#i feel like that's a given and also that frank is not a doctor)

[variousqueerthings]

would you trust BJ with those surgeries or did you just not mention him in the context of those specific gifs?

it was just in connection with those gifs, because henry is talking about trapper and hawkeye in the scene as looking like "freelance abortionists" and my instinct being, "I think that's a compliment actually" (although ofc the disclaimer there is that some people offering abortions before it was legal were not good/caused a lot of violence and death and used desperate people for money/were not real doctors --so really what henry is saying is that they look disreputable)

(but the point still stands of course)

(the other even more tangenty point I feel like I need to make is that many trans people throughout time have also received surgeries from people who were everything from unprofessional to straight-up murderers, so these communities really ought to stand together for safe access to healthcare)

so in conclusion: in the fantasy that exists of accessing decent healthcare, hawkeye, trapper, and bj would all be supportive! also potter, whom I started headcanoning as trans and now I cannot unsee that. henry depends on how you want to read him, but I think he would after the war if he'd survived, he's been radicalised enough. and charles has helped out several of honoria's friends personally.

[kindaqueerngl]

short fanfic ig?

It hurt.

it hurt when Nico realized that he never had liked Percy.

that on it's own didn't hurt, but the fact that he thought he'd had a crush on Percy when really he was just alone and in pain and he liked the comfort of another human being.

which made Nico think that maybe he couldn't feel love.

maybe he was heartless or gross.

he'd never have someone like how Leo had Jason, or Percy had Annabeth, or Hazel had Frank, or Reyna had Thalia.

his face felt warm and his heart hammered as he slumped against the wall in his cabin, feeling his throat begin to close up and his eyes sting.

he curled himself up, shaking, trying to take deep breaths.

no one could hear him cry. It would be to embarassing.

he shuddered, feeling a tear trace down his face.

he remembered how he felt special when he'd liked Percy. but that wasn't real.

he didn't know why it was upsetting him so much.

he didn't know why he was being so overdramatic, why he was crying and shaking in his cabin when he could be of worth.

he didn't know why he was being useless.

the thought forced a sob from his chest, shaking his core as more tears spilt from his face.

he remembered what Will had told him.

"you're having a panic attack" said Will's soft voice in the back of his head.

the same thing that was happening a now had also happened a while ago, after Nico had had another Tarturus flash back.

he breathed deeply through his nose, trying to calm himself down while trying to remember the advice Will had given him.

"go to your happy place, Di Angelo. Try to think of things that make you smile. or laugh. or just feel good".

Will had told him this while rubbing his back in a rythmatic way, tracing invisible circles on his spine.

he remembered that Will had started awkwardly laughing and apologizing for being a dork with horrible advice.

Will had always been there, though Nico didn't know why. Will was constantly looking after Nico though Nico didn't return said generosity.

and yet Will went out of his way to talk to Nico.

to text Nico through the demigod safe phones Leo had desinged.

to make him laugh or smile.

Nico's breathing began to steady slightly, and instead of a clogged throat it just felt dry. he wiped the tears off of his face, feeling his breath shudder.

his heart began to regulate, but spiked again when he heard a knock at the door.

he tried answering, but instead of saying yes, he just made a weird gargling groan with his throat.

the doorknob twisted and the door creaked open, revealing Will Solace who was scanning the cabin for Nico.

"Nico"? he called, his voice startlingly loud compared to the lulled silence of cabin thirteen.

"hey" Nico croaked, now sounding less like a dying frog and more like he had a tissue in his mouth, muffling his words.

"Nico"? Will raised his eyebrows, "what are you doing on the floor"? he creaks the door open further, washing Nico in slivery moonlight.

Will's eyes widen and his surprised expression melts to concern.

"before you ask, I'm fine" Nico mumbles as Will closes the door behind himself and sits next to Nico.

"you've got to stop doing that, you know. I'm a doctor. I know when people are in pain, whether that's physical or mental".

Nico scoffs. "you're more like a school nurse".

"plus, you have red splotches around your eyes. You've been crying" Will adds, ignoring Nico's sarcastic comment.

"well... everyone cries" Nico mutters.

Will sighs.

"why"?

Nico arches an eyebrow.

"I dunno. You're the "doctor". You should know better then me" he answers, rolling his eyes.

"not that, dumbass. why are you crying"? he jabs his finger into Nico's ribs playfully.

another shuddering breath. Silence.

"you don't have to tell me. I know you're apprehensive when it comes to trust. No pressure, Di Angelo", Will says gently.

deep breath.

"I feel..." he looks down at his hands, scars jagged like lightning bolts.

"sometimes I feel like I'm uncapable of... love, I guess".

"what"? will asks incredulously, his eyebrows shooting up to his scalp.

"sorry" he says in a gentler tone, averting his eyes, "but you aren't, Nico. Love doesn't have to be romantic".

"I know, but that's the thing. I want to feel... attached to someone. But I just... I don't... I don't know? like it feels like no one wants to be attached to me, and I'm scared to be attached to someone, because I've lost people before and I'm scared it'll happen again because it's horrible. And what if I mess up? And what's it supposed to feel like? I've never really truely liked someone, even when I thought I did. So was it fake? am I fake"?

Nico stops, realizing just how overdramatic he was being.

Will breathes deeply, chewing his lip like he does when thinking.

"Nico... how do you know"?

"what"?

"how do you know that no one wants to be attached to you"?

Nico's eyes widen, and he looks down awkwardly.

"maybe... maybe the person you liked before, you really did like, just not love. They're different things. Sometimes when you like someone, it's almost just like friendship with added steps. When you love someone, it's so many more steps, so many steps that it clouds the friendship aspect, though it's still there", Will says, his eyes trained on Nico's.

"maybe".... Nico whispers, trailing off into silence.

"Will"?

"yeah"?

Nico paused, but asks carefully, "have you ever loved someone like that"?

The corners of Will's lips curve upwards, his dimples reappearing.

"yeah".

Nico nods, not knowing exactly how to say what he wants to, but knowing exactly what it would sound like.

"thanks for talking to me, Di Angelo. I mean it".

Nico smiles, which hurts his cheeks slightly.

"thanks for listening", he replies as he rests his head on Will's shoulder, listening to the sound of his heavy breathing.

[mylittleredgirl]

m*a*s*h reaction post released from my drafts!! i don't know why i have been worried about making a Good Post when legitimately everything that could ever be said about this show has been said.

so i will SHARE MY THOUGHTS ABOUT SEASON THREE currently in progress:

ooooh war got a sweet budget increase in the off-season. pyrotechnics! helicopters! ACTIONNN BAYBEEEE

i'm falling more in love with everyone, details to follow

top of the list: trapper my bestie has been promoted to trapper my legit fictional crush 💕

don't get me wrong, in real life i would slap his face, but i'm with hot lips on this one. the hair, the smile, every time he takes off his shirt... take me to the supply tent or lose me forever

HOWEVER, i happened to notice that he is not on the header pic on hulu* and none of you talk about him so i must regretfully conclude that he will eventually leave the show

DON'T TELL ME WHEN

anyway i am cherishing him as one cherishes an old dog not long for this world

*speaking of hulu: i have now joined the henry blake appreciation society thanks to this One Weird Trick (reupping my hulu account for a month because i lost my shit after the dvds cut out at the climax of an episode AGAIN)

i went back to rewatch the episodes that didn't play on the dvds, and turns out a lot of them were henry eps (including the trial of henry blake and the one where he is waiting for news about his new baby...) (and also the one where he fell in love with a cheerleader but you can’t win ‘em all)

just in time to appreciate that scene in "o.r." where he tells hawkeye he doesn't want to be discharged so that he can keep doing real doctoring 🥺

"o.r." had so many good character bits!! even frank got some depth?? or at least an explanation for why he's Like That...

other eps i liked:

"iron guts kelly" -- felt like a follow-up to the one last season where hot lips got wasted and broke up with frank and then hawkeye and trapper had to sober her up, which i also loved! "we hate her but she's OURS to hate" is such a good character dynamic.

also lmao every time she cheats on frank, GET YOURS GIRL 😘

the frank/margaret thing is strangely compelling actually? it's like an inverse ship for real. will-they-or-won't-they but for breaking up. same energy though, like i'm glued to the screen rooting for them to fight instead of kiss.

"check-up" i was sooooo brave you guys making peace with the situation BUT THEN TRAPPER STAYED!!! i feel like my crush has been given a stay of execution

i don't know if i ship it per se but i really hope he and margaret hook up exactly once and literally everyone regrets it

i've seen some more episodes and have more thoughts but i need to lie down a lot first

oh one more thing:

i realize "m*a*s*h actors amazing" is not breaking news, but i'm specifically obsessed right now with how they are always interacting with props. i don't even mean the o.r. tools or scripted things, but how in every scene they're doing comedy while also moving crap around, pouring things, drinking, shaving, changing clothes, handing (or THROWING) things to each other, just making a mess all the time while still hitting their lines and comic beats. it's a master class in whatever that is.

anyway it's so good!!! more to come 💕

[albertasunrise]

Back to Reality - Oops Baby

Masterlist

Summary: Being best friends with Frankie meant movie nights, drinks with the guys and a shoulder to cry on when you got your hear broken. He is head over heels for you but you don’t feel the same… yet a drunken mistake will tie your lives together forever!

Relationships: Frankie Morales x Reader

Warnings: Like AO3 I choose to give none. Read at own risk. 18+ (Sorry this took so long! I hope you enjoy 😘)

Series Masterlist - Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8

You gawked at Ben as the piece of information he'd given you set in. Frankie. Your Frankie thought you were dead. Ben watched you closely as a myriad of emotions flitted across your face. His arms gently bounced Esme as she settled against his firm chest and fell asleep once more. He knew this was a difficult idea to process but he also knew that you had to understand that Frank was delicate right now and needed time to assimilate this world instead of the one he'd been trapped in for weeks.

"Titch?" He piped up after you had been silent a while, his eyes searching your face for any sort of understanding.

"He thinks I'm dead?" You asked and he nodded grimly "What?… How?… What do you mean?"

"When he woke the first time, he was sobbing about how he was going to see 'her' again. Initially, I had thought he meant Mel but it soon became clear it was you he was talking about." Ben answered as he rested his cheek against the crown of Emse's head "The doctor believes that when he was in a coma he was dreaming but aspects of reality trickled in." He continued "So those days we sat by his bedside and you asked him to come back to you, he could hear you. Or I suppose the ghost of you."

You couldn't hold back the sob that fell from your lips. Your heart shattered completely and you sank to the floor as you processed what Ben had said.

"So all that time he's been living in a world where I died and he's had to raise little Esme all alone." It wasn't a question. It was just you stating a simple fact and Ben could do nothing but watch as you fell apart on the clinical hospital floor.

"Titch, I know this is a lot to take in and I know your first instinct is probably to run back in there and try a convince him that this world is real and that you are too but…"

"I know what you're going to say, Ben." You interrupted "He's fragile and we need to be careful with him. I get it!" You snapped "I will stay away."

"That's not what I am saying." Ben groaned as he carefully lowered himself onto the ground beside you, his large hand cradling Esme's head as he slid down the lino-covered wall "He just needs a few days to adjust. He's been in a coma for close to two months. He's confused and it's going to take a few days for the fog to clear. So perhaps we ease him into this gently."

You nodded, knocking a few tears loose with the action and Ben smiled as you rested your head on his shoulder.

"He's back with us Titch and he's getting better." Ben stated as he nuzzled the downy hair on Esme's head "You and him and Esme are going to be a family but he's still got a road ahead of him."

You nodded, taking Ben's free hand in yours and giving it a gentle squeeze.

"We just need to help him walk it. At whatever pace he can manage."

The next few days were torture. You avoided the hospital like the plague, handing Emse off to Ben each day so that he could take her to see Frankie. You knew he was going to try and get Frankie to come around to the fact that you are real. That this isn't a dream but Frank was out of it during his visits. They had kept him mildly sedated in order to keep him calm as he got used to being awake. Ben and Will watched as his awareness slowly but surely ebbed its way through. Fish became a little more coherent with each visit.

"You think you feel up to holding her today?" Asked Ben as he took the bottle of water Frankie had been sipping from off of the man and placed it on the table "She seems smaller than I remember." The man said and Ben shared a look with Will.

"Remember what we talked about yesterday Catfish?" Will asked as he perched on the bed "You've been sleeping for a while and what you remember of Esme was a dream."

Frank's brows drew together as he tried to remember the conversation in question. Things were still so fuzzy. Memories felt heavy but he tried to figure out which ones were real and which ones were just a coma-induced fantasy.

"Who's been taking care of Esme whilst I've been gone?" He asked, his voice quiet and uncertain as his eyes flitted between the two Miller brothers.

"Titch has been." Ben stated "She woke up a few days after you had your heart attack." He continued as he placed his hand on his friend's and squeezed in in a reassuring gesture "She really wants to see you… She's missed you like crazy."

Frank just closed his eyes and shook his head as a few silent tears slipped down his flushed cheeks "Why would you say that to me." He choked "Why give me hope when there isn't any."

"Fish I am telling you the god's honest truth." Ben urged "Titch didn't die. It was all a dream."

"Ben." Will piped up, giving his younger brother a look that silently said 'That's enough.'

"I would like to hold my daughter now." Frankie stated plainly and Benny nodded, smiling down at little Esme as he scooped her up and placed her into her father's waiting arms.

The pilot beamed as he looked down at his daughter and it was the first time in days that either Miller brother had witnessed genuine joy from the older man.

"Hello, princessa." He cooed as he placed a kiss on the tip of her nose "You are so pretty." He resumed as he stroked her plump cheek with the tip of his pointer finger "Just like your mumma."

"Titch is such a natural with her man." Ben beamed as he watched the scene unfold "Seems to know what Esme wants before she even cries. It's mad." He chuckled but Frankie didn't look at him. Didn't even acknowledge that he had spoken.

Ben's shoulders visibly shrank at that.

Will motioned for Ben to follow him as he stood from where he had perched on the bed and made his way out into the hall, letting the pilot know they'd be back in a moment before stepping far enough away that they were out of earshot.

"I think we need to bring Titch to visit." Will stated plainly.

"But he still doesn't believe she's alive." Ben argued, glancing at the man through the glass wall of his cubical before returning his attention to Will.

"He's stable. The doctor said today that his vitals are strong and he's confident that the worst is behind." Will stated as he scraped a hand over his short blonde hair "I think it's time we bring her here. So that he can see for himself that she's alive and well."

"I don't know Will." Ben replied, shaking his head as he thought about it "You remember how he was last time he saw her."

"He had just woken up from a 7-week coma and he was confused." Wil growled "He is now awake, lucid and talking so I think now is the time to rip that bandaid off. We're gonna need to eventually"

Ben nodded. He knew his brother was right. Frankie was going to have to see you at some point and he had promised you that it was a few days that Fish needed to get himself used to this reality. Well, those 'few days' had long passed.

"Fine." Ben conceded "I will bring her with me tomorrow when I come to see him with Titchy." He replied "You're right."

"I know." Will teased as he gave his bother a friendly pat on the arm "Happens more often than you think."

"Shut up." Ben grumbled before they returned to the pilot's room.

"Are you sure about this Ben?" You asked as he led the way to Frankie's room.

When he had said it was time you visited with him and Esme you had been sceptical. You didn't want to go through another ordeal like the one you had experienced before. In just over a week you had witnessed him go into cardiac arrest and then wake up and beg you to leave him alone.

You weren't sure how much more your heart could take.

"Will said that it's time we rip that bandaid off and I agree." He stated simply as they came to the ICU "He's stable and getting stronger every day so I think it's time he starts to get used to the idea that you are very much alive and kicking."

"Your arse if this doesn't go well." You added and he chuckled.

"Fair enough."

You stopped outside Frankie's cubicle and noted he was sleeping and you felt yourself grow more and more nervous by the second. Ben didn't need to look at you to see this.

"I will go in, and let him know he has a visitor. Give me a few minutes okay?" He said softly as he placed a comforting hand on your arm "I'll wave at you to come in when he's ready okay?"

You simply nodded and watched as Ben stepped inside the glass room, his smile growing wide as Frankie's eyes cracked open and fixed on him.

…

"How are you feeling this morning brother?" He asked as he sat himself down beside his friend.

"Little stronger today." The pilot answered and Ben grinned at his reply.

"That's good Fishcakes." He chucked when the pilot groaned at the nickname "Feeling up to a visitor?" He asked and Frankie gave him a perplexed look "Titch is here." Ben stated and Frankie's eyes widened "She really wants to see you." He finished as he looked over his shoulder at you stood in the ward as you fidgetted with your hands.

Frankie's eyes followed Ben's and his eyes widened further as he saw you standing there.

"You can see her?" He asked Ben and the younger man chuckled.

"Course I can."

"She's really there?" He asked and Ben just smiled at him sweetly and nodded before motioning to you to come in.

You nervously stepped inside. Esme's carrier in one hand and the other pushing the glass door open. Your eyes never left Franks. Not even when you placed the carrier down on the floor beside you. The two of you just stared at each other for what felt like an eternity before Ben finally spoke up.

"I'll leave you two to catch up." He said as he picked up Esme "We're gonna go say hi to Esme's fans… Aren't with Titchy." He said as his voice adopted that high-pitched tone that was only for her.

Neither of you looked away as he left. You just continued to stare like it had been years rather than weeks without seeing or speaking to each other. When you couldn't take the silence anymore you spoke up whilst taking a seat at his bedside.

"How are you doing?" You asked, your voice quiet and timid as you searched his face for something.

"Stronger." He replied simply and you nodded "Still confused."

"I bet." You replied, trying to lighten the mood that had settled over the room "I'm so happy you're awake."

"Am I?" He asked and it was your turn to look confused "What if this is some sort of coma-induced dream?"

"Frankie-"

"How do I know that this isn't just my dying brain showing me what it is I want to see?"

Silent tears slipped down your cheeks as you and him just continued to stare at each other.

"I want to believe this is real." He hicupped as his own tears started to fall "I want to believe that the woman I love is alive and sitting right in front of me but I can't."

"I am real." You urged as you grabbed his hand and brought it to your face "Does this feel real to you?"

"Everything there felt real too!" He stated as he snatched his hand away "The pain… The heartbreak… All of that felt so real."

You sobbed loudly then as he continued.

"The pain I felt when that car struck me… it was so real. The pain of not being able to breathe as I lay there dying felt so real and I…" He trailed off but you knew what he was going to say.

He had been ready to die.

"What can I do to convince you that this is real?" You sobbed as you hugged yourself.

"I don't know." Frankie answered honestly "I don't want to accept this, that you are here right now, alive and well only for me to wake up one day in a different hospital bed and realise that it wasn't real. I can't lose you again."

"That's not going to happen!" You pleaded but he just shook his head.

"I wish I could believe that."

You were saved by the Ben.

The younger Miller strolled in with a grinning Esme in his arms and you quickly wiped away your tears and schooled your features.

"Titchy here is quick the chick magnet." Ben chuckled as he bounced her and she smiled widely as she shyly shoved her head in his chest "Awe… You weren't all shy a minute ago."

"Why do I get the feeling you're going to willingly babysit when I go back to work?" You chuckled and the man just shrugged nonchalantly.

"Because I'm an amazing uncle?"

"That you are." You said fondly as you took Esme from him "Time for someone's lunch you said as you sat down again and pulled down your tank top. Smiling as Esme eagerly latched to your breast and started to suckle.

Ben watched a moment in fondness before his eyes travelled over to Frankie who was watching in awe. His eyes were red and teary. From what, Ben wasn't sure but he did wonder if it was partly due to the beautiful spectacle of you breastfeeding Titchy.

He had been able to sense as soon as he walked in that your reunion hadn't been what you had hoped. So instead of prying, he tried to bring some joy and Titchy was nothing but pure joy in his eyes. He knew that both you and Frankie would talk about what had happened when you were ready. He wasn't going to push the subject. He knew this was going to take time and he was there for the ride.

So in the following weeks, You visited with Ben, hoping that each visit would bring him around to the idea that you were alive and that this wasn't some fever dream.

Then when the doctor announced that Frankie was well enough to go home, Ben helped you move into the pilot's house. You had figured he would be more comfortable in his own environment but he still needed help. He was getting stronger every day but he still had days where he felt rough and bone tired.

"Can I get you anything else?" You asked as you walked into the lounge and placed the freshly brewed coffee you'd made for him down on the table beside him.

Today was one of Frank's worse days. But he hadn't wanted to stay cooped up in bed. So you had helped him to the couch that you had set up with pillows and soft blankets. Esme was now napping on his bare chest, skin-on-skin time being something he had demanded the moment he had gotten home. You couldn't help but glance at the large scar between his pectorals. It was healing well but still looked pink and slightly angry. It was a clean cut. Almost a perfect straight line, right down the centre of his chest. The surgeon had said he was sure that with time, the scar would fade to the point that he almost wouldn't notice it but Frankie hadn't really cared all that much.

He was littered with scars from battle after all.

"No, thank you." Frankie replied as he glanced up at you and smiled before returning his attention to the drooling baby on his chest "She's so perfect." He stated as you sat down on the armchair across from him "I still can't believe that you and me made her."

"Yeah, I know what you mean." You chuckled "I still have to pinch myself on the daily because I can't believe she's real." You flinched at your statement, internally scorning yourself for your choice of words but Frank didn't appear to be phased.

"I hope she is." Was all he said as he stroked her cheek with his thumb, smiling sweetly at his precious angel.

You watched him for a while. Admiring how much of a natural he was with her. Since getting him back home you had started to express, allowing him to do some of the feeds whilst you cooked or cleaned, whatever needed doing.

Frankie did what he could on the days he felt well enough but on the days that he didn't you know he was torturing himself. He hated how weak he felt. This was a man who had never been afforded the opportunity to be weak. He was expected to be strong every day of his life. To walk away from battle even if he'd taken a bullet to the leg.

"I never told you how wonderful Esme Nursery is!" You said after a little while "You didn't such a wonderful job. Especially as you were squeezing it in between caring for her and visiting me in the hospital."

This made Frankie pause and he blinked up at you as he studied you closely.

"Ben told me that if you weren't with me at the hospital or caring for Esme, you were spending every waking moment getting that nursery finished."

"I had to keep myself distracted." He replied, his eyes glistening with unshed tears as he remembered how every time he'd closed his eyes, he pictured you as your face paled and your eyes had drooped. The alarms had rung in his ears for days.

"I know it must have been really hard for you, Fish." You said softly as you gave him a sympathetic smile.

"Not as hard as it's been for you." You didn't react to this.

This was the first time he'd acknowledged you and what you had likely been through whilst he'd been in a coma. He had still been weary of believing you were real. The odd comment here or there making it clear to you that he still didn't believe this was real.

But you could see that he wanted to.

"I don't want this to end." He whispered, so quietly that you almost missed it but you didn't.

"It won't." You replied with a smile.

Frankie glanced at you and noted a new expression you'd not seen before. Something that almost looked like hope so you hoped that your next statement would give him that.

"We're here to stay."

Next

For updates follow @albertasunrise-ficsblog

[timeagainreviews]

Bursting Your Bubble

Liam Lynch once said- “The internet is a glimpse into how rude people will be in the future.” At the time it felt like just another funny little line from his song “Internet Killed the Video Star,” (not to be confused with the Limousines’ song of the same name) but nowadays it feels prophetic. Just this morning I made the mistake of reading the comments section and it’s thrown my day off considerably. From the comforts of our keyboards, we can write horrendous things. Treat strangers with contempt. It’s sometimes easy to forget there are actual people on the other end of our glowing screens. Insularity breeds contempt for the different. We live in our little bubbles.

It would be easy to blame the posters, the content creators, the influencers. A few bad apples spoil the bunch. But as psychologist Philip Zimbardo would say- don’t blame the apples, don’t blame the barrel, blame the barrel makers. The people who put the apples into the barrel in the first place. Despite everything Russell T Davies’ “Dot and Bubble,” is trying to say, one question hangs over it and the rest of this season- who is the barrel maker? Things in Finetime are anything but fine, but by whose design? One might assume it’s Susan Twist’s character, but who is she? This is the overarching question of season one, but is the question beginning to feel a bit drawn out?

From the outset, “Dot and Bubble,” acts as a sort of Black Mirror version of “Blink.” We’re given a young blonde woman who finds herself in a dangerous situation that requires her to look at something she would usually ignore. All the while, the Doctor and his companion are forced to talk to the young woman through a screen. The difference here is that while Sally Sparrow had gumption, Lindy Pepper-Bean is about as useful as a wicker toilet. She lives in “Finetime,” an actual bubbled world. Her “Dot,” device then creates yet another bubble around her head. It’s bubble inception. The bubble tells her when to wake up, how to walk, and even when to pee. (Shout out to my boy Dr Pee!) Because of this, Lindy lives an unobserved life where hard questions need not bother her.

Everything about Finetime is a hyper-realistic nightmare of overstimulation. It’s like “A Clockwork Orange,” meets “The Stepford Wives.” Lindy can ignore her problems when there’s always a new Ricky September video on the horizon. As Frank from Brad Neely’s “The Professor Brothers” said- “We danced like those people in the hyper-tight light of fried chicken commercials.” Lindy and her “friends,” can completely ignore the fact that their friends have slowly begun disappearing. They don’t even seem to notice when they’re the only ones in the room, how would they notice gigantic slugs eating each other?

With Ncuti Gatwa away filming season four of “Sex Education,” the show had to do a couple Doctor-lite episodes. These are usually hit-or-miss among fans, but as “Blink,” proved back in 2007, they can become fan favourites. The Doctor and Ruby’s roles are reduced, but this episode does a good job of making them feel like a recurring part of the story. Even though they spend the bulk of the episode in what looks like the intro to “The Brady Bunch,” it never feels like we’re being underserved.

Lindy’s friends float around her like talking heads in her holographic bubble. But she keeps getting interrupted by the Doctor and his bad vibes. Even though Ruby is also invading her privacy despite not being on her friend list, Lindy is willing to hear her out. We’re not told why up front, but there is a reason Lindy can believe Ruby might feasibly be tech support, but the Doctor could not. Due to Lindy’s impatience, Ruby is forced to talk to Lindy as if she were a child, but not so much that she catches on. Anyone who stops Lindy from either working or playing is a massive drag to her. She really just wants Ruby and the Doctor to go away. How do they not know how society works? Why are they asking such stupid questions when the answers have been drilled into everyone since they were children?

We learn that Lindy’s mother is Penny Pepper-Bean, but she’s actually another Susan Twist cameo, so she could be anyone. Thankfully, both the Doctor and Ruby recognise her this time, and it’s not in an aborted timeline. I saw someone mention on Facebook today that they felt the Doctor recognising her felt rushed, and I couldn’t disagree more. It was high time we got something from this storyline. While it has been nice to genuinely be curious about Doctor Who’s mysteries again, this one has felt like a lot of the same. With the Doctor and Ruby now clued in, we have somewhere else to go in the future. Maybe now Susan Twist will come out from behind the mask and we can learn something more about her. Maybe now the Doctor will start looking into her involvement.

I’m usually not interested in fan theories as they’re often filler content when YouTubers and bloggers don’t have anything else to talk about. But here I believe we’ve been given quite a lot to work with to formulate a theory or two. I know I said “It’s probably not the Rani because it’s never the Rani,” but at this point, if she’s not the Rani, they’ve wasted their biggest opportunity to reintroduce audiences to her that the show has ever had. At this point, it would be weird if she wasn’t the Rani. The things she’s been involved with have all of her usual hallmarks. We have genetic manipulation in “Space Babies,” humans are being treated like lab rats in “Dot and Bubble,” and then there’s the whole disguising yourself in plain sight aspect. At this point, the bigger question isn’t whether or not she’s the Rani. The bigger question is why wouldn’t she be? Why would the show come so close to revealing her and then pull back?

Ruby finally convinces Lindy to look beyond her bubble where she witnesses her co-worker being eaten by one of the Man-Traps. Usually Lindy could just ask her Dot to guide her to safety, but for some reason, it feels more than ready to direct her right into the open mouth of a Man-Trap. Lindy must walk without the aid of her Dot, and man does she suck at it. She quite literally cannot walk talk and chew bubblegum at the same time. Part of me was worried the episode was going to spend all of its time making fun of young people and their phones. It’s cliched and honestly, I’m tired of it. But within the context of the episode, Davies isn’t attempting a technophobic condescension toward the youth of today. Instead, the episode endeavours to highlight the danger of relinquishing your thoughts and actions to outside entities. If we let others tell us what to like, who to like, or how to live, you may as well become worm food.

Having narrowly escaped death by slug, Lindy is forced to bumble about outside while the Doctor and Ruby direct her like the most exasperated form of Google Maps ever. An interesting aspect of this scene that I’ve not heard anyone talk about is the greenish-blue blood seen from a body being dragged away. You may not know what I’m talking about, but I’ll post a picture below. You may look at that and say “That’s not blood, that’s slug goo.” But where else in the episode do we actually see the Man-Traps leave behind any kind of snail trail? I’m going to go out on a limb and say I think the people of Finetime are blue-blooded, and considering what we learn about them, it makes sense. Blue blood is often a symbol for aristocracy, but it can also be used as a way to imply an inbred nature. In this case, we could infer that the citizens have blue blood because they don’t “dilute,” it with the blood of non-white people. Oh did I not mention the Finetimers are racists? More on that in a bit.

Throughout most of this episode, only one of Lindy’s friends seems to be concerned with the fact that people are going missing, and that’s Gothic Paul. Gothic Paul was a nice little addition to the episode because a trans man plays him and they didn’t make a big deal about it. He wasn’t even killed for being trans. He was killed for being delicious and too dumb to notice. A diversity win! Compare this to Chibnall’s gay representation where a character says “By the way, I’m gay,” and then spiders eat her face. LGBTQ+ people are allowed to exist in such a manner that it doesn’t feel like “kill your gays,” when they kill our gays. Representation has been so good that it’s not even problematic that a drag queen made a child disappear. You know, the thing all of those conservatives are worried about with drag story hour? That’s just the Maestro’s schtick. 

After the battery in Lindy’s Dot goes dead, she’s basically a sitting duck. That is until she hears a familiar voice call out. A voice belonging to none other than the dreamy Ricky September. Maybe it’s the insular nature of being a pop star, but Ricky isn’t bogged down by his Dot. Instead, he’s learned to appreciate existing offline. Because of this, Ricky reads things about their people’s history. And even luckier for Lindy, Ricky can actually walk and move about in the world. After a bit of starstruck awe, Lindy takes his hand as he leads her away from danger. It’s almost sweet if you don’t suspect what’s coming.

Ricky leads Lindy to Plaza 55 where a door leading to the river flowing beneath the bubble can lead them out into the Wild Woods. Knowing a bit about coding, Ricky simply needs to type in two digits every five seconds and the door will come open eventually. With no Man-Traps about, Lindy needs only to sit tight and let Ricky work his magic. While she waits, Lindy is able to charge her Dot which enables the Doctor and Ruby to contact her again. The Doctor infers that the Dots can see the Man-Traps, but willfully encourage people to walk directly into their mouths. As it turns out, the Dot hates Lindy and her friends about as much as the audience does. The AI has gone rogue and it’s taking these airheads with it. Sadly, this is also when the episode starts to get bogged down by the season's overarching plot.

The Doctor deduces that the Man-Traps are eating the people in alphabetical order. This leads him to believe that the AI must have created the Man-Traps, otherwise they would eat whoever, whenever. The reason I feel this feels bogged down by the overarching plot is that I can’t imagine these golfball-sized Dots being capable of growing creatures in a laboratory. The most they can do against Ricky and Lindy is act as a projectile. They don’t even have thumbs. Because of this, it’s logical to imagine that there is a third party involved. It’s not hard to imagine who that third party is, considering Susan Twist’s cameo. But in the meantime, we as an audience are left in a state of limbo where this is either part of some greater plan, or an unsatisfying plothole. Albeit, not an incredibly episode-breaking one. After all, the Daleks manage quite a bit with only a plunger.

With Lindy’s Dot trying to bash their brains in and Lindy being next in line, alphabetically speaking, we are finally introduced to who Lindy actually is as person. Using her mega fan knowledge about Ricky September, she informs the Dot that Ricky’s name is a stage name and his real name is Coombes. Ricky can barely believe the betrayal from the woman he’s tried so very hard to save. But her gamble pays off as the Dot refocuses its attention on Ricky, giving Lindy enough time to escape to the river while the Dot strikes down poor Ricky. As face turns go, this is one of the worst in Doctor Who history. However, it’s not entirely without warning. Certain lines of dialogue have clued us in to Lindy’s true nature throughout the episode.

Before we leave him behind like Lindy so callously does, I’d like to take a moment to talk about Ricky September, as I don’t think we’ve seen the last of him. It was hard to tell what the Dot does to Ricky because the camera looks away, but he could have survived. Why I think this is because they spend a lot of time building Ricky up as a character. Both the Doctor and Ruby have shown a romantic interest in him. There have even been rumours that there would be a sort of love triangle between the Doctor, Ruby, and Ruby’s boyfriend. On top of that, we’ve got another blonde-haired blue-eyed person with RS for initials. Even further, the S in both names indicates a point in time- September and Sunday. And just because Ricky comes from a community of racists doesn’t mean he is one. Like he said, he does a lot of reading. Perhaps he’s learned better. Or I’m wrong and he has a Dot-sized hole in his head.

Finally, we get to see the Doctor and Ruby in the flesh. Even more finally, we get to see them both in the costumes they wore in their first costume reveal! Lindy gives the Doctor and Ruby some shitty excuse about Ricky turning back to save more people. She even gives a begrudging thank you to them, but ultimately can’t bring herself to let the Doctor help her or her friends. Lindy and her fellow survivors can’t bring themselves to interact with the Doctor because he’s black. It’s as heartbreaking for the Doctor as it is infuriating to Ruby who can only stand there and watch her friend experience this ugliness. But the Doctor is still the Doctor and he’s a bigger man than their small minds. He continues holding out a lifeline to some of the most undeserving group of spoiled narcissists to ever grace the screen of Doctor Who.

I’ve seen people complain that the Doctor does this. That it doesn’t mesh with the same character who once punched a man who was racist toward Bill. But that was the Doctor drawing a line and defending his friend’s honour. The Doctor’s compassion is so great that he’s willing to forego his sense of self-respect to save lives. This is the same man who tries to reason with racist genocidal aliens, he doesn’t stop just because they look human. I know I would have let them die, but the Doctor is a better person than me. That’s not to say any of this is easy for him. It very clearly cuts him to his core. Ncuti Gatwa gives an earth-shattering performance here, and when you consider this is the first scene he filmed after the Giggle, it’s fucking astounding. This is the exact type of range I was hoping they would bring to his character.

As a white member of the audience, I am left with a lot of uncomfortable realisations. Like, I barely batted an eye at the fact that Lindy’s friends were all white. I’m also left wondering how many people the Doctor has saved in the past who might have also treated a black Doctor differently. But I also feel like this ending took me by surprise for a different reason than my own ignorance. I simply never expected Doctor Who to go there. The topic of racism is not new to Doctor Who. Martha experiences quite a bit of it, especially in “Human Nature.” But even their more recent attempt with “Rosa,” fell short by implying that in 3000 years, no other black person would stand up for their rights. It was an oversimplification of the civil rights movement that left me wondering if Doctor Who was capable of tackling such heavy issues. I never felt like the show properly addressed the Doctor being a woman, so believe me when I say how much I appreciate them addressing the Doctor’s race. Even further, I loved that it ultimately isn’t the Doctor who will suffer from their racism. Their prejudice has doomed them without anyone else’s help.

It’s weird to look at this episode on the TARDIS wiki and see the Dots and Man-Traps listed as the main enemy. Because really, it’s Lindy who is the real monster. It’s Hoochy Pie and her wack-ass trumpet. Also, can we not come up with a better name than Man-Trap? What about Erascists? They erase e-racists. Just some good little sluggy bois taking out the trash. I stan a king. The Dots hate those evil trust fund dickweeds, and honestly, same. Evidently, the name Man-Trap was introduced in Doctor Who Unleashed, which for the 4th week in a row, I’ve forgotten to watch. One of the side-effects of Doctor Who’s screwy release schedule is that now I completely forget Doctor Who Unleashed even exists. One benefit, however, is that I often get to rewatch the episodes the next day with my partners who didn’t want to stay up late. The benefit is that I’ll notice things I missed the first time. It also allows me to experience the stories for what they are, as opposed to what I expected them to be.

Being able to watch “Dot and Bubble,” with hindsight has given me an even greater appreciation for this story. Over time, I feel people will eventually regard it as one of Davies’ best. Its tone and themes remind me of something you would find in the Seventh Doctor era, which is high praise coming from me. Ricky feels like the promise of a character like Pex from “Paradise Towers,” properly realised. Hopefully, like the graffiti says- “Pex lives.” Dylan Holmes Williams does a fabulous job directing as the episode wastes nothing. It’s a Doctor-lite episode that manages not to waste a moment of screen time with the Doctor. In less than five minutes, Gatwa manages to be the command performance in an episode of solid performances. But much like “The Fugitive of the Judoon,” this strong episode remains feeling unresolved due to the plotline still hanging over its head. Once we have the hindsight of knowing how it fits into the greater storyline, it could appreciate in value. One can only hope.

[luckyladylily]

Followed from the 'men or bear' post and simply trying to be social,

never read (or watched) dune but why do you feel its over rated?

So I've overplayed it a bit over the years because it's fun, but I have basically two major problems with Dune.

The first of course is the standard early to mid 20th century problem of it was written by a sexist racist white guy, but also I can't exactly judge if Frank Herbert was unusually racist and sexist for the time. But it is very much there, and it very much impacts the quality of the series for me. I don't really talk about this much because a given when dealing with older sci fi.

The second point is where I really get my rant on. See, the thing is Dune isn't the worst book ever. But for many years, well into the 2000's, a very large and very vocal group of people insisted it was the greatest sci fi novel ever written. So, in high school, I pick up the novel.

Now you need to understand, I read voraciously as a teenager and at a very high level. I'm not saying I'm better than other people but when you've read Moby Dick you get an idea of what a master can do with words. When you've read Issac Asimov you begin to understand how ideas can be woven together in a mind expanding way.

So I pick up "The greatest sci fi novel ever written" expecting it to be, at the very least, good. It was not good. It did not even come close to meeting the least of my expectations. I was astounded that anyone considered *this* the greatest sci fi novel. Really? Better than Foundation? Better than Frankenstein? This shit won a fucking Hugo and a Nebula? People compared this favorably to Lord of the Rings?

It's not fucking Lord of the Rings.

Anyway, what is actually wrong with it. Starting off, the book has decent ideas, but they are not presented in a particularly inspired way, nor is it the best presentation of those ideas. It was the first time that a white guy presented many of these ideas that he borrowed from other sources to other white people, and I guess that counts as originality back then. But in that respect it is just uninteresting. The real problem is how it is written. Which is badly, both in terms of prose and plot.

I am going to link you to my rant on Dune chapter 1. I discuss prose and presentation in that rant. It is difficult to summarize because there is just so much wrong with it. But to give an example of where it falls short in plot, lets talk about an event early in the first book. This is a spoiler, so fair warning. I call this the most uninspired and unearned betrayal ever.

Paul, the main character, is the heir to the House Atreides. In order to set up the rest of the plot, Herbert needs House Atreides to be destroyed through treachery. But Duke Atreides, Paul's dad, has to be shown to be a brilliant, wise, and capable leader. No run of the mill treachery can get past him. To solve this problem, Herbert introduces Duke Atreides personal doctor, and Duke Atreides directly states to everyone (especially directly to the audience) that this man is 100% trustworthy and unbreakable because he has undergone special mental conditioning making him incapable of causing harm. In X many hundred or thousand years no man so conditioned has ever broken. He is an unbreakably loyal man. And thus we have a character Duke Atreides can trust implicitly, so he can later be stabbed in the back without looking like an incompetent moron.

So now you probably think this is where we set up the dangerous nature of the Baron Harkonnen (greatest enemy of House Atreides), somehow brilliantly finding some mental weakpoint, or maybe inventing a brand new form of mental torture that successfully breaks the conditioning, or something else establishing Baron Harkonnen as a force to be reckoned with. So, how did Baron Harkonnen break the unbreakable man?

He kidnapped his wife. That's it. Didn't even torture her in front of the man, just nabbed her and said "hey do my bidding or I'll kill her!" And the unbreakable man folds like a cheap suit. He doesn't even bother to get proof of life. So in the hundreds or thousands of years these supposedly unbreakable people have been around the secret all along was kidnap their loved ones. No one has ever tried that before? Really?

I need to stress, this is not a misdirect and no other explanation is given. We are genuinely supposed to buy that the doctor is effectively unbreakable, that the Duke is wise and correct to have accepted this at face value, and that kidnapping the doctor's wife was actually the twisted, brilliant treachery it's place in the story would suggest.

It is astoundingly bad plotting that only exists because Frank Herbert couldn't be arsed to give a fuck about the plot of his own book. Even worse, it isn't a hard plot hole to fill with a better betrayal that also made logical sense. For example, Herbert could have written a character that the Duke naturally trusted implicitly, perhaps a brother or close friend, and shown why and how that trust exists. This would make more sense, give the betrayal real emotional weight, and matter in a much more personal way to our protagonist.

But no, that would take effort. Frank Herbert, master of tell don't show, just parades out a character and directly tells the audience that he's 100% totally trustworthy no for realz bro, and then expects us to just go along with the idea that the betrayal was earned and isn't fucking stupid. This is the level Frank Herbert is on.

But anyway greatest sci fi novel ever written, am I right? Winner of both a Hugo and a Nebula!

This is why I hate Dune. Not because it is the worst thing ever, there are even things to like in it, but it is like millions of people collectively decided that Bicentennial Man was the greatest science fiction movie of all time and it won the best film oscar and people are comparing it to the all time greatest films ever made and I'm over here just. Sure, it tries to play with some interesting ideas but it's got structural problems, there are acting issues, the script is poor. There are things to like but it's mid at best! Is everyone in on some collective joke? Am I in the fucking twilight zone?

Now, in the couple of decades since I first read Dune the "best sci fi novel ever" nonsense has pulled back a lot. I don't think I've heard someone make that claim in years. But it can be fun to be a hater, especially when something deserves it.

Edit: I want to make it clear I don't think less of anyone for liking Dune. Dune is probably a great playground for fandom and god knows I don't have a leg to stand on when it comes to my personal favs. I also hear the new movies are good, and nothing about Dune makes me think it couldn't be adapted well.

[kaylinalexanderbooks]

Personality through quote

Thanks to @elsie-writes here and here and @leahnardo-da-veggie here!

Rules: have your OCs respond to a given prompt then give the people you tagged a prompt

Got long, below the cut :)

[A quote about feelings]

Lexi: "I have a lot of feelings...they all are pretty intense. Every emotion is like that for me. When I'm happy, I'm ecstatic, exhilarated. When I'm sad, it's like I'm depressed. I get just a little stressed and my anxiety flares up, and I start crying. It's a lot, honestly."

Maddie: "Feelings are fine and cool, I guess. I like my feelings toward Lexi and Kelsey. Don't really like my feelings toward someone like Brycen. Not sure how I feel for others, though. They like me, which is cool. I dunno. Feelings are super weird."

Ash: "I think I'm starting to understand feelings of others better now that I've discovered my telepathy. It's interesting, seeing how I experience other's emotions. It gets a little metaphorical. Fascinating stuff."

Gwen: "I mean, Lexi was once upset and I was sent to comfort her because I was apparently the most empathetic there. I'd say I'm in touch with my emotions. I get a little too emotional at times. I hold back a lot more than people think, though."

Robbie: "Dude, feelings are kinda dope. Like our brain just feels sad and our chest physically hurts. Doctors can't explain it. [Pause] Okay, both of my parents are doctors and they kinda can, but it's cool regardless."

Akash: "Huh. Well, it's important to feel feelings, and it took me a while to face them. I'm good now, though. I think it's important to face them."

Jedi: [silent for too long] "Well, *rubs back of neck* "I like to...think of myself as someone in touch with his own emotions...."...*nods*

Carmen: "No."

[A quote about their thoughts on NFTs and/or cryptocurrency]

None of these guys would like it but this is a fun prompt!

Lexi: "Isn't crypto a scam? I don't like the idea of that. Just stick to regular money."

Maddie: "NFTs don't make any sense. Just right-click the image. Downloaded."

Ash: "Honestly, I feel like owning an image sounds fun in a silly way, but I'm not that reckless with my money. Would rather spend it on tangible things."

Gwen: "I'm uncomfortable with the idea of people charging you to own an image, fake money or not. I mean, why not make actual art?"

Robbie: "Oh my God did you see the NFT ape movie? Dude, it's so bad. I can't believe there are people this stupid."

Akash: "Not only is it unethical, it literally makes no sense. The money isn't real? Why would you do that? Like, have you looked at the value of crypto?"

Jedi: [intently listening to someone explain crypto and NFTs] "Well, now that is just ridiculous. How in the world do they expect to regulate that?" [A few more minutes of baffled rambling]

Carmen: [also had to have someone explain it to her, but she interrupted more] "Are you kidding me?! Is stupidity a common genetic trait among Ceters?!" [More ranting]

[A quote about remembering the ones they lost]

Well uh I'm not gonna go into any major spoilers so I'm gonna expand the meaning to more than just death.

Um, gradually gets sadder because my first few have not experienced their main trauma yet >:)

Lexi: "Oh, I had so many friends in elementary school! I mean, I still have a lot of friends, but I miss those who went off to different intermediate schools. It's okay, though! I found them on social media, and a couple had phones by fifth grade. I should totally hook up with them again! Thanks for asking!!"

Maddie: "I guess Brycen. He was my friend before he became a jerk. I would like to be friends with him again. Like, then him before he was a jerk."

Ash: "I miss the friendship I had with Shelby. I don't know why, it was literally only for a week or two. But there was...something about her friendship that sucked me in. I still have Lexi, so I think I'll be okay. Then there's my ex-stepdad, Frank. He was sometimes fun. Toward the end he became rude. Before that, though. I miss when I felt like he was a dad, I guess."

Gwen: "My grandfather died when I was very young. He was amazing, though, and I am just glad I remember him. He read stories to me and played with me. And then there's my cat, who we lost a few months ago. She was really sick. I still miss her."

Robbie: "God, I miss Lalika, Akash's mom. She was basically a second mom to me. I talked so fast around her as a kid. She was just starting to learn English when we met, so I don't know if she got everything, but she would always smile and laugh when I did, paying attention to my emotions so she could respond appropriately. But I also loved to read aloud my favorite books to her, so I helped in that regard I guess. She went to all my plays. She made sure to get something for my birthday, and Sam's, separate from Akash's gift. She was amazing."

Akash: "My mom. Every day, I miss her. It's...hard to move past it, I guess. She would listen to you. I still remember her songs that she'd sing, and I still listen to them. She loved taking pictures and filming everything, which I am so grateful for now. She fought for me, when the school district dug their heels in about something. Made sure I had everything I needed to succeed. She was the best."

Jedi: "My mother fought for me my entire life. She pushed to get me an accelerated academic program, fought to drag me and my sister to a better place where I could thrive. Fought my father when he...let us say, went too far. She was fiercely protective. I owe her my life. I just wish I could have repaid her."

Carmen: *scoffs* "I knew Atsila my whole life. Why wouldn't I miss her?" [Yeah sorry that's all you're getting out of her]

Tagging @dyrewrites @ceph-the-ghost-writer @elsie-writes @mk-writes-stuff @aalinaaaaaa @sam-glade @thebejeweledwatercat @winterandwords @mysticstarlightduck @somethingclevermahogony + anyone else ;)

Prompt: A quote about a weird habit they/someone else has.

TSP intro

TSP tag list (ask to be +/-): @thepeculiarbird @illarian-rambling @televisionjester @finchwrites

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 14/03/2024

My Dr. Eggman Can't Be This Evil!

Season 1 Featured on: 7 Somari Dad Also on: Your Onii​-​Chan's Favorite Rips!

Ripped by Smoky

Look: It's a point I've made before and a point I won't needlessly harp on about, so let's get it out of the way: Season 1 of SiIvaGunner was, as most firsts tend to be, far simpler than what we'd get just a year or two later and beyond. But it was before SiIvaGunner came to be known for its lovingly crafted and detailed mashups like Hella Pummel, before the ludicrously in-depth projects like my rip :), before we'd start getting delicately authentic melodyswaps like Outertale of much of any original covers or compositions like Trial of the Heart. Back when the very idea of disguising video game music edits as normal, unedited music rips, was still something really novel. The novelty of the channel paired, with a lack of basically any set-in-stone recurring jokes other than Grand Dad, resulted in some true classics like Pikmin Park, Live and Ooooooooooooooh, Dr. Soulja - and, of course, My Dr. Eggman Can't Be This Evil!.

Now, let's start with a bit of a disclaimer - there's obviously a whole bunch of baggage to unpack with the humor surrounding the Your Onii​-​Chan's Favorite Rips! album in general. 2016 was the absolute plateau of edgy YouTube humor being in the mainstream, right before LeafyIsHere, iDubbbz, Keemstar, Filthy Frank and all the others sort of petered out from YouTube's stricter moderation. It was, in no uncertain terms, the time where making fun of how weird anime could be was at its most trendy. The joke in My Dr. Eggman Can't Be This Evil!, and the joke of almost all the rips featured in Your Onii​-​Chan's Favorite Rips!, is to reference the anime franchise Oreimo, one that's effectively built entirely around the theme of being attracted to your younger sister. Despite its incestuous contents, the series sports a poppy, happy-go-lucky, bubbly aesthetic - hence, prime material to make jokes about how bizarre it is for Japan to effectively glorify such taboo relationships. Now, this is far from the only risque topic that early SiIvaGunner chose to tackle, and even back then there were topics such as described in Stickerbrush State of Mind that were still seen as going "too far" - but many of those have faded away as distant memories overtime, rips which failed to gain much of any traction, only really remembered as an edgier footnote in the channel's legacy.

So then...what makes My Dr. Eggman Can't Be This Evil! any different, worth highlighting here today?

Put simply, I don't believe its million-plus views come purely from Oreimo fans, or from people deep in the trenches who find references to weird anime to be inherently funny. I believe the views are there because of a far simpler, far more effective joke in play: the contrast between a song as bubbly as Oreimo's opening theme irony, and the vocals of E.G.G.M.A.N. and the character its attached to, is simply very funny. The original E.G.G.M.A.N. is sort of an industrial rock "anthem", where the titular doctor celebrates and glorifies his own destructive goals in a theatrical, self-aggrandizing, yet still aggressive way - an aggression that feels as if it disappears entirely without the track's original instrumentation. An aggression that, with the instrumentation replaced with the sugary sweetness of irony, turns into something purely theatrical, like a performance from a School Idol, a performance from the heart - which, given who Dr. Eggman is as a character, is obviously a very funny mental image. Pikmin Park was listed as one of the classic Season 1 rips above for good reason - it, too, plays on this same sort of contrast in songs used for a mental image that's simply too good not to get a chuckle out of.

Thing is, while Stickerbrush State of Mind was fondly remembered for just how much of a genuine banger it was, while Pikmin Park is considered a classic due purely to how well its joke works, I believe My Dr. Eggman Can't Be This Evil! succeeds above both of them due to mastering both sides of the coin. It's already very funny as a concept due to the contrast in songs used, yet a similar BPM and excellent mashup work by Smoky makes the rip an incredibly fun rip to just listen to as a good piece of music, vocals and instrumentation working in harmony far better than they probably should. It is, in that sense, a shining example of SiIvaGunner's biggest strength, the ability to make its viewers smile both from its jokes and from the surprise of hearing good music. It's the perfect harmonization of two jokes, preserving the strengths of E.G.G.M.A.N's vocals whilst using every piece of irony possible to highlight this new cutesy feel - a deceptively simple joke executed perfectly, transcending the dicey origins of its conception and becoming far funnier in a completely different way.

[trinityalps]

Comparing the types of abuse and ACES experienced by the gang during childhood. LONG POST

Physical Abuse 

Mac from his mother

Both Charlie and Mac are physically abused by peers. Specially mention to Charlie being force-fed things.  

Emotional Abuse - Every Single One of Them 

Charlie’s mom is coddling, controlling, emotionally manipulative - although possibly not intentionally - and expects/requires Charlie to take care of her. 

Mac’s mom actively rejects Mac and seemingly always has. She barely speaks to him and expects him to remain quiet as much as possible. She actively insults him. Luther is homophobic and enforced an unobtainable standard of masculinity onto Mac. Seems to enjoy setting up tests for Mac to fail. Is hot-and-cold and unpredictable in his affection 

Dennis is the Golden Child for his mom. She has high standards of presentable-ness he must maintain. She seems to have inspired his eating disorders and fear of aging or being ugly. He learns from her that degrading his sister is necessary to maintain his ‘status’/safety. 

Dee is despised by her mother and scapegoated. She is demeaned constantly, including for a medical condition and the treatment she needs.  

Both twins are ignored by there father and sporadically antagonized. Frank demeans them, insults them, and creates elaborate tricks to upset them for his own entertainment. 

All members are bullied in their childhood. Special mention to Dee and Charlie. 

Sexual Abuse

Charlie. Molested by his uncle, whom his mother allowed him to share a room with. His mother ignores Charlies distress enough that Jack can be actively Inappropriate in front of Bonnie and she does not react to him voicing discomfort.  

Dennis is a victim of statutory rape. He rationalizes it as something he should have enjoyed. Also, I’d like the throw out that his relationship with Barbara feels very emotional-incest in my opinion.

Both Charlie and the Twins are exposed to the sexual activities of adults at a young age due to Bonnie doing sex work and Frank hiring sex workers. 

Not quite sexual abuse, but Mac forces himself to have a lot of sex with people he is not attracted to in order to prove his worth and masculinity. 

Physical Neglect 

CHARLIE. Did not have anyone making him bathe as a child enough that he was visibly filthy throughout seemingly all of highschool. His adult teeth issues imply he was not taught to brush them and probably was not taken to a dentist. Presumably not to a doctor either.

Charlie was allowed to start doing drugs [inhalants, which are dangerous] seemingly without intervention despite it happening at school and being a spectacle among the students.  

This is only speculation but given Charlie’s adult eating habits, I wonder what his food situation was like growing up. Also when did Charlie stop using toilets 

Both Mac and Charlie are under supervised and allowed to get into dangerous situations 

Emotional Neglect 

EVERY ONE OF THEM IM NOT GONNA LIST IT ALL OUT. 

Special mention to Frank seemingly actively teaching Dennis to repress his pain. 

Mentally Ill Parents and Parents with Addictions 

BONNIE BONNIE BONNIE 

Also Mrs. Mac appears to be pretty depressed. Chain-smokes. 

Frank is Frank

Barbara is a drug addict. Referred to by Frank as ‘pill popping’ 

Luther sold drugs, presumably there were drugs in the household during mac’s childhood. Presumably Luther and Mrs. Mac were users if not addicts. 

Jack is not a parents but was present in Charlies childhood and has some sort of dysmorphia or delusion regarding his hands. 

Parental Incarceration and Abandonment 

Charlie’s Dad

Luther

Education Neglect 

Charlie has been diagnosed with any type of learning disability despite being functionally illiterate. Was never given any type of help for behavioral issues despite still biting at least as late as elementary school. As far as we know he never had school staff intervene with the horrific bullying he experienced and no one appears to have called CPS despite him being visibly neglected. [I’m not sure what the mandatory reporter laws of Phili in the 80′s were like but what we know of Charlie’s school year would be a mandatory report for teachers today] 

[teatimeatwinterpalace]

27 January 1859 | Birth of Kaiser Wilhelm II  

The husband of the young mother provides us with a poignant portrayal of her intense suffering. After Martin had examined the Princess, Fritz asked him for a full and frank account of what could be expected. Martin explained that while Vicky’s life was not in danger, that of her child was. Fritz thereupon instructed the doctors ‘only to think of the mother, but was informed that it was medical practice to try save both mother and child’. The Prince nevertheless prepared himself ‘to witness the birth of a stillborn child’. He vividly describes the pitiful condition of the mother, who was unware of how dangerous the situation was for her baby: 

Vicky’s pain, as well as her horrible screams and wails, became ever more severe; however, whenever she was granted a respite from her suffering, she would ask for forgiveness from everyone for her screaming and impatience, but she could not help herself. When the final stage of labour began, I had to try with all my might to hold her head in place, so that she would not strain her neck over much. Every contraction meant a real fight between her and me, and even today [29 January] my arms still feel quite weak. To prevent her from gnashing & bitting, we made sure there was a handkerchief in her mouth at all times. Occasionally I had to use all my strengh to remove her fingers from her mouth, & also place my own fingers in her mouth. With the strength of a giant, she was at times able to hold off 2 people, & thus the awful torture escalated until the moment of birth was so near that complete anaesthesia with chloroform was undertaken... Vicky was laid at right angles on the bed; she let forth one horrible, long scream, & was then anaesthetised.’

Fritz describes how, upon hearing not a cry from the newborn, he sank ‘in a half-faint’ onto the bed next to Vicky, whom he had been holding in his arms during the entire ordeal. Martin’s tone of voice as he uttered the words ‘It’s a prince’ seemed to confirm the father’s worst fears, and Fritz thought that what the doctor meant was: ‘such a shame - a boy on top of everything else’, until suddenly heard the child crying in the next room. ‘The sound cut through me like an electric shock; Martin said I should go in, Countess Perponcher took Vicky in her arms, & I staggered, in a half-faint, into the next room where the baby was in the bath, & first I fell into Mama’s arms, & then I sank to my knees. The baby cried again when he was given a further number of slaps, and everything seemed to indicate that all was well, indeed, wonderful, & I was assured that he would live!’

Young Wilhelm: The Kaiser’s Early Life by John C. G. Röhl.

[marley-manson]

My main takeaway of Fade Out, Fade In is that Hawkeye is extremely chill and secure lol. I feel like I've seen it used as an example of Hawkeye's egotism and I think that must be due to misremembering the episode because Hawkeye is constantly gracious wrt Charles as a surgeon. He's overjoyed that Charles knows the aneurysm operation they need to do and more than happy to let him do it, assist, and learn from him, asking questions and complimenting him. He's quick to give him the credit afterwards when Dr Berman wakes up as well.

When Charles finds a flood of patients too intense and doubts himself, Hawkeye reassures him by saying, "We're not any better than you, it's just that by sheer repetition we've gotten fast."

What Hawkeye takes issue with and makes fun of is Charles' superiority complex. He rolls his eyes when Charles pointedly insults him or anyone else, he mocks his haughty demeanour and upper class accent, calls him Chuck to annoy him, etc. This is all separate from his skill as a surgeon, which Hawkeye vocally admires, and all completely warranted because obviously Charles is an asshole lol.

The second takeaway of this episode is that I wish Potter was a villain. I'd forgotten this, but he's the one who arranges to keep Charles at the 4077 when otherwise Baldwin would've taken him back. Blah blah blah they need good surgeons and saving lives is important and someone's gotta do it blah blah blah, fact is Charles is well within his rights to hate Potter for this and I wish he did, and I wish we could be on his side about it properly, because I absolutely am on his side here.

Instead it's framed as something Charles deserves for being haughty, and a trial by fire to improve him. I would prefer to see it framed as a personal tragedy that engenders sympathy, perhaps planting the seed of comraderie between him and Hawk and BJ. Not a fan of framing being forced to work in a warzone as character building.

And now some miscellaneous thoughts:

-- Hawkeye clocks that Berman is jewish after hearing him speak one sentence (i assume, since hawk immediately jokes about him kibitzing), for the jewish hawkeye headcanoners

-- also love how overtly gay Berman is, I'm calling the "you doctors are all alike" joke as evidence of Berman clocking Hawkeye in return

-- "command me, o tall one with the presbyterian features" is such an amazing Klinger line

-- Hawk stealing Frank's boxers for himself

-- the scene with Margaret and Hawkeye and BJ is such an awful bait and switch lol, I go from 'aw they're friends!!' and loving Hawkeye when he tells her she doesn't have to tell them what's bothering her but she's clearly upset so she should sit and have a drink either way, to 'nooooo' when the (narratively endorsed) answer given to Margaret is she's too much of a flirty slut and it hurt Donald's feelings :(

-- Hawkeye being nice to Frank on the phone even when he's pissed at him and throws the phone immediately afterwards was cute honestly. Hawk speaking for both him and BJ was cute and married too ("we both think that's wonderful. we're proud to have known you")

-- BJ and Hawkeye both collaborated on the snake prank but Hawkeye's the one who gets a comeuppance >:( "Please, Mozart" is a fantastic final line though.

-- OH! the patient who didn't want to go back to the front because he doesn't want to kill anyone else! When he speaks to Mulcahy, Mulcahy starts off with his usual rote 'yeah it's scary go fight anyway' thing, and when dude corrects him about his reasons Mulcahy doesn't say anything, just stares off into the middle distance. And that's the end of that storyline.

Like man I would've liked to know what Mulcahy said to him lol, how Mulcahy squared that with himself. It's a fantastic counterpoint to his usual encouragement but I want more. Wish we could've repeated this premise in a Mulcahy-heavy episode.

[glazedtrash721]

Beware, this is a LONG post!!

TW: a lil' scopophobia perhaps

So, you know how there's a boat load of Welcome Home AUs floating around?

Well, now there's one more!! (And even more given some time!)

Let me introduce you to my first Welcome Home AU:

Children's Hospital AU!!

In this AU, all of our lovely neighbors are staff at the town's local Children's Hospital, which is officially titled the "Healthy Home Children's Hospital", or HHCH for short! This AU doesn't really have any spooky or funky elements to it, as I was pretty desperate for ideas that haven't already been done when I thought of it. Although, this AU does serve its purpose in being very cute and wholesome, and I'm sure that it could make for some fun content!

Characters and more info can be found under the break!

By the way, these drawings are not to scale! I just made them so that they would fit on the page :/

Anyways...

Let us first start with the Doctors!

Doctors Darling, Joyful, and Frankly have bested too many years of medical school and are now here to take care of their young patients! Both Dr. Wally Darling and Dr. Julie Joyful are physicians, and they can be found buzzing around the hospital, tending to whoever needs it! Dr. Darling, with his calm and cool energy, is more often assigned to older and more anxious kids. Dr. Joyful, on the other hand, is often tasked with the care of younger children and babies with her more energetic and sweet personality. Dr. Frank Frankly is the surgeon of the group, and he excells with his steady hands and his thirst for knowledge and for solving problems! Dispite his grumpy appearance, the children find him a joy to see when he checks up on them before and after surgery!

Next, we have the Nurses!

Nurses Sally, Barnaby, and Howdy help make up the back bone of the hospital, and they are always on their toes helping those in need! Nurse Sally can typically be found in the ER, where her quick feet and her sunny disposition are a must have, though she can be found bouncing all over the hospital! Nurse Barnaby never fails to put a smile on a patient's face with his funny jokes, and he is a dream when someone needs a distraction from a needle or anything else that may be frightening them! Nurse Howdy is extremely handy with his four hands and arms, making him an amazing multi-tasker! He is also a master of hugs, and he is wonderful with calming down particularly upset patients. He and Barnaby are also often called on the occurrence where a patient (or even parent!) needs restrained, thanks to their size and even tempers!

Lastly, we have those with more miscellaneous jobs!

Mr. Eddie and Ms. Poppy also have important jobs that help the hospital and its patients! Eddie is the HHCH's trusty mailman! He takes gifts and letters from the mail room and gift shop and delivers them to their recipients. As he knows the hospital's layout like the back of his hand, he also often accompanys visitors and volunteers, such as those who bring therapy dogs and such! He also takes extra care to dress up on holidays and other occasions! Ms. Poppy is an Emotional Consultant, and she is there to help patients and their families make difficult decisions, usually regarding treatment. Still the nervous bird that she is, she still tries to put on a brave face and a warm smile to those who need a little extra guidance or reassurance.

They're all colorless now, but I'll probably add that soon lol.

Also, I haven't designed Home yet, but I imagine he'd be the Headmaster of the hospital or something similar? I may give him a design later on.

Anyways, that concludes my first Welcome Home AU! Feel free to ask for any specific info that you want me to elaborate on, and feel free to use these silly dudes in your own fan content, given that it's not sussy (NSFW in the sexual way), and that a lil' credit is given! Otherwise, go ham!

[chip-potato]

Hey, so I think I figured out why the Gaster Followers are the way that they are, and also why nobody seems to talk about Gaster himself, despite his very apparent importance in the Underground society's history. The Followers are, literally, being hurt and consumed by bad memories. (tw: suicide mention) Monsters' bodies are made of magic, and as such, they work differently than human bodies do, which is evident especially with the concept of Falling Down, described by Alphys in the True Lab logs as a monster, after losing all hope, falls to the ground in a comatose state and seemingly has no way of reawakening or doing anything except for eventually dying. Hope, or rather the absence of it, plays a key role in this interaction. From this, we can gather that how a monster feels can have a tangible impact on their physical health. It stands to reason, then, that witnessing a traumatic event can cause a similar kind of damage to a monster's psyche, and therefore their bodies. Not only that, but turning our attention back to the True Lab, we can encounter amalgamates called “Memoryheads”--

-- which, if you interact with them in a specific way, can fill our inventories with an item called the "Bad Memory". These bad memories cannot be thrown away, and if you try to use one, you take a little damage. But that's just what happens to Frisk, a human. What happens if a monster were to be given a bad memory? The game, according to my theory at least, gives us the answer to that question in the form of the three Gaster Followers you can randomly encounter around Hotland. Yes, followers plural. It is my personal belief that all three of them have pieces of Gaster. Or, perhaps it’s more accurate to say that the pieces... have them? Deltarune finally gave us a look at what Follower 3′s normal self looks like, and due to the fact that everyone in Deltarune doesn’t change that much physically from their Undertale counterparts, we can (in my opinion) safely make comparisons between every Follower and their more colorful selves.

To be frank, it’s... a little concerning, because looking at it all at once, it’s quite obvious what’s happening to these monsters. They’re holding onto Bad Memories, which are apparently in the process of consuming them. Follower 2′s hand has been replaced or melded with one piece, the borders around 1′s eyes and mouth seem to suggest (at least to me?) that it’s practically being WORN, like some kind of bodysuit. 

And, of course, 3... good lord, look at Follower 3. Knowing what’s meant to be what in this sprite now makes it appear that 3′s body has Fallen Down, but the memory might be able to keep it upright and sort of... puppet it around? It’s almost like a burlap sack was thrown over the guy, honestly. Possibly while it was frozen in the second frame of its animation, as you can tell from its beak and wing shapes matching up with the “jaw” of their Follower/Undertale version. Follower 2, though, is especially interesting due to the fact that his piece seems to bear the most resemblance to an attack the Memoryheads are known for doing:

In any case, the trend is clear: holding onto Bad Memories (or in other words... trauma) literally eats monsters up. You can tell it’s eating them up in the metaphorical sense, too. Vague as they are, all of their dialogue revolves around Gaster, and as a matter of fact it’s basically the only confirmed sources of information on this character that we have. It’s all they know, too. Due to its importance to my theory, here is a comprehensive list of everything directly told to us by the three Followers: 1 - Doctor W.D. Gaster was the Royal Scientist preceding Alphys. 2 - Gaster’s brilliance is described as “irreplaceable.” This is corroborated by another Follower, calling Gaster an “act to follow.”  3 - Gaster created the CORE. 4 - Gaster, at some point, “vanished without a trace.” 5 - There was a rumor that “(Gaster) shattered across time and space.” I specify that it seems to be a rumor due to this being prefaced with “they say,” a common way to simply say that something you heard is a rumor being passed around. 6 - This same follower, #2, is able to say this “without fear,” due to possessing a piece of Gaster themselves. 7 - At some point, Gaster’s “experiments went wrong”. 8 - Gaster’s life was “cut short”. This wording of “cut short” is shared across two of the followers, and given Undertale’s style of writing, it’s likely significant in some fashion. 9 - Gaster “fell into his own creation.” 10 - Asgore “waited so long” to hire a new Royal Scientist. 11 - Asgore "took so long” to hire a new Royal Scientist, which seems to imply something different to the “waited so long” anecdote from another follower. “Took so long” implies a process that took a lengthy amount of time. “Waited so long” implies, well, waiting a long time before beginning the process. 12 - Alphys “works faster” than he did, most likely meaning that her output in terms of experimentation results and inventions were faster. 13 - There is speculation that Alphys will “end up the same way”. 14 - Despite everything else said about Gaster, Follower 3 refrains from elaborating on the experiments going wrong, claiming that “... it’s rude to talk about someone who’s listening.” Potential conclusions to draw: - (3 + 9) Gaster fell into the CORE. - (10 + 11) Due to Asgore seemingly dragging his feet, there was a long stretch of time where there was absolutely no Royal Scientist. - (2 + 12) Gaster was, seemingly, quite the perfectionist. - (3 + 12) Alphys was the creator of everything hi-tech seen in Undertale, with the exception of the CORE. - (7 + 13) Gaster and Alphys, perhaps, experienced similar situations of their experiments going wrong during their respective tenures.

Now, a lot of this is important, but I want to draw attention to the things concerning comparisons to Alphys, and Gaster’s experiments going wrong. Alphys, as I’m sure many of you know, is depressed. She is depressed due to her feelings of failure regarding the Amalgamates, an experiment into Determination that went wrong, in the True Lab... and she fights back against that regret by watching anime and blogging about her bad opinions online. It’s not exactly a healthy coping mechanism, but at least it’s... something. Something that Gaster, presumably, did not have. Now, let’s look back at Gaster’s Entry Number 17: “ENTRY NUMBER SEVENTEEN DARK DARKER YET DARKER THE DARKNESS KEEPS GROWING THE SHADOWS CUTTING DEEPER THIS NEXT EXPERIMENT SEEMS VERY VERY INTERESTING ... WHAT DO YOU TWO THINK?” Due to Deltarune's frequent allusions and ties to this piece of dialogue (and the noise being emitted in the room it’s found in), we now know, more or less, what was happening here: Gaster was witnessing the creation of a Dark Fountain, hinted at by the present tense of the words like “GROWING” and “CUTTING”. Due to Fountains requiring Determination to open, however, it is unlikely that he would be able to open one himself and survive, so it is likely that he enlisted the help of... someone. Possibly one of the “you two” mentioned at the end, or perhaps even a third party. Due to the fact that Gaster is a historical figure of sorts, this narrows down who this Fountain-puller could be by... a lot, actually. There’s only one real candidate, I’d argue.

But that’s a theory for another time, I think. Getting back on track, it would seem that, either soon after this Entry or at a later point, something went wrong with these Dark World experiments. Gaster presumably thought that things went wrong to such an extent that he would be unable to face the consequences of his actions, for whatever reason, leading to him “falling into his own creation”. Due to the parallels between him and Alphys made by the Followers themselves, and assuming this to be accurate information, it is very likely that Gaster was attempting to take his own life. However, that did not happen. Instead, while his life was indeed “cut short”, pieces of him scattered across time and space. Some, ending up in the hands of monsters who would later come to obsess over him and his legacy. Consider the broader context of this, for a moment: this sort of news would likely come as a deep emotional cut to a populace of monsters stuck in a cave with seemingly no way to break the barrier preventing them from leaving. Monsters that, mind you, go into a coma and eventually die if they lose hope. How could Asgore go about explaining to everyone that Dr. Gaster, one of the most brilliant minds monsterkind has ever known, was just... gone? It’s simple: he couldn’t. No formal announcement could possibly be made that wouldn’t result in bodies dropping like stones. We are talking potentially pounds of dust littering the streets. So, my theory-within-a-theory here, is that Asgore allowed news of Gaster’s fate to pass from one person to another in the forms of vague rumors. Once he felt confident in it being spread enough, he began to hold auditions for a new Royal Scientist, to complete the cover-up. The reason why nobody (aside from the Followers Three) talks about Gaster is because, due to the way monster bodies interact with their feelings, it quite literally hurts to talk or even think about him. Additionally, anyone who does think about Gaster for too long, starts to be consumed by those thoughts. The same Bad Thoughts that the Memoryheads give you. It's not any sort of memory wiping/timeline shenanigans, or at least not in the way people may think at first glance. It’s just... simple monster biology.

[andydrysdalerogers]

Sliding Into Home ~ Maybe I Should Have Ducked?

Pairing: MLB!Frank Adler x Abigail Hernandez (OFC)

Synopsis:

After a trade from Boston to Los Angeles, first baseman Frank Adler would seem to have it all. Money, women, an amazing niece, yes Frank should have it all. Except for one thing. One thing that left after a mistake five years ago. Los Angeles should be the chance to start over. Except she is supposed to be in Boston. Not his new medical director.

* A Frank Adler AU x Major League Baseball Story**

Warning: ANGST (i can't stress this enough), second chances, cheating, S~M~U~T!!, slow burn, drug use, abandonment issues, betrayal, domestic violence (i may have missed some), flashbacks

Dividers by me

I do NOT give permission for my work to be translated or reposted on here or any other site, even if you give me credit. DO NOT REPOST MY FICS. Reblogs, comments, likes, and feedback ALWAYS appreciated

Previous: Wanna Feel Safe Again

Sliding Into Home Master List Main Masterlist

San Francisco is usually beautiful in late Spring. The air wasn’t sweltering yet, the flowers were in bloom.  

And the rivalry with Los Angeles was in full swing.  

Frank gritted his teeth at the thought of having to see Bobby Fuller again.  That asshole had been traded two years after the Vegas incident and he and Frank had been at each others throats during that time. So seeing him with the Giants was hard.  The Dodgers would be playing the Giants more often than he did with the Red Sox.  

During the first inning, there was almost a full out brawl when the pitcher almost hit Frank in the head with an errant pitch. Frank got into his face but never made a violent move.  The benches were  given a warning and play continued.  

Abby sat in the dugout as the trainer on the field, a responsibility that she enjoyed because not only was she involved with the team, but she was also close to Frank.  They didn’t interact much, knowing the TV cameras were everywhere, but Frank gave her a side smirk every once in a while, allowing the butterflies to gather in her stomach. When he could, he gave her a gentle touch, so she knew he was there.  

It seemed the game calmed down for a few innings until the top of the sixth.  Frank was back at bat and observed a pitching changeup.  The new pitcher, Smith, stopped to hear something from Fuller and then warmed up. Frank was curious but he let it go, concentrating on the pitch. The first one was low and inside, the second was away.  Frank smirked. He knew he just needed to be patient.  

Except when the fastball went wide of the box. And bounced off of Frank’s hand and into his face.  

He dropped to the ground, not moving. Abby grabbed her bag and followed another trainer out to the field. “Adler? Frank? Can you hear me?” Abby looked at Dave, the other trainer. “We need to move him. Get the brace.”  After fitting Frank with the neck brace, Dave and Abby carefully turned him over. “Oh Frankie,” she whispered.  

Frank had blood coming from the side of his face. “Fuck,” he moaned.  He blinked. “Cricket?”  

“Oh thank God. Let’s get the backboard,” she ordered Dave. As the EMTs came in, she smiled down at Frank. “If you wanted my attention, there are other ways Franklin.”  

“Full name treatment. I’m an injured man Cricket.” He smiled but immediately grimaced. Johnny came over to check on him.  “Hey man.”  

“Adler, jesus, are you ok?” 

“Maybe I should have ducked?” 

Abby smacks his shoulder. “We’re gonna get him checked out Storm.”  They loaded him to a cart as the crowd in San Francisco clapped and Frank gave a wave.  

The ride to the hospital was quick and Abby spoke with the attending physician to advise what happened.  She stood back in the examination room as the doctors on call checked him over.  The lead doctor came to speak to Abby. “Dr. Hernandez, it looks like Mr. Adler has a very minor concussion, a contusion on his face that will require a couple of stitches and a broken pinkie finger.  My recommendation is three weeks of healing.”  

Abby let out a sigh of relief. “That's better news than I had hoped for.  I agree with your assessment.  I will let the team know. Thank you so much.”  

“We can release him in your care today but no flying for 48 hours. Let me know if you need anything else?” 

“Just copies of his records for the team.” They shook hands and Abby went to Frank. “How do you feel about a small vacation?” 

“That bad?” 

“Broken pinkie, a small cut that needs stitches, and a small concussion. The League is putting you into concussion protocol, which is two weeks and the pinkie will need an extra week.  I’m sorry love, but three weeks on the injury reserved.”  

“That’s all of June,” Frank whines as he leans his head back.  Abby runs her nails through his scalp gently and he lets out a hum of contentment. “Will you stay with me Cricket?” He looked at her with puppy eyes.  

“I will have to work a little but yes, I can stay with you.”  

“What about...” 

“He’s back east with the firm. He took a case over there that will last about a month.” She bit her lip. “We’ll be fine.”  

Frank kissed the inside of her wrist. “I love you.”  

“I love you.  Now, let’s get you discharged and to the hotel. I need to let Todd know your status and have another trainer join the team for the rest of the trip.”  

When Frank and Abby arrived back at LAX, a teary Mary and Scott were waiting for them.  Mary ran up to Frank and he scooped her up with his good hand.  She cried into his neck, and he tried to sooth her. “Hey Nugget, its ok, I’m ok.”  

Mary pulled back and squished his face between her small hands.  She pushes his head around, inspecting the cut and his eyes. “Frank, you scared me.” She pushes his lips to make him smile. “You’re smiling.”  

“Yeah, I scared me too.  But Abby took good care of me.”  He flashed a soft smile to Abby before Mary launched herself into Abby.  

“Thank you, Abby, for taking care of Frank.”  

“Always Nugget. I’ll always take care of my family.”  She put Mary down so Frank could take her hand and she turned to Scott.  “How bad?” 

“She cried until you guys called. It was pretty scary.” Scott huffs.  “If he wanted your attention...” 

“I did not do it to get her attention,” Frank growled.  “If I wanted to get her attention, I would just need to show her my...” 

“Franklin!” 

Scott snickered as Frank groaned.  “Franklin, that’s so lame,” Mary says.  

Frank looks at Abby, who blows him a kiss. He shakes his head but returns the gesture as they make it out to the car.  Getting home, Frank gets to the couch and leans his head back. “Are you in pain Frankie?” 

“A little, Cricket.” He grimaces. “Just feel pressure behind my eyes.”  

“Yep, that’s the concussion.” Abby reaches for her bag and takes out a couple of tablets. “Here, let me get you some water.” Scott comes around with a bottle of water and Frank looks at him gratefully. He swallows the medicine and tries to close his eyes. “Baby, if you want to sleep, you should be in your room with the curtains closed. You’ll feel better, promise.”  

“Will you lay with me?” he asked pathetically.  

“Sure love.”  She helps Frank up and into his room. She gets him down and curled up against him. “Better?” He nodded and closed his eyes. “Rest, my love.  I’ll be right here.”  

The next ten days were calm with Frank still recovering from his concussion. On day 12, he became restless. He woke up with his Cricket in his arms, her butt right up against his pelvis. Christ, her ass is perfect, he thinks. He lets his hand wander down, dipping below her panties. She sighs in her sleep, but Frank wants to wake her up. He pulls her leg over his hip to open her up and lets his fingertips dip into her folds. Fucking wet and warm for him, like always. He slowly sinks a finger in.  

“Frankie,” she moans softly. “Baby, your head.” 

“It is clear as ever Cricket. Can I have you?” She nods and Frank smiles. He adds a finger and pumps at a steady rhythm. She cries out quietly and he palms her clit.  He brings her to the brink and watches as she shatters in his arms.  

“Need. More,” she pants.  

“Whatever you need Cricket.”  Frank pushes her panties down her legs and then pushes his own boxers down, grasping her knee and pulling it back over his hip.  He let his tip dance around the remnants of her release before slowly pushing in. She purrs at the stretch, and he gives a low chuckle.  “Can you be quiet for me Cricket? Can you be a good girl and be quiet?” He feels her nod against his ear. He pulls back and rocks back into her and he can feel her hum at the sensation.  “Good girl. Such a good fucking girl.”  

Abby is lost in the sensation of Frank taking her apart slowly. He isn’t rough or fast, just taking his time, making her feel everything. She whimpers at a particularly deep thrust into her womb but she doesn’t cry out. “That's my good Cricket,” he whispers, making her clench around him. “Didn’t realize you have a thing for praise, my love.”  

“Frankie,” she whispered. “Don’t be cruel.”  

“Never, my love.” He ran a finger down her skin until he met her clit.  He rubbed slowly, feeling her build around his cock. “Are you almost there? I know you are, can feel it.”  

“Yes,” she gasped. He didn’t stop until she shattered, seeing stars as he pumped in one, two, three and released inside of her with a low groan.  

“I love you.”  

“I love you more.”  

“Not possible.”  

“Let’s take a trip.”  

Abby looks from her coffee. “What?” 

“Let’s go on a trip.  Nug has her trip to DC this week, Scott’s heading back to Boston while she’s gone. I can’t stare at these walls anymore Cricket.”  

“You’re on injured reserve Frankie, you can’t just take a trip.”  

Frank pouts and gives her puppy eyes.  “Please?” 

“Oh so you think that just giving me eyes and a sweet little please is going to change my mind.”  Abby turns back to her computer with a scoff.  She misses Frank coming from behind her and sweeping her curls off of her shoulder.  He presses sweet kisses to her neck and shoulders, watching her lose her head and tilt back, exposing more of her.  

“I can stop, my love, and just go back to the couch.”  

“N-no.” She closes her eyes as her hand cups the back of his neck.  She can feel his smile against her skin.  

“Just a few nights. Please.”  

Abby starts to lose control of her gasps. She knows she needs to be quiet but the sensation of his lips on the column of her throat is one of the best she’s ever felt. “Ok,” she whispers as he nips her gently. “Fine, where do you want to go?” 

After Mary is dropped off with the school for her trip, Frank heads to the airport to drop Scott off for his flight to Boston.  “Have fun Frank,” he said with a wink.  

“You too Scott.” He gave him a hug and walked back to his car.  As he drove away from LAX, a sign blinked at him and an idea hit him. It was time, he thought to himself. He messaged Abby.  

Frank: pack for the heat  Abby: Why?  Frank: I want to take you somewhere and it will be hot.   Abby: I hate being hot.   Frank: Humor me  Abby: 😑 Fine.   Frank: Love you. 😘 

Abby packed her suitcase, smiling at the message Frank sent when another popped up 

Mike: How’s the road trip?  Abby: Fine.  Mike: I miss you  Abby: You too  Mike: I’ll be home in a week.   Abby: Ok, I’ll be home 

“Fuck,” she muttered.  She hated that she hadn’t had the nerve to just break it off yet. She was just scared of Mike’s reaction. Abby wasn’t normally a confrontational person.  The last time she was hostile, well, she lost Frank. The memory made her sad. When she heard the door open, she shook it off and closed her case.  

“Hey Cricket. All set?” Frank’s excitement was in the air.  

“Yeah baby, I’m all set.” Abby smiled as she wrapped her arms around his neck.  “Gonna tell me where we are going?” 

He kissed her nose. “Nope. Let’s go.” He grabbed her bag and his and headed to his Camero.  

“I can’t believe you still have this car.”  

“I can’t believe you would think that I got rid of it.” Frank started the car and headed out. “This is my prize for getting drafted.”  

“And here I thought that was me,” she replied without a thought. Frank smile dropped a little. He swallowed, wondering if this road trip idea was smart. He stayed silent, thinking about all the details and hoped that she would listen.  

A few hours later, Abby’s face was in disbelief.  Frank had taken them to Las Vegas.  She didn’t know what to say. Why would he bring them to the very place that had broken them?  Having never been to the city herself, she was awestruck at the lights and sounds.  Frank pulled into a fancy one, the Bellagio and had the valet take their car and bags.  He held her hand as they walked into the lobby.  Abby gasped as she took in the glass flower ceiling. “Wow.”  

“It is beautiful,” Frank commented. “When the team had come out here and we were walking around, I remember thinking that you would have loved this.”  

“Is this... is there where...” 

“No Cricket. I will never go back to that particular hotel ever again.” Frank checked them in and a hotel concierge walked them to their room.  “This is one of our high roller suites, sir.  If you need anything just call the desk and someone will be right up.”  

“Thank you.” Frank tipped the man as Abby took in the room.  It faced out to the strip and she could see the other hotels. Suddenly, what sounded like a cannon blasted water up in the air and the fountain began to dance.  

“The fountain,” she squealed as Frank chuckled. She could faintly hear the remnants of a Frank Sinatra in the air as the towers of water began to dance.  When it ended, Abby clapped. “That was amazing.”  

“It says here that it happens every half hour to a new song until midnight so we can watch it again if you like Cricket.”  Frank loved watching her as she enjoyed the show.  It was something he remembered from that awful October, wishing he could have shared it with her then. “C’mon baby, let me feed you and we can take a walk.”  

After a delicious meal, Frank and Abby walked hand in hand on the crowded streets. They pointed at the different signs, different characters that were walking the strip, laughing, and enjoying being just Frank and Abby.  As they approached one hotel, Frank’s palms began to sweat. “Frankie?” 

“Can I tell you a story? It doesn’t have a happy ending but maybe we can rewrite it.” Frank looked to his feet.  

“You can talk to me about anything, love.” Abby cupped his cheek. “Take your time.”  

Frank swallowed.  “About five years ago, I won the big game for my team, and we came here to celebrate. I really didn’t want to because I had my amazing girlfriend and my darling little niece at home, but I didn’t want to come off as a bad team player.  My best friend came with me, and we lived it up.  Our captain had gotten us a couple of tables at a club, and we had fun.” Frank sighed and pointed to the club in front of the MGM. “See that sign? Its for the club we went to.  This is the hotel we were staying at.  Anyways, we partied and went back to the suite where some of us had been staying at.”  

“Alone?” She asked, quietly.  

“Me, yes.  Some women approached me that night, but I refused.  I wasn’t drinking as much as the rest of the guys from what I can remember. Anyways, some of the guys had brought girls back with us and the hotel had set up a bar for us to drink from.  There was a pool off the balcony of the room and the girls were getting in with just their underwear.  I was uncomfortable.  I said that to Mike. The last thing I remember clearly was him handing me a glass of scotch.  He said, ‘Adler, you earned this.’ You’re a good man to Abby and a wonderful father to Mary.  Just relax and enjoy.’” 

“Mike handed you that drink?” 

“That’s the last one I remember.  When I woke up, I was in a room, not mine. My head was splitting, and I was dehydrated.  I made it to the bathroom and when I looked back, I saw the blonde. I yelled at her, asking her what the fuck she was doing in my room. She panicked and said she didn’t remember coming in there with me.  Mike rushed in and told her to get out while checking over with me.  I asked him what I had done, and he said, I swear, he said that I got drunk, and I couldn’t make it to my room so he put me in his.”  

Abby closed her eyes. “Why would Mike lie?  He had no reason to.”  

“Abby, I love how you are so trusting but Mike has had it bad for you since high school. But he knew I liked you and was working up the nerve to tell you for years. But back to the story. I called Steve and asked what I should do.  He was here as well with another client.  He asked me to stop the girl and ask her for the truth.  I did manage to stop her, ask her and promise not to go to the press.  I would pay anything for it not to go to press.  I needed to tell you first.  Steve showed up and got an NDA in place. He talked to her and she confirmed, nothing happened.”  

“But then the pictures came out.”  

“Then the pictures came out.  I was so angry that someone, who knows who, they violated my privacy, my trust.  I was desperately trying to get to you first but by the time I landed, it was too late. You didn’t let me explain and I lost you.”  

“Oh Frankie,” she cried as she pressed herself into his chest.  

“I’m so sorry Cricket. I should have called, I should have done something else to stop this from happening. I lost five years with you when a simple phone call would have solved everything.  I am so sorry.”  

“I’m sorry too Frankie, I should have just taken a moment to listen to you. When I got those texts of those photos...” 

Frank pulled back. “What texts?” 

“I got an anonymous text with the photos and an audio of you just says, “I can’t tell Abby,” I thought, well I thought it was more common.”  

“You don’t know who sent it.” She shook her head. “Fuck, I don’t, I don’t even know what to say.  I was always going to tell you but I didn’t want to do it by phone.” He pulled her back into his arms and held her tight. “I love you Cricket.  I never stopped.” He kissed the top of her head as they held each other.  

Abby sighed after a while.  “Take me to bed?” 

Frank didn’t answer, just turned away from the hotel that ruined his life and started back to the fountain.  As they walked, Abby spotted something and stopped.  “Cricket?” 

She pointed at the building. “We could make better memories.”  

Frank stared at the building and back at his girl.  

Next

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[becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys]

Doctor Who, but Chronologically: 32

Second half of the two-parter! The Doctor gets them out of it by making a radio go all loud and gross. I too get sensory overload. I feel sorry for these Daleks.

Anyway, this is actually a very fun and intriguing bit of plotting – the Daleks, now led by the human-dalek hybrid that is Dalek Sec with a beard of penises, have been stockpiling humans. Dalek Sec wants to make lots of hybrids, using a lightning strike to the Empire State Building – now with those Dalek bumps on – to power it. So far so normal, except Dalek Sec has caught human feelings, and now thinks they need to Embrace Emotion. He wants the Doctor to help, so that they might have lots of little humany Daleks running about, and also so they can be taken to a new planet and allowed to start a new race.

This goes down with the other Daleks of the Cult of Skaro approximately as well as a priceless porcelain vase being fired down a fifty foot well out of a cannon. Inevitably, mutiny occurs. They tamper with the gene solution so that the hybrids created will be, like, super Daleky, no emotions. They also make Dalek Sec wear a collar and leash and crawl around on a stage, because even Daleks have kinks I guess.

Fortunately, Martha, Frank, Tallulah and Lazlo manage to hold off the pig slaves (actually, Martha has the genius idea to rig up a set of metal poles so that the lightning that strikes the Empire Stake Building will fry the pig slaves in the lift, because Martha is brilliant and hyper-competent) long enough for the Doctor to get up to the main mast and remove the Dalek bumps. Except he doesn’t do it in time, so he just wraps himself about the mast like a koala and screams as the lightning hits him too. This means the hybrids have Time Lord DNA, and so turn on the Daleks; Daleks Thay, Jast and Sec are all killed, but Dalek Caan survives.

“The only Dalek left in the universe,” the Doctor says sorrowfully. “Like I’m the only Time Lord left.”

We have literally seen Daleks with both Smith and Capaldi, and more than one at that, so lol no. What a silly continuity error! It’s almost like this watch order is completely broken.

HOWEVER is that the first mention that the Doctor is the only Time Lord left? I think it is! Gosh, I wonder what happened to the others?

Other notes – Martha is great again. Something that gets clearer and clearer when you watch this way is that RTD really knows what the point of a companion is and how to use them – neither Moffatt nor Chibnell do. Well; Moffatt has an idea, actually, it’s just a very bad idea because he thinks they’re props for the Doctor’s Man Pain rather than characters in their own right. Chibnell straight up does not know. Ironic, given that he gave himself three at a time, and there’s not enough for even one of them to do.

But RTD companions are co-protagonists; Martha in this episode actually has a fairly small showing, comparatively, but still gets to use her medical skills, break into the Empire State Building, find out exactly where the all-important Dalek bumps that need removing are, and rig up the pipework to electrocute the pig slaves. If you wrote her out, you would need to change the plot to get it all to work still, AND would lose important humanising story elements. It would, quite literally, be a worse story without her. In the last two Yaz episodes, if she was removed there would be no difference or impact whatsoever.

And, in a final moment of glory for the comparisons, as they stand in a theatre before the final showdown, waiting for the Daleks to arrive, the Doctor turns to Martha and tells her to run.

“No,” she says. “I told you I’m staying.”

“And I told you it’s not safe!” the Doctor snarls. “Leave! I’m giving you an order!”

And Martha squares the fuck up to him and says “So who are you, then, some sort of Dalek?”

Lol

(Compare: Amy, the “spunky no-nonsense one”, scurrying immediately back to the TARDIS without a word as the Doctor yells at her to leave.)

ANYWAY, fun episode! Weird accents! Very bizarre that Spider-Man was in it! Let’s update the plot threads.

Oh, on the subject of which, I realised yesterday I’ve forgotten to tick one off: now that we’ve met Dead!Bill and heard she was cyber-converted, we know the answer to “Who did the Doctor lose to Cyber conversion?” Sorry about this shameful lack of consistency at my end.

“She” (an unknown person) is returning (perhaps River returned as Missy. Maybe Me? Maybe Clara???!)

There is something on Donna’s back

An entire planet, Pyrovilia, just… disappeared, somehow. (Maybe because the TARDIS is exploding??? Saturnine was also lost, and that WAS because of the TARDIS exploding. The lion man’s planet was also lost but he was a bit of a knob about it if I’m honest.)

Amy is maybe dead (she’s not)

The Doctor has been cubed (he’s out, but how?)

River is possibly blown up  (unless she’s Missy)

The TARDIS has blown up  (It’s fine now. Except it’s sort of melting now because it’s corrupted, but it’s fine again)

The universe appears to have ended  (the universe is back again)

The Doctor has employed(?) Nardole

(And Nardole was “reassembled???” Nardole had glass nipples and invisible hair?? WHAT THE FUCK IS HE)

There’s a vault in the TARDIS and it contains Missy but we don’t know why (sometimes she knocks for the bants)

What has happened to all these companions and where are the new ones coming from?

There’s an immortal Viking girl now. Her name is Me and she’s now looking after the people the Doctor abandons

What’s With The Silence?

Why was Rory entirely unconcerned by the entire world suddenly going silent when that is Not Normal and should have been, at the very least, extremely disconcerting?

What did the Doctor do to Queen Lizzie One?

Who is Captain Jack Harkness? (Is he the one who gave the companions a warning about the lone cyberman?)

Why is Amy seeing a one-eyed woman in a vanishing window?

What’s with the Doctor’s future involving getting shot by an astronaut?

Is Amy pregnant and why is it inconclusive?

Who is Sarah-Jane Smith?

How is the Doctor Bill’s teacher and why/where does he have an office?

What is going on with the Cyber War and the Cyberium???

What happened with the Other Cyber War?

What happened with the Third War that deleted the void?

Why does Rose seem particularly important?

What’s with the Weeping Angel statues, and why can’t you blink at them?

What order do these Doctors go in? (Eccleston, Tennant, uncertain, Smith, Capaldi, Whittaker)

Which companion just… forgot the Doctor, and how?

Yaz and Vinder are about to die as Mori/Mwri/Muuri

There is a Lupari shield around Earth.

What’s a Time War?

What’s the Rift?

What’s Bad Wolf?

What happened with Amy’s pregnancy?

In which war did the Doctor become a war criminal, and how?

Who is the Master?

Why has Amy forgotten Rory?

Is Rory plastic or not?

Why is the Doctor sulking on a cloud?

How exactly does the Doctor have a cloud?

What exactly happened with Strax to, uh, tame him?

Which friend killed Strax?

Which friend brought Strax back?

Where did this lesbian lizard and human couple come from?

What happened with Clara as Souffle Girl and the Daleks?

How does Clara actually join?

Why so many Claras?

Why is Missy apparently in robo-heaven?

Why is probably!Missy pushing Clara and the Doctor together?

What is Trensilor and what happened there?

Who is Handles?

The Doctor is about to be dissolved by a beautiful geode man

The universe is being crushed by the Flux

Will the Doctor open the fobwatch?

Sontarans are invading Earth again

Who is Kate?

Who is Osgood? Another name of Clara’s again?

The fuck is the deal with the Grand Serpent

Does Martha get to go to an ice cream planet with 12-fingered massage aliens?

How did the Doctor forget Clara?

Who is Bill’s puddle girlfriend Heather?

How did Nardole die?

When does Bill get Cyberman-ed and die?

When does the Doctor shrink and enter a Dalek called Rusty?

Whittaker is falling to her death rn

Was that ring relevant?

Does anyone know the Doctor’s name?

When did Yaz talk to Dan about fancying the Doctor?

When did Dan talk to the Doctor about fancying Yaz?

Who was the Doctor’s wife?

What’s happening with the bees?

What happened with Donna’s ex and a giant spider?

What war wiped out the Daleks, and is it one of the ones already mentioned?

What did the Doctor mean when he said “The (Daleks) always live, while I lose everything?”

If Dalek Caan is the last Dalek left why are there more now?

How did the rest of the Time Lords die?

[a-very-sparkly-nerd]

Snake Boi Callum Week - Day 3: High Mage/But Rayla Was In Trouble/Mirrors/Magic

(heads up, possible TW for pregnancy complications; I know they can hit close to home, and better safe than sorry!)

I'll Become the Monster, Like None They've Ever Known

Silence was not a good thing. Silence meant grasping for words, words to soften the blow. Or, worse, a kind lie.

“Well?” Rayla prompted, and Xan finally moved away from her stomach.

He straightened his glasses, slowly writing and checking off boxes on his clipboard he not-so-subtly held out of the couple’s view. “I…”

Out of nerves, Callum squeezed Rayla’s hand so hard that she hissed. Immediately loosening his grip, he murmured an apology before turning his attention to the doctor. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Your baby…” Xan began, and now he wouldn’t look at them, and that was not a good sign. “Well, they’re malpresented. That means the fetus isn’t correctly positioned. In this case, your child’s head is at the top of the womb, near the heart, rather than near the birth canal.”

“What does that mean?” Rayla asked nervously, glancing to Callum as he felt her heart rate speed up. “Can it be fixed?”

“Well, no,” Xan said. “There are chances of both the mother and child surviving the birth, but those are rare. The chances of one of you surviving rather than the other is about 50/50, given that most result in the death of both.”

Rayla leaned back against the chair, somehow paling even more as she let herself go limp onto Callum. He put an arm around her and rubbed slow circles into her back.

Xan wasn’t done. “However, your pregnancy is also ectopic.”

Callum sharply looked up at him as Rayla buried her face in his shoulder. “And what does that mean?”

“It means your child can’t be carried to term because it is growing outside of the uterus. To be frank with you, I’m shocked you haven’t come to me with concerns of, at the very least, extreme discomfort.”

Rayla… even all these years later, she still didn’t complain when she was mildly uncomfortable, or even in debilitating pain. She still never wanted to burden anyone, and now it could cost her her life.

He shot to his feet. “And why didn’t you tell us sooner?!”

“An ectopic pregnancy can be diagnosed anywhere from the first trimester to quite literally during labor. And malpresentation usually shows up at thirty-six weeks pregnant on average. We actually got quite lucky, finding it as early as we did.”

“You call this lucky?” Callum spat, pacing now as his voice came out strangled. “My wife and child are both going to die!”

“Well… not necessarily…”

Rayla tugged his hand, and he sat back down, tucking her further into him. “What are the survival odds?” he asked in a low voice. “For either of them?”

Xan took off his glasses and wiped them off with the hem of his shirt before repositioning them on his face. “Near zero for even one of them surviving. I think it’s safe to assume both Princess Rayla and your child will die if the birth continues as planned.”

Rayla threw her arms around his neck, her sobbing loud and clear despite being muffled by his shoulder. His shirt was quickly soaked, Callum pulling her into his side and rubbing her shoulder.

Still, he had to ask. “And if the birth doesn’t continue as planned?”

“Well, if we act now, one of them can be saved. We can perform a surgery to remove the child, and your wife’s chances of survival will skyrocket; I can near assure you she will live and be just fine in due time. Or, given how far healthcare has come due to the use of magic, we can force the birth and an Earthblood and Sunfire elf can heal the child and give them the nutrients and growth needed to simulate a normal pregnancy, an incubation if you will, to keep them healthy until labor would be induced in normal time. But Princess Rayla will not live.”

Callum let those words sink in. Rayla or their child, probably both, would die if a decision wasn’t made at this very moment. It didn’t feel real. It felt like a nightmare, a cold dread wrapping around him, like a cruel trick because the universe could never get enough of fucking around with his and Rayla’s lives. It’d been difficult enough to conceive, only able to do it at all because of magic, and now this? It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fucking fair.

Read more on AO3!

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