#he’s jumping off buildings and doing the math on his shots in real time | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

abarbaricyalp · 3 years

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hi. you still taking prompts? sambucky meet cute: the lobby of some kind of really tall building and they both have to get to the to top floors. bucky gets to the elevator first, pushes the "door close" button cause he's in a hurry even though he sees sam rushing towards it, but sam gets there just in time. he saw what bucky did so in retaliation he just pushes every single button to make bucky late. now they're stuck in the longest elevator ride, having to stop at every floor

Friend, this is not a meet cute. This is full on meet ugly 😅

AO3 link in the reblog

Push All My Buttons

Bucky was being haunted. That was the only logical explanation for how someone followed him from Brooklyn to Manhattan, mostly on foot. He’d seen the same guy on two trains, across approximately a thousand city blocks, and in the dumb cafe that Bucky squeezed into five seconds after it opened.

And now, the same handsome young black man was standing in the middle of the Stark Tower lobby, looking lost. Bucky quickly hit the close door button of the elevator that he blessedly had to himself. Apparently, he hit it too loud because the guy’s gaze snapped over to him and recognition lit on his face.

Bucky hit Close Door again.

“Hey! Could you hold that!” the guy called, jogging across the lobby floor and avoiding milling people. The fucking tourists on the ground level were killer.

Bucky was not letting a stalker into the elevator with him when he had 91 floors to get up. He hit Close Door for a third time.

Finally, the guy seemed to realize what Bucky was doing and he scowled before tossing his army bag towards the closing doors. They hit the bag and opened up just in time for the guy to jog over, grab his bag, and step inside.

“You’re kind of an asshole,” he said as he slung the duffle over his shoulder again.

“I’m late to a meeting,” Bucky said, which was true. Mostly what he wanted to say was ‘don’t kill me and wear my face as a mask’ or whatever someone who’d followed him over three boroughs would want to do.

The man looked over at him from the corner of his eyes, looked at the highlighted 91 and then reached over to smooth his hand up every single button on the machine. 2-93 lit up.

Bucky stared.

The man crossed his arms. “Now we’re both late.”

92 and 93 unlit themselves. Those were Stark’s personal suites. 2-91 remained lit.

“You fucking asshole,” Bucky groaned and dragged his hands over his face. “Why would you do that? I’m meeting with Stark. I’ve got his-his-his fucking coffee. Jesus.”

“Because I’d rather be late and piss you off than be on time and let you get away with trying to close the door in my face.”

“What was the point of following me all the way around the city? Are you trying to make my life difficult?”

Now the man fully turned to look over at him. The elevator stopped on the second floor and no one was waiting. “I’m not following you. I don’t even know who you are.”

“Are you kidding?” Bucky asked. “You’ve been on my ass since Lloyd’s, in Brooklyn.”

The man frowned. The elevator eased up to the next floor. “Why would you stop at Lloyd’s if you were coming all the way in here?”

“I like to eat on my commute, that’s not the point! You followed me!”

“Pal, I dunno how to tell you that anyone coming from Brooklyn to Stark Tower’s gotta take a pretty similar route.”

“It’s Bucky, pal.”

“Sam,” the guy said and then honest to God offered his hand out like he wasn’t actively ruining Bucky’s life.

On the fifth floor, someone stepped into the elevator, looked at the buttons and stepped back out. Bucky shook Sam’s hand with a resigned sigh.

“Where’d you get that piece of machinery on your arm?” Sam asked around floor eight.

“It’s not on my arm,” Bucky answered. “It is my arm.”

Sam rolled his eyes and punched the door close button. “Fine, where’d you get that piece of machinery on your torso?”

“It’s not Stark tech,” he answered because he knew that was actually what Sam was asking about. He let his eyes slide over Sam’s body quickly, trying to discern if Sam was here for a prosthetic. The bag on his shoulder and the silver ball-chain around his neck gave away that he was military. Stark Industries had a veterans program, so there was a good population of soldiers walking around the building at any given time. Sam was wearing pants, so Bucky couldn’t be totally sure he didn’t have a bad leg, but he hadn’t clocked any limp or awkward gait since Brooklyn. “You here for a prosthetic?” he asked anyway.

Sam snorted and shook his head. The door opened again and someone got on before reaching to press the ground level button.

“Shit,” the woman said, upon seeing everything else lit up. She quickly hit the door open button and jumped back out. “You know, if you two wanted extra time together, having the doors open on every floor was probably a bad idea.”

“That’s not what we--” Bucky started to argue, but the doors slid shut in front of him.

“Anyway,” Sam started again. “I’m not here for a prosthetic. I’m here with Colonel Rhodes.”

“Wow, big man on campus,” Bucky said drily.

“Oh, right, you’re so unimportant, going up to the 91st floor,” Sam shot back.

“I work here,” Bucky said. He held up the quickly cooling coffee in his hands. “Glorified secretary most days, but I’m supposed to be an engineer.”

“What kind of machines do you work with?”

“Not the planes or the suits. Military tech, mostly. I try to stay away from weapons when I can.”

“Did you serve?” Sam asked.

Wish I hadn’t, Bucky wanted to say. “Nah, actually I lost my arm when Stark flew into an uncaffeinated rage and threw a saw at me.”

“Whatever, man. There’s a thousand ways to lose an arm. It ain’t gotta be out in the desert.” His cheeks didn’t quite color, but he crossed his arms and stared ahead.

“Mountains,” Bucky corrected. “Special OPs.”

“Oh, right, but I’m the big man on campus,” Sam said, holding up his hands in mock surrender.

“Rhodes is a big deal around here. You think Stark’s letting him out of his sight for just anyone?”

“The Air Force is testing a new gadget. Rhodes is involved ‘cause Air Force. Maybe you worked on it.”

“Yeah, maybe. It’s a big program. Stark’s got a lot of things going on all at once. Lots of engineers and designers.”

The elevator stopped on the 25th floor and Sam and Bucky both said, “We’re going up,” at the same time to keep the group of suits from crowding into the elevator with them.

Sam kicked his bag into the corner and sat down heavily in front of it, leaning back and closing his eyes. “So you’re a soldier who works for Stark Industries but didn’t get your prosthetic from him, even though he’s the cutting edge of prosthetics and has a full-paid program for those injured in duty.”

Bucky gave up and sat down too. He cradled the coffee cup between his legs, which was probably a bad idea, but this whole morning had been bad. “My story’s a little more complicated than that,” he said. “A lot more twists and turns. My arm is still high tech, though. I asked for a flamethrower, or at least a saw hand but I didn’t get it.”

Sam laughed and, for the first time all morning, Bucky thought maybe he wasn’t so angry at him anymore. Sam laughed like nothing had ever hurt him before, which made it feel like maybe nothing had hurt Bucky either. “Well, there’s your problem. Stark would’ve definitely given you that, from what I hear about the man.”

Bucky grinned over at him and dropped his head back against the wall. It was uncomfortable and the jostling of the car every few seconds rattled his brain, but it beat standing up, or keeping his eyes on Sam for too long. “You’re still in the service?”

“Well, not all of us are so lucky to get a medical discharge on our first tour.”

“Oh, yeah, real luck of the Irish, me. And it was my second. I wasn’t SpecOps until I finished my first stint in the army.”

“Right, right,” Sam said. Then, “You joined up young.”

“So did you. I mean, I assume you’re on your second or third tour too, if you’re being asked to work with Rhodes.”

“Second. I took a long leave to do some school stuff.”

“Oh, so working with Rhodes and you’re smart. You really are the whole package.”

“I’m working with Colonel Rhodes because I’m smart,” Sam corrected. “I could probably take your job. I’m real techy.”

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t. I’m fond of my apartment and I definitely can’t afford it without being here.”

“Right, I assume you make buck working for Stark.”

“Eh, he’s still a multi-billionaire, he could pay us more.”

“What’s that say about the military then?”

“I’ll drink to that, bro.”

Sam chuckled again and opened his eyes to glance over at Bucky. “How does someone go from losing their arm in a SpecOps mission to working for Stark Industries.”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. It’s at least a three course discussion.”

The elevator dinged on level 39 and paused, though there was no one there.

“Almost halfway up,” Sam pointed out.

“You are good at math,” Bucky joked just to see Sam roll his eyes again, which he did. “Why Air Force?” he asked when the doors decided to shut again.

“It’s gonna sound so stupid, but I’ve been dreaming about flying since I was a little kid. I wanted to be an astronaut and a lot of astronauts were in the military. So, air force. Figured if I never got to space, at least I spent years in the air anyway.”

Bucky didn’t think that was stupid at all. “You’re right, that’s pretty dumb.” Sam flipped him off with a laugh. “Are you a good pilot?”

“Pal, I’m one of the best out there.”

“God, you chair force guys are all the same,” Bucky said. He squawked as Sam leaned over to tackle him down. “Coffee, coffee! Sam, if you spill Stark’s coffee I’ll make you explain it to him!” he threatened as Sam pulled him away from the cup that had managed to remain upright by an unlikely bout of luck and physics.

Sam was fucking strong, wrangling Bucky down and holding him still. Sure, he was on his knees and Bucky’s legs were mostly trapped under him, but still. Bucky wasn’t a small guy and the prosthetic wasn’t light either but Sam had tugged him out of the corner anyway.

“Oh my God, seriously?” a guy asked on the next floor.

Bucky took the moment of distraction to dig his knee into Sam’s ribs and flip them over as the doors shut again. He locked his fingers around Sam’s wrist and held it to the floor. Sam tugged at the hold futilely.

“Shit, what’s that made out of?”

“That’s another three course answer.”

“At this rate? No chance,” Sam said and got his foot braced against Bucky’s shoulder before shoving him off. Bucky sat back and made sure the coffee was still standing. Sam leaned up against the wall by the doors. They both took in heavy breaths.

“What are you doing with Rhodes?” Bucky asked at floor fifty, when he was pretty positive they weren’t about to leap at each other again.

“Maybe that’s a three course answer,” Sam responded with a small smirk.

“I didn’t know Stark was working on planes with the Air Force.”

“Did I say plane?”

“Helicopters, whatever,” Bucky amended with a wave of his hand. “What do you fly?”

“I’m pararescue.”

Bucky let out a low whistle. “Shit, that’s more impressive than working with Rhodes, maybe. You a doctor?”

“I’ve got triage training, but I’m not, like, ready to walk into an E.R. as soon as I get home or anything.” Sam ran his hand over his buzzed hair and Bucky suddenly wanted to know what it looked like grown out, or if he’d ever kept it long. How he styled it and if he had facial hair and what he was hiding under his shirt and Jesus Christ, he needed to think about anything else.

“Well, from what I’ve seen, your beside manner probably sucks.”

Sam kicked out his foot lamely, missing Bucky’s by a mile. “You ain’t hurt. I don’t gotta give you no bedside manner.”

“What floor do you want off on?” Bucky asked after a glance at the rapidly dimming lights on on the button panel.

“85.”

“Right, yeah, Rhodes works there. We’re at 70 now.”

“What’s it like? Just offices?”

“Nah, he’s got a whole training floor. There’re a few offices, a reception area, but there’s also a gym and some space for simulated battle, sparring rooms. It’s pretty cool. You’ll have a lot of room for whatever he’s doing.”

Sam nodded and looked over at the gaping doors with the first look of unease he’d had all morning.

“You nervous?”

“You would be too,” Sam answered. “If you knew what I was doing. But, hey,” he looked away as the doors shut, “my partner’s already up there, so I can’t make any more of a fool of myself than he probably already has.”

Bucky grinned and shrugged. “I dunno about that. You seem pretty incapable,” he said sarcastically.

Sam kicked out his leg again and then stood up and grabbed his bag from next to Bucky. “You work here every day?”

Bucky nodded and took Sam’s hand when he offered it down to him to haul himself up. “9 to too late.”

“Well, I’m around for a few weeks. Maybe we could walk together instead of around each other next time,” he suggested.

Bucky ignored the swooping of his stomach. “Yeah, if you can keep up.”

Sam jostled his ribs with an elbow. “I can keep up. You’re the one with the machine on your arm.”

“Yeah, and what about it? I could hand-walk faster than you could run.”

“Oh, I doubt that,” Sam snorted. The door opened on floor 80 and Sam’s mouth screwed to one side briefly before he looked at Bucky. “Maybe you’ll get my number out of all of this eventually.”

“Maybe I don’t want it after this stunt.”

Sam placed his hand on Bucky’s metal shoulder solemnly. “You want it.”

With a grin, Bucky shrugged Sam off and shoved him forward. “Get outta here, Wilson.”

“How’d you know--?” Sam asked, taking half a step back to the doors.

Bucky reached over to trace his fingers over the name patch on the other side of the bag. “I’m just a good guesser.”

“Hey, that’s not fair. What’s your--”

The door shut between them and Bucky sagged back against the wall with a sigh. His heart was racing like he was a teenager again and his head felt cloudy. This meeting was not going to go well at this point. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to focus on anything but Sam’s smile or the way he looked in boots or the weight of him above Bucky’s body.

When the elevator dinged on 91, he grabbed Stark’s coffee and let himself off and then almost immediately ran into Rhodes.

“Oh, hey, sorry. Hey, I was just on the elevator with your meeting,” he said. “Sorry he’s late. I hit a bunch of buttons on accident when I got in,” Bucky lied as he passed the coffee to Stark.

“No harm, no foul,” Rhodey said easily. “Clearly I wasn’t even down there. I was actually waiting on you.”

“Me? What for? I’m not working on anything military.”

“You’re not?” Stark asked around a mouthful of coffee. “You assigning yourself projects now?”

“You didn’t say anything about the wings being military. I mean, how would that even work? It’d put a soldier in the air bare.”

“Yeah,” Stark agreed sarcastically and clapped a hand down on Bucky’s metal arm. “What kind of soldier runs around without full body protection.”

“What are you calling the project?” Rhodey asked, guiding the discussion back to where it was supposed to be.

“EXO-Falcon,” Bucky said. “I was modeling it after some of Stark’s EXO-skeleton suits, but it’s much more compact, situated on the back with all support sitting around the chest and ribs.”

Rhodey nodded. “Can I see them?”

Bucky quickly dashed to his work bench and came back with the wings in their case. “They’re carbon fiber, which makes them a little more flexible and keeps them a little lighter weight. I had thought about doing interlocking plates like my arm, but it wasn’t working. I took some of the more basic structures of my arm and modeled a folding mechanism out of it instead. The wings retract into and out of the case.”

He pulled the jetpack on and stepped away from the other work spaces before clicking the wings open. They snapped out behind him, grand and proud. Not unlike how Bucky was feeling at that moment.

“And the jetpack? Is that ready to go?” Rhodey asked.

Bucky shifted from foot to foot. “Well, in theory. I haven’t tested it out yet ‘cause I’m not trained to do things like that, but I’ve put DUM-E into the air and nothing blew up.”

“Well, the Air National Guard guys here today will be thrilled to hear that,” Stark said. “Shall we?”

“You don’t wanna test the jets before you put it on someone?” Bucky asked, a little strangled. He trusted his design. But he really, really hadn’t put as much time into the whole human safety element as he did the ‘up and running’ element.

“We’ll strap a crash test dummy to them in over the mats. It’ll be fine. The fire suppression system on 85 is better than up here.”

“No it isn’t. It’s just further from your suites,” Rhodey said.

Stark shrugged and tossed a piece of pastry in his mouth. “It’s my building. I say we go down to 85.”

“Well, that’s where I left your trainee or whatever too,” Bucky said as he shrugged off the pack and packed it all back up. “Do you want me to grab the other pack?”

“No worries, I’ve already moved it,” Stark said. “I knew Rhodes was coming by. You’re welcome, those things are heavy.”

“Don’t act like you didn’t have DUM-E move it,” Rhodey teased. He made his way over to the elevator and Bucky followed with Stark on his heels. The ride down to 85 was much faster than the ride up to 91. It was a miracle what not hitting every button could do. They stepped out onto the floor and made their way to the training mats, where two other people were already standing.

“Barnes, I’d like to keep you on the Falcon project,” Rhodey said. “No one knows the wings like you do. That being said, you’ll be working with live test subjects now, so it’s a little more critical.”

“Hey, you don’t have to say it that way!” the blond man in the middle of the room said. “Call us, like, Top Guns or something.”

“You don’t get to choose your nickname around here,” Stark called over, propping himself up on a stack of sparring mats to watch from afar. “Ask Manchurian Candidate. He definitely didn’t choose his.”

Rhodey rolled his eyes. “Barnes, this Sergeant Wiatrek and Sergeant Wilson.”

Fuck.

“It’s Barnes, huh?” Sam asked, smugly crossing his arms over his chest.

“Oh, Sammy, you didn’t hook up with this guy already did you?” the blond asked in teasing horror.

“Screw you, no. I met him this morning.”

“Ah,” Rhodey said with a grin. “This was the meeting you made late,” he said to Bucky.

“Yeah, we met this morning,” Bucky confirmed with a raging blush. How was this his life?

“Well, good, you can get right to work on the wings,” Rhodey said. “Let me go find a crash dummy.”

“DUM-E,” Stark called as Rhodey started away.

“I’ll find that doll first,�� Rhodey challenged.

Bucky turned from their bickering and looked at Sam, then the blond next to him.

“It’s Riley,” the other man said and offered out his hand. “I’m better conversation than this one.”

Bucky doubted it. He shook the guy’s hand and then held out the briefcase like a shield between him and Sam’s teasing gaze. “Do you wanna see the wings?”

Riley nodded eagerly and Bucky moved to another stack of mats to open the case. Riley and Sam stood on either side of him. As Riley pulled the jetpack free, Sam pulled out his phone. Bucky thought he was going to film his friend inevitably crashing, but instead he turned on the auto-help.

“Hey, where’s the nearest three-course restaurant?” he asked without looking away from Bucky, without his grin faltering.

Bucky dragged his hands down his face as he looked at Sam. Riley yelped behind them after the tell-tell whoosh of the jet pack, but Sam still didn’t look away. Bucky couldn’t either.

#sambucky #sambucky fanfic #sambucky fanfiction #sam wilson #bucky barnes #the falcon and the winter soldier #the falcon #the winter soldier #fanfiction #fanfic #writing #i answer things

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creativebeansofchaos · 2 years

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Hi! Can you do a fanfic request about Dave Lizewski? So for this request is really about Stacey Quinn being the new girl at school, sits nexts to Dave Lizewski in all of her classes and that's where the love sparks come in place where they become friends into lovers while seeing each other. Stacey is infatuated with Dave. Dave was always invisible with girls but when Stacey notices him all the time at school, he always fantasies about Stacey 24/7 like her body and her boobies. Can you make it smutty or nsfw? Stacey is 5’5’’, hourglass figure, slightly tanned skin, long face and pointed chin, long wavy buttery blonde hair, icy blue doe eyes, a beauty mark below her left eye, Hello Kitty on her left thigh, rhinestone navel belly ring on her belly and flawless sculpted legs. Please and thank you!!!

P.S. Dave Lizewski is from Kick Ass where he is a superhero but in this request I want him to be just an ordinary teenage guy in high school. He’s super dorky and into hot girls like Stacey. Basically he’s a perv himself.

-Nonnie

There maybe follow up focus to this so here is basically chapter one.

Kick-Math (the name is a working progress)

Dave x OC

Summary: Stacy is new to the school and struggling in math. She needs a tutor and guess who is sitting next to her in class.

She was new to the school. I saw her yesterday and since then I have not been able to keep my eyes off of her. Her perfect hair and body just everything about her. Was just perfect. I felt a hard jab into my side and Todd saying “ Dave, daVE, DAVE.”

“WHAT?!”

“Your staring again.” Looking back at Stacy she gave a small wave before walking off. Her skirt just short enough to tease. I continued watching her letting out a small sigh. That Todd presided to mock but a elbow to the guy shut him up real quick.

“Come on man lunch is over and we have calc next (calculus).” We cleaned off our table and walked out of the cafeteria. Walking up the stairs we continued with idle talk that I could really pay much attention to because she waved back. (´∀｀)♡

This was one hundred percent the worst class. Mr. Dod ‘ya that’s his name’ moved Todd and i to opposite sides of the room. Because apparently we “talked to much”. No I have an empty desk next me and an empty hole in my heart. (Sarcasm)

Ya that hole was immediately filled when she walked in. I looked across the room at Todd who was making kissy faces at me.

( ˘ ³˘)♥

(¬_¬)

ಠ‿↼

When I looked back at the door she and she was no longer their but I was not able to dwell on the thought for to long before I felt a light tap on my shoulder.

“Hey, do you mind if I site here.” I spun around so fast I think the hole class heard my neck crack. There she stood tall, blonde, boobs.

“Um…”

“Oh eh… yes, no, I mean, …. No one is sitting there so sure.” She flashed me a smile before placing her books on the desk and sitting down. I could help but notice her thighs plush out as she sat and the way her skirt went up.

“OMG” (〃∀〃)ゞ

“Hm? Did you say something?”

“What I didn….NO” She giggle before going back to the work sheet. I have to be more careful not to say things out load but Holy hell is she hot but it is so much better up close. She smells like freaking strawberry’s. 🍓

Class soon ended with me not getting any of the work I needed to done. I was walking to the door with Todd when Stacy called out for me.

“ Wait, what is your name?” Todd gave a laugh trying so hard not to be to loud.

“Uhh……………………….Dave?” She smiled as she walked past us ass practically jumping as she walked.

Once she was out of ear shot Todd bust into tears laughing. Mockingly copying me.

“Uhhhhh……………….Dave.” Smiling and continuing to laugh. “What you forget your name for a second?!”

“Shut up!” 凸( •̀_•́ )凸

The day finally ended and as we were walking out building I felt a soft tap on my shoulder. Turning around my heart almost burst from my chest. Stacy was standing their looking aT MEEEEEEE!

“Um …. So I was wondering if maybe you could help me with the calc homework?” My voice was gone and all I could do was nod and I nodded aggressively. She giggle and my face heated up I would be a tomato.

“Ok so I will see you at the library at 4?”

“Yaaaa” 🤤☺️

End chapters 1

(I hope you enjoyed)

#fanfiction #original character #fanfic #fanfics #kickass #Dave x OC #kick ass fanfiction #kickass x OC #request

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ninjago-happens-here · 3 years

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@ninjago-angst-week sorry I'm late!

Day 6: Anger

Kai hates the universe for everything. Surprisingly, his teammates don’t agree.

Or 5 times where Kai lets anger control him, and 1 time he doesn't.

Word count: 13,944

- Nya - It’s been 6 days. Kai has spent all his time at Wu’s Monastery doing nothing but training and passing out from exhaustion. The only reason why he kept going was his love of his sister- and his spite against the universe. First Spinjitsu Master, why had Lord-fucking-Germadon take his sister as a hostage? He was just a poor blacksmith, trying his best to make ends meet and to get a proper education for his bright, 14-year-old sister. But the universe has decided to throw another curveball at him by forcing him to become a ninja and complete this stupid course-

“ARGH!” Kai shouted in frustration as he was thrown off by the training course, again. “Failed,” Wu said and took a sip of his tea. Punching the obstacle course, with another shout, Kai seethed, seeing the colour red dancing all over his eyes. What did the old man know about saving people anyways? Why can’t he just fight Wu and be done with it? Graduate his class, be finally given the location to where his sister is, and end this chapter of his life- because he was all for it.

Looking for his tormentor, Kai noticed that Wu has slipped away, with all the stealth that only a ninja master has.

Taking deep breaths, Kai balled his fists even tighter, nails pressing indents into his palms. Tomorrow. There still was tomorrow. And by god was he going to pass because he won’t let his sister spend another day in captivity.

All he needed to do was complete the training course before Wu finishes his tea.

He had done it. Of course, it took a well-timed sword throw to technically pass, but he was done sitting around and waiting for some unknown force to rescue Nya. Master Wu told him to get a goodnight’s rest as they were going to leave in the morning. Yeah right. As if he wasn’t going to spend this night tossing and turning around again.

He didn’t spend the night staring into the ceiling of the monastery. Rather, he was rudely ambushed by 3 men dressed in black, who actually weren’t as much of a challenge that Kai thought they would pose. Huh, maybe the training Sensei Wu put him through was pretty useful after all.

All praises for the cryptic old man were thrown away once Wu revealed the 3 men to be his students. Seriously? Didn’t Wu just tell him to get a good night’s rest? Kai barely kept the snarl inside him when Wu did his spinjitzu thingy and he suddenly was in an entirely different get-up.

Hey! Kai thought angrily. What’s the big deal? The garment was loose-fitting and a solid shade of red, and whilst red may be Kai’s colour, the garb was still drab-looking and overall, not something Kai would have picked out for himself..

Wu then gave a quick introduction of the 3 men who attacked him, who were probably called Jey, Zain, and Coal. Hey, don’t look at him like that! It’s not like he had the time to go to school and learn Maths and the Ninjago Alphabet. Anyways, they were all, apparently Elemental Masters? Of lightning, ice and earth nonetheless. Now, Kai can understand Earth. And Kai of course can give a testament to fire. But what do lightning and ice have to do with the elements? Shouldn’t it be Air, Water, Earth, and Fire or something along those lines? What was the FSM thinking, naming these the elements of creation?

Just as Kai was about to head back into the monastery and actually catch a few Zs, Wu called to them telling them that they have to protect the 4 weapons of spinjitzu in order to beat Garmadon to them, for the Skulkin must have taken the map that Wu had hidden in the Four Weapons.

“And rescue my sister,” Kai stated, daring anyone to challenge this non-negotiable mission.

“We’re rescuing a girl? Is she hot?” The ninja in blue (seriously, why blue on a ninja? It really does not help his stealth) just straight up asked Kai if his sister was hot. Kai’s first instinct, of course, was to punch Jay hard in the teeth, followed by an elbow straight to his gut. But if he was going to be teammates with this guy, he had to control his urges and only glare at him through the convenient slit in his mask. The blue ninja chuckled nervously as Kai’s eyes bore holes into him.

“Does she like blue?”

“Back. Off.”

“When we find the weapons, we will find your sister. We rise at dawn to look for the Scythe of Quakes in the Caves of Despair,” Wu concluded the impromptu meeting at night, which diffused the tension between Kai and Jay. The fiery anger he felt pooling in the balls of his hands started to dissipate. In fact, most of his energy was gone too. Kai felt like he was sagging under the weight on his shoulders and immediately headed for his room, where he collapsed immediately upon reaching the soft, inviting mattress. It was the best sleep he had in possibly years.

Of course, Sensei Wu upheld his promise of rousing them at dawn to go collect the first Golden Weapon. What he didn’t warn the ninja beforehand was that he was going to use them to be his literal slaves, and Kai spent the morning running whilst pulling a carriage like a horse. This has to be illegal, Kai grumbled to himself. He was starting to be seriously short on breath. Luckily, his teammates seem to at least have some strength and endurance training, so whilst he was stationed at the easy middle, Cole was at the front spearheading the charge whilst still holding conversations like it was no big deal.

“So…huff, how did Sensei find you guys?” Kai panted, wanting to learn more about his teammates.

“Let’s just say if it wasn’t for Sensei Wu, we wouldn’t be seen together.“ Cole started

“I was testing my limits,” Cole gave a brief description of how when he was rock climbing, he found Sensei Wu already at the top of the mountain, drinking tea and offering him a cup.

“I was testing my inventions,” Jay also panted out, and tried to ramble about how he was testing a flying machine and crashed through a billboard (what?) before seeing Sensei Wu, was also drinking tea and offering him a cup. He couldn’t really talk too much, because at this point he was getting tired too.

“And I, was testing myself,” Zane said, whilst recalling how he was practicing to hold his breath underwater for even longer periods of time when he found Sensei Wu sitting next to him at the bottom of the pond, still somehow drinking tea before offering some to him, which immediately led Zane to choke.

“You’re right, if it wasn’t for Sensei, none of us would-” Kai said before Wu shouted at them to stop. They were here.

Immediately, everything felt more real to Kai. The drowsiness that he felt clouding his mind was cleared as pure adrenaline shot through his veins. He couldn’t fail now. Not when Nya’s life was on his hands. All he has to do was to collect 4 Ancient Weapons that have powers and he would be able to face off with Lord Garmadon. Jumping into action, he weaved through the Skulkin that were strolling and working in the area, body moving in autopilot and mind focusing on only one thing: Get the weapon.

On his way to the opening of the cave, Kai spotted Samurai reading the map to the 4 Golden Weapons on a watchtower. Kai immediately took a detour and climbed up onto the roof, where he could see Samukai reading the map.

“What’s the matter with you,” Jay whispered, hitting Kai on the head. Kai shushed him, before returning to watch Samukai laugh menacingly whilst holding the map upside down. Kai wondered how incompetent he was one week ago to have let this guy kidnap his sister. “The Golden Weapon is near,” Zane observed, before taking out a shuriken with a rope attached before looking at Cole for confirmation and then throwing it done, landing squarely in the middle of the map before pulling it back, holding the prize squarely in his hands.

There was no time to waste. Kai immediately backflipped off the building before climbing to the outcrop where 2 guards were stationed. Picking up a convenient lamp head, Kai carefully snuck by the 2 guards before ducking into the cave system. Kai began to start pushing the rock blocking the path to the weapon. But no matter how much he exerted himself, it didn’t move one inch. He felt like he was trying to make a sword again, doing everything he could but still failing. Grunting and groaning, Kai gave it his all.

Not soon enough, Kai heard the footsteps of his teammates.

“Hey, before you race off again, you gotta remember that we’re a team.” Cole’s patronizing voice made Kai stop his futile attempts at trying to push the boulder on his own. Kai looked at the 3 Ninja before sighing. “Yeah, whatever.”

The white, black and blue Ninja gathered around him and they all started to push, actually managing to shift the rock. Giving the rock his all, Kai did enough on his part to be suddenly be blasted by a golden light, shining from the cavern behind the rock. As his eyes got used to the sudden brightness, Kai spotted the Golden Scythe, sitting on top of a weird creature’s head.

“Woah, that is SO COOL!” Jay exclaimed, and his voice reverberated throughout the entire cave. Kai cringed from his volume. Here’s to hoping that the entire skeleton army outside won’t discover them. Cole shushed Jay again, before pulling out the Golden Scythe and jumping back down onto the cave floor. Wrapping it in a sheet of canvas, Cole once again reminded Jay to not be so loud.

“Oh, don’t be paranoid!” Jay brushed off the sentiment. Kai couldn’t believe that this guy was his teammate. “We’re totally on the other side of the caves!”

“Zip it, okay?” Cole admonished the blue Ninja whilst handing the wrapped Scythe of Quakes to Kai. It’s okay with him. As long as he can make sure that this weapon is safe which in turn ensures that Nya is safe, he’s alright with taking the Scythe. “Now that we’ve got the Scythe, let’s sneak out whilst the boneheads are still busy.”

“Alright team, everyone sticks together. Way out is right around the corn-“ Cole suddenly came face to face with Samukai. All Kai could think at that moment was Fuck the blue guy. Because seriously. Now he was going to have to fight these guys. And alright, honestly- Kai was more than happy to throw hands with the skeletons that captured his sister. In fact, he’s been waiting all week to do so. But come on, this guy was supposed to be a ninja? Pulling out his sword, Kai stayed in the middle of his teammates for a bit as they tried their hardest to protect the Scythe, but quickly they were drawn by enemies elsewhere and the red ninja was left in a precarious situation.

“Kai! Throw it here!” Thank god for Zane. Honestly, he took back what he said about how this guy takes things a bit too seriously, now that he was in the heat of battle and could feel every beat of his heart. Kai heaved the heavy weapon to Zane. Immediately, the heat was taken off him and Zane had to pass the Scythe to Cole as he was dog-piled by 3 Skulkin in seconds. Cole made it past a long line of skeletons before catching the Golden Weapon, but Kai could see 5 to 6. no, 9, 10- argh, who cares! Either way, there were too many enemies.

“Let me handle it!” Jay shouted, taking out a couple of enemies quickly, before exclaiming, “Hey! Guys!”

“It’s just like the training course! Over the planks, dodge the swords- here comes the dummy!”

Kai heard multiple enemies being defeated before a bright blue light shined through the caverns as this guy did spinjitzu. What. The. Heck. Kai’s level of respect for him instantly rose.

“Jay! What’s the key?” Kai waved at his teammate desperately. He had to do spinjitzu too- if he ever was going to see Nya again.

“Hehe, I’m just going through the motions! This is what Sensei must have meant when he said we already know it!” Jay laughed from inside his tornado as Kai watch him take down 4 enemies in one second. Kai contemplated this for a moment, before relying on his muscle memory to dodge a couple of Skulkin.

“Over the planks, dodge the swords- here comes the dummy!” Spinning in a beautiful vortex of red, orange, and yellow, Kai saw the world around him slow down as he moved with enhanced power and agility, taking down enemies with incredible ease.

“RETREAT!” Samurai shouted, and Kai could hear the screams of the skeleton army mixing with the beautiful chime of his team’s spinjitzu. Slowing down, Kai stopped his spinjitzu and surprisingly, didn’t feel dizzy. Man, this spinjitzu thing is really cool.

“Hah! Guess they didn’t want a second serving of these babies,” Cole flexed his biceps as Kai and Jay both shook their heads in dismay. “Good thing they didn’t check out the merchandise on the back!”

From the corner of his eye, Kai watched as Cole turned around to emphasise his point. Alright, 2 can play at the end game. Raising the Golden Weapon of Spinjitsu, Kai cheered and high fives Jay. That dude has many faults, but he would be able to have Kai’s back in a moment of need, and Kai vows to watch his back too.

“Uh… guys?” Cole stammered. Kai and Jay rolled their eyes. What was Cole trying to get at now?

“Didn’t Sensei say there was a guardian protecting the weapons?” Zane recalled. Kai tilted his head to the side, before turning to his right AND WHAT IN THE WORLD IS THAT.

“Is that- a..a, that’s- not what I think it is, isit?” Cole blubbered, his voice an octave higher.

“Y-you mean a dragon?” Jay stammered.

“Uh, that sure looks like a dragon!” Kai panicked, his voice on the edge of a scream.

“I sense that we won’t be able to spin our way out of this one,” Zane stated with the calmest out of any of them.

Out of the blue, the dragon breathed out a breath of earth, and Kai was suddenly flung to the side. Screams filled the cavern as his teammates landed from their dodge. getting up on his feet, Kai immediately started to run towards the exit, clutching the Golden Weapon tightly. Unfortunately, they were cornered, and Kai did the only thing he thought he could.

Removing the canvas, Kai moved to use the weapon but was stopped by Jay, stating something about how Sensei told them not to.

“Well you better keep your mouth shut,” Kai growled as he ran towards the otherworldly creature. Nothing was going to stand in his way from reaching his sister. Cole shouted something at him, but he raised the weapon high above his head and brought it down to the earth in front of the dragon, causing a split in the ground like a fault line and the cave started to shake. The dragon was temporarily rendered stunned as a large piece of rock fell on his head. It reacted too late, for Kai and his team were getting out of here.

“We gotta escape!” Kai said frantically. Looking up, he and his team saw the caverns opening up to the skies. “We’ll use spinjitzu!” Cole proclaimed, and Kai spun into his tornado, finding that the boost in speed and strength was exactly what he needed to make through the opening in the ceiling of the cave.

Landing on the ground in front of his sensei (on both feet, take that Zane and Jay!) Kai immediately devolved into cheering and celebrating with his teammates, because who wouldn’t after such an adrenaline high? They were 1 weapon closer to finding Nya, and Kai had learned the amazing art of Spinjitsu, and he had just escaped from a dragon.

“ENOUGH!” Sensei Wu shouted. Kai immediately felt his mood sinking. “I told you not to use the scythe!!” Of course, Jay, then Cole, immediately threw Kai under the bus.

“Using it was my only option!” Kai said, starting to get frustrated with his teacher and teammates. Couldn’t they see it that was a matter of life or death? He just saved all of their sorry asses!

“And what makes you think that you’re more important than your team? Huh? Huh!?” Wu got closer to Kai’s face, and he was not happy. Not happy with this at all.

“They took my sister, remember?” Kai stated angrily. Who did the old man think he was? Nya was everything to him, and losing her- Kai did not want to think about losing her.

“There are still 3 weapons left. Maybe next time, you can do it right,” Wu admonished him, and Kai could only watch as his teammates follow in their master’s footsteps. Whatever. It’s not like he needed a team. Hoisting the scythe onto his shoulders, Kai swore that nothing, not even the First Spinjitsu himself, would stop him from saving Nya.

Over the course of the next few days, Kai learned of a technique called the ‘Tornado of Creation’ as they journeyed all over north Ninjago and found 2 of the remaining 3 weapons. Just before they headed to the Fire Temple, Wu made them all rest, for some reason he was unwiring to share. Kai privately thought that it was for them to recuperate their energy because his sister was going to be the one they rescue next, and once he got his hands on the Sword of Fire, nothing would be able to stand in his way, his team included. If he was being honest with himself, Kai was grateful that they had time to celebrate his past achievements. They had been through so much climbing, exploring, and journeying these fast few days and they have beaten Garmadon’s Army too many times to not do something about it. His mood was so great that he even invited Sensei Wu to dance with them as Cole played the bongo drums that they had stolen from the skeleton army at one point.

Kai didn’t know when he fell asleep, but what he did know was that he was roused awake by a voice whispering his name. At first, he was groggy with exhaustion, but the second time Nya called out to him, Kai was wide awake. Looking at the source of the sound, Kai saw his sister standing directly at the edge of his camp. Immediately, Kai felt a great wave of relief wash over him. His sister looked, at least in the dark, fine and free from any visible injuries. He was just about to get up and reunite with his sister when she suddenly stated that she had to go, and started to run away from him.

Kai immediately shot to his feet, alarmed. There was definitely something wrong. He followed her as best as he could through the dense forest, calling out to her, but not receiving a reply. He was led to a temple sitting right next to a volcano. Ghostly whispers of his name reached him as he saw his sister’s vague figure entering the temple.

“Nya?” In a heartbeat, he arrived at the front of the temple. Fully pushing open the doors, Kai was blown away by the cavern and the inviting, welcoming warmth of the lava that slowly cranked up the further he went. In fact, it was slowly stifling, and Kai wanted to grab Nya and get out as fast as he could. Looking all over the place for her, Kai saw the image of his sister appear right in front of the Sword of Fire.

“Nya!” Kai said with a smile, running towards the platform. He was praising FSM for this miracle when suddenly, he skidded to a halt as Nya transformed into a large shadow that laughed menacingly. It was Garmadon. And he- was dangling Nya, wrapped in iron chains, on top of a pool of lava.

“KAI!!” Nya shouted desperately. The red ninja called back to his sister, as Garmadon taunted him, stating that only by removing the sword, could he save his sister. And as much as Kai hated the fact- Garmadon was right. There was nothing he could do but take the sword and save his sister. Nya begged Kai not to listen, but the chain had suddenly lowered her even more, and the screams of his baby sister were too much for Kai to bear. Taking a deep breath, Kai did a series of acrobatics pulling out the Sword of Fire and doing spinjitzu on the walls in order to get to Nya, and then to get her to safety on the other side. Landing o the warm rock, Kai pulled his sister up and told her to stay close.

Then Garmadon appeared directly in front of him, and Kai changed his mind. Not long after, he was getting beat up by a shadow- a shadow of all things! Then, Garmadon played extremely dirty and duplicated himself, and in no time at all, Kai lost the sword and Garmadon picked it up. Tired, out of breath, and running on a combined 18 hours of sleep this past week and a half, Kai collapsed and couldn’t move any further.

Just in time, Sensei Wu arrived and started to use his shadow to properly fight Garmadon. As Kai could only sit and watch, he saw Sensei Wu’s incredible usage of shadows, and his respect for him rose even more. But soon, the feeling of calmness turned into panic as he remembered his 3 teammates who were probably out like a light.

Nya gave Kai a hand to stand up, and they both moved to be closer to Wu. Soon, they were assaulted by Garmadon showing them that the Skulkin has taken Kai’s brothers and 3 of the 4 Golden Weapons.

“My brother must not unite the 4 weapons. We must keep them apart!” Sensei Wu commanded, to which Garmadon responded by rousing the dragon guardian. With a swipe of its flaming hot tail, the Fire Dragon blocked the entrance of the Fire Temple. There was no way out.

“He’s taken away all our options!” Kai said, starting to panic even more as the Fire Dragon breathed on them.

“All but one.” And soon, Kai lost his Sensei to the Underworld. Feeling terribly guilty for not being a better student and teammate, Kai collapsed on his knees. However, he was soon confronted with greater, immediate danger.

Luckily, he seemed to be able to talk down the dragon that was guarding the sword. They reached an understanding that they were trying to protect the weapons from Garmadon, and just in time too. He heard his teammates outside the temple and Flare did too, opening the temple dramatically. Too soon, he had to split from Nya again. But he would return in no time at all, with all members on his team.

Through a great load of traveling by dragon, managing to use the Tornado of Creation, and watching Samurai get vaporised whilst Garmadon passed into a portal to another realm, they eventually returned to Ignacia, and Kai could finally feel safe again. Of course, he immediately slept for 3 days straight after making sure that Nya was doing alright and that she could take care of herself for the next few days.

This was not the first time he was fuelled by only his fire, and unfortunately for his body- it would not be the last.

- Lloyd - The next time that Kai could say with 100% certainty that he hated the universe was when Garmadon decided that it was a good idea to turn them into all children. They then had to be saved by Lloyd, his baby brother, but in return- he had grown. Too fast. Way too fast.

And Kai had to look at his failure, his inability to protect Lloyd because it falls on his shoulder to at least stay beside the green bean whilst he deals with the fact that he was older now. And whatever fallout was happening with his body. Because whilst Lloyd can try to insist that he’s fine for the 100th time, Kai is not letting him get out of bed whilst he has a 40 degree fever.

So whilst Kai stews angrily at the edge of Lloyd’s bed, he reflects on all the things he’s going to punch the First Spinjitsu Master for. Honestly, he did not know where the thought came from, but today was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Kai will be honest- he hadn’t always been this friendly with Lloyd. In fact, if he saw someone else doing what he did to the kid when they first met, he would sock them in the eye, no questions asked. (In fact, he wanted to do that to himself now.) But then he got close to the brat. He saw himself in the kid, just- lost without an anchor as Kai had in Nya. And the ‘demon spawn’ became ‘kid’, and ‘kid’ became Kai’s baby brother. Kai’s baby brother who he lost at the arcade just because he was too focused on his ego, going after the damned Samurai who turned out to be his baby sister. Seems like Kai can’t do much protecting at all.

After Kai had rescued Lloyd from the volcano (Fuck you Pythor), it was revealed that Lloyd was the Green Ninja, and would, in turn, have to fight Garmadon And whilst at first Kai felt elated that the search for the Green Ninja was long over, he then felt horrible to see Garmadon and Lloyd falling out as both knew that they had to fight each other. Kai could see Lloyd’s lip tremble as his father released the hug, and almost start to cry when Garmadon disappeared after having saved the Ninja and the fang blades.

He knew that Lloyd had it especially hard, seeking his father’s approval and attention, yet not getting it as Garmadon tried his hardest to delay the oncoming final battle, but furthered it instead. He saw Lloyd look incredibly small in their tiny apartment, and wished that he had just earned more money, or that he had somehow managed to defeat the Great devourer instead of Garmadon.

Yet all he could do was comfort Lloyd when he opens up about Darkley’s (boy, wasn’t that’s something they’d have to unpack in the future) before they returned to the accursed school, or treat Lloyd’s sore muscles before the kid has to inevitably wake up at 5 AM tomorrow to do an insane amount of training.

He hates how all the pressure in the world is hoisted by the shoulders of his baby brother, and he would do anything, anything to give Lloyd a good childhood.

Now, he can’t even do that. Unless the element of time exists, all he could do was count the numbers of a good childhood Lloyd had on one hand. And goddamnit. All Kai really wanted to do was to give Lloyd the childhood didn’t have, not the incomplete one he had given Nya that ended with a kidnapping. Was that too much to ask for?

A drop of a hot tear escaped Kai’s eyes and rolled down his cheek. Quickly snapping his head towards Lloyd, he saw that he’s fallen asleep. Okay, thank FSM for that. Kai did not want Lloyd to see his big brother cry. Now, Kai didn’t want to be a bad brother. But he wasn’t Lloyd’s only family left. He’ll just ask Zane to watch over him as he runs the training course at Dareth’s dojo.

Or maybe not, Kai thought as he sat on the roof, hidden by water tanks and billboards as he had a meltdown. He didn’t even know why he was crying! All he knows is that suddenly, he can’t stop the water flowing from his eyes, even as his own body heat evaporates them as soon as they are shed. His head was still stuffy even though the night air breezed past him. All he wanted to do was to shout, screen- anything to release the tension he’s been building up in his body. Now that he’s reached his breaking point, he was ready to release like a coiled spring.

But he couldn’t. They were living in the midst of Ninjago city, not on the Destiny’s Bounty. And they would get kicked out of their cramped apartment if Kai just shouted at the night skies. So Kai hissed, growled, and wrapped his hands around himself, and squeezed as much as he could. He wanted to fight anybody, be it serpentine, skulkin, Garmadon, or even the First Spinjitsu Master himself.

The air around him got even more suffocating as his fist couldn’t find anything to connect to.

And suddenly, the roof hatch opened suddenly, scaring the living hell out of Kai Smith. Jumping into action and getting into a ready stance, Kai immediately felt the tension dissipate as it revealed that it was just Cole.

“Wow Kai, you must be really wounded up to be spooked like that,” Cole commented whilst giving Kai a smirk. Kai glared back at his team leader before futilely trying to wipe his face clean. Ah well. He tried. Cole snorted. “I always knew that you were a big softy.”

“Got any reason why you came up here?” Kai grunted. His ego had taken enough bruising these past few weeks.

“Of course buddy. I needed to spar with someone at full strength, and since Zane is looking after Lloyd and Jay won’t be able to effectively take my hits, I had to find you.”

“Psh, whatever. You’re in luck that I need to let off some heat too,” Kai shrugged off.

“Cool. Race you to Dareth’s Dojo?” “You’re on.”

In a few minutes, Kai would come to regret his decision. Hey, it wasn’t his idea to race with the idiot who got himself dehydrated via crying. Still, falling in only just a step behind Cole (It’s been 80 years, Coke joked), he grabbed the energy drink Cole held out to him and take an unprofessionally huge gulp. Man, was he going to feel that later. Still, a promise was a promise, even if it was a verbal agreement. He watched Cole do his warm-up stretches before settling into his own normal routine.

Too soon, they rolled out the sparring mats, and Kai had a fleeting feeling of vertigo. Why had he agreed to this again? Oh yeah. Lloyd’s life is shit, and I can’t do anything. Balling his fists tightly, he started to bounce from on the balls of his feet.

Too soon, he ended up on the mat. And then again. And again. When he was defeated for the 4th time, Cole called for a break and sat down next to Kai, who was lying on the mat and just staring straight into the sky.

“Why did destiny make him grow up so fast?” Kai’s voice was trembling too hard for even Cole’s liking. “It’s not your fault-“

“IT IS MY FAULT! My fault, that I couldn’t protect him! Not from the serpentine, not from Garmadon, not from destiny!What’s my worth as a protector if I can’t even defend the one destiny said I must?!” Kai wailed out, enraged with everything. After his anger outburst, Kai breathed out deeply as his whole body sagged, the tension broken. They sat in silence as Kai contemplated what he was going to do next.

“You know Kai? Maybe you should talk with the Green Bean about this. But just so you know, no one is blaming you for what Garmadon had to do, and in turn what Lloyd had to do in order to save all of us,” Cole responded and stood up. “Thank you anyways for agreeing to spar with me.”

He offered a hand, to which Kai grabbed and was pulled upright.

“You go ahead. I’ll go wipe down the mats here,” Cole stated. It was a regular schedule that they had made up in order to reduce the amount of traffic using their tiny bathroom, and Kai gratefully accepted the chance to go first. If he was going to talk to Lloyd, he had to at least get his spikes up to regular Kai standard.

After doing the bare minimum amount of cool-down stretches, Kai took a swig of the energy drink as he jogged back home. After showering and gelling up his hair, Kai was ready to sit down with Lloyd and just- talk. He finished his bottle and prepared some sandwiches as the sun rose on Ninjago City, showering the apartment in fragmented light.

Just on time, Lloyd returned from his morning run, this time accompanied by Zane. Kai patiently waited for him to be done with his shower before Lloyd sat down right beside him and took out a peanut butter and jam sandwich from the small pile on the plate. Zane gave Kai an acknowledging nod as he went to grab his work bag before going back out the door.

“Hey, bud. How’re you doing?” Kai started tentatively. Lloyd, having just taken a huge bite of the pb&j, looked mildly alarmed at the confrontation, but still answered after finishing the bite.

“…honestly Kai? My bones don’t feel on fire anymore and Zane has said that my fever had gone down through the night. Still, I don’t regret what I had done,” Lloyd responded earnestly before taking another bite of the bread. If Kai didn’tknow better he would have thought that the kid had faced starvation before, because he was still eating as if the food could be taken away at any moment. Keyword: thought.

Kai really wanted to continue the talk after Lloyd had his fill, but knew that Lloyd’s busy schedule didn’t allow for such talks. So, he pushed down all the instincts that screamed that he was a bad brother and gritted his teeth.

“I know that that wasn’t your choice-“

“It was my choice!” Lloyd cut in even though he was still chewing. Gulping down another mouthful of food, Lloyd continued. “… because if I couldn’t even consider that my choice, how much of my life can I say that belongs to me?”

Kai was stunned into silence. In his mind, he didn’t think that Lloyd had thought of throwing the tea like that. He wondered how much Lloyd had been holding in inside of him, how much he had to endure being told by people that he hadn’t had a choice. Thinking back to the time where he couldn’t save Nya without listening to others on what he had to do, Kai felt even worse. Cole was right- he wasn’t at fault for this specific action that Lloyd did, but he was at fault for not being understanding enough, or even approachable enough.

Taking advantage of Kai’s speechlessness, Lloyd finished up his sandwich before reaching into the pile and taking out another, this time picking out a Nutella and cheese combination.

“It’s not just that. Now, I can finally go on missions with you guys. Now, you guys don’t have to hold back on me, and I can train for longer amounts of time. The Final Battle will be on us whether we’re ready or not, and I too would feel much safer if I am prepared to… to face my father,” Lloyd said before continuing to stuff his face with breakfast.

Kai’s brain began to work again, and he formulated a good enough response. “…Alright buddy, but just so you know, you’re still not going on missions with us.” Lloyd’s face immediately formed a pout and Kai grinned, rubbing his blonde hair. “Also, since when did you start speaking like that? ‘The Final Battle will be on us whether we’re ready or not.' Wow, such language. Much eloquence.”

“That’s because you guys gave me 2 hours to spend studying Uncle Wu’s books every day,” Lloyd huffed in annoyance, having finished another mouthful of bread. “But seriously Kai, please don’t be angry for me. It really isn’t your fault.”

Kai mused over those words as he watched Jay trained Lloyd with his acrobatic abilities. Of course, the kid was still getting used to his taller and larger limbs, but Kai could see him improve at an incredibly fast rate. Lloyd was right, in a sense. He didn’t really have the legal right to worry over Lloyd’s physical and mental wellness, but still- he was Kai. Master of Fire, protector of the Green Ninja, and he should be allowed to feel the fuel of his anger at any time he so pleases. If it happens to be an injustice to his trainee and well- who can blame him?

He accidentally fell asleep during Lloyd and Jay’s training, having to catch up to last night’s lost sleep, and boy was that a bad idea. He forgot one of the most important rules within the Ninja’s family: Do not fall asleep when with Lloyd and Jay, because those two can pull some terrible pranks.

Kai didn’t notice anything wrong until he passed Dareth’s trophies and saw that his beautiful hair was not spiked. Kai swore that when he sees those two again, he would chase after them until they begged for mercy because Kai cannot be seen in public with hair like this! Feeling his eye twitch, Kai wondered if Lloyd was going to be the cause of him popping a blood vessel.

Years later, Kai would realise that indeed, Lloyd would give him his first grey hair at 19. That damned brat.

- Zane - When Zane… left the team, all Kai could feel was a sense of numbness. He floated through a fuzzy reality as nothing seemed real to him anymore. His family was in shambles, broken pieces that were scattered without their missing piece completing them. The fact that Zane was gone didn’t really register to him until they had asked Lloyd to do a speech honouring the titanium ninja. Lloyd, face as pale as the gi Zane used to wear, couldn’t say any words, so he volunteered to step up for his brother. Lloyd looked at him with thanks, before disappearing off to whatever world he was in just moments before. Kai joined him, staring aimlessly at their ceiling, before having to get up and pen down words that he was going to say, to honour Zane.

He realised that he couldn’t, really couldn’t. The words just wouldn’t come out of his ink pen, even though he was pretty much literate now. He could only manage to jot down a few words that summarised what Zane was to him. A brother. A teammate. A fellow Ninja. Built to protect those who cannot protect themselves. But words can't do Zane justice. How could he capture Zane's cool-like grace, his calm calculation when it matters most? Zane's amazing cooking, his incredible kindness, and all-around sweet nature? How could he describe his first time meeting him, first time working with him, when he discovered his true potential and saved all of their sorry asses? How could he do all that?

Hot, angry tears dribbled down from Kai’s eyes as he hunched over their kitchen table. No, this wasn’t going to do. Kai decides that he'll just have to wing it.

As soon as he had finished his speech and paid proper respect to Zane, Kai left his family and just wandered around aimlessly, going from bar to bar to drink and inevitably get into fights.

Having been thrown out of almost all bars in Ninjago city for ‘disrupting common services’, whatever that was supposed to mean, Kai soon found himself standing in front of Yang’s Tavern. From what he heard, this place was run by quite a few Serpentine and they had a ‘Slither Pit’. Whatever that meant. What Kai needed to do was to feel his fist connect to something flesh-like, and he will be okay.

Months passed, as Kai found himself falling deeper and deeper into Ninjago’s criminal organisations. Under the name ‘The Red Shogun’, he would remain the undefeated champion, all whilst working for different kinds of bosses as ‘security’. Kai knew that he shouldn’t be doing this, that he shouldn’t be helping criminals get away with their criminal activity, shouldn’t have let human merchandise go under his nose. But he couldn’t bring himself to care. Nothing really mattered after Zane’s death. Nothing had mattered at all. Kai was stuck down in the pits of hell, drinking himself to half-death before the barkeep regulated his intake just so that he could bring in the cash that Kai made through betting, before receiving poor attempts to reach out by Lloyd.

Somehow, the kid had gotten the number of his burner phone. He even sent mail to the bar, to which Kai and his bar buddies had laughed at. Kai didn’t feel too bad for ignoring the kid. Zane’s death was partially his fault anyways. (Nromal Kai would have been horrified to hear him think this.) Kai was angry. Angry that Lloyd didn’t try hard enough. Didn’t try hard enough to defeat the Overlord, when he had a clear shot. Angry that Lloyd had apparently failed to defeat the Overlord 100%. Angry that he had been captured whilst literally wielding the power of God, only for the Overlord to use its incredible power to construct a new body. Angry that Lloyd didn’t try hard enough to keep the team together, to reach out to him, or even to speak at Zane’s funeral.

But above all, Kai was angry at himself. Angry that he had made fun of Zane for his passions and clothes. Angry that he did not try hard enough to train Lloyd, and ultimately failed to be with him in the ‘Final’ battle. Angry that he couldn’t have done his job as a ninja properly, getting captured and tied to a rocket ship which only made them have to try rescuing him instead of stopping Project Arcturus. Angry that he couldn’t do anything when Zane took on the Overlord by himself again.

And Kai was angry at Ninjago. At the world. At the universe. At the First Spinjitsu Master, who had no right to decide that his family had to face the world like that. Angry, and wondering why he was being put through this kind of torture: not being able to live, and yet not willing to die. Kai was a man of action and he had to stay in motion- so his knuckles split. So he goes ‘home’, to the hotel room in Yang’s Tavern, covered in bruises and sometimes even blood- just not his. So he has to take part in crimes, never rising above the level of a security guard, all whilst feeling terrible. He did not know how to get out of this state and feared that if he did, he would collapse into a lump of uselessness.

He fought all day and night, and in the moments where he wasn’t fighting, he was drinking. His sleeping schedule has shifted to between 6 AM and 2 PM. All whilst he kept grieving over a death that was not deserved.

After a year, Lloyd somehow inexplicably showed up on his doorstep, telling Kai to not drink too much ‘juice’ (he rolled his eyes at that and smiled fondly at Lloyd’s innocence) and asked him to show up at Chen’s noodle house where he was holding a meeting with his other teammates.

Unexpectedly, this led to a discovery that instantly brightened Kai’s mood before dampening it slightly. Zane was alive! But they had to fight through… an elemental tournament to get him? At this point in time, Kai was alright with doing anything, anything to get Zane back.

Just 2 weeks later, Kai would hesitantly retract his statement. Sure, they had gotten Zane back, but in exchange, Lloyd had to lose Garmadon to the Cursed Realm. Kai wonders if they’ll ever be able to make it through a fight with everyone intact, but today wasn’t about him. He felt a familiar spark of rage burning brightly through his chest as he watched Lloyd trying and failing to smile. From the corner of his eye, he saw Zane approaching him.

“Kai, can we talk for a moment?” Oh, dear. What is this about now? Was it about how Kai had almost killed their baby brother over a stupid staff? Or the fact that Kai had very stupidly fallen for the Criminal Mastermind’s daughter? Did Zane find out about his criminal activity?

Well, it wasn’t everything that Kai had thought would happen, although the topic had come stupidly close to the last point. Zane confronted him, making him open up about his ‘feelings’ or whatever, before telling Kai that the alcohol content in his body was too high and that his livers were on the edge of failing. Well. Good to know that Zane is still regular old Zane who’d scan you without permission.

“Kai, all I’m saying is that you are free to tell me anything. To just let it all out -“

“I can’t let it all out!” Kai shouted in annoyance. What did Zane know about grieving- Oh wait. Doctor Julien. Well, what did Zane know about Kai’s specific method of dealing with his issues? He was fine.

“Why not, Kai?” Zane asked with a bittersweet smile. Kai looked around, desperately searching for an answer that he doesn’t have.

“Well- I can’t tell you that! Just know that it’s okay for me to feel angry!” Kai stated very, very eloquently. Zane just gave him a look that said ‘bullshit’. “It’s also okay for you to be sad, and to cry.”

“You’re-you’re wrong!”

“And you’re a hypocrite, Kai. You can’t make Lloyd do the right choices if you aren’t gonna do them yourself.”

“Well- Lloyd’s just a child! A teenager at best, really. Me? I’m a fully legal adult! I can make my own decisions!” Kai seethed. Zane looked sad for a moment, before straightening up and doubling down.

“Whilst according to Mill’s Harm Principle, you’re free to do anything that could harm yourself without damaging others, might I remind you that you’re still a role model for Lloyd, Nya, and even Jay? Please, Kai. If you can’t do it for yourself, at least do it for them.” Zane pleaded. And damn it. Whilst Kai wouldn’t lift a finger to save himself, just the thought of Lloyd doing what he’s done sent a shiver down his spine. Zane was right, as always. He had to be the big brother, and being the older brother means that he has to display healthy habits more. FSM knows that Lloyd would need it. So he sucked up his pride, arrogance, and ego, then threw it all away, metaphorically off the Bounty

He knew that they would always come creeping back to him later, but for now, Lloyd needed a functional older brother, and Kai was going to be exactly what he needs.

“Thank you, Zane,” Kai stated. Grinning, Zane waved Kai on to go save Lloyd, who now looked like he was drowning from some invisible force.

“Lloyd? Lloyd buddy, you there?”

- Cole - Of course, Kai couldn’t stop his blood pressure from reaching a boiling point. How could he? This month had been the worst month for his health since- well, since forever! Who would’ve thought that Wu’s dead first student would escape the Cursed Realm just to possess Lloyd in order to exact an act of stupid, grand revenge because he didn’t get the title of the Green Ninja?

Kai had to fight his baby brother, lose the staff of the First Spinjitsu Master, fail to defeat ghosts, bargain with a stupidcrook for some weapons that were actually effective to ghosts all whilst looking for the scroll of Airjitzu, who guess what? Turns out Ronin had it all along. And he had just handed it to Morro, which caused all of them to go to this cursedtemple, which was designed to be a terribly haunted house, because it just amplified Kai’s fear of water a 100 times more, and all that culminated in a stupid idea where they tied themselves together to not lose track of the other, which caused Cole to lose valuable time when the scroll of Airjitzu was dropped right as they were at the door to the temple.

Spinning around to check on his teammates, he saw a pale green sheen. Just as he was about to raise his weapon, he heard Cole’s voice calling out to them that they had the scroll. And oh. Oh no. No, Kai couldn’t deal with this anymore. He watched Cole realise with horror that now, he was technically dead, and wail.

Kai’s blood vessels were very, very close to popping. Being an alcoholic had not helped with his anger issues, and having faced too many setbacks, all whilst not having any powers or any victories, Kai was prepared to curse the entire 16 realms.

As Nya parked the bounty right next to the floating temple of Airjitzu, Kai could see her face widen in shock and horror at Cole. Fists clenched the tightest they had been in a while (and that was saying something, given that he had failed to protect Lloyd again) Kai could only take over the lead as he herded his teammates onboard the ship.

Cole’s a ghost now. So what? He can deal with that later. For now, they had to beat Morro to the Cloud Kingdom and the Realm crystal if he was going to have any chance of having Lloyd back.

Well, that was a lie, Kai thought to himself after the heat of the moment. Their ship was now charted towards the Wailing Alps, trying to make it as the Blind Man’s Eye passed over the top so that they may use Airjitzu to get the Sword of Sanctuary. And that meant they had time. Whilst Zane and Jay were working on some mechs to help them traverse the mountains, Nya was training with Sensei Wu to unlock her true potential faster, and Misako was packing them supplies. That meant that Kai and Cole were left in the bow of the ship. The air just felt denser than usual, even though by all logic, it should have been lighter due to their high altitude.

Kai watched Cole trying to tap a button on the control board, but couldn’t manage to get his hands to temporarily appear solid. He saw the frustration on Cole’s face grow as he gave up and slammed his hand on the board, accidentally touching on several buttons. Immediately the ship started to list onto the left side. So bracing himself Kai rushed to the position and immediately undid the damage Cole had done.

Cole then let out a scream of frustration. “All I wanted to do was to view the stupid GPS! Why. Can’t. I. Do. Anything. Right?” Cole angrily shouted, punctuating each word with a kick aimed towards the control panel, but never managing to connect. He immediately sunk onto the floor and held his face in his hands.

Kai sucked in air through his teeth. He wasn’t everyone’s go-to when comforting them from anger, but it seems that he had to step up this time.

“Hey, Cole?” Kai started gently. “Yeah?” Came a muffled response.

“I know that I’m not the best person to do this, but I just want you to know that I hate the universe as much as you do, and it’s alright if you wanna just shout and spar with me-“

“Hah! As if I can do anything good with this. Stupid. Body!” Cole replied, voice tense with frustration. Kai frowned.

“I’m serious Cole. And you will get better at using this body. Remember how Morro’s ghost friends had beaten us? Imagine them, not realising that we actually have a pretty powerful member right in their midst. Think of the recon missions you can do as a ghost! Imagine how satisfying it would be to just punch Morro in the nose without feeling bad for hurting Lloyd!” Kai picked a direction and resigned himself to it, smile getting more manic as he realised that hey! Cole’s new body is actually kinda cool. Cole snorted.

“Imagine all the pranks I’ll be able to pull on Jay. And imagine me possessing Mr. Cuddlywump-“ Both of them dissolved into laughter after this thought, each imagining Jay’s terrified expression as Cole’s voice comes out of the teddy bear that he thinks nobody knows he hugs every night.

“Hey- you know that being a ghost would be incredible for your stealth right?” Kai ribbed Cole gently, finding delight that it actually connected. Cole scoffed. “Oh, don’t remind me Mr-I-blew-up-2-trucks-filled-with-jet-fuel-and-thought-that-I-wouldn’t-be-noticed.”

“Hey! It was just one time.” Kai defended himself. “Seriously though, imagine all the cool shit you can do now.”

“Too bad that I won’t be able to eat anymore,” Cole said mournfully. Kai raised his eyebrow. “Nah, this just means that you can eat as much as you want and wouldn’t be scolded by Sensei Wu. Also, don’t we have Hungry Ghost Month right before Day of the Departed?”

“Holy shit, Kai. You’re right! You know, maybe being a ghost isn’t so bad after all,” Cole said with a hearty grin. With a grin of his own, Kai thought to himself that really, being a ghost is no big deal. We have a nindroid as a brother after all! Besides, at least Cole is still with us in, heh, spirit.

Too late did Kai consider the cons of being a ghost. As Cole watched helplessly from the banks of the river that Lloyd was drowning in, Kai had to bite his own tongue to stop himself from screaming as he plunged into the water to save Lloyd from drowning. Too late, after the defeat of the Preeminent, did he see Lloyd flinching from Cole’s touch, which led to a very heartbroken Cole and an extremely apologetic Lloyd. He saw Lloyd trying his best to just endure and adapt to the change, and his heart was filled with anger again.

It wasn’t as bad as his breaking point at Yang’s temple, but he now has a grudge against Morro that runs through the core of his being, like how ‘Nya is my Sister’ and ‘Lloyd is my baby brother’ are the code of his being. Still, victory tasted bittersweet as he gets to finally pat the golden head of hair his brother has.

Kai would be okay to go through anything, as long as he had his family with him.

- - Jay - Family. That’s what Kai’s life has circled back into, hasn’t it? He had fought skeleton armies for his sisters, fought snakes with his brothers, trained the youngest to fight the literal embodiment of evil, went through an entire tournament for one of his brothers, fought with Wu’s student to save Lloyd, and now destiny decides for him to face another whiplash.

His parents. His good-for-nothing parents. They had left Kai when he was 6 and Nya when she was just 3. It had been absolute hell, making sure that they had enough to eat, enough to drink, and enough to wear during the winter. Kai had to start working at the blacksmith shop when he was just 8, trying to find some independence from the goodwill of his neighbours. And whilst he was working odd jobs, being a stable boy, an errand boy, doing some house chores for the minimum wage- he also had to make sure that his baby sister could attend school properly.

He had properly started to work at the forge when he was 12, having sold most of his father’s previous work. Soon, he found ease in making spear tips, armour, and samurai-style helmets. He had been working on doing a good sword when his sister was kidnapped, and his entire life changed as he tried his hardest to bring her back. Since then, he hadn’t gone back to his old home in Ignacia.

But he couldn’t ignore it anymore.

Looking at the smithing symbol on the inside of the Vermillion Warrior’s helmet, Kai had to take a quick journey back to his old home, back into his past. Picking up a decade-old helmet, Kai’s worst fears were confirmed.

“I knew it,” Kai said humourlessly as the puzzle pieces began to construct a monstrosity that he never wanted to know. In a fit of anger, he punched his father’s symbol, to which a secret hatch just suddenly opened. Curious, Kai took a look at the basement of the shop, only to see a double-edged blade as well as some old armour. What was he making? Kai wondered, before shaking his head. It doesn’t matter now.

With single-minded determination, Kai took the blade, old, and a new helmet, then immediately headed to someone who he knows would understand.

10 minutes later, Kai was sitting at a booth in Chen’s Noodle House, venting out all his frustrations to Skylor, who, bless her, had offered him free noodles as he spilled out his feelings. Of course, Kai didn’t feel much better after doing so, but at least he felt like he wasn’t suffocating anymore. Just as Kai was summarising his rant, incomes Nya, proclaiming something about how Skylor was the mysterious and new Samurai X. Kai’s stomach suddenly started to churn and he gulped. He had to break the news that their parents were still alive to Nya. And whilst that was mean, what Kai learned throughout his years as being a Ninja that being honest with your teammates was the difference between life and death. Funny, he remembered a weird dream that was focused on this exact point. But Kai didn’t have time to reminisce now. All he could do was think of ways of breaking the news to Nya.

Too soon, Kai Smith, no not Smith, Kai had to think of a better surname after this was all over. Anyways, their team has decided upon infiltrating Krux and Acronix’s secret base, which also meant that they will find his traitorous father. Instantly, he felt a searing hot pain radiate from within his ribcage. teeth clenched, fists tightened, he and Nya arrived at the swamp.

He had a single-minded focus on finding his parents and nothing could stop him.

“Kai, I don’t see anything. Give me the map,” Nya whispered. “Hmmm, what even makes you think that Acronix and Krux will be around here?”

“I honestly don’t even care if they are,” Kai said noncommittally and looked around his surroundings. In the distance, he saw a building, right where the blacksmith shop was situated on the map. Heart pounding, he raced up the planks leading up the shop.

Kai was in too deep to stop now, to have second thoughts. Seeing his father’s blacksmith symbol on the door, builds up his resolve to kick the door open.

“I knew it!” anger, like how lava flows down a volcano, seeped into his bones as his father stared at him like he was some kind of stranger. In all fairness, he was. Because what kind of ‘father’ was Ray Smith for abandoning Nya, for abandoning him, all those years ago?

“Who are you? What do you want?” Those words cut deeply into Kai’s heart, etching all kinds of feelings that Kai couldn’t process. Because all he could see. Was red.

“I WANT JUSTICE!” With a war cry, Kai drew out the double-edged blade that his father had watched. But this time, he wasn’t fighting to disarm, to defeat, or to stun. He was fighting to kill.

Running towards the blacksmith, Kai jumped to plunge the blade into his father’s chest, only for him to dodge, Raising another strike, he missed and hit the edge of the forge. Spinning around, his next shot was parried by his father.

Blocked by his father again, Kai gave his old man a chance to explain himself. But what was said was, “You’re red like a Vermillion Warrior. But you’re no snake.”

“No, I’m not, BUT YOU ARE! TRAITOR!!” Kai broke out of his father’s block, spinning the weapon before clashing it with his father’s hammer again. His next few strikes were dodged and a kick sent Kai sprawling over the anvil. Getting up again, Kai swung the weapon wildly, getting dodged before being thrown back by a well-timed shot from his father.

“You messed with the wrong blacksmith, my friend,” Ray said, standing over Kai’s body. hearing those words sent a hot shot of seething fire down to his free palm. Building up a fire in his hand, Kai stood up and spun the double-edged blade.

“Fire power…” Ray thought out loud. Shocked, he could only get out of the way as Kai threw a fireball at him.

“No… you’re certainly not a guard. You’re… my son!” Hearing those words made Kai pause. He didn’t know why, he just couldn’t move. Too many emotions were battling in him, and he could only focus on his father’s next few words.

“Kai! You’ve inherited my elemental power!” his father had actually said that. In joy. Suddenly, his fire was rekindled.

“That’s the only thing I’ll ever inherit from you!” Kai started to move, to continue the fight when suddenly his baby sister screamed for him to stop from the front door.

“He’s a traitor!” Kai explained through gritted teeth.

“He’s still our father,” Nya begged Kai to reconsider.

“Whatever it is you think, I can explain-“

“Yeah… BET YOU CAN!” Kai threw back his left hand, ready to unleash another fireball at his father when a jet of water put his element out.

“Kai, let him speak!” Nya pleaded. “There’s no harm in hearing him out!”

Kai then moved to throw the double-edged blade at his father, who had dodged out of the way. sensing that Nya would just put out his fire again, Kai pounced on his father and dragged him hip by the collar of his clothes, and began to wrestle with him.

“It ends here! NOW!” Overpowering his father, he managed the wrench his left hand free, and pulled it back into a punch.

“Kai, you don’t know what you’re doing!” “I DO NYA! I ABSOLUTELY-“ “I’m not your sister, son.”

Kai suddenly stopped. His mother… was alive?!

“Huh? M-mom? I-I don’t believe it!” Kai released whatever he was holding as he turned around, trembling.

“That makes the 2 of us,” Maya stated sweetly, and suddenly all the memories that Kai had been oppressing came back- he could see the woman who cared for him, hear the lullabies she used to sing Nya to sleep, smell the floral shampoo and scent of mountain springs that hung around her. He remembers the taste of the food that she had made, and the warm, slender hands that held his own. As Kai watched his mother fuss over his baby sister, his resolve to fight, to seek revenger, crumbled away into pieces.

Removing his hood, he threw his arms around his mother, still smelling the scent of mountain springs, feeling the her skin, folded and cut in several areas, but still warm and firm.

But suddenly, he remembered the snake helmets and of Sensei Wu, and immediately pushed her back.

“Why, she’s as guilty as he is! They’ve been helping Acronix and Krux for years!” Kai seethed. “They’re the enemy!”

“Is that what you think?” Maya reproached. “We are not your enemy.”

“Then how do you explain this?” Kai took up the vermillion warrior’s helmet and showed his father’s symbol to his biological family. “Dad’s blacksmith stamp on every piece of Vermillion armour!”

“They forced us to work for them! Part of their revenge…” Maya rebutted.

“For what?”

“For creating the time blades,” Ray shook his head and creased his forehead. “It goes back a long tie, then Acronis and Krux were still Elemental Masters.”

Ray recounted how Wu had asked them to forge blades made of a chronosteel, a sort of metal that suctions your elemental powers away permanently if you used them to their true potential on the metal.

“We had worked for days and nights. At the end of it all, we were so exhausted, that we could not participate in the fight. But Wu had told us the results of the fights, about how he and Garmadon had sent the Time Twins and the Time Blades into a Time Vortex, essentially having them lost to time.”

“Yet, immediately after the portal has closed, Krux had gotten away. And he had gotten a glimpse of the Blimp too. He now knew that his brother was being sent to the future without him.”

“Now, he had decades to scheme and plan. He adopted the persona of the kindly Dr. Sanders Saunders. He had begun making the first batches of Vermillion out of the Great Devourer’s eggs. And his army would need weapons. Armour. Vehicles.

“So he went looking for us, and we had built a cordial relation with the old man.”

“One day, he suddenly revealed his true colours and held you two at sword point, stating that if we did not cooperate, he would not hesitate to kill you,” Maya said, eyes glistening with tears. “What could we have done?”

Kai didn’t know how to react. He stood there shell-shocked. His parents.. they weren’t traitors after all? The fire of anger fizzled out. “Okay, but what about the stamp?”

“I stamped every piece of my work, hoping that one day, someone would figure it out,” Kai’s father admitted. “So that together, we can stop Krux and Acronix’s plan.”

“What is their plan?” Nya asked. Ray shook his head and creased his eyebrows in fear. “To control all of time.”

That revelation shocked Kai into speaking again. He looked at his father, bruised, dirtied, and tired from their fight before. The feeling of guilt bubbled in his stomach, and Kai had to immediately right the wrongs.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know,” Kai began, wincing internally at his bad apology. But Nya- blessed Nya, had saved him by asking about Krux and Acronix’s plan to control all of time.

“They made me design the Iron Doom, a machine capable of transporting the Vermillion warriors through time,” Ray explained, rolling out a blueprint of the iron doom.

“So you built a Time Machine?” Kai asked incredulously. Ray huffed. “No, just the shell. I’m afraid the Time Machines are bit out of my skill set.”

“But Cyrus Borg was forced to design a power source capable of powering the machine by using temporal energy from the Time Blades,” Maya said whilst rolling out another piece of blueprint next to Ray’s this time of some sort of machine.

“Oh no! That must mean that the pause we felt earlier… that must mean that there are 3 blades in the present!” Nya exclaimed. Kai thought out loud that if Krux and Acronix got the blade, there will be only one left. “And if they get that, their time traveling mega armour will be fully operational!”

Kai stared dumbfoundedly at the smile shared between his parents. “Sorry, full operational is… good news?” Man, if his parents could just pick a side already!

“They’ll never get it,” Ray said with a smile. “Master Wu found it shortly after Acronix disappeared. Turns out it had the power to reverse time. Wu knew it was too dangerous to keep, so we hid it, buried deep in a location where only a combined elemental power of Fire and Water can reach.”

“And since you inherited our powers-“ Kai’s mother gasped sharply. “You must leave. Now!”

Ray looked downright alarmed. “You’re right. If Krux and Acronix knew you were here, they could-“

At this moment, the door burst open and time stood still.

“Could force you to retrieve the Time Blade for us? Excellent suggestion,” Krux said with a menacing smile.

“No way! We’ll never retrieve the Reversal Blade for you!” “You tell him, brother!”

“You will! Or your parents will face the same fate that they tried to protect you from.” Krux countered, his smile stretching impossibly wider.

“We’re done serving you, Krux. Bring your worst!” Ray shouted, charging towards the Time Twins. Kai watched in horror as Krux used the Pause blade to stop his father’s momentum immediately, before giving him a hard kick in the gut.

“DAD!” Kai shouted, watching his father still frozen in place, bouncing on the hard floor.

“Look what I found,” drawled the voice of Commander Machia, wheeling in-

“Master!” “Wu!’

“You know, it occurs to me that the Reversal Blade is the only way to undo Wu’s Time Punch.” Acronix grinned.

“I…I’m afraid that’s true,” Kai’s father said, having gotten out of the pause effect.

“If you want to save your master, you’ll have to retrieve the 4th blade.” Krux walked even closer to Kai, before snatching away the double-edged blade. “And I’ll take that.”

Lightning flashed over the skies, creeping in tendrils and thunder boomed, rocking the ship. Kai and his family were stuck on a ship, not able to help his other family back at the swamp to fight off a whole swamp’s worth of snakes! And to top it all off, he had to retrieve the 4th Time Blade for the Twins, directly enabling Krux and Acronix’s plan!

Kai felt anger in the many hot drops of rain the fell onto his skin. But he couldn’t afford to lose himself here, he and Nya would have to work together, get past all the challenges and get the time blade, save Wu and get out of here!

Yet, once he and Nya had returned to the ship, the blade was immediately knocked out of his hands and his father took another Time Punch. Just as he was about the throw hands with the Time Twins, he was hit with a jet of brilliant red light, trapping him a Pause as he could only see the ship moving away from underneath him. They barely had the time to pull up their fusion dragon before heading back to the swamp.

Upon their arrival, they saw the Time Twins enter a temporal vortex. They had to follow them. There was no other choice.

A long, tiring battle in the past 40 years ago had taken its toll on Kai and Nya. They had managed to reverse the Time Punch on Master Wu (though Kai wonders if maybe Nya used a bit too much) and they had managed to drive Acronix and Krux back into the Temporal Vortex, this time actually sneaking aboard the ship and trying to remove the Time Blades from the engine of the Iron Doom.

Unfortunately for Kai, he just couldn’t lift the Reversal Blade, but Sensei Wu had. Throwing the Time Blade to him, Kai almost didn’t register Wu telling them to use the blade of Ray before throwing both of them out of the time stream and back into the present.

After had used the time blade on his father, Kai and Nya were tasked with Master Lloyd’s command to return the Reversal Blade to its place in the Boiling Sea. Of course, Kai had complied, adrenaline still fuelling his body. And yet when all was said and done, Kai collapsed upon reaching the Temple of Airjitzu.

The days after Kai and Nya returned to the present without Sensei Wu were some of the worst. Kai felt like he was over bursting with emotions. Guilt, grief, and anger clouded his mind over the loss of Wu. Joy, confusion, and deep-seated anger clouded his heart over his parents. Kai didn’t know how to deal with everything. He couldn’t really talk with his previous confidence, he couldn’t move without double guessing himself, and his decision-making skills were in pieces, grounded into a fine dust.

Does he reconnect with his family or not? What could he do the aid the search of Sensei Wu? Are Nya and Lloyd doing alright? Cole seems to be the hardest hit out of all of them, maybe he should go check on him?

Lying on his bed in the Temple of Airjitzu, Kai couldn’t muster his strength to well, do anything! He just needed some time to just… process, everything that had happened in the past month. His parents, of course, had given him some space, and just said that when he’s ready to contact them. Kai thinks that they also didn’t know how to deal with his situation and just took a cop-out. Or maybe they just wanted to breathe fresh, non-swamp-sewer air and tour Ninjago after being in captivity in 10 years. Honestly, who knows?

Lloyd had walked in and provided a brief source of relief for Kai, but too soon had he walked away, going back to his training. Kai saw his baby brother’s eyes sporadically turn green, infused with his element, in just 3 days. Kai would have joined him too, doing whatever hellish program he had set up for himself, if he wasn’t just ambushed by his feelings whenever he tries to get up, wondering if that was even the right choice. He certainly felt that it was his fault that he lost Sensei Wu, and now his kid brother had trained so hard that his eyes became green just to find Sensei again.

Nya was dealing with her own reconciliation with his parents and sometimes offered Kai a shoulder to cry on. Mostly, she was by herself, as Jay had told Kai to ease his worry. Still, his worry for Nya is topped only by his worry about the future.

Cole had also been hit hard by the loss of Sensei Wu and was shutting himself in. Zane was still trying to spend time looking for Pixal throughout the Bounty and any of our other bases of operations, trying to tracer her down.

That left Jay, who really, was as much of a help as a hindrance to Kai. Hanging out with Jay meant that Kai soon developed a terrible sense of humour, an arsenal of horrible puns, and way too many prank ideas. Jay had made sure that everyone was fed, watered, and in some cases- slept. Of course, being the responsible one for once meant that Jay had to bully his most stubborn teammates into taking a break, or having some food.

“MOOOORRRRNNIIIIIINNG!” Kai was once again woken up by Jay’s terrible screeching. Turning to face the wall, Kai pushed a pillow on top of him just so he could remain in the land of sleeping for longer. No such luck.

“KAAAIIIIII! GET UP!” Jay, screamed as the door to his room flung open. Aw man here we go again, Kai grumbled to himself.

“So what would you like to have this morning? Eggs and bacey? Toast with jam? How about-“

“How about you shut up and leave me alone!” Kai shouted, irritated by the perky tone that Jay has adopted. Watching Jay’s smile become less bright and more forced, Kai couldn’t help but feel a little guilty. Sitting up and rubbing the base of his neck, Kai apologised for his outburst. “Sorry, Jay- it’s just that I need some time, alone.”

Jay nodded solemnly, before sitting down at the edge of his bed. Kai watched as Jay took a deep breath before saying his piece.

“I know Kai, but… Nya… she needs you. You have got to fix your relationship with your parents, or at least start on the first step. I’m going to be honest: I’m not good with people like you are. I don’t know how to get Lloyd to rest, because he’s going to break his body this way. Don’t get me started on Cole, who won’t open up to me at all. And I can’t out logic Zane. He keeps saying that since he’s a robot, he doesn’t need rest as we humans do.”

Kai stayed silent for a while, mulling over Jay’s words. Truth is, if he could, he would have done so already. What did Jay know about these kinds of relationships, anyways? In fact, when compared to everyone else on the team, Jay has the best relationship with his parents. So what was the point of this? Kai felt his hands curl up into a fist, bunching his bedsheets. Taking a deep, shuddering breath, he breathed out to calm himself down before he could impulsively do something he’d regret.

“No can do, Jaybird. I don’t even know where to start,” Kai said regretfully. Kai honestly expected for Jay to slink out of his room, to go pester Nya to try or to get Lloyd to see sense, or to even get his best buddy to open up about his troubles. Kai did not think that Jay seemed to double down, taking several huge gulps of air, and one the edge of hyperventilation. He saw Jay’s hands tighten into fists before he spoke in a trembling voice.

“Kai… did is something that I really, really don’t want to share. It’s something that I keep wanting to erase out of my memories. But I can’t, because no matter how much I try to see it as just a prank- it’s the truth. I’m… adopted,” Jay finished in a hushed whisper. Immediately, Kai sat up straighter. He hadn’t heard this before. “Please, please, keep this a secret, Kai.”

“…so, when did you find out?” Kai whispered back.

“It was at the height of our popularity craze right after stix. A letter had come in, about how my father had died. Immediately, I went off to my Ma and Pa’s scrapyard, but it turns out that I had been adopted, and that my biological father was… Cliff Gordon,” Jay’s teeth had begun shuddering as tears came leaking out of his eyes.

“Oh,” That’s all Kai could really say. I mean, how were you going to reply to that?

“Of course, I felt all sorts of different emotions at first. Relief that my Pa didn’t die, confusion at why I was abandoned on my parent’s doorstep, realisation why neither of my parents had elemental powers, and eventually gratitude because my biological father had written me into his will.”

“But Kai, you don’t just easily forget the feeling when you thought that your parents died. I’m sure that if Cole was himself right now, he would have knocked some sense into you.” Jay stated with a small smile. “Our lives as Ninja are really, really dangerous. Yesterday, we lost Sensei Wu. Tomorrow… well, let’s just say that as a Ninja, you have to cherish time with your loved ones. Don’t put off tomorrow what can be done today.”

And Kai seriously was lost for words. Jay was… 100% right. There were no faults, no counterarguments. Danger was a Ninja’s job description, and too soon he could leave this realm without patching things up with his parents- his parents had almost done so too when his father had been struck by the Forward blade. If he couldn’t do it for himself, and his parents- well, he could do it for Nya’s sake.

Suddenly energised, Kai stood up.

“Thank you, Jay.”

And off he went to call his parents, checking in on them, holding a conversation that had a semblance of normality. They had talked about safe topics, about interesting areas Ray and Maya had visited, about Kai and Nya’s adventures, and about Kai’s team, Sensei Wu- anything, really.

Tears of joy fell down his cheeks before he decided to barge into Nya’s room, throwing open her curtains and rousing her from her slumber.

Because now, they had a chance. They could reconcile.

And then they can find Sensei Wu.

- Kai - It was their first machine in 6 months, and Kai had managed to lose his powers. Again. This time, however, the warmth and fiery spirit that Kai could always cling to were gone as well. He had always felt utterly powerless without his fire. But without his anger? Kai was more than useless. He couldn’t even defend the civilians from the fire snakes, because he was out of shape as well and had to rely on Jay to save him. Jay!

Severely discouraged by this fact, he told his team to just ‘go ahead without him'. He would not be of any help to them anyways. He would only add more onto their already full plate as they would have to focus on defending him too.

Slumping next to an overturned car, Kai hid his face in his hands. What if he never gets his powers back? Would they hate him? Forget him? Maybe he could become The Red Shogun again, maybe pilot a mech as Pixal does.

Kai’s jumbled thoughts were interrupted by a kid (seriously, how many disasters have Ninjago faced to let people carry on their normal lives whilst it’s raining fireballs?) handing him a journal, stating that Kai was his favourite Ninja and could he please, please sign his notebook?

“Sorry kid,” Kai huffed out. “I’m not really a ninja without my powers.”

“Well then, why don’t you go help your teammates?” The kid, Max asked.

“Because, I’m useless, that’s why!”

“Well- if you don’t help the ninja, I will!” And with that, Max stormed away and started to head for the scene of danger. Kai called out to him futile to come back and resigned himself to his fate. Picking up the notebook, Kai saw a cartoonish sticker of him in his ninja mask at the front, before coming to an epiphany.

His teammates didn’t like him for just his fire. Nor did the Ninjago citizens. He carried everyone’s hopes and dreams on his back and he can’t just turn around now and leave him to face the enemy alone!

What was he thinking?

Immediately, Kai rushed down the street to the Ninjago Museum of ancient artifacts.

Kai didn’t always have to run red hot. He didn’t need to perpetually be angry. Sometimes, it’s okay to mellow out. But now is not the time. Now, he has to save his family from one crazy snake lady who was fuelled only by revenge.

Kai couldn’t just be fuelled by his anger. Facing off with Aspheera taught him that. Being angry all the time was exhausting when he inevitably turned off the switch. Anger clouded his thoughts, made errs in his judgment, caused him to be impatient- all whilst ignoring the important parts of his life- his family. And from now on, Kai would only tap into anger when it was absolutely necessary. What matters the most to him isn’t feeling invulnerable, like nothing could hurt him, especially if he was protecting his teammates. Rather, it was the job that Kai had to do. Emotions in battle are a tricky thing, but all the times he observed Lloyd setting aside his feelings for the greater good had made Kai realise that emotions can be easily goaded. Manipulate, by enemies such as Chen and Harumi.

In a life or death situation, Kai couldn’t just rely on his feelings. He had to embrace his moral code, the values that he holds dear, and act upon them, even though it may seem impossible at times. And he shouldn’t get frustrated with his team.

Kai may be angry, but the only time he’ll properly deal with his emotions will be when the battle is all over, and then he will learn how to compartmentalise, how to sort through his emotions. Maybe he’ll take up blacksmithing part-time again.

All Kai knew that was in this instance, he refused to let his life be ruled over uncontrollable feelings, mostly of rage. He was the master of his own emotions.

And nothing will stop him from helping out his team.

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purrincess-chat · 3 years

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Marinette Dupain-Cheng’s Spite Playlist: Remix CH3

It’s akuma time! This chapter hurts worse down the line, if you can believe it. I have a lot up my sleeve for Alya and Marinette this go round ;)

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Previous First Next AO3

Chapter 3: Ignorance

Nino entered the locker room, nodding his head to the beat playing in his headphones. Alya was taking the whole Marinette situation hard, so he wanted to make sure she was okay. Maybe they could go out for some ice cream to cool off, then try talking to Marinette about what happened. Surely, there was an explanation for it.

As he rounded the corner of lockers, his eyes widened with terror. Red lips upturned into a sinister smirk, and Hawkmoth’s newest creation stared back at him with a set of familiar hazel eyes.

“Alya?” he gasped.

“Not anymore.” She trailed her thumb over the small pitchfork in her hands. “I’m Backstabber, and I’m going to get revenge against my so-called ‘bff.’”

Nino turned to run, but Backstabber launched a pitchfork straight into his back where it disappeared with a spark. She paced over to him, lifting his chin as tiny devil horns matching her own appeared on his head.

“Now,” she cooed. “Isn’t there something you have to say to your best friend?”

♪♫♪ Let It Die ♪♫♪

Across the street, Adrien and Marinette sat in her living room, picking away at their homework. Adrien was in her living room. Sitting on her couch. Drinking her tea. He was too beautiful for words, his gorgeous green eyes scanning over his maths problem. His face alone made her regret ever leaving Francoise-Dupont. How was she going to survive without seeing his radiance every day?

Marinette was too busy memorizing the rhythm of his breathing to focus on her work, the memory of his arms wrapped around her still fresh. He’d cradled her in his arms. Of course, it was because she was ugly crying, but she would ignore that detail.

Adrien was too perfect for words. How did she ever think that he would abandon her when she left? Their friendship meant a lot to him. She meant a lot to him. It was a fact that she’d spend hours dreaming about. One day he’d hold her in his arms and whisper those three beautiful words. Then they’d get married, have 3 kids and a hamster named-

Adrien’s phone rang, snapping her from her trance, and her heart sank. It was probably his father demanding that he come home like normal, but to her surprise, Nino’s picture flashed on the screen.

“Hey, Nino, what’s up?”

“Ya know what, Adrien? I’m tired of your goody-two-shoes act, pretending you’re all innocent,” Nino said.

Adrien’s eyebrows raised. “What are you talking abou-”

“I’m gonna tell your dad to start homeschooling you again so the rest of us don’t have to put up with you anymore.” Nino hung up with a maniacal laugh.

“What was that about?” Marinette asked.

“I don’t know,” Adrien said, staring down at the screen, “but it can’t be good.”

“You don’t think he was akumatized, do you?” She reached for her purse.

“If not him, then probably someone else, I should get home before things get too crazy. I’m sure Ladybug and Chat Noir will handle everything soon, so stay inside where it’s safe, okay?” He shoved his tablet and textbook back into his school bag quickly. “See you around, Marinette.”

“Uh, yeah, see ya…”

Marinette reached for her purse the moment the door shut behind him. “Let’s get out there and capture this akuma before Nino gets to Gabriel Agreste. Tikki, transform-”

Before she could finish the phrase, the front window of the living room shattered, and Marinette shielded her face from the debris with a yelp. Her purse tumbled under the coffee table out of reach.

“Hey, Marinette.” A familiar face loomed over her with a twisted grin. “Remember me? Your bff?”

“Alya?” Marinette gasped, stumbling over the side of the couch. “What happened to you?”

“Don’t play dumb with me.” She readied another pitchfork. “I’m not Alya anymore. I go by Backstabber now, but I bet you know all about that sort of thing.”

Backstabber tossed a small pitchfork and caught it again as Marinette inched toward the stairs.

“What are you talking about?” She needed to reach her purse, but Backstabber was closing in.

“You know what you did,” she snarled. “I’ve got a pretty pitchfork here, how would you like to shove it into my back? Oh wait, you already did!”

Marinette turned to dash up the stairs, narrowly dodging the pitchfork as her parents burst through the front door.

“Marine- Oh!” her dad gasped before taking a defensive position between Backstabber and the stairs. “I won’t let you hurt my daughter!”

“If you knew what she was really like, you wouldn’t bother protecting her.” Backstabber’s eyes narrowed as Marinette’s mom entered the room. “But tell me, daddykins, can you protect your wife and your daughter?”

With a flick of her wrist, Backstabber launched another pitchfork at Marinette’s mom. Her dad jumped in front of her, turning his back and taking the attack himself.

“Dad!” Marinette gasped as two horns appeared on his head before she retreated through the trap door into her room.

“Tell me, Marinette,” Backstabber continued, pursuing her calmly as Marinette scrambled to the loft stairs. “Did you ever consider me a real friend?”

“Of course, I did!” Marinette paused halfway up.

“Then how could you abandon me?” Backstabber palmed another pitchfork. “How could you leave without telling me?”

“How could you abandon me?” Marinette shot back, eyes stinging. “How could you take someone else’s side over mine? How could you put me in the back of the class by myself and not even apologize?”

“Lila was right about you. You really are just an attention-seeker, always playing the victim,” Backstabber said.

Marinette clenched her jaw before crawling over her bed and through the skylight onto the balcony. She climbed over the wall, wobbling as she made her way out onto the rooftops.

“You know what I think?” Backstabber called, and Marinette spun around to face her. “I think you’re the real liar. Always running late, making up excuses, disappearing suddenly, so what secrets are you hiding, Marinette?”

Before Backstabber could attack, Chat Noir smacked the pitchfork from her hand with his staff. “It’s dangerous to play on the roof. Someone could fall,” he said with his usual taunting lilt.

“I don’t think Marinette can sink any lower.” Backstabber glared through her. Marinette’s hands clenched into fists at her sides.

“What happened to you two? I thought you were best friends,” Chat Noir asked, taking a defensive stance in front of Marinette. “Not too long ago you were putting your neck on the line to save her, and now you’ve turned your back on her?”

“She turned her back on me!” Backstabber shouted.

“Only because you were being a bad friend!” Marinette shot back.

Backstabber flinched, squeezing her eyes shut before she unleashed a slew of pitchforks with a growl.

Chat spun his staff to deflect them as Marinette cowered behind him. She needed to find a way out of this to transform. Maybe Ladybug could talk some sense into Alya, but her purse was still down in the apartment.

“Ah!” he hissed as a pitchfork grazed his arm.

Marinette cupped her hands over her mouth in horror, but nothing happened. “Why didn’t it transform you?” she asked, closing her eyes and picturing her dad. “Of course! Her attacks only work if they hit you in the back.”

“Then I guess we’ll have to keep this battle face-to-face,” he said, wrapping an arm around her, “but first I should get you to safety.”

“Not so fast, kitty!” Backstabber growled, charging in, but he dodged out of the way before she could strike.

Landing in the street, Chat Noir set Marinette down and brandished his staff once more.

“Go! I’ve got your back,” he shouted as Backstabber gave chase. “Cataclysm!”

As Marinette ran up the street, Chat Noir touched his palm to the concrete, opening a crater to the sewers to distract Backstabber while Marinette escaped. She needed to meet up with Tikki before Chat Noir changed back.

Ducking back into the bakery, she tiptoed around the counter and pressed a hand to the side of her mouth. “Tikki?” she called in a hushed tone, creeping over to the backdoor.

“Marinette!”

She jumped as her kwami phased through the floor and flitted into her face.

“Thank goodness.” Marinette breathed a sigh of relief. “Come on, let’s go before Backstabber gets the best of Chat Noir. Transform me!”

Chat Noir’s cries echoed between the buildings as Ladybug stepped out of the bakery, and with a practiced toss, she created a net between two light poles with her yoyo to catch him.

“I see this battle is really flying by,” she said as he climbed down.

“Yeah, and we need to move quick. I don’t have a lot of time left.” He held up his ring finger where three pads flashed.

“Oh look, the cockroach has joined her mangey stray,” Backstabber cooed.

“And she’s about to kick your butt.” Ladybug charged in.

With each strike, Ladybug scanned her person, trying to figure out where the akuma could be hiding. Nothing stood out besides the intricate brooch embedded in her suit. Alya never wore jewelry, and Ladybug couldn’t fathom why the akuma would be there. As she dodged another swing, a familiar photo of the two of them nestled inside the jewel stood out. Back flipping out of the way a few times, she pressed her hands to either side of her mouth.

“Chat Noir! The akuma is in the photo in her necklace!” she called as Backstabber crossed her wrists to block his staff, forcing him back a few paces.

“What’s the plan for getting it because I’m running out of time,” he said urgently—his last two pads flickering.

“Lucky charm!” She caught the two necklaces as they fell from the sky, turning them over in her hands to read the two halves of a heart together. “Best friends forever… What am I supposed to do with this?”

She glanced around with a pensive frown, singling in on the photo in Backstabber’s necklace and the tears bubbled in the corner of her eyes.

“M’lady?” Chat Noir dodged another pitchfork.

“Go! I’ve got this.” She ordered, but he eyed her skeptically, his ring flashing.

“Are you sure, m’lady?” he asked.

“Positive.”

Chat Noir glanced between them with a conflicted frown before vaulting himself into the rooftops.

Ladybug took a stance in front of Backstabber in the middle of the street. “Just you and me now,” she said with a gentle determination.

“How do you expect to beat me with that?” Backstabber scoffed, cocking a hip to one side.

“Not with this.” Ladybug shook her head. “With words. You’re upset that your friend abandoned you, right?”

Backstabber seemed taken aback. Her jaw clenched as Ladybug held up the necklaces.

“She’s your best friend, and right now you’re hurt and confused, but have you considered that maybe she’s feeling the same way?” Ladybug continued.

“She left me!” A tear rolled down her cheek. “She didn’t even say goodbye!”

“Don’t you think she has a reason? Best friends don’t just abandon each other.”

Backstabber weighed it before shaking her head. “What reason could she possibly have had?”

“There’s a lot you probably don’t know about your friend. Secrets that she wishes she could tell you but can’t…” Ladybug averted her gaze. “I’m sure you’re both hurting, and Hawkmoth took advantage of that, but you’re stronger than he is, Alya.” At the sound of her name, Backstabber flinched, and Ladybug paced over to place her hands on her shoulders. “I know you are.”

Backstabber searched her gaze, lips quivering, shoulders shaking. She hugged her sides as hot tears spilled down her cheeks, sinking to her knees. Ladybug crouched beside her, fastening one of the necklaces around her neck before opening the clasp of Backstabber’s locket and removing the picture inside. Ladybug stared at it with a frown before ripping it down the middle, separating the two smiling girls and freeing the black butterfly from inside.

“No more evildoing for you, little akuma.”

♪♫♫ Miserable at Best ♪♫♪

When the doorbell rang, Marinette stood up from the couch and straightened her blazer. She took a deep breath before striding over to answer it. Miraculous Ladybug set everything back to the way it was, but there were some things that her superpowers couldn’t fix. This time she would have to face them herself.

“Hey…” Alya gave a half-wave when Marinette opened the door.

“Hey,” Marinette replied.

“Sorry about earlier,” Alya said with a wince. “I was upset about you leaving, and I guess Hawkmoth could sense that.” When Marinette remained quiet, she bit her lip. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Marinette averted her gaze. “I didn’t want anyone to make a fuss because I’d already made up my mind.”

“Why did you leave?”

“Because-” Her words caught themselves on the tip of her tongue.

What was she supposed to say? That it was because her friends abandoned her? That her friends trusted a stranger over her when she’d proved to them time and time again that she was trustworthy and honest? That she didn’t say anything because her friends would have tried to guilt her into staying because she couldn’t provide them a believable answer for why she was leaving? Even now she couldn’t think of a viable way to prove to Alya that Lila was lying, since she was so insistent on Marinette having evidence. Alya wasn’t one to take her word without proof even though she seemed to have no trouble doing that for Lila. Marinette wasn’t sure which was worse: Alya’s lack of trust in her or her overabundance of trust in Lila.

“Because of Lila?” Alya asked, and Marinette fixed her gaze on the door handle. “Why are you so bothered by her? She’s never done anything to you, and all you’ve ever done is accuse her of lying about everything.”

Marinette wanted to tell Alya the truth more than anything, but given her track record, she didn’t think it would do any good. She couldn’t prove that Lila had threatened her, and even mentioning it would seem like another vain attempt to defame her. As much as it pained her, Marinette didn’t have an answer for Alya. If she was so bent on having concrete evidence, then there was no point in trying to come up with one, so she simply shrugged.

“I don’t know what has gotten into you, girl, but it’s not healthy,” Alya said. “If you’d just give Lila a chance, you’d see that-”

“No,” Marinette said firmly, and Alya’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “Sorry, but I won’t play along with her.”

“Play along with- this isn’t a game, Marinette! She’s just a person with an exotic life,” Alya chided, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Honestly, it won’t kill you to try.”

“I can’t be friends with her.” Marinette shook her head.

“Why?” Alya asked. “Give me one good reason why. I’m sure if you tell her about Adrien-”

“It’s not about Adrien.”

“Then what?” Alya held her arms out. “Don’t tell me you’re jealous of her getting attention from everyone.”

Marinette recoiled at that, eyes stinging. The fact that Alya even mentioned that proved that Lila had her hooks in too deep. Alya couldn’t be saved. As much as it pained her, there were some villains out there that even Ladybug couldn’t defeat.

“I’m not jealous of her, but I am a little hurt that my best friend is siding with someone she barely knows over me,” she said with more bite than she intended.

“Can you blame me with how sketchy you’ve been acting? What proof do you have?” Alya shot back, hands balling into fists when Marinette shifted her weight. “Lately, I feel like I don’t know you as well as I thought I did, girl.”

“I’m starting to think the same,” Marinette said.

“Then I guess we shouldn’t consider ourselves bffs if there’s so much we don’t know about each other!” Alya retorted. “Maybe we shouldn’t even be friends at all.”

Marinette suppressed a sigh, heart sinking as she held Alya’s gaze before three of the most painful words passed her lips. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”

Alya took a step back, jaw dropping. Her eyes burned into Marinette’s, fresh tears bubbling in the corners. Marinette wore a steely mask, relaying no emotion despite the hammering in her chest. She bit her lip to hide how it shook.

Alya finally flicked her gaze to her feet, rubbing at her cheek before a tear could escape. “Well, I guess that’s that then,” she said. Alya turned and stormed down the stairs.

Marinette closed the door, lingering with her hand on the handle. Her shoulders shook, and she sank to the floor with a whimper, hot tears spilling down her cheeks. As it turned out, the high road was far lonelier than she’d ever imagined, but there was no going back now. She’d made her choice.

#mdcspr #marinette dupain-cheng's spite playlist remix #my writing

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jess-emurphy · 3 years

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List of things the live action adaptation of Alice in Boderland missed out on that doesn't change the grand plot of things but were pretty neat and I wish they were there. This manga is one if my top five favourites so I'm incredibly passionate about it and anaylse it to shit

These are spoilers for the manga if you want to read the first arc but I will only discuss things that affect season 1 of the show and up to that point in the manga (where the face cards are revealed). Again, these really do not affect the plot considering the show got to the face cards just fine without changing anything major.

I read the manga back when I was like 15? I was in high school and used to read it during classes and was sobbing onto my maths notebook during the seven of hearts game.

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Okay this wasn't a live action thing but in the manga, when Chishiya took down his hood and we saw his face, the comments were calling him ugly 😭😭😭 it was funny as fuck and I'll never forget it.

At the end of the seven of hearts game, Arisu's reward for winning was mutton chops. He burns the whole building down.

Arisu was still in high school in the manga (or at least, just out of it) and Karube actually has to keep telling him and Chota off for drinking at his bar.

The show really missed out on showing Tatta (the man in the cap) and his arc of being a scared young adult who's friend is murdered in front of him, nearly extracting revenge on the man (Last Boss) who did it before deciding he would rather let Last Boss slowly die in a painful way to the fire and save his own humanity. And that was pretty cowardly of them 😤

Aguni getting his scars from the tiger.

Phones work in the world. They aren't used the way the show does. Chishiya actually charges his to listen to music and someone remarks "did that guy join this game just to charge his phone? Ballsy"

Arisu telling Hatter that the seven of hearts card is Usagi's so she could be a higher number rank because he believes shes more deserving of going home.

Arisu using his ability to pretend to not be there like he does in front of his family to hide from the tagger and slow his breathing down.

Chishiya's monologue about why he chose the top floor of the apartment building, show casing how smart he is but not willing to give anyone else that tip.

The part where Chishiya has to pick up all the cards he threw and Mira comes over like "yo i'll help short ass" 😩

The first game was actually set in a festival setting where their goal was to answer questions.

The tunnel game set in the highway did not include Usagi or Arisu. It was a side chapter featuring a new guy who's motive to survive was to get back to his girlfriend who had only ever been abused by men. He didn't want to die because if he did, she would think he left her just like every other man in her life and it was actually very heart breaking. The game itself was fairly the same except the end part was a bomb, not a flood.

During when Hatter is shot, Number Two disappears and is presumed dead. In the show, he's alive. And in the manga he was Number Three.

Aguni was Number Two. There was no voting in the manga, he was just automatically Number One.

Asahi in the manga, while feling guilty, allows the witch hunt game to go on because she despisea how humans have become, killing each other mercilessly. She only ever sacrifices herself because Arisu gave her hope that there is good people.

Usagi hanging onto the side of the hotel, back fliping off, catching the ledge and kicking a man unconcious who was standing by the open window.

In the tagger game in the show, the twist was there was a second tagger. In the manga, the twist was that there was a second gun. Karube got injured because he jumped off the side of the building, caught the ledge but fucked up his stomach.

Aguni was never in that game. He never met Karube or Arisu before.

This one I can't remember completely but I believe Karube finds out about the beach via a car radio.

In the manga Arisu never got to see Karube one last time.

Shibuki's three of hearts game where she essentially gave up, was willing to die but that in fact saved her life.

Thee game where Arisu proves himself worthy to An happened without Arisu. That scene was there to actually show case An's intelligence all on her own.

In the manga, we actually get to see what type of games everyone specialises in. Arisu specialises in hearts, Usagi spades, Hatter spades, Kuina clubs and Chishiya diamonds, to name a few.

In the manga, Arisu played one other hearts game before the beach (this could be wrong but the actual chapters never stated a timeline). It was a four of hearts.

DOUDOU? WHERE IS MY BOY DOUDOU? The live action really said fuck Doudou he doesn't get to be in this sorry.

Tatta's Lamborghini and him being a mad man, driving it around 😭 as he should

Kuina showing off her boobs to the men because they were being transphobic 😤

Between the ten of hearts and the arrival of the face cards, three days passed. During these three days, the characters partied, did golf, goofed around, tried to enjoy life and figure out what happens next. A whole interaction happens here with Arisu and Usagi and it kept cutting to another character who was travelling around (and some stuff about a dead deer and friendships or something who knows I was distracted by a crying Arisu my poor boy). Arisu also has a thing where he tells Usagi to never leave him and it broke my heart.

Kuina and Chishiya? They might as well be enemies. She HATES him for what he did to Arisu and Usagi. He's actually not seen with anyone during those three days before the card faces.

Niragi ugly af in the manga.

I hadn't read the manga in years since it ended but I was convinced that Kuina was a Black Japanese woman BUT NO SHE JUST SUDDENLY CHANGES SKIN TONES AFTER TRANSITIONING. I had to do a double take when rereading the manga. I know it's supposed to be a tan but It had been years okay cut me some slack.

Hatter's gravity defying hair. This changes no plot. I just thought his hair was very funny and I would lpve to see an actual attempt in real life.

Okay thats literally all I can think of. Overall, I was happy with the live action and the literally only thing I was upset at is the fact they cut a whole character out. He may show up to season 2 but with the way the show went, I doubt they'll go back in time just to show off a random four of hearts game that this character was in with Arisu. I wish we got that cute hug with them of Arisu being tackled by this scrawny 16 year old. 😤

#imawa no kuni no alice #alice in borderland #ryohei arisu #karube #chota #usagi yuzuha #chishiya shuntaro #kuina hikari #nigari #morizono aguni #Hatter #imawa no kuni no alice manga

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2manyfandoms2count · 3 years

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I love you (not) - Chapter 9

Tackling two prompts of @marichatmay again ('take a break' and 'cuddles'), it's probably not going to help much with catching up on the schedule but it's okay.

We are now a little over a third into the story, and... Are those real feelings that are emerging in the fake relationship? Perhaps... Still quite a bit of oblivious dumbassery to go, though, else it wouldn't be fun :D Hope you enjoy!

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Chapter 9: In which Marinette gets mixed up in her checklist

"I'm sure I'm missing something…" Marinette mumbled as she read through her extensive to-do list of the day, tapping her pencil against her chin.

School

HomeworkFrench: Dissertation Maths: exercises 5,9,12 p.132 Science: Lab report English: Act III, scene 1 Hamlet History: revision test Extra last minute?

ALYA’S BIRTHDAY PREP: coordinate surprise party + finish gift

Kitty section: costume prototype for single 2

Art project: finish dress

Picnic Alya, Nino, Adrien

“I swear there was a seventh thing I needed to do today.” She squinted, scanning her surroundings in the hopes that it would jog her memory. There was so much going on these days that things kept piling up, but today she was determined to catch up with everything. She didn’t have much of a choice, anyway; most of the items on her list had a set deadline, and it was coming at her faster than she liked. She preferred not to get hit by the truck head on.

Her eyes landed on Chat Noir’s blanket, which she’d draped over the back of her chaise after he’d left on the night of his birthday, over a week before.

“Right! Chat Noir - Ask Chat Noir to take a break, ” she mumbled, scribbling down the last point, before setting the list down next to her computer keyboard. She'd abandoned the idea of full on breaking up with him given how their relationship was dragging on; a break seemed softer to ask for first, and it could easily be followed up by a breakup.

It was going to be a long day, but with a bit of rigour, and thanks to her early start, it would all work out.

“Don’t you think that’s a bit much for one day, Marinette?” Tikki peeked over her shoulder, letting out a small yawn.

“Well, maybe for a normal girl, but not for Ladybug.” She yawned reflexively, and her kwami shot her a pointed look. “I know, I know. I have to power through, though - it’s not my fault I got sidetracked so much these past few days. I honestly wonder what Hawkmoth does as a living, the man has too much time on his hands.”

“Are you sure you don’t want to get a tiny bit more sleep? To help with your productivity?” Her Kwami asked, looking slightly worriedly at the bags beneath her eyes.

“It’s 6am, Tikki, not the crack of dawn. I’ll have to be up by the time I fall back asleep again.” She waved her concern away. “I’ll just let the stress adrenaline work its magic. It’s going to be fine, don’t worry.” Tikki pouted doubtfully. “Now, would you mind reading me the Hamlet scene while I finish sewing up my project?”

---

This is a disaster , Marinette thought as the formulae she read on the page danced in front of her eyes. It didn’t matter how many times she went through them, they just didn’t compute.

She looked at the time: 6:45pm. She had fifteen minutes before her picnic, and she had to finish her maths homework, her dissertation, her History revision, the Kitty section prototype, and send out individual messages to remind everybody of their tasks for Alya’s birthday so it wasn’t too short notice for the weekend.

She tried to ignore the palpitations of her heart; maybe she’d overdone it on the coffee during the day. It wasn’t like she had a choice, anyway.

She’d discovered as she'd walked into class that she had a class president meeting with Mr. Damocles over her lunch break, which had been when she’d planned to squeeze in some of her work.

Then, while she’d been packing her bag at the end of her classes, ready to leave, an Akuma had emerged. It had been a tricky one, too; Chat and her had spent about an hour chasing it around Paris before finally catching it.

Adding to that the fact that her 6am rising had left her exhausted by the second period of the day, she really hadn’t been the most efficient anyway.

“I think you know what you need to do, Marinette,” Tikki said apologetically, as if reading her mind, floating up to her with her phone in her flippers. Alya’s number was already dialled on the screen.

Marinette sighed and took the phone from her, pressing the green button before lodging it between her shoulder and her ear.

“Hey girl!” Alya’s excited voice sounded on the other end of the line. “Nearly ready to go? We really picked the right night for a picnic; the weather’s super nice.”

“About that…” Marinette winced. “I’m so sorry, I won’t be able to make it.”

“You’re kidding, right? You ’re passing up on an opportunity to have a picnic with Adrien? Are you ill?” Alya said after a small beat.

“Trust me, I surprised myself.” Marinette pinched the bridge of her nose. “I just feel like I have a bit too much on my plate right now, and I wouldn’t be great company if I came. I hope we can find another time to go out again, but I think studying and going to bed early is what’s best.”

“It’s true that you’ve seemed kind of out of it lately,” Alya said compassionately. “Don’t worry about us, take care of yourself! I promise I’ll take loads of pictures, it’ll be like you were here. And I’ll bully Mr Agreste with you after our exams to get Adrien out again if needed.”

“Thanks for understanding Alya.” Marinette smiled.

“That’s what best friends are for!” She could almost see her wink. “Now, get back to work and then go to bed! We’ll see you tomorrow.”

There was a bit of chatter on the line before Alya hung up, as she met up with Adrien and Nino.

“Wait, Marinette isn’t coming?” Adrien’s almost disappointed voice was the last thing Marinette heard before the communication ceased.

She found herself quite immune to it. She decided not to dwell on it.

---

Adrien enjoyed the picnic very much, as he did any opportunity to hang out with his friends, but his eyes kept drifting to the empty space next to him, where Marinette would undoubtedly have been sitting, were she with them. He hoped she was alright; Alya had told him that the reason why she wasn’t coming was because she was studying, which was fair considering the amount of homework they’d been given in the past few weeks, but he did feel like she was overworking herself a bit.

He didn’t doubt her ability to take on all of her projects, but he wished she’d slow down a little, for the sake of her health. What would he do if his everyday Ladybug burned out?

He wondered what Alya’s curious gaze meant when he voiced his thoughts about the situation. He panicked a little when she said that maybe a boyfriend could help get her mind off of work - firstly, because Marinette technically had a boyfriend, which he was surprised Alya of all people didn’t know. He thought the two girls told each other everything. Was Marinette keeping their relationship a secret on purpose? Was she confused about their status, which, he had to admit, he wasn't sure was himself? Was she (the thought scared him) ashamed of him?

Secondly, he found his heart squeeze peculiarly at the thought of Marinette having a boyfriend other than him . He decided not to dwell on it.

He couldn’t help but take the long way home, passing at the bottom of her building, after the picnic, though. And, seeing that there was still light in her room at past 11pm, he decided that he should probably do something; for her well being, not as an excuse to see her, of course.

He transformed in a back alley, then extended his baton so he could peek through the window closest to her desk. Maybe she was already asleep, but had forgotten to turn her lights off.

The sight of her bent over a sheet of paper, hands buried in her hair as if ready to tear it out of her scalp made him knock.

Marinette jumped at the unexpected sound, and looked up, looking quite haggard. Her features softened when her eyes met his.

There was a hint of a smile on her lips as she opened the window. “Hey Chat, what are you doing here?” She yawned.

“Bedtime patrol, just making sure that citizens are going to bed at a reasonable time,” he smiled, stifling his own yawn.

“That’s nice of you. But, does that mean that I’m in trouble?” she drawled out, leaning forward to boop him on the nose. Her exhaustion was clouding her better judgement.

“Depends, are you nearly done with your studying?”

“When will I ever be nearly done,” she snorted, turning around to take a look at her checklist.

Her feet caught in the straps of her backpack and she wobbled forward, but Chat pounced inside in time to catch her before she could tumble down.

“Woah there, little lady… Your spatial awareness is worse than ever,” he said fondly as she clutched his arms. “Sorry, but I’m not letting you get back to work.”

“But I need to finish something…” Marinette protested.

“What you really need is to take a break.”

Marinette paused to think about it. Taking a break with Chat Noir… she seemed to recall that was on the list.

“Okay.” She shrugged.

“Good. Come here, then.” Chat Noir sighed in relief at her lack of resistance and started to lead her towards her bed, but before he’d let out his whole breath, Marinette was already trying to make her way back to her desk.

“Wait, I actually still have so much to do…” She reached for her flashcards, which tumbled at their feet.

“Okay, tell you what.” He kept hold of one of her hands as he picked the flashcards up to avoid her escaping. “Why don’t you take a small nap, and I’ll stay here and keep an eye on the time. I’ll wake you up in an hour, and when I leave I’ll turn a blind eye on your choice between going to bed and getting back to work.” She looked at her doubtfully, and glanced at the cards in his hands. He took a closer look at them; their content was that of the test they had the next day. “I can read you these while you fall asleep so it’s not too much of a waste of time, if you want.” He waved them in front of her face, hoping she’d say yes. He really needed the revision, too.

Marinette nodded and he led her to her chaise, helping her lie down on it. He started draping his blanket over her and was about to go and sit in her desk chair when she grabbed his free hand and pulled on it, a lot more strongly than he would have expected from her, especially in her exhausted state.

“Take a break with me.” She shifted to her left and patted the newly formed space. “Please?”

Her pleading bluebell eyes were difficult to deny.

“Okay,” he said as he sat next to her. Marinette snuggled up against him and sighed contently.

Chat’s heart skipped a beat. He wrapped a tentative arm around her and cleared his throat before starting to read. “The Hundred Years’ war actually lasted one hundred and sixteen years, from 1337 to 1453…”

His own tiredness hit him like a truck after a couple of pages, when he heard her soothing, gentle snoring. He lowered the flashcards to watch her sleep. She looked so tranquil, a peaceful smile drawn on her lips as her body slowly followed her breathing.

He felt his eyes close, and soon the both of them were breathing in sync, holding on to each other.

Needless to say, Chat left a little later than anticipated the next morning, woken up by the rising sun. Neither of them complained, though; both had had one of the most restful nights in a while, and both aced their History test.

Each wondered if they weren’t onto something in terms of revision technique.

Adrien almost gloated to Alya about how maybe Marinette didn’t have a boyfriend who took her mind off of work, but she had one who took care of her while she studied. Almost.

#marichatmay2021 #marichatmay #miraculous ladybug #the miraculous tales of ladybug and cat noir #ml #miraculous fanfiction #miraculous fanfic #ml ship month #marichat #marinette dupain-cheng #chat noir #day 11: take a break #day 12: cuddles #elle writes #love you (not)

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teamhappyme · 3 years

Text

a series of promising events (4/5)

aaron hotchner x female!reader

word count: 6.7k

a/n: happy new year!! we’ve made it to part 4! this part differs from the 3 previous ones, as it takes place all in one (and a half) days. But there are flashbacks, represented with italics. if anything is confusing with the timeline, or anything else is confusing you in general, please let me know! my brain is a weird place and does not connect the dots when i post for a public audience. i hope you guys enjoy this part, it was really fun for me to write!

get ready, let’s go friends!

here are the links to part 1, part 2, & part 3

****

October 2012

“Some people care too much. I think it’s called love.” - Winnie the Pooh

You’re known for your predictability. Yes, you’re overly kind, extremely perceptive, and a little bit of a literary genius. But those closest to you knew the predictability of your life.

You craved routine. You woke up at 5:30 every morning, had breakfast, watched the news, and caught up on some domestic things before heading into the office. You stopped at the same bagel cart every morning, an Asiago bagel with butter for you and a coffee for Spencer. Monday’s, you treated the whole team. You got to work at 7:12, second only to Hotch.

The team knew how you would react to every case. Missing or dead children would cause you to go silent, families being the target would choke you up, and anything including a scumbag with a signature kill made you nauseous.

So it was safe to say they were more than surprised to find out that you’d left for a month long european holiday, from an email, with Strauss cc'd on it. The team couldn’t remember the last time you went on vacation, because you hadn't gone further than two hours in one day.

In your travels through Europe, you stopped in countries that you’d only dreamt about visiting in your dreams. You saw Nyhavn, Denmark, the colorful canal right outside of Copenhagen. Hopped through Warsaw and Gdansk in Poland, before being silenced by your tour of Auschwitz. Next was France, the country you always said you would flee to once you aged out of the system. Besides hitting all the touristy attractions in Paris, you traveled through the alps, and made sure you stopped to see Giverny, the little village that inspired Claude Monet and his water lily paintings. The last true destination was Spain, jumping at the chance to flex your spanish minor muscles. You roamed Barcelona and Madrid, feeling a little like the Cheetah Girls as you stood in front of La Sagrada Familia.

The more you travelled, the more you’d thought about quitting. Thought about sending your resignation to Strauss through an email, leave your desk full of the mementos and picture frames, and continue falling in love with the continent you’d never been to before.

But then you made your final stop in London, to the sister who you missed immensely, and lost the nerve entirely.

“You’ll regret leaving them for the rest of your life,” Emily said to you, and you wondered for a second if she was projecting her decisions onto you.

“They don’t deserve me.” You’d mumbled out, just loud enough for her to hear. “I can’t continue on like this.”

You’d given the team everything you had for seven and a half years. The job demanded personal sacrifices you never thought you’d be capable of, until you met the people who signed on for this before you. The people who shared the same commitment to helping others, the responsibility to improve the world around them before the one that housed them. It was the first time you felt at home in your quarter century existence.

But the work never seized. The jet began to feel more like home than your apartment, hotel beds provided more comfort than your own pillow covered mattress. And no matter how many people you saved, no amount of gratification from loved ones could quell the loneliness building back inside you.

So you listened to Emily, and came back to the states on your original return flight, October 23, 2012. You returned to the real world in less than seventy-two hours and promised Garcia you would brush up on the next case before debriefing on Monday morning.

You were betting on the fact that the team wasn’t lingering around the office, considering it was seven thirty on a friday night as you headed up in the elevator, fresh off your flight from the UK. The last thing you wanted was someone to corner you, when all you wanted to do was sleep off the lingering memories of your last night here.

The glass doors leading into the BAU gave you a view of the bullpen; empty. Opening the door, you walked over to your desk, quickly glancing around the other spaces to see if anything had changed. It hadn’t.

Grabbing the files Garcia left on your desk and your car keys from the drawer, you tidied up the space the tiniest bit. You made sure everything was squared off to your monitor, updating the days passed on your desk calendar. You wrote a reminder on a yellow sticky to thank Reid for watering your small desk plant and stuck it to the screen for Monday. Everything looked like it was in its place, until you saw a blue stress ball sitting on your chair. Your head whipped up to the office at the top of the stairs, but the lights were off and the door shut. He wasn’t here.

But you could feel the stare of his eyes from four weeks ago on you just the same.

You guys were working a local case in the District.

The unsub had murdered three men, each with one shot to the head execution style. There were no signs of torture, and all three men were found with their eyes closed and arms crossed over their torsos; signs of remorse.

It took the team thirty hours to stick the profile and find the woman responsible. Her name was Kathryn Downey, a forty two year old mother of three, with a law degree that hadn’t been used in fifteen years. After digging into the victims personal lives and her own, the motive and stressor became clear to everyone; her husband had cheated on her.

You found Kathryn with a gun pointed to her husband’s head, his hands and feet duct taped, and a strip around his mouth keeping him silent.

Her hands were shaking, and you knew from the second you saw her that she didn’t want to kill him. She was angry, and full of rage, but she wouldn’t be able to follow through with this.

As long as you use the right language.

“Kathryn, put the gun down, we’re with the FBI.” Hotch started in a calm voice, but she shook her head, hands shaking faster.

“No. I have to do this. He,” She took a breath, pushing the hair out of her face with her free hand. “He has to pay.”

You glanced at Aaron before taking a step closer, slowly lowering your weapon. She needed to feel safe, and she needed to feel like an equal.

“Kathryn, my name is y/n l/n. I’m with the Behavioral Analysis Unit from the FBI. I really want to help you through this situation, so I’m going to put my gun down, alright?” You slowly lowered the gun to the ground, kicking it back gently to Hotch.

“Now Kathryn, I know your children are here. I don’t want anything to happen to them, and I know you don’t either, so could you tell me where they are so we can help them?”

“In the basement, I locked them in the basement. I didn’t want them to,” She let the thought end, not wanting to manifest it into the universe. She didn’t want them to see their mother kill their father.

Hotch spoke gently into the comms, getting Morgan and Rossi down to the kids.

“Kathryn, I want to know why we’re here in this situation. I’ve read the file, I profiled you and your family, but I want to know your side of the story. Why are you holding a gun to your husbands head?”

Her eyes widened in the slightest, and you were sure it was from the empathy in your voice. But this was your specialty, and you were determined to talk this woman down.

“He cheated on me,” She whispered, and for a split second, you thought this was going to be easy. But then she pressed the gun harder into his head, and let out a low laugh. “After everything I’ve done for this family, for him, he just takes his pants off for another woman?”

You heard the safety click off, and Hotch’s own in return. Please do not end in a shootout.

“Kathryn, don’t look at him. Don’t think about him kneeling in front of you. Just focus on me. Tell me how you got to this moment right now.”

“How did I get to this moment? I got here by following around this sad excuse for a man for the last twenty years. Like a moth to a flame, I couldn’t escape this life of mine.” Her eyes started to water, and you internally sighed. You were getting somewhere. “I have a law degree, you know. Fifth in my class at Columbia, and I only used it for a year. And it was in sleazy corporate law. Because I got married, and I got pregnant, and Sean wanted someone to stay home with the kids.

“I went from the intelligent corporate attorney with her eyes set on the attorney general’s office, to a cliche housewife who spends her days cleaning and dotting on her husband and kids. I never wanted to be this woman,” She closed her eyes, letting the tears fall down her face freely. She looked so young in this vulnerable state, too young to have three children. Yet she looked so tired, and so defeated. “I gave up everything for this family. I gave up my career, friends, bucket list dreams, and a life that was waiting to be lived, for this man. I cater to his every need, I listen to him drone on about work, assure him when he’s feeling anxious, and give in when he needs a release. I am my children’s rock; when they need a shoulder to cry on I’m there in a second. They need help with their math homework, I’m the number one girl. But when it’s my turn to fall apart, when it’s my turn to be lifted up and supported, nobody is there for me. And he should be able to be there for me.”

If you hadn’t undergone intense training at Quantico, you would’ve been in tears by now. You empathized with this woman more than you should, and you were trying so desperately to help her out of this situation. So you continued to dig your fingernails into your palms, and spoke again.

“I know what you’re feeling, Kathryn.”

“You don’t know what I’m feeling!” Wrong move. She ripped the gun away from her husband and fixed the trigger on you. Hotch moved so that he was only one step behind you, trying to get her to lower the gun. “You have no idea what this is like!”

“I do, Kathryn. I promise you I do. I may not be a wife, or a mother, but I know what it’s like to give yourself completely to a person. I know what it’s like to hold onto the stress and fears of the people you love. I understand, because I’m this person too.

“People like you and me, we feel the need to be the emotional support for everyone we love. We never want to see them struggle, and we never want to see them in pain. So, we listen. We overcompensate to make them feel better, and we check in regularly to make sure they’re okay. Our happiness, as strange and sad as it may be, is directly linked to theirs. We can’t be happy unless they’re happy. But once they come out of their depression, once they thank us for being the light in their lives, they walk away, and take the happy rainbow with them. And they don’t leave any for us.” Tears continued to fall down her face, but you needed to go further. She was going to break if you kept going. “Kathryn, I was in your position not long ago. I remember what it feels like when you realize that the love you have for someone won’t be reciprocated. That after everything you’ve done for them, all the small moments that you succeeded in taking their grief away and bringing happiness back into their life, they still don’t appreciate you. And it’s heartbreaking.

“But I’m standing across from you today, on the other side of that pain, trying to tell you that it gets better. It doesn’t go away, but it gets a hell of a lot better, Kathryn. So please, do not let this one moment that you couldn’t take the pain away ruin all the times you did.”

You expected the tears. You expected an emotional end to this situation. You didn’t expect Kathryn Downey to drop her gun in the middle of the room, and collapse onto you. But that’s exactly what she did. And instead of letting go to untie her husband, instead of joining Hotch in cuffing her, you held her for a minute. You held her breaking heart in your hands, and tried your hardest to take away all her fears and pain for once in her life.

After a minute, you pulled away and grabbed a hold of her upper arm. She gave you a slight nod, knowing this is what was always going to happen. You led her down the stairs and into the back of a squad car, as Aaron helped the husband to his children once outside of the house.

You were leaning against the suburban that you came in, watching as the team debriefed with the local pd before being dismissed. But amongst the chaos, Hotch found your eyes, and gave you a knowing look. One that meant you were going to talk through the very personal negotiation you gave.

The team arrived back at the office just shy of ten o’clock, Penelope waiting for Derek at the elevator. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder as you led the gang into the bullpen, everyone dropping their go bags at their desks.

You lingered for a moment as Hotch made his way up to his office, knowing you’d be joining him in a few seconds. You grabbed your blue stress ball, complimentary from the C.A.L.M. department meeting, as through the curtains you could see him drop his bag before checking his phone for any messages from Jack.

“L/n,” Here it comes. “Can I talk to you in my office please?”

You and Spencer shared a look, and he gave you a comforting smile in return. You took the steps two at a time to his office, and shut the door behind you once you arrived. He was standing behind his desk, so you didn’t feel the need to sit yourself.

You waited for him to speak, since he was the one that called you in. It was a little childish, but you weren’t the one who wanted the discussion.

“I want to talk about the negotiation.”

“I thought it was pretty successful. I empathised, I got her to drop her weapon, and no one was injured in the process.”

“Y/n, you know that’s not what I meant.” He uncrossed his arms, letting out a sigh. The two of you were too exhausted to have this conversation, but that wasn’t going to stop Hotch from going on. “I told you that you could lean on me when it all became too much.”

“That was six years ago, Hotch.” Defensive, but not rude. A fine line. “And this wasn’t about work, this was personal. You’re not obligated to listen to our personal issues that take place outside the office.”

“And you are?” Stop spinning my words, Hotchner. “I know you, y/n. This isn’t just something that can be brushed back under the rug.” You scoffed. “You don’t know me.”

“Excuse me?”

“You don’t know me, Hotch. None of you do. You know my file. You know that I got a full ride to Bowdoin, that I was a social worker before transferring here, and that most of my life before eighteen was sealed away. I confided in you six years ago about my childhood and now you think you know me?”

“Why are you getting so defensive?”

“I’m not-” You paused, knowing that if you finished that statement it would, in fact, be defensive. “I’m just really tired and I don’t want to be having this conversation right now.”

“It’s not healthy for you to keep everything in while people spill their lives to you. And you know that.”

“Hotch,” You warned, your exhaustion quickly turning into rage.

“What, you really think I’m just going to drop this after hearing you confess to a serial killer that you have no joy in your life? And now you’re going to try and convince me that I don’t know anything about you? Bullshit, y/n. I know that you talk to your foster siblings every sunday to check in and make sure they’re all doing okay. I know that you volunteer with Garcia to help the families of victims cope with their loss. I know that you cling to Spencer like gum wherever you go to make him feel less insecure in a bar.”

“Stop it,”

“I know that your favorite color is purple, that you still write articles for CNN and The Times under a pseudonym. And I know, more than anything in the world, you want to be the mother that you never got to have.”

“Stop it!” You threw the blue ball into his builtins, hitting one of his stupid administrative awards in the process. He didn’t even flinch. “You don’t get to know me like that.”

“Why not?” You let out a low laugh as tears started to fill in your eyes. He was oblivious, and that's what made it hurt even more. You cracked your knuckles for a few seconds, waiting for him to connect the words you spoke at the Downey house and your frustration with him in this moment.

But his face softened, the wrinkles disappeared from his forehead, and you knew he figured it out. He didn’t need to say the words for you to know exactly what was going through his head. But he was with Beth, and you were not going to interfere. This wouldn’t change anything.

“It’s late, I should head home. I’ll get you my report before monday.”

You left his office without saying goodnight, and you tried to ignore the rest of your team huddled around Morgan’s desk, pretending not to be eavesdropping. But they totally were.

Instead you grabbed your bags, giving Spencer a reassuring smile as his gaze lingered on you for a second longer. You had no intentions of turning around to see Hotch’s face. But if you had, you would’ve seen the same heartbroken expression across his face, realizing he let you walk away.

You tore your eyes away from the office, not wanting to relive the memory any longer. You stashed the stress ball under your monitor before turning out the light, and making your way back to the elevator.

Once you were settled back in your apartment, you sent a text to Reid and JJ, letting them know you got in okay and that you’d see them at the office on Monday. After getting a thumbs up and a ‘glad you’re home’ in response, you turned in for the night, trying to dream of nights in Paris and Barcelona instead of at the BAU.

---

It was hard for you to get back in the routine of consulting and profiling. Garcia had left you copies of three cases the team was going to be working on when you returned, and you’d barely worked through the first one in two hours.

Three teenagers went missing from their small town in Idaho, and all were found in Seattle in the same week. Of course, your first case back included kids.

You resorted to calling Spencer when you really had no idea where to begin. You felt like a rookie all over again, asking for help when creating a geographical profile or running new negotiation tactics. But your best friend was quick to help, assuring you that once you got back to the office, you’d fall back into the routine.

“Did you have a good time?” He finally asked, albeit apprehensively. You didn’t leave on the best terms with anyone, and they all seemed to know what pushed you over the edge.

“I did. It’s amazing to know that there is a whole other world out there that we don’t even know about. It’s so different over there, Spence. It’s peaceful, and beautiful, and everything the place you call home should be.”

You could hear the intake of breath over the line. “Does that mean you’re moving to Spain?” A smile crossed your lips just thinking about Barcelona. But, it wasn’t home.

“This is my home, Spencer. I’m not leaving anytime soon.” You left out the part about contemplating a new life for the better part of three weeks, knowing it would only cause him more paranoia. You were staying in Quantico, continuing what you were born to do.

After drafting a rough profile and reviewing family statements, you took a break from the paperwork staring back at you all morning.

You made your way into the kitchen to find something for lunch, the afternoon approaching quick. All you really wanted to do was crash on the couch and watch old movies for hours, until monday morning inevitably rolled around. Selfishly you wanted your vacation to last forever. But your mind, and your bank account, thought differently.

After consuming a sandwich and some chips, you brought back the fresh mug of hot chocolate to the kitchen table, ready to take on the second file. Two women raped, tortured, and murdered outside of Miami. Why the fuck did it always have to be Florida.

Halfway through the family statements, there was a knock at your door. You grabbed your gun from the side table, just in case. Only three people had a key to your apartment. One of them was in England, one you just got off the phone with, and one… you didn’t exactly know where you stood with him.

After checking the peephole and seeing Hotch on the other side, you let out a sigh of relief. No one is coming to muder you. But it was quickly replaced with the memories of your last encounter, and the unspoken realization of feelings unrequited.

You placed your gun back on the table, and unlocked the door for him. He was wearing a navy blue quarter zip, jeans, and sneakers, the ultimate Aaron Hotchner not on duty look. It made your heart beat just a little faster noticing his hair was free of any gel, flopping naturally as he walked.

“Hi,” You greeted him, half of you hidden behind your front door.

A shadow of a smile crossed his lips, and he placed his hands in his pockets. “Hi. I’m sorry for stopping by unannounced. I know you must be tired and getting ready for Monday.”

“No, it’s okay. Did you want to come in?” You opened the door a little more, stepping out to show your sweatpants and sweatshirt look from behind the door.

“Thank you.” He murmured as he walked through the entrance, moving to take off his shoes. You told him a million times that you didn’t follow that rule, and that you hated it when people made their guests remove their shoes. But he told you once that it was a sign of comfort, that he felt at ease in someone else's home.

“Can I get you something to drink? I have some tea bags left over I think, or I can make you a cup of coffee.”

“No, I’m okay.”

“Are you sure? It’ll only take a second. Oh, are you hungry? I still have some sealed crackers from before I left, might have something in the freezer if-”

“Y/n,” He interrupted you and you stopped in the middle of your path to the kitchen. “I’m fine.”

“Okay,” You nodded, making your way back to the living room. “Oh, I um, got something for Jack while I was in England with Emily. I know it’ll probably keep him holed up in his room for a week, but I couldn’t resist.”

You pulled out the bag of souvenirs you got for the team, grabbing the London attractions lego set you bought for the young boy. Aaron smiled when you handed it to him, knowing the two of them would no doubt be starting this when he got home.

“You didn’t have to get this for him. But he’s gonna love it.”

“I know.” You reached in the bag once more, pulling out the gift you got for Aaron. “And I know you’ll probably never wear this, but I had to get it for you.”

He opened the box, a british flag tie on the inside. He couldn’t help the laugh that escaped his lips, the tacky gift really meaning a lot to him. “Thank you. I can honestly say this is the most unique gift I’ve ever received.”

“Glad to hear it.” You tucked your foot underneath you as you settled onto the couch, letting Aaron set the gifts aside. You knew what conversation was coming next, but you didn’t have the courage to start it. Especially since he was the one to come to you.

He settled in on the couch, a cushion between the two of you, a clear boundary that he’d set.

“Did you enjoy your time over there?”

“I had a really great time. I can’t believe I’d gone thirty two years without leaving the country. You don’t realize how much of the world there is to see until you go and uncover a small fraction of it.”

He smiled while beginning to pick at his fingernails. This was a new tell of his, he was usually extremely reserved with his anxiety. “You sound like Emily.”

“I’m going to take that as a complement.” You said with a small laugh, adoring the woman across the ocean.

“It is. She called me a few days ago, told me you guys had a nice visit.”

“We did. Prentiss knows how to have a good time no matter the city. It was a little too much for me, though.”

“Nobody can quite keep up with Emily.” He added before letting out a breath.

“She also told me that you were contemplating leaving the BAU.” There goes the first shoe, dropping from the ceiling. “Are you still thinking of quitting?”

“No.” It was the truth. Em had spoken some sense into you, and you knew deep down, like you told Spencer, this was your home. “I just needed a break from everything. And Europe was an amazing distraction. But I’m back, and ready to get back into the swing of things.”

He nodded, some tension slowly released from his shoulders. He couldn’t lose another member. It was too soon.

“Was it because of me?”

“What?” Even though you were expecting this conversation, it still caught you off guard.

“I’m not conceited enough to think you fled to another continent because of a fight, but is that what pushed you over the edge? What led you to want to quit the BAU?”

In a word, yes. The argument was the last straw on the camel's back. You’d spent years with this unit, fulfilling a destiny that you made up for yourself so that you wouldn’t feel guilty for not having a family or friends to confide in. You spent the better part of the last three years pining for a man you couldn’t have, trying to fill the holes in your life by playing pretend. So yes, it was Hotch that pushed you over the edge. But you learned a hell of a lot about yourself in those four weeks.

“Hotch, did you know that this was the first time I went on an airplane for my own enjoyment? This was the first vacation I’ve been on in my life. I booked a flight on a Thursday night that left at six a.m. the next morning. I was spontaneous, and in control of all the moves I would make for the next thirty days. I’ve never felt more liberated in my life.

“But then I landed in Copenhagen, and had an anxiety attack. I can’t speak Danish, I have no idea how to get around a new country, and I only had thirty dollars in cash to my name. And the only thing I could think of to help me get through it, was calling you. I had your contact pulled up, ready to call you and tell you what a stupid fucking mistake I made. But then I could hear your voice in my head, saying ‘I know you’, and I’d never turned my phone off faster.”

“Y/n,” He sounded exhausted himself, but you weren’t going to give in to the apologies. Not yet.

“I had the time of my life there. I went to places that I never thought I’d get to see in my life. Places that my foster parents told me I’d never be important enough to go to. But I made it. I made it to Giverny, and I saw what inspired Claude Monet to paint the Water Lilies series with my own eyes. I went inside La Sagrada Familia and walked on the steps that Gaudi dreamt of. I saw everything I wanted to, and I wept every place I went to. Because I got myself there. I persevered and worked my ass off my whole life, to get there. I didn’t have any parents, I didn't have any siblings, a spouse, or children. I did it all by myself, and it felt pretty amazing to accomplish that.

“No one knows me like I do.” You finished. Your walls were back up starting to feel secure in your own skin again.

He stayed silent for a few minutes, maintaining eye contact with you the entire time. He was calculating his response, trying to formulate the perfect response to get the two of you back on track. It was exhausting watching his brain work, and you wondered how tired he must always be.

After another minute, he sighed and dropped his hands into his lap. “Beth and I broke up two weeks before you left.” The other shoe had dropped.

“What?” For the second time tonight, you were rendered speechless by Aaron Hotchner. This was not the response you were expecting, and not the news you expected to hear anytime soon. The two of them were obsessed with one another, how could they just end it?

“We ended it two weeks before your trip. She accepted a job in Kyoto, and didn’t want to string me along with long distance. But she also said she knew my heart wasn’t in it anymore.”

You stood up from the couch, not being able to sit still with this new information. Hotch and Beth were no longer together, he said all those things to you as a single man, understood what you felt for him, and still let you walk out of his office. For four weeks.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” It was his turn to stand, still leaving enough distance between the two of you to continue your pacing.

“Don’t deflect to another conversation.”

“You’re the one that brought it up!”

He sighed, running a hand through his perfectly shaggy hair. “I don’t want to have this conversation with you again. So please, get it through your thick skull when I tell you that I know you. And I don’t mean that on a bureaucratic superior level. I know you, y/n. And just because you’ve been alone your whole life, doesn’t mean you deserve to be alone for the rest of it.”

Your eyes started to water, so you looked away, gluing your line of sight to the wall next to you.

“You give us all one hundred and ten percent of your attention when we need you. And when I say all of us, that includes Jack and Henry. I’ve never met someone so intune to another person's feelings, who exudes so much empathy with one look and a smile. And we’ve taken you for granted for seven and a half years. Me the most.” Your eyes found his brown ones, begging you to continue looking at him. “I couldn’t have gotten through Haley’s death without you. And that is the biggest understatement of the decade. I am eternally grateful for all that you’ve done for me and Jack. But at the same time, I’m so sorry that it pushed me further and further away from you.”

His own eyes started to water, and he choked out a laugh. “What you said to Kathryn Downey, about giving yourself completely to a person and not getting the love reciprocated. I felt like an absolute idiot for not realizing that you felt the same way I did.” You closed your eyes with his confession, letting the tears roll down your cheeks.

“There were so many times I wanted to tell you. But then Haley took Jack, and Foyet came, and the world got away from me. And I’m so sorry that you’ve felt the need to carry all our problems on your own.”

“Hotch, you don’t have to apologize.”

“Please, don’t call me Hotch right now.” He took a step toward you. “It’s Aaron, when I’m standing in front of you, begging you to just let me in.”

“I don’t,” Your voice cracked, and you rubbed your hands over your face in frustration. “I don’t know how to let someone love me.”

“I know,” He took another step closer. “You’re just going to have to trust me when I tell you I’ve been in love with you for years.”

He didn’t see the rest of your tears fall, because you threw yourself at him, wrapping your arms around his neck and burying your face in his shoulder. His arms found their place around your waist, pulling you two impossibly close.

“I love you, Aaron.” You could feel him laughing with his chest pressed against your own, and he moved to kiss the side of your head.

“I love you.” He whispered back, causing the last of your tears to fall onto his sweatshirt.

He started to pull away, just enough to get a look at your face. His eyes were no longer filled with tears, but his cheeks still glistened when the light illuminated the damp spots on his face. He brushed a piece of hair behind your ear, letting his knuckles gently graze your temple. You caught his hand in the middle of his movement, lacing your fingers with his own. You’d been dying to know what it felt like to hold his hand like this for years, when you found yourself comforting him in his office one night, lightly holding his hand in yours. But this was so much better.

“You good?” He asked, and the corners of your mouth turned up the slightest.

“I’m good.” He traced the lightest check mark on your laced hands, causing a true smile to grace your face.

“You have a tally to see who can make me smile the most?”

“It’s just mine. Been keeping it for years. But I’m always in the lead.”

You laughed while letting go of his hand, wrapping your arms back around his neck. His eyes flickered to your lips for a second before looking back at you. You gave him a small nod, knowing he was asking for your permission.

When his lips met yours, you knew this was the feeling that all the fairytales sang about. He was gentle at first, slotting your upper lip between his own. It was slow, and full of love from the years of knowing one another inside and out. He bit your lower lip softly, barely there, and you slowly parted your lips, letting him trace your tongue with his own.

All you could think about was how warm he was, how his breath was actively leaving his lungs and entering your own as if you were one person. It was all consuming, and you were grateful that he took the lead, because you couldn’t focus on anything but him.

His hands slipped under your sweatshirt, resting on the skin just above your hips. You let out a small gasp as his cold fingers made contact with the sensitive skin, but it only made him laugh into the kiss.

After a few more moments of getting lost in the feel of one another, you reluctantly pulled away, needing air to fill up your lungs. But Aaron didn’t go far, gently resting his forehead against your own.

“I love you. And I don’t think I’m ever going to be able to stop telling you.” You closed your eyes and tilted your head up, slowly kissing him again.

“I’ll never get sick of hearing it.” You mumbled, your lips still grazing his own. He smiled into the kiss, which only made your heart glow brighter and brighter the more he showed you how he felt.

You pulled away first, tracing the outline of his jaw with your thumbs. “You are the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” He tilted his head to the side, just enough to press a kiss to the palm of your hand.

The tenderness this man exudes is beyond belief. “I really love you, Aaron.”

He laughed while pressing a kiss to your forehead. “I’m glad to hear that.”

You let him hold you for what felt like an eternity, but in reality was only a few minutes. “I promised Jack I would take him out for ice cream to make up for missing his soccer game last night.”

“Okay,” You said and started to pull away, but his grip on your waist only tightened.

“Really? You’re just gonna let go without a goodbye?” You laughed at his fake hurt expression, so incredibly happy that you get to see Aaron in this light, enjoying his son, his life, and you.

“I’m not about to stand in the way of Jack Hotchner and a sugar rush. That guy loves his sugar.”

He let go of your waist, but not without a light squeeze to your sides. “I know we literally just started this, but I really would like to tell him. I don’t want to keep any more secrets from him than I have to.”

You smiled at the thought of Aaron telling Jack how in love the two of you were. It made you feel complete, in a way you never thought you’d get to experience in your life.

“Tell him. As long as he doesn’t blab about it to anyone on the team just yet.”

“You sure?” You nodded while passing him the souvenirs as he slipped his sneakers back on.

“Aaron, he’s your son. I’ve loved him as long as I’ve loved you, maybe even longer.”

He stood up once again, that stupid smile not willing to leave his face any time soon.

“I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”

“Must’ve been something pretty good.” You said with a laugh, which he silenced by placing his lips on yours. You hoped the butterflies you felt now would be there every time he kissed you, no matter how many years have passed.

“Like that.” You said once he pulled away. His dimples were showing now, and you wished that you could take a picture of him in this happy moment and remember it for the rest of your lives.

“I’ll call you tonight.” He said and opened the front door.

“Okay. Have fun, tell Jack I said hi.”

“I will.” He kissed your cheek before starting the walk back down the hallway. He didn’t even make it halfway before turning around, and giving you one final kiss in the doorway.

“Love you,” He said and gave you one more peck, before you shoved his shoulder. “I love you too. Now get outta here, Hotchner.”

****

tags: @simplyprentiss @michaelahah @ssahotchner99 @svrgicalhands @hotchtopic @unionjackpillow @philcoolson @tommhollandzxhaz @kathleenjasmine @canimarrypizzaornah @reaperwalking @inlovewithaaronhotchner @shelbymm11 @mrshotchner23 @tropicalwrites @averyhotchner @dreamy-moments @softhxtch @crazymar15 @theinsanespaceship15 @wecouldbreakthedistance @jeor @funnycuteandannoying @andherestograce @thisisntjuliana @captwilson @kennedyblair @lovelysunflowerxoxo @rcompton @iifaequeenii @iwaizumiee @mrsaaronh0tchner @abbeyannsmith-blog @becausehello @rinacriedpower @ssa-raye @ephemeral-barnes @slxtherinchxser @baueoud @lieswithoutfairytales @hug-a-bug-boo @blogmythoughts @freebanditghostcalzone @sugarbutterbailey

#aaron hotchner x female! reader #aaron hotchner x female!reader #aaron hotchner x reader #aaron hotchner fic #aaron hotchner imagine #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #jules writes shit ??

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blissfulalchemist · 3 years

Text

OC Profile Bloodlines

Tagged by @earthmightiest and @faithchel

TWC FC5

GENERAL

alias(es): Tia

gender: Female

age: 27

birthdate: December 1, 1990

place of birth: Santa Cruz, California

hometown: Santa Cruz, CA and the open road

spoken languages: English, some Greek and Latin (a better reader and knows more the rules on how to pronounce words), and Math

sexual preference: Heterosexual

occupation: Traveler, witch, trained dhampir, forever annoyance of Conner.

APPEARANCE

eye color: Hazel Green

hair color: Natural Black/Dark Brown

height: 5’9”

scars: No scars but plenty of tattoos (I just never want to put an artist through all the tiny ones and random places of them)

FAVOURITE

color: Sunset Orange and Sky Blue

hair color: Oil Slick style. Basically how she has it all the time.

eye color: No preference but currently pale blue grey 🥲

song: “Landslide” by Jackson Wooten

food: Sushi and Grilled Chicken(many flavors are greatly appreciated)

drink: Alcoholic is an Old Fashioned, Non-alcoholic would be smoothies, though please make sure the green ones are sweet please.

HAVE THEY

passed university: No

had sex: Yes

had sex in public: Yeah. I mean both in bathrooms and storage closets but she also lives out of a van so almost all encounters are sort of public.

gotten pregnant: No

kissed a boy: Yep

kissed a girl: She had to make sure so she did twice.

gotten tattoos: Oh yeah….she has soooooo many

gotten piercings: Just on her ears but she doesn’t always keep them.

been in love: Not until Conner actually.

stayed up for more than 24 hours: Almost. She always almost makes it but just misses the mark.

ARE THEY

a virgin: No

a cuddler: She can be

a kisser: Yes

scared easily: Not really no.

jealous easily: A little but Conner doesn’t give her much reason to be jealous.

trustworthy: Yes she is you can trust her but she holds some reservations about trusting other people.

dominant: Yes

submissive: No

in love: She is

single: Yes and no. She’s holding out for her man!

RANDOM QUESTIONS (tw for self harm/suicide mention)

have they harmed themselves: No

thought of suicide: No

attempted suicide: No

wanted to kill someone: Yes and is capable of doing so.

have/had a job: Yeah a lot of little side gigs.

have any fears: Yes. She fears never having something like home and of being used.

FAMILY

sibling(s): No.

parent(s): Lani Caro (mother, deceased), Unnamed Father (Soon for a name, Alive)

children: None

significant other: Conner eventually

pets: Paps the red tailed boa and Mesa the Aussie Shepherd

GENERAL

alias(es): Conner Endicott, Khakis, Smallville, Con Con, and other various nicknames

gender: Male

age: 30

birthdate: September 10, 1987

place of birth: Charlottenburg, Romania

hometown: Charlottenburg, Romania and Rexburg, Idaho

spoken languages: Fluent in Romanian, English, Greek, Latin, Italian, Russian. Partial (Could read it better): German, French, Spanish, Japanese, some Scandinavian

sexual preference: Bisexual

occupation: Local botanist/gardener, witch, undercover Alchemist, mafia lackey, Tia’s handler (the most important job he has)

APPEARANCE

eye color: Pale grey blue

hair color: Black

height: 6’3”

scars: A few minor burns along his hands can only really see them if you know where to look

FAVOURITE

color: Purple and like a dark sea foam green

hair color: Light Brown and Multi Color

eye color: Amber and Green

song: “But Not For Me” by Chet Baker and “Basket Case” by Green Day

food: Papanasi (homemade)

drink: Coffee though not too sweet and probably with a shot or two of espresso when needed. Alcoholic though he sticks more to clear liquors and mixed drinks with them.

HAVE THEY

passed university: No he got two years in though.

had sex: Yes

had sex in public: No. He’s not that kind of guy.

gotten pregnant: No

kissed a boy: Yes sir

kissed a girl: Yep

gotten tattoos: Yep. He’s got Along his left ribs: selfless in Georgian - უანგარო, peaceful in Armenian - խաղաղ, healing in Nordic Runes (Elder Furthark) - ᚺᛖᚨᛚᛁᛜ, Alchemy Symbols for Life and Death on the back just between his shoulder blades the highest point of the arcs connecting/interlocking (this was before he was forced to join so it’s a tad ironic)

gotten piercings: No

been in love: Yes

stayed up for more than 24 hours: His record is 76hrs

ARE THEY

a virgin: Nope

a cuddler: Yeah :’)

a kisser: Yes but sometimes you gotta initiate it and then it’s all over!

scared easily: He’s more paranoid then scared

jealous easily: A bit yes. He can get over it but he’s very cold shoulder type.

trustworthy: Not really….it’s a bit complicated. He only trusts three people entirely.

dominant: Yes

submissive: His anxiety allows for this but he’s stubborn when he wants to be.

in love: God yes!

single: Yeah he’s also waiting for Tia. :’)))

RANDOM QUESTIONS (tw for self harm/suicide mention)

have they harmed themselves: No

thought of suicide: No

attempted suicide: No

wanted to kill someone: Yes and no.

have/had a job: Yes, though he spent most of his working life helping mom out in her shop.

have any fears: Yes. He fears the undead (as one should), being deported as he’s pretty sure he and his mom are in the states illegally, and more develop as events happen.

FAMILY

sibling(s): None

parent(s): Zabine Enache (Mother, Alive), John Constantine (Father, Status Unknown) hush I’m aware but like it’s very possible he’s a real person in some capacity, Stasia (Ancestor, he is a direct descendant)

children: None

significant other: Tia eventually

pets: If Mesa could talk she would call herself his familiar but he’s yet to fully accept it.

GENERAL

alias(es): Stasia, Tana, and Stella

gender: Female

age: ~500 years old

birthdate: Unknown

place of birth: In what is now Lithuania

hometown: Unknown but not too far from Charlottenburg.

spoken languages: Lithuanian, Romanian, English, Russian, Ukrainian, German, there are many others that while not fluent she can hold basic conversations in or can better read than speak.

sexual preference: Not specified as she chooses to not use labels but if you had to she’d agree more with aromantic bisexual.

occupation: Witch, Strigoi leader, Boss Ass Bitch, CEO of a trading company with many small businesses.

APPEARANCE

eye color: Blue Green but more leans to blue

hair color: Black

height: 5’6”

scars: None thanks to her life extending spells.

FAVOURITE

color: Purple and White

hair color: Light Brown

eye color: Emerald Green

song: “Oxygan una Xacarilla” by Rafael Antonio Castellanos

food: More inclined to pork and anything Carly makes for her. Stews are fairly common

drink: Whiskey and Brandys. Also lattes with whipped foam.

HAVE THEY

passed university: Yes, in computer science

had sex: Yep

had sex in public: Yes not so much in modern times though

gotten pregnant: Yes

kissed a boy: Plenty

kissed a girl: Yeah Carly’s been her favorite.

gotten tattoos: Once but she healed it away. She got curious.

gotten piercings: Just her ears

been in love: No

stayed up for more than 24 hours: Yes. She makes many worldly visits.

ARE THEY

a virgin: No

a cuddler: No

a kisser: Sort of. She’s not in a relationship so she doesn’t all the time

scared easily: Hahaha Good luck.

jealous easily: She can be but it’s more situational and is an emotion that is pushed down.

trustworthy: No. Just….no.

dominant: Yes very much so.

submissive: Nope never really was.

in love: No not really

single: Yes

RANDOM QUESTIONS (tw for self harm/suicide mention)

have they harmed themselves: Yes but for spell work only.

thought of suicide: No

attempted suicide: Uhm kind of ish. She wanted to see how far her immortality would take her and tried to jump off a building.

wanted to kill someone: Yes and has done it many times over.

have/had a job: She makes her own jobs so yes.

have any fears: Being without her power, no control, and getting old with little to no legacy.

FAMILY

sibling(s): Sabine Enache (Identical Twin, Deceased) and two unnamed Brothers (Both Deceased)

parent(s): Unnamed Mother and Father both deceased.

children: Ozana Enache (Deceased), Zabine and Conner Enache (Direct descendants, Alive)

significant other: None (though you could put Carly under this label if you wanted)

pets: Her Strigoi lackeys

#hypatia caro oc #stasia e. oc #conner enache oc #tag games #oc profile

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busterkeatonfanfic · 3 years

Photo

Chapter 32

When Buster walked into Nelly’s apartment building, she was on the phone in the hallway. She turned her head at the sound of the door and said, “Oh!” He walked to her and tapped the thin brown paper box in his hands, drawing her attention to it. Inside was a big fat chocolate cake.

“No, it’s just Joseph,” she said to the person on the other line. He raised an eyebrow. “Well, I ought to get going now … Yes I’ll write soon … No, I haven’t yet. Yes, I will. I love you too. Goodbye.” She hung up the phone and turned to him with perplexity written across her face.

“Happy birthday,” he said. “Who’s Joseph?”

“Hush. Get inside before someone catches you standing there.”

Beneath the box was the Paul Whiteman Orchestra’s most recent record, “You Took Advantage of Me,” the one they’d performed during his first dance with Nelly last night, and inside the sleeve a photograph he almost hadn’t developed. He set both box and record on Nelly’s broken dining table, making a mental note to get her a new one one of these days. “How’s the birthday girl?” He turned back to her.

“Oh, just fine,” she said with a smile, although it looked a little strained to him. Her eyes were tired, a milder echo of the hangover he knew was also written across his face.

“Not very convincing,” he said, putting two fingers under her chin and tilting it. Her soft lips pulled his thoughts in a different direction, and her bedroom was west on the route. “Shouldn’t have kept you out so late or letcha drink so much.” He stroked her cheek and looked into her eyes.

She smiled again. This time, there was no question it was forced. His stomach did a mild flip as he recalled their liaison at the Villa a week ago in which he hadn’t used a thin. Maybe she was feeling sick because— He dismissed the thought. It was too early for that. While he wasn’t an expert on the finer points of the birds and the bees always, he was sure things didn’t go that fast. He cupped his hands over her shoulders and gave a little squeeze. “Say, what’s the matter? If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were sad it’s your birthday.”

She shook her head and shrugged. “I’m always sad on my birthday. When I was a girl, it was because I thought it never lasted long enough. I wanted a whole week of birthday. Now that I’m grown up, time goes too fast. I always wonder what I’ve got to show for all those years. Not much.”

“Aw, c’mon. You got plenty. Steamboat opens tonight and you’ve got that Barrymore picture too. And your play,” he said.

She smiled weakly again. “I suppose. Lately I have this feeling that everything I ever try just sort of drains out of my fingers, like water. Maybe it’s just middle age talking.”

“Oh, that’s all bull and you know it.” He kissed her forehead. He didn’t tell her he knew exactly how she felt, his marriage and career in pictures like water through his fingers. Instead, he just said, “You ain’t middle-aged, either.”

“Look where you were when you were twenty-seven, though. You were on top of the world. You were—” She stopped and thought, brow furrowed. “Help me out,” she said with a laugh, when nothing apparently came to her.

He did some quick math. His twenty-seventh year would have spanned 1922 and 1923. Day Dreams, The Balloonatic, and The Love Nest all came out around then. It had all been films in those glorious years, barely a moment’s rest between shooting and cutting. They did The Three Ages in ‘23 he was pretty sure, and they’d definitely done Our Hospitality. Jimmy was still very much a baby and Bobby went from a twinkle in his parents’ eyes to a person whose kicks could be felt through Natalie’s stomach by the time his papa’s twenty-eighth birthday came around in October. There’d been a house in there too, but he struggled to remember which one.

“Doing my first full-length features,” he said, wandering over to the sofa and sitting on the arm. “That was the year we did Three Ages and Our Hospitality. Went to Oregon for parts of Hospitality. We built a real Stephenson’s rocket for it—that was the train. Back then they’d just hook a few coaches to an engine. Stagecoaches I mean.”

“Was that the one with your wife? And it was a little like The General?” said Nelly, sitting on the opposite arm of the sofa.

“Well, not too much like The General,” he objected. “The story’s different. Much different. But yeah, Nate was the leading lady in that one and I grew my hair out for that one too.”

“You must love her very much,” she said politely, giving that same small sad smile.

Understanding hit. He could guess why she’d seemed so sad when she left last night and why she was sad now. They were at a crossroads. Ambling along the path of their affair, he hadn’t seen it coming up this soon. He wasn’t sure he was ready for it. It meant deciding whether to change direction or keep walking along in the same one. Feeling his heart in his throat, he stood back up and went back to the table. He wanted a cigarette. “Aren’t you wondering what’s in the box?”

“Is it cake?” she said.

“Palazzo Bakery. You only get a piece if you guess the flavor though,” he said. He went to fetch a long knife and some plates from the kitchen as Nelly called, “Chocolate!”

He laughed. “Lucky guess.”

At the table, he cut a big slice for each of them. “You forgot the forks,” she said, as he handed her a plate. He set his own plate on the side table and lifted her slice of cake between his fingers and held it to her lips. She giggled and took a bite, getting chocolate icing all over her mouth.

“Guess I'll go get those forks,” he said, planting a big kiss on her chocolatey lips and licking the sweetness from his own as he went back to the kitchen for forks.

Nelly gave a sigh of contentment when she set aside her empty plate. “I could almost go for another.”

“You oughta since it’s your birthday,” he said, taking his last bite.

“Twenty pounds, remember?” she said. She had a straight face, but he could tell she was teasing.

He set aside his plate and jumped on top of her, bouncing her back against the sofa cushions. “Okay, if you wanna bring that up again I’ll make you laugh the weight off.” He tickled her ribs as she squirmed and shrieked and tried to fight him off. He pinned her wrists by her hip with one hand and used the other to assault her underarms and waist.

“Stop!” she said, laughing. “Uncle!”

As soon as he made the amateur mistake of letting go of her wrists, she turned on him, dancing her fingers over his stomach so fast he was caught off guard. He was laughing too hard to grab her hands. Then, as quick as the assault had happened, it was over and Nelly was pulling him on top of her in a heap.

“Mmmmm,” she said, chuckling and rubbing her nose into his throat.

“Mmm?” he said. He tugged on a strand of hair that had come free of her chignon.

“Mmm,” she said. She ran her hand through his hair and upset his hat, which she flung to the floor.

The image of a crossroads floated through his mind again, unbidden. To drive it out, he put his hand under her dress and fiddled with the strap of her garter. She sighed as he unhooked the forward part of her stocking and slipped his hand around to the back of her thigh to undo the other. He did the next two clasps using two hands, and drew off the stockings slowly, appreciating the shape of her legs. She seldom shaved her legs and he liked the hair there, faint brown and baby-fine. For his next trick, he reached back under her skirt and slid a hand inside the leg of her knickers until he found her bare hip. She murmured. He wanted to take her mind off the crossroads too. He stroked her hip with his fingertips, teasing. Slowly, slowly, he slid his fingers into her pubic hair. The hangover that had been beating inside his head was forgotten as all his concentration went to one of his favorite pastimes. He trailed his fingers first over her mound, then down each of her outer lips. Nelly gave a quavering moan. He wouldn’t touch her where she wanted to be touched, though. He circled back to her mound and she pressed her hips forward to receive more of his touch.

“It’s your birthday, you get to call the shots. What do you want?” he said. He drew two fingers down both her lips simultaneously and looked at her face, watched her mouth part. Her only answer was a soft, feminine moan that ratcheted up his own arousal. He withdrew his hand from her knickers and stretched his body on top of hers, making sure that she could feel his erection.

“What do you want?” he asked again, pressing against her.

“You,” she said, opening her eyes a slit.

“Specifics?” he said. He wanted to do what would make her happiest.

“Oh Bus, just fuck me. Please.”

She’d never, ever used that word before. It reduced him to a stick of dynamite with a lit fuse. He stood up to get rid of his pants and drawers, while Nelly pulled up the skirt of her dress and peeled down her white cotton knickers. He’d never put on a prophylactic so fast.

“Don’t hold back,” she said, seeking out his eyes as he put a knee onto the sofa. “I want to be ravished.”

He took his prick in hand and guided the tip into her. He had to think of something else for the first few breaths. Eddie Sedgwick’s face came to mind and that worked. He slid all the way inside her, now not in immediate danger of coming but still not far out of peril. “Give me a minute,” he said, hands gripping her bare knees. He thought of unsexy, ordinary things: the side of bacon he’d had with breakfast, changing the tire of Jingles’ car with him, a new pair of rubber waders he’d bought for fishing. After a minute, he was able to get back down to business. He slid his hands over her thighs and began to make love to her in steady strokes, watching the way her brow creased and her nostrils flared. “This good?”

“Will you go faster?” she said, her hands encircling his wrists. She pulled him flush on top of her.

He laid as flat as he could get, elbows on the sofa cushion and hands over the crown of Nelly’s head, and gave her all he was worth.

“Oh yes. Yes, yes,” she said, the pitch of her voice rising. She sounded desperate. “Harder.”

No amount of contemplating Jingles’ tire could have held him back now. He bore down on her as fast and hard as he could go, and his orgasm came just as quick and hard, one of the best he could remember having. He was aware they were both shouting loud enough to alert every damned neighbor in the building, but he couldn’t help it. He stayed inside her until every residual pulse of pleasure was gone before he pulled out. His muscles went slack and he was surely crushing her, lying on her like he was, but she didn’t complain. He wasn’t aware of falling asleep. The slamming of another door in the apartment building woke him and he startled. He pulled himself to his elbows. “Shit. Didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

Nelly, though, was also blinking awake. “What’s the time? You’ve got to get to the premiere,” she said.

He looked at his wristwatch. They’d only been out ten minutes. “Oh, that’s still a few hours away.” It was only half past four, and the premiere wasn’t until nine.

“How do you think it will go?” she said.

He climbed off of her and went into the kitchen area to dispose of the prophylactic. “Keep thinking it’ll have to be a smash. I said it before, that ending’s second only to The General.”

Nelly disappeared into the bathroom, but didn’t close the door. “Hmm,” she said. He picked up his pants, pulled the handkerchief out of the pocket, and wiped himself off. He was dressed when she returned and smoking a cigarette on the sofa.

“Hmm?” he prompted.

She shrugged. “I think so too, but I don’t have the least bit of experience with audiences. Or critics.”

“Sure you do. Don’t your plays get reviewed?”

“Oh,” she said. “I never thought of comparing them to pictures. They’re so different, aren’t they? The critics were usually on the same page as us and the audience for the most part. The only one that got us panned was Processional.” She stopped to pick up her knickers and began to put them on. “The director was in love with it. Mr. Zweigle. We knew from the get-go the audiences would hate it. It was very—what’s the word. Avant-garde? Abstract? Went whooshing straight over their heads and we ended the run early. It really didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me either. Maybe it would have played better in New York City. I don’t see what’s not to like about Steamboat, though.”

“My production man tried telling me the people whose folks had died in floods would cause trouble for me, that’s why we switched to the cyclone idea,” said Buster. “What I don’t understand is that more lives are lost each year to cyclones. I guess we might get panned there.”

“It will go fine. Everyone will love it,” Nelly said, sitting next to him.

He put an arm around her shoulder, feeling comforted. “Why don’t you go put on the new record I got you?” he said. He’d remembered the extra birthday gift.

She frowned. “You shouldn’t have gotten me another record. You got me a whole band last night.”

“Blah blah blah,” he said, waving her off.

She glared at him in mock anger, but went to put the record on the phonograph that sat on top of her desk. She changed the needle and slid the record from its sleeve. The photograph slipped to the floor as he’d expected it would. He wanted to warn her about it before he left. “What’s this?” She picked it up and turned it over, and her face reddened. “I didn’t think you’d really develop that,” she said, laying it on the desk.

“Just see you don’t leave it lying around for Bradmont or Mr. Hernandez or whoever to see,” he said. He’d never given a girl a naked photo of himself before and wasn’t in love with the notion, but he had so many wicked photos of her now it had seemed only fair to trade her one of him.

“Bradford,” Nelly corrected. “I owe the night to him. He was very good to me.”

Buster still thought she’d been over-cautious bringing Bradford along but didn’t see the point in arguing it. “Who’s Joseph?” he said, since they were on the subject of names.

She blushed as she placed the record into the phonograph. “You. I was trying to get Mother off the phone one day and told her I had a date, but it was the wrong thing to say because then she asked what his name was and said Joseph. It just came out. Now she thinks I’ve got a beau named Joseph.”

“Well you do. Strictly speaking, my name is Joseph.”

Nelly bit her lip, her back to him as she pulled out the arm of the record. The phonograph scratched and hissed to life. Horns and strings rang out. Next to the real Paul Whiteman Orchestra, the recording sounded subdued.

“Charlie Chaplin said he’d see me this week,” Nelly said. “I told him I worked in the prop department at United Artists and he said he’d have to change that.”

He wondered why the change of subject. “That’s good. Ain’t it?” he said, raising his voice to be heard over the music. Charlie had the habit of promising things he had no intention of giving, but he wasn’t going to set her straight.

“I suppose. Shouldn’t I feel more thrilled?” She came and sat on the sofa next to him.

He stubbed his cigarette into the cracked saucer she kept on the side table for him. “Should you?”

“My heart isn’t in Twelfth Night either,” she said fretfully. “At first I thought it was because I didn’t get Viola. You know, because I’ve done Maria before and I don’t have to work so hard to learn the lines. It’s not much of a challenge. Then I thought, I work so much maybe I’m just too tired to do a play right now.”

He noticed her picking the skin around one of her fingers. “What are you saying?”

“Let’s just dance,” she said, grasping his hand.

He stood up and put both hands on her waist. From the phonograph, the singer with the funny name crooned, I’m a sentimental sap that’s all, what’s the use in trying not to fall?

His hangover was placated that evening by two glasses of whiskey before the premiere, which reunited three-fourths of the guest list from his party the night before, Chaplin, Lloyd, Fairbanks, Pickford, and so forth. From their faces, Buster could tell they felt about as wrung-out as he did. Only Natalie didn’t seem hungover, although it hardly mattered. She was so sulky he began to wonder if Nelly’s mood was catching.

With the theater favorably packed with his friends and fellow actors, Steamboat was guaranteed to be a smash hit. That said, Buster could tell fake laughter from real belly laughs. Steamboat’s reception was real. The men in particular found the cycle sequence howlingly funny. The scene with the house drew a collective gasp that satisfied him to his core. Natalie laughed little. He couldn’t figure it out, but was determined not to let her sulkiness get under his skin and basked in everyone’s praise afterwards. There were shoulder claps and back pats galore. Finally he was back to delivering hits again and could go to Irv and tell him to sack the army of writers. It was that thought he slept on that evening.

When he woke up the next morning, the hangover had disappeared and he felt more cheerful than he had in days. He whistled “Daisy Bell” as he dressed. It wasn’t until he’d gotten downstairs that he sensed danger. Natalie was waiting for him in the breakfast room but there was no breakfast on the table. She’d been crying. Her eyes were puffy and she wasn’t wearing any makeup.

“What’s this about?” he said.

Her voice trembled. “We need to talk.”

The four worst words a woman could say to a man. “Okay,” he said, putting his hand on the back of a chair and preparing to sit down.

“I don’t want the help hearing.” She stood up.

He caught her elbow as she came around the table. The crook of her small arm was hot and moist. Dread had replaced hunger in his stomach. They headed for the living room. When he stepped into it and saw Constance and Norma sitting on the sofa with tight, cold expressions, he knew right away what it was about. Constance stood and took Nate from him. Natalie was tucked between her sisters like a chick between mother hens. Buster sat in the armchair diagonal to them, feeling out of his body.

“How’d you find out?” he said. Outwardly, he was calm. Inwardly, his pulse was hammering.

Constance curled a protective arm around Natalie as Natalie dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.

“It’s been going around a couple weeks, that you’ve had a girl at your bungalow,” said Norma. She twisted a handkerchief between her fingers, but was not crying and did not look as though she planned to.

He tried to remember who knew. Caruthers didn’t count; he’d been entrusted with more sordid details than the affair with Nelly. Louise Brooks and George Marshall knew. From what Nelly had said, Eddie Sedgwick. It must have gotten out through Eddie. He pulled his pack of cigarettes from his pocket and extracted one, concentrating on every detail. It gave him the excuse not to look the Talmadges in the faces for a few moments.

“Norma said you wouldn’t be stupid enough to bring her to the party,” Constance said, voice full of scorn. “I said you would.” Her eyes blazed. “I was right.”

Nestled between her sisters, Natalie sniffled. Even if there had been rumors, he didn’t know how they’d connected him to Nelly specifically. As if anticipating this question, Norma said, “Dutch followed you when you left the party last night.”

“That girl?” Buster said. “No. She’s got a boyfriend.” He didn’t think the lie would get him anywhere, it just came out before he could stop it.

Constance laughed. “That preposterous boy she was with? You could tell from a mile away he doesn’t favor girls.”

He lit the cigarette. He’d forgotten he was holding it. As he took the first drag, he started to formulate a strategy. He would willingly accept whatever punishment they meted out and from now on be more careful with Nelly: no parties, no more overnights at the bungalow, no more being gone for stretches longer than two hours. He avoided looking at Natalie. That chewing guilt was working at him again and he didn’t want to fall into that endless circle of trying to figure out where their marriage had gone wrong. It was her fault things were this way. No, his. No, hers. No, his.

He looked at his sisters-in-law. “So?”

“You know the rules, Bus,” Norma said gently. She looked sad.

He hated the feeling that he was letting her and Dutch down as much as Natalie. He tried not to show it. Blowing out a cloud of smoke, he said, “So I got a little careless. I’ll keep it under wraps from now on.”

Norma shook her head. “You got attached.” When Nate had decided on separate bedrooms and he’d gone to Peg to declare to her that he intended to have his needs satisfied come hell or high water, she had agreed—with the smallest of conditions: keep it discreet, don’t get attached, don’t spend any money.

“Even if I do care for her a little, so what?” he said. “I’ve hardly spent a dime on her. She don’t want that. Told me from the beginning no satin and pearls.” It felt strange to bring Nelly out in open conversation after hiding her for so long.

“You don’t understand,” said Constance. Her eyes sparked.

He looked at Natalie, wedged under Norma and Dutch’s shoulders. He wanted to see how she felt about all of this. She refused to meet his eyes, though, only looked down and wiped at her eyes with her handkerchief.

He scoffed. “Understand what? I get it, it’s an interrogation. I’ve done a lowdown, mean thing to my wife. You want me to apologize and make amends. Well I’m sorry.” As soon as he said it, he was sure he wasn’t. He was only sorry he was careless and they’d caught him. “I have needs. You can’t expect me to go without. Don’t know why we keep going in circles about this.”

Constance reached behind her and flung several pieces of paper at him. Some landed on the coffee table and others on the floor. His brain took a moment to catch up with his eyes. Nelly was staring at them all from the photographs, breasts fully bared, clearly sitting in the Keaton bathtub. In a solitary photo, there he was holding a towel in front of his prick, gazing at the girl behind the camera lens. His heartbeat trilled like a military drum. The last he’d seen those photos, they’d been in his bedside table drawer. He hadn’t bothered hiding them. He hated that his private, intimate moment with Nelly was now seared into the Talmadge girls’ minds. He felt like a scolded, whipped little boy. As with his parents when he was a tot, he knew that nothing he could say to them would convince them that he had a side too. So he didn’t say anything. He looked down at the photos, then up at them. He was grateful for the blank pan that came so easily.

Now Norma stood up and did a funny thing. She gathered all the photos, squared them like a stack of cards, and put them in the little leather handbag at her feet. “I’m sorry,” she said. She did really look sorry as her eyes searched his. “You know the rules. I made some calls this morning. She’s no longer working for United Artists.”

“Huh?”

“We had her fired,” said Constance. She looked smug and triumphant.

Buster sat upright. “You did what?”

“She simply cannot work in pictures any longer. I’m sorry,” said Norma.

“You’ve got no right to do that,” he said, voice rising. “She didn’t do none of this. It was all me. Why’s she getting all the blame?”

“That slut knew you were married,” Constance said. “She oughta have seen it coming.”

He stood up. The cigarette seared his fingers and he dropped it, shaking his hand. It had burnt down without him noticing. “Don’t you call her that word,” he said. “She ain’t like that.”

“I call ‘em like I see ‘em,” said Constance. The expression on her face dared him.

“Buster, the cigarette,” said Norma.

He dared. “You’re the one who’s the slut,” he shot at Constance. “Buster, Jack, Michael, Ricky—want me to go on?”

Constance just smiled. “I’m not fooling around with married men. Nor am I married.”

“Pick up the cigarette, c’mon,” Norma said. “The carpet, you’re ruining the carpet.”

“Yeah? What about Norma? She’s married. She’s going outside her marriage.” He knew even before the protests were out of his mouth that they’d make no difference. The only thing that mattered to them was Natalie. As long as Natalie had been wronged, he could object until the cows came home. He picked up the smoldering butt and ground it out on the coffee table, daring them again.

“Sit down,” said Norma. Again, her voice was gentle. “I’m sorry, but Natalie comes first. You must tell this girl that it’s over.” “Nelly. Her name’s Nelly.” They must have known her name if they were able to find out where she worked, but it still felt fitting to say it out loud. This was a person they were talking about, not a chess piece to be moved off the board.

“Please tell Nelly it’s over,” Norma said. She looked apologetic.

Buster looked at Natalie. Her head was still down. He wanted to barter with her. Let me keep seeing her. What do you care anyway as long as you have your furs and your fancy parties? He looked at Constance who had a half-smirk on her face, like she knew something he didn’t.

“If I don’t?” He could already tell by the look on Constance’s face that they had him checkmated. He just didn’t know how yet.

“We’ll go to Mr. Mayer with the pictures. It’s as simple as that,” Norma said. She twisted the handkerchief.

He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You’re kidding. You’d ruin my career over something like this?”

“It’s you who’s ruining it, not us,” said Constance.

“What would happen to Nate then, huh? What’d happen to this house? All the parties?” He refused to accept that they’d pull the pin over something so trivial. If there was one thing he was sure Natalie did like about him, it was his handsome paychecks.

Between her sisters, Natalie began to cry audibly.

“We’ll take care of Natalie and the boys,” Constance said, with a dismissive wave.

He considered it. They were both still successful in pictures. It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility.

“Just tell her it’s over,” Norma encouraged. “We don’t want to go that far.”

He knew too, sure as he knew anything, that they’d make sure Nate got more than her fair share in a divorce. She’d get the house, the kids, and whatever alimony could be squeezed out of him after he was ruined. He felt frozen. Nelly would take him even down-and-out; her line about diamonds and satin wasn’t a bluff. He just didn’t know if he could live with himself knowing he had messed up her career and he couldn’t offer her a darned thing with his gone too. It was selfish, but he didn’t want to give up everything he’d worked so hard for either, the plum gig at M-G-M, the Villa, and most of all his boys.

“Alright. I’ll tell her.”

Checkmate. King vanquished. Three queens crowned. Note: Well, you saw this coming, didn’t you? I feel I’ve been rather harsh to Natalie in this chapter, but remember, we’re only getting Buster’s perspective here since none of the story is written from Natalie’s POV. Who knows if Buster really felt so cynically toward Natalie either. I suspect not. He seems to have had a soft spot for her even after their divorce. She did like her material comforts, but as he says in his autobiography, so did he. I’ll probably go back to a biweekly posting schedule again, so look for Chapter 33 the weekend of the 18th.

#Buster Keaton #Fan fiction #RPF #Actor RPF #Golden Age Hollywood #Silent film

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zinnia-the-rabbit · 3 years

Text

Bakudeku oneshot: How could I forget someone like you...?

•No au•

•Fluff•

•Basic explanation: Izu gets hit by a quirk that that makes him forget the person loves the most•

This is a looonngg one, so it's gonna be in two parts!

🧡💚🧡💚🧡💚🧡💚🧡💚🧡💚🧡💚🧡💚

•°•"K-kacchan, wait! You're running way to fast!"

" Shut the fuck up, Deku! Just hurry the fuck up! We need to stop this god-damned bastard!"

Izuku looked around as he ran behind Katsuki. Screams here and there as they ran. No, not those of pain, but of fear.

There was debris everywhere. Destruction and fire any place you look. Smoke blocked their view, only being able to see about six feet ahead of them.

The league of Villains had attacked again..this time, they had new recruits.. they were way stronger than the last times they attacked.. though, they league didn't try to kill anyone exactly..

They just started destroying buildings, causing mass panic..

Katsuki and Izuku were busy chasing one specific member of the league. His name was Forgetmenot. Like the flower. No one had any idea why.. considering he was a new villain.

They were only chasing him because he attacked Kirishima. And it pissed Katsuki off.

I think we all know why..

Now, Katsuki and Kirishima have never said they were together.. but c'mon! Do they think their friends are all that stupid!?

"There he is, the fucking bastard!" Katsuki shouts, speeding up.

Forgetmenot was a bit taller than Katsuki, and had a better build too. He had jet black hair with pastel pink streaks going through it. A sharp, attractive jawline and pearly white teeth. His skin was pale. Very pale.

But, the thing that stood out the most..his eyes.

They were an amazingly beautiful baby blue, his pupils a bright yellow.. just like a blue Forgetmenot.. but, just because your eyes resemble something, doesn't mean you make that your title!

So, it had to be something to do with his quirk..?

"K-kacchan! Wait! I don't think you should try to fight him when we don't know what his quirk is-!"

Too late. He already starting attacking him.

Izuku couldn't really tell who was who as they both ran further into the smoke. He tried keeping up.

When he finally caught up, Forgetmenot was standing a few feet away from Bakugou, a glow coming from his hands.

It was all pastels. Pinks, purples, blues. It was absolutely breathtakingly beautiful!

Just as the villain was about to blast Bakugou with the mesmerizing colors that emitted from his palm, Izuku jumped in the way, ignoring the calls for him to stay back.

He took a painful blow to the chest, falling back against Katsuki.

He started coughing violently, seeing the pale male starting to flee. Izuku went to stand, but a sharp pain shooting through his back and chest held him in place.

"Deku! I told you not to get in the fucking way! I said stay back!"

Izuku looked looked up at the boy he had fell onto, though his eyes were very blurry from the pain, tears rolling down his cheeks.

"You fucking idiot!"

He let his eyes close, feeling sleepy.

"Don't you fucking dare, Deku!"

He opened his eyes for another second, before starting to doze off again.

"Deku, if you fucking die, I swear to God!"

He looked up to see an ash blonde he didn't recognize.

"I-i'm sorry...who are you..?"

The last thing Izu saw was those piercing red eyes widen with shock and sadness before letting sleep consume him...•°•

~•°•~Izuku~•°•~

Beep......beep......beep...... beep......

I woke up with the worst migraine I've ever had. My chest burned and my arms and legs felt so weak..

When I opened my eyes I immediately had to close them. All I seen was white. Bright, blinding white. I blinked away the pain before being able to look around.

A hospital room..?

Beep......beep......beep......beep......

I tried to sit up, but the aching in my body held me restrained, captive against the bed.

I looked over and seen I had an IV on my right wrist. Both of my arms had cuts and bruises. Nothing too serious. They'd heal in a few days..

I finally forced myself to get up, letting out a pained hiss as I did.

Beep......beep......beep......beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-

The heart monitor started going off as I took the finger clip thingie off my middle finger.

My eyes shot up to the door as it slammed open.

My mom and a nurse rushed into the room. They both seemed relieved.

"Izuku, my baby! Are you ok!?" She rushed over and hugged me, which I happily returned her warm embrace.

She started sobbing in my shoulder.

"Izuku, Izuku, my poor baby! Are you ok?!"

"M-mom, I'm fine..my chest and back just hurt really bad.. what happened..?" I asked as I rubbed her back.

" You were hit by a quirk, dipstick! I told your fuck ass to stay back! But, no! You just had to jump in front of me, Deku!"

I looked up at an ash blonde with spikey hair, who I didn't know, walk into the room. He had beautiful red eyes that were narrowed at me. He had a sharp jawline,and a pretty impressive build.. he was also way taller than me.

"Wh-who are you..?"

His eyes twitched as he started walking twords my bed.

"Cut the shit, Deku! You know exactly who I am! It's me, Katsuki! Or, as your bitch ass calls me, 'Kacchan'!" Katsuki shouts.

" I-i don't know anybody named Katsuki! And I've never called someone Kacchan?! I have no idea what you're talking about!" I protested. I know I looked scared. I was. There was a complete stranger walking twords me.

"Izuku, honey..how could you not know Katsuki..? You've both been friends since you were five.." My mom said, almost in shock.

Since we were...five...?

After a few hours I finally got discharged from the hospital. The doctors told my mom why I only forgot who Katsuki is.. though I still couldn't believe that I actually knew the guy.

When I asked her what the doctors said, she said she couldn't tell me..that I might freak out with the new information..

I was forced to stay home until my injuries healed. That took about a month..

So, during that time, I wasn't allowed to go UA... No training.. No going to see my friends.. I couldn't even go to the store.. just stay home..

Kacchan came by everyday, though. He would bring me my work, and even his own so we could work together. He even came by on the weekends just to hang out.

According to Uraraka, he was really bummed out that I forgot who he was.

She said his usual mean and outrageous behavior had almost ceased to exist.

She said that instead of yelling at everyone ,he would barley even talk at all. Instead of calling his friends by the rude nicknames he had given them, he was calling them by their real names.

"I asked him about it..",she had said during one of our many phone calls.

"He said he just couldn't understand why you had only forgotten him.. the person you've know your whole life.. he said it hurt him.. he wouldn't tell me why though.."

"Didn't you say that he was always really mean to me?" I asked, jotting down an answer to a math problem I was working on.

"Mhm!", Ochaco hummed back.

There was a knock on my front door. Kacchan had come over to sudy.

I stood up from my seat in the kitchen, walking twords the door.

"If he was so mean and hateful twords me, why should he care that I forgot him...?"

I heard Uraraka hum in thought as I opened the door and let Kacchan walk in. He seen I was on the phone so he just walked into the kitchen. I closed the door, and followed behind him.

"I dunno, Deku... maybe... maybe he was just acting that way? Maybe he just.. didn't want you to know he actually liked you?"

"...that makes a bit of sense, I guess.."

I sat across from Kacchan, him already flipping through the pages of his math book to find the assignment we were supposed to work on.

"Well,I gotta go, Uraraka. Kacchan is here to work on our math. I'll talk to you later." I smiled, seeing Kacchan glare at my phone.

"Alright! Have fun, Deku! Love you!"

"Love you too, Ura." We both made a little kiss noise before I hung up and put my phone on the table.

"Really? Talking to fucking mochi cheeks, when you could be talking to me?" Kacchan huffed, crossing his arms over his chest. He was basically pouting.

"Don't act so jealous." I giggled.

He stared ranting about how he wasn't jealous, and how he just thought it was rude I was ignoring him, the guest...

I rolled my eyes and found myself lost in thought.

How Could I Forget Someone Like You...?

#bakudeku fluff #bakudeku fanfic #bakudeku #bakudeku fic #bakugou fluff #bakugou fanfiction #bakugou fic #bnha deku #bnha bakugou #deku fic #deku fanfic #deku fluff #bnha fanfiction #bnha fic

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b4kuch1n · 4 years

Text

The Future Is In Space! (and so is the rest of you)

Okay, so. Gordon should’ve seen this coming.

And he did, to be fair: Joshua’s always loved space. Joshua loved the idea of flying cars when he was a tiny little thing, if the fact that all of the toy cars he had were thrown with intense force at one point or another meant something, and he clapped at the night sky once when Gordon got them both stuck at a gas station in the middle of nowhere due to… circumstances… which was super, ultra, uber cute as fuck . Especially because Gordon had just applauded him for singing along to a song on the radio when they parked, and that was very possibly the first time Joshua registered clapping as a possible positive reaction to something he likes, or whatever like that. Gordon Freeman has a PhD in theoretical physics and theoretical physics only.

The point is that Gordon loves Joshua so fucking much. No, the point is that Joshua has always liked space. He chose for himself a set of space-themed PJs when Gordon took him to the mall, and he likes food with weird colors because that’s “alien food”, and he has given away all of the toy cars he had to make space for toy space ships of many sizes, and Gordon has had to have a conversation with him once about upending a dusty fish bowl onto his own head so he could look like an astronaut. He doesn’t do that anymore, because Joshua is genuinely a really smart kid who just needs the required pieces of information to put things together by himself.

Gordon loves him so much.

Gordon also has only experienced a single year of relatively radiation-free, sludge-free, organic, non-Black Mesa- poisoned air and also freedom (to an extent) since. You know. Almost dying and also losing his right arm in Black Mesa. Where he jumped into a few portals, one of which leading to an alien world called Xen, where he had to kill what seemed to him at the time a spiteful god against his own existence.

That, and not the Joshua-loves-space part, is the part he didn’t see coming. Hadn’t. Still doesn’t, if he can be honest for a minute. There are days it still doesn’t feel real, just to contrast nicely with the days when what’s left of his right arm and his right shoulder hurt, and days when power outage hit unexpectedly and the lights went out without warning, and days when he fights to not let some stupid fucked up slights against him go because that’s just how the world is that’s how things are now keep your head down and don’t think Gordon just shoot just let your trigger finger pull itself in you are in a comedy of error a laugh track a monkey on a leash just dance just move your feet j

Hey, no digging your heels in there. Throw yourself off your rhythm, Gordon. Joshua. Joshua loves space. Joshua is going to an elementary school now. Joshua just came home from a “career” day, and the parent invited to speak is a retired astronaut.

Joshua said: “I wanna be an astronaut when I grow up!”

Joshua likes numbers. Somewhat. He’s not averse to them, at the very least, and homework’s kind of bullshit from the concept to the execution but when Gordon and Tommy and Coomer sit down to keep him engaged while he does it he has fun with math homework. He likes video games, he likes the puzzles in the youth magazines they signed up for at his school, he likes messing with shape blocks and pulls out some cool combinations Gordon doesn’t see coming sometimes. Joshua is a smart kid that enjoys a fair challenge. Joshua is totally astronaut materials.

Joshua is going to space.

Joshua is absolutely going to space.

Xen is, coincidentally, also in space.

Gordon is calm. He totally has a good poker face. He performs well under pressure, especially very specific types of pressure, e.g. when there are rules in place he can cling to and ground out an appropriate plan of action. He could improvise a presentation in class in a pinch, because he knew what presentations are and what he’s been working on and what the teacher expected. He could jimmy his car out of an ice patch, because he knew how cars work and how ice acts. He can smile and say “That’s great, Joshie! You just gotta work hard for it, and then you’ll be in space in no time.”

Gordon has an image he can provide to show how he feels.

[Picture ID: a drawing of Gordon Freeman standing in front of his son Joshua, cut off at their chest. Gordon is a tall man, a bit heavyset, with tan skin and mid-back length, messy curly brown hair that’s greyed at his temples due to stress from surviving the hellhole that is Black Mesa and Xen. He’s wearing his comfortable worn-and-faded t-shirt, which is orange with a very faded graphic printed on the front. Joshua is a young boy with brown skin and short dark curly hair, brown eyes that’s brimming with light and happiness, and a wide happy smile. He’s wearing a light green t-shirt. Gordon is smiling at him, with another shot of his face enlarged and superimposed on the drawing right next to his head. This Gordon is screaming. This Gordon is screaming his heart out, and his face is scrunched up while his mouth opens wide, and he’s screaming a silent scream and he will never stop.]

---

Contrary to how it appears to everyone, Benrey doesn’t live full time at the Freemans’.

Well. He does “sleep” there. If he actually sleeps. That’s one of the questions that Gordon has had ever since Black Mesa that he never got to or bothered to ask, and then when they had to defeat Benrey in the final boss fight he thought that was it with his chance to ever ask. And then Benrey came back and the situation took a hard left into throw-the-whole-suitcase-out awkwardness and Gordon thought it better to never bring those questions up ever again. It’s. Ongoing. Like his climb back into being a normal, mostly law abiding, neutral good citizen, who has no ties to that research facility that blew up and opened a portal to hell in space.

It helps that Benrey really is just… a dude. Now that he’s not eighty feet tall and clipping through walls anymore, he can definitely pass as someone who just really loves to mess with people for a laugh. Which… well, Gordon’s judgement of character is probably better discarded in the kitchen trash compactor now, but he’s not gonna lie and say that’s all Benrey seems to him. He doesn’t even mess with people for laugh, not really. He is just. Like that. He’s an alien, but in the sense that’s…

Well, to Benrey, humans are alien. So that’s that.

And also Black Mesa did stretch the definition of ‘human’ in the physical sense pretty thin. So, again, that’s that. It all fits together like sliced pita bread.

The other thing that helps is that Gordon has the tendency to forget about risks or consequences when they are not directly in front of him, which he sometimes overcorrects, but this time around it helps move the sentiment into the philosophical window pretty quick, and then he can throw a brick through that one, because philosophy sucks ass. Gordon’s moving along well! He only had to change prosthetics twice because the first two were in order too heavy for his shoulder and too energy consuming, and all three are fully covered by the overlords that didn’t want Black Mesa to become a Thing in history, and now he works remotely for a uni that just lets whatever happen. It’s chill. It’s mostly chill.

He could’ve just chugged along never thinking even an inch deeper about Benrey’s Benrey-ness again, and Benrey makes that easy, because Benrey loves walking around and looking at things and being a bit of a spectacle with a straight face. Okay, Gordon doesn’t know for sure if Benrey loves doing those things, because he’s not Benrey. He just knows that Benrey does those things, frequently, and with an expertise that baffles even him, who knows full well how Benrey is. Well enough. Awkward territory, all of this is, really. The Point Is that Benrey actually doesn’t appear at home too much! He plays games through the night sometimes, sure, and ever since he called second dibs on any cereal in the apartment he always appears at the right time to claim that, but the whole thing is. Balanced. Benrey doesn’t seem to have physical personal belongings outside of the PS3 and four copies of Heavenly Sword he lugged back one day (the rest of the game library everyone kinda chimed in here and there to build up, because console is common ground fair use for everyone, while PC is where Gordon streams and also works, so it’s off limit), and he rarely uses utensils to eat anything, so to anyone but the team it’d seem like he’s barely there at all. Except for his presence of course. That’s… a lot harder to negotiate.

Gordon’s gotten very, extremely good at it though. It’s his life. Things fit together, mostly. He can deal, he has been dealing, and it’s even been fun. It’s definitely really funny here and there.

Gordon’s about to break the equilibrium. Introduce a nasty new specimen into the scene.

“Bro I knocked for a hot minute,” Benrey says, at the same time as Gordon’s blurting out, “I need to go back to Xen.”

“Huh.”

“Wha- Why do you knock? You’ve never knocked. You’ve literally only ever broken in.”

“Wanna… start now.” Benrey intones in that exact way, and then knocks on the door again. It doesn’t even sound good. These doors are all made with the weird thick composite that makes a dull plastic sound when knocked on.

“Don’t do that, just use the doorbell if you want to-” Gordon catches himself. “No matter. I need to go back to Xen. As soon as possible, but anytime in the next… twelve years… will work.”

Benrey just looks at him for a long time. An extended minute. Maybe even two.

Gordon is just staring back.

“You’re at. The door.” Benrey says, in a low voice. Gordon blinks. “Rude… rude little boy Freeman, huh.”

Gordon takes a deep breath. “Benrey-”

“Gonna let me in? Soon? ‘s bad etiquette… greeter… doesn’t even let guests in. Bet your wares aren’t even good.”

“Alright! Alright.” Gordon snaps, but he also does step back for Benrey to walk in, which. Really, that’s never been necessary. Benrey’s always come in and out as he pleases. Usually Gordon just walks out into the living room and Benrey’s already on the couch playing whatever game catches his eyes on that day. The decorum of knocking and walking in is simply never present.

Well, Benrey does knock on Joshua’s bedroom door. But that’s it.

They walk together into the living room, then Benrey situates himself on the couch, and Gordon settles on the carpeted floor next to the table to observe him. He’s never seen Benrey actually fold his limbs up into the position he’s usually already in when walked in on before. It’s mostly normal movements, which still catches Gordon off-guard a bit.

“Nice couch you’ve got here,” Benrey says, and pulls out his phone to fiddle with. It’s a Nokia 2700 Classic, with a theme downloaded from the Ovi Store, and a firefighter-themed 2D platformer that does get insanely hard in places. Tommy got him a snazzier Blackberry a while back, but he refused that one. Gordon didn’t really get it, but. Whatever.

“It’s always been here,” Gordon replies on reflex.

“Liar… Gordon Lie… man.” Benrey seems to need to chew on that one for a second. “Gordon Lieman. This building’s like. Ten years old.”

“That’s practically forever dude. That’s longer than they sent me to MIT for. Joshua’s not even that old.”

“He’s gonna. In… seven… years.”

Gordon remembers what he needs to talk with Benrey about again. “Goddamnit,” he slaps his own face - not with the hard prosthetic this time, thank you very much. Took him six months of HEV training and a year with a prosthetic to get it to heart. “Okay, so. Xen.”

“Wait. Math’s wrong… eleven. Years.”

“Don’t distract me! Xen!” Gordon throws his arms up, finally making Benrey actually look at him proper. “Joshua wants to be an astronaut when he grows up.”

Benrey puts his phone down.

“Yeah,” Gordon scrubs his face, with his flesh hand. “So I need to… do something about Xen. I have a plan. I need to find materials, and then I need a way to Xen…”

“What’s an astronaut.”

“A- no.” Gordon sits up straight. “No, you’re fucking with me. You’re doing this on purpose. I’m fucking about to go nuts, dude.”

Benrey looks him up and down, makes sure his head movement is clear in the dark living room, lit only by the lamppost outside the window. “Yeah,” he says, “no shit. You wanna go back to… Xen… and stuff. Freeman lost his mind.”

Gordon opens his mouth to retort, but then closes it with a click. “Okay,” he mumbles after a moment of thinking it over, “okay. I get where you’re coming from.”

“Haha, get it. ‘cause I’m from. Xen. And shit.”

“Not funny, dude.” It is a bit funny. “But I’m not- okay, so, listen, Joshua’s a determined kid, alright? He’s smart, and he’s healthy, and he likes space. He’s… the chance of him becoming an astronaut is not zero.” Gordon pulls his legs up to his chest. “If it’s up to me, it’s gonna be a hundred percent, ‘cause that’d make him so happy. But even if I’m not the one writing the almighty script I’m still gonna do my best to help him if he’s serious.”

Benrey continues looking at him. “Uh-huh.”

“And… that includes. Never letting him near Xen.”

“Mm.”

“And I know, I know Xen’s like. Ten fucking floating rocks at least a million Texas lengths away from Earth, but it’s still there, y’know? It’s still there. You’re from there! You know it’s still…”

“Yeah?”

“... I. Want to blow Xen up.”

Benrey settles into the draw-me-like-a-French-girl pose. “Sounds good. How’re we doing that.”

“Well, we’ll need explosives that can actually detonate in Xen’s climate, and acquiring that’s gonna put me on so many shitlist-” Gordon almost physically grabs his own hand to yank himself back to Benrey’s answer. “Wait. Are you really just… relenting? Are you actually in this now. Benrey?”

“Say more about the explosive though.” Benrey blinks innocently at him. “Please? Explosive cool. Maybe illegal. Super cool though.”

Gordon is not doing the frog mouth thing. He’s not. He’s totally not. He sighs a long sigh; there, no more rude expression. “I am only thinking about using explosives, because it’s costly and we’re gonna have to transport it. So you have nothing to snitch about. Who would you even snitch to, anyway? Fucking- we are under an indefinite two-way nondisclosure clause, if any of us ever open our mouth to a stranger about that we’re gonna get sacked, but. Wait are you even involved in that? You came back after we signed those papers. Well Tommy’s officially ‘representing’ us, so it’s all tangential kinda, so maybe he can just add you, but why would you-”

“No explosive run huh… What’re you gonna… use. Then.”

“-subject yourself to the law- alright, yeah uh. To be honest I was thinking raw force? Because I do have around twelve years to make this work, and Coomer has insane strength that has leveled a Xen island before, and Bubby is… I think he just isn’t aware that there’s supposed to be a limit to human strength at all. They forget to put that in when they pumped him with knowledge juice. He can- wait, Bubby can just make fire. He can maybe negate the climate conditions for us, so explosives are still in the question here, and- Darnold, last I heard he’s doing some ‘Sour Patch Kids but real’ stuff… sounds like seriously corrosive stuff… We can. We can have a plan.”

Benrey is on his phone again. “Nice.”

“Yeah. Okay.” Gordon dry swallows some dust from the carpet. He realizes he’s gripping on it pretty hard with his prosthetic; he’s close to ripping a chunk of it out. He takes a deep breath and relaxes the plastic hand. “We’re gonna need to make and test the explosives, and we’re. I need to tell everyone. Convince them to help. And we’ll need a portal back to Xen.”

Benrey’s still clicking away on his phone - probably playing that firefighter game again - but he’s looking at Gordon at the same time. Gordon looks up just in time to catch the sharp grin disappearing from his face.

Alright. Maybe Benrey does love doing Benrey things. At least one of them’s actively enjoying this.

---

Gordon’s well aware how ridiculous he is. Is sometimes seen as. Perceived as. Terminologies.

Mostly he copes fine with that. He’s lived it for as long as he’s alive. Most decisions he makes are met with a raised eyebrow at the sublest and outright laughter at the rudest. Transitioning, that was a long, long period of his parents going from “haha funny joke but don’t tell it in public yeah” to “oh shit that’s for real huh? That’s for real” to confused, but silent, silence. Him applying for MIT and seeking a scholarship was definitely the career advisor at his high school laughing uncomfortably for a long time, because Gordon’s never held down a project properly, has he? How’s he doing this? And then him adopting Joshua officially was at least ten separate conversations with Joshua’s grandparents patting him on the back, it’s okay if you don’t! We can care for him. It’s nice to have children around the house again! We know you’re busy! We know there’s things youngsters like you want to do before getting tied down with children. Trust us, we know. You don’t have to .

Gordon knows. He’s never had to make any of the decisions he actively made, but one, that’s why they’re decisions and not punishments , and two, in many ways including cerebral, he did. Kind of have to. In many ways those are the only steps that make sense for him to take. They were the foundation to who he is as a person, with a sense of self that must be supernaturally obscure, because he’s. He’s got a lot of things to balance. A lot of tight ropes to walk.

Gordon’s many things, a lot of those he doesn’t fucking recall himself. Maybe that’s by itself absurd enough. He’s had a lot of time to learn, and a bit of time to relearn, being okay with being absurd.

Black Mesa “helped”, in the same way it spared the rest of him when it got his arm cut the fuck off. It’s a horror comedy. It gave him a bit of a new perspective on absurdity.

“Don’t you dare,” Gordon grouches, because he’s learning. He’s always learning. “Don’t use the a-word.”

Bubby puts his arm together in front of his chest. “I’m not about to! Don’t presume you know what I will do.”

In a way Bubby’s incredulous look stings worse than Benrey’s deflection, Gordon reasons, because Benrey has emotional (?) stakes in Xen’s existence. Maybe he has an external heart or something that’s still beating and keeping him alive on Xen, though Gordon hopes he’d’ve at least been transparent about that when they talked about blowing the place up. Bubby though, Bubby doesn’t have emotional ties to many things altogether. Bubby’s also a tube baby who sets himself on fire with his thoughts. Himself and other people and/or objects. Not as absurd as Benrey being Benrey, but absurd enough to be way above Gordon on the a-scale, and thus has no rights to call Gordon absurd.

“You have to admit though,” Bubby says after a moment of silence.

Gordon takes a deep breath. “No, actually, I don’t have to admit shit,” he says, with what he can call patience with just a little bit of definition stretching, “you ever thought of that? I actually can just never admit that blowing up a whole planetoid system is a bit out-of-the-box thinking of me. I can just say that it’s totally normal and expected behavior of me, and what’re you gonna do with that? Huh? Do go on.”

“Oh don’t be pissy at me,” Bubby huffs, and goes back to staring at the buoy bobbing on the water surface, tied to his fishing line. “You’re scaring away the fish, Gordon. Everyone knows you don’t talk and stomp around on the piers while people are fishing. It’s rude.”

“You’re literally only trying to see if you can set a fish on fire as a prank,” Gordon points out, more for his own sanity than to prove anything to anyone, least of all Bubby.

Benrey looks like he’s ignoring Gordon and Bubby’s exchange, just sitting at the edge of the piers, legs swinging evenly, but Gordon well knows he’s listening in. If not because he’s somewhat invested then because most things that frustrate Gordon is great entertainment to him.

He is, maybe, a bit, somewhat invested though, must be. He brought Gordon to where Bubby and Coomer are camping, afterall. No reasons else to do it, especially when they have time to wait for them to come back to civilization. Twelve years, in fact.

Gordon can wait (he can forget, but in his book that’s the same as waiting, really), and he doesn’t begrudge Bubby and Coomer’s “honeymoon trip”, which has consisted thus far of them trampling about in ~~nature~~ , e.g. deep ends of the world that they do not and should not have access to, but somehow end up in anyway. Gordon only knew because Coomer’s grown fond of taking pictures, and once in a while if they get wifi he sends everyone some. The most memorable one was a pitch black square except for two dots of light in the distance, with the geotag pointing to them being in the Mariana trench.

They’re having fun, and Darnold and Tommy take effort to “decontaminate” them between trips, as well as make them learn wildlife interaction guidelines (Bubby probably already knew, but he didn’t care, and still nobody’s sure if he cares now), so Gordon doesn’t mind. Has no reason to mind. Until now, but only a tiny bit.

They decided to stop in a seaside town somewhere up North three days ago, and wifi’s spotty at best but Coomer still managed to send them pictures again - of him fighting a dolphin and Bubby making fun of a goat skeleton in a museum - and then Gordon got tired of staying up thinking about Xen at night and shot his shot. It took them another day to check their message again, and Bubby replied saying “don’t third wheel other people, weirdo” and Gordon just sighed and resigned himself to staying up way too late for another week or so. But then Benrey asked him to go to GameStop with him, which. Admittedly that was suspicious as hell, but Gordon reasoned Benrey knocked and asked to be let in the other day, so what the fuck, right. And then he stepped through the GameStop’s door, noticing the glass being darker than usual, and ended up on this piers where Bubby’s been trying to have a laugh at some poor fish’s expense.

Bubby made fun of him for third wheeling again, despite Benrey also being right there, and despite Coomer not even being there.

“Did you guys have a fight or something?” Gordon asked, because maybe he can be a little bit spiteful. He’s allowed.

“No,” Bubby grumbled. “Harold impressed Gregory with his punching power, so he’s invited to the Punching Tournament. I don’t like being in water for a long time so I stayed. Their sandwich’s not even good.”

Gregory turned out to be the giant squid that lives a few kilometers off the shore, and another few kilometers under the sea level.

“I’m gonna issue an a-word ban, actually,” Gordon declares, when he comes back to where Bubby’s sitting on his journey to wear a track into the piers. “I think that’s more conducive to real conversations.”

He’s being distracted, he knows. And maybe he’s letting himself be a bit distracted, so he can have a minute to improvise a script. Benrey just fast traveled him here, he did not prepare any materials, he doesn’t even have his notebook with him. That’s where all of his plans are! And his doodles. Mostly his doodles, but that’s a part of his thinking process, so he’s allowed.

“Alright, Mister Fucking-Insane-Person,” Bubby shrugs.

“Doctor.”

“Oh, my bad! Doctor Fucking-Insane-Person.”

“Also that’s a ban dodge and you know it. Also you still don’t have any rights to call me anything! I refuse to submit in this matter.”

Bubby turns around fully to put his hand on crossed legs and stare at Gordon. “You sure, Gordon? Are you very sure about that, when you warp out of thin air to where I am missing my husband very much and not torturing fishes for fun, saying things about blowing Xen up ? Is that not ragingly absurd, Doctor ?”

Gordon takes another deep breath. For his own benefit. For his own wellbeing. “Okay, one, Benrey warped me here, I was not responsible for that. Two, you’re trying to set fishes on fire, and your husband is punching more fishes while a giant squid cheers him on, probably. And three, which part of blowing Xen up is absurd, now? Feel free to elaborate on it. I’m all ears.”

“The very idea of it!” Bubby exclaims, accidentally shoving his fishing rod off the optimal position, chasing away the few fishes not shunned by his radiating malicious intent yet. “Who even thinks of that?”

“Me,” Gordon snaps back, “and you guys kinda ruined what ‘absurd’ even means at all for me, so don’t try me at it.”

Bubby shuts his mouth with a click, but his brows are still furrowed in the exact way that claims, loudly even if soundlessly, that he thinks that’s stupid.

“No, go on, Doctor Bubby,” Gordon presses. “You’ve got the quiz. Try your hand at it again, go ahead.”

“Alright, then, how are we even doing it? If we’re doing it. And there’s no we yet, mind you.”

“I- okay.” Gordon holds his hands up. “I’ll admit I do not have the specifics yet. But logistically at least, it’s entirely possible. We’ll need,” he calculates a number real quick, “thirteen hundred pounds of column charge slurry, but if we have something high corrosive we can wrap up safely until detonation we’ll need even less. We can. Make that much. If we have Darnold’s help. We need access to Xen itself, which Tommy has the biggest chance to get. We’ll need to put the explosives deeper into the ground than surface level, so we’ll need to dig some holes, but with Doctor Coomer’s strength we can take care of that. And then we’ll need to trip it, and that might pose a problem in Xen’s climate, but we can manage a chemical fuse, or. Y’know. Just burn it hot enough to explode, which.”

He ends that speech with a vague and a bit jerky wave of his hand towards Bubby.

Bubby just blinks. “Huh.”

Benrey snickers under his breath, either at a fish or at Bubby’s reaction, Gordon doesn’t know. He wouldn’t even be able to guess, since Benrey still has his back to the entire commotion.

Gordon catches himself holding his breath, so he consciously exhales slowly. It’s okay. It’s whatever. He has twelve years. He can take some detours if necessary. He can forget, even. Maybe.

“That Doctorate turns out to be for something, huh,” Bubby continues. “That does sound pretty plausible, afterall.”

“Huh,” Gordon’s turn to blink. “Wait, that’s it? You’re in now?”

“Yeah, sure,” Bubby swings his arm out, “even though I’d like to be testy for a while longer, I also want to blow things up. Outside is very large, but it severely lacks opportunities to see things explode, so I’ll have to make it happen myself now.”

That’s a tiny bit worrying, but Gordon’ll take it. He’s used to Bubby being a tiny bit worrying anyway. Wouldn’t be Bubby without it.

“Now shoo,” Bubby turns around to fiddle with his fishing rod again, carefully moving it back to the optimal position, “you chased all the fishes off. Gonna have to start my work from the beginning now. It’s hard work tricking fishes, you know.”

“Don’t tell Coomer,” Gordon warns, “I want to let him know myself.”

“Sure, sure.”

“I’m serious.”

“Aren’t you ever.”

Gordon figures he’s done all he can on that front.

Benrey catches up with him when he’s walked away dramatically for a few minutes and is now at the main street of the town. “Rudeman.”

Gordon did forget him at the piers, so that’s on him. “Sorry, but also, do you have a plan to get us home, or what? ‘Cause I don’t have my car and I’m not hitching a random ride if I can help it.”

“Gotta... find a GameStop first. Score some Sports Champions 2 for the. PS3.”

“Alright.” Gordon nods. “Wait, do you need a GameStop to transport us? Is that a thing?”

“Huh,” Benrey just looks at him, and then pulls out his brick phone.

Gordon rolls his eyes, but then catches a glimpse of the screen, and sees the digital clock. “It’s- fuck, it’s almost five! Joshua’s almost home.”

“Oh look, no GameStop on the… roadside. What’re we gonna do.”

“Benrey, you- goddamnit,” Gordon frantically pulls his phone out of his pocket. He tries to yank his right arm out of Benrey’s hold to hold it steady, but Benrey doesn’t yield. “Fucking, let me,” he unlocks it and finds Joshua’s number, which is on top, because he added ‘01’ before his name, because he’s had plenty of experiences with arranging files so they don’t disappear on him, “c’mon, c’mon… Hey Joshie! Are you at school right now?”

“Hi Dad, yes,” Joshua answers, at the same time Gordon registers that he’s walking, Benrey pulling on his arm.

“Sorry I called in the middle of class, buddy, but we’re gonna. I’m gonna be a bit late home, okay? I’m outside right now, but I’m on my way- oh, no, we.”

They’re in his living room. Gordon puts his arm, just released, on top of the couch. This is his couch. The bowl of cereal he finished right before Benrey dragged him out’s still on the table. The PS3 lays silent in the TV cabinet, as it’s always been. He does go around the table to put his free hand on all of these things just to be sure.

“Dad?” Joshua asks from the other end of the line. “Are you okay?”

“I.” Gordon dry swallows. “No, yeah I- I got home. Me and Benrey were out for a bit and we got? Lost? But we found our way back, and I’m. I’m home now. I was really worried I wouldn’t make it back in time to open the door for you, so I called! But I’m home now.”

“That’s good!” Joshua says, even though Gordon can still hear worry in his voice. Sweet kid, his boy is. “Thank you for telling me in ad-advance.”

“I’m sorry I interrupted your class. Dad’ll be more careful next time.”

“It’s okay. What are we having tonight?”

Gordon takes a deep breath, holds it in for a moment, and then breathes it out, slowly. “We can have mac and cheese again, or we can try our hand at naan and make some soup to go with it,” he says, willing his voice to calm down. “We still have the yeast Ms. Juney gave us last month, right? We can go get bread flour when you’re home.”

“Okay.”

“Go back to class, buddy. See you soon, yeah?”

“Yeah. Can we have chowder tonight too?”

Gordon laughs. “We’ll look into it, but sure! If we can find the ingredients for it. Alright, bye now. Love you, honey.”

“Okay,” Joshua says again, and when Gordon’s about to move the phone from his ear, he adds, “Love you too, Dad.” And then he hangs up.

Gordon goes to the couch and sits down. He’s maybe cradling his phone a bit. It’s still warm from him gripping on it way too hard. Deep breath in, deep breath out.

“That went well, huh,” Benrey says, from the hallway. Gordon looks up to see him closing the door behind him, what looks like a copy of Sports Champions 2 for the PS3 in hand.

Gordon laughs, again, for real this time. “That’s- where'd you even get that?

---

They did make naan, or a version of it. Joshua likes messing with flour, Gordon caught him walking his fingers through the bowl, leaving tiny “footprints”. They couldn’t agree on a fish to put in the chowder, so they shelved that plan and bought some canned beef-and-vegetables soup instead. The naan turned out… fine. They tasted enough like naan, and Gordon only burned like two. Which was maybe thanks to the apartment’s stove top burning a bit less hot than it did the last time they used it; Gordon made a mental note to check on the gas or. Whatever one does. When that happened. He just needed to look up a number, call it, and stand next to the (hopefully) professional who would come while they did their work.

Benrey sat at the couch while the Freemans cooked and ate their dinner, either being on his phone or scrolling idly through the PS3’s library. Joshua asked if he could try and throw naan pieces into Benrey’s mouth from the kitchen table, which Gordon allowed, but with the preset limit of only three pieces, and the condition that he picked up the ones that missed himself. He then asked Benrey very politely if he could open his mouth to catch the bread, and then made a lot of mental calculations before throwing each piece. The first one missed, but the other two were snatched up by Benrey in a somewhat shark-like display, which Joshua clapped excitedly for.

Gordon heard Benrey come to the kitchen table, which Joshua was wiping off with the designated kitchen rag (the fourth one this month alone; it feels like someone’s eating them as they’re replaced sometimes), while he was cleaning the dishes. “Hey lil’ gamer dude,” Benrey said, and Gordon could hear him rustle around in a pocket of his puffy vest. “Scored big in the. Minigame.”

“Thank you,” Joshua replied politely.

“Here’s your price,” Benrey said. Gordon assumed Joshua was holding out his hands to receive whatever Benrey gave him, because he couldn’t hear any noise that thing made, just Joshua’s little excited gasp.

“It’s like the... Intarna-Internation… nal… Space Station!”

“Huh,” Gordon could hear Benrey blink, “that’s what it is…”

“Yeah! These are, here, they’re solar panels! They charge the batteries in here.”

“Nice.”

“Thank you Benrey!”

“Yeah, GG.” And then Benrey shuffled back to the couch, if Gordon interpreted the noises correctly.

Joshua held onto the price trinket until he asked Gordon to put it in the tool cabinet, along with the cake moulds and decoration kit courtesy of Gordon’s hectic MIT years. It was… Gordon could see why Joshua thought that was where it should go. It could be considered a cookie cutter, if the shape weren’t kinda suboptimal for a cookie. It also did look like the ISS, with wings and all.

Nobody in this household’s baked anything sweet in this apartment for at least a year, but. Well. Never say no to free, reusable stuff.

Gordon’s phone vibrates when he’s just sat down at the kitchen table again, a mug of garbage instant coffee in hand. He abandons it to go get his phone from where it’s charging on the living room table.

It’s Coomer. “It’s Coomer,” Gordon says out loud. “That’s weird- he’s. He doesn’t call.”

“He’s calling. Now.” Benrey says from where he’s sitting, on the couch. Gordon takes a deep breath and doesn’t deign it worth a rebuttal. He accepts the call instead.

“Hello Gordon! I heard you want to blow Xen up.”

Gordon pinches the bridge of his nose. “Bubby told you.”

“He did! In great details!”

“I- alright, whatever, I didn’t expect actual results with that one anyway.” Gordon remembers about his coffee. He comes back to where it’s waiting for him on the kitchen table, and takes himself a generous sip, letting it burn his mouth. “Fuck!” He sets the cup down maybe a bit forcefully. “Oh that’s a bad decision. What did- what did he tell you?”

Coomer takes a moment to gather his thoughts, leaving a blank minute where sounds of the wind and waves on the shore come through his mic. Gordon hopes he isn’t thinking about sleeping out there tonight, for the full nature flavor or whatever. “ A large part of his speech was about explosion! And how big and grand it would be. And also about how much he fucking hates Xen!”

“Glad we agree on that front,” Gordon mumbles.

“So am I! I also fucking hate Xen!”

“That’s. That’s fair, really, it’s a garbage place. But- did he, like. Have you heard anything about the actual plan? Did he tell you anything about the actual plan I definitely mentioned to him?”

Coomer pauses for another moment, probably to recall. “Nope! Not a word about a plan-”

“I fucking knew it,” Gordon mumbles.

“-though that is very thorough of you, Gordon!”

"Okay, listen,” Gordon picks his mug of coffee up and starts pacing. “I actually don’t… have all of it yet. I know me and Benrey are in,” he flicks his gaze to Benrey again, who does nothing to deny the statement, “and Bubby’s now in as well. I still need to- okay, the plan’s basically that we find or make enough explosive for the ten asteroids on Xen, we bury it at the core of said asteroids, and we blow that up so it blows Xen up. I have- I don’t know the specifics of how to make that much explosive yet, but I’ll convince Darnold somehow, and if he sits this one out then we’ll borrow his lab when he’s not using it. And I’ll ask Tommy about a way back to Xen, his. His dad’s done that plenty. He doesn’t seem to like Xen much, right? That’s the impression I got, so we can spin this into us doing him a favor or something. And then we transport the explosive to Xen, I can borrow a truck for that, I know someone, and then we dig into the ground there, that’s where we can really use your superstrength, and then we put the explosive in and. Set it on fire. Bubby, uh, agreed to take care of that.”

Another beat of silence follows Gordon’s speech. He seems to have been making that one a lot recently, mostly to himself, in his room, while writing things down in his notebook. He finds himself chewing on his own lip, so he makes himself stop and takes another gulp of the coffee, which has thankfully cooled down to gulp-appropriate temperature.

When Coomer speaks again, he seems to have chosen his words carefully. “I will need to ‘sleep’ on this, Gordon. You are right in your assessment that you do not have your plan together yet!”

Gordon takes a deep breath. “It’s okay,” he says, as much to Coomer as to himself. “It’s true. It’s half-thought up right now. I still need to figure out- figure out Darnold and Tommy and Mr. Coolatta. I, yeah,” his voice’s dropped to a mumble by now, “I think I need to sleep on it too.”

“Gordon.” The rustles that accompany Coomer’s voice gives the impression that he’s sitting down onto the pebble-littered beach as he speaks. “I would like to see Xen obliterated, and I think we can get it done.”

“That’s,” Gordon stops on his pacing in the kitchen, “That’s not. It’s okay if you’re not interested, Coomer. You don’t have to walk it back on me.”

“Please do not question my fucking hatred for Xen, Gordon.”

“O-okay.”

“But I am not in favor of hazy dreams anymore. I have gotten to see a lot during my ‘honeymoon’, and now I have broken free, and mere words on a script cannot placate me. I would like to see proof that it’s possible before I participate.”

Gordon takes a deep breath. “Okay.”

“I believe you can do it, Gordon!”

“Thank you,” Gordon says, a little bit dazed, while Bubby’s voice comes through from a distance at the same time, “Are you reciting poetry again?”

“In what distant deeps or skies, burnt the fire of thine eyes?” Coomer answers. “On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand, dare seize the fire?”

“Stop praising that tiger while I’m right here!”

“I’ll,” Gordon says before Coomer can get fully caught up in Bubby’s antics again, “I’ll come back to you with. The details. When I’ve hashed it out. Thanks for,” he exhales, “thanks for holding out for me, Coomer.”

“So it is, Gordon, so it will be!”

Coomer hangs up there, and Gordon sits down at the kitchen table again. He finishes the mug of coffee in one long gulp. It’s gone a little bit more room-temperature than he likes.

“Sleep on it,” he mumbles, “good advice.”

“You should. Do that.” Benrey says from the couch. “Sleep good for body for soul.”

“You know what, when you’re right,” Gordon says, and stands up and goes brush his teeth. He then sits down at his work table and writes down questions until four in the morning.

---

Gordon used to suck at making phone calls. He’s kind of a champion at it now.

Funny thing is there’s an epiphany to it as well: he didn’t grow up with cell phones, so making phone calls was a hierarchical thing for him until he was like. Twenty years old. Kids used the landline when absolutely necessary only, and adults used it whenever they damn well pleased, because they paid for it and they had businesses to take care of . And Gordon was… not much of a rule breaker, surprisingly enough. Oh he fell short of where rules lay plenty, but he didn’t really intentionally break them. So he took calls when his parents said he could and when he absolutely needed to, and that habit persisted well into his adulthood.

He might also just be not very good at holding his tongue when speaking and. That was no good for phone calls. Kiddies phone calls. ‘cause he just realized one day that adults said whatever the fuck they wanted on the phone really, and nobody chastised them for it, no divine punishment, no sudden death round.

A sermon on self-love, that was; Gordon just takes phone calls now. Worst case scenario, he just turns his brain off and lets his mouth do its work. When people don’t presume they know better than him, they don’t presume he’s talking out of his ass ninety percent of the time.

That’s- that’s what he thought. Gordon’s wrong, a little bit. He can be wrong. Has been wrong plenty before. He can correct himself, here, he’s gonna do it right now: worst case scenario, he has to recite his plan, conceived so far in total isolation from anyone he knows and whose opinions he cares about, to the person who’s the most skittish and averse to what his plan is bringing about among those people, over the phone, where he can’t see and gauge body language and facial expressions.

Gordon would… like to meet Darnold face to face for this. But. It’s work. It’s, well, it’s closer to work than to play, given that he’s gotten mildly stressed out over it, and their lunch at the only Taco Bell in the whole desert is strictly pleasant, not-work talk only. And Gordon really, really enjoys those lunch dates, because he never has to think about damage control or having an identity crisis in the middle of one. They’re just nice, normal, a tiny bit shouty (the Taco Bell is usually packed and the acoustic’s not good, but it’s a Taco Bell, and it’s a ritual now), mostly jovial, lunch with a friend, eating subpar food he’s learned to enjoy. They don’t talk about what happened at Black Mesa, they don’t talk about work in general, they don’t even talk about soda outside of appraising the gaudy color combinations for any new sponsored drink. They talk about Joshua, about Darnold’s cat Lumbar Support, about Coomer and Bubby’s travelling, about new game releases, about Sega vs. Nintendo, about the weather.

Gordon doesn’t want to fall short of where the rules lie, not this time. So he calls.

“Doctor Freeman?” Darnold answers with the title, which sets the tone pretty well. Gordon takes a deep breath and steels himself.

“Doctor Pepper.” He pauses. “Darnold. Hey. I, uh, I’ve got a thing I wanna ask.”

“Go ahead!” Darnold goes quiet for a moment, to finish his sandwich, Gordon’d guess. He’s called in the middle of Darnold’s lunch break. “I must preface however that we’re working outside of office hours, and I can only advise you at the moment. Anything further will have to go through the… official channels.”

“Okay, that’s alright. I just.” Gordon worries his lips. He realizes he’s tugging pretty hard on his left sleeve; he makes himself let go. “I have a. Plan. That’ll need your expertise.”

“I’d be delighted to help then! Feel free to share more.”

“It’s about, uh.” Gordon takes another deep breath. He’s been consuming a lot of oxygen recently. “IwanttoblowXenup?”

Darnold goes, predictably, quiet for a moment. It doesn’t sting less when it’s predictable.

When he speaks again, it’s in a clipped, professional-but-barely tone. “Please say that again, but slowly.”

Gordon closes his eyes against the sunlight streaming in from the window in his bedroom. “I want to. Blow Xen up.”

“Gordon,” Darnold sighs. “Doctor Freeman.”

“I know.”

“Your megalomaniacal tendencies have grown since we last met.”

“It’s not- I’m not doing it for fun!” Gordon throws his free arm up. “Okay, this is genuinely a lot of effort and stress for something I’d do for pleasure, Darnold. I also couldn’t care less about fucking Xen - okay that’s not true, I’ve lost like a week of sleep over blowing it up, that’s not not caring, but like. I can’t. I need it to not be there,” he stands up from his bed and starts pacing, “and I have. A plan. Half of one. About that much. So it’s not hopeless-”

“Gordon, please slow down.”

“-as long as I have your help and- and Tommy’s, okay, I will. uh.” He taps on his thigh with his free hand too, for good measure. Go the whole nine yard with fidgeting, why not. “I. So, Joshua wants to be an astronaut,” he intones, and for the first time in a while he’s reminded again of how this started, how it took over his life for a hot minute, and it almost gives him the hiccups, “and. Y’know. Xen is in space. So it needs to not be there anymore. So I want to. Blow it up.”

Darnold goes silent again. Gordon thinks he can hear the epiphany punch the air out of him. Fuck, he hates phone calls.

“As much as I want to berate you about how you’re treating this matter and yourself,” Darnold resumes primly after a moment, “my lunch break is ending in exactly fifty-two seconds, and this sandwich will take me another two bites to get through. I’ll see you in the Taco Bell’s parking lot at three AM this afternoon, Gordon. Drink water.”

He hangs up. Gordon goes drink water.

Benrey clips into the apartment when Gordon’s on his third mug of iced water. “Whoa, hydration streak,” he says, settling himself on the kitchen table.

“I can go a bit crazy,” Gordon mumbles. “I’m allowed a little bit of funk and insanity. This is my house.”

“It’s… actually. MFA’s.”

Gordon groans. “Don’t fucking remind me. I tried to forget that. Also it actually belongs to the NRC, since they apparently can just scare MFA into giving employees housing, which I’m really fucking horrified by, but I’m choosing to not think about it, and you can’t make me.”

“It can be mine soon.”

“Do not attack and dethrone Nils Diaz.”

Benrey huffs. “Killjoy Freeman.” He shifts his pose so he’s sitting up straighter. “You wanna… try out Premium Water? Free trial for a week, you can manually cancel your. Subscription. After.”

Gordon stares at him. ��What’s Premium Water.”

Benrey opens his jaws, wide, showing his teeth. He points inside as if there’s anything Gordon wants to find at all in there at the moment. Then he closes it with a click and stares back at Gordon.

Gordon just sighs. “No, Benrey.”

“Guaranteed beddy bye time, no charge,” Benrey blinks at him. “Black Mesa Sweet Voice™ a hundred percent effective. Five stars… satisfaction… rating.”

“You’re fucking lying, because I’d never leave it five stars. You get three at best.”

“Gonna catch you when you fall off the. Chair. Gonna be romantic.”

Gordon laughs. “No, not allowed.” He sighs and finishes the mug of water like it’s mead and he’s some Dungeons and Dragons elven ranger. He gives himself brain freeze. “Ah, fuck, oof,” he slaps his own forehead, “bad decision. Bad decision. Okay, I. I appreciate you asking instead of just going for it, but that’s the reality of asking, right? The person you ask can say no. And you’ve just gotta learn how to deal with it.”

Benrey just keeps staring at him, but he’s used to that now. It’s only a tiny bit unnerving. “How’s learning’s... satisfaction rate.”

Gordon sighs again. “It sucks ass. Fucking hate learning.”

Benrey grins at him, and then he checks his phone and it’s already time to go.

“Drink this,” Darnold says immediately when Gordon climbs into the shotgun seat of his car, and holds out a beaker of bubbling purple liquid.

Gordon just stares at it. “Darnold, what is this.”

Darnold sighs. “It’s the Potion of Not Telling. I also drank a sample before coming here,” he holds up an empty beaker with some of the same purple liquid at the bottom. “It blows us up if we tell our employers what we’re up to.”

Gordon ponders this very carefully. “Does. Tommy, for example. Does he count as my ‘employer’?”

“No,” Darnold says. “‘Employers’ only cover people and/or establishments you’re currently under an employee contract with and receiving salary from.”

“Alright,” Gordon intones carefully, and downs the whole beaker. It tastes like… the jello packaged like seahorses Tommy brings over sometimes. The red ones, specifically. It makes him feel a bit bloated, immediately, and he rubs his side a bit anxiously when he sits down in the car. “You’re actually under NDAs at all times, huh,” he says, as an opening line.

“Same as you, Gordon.” Darnold takes the beaker back from Gordon’s hand and puts it in with the other one. “Black Mesa seeked me out and offered to find me a position in a brewery, as well as fund any of my independent ventures, as long as I do not say a word about what… transpired… back there. The official record’s that I was stranded on an island with curious dino-esque creatures for four years, instead of worked in Black Mesa’s mixology department, and honed my craft with their help, using the fruits native to that island.”

Gordon laughs, and rubs his face with the prosthetic hand. It’s like putting your face on the car’s dashboard. “Sounds like them alright. At least yours sounds exciting, instead of fucking insane. They said I was ‘chasing an entropy in the desert’ and it ‘ate my hand’. What the fuck does that even mean?”

“We attempted feats of miracle, only it was not under their accountability,” Darnold says, “and we were punished for it. No matter, we have more important things at hand. What is this plan you’ve cooked up, Gordon?”

Gordon takes a deep breath, finding it easier than it’s been for a while, and relays what he’s got down of the blow-Xen-up plan to Darnold. They never look at each other meanwhile, both staring at the cars lined up haphazardly in the lane across from them, Gordon in a barren calmness as words leave his mouth, Darnold with his arms crossed in front of his chest, his whole presence compacted into a contemplative, silent piece.

“That is an intense reaction to a faraway threat, Gordon,” Darnold says when Gordon’s speech is over. “Xen is not only at least a galaxy away, but also a few dimensions over, if I understand the briefing right. I haven’t thought about that wretched place for almost a year.”

“Sorry,” Gordon says, not really feeling any of it, but making the effort.

“You don’t have to. I understand where you’re coming from.” Darnold taps idly on his own arm. “I was… extracted… swiftly from Black Mesa after I met you and your friends. I did not witness what happened after, but I saw… enough.” He takes a deep breath as well. “We can all have intense reactions to anything.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not maladaptive,” Gordon says. He’s gone to therapy. It was really good for helping him build a system that filters out the things that actually fucks him up and makes some sense of the rest, but it doesn’t lift him out of the comedy of his life itself. It can’t. That’s not what therapy’s for.

“Indeed,” Darnold says. “But I can’t be the judge of that. My domain lies with potion mixing, and I dare say I am a true expert at it, but I can’t claim expertise at other people’s life. Especially not yours.”

“I get it,” Gordon nods. The world kinda bobs a tiny bit when he does that. “I. Know not to indulge my impulse mostly. But sometimes decisions come back to haunt me, and those are usually just about choosing one furniture over another, or tying my shoelaces in the bunny ears way instead of the circle way and having them undone in the middle of a meeting and stepping on them and falling on my face, but this time it’s. It’s Joshua’s life. And there’s just no limit anymore to what can happen, not since.” He swallows. “Black Mesa.”

Darnold nods.

Gordon blinks. “I know it’s a little bit crazy.”

“It might be,” Darnold says, “but as a famous mixologist once said: nothing ventured, nothing gained. Even if that gain is just your peace of mind.”

Gordon lets out the breath he isn’t even aware he’s been holding. “Thank you.”

“You do not need to,” Darnold smiles, “I do stand to gain from this as well, since I really need to test this flavouring that’s supposed to land on pleasantly tart on the taste scale but goes into intestine-destroyingly sour territory instead. I need to know what makes it that corrosive, and testing on humans is entirely unethical.”

---

Gordon got home before Joshua. Benrey’s also not home. He lays down on the couch and takes a nap.

He wakes to a quilt over most of him, light turned on in the living room and in the kitchen, and silent chatter. His sense of smell kicks in a minute or so into him still laying on the couch, blinking up at the ceiling; he smells fish sauce and sugar cooking.

“Tommy’s over,” he mumbles.

“He awakes,” Benrey says, seemingly into thin air. Gordon feels the couch shift minutely as Benrey makes to stand up from where he’s sitting leaning back on it. “Good eatin’. I’ll go get the. Food. Coloring.”

When Gordon’s gathered enough of himself to sit up, Benrey’s nowhere to be seen. Tommy’s shifting something animatedly on the stove, while Joshua carefully carries one bowl at a time to the kitchen table.

“Hey Dad!” Joshua says when he catches Gordon’s eyes. He puts the bowl he’s carrying down to free his hand for waving. Gordon waves back.

“Hey Joshie, hey Tommy. What’re you guys making?”

“Caramelized pork b-belly!” Tommy says from his stove station. “And... sautéed vegetable medley.”

“With rice!” Joshua adds.

“A perfectly balanced meal.”

“I picked the vege-ta-bles!”

Gordon folds the quilt to busy his hands. This one’s definitely not his. He may have one somewhere in the closet, but it hasn’t made an appearance in… six months. He thinks. “What did you get for us, buddy?”

“Carrot!” Joshua holds up a finger. “It has a lot of vita- vitamin… A.”

“Awesome,” Gordon says and goes over to the kitchen table to high five Joshua. “What else did you choose?”

“String beans!”

“Oh?” Joshua hasn’t been much for that.

“Uncle Tommy’s gonna teach me how to eat them!”

“A dash of- of flavour, packed in one Kn●rr’s Complete Seasoning packet, is all you’ll need!” Tommy switches to a lower voice when Gordon peers over his shoulder at the pan on the stove. “That is not true. Kn●rr is only… fit to be- be on the floor.”

“Are- you’re not putting that in then?”

“No, I just use salt and pepper.”

Joshua giggles. Tommy extends a hand that Joshua can slap on in place of a high five.

Gordon gets out the utensils - spoon for Joshua, chopsticks for him and Tommy - and brings the rice cooker to the table once the light’s jumped to orange. He plates the pork, scooping Joshua’s helping into his personal plate first, while Tommy finishes with the vegetables. Tommy lets Joshua choose which vegetables to go on his plate; Joshua bravely gets a little bit of everything.

They eat dinner on top of companionable conversation, Gordon and Tommy taking turns asking Joshua about school and other things.

“I heard you want to- to be an astronaut,” Tommy asks. Joshua dutifully finishes his mouthful before answering.

“Yes! I want to go to space!”

“Do you want to meet- aliens?”

“Yeah!” Joshua’s excitement cools down a little bit as he scoops up another spoonful of rice with a piece of string bean carefully balanced on top. “I read the Wiki-pea-dia about it though. They say there’s no dis-discernable e-vidence of aliens yet. We sent the Voyager Golden Records an’ they haven’t… answered yet.”

“That’s how p-physical mails are,” Tommy smiles while getting himself a piece of the caramelized pork. “It used to take… weeks... before we hear from our friends who are far away. And the- the universe doesn’t have a… an Everywhere Wifi Network yet.”

Joshua shares a conspiratory look with Gordon and mouths not yet . Gordon laughs. Gordon’s clutching his bowl maybe a bit too tight.

“You can become an astronaut and- meet aliens. In space,” Tommy waves his chopsticks with a flourish.

“I’ll teach them what- what e-mails are!”

“It’ll take a- a lot of hard work, and you have to be able to eat string beans.” Tommy takes an exaggerated look at Joshua’s plate, now cleaned of food. “Oh! Would you l-look at that! Mister Joshua Freeman is… perfect astronaut materials, according to… the NASA guidelines.”

Joshua beams with a pride that knocks something loose in Gordon’s chest.

They finish dinner and clean up together, then Gordon sends Joshua back to his room to do his homework, agreeing to an hour of video game after if he can get it done before nine. Gordon cleans the dishes while Tommy puts the kettle on and makes them both hot chocolate.

“I bought some-something for Joshua today,” Tommy prompts. Gordon looks back to see him hold up the exact same cookie-cutter-thing Benrey gave Joshua the other day.

“Oh- oh my god.” Gordon laughs. “Holy shit?”

“Wh-what’s the matter, Gordon?”

“Do you guys have like a hivemind or something?” Gordon pulls off a glove to open the tool cabinet and pull Benrey’s gift out. “Benrey gave Joshua this. I don’t even- what’re these supposed to be? Where d’you guys even get them from?”

“It’s the- International Space Station Biscuit Cutter!” Tommy puffs out his chest, slightly indignant, but definitely bemused as well. “They’re issued by- NASA, cut from the s-scrap metal of the hulls of… prototype spaceships. They’re very rare!”

Gordon stares at the one in his hand. “And now we have two of them.”

“They’re… very valuable! You can sell them for a high price.”

Gordon smiles. He puts Benrey’s apparently rare and expensive gift back into the tool cabinet and puts the glove back on. “You’ve gotta ask Joshua about that. It’s for him, afterall.”

They fall into a comfortable silence, crumbled into grains only by the click-clack of dishes in the sink and the water running from the faucet. Gordon weaves himself into a solid piece of nerve, bracing, bracing.

Tommy’s… better acquainted with the crazies of these things than most, maybe. He’s apparently said “fuck it” to the administrative work that his dad would’ve liked to hand back to him at one point, and just. Got a PhD in nuclear physics instead. Gordon’s been through something like that, and from experience he can tell that it would’ve taken real nerve to do it. He also can tell that no matter what it still rubs off on you, and you don’t recover from that kinda consistent exposure to idiosyncrasies, because you don’t ever feel like there’s anything to recover from , really. It’s just how it is, and the world’s off-kilter, not you. Like Benrey, Tommy’s world runs on a different axis, and he and the rest of them are, in many ways, looking both through strange eyes.

Gordon’s a little bit jealous of that. He’s honestly not sure if he can ever fully get Tommy, but then. Plenty of people never get him, and here he is. He can learn to wear it as well as Tommy, one day.

Right now though. Tommy’s important to the plan. Gordon knows that, in a theoretical way. Ha, theoretical…

“I would like to not be insane,” Gordon says, more to himself, at the same time as Tommy setting his cup of hot chocolate down and saying, “Benrey… told me.”

“Oh… I. That’s? Good?”

“Wha- you’re not insane , Gordon!” Tommy waves his hand. Gordon can hear it, even if he can’t see it. “You’re… creative.”

“Thanks Tommy,” Gordon says with a huff of laughter that he doesn’t think reaches Tommy at all. “I. I get it though. I got Bubby to turn around on it, but everyone else did say that it’s a little bit fucked up that I thought of doing that at all.”

“But they… agreed on helping you anyway.”

Gordon taps on the metal wall of the sink. “That’s… yeah. Well, other than Coomer.”

“Doctor Coomer doesn’t think you’re crazy,” Tommy protests. “He just has... boundaries.”

“That’s fair. He’s allowed that. He more than deserves that.” Gordon blinks. “Wait- why am I arguing down on my side? I need you to be on board for the plan to work.” He laughs, bowing down over the sink. He’s shaking a little bit. “Wow. I’m a little bit gone. Can I be a little bit gone?”

“You’re… totally allowed, Gordon” He feels Tommy tug on his elbow. With a deep breath, he lets go of where he’s gripping on the edge of the sink with white knuckles, and lets Tommy lead him to the kitchen table. He dutifully sits himself down on a chair, lets Tommy take off the gloves, and holds the cup of hot chocolate Tommy pushes into his hands carefully. “It’s your house.”

“It’s MFA’s.”

“It’s yours,” Tommy says, determinedly, and Gordon takes a deep breath and sidesteps every implications that has. “You can have your fears, and… and your plans, and your hopes. For Joshua. It’s your place, Gordon.”

Gordon takes a shaky sip of the hot chocolate. Tommy puts on the gloves and finishes washing the dishes for him.

“Sorry,” Gordon says, mostly aiming at the dishes thing, but. He also just kinda wants to put that out there.

“There’s nothing to be… be sorry for,” Tommy replies, amidst the noises of the dishes and the water running.

Tommy talks while Gordon drinks his hot chocolate; in the end, whether he wants to or not, he’s accepted a bit of the job the Gman holds. Gordon knows this, that’s how Tommy vouched for and kept the Science Team from a much worse fate than relative freedom except for a story no sane man’d believe anyway. Mister Coolatta Senior seemed to be impressed by the choice, aside from all the worries that come with it.

“He’s… he’s proud of me,” Tommy says, softly. “I know he only wants what’s best for me.”

“He’s been awfully accommodating,” Gordon says, remembering about the movie night they had after Tommy’s birthday bash last year. That man pulled a gun on him. As if he’d walk out on Tommy, if Tommy’d asked for him to stay around.

“He… doesn’t involve me… with his problems,” Tommy says. “Some parents do that.”

Gordon can’t find anything to say to that, so he finishes his hot chocolate.

“I got a vote when they brought Xen up the-the other day,” Tommy says, when the dishes have all been cleaned and put on the rack to dry. He pulls out the chair next to Gordon and picks up his cup of hot chocolate. It’s still steaming, somehow. “I-they were thinking it was- it’s too risky to leave a bridging point open like that. They want to… demolish it.”

Gordon chuckles, and then it becomes a full body laugh, and then he’s curling up on himself, the empty cup between his hands. He shouldn’t clutch it like this, it might break. He’s broken the handle off of a mug before, when one of his old prosthetic wasn’t calibrated perfectly. He can’t stop laughing though. Not enough to let go of the cup now.

“Holy shit,” he wheezes. “holy motherfucking shit. We’re doing it. We’re doing it? Xen’s fucking going down.”

“It sure is!” Tommy says, and claps a polite golf clap for Gordon’s victory.

---

Gordon does have shit he needs to do for the online classes he teaches, but outside of it he’s still way too idle. He and Joshua go to the aquarium and the museum whenever the schedule works out, and once in a while they drive by Roswell to catch a plane taking off into the sky, and he does grocery runs and tries to clean around the house and do laundry on a timetable, and there’s always the PS3 Benrey dragged back that’s now public good, as well as his probably too long Steam list, but. Gordon’s shit at talking himself into and out of doing things. Sometimes it just doesn’t feel right to start doing something, so there’s a black hole of time between him thinking “I should get to this” and him actually doing it. And Joshua’s life isn’t just him; his son’s going to school now, and he’s made friends at school, and he talks to them on the phone and goes hang out with them on weekend afternoons.

Gordon’s not as good at holding onto time anymore, now that things’ve. Changed.

So figuring the explosives out’s been good for him. It’s just what he does back in uni again, except without a supervisor, without having to write anything down properly (just legibly’s enough), and without peer review. It’s mostly math, but with the spirit of two middle schoolers stealing sodium crumbs from the school lab to throw into puddles. It’s closer to play than he expected. Closer than playing Horse Simulator 3D on the PS3.

He and Darnold spend the day building the corrosion rate equation, pouring Darnold’s concoction on rocks Gordon figures have the same make-up as the ground on Xen. Benrey doesn’t bring the venture up often, but every other day Gordon finds clumps of dirt and random rocks that weigh suspiciously little for their size in his glove compartment. He brings those in for the pour test as well, and they build a simulation based on them.

Balancing the corrosion with the heat’s a bit tricky; Gordon needs to know how hot Bubby’s ignition can go, since their number’s high. He was about to shoot Bubby a call when Coomer’s latest photo arrived. Gordon recognized the street in it.

They put the project on hold for an afternoon so Tommy and Darnold can have the lab to decontaminate Coomer and Bubby. Gordon spends that afternoon getting the air fryer he ordered last week out of the box while Benrey reads the manual out loud wrongly. He calls Joshua to let him know they’re having guests over that evening, thankfully in the middle of the school recess this time. Gordon tries to remember Joshua’s exact timetable at school, he really does. It’s just not fruitful a task.

When Joshua arrives home, Gordon’s in the middle of arguing with Bubby over how much water’s left in air fried food. “Hey Granpa! Hey Bubby!” Joshua waves at Coomer and Bubby, “hey Uncle Tommy! Hey Doctor Darnold! Hey Benrey! Hey Dad!”

Gordon steals the chance to close the air fryer while Bubby’s joining in with the “Hey Joshua!” chorus and distracted. “We’re making spring rolls and egg rolls!” He calls after Joshua, who’s in his room putting his backpack away. “You can choose the filling yourself!”

The kitchen barely fits everyone, so comes dinnertime they move the living room table up next to the TV cabinet to make space for the spare straw mat, and lay out a tablecloth on top for good measure (Gordon’s had enough experience to remember to do that). They sit on the floor in the living room together, almost shoulder to shoulder, and at some point the conversation gets away from Gordon entirely. He just nods when Joshua points at something he wants and gets some in the bowl for him.

“I’ve heard somebody wants to become an astronaut,” He hears Coomer say at one point.

Joshua puffs out his chest proudly.

“Doesn’t everybody at some point,” Bubby says. “I wanted to be an astronaut too, when I was forty.”

“Oh I have seen the photos,” Coomer continues, a gentle light in his eyes, “It is very beautiful out there.”

Joshua asks for help with his homework after dinner, and Tommy and Darnold sit down with him for that. Benrey joins Gordon at the sink while he’s pouring dish soap into one of the large bowls they used. He doesn’t know what to do but blink at him, dumbfounded.

“Check this out,” Benrey says, and spits lime green into the sink. When the light clears, the dishes have become spotless.

Gordon stares at the sink. “I- you- th- is that- you can do that? ” He points at the plates. leaning on the sink’s edge.

Benrey grins. “New… new skill acquired bro. Just got the EXP for it.”

“You spent your EXP on dish cleaning ?”

“We should conserve water, Gordon!” Coomer declares from behind him next to the kitchen table. “Water shortage is caused by corporate greed, but with certain individual actions we can improve the situation ourselves!”

“Please don’t kill Mark Schneider.”

“Worry not, Doctor Freeman! His death will not be by my hand directly!”

Gordon laughs, helplessly. “Everything happens so much,” he laments, only semi-jokingly, as he takes off the cleaning gloves and puts the plates on the rack.

“Keep up, Doctor Freeman,” Bubby says.

“They certainly do,” Coomer says, much more nicely. “I’ve heard your plan is soon coming to fruition!”

Gordon nods. “Yeah, it’s. Yeah. We were,” he swallows, “Darnold and I, we were about to ask for Bubby to let us test his fire. Figure out if he can reach the ignition point we need.”

“Well now, that sounds like a challenge,” Bubby says.

Gordon finds a price tag still stuck on one of the bowls that he’s very sure wasn’t there when it was brought out. “Benrey,” he groans. Benrey just gives him a shit eating grin. “You’ll need to hold a temperature for about three minutes, and then the mixture takes care of the rest,” he says to Bubby, while swatting Benrey on the shoulder.

“Just three minutes, isn’t it.”

“Do not try and stay for more. I’m serious. When it explodes it’s gonna turn seriously corrosive. You’re gonna be sludge ten seconds after it gets on you.”

Gordon can hear Bubby blink. “Oh- oh. This is serious huh. We are blowing Xen up.”

“We are, darling,” Coomer affirms.

Bubby shifts on his chair. “I’ll need. A minute.”

When Gordon’s done with the dishes, he turns back to the kitchen table to catch Bubby letting go of Coomer after a hug. “Son of a bitch, you went for it, you motherfucker,” Bubby says, a bit too loudly, fixing his glasses.

Benrey sings a very high note over his voice. “Language!” Gordon hisses.

“Oh, sorry.” Bubby pats his own mouth. “Forgive a man, I’m still working through it.” He switches to a mumble, seemingly only to himself. “It’s real. I’m gonna set Xen on fire. Gonna show Black Mesa what for. It’s really gonna happen…”

Coomer pats Bubby on the back lightly, making him almost hit his face on the table. “We’ll finally move fully away from the game, my dear Professor,” he says, and he’s smiling. He’s smiling very wide.

“I can be your Professor,” Bubby mumbles. “I can blow Xen up.”

“ We can blow Xen up,” Gordon corrects him. “Me and Darnold didn’t agonize over a- darn modifier for a week and a half so you can set our work on fire and take all the credits.”

“Hush, let me process things, you rude bastard.” Benrey censors bastard with another burst of pinkish light.

“I can see the other end,” Coomer says, cheerfully. “Now, Gordon, I’ve heard you need help digging into the core of a few asteroids?”

---

They mark a date for the excursion.

He ‘woke up’ early, and made himself and Joshua an actual breakfast for a change while Benrey finished off the box of cereal that was open. “Dad’s got a work thing coming up,” he told Joshua while scooping extra egg onto his plate. “I’m gonna have to stay on site for a night.”

“So you’re not going home tonight?” Joshua asked, taking the plate handed to him by Gordon, but making no move to go back to his chair.

Gordon nodded. “I’ll be home tomorrow though, but you’re gonna have to stay at your grandparents’ tonight. I’m gonna come pick you up at their place tomorrow afternoon. You should pack a spare change of clothes and your pajamas to bring to school.”

“Okay,” Joshua said. And then, “What’re you staying on-site for?”

“I’m,” Gordon said, “Okay, you can’t tell anyone this, yeah? I’m blowing asteroids up.”

He could see Joshua’s eyes brighten. It was visible . “ In space ?”

“Yes,” Gordon laughed. “But it’s very experimental, which means…”

“It’s not ready for the public eye yet,” Joshua whispered, almost reverently.

Gordon laughed again, and took off the mitten on his hand to ruffle Joshua’s hair. “You’re gonna be okay staying at your grandparents’ place? If you don’t like that I can ask someone else to come over instead.”

“It’s okay,” Joshua said, finally content to go sit down again. “Can I bring my skate shoes?”

“Sure thing, put them in a bag.”

Gordon called Joshua’s grandparents to let them know to pick him up at five (Joshua chimed in to ask them to remind him about the roller skates), and then Joshua got his backpack and spare clothes and bag for the shoes and the house was once again vacant.

They don’t have a vehicle, but Tommy sings and Bubby joins in and Darnold keeps a beat and after a while Benrey starts playing songs out of the shitty speaker on his phone. Gordon’s even spent the day before sleepless, but that’s kind of everyday now. He hadn’t anticipated having to get used to a day having twenty four hours again, but well. He hadn’t anticipated anything while going through Black Mesa, really. It wasn’t really ideal thinking-far-ahead environment.

Benrey seems bouncier when he’s on Xen. Gordon didn’t think about it, but when he steps through the portal he has a flash of that image from what feels like a lifetime ago: Benrey giant as the Earth itself, blocking everything else in sight, his form longing to catch up with his already immense, oppressive presence. Taller than any walls, any mountains, any barriers between himself and a measly human’s fleeting existence.

Gordon shakes his head. At his least incomprehensible, Benrey’s said it was “a show”. “Like. Cable TV. A television series,” Gordon’s asked.

“Like a cutscene,” Benrey’s replied, as if Gordon was the one too slow for the course.

Benrey now felt nothing like whatever that was that happened to him and the Science Team last year. Benrey now felt just… like a dude. Doing a barrel roll, while saying “Ooooo barrel roll” with a straight face. While his Nokia 2700’s still crushing whatever song it’s playing into oblivion.

Gordon doesn’t deal in implications anymore, so he starts singing along to whatever everyone else’s singing as well, and focuses on carrying their homemade Xen-specific dynamite blocks to where they’re going to dig their largest hole into the core of this wretched piece of rock.

It takes a day, kind of; he doesn’t sleep, out here in the thin atmosphere of Xen, where the stars don’t blink and red light comes in a hue from inside the dirt. He doesn’t have to force himself to go lay down at midnight like back home, he just sits down, at the edge of the portal, when the explosives have all been installed, and watch Coomer and Bubby ready themselves.

They can hear Bubby’s cackles ringing in Xen’s air and also in their comms, as he lays in Coomer’s arms and they race the fire, starting from the outer ring of asteroids to the main Xen island. They jump from rock to rock, red light trailing after them while the dirt itself breaks apart, not with a boom, but with the sound of bubbles breaking after a wave crashes on the shore. Xen glows brighter than it probably ever has, in its disintegration.

Benrey sings a few vacant notes, standing on nothingness; the light from his mouth blends in almost perfectly with Xen’s dying light.

“You got all of your belongings outta there?” Gordon asks, half as a jab, half serious. “Didn’t leave anything important in your old apartment?”

Benrey doesn’t answer, for a moment. When he does, it’s just to mumble, “oh look, there’s fireworks.”

---

They got home early from it.

Gordon takes a nap on the couch; he only wakes up from Benrey turning the sound up to max and then shooting a rocket at a truck in Far Cry 3. “Dude,” he throws an arm up over his face, and winces when it’s the plastic arm. “What the fuck.”

“Go pick Joshua up,” Benrey says, definitely too conversationally, and barely understandable under the noises from the game. “Gordon. Sleepman.”

“You’re slipping,” Gordon comments as he wrestles himself out of Tommy’s quilt. He forgot to give it back to Tommy, he realizes sleepily, picking up the phone he left charging on the living room table. It’s seven already.

The drive to Joshua’s grandparents’ place is not a long one. He finds Joshua sitting at the porch of the little house, backpack and the bag with the roller skates at his feet. Joshua jumps up at the sight of Gordon’s car, and before he can walk through the gate he’s already found his arms full of his son.

Joshua clings to his neck with a death grip. “I’m sorry I’m late,” Gordon says. “I was tired, so I took a nap, and forgot the time.”

“It’s okay,” Joshua mumbles, “you were tired.”

“I blew up so many asteroids though.” Gordon says, and Joshua laughs.

They drive home after saying goodbye to Joshua’s grandparents (Joshua’s grandpa put a wrapped up pot pie in Gordon’s hands with an iron grip and a gaze that communicated clearly what would happen if he refused it), and Joshua agreed to take a detour to the Roswell airport for the night. Gordon absentmindedly texts Benrey taking the kid to watch airplanes, get your own food , and puts his phone away for the drive. The radio’s on, but Joshua doesn’t sing along. Gordon’s vocal cord’s still tired from Xen (no more, Xen-no-more it is, there’s just a vast of empty space inbetween dimensions there now) so he also stays silent.

They get ice cream at a drive-thru on the way, and then they’re at the highway, parking on the roadside, looking over the rail at the airport. A plane leaves the ground there and goes into the air. Gordon’s struck by how different it is from a bird or a moth; nothing about the plane communicates any internal movement, it just. Moves. Up and up. Like a JPEG sliding across the screen under someone’s puppeteering with a mouse.

Joshua stares at the plane, unblinking. “Is it dangerous in space, Dad?” He asks.

Gordon taps his hand on the steering wheel. “It’s.” He starts saying, but stops to clear his throat. “It can be. There’s a lot of math going into making things that bring a human into space, and a lot of different people doing different parts of that math, and. Sometimes some people do their math wrong. Sometimes they try something new, and we don’t have the good math for that new thing yet. Sometimes new things break into the old math, and we need to. Work around that new thing.”

“What happens if,” Joshua swallows, “someone does the math wrong?”

“We try to catch it,” Gordon says. “That’s why there are so many people doing the math. So if someone gives the wrong answer, they can spot it early, and fix it.”

“What if nobody does,” Joshua says. He’s still looking through the car’s window, at the stroke of cloud the plane’s long flown past.

Gordon puts his hands on the gear stick. “That’s very, very rare to happen,” he intones carefully. “They have to check, over and over, before they send a ship into space.”

Joshua turns from the window to Gordon. He looks at Gordon’s prosthetic hand, on the gear stick. “I’ve only found books about spaceships that have gone to space,” he says, quiet.

Gordon turns over, and holds out that hand. Joshua climbs over the gear stick to give him another hug. “Experiments are important to those ships too,” Gordon says. “They give the people who make the ships important information to make them safe.”

Joshua just buries himself in Gordon’s arms.

“I’m really sorry I came home late and didn’t call you, Joshua,” Gordon says, and hugs his son tighter. “I won’t do that again. I’ll always call when I’m home late.”

“I don’t have to be an astronaut,” Joshua mumbles.

“Oh, no- nononono, listen,” Gordon says into his hair, with all the determination he can muster up. “Listen, Joshua, you become whoever you want to, okay? You don’t have to be anything, but you don’t have to not be anything either. That’s my mistake, you didn’t do anything wrong. You’re good. You’re good. You’ll be an incredible astronaut. You’ll be the first man on Mars. Jupiter, even.”

“Jupiter is a gas giant,” Joshua mumbles. “There isn't any land to land on.”

Gordon nods. “That’s why it’s called landing , I get it.”

---

They drive home after, and Joshua asks to sit with Gordon while he and Benrey play Mario Kart. Gordon agrees, which means he has to clamp down on any curse he almost lets out when someone bumps him off the damn road, while Benrey does some magic or whatever on his screen. Who the hell knows.

After their third match, Benrey elbows Gordon in the arm to signify a break. “Beddy bye hour,” he says, not even looking at Gordon, “for… babies. Hattrick means I make the rules.”

“You didn’t come first in the second match,” Gordon argues, but quiets down when he looks down to see Joshua asleep leaning on him. “Okay, don’t fucking choose Toon Link for me again while I’m away,” he points a finger at Benrey, who’s residing smugly in the to-be-chaos of his own making. “I’m fucking serious.”

He carries Joshua to his bedroom and tucks him in, and then detours to the kitchen for some water.

“Ooh, hydration,” Benrey comments idly.

“What d’you know about it,” Gordon mumbles when he settles back down on the couch. He looks at the TV screen to find Inkling on one of the shitty bikes. “What the hell man, this bike sucks ass. Fucking Shit Taste McGee over here.”

Benrey laughs.

Gordon plays the game, while thinking about the sendoff party they’re throwing for Bubby and Coomer next week, before the grandpas go off gallivanting in yet another forbidden corner of the Earth. Coomer lovingly calls it their “honeymoon”, but Gordon has full faith this is gonna be what they do forever. Or at least until they’re bored of Earth, and start aiming for the Moon instead. Probably not a bad place to be in.

“Thinking Xen thoughts, aren’t’cha,” Benrey says, while sending a shell after some poor computer character.

Gordon grins. “Ha! Sike! I’m not even thinking about Xen.” He pauses, catching the full force of a fireball a Mario shoots at him. “I haven’t thought about Xen at all actually. Since I got home with Joshua.”

“Achievement unlocked,” Benrey says, and extends a hand. Gordon stares at it.

“Wh- huh?”

“High five, idiot.”

“Oh,” Gordon says, and slaps that hand. Benrey’s eyes widen at the noise.

“Yo that’s a. Crunchy noise.” He claps his hands together, and he’s laughing now, light flowing out in a thread of something like baby blue. “This rules,” he says happily.

Gordon smiles, and then some motherfucker flings a shell at him, so he falls off the road again.

He stays up way too late again, and time doesn’t stop slipping, and when Darnold gives him a vial of neutralizer for the Potion of Not Telling at their little party the week after it gives him something like mania and he hugs Coomer like an idiot while the old man slaps his back in a motion that’s supposed to be comforting. He sleeps that off as well afterwards, and wakes up to Tommy surfing the channels on his TV, complaining about lack of daytime talk shows. When he forgets about the scheduled blackout a month after, he still calls the concierge with shaking hands and then climbs into his bed like he’s four again and there’s a storm outside. He still thinks about Black Mesa, and about Xen.

There’s just a little addendum now, that he can remind myself of.

It’s weird how quickly it blends into everything else, but. Well. It’s weird everything .

He makes cookies again, comes the winter, and teaches himself how to decorate cookies, just to have something to do. Joshua throws his pencil onto the notebook one day to go dig out the lumpy, supposedly-ISS-shaped cookie cutters from the tool cabinet.

“Careful,” Gordon calls after him.

Joshua toddles back with the cookie cutters in hand. “Can we have ISS cookies?” He asks.

Gordon says yes. He also looks up a buncha references, prints them out, and tries to get the cookies exactly correct, making two “outside” cookies and an “inside” one, with schematics of the inner chambers of the ISS drawn on. Joshua loves it.

“Here’s where the astronauts sleep,” He points at the spot that’s supposed to be the service module, and Gordon’s proud of getting that part right on the cookie.

He ruffles Joshua’s hair again. “Hey, maybe you’ll sleep there in twenty years,” he says, and marvels at the levity to that sentence. Just a little bit. It’s washed away with Joshua’s smile, and then they busy themselves with folding bags for the cookies instead.

#hlvrai #gordon feetman #joshua freeman #benrey #tommy coolatta #dr. harold coomer #bubby #darnold pepper #fanfiction #ask to tag #+ one art inside but it mostly has to do with the fic #I will. draw more from this fic and put them in as time goes on #the formatting's a bit wack bc I just copied the formatting from ao3 #I will come back to fix stuff up later #okay now I take more naps #have a good day! and also thank you for reading this fic if you do!

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