#i have zero stakes in this i thought it was slightly funny

[relto]

there are currently some efforts in my work group to analyze experiment data using machine learning, and the expert wanted to present his first attempts today. some 10 minutes in the scientists started arguing so much about whether or not the first practice dataset (made by one of them) accurately represents the experiment data that the expert barely managed to finish the presentation.

[moonbaby26]

Title: The Past

Pairing: Peter Maximoff x Reader, and past references to Peter x Crystal (from The Inhumans).

Summary: Continuation from previous chapter. Set after the battle with Apocalypse, you and the others are still biding your time while waiting to get back home. After touching base with Xavier to see where everything stands, you get to spend some more alone time with Peter and learn more about his fears and his past.

Notes: Please don’t @ me Inhumans fans! 🥺 I have zero problem with Crystal. And for those that don’t follow the comics, Crystal and comics!Quicksilver were once married, even having a daughter together named Luna. But the two weren’t compatible, and things went sour. Crystal cheated on him (Pietro was shitty to her too) and their marriage was eventually annulled. She remarried later, but he never did.

Warnings: Some cursing, a bit more necking. Talk of past unhealthy relationships, mention of sex.

Chapters: Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Taglist: @drikawinchester , @n0obmaster69 , @alexloveskili , @what-a-silver-lining , @bluesprings18 , @weakmoony-stuff , @slytherinsi-mp , @wintwrsoldiwr , @tommy-braccoli , @amourtentiaa , @cringingmemeries , @bi-panicatthe-disco , @himbos-are-my-lifeblood , @simp4mcuwomen

Peter Maximoff x Reader Masterlist

—————————

“Charles!” You heard Hank’s relieved surprise from somewhere nearby, yourself immediately trying to get back out of the bunk at the commotion.

Peter had no choice but to let go of you then, albeit still somewhat reluctantly before he sat up himself, grabbing his crutches off the floor to follow you.

“Well it’s about time. We were starting to wonder if we needed to mount another rescue,” Raven chimed in, one hand on her hip as she looked Xavier over. “Rough night?”

You could see the Professor then, seated tiredly in the wheelchair they’d given him with the rest of the group now standing around as you joined them.

“It was quite a strenuous night, yes,” Xavier responded, evidently having just come into the barracks as the door still hung open behind him.

Peter chuckled oddly beside you at the Professor’s choice of words. Though not all that loud to really have been intended for the group.

You wouldn’t have thought much of it, except for the funny look that came over Xavier’s face as he chided him instantly. “Peter, that is entirely inappropriate.”

But the others, save maybe Jean, looked just as confused as you at the seemingly random exchange, before Xavier kept on.

“Yes, Peter...Moira did accompany me all night. We had a lot to catch up on, even after the officials were done with their lengthy interrogations. But she and I talked. Please do keep your mind from the gutter. The strenuous activity I was referring to was the constant mental blocking and redirecting I imposed to those doing the questioning as to spare you all from being put in a poor light, or even remembered too well as significant players in this at all to keep you out of their future investigations.”

For his own part though, Peter didn’t look too embarrassed, or put off any really from the abrupt admonishment. Even as the Professor had just given details on the lengths he’d gone through to protect everyone, Peter only smiled, raising both hands as if to feign innocence, the crutches propped under his arms. “Hey now. No judgement here, Prof. And I didn’t say it out loud, right?”

“You didn’t have to.” Xavier sighed. “When something strikes you as funny, especially something sophomoric, you transmit it like a beacon.”

Peter looked both curious and amused at that new concept, but said nothing more.

A sly look was starting to glean behind Raven’s eyes though before she interceded instead. “You know, I don’t think I fully believe you, Charles.”

“Pardon?” There was a little surprise as Xavier glanced up to her.

But she just tilted her head, smirking slightly. “For as much crap as you always gave me about staying ‘professional’ with teammates back in the day, you think I’d just offer no comment now? Don’t lie to them. You didn’t only talk. Knowing your past with her, I’m sure of it actually.”

Peter just whistled then as Hank stared in helpless silence.

“Raven...” The Professor warned, but already knowing it was likely futile. “Is this really the time?”

“These might be your new X-Men, Charles.” She motioned to you all. “After all they’ve been through in the last 48 hours, I promise you they aren’t just kids anymore. Just like we weren’t.” She glanced to Hank briefly, then back to the Professor. “Don’t make them think we all walked around like robots back then, or that we would now. I always hated when you did that.”

Xavier closed his eyes a moment, taking a breath before looking back to everyone. “Admittedly, there has been much self sacrifice recently, and I am extremely proud of you all for how you rose up to help defend one another when everything was at stake. And there is nothing shameful in forming more personal bonds, of course. Raven is correct in that regard, though her delivery and sense of timing may leave something to be desired.”

Raven still shook her head. “You use so many words to still say nothing sometimes.”

“Hank, feel free to speak up any time now really.” Xavier deadpanned.

“Um, well...” Hank stammered a bit. “Did they say anything about when we might get to leave?”

The awkwardness was lessened somewhat at that as you all perked up at the question, equally ready to move on from this ship.

“Yes in fact, thank you, Hank.” The Professor was visibly relieved to get back to a more practical subject. “We will sleep here again tonight, but tomorrow they’re taking us to Kasteli airport on the island. It’s just a single runway, but large enough for the government flight they’re chartering to come here. It will be making multiple stops to pickup as many stranded U.S. targets as possible in the European region before crossing the Atlantic to deliver us to McGuire Air Force base in New Jersey.”

“Really...Jersey?” Peter commented flippantly. “Better than nothing I guess.”

But Xavier just ignored the interruption this time, “Moira’s contacts will furnish us all with I.D.’s and passports to get back into the country. For those of us that already had one, but may have lost it in all the recent events, it will be a reprint from previous government record. For those that never had one, they will create them for you.” He looked to Ororo and Kurt particularly there.

“What about the school?” Scott asked, “And all the other students? Are they okay?”

It was true that after you’d all been taken by Stryker and his men, you couldn’t know what had happened to anyone else after. Where they’d gone now with no place to stay, and if they’d remained safe with Magneto’s previous lashing out on the world.

The Professor nodded, clearly approving of that concern. “It was very difficult to get in contact with anyone directly. But again, Moira pressured her agency for assistance there. I’m told they were finally able to reach some of the staff who had taken the students to nearby hotels while trying to inform their families of their whereabouts. The explosion has been officially deemed due to a ‘gas leak’ however.”

He looked to Scott directly then though before continuing solemnly. “Of course for your family, Scott, an agent went personally to inform them of the truth. I’m so sorry. I know there hasn’t been any time to mourn Alex yet. His sacrifice will not be forgotten. He was only trying to protect me. We will have a proper ceremony for him as soon as we are able.”

You saw Jean take a hold of Scott’s hand as he only nodded rather than reply, seemingly unwilling to talk much more on that subject right now.

Xavier understood, keeping on. “As for the school itself, it will take time to rebuild of course. For those that do have safe homes to return to with family, that will have to be where they stay for now.” Yet the look in his eyes said how surely he knew that that would not be the case for many. A very common thread in so many of your histories was rejection by your own families.

“And for those who do not have anywhere else safe to go, I’m going to see what we can rent or lease in the interim once we’re back in the states. Hopefully something a bit more comfortable than the local motels.”

“And Stryker?” Raven interjected again, a little coldness to her voice though. “Did you call your ‘interviewers’ out on that bullshit?”

The Professor ruffled slightly at the language, but did not argue with it. “They claimed ignorance on those operations entirely. Looking into their minds, they did believe those facilities existed, but it was completely above their security clearance to know anything of what went on inside them. I think Stryker had partnered more with a private firm to be honest.”

Hank sighed. “Wonderful, more secret organizations bent on using us for experimentation and weaponry.”

Xavier agreed. “Yes, that will remain an ongoing threat I’m afraid. But all the more reason for us to keep training the youth. We will not be helpless in this world as long as we continue to grow our strengths together, and protect one another.”

Raven raised her eyebrows at those words. “Hmm. That almost sounds like the need for some kind of team again, doesn’t it, Charles? Fighters instead of pacifists? Maybe you should actually listen to the things I say for once.”

He didn’t rise to her baiting though, only starting to back his chair away then. “In due time, Raven. We shall see where this all ends up. But as for the present, now that everyone is caught up on what we know, I believe several of you were wishing for some time above deck.”

“That is an understatement,” Ororo answered, looking surprisingly uncomfortable the more you actually looked at her then. “The longer we’ve been here the more it feels like a tomb.” She added.

“She has claustrophobia.” Jean replied only in your mind, likely seeing the puzzlement on your face. “But she’s been hiding it well.”

You felt a bit guilty for not having noticed regardless, immediately glad for Jean sharing so that you could end that obliviousness. That was just the basics of being friends, knowing what the others were going through, to be of help whenever you could.

“Yes, absolutely!” You spoke up too. “Will they let us walk around a while up there?” The whole Mediterranean was outside, the sky and the water. And anything would be better than this endless grey metal, bulkheads, and compartments all in artificial lighting.

“I don’t know that I’m going to give them much choice,” Xavier smiled, fully exiting back out of the doorway then. “Come along all of you. We’ll see what we can do.”

—————————

You were certain that the Professor had indeed used a good bit of mental persuasion to grant you all full access to the flight deck. But as no planes were taking off, landing, or anything at all really, it was fairly safe to wander as you pleased right now.

Scott had wanted to get a closer look at some of those jets regardless though. Himself, Jean, Kurt, and Ororo going over to check out those that were still parked near the center of the deck.

Raven and Hank had wandered off somewhere near the bow, while Moira had reappeared and you’d seen her sit down in the shade under the ship’s bridge tower with Xavier. You could see them still talking as you and Peter had walked off towards the stern.

The air did feel as good as you’d hoped. It was cool, with that distinct smell of salt, dancing both you and Peter’s hair around lightly in the breeze.

But you wished you could really be at the water’s edge, to touch it, or even swim in it. It’d been such a long time since you’d gotten to be at the ocean.

It made you wonder too though where Peter had spent his time as a child. Had his family travelled to the beach much during his summers growing up?

“So you lived near Washington D.C.?” You asked, looking upward though as you now walked under a fighter jet’s wing, many more left waiting here at the aft of the ship. You remembered his words to Magneto, about the Pentagon being so close to their home at some point. Even if Peter had never known his father had been imprisoned there all along.

“Still do.” Peter answered, reaching out to grab your hand before you walked back out of the shade from under the jet. “Want to sit down?”

You glanced back at him, already wondering if he was being purposeful in this location or not. You were now as far from the others as could be after all. And even from the bridge, the sailors wouldn’t be able to see you now beneath this jet.

He smirked, maybe knowingly even as he responded crassly. “What? These things are killing my armpits.”

You smiled, still wondering, but helped him sit down anyway as you set the crutches beside you before joining him.

“So you still live by the Capitol....” You continued, gently prodding to try and hear more about him.

“Yeah,” He snaked one arm around your waist. “Suburbs just outside of D.C. Still in my Mom’s basement, same as always.”

You did recall him joking about that on the ride to Egypt, about still living with his mother. But what kind of woman was she though? Bold enough to flee from Magneto to a whole new country to raise her children at least. “Is she...” You weren’t quite sure the polite way to ask. Or actually if you even should, but it was already out of your mouth, so you continued hesitantly. “Is she like us?”

“Nah. She’s not a mutant.” He responded easily. “But my sister is.”

You looked back to him at that. He hadn’t told you much about Wanda yet, besides the fact that they were twins and that maybe she’d had some struggles with depression. Which was so common for your kind as well as you tried to learn to accept yourselves and the world’s sometimes cruel view of you.

The reminder of him being a twin was of course fuel for your imagination too as you tried to picture what any twin sister of Peter’s could really be like.

But he was getting surprisingly good at reading your expressions it seemed as he just laughed. “No, Wanda’s not just a female version of me if that’s what you’re thinking. I doubt the world could handle that, right?”

“Probably not.” You admitted. Trying not to get distracted with the mental image of a much more feminine Peter zipping around.

When you felt him tug you closer to him, you came back to attention. His fingertips were messing with one pocket of your pants idly now.

“She’s way smarter. More powerful for sure.” He then continued after a moment, with a little more consideration. “A little scary too actually. A lot more like our Dad I guess.”

“More powerful than you?” You asked honestly. Of course his powers might not be as in your face as something like Scott’s eye beams, or Ororo’s lightning bolts and their destructive power. But he’d already impressed you, no question.

“Well yeah. I’m just a jerk that runs fast.” He replied, looking a little surprised by your sincere look. “You think that’s powerful?”

“Peter, you can practically stop time on a whim. That’s way more than just running fast.” And that was no exaggeration to you. There was no other way to explain how he’d cleared the whole mansion even faster than the explosion could take it.

“I mean it’s saved my ass a few times yeah.” He conceded. “But...” He quieted, still watching you.

That serious look had come into his eyes again, like a cloud crossing over the light. He wanted to say something more and couldn’t.

“What?” You finally asked gently. It was just the two of you now. “You can say whatever you want, Peter.”

It was so evident that he wasn’t yet used to the freedom of expression that many of the rest of you were. He hadn’t had those years worth of safety net within the school, getting to air your thoughts with one another as almost second nature after so long.

He took a breath before eventually trying though. “Well...when I first started figuring out what I could do, it was such a rush, definitely. I could skip class whenever, take anything I knew Mom couldn’t or wouldn’t buy me. The dickheads that used to try to push me around couldn’t even touch me anymore.”

Yet he shifted, some unease still building in him even as you just listened quietly. “But, eventually you realize the people who barely gave you any notice before, that then they can’t even see you at all any longer.”

He was looking in your eyes again, as if he was still waiting to see some judgement there, but he’d already said too much to stop now. He couldn’t reel it back in, even if he may have wanted to. “And when I got older, I finally started having these nightmares...that everything got stuck like that you know. More and more, that I was going to do it too long one day, too many times one day and everything was going to finally stick that way for good. That no one would ever hear or see me again. Like this super shitty purgatory, of frozen people all around, and you’re just some ghost moving through them.”

You were surprised at first, yes. But maybe not so much the more you really considered it. What he spoke of was a horrible fate to consider to be sure. But for someone you already knew could actually be very self conscious at his core, there was even another layer to it. Was it really that much of a stretch that he could also worry about feeling even more unseen? More invisible, to the point that that could be his life forever?

The flashy jackets and clothing tied in a bit more now to that overall profile you were putting together here. But it meant so much to you that he was willing to share this at all, when it clearly was something very deep for him.

“I still dream that sometimes.” He admitted. “Freaking sucks.” He raised his bare left wrist then, looking at it with some regret. “It’s normally why I always wear a watch too. If nobody’s around for me to judge what speed I’m moving at, I have to look at the second hand to make sure it’s still trying to move. Freaks me the hell out if I can’t check it.”

You knew he’d left all his other things in the jet when everyone had changed into those flight suits before heading to Egypt. And all that was gone now. “You are powerful.” You insisted softly though. “And I don’t think I’ve ever met one of us yet that didn’t fear losing control, of becoming a victim to our own abilities in the end...”

Without thinking you turned then, getting up on your knees so you could wrap your arms around him. You felt him tense only for a moment, surprised but then quickly accepting the tight hug for what it was as he relaxed into it.

You spoke into his ear as he slid his arms back around you in return. “You don’t have to hold any of these things in any longer either though. You’re with friends now.”

But when your grip eventually loosened, he just pulled you around so that you were then seated nearly in his lap before he hugged you around your waist again.

“But for how long?” He asked seriously. “You and the others will go back to New York won’t you once we’re back in the U.S.? And I’ll have to go back to D.C. to show Mom I’m not dead, I’m sure she’s tripping out right now.”

“Well...” You understood he’d certainly have to go home for at least a while. But the school would be rebuilt eventually. “Have you thought about, once the school is established again I mean, maybe joining us?”

That did get a slight chuckle from him. “I’m already a dropout, babe. I never even finished high school. Not really a good candidate for higher learning.”

But you weren’t so easily dissuaded. “It’s more than just math and science classes, Peter. The younger kids always need mentors. And there’s the chance of working with the Professor and the other staff too, learning to unlock your full potential. You don’t have to hold back there, or hide anymore.”

He caught you by the bottom of your chin then though, tilting your head back as he seemed to consider kissing you again. “You want me to come there then?”

“Yes.” You agreed, the word at least sounding confident despite your heart rate increasing again.

“And are we going to share a bunk again tonight?” He smirked, knowing full well he was now derailing a previously serious conversation.

“I guess that depends on you.” You tried to counter, but he really had too unfair of an advantage in how easily he could still fluster you. And you weren’t sure when that was ever going to fade.

You waited for him to continue the banter though. To do anything really. But for several long moments he only watched you instead.

“Well?” He finally said.

“Well what?” You answered.

“You want to make out under this fighter jet before they call off mutant recess? The bell’s probably going to ring soon to send us all back to being out of sight, out of mind on the U.S.S buzzkill.”

Sometimes you wondered if he was actually the older of you two at all. “Don’t enjoy your own jokes too much now. You know what Xavier said about you transmitting your thoughts.” You were at least able to taunt back a little.

“Ah, he’s all about that CIA chick right now. I mean, more power to him, nothing wrong with it. She seemed pretty badass. But he should have just taken the compliment earlier instead of trying to drag me about it. But not bad for an old dude you know? Especially now that he looks a little more like Mr. Clean.”

“Peter.” The Professor wasn’t even that old, but it was by and large beside the point. “You’re trying to make me kiss you again so that you’ll stop talking aren’t you?”

“Maybe.” He grinned. “But hey, I never thought I’d get this far, I’m going to enjoy this every chance we get.”

The newness hadn’t worn off at all, that much was true. But wouldn’t it eventually? And would he still think so much of you then? You couldn’t know the answer to that.

It was probably best to actually agree with his viewpoint for the time being. To just appreciate the chances given in the here and now. None of you could know what the future had in store for anyone or anything, not anymore.

You were already right in front of him as you ran your fingers along the back of his neck. You held him there briefly, then pulling him in to initiate the first kiss, before he met you eagerly with another.

One of your hands stayed in his hair, the other splayed down onto his chest. After a moment, you realized you could feel his own heartbeat through the thin t-shirt. So very fast, like everything else about him before you felt him grabbing at your hips.

He was trying to get you pulled more into his lap as he shifted his legs to make room. You let him, but there was something slightly funny as you still had to help to not knock into his broken leg when he had trouble moving it in the way he really wanted.

But he could feel your smile against his lips. He pulled back enough to respond, your foreheads touching. “You just wait until that damn thing is off. I’ll be ten times as suave then.”

“I’m not complaining.” You laughed softly. Maybe even a little glad that he did have that handicap to slow him down right now. Though you quieted again when you felt him move down to nip at your neck, before he kissed it a little more roughly.

When you tensed a little, he paused. You could hear the tease in his voice. “Don’t worry, I won’t leave any hickies. Scout’s honor.” He knew you still cared about appearances to some degree, that and the privacy to not show off all of what you’d done in front of the others. “But you ever had one?” He asked anyway.

“No.” You answered without hesitation. You didn’t feel any need to pretend with him.

He pulled back a little again at that though, enough that you could look at each other and you wondered if he was finding this hard to believe.

“But you’ve had boyfriends right?” He asked, before considering a little more. “Or maybe girlfriends? I mean, I’m cool with either just for the record. We get discriminated on enough as it is to bother being worried about what side of the fence anybody is playing on.” He smiled, rubbing his hand down your side. “If I’m going to like someone, I’m going to like them for them. Everything else is just bonus.”

You’d never really thought about it to be honest. If you were attracted to someone, you just were. But it sounded like he was of similar thinking, which was nice. “I haven’t really had anybody.” You answered. “I’ve been at the school since I was pretty young. And you just end up seeing them all as family I guess.”

His eyebrows raised and he hesitated a while, before finally speaking again a little bit carefully. “So...please don’t punch me, but um, does that mean you haven’t...you know?” He didn’t seem like he could say it. Or that maybe he was actually afraid of offending you all of the sudden. Which would be a first.

But just because you were inexperienced, that didn’t mean you were naive. And it was awkward, but not frightening. You weren’t afraid to talk to him this way. “I haven’t had sex, no.” You responded plainly, but did have a little concern on him possibly panicking as you made sure to clarify. “And I’m not a minor. This would have been my senior year and then some I guess if you compare our class levels to normal high school grades.” But Xavier’s school was still a little different. “Or maybe it’d be more like freshman year of college.”

Peter took a breath. “I mean, yeah I figured you were legal. Good to confirm, but um, you realize this means you have no idea if you should have waited for someone better or not?”

He was getting self conscious again. You’d already been through this before. Where he acted as if you were making a mistake just to choose him. You tried to turn this back around. “It doesn’t matter to me who you’ve already been with. And yes, I might be inexperienced, but you’ve got to trust me that I’m capable of choosing who I want now.”

You could still sense him wavering, but he at least didn’t lock up to the point of not answering. He was trying to fall back on a little humor, his go to. “Well it’s not like I’ve been all around either. It was really just one, but you know, a good bit of practice there.” Though as soon as he said it that way, he seemed to regret it, trying to explain further. “I mean, she didn’t give two shits about me in the end. I thought she did. But I didn’t use her, it was more the other way around. At least in my view.”

You quieted, that new spill of information you felt signaling a much deeper story under the surface. And he seemed really nervous as if he hadn’t intended to bring up this subject at all. “It’s okay.” You answered quickly. “Like I said, the past is the past. It doesn’t affect what I feel about you. But if you want to get something else off your chest right now, my time is yours.”

And he did want to talk. You could tell he did. Like this was something he never could speak of normally. He seemed surprised at his own self as the name finally did come out. “Her name was Crystal.” But he still tightened his grip on you even as he kept on. “Back when I was still in high school outside D.C., she’d started there. Her family was always moving, I don’t know why. But I guess because she was new she didn’t know the whole hierarchy shit, where I was on the bottom with the other weirdos always in detention. And she figured out I had powers, she did too. I’d never met anyone my age that did. We started hanging out, and before you know it I’d be speeding to her house and all at night. My Mom never knew. Wanda did, but I think she saw the fuck up coming and decided to let me figure it out for myself.”

You felt no jealousy to the confession. Genuinely you were only listening, knowing these details only gave you a more complete picture of him. Who he was now and why.

“I’d never gotten attention like that before you know? You start thinking it’s real and you get carried away. And I’m not saying she was manipulative or any stupid crap like that. She wasn’t. She just wanted to fool around with somebody, wanted to feel good. But it probably shouldn’t have been with me is what I mean. Not for that long anyway just to cut me off at the knees when she was ready to move on again.”

So she’d just wanted a physical relationship. While Peter had misunderstood it to be more, and had had to suffer for it when the truth finally showed. You could understand how that would be extremely painful. Especially if it was the first real intimacy he’d ever had.

He kept on though, likely something very cathartic in finally getting to let go of all this. “And we had a huge blow up in the end. When she’d started sleeping with someone else. I probably said some stuff I shouldn’t have, I mean she was never mine to be mad about I guess. But she was no pushover. She told me to fuck right off, and I never went back. I quit going to school and they moved away again eventually. So that was the end of that.”

Then that was likely the real reason he never finished school you realized, not just because of boredom with it or any lack of ability on his own part. It was sad, but you didn’t see him as anyone to be pitied. He’d survived that negative experience to still be here with you now.

And you couldn’t take those old scars away, but you could at least make sure you didn’t leave any room for miscommunication now. You could let him know exactly what he had in you, to take or leave as he wished. Because nothing could work here either unless you both were on the same page.

“Well I can tell you that you will never just be a hookup for me. I mean, yes, I might not be as satisfying I guess, not knowing all about this. But, I’m attracted to you. Not your body, not your powers, just you. I want to be together until you decide otherwise.” You smiled, calling back a bit to his words in Egypt. “Together exclusively until I annoy you or you get bored of me.”

He laughed, unable to help himself. “And I still don’t deserve it.” He insisted, but agreed anyway. “Exclusive is good, no other guys or girls. Just us annoying the hell out of each other until the end.” He then nuzzled his head back against your neck, continuing. “I’ll be slightly more behaved too I guess. Now that I know it’ll be your first time, it can’t just be in an aircraft carrier broom closet or some crap after all. I’ll try to think of something a little more romantic in the meantime.”

“Gee thanks.” You smirked, before kissing him lightly again. There was still oh so much trouble to look forward to it sounded like.

He leaned into the kiss, trying to taste you as much as you’d let him. But you thought you could still feel him smiling a little too, before another sound went off in your brains.

“All of you, they’re asking us to clear the flight deck as they have a pair of helicopters trying to come back in from patrol.” The Professor’s voice was a bit impersonal, the way it could be when he was essentially copying the same message to multiple minds one after the other.

“And that would be the bell,” Peter sighed. “Recess over.”

You were a little disappointed too, but there was still tonight after all. “There’s still the bunk later,” You reminded at that, standing up and offering him your hand.

He grabbed it, quickly pulling himself up before leaning in to kiss you one more time. “That a promise?”

“Maybe.” You answered, handing him his crutches.

“Tease.” He countered with a smirk, before you both started walking back towards the others.

It’d be one more night in close quarters, and then on to the long trip home tomorrow.

——————————

(Continued in next chapter here)

[kiranatrix]

Do you think both L and Light were incapable of romantic and platinic love? I remember Ohba saying L could never have a friend because of his trust issues, and while Light had friends at school it seemed like it was "just for show" in a senese, since he couldn't really connect with anyone

Hi anon! Thanks for the question! I think both of them are ‘capable’ of some kinds of love but the events of canon (and their lives) really corral both opportunities and expression of it.

Light

Romantic. Ohba said in HTR that Light was incapable of romantic love with a woman. Does that exclude men? Dunno, but under canon circumstances where Light is Kira, I don’t believe he’d let himself fall for anyone. That’s because he believed attachments can compromise his judgement and sway potentially hard decisions he might have to make as Kira. But having to remind himself of that fact means that he knew he wasn’t totally immune to it. A little giveaway about himself in his thoughts. He was capable of it and actively prevented it.👇

Platonic. Light is capable of platonic love and demonstrates it in canon with his family. He loves Sayu and his parents, and greatly respects his father. Perhaps that’s filial love specifically, but I’d argue it’s close enough to show Light can care for other individuals without romance or gain.

Idealistic. In a sense, Light has a great love of humanity (as Ohba says in HTR) but has a funny way of showing it haha. But there’s an enormous amount of effort he expends on changing the world for the better (his idea of it) and wanting to be a god is only part of it. There’s ways he could have done that that didn’t even up with some net positives for the world (wars ended, crime reduced) and he put himself in the (self-identified) role of martyr for it. His motivations were a complex mix of selfish and selfless. It’s probably more comfortable to take that complexity away and consider him just a madman unable to love, but that strips away a lot of impact of Light’s story. He could love but not all love is healthy.

L

Platonic. I do think L was capable of platonic love although there’s no canon examples of it. The reason I say this is that he does show some concern over the safety of the Task Force and kind of goes ‘blue screen’ when Watari died. It’s never clear what Watari meant to him exactly but the man was an ever-present, solid relationship in his life he depended on, who raised him. In the anime there is slightly more warmth between them vs the manga, but either way, I think his level of reaction to the potential or actual death/harm to others close (or perhaps just useful?) to him suggests he is capable of it. On the other hand, L shows no care at all for those not close (or not useful/adversarial) to him. He shows no concern for the Wammy’s kids, Roger, the Yotsuba group’s victims, Misa, or Light. And even though Soichiro is both useful and close to him, L shows little to no care towards the man’s feelings or trauma asking him to do things (like pretend to shoot his son). So I would say L is capable of it but the bar is very high and conditional.

Romantic. In canon? Flat no. Past his own self-awareness about his quirks and difficult personality, he has a dangerous, isolated, and very mobile lifestyle that would be unfair to subject anyone to. In some ways it’s a similar consideration as Light— attachments would compromise his ability to do the thing he loves most. He also gets bored quickly, had mood swings, doesn’t compromise, has stubborn tastes and ways, zero social skills, a suspicious and over-analyzing nature, is pretty much a manbaby with no life skills, and deeply entrenched trust issues. That’s not to say he didn’t potentially experience romantic attraction in canon (maybe to Light since they were so very similar), but that’s different from love. Canon!L would make a pretty horrible boyfriend imo (sorry!) but that’s what AUs are for. If placed in a different situation from canon, I think romantic love could be possible; but he’d probably be a big mess lol with so little experience, possibly fall hard and have a lot of confusing emotions/uncertainty/sulking/awkwardness. I love to think about him in AUs!

Idealistic. Again, flat no. On the one hand he initially gives lip service that he’s pursuing Kira out of high-minded ideals of justice, but everything he does and says after that betrays why he’s really doing it. For fun, to win. It’s a game to him, like playing the stock market was when he was younger, just on a much bigger chessboard with high stakes. Kira is the best opponent he could hope for. So yeah, he lied about the whole justice thing lol. Which is one of the reasons I love his character! It’s refreshing!

[ace-in-a-shopping-cart]

Detroit Evolution Character Studies.

If you haven’t seen the absolutely lovely Reed900 fan film Detroit Evolution by @/octopunkmedia, I highly recommend it. (This also contains spoilers for it so watch before reading this.) I’m not done with these character studies as I plan to do one more for both characters.

Essentially, these are scenes taken directly from the film where I wrote it out, action, words, and all, as well as tried to capture what I thought they would be feeling/thinking in those moments as a way of learning to write the character’s voices (or my version of them). Word Count: 2,345 TW: Cursing, blood/ injury/ death mention, brief mention of food.

Nines

Timestamp: 11:22

He carried the full coffee mug from the break room to Gavin’s desk, a spring in his steady step. Placing the mug down, he looked at Gavin, a challenge in his eyes.

Gavin looked up from his phone. “Thank god.”

Nines held back a sigh. “I hate you.”

“You love me.” Gavin sassed back.

Nines pushed at Gavin’s feet that were propped up on the desk. “Move your feet.” He listened to the small sound of surprise that came from the human and sat where the feet had been, waiting for Gavin to stop spinning. “Have you been reviewing the case?” He glanced at the inactive computer screen.

Gavin sat straighter in the chair and leaned forward. “You know me. When do I stop?” He pulled up the case file on his computer. “Our victim’s an AC900, right? That happens to be a model designed for athletics and endurance. So, her thirium pump is one of the most valuable out there.”

Nines tilted his head. “You think the killer could have black market motivations?”

“You can’t rule it out. Not with how advanced that part is. So, once I made that genius deduction, I went through a list of my contacts in the android parts market and they got back to me with some common drop sites for black market deals.”

Nines was wary of where this was going, his LED circling to yellow. “Contacts? There are black market dealers who collude with the DPD?”

Gavin sat back, posture relaxed. “They give me intel, I stay off their back.”

“That doesn’t seem legal.” it defied his sense of logic to work with criminals to catch other criminals, even if the method had some merit.

Gavin spun his chair to face him, voice becoming defensive. “Okay, Nines. Sometimes you gotta bend the rules if you want to catch a bigger fuckin’ fish, alright? I know it’s not your protocol or whatever but, that’s why you got me.” He took a sip of his coffee, looking pleased with himself.

Nines leaned on his hand. “How would I ever succeed without your obstinance and rule breaking?” Sarcasm was something he’d mastered soon after deviating and used often with Gavin.

Gavin set his mug down, crossing his hands over his lap. “Yeah, you got a real funny way of saying ‘experience and wisdom’.”

“Wisdom?” Nines almost scoffed. “Gavin, I have a database in my brain containing over two hundred thousand words in the English language and I believe you found the one that least applies to yourself.”

Gavin looked up at him. “Shuuuut the fuck up.” He reached forward to tap his keyboard, bringing their attention back to the case. “Look, if we can intercept some dealers and bring ‘em in, we’ll find out if our victim’s thirium pump has been making the rounds. That could lead us straight to the killer.” He looked at Nines for his opinion.

Nines hummed. “It’s a good start, but waiting for a dealer to cross our path could mean it could take weeks to find a lead.” His LED went to blue as he thought it over.

“Thought of that too, smartass. There are definitely some sites where black market activity is hot.” He pointed at the screen and Nines turned to look. “These apartments out in Ferndale and Slide Docks-” he moved to point at another part of the map on the screen. “-here.”

Nines considered the information and screen. “We’ll need to split up to cover both.”

“Nah, you won’t have to miss me.” He gestured to the new detective with his mug. “We’ll get Chris on one of them while we go to the other.”

Nines looked at Chris, who seemed to have a lot on his mind. “He’s been quiet, since Jericho.”

Gavin busied himself with gathering his things. “Okay. Maybe work will take his mind off of it.”

Nines hummed, watching him. “Burying troubles in work is your usual approach.”

Gavin stood and rounded his chair, blowing a kiss to Nines sarcastically. Nines turned his head in time to notice Gavin flip him off behind Nines’ back. He smiled at the antics and followed the detective.

Nines

Timestamp: 54:00

‘I need you to come back to me, Nines.’

Nines could hear Gavin, even as he was trying to search every line of his code for a way to fix this corruption.

‘You are my partner. Come back to me, Nines.’

Nines heard a glitch in the garden before Gavin’s voice spoke again, closer this time, different. “Hey, tin can.”

He looked up to see his simulation of Gavin standing there. Calling his name, Nines ran over to him. He said his name again as he tried to hold him, only to be met with loose pixels and glitching code. He took a step back, anger in his voice. “What did she do to you?”

Gavin’s voice was distorted and his pixels were out of sync. “Code’s all buggy from Ada. You gotta delete me. Delete all of this, start from scratch.”

“Delete it?” Nines felt panic rise in him at that. “No, I can’t do that. This is where I process everything. I can’t just erase it.”

“You can rebuild another one after.” Gavin looked up into the trees. “Doesn’t even have to be a garden. Hell, make it a theme park, I don’t know.” He looked back at Nines.

“I can’t rebuild you.” His voice softened. Nines had spent pain-staking hours programming Gavin’s code and making him as close to the real thing as possible and now he was being told to delete it all? He wanted nothing more than to just hold Gavin.

“Look. You don’t have to give a shit about me. It’s all just fucking fantasy, Nines. You got the real thing up there. And the only way to get back there is to let go of all of this.”

‘Come back to me, Nines.’

The Gavin standing before him glitched again and Nines nodded slightly. “Okay.” He moved away, unable to look at him as he did this.

‘I need you. I need you to come back to me, Nines.’

With the real Gavin’s voice echoing in his ears, Nines carefully and ruthlessly tore down every line of code he had to. Thoughts of the past few days, images of his friends and Gavin, tumbled through his mind as he destroyed his sanctuary, the place he went to relax and to process and feel safe. A place that had been tainted by Ada’s forced entrance.

As soon as the last zero was deleted, Nines regained full control of himself.

Gavin

Timestamp: 24:30

Gavin grunted as another fist connected with his face, breaking his nose. Faintly he heard a voice call his name. A hand reached out but instead of a punch- He jolted awake, hands reaching to fight off his attacker, whoever's hands were now on his shoulders, fighting him back. Nines’ voice broke through the fog of sleep and Gavin stared at him, calming down just a bit as he found one of Nines’ hands on his chest, the other holding his right wrist gently. Nines gave one more, comforting, “”it’s not real, you’re safe,” before releasing Gavin and standing up.

Gavin shifted, moving to sit up against his headboard as he tried to calm his breathing. He shifted the pillows behind him, all too aware of Nines’ concerned gaze.

When his breathing was slower, Gavin spoke. “What- What’re you still doing here?” He knew Nines had mentioned reviewing case files but thought he would have left, bored of Gavin. Most did.

“I stayed to review our case files.” Nines’ voice was soft, as if Gavin were a deer that would startle at a too-loud sound. “I heard you struggling.” He moved away from the bed a step or two. “I’ll go get you some water.”

Gavin shifted positions, shaking his head. “No, no, no, I”m fine. I’m fine.” If he repeated it enough, maybe he’d believe it himself. He cursed a few times, softly, as he tried to find a comfortable position.

Nines sat back down on the edge of the bed. Gavin cursed again, the loudest sound in the room being his still heavy breathing. He leaned his head back against the wall, too exhausted to care. “Guess now you know why I don’t sleep.”

“What were you dreaming about?” Gavin was grateful for the lack of judgement in Nines’ voice.

Gavin dropped his head down, shaking it as he stared at his sheets. “Nothing. I don’t even remember.” Not a complete lie, it was reduced to fear and feelings and flashes of memory now, so distorted from what it once was. “Probably bore you, if I did.”

There was a small smile in Nines’ voice, still soft but now holding a note of affection. “Learning more about you would never bore me, Gavin.”  Gavin didn’t quite believe him and Nines kept talking. “Would you like me to stay with you? Research shows that physical touch is good for humans, it releases serotonin which has a calming effect-”

Gavin’s skin crawled at the thought of touch and he began protesting as Nines continued. “-I think that-” Nines heard his protests and stopped.

“No.” Gavin shook his head, breathing almost under control. “I’ll take my chances with the cat.”

“Okay.” Nines stood. “I’ll be in the living room if you need me.” He turned and began to walk to the door.

Before Nines could reach it, Gavin spoke. “It was about this one night.” He looked up at Nines, wondering if the android knew the level of trust Gavin was showing. “It just makes me feel like I’m back there.”

He paused as Nines came back to sit on the side of the bed where he’d been before.

He took a deep breath. “I was a dumb kid. Dropped out of high school, fell in with some shitheads dealing red ice for a little while. I just . . . I just couldn’t do it. I stopped. And they fucked me up, kicked me out. I’m wandering around the streets of Detroit, bloodied to shit, nowhere to go. Fowler found me. He was on patrol. He just, put me in his car, drove me to a diner. Bought me coffee. Told me I could intern at the DPD for a little while. Have something to do, you know.”

Nines listened patiently, only commenting at the end. “Sounds like a happy ending. Why is it a nightmare?”

Gavin’s eyes turned haunted. “‘Cause every time it replays in my head, he doesn’t show. And I just die out there. Bleeding in the fucking snow and no one cares.”

Nines stood, looking like he was prepared to go back to the living room. “Are you sure you don’t want me to stay with you?”

Gavin looked up at him, his face illuminated by the light of the window, and didn’t trust himself to speak. Instead, he just slid over and hoped he understood.

Nines did, his LED glowing yellow in the dark room  as he moved to sit where Gavin had been. He gingerly turned so his cloth-covered back was toward Gavin. The human appreciated the gesture, feeling comfortable and vulnerable enough to extend his hand, palm up, to Nines. The android carefully took it, his synthetic skin retracting but Gavin brushed that off as him offering less skinship.

Gavin’s breathing stuttered slightly but he slowly placed his head on Nines’ shoulder blade and shoulder. He felt Nines rest his head on Gavin’s, the android’s thumb running over the back of the human’s hand.

“If you tell anyone about this, I’ll have you scrapped for parts.” There was no bite to Gavin’s words.

Nines shook his head. “Empty promises,” he said, a smile in his voice.

Gavin

Timestamp: 57:19

“I think I can help with that.” Nines’ voice came from the doorway.

Chris called his name while Gavin looked on in disbelief. Tina stood by Nines, Gavin was vaguely aware of her trying to get Chris to leave Gavin and Nines alone but he only had eyes for the android.

Nines stepped into the room as the two left. “Distracting yourself with work at two A.M.? Now I know you missed me.”

Gavin’s shock wore off at the playful banter. “You undead asshole. How did you wake up?”

They both approached, almost meeting in the middle of the room, as Nines spoke. “I heard you. Your voice broke through.”

Gavin backed up a few steps even as Nines continued advancing. “Goddammit. You mean you- you- you heard everything I said?”

Nines smiled. “Every word. A force you can’t live without?”

“I . . . hate you.” There was barely any force in his words.

Nines finally reached him, that soft smile still on his face as understanding shone in his eyes. “You love me.”

Gavin looked up at him and their eyes met. He looked down to see Nines’ skin retract on his hand, gently taking it into his own hands. Nines’ other hand came up to cup Gavin’s cheek and draw his gaze back to his face. Gavin closed his eyes, getting used to such tender touches, before opening them and looking at Nines. Then, they were kissing, both putting the emotions they couldn’t put to words into it.

When they broke apart, Gavin panted for a moment before speaking. “What dipshit programmed you to do that?”

Nines laughed, sounding just as out of breath as Gavin felt. “I’m the most advanced android ever made, detective.”

Gavin threw his head back dramatically, Nines’ hand sliding down to his neck. “Oh, you are such a fucking prick.”

“Takes one to know one.” Nines snarked back.

Gavin sniffed, finally noticing what Nines was wearing. “This is my jacket?”

“Yeah, you left it at CyberLife. They didn’t keep my clothes.” He laughed and looked around. “I see you’ve been making progress without me.”

“Yeah, uh. Guess we’ve got some catching up to do.”

Nines didn’t respond, simply leaned down for another kiss.

[yeojaa]

up all night.

inspiration:  “i'm sorry I keep staring, but you're really the hottest thing i've ever seen in my entire life and i don't know what to do about it.”

i’ve never written for joon before so please don’t burn me at the stake! 🥺 this is dedicated to @sahmfanficbts and ty mucho to @salvejoon​ and @moonmintrails​ for reading through this for me 💖 part two will be forthcoming!  

pairing.  knj x f!reader.  rating.  general.  tags.  mc is a recreational drug user (nothing hard!  just gummies!) and there’s mentions of like, boning and booze.  but generally, just a warm n soft fluff piece.  wc.  1.1k.

The neighbourhood bodega is your happy place.  

It’s where you go when you’ve had a long day at the office and want to drown yourself in six different types of Ben & Jerry’s, the likes of which it always has in stock and in all the flavours you want (Cherry Garcia, Half Baked, Peanut Butter Cup).  It’s where you go when you’re too lazy to make dinner and want to inhale a perfectly made, smooshed down deli sandwich piled high with all your favourite accoutrements.  It’s where you’ve cried quietly, standing in the snack section after a terrible breakup.  It’s also where you’ve, perhaps, spent too much money on beer after an impromptu decision to wake up with a pounding headache.

It’s somewhere that’s seen you grow up, from your shitty pre-teen days - when you’d had that godawful fringe and those ugly sneakers your parents had bought from the Super A Mart in Chinatown - all the way to now, with your slightly cuter shoes and significantly better hair.  It’s watched you grow as much as your family has, a figurative presence in your life that’s shaped you through the years.

It knew when your time of the month was and how much chocolate you ate when it came around.  It knew the sheepish way you’d scuff your toes when you were buying things you shouldn’t:  beer using a remarkably bad fake ID when you were fifteen, cigarettes during a brief stint during your first year of university, and condoms when all of your friends had started fucking like rabbits and you didn’t want to be left out.

All of that to say, your neighbourhood bodega knows you well and with that comes the uneasy acceptance that someone else - someone with a heartbeat and a brain and big imposing shoulders - knows you just as well, if not better.

Kim Namjoon.  Son of Mr. and Mrs. Kim, card-carrying pantydropper, and the guy you’d harboured a crush on for the better half of your adolescent years.

You weren’t really sure when it’d happened - just that it’d followed you from the tender age of thirteen when you’d first gotten flustered over his big dimpled cheeks and slow, tight-lipped smile.  It didn’t matter that he was four years older than you - now an astounding twenty-eight - or that he’d witnessed you embarrass yourself since you were old enough to stick your own foot in your mouth.  You simply couldn’t help it.

He was cute in a way that snuck up on you, that you didn’t need reminding of but that presented itself at the strangest times.  

Like when you’d be half-baked and stocking up on munchies, dressed in running shorts and an oversized tee shirt because you were too lazy to change into anything else.  He’d flash that goddamn smile of his as he rang you up, biting back laughter when he’d scan the fifth bag of Goldfish.

Or when he’d catch you huffing and puffing at absurd times, lungs heaving from having jogged all the way from Crown Heights station.  He never had to ask what you needed - would only silently pop the locked door back open and let you in to get whatever you seemed so desperate for.

You knew they weren’t the best impressions - little facets of your wayward personality presented like a whirling dervish - so you’d never thought more of it.  

After all, he was Kim Namjoon and you’d heard about all the ways he broke hearts.  Never on purpose, fortunately, but with increasing frequency since you’d started running in the (surprisingly) same circles.  He was as unattainable as the specialty imported chocolate on the top shelf of his parents’ bodega - always enticing but terribly out of reach.

Which is why you’re gaping at him now, a not-very attractive fish out of water.  

“What?”  You’re not sure whether it’s the fact that you’ve got one AirPod lodged in your ear, but you don’t trust what you’ve just heard.  It makes zero sense, like 400-level mathematical equations.  You were a political science major, for crying out loud.

When Namjoon responds - in that confident, measured way of his - you have to focus hard on the words.  “I asked if you wanted to get drinks with me.”  

Drinks.  With him.  With Kim Namjoon.  The Kim Namjoon.

You feel like your brain’s short circuiting and not just because of the THC gummy you’d taken right after work.

“You… want to get drinks?  With me?”  You know you must sound a little stupid - though you swear you’re not and you think, despite all signs pointing to it, Namjoon doesn’t believe so either.

He laughs as he bags up your purchases:  candied almonds, a bag of sour Skittles, chocolate milk, and three things of chips.  The sound keeps you occupied, wholly focused on the way it echoes out of that big cavernous chest of his and battles the lofi that’s playing in your ear.  You wonder how someone can be so effortlessly charming.  

It probably has something to do with your crush.

“Is that so hard to believe?”  He spares you the sympathy, instead offering a playfulness you’ve never seen up close and personal.  It feels nice - sun-warm and organic, like spending a day at the park.  

You decide in that moment - in your oversized boyfriend jeans and big sunglasses pushed up in your hair, with your absurd amount of goodies resting on the counter between you - that you want more of it.  You want more of Kim Namjoon, even if you’re unravelling his mysteries as you go.

“I guess not.”  

“So, drinks tonight then.  10 PM.  I’ll meet you at your place.”  There are no further questions - just statements that pop off his tongue and sink comfortably beneath your skin.  It feels good, if not a little strange.  You’re still trying to wrap your mind around the fact that this is happening.

Your lips move before you have a chance to stop them, words tumbling out in a haste you attribute to your high but that seem more like nerves.  You hate that it makes you sound so uncertain because you know you’re funny and you sure as hell know you’re cute, but it feels like you’re a little leaguer facing off against Jose Canseco.  “Can I ask why?”

He shrugs - an impressive roll of his shoulders beneath the plain white cotton that hugs him in all the right places and makes his skin glow honey gold against it.  “You're really just the hottest thing I've ever seen in my entire life and I know I’ll hate myself if I don’t do something about it.”

You thank your lucky stars for the Kim’s bodega then.  You promise you’ll never visit another one for the rest of your life.

[st-just]

Semi-coherent thoughts on Oathbringer

So, overall probably the most even of the series so far, I’d say? Not to say I didn’t like it – I really, really loved the finale, and there were plenty of great lines, but my god were there a lot of pages spent on nothing happening (honestly it kind of reminded me of the latter volumes of ASOIF, in that sense) – then again, I suppose that is kind of just the nature of these 1000+ page fantasy epics. There were some setting reveals that really were fascinating, and legitimately a bit surprising. Going to have to take a break from the series until the friend I got Rhythm of War for is done so I can borrow it, though I suppose that’s no huge loss compared to the however many years everyone else had to wait in between them.

So in terms of pacing it’s...bad. Or, well, that’s probably a bit unfair. There’s absolutely plenty of fat to cute, but again I do think that might just come with the territory of committing to like a dozen POVs across a tree’s worth of paper (though there were absolutely like 100+ page stretches where I’m not actually sure the plot meaningfully progressed). That said, honestly the main pacing issue isn’t so much the bloat as, like – okay, Dalinar’s arc was a pretty consistent throughline, but for Kalidan and Shallan it kind of felt like there was one whole story in Urithiru, and then from the mission to Kholinar and the journey through the Cognitive Realm felt like its own separate novel? I mean, not sure if that makes any sense, but it really did kind of feel like there was a whole additional first act of table and stakes setting once they arrived in the city.

Though, to argue in favor of bloat for a moment – I was chatting with  @lifeattomsdiner​ bit back about The City We Became, and they mentioned that the size of the cast meant that you don’t actually really get to know any of the protagonists that well on their own. And I suppose that is the advantage of the 1200-page-per-volume epic cycle – even with characters you only really meet in interludes like Szeth, Vargo and Venli (incidentally three of my favorites), you spend enough pages inside of their head that you do really get to see what makes them tick and learn to love/hate them. Speaking of – props to Sanderson as an author, really – it’s vaguely astounding that he manages to keep track of that many internal monologues and actually make them seem distinct from each other.

Breaking things down by character a bit more – this book really did actually enjoy/get invested in Dalinar way more than either of the previous two, which again I’m told is more or less the expected reaction. Given the amount of tumblr brain poison I’m voluntarily exposed myself to, it’s honestly more than a bit of a nice change to see a character on a redemption arc who is actually unambiguously in need of redemption. Because holy shit, pulled, like, exactly two punches in terms of making the guy as genuinely loathsome as possible before he starts breaking. And, well, obviously he was on a redemption arc, but there was a bit near the end there where I really did think that the book was going to cut to black on an ‘end of Act 2, maximum darkness before dawn’ moment with, like, all the Skybreakers and him kneeling before Odium as the city fell. But I suppose that would be a bit much of a cliffhanger for a series with installments this weighty.

This was pretty clearly Shallan’s ‘getting over my personal bullshit’ book, like WoR was for Kaladin and WoK was for Dalinar, though spicing things up with increasingly severe DID as the book went on did make things more interesting at least. Also, I have no idea if this is actually true, but according to the friend who pestered me into reading these when someone asked Sanderson if he’d intentionally written her as bi he just kind of shrugged and said ‘sure, why not,’ which is fun. It was more than a bit, I don’t know, forced?, to have Wit just wander in from stage left and give her a desperately needed therapy session while she was in the middle of a breakdown and propel her development for most of the rest of the book, but on the other hand she’s pretty easily the main POV I’m most invested in by now, and the live triangle the text repeatedly threatened me with never actually became a thing, so I can’t really complain too much. Honestly super curious about the Ghostbloods and what they want out of her given, well, for a shadowy murderous conspiracy, everything they’ve wanted out of her so far has been pretty much entirely benign. Like, of the three major shadowy murderous conspiracies they’re easily the least problematic for the future of humanity at the moment. She should just commit and join for real imo.

As always, Kaladin’s POV is mostly good because it means we get more Syl, who is the single best character in the entire story I’ve decided. But also, I really quite liked his whole sojourn with the newly freed Parshmen and dawning realization that ‘wait these people are basically entirely right’. Also, the delicious delicious angst of spending however many dozens of pages getting to know them and then the wall guard and then the two groups killing each other in a confused melee while he has a mental breakdown. Easily best moment in the book (but then I’m a miserable person).

Adolin is honestly significantly more entertaining to follow than I really expected, though I’m still not like especially invested in him as a character. His relationship with his tailor was quite charming, though, as was the fact that he cares enough about fashion that he learned to sew. Honestly I was rather expecting/slightly dreading his main arc this book to be, like, inadequacy or insecurity over being almost literally the only member of his family that’s not a Radiant, so it’s kind of a pleasant surprise that he seems to have just accepted that (too well-adjust, I guess?). It is however extremely funny that the fact he just straight-up murdered one of the kingdom’s most important aristocrats and the major antagonist of the first two books seems to have resulted in absolutely zero consequences of any kind for him.

In terms of minor characters, the one I’m most invested in by a pretty substantial margin at this point is Venli, as she’s getting a front row seat to all the most interesting bits of the setting, ‘cultist growing increasingly disillusioned about return of ancient and terrible eldritch god’ is a really entertaining character arc just in principle, and because as of the end of the book she represents the morally objectively correct perspective and political line I’ve decided and will fight people about. Curious what sort of superpowers she’ll get. (Vargo and Szeth are still both great though, too).

The Unmade are really fun as a worldbuilding conceit/excuse for weird fucked up monsters. And it really is kind of funny that at least a third of the God of Evil’s nine generals/children/favoured beasts are, like, at conflicted or ambivalent about the whole ‘exterminate humanity and remake the world as a monument to my glory’ thing.  

Really, on an extremely shallow and entirely aesthetic level, between the evil red crystal/lightning aesthetic, the remote mountain fortress as a stronghold of the heroes in the face of the coming apocalypse, tears into the realm of spirits, the quirky evil minibosses each handling corrupting/conquering a given center of civilization, etc, the whole thing kind of reminded me of Dragon Age Inquisition. Which reminded me of how disappointing the story to that game was, which made me like the book more by comparison, but anyway. Yeah, good book.

[anokaiwritingblog]

Oh hey. I forgot I have a writing blog. Here’s a WIP of my short story collection for my creative writing class. It’s a WIP for one of my major ideas I want to do.

Once every century, it is said that the planets of the solar system align perfectly. In a perfect row, they cast upon the ultimate shadow upon one another; opening the gates to other realms far from our own. It was said that the fallen god rose from this gate and set his sights on destroying our system just like his own. But where evil went, goodness was sure to follow. Out from this gate came the Holy Maiden and her summoned knight. Together, they sealed away the fallen god and cast light back into our system. The two understood that the battle was far from over. “Catch a fish for a man, he would eat for a day. Teach the man how to fish, and he eats for a lifetime.” Despite their love for each other, the Holy Maiden and her summoned knight agreed to go on separate pilgrimages to spread their teachings. The Holy Maiden remained in our system and founded us, the Holy Order, to pass on her teachings and traditions to future Holy Maidens. Her summoned knight, on the other hand, returned into the gate and spread his words to the numerous realms behind the gate. With their sacrifice, we have prevented the fallen god’s awakening over a thousand times…​

“Ay yo… so, like… cool lore but like… pretty cringy not gonna lie. You lost me at the “aligning of the planets” bit. It went from horoscope bullshit to cliched pre-teen novels with a bit of a JRPG elements in there,” a voice spoke out, breaking the breathtaking spell that weighed heavy in this beautifully painted dream.

The wind blew soft through the empty courtyard as no one said anything. In a walled-off garden stood seven bodies, each facing each other in a circle with a pond that separated each figure. Each stood on their own path that was surrounded by the water on each side but behind. A mini pier if you wish to imagine. The water was clear, yet the light was too blinding to see past the surface. All seven figures were outlined well enough to show that they were all women, yet a shadow covered their faces to remain a mystery to one another. Sitting above all this was a pink-haired woman. Her hair was braided back and looked far too youthful to be talking like an elder. Her prink eyes scanned each woman to search for the back talker, a glare like a dagger and on edge. Despite that, she kept an icy façade.

“Who cut me off? Head Nun of the Holy Order?” the pink-haired woman spoke up, looking down at the crowd of women below her.

“Uh, me.”

Slicing through the air, the Head Nun’s eyes locked on to the woman who spoke up; her hand raised slightly while maintaining the image of being smaller than what she was. Her limbs were tightly held together like a defensive turtle yet flashing a Chester cat grin in reception of the attention. “No offense lady but I felt like I heard this exact same plot with some gacha game I played last month. Can we just skip all this tutorial nonsense to get to the fuckin’ point already?” the woman continued, her blunt and straightforward words not matching the lowkey appearance she was trying to give off.

“Oh! You played Fate/Grand Order too? I’ve been trying to pull Gilgamesh for my team for months,” the woman on the right of the back talker chimed in. Though she was covered in shadow, the third party was animatedly clapping her hands together in excitement that she found a companion who played the same game.

“Eh, I stopped after two months. The drop rates are insane for that game and you don’t get enough of the in-game currency. I prefer Epic Seven since you actually win the gamble in summoning a strong hero-“

“Silence!”

Slamming her hand against the armrest of her chair, the Head Nun demanded all attention back onto her. The sound of flesh against marble echoing throughout this supernatural courtyard. Zeroing in out the outlier, the Head Nun sized her up before letting out a scoff. Receiving this judgmental look was a young woman of 21 years. If she never stood by herself, she might have blended in with a crowd with her rather ordinary looks. Brown hair, matching brown eyes, and a pair of glasses. Tell that description to any sketch artist and they would draw any other woman. One in five women look exactly like her. Was that statistically correct? Of course not, but most would believe it these days.

The nun craned her neck over these seven girls, peering down with arrogance. Who would have thought that the bold one in this group wasn’t the goth but this… loser. Despite not being affected by the spell, the rebel was overseen like the shadow of her chair or the tree’s. “Are you done speaking over me?”

“No, actually. You aren’t hurrying the fuck up and you rudely cut me off from having a pleasant and stimulating conversation from my neighbor here,” the woman said, “If you aren’t going to tell me what my horoscope is, I don’t want to hear another hour of lore.” From her sides, the woman could hear the reactions from the other girls who listen in to this back and forth. Some ‘tsk’ from her disrespectful actions while others acted a bit shocked. Of course, there were those who snickered from the show while one seemed to be rather disinterested. Tough crowd… To be fair, she wasn’t normally as blunt as she was today. She knew when to keep things to herself but quite frankly, this lady was going on for the last hour about prophecies and cosmic evils. This nun sounds like those writers who only focus on worldbuilding and not writing their story.

“Hurry up? We’re talking about the end of the world- YOUR world. This “lore” is vital. People’s lives are at stake with this information, Two,” the Head Nun said.

“Shit, really? Then why don’t you act it? Literally… no agency. This is the part where a creative writing teacher tells you “show don’t tell”,” Two answered right back; sarcasm dripping from every syllable. She wanted to correct the hag. Her name was Mia, but she understood there was anonymity for a reason. She was tactless, not stupid. Well, Mia would argue she had some tact, but her patience ran thin do this grossly, mishandled magic society. She thought those campy young adult books with groups run by idiots were meant to be… you know, fiction?

It all started right when Mia got to bed. She just got home from a long shift at work and all she wanted was nothing more than lay in bed. And that she did once she took an evening shower before bed. It was normal, everyday stuff for the third-year college student. She had school tomorrow and Mia just wanted to rest her aching body. As soon as her head hit the pillow, she opened her eyes to a completely new world. Looking around, she found herself not alone. There was one other person with her face covered and the pink-haired woman as well. Mia was greeted as “Two” and was told to wait for the other five to show.

That was an hour wasted in waiting and add in the additional hour for the hefty speech, we got our recipe for an irritated Mia. She didn’t go to bed just to stand up for two hours for some fantasy bullshit. Any other time? Sure. It’s cool. But now??? WHEN SHE HAS A TEST TOMORROW?! INCONVENIENT! It killed Mia since this was pretty fucking cool and different from the norm. Everyone dreams of being picked the chosen one but, come on… this was too predictable. If you read a fantasy book or consumed any fantasy media before, then you know what’s going on.

“Rude child. This information isn’t something as trivial as a novel,” the Head Nun spoke, looking down at Mia like a haughty teacher.

“I’m gonna assume that we’re all candidates in being chosen as the new Holy Maiden. We chose our knights or whatever. Compete and whoever wins must reseal the fallen god then tada! Happy ending! Yay!” Mia said. She even raised her hand at the ‘yay’ portion of her phrase. “Listen dude, I play too many games and read a shit ton of books for this. Can we please not do this while I’m in my pajamas?” Mia said, practically begging to be released from this mild inconvenience.

“… You guys weren’t exactly chosen. The universe brought you to us…” the Head Nun spoke, not really arguing with what Mia said. There was a cocky grin on Mia’s face as she just couldn’t help but find it funny how she got some otherworldly person tongue-tied.

“A lottery system huh… sounds about right. An NPC like me wouldn’t be chosen normally… I’m way too smart to be a main character,” Mia thought. She glances to the side for a moment before back on the show.

“Well… I’ll work with Two on this point and speed things up. Time is of the essence,” the head nun spoke, acting as if she was graciously fulfilling Mia’s wish. At this point, Mia didn’t care. Whatever helped the nun feel powerful or whatever… “As Two pointed out, all seven of you are candidates for becoming the new Holy Maiden. You will come into this realm three times a week for your lessons to strengthen your magic and during your regular days of the week, you seven will compete with one another. Your knights are the extension of your magic. When one knight trumps the other, they prove you are the strongest magic user and your defeated candidate is knocked out of the running. This continues until the last one is standing,” the nun explained, “We have hidden your faces and names from each other to keep you guys from cheating and attacking each other when you aren’t ready for combat. If you wish to fight, it’s up to you guys to discuss how to go about it.”

“A battle royal? I thought dystopian novels where kids kill each other in a game was out of fashion? I mean- they already got the Mirai Nikki vibe with the covered faces in the central hub…” Mia thought. She laughed under her breath with mild amusement at the situation. She decided to keep her thoughts hidden now as she surveys the competition. She wasn’t sure if she was going to take this seriously, but she thought she should start hiding her thoughts on the matter now. “The Head Nun never said we couldn’t figure out each other’s identity and jump them… nor any etiquettes of battle… how curious,” she continued her train of thought as she waited for the nun to finish.

“We’ll now do the summoning ritual. One, please kneel down and place your hand into the water to help your knight rise,” the Head Nun spoke. One looked around confused by the order, but she soon nervously did as she was told. She knelt and placed her hand inside. There was a good pause before One jolted. Slowly, One stood up to her feet as a tall figure rose from the water. Just like the girls, his face was hidden from everyone else but his master, no doubt. But his figure was very much noticeable.

“YO! Did you just summon a furry?!” Mia exclaimed before bursting out laughing. She pointed a finger at the girl next to her in a mocking fashion. While she couldn’t see the competition, Mia could at least see a pair of fuzzy dog ears on the knight’s head. But despite her words, Mia knew that, realistically, this knight was most likely a beast man or even a werewolf. She simply didn’t want to lose this chance to taunt her competition.

“Two! Please restrain yourself and respect your fellow maidens and their knights,” the Head Nun spoke. The pink-haired woman coughing into her hand to break up the interaction. “Now, for the love of God. Please shut up, kneel, and summon your knight.”

“Damn, at least ask for my consent before forcing me on my knees,” Mia muttered before kneeling as instructed. She felt rather stupid but seeing how the first maiden got a knight, Mia decided to just trust the action. She submerged her hand in the opaque lake. It was wet alright. Yet despite being in spitting distance to the surface, Mia couldn’t see past her reflection. “Come on RNG don’t fail me now. A hot guy would do wonders for my mental health,” Mia joked, “I hope re-rolls are free.”

On the edge of non-existence and existence, a subconscious mind rose to consciousness once more. He drowns in nothingness and breaths in hopelessness.

There was no sky nor ground to define his abysmal prison. Not even a memory to keep him company.

A hand reached out from above. A hand surrounded by light and a promise of warmth. He attempted to reach for it, yet he was restricted from moving and was forced to watch another steal the opportunity from the shadow. He watched the pair of hands meet and just like that, the light was gone.

He sank deeper into the depths of this unholy waiting room.

Yet again, a hand was extended from the dark with the temptation of freedom. Cautious to reach for it after the first time, he looked around for others who wished to take it. Many came and all walked away. No one wanted to take this hand.

He made an attempt to take it, if only to escape, but found that he was unable to pry himself free. Defeated, he decided to give up on the opportunity. It was pointless anyways.

Left unheld, the hand does not reel empty handed. No. Instead, it curled its fingers until one finger remained up.

One big ‘fuck you’.

What the fuck? So much for an inviting presence. Who did this person think they are? It wasn’t like he didn’t try to take their hand. But seeing this middle finger dangling in front of him like a fishhook with bait, he reached for it once more to drag the hand down into the depths with him. He was tied in place but after some furious tugs, he was freed with a pop.

Taking the hand, it became evident that the one getting snatched wasn’t them but him. Curled fingers shifted forms into a vice grip around his wrist upon skin contact. The dark veil that covered him were ripped off in that instance. Lights, sounds, textures, tastes, and smells flooded his senses as he became a person once again.

Planting both feet on the ground, Mia used both hands to reel up her prey. This summoning was nothing graceful like the girl next to her. It was primal and chaotic as Mia’s partner was floundering under the water. So much for a knight in shining armor. This guy isn’t fighting any dragons anytime soon if he’s having difficulty wrestling against an inanimate substance.

Letting out a battle cry, Mia used all her strength to bring her knight to the surface and onto the pier with her. It wasn’t his entire body but enough of it was on land that it was easier to drag the rest of him out with less trouble. Mia fell backwards on her butt and was slightly out of breath after that intensive ritual. Shiiiit. Carrying a body is a lot harder than it looks kids! Don’t trust what you see on TV. The more you knowミ★

Mia was the image of ‘tired’ with her slightly flushed cheeks and skewed. Fanning herself, she patiently waited for the man she pulled out to make the first move, yet he was belly-down, still as a door nail. For someone who had a lot of energy to fight against help, he suddenly became as complacent as a kitten.

Oh fuck... he isn’t dead, is he? Cause that’ll be pretty awkward ngl ┐(´-｀)┌

Mia leaned forward to inspect what she pulled out. She lifted his pale arm to search for a pulse. It was cold to the touch and she couldn’t tell if the steady thud she felt was his or an echo of her own. Upon letting it go, it limply fell to the ground with no flinch from him. Crap. Don’t tell her that she accidentally pulled out a dead body?! Well, Mia knew that pulling trash can happen during fishing mini games but she thought that this more of a “guarantee knight summoning” deal. Mia refused to believe that she waited five humiliating minutes waiting just to pull out a corpse. She wants a refund, god damn it!

Moving his head, Mia planned to check his pulse from his neck to double check if he was dead. There was no resistance in the action, yet she found herself meeting a pair of responsive red eyes peaking from between snowy white hair. The two of them stared at each other for a moment as they both seemed like caught criminals in the middle of a crime. The man’s chest raised up and down as he breaths; a piece of evidence that doesn’t escape Mia’s attention. He’s…

“HE’S HOT!!!”

Scrambling to her feet, Mia put both her hands in the air and let out her victory screech to the worried silhouettes surrounding her. No wait- she should be yelling how he was alive, not his appearance. Yet here she was, doing a victory dance on top of her knight in a pair of polka dotted pajamas. Give her a pitchfork and a tail then you got the image of an imp dancing on a grave. “Bro! He’s so hot... Edward Cullen lookin’ ass- I mean, not like the musty looking Robert Patterson version but how you imagine he look like based on the description,” Mia explained to anyone listening with a wildly inaccurate and vague description of the man. She waved her arms animatedly as she gossiped with her peers with the person in question crawling to his feet.

“Dude, that should be the last of your concerns,” Five said.

“I think you should make sure he’s okay…” Seven said, joining Five in expressing concern.

“Whoa there! You can’t really blame my maiden here for getting hung up on my dashing good looks. Dead or alive, you’ll notice my face first before anything else.”

Laying a heavy hand on Mia’s right shoulder, the man wrapped his arm around the woman to stand in solidarity it her. Surprised by the action, Mia tilt her head to the side to look at her knight to judge which side he was playing on. She locked eyes with him once more but not on accident this time. His touch was uncomfortable, yet she doesn’t push him away. They were a pair of souls with two different goals yet had a silent agreement to meet in the middle for the moment.

“Good to see you again, Catherine. You hardly look over two thousand years old,” Mia’s knight said, being the first to break their line of sight to look at the Head Nun. The nun sneered as the source of her stress doubled over the course of ten minutes.

“Ashley…” the Head Nun said, nearly hissing out the name. Her knuckles were turning white due to how tightly she held onto her armrest.

“Ash,” he corrected her, with equal amount of distaste in return. Ash was smiling but he on edge just like the Head Nun. But this rivalry was interrupted when Mia pinched Ash’s hand to catch his attention. He looked back down to receive Mia’s disapproving expression at his brief quip with the Head Nun. It seemed hypocritical that Mia was suddenly policing his attitude considering she was flaunting on the competition, but Ash clocked on what’s making her step in. “It’s okay,” Ash said, leaning down to whisper into Mia’s left ear, “This was just between me and her. No one heard me use my name. Not like it matters.”

“I’m just disappointed that you don’t have a chainsaw arm,” Mia whispered back, pretending she never had that concern by throwing out a seemingly random thought. Ash stared at her as if she was insane and as if to say ‘what are you talking about’ with expressions alone. “What? You never seen the Evil Dead franchise?” Mia whispered, “Not a fan of zombies movies?”

“You watched me rise from the depths, fight other knights, and you’re asking me if I’ve seen a movie?” Ash said, in disbelief at her question yet finding himself amused by it at the same time.

“I take it that you don’t have Netflix in the void then.”

Watching the duo snicker and conspire with each other like a pair of high school delinquents, the Head Nun rubbed her forehead as a migraine began to surface. She was losing control once again thanks to double trouble. Even the other girls who were patiently waiting began talking among each other. “Oh my god… like I thought, this was the worst combination I’ve ever seen in my lifetime…,” the Head Nun muttered to herself. She covered her face as she shook her head slowly as if she was contemplating something. “I didn’t realize it would be this bad… Out of all the times for that guy to make an appearance, he had to end up with her,” she continued muttering before ultimately lifting her head to look down at Mia and her summoned knight. The Head Nun needed to separate them. “Ah, Two? I don’t mean to disturb your… fun. But you summoned one of the more… troublesome knights considering his background. I’ll allow you to “re-roll”. How does that sound?” the Head Nun spoke, her voice sickening sweet and obviously fake.

Mia and Ash quickly turned to look at each other for how their partner would react. They wordlessly conversed with Mia gesturing the two of them then to the Head Nun. Ash’s only reply was an uncaring shrug but ended up nervously shaking off the water that stuck to his hair to appear distracted. “Yeah… no deal, Howie Mandel,” Mia said, trailing off for a moment to gauge last minute expressions from Ash before turning her full attention on the Head Nun. “You doing that makes me want to stick with Mr. Abominable Albino even more,” she said.

“Abominable Albino?” Ash said. He had a hand over his chest and appeared almost offending by the alliteration. He was hardly offended by being called such a thing but the fact that Mia wasted a braincell to make an awful pun in the middle of a fantastical end-of-the-world scenario.

“Whenever some untrustworthy figure makes some inflammatory comment about one of the leads, they’re obviously doing that to cause aa divide between the leads for their own benefit,” Mia continued as she ignored Ash’s offense to her words. She waved her hand in the air as if to disperse the fog of misinformation. “You even had a mini aside moment where you muttered to the readers that there’s something more about Ash!”

“Pardon?”

The Head Nun looked completely lost as Mia’s rambling turned to the meta and spoke about invisible audience members. But just like Ash, Mia ignored her words to continue her spiel. “And even if he’s a piece of shit. Worthless. Good for nothing. Pathetic. Dead weight. Only a pretty vase-“

“Okay. I think she gets it already,” Ash said, cutting in as the terms began to pile in his heart. He squeezed Mia’s shoulder to have her move on to the point.

“I will never give him up,” Mia said.

“And... why is that?” the Head Nun asked, wringing her dress in fear that Mia figured something out that she wasn’t supposed to.

“Because he is hot. I made that pretty clear since the beginning,” Mia said. She held her head high and mighty with not even a hint of shame. For a moment, Ash was about to feel touched by Mia coming to his defense. Touched enough that it would make him loyal to her and act as a spark to a turbulent but heartfelt young adult love story which would turn into a mildly popular trilogy with an eventual movie deal before fading into obscurity. But the curtains closed on that sparkling yet oddly specific future as Ash realized that he was stuck with the weird kid. “I mean- I guess I value him as a person too… or something. Power of belief or whatever inspirational term author’s like to use to tug on heartstrings.”

[dragonrajafanfiction]

The Wedding (Part 1) The Trap is Laid

Oh yeah... It’s all coming together... @rurifangirl

Thanks to an entire bottle of vodka you slept soundly. The sun was well up on the horizon when you crawled out of bed and took your time in the Jacuzzi. Your heart was beating fast both with excitement and nervousness.  But you had to stay in character. You loved Chime. He was wonderful, sweet, shy and beautiful, so beautiful. You dressed in a comfortable robe and reminded yourself of Z’s advice on the night of Chance’s death. Ignore everyone and speak to no one unless absolutely necessary. 

You open the shades to the windows over Tokyo and gasp.

Hydra’s minions had all left last night. The owner of the Takamagahara had a 75% stake in Hydra assets. If she sold it all, she could bankrupt the entire organization in an instant. So she had forced them to hold off on their assault for 24 hours.

But the Hydra were still the owners of Tokyo itself. Hydra still blockaded the area and controlled the subway station from the outskirts a few kilometers from here. The vast majority of merchants cooperated with them and the streets were desolate. This is called ‘clearing the area’, clearing out all the irrelevant people before the important people meet. After the clearing is done, Takamagahara will become the lone store on the street. If the negotiations failed, Hydra could go on a killing spree. The police department won't care about it, and there won't be anyone on the street to bail you out.

The streets were deserted, businesses were closed. There were signs on the doors saying "Sorry for the suspension of business". The police have set up barricades at both ends of the road so that cars without special permits cannot enter.

Taking advantage of the empty streets, the staff had lined both sides with garlands of roses, lilies, poppies and baby’s breath. Ribbons were tied to every tree. Ice sculptures of famous romantic scenes from classic literature were on the way. They were setting up stations with booths for food and souvenirs. Huge banners announcing the marriage between the “Dragon Lord Chime Gen and his Dragon Lady MC” hung over every major intersection. It looked more like a fairy tale royal wedding than a meeting between the Yakuza leaders of Japan.

Your heart beats faster and you hurry out of your executive level bedroom and head to the first floor where redecorating was in full swing! With the help of the construction team they had dressed it up as a night scene of the Shinjuku district, with neon signs of all sizes and an elevated bridge spanning from above.

“I hope everything is to your liking?” Su Enxi, the owner of the Takamagahara smiles smugly behind you.

“This is amazing! It’s like Tokyo Nightlife has come inside!” 

“We chose the theme of a Yakuza wedding! So everyone here will be dressed as gangsters.” She held out one of the fancy invitations. The art was in the style of a Yakuza Tattoo with dragons, koi fish and tigers crawling in that traditional Ukiyo-E style that the Hydra Executive Board were famous for. On the inside was a lot of Japanese text you couldn’t read, but the art depicted shadow figures standing in a desolate alley.

“I love it!” You hand it back to her.

“Good. Here’s the guest list.” She hands it to you.

You blinked a bit. You didn’t recognize any of these names. 

“We didn’t know who you would like so we invited pretty much every major powerplayer and celebrity in Japan. Only women of course.” 

“These are all celebrities?” You stare at the list trying to find at least one name you knew.

Enxi frowned slightly and you flinched. How should you know? You were born nearly 40 years ago and you didn’t know any of these people from Adam. She expected you to be impressed. “Oh, right! Yes, I … yes I”m happy they’re coming!” You say, trying to recover.

It didn’t work and she takes back the list with an annoyed huff. “Don’t worry about learning their names. They’re only here to serve as shields and bargaining chips. The Hydra won’t be able to clear the area quickly if these celebrities are having a great time. If they try, it will be too much of a propaganda scandal.”

“I see.” You nod sagely. “Thank you.”

“Now go upstairs, eat, and get to the salon at 4 pm.” She checks her watch. “Guests will start to arrive at 8 pm tonight.”

“Where’s Chime?” 

“The groom? Hiding. It’s bad luck for the groom to see the bride before the wedding.” She doesn’t even look at you as she walks away and claps her hands. “Chop! Chop! Let’s get moving!”

You return to your room with breakfast and hear a soft knock on the door. You open to Caesar who steps inside. “Ready for your big day?”

He was dressed casually again, just jeans and a muscle shirt. After all, he was going to work soon and probably wanted to relax.  He looks over at the bottles of vodka and the bit of cigar you’d left on the table and raises an eyebrow. It looked like you had guests last night. “Did you party without me?”

“You can say that. Just some old friends.” You walk over to the massive floor to ceiling liquor cabinet and open the door. “Can I get you something?”

“I’m good.” He pauses again. He didn’t follow you. He’s staring at you.

“What?” You stare right back.

“Aren’t you going to ask about Zero?” Caesar asks.

You frown and close the cabinet. “Oh, that girl? Is she recovering alright?”

“She is. Lu Mingfei is looking over her for now. I’m surprised you didn’t come down to visit?”

You bat your eyes innocently. “Did she ask for me?”

Caesar turned away and walked over to the dining table, dropping the subject. The man was sharp. No doubt he saw the photo of Renata and immediately recognized Zero. When you met Zero, he likely noticed your reaction. He didn’t understand but he would drop it for now since it was clear that despite your obvious past affection you weren’t going to talk about her. “I want to say you came through again with this sudden wedding. I did not think you would go this far. How did you convince that Gen brother?”

“I just framed it as a way to convince Chisei. Is it extreme? Yes, but he’s that desperate.” You deliberately avoided mentioning anything about King General and moved away from the liquor cabinet to make tea instead. “Have you talked with Chime?”

“He’s still asleep.” Caesar picked another cigar from the box and lit it. “I trust you’ve thought through all the implications for going through with this?”

“Yes.” You say, putting the tea kettle on and waiting for it to boil. “I’ll start with the implications if things go badly. Let’s say that Chisei is a bigger idiot than we thought and he does kill Chime. As his wife, I won’t be spared. This marriage puts me not only in the Devil Clan officially but also in the upper rankings. At best, I’ll be imprisoned forever. But more likely I’ll be killed as a Devil.”

“Should our special guest arrive and I can’t use my love effectively, hundreds of people could die, all of them top celebrities. More importantly, I’ll lose my entire world even if I do manage to survive.” Everyone you ever knew was here. Z, Renata, Caesar, Chu Zihang, Lu Mingfei and Fingel. If they all died tonight, you would be desolate with nothing left.

You return with the tea and sit down across from him. “If things go right, then a lot of things will be in your hands, not mine. You’ll be negotiating my place in Japan with Chisei. Once all the things are completed, I’ll be in a position to help run the Devil Clan just by my position alone as his wife and I'll be easily installed as Japan Branch lead should Chisei and Chime follow through on their desires to vacate those positions.”

Caesar nodded slowly but then he shuddered. “So cold.”

“What?” You look up.

“If you marry that guy I won’t see you for quite some time. You won’t be coming back with us.”

You smile over your cup. “Oh don’t give me that. An old friend is better than two new ones. As the saying goes.” You quip, slyly referencing Chime’s split persona. “I still have your wedding to attend. And I consider you my best man at this wedding.”

“Brides can have a Best Man?” Caesar asked.

“It’s my wedding. I do what I want.” You rest your chin on the heel of your hand.

Caesar took a deep breath and took the cigar with him as he stood. “Well, I gotta do what I gotta do. There’s going to be shows before your appearance and I'm in one of them.”

“Break a leg.” You say as he leaves.

You still feel uneasy. You want to talk to Z. You stand up and leave that room and go to the bathroom, a spot Fingel had described as a blind spot. The bathroom was empty when you got there but when you turned to the mirror, Z was standing behind you. 

You whirl, with a ferocious look.  “Stop doing that!”

“Why? It’s fun!” He’s dressed in a tuxedo with golden cufflinks in the shape of dragons. “Why are you the only one who gets to have a good time? Enjoying the festivities?” He asked coyly.

“Yes I am. You’ve really outdone yourself. Thank you.”

Z suddenly frowned. And then he smiled again. “Hahaha… you almost had me there.”

“Yep! I hate you. You didn’t tell me Renata was alive. Go find a city bus to lay under.” You wink, but your words are serious.

“I’ve got my finger in so many pies right now. It’s not even funny. Show some respect. I just stopped by because I’m just so excited for this!” He held up a poster.

“I can’t read that.” The poster was of an evil man with a white rose in his mouth and a blood-stained sword across his chest, his eyes fierce, yet irresistibly sultry.

“It’s a wanted notice for the dangerous Ruri the Midnight Ripper!” He breathed excitedly, reading the poster. “The dangerous killer Midnight Ruri is active in the nights of Tokyo. He has killed countless young women, and the yakuza clan has offered a reward of 10 million yen for his head. Every woman going home tonight should be careful. It is said that he only attacks the most beautiful women, so the most conservative dress is the safest.” Z licked his lips and chuckled.

“Ugh. That’s insulting to the groom! Why would you do that?”

“It is the groom! You marry one, you marry the other!” Z laughed incredulously, slapping at the poster with his hand. “Did you forget? Or do you think it doesn’t matter who he kills so long as you’re alive?” He gives you a long glaring smile.

You gaze at him silently while he rolls up the poster. “It’s a beauty contest! All the ladies will read this and get excited. They’ll say ‘I’m the most beautiful. I hope to get targeted by Ruri!’ They will dress provocatively in hopes of attracting the attention of Ruri the Ripper. The venue will be loaded to the brim with delicious tempting targets!” He lets out another bird-like ‘ke-ke-ke’.

You can only scowl because you can’t argue.

“I didn’t tell you his true nature when you fell in love with him, I just told you not to do it. So… you can be forgiven for that. But this? Oh no, sweetheart. This is on you.” He points the poster at you. “But, don’t back out now!”

“I won’t. A lot is riding on this.  I feel like there’s a dagger at my back if I don’t go through with it…” You trail off, eyes lowering to the dagger that Z always kept at his side.

“It’s a hot, sexy dagger right?” Z swayed his hips and then turned around. “You kids have fun playing dress up. I’m going to get back to work.” 

He took one step and vanished.

You would spend the rest of the day in the beauty salon. Your dress was pure white, embroidered with pearls and diamonds that gave off the impression of scales, as though you were dressing up as the White King Izanami herself. Your hands were covered with elbow length princess gloves to hide the black veins on your skin, but then they stuck jewels in a mask like pattern on your face, trading your real scales for artificial ones. Your hair was piled high on your head in a traditional Japanese bun with silver sticks resembling horns.

The night fell and the desolate streets flooded with hundreds of Tokyo society elites as well as Hydra elite warriors. It turned out that Enxi used her financial clout to grant traffic passes to all the guests. Traffic was bumper to bumper. Every guest invited showed up to this wedding that shut down a major part of the city for an entire day. No one wanted to miss such an exclusive event.

The Takamagahara was filled to the brim with sleeveless and backless dresses, fishnet stockings in high heels, dangerously short skirts and perilously low cleavage.

The waiters wear black uniforms. They roll up their sleeves to reveal dragon and tiger tattoos. To light a customer’s cigarette they will draw out a waist pistol. The muzzle of the gun produced bright flames. It was impossible to tell who was armed with the real thing or with these toys. Because everyone was dressed as a Hydra Yakuza, it was hard to tell the Hydra members from the guests! 

The men and women shouted and played craps. The wine flowed endlessly. Occasionally the Whale came on stage to say two silly and majestic words, followed by a performance. Diamond was here to do his sexy rodeo strip show. There were popular shows such as BasaraKing's "Cleopatra" and Ukyou's "Sakura Falling on Itsuru Island". Armani was here to entertain guests with card tricks. Calypso dazzled a few of the younger guests. 

The sound of a powerful engine drowned out the music. A Harley Davidson motorcycle pulled into the middle of the dance floor. Caesar was dressed in a tight leather jacket, all covered in silver chains, with a shiny Desert Eagle stuck in his belt. He took off his sunglasses and threw them at the guests, "My engine is burning hot, are you ready?"

“BasaraKing! BasaraKing!" Hundreds of roses were thrown onto the stage.

White rose petals fell from the sky, and Chu Zihang, wearing a red leather trench coat with a skull mask, crashed from the sky to the center of the stage. Caesar drove his motorcycle towards Chu Zihang, and the two faked a fight, as if they were performing some kind of gangster stage show.

You watch from a hidden spot near the stage. You still have not seen Chime and Chime hasn't seen you. But it was almost time for the main event. Your wedding. All of this celebration was a luxurious trap for the King General and you searched the crowd looking for him. But if he was here, he wouldn’t be in the crowd. He’d be somewhere where he could see you. You were his target. You were his prey.

After a few rounds of fighting, Chu Zihang had picked up Caesar's dropped Desert Eagle and shot him through the chest, but then he suddenly swooped in and hugged Caesar, who was about to fall down.

The scene is about a pair of mob brothers, Caesar as the unruly brother and Chu Zihang as the lonely and sensitive brother. They grew up alone, but determined to be the best of the best. The brothers heard that politicians and gangsters must cooperate with each other in order to go higher and higher. So the two brothers drew lots, one to grow up as a gangster to defeat various gangs as the king of the gangsters; one to go to the University of Tokyo as a famous lawyer, and then enter the political world as a great politician. The result of the lottery is that the unruly brother Caesar is going to be a politician. While the sensitive brother Chu Zihang is going to break into the difficult underworld.

But they obeyed their destiny, and the two agreed not to contact each other again. But they always helped each other in critical moments. No one knew that the brother of the mob boss was a rising star in politics, and no one understood why the brother's gang always survived in the anti-gang operations.

Twenty years later Caesar’s politician character became a member of parliament and became even more headstrong, wanting to be the overlord of all Japan. So he set off a storm of anti-gang raids, and all the gangs were badly hit. Chu Zihang’s character had to intervene to stop the brother, saying that the yakuza had a long history in Japan and many people depended on them for their livelihood. If the yakuza were destroyed, it would be impossible for the brother-led government to support so many of the underprivileged in society, which would be tantamount to destroying the underprivileged in society. But Caesar’s character said that there is no such thing as the yakuza in his future plans, and it doesn't matter if he sacrifices some people's interests. Everything has to make way for his political future.

Finally, the brothers meet under the Over-Sea bridge in Tokyo Bay and duel in the same way they did at the place where they first drew lots and parted ways. In the end, it is the Gangster who shoots through the Politician brother's heart.

Chu and Caesar are acting out the ending of this ski.  Caesar is dying when he finally tells the truth. Because he has a terminal illness and can no longer protect Chu Zihang secretly. He fears that after his death his introverted brother will not be able to control so many yakuza gangs, so he sweeps the yakuza with his own iron fist.

"Remember our original agreement to be the number one yakuza emperor of Japan!" The brother's last words, "My brother will be number one in Japan!"

The applause was deafening and the guests were in tears. The play actually was acted very silly. Chu Zihang's mouthful of second-hand Japanese looked like he learned it off Duo Lingo, but the women who came here either loved BasaraKing and Ukyo or both, and those flaws were overlooked. 

A sad song started playing as the cherry blossoms fell over the two brothers. It was a popular song, only marginally appropriate, and the gist of it was two people who declare to each other how much they truly mean to each other, only after it was too late.

You didn’t know they were going to put something on like this. It was clearly directed at Chisei. Even though you were the main act, Caesar and Chu Zihang were supporting you and Chime in their own way.

Once the stage was cleared. The lights went up. Caesar hurried backstage. “Hey!” He whispers. “Knock ‘em dead!” 

You give him a grin and a thumbs up.

[the-resurrection-3d]

so what was ever good about acotar anyway?

For some reason, I’ve been very tempted to reread ACOTAR lately, and so I’m going to just make a quick list of what I remember specifically endearing the book to me back when I first read it in 2016 so we can compare notes later. This will, however, also include some retroactive criticisms now that we’re four years on from ACOWAR ruining everything forever. 

Twigger warnings for discussions of abuse, csa and neglect, as well as me using my complimentary R Slur Pass.

For some context: 

>Be 18yr me in 2016. 

>Be in your first semester at college. 

>Be so fed up with YA romance that you avoid books just for hinting at them in the summary. 

>Be also brainstorming a series with your roommate called The Cuckmaster Saga. 

This is probably going to sound embarrassing, but I’m being completely sincere when I say that part of why this book excited me was simply the novelty of finding a YA romance book that I liked. 

I’d fallen out hard with YA in general by this point in my life, partially because of a string of fairy tale “retellings” that clearly gave zero fucks about the source material beyond using the iconography in its marketing. Folklore had been my special interest for a while, and my excitement for the series and all its little extra niche references coincided with finally getting to study folklore in a true academic setting.

Which leads me to point one:

I love the idea of combining BatB and the Tam Lin ballad. I know some people have complained about this, but honestly, I enjoyed finding a retelling that mimicked the mix-and-match structuring of a lot of folktales. ACOTAR isn’t even the messiest or least coherent mash-up by a huge margin. Unfortunately, this aspect of the series severely lessened as it went along — remember when we all thought ACOWAR was going to be a Snow White retelling and then there was just one scene with poisoned apples? Lmao.

[If anyone wants an author who does YA mash-ups that are actually YA, I’d recommend Rosamund Hodge, whose books are always interesting in their sheer weirdness even when the story itself slightly falters. I mean, I wrote a whole 20-page thesis on her Red Riding Hood/Maiden Without Hands retelling and still didn’t cover everything I had thoughts on. (Tragically, however, I must inform you all that she is a Catholic Reylo. Rest in pepperoni.)]

It is fucking hilarious in retrospect that SJM clearly knows a bunch of different folktales and folkloric creatures but thinks it’s believable for shadowsinger powers to have no theorized origin “even [in] the rich lore of the warrior-people” (ACOFAS 65). Bro fuck outta here. 

But this leads into point two — Feyre and her family. It’s very obvious that SJM based Nesta and Elain’s dynamic with Feyre off the common folktale trope of having the youngest sibling be the only competent person in the room (and Katniss Everdeen). I thought it was honestly a lot of fun to see this trope done with some interiority; you can practically hear Feyre seethe about what useless hoes her sisters are between every line. I genuinely giggled through these parts on my initial readthrough. 

I’ve seen some people complain that Nesta and Elain’s behaviors aren’t realistic in this situation, but au contraire! Nesta and Elain’s actions in book one are (...almost) perfectly realistic. Without revealing too much, my grandmother grew up in poverty with a few older sisters, and yet my great-grandmother would make her do all the work and constantly force her to give up her possessions (like her car) to the older sisters whenever they wanted them. Even to this day, when they’re all in their 70s and 80s, one of these sisters still relies on my grandma to do basic shit like balancing her checkbooks. I’ve also observed similar dynamics play out plenty of times between an adult child and an overindulgent parent, with people literally ruining their lives and bodies all for the sake of sitting at home all day buying furry porn off the internet. 

Nesta and Elain are basically the psychology of this type of person split in two — Elain the soft, delicate, perpetually victimized front they put on for the world, and Nesta the ice-cold, bitter, and aggressive bitch they truly are. 

Honestly, the only thing I would change about this set-up is either keep Ma Archeron alive or give Papa Archeron more personality than a plank of damp wood. What’s truly missing here is a parental figure enforcing this fucked up dynamic — I don’t remember it being clear that Feyre’s always had this role, just that she took it on after her mom’s death. Making it clear that Feyre’s always been forced to be this way — alongside giving the mom more characterization — would have gone a long way towards making this dynamic feel more realized and less like the narrative using trauma and pity as a shortcut towards reader engagement. 

Then again, that would require SJM to have a female villain in this series who isn’t a rapist, and quotes I’ve seen floating around from ACOSF make it pretty clear SJM doesn’t know same-gender sexual abuse even exists. 

Anyway. 

Point Three (or rather 2B): Feyre realizing she doesn’t have to hang around her family just because she feels obligated to love them was a fucking banger. I loved it so much; having a story, especially a YA story, that showed you aren’t obligated to love a family that treats you like shit was so special to me. Especially since I was also leaving my family for the first time, and going home to visit them every other weekend felt like being hit point-blank with a Psyduck blast. 

Thankfully, my relationship with my family has gotten a lot better, but I’m still really disappointed that Nesta and Elain were forced back into the story, rather than them reaching out to Feyre and making amends because they wanted to do better.  The closest we got to this was the revelation that Nesta almost made it to the Border by herself after Feyre was taken, which was definitely badass, but also unfortunately the only Nesta scene I’ve liked in this entire fucking series. If SJM was going to force Feyre to regress into being Nesta and Elain’s tardwrangler again, then she should have followed up on Amren’s line in ACOWAR that Feyre treats Nesta and Elain the way Tamlin treated her. 

“I asked them to help once—and look what happened. I won’t risk them again.”

Amren snorted. “You sound exactly like Tamlin.”

[. . .] and I said, “She’s right.”  (169-170). 

But I’m sure everyone who’s read ACOSF knows how well that’s going. 

Point Four: the femindhjdfhfdh I can’t even write that with a straight face. I mean let’s be real, I too enjoy seeing female characters I like become queens and all that other stuff, but it was clear to me even on my initial reading of ACOMAF that it was all shallow and designed to help delineate good guys from bad guys without much in the way of nuance. It certainly took me out of the experience a little, but at least it ties into the books’ themes of recovering from abuse and shacking up with a Certified Women Respecter. 

My actual point four: Truthfully I only bought this series for the meme of having the first shitty love interest getting cucked in the second book. ACOWAR gave me some complicated feelings on Tamlin, and I honestly think he should have just stopped appearing in the series after that — BUT, having him be dragged back in once per book just to call him a cuck and cockslap him around a little bit is fucking hilarious. Pointless! But hilarious.

I also think that this kind of arc is a great critique of the standard “happily ever after,” acknowledging that in real life, you’re much more likely to just pass from one abusive household to another because you don’t know what healthy love, communication, and boundaries are. (Arguably many folktales are the fantasies of women who are well aware of this reality but want to imagine a world that’s otherwise). I definitely have a lot of problems with SJM’s claims of “sex positivity,” but acknowledging that Feylin used sex as a means of avoiding communication was another great touch.

I wish that this whole King of Hybern shit was completely cut just to focus on these themes more; it’s very clear SJM only included it because fantasy series = BIG EPIC WORLD-ENDING STAKES!! I've read maybe ten pages of Throne of Glass, so I can't speak for how she handles epic fantasy there, but I know for me and a lot of other stans, the Hybern plot had licherally nothing to do with what we liked and connected to in these books. 

But I must soften here, because I totally empathize with feeling like big stakes are “necessary” for a fantasy story and that no one would want to read your books without them. YA fantasy is the reason why TV Tropes coined the term “romantic plot tumor,” after all. (Source: I’m making shit up.) 

What else… what else… uhhhhh. I think that might be it, at least for substantial things I don’t have to qualify too much. I of course have plenty of little things I used to like but have now been tainted because ACOWAR ruined everything forever and ACOFAS danced on the graves (such as how I liked Lucien but everyone in the books shits on him now to the point it’s stopped being funny). But this post is too long anyway.

[transbibennyweir]

Sarah coming out to her family as vampire -Al

you got it! this was really fun to write. find it on ao3 as well

Getting turned into a vampire by her now ex-boyfriend was not on her list of high school ‘need try this at least once’, but Sarah learned that there were actually worse things than being a vamp. If anything the first week was tolerable if not nerve wrecking. The second was even manageable. By the third the lying and rat eating and overall weirdness of her new day to day life felt almost natural. Well, as natural as fighting the undead and chasing down rodents for a midnight snack could feel. Even after becoming a full on vampire things weren’t too different, the impending dread of never aging and all her friends and family dying still weighed on her, but at least she was more confident now. More herself in a way that might have scared her if she was still her fledgling or even human self. And maybe it should scare her more.

Maybe the fact she could eat people should still freak her out. Maybe living seemingly forever should terrify just as much as it first did. Maybe she shouldn’t be even consider telling her parents about any of it, but there she was; sitting across from her parents at their dinning room table. Over the course of her time as a the undead she felt more and more like a stranger in her own home, a stranger to her family. Sometimes she could say she was a stranger to herself.

“Mom, dad,” her voice came out nervous and quick. “I wanted to talk to you about some stuff. I know I’ve been pretty distant about my life this year, but I figured now is as good a time as any to fill you in with what’s been going on with me.” A part of her was kinda glad she didn’t have a beating heart anymore, less distracting with it not drumming in her ears.

“It isn’t drugs, right?” Her dad blurted suddenly worried. His tie worn low around his neck from just coming home from work. “That Jesse boy hasn’t done anything to you either?”

“Michael!” Sarah’s mother nearly shouted, slapping her husband’s arm. “Don’t say things like that! ‘Sides our Sarah knows how handle herself. Right, sweetie?”

Watching the exchange between her parents caused a slight laugh to calm her nerves back to something more manageable, her chest feeling lighter. “What? Ha, no. Not anything like that and I could totally beat Jess’s ass if he tried something now.”

“Sarah!” Her mom squeaked as her father laughed and ruffled her hair. “Mhm. So, what’s this you want tell us?”

Deep breath in, deep breath out. Just have spit it out. Everything is going be okay and if not... Well, if not then she hoped Benny still knew how do the brain wipe spell. “Right, Okay. So I know this is going sound crazy and make zero sense, but uh, ha I’mavampire.” She flinched into her self waiting for the reaction, she felt the worse yet to come. There was silence then a sudden booming laugh coming from her father first followed by her mother’s more soft giggle.

“Sweetie, that’s very funny, but I think you’ve been reading Dusk too much again.” Sarah’s mother giggles muffed into a charmed smile. “What’s this really about?”

Perhaps Sarah was too use to the strange, unexplained supernatural world of mystery and magic that if someone walked up to her and revealed they were a creature of the night, she’d believe them no questions asked. Maybe that was a worrying thing to just accept but somehow there was stranger things to accept as truth. Granted your own child being a blood sucker might be a hard pill to swallow no matter how use to the weird one might be.

“No, mom. Dad. I’m being serious here. I can, I can explain it. Mostly.”

“Sarah, don’t be ridiculous. If you’re going ask for a family meeting at least try not waste our time with these jokes.” Her father said, his tone even but annoyed. Funny how her short temper came from him. Even more funny that they were both quick to get annoyed now. Sarah’s frustration just slightly getting the better of her, and in a moment of total dumbassery she flashed her fangs with a hiss and snake yellow eyes. Shit. Okay. Okay. Well, maybe they can’t deny it now?

Then her mother screamed because of course she’d scream. “Damnit, Lynn I told you there was something wrong with this town!” Now her father felt the need to shout because shouting always helped. “Who did this to you? Was it that Jess boy? I’ll-I’ll kill him. No-I’ll rekill him!” Her father ranted and began to pace around the room as her mother fanned herself to calm back down. Although it wasn’t do much to ease herself. Sarah held her mother’s hand.

“What? No-Well, I mean. Yes, yeah this is kinda sorta totally Jess’s fault, but I uhh kinda killed him. More or less. My friends helped. Y’know the ones. Erica and those three weird boys.”

“The dorky ones?” Her father asked, stopping his pacing around the room.

“I mean... yeah.” Sarah replied slowly.

“And what are they? Human? Wizards? Vampires? Leprechaun?!”

“I think wizard falls under human but yes to like the first three.”

Her mother held her chest whispering some nonsense to calm herself down, it wasn’t working and the constant talking was going drive Sarah up a wall. “My baby is dead. But she’s right there. Undead. My baby is a little undead monster-”

“Hey!” Sarah and her father shouted at the same time. “I’m not a monster! I even get my blood from a human friendly truck and I help the town from being like wracked from whatever weirdness of the week I have fight.” Okay so maybe that wasn’t super reassuring and helpful, but she was feeling honest.

“Great, a vegan vampire!” Her father said tiredly.

“Listen, between grandma’s sixth toe and cousin Hector’s French Fry nipples I feel like I’m still the least weird person in the family.”

The laugher was back, if not more manic then before. Her father sat back down out stretched his tie as a nervous tick. “Hah, the truth is your mother and I have noticed that this town can be pretty... Strange, to say the least. But I just thought it was because it was toxic waste not because the whole place is basically haunted.”

“Cursed more like it,” her mother whispered. Sarah winced, all things considered this was going more smoothly then she would’ve thought. Which is great, totally. If only her mother didn’t look like she was a manic giggle away from losing her marbles. Suddenly realizing what she said her mother quickly corrected herself. “But! But-but we still love you, Sar-bear. I guess you’ll really be our baby girl forever now.” Their shared smiles were sad but honest. Sarah’s parents would always love her and living forever felt less scary knowing their love for her would last just as long. The comfort reaffirmed by a family hug between the three of them.

“And you made sure to get back at that Jess boy? Stake through the heart or something like that?” Her father asked half jokingly.

“Michael! Don’t encourage staking people through the heart.”

“It’s okay mom. He totally deserved it. Plus, I learned how do my makeup without a mirror which is a bonus.”

“You’ll have teach me that trick.” Her mother laughed, relaxing into Sarah’s touch.

This time their shared smiles felt less stained and sad and more hopeful now that there weren’t secrets and a cavern of distance between her and her parents. Maybe this wouldn’t be as painful of a change as she thought. Maybe it’d be just as manageable as week two of starting out her vampire life, just now she had a little more support to get through it all. So yeah, maybe this wouldn’t be so bad. Now if she could just tell them about every other weird thing in her life that would be perfect.

[plaidbooks]

Everyone Deserves Love chapter 6

A/N: The sexual tension rises! This chapter is a lot of housekeeping and waiting for things to happen, much like how the characters are waiting for shit to hit the fan. Fun fact, for fight scenes in this story, I reenacted them with my mom to make sure they were realistic. Also, the thought of Barba flustered and face first in a wall is highly funny to me.

Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

Tags: briefest of child abuse mention (not explicit), normal SVU stuff, Devon gets a little intense during an interrogation scene, but not too bad

Words: 5k+

Office of Rafael Barba

1 Hogan Place

Monday, April 6th. 1:05pm

  “Whatcha working on?” Devon asked as she shoved the last bit of her sandwich into her mouth. It had been two weeks since the last attack on Barba, and today was the day that they were finally going to go get Devon’s stitches taken out. Thank god, these things itch so bad, she thought, fighting the urge to scratch at her shoulder. She was currently in one of Barba’s chairs, legs draped over one of the arms, back against the other.

Barba glanced up, smirking at her easy-going posture. “Just finishing up this closing statement for tomorrow, then we can leave.” His eyes drifted back to the legal pad in front of him, pen tapping on the desk lightly as he thought.

“Barbs, you’ve been working on that statement for the past hour. If it’s not done yet, then what makes you think it’s gonna be done any time soon?”

He huffed out a laugh. “For someone with unlimited patience in terms of staking out a perp, you have zero patience for paperwork. Now hush and let me finish this.”

Devon rolled her eyes and continued counting the wooden boards in the ceiling. Barba gave her another glance, before shaking his head and continuing on his statement. After spending the better part of three months with the agent, Devon had certainly proved herself to him in terms of her being able to protect him. He felt at ease around her, not nervous or anxious at all, even with a deadly gang still out there. And even though she seemed relaxed, especially now, lounging in the chair, he knew that she was still on high alert, listening for footsteps outside his office. He still had no idea how she heard people approach from so far away, but she always knew when someone was about to enter well in advance. And no matter how she was sitting in a chair, or on his couch, she was always up and by his side before anyone came in, ready to defend. It was weird the first couple weeks, and the people who visited—usually other attorneys or colleagues—always gave her, and Barba, a weird look, and a wide berth.

The first day someone had come in, Devon had her hand on her glock, resting it easily, but not drawing it. The poor paralegal who was just delivering a message almost passed out at the sight of it.

“We need a code word…for when someone comes in that you don’t know,” Devon had mentioned after the white-faced messenger left.

Barba raised his eyebrows. “You know, I’m not going to know everyone who comes into my office. I didn’t even know that guy. Maybe you should just not grab you gun?”

Devon shot him a glare at that. “And leave you unprotected? No thanks. Like Han Solo, I plan on shooting first.”

 “I—did you really just make a Star Wars reference? Really?” Devon smirked at him. “No, you don’t need to shoot anyone in here.”

And that was that. They never made a code word, but Devon did stop reaching for her gun when people came into his office. Though, she did still stand by his desk and glared at everyone who entered, daring them to try anything.

“You know, you haven’t written anything in ten minutes,” Devon said, snapping Barba back to the present. He looked at his legal pad, at the words, the scribbles, the scratched-out phrases. Suddenly, inspiration hit; he knew exactly how to finish his closing statement. He furiously started writing, cursing his hand for not being able to keep up with his thoughts. After a few moments of scribbling down some last-minute thoughts, Barba put down his pen.

 “Done. Let’s get you to the hospital,” he announced; he could read over it again later that night, at home. He stood, gathering his things. Devon got out of the chair, stretching with her full body—right arm being able to lift high above her head. She scrunched up her face as she stretched, making a weird, groaning noise, then releasing the tension in her limbs.

“Feeling better?” Barba asked, amused.

 “Much,” Devon replied, smiling. Sleeping on a too-small couch for the past ten weeks hasn’t been the best for her back, but like hell would she admit that to him, especially after their last fight about it. He still tried to force her to sleep in his bed—with him taking the couch, of course—at least once a week, to which she denied him every time. She definitely appreciated the thought, but she was there to protect him, to make him comfortable, not the other way around.

Mercy Hospital

Monday, April 6th. 2:37pm

It was something else to have left the office while the sun was still high in the air; Barba had taken a half day just to make this hospital trip with Devon. It shocked her just how much it meant to her that he took time off to go with her, even though she had offered to have Detective Amaro or Fin cover at his office while she got the stitches out.

 “I need the time off, if I’m being honest,” Barba had said. “I’ve been working too much recently.”

Devon rubbed her arm nervously. “Are you sure? I still feel bad that you’re using vacation time for this.”

Barba waved her off. “Don’t feel bad; I got over a month in vacation days saved. Besides, we’ve been having too much takeout. Why don’t we do some grocery shopping after the hospital? I’ll make one of my mom’s special recipes.”

 “Wait; you cook? And we’ve been eating shitty takeout for months?”

Barba laughed. “Yes, I cook. I just haven’t been allowed to go to the grocery store,” he gave Devon a playful glare. “Besides, I haven’t had the time.” It was true; it was rare that they made it back to his loft before 9pm.

She thought about it, weighed the options of going to the store, about how likely it was that he’d be attacked there. “Fine, but let’s stock up so we don’t have to go back for a while. Plus, I’m going to introduce you to this magical thing called Instacart….”

When the nurse came to get Devon, Barba looked like he was going to stay out in the lobby. Devon only needed to give him a stern look to have him following them back to the room.

 “Family only,” the nurse was starting to say.

 “He’s my, uh, boyfriend,” Devon blurted out. Besides the red creeping up her neck, she kept a straight face. Barba, however, raised an eyebrow, face flushed.  He opened his mouth to say something, thought better of it, and closed his mouth again.

The nurse gave them both a look. “Alright…,” she replied, motioning for Devon to sit on the raised medical table. Barba sat in the chair in the corner, trying to melt into the wall. After the nurse checked Devon’s blood pressure, throat, and ears, she informed them that the doctor would be there in a moment, and to take off her shirt and change into the hospital gown.

“Boyfriend, huh?” Barba asked as soon as the door was closed, not quite making eye contact. “Amaro and Rollins are going to have a field day if they hear about this.”

 “Look, it was easier than explaining the whole ADA-being-threatened-by-a-gang-thing, okay?” Devon said, taking her shirt off. Barba groaned and turned to face the wall.

 “I feel like I’m in a bad romcom,” he mumbled, voice slightly muffled by the wall.

Devon’s face grew warmer, but she smiled at the sight of Rafael Barba, master attorney, face first in the corner of the room. He was too damn cute when he was flustered. Devon smacked the thought away. “At least you didn’t blow your cover.”

 “After this, we never speak of this again.”

Once in the gown, Devon sat back on the table. Barba eventually turned back around to face the room, face not quite as bright, and they waited for the doctor in awkward silence.

Apartment of Rafael Barba

Monday April 6th. 4:30pm

 The grocery store was largely uneventful. Devon was on high alert the whole time, as per usual, while Barba seemed undisturbed, walking up and down the aisles, grabbing supplies.

“How have you not had a heart attack with how tense you are?” he jokingly asked.

Devon rolled her eyes. “It’s a skill, I guess.” Though, she seemed to relax after that, if only just a little bit.

Once back in Barba’s loft, he changed out of his court suit and into slacks and a simple t-shirt, and started getting to work prepping dinner. Devon grinned; she secretly loved when he wore casual clothes. Even on his days off, when they stayed in the apartment watching TV or catching up on work, he normally wore a polo shirt, or a less fancy dress shirt.

“I hope you don’t mind eating a little late tonight,” he called from the kitchen as he cubed the steak.

“Like we don’t every night?” Devon called back, grinning.

Barba huffed at that. “Fair enough.” After a few moments of them both working in silence, Devon picked up her laptop and moved into the kitchen. It was a decent sized kitchen, big enough that he could work on the counter, chopping and marinating ingredients while she hopped up on the opposite counter, typing away on her laptop, a small island in between them. Every now and again, she’d glance up at Barba working, appreciating how deftly his hands moved from meat to garlic to limes. He had rice already steaming and black beans cooking at a low temperature.

“Did your mother teach you to cook a lot of meals?” Devon finally asked, reports long forgotten.

“A few. My abuelita taught me more, but my father didn’t like the idea of a man stuck inside cooking all day,” Barba replied bitterly.

Devon was going to drop it, to leave the conversation there. She wasn’t quite sure why she opened her mouth, but she found herself saying, “neither parent taught me to cook. But, if dinner wasn’t done before father got home, then there would be hell to pay. Sometimes, mother would be too drunk; she’d be passed out before he got home, so I taught myself to cook basic meals…just something quick and easy, before father got home.”

The silence that followed this statement was deafening. Devon’s face flushed as she realized what she had told him, what she had let loose; she didn’t let people know about that time in her life. She was still reeling from the fact that she even spoke when Barba answered in the softest voice.

“Seems like we both had shitty fathers.”

Such a simple statement, yet Devon felt closer to the counselor. They did let the conversation die there, though, neither one wanting to delve deeper into their traumatic pasts; that would be a conversation for another day. Devon swore she could still feel Barba’s touch, the ghost of his fingertip as he trailed it along the scar on her back all those weeks ago, and she shuddered. Maybe they would continue the conversation.

“So, what’s the name of this dish?” Devon asked, pushing all of that out of her mind. She lightly jumped down from the counter, moving to stand next to Barba. She watched as he moved the marinated meat into the pan with a loud sizzle.

“Bistec de palomilla. It’s simple, but delicious. It won’t be nearly as good as mí Mamí makes, but hopefully it’ll still be good.”

Devon smiled; it was endearing that he called his mom “Mamí.” She had the sudden urge to wrap her arms around his shoulders, to lean her head against his. Fighting this urge, she went back to her forgotten laptop, pretending to type on it. “I’m sure it’ll be great. It already smells amazing.”

“Garlic cooking always smells amazing,” he commented matter-of-factly. She nodded, then snatched her laptop and moved back to the living room. She wasn’t sure what was happening to her. I’ve never had someone cook dinner for me before. That must be it, she thought. It had to be. Why else was she feeling so touched, so excited by a simple dinner?

Dinner, as predicted, was amazing. Devon had to restrain herself from shoveling the food into her mouth faster than she could taste it.

“If this isn’t as good as your mom’s, then I’m going to have to try her version,” Devon said in between bites.

Barba gave her an amused smile. “Usually, we marinate the meat much longer, but I didn’t have the time. One day, I’ll have to make you ropa vieja…maybe on a weekend when I have time to slow roast the meat.”

“I will eat anything you make,” she promised, causing him to chuckle warmly. They talked about food for a little, including Barba raving about his abuelita’s tamales, before they fell silent once more.

Barba cleared his throat awkwardly. “Did you, uh, want to talk about your parents? Because I’m all ears if you did.”

Devon choked on a piece of rice, sputtering. “N-not really,” she coughed out. Once she composed herself, she asked, “why, did you want to talk about your father? Cause I promise I won’t judge you.”

He should’ve known she’d turn it back on him; she always did when he asked about her parents. He should’ve just taken the little bit of information he got earlier, been happy with that. She’d talk about it when she wanted to…if she wanted to.

“Look, I’m not going to push it. I just want you to know that I’m here if you wanted to talk,” he replied gently. Barba’s phone chimed, mercifully saving Devon from responding. A moment later, her phone went off, too.

“Seems Liv wants us to stop by tomorrow,” Devon reported, reading over the text.

“Seems like it,” he agreed. The tension didn’t go away, so Devon stood, grabbing her plate and taking his empty one, heading to the kitchen. She made it to the sink, turning on the water, and started washing the dishes.

“You don’t have—” Barba started, following her to the kitchen, before Devon cut him off.

“You cooked. I’ll clean,” she said simply. He just stood in the doorway, watching her until her hands began to shake in a panic that she hadn’t felt in decades. It’s just Barbs, not father, she thought, but it didn’t stop her heart from beating faster. Finally, he left the kitchen, heading back to the living room and pulling some files out of his case. Once the dishes were done, Devon joined him, taking her usual spot in the armchair, laptop out, and typing away.

SVU Department

Tuesday, April 7th. 10:08am

This had been the most relaxed Devon had felt since taking on the job of protecting Barba. Which wasn’t saying much; she’d seen people sneak guns into the precinct before, perps and suspects alike lashing out and hurting those around them. But it was nice having a room full of detectives around. So, when Olivia asked to speak to Devon in her office, alone, Devon had no qualms with leaving the ADA with the squad; they were going over some case, anyways.

“So, how’s the 24/7 going?” Olivia asked as Devon closed the door behind her.

Devon took the seat across from the Sergeant. “Ah, it’s been going well. No attacks since the Olivera brothers, though that’s just making me more anxious than anything.”

Liv nodded in agreement. “You’re worried that they’re planning something?”

“Why else take this long? Have you heard anything?”

Olivia let out a breath, leaning back in her chair. “No, I haven’t. I don’t know how such a low-ranking bunch of kids are keeping their mouths shut. No one’s talking.”

Devon thought for a moment. “Want to let me have a go at one of them? Whoever you think might be a weak link. I’ll just need someone to watch Barba for a bit while I interrogate them.”

Olivia gave Devon a long look, trying to judge what her real intentions were. “I trust that you know we do not harm the people we’re interrogating?”

Devon gave her a grin. “I know that, and you know that, but they don’t need to know that, right?” That seemed like the correct answer, because Olivia nodded, standing. Devon stood up with her, followed her out of her office. Liv glanced over at the squad; they were in the bullpen, discussing the rape case that Barba was initially called in for today. Seemingly satisfied that they would be there for a while longer, Liv led Devon to interrogation 1, both of them missing the fact that Barba turned at the last moment to see them entering the room, his brow furrowing.

“I didn’t know you had one here now,” Devon said, silently wishing she had her knife; the EMT never got back to her on it, and the small dagger she was using as a replacement was quicker, yes, but paltry in comparison.

“Tony Garcia--we only have him until tomorrow morning. Then he goes to Rikers. If you’re going to get anything, it’s going to be now.” Olivia leveled a heady stare at the agent. “Look, I’m going to let you take point on this. But don’t go too overboard, okay?”

Devon nodded, mentally aligning herself with the mean, scary, intimidating Federal agent that she had to be. She’s only done this a handful of times, and every time, it left a bad taste in her mouth; she saw the look that the observers gave her afterwards, the fear that they tried to mask. But they needed answers, and they needed them now.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Liv said. Devon took a deep breath, rolled her neck, then burst through the door, slamming it against the wall. It hit so hard that it ricocheted off the wall, closing harshly behind her. The man in the chair had been slouching before she came in, but now he was sitting ramrod straight, eyes huge.

“Why, hello there, Garciiiiii-ya!” Devon said in the most obnoxious, over-the-top voice she could muster. “I’ve heard that you’ve been a bit of a bad little boy, huh? Not telling the good detectives here anything.”

“What the hell is this?” Garcia asked, looking at the one-way mirror in horror. Good, so the façade was unsettling him. But would that be enough to make him talk? Devon wanted to push him harder.

“No one’s there ta help ya, buddy boy. It’s just you,”—Devon took her knife out and pointed to him—“and me.” She slammed the knife down hard enough that it stuck up straight out of the table, blade sinking into the soft metal a couple of centimeters, the handle far enough out of reach that Garcia, with his hands cuffed to the table, couldn’t grab it. Devon moved to stand right next to the man, uncomfortably close, putting her head right next to his ear, so close that he could feel her breath on him. “Now, are you gonna answer my questions, or am I gonna start taking bits of you?”

Garcia lurched away as if she struck him, trying to put as much space between them as possible.

In the observation room, Olivia watched, listening intently. It was working. As much as Olivia hated watching Devon play this role, it was actually working. Garcia was going to break, he had to—

“What the hell is going on in there?” A voice asked. Liv turned to see Barba sticking his head in. Once he saw the scene unfolding, he came to stand next to the Sergeant, intrigue and a creeping horror rooting him to the spot, like watching a car crash.

“Y-you can’t do that!” Garcia yelled, once again looking towards the mirror. “Please! Someone! Get her away from me!”

Devon chuckled darkly, pulling her knife out of the table and sitting on top of cool metal, using the tip of the dagger to pick under her nails. “I already told you, no one’s there, Tone. It’s just us. So, here’s how this is gonna go; either you start telling me about the Ace’s hit on ADA Rafael Barba, or I’m going to take your pinky. Then your ring finger. And so on and so forth, you get the picture. Now, which hand is your dominant hand?” When Garcia didn’t answer, she reached for his left hand—the hand closest to her.

“Wait! I’ll tell you everything I know! But I’m only a scout; I don’t know much,” Garcia pleaded.

“You have to the count of three,” Devon replied. She stood, gripping his wrist in an iron grip. She was pushing his hand against the table, attempting to get his fingers to lay flat. Garcia was struggling against her, but with his cuffed hands and seated position, he quickly lost. With his fingers splayed on the table, Devon held the dagger poised above his pinky. “One…two—”

“We’ve been waiting!” Garcia yelled, causing Devon to pause. She didn’t release him, continuing to hold the razor-sharp edge an inch from the man’s digit.

“For?”

“Marco to get back into town. He’s the best of the Aces,” he gasped out. Devon thought for a moment, contemplating if she should try and get more out of him now, if he’d shut his mouth later. She had no idea who this Marco was—never saw anything on him in the database.

“When does he get back?”

“I don’t know! I told you, I’m just a scout, I swear!”

“Wrong answer, Tone,” Devon said, repositioning the dagger above him. Instead of more information, though, Garcia just started yelling, begging and pleading for Devon to have mercy on him, that he knew nothing. Just then, the door burst open, Olivia coming in.

“That’s enough, Motely,” she ordered.

Devon let out a disappointed sigh. “You’re no fun, Sarge.” As she was leaving, she turned and winked at Garcia. “Just remember, I work with the FBI. I can find you anywhere.” She gave a little wave and a bright smile, and she thought Garcia was going to faint. Once in the observation room, Devon let her shoulders drop, resheathing her dagger and trying to shake off that persona.

“That was…highly disturbing,” Barba muttered, making Devon jump; she didn’t even notice he was there. Devon was suddenly embarrassed. How much did he see? By the look in his eyes, he had seen enough.

“Yeah, that’s kinda the point,” she replied defensively. “Besides, at least I got a name out of it.”

“Which is better than nothing, but barely,” Olivia announced, coming out of the interrogation room. “Good job in there, Devon. You made the man piss himself.”

She hated the accusatory tone that Liv used; was she really that intimidating? She couldn’t bring herself to look at the counselor, but she felt his gaze on her, examining her. She didn’t think she was that bad. But then, replaying the scene in her mind, maybe she was that bad. Ugh, she needed a shower.

Barba couldn’t look away from the agent, someone who he had thought he had all figured out. You don’t know her as well as you think you do, he thought disparagingly. “Do we know who this Marco is?” He asked, finally pulling his eyes to look at Liv.

“No, but we can find out,” Olivia replied. “I’ll have Rollins look into it, shoot you an update when we have one.”

Barba nodded, then looked at his watch. “Fine. We need to be heading to the courthouse; I have a trial in twenty minutes.” Still avoiding eye contact, Devon led Barba outside to wave down a cab.

They spent the first few minutes in an uncomfortable silence. Devon looked out the window, willing the taxi to go faster, so that Barba would be sucked into court, and she could just sit in the gallery with her shame.

“Where’d you learn to do that?” Barba finally asked, breaking the silence. His voice was low, like he didn’t want the driver to hear him. Like he, too, was embarrassed and ashamed of Devon’s display.

She sighed through her nose, closing her eyes. “Just something I picked up while working.” Hoping he’d drop it, she continued staring out the window. She felt him shift on the seat next to her, but he didn’t ask any more questions.

Courthouse

Tuesday, April 7th. 12:15pm

They made it to the courtroom with five minutes to spare. Barba took his normal spot by the prosecutor’s table, Devon sitting right behind him in the gallery. She was so absorbed in her thoughts, she didn’t pay attention to the trial at all, completely zoning out until the Judge banged her gavel, calling it quits for the day. Devon looked at her phone, shocked to find that it was nearing 5pm. How’d she miss over 4 hours of the day? Focus…she thought to herself, mentally shaking the fog out of her mind. She stood as Barba packed his things, putting the papers neatly away into his attaché.

“Your office next?” she asked; a normal question after a trial. She usually had his schedule memorized, but it changed often, and the visit to SVU had thrown a wrench into the day.

He snapped his case closed, taking the handle and looking up. “Yes. I only have a couple things to work on, then we should be done for the day.”

“Good. That gives me some time to look into Marco,” Devon replied. It’s not that she didn’t trust Rollins and the NYPD’s resources, but she knew that her resources were better. Barba nodded, the same look from the observation room flashing through his eyes for just the briefest moment as he looked at her, then it was gone. Devon swallowed past the lump in her throat, turning to lead him out of the courtroom. After working together so long, she knew the building as well as he did, maybe even better. She had a way of noticing hallways and doors that most people didn’t. She kept at a brisk pace, one that Barba almost had to jog to keep up with.

Office of Rafael Barba

1 Hogan Place

Tuesday, April 7th. 5:15pm

Devon was typing furiously on her laptop, scanning the FBI’s database for any Marco in New York City affiliated with a gang. At first, she simply looked within the Aces, but that search turned out to be futile. It didn’t help that Olivia had texted her as much; Rollins had hit a dead end, and they had no other possible leads on the name. Tony Garcia had refused to answer questions, or to talk at all, anymore. It seemed like he was scared into some sort of stupor, his eyes unfocused and his mouth not forming any words. So, that left Devon to find out what she could on the one lead they did have. And she would find something. She had to. For Barba’s sake.

Ping! A page uploaded. This looks promising…Devon thought, clicking through some files. She found a name, one that had appeared a couple of times in a few homicide cases; Marco Sorrel.

She waited for his page to load, then called, “hey Barbs, come look at this.” She was seated on the couch, Barba at his desk, as per usual. He looked up at her voice, then stood and came over. This was the first time she had spoken since getting back to his office, and he was somewhat relieved to hear her voice. He sat on the couch next to her, huddling close to look at the screen.

There was a picture of the man on the left side of the screen, his profile on the right. The picture showed a Hispanic man in his early 30s with short, black hair. He looked like any face in the crowd, no particular identifying marks outside of mean-looking eyes, and one other thing; he had a tattoo on the right side of his neck: two poker cards, an Ace of Spades and an Ace of Hearts.

“Those tattoos seem a little cliché for someone in a gang called the Aces,” Barba pointed out.

“I’d hate to agree with you, but I do. Tattoos mean nothing, really; just a way to tell him apart from the crowd. Look at this though.” Devon pointed to the other side of the screen, the one with his criminal profile written out.

“Says here that he’s been connected to at least six counts of aggravated assault, and three homicides,” Devon continued. “He’s never been caught; every time he gets cornered by cops, it seems, he shoots his way out of it. Hmmm…no family, no aliases, the guy seems to be unattached.” They sat in silence, letting the weight of Devon’s words sink in.

“That…doesn’t bode well for me,” Barba finally said. He meant it as a joke, but his voice fell flat. “I’m almost glad that whatever persona you had in the interrogation room is at least some part of you.” He wanted to take the words back as soon as he said them. He saw the look on her face, how her eyes seemed to dull slightly.

“You’re right; it’s good that I can scare someone so bad, they urinate. I’ll be sure to remember that when Marco comes after you.”

“Dev, I’m sorry, that’s not what I meant…”

“What did you mean, then? What could you possibly have meant?” Devon asked, voice deadly quiet. She stood, closing her laptop and walking to the other side of the office. Barba cursed himself; he saw how she had collapsed in on herself after the interrogation. How could he have made such a stupid comment?

Barba pulled himself to his feet, took a step towards her, then stopped, running through his words. “I’m sorry that I said that; it was a stupid mistake. Devon, you don’t need a persona to take on Marco. Did you forget how you’ve already saved my life? Twice? Hell, you got stabbed protecting me! I can never thank you enough for what you’ve done for me, what you’ve sacrificed for me. And even before today, some thug like Marco Sorrel wouldn’t scare me, because I know I have you watching my back.”

They stood in silence for a moment, Devon drinking in his words. This was the first time he ever thanked her for her service, ever acknowledged the fact that his life was in danger. She felt familiar butterflies in her stomach, and tears briefly tinged in her eyes. She blinked them away rapidly, not even completely sure why they were there.

Just when Barba was sure Devon wouldn’t respond, she spoke, softly at first. “Look, Barbs…I know this hasn’t been easy on you, as much as you like to act like nothing’s changed. You always seem so calm, collected, and hell, maybe you are. I’ve only known you for a couple months, and only while you’ve had a target on you. And I know that I’m not the easier person to be around,” she shrugged, smiling slightly. “But in this time together, you went from a victim in my mind to a friend. I do actually care about you, about your wellbeing. Unfortunately for you, I’m a ride-or-die friend as it is. So, while I appreciate your words, trust me when I say I’m not ‘sacrificing’ anything by being here for you. I’d be here anyways.”

He had never felt safer in his life, standing in his dimly lit office, staring at this stranger—no, this friend—who had come into his life like a whirlwind. So, this is what it’s like to have someone you can trust with your life, Barba thought. He was suddenly very jealous of Olivia; she had a whole team of people like this? Maybe there was something to this whole “friends” thing that Barba had been missing out on, something he didn’t realize he wanted, needed.

“Thank you,” Barba said sincerely. There was nothing else he could think to say; nothing that could convey his thoughts any better. He gave her a smile, one she returned before taking the few steps to him and enveloping him in a hug. It caught him off-guard—Barba wasn’t much of a hugger—but he returned it, rubbing a small circle into her muscular back. He tucked his face into her hair, breathed in her scent; she felt so strong, so reassuring in his arms. He could have spent a lifetime standing there, holding onto her forever. But just as quickly as it started, Devon was moving away, arms releasing him as she pulled back.

“Sorry, I should have asked before hugging you like that,” she said, cheeks flushed.

“No, no, it’s fine. Really. I don’t mind.” Their eyes made contact, locking them into place. Devon wasn’t sure what she saw there, but she couldn’t force herself to look away. She could still faintly smell his cologne on her, feel where his hand had rubbed her, where his head had rested against hers. Feeling her face heat, she ducked her head, breaking the eye contact.

“Almost done?” She asked, gesturing towards the paperwork still scattered on his desk.

Barba swallowed past the lump in his throat. “Ah, almost. One more opening statement to prep for….”

And just like that, the moment was gone, and they were both back to their spots, Barba at his desk, Devon on the couch, both working away into the night.

[artificialqueens]

Different People (Different Arguments), 3/14 (Branjie/Jankie) - Ortega

a/n: ayo!! so sorry for the update gap fam, but chapter 3 is here! soooo hope u all enjoy. p.s. i promise I love Nicky, Gigi and Crystal…but every good story has a bad guy right???

fic summary: Brooke Lynn is a political advisor for a government department where she has to contend with an incompetent Minister, maintaining her stone-cold bitch image, working alongside a press team of slackers, and the Prime Minister’s ever-so-slightly terrifying enforcer breathing down her neck 24/7. So when a familiar face from her past arrives as her new boss, she’s not exactly thrilled to add another problem to her ever-growing pile.

And then she admits she’s got a crush on her coworker.

Last chapter: Jackie became a breakout political star after she spoke out against the homophobia and misogyny in the media, and Brooke finally acknowledged that her feelings for Vanessa maybe weren’t as platonic as she’d thought.

In this chapter: When Shadow Minister Nicky Doll and her advisors arrive at DoSac for an informal, pre-election briefing, Jan tries to cope with the stress of seeing her old colleagues again. There’s more at stake, though, when Jackie reveals a secret that cannot get out.

***

Casting her eyes over the meeting room, Brooke attempted to focus on what Jackie was actually saying. She was trying her hardest, she really was, but it was just that Vanessa was wearing the red jumper today, the really soft one that made her look more cuddly and adorable than normal.  

Brooke had a crush on Vanessa. She’d accepted that now. The way to deal with it was just to never act upon it, talk about it, or to admit it to anyone outside of her own head. She’d spent so long cultivating the perfect stone-cold, heartless bitch image and she wasn’t exactly going to do anything to taint that now. The most important thing she had to remember was that she didn’t need anyone- she had no desire to be in a relationship, to be tied down and have to answer to someone else all the time. She had a perfectly good bullet to get her off and if she felt like it she could always go and pick up someone random from a bar. There was always that irritating aspect when the afterglow had faded, though, if whoever she’d used for the night wanted to stay over, or heaven forbid see her again. Things were just better as they were, Brooke concluded. She couldn’t get attached, or hurt, or fall in love this way. If there was one thing she wasn’t, it was vulnerable. Getting into a relationship with someone put you in the weakest position you could possibly get.

She would know, after all.

Still, she was allowed to dream about it; an ideal world in which love worked out the way it did in books and movies, one huge cliché where Brooke and Vanessa were happy together and lived in perfect domesticity, had the best sex of their lives and went on adorable dates. It was simplistic and shallow and completely unrealistic, but perhaps that was all it was meant to be.  

Gazing at Vanessa again, she was surprised to see her eyes already on her. She was even more surprised when she looked around the room and saw that everyone else was staring at her as well.

“Brooke Lynn?” Jackie asked, staring at her expectantly. She stood in front of a huge whiteboard with marker pen scribbled all over it- generic buzzwords such as “connectivity”, “inclusivity” and “diversity” sprang out to her, but nothing really indicated what Jackie could have previously been talking about.

“Um. The fiscal year?” Brooke guessed blankly. Jan laughed from across the table, throwing her head back and letting her blonde hair cascade down the back of the chair. Jackie didn’t find it as funny.

“For God’s sake, Brooke, this policy is only going to work if everyone pays attention and has some form of input other than just staring at me with glassy eyes like they’ve been goddamn taxidermied!” she sighed, sitting her pen down on the table and sliding into an empty chair. Brooke felt a pang of guilt- Jackie had been doing well in the two weeks that had followed her Von’Du interview and had received heaps of public support and attention. The perfect time, Bianca had insisted, to get some new ideas out there and into parliament.

“Sorry. Remind me of the premise?”

Irritated, Jackie rolled her eyes before Vanessa cut in with a sweet smile. “Issa scheme to get the UK to house more refugees and get ‘em into work therefore boosting the economy, diversifyin’ the nation and basically makin’ us look like good guys to the rest of Europe.”

Brooke shot her a grateful smile across the table, trying her best not to blush.

“Thank God someone’s been listening,” Jackie smirked. “We’re basically just trying to come up with a name for it. Or a tagline or something.”

Brooke pressed her pen to her lips, thinking for a second. Nina suddenly piped up from beside her.

“What about…Don’t be bigoted. Be uninhibited,” she said, her suggestion met with utter silence from the rest of the group.

“Well that was nice, Nina, but how about something a bit less…” Jackie thought for a second, trying to find the correct word.

“Shit?” Brooke shrugged, Jan once again letting out a peal of laughter. Vanessa was clearly trying to conceal her giggles from the other side of the huge table, while both Nina and Jackie looked unimpressed.

“Do you have any better suggestions?”

“No, and I’m not going to pretend like I do! I’m not going to just yell out any old crap like I’ve got shit idea Tourette’s,” Brooke shrugged, Jan now bent over in her chair from laughter and Vanessa now audibly giggling. Brooke couldn’t tell, but she could have sworn Jackie let out the tiniest snort of a laugh before regaining composure.

“Ladies, please, this is important! This is a good damn idea, if I’m allowed to blow my own trumpet, and we’ve got to get it out there sooner rather than later,” she insisted. A loud, harsh vibration from Nina’s phone startled them all.

“Bianca’s here,” she announced, trying to keep her tone bright. Before the girls even had time to react to the news, Bianca had appeared in the room in a smart, tailored black and white suit.

“Good morning to you all, shit Spice Girls impersonation act,” she smiled cheerfully.

“Mornin’, Bianca,” Vanessa greeted her.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Jackie quipped dryly, lounging back in her seat.

“Two things from me,” Bianca began, ignoring the Minister’s sarcasm. “The shadow minister’s visit, today at 11. They’re going to be talking to Nina and the rest of those brain-dead, civil-service puppets out there about what’s going to happen if they take office. Nina, your job is to basically communicate to them that they’ll be taking it out of my cold, dead hands.”

“Fuck, that’s today?!” Vanessa exclaimed somewhat involuntarily, earning her a steely glare from Bianca which in turn made Vanessa look as if she was seconds away from death. Reaching into her pocket and retrieving her phone, Brooke fired off a quick text to Vanessa under the table.

B: It’s okay. Snakes only eat once every few weeks x

As Bianca briefed Nina, Brooke watched as Vanessa looked down into her lap and smiled, a light blush colouring her cheeks very slightly, although that could have just been the light of the room. Satisfied that she’d made Vanessa feel better, she tuned back in to what Bianca was saying.

“…you tell them nothing. Except where the toilets are, but you lie about that.”

“So who’s actually accompanying Nicky today? I’ve heard nothing and I want to make sure I’m relatively prepared for whoever enters my department,” Jackie folded her arms across her chest, already defensive.

“You already know about Nicky. Privately educated daddy’s girl and massively out of touch with the electorate. Probably a lizard wearing a human skin suit, I’ve never particularly wanted to get close enough to her to check if that theory’s true,” Bianca shrugged. “The other two coming with her are going to be her advisors, Gigi and Crystal.”

“Oh no,” Jan suddenly exclaimed from her chair. Her face had gone incredibly ashen, her eyes wide and fearful. Suddenly Brooke was acutely aware that she no longer had only Vanessa to worry about. If Jan’s old colleagues and ex-friends bumped into her it wouldn’t be particularly pleasant, and Jan would no doubt be incredibly shaken. Crossing the floor was like a betrayal, pledging loyalty to one party after being aligned with another was treacherous, and so it was likely that Gigi, Crystal and Nicky still wanted Jan’s head on a stick.

“Oh yes. Gigi Goode, bit of a newborn as far as politics is concerned but she’s got impressive credentials. Graduated from Oxford University with a first class degree and a PhD in Politics and Business. Won the World Universities Debating Championships five consecutive times. She’s confident, clever, and has zero scruples. Knows every loophole in the world of politics,” Bianca reeled off. Jackie raised her eyebrows, clearly impressed.

“She sounds interesting.”

“Don’t even make contact with her, she’ll probably have you telling her the fucking nuke codes and all the department’s discrepancies within the first 30 seconds of meeting her.  Crystal Harness is a different story,” Bianca frowned. “Not too good when it comes to actual political knowledge. Nina, you and her would get along. She’s a baby too, really, not been in the game long. Graduated from Oxford Brookes. Second class degree in Psychology and Sociology. Don’t think for a second that this is a reason to underestimate her. She is cunning and has intellect and knows everything about everyone, don’t let her see you break a sweat.”

Jackie looked momentarily terrified. “I didn’t realise Nicky had some kind of metahuman task force working for her.”

“They’re not that bad,” Brooke sighed, tipping her head back in her chair. “If you talk to Nicky entirely in cockney rhyming slang, she’ll just combust. Gigi is fine if you give her a fake smile or two. Crystal is basically simple. You’ve got nothing to worry about, Jackie.”

Feeling the mood in the room change, Brooke turned around in her wheely chair and was met with Bianca’s icy stare.

“What part of ‘don’t underestimate these people’ do you not understand? What, you think they’re here for a jolly little chat with Nina about worker’s rights and office hours? They’re here to get intel, and I want you all to be more airtight than some middle-aged white woman’s Tupperware. And no, that’s not a euphemism.”

Brooke watched as Vanessa wrinkled up her nose in distaste. She had such a cute little nose, and Brooke found herself imagining how perfect it would be to just kiss it gently before they both drifted off to sleep together in a little house that they shared. Frowning involuntarily, Brooke chased those particular thoughts out of her head. They were way too intense, too weird and commitment-y for her friend she had a stupid crush on. Remembering what Bianca had said earlier, she turned and faced her.

“What was the other thing? You said you had two things to tell us.”

“I’m getting there! Right, Jackie, I’ve got you a good photo op this evening. Some new charging points for electric car owners, it’s going to be the biggest one in the UK and a big step for climate change, yadda yadda yadda. We’re going to get you driving in a fucking Prius or something, charging it up and then driving out again. Pretty simple, but effective- what? What is it?”

Every head in the room turned to face Jackie, who looked as if she’d seen a ghost. Her hands were gripping the edge of the table, her knuckles white. She’d turned pale, her face ashen, and she seemed worried.

“Driving? No, I can’t drive, there’s no way,” she babbled, her usually calm and composed exterior completely destroyed.

“Jackie?” Jan prompted quietly, clearly concerned. Brooke shared a brief look of confusion with Vanessa. It was clear nobody had the faintest idea what was going on.

“I mean, you can drive. We have your drivers’ license, you sent in a photocopy as proof of identification when you received Darienne’s job. I don’t really see the issue here?” Bianca curled her top lip, completely unfazed by Jackie’s behaviour.

“Bianca, you don’t understand…I’ve not driven in ages, I…do you not-”

“Do I not what?” Bianca cut in, her irritation mounting by the second. “Look, I don’t really have time to stand here and argue the toss. This is part of your job. You’re doing the goddamn photo op. Christ, this was the girl who two weeks ago was desperate to get on prime time television. Now you’re shitting yourself at the thought of driving a bloody battery operated car. Get it done. 6 o’clock tonight. See you all later.”

As Bianca click-clacked out of the department, the mood in the room was still very tense. Almost frozen, Brooke thought, the tiny hairs on her arms standing up from goosebumps. Jan was the first to speak.

“Jackie, are you okay?” she almost whispered, her voice both deafening and quiet in the silent room. There were a few seconds (minutes?) where there was no response at all, in fact Brooke was almost convinced that nobody even breathed. Finally, Jackie spoke.

“Yep. All good. So, um, if you ladies can continue thinking up some form of line or title we can use or something while you’re finishing off that immigration data, and Nina if you can just forward me the protocol for Nicky’s visit again so I can read over it, then that would be great,” she said, her body almost frozen in place and her face wearing a fake smile.

Deciding not to push it any further, Brooke simply nodded and walked back to her desk. It wasn’t long before Vanessa was following behind, rolling her own wheely chair along to sit beside her.

“What d’you think all that was about?” she whispered, leaning her elbows on Brooke’s desk expectantly. Brooke couldn’t help but stifle a laugh- Vanessa could be such a gossip and it was one of the things that was oddly endearing about her. Trying not to be too taken in by her perfume and parted lips, Brooke instead threw up her defences again and rolled her eyes.

“I don’t know, ‘Ness. To be honest, it’s not my place to ask. It’s not yours either,” she chastised softly, hitting Vanessa gently on the nose with her pen. Wrinkling her nose and pulling away, Vanessa shrugged.

“You’re right, I know. Still, she was kinda rattled. Hope she’s okay,” Vanessa frowned, nibbling on her bottom lip.

“She’ll be fine. Honestly. Just go and do your damn job.”

“Hmm. Winding you up’s more fun, baby, but I’ll do what I’m told,” Vanessa winked at her, shooting back off to her desk in her chair.

Feeling her heart speed up, Brooke fleetingly wondered if maybe the feelings she had for Vanessa weren’t entirely one-sided. That was flirting, right? Brooke wasn’t reading too much into it? Or maybe she was. Reality brought her back down to earth with a bump, telling her what a ridiculous thought that was. Vanessa saw Brooke as a friend and a co-worker, and that was where her feelings ended. Brooke couldn’t let herself get carried away or distracted with the idea that Vanessa would ever treat her as anything more than what they already were.

Letting out a huge exhale of breath, Brooke opened up the immigration spreadsheet and was about to start working when there was a thud of two elbows on the empty space to her left. Turning slowly in an attempt to conceal her flinching, she was met with Yvie; head in her hands, black dreads cascading over her shoulders and a huge, smug grin on her face.

“Don’t even say a word,” Brooke warned her, clearly too late as Yvie began sniggering a laugh behind her hands.

“I wasn’t actually here to gloat, but now you mention it…” Yvie joked, lolling lazily against Brooke’s desk. “So you’ve not admitted anything to anyone else. In fact, you’re probably maintaining the fact that there’s nothing to admit. But you’ve definitely admitted something to yourself, because I think your face is so red that you could go stand at a street corner and act as a traffic light.”

“If you keep talking, I’m going to staple your mouth shut,” Brooke glared, grabbing the stapler on her desk for emphasis. It didn’t seem to intimidate Yvie at all, who was still grinning maniacally and completely unfazed.

“Hey, like I said! Not here to gloat at all. I’m actually not here to talk about your deep feelings for your coworker in any way. Just thought you might like to know that Akeria texted me this a couple minutes ago.”

With that, Yvie produced her phone and held it out to Brooke so that she could read the screen.

A: ahahaha yeah. Big Silk with the fuckin bodyshots man!! Don’t actually know how she made it in today. Also, 100% confirmed Nicky’s looking for stuff to take Jackie down with bc she’s still pissed about that dig in the Von’Du interview. watch ur back xo

Attempting to ignore whatever conversation that had been going on before, Brooke focussed on the important information. She wished she could say she was surprised by the shadow minister’s plan but in all honesty, she’d highly expected it. Sighing, Brooke handed Yvie her phone back.

“I mean, I’m not too worried. What can she possibly dig up? Jackie will’ve been vetted by Bianca already,” she shrugged, clicking on a single cell of the spreadsheet half-heartedly.

“She got pizza delivered to the office last week?”

“That’s not even- Yvie. Come on,” Brooke raised one eyebrow in disbelief. “The papers would be hard pressed to conjure up a paragraph on that. Jackie will be fine.”

Appearing to be satisfied, Yvie pushed herself off the desk and made to return to her seat, but not before turning back to Brooke with the same smug look on her face as before.

“You know, I don’t think anyone in the office could’ve missed that wink Vanjie gave you just there. Whatever you’re feeling, I don’t think it’s as one-sided as you think,” she smirked, making sure to keep her voice low. Unsure of what to reply, Brooke simply narrowed her eyes, picked up her stapler and clicked it twice in warning. Chuckling, Yvie sauntered back to her desk.

Trying not to even entertain the thought that Vanessa could like her back, Brooke continued with her work. All of the numbers suddenly seemed scrambled and jumbled up, making no sense to her whatsoever. Feeling as if she was about to scream with frustration she made to ask Jan for advice until she noticed her desk was empty. Come to think of it, Jan hadn’t actually left the meeting room with her and Vanessa. Bullshit if she was getting away with doing nothing while Brooke worked on this entire set of figures by herself. Getting up and smoothing her skirt down she made her way to the meeting room only to find it empty. Puzzled, she began to walk slightly aimlessly down the corridor, her curiosity piqued at the disappearance of both Jan and Jackie. It was unlike Jan to just wander off without telling either Brooke or Vanessa where she was going.

Reaching the photocopier and a dead end with no Jan in sight, Brooke was about to give up and ask Nina for help instead when she heard two sets of muffled voices coming from the stationery cupboard.  

“I’m just panicking, I know. But I feel like I have good reason to. I mean, it’s going to be absolute carnage if this gets out.”

“It won’t, don’t worry. I still can’t believe Bianca missed that when she vetted you. But please don’t panic, it’ll all be fine! I’ll speak to Nina and I’ll get her to quietly cancel it.”

Jackie and Jan. What the hell were they in the stationery cupboard for, and most importantly, what were they talking about? Whatever it was, it sounded serious. If it was serious business, Brooke deserved to know. Making to burst open the door in a show of outrage, she stopped herself when Jackie’s voice spoke again.

“I just feel like such a failure. I should’ve known it would get out, I should’ve said something-”

“Hey! You are not a failure,” Jan’s voice cut in urgently. There was an odd sort of pause in which Brooke wasn’t quite sure what was happening. “You’re a good person, Jackie, and a kick-ass politician. You’re the best thing to happen to this department since I arrived, even if I do say so myself.”

Soft laughter, then Jan’s voice again. “You’re incredible. Don’t ever doubt that.”

Another pause. Brooke couldn’t quite bring herself to move, somehow feeling as if she shouldn’t be hearing this at all. Composing herself, she rested her hand on the door handle.

“Jan I…this might seem inappropriate, but-”

“Okay, what the hell is going on in here?” Brooke demanded as she flung open the door and revealed herself. Both girls seemed to jump back a bit, Jackie looking to the floor awkwardly and rubbing the back of her neck, Jan’s mouth forming a perfect circle as her jaw dropped in shock. They had both gone bright red, which Brooke thought was odd for two colleagues having a professional conversation.

“Jesus, Brooke, you scared the crap out of me,” Jackie breathed out raggedly, her voice spooked but holding an underlying note of irritation.  

“I don’t care, you haven’t answered my question. What were you talking about? What’s going to be carnage?” Brooke replied, keeping her glare cold. Jackie kept her eyes trained on the floor, not seeming to want to look up anytime soon. Jan still hadn’t spoken.

“Close the door,” Jackie said finally, sounding a little shaken. Feeling the wind slightly knocked out of her sails, Brooke did as she was told and watched as Jackie steadied herself on the shelf and sat on an unopened box.

“Um. Do you remember I kind of went off grid after uni? A lot of people were asking after me and couldn’t really find me.”

With a pang of guilt, Brooke’s first reaction was that she hadn’t really cared. She’d been glad to see the back of Jackie at the time, if she was honest. Times had changed, though, so Brooke simply nodded instead. Jackie wrung her hands together, her face completely racked with nerves.

“I wasn’t in a good place. My mental health spiralled out of control pretty dramatically once I graduated, I struggled to find a job for a while and when I did, I got way too into it. I would work myself into a frenzy, I’d do consecutive days on two hours of sleep…at one point I was averaging a panic attack per day. I didn’t really, um. I didn’t really have anyone to talk to about things. I tried going to therapy but it just didn’t help. I don’t know…it felt like I was making progress just being able to know that I was visiting someone, I guess, but I wasn’t really. Anyway, you don’t need to know my sob story,” Jackie frowned, shaking her head repeatedly. “To cut a long story short, I was driving into work one day, trying to do twenty things at once as usual. It was idiotic, but I was on the motorway and a text came through from my boss and wanting to seem like I was organised and in control, I tried to type and drive at the same time…the motorway was quiet, there was nobody around me…fuck, sorry-”

As Jackie’s voice broke slightly, Jan crossed over to where she sat and rested a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“I crashed into the barricade in the central reservation doing fifty miles an hour. God knows how I’m still alive. The police obviously came along with the ambulance and the fire brigade and of course they wanted to know how it was that I managed to crash on a clear stretch of road with no other drivers around me. I’ve never been able to lie to save myself, so I just told them. I’d only passed my test the year before that, so they took my license away. That’s why I can’t do the PR thing. It’s illegal for me to drive. I got a fake license purely so I could take this job.”

Leaning against the door, Brooke felt she wanted to sit down too. This was so much to deal with. She couldn’t style herself out as not caring about this, because she actually felt sick to her stomach with guilt. She couldn’t believe Jackie had coped- or not coped- completely on her own through all this horrible mess. Even though there was no way she could have known, Brooke just wished she could’ve done something differently. She desperately hoped Jackie was better now.

“Jackie, I’m so sorry.”

“No, no, don’t be sorry. This isn’t about me being…enormously god damn mental in the head, or whatever,” she snorted a derisive laugh. “I’m more worried about how we’re going to placate Bianca. Jan said she’d talk to Nina and get her to cancel the shoot but Bianca’s going to ask questions.”

“Well it’s not your fault she didn’t vet you properly,” Brooke shrugged, how Bianca would feel the absolute last thing on her mind right now. “So she can just deal with it. How Bianca feels doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re okay.”

Jackie looked up at her, her face grateful but slightly taken aback at this raw show of compassion. Truthfully, Brooke was also slightly shocked at how kind she was being towards her. She was grateful for the shout that came from the hall suddenly.

“Brooke? Guys? You in there?” Vanessa asked, as she opened the door and stepped inside the stationery cupboard that was ever-decreasing in space. Confused by the presence of her boss and the two other advisors, her perfect eyebrows became furrowed together. “There some meeting I didn’t know about?”

“Yeah, in the stationery cupboard. It was really important, girl, did you not get the memo?” Jan laughed affectionately. Laughing briefly at her own ridiculous assumption, Vanessa then tentatively looked at everyone else again.

“So…why we all here?”

Brooke briefly looked at Jackie, then sighed. “Jackie can’t do the PR stunt because legally, she’s not allowed to drive. She got done for texting while driving years ago and her license got revoked.”

Vanessa’s mouth dropped open a little as if she was about to ask how, then shut again as she clearly decided against it. “Does Bianca know?”

Giving her an affectionate smile, Brooke raised her eyebrows at her. “V. Come on. Use your brain.”

“Fuck, ‘course not. I’m so not with it today. So what’s happenin’?”

“Jan’s telling Nina to cancel it and when Bianca finds out, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. What’s important here is Jackie,” Brooke said decisively. Shocked again at the vulnerability she was showing, she smoothed down her black pencil skirt and sniffed once, trying to ignore just how close Vanessa was in the tiny space. “So that’s settled. Can we all get out of this cupboard and do some damn work? I feel like I’m suffocating.”

Without speaking, the four girls filed out of the cupboard as if the conversation had never happened. Brooke’s head was still slightly spinning as she slumped back in her chair, the excel spreadsheet now more confusing than ever. She was still attempting to take in everything that Jackie had just told her. It was so much to process, and Brooke couldn’t shake the guilty feeling that was settling in the pit of her stomach, the feeling that maybe there was something she could have done to help all those years ago. Sighing, she cast her eyes to Jackie’s glass-fronted office where the Minister was now typing into her phone, her face failing to betray anything about the heartfelt conversation that had just taken place. Why the hell did Jackie have to confide in her like that? Life would be so much less stressful if everybody just kept their guard up like Brooke did.

Still, she mused, everyone would probably be a whole lot more lonely.    

Suddenly, Brooke’s phone screen lit up with three messages at once- two from Jan, one from Vanessa.

J: I would love to, that sounds amazing (: we could go for sushi?? Wardour Street has some really nice places! Xxx

J: whoops wasn’t meant for you lol sorry

Brooke would probably have been about ten times more intrigued and curious about Jan’s text if she didn’t have a text from Vanessa awaiting her.  

V: I don’t care what kind of front you try to put up, you’re kind and caring and a total sweetheart x

Not even daring to look up and risk meeting Vanessa’s eyes, Brooke reached for a piece of paper on her desk and began to fan the blush that had just flooded her cheeks. Trying her best not to think about what Yvie had said earlier, she began to compose a reply.

B: You’re a cutie. Don’t tell anyone I was nice to you though, being a bitch is kind of my brand x

Risking a peek up over her monitor, Brooke watched as Vanessa picked up her phone and giggled, covering her mouth with one perfectly manicured hand.

God, it was going to be a long day.

***

They had arrived.

Brooke felt like a bird of prey as she stood beside Jan and watched from above as Nicky and her two advisors were greeted by Nina in the lobby. Even from six floors up Brooke could tell that Nina was hating the fact that she had to be at the very least civil to the three opposition members. Narrowing her eyes, Brooke watched closer.

Nicky was using the tactic she employed every time she had a television interview; gushing about how happy she was to be here, playing the humble, meek elected representative of the people. She was wearing an immaculate navy pencil dress with what appeared to be a Tiffany heart around her neck, and her sleek blonde hair was piled on top of her head in a bun. Following dutifully behind her were two others. The first girl Brooke heard before she saw- a cry of excitement at being in the building had been the very thing that proclaimed the arrival of the opposition. She was still making an obscene amount of excitable noise which travelled up the floors of the lobby as if it was riding the elevator. Squawker- or Crystal, Brooke supposed she should call her- was equally well turned out. She gave off a clear professional vibe in her button-down shirt, blue skirt and little heeled boots, and her curly red hair was swept over one shoulder.

“Gigi needs her roots done. See?�� Brooke whispered to Jan, not taking her eyes off the three opposition members. Receiving no response, Brooke turned to look at her friend. Jan’s shoulders were tensed up as she trained her eyes on the member of the opposition in question. Her style was immaculate and she wore a pressed white shirt with huge sleeves and a pair of smart tailored black trousers with her high heels. Her long, blonde hair had been immaculately styled and blow-dried, and Brooke found herself wondering how or if she had the time to do that every day. Looking to Jan again she found her brow furrowed, biting at her long, painted nails.  

“Jan, come on. Don’t ruin your nails, you’re better than that,” Brooke scolded, grabbing gently at Jan’s wrist and pulling it away from her face. Jan finally turned to meet her eyes before looking quickly back down at the floor again. “Hey. Talk to me.”

Sighing, Jan leant against the balcony, watching as the opposition were led away to the lift. “Sorry. I know I’m not myself today. It’s just this is really, really freaking me out. It’s not like this is the first time I’ve seen these girls since I crossed the floor, but to have them here where I work? It’s just a lot. It sounds dramatic but like…it kind of feels violating, if that makes any sense?”

Brooke nodded slowly. “I know you’re worried about it. But you’re being really brave about the whole thing. And hey, you kind of have an advantage, I guess! They’re on your territory, they’re not familiar or comfortable with anything here. Mainly because nothing’s engulfed by the flames of hell or costs over £10,000.”

Snorting a brief laugh, Jan’s face grew somewhat blank again. “I mean. Their tanks are on our lawn, though, they know we’re shook.”

Rolling her eyes, Brooke laughed derisively. “Jan. These private school bitches are not going to take power. You live in this country at the moment, do you really think the public are going to vote for people like Nicky?”

“Well, the public are idiots.”

Brooke gave a snort. “Jan, you can’t say the entire nation are idiots.”

“Yes I can, I’ve met them,” Jan deadpanned, signing off with a smile. Brooke relaxed against the balcony, comforted by the fact that Jan clearly felt a little better.

“Listen. One single day. One day of smiling and nodding like a puppet and just taking whatever crap or snide comments or shade they throw at you. You’ve handled so much worse,” Brooke smiled reassuringly, resting both hands on Jan’s shoulders. Comforted, Jan made to turn back to the department when suddenly she whipped her head back round.

“Brooke,” she murmured. “What if they find out about Jackie?”

“What, that she exists? I know it was a crushing disappointment to us all but they’ll get over it some day,” she deadpanned. Jan gave a colossal roll of her eyes.

“No, you bitch! The license thing,” Jan sighed in exasperation, raising her voice just a little.

Brooke paused for a moment. It was weird how protective Jan was of her boss. She was never like that with Darienne at all. Fair enough Jackie was far more competent but still, it wasn’t as if the two shared some deep personal connection or anything. Brooke thought about asking her about it, but instead decided that that probably wasn’t what Jan needed right at this very moment.  

“Who’s going to tell them? Me? You? Vanessa? Jackie herself? We’re the only ones that know. Come on, Jan, think,” Brooke tapped the side of Jan’s head once, punctuating her point. “It’s not going to get out.”

Smiling slightly, Jan seemed to compose herself and took one deep breath. As if something had occurred to her, she let out a laugh.

“God, what’s happening to you, Brooke? First you’re nice to Jackie for once and then you listen to me vent for ages. Your cracks are showing,” Jan smiled. Brooke attempted to style it out by shrugging, secretly a little unnerved that her recent empathy was being noticed.

“Stop psychoanalysing me, psycho, and let’s get back to our desks.”

No sooner had both girls turned the corner towards their office when they came face to face with the three members of the opposition coming out of the lift, Nina leading them. Jan immediately froze in place, seemingly unable to move. Brooke wanted to do something, anything to reassure her but before she could even look at Jan, Gigi’s cold grey eyes met her own.

“Nicky,” she turned to her boss, her cheerful, light voice at odds with the stare she was giving Brooke. “You go on ahead with Nina. Crystal and I are just going to have a little catch-up with a couple of old friends we haven’t seen in a while.”

Brooke wasn’t easily intimidated and she swore that today would be no different. As Gigi and Crystal advanced towards them, she drew her shoulders back and tilted her head, not giving a single thing away on her face. She could feel Jan growing more and more timid beside her. Christ, if these girls were planning on giving her friend a hard time then they’d be leaving the department in an ambulance.

“Brooke Lynn. Jan! So good to see you both,” Gigi began, her smile smug as she rested one nonchalant hand on her hip. “God, how long has it been? When was the last time we saw these two, Crystal?”

“Gee, Gigi, I don’t know! Did they not serve us at McDonalds when we went to get nuggets a couple days ago?” Crystal chimed in, flashing a quick, amused smile at her friend. Brooke muffled a derisive laugh as she shook her head. She couldn’t quite believe the schoolyard bullshit that these adult women were trying to start in her department. Still, if this was the game they were playing, then Brooke would play accordingly.

“Clever, implying that we’re both in minimum wage retail sector jobs! Something which your party loves to shit on very often. I love it,” Brooke smiled sweetly, gently clapping her hands. Gigi gave a fake laugh.

“Ladies, relax! It’s just some classic cross-party fun, no harm meant by it. You know that, right, Jan?” she flashed her a false smile. Brooke watched as Jan, shoulders now so hunched she was practically concave, gave a meek nod in response.

“You know, we really miss you, Jan,” Crystal nodded somberly, her voice high and sweet and almost-but-not-quite masking the fake sincerity behind her words. “Nicky’s always saying how open she’d be to having you back if you’d ever want to cross the floor…again! Gigi and I miss you too. We miss our friend.”

With that, Crystal reached a hand out and touched Jan’s arm gently. Flinching a little, Jan finally met her former colleague’s eyes and gave a weak smile. Brooke felt a flame of anger sting her veins as she watched the whole interaction. It was the same every time Jan ran into these two- they would start with the bitchy high school bullshit and Jan would be unable to ignore it, growing more and more quiet and subdued with every passing comment. Fuelled by her anger and dislike of behaviour of the two girls in front of her, Brooke snorted sardonically.

“Friend? Spare me the bullshit, you’d stab yourself in the back if it meant you got ten more followers on Instagram. Now if you’ll excuse us, we need to get back to work. You know, being in power? But this has been lovely,” Brooke flashed her bright white teeth in a smile, which Gigi returned equally as insincerely. “I haven’t had the conversational equivalent of hepatitis C in a long time.”

“As always, Brooke, you’re a very funny girl. Quite the comedian,” Gigi gave a tight-lipped smile as she stepped to one side and cleared a path down the corridor for the two girls. Hooking her arm through Jan’s, Brooke began to leave and had taken roughly three steps when she yelled her retort over her shoulder.

“I’ve got a lot of jokes, but none as good as your boss!”

Still fuelled from the frustration coursing through her veins, Brooke steered Jan the rest of the way down the hall and into the small kitchen like a demented steam train. It was only after she flicked the switch on the kettle so hard she thought she might have broken it when Jan spoke.

“I know they annoy you, babe, but don’t be too hard on them.”

“Don’t be too…Jan! They were standing there making you feel like a sack of shit, I wasn’t going to sit back and let them rip you to shreds! God, I can’t believe you’re defending them,” Brooke cried, grabbing two mugs and two teabags so hard she felt they might crumble apart in her hands. Silent for only a moment, Jan began playing with the edge of a tea towel, deep in thought.

“They were my friends once though. Who knows, maybe…maybe they were being serious. Maybe they do want to be friends again.”

As the kettle reached boiling point, Brooke took one deep, calming breath and began pouring them cups of tea. Part of her hated the way that she’d been conditioned into going straight to the kettle when something was angering or upsetting either her or her friends, as if a ridiculous hot drink was going to help make things any better. Vodka, now that would go some way to really help the situation. If Brooke and Jan shared a 75cl bottle, they’d be able to get so wasted that those idiots from the opposition wouldn’t bother them anymore. The bottle would also be ideal for smashing over Gigi’s smug face. Too bad it was too early for alcohol, Brooke mused, as she handed the smaller girl a steaming hot mug of tea. As Jan gave a grateful smile and began to sip, Brooke found herself wishing she could knock some sense into her. One of Jan’s biggest strengths was very feasibly also her biggest weakness; her determination to always focus on the good in people, to ignore their flaws and instead choose to look at their positives. It was something that made Jan such a horrendous judge of character. Christ, she’d worked for the opposition for a year, after all.

Casting another glance at her friend and deciding she’d visibly gained back a little of her confidence, Brooke grabbed her own mug off the countertop.

“Right, come on,” she said decisively. “We’re going to go back to our desks and drink these up and get on with our work, because these snakes that have slithered into the department don’t change a single thing about how capable you are as a professional. Okay?”

With a stifled smile Jan led the way back to the office, leaving Brooke wondering if she could still maintain the bitchy façade she always presented to the world if she was getting this good at cheering people up.

***

Sadly that wasn’t the only encounter they had to suffer with the opposition that day. Nicky soon appeared in the department’s offices with Nina, almost as a grand finale to the tour of Dosac she’d been given so far. She watched with narrowed eyes as Nicky made her way from desk to desk of the comms team, shaking hands and smiling in a sickeningly sweet manner that made Brooke want to hurl. Gigi and Crystal hovered behind Nicky’s shoulders like little cartoon devils and angels, except in Brooke’s opinion neither of them had many angelic qualities about them.

Attempting to ignore the gatecrashers in her office, Brooke turned back to her monitor. She supposed that maybe both Gigi and Crystal were pleasant people. Perhaps even Nicky at a push. They might still have been fun and friendly people to hang out with, after all, the politics they followed didn’t define them. Suddenly remembering a very obvious exception (Hitler), Brooke sent another withering glare the opposition’s way. Hit with another pang of doubt, she reasoned that comparing Nicky Doll to Hitler was perhaps an overreaction. Tuning out of the immigration stats that sat in front of her, Brooke instead found herself listening in to the conversation between Nicky and Nina.

“The space here is lovely. Very professional, very focused. There’s maybe about twenty-five percent that I’m not okay with, though. I think I’d prefer isolation booths for everybody to work in- it’ll keep everyone more on task,” Nicky asserted, Brooke noticing out the corner of her eye how Yvie and Scarlet both recoiled in horror at the thought of not being able to chat and keep each other going throughout the day.

“Okay, so you’d prefer isolation booths in addition to the longer working hours of 8.30am til 7pm, and only half an hour for lunch,” Nina confirmed. Her hair was twice as big and frizzy as it usually was, probably as a result of tearing half of it out in frustration after the amount of hours she’d spent with Nicky.

“Christ, does she want us chained to the phones as well?” Adore mumbled. Brooke immediately tensed up- if she had heard that comment, then Nicky definitely had too. Sure enough, Nicky whipped her head round and stared Adore straight in the eye.

“That’s very funny, but no. I would not be chaining people to phones, I would simply be employing popular and common tactics that are used by employers the world over. Something which you wouldn’t have to worry about, because I wouldn’t have you working for me,” she smiled fake-sweetly, her voice getting more and more clipped as she reached the end of her sentence.

Brooke found herself praying that the opposition would never reach any position of power whatsoever if they were going to have this tiny dictator running the department. Adore had slunk down into her wheely chair, as if trying to make herself invisible. Suddenly, Brooke heard Jackie’s office door open behind her.

“What the hell is going on out here?” she muttered as she reached Brooke’s desk, looking straight at the visitors to the department. Glad of an opportunity to relieve the tension, Nina once again plastered the fake smile on her face.

“Minister, may I introduce your opposite number, Shadow Minister Nicky Doll,” she smiled at Jackie, waving a hand at Nicky as if she was unveiling a booby prize on a game show.

It was interesting to watch how the two women regarded each other. Nicky immediately narrowed her eyes, pursing her lips together in a display of agitation at no longer being the highest authority in the room. She made no show of moving to shake Jackie’s hand, in fact she didn’t appear to want to speak to Jackie at all. Instead, Jackie herself made the first move and stepped forward once, twice, finally reaching a safe distance and holding out a hand for Nicky to shake. Her face was placid and gave nothing away. Almost Sleeping Beauty-esque, Brooke thought.

“Nicky, it’s so good to finally meet you properly,” she smiled calmly as Nicky gingerly took her hand to shake. “I hope you and your team have had a good day in the department?”

“Oh yes, it’s been lovely. Although obviously there are a number of things that will need changed once we get into power!” Nicky gave a fake little laugh, her eyes still hostile.

“Well. If,” Jackie wrinkled her nose in a smile, which Nicky returned sourly.

Brooke was suddenly distracted by a buzz from her phone. Yvie.

Y: Christ there’s more fake smiles in here than the outpatients’ at a fucking plastic surgery

If Brooke had been in the mood she probably would have been howling with laughter, but the tense, uncomfortable conversation was still taking place.

“I found it interesting that you chose to highlight my disagreement with Manila Luzon in your interview with Chad Michaels. I felt it slightly undermined your point about the need to raise other women in politics up when you yourself were clearly intent on taking me down,” Nicky continued to smile falsely, the bitter undertone to her words not going unnoticed by Brooke. Jackie kept calm, smiling lazily back and raising her eyes to the ceiling.

“Oh, I don’t know about undermining my point. In order to make a good argument, you have to present some evidence to back it up, and that’s all I was doing. I’m sure you understand it was nothing personal,” she said, giving a little nod.

Nicky flared her nostrils, her face now unimpressed as she swept a hand through her hair, rendering her bun a little messy. “Well. It was lovely to meet you anyway, Jackie, but I still have numerous issues to talk through with Nina. If you’ll excuse me.”

With that, Nicky turned on her heel, not even bothering to wait for a reply. On her way back to Nina, she stopped to murmur something in Gigi’s ear, which then resulted in Gigi marching round the corner. Brooke could have followed her up, but was too distracted by Jackie coming to hover at her desk.

“Numerous issues? I’ll bet she has numerous fucking issues, God. Let’s hope that lot never get into power, she’s more unhinged than a flat pack IKEA cupboard,” Jackie whispered, causing Brooke to splutter a laugh. Jackie smirked at her reaction, then her face grew suddenly serious. “Did you know if Nina managed to get that photo op cancelled?”

“She did it about half an hour after we spoke. Jan really got on her back about it, so it was pretty impossible for Nina to wriggle out of it,” Brooke explained offhandedly, trying in vain to focus on her work. Looking up, she noticed that Jackie seemed to have a faraway look on her face.

“She’s so good, isn’t she? Jan. She’s just incredible. So organised and on it,” Jackie said quietly to no-one in particular. Confused, Brooke simply nodded. Apparently remembering where she was, Jackie cleared her throat, smoothed her skirt down and returned to her office.

Around ten minutes later, Brooke thought she was making some real headway with the persisting immigration data. That was until she almost jumped out of her skin when she felt a hand come crashing down on her shoulder. Spinning around rapidly in her wheely chair she was shocked to see Bianca looming above her, her face grave as her eyes met Brooke’s.

“Bianca, holy fuck. You scared the crap out of me,” Brooke sighed, Bianca not even cracking a smile as her grip on Brooke’s shoulder tightened and she escorted her out of the room. Brooke’s stomach churned as she was led out into the corridor. What the hell was happening, or what the hell had happened, or what the hell was about to happen?

The bright white light of the corridor contrasted violently with Bianca’s expression, which was the personification of the wrath of God itself. She was silent for a moment, which prompted Brooke to tentatively speak first.

“So, um. Why did you want to see-”

“I want to know why a certain Sasha Belle over at transport now has the very same PR stunt I very nearly passed a kidney stone to secure for Jackie,” Bianca snapped. Her voice was cold and low, and Brooke felt goosebumps prickle over her skin just hearing her speak. She felt conflicted. Half of her wanted to reveal Jackie’s personal reasons for having backed out; it was a legitimate excuse and might even make Bianca feel some form of remorse, God willing. On the other hand, it was a part of Jackie’s life which Brooke was sure she wanted to leave behind, and if more and more people knew about it, well. That would make it increasingly hard to forget. Biting her lip, she tried to tell a white lie.

“She had personal reasons for backing out. We decided as her team of advisors that it would be best if she didn’t go through with it.”

“I don’t give a rat’s ass what deeply held personal fucking reasons she had against it, it is her JOB to go to photo ops, it is her JOB to give herself media coverage!”

“Well she couldn’t even if you wanted her to. Not legally anyway,” Brooke found herself saying, her voice too loud in the echoey hallway. Bianca raised her eyebrows a little, as if urging Brooke to go on. Slightly regretting having not simply kept her mouth shut, Brooke continued.

“Jackie had her driving license revoked. It was years ago- she was texting while driving and crashed on the motorway. So even if she wanted to do the damn publicity, she couldn’t,” she explained, sighing as Bianca’s face slowly took on a look of realisation. “I don’t know how you didn’t already know this, Bianca. Her license was fake, I don’t get how that slipped by you. I thought you did background checks on everyone that came within a five mile radius of the party.”

Bianca exhaled loudly, slowly running one hand down her face. She opened her mouth to speak, then shut it, then opened it again.

“When I asked you about Jackie, it wasn’t just a casual, out-of-interest enquiry. We were seriously fucking desperate. We had nothing on her, nothing on her at all apart from the fact that we knew she had a degree in politics and she’d been around the stock exchange for years. We were just desperate to get Darienne out of the party and stop the fucking spiral of madness she was driving us all down. Her position had become toxic, Brooke Lynn, nobody we approached about the job would touch it. So we needed somebody unknown, someone who wouldn’t know or understand who she was succeeding. That’s why we failed to do intensive background checks. I mean, we established that Jackie hadn’t murdered or stabbed anyone, for Christ’s sake. But everything else we had to skim over. We couldn’t have had Darienne in her job for any longer, it would have just…it would have just killed the party.”

Brooke could sort of understand where Bianca was coming from. Taking a calming breath, she suddenly felt the panic rise up in her throat again. “But Bianca, if this gets to the papers-”

Bianca cut her off, holding a single hand up in front of her face and looking down the corridor with suspicion. Wordlessly, she walked to the double doors at the end of the corridor and wrenched them open. Behind them stood Gigi, who jumped at the sudden movement.

“Oh. Hello Bianca. I was just, uh. Trying to find the toilets. This department is like a damn labyrinth, you know?” she laughed awkwardly, almost paralysed under Bianca’s glare.

“Do you want a massive cup to press against the door too, or are you good?” she quipped dryly.

Brooke’s heart began to palpitate nervously. Gigi had clearly been behind that door and listening for quite some time. How long, she didn’t know. But if she’d heard the reason why Jackie couldn’t drive, this was all different kinds, shades, textures and flavours of bad.

“Bianca, really. All I heard was that Jackie wasn’t exactly vetted properly. Which, you know, could be kind of a big story in itself, I think,” Gigi smiled cunningly. All at once, Brooke wanted to laugh. Attempting to get the upper hand on Bianca Del Rio was an interesting tactic, one which basically ensured you weren’t going to win. Deciding to step back, Brooke let Bianca take the reins.

“Oh, I see! You were looking for a story! Well here, here’s a great one for you,” Bianca smiled sinisterly, putting Brooke in mind of a predator about to pounce. “Did you know that Jaqueline Cox is sitting in that office there despite the fact her driving license got revoked? She crashed her car on the motorway because she tried to text and drive at the same time. Did you not know that?”

Brooke watched as Gigi’s face lit up at the revelation. She had to admit she didn’t really know where Bianca was going with this or what she had to gain from revealing the information to one of the Shadow Minister’s aides. As Brooke attempted to interject, Bianca simply turned and fixed her with a smile.

“You didn’t know that, no?” she asked Gigi again. She simply shook her head, delighted at what had just been revealed. “Oh, wait, of course…you wouldn’t know that! Because the only people who do know that are, um, Miss Cox…her three advisors…and me. If this information got to the press…I would know that it came from you.”

Brooke wanted to practically jump for joy as she saw Gigi’s face fall, growing very apprehensive as Bianca took two steps towards her. Her voice lowering, Bianca continued the onslaught.

“And I would rain down upon you so hard that your body would have to be re-assembled by crash team investigators-” she hissed. Gigi opened her mouth to defend herself and Bianca immediately stopped her. “- do not fucking interrupt me, girl. Now, you breathe a word of this to ANYONE, you fucking living toothpick, and I will-”

Already shaking with laughter, Brooke ducked her head out of the door and ran into the offices.

“Jan! ‘Ness! Come quick. Bianca’s going off on one at Gigi,” she stage-whispered, the two girls looking up, bemused but quickly following Brooke back to the corridor doors nonetheless. The double doors were fronted with a small pane of clear glass, which the three girls all peered through to see Bianca continuing to verbally grill Gigi, now far less composed than she was before.

“…I will eviscerate you, right? And I mean, I don’t have your education, I don’t know what that means. But I’ll start by plucking your eyes out and I’ll busk it from there. Okay? Glad we’re agreed. Have a great day.”

As Gigi stumbled back down the hall in a daze as if she’d just crawled out of an avalanche, the three girls on the other side of the door tried to compose themselves after their laughing fit.

“Bianca has such a way with words,” Jan mused, wiping tears from her eyes. “So why was she yelling at Gigi, what had she done? Looked at her?”

Brooke explained what had happened to the two girls, watching as their facial expressions shifted from confused, to fearful, then some semblance of reassured. There was still an aspect that was a little panicked, however, the knowledge that Gigi knew about Jackie’s past clearly worrying them both.  

“Look, don’t give it too much thought. Bianca has it all under control. She always does,” Brooke reassured them, shrugging as she walked back to her desk.

“Guess I’m happy to trust Bianca,” Vanessa smiled, relaxing a little. “Hey, you ladies had lunch yet?”

“Not yet. Pret?” Brooke offered, Vanessa smiling beautifully and picking up her bag from her chair. Brooke didn’t miss how Jan simply nodded silently, her face still troubled, clearly not as trusting of Bianca as Vanessa was.

***

As the three girls sat huddled around Jan’s desk eating their lunch, Brooke watched as Vanessa scoffed down her messy meatball panini with marinara sauce and mozzarella cheese that oozed out the side and made long, inconvenient strings. She could have teased Vanessa for her shambles of a lunch but she decided against it, instead choosing to compliment her.

“‘Ness, how can you eat literally whatever you want and still look so good?” Brooke asked, attempting to look offhanded but still feeling like her guts were made of jelly as the words came out her mouth. It was hugely tiresome how much more nervous and self-aware she was around Vanessa now that she’d actually acknowledged her crush on her. It was much harder to pretend things were purely platonic if she gave her a compliment.

In response, Vanessa simply smiled bashfully and shrugged, her mouth full of food. “Hey, I always wonder the same thing about you, baby. I’d kill to look like you.”

“With these thighs? Girl, no you wouldn’t,” Brooke snorted, trying to keep herself from blushing.

“You got good thighs,” Vanessa insisted, making Brooke wonder just how much attention Vanessa paid to her legs. Snapping out of it, Brooke told herself that she was probably just being kind. After a beat of silence, Jan cut in.

“Well, I know both of you find me wildly attractive and are also madly jealous of my amazing figure, which is why neither of you have said anything,” she joked through a mouthful of salmon salad. Brooke gave her a playful shove, shocked when she heard a little cry.

“Jesus, Jan! It wasn’t that sore.”

“That wasn’t me. That came from Jackie’s office,” Jan said gravely, looking at the Minister’s office door where she could just see the blonde bun belonging to Nicky peering over the strip of frosted glass. Exchanging concerned looks, all three girls made their way over.

Brooke was the first to walk in and when her gaze met Jackie’s her heart sank. She was sitting behind her desk and had turned pale, her eyes frightened and huge in her face which had gone almost ghostly white. Turning her gaze to Nicky she noticed that the girl seemed smug in some way, as if she had the upper hand. In a moment, Brooke knew exactly what had happened.

Gigi had spilled.

“Miss Doll, you ain’t actually allowed in here. This is the Minister’s private office,” Vanessa began in a valiant effort to stick up for Jackie who was clearly past sticking up for herself.

“Oh, it’s quite alright. Jackie and I were just having a little chat. A little reminisce on the past, if you like. Well. Her past,” Nicky smiled, casting an amused gaze at Jackie whose face was ashen and defeated as she sat at her desk. Brooke suddenly felt herself overcome with fury.

“I hope you’re giving Gigi a big pay rise for that information. She won’t have much time to spend it though once Bianca finds out. I’d maybe give her two…three days left to live?” she hissed, her face contorted as she glared at the shadow minister.

“Brooke Lynn, is it?” Nicky addressed her, Brooke momentarily wondering how she knew her name. “Brooke Lynn. We all know what it’s like in politics. Unfortunately if someone has some information on someone else, it’s only natural that they’re going to exploit it. And that’s all that’s happening here! It’s not personal. Just professional.”

“Like hell are you exploiting anything,” Jan spat, her face dark. Come to think of it, Brooke had never really seen her so angry, but the tiny girl was like a spitfire as she narrowed her eyes at her old boss. “You know full well where to draw the line between personal and political information. If you leak this to the media then you’re more reprehensible than the party you represent.”

“I’m sorry ladies, but this is how you play the game, and I play to win. I’m not really prepared to discuss it any further,” Nicky rolled her eyes, picking up her bag from where it sat on Jackie’s desk.

Just as she made to leave, Nicky turned to see Bianca standing in the doorway of Jackie’s office, glancing with confusion at the scene in front of her.

“Bianca!” Vanessa cried, for once happy to see the Prime Minister’s enforcer. “We were just talkin’ about how Nicky maybe shouldn’t go to the papers about Jackie…? Telling them about her driving license? Tryin’ to think of a reason why this would reflect badly on her party in some way…?”

Brooke watched as Vanessa looked pleadingly at Bianca, willing her to do something, anything to spin them out of the situation. Bianca for her part seemed calm, upbeat even.

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe she should! Good idea!” she shrugged, flashing a smile Nicky’s way as she turned and made to leave the room.

Vanessa’s face immediately dropped as if she’d been slapped. Jan’s expression was completely blank. Brooke didn’t know what to think. It seemed as if Jackie was holding her breath, and Nicky simply stood rooted to the spot, her eyes still on Bianca as if she knew there was more to come. Sure enough, Bianca reached the doorframe, stopped, and turned on her heel.

“Oh, shit, wait a minute! I know why she shouldn’t! Because you know, if she did that…she’d be dead,” Bianca said simply.

Brooke watched as Nicky blinked silently at her. Bianca continued to speak.

“To me. To her advisors. To her party. To the electorate. And the only job she’d get in power is for this government’s catering company sweeping up crumbs as a kitchen cleaner, because I’d call every journalist I know, which of course- that’s all of them! Isn’t it Nicole! And I’d tell them all that lovely little story I’ve had saved for a rainy day, about a certain Right Honourable Lord Doll- how is your Dad, by the way?- and how he enjoyed a lovely five years as a member of the Bullingdon Club at university, a club so fucking morally bankrupt they had a exposé film made about them! Of course, the homeless person your Dad had to burn money in the face of for his initiation- he didn’t enjoy it so much. Nor did the live pigeon he had to bite the head off of either. And I believe there’s also rumblings about…something about a pig, which I won’t go into. And so I’d quite happily email all these journalists any photos and soundbites and CCTV footage they wanted, because I’d say…I’d say that’s quite a big story. I’d say that would probably contest a Minister’s silly little eight-year-old car accident in the running order of the ten o’clock news. That’s what I’d tell her,” Bianca finally finished calmly, smiling a little at Nicky whose mouth was now hanging open like a goldfish. Turning to Vanessa, Bianca simply nodded on her way out of the door. “But maybe you should tell her!”

Catching Vanessa’s eye, Brooke couldn’t help but burst into a triumphant grin. Vanessa returned the smile, now completely relaxed knowing that Jackie had the upper hand. Nicky was still standing completely still and hadn’t moved since Bianca had left.

“I’ll, um. I’ll ask Nina to get your coat,” Jackie addressed Nicky pleasantly, sitting at her desk and pushing a single number on the phone as Nicky simply nodded wordlessly.

Brooke wanted to burst out laughing. Bianca had her enemies in Westminster, but she was also an absolute mastermind.

***

They had made it through the day. They always did, after all. They were a great team, Brooke thought, and God help them if they were ever disbanded in any way. Sitting in a quieter corner of the office with her head tipped against the head of the sofa, Brooke took a deep breath. It was often needed at the end of days like these. Jan sat to her right, curled up against the arm of the couch and simply staring into the distance. Thinking for a moment, Brooke turned her head and stared at Jan.

“Do you think Bianca really had all that stuff to back up what she said about Nicky’s Dad?”

Jan smirked and met Brooke’s eyes. “It’s Bianca. She’s a walking, talking database. She probably has shit on all of us. She probably knows stuff about us that we haven’t even done yet.”

Before Brooke could even try to get her head around Jan’s words, Vanessa joined them. She flung herself against the sofa dramatically, gently tilting her head so that it rested in the crook of Brooke’s shoulder. For a second she could barely breathe.

“I wonder what she’s going to do to Gigi when she next sees her. Can’t imagine I’d want to be in her six-inch heels right now,” Brooke continued, trying to talk through her breathlessness.

“We talkin’ about Bianca?” Vanessa murmured, nuzzling her head against Brooke’s shoulder to get comfortable. Christ, why the fuck did she have to do that?

“Yeah,” Jan smiled wistfully. “God, I’d be running for the hills if I was her. Alyssa’s charity ball is in three weeks, remember? I wouldn’t put it past Bianca to stage a live crucifixion as the night’s entertainment.”

Brooke felt Vanessa laugh softly against her side. She was such a warm, happy person, at least when she wasn’t stressing her head off at the latest party shambles. She was too good to be working here, but Brooke was so glad that she was.

“So you’re not going to be ditching us to run back to the opposition anytime soon then? Not going to be meeting up with Gigi and Crystal for a cute little catch-up coffee?” Brooke only half-joked, turning to address Jan again. She watched as Jan’s face grew a little dark, her brow furrowing as she let out a derisive laugh.

“I’m not fucking with anyone who attempts to sabotage Jackie’s career,” she said forebodingly.

There it was again, Brooke thought, this protective side to Jan which she’d never really seen before. She didn’t think she’d ever get over how strange it was.

Footsteps behind the sofa prompted all three of them to turn around. It was Jackie- she’d freshened up her makeup a little and had sprayed some deodorant or perfume or something that smelt nice. Reaching the sofa, she gave a warm smile to the three girls.

“Thanks for your support today, ladies,” she said sincerely, leaning on the back of the sofa. “It was a tough one, but we got there in the end.”

“Sorry that Nina couldn’t arrange an alternative bit of PR in time, Jackie,” Vanessa smiled apologetically. Jackie let out a small laugh.

“Are you kidding? That was a blessing in disguise. After the day I’ve had the last thing I want to do is go and feign interest in electric cars for an hour,” she shook her head. “Seriously though, thank you. You three are a total blessing.”

Brooke was surprised when she then turned to face Jan, her expression turning a little shy. “Ready to go?”

“Yeah, two minutes. I need to pack up and I’ll be good,” Jan smiled timidly back at her, her cheeks going a little red.

“Okay. I’ll wait at the lifts. See you tomorrow, girls,” Jackie said finally, waving goodbye to Brooke and Vanessa before walking away.

Vanessa tipped her head off Brooke’s shoulder to lean forward and look at Jan, who was grabbing her coat. “Where are you two off to then, Miss Ma’am?”

Jan stopped in her tracks, as if she hadn’t really been expecting the question. “Oh! Um, Jackie’s just giving me a lift home.”

Brooke screwed up her face at her friend. “A lift home? In her car? That she drives? Is that meant to be a joke?”

Seemingly realising her mistake, Jan smiled and shook her head. “I meant her driver. Her driver’s going to drop me home on the way back to Jackie’s.”

Brooke sat blankly for a moment, turning to Vanessa and seeing her face hold the exact same expression. Vanessa laughed in disbelief. “Your flat’s five minutes away, you lazy shit!”

“Hey, give me a break! I’m exhausted, a five minute walk is still a walk I don’t want to do, and I’ll take what I can get,” Jan shrugged, grabbing her bag and making to leave. “Bye, girls. See you both tomorrow.”

Brooke gave a tired reply as Jan made her way out of the department. Sighing, Vanessa leant against the arm of the sofa, kicking her legs over Brooke’s lap and subsequently causing Brooke’s pulse to quicken by about 90%. They sat in silence for a moment, Brooke’s brain too full to even contemplate starting a conversation. Luckily, it was Vanessa that spoke first.

“Do you think something’s goin’ on there? Between Jackie and Jan?”

Brooke paused. If it were any other situation, she’d maybe have thought Vanessa was right. But this was work, and sometimes people got incredibly passionate about their party and the people that ran it. Jan had had to put up with Nicky, and then Darienne. It was only natural that now that she was finally working for someone competent of course she was going to want with every fibre of her being for that person to do well. Turning to face Vanessa, Brooke made a doubtful face.

“No, girl. Jan’s just loyal. She wants to see Jackie do well. That’s all I think it is anyway.”

Brooke watched as Vanessa knit her brows together, frowning momentarily then casting her gaze into her lap.

“You know-” she began, then cut herself off as she decided against saying whatever she had to say. Then, changing her mind, she began again. “I swear you’re so blind half the time, Brooke Lynn. I think you have your guard up so high you can’t even see when someone has feelings for someone else. It’s kinda…I don’t know. Anyway. It don’t matter.”

Brooke watched, astounded as Vanessa swung her legs off her lap and stood up. Her face was bright red, as if she was embarrassed in some way. Brooke felt she had to reply, but she had no idea what to say or how to respond. She simply blinked at Vanessa, as if her last ditch attempt at communication was morse code.

“I’ll, uh. I’ll see you tomorrow then?” Vanessa continued, smoothing down her dress and smiling as if she hadn’t said a thing. Going along with the façade, Brooke nodded slowly. “Bye, Brooke.”

As Vanessa’s footsteps retreated down the office and into the lift, Brooke just stared straight ahead and tried to make sense of what Vanessa had said, or what it even meant, or what the implications were. It had felt like she was mad at her in some way, although Brooke couldn’t figure out what she’d done. What had she meant by it all? It made Brooke’s head hurt.

She was still there when the cleaners arrived half an hour later, and she still hadn’t managed to unscramble her brain. Giving up, Brooke grabbed her coat and bag and made her way to the lifts, stuck with the feeling that somehow she’d left something behind.

[onmywaytobe]

Dissidia Writeblr: September 2020 Week 4

ya girl had a lot more going on than she thought so this is v late and i am so sorry @dissidia-writeblr i still love u plz enjoy

••••••••

Tess and her twin, who introduced herself as Kyra, led Owen and Cam out of the city and toward where an airship is hovering. Owen’s jaw dropped. It seemed this place had far more advanced technology than home. He’d seen these airships flying above Dagen, but assumed they were airplanes. Cam was similarly stunned, and Kyra looked back at them with a frown.

“We’ll let you come with us and...help, I guess,” Kyra said reluctantly. She exchanged a glance with Tess. “But only because we want to make sure you’re safe from the labs. The people within are a little...possessive of the summoned ones.” It was clear that she was worried about bringing them along, but she was willing to go along with Tess.

Kyra waved up at the airship, and a ladder fell down so that they can climb up. Owen scrambled up the ladder eagerly, drinking in his surroundings. The steel underbelly of the ship radiated heat from the engines, and a small hatch spun closed behind them as they ascended into the ship. The inside of the ship looked like Owen expected, and he realized that everything seemed so familiar because he had just re-watched Firefly with his dad. This only made him more excited.

Five other people were on the ship: a woman with only one arm and one eye, a guy with ginger hair, a guy with black hair who’s talking to the ginger haired guy, and a guy and a girl both with long silver hair and multi-colored eyes. The woman walked up to Tess and Kyra as the others stared at Owen and Cam. They were definitely intruding on whatever this rescue mission was. Owen fidgeted, and Cam began to crack his knuckles, a nervous tic of his.  

“We have one more stop before we head to Velaris.” The woman smiled to herself. “This is the second time I’m headed there in a couple days.”

Kyra grinned. “Thanks, Zerith.” She looked over at the others and laughed. “They’re okay. They’re just people who have been summoned here. We didn’t want to leave them to the labs.” Owen let out a sigh of relief, glad that Kyra was advocating for them. The others nodded and turned back to talking quietly amongst themselves.

Tess went over to join them, but Kyra lingered. She smiled at Owen and Cam. “You’re safe now. We have some business to take care of. One of our friends is missing. I’ll introduce you to everyone.”

She pointed at the guy with ginger hair, who was eyeing the newcomers as subtly as he could. “That’s Zero. His real name is Zerion, but we all call him Zero.” Then she pointed to the guy with black hair by his side. “That’s Will. His real name is Wilson, but he’s too embarrassed to admit that himself.” Now she pointed to the guy with silver hair, who gave a friendly wave when he noticed the attention. “That’s Kalen.” And to the girl with silver hair, who was much more intense. “And that’s Selia.”

“You guys have such cool names,” Owen said in awe. Cam nudged him, indicating that might have been rude to say. “What? It’s true!” Kyra continued to smile, amused by his astonishment. Owen grinned back at her, glad that they had a friendly tour guide.

Soon Kalen came over to introduce himself. “Welcome aboard! I take it Kyra has told you all about us?”

“Only the bad things,” Kyra teased.

“Ha! It’s all true.” Kalen winked at Owen and Cam conspiratorially, immediately putting them at ease. “Don’t worry. We’ve seen people summoned here before. You’ll get home safe as soon as the magic wears off.”

Zero had drifted over to join them while they spoke, and Will followed. “Can you tell us about the place you came from?” Zero asked. “Is it very different from here?” Will smiled encouragingly.  

Owen could tell Cam was getting a little overwhelmed with the attention, so he took the lead. Luckily Kalen went back to Selia after seeing that they were comfortable, which left Owen talking to Zero, Will, and Kyra. He felt a little funny explaining his home to these strangers like they were aliens. They looked human enough, so maybe this was more like a parallel dimension. He told them about Camp Harmony, and balancing, since he figured there was no reason not to trust them. They all watched with fascination (and a little fear) as he summoned fire to his hands.

He had just about persuaded Cam into talking about what Earth balancers could do when the ship stopped. Everyone made room for the newcomers: a girl with ginger hair and another guy with black hair. Kyra whispered that the girl was Kali, and the guy was Wayne.

Kali went over to Cam and Owen straight away. “You’re new!” she commented. Owen and Cam introduced themselves while she looked them over. “You have a unique look about you,” she said when they’d finished. “I’d like to draw you sometime, if you’ll let me.”

“Sure,” Owen replied, nonplussed. She grinned and left to go digging in her bag, potentially for drawing supplies. Cam raised an eyebrow, amused.

Will frowned slightly, looking around for someone missing. “Where’s Kaito?”

“He has a job to do, so he regrets that he can’t come with us,” Wayne replied gruffly.

The airship started up again. Will turned his attention back to Owen and Cam, who had about run out of things to say. “So what’s going on here?” Owen asked.

Zero and Will exchanged glances. “It’s...complicated,” Will said. Owen got the feeling that everything here was complicated. “Our friend Liath has been captured by the people we’re fighting against. And we’re not the type to leave one of our own behind,” Will explained.

“We have to go back to Velaris.” Kyra scowled. “And it’s almost definitely a trap. But like Will said, we’re not leaving our friend behind.”

“I understand completely,” Owen said, looking directly at Cam, who smiled.

“One time I was almost burned at the stake, and this one wouldn’t let it happen,” Cam said, tilting his head at Owen.

Kyra, Will, and Zero looked impressed. “Maybe you guys will be helpful after all,” Kyra muttered, daring to be hopeful.

After a while, the airship stopped over a continent that seemed to have different ecosystems. They had arrived at Velaris. The others climbed down immediately, but Kyra lingered and glanced at Owen and Cam. “You can stay safe on this ship. You don’t have to come with us.”

“Are you kidding?” Owen was already on his way towards the ladder. “I was promised a rescue mission. I’m here to help if you’ll have me.”

“Just tell us what you want us to do,” Cam agreed.

Kyra raised an eyebrow at them. “I don’t think you two know what you’re signing up for.” Then she smirked. “But I’m sure you can handle it. Follow me.”

[memaha19]

Things I Want(ed) From KH3 That Re:Mind is Probably Not Going to Fix

 AKA, a brief interlude from Frozen 2 posting because Kingdom Hearts was on my mind this morning.

AKA, I’m excited for Re:Mind but still...

AKA, KH3 disappointed me and I’m still salty about it almost a year later.

AKA,  there are many “my problems with KH3″ posts/discussions floating out there on the internet and many are probably worded better than mine but, as I said, the game was on my mind this morning.

Just...the worlds. The Disney worlds in KH3 bothered me. There were so few of them but they were so so LONG. Some of them were painfully long. Toy Box felt like the longest experience of my life. Every time I thought that level was coming to an end, BAM, another trek to another area. And Arendelle...though I love Frozen, there’s only so many times I can trek up the mountain only to get thrown off and have to climb back up again. There were so few worlds, only seven, I believe, (because we’re not counting Twilight Town or the 100 Acre Woods, more on those later), that I think they could’ve given us a few more worlds and made the levels a little...shorter? A little more detailed and charming? The levels were huge but empty and devoid of the character that previous Disney worlds had in other games. The previous main games had about 10 or 11 worlds, not including the throwaways (like Atlantica in KH2) or the final worlds (TWTNW and End of the World), so there could’ve been some more! Birth By Sleep had numerous shorter worlds and I vastly prefer that to slogging through the same world for hours. Even the way that KH2 had us revisit each world would’ve been nice.  What’s more, they could’ve taken some of the massive time and space devoted to the empty, excruciatingly long Disney worlds and given us more time in Twilight Town or the Keyblade Graveyard, or put a playable Radiant Garden in the game. Those non-Disney worlds always served as nice interludes in the other games and it’s sorely lacking in this one. (And yes, I have heard that Re:Mind is going to let Scala be a playable world, so I’m excited for that!)

Related, I also wanted some worlds from older Disney films. I know the other games have had worlds from older films, but almost all of KH3′s worlds were so jarringly...current. I would’ve liked to see some of the older Disney film worlds rendered in the beautiful graphics of KH3, but, instead, the oldest film represented was Hercules (1997). Three of the worlds (maybe four, actually, with the Pirates world) were from movies from this decade (Corona, Arendelle, and San Fransokyo).

Related, they did the 100 Acre Woods so dirty. It was disappointing and short. It used to be a fun little interlude between the big worlds in previous games, a time to chill and play a mini-game and not have to fight a big boss fight. This was like “hello, here’s one mini game, goodbye.”

Related: all that Twilight Town exploration we got in the other games and this one gives us the forest and the town square area and that’s it?! We can’t even go to the clock tower or inside the mansion? When we first got to Twilight Town I was like “wow this is gorgeous!” and then quickly disappointed when I realized we couldn’t go anywhere.

Related, I’ve seen others say this and I agree: the Disney worlds seem like they’re just there, oftentimes, to get in your way. They feel like obstacles to the actual plot because they didn’t bother to place much/any relevance to the plot into any of the Disney worlds. Sometimes we get little snippets of the big story, like Marluxia and Larxene hanging around in Corona and Arendelle just to say cryptic things without ever being a real threat (that in itself is weird too, I spent ALL of the Corona level bracing myself for a fight with Marluxia only to fight...Mother Gothel’s heartless?) but it feels like two different games: The KH that wants to still be about Disney worlds and the KH that has gotten so deep in its own world building that it doesn’t have time for anything else.

Related, again: KH3 has an abundance of Disney worlds where Sora being there doesn’t make any difference to the plot. The most fun Disney worlds have always been the ones that have an original story that we’re actually involved in. Corona is just the plot of Tangled with Sora and co. tagging along. Their presence or lack thereof make no difference to the story. Arendelle is the same way.

The boss battles in the worlds were...lame. I understand that it maybe doesn’t make sense to fight someone like Mother Gothel, who never shows any physical fighting power in Tangled, but we can’t fight Zurg? We’re in a literal toy store and we can’t fight Zurg as the boss? We have to fight a weird doll and 800 robots? We have to fight Hans’ heartless? Not Hans? We fight Mother Gothel’s heartless? Not Marluxia, who’s been harassing us all level long? I understand that they held the KH characters back because of the whole “assembling 13 pieces of darkness for a big final battle” thing, but we had to fight Xemnas like ten times in previous games, they could let us fight Marluxia twice.  I feel like the other games were a lot better at having us face a combo of heartless/nobodies/unversed AND Disney bosses. But, as the game has really zero interest in making the Disney worlds a part of the plot, they throw these cheap (and endless) unversed/heartless bosses at us and they’re all so EASY. They could have, and probably should have, let us fight the Organization at the end of each world and then let us fight them again in the Keyblade Graveyard, similar to the way Chain of Memories had us fight each Organization member a couple times.   

When you finally do get through the Disney worlds, the ending is like “here’s all these characters that have been missing from the rest of the game” and the Keyblade Graveyard flings boss battle after boss battle at your face without much rhyme or reason. And while some of them are fun, some of them feel like “let’s just pair these characters together and make you fight them at the same time so we can save some time because we didn’t bother to put any of these fights into an earlier part of the game”. I’m looking at the Luxord/Marluxia/Larxene fight in particular. I would’ve understood pairing the last two together, but then Luxord is also there like they didn’t have any other place to put him.

This game is too easy. I’m not great at video games. I’m good-ish. I’m into stories more than anything so I hate when a game’s difficulty keeps me from completing it and keeps me from seeing more of the story. But I still like a little challenge. I have not-so-fond memories of yelling at the TV as I died time and time again fighting Ansem/Riku at Hollow Bastion in KH1, but I also have fond memories of finally beating him and what a rush it was! I didn’t get any of that in KH3. I’m not sure I died more than once or twice, if that.

The way they just let the Organization members hang out in the worlds and do nothing has always seemed weird to me. They’re big parts of the overall plot but now they just stand around and verbally harass Sora? As I said above, I spent all of Corona thinking I was going to have to face Marluxia at the end. Instead, they stand around in the worlds and then they stand around in the Keyblade Graveyard in the cutscenes and just talk. Also, okay, maybe I get the reasoning behind why Luxord was in the pirates world and why Vanitas was in Monstropolis, but Marluxia seemed like he was shoehorned into Corona solely because of the connection between the magic flower and his powers, which was stupid. And Larxene had zero connection to anything going on in Arendelle.

All the characters we’ve been waiting for (Ventus, Aqua, etc.) don’t appear until the very very end, which is a problem with the story pacing. They tease us, very early, with Riku and Mickey trying to find Aqua and then immediately drop that plot point to give us some empty Disney worlds. (Side note: this 100% tricked me into thinking we’d be switching back and forth between what Sora was up to and what Riku was up to and I was sorely disappointed as I played and realized it wasn’t true.) They dither in this “Sora needs the power of waking” to avoid giving us Ventus until the very end.

Just...the story pacing in general, which kind of ties into everything else.  This game has a beginning, because it had to, and something they wanted to end with but they weren’t really sure how to fill the space in the middle. You spend most of the game just chilling in the Disney worlds with very low stakes. This big battle waiting at the end is always there in the background but, partially because the Disney worlds feel like distractions that don’t add to the story, the middle of the game never really feels like it’s building toward the ending, or anything. And then, when you do get through the Disney worlds, about 75% of the plot is thrown at you in the last hour or two of the game. It reminds me (a lot of this game reminds me, actually) of FFXV. I love FFXV dearly, I’ve poured A TON of hours into gathering ingredients and taking photos and doing side quests, but it has the same plot issue. The majority of FFXV is a light-hearted journey about four bros on a roadtrip, only for everything to take a VERY dramatic tonal shift about 3/4 of the way through the game and then stay very very SAD for the rest of the game. KH3 does something similar, with the way we spend most of the game traveling through Disney worlds and cooking food with Remy, only for the game to suddenly remember at the 11th hour that it’s supposed to be wrapping up this big 10+ year long story and thrust you into battle after battle and plot-heavy cutscene after plot-heavy cutscene.

To the pacing point: yes, I’m aware these games have always had slightly funny/back-loaded pacing. However, a main thing the other games had that KH3 lacks is that Radiant Garden/Twilight Town/Traverse Town interlude world that helps push the plot along. Without that in KH3, we get a ton of long Disney worlds where we’re like “when is the story going to happen?” and then the Keyblade Graveyard where suddenly ALL of the story is happening. Previous games have let us experience the Disney worlds for awhile before bringing us to an interlude world which furthers the plot, a la the big Radiant Garden section in KH2 that happens midway through the game.

Anyway, I think Kingdom Hearts 3 was a gorgeous game, graphics-wise, and I’ll still be shelling out money for Re:Mind come January, but after waiting for 14 years for a continuation of the main story line, this game just feels like, after everything, Nomura still wasn’t sure how to end it? It feels rushed and underwhelming and incomplete as hell. 

TL;DR: I have all these thoughts about KH3 that I’ve waited 11 months to express.

[langxue]

Avengers Endgame Initial Thoughts

Okay. I have some Thoughts about Endgame, most of them fairly critical. Also highly subjective. So here goes. Spoilers abound, for Endgame and other MCU content.

1. OMFG they completely wasted Captain Marvel.* In her own movie, Carol is a fairly laid back, adaptable, competent, and Silly person. She has a wonderfully casual charm and sarcasm that’s really fun to watch. She’s also a powerhouse, and by the end she definitely knows it. (Like seriously, she destroyed multiple of Ronan’s ships in under a minute. In GotG, it took a whole fleet just to slow one of them down, plus a team on the inside to blow it up. And then Carol’s just like “nah, you’re done now.”) And then you hit Endgame. And we have a stoic, closed off Captain Marvel, who shows up, talks a lot about how awesome she is, and then spends fucking 80% of the movie on a shelf on the justification that she’s helping other worlds that are also in trouble. Which is a fine justification to keep her away for some of the setup. But the heroes’ main plan is time travel. Which means it’s not time sensitive, and they keep making a big deal about only having one shot. Why, in that case, wouldn’t you wait until you could get Carol on your team?? Thor is a psychological mess. Keep him on the bench and bring in Carol. OR have her on hand to use the gauntlet after all the stones are collected. But no, they just went with “eh, we’re not sure how to contact her, so we’ll just skip over that option entirely.” So they wasted her character as a character with minimal interactions with the others, and zero of those interactions actually being in character (except maaaybe with Peter at the end, but that very much felt like two actors trying very hard with very little to work with), and then also wasted her as far as plot impact, opting for a heroic re-entrance most of the way through the movie.

2. The time travel felt extremely poorly explained, which is really bad when your plot completely hinges on it, and is especially bad if you’re gonna rag on other movies with time travel. Back to the Future is paradoxical nonsense, but it’s self-consistent paradoxical nonsense. Endgame was some kind of multiverse with zero clear understanding of how different timelines/realities could and could not interact with each other. I’m still trying to wrap my head around all of the possibilities and whether there actually is an internal logic, but at the very least, while watching the movie, it entirely felt like they were doing whatever they wanted to suit the plot. Which is a bad sign when dealing with time travel. (My general approach to time travel is that you either have to completely handwave it or completely explain it. And that explanation doesn’t have to be an info dump! It can just be apparent in the story itself, such as with Time-Turners. Though I personally don’t mind time travel info dump tbh.)

3. Relatedly, the secret to time travel is to model an inverted Möbius strip and get the eigenvector of that one particle there. I don’t think I’ve been that annoyed but technobabble in a long time. That’s math word salad, as far as I can tell (though I’m admittedly not a mathematician. If any mathematicians can clarify how this makes any sense, I’d appreciate it, but in the mean time, I’m going to assume it’s garbled nonsense.)

4. Still on time travel but I’m having one hell of a time figuring out Steve’s ending. Like, how can he do that within the confines of the time travel mechanics? Why wouldn’t he come back and spend that time with Bucky?? Since, you know, they’ve like barely spoken being reunited?? For Pete’s sake, don’t set up their bond like that, spend two full movies on the turmoil cause by Bucky’s return, and then just fucking drop the plot line on the floor because you wanted to stick Steve back with Peggy. What in the fuck.

5. IM. SO. MAD. ABOUT. GAMORA. (And also Natasha, though that’s a slightly different anger.) GAMORA’S DEATH WAS THE MOST BS THING IN INFINITY WAR AND WAS ALSO THE DEATH I WAS MOST CONCERNED THEY WOULDN’T CORRECT. AND GUESS WHAT. THEY DIDN’T. SHE’S STILL DEAD.** The soulstone mechanic can get Fucked, because Thanos should never have been able to get it like that (and relatedly, should Hawkeye have gotten it, since Natasha threw herself, rather than being sacrificed? I’m undecided, but mad either way).

6. Is Loki still dead? Was he ever dead? We just don’t know. If he is dead, that was an amazingly dumb end and I object. If he’s not dead, that is a dumb cliffhanger and I object.

7. I don’t love Thor + Guardians’ dynamic? It feels very off, and I can’t tell if that’s just because it’s Avengers and therefore all the characters have gotten slightly flattened or if it’s just an unappealing dynamic to me. But we already had Quill vs Rocket leadership tension. I don’t was more of that but with Thor. That’s dumb. I’m hoping that it gets more nuance/resolution going forward, but I’m not holding my breath.

8. Relatedly, why would you put Valkyrie in charge of Anything but a battle plan? Nothing I’ve seen of her makes me think she’s well suited to general leadership, and I think she’d chafe under it just as much as Thor does. She’s not the Responsible One to take things over so Thor can go have another finding himself adventure. Ffs.

9. Probably no one’s fault because actor contracts are complicated, but I’m still salty about Lady Sif being 100% absent and unacknowledged for this whole thing. Largely because I haven’t gotten to see her interact with Valkyrie OR Carol and I feel cheated.

10. Some quick minor things before I go on a big rant. It bothered me that Thor’s depression and poor coping was just a joke, basically just “Oh look he’s fat and scared now, isn’t that funny?” I’m so tired of Tony vs. Steve, and I hate that they waited until the last fucking movie to sort of kind of resolve it. You don’t get to pull on found family heartstrings and tropes when you’ve done such a bullshit job of actually showing us a family. You’ve had 20-odd movies to do so. Do better.

11. Okay. I like battle scenes. They’re fun! They’re dramatic! If done correctly, they can give a very tangible sense of odds and stakes. But. Not every movie with high stakes needs a big final battle.

Okay, to clarify a bit, I’m specifically referring to army vs. army battle scenes here. Big punch outs between titans, or scrambling to minimize damage from a disaster are different, and have their own applications and pitfalls. All clear? Great.

Battles, with two armies facing off against each other in fronts, look cool, but fundamentally make no sense in the context of Endgame. Battle lines exist so that you have not very many people actively fighting at once, and so that you can protect the people next to them. When the frontline gets tired, they rotate back and others take over. Battles are not the same thing as skirmishes and they are not mass melees. If a battle turns into a mass melee, something has gone very wrong and you should in all likelihood pull back immediately to regroup.

All of this breaks down when you have an opponent who can break up or ignore your battle lines. Historically, this was artillery and guns—things that forced battles into a cover-based issue. In superhero movies, it’s... pretty much every character of note.

Thor’s lightning —> broken battle line

Black Panther’s suit discharge —> broken battle line

Falcon attacking from above —> pointless battle line

Wanda or Carol doing... anything —> pointless battle line

All of Thanos’ many flying troops —> pointless battle line

Thanos’ warship overhead —> what are you doing pls stop this

All of which is to say that traditional battle tactics don’t apply to this conflict. But the battle we’re shown doesn’t reflect that, and it feels very... weird as a result. Where who’s winning is entirely arbitrary, rather than any kind of steady build.

This tends to lead to a very episodic battle, where you show off individual characters or small groups of characters fighting. Which is fine, though contributes to battle progress being unclear. But there’s a temptation then to give everyone equal levels of badassery in their vignettes, and I think that’s a mistake. The avengers et all are a complementary group. They have members suited to a battle field and members that aren’t. That isn’t to say that Hawkeye and Black Widow can’t hold their own, but their skill sets aren’t specialized for something like this, and so any attempt to make them seem equal in this way is going to either fall flat or cheapen the battle suited heroes’ specialty.

And this tendency to level the field of badassery can also lead to situations where Okoye is backing up Carol for a charge, and I just.... gah. I love Okoye. So much. Carol does not need her help to rush a group of enemies. Carol doesn’t need help from any of the women who showed up behind her except for maybe Scarlet Witch. I get what they were going for. I get that it was supposed to be a Girl PowerTM moment. It wasn’t. It was dumb. It was so very much the wrong time for that moment, because this was not a context where Carol needed help. She just flew through a spaceship. She can fly through some enemies no problem. And it’s probably easier if she’s not worried about her allies getting caught in the blast. And then they had to make the backup team useful, so they made Carol struggle in a moment where she just shouldn’t have. You don’t get points for Girl PowerTM if you have to de-power one of your women just to make it make sense. Give me more scenes with Gamora and Nebula helping each other through Thanos’ abuse. Give me scenes with Carol and Okoye bonding over putting up with impractical people. Don’t give me this battle scene bullshit, I don’t want it.

11. I remain pissed off that there are no actually articulated arguments against Thanos’ fucking stupid plan. What the actual fuck, this is not that hard. 

Okay. Now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, some things I actually really liked.

1. Steve wielding Mjolnir was fucking amazing and I’m so pleased.

2. Any time Scott was on screen.

3. Peter Parker is a precious child and he needs to be protected.

4. I actually really like the set up for the time travel nonsense, and I liked that they seemed to be doing something other than a mass melee battle. That the group was divided into manageable teams, and sent on different kinds of missions that required them to be clever and play to their different strengths and help each other through. And then they shoved in a giant battle anyway, because fuck you that’s why.

5. I can appreciate what they were trying to do in giving all of the non-returning Avengers decent send-offs, even if I didn’t like some of those conclusions.

6. There were some genuinely funny moments, but I’m struggling to recall them right now.

7. Oh wait! “It’s an earthquake in the middle of the ocean. We handle it by not handling it.” That one was great.

Okay, that’s all for now. I might have more later, once I’ve picked apart the time travel a bit more and dined some processing.

I think it’s also worth noting that like... ensemble movies with a cast this big are *hard.* character are going to end up feeling confined, and there’s less time to grow because there’s just less time per character. But I think we could’ve had better, and I think if they focused more on group growth in the group movies instead of just drama, then they would’ve been in a better place and had a better story.

It’s probably also worth noting that I really liked Thor: Ragnarok, really like Captain Marvel and really didn’t like Infinity War. So I sort of went into Endgame feeling like it had to make up for Infinity War and live up to the higher at from the recent solo movies. And I really wanted to like it. I really wanted them to pull it off. But those are high and fairly specific standards, and so they fell quite short.

*This should be taken with a grain of salt, because I’d been dreading Endgame as an obligation to watch, and the Captain Marvel movie was the only thing that sparked my interest again. And then Endgame massively dropped the ball as far as I’m concerned.

** there was some stuff at the very end that makes me wonder if there’re plans to still bring her back in a later movie. But it doesn’t change me call bullshit on everything that Infinity War/Endgame has done to her.

[deltaengineering]

Winter Anime 2019 Part 4: That’s all, folks.

Over already? This is a pretty thin season with not a lot of shows, so it’s not that surprising that there’s not many good ones either. Still, a weak showing. Oh well, let’s get it over with. There were a few decent ones in the last batch.

Circlet Princess

What: Dimwitted schoolgirl is good at some vaguely defined virtual fighting sport, changes school based on it, finds out relevant club has been abolished. Forecast says: 5 member plot incoming.

❌ I think it’s already clear this show isn’t very ambitious, and not very well written either. A game adaptation at its laziest.

❌❌ Man, this girl is STUPID. What the hell.

❌ The rest of the cast are less stupid (which isn’t hard), but that just means they’re so forgettable they might as well not exist.

❌❌ It looks cheap, and by that I mean really really cheap. The character design is ISO standard anime and it’s mostly on model, but that’s as good as it gets. The animation just sucks. That’s a death sentence for an action/sports show with terrible characters.

Bermuda Triangle - Colorful Pastrale

What: Japanese Spongebob, as in cute mermaids. Doing things optional.

❌ To make this quick, this is almost exactly Pastel Memories, only every problem is just a little less extreme. It has fewer characters, it’s looking slightly better, there’s a tiny bit more going on, the setting is mildly more interesting. That still means it is:

❌❌ 1. A boring mess in which a handful of samey girls do nothing of much interest in a location that should be unique, but isn’t.

❌❌ 2. Conspicuously cheap. It even has the same sightline problems.

❌❌ 3. Featuring a character model sheet that is “off” even under the best circumstances. This time due to the very offputting decision to give everyone blobby triangular irises.

❌❌ Unlike Pastel Memories (which was an ad for a mobile game) this is an anime original, so it really has no excuse being this lame.

♎ I find it amusing that Pastel Palettes are providing the OP for an anime, and it’s not the one currently airing that they’re actually characters in.

Endro~!

What: Kiraralike comedy thing in a generic JRPG setting.

♎ Namori character designs, so it’s like Spyce in that it just seems like the Yuru Yuri cast cosplaying a genre. But hey, Namori character designs do look good.

❌ I’m not as done with generic JRPG settings as with generic isekai settings, but it’s still a real problem since the former is now a subset of the latter. Mildly making fun of it does not improve things much either.

✅ The tone is cutesy and pleasant. I find this much preferable to something like Mahoujin Guru Guru, which is pretty much the same thing but with abrasive, high-intensity slapstick instead.

✅ It’s backing that up with generally high-quality, agreeable pastel looks.

❌ Not being annoying is a start, but beyond that this seems very middle of the road and predictable. I don’t get much out of the genre “parody” and simply being cute is still not an unique selling point in anime.

Grimms Notes The Animation

What: Did someone say JRPG? This is a mobile one, vaguely based on fairy tales as the title implies.

✅ This universe runs on the idea that every NPC’s fate is controlled by a preset story they’re aware of. You could make a good story about that if you took it seriously. It even does that somewhat, but only to the degree that you’d expect from a throwaway sidequest in a moderately well-written JRPG.

❌ And the reason for that is that it has to make room for being a JRPG, of course. Read: It’s irritatingly mechanics- and combat-focused. Stuff like the characters changing form when in fights just seems overly complicated and adds nothing.

❌ Said combat looks competent, but not good enough to make up for detracting from what could have been an interesting setting. Merc Storia did this aspect far better (by usually not doing it at all).

❌ So it ends up being better than expected, but then that only amounts to a disappointment.

Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai / Kaguya-sama: Love Is War

What: Kaguya and Miyuki are in the student council of a prestigious school and HATE HATE HATE each other. Specifically, they hate the part where the other one won’t just finally admit their love.

✅ The joke here is that it’s operating on full intensity at all times, over the most simple matters. It’s pretty much Kaiji, only about dating - complete with hammy narrator. This is another one of those shows where I can’t say with certainty that it’s solid, but I had a blast during the first episode.

✅ Regarding Quintuplets, I made it clear that I love me some sparks in my romantic comedies. It doesn’t get much more explosive than this.

✅ The characters are comparable to Quints too: Smart scheming upstart vs. rich scheming ojou, with a simpleminded girl in the middle that ends up winning more often than not simply by not overdoing it.

✅ The visuals are just as over the top as the proceedings depicted. Occasionally a filter massacre, but mostly cool.

♎ The long-term viability of this show depend entirely on whether they can consistently come up with scenarios that work, which isn’t a given. Also, this is so intense it might become tiresome - I already felt some fatigue towards the end of the first episode. We’ll see, I guess.

Kakegurui ××

What: Some weirdos think they can crash the party at Hyakkaou with an intent to scare the daylights out of Yumeko and Midari, of all people. Let’s just say they were not as prepared as they thought.

✅ As you might have guessed by me watching the sequel, I liked Kakegurui. It has its problems, but if you’re down for some crazypants madness, this show delivers.

✅ This is one of the better episodes of it too, because it gets right into it and the game they play is dead simple. Kakegurui was never about smart moves or strong characters, so not having anything detract from our girls deriving the entirely wrong sort of pleasure from danger is a plus.

♎ Sadly, the OP is a step down (though still great) and the ED is simply an inferior, overcomplicated version of the magnificent original one. They seem to know this too, because they play the OP cut of Deal with the Devil in its entirety for a montage. The rest of the production is on par with the original though, so it’s fiiiine. Oh well.

❌ It got Netflix’d again and the subs situation is dire. Since this is one I actually like, I might have to wait for the official release.

Kouya no Kotobuki Hikoutai / The Magnificent Kotobuki

What: Piston-engined fighter plane pornography.

✅ This delivers where Girly Air Force failed: Close to zero exposition, the majority of the episode is just planes dogfighting with barely any talking either. And that part is executed really well. I think the plane startup sequence alone is as long as the total of Girly’s airtime.

✅ Guess what, it’s Tsutomu Mizushima, previously known for unbridled panzer (und girls) pornography, and boy can you tell. However, this cuts out a lot of GuP’s bullshit: A plane doesn’t have the cast of K-ON in it, it’s not over-the-top zany, and whatever this universe is, it can’t be as insipid as GuP’s. The classy milwank exists you guys, we found it.

✅✅ The music really helps here, sky pirates vs zeppelins just wouldn’t work without some classic swashbuckling orchestra background. Fat sound mixing on the dakka too. It’s great.

♎ Can’t really say much about the narrative because we kinda skipped that in this episode aside from the obvious, but Mizushima’s Shirobako collaborator Michiko Yokote is writing it, and that’s a good sign.

❌ Now we’re getting to the elephant in the room though: There’s no way the planes wouldn’t be CG in 2019, but the characters are CG too, and their animation is mediocre. Also, they did the KADO thing where they 2D-animated the side characters that aren’t important enough to model. This has the funny side effect that you can tell who’s going to die real soon by them looking better. It’s far from great, but probably a worthy tradeoff if the mechanical side is this extensive and also delivers.

✅ This is definitely not for everyone, since you have to have more than a casual appreciation for those magnificent girls in their flying machines. I do, though.

revisions

What: A chunk of Shibuya gets teleported to the dystopian future, local doomsday prepper gets handed a large robot because he’s special.

❌ A Goro Taniguchi joint being a poorly conceived scifi mess? Say it ain’t so! I especially dig the tryhard English jargon (mecha: “String Puppet”, monsters faction: “Revisions”, particular monster, I think?: “Civilian”, tacticool operetah: “Balancer”).

❌ Works very hard to characterize the main character, to the detriment of everyone else. A for effort, but you made an unlikeable asshole though.

❌ This is another full CG show, with the quality of the animation being curiously variable. Sometimes it’s well above average and sometimes it’s painful. There doesn’t seem to be much method to it.

✅ Tries to establish stakes by being mondo edgy and graphically murderizing some poor bystanders. It’s adorable.

❌ If you’re really jonesing for some mecha, you can watch all of this on Netflix right now. It’s not like you have any alte- wait, Egao no Daika has mecha too. Well there you go then. That’s a better show.