp.

“Sorry I didn’t catch you,” a voice—a familiar one, but one she can’t quite place—says from behind her. “I think you’d have broken a few of my bones.”

She whips her head around to see a red-haired woman dressed in blue and white, bunny ears sprouting from her head, leaning on an umbrella as if it were a cane. Tortue tries to leap to her feet, shield up, but pain spikes through her ankle the second her foot meets shingle. “Augh!”

The woman immediately drops the umbrella, and her arms are around Tortue’s body. “Careful,” she says. “Don’t want to put too much weight on that.”

“Don’t touch me,” Tortue growls.

The woman laughs. “Relax, Foxy. I’m not an Akuma.”

Tortue blinks. Foxy? She’s wearing the Turtle, not the Fox, which means… “You—you know who I am.”

The woman smirks and throws up a peace sign. “The name’s Bunnyx,” she says. “Wielder of the Miraculous of Time, from ten years in the future.”

“Prove it,” Tortue says. “What’s Ladybug’s real name?”

Bunnyx snorts. “You’re not getting it that easily… Alya,” she says. “Also, Nino’s sort of downplaying how worried about you he is. You really should start being more careful before you give him a heart attack.”

Tortue stares at Bunnyx, then blinks. “...Okay, you’re for real,” she says. “What are you doing here? Are you warning us about something?”

Bunnyx shakes her head. “I brought Carapace and Rena back from my time for one reason,” she says. “Future Hawkmoth has discovered Ladybug’s identity, which has put her daughter in danger.”

“Daughter?” Tortue says.

Bunnyx continues as if she hasn’t heard. “Ladybug asked me to bring her back in time to protect her from Future Hawkmoth, but I needed backup just in case she followed us. You and your boyfriend were the obvious choice.”

“Where is she?” Tortue says, trying to work her way to her feet. She hisses as pain lances through her ankle again.

“Jeez, stay down, Tortue!” Bunnyx says, carefully easing her back into a sitting position. “You need to be careful. We need you for this one.”

“Don’t bother,” says a voice that sounds like Tortue’s own as an older, taller Rena Rouge lands in a crouch. “I had absolutely no self-preservation at that age.”

Carapace lands next to her, softer, gentler. “You nearly killed me like eight times,” he says, cradling a baby in his arms. He looks down at Tortue. “Hey, babe.”

Rena rolls her eyes, gently punching Carapace’s shoulder. “Don’t flirt with young me, you butt,” she says.

Tortue stares at the baby, wide-eyed. “Is that…” she murmurs.

Rena nods. “Our god-daughter,” she says.

Carapace smiles. “Do you want to hold her?”

*

“She’s… mine?” Ladybug says, gazing down into her daughter’s emerald-green eyes.

The baby laughs, reaching up toward her mother’s face and pressing her chubby palm into Ladybug’s cheek.

“Who’s the father?” Chat says to Bunnyx, hope shining in his eyes. (Tortue admits to herself that she’s just as interested in finding out.)

Bunnyx smirks. “Oh, Kitty Noir, you know I can’t tell you.”

Chat looks crestfallen. “Not even a hint?”

“She’s so small,” Ladybug whispers, pointing a finger at her daughter’s face. The baby laughs again, gripping her mother’s finger in between her hands.

“You said she’s my—our god-daughter?” Tortue says.

Rena laughs. “My boyfriend has spent more time pampering this little terror than he has me lately,” she says. She turns and pokes Reynard in the chest. “You’ve got some growing to do, babe.”

Carapace rolls his eyes. “Please don’t flirt with the babies, babe,” he says with a smirk.

The laughter that follows seems to come from everywhere and nowhere, and Tortue looks around, unsettled.

“...Wasn’t that funny,” Carapace mutters.

Bunnyx walks toward the edge of the roof, looking down. “Missing the point again, Shelly?” she says, pointing down. “It’s starting.”

“What is?” Chat says.

“ATTENTION PARIS!” a booming, feminine voice echoes deeply through the sky as if it’s rebounding off the very atmosphere, followed by a sudden eruption of Wagnerian opera. “YOU HAVE BEEN SELECTED TO JOIN THE RANKS OF ODIN’S MIGHTY WARRIORS IN VALHALLA!”

“Ah,” Chat says, nodding. “Akuma time.”

“Bad one,” Bunnyx agrees, nodding. “We picked today for a reason. Two illusionists needed at minimum.”

Tortue gingerly attempts to stand, only for the pain in her ankle to spike like a jagged piece of bone. “Ah!” she yelps, collapsing backward.

Immediately, two sets of hands are holding her up—Reynard’s and Carapace’s. “You okay?” Reynard says, his eyes soft and concerned.

Carapace swallows. “I’m sorry, babe, but I—” He glances at Rena. “We are going to need you to stay out of this fight. You’re injured.”

“I can help!” Tortue protests.

Carapace shakes his head. “I know how much it means to you to be out there with us, but A—um, sweetie, I need you alive, okay?” He smiles, glancing back at Ladybug. “Besides, um. Someone needs to keep the baby safe.”

Reynard raises an eyebrow. “You are a braver man than I,” he says.

Rena laughs. “Oh, it’s just ‘cause she’s a baby,” she says. “He knows I’d rip his throat out if he tried that.”

“You are also much less suicidally reckless than she is,” Carapace shoots back.

Rena shrugs. “Fair point.”

Ladybug approaches, carefully laying the baby into Tortue’s arms with a look of regret. “Stay safe, okay?” she says. She looks down and presses a kiss to her daughter’s forehead. “And keep her safe.”

Tortue swallows, overwhelmed by the—the everything. The trust Ladybug is showing her, the softness of the moment, the sadness in the child’s eyes as her mother goes back off to battle… it’s too much.

“I’ll do my best,” she croaks, trying not to tear up.

*

Carapace had carried her away from the battle. Vilekyrie controlled the sky, making it difficult to keep the baby out of her reach, but he’d found her a little out-of-the-way cubbyhole that nobody would come looking in during the attack. Or, well. Not a cubbyhole, really. More of a luxury suite at the Hotel Gran Paris.

“How did you know nobody would be here?” Tortue had asked him.

He’d only smiled in reply. “Spoilers,” he’d said. “Love you forever, but I gotta get back there.”

“Good luck!”

Now, about forty minutes into the battle, she can hear the clash of swords, the clanking of armor, the screaming of horses as they flew past her shaded window. She’d looked outside earlier, caught a glimpse of the copies of Vilekyrie flashing across the sky—copies of her that kept growing by the moment—and the marching of ghostly Viking soldiers on the ground: the Einherjar she’d selected from Paris’ citizens, transformed into undying warrior spirits. It doesn’t seem to be going well, but then, she doesn’t really have the best vantage point.

The baby is fussy, fussier than she was when Ladybug was around—Tortue can only guess that it’s because she wants her mother. The room has been stocked with formula and fresh diapers, and, thanks to her experience with the twins, Tortue has plenty of experience with taking care of a baby, but the girl just won’t settle down.

There’s a quiet footfall on the balcony—not a Vilekyrie, and the Einherjar can’t seem to climb. Tortue turns around to see the balcony door creek open, followed by a pair of large orange ears. “Hey. Mini-me,” Rena says. “You hanging in there?”

Tortue smiles, rocking the baby gently in her arms. “You didn’t tell me her name,” she says. “Feel weird just calling her ‘baby’.”

Rena ducks around the door, shutting it behind her, then bends down, cooing over the child’s delighted face. “HellooOOOooo!” She tickles the baby’s nose with her finger, and the girl laughs.

Rena looks back up at Tortue with a sheepish smile. “Sorry,” she says. “No names. Spoilers.”

Tortue rolls her eyes. “Am I always this aggravating?”

Rena gently wraps her arms underneath the baby’s back, lifting her from Tortue’s arms. “Pretty much!” She turns back to the baby and blows a raspberry.

“What’s up?” Tortue says. “Why aren’t you with the others?” As if to punctuate her point, an explosion sounds in the distance, and Tortue raises an eyebrow.

“Needed to talk to you,” Rena says, sitting down on the plush velvet bedspread across from her. “Also, I told them you were planning on running into the combat zone, so…”

“I was not!” Tortue yelps, leaping from her desk chair. The baby immediately squeals in distress.

Rena grins. “I know,” she says, gently tickling the child’s nose. “But they believed me when I said it, and by the time they figure it out…”

Tortue sighs. Gods, her older self is annoying. “What do you want, Alya?”

The animation in Rena’s face slackens, and she looks down at her own stomach. “I… want to show you something.” Keeping one hand under the baby, she reaches behind her and unslings the flute, opening the space within. “Take a look.”

Tortue reaches inside the extradimensional storage space inside Rena’s weapon, confused—and then her fingers close around something small, round, and metal, and she understands. “You’re going to propose,” she says, fishing the ring out of the flute. She stares at it, entranced.

“Yep,” Rena agrees with a nod, gently bouncing the baby. “Bought the ring last week.”

Tortue doesn’t even know what to say in this situation. Is it… weird to congratulate herself? Some situations, there aren’t just good responses for.

Rena sees her face and laughs. “Don’t look so shocked, Mini-me,” she says. She carefully rocks Ladybug’s baby, staring into her green eyes. “I mean, you always knew we were gonna do this eventually.”

“Yeah, but… kinda young?” Tortue says, handing the ring back to Rena.

“Ladybug’s younger.” Rena absently places the ring back inside her flute, still bouncing the baby in her other arm. “About a year younger than you, actually.”

Tortue blinks. She’s—well, she figured out a while back that Ladybug wasn’t actually 5,000 years old, but she’d always assumed she was, maybe, Anansi’s age? The thought that Ladybug is younger than she is... “Yikes.”

“Yikes is right,” Rena says. “And she has anxiety. So every time you go running face-first into danger like you’re never gonna die…”

“Is this a lecture?” Tortue says.

“Little bit,” Rena responds.

Oh, great. The last thing she needs right now is a lecture from herself of all people.

Rena rolls her eyes. “Listen, Kit, sometimes—sometimes Ladybug isn’t gonna be there. She doesn’t always show up, you know.”

Tortue narrows her eyebrows. “Yes she does?” That’s, like, the big consistency. Aside from that one time where the Akuma and the Sentimonster were in different cities, Ladybug has shown up for every single Akuma battle.

Rena shakes her head. “She has a life, Alya. And, well, sometimes she needs Chat to cover for her.” She looks toward the curtained window, toward the sounds of the battle still filtering in from outside. “And sometimes, Chat and Viperion get taken out early, and the only person who can use the Ladybug is you.”

A chill runs down Tortue’s entire body. The responsibility of using the Ladybug Miraculous—it’s terrifying. It hadn’t even occurred to her that it might pass down to her, that—oh, no. This is… this is what Ladybug feels all the time, isn’t it?

“Listen, however you feel about Nino now?” Rena says. “It’s nothing compared to what it’s going to be. He and I, we’d do anything for each other.” She breathes in, stroking the baby’s head. “Which means that, well, you and I need to stay alive.”

“The Miraculous Cure—”

Rena shakes her head. “It’s good, but it’s not… 100% reliable. Sometimes, Ladybug can’t be there.”

Tortue’s mouth opens, closes. Opens again. “Oh.”

Rena stands and places a hand on her younger self’s shoulder. “Alya, someday, you’re gonna get hurt. You’re gonna get hurt in a way that Ladybug can’t fix, and you’re going to wonder if you even deserve this Miraculous. If you even deserve Nino.” She looks down at the baby with naked fondness in her eyes. “I’m telling you now—you deserve way more than you realize. But if you want to make it to see our wedding...” She trails off.

Tortue waits for her to finish, but Rena doesn’t say anything else. The implications in Rena’s words are disconcerting, and Tortue asks the question that’s burning inside her chest. “Am I going to die?”

“Of course you are,” Rena replies. “You’re going to die a lot. But some of them are going to be harder to come back from, and Alya.” Rena’s eyes bore into hers. “You need to come back. Okay?”

“Okay,” Tortue whispers.

“Miraculous LADYBUG!” Ladybug calls from outside, and pink insects swarm across the room. There’s a brief moment of pain as Tortue’s ankle snaps back into place, immediately replaced by cool relief as the pressure vanishes.

Rena puts a finger to her lips. “Don’t tell Reynard, okay?” she says. “About the ring.”

Tortue mimes zipping her lip.

Rena nods. “Thanks,” she says. “Oh, and one more thing—you’re also gonna need to be more careful if you want to get into a good journalism school. Nobody wants to be the professor that killed the Ladyblogger.”

Tortue blinks. She… hadn’t even thought of that. “That makes sense, I think?” she says.

The balcony door creaks open and Carapace peeks through. “Hey, guys,” he says. “How’s everything going in here?”

“Really great!” Tortue says. She eyes her older self. Rena is fidgeting, looking away from her boyfriend’s face, and Tortue realizes—if she doesn’t make the push, Rena isn’t going to do it. “I think Rena has something to tell you.”

Rena glares at Tortue. “Betrayal!” she hisses.

Tortue laughs. “You’ll thank me later.”

Carapace glanced between them, confusion written across his face. “Um, what’s going on?”

Rena takes a deep breath, then carefully hands the baby to Tortue. “Hold her for a moment?”

“Of course.”

Rena looks at her boyfriend, then drops to one knee, fishing the ring out of her flute. “Nino Lahiffe. Will—will you, um…”

Carapace gasps and covers his mouth with both hands, his eyes shining wetly. “Alya?” he whispers.

Both of them sit in shocked silence, staring at each other, frozen, and after a moment, Tortue gets fed up. “Babe,” she says. “Say yes.”

Carapace glances at her, then back and his girlfriend... then lifts his fiancée bodily into the air in a crushing, spinning hug.

“Yes, yes, yes!” he crows in delight.

*

The portal closes, leaving just the four of them behind.

Ladybug huffs in relief. “You know, I love Bunnyx, but… every time I see her, it’s a brand new disaster.”

Chat looks at her in confusion. “Every? Isn’t this only the second time?”

Reynard sidles up to Tortue Verte. “So, how was meeting your future self?” he says, as Ladybug and Chat quietly discuss something else off to the side. “Mine was a lot more confident than I expected.”

Tortue snorts. “Kind of a butt,” she says. “But then again, that’s not much of a surprise, is it.”

Reynard coughs. “I invoke my right to not incriminate myself,” he says.

Tortue smacks his shoulder. “You’re such a dork.”

Reynard smiles. “Your dork.” He looks at where the portal vanished. “For quite a while, apparently.” He turns back to Tortue. “She tell you anything interesting?”

Tortue smiles, thinking about the proposal, about how happy she and her Nino were. About all the advice her future self gave. She has a lot of work to do.

“Sorry, babe,” she says. “Spoilers.”

[mobagehelllocal]

"huling sayaw"

twst oc week - day seven: free day or alternate universe

*arknights au

“hold my hand, before we have to give each other up everything, I will give to you. everything.”

She had been on the run for days.

Raina gritted her teeth as she tugged her hood lower across her face to shield herself from the heat of the sun. She turned around, her eyes squinted as she glanced at her fellow travellers. Most of them (just like her) bore the mark of the Infection—Oripathy. Dark, crystal shapes that emerge from the skin.

“... We shouldn’t be too far away now.” She kept her voice calm and in control—even if she wanted to scream and cry about how unfair their situation was.

“Where exactly are we going, Raina-nee?” Her eyes met that of a child, clutching onto her older sister. Both had contracted Oripathy the most common way: being exposed to a dead body with the disease. Her heart broke—their futures, stolen from them. Not by the disease, but by the treatment they received from their homeland—Laterano.

It was the Laterano decree, that those who became Infected were forbidden from staying or entering Laterano territory.

“... We’re going to Rhodes Island.” Her smile trembled—and she was sure it was more of a grimace. “I am friends with the Doctor there—we exchanged research quite a bit before...” her voice trailed off. “... If there is a place who will accept us... I’m sure Rhodes Island will.” She looked up, and hoped that there was nothing but determination on her face. “So just a bit more everyone..! We can do this.” She helped guide everyone across the sandy terrains they were crossing before—

She raised her head again and peered into the distance. The sun had just begun to set, dragging its brilliant colours of red and yellow past the horizons. In its wake, the sky began to darken purple and blue--like a bruise.

“We’ll need to set up camp soon...” Her hand reached up, and clamped tight on a small, diamond shape charm that hung around her neck. She felt her heart twist as she traced the shape with a finger—her eyes watered, and the smile she had been desperately holding up—immediately curled downward.

‘I miss them, gods I miss them. I don’t know how to live without them.’

After all, It was the first time, since she was born, that she was separated from them.

--

“Sankta Raina. You are accused of harbouring Infected when it was clearly against Laterano Law. Do you deny it?”

“I do not—but do you not have any humanity in you? These people are still Laterano citizens and are owed help by our government, on our lands—”

“Silence, Sankta Raina. You were not asked to speak.”

“That’s—”

“Sankta Raina. You are also accused of being Infected yourself… and hiding it from Laterano Authorities. Do you deny it?”

“… I do not.”

“Then you and your harboured Infected will be banished and stripped of your Laterano Citizenship and Privileges…”

“Are you serious? Now of all times, we should be united in understanding Oripathy and healing it…! Banishing me—us—it will not cure or help anything—You are just delaying something inevitable—!”

“Out there, you are no longer our concern or our problem. You are on your own, Sankta Raina. You will be stripped of your firearms on your way out of Laterano. Do you have any last-minute requests to make of us?”

“Oh, so now you ask!?”

“Speak it. And perhaps we will permit it.”

“… You won’t tell the twins.”

“Naturally. The two of them are core members of Laterano’s Apostolic Gun-Knights. Their very reputation… their future would be tarnished by your actions… No, the two of them will be kept far away from the trouble you have caused, Sankta Raina.”

“… I’m glad we can agree on one thing.”

--

‘Jade, Floyd... I hope you two are okay. I hope you are not kicking up too much of a ruckus...’ she couldn’t help but desperately pray to any god or higher being that could be listening.

The twins were well loved in Laterano due to their effectiveness as Apostolic Gun-Knights and enforcers of the Laterano law. Their future in Laterano was brilliant—and not one she wanted to mar with her selfish actions.

“Perhaps… I can meet them again one day…” she raised a hand to trace the scars of Oripathy on her cheek. ‘But who am I kidding…’ It would be impossible to cross paths with them again—knowing that Laterano was likely going to send them as far away from her as possible.

‘So until I discover a cure… I can’t see them… and even then, with what I’ve done… Laterano will not make it easy.’ She gritted her teeth, the tears started to gather at the edge of her lashes and she started breathing heavily in an attempt to not let the tears fall.

‘I can’t cry..! If they were here—! They would tell me not to cry—!’

Her thoughts are cut off by a sharp scream behind her. She turned immediately, and what she saw made her eyes widen.

‘Laterano’s Apostolic Gun-Knights!?’

She rushed over to her group as she rubbed fiercely at her eyes to ensure there were no tears before she confronted the Gun-Knights. She slid to a stop and spread her arms out in a protective stance over her group.

“We were peacefully allowed to leave Laterano territory.” Her eyes narrowed and she bared her teeth. “So why are you here? Threatening my companions?”

The Gun-Knight peered at her.

“Are you Sankta Raina?”

“Y—yes. Why do you need to know—!?” Before she could finish her sentence, the Head Gun-Knight gestured with his fingers and two of his accomplices quickly manoeuvred themselves to hold her down on either side. “What are you—?”

“We have reasons to believe that the criminals we are chasing down are looking to meet up with you.” The Head Gun-Knight said. “So we are using you as bait.”

“Criminals?” She questioned, stunned. “What—who would—? I’ve never—!” The Knight looked almost bored as he stared at her.

“Who else but—”

‘No they wouldn’t—’

“J—”

BANG BANG.

The Knight slumped down, dead—and her companions all shrieked in surprise. Raina flinched as she felt blood splatter across her cheeks before she craned her neck to see—

The Twins.

Just as she remembered them. Aquamarine halos and diamond shaped wings shimmered under the light of the daybreak sky. They were beautiful—so beautiful. Raina’s heart skipped a beat at how handsome they were—standing before her, protecting her, as they always did since they were children.

Except...

“Awww, we wanted to keep it a secret a little longer~ Ne, Jade?” Floyd had a tail. Diamond tipped—like his wings. It twisted and flicked around, as if expressing his excitement.

“Ee, Floyd. Oh well, we can’t deny that this slight hiccup in our plans isn’t fun at all.” Jade had horns. Tall and curved wickedly—beautiful and grotesque on an angel...

“Ehehe. You’re right~! Let’s… have some fun…!” Floyd’s horns were identical to Jade’s—if not somehow pointed outward.

“Fufufu….” While Jade’s tail was identical to his brother in appearance, he moved his lazily by swinging it from side to side.

‘The Law is absolute. From the moment a Sankta aimed their gun at another of their kind, their fates were decided.’

Raina could only stare in horror as she watched the twins decimate the entire squadron of Apostolic Gun-Knights—with eyes glowing gleefully and mouths spread into wide, sharp grins. The other Gun-Knights stood no chance—the twins were considered their best agents in decades. Once they had finished, they turned back around, their eyes immediately fixated onto her. Floyd moved toward her eagerly before Jade raised his hand and stopped his brother. Floyd frowned and opened his mouth to protest but he was interrupted by Raina.

“... Why…?” She felt her throat dry. She was caught between sheer happiness at being able to see them, sorrow upon knowing what must’ve happened and—anger. Anger because she did not want this future for them. “Why!? Why are you here—I made sure—!”

“As if they could hide something so important from us.” Jade cut in, calmly. His gold and olive eyes peered down at her, before it flickered off to the terrified group behind her. His smile turned cordial. “Well, it’s quite late in the day. We should set up camp. Don’t you agree d—Raina?”

She turned around at that, to see that her group was staring at the twins in pure fear… as they would any Sankta who had fallen from grace. “Yes… Do… do not worry.” She stood up shakily, “They’re my friends… They’ll keep us safe.”

She smiled—and she wondered again, how reassuring could it even look—when she herself was terrified.

‘What have you two done…?’

--

The whole group skittered around when the twins had rejoined them after disposing of… the bodies. She had only approached them once—to offer them dinner, before she slipped away from their grasp to look after her companions. She could feel the heavy weight of their gaze on her shoulders—down the black crystals that formed on her arms… But she ignored them for as long as she could as she dressed or reworked any of her companions’ injuries.

She did this—going around the hot fire at the center of their camp, until there was no one left to distract herself with and—

“You’ve kept us waiting long enough!” Floyd pouted as he yanked her down to sit in between him and Jade. The other twin stared at her, as collected as ever, as he poked a stick into the fire.

“I have to take care of everyone.” She bit out. “They’re my responsibility now.” Floyd only huffed in response before he nuzzled into the curve of her neck, lips dangerously close to—

“Don’t—!” She flinched back, briefly hitting Jade as her hand went up to cover the crystals that had formed across her skin.

“Haah? You’ve never resisted squeezes before!” His expression twisted. “Is it because of these?” He gestured to his newly acquired demon horns and tail.

“No--of course not—it’s… I’m… an Infected now… I just thought...” The twins snorted in unison.

“You must be a unique kind of stupid, doll. If you think your infection will make us stay away from you.” Jade said dryly, as his hand snaked around her waist and pulled her tight against his side. Before she could protest, Floyd moved, and pressed up against her—which squeezed her in between them both.

“You…” She felt her eyes water and she blinked rapidly—in an attempt to not let her tears fall. “Nothing’s changed…?” her voice cracked.

“Absolutely nothing.” They said vehemently, once more in unison.

“Your future…” She raised a shaky hand to trace her fingers up the length of their dark horns. Both twins bent down, their eyes fluttered shut at the sensation of her hand against their new appendages. “... You shouldn’t have fallen… not for me.”

“On the contrary.” Jade purred as he nuzzled against her shoulder, lips pressed against the crystals there. “How could we picture a future without you?”

“Besides, it was getting boring in Laterano!” Floyd smiled, goofily as he nuzzled his nose against the curve of her shoulder. “It’s more fun with you!” She gritted her teeth, her hands fell away from their horns—and cupped her own face. She started to cry. She had thought she had lost everything but…

'But she hadn’t lost anything. Not anything of value anyways.

“T—thank you… I’m sorry…!” She began to sob, “I’m sorry I kept it a secret…! I should’ve… told you guys… I…” her whole body began to shake, and the twins only drew closer.

They had been together every day and knew they would see each other every tomorrow. It had simply become impossible to imagine a future without each other.

“That’s right! Say your sorry! To think you were going to have fun without us!” Floyd pouted.

“Cry for now, dear doll. Let it all out.” Jade said smoothly. “And don’t forget, from here on out. We have already fallen… it doesn’t matter how much farther we fall.”

--

“let’s say goodbye after our last dance who knew we could fall from the heavens? so together, let’s give each other up— after we dance one more time”

--

*huling sayaw - 'last dance'

[winterpower98]

Ok but what if the Traffic trio go back in time and meet the Jorney to the West crew?

This is the Time-traveling shenanigans I was waiting for LET’S GO! (I haven't finished the book yet, I'm just at chapter 14, so the JTTW crew might seem a bit OOC)

Ok, first of all, let’s say that the Traffic Light Trio meets the JTTW gang after they had to deal with Red Boy (I’ll call him that for now just so it’s easier to tell him apart from RedSon).

So our band of colorful kids finds themself pretty much lost in what looks like a forest with no idea of when they are. They opt to walk around for a bit in the hopes of finding something that might help them, and they do find someone.

Not too far away from where they appeared there’s a camp with a water demon and a pig demon bickering amongst themselves and a meditating monk.

Surely these aren’t the same monk and demons that traveled west with the Monkey, right? Aaaaaaaannndd MK is already gone talking to them. Great

The monk and the demons are startled by the new human but, thanks to MK’s charm, they quickly fall into a pleasant conversation.

“What bring you here in the middle of the woods young one?” “Oh, me and my friends, we ... we’re traveling to a nearby town! Yup, that’s it!” “And where are your companions?” “They’re ... looking for food”

So now Red and Mei are left hiding somewhere (there’s no way in hell Red is going anywhere near the monk, especially because he couldn’t see where the monkey was) while MK happily chats with the pilgrims.

Meanwhile, hidden by the tree’s fronds, the Monkey King silently observed everything happening. He saw the three younglings appear out of nowhere and he saw the demon and the girl hide not too far away from their camp. The only reason why he didn’t spring down and took care of the demon yet was because of the young boy that was chatting with his master.

There was something about the kid's aura that was so familiar. Almost like looking into a mirror, but not quite like a reflection.

So, now truly curious about this kid, the monkey jumped down from his hiding spot and in front of the boy.

Now, the first reaction that the monkey expected out of the kid was panic, but what he got instead was eyes full of admiration and his name pronounced without any fear.

So this kid not only knew who he is, he's not scared of him? Well, there's a first time for everything.

And the Monkey wasn't the only one surprised by the boy's odd behavior, his gleefulness did not go unnoticed by the other demons and the monk (who already knew this was going to bost the monkey's ego by several times and would probably cause some problems).

Wukong, now truly amused by the kid's antics, asked him to call for his friends and MK's happy-go-lucky attitude was quickly replaced by hidden panic.

He knows that Monkey King and his companions had to fight RedSon and would surely recognize him even if he's several centuries older now. The problem is that he doesn't know if the pilgrims had already fought Red or not, and now that he thinks about it he should have tried to gather that information while he was talking to the monk.

So now MK is trying his best to come up with an excuse as to why his friends couldn't come to meet them, and he was utterly failing!

Seeing that things were going downhill for her friend, Mei decided that they might as well be done with it, and went up to the camp dragging behind a complaining Red.

As soon as the green girl and the fire demon were in sight, the pig and the fish took a defensive stance while the monk became several shade paler. The monkey, on the other end, kept looking rather amused.

"What are you doing here? I thought Guanyin had looked you up somewhere. Don't tell me she let you out on good behavior?" And before Red could spat out some insult at the monkey, Mei slapped a hand over his mouth and answered for him. "Yup! Red here is been a really good demon! He's hanging out with us now!"

With everyone a tad bit calmer after Mei's lie, the two groups sat at the opposite sides of the camp and kept for themself.

Now, after the whole incident with the young version of the Traffic Light Trio, the two mortals and the demon find out that the artifact that allowed them to go back in time needs a whole day to recharge before it could be used again. Which meant that they had to wait till the next night before they could go back home.

Be in the past for a whole day wasn't a problem for MK, the change of seeing his idol in his glory days was too good to past, but Mei and Red were less thrilled about it. Zhu Bajie had been looking at Mei since she set foot out in the camp and, while she wasn't exactly new to this type of attention, she definitely wasn't a fan of it. Red was currently having a glaring contest with the Monkey King, Wukong's gaze clearly saying "try anything funny and I'll make you taste my iron rod" and Red responding with a "fuck you" look.

The air was dense between the two parties and it stayed that way up until everyone went to sleep.

The next day the JTTW gang set to travel again, followed by the two mortals and the demon, in silence.

But the silent peace was interrupted in the afternoon when demons decided to attack the traveling group with every intention of kidnapping the holy Tang priest.

Mei and Red had no problems defending themself, one with her jade sword and the other with fire, but MK was not doing so good.

Since they met the pilgrims MK did his best not to use any of Monkey King's powers, because he didn't know if it would mess up with the flow of time if his mentor find out he had a successor before he decided he wanted to retire.

So he was now fighting with his bare hands and he was getting quickly tired out.

Red: Noodle boy what are you doing! Use the staff! MK: But, Monkey King- Mei: We'll deal with him later!

And so, the Monkie Kid manifested the as-you-wish cudgel and set off to fight again.

Now, the appearance of a second golden staff did not go unnoticed. It distracted Sandy so much that a demon manages to get a lucky hit on him, but he was quickly killed by the fish.

After the fight was over, and the demons that weren't killed run away, the monkey approached the MK.

The soon-to-be mentor standing right in front of his successor, like a specular image, and asked him why he had an identical version of his golden cudgel.

Knowing full well that lying to Wukong would be futile (if not extremely stupid) the kids had no other choice but to tell them the truth.

And so they explained everything, from MK becoming the monkey's successor, to Red joining their side, and the artifact that led them here.

The monk and the pilgrims listen to them intently, but they didn't truly believe the story these kids were telling them.

When the Traffic Light Trio was done explaining their story, Wukong started to laugh. And not because he didn't believe them, on the contrary, he was sure that 99% of what they told them was true! No, the Monkey was laughing because "he wanted to retire". That had to be a joke right? Why the hell would he ever retire!?

After the monkey's laugh finally subsumed both parties started to happily chat, with the pilgrims asking questions about the future and the youngest three doing their best not to answer those questions.

But sadly, the time artifact was finally fully charged and it was time for the Traffic Light Trio to go back home.

So after some quick goodbyes and farewells (very quick on Wukong's part) the two mortals and the demon grab a hold of the artifact and get transported back home.

Several days after their little trip back in time, MK can't get Wukong's words out of his head. "Why would I ever retire?"

With time people can change and MK knows how much the Monkey King changed during his journey west, but there was a weird feeling that went along with the words the young monkey spoke, and he couldn't stop thinking about it.

[liquid-luck-00]

Connections 3

Chapter 3

this is based on @thepeacetea daminette soulmate au

Masterlist *** First *** Previous *** Next

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

Mari knew that this final concert was for a charity fair and that dad would perform on the last day closing the entire thing. She couldn’t wait to explore the fair and she went downstairs to leave the hotel to start.

 ---

 Damian didn’t want to be in France much less in Paris, but Mother dragged him away from the league in order to, as she says, ‘teach him something they cannot at the base’.

They were standing in the lobby of the hotel and Mother was surveying everyone who entered and exited the room. “See that little girl there” she was pointing to a girl that seemed to be his age with bright blue eyes and blue-black hair.

“Yes, is she the target”

“Yes, you have one week to gain information on her and report to me what you find” Damian didn’t understand what he was supposed to do, his confusion flashed across his face and mother must have noticed. “you must figure out her deepest secret, in other words get close to a target in order to determine their weakness.”

Damian nodded to his mother and walked over to the girl in question.

---

 Marinette couldn’t wait to visit the fair there were rides and games and she didn’t know what to do first. She was walking out of the hotel when she noticed him. He was around her age, he had black hair and jade eyes, he seemed to be walking towards her and that was when she turned. He stopped and seemed to be struggling to say something, so she started.

“Hi, I’m Marinette.” She gave a small wave and he seemed to break from his struggle.

“hello, I’m Damian” he gave her a curt nod and continued “I was going to the fair and was wondering if you would accompany me?” at this Marinette simply burst into a fit of giggles. She looked up and he seemed to be confused but it changed quickly into a scowl.

“I’m sorry” she managed between the laughter, “but you just sounded like such and old man” she gave him a lopsided smile. “I would love to go to the fair with you. Come on” she grabbed his hand to pull him and then immediately let go and started to walk towards the fair ground.

 ---

 This girl would be the death of him. He hasn’t gotten any information of importance other than her name. She was insufferable! Damian couldn’t believe his luck, he had to deal with her for a week and she might not say anything useful.

The two of them spent the day going from ride to ride and stayed in relative silence until another girl around their age showed up in line behind them.

“I can’t believe you went to Achu with your parents over the summer” a small girl with blonde hair squeaked.

“I even met the Prince; he is our age and he has the most adorable little brother. He even gave me a gift before we left.” The girl pulled out a necklace that he recognized was from a vending machine. He scoffed and turned his attention back to Marinette. She looked like she was trying to remember something, but it kept eluding her. She was weak of mind which means he should strike now.

“What are your interests?” he spoke curtly, and it seemed to pull her attention back onto him.

“Designing I guess” she responded with a shrug.

“TT. You guess that makes no sense” this was going nowhere, and she wouldn’t stop giving round about answers.

“My interests are always changing but that is the most resent” she only responded with a shrug.

The rest of the week went by the same she never gave him a true answer and he was frustrated. Mother seemed to laugh at him but even when she met Marinette she was also thrown in circles.

On the last day of the festival before they went back to the hotel, he went to say goodbye to her. He simply went to shake her hand, but she pulled him into an embrace.

“You know I can cut you free Out of the drudgery and walls you keep in So trade that typical for something colorful And if it's crazy, live a little crazy You can play it sensible, a king of conventional” she whispered in his ear singing the sentence and pulled out of the embrace “Goodbye Damian” she gave him a wave, turned, and walked away. Damian stood there confused and light at the same time, but he didn’t know why.

Who the hell is this girl. That sentence sent chills down his spine almost as if, as if she knew exactly what he was. But what did she mean, truly, she couldn’t have known that he is an assassin. Surely that is not the case.

Little did he know that those words would follow him.

 ---

 Marinette had fun this past week, she really enjoyed spending time with Damian, but something just felt off. She felt as if she had to be on constant alert. It didn’t help that he kept tying to get her to answer so many questions, so she decided to not give direct answers. If he asked her favorite color, she would say she didn’t have one but liked pink and also white. If he asked her age, she would say it wasn’t important. She knew that he was annoyed with her answers but then again, he never gave her straight answers to her questions. But then again, he did keep hanging out with her, so she didn’t know what to think of him.

She was however proud of the fact she got him to laugh, well it was more of a chuckle. He was so stoic but she saw his reactions that he covered quickly, and that was odd, almost as if he couldn’t show how he was feeling, so for the week she made it her job to see how many emotions she could pull out of him. Granted they were few, but they were there, and that was a victory.

Dad, Penny, her were staying two extra nights in Paris in order to rest before heading back to Gotham. Mari couldn’t stand staying in the room, so she went to go explore the city. As she walked around, she couldn’t help but be drawn to a little shop. So, Mari went in, she didn’t know what to expect but she didn’t expect to see an old man in a Hawaiian shirt standing in front of a phonograph.

“Hello. Oh! What are you?” Mari shifted her focus from the man to a small drawer near the man.

The man chuckled and responded to her “I believe you mean Who not What”

Marinette simply shook her head and stepped closer to the drawer. “No, I meant what” she stated as a fact more like and adult than a child. Coming to the drawer she opened it to find a small creature that resembled a turtle of sorts.

 ---

 “Master?” the little turtle stated questioningly as he looked at the man, who only sighed and turned to the little girl.

“you must have questions?” she only nodded, she was a strange child, almost as if she has suffered greatly at such a young age but still was full of light. “come child”

He turned towards the phonograph and opened it ad retrieved a pair of earrings that he handed to the girl. “My name is Fu and this” he waved towards the turtle “is Wayzz”

“it’s nice to meet you both” she had finished putting on the earrings when there was a flash of pink light.

“hello there, hello again Master Fu” a red figure not unlike the turtle appeared. “Hi my name is Tikki”

The girl seemed to be confused but analytical “these two” he motioned towards Tikki and Wayzz “are known as kwamii and are bound to the miraculous, the earrings I gave you are bound to Tikki. But I must say you child are highly perceptive to be able to sense Wayzz. You must be a true chosen to have that gift.”

He smiled at the girl who asked many questions, by the time all her questions were answered it was noon. She rose and was about to exit the shop when he called out.

“For the safety of yourself and of the kwamii you must never reveal your identity or Tikki”

She looked at him with a look of pure determination and said “It is a secret. Which means the less people who know the better” with those words the strange little girl left the shop along with the kwamii of creation.

 ---

 The last morning in Paris Marinette stayed in the hotel they were leaving around dusk, so she wanted to stay close.

“What are you doing hanging out alone Dupain-Cheng?” Chloe remarked with a smirk. But Mari saw through it, she knew Chloe and she knew that Chloe knew that Lila was a huge liar.

“Well dad and I were here for the fair, and Clo its Stone actually” she replied with a smile as she walked towards the girl.

“I know” her posture shifted, and the two girls embraced, “how have you…?” she drifted off.

“nope were going to have fun all morning because I have to leave”

“Ridiculous. Utterly Ridiculous Mari” she spoke exaggeratedly while giving Mari a smile and pulled her off into the hotel.

Mari couldn’t help but think how much things had changed in only a year. She had a dad who loved her and Penny was practically her mom (who was made her godmother), her best friend in Paris (Chloe), and she now had three brothers and Bruce who was practically a second dad (not even Jagged opposed this), not to mention she now had Tikki and she couldn’t be happier. Gotham looked more and more like home the closer she flew to the city, she couldn’t help but smile, she had a home surrounded by people who loved her.

Next

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

Taglist🐞🦇

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[hello-im-not-a-possum]

2. twisted

The cartoon that came out of the machine was pretty as a picture, perfect in almost every detail, and had a bubbly, positive personality. But she was not what Joey had wanted Susie to become. (Set in an AU where Joey gets perfect toons from his freshly killed employees and STILL isn’t happy, the unpleasable bitch…)

“Progress report to GENT home office, Client; Joey Drew Studios.

With the addition of the new ink recipe to use in the machine, we have made an unbelievable leap in progress and have almost met our client’s expectations. What had started as a machine to mold life sized figures out of ink has now done things that border on being supernatural.

Although Mr. Drew seems unimpressed, even frustrated with the results at times, in spite of the fact that the models have come out identical to their cartoon counterparts.

The process of running the cartoon film through the machine for the figures to imprint on has been successful, but it looks like that unless someone goes through the trouble of making a short that only has ONE character in it, the machine picks what character it makes at seemingly random. That is our client’s complaint; that instead of being user chosen, the machine picks out which living, breathing, thinking ink models it makes at random. Upon working on this, if I were to be in the client’s shoes, I’d have several valid complaints regarding the machine and the models it created, but our client’s complaint… Is that the machine that doesn’t have a system that allows the user to pick and choose which model it makes yet creates a physically flawless model every single time, does not allow the user to pick and choose which model it makes. He never ceases to infuriate me.

On a sour note, there was an incident with the figure in the likeness of a character called ‘The Brute’. Upon its creation, it immediately went and broke our client’s leg in a very… well, brutal fashion too. But fortunately, it has not physically attacked anyone since The Cameraman figure was made as we have threatened to separate them if it keeps up that behavior. It still likes to insult people, and it still does things that unnerve me though. We’re hoping that the rest of the figures will be less violent and or creepy.”

Thomas clicked off the recording and sighed as he looked at the newly made report, there was no way he could submit this to his boss without someone sending in someone to make sure he wasn’t huffing in ink fumes and whatever the Studio workers smoked to consider any of this to be normal.

“Hey Tommy! I think I figured out the issue with the machine! Or rather, its fuel.”

The mechanic grit his teeth and turned to face his client.

“What? I wasn’t aware that there was a problem with it.”

“Why, Tommy, how could you forget? I’m talking about the figure deposit problem of course! Why did we get The Brute when we wanted to get Boris? Why did we get Cameraman when we wanted Bendy? The answer was so simple, why, it was even staring at us the entire time!”

“Uh huh…” Thomas did not look convinced. “And what was this issue?”

“The ingredients, the Ink of course! You simply can’t put blueberry pancake batter in an oven and be surprised when you get blueberry pancakes instead of blueberry muffins, We got those two knuckleheads before we got the real stars of the show because the souls used to make them weren’t fit to make those two, but the machine still did what it does best: made living cartoons.”

Tom had an uneasy feeling in his gut as Joey grabbed his arm and led him to the Ink Machine’s room. He felt like a sheep being led to the slaughterhouse, he KNEW what went down in there! He knew the other ingredients, not well, per say, but for long enough to judge them and their characters.

He didn’t shed a single tear when Sammy was used in it, in fact, he was rather pleased with the results before it started acting out like that. He and the music director were almost always at each other’s throats for one reason or another. If you asked him, the ex-musician was strange, rude, clearly mentally unstable, and sometimes even cruel. And even if he wasn’t, his physical health had declined so much over his time at the studio that it was obvious that he would die regardless of whether or not he was put in the machine. Feeding Sammy to that machine was an act of mercy, really, and even if it wasn’t, it served him right to become a- err, The Brute and have him put the former musician in his place- put his villainous ways to a decent cause. Now if only someone could ensure for a fact that The Brute would behave...

Now the other ingredient, Norman Polk, was a different story. The man was old, weird and kinda creepy. On the surface, the man was an ideal candidate. Like Sammy, he would die anyway and nobody would miss him when he did. But on the contrary, he seemed like he still had some good years left in him. And while he was weird and creepy, he had been those things in an oddly endearing way that most of the studio had either liked or tolerated enough to not be bugged by it. The mechanic didn’t know how to explain it, that man reminded Tom of a mysterious, mostly-estranged relative that shows up out of nowhere and was always there for you even if you don’t always see him. So when the man snooped too much for his own good and had to be silenced… Tom could never look the resulting toon in the eye, or in his case, the lens.

But the mechanic couldn’t deny that it needed to be done, after all, the former projectionist was far too nosy for anyone’s sake. Nobody who knows the secret of the Ink Machine (or rather, it’s unconventional secret ingredient needed for its ink) should be free to wander the studio and spill the beans.

And a feeling in his gut was beginning to tell him that that was why he was the next on the chopping block.

He had built it, he learned what it would take to make it work, he had done what it took to make it work, and it was working now; No more models that would only move a tiny bit before collapsing into puddles! No more off model models! No more issues aside from x, y, z… -No more reasons for Joey to keep him alive when it was now too dangerous to his business… 

A tiny voice at the back of his head told him it served him right. The creator of this unholy torture device would now be consumed by it, just like how the maker of the Brazen Bull was the first victim it claimed.

At this point, he was almost morbidly curious on who or what the machine would make him; would it poke fun at his past and make him that territorial junkyard guard, Canoodle? Would it ironically punish him for his greed by making him The Fat Cat of the show, Boswell Lotsobucks? Would it acknowledge that although he was a villain to the bitter end, he still tried to go clean only for demons to drag him back down his dark paths and make him into Charley? Thinking about it, any butcher gang member would be a good enough fit really.

He was a mix of relieved, disappointed, and horrified when he was brought into the room and saw the unconscious voice actress of Alice Angel strapped to a mobile operating table. Joey seemed to ignore his reaction as he proudly showed her off and began to monologue.

“Like Boris, Sammy was a musician, simple-minded, and was very loyal to those he considered friends until the bitter end. But what made Sammy more like the Brute then Boris- Aside from body type, obviously, was that Sammy had quite the short temper on him, one that got messed with often, and a tendency to hold onto a grudge that can’t be swayed away with a good meal or a bad joke… Just like our friend; the Brute.”

Tom stayed speechless as Joey continued his seemingly prepared and rehearsed speech.

“As for Bendy and Norman, well, it’s obvious that those too simply weren’t compatible in the slightest! Sure, they both have their mischievous sides, but that alone doesn’t make a man into a good imp… However, do you know who DOES have more in common with Mr. Polk? That’s right! A certain smart alec-someone who knows a thing or two about anyone, everyone, and everything whether he wants to or not. Someone with a darker, more jaded sense of humor than our little devil, someone who can lurk in the shadows, or in his case, ‘backstage’ for safety or to gather Intel, but be happy and proud to take the front stage when the need arises! ...Alright, I can see that Norman’s soul may have influenced the personality of our Cameraman, but at least he did it in ways that make sense to the character.”

The mechanic continued to stay silent as Joey continued.

“But the main point is: we know what to do to fix this little issue. If we want a main character, we need someone who embodies the soul of that character. And Ms. Campbell here said it herself; Alice is a part of her!”

“Joey…”

“Why, she’d be thanking us if she knew what was coming! This is a dream come true for her! She always seemed to be the happiest when she was singing our angel darling’s songs…”

As if he was snapped out of a trance, the mechanic pulled Joey to his face, gripping the animator’s arms tightly and shaking him up a bit.

“Joey! We can’t do this! Susie isn’t like Norman or Sammy. She’s young, healthy, and still has a lot to live for. Nobody would buy that she passed on from something out of the blue, or that she moved away without warning or telling anyone. Everyone in the studio loves her and talks to her frequently! If we do this, especially so soon, they will make the connection, and they will find out about this. It was bad enough when Norman went, imagine if someone as well loved as her went too!”

Joey just laughed and slapped Tom’s shoulder.

“Oh Tommy, all we need to tell them is that Susie got her big break and is Bringing Alice to life in ways never before seen! And to sell the illusion, also tell them ‘you know how those folks in Hollywood are with their schedules, always a bunch of busy bees.’ They’ll bite, you just have to trust me.”

“What if they don’t?” the mechanic argued. “What if they start snooping around and start to piece together what really happened to her?”

Joey’s smile wavered a bit, but remained steadfast.

“Well, we’ll just have to cross that bridge when we reach it. And when we do, we’ll have our answer!”

“Nnnnggghhh…”

Both of them shuddered when they heard the voice actress start to stir awake.

“I swore I used stronger stuff in her drink…”

“...Jo...Joey..? ..Mr. Conner..?” The voice actress’s real eye widened in horror as she looked around, and her voice wavered as she grew more and more frantic. “WHat’s going on?! Where am I- Why am I tied up?!”

“S-Susie! Everything’s perfectly fine my dear, you just need to calm down a bit and I’ll explain everything…” He subtly jabbed Thomas in the ribs with his elbow. “Tommy!” He hissed “Throw her in the machine already!”

The frightened voice actress began to struggle against her restraints while Tom hesitated. Joey shot him a glare as he strolled up behind Susie and put a ‘reassuring’ hand on the weeping angel’s shoulder.

“Joey, please… let me go… Don’t do this to me!” Tears were running down the woman’s face, her voice was soft and breaking from her stress. “Just let me go and I promise I won’t tell anyone…”

“Now, now, Susie, there’s nothing to worry about, yes I know this looks unsettling from your position… But you and Alice are going places, new, big places that most people only dream of seeing! You’re going to bring her to life in ways that will touch the hearts of generations!”

A flash of realization crossed her face.

“Joey… answer me this: when Sammy ‘died from untreated lung cancer’ did he actually die from lung cancer? And when Norman ‘died from a workplace injury’ did he really…?” her voice trailed off a bit with uncertainty before asking her third question. “Did their deaths have anything to do with those two toons that showed up?!”

Her questions were not answered by words, but with actions as the two men stuffed her into the machine. When it turned on, her screams echoed throughout the mostly empty studio, chilling all who heard them to the very bone.

When they finally stopped, the machine whirred and roared to life and Joey rubbed his hands together in glee as he watched the machine work its magic.

Thomas, on the other hand, stood in silence while staring at his hands as dread and guilt sank in his gut.

The former man’s smile fell into a look of confusion when he saw a pair of gloves with ‘X’ marks on them come out, followed by arms that connected to them. That look of confusion fell deeper into a frown when he saw the arms stretch, curl, and twist when the gloves reached the floor as if they were streams of ice cream coming out of the machine at an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Alice didn’t have arms that curled and stretched, but Joey knew a certain demoness toon who did; Miss Twisted. He was cursing under his breath, of course it would complete their little trio before giving him what he wanted! Now he wasted his one shot at getting Alice!

The rest of the toon didn’t even get out of the damn machine, it was like she was taunting him by continuing to stretch her arms and let them continue to coil in piles on the floor instead of showing him the finished product.

Furious, he marched over and grabbed the toon demoness’s arms and yanked her out of the damn machine.

“Stop messing around!” He scolded before pausing and reapplying his signature smile. “Your friends Brute and Cameraman have been worried sick about you ever since their creation! You wouldn’t want to keep them waiting for you any longer than they’ve already been, right?”

He could’ve been imagining it, but he swore that she had a look of pure terror on her face before she put on a fake smile of her own. And was it just him, or was this Miss Twisted’s left eye slightly discolored, glassy looking, if that made sense for someone with pitch black pie-cut eyes. The grayer eye she had reminded him of Susie Campbell’s fake eye.

“Y-yeah! You’re right!” She pushed Joey out of her face, clearly uncomfortable by his staring but pretending to be perfectly fine. “I can’t keep my boys waiting for too long, who knows what they’ll do?” She chuckled nervously. “So… where are you keeping them? where are they hiding?”

“Tommy here will be happy to show you, just follow him and-”

“Thanks!”

The demoness chipperly chirped and swiftly yanked Thomas out of the room at a speed that almost insulted the man.