#i simply cannot choose a phase for them because they’re all so good!

[rendevok]

twitter fluff requests! 💞

[generic-whumperz]

OC in 3

Choose 3 pics to represent your OC

Oops, I got overly excited and made 10 three-picture collages

Omg thank you @mj-iza-writer for the tag! I am honored that I came to mind! 🥹

No pressure (& open to anyone interested!) tag: @rainydaywhump @eatyourdamnpears @clairelsonao3 @dresden-syndrome @lights-out-knives-out @snakebites-and-ink

Soooo, I know I’m supposed only to pick three pics, but honestly, I simply cannot (I know, no surprise there). I have been wanting to do a vibe photo dump for The Aid (the Whumpee & title of the story) but have yet to do it (hello, my ever-expanding Pinterest boards), so I’ll take this chance to explore The Aid’s past phases he’s gone through (pre & post-Wyatt {Whumper #2}) and give some explanations because it’s a lot. However, I don’t know if explanations are necessary for this tag game, but I’m famously too much, so of course, I’m going to over-explain myself because of my crippling fear of being misunderstood!

Ironically (ironic because his real name reveal doesn't come until around chapter 25-ish), I call his time with Madame Eleanor (technical Whumper #1) his “Aid Era” because that’s when he becomes this character we are introduced to and currently know him as. Yet, this is the part of his life he is phasing out of. **Insert something-something about being haunted by your past.**

In the current storyline, he is going through a succession of more changes, and his world is about to be turned upside down yet again, but I’ll hold off on showing those for now because they’re spoilers, and I have more than enough here!

Starting from the top, here we goooo—

P.S. The people in these pics are not what the characters look like, this is simply vibes only!

Day 1

1. As soon as The Aid arrives at his new home, Madame Eleanor gets custom-made Gucci uniforms made for him that looks like this. This is his go-to everyday attire. (I spent too long looking at scrubs and hospitality uniforms on and off for over a month—tell me you like it and think it’s cool and sleek.)

2. He has a special built-in in his closet specifically for all his fancy, jewel-encrusted collars Madame Eleanor gifted him throughout the years, but this is what the facility's standard-issue collar looks like for his designation (Grand Servant: Domestic Aid).

3. His favorite Prada frames Madame Eleanor also got him that he bitches reminisces about in Chapter 6 (Wyatt breaks them because he’s an asshole, leaving him straight up blind for several months).

Fancy Threads

Eleanor Sullivan was a Rich Bitch™️ (I will make a separate post at some point about her house and The Aid’s room specifically because I spent way too much time obsessing over these deets), so best believe she had her servant dressed to the 9s in designer fits when out and about or for Family events and the like. She may also put him in a butler uniform from time to time when they were hosting a party at their residence—which was often, Eleanor was known for her soirées. (To clarify, he’d still wear a collar even when dressed up, and all those attending knew who and what he was.)

The Host

He loved a good party just as much as Eleanor did! He likes serving and seeing people have fun and enjoy themselves (people-pleasing empath). He was known for his food displays and had a knack for creating a proper afternoon tea spread that garnered attention from all those present. I also have Pinterest boards of some appetizer spreads and cool drink tables he would put together because I was really trying to understand him as a character.

Speaking of Empath…

We can’t talk about him without bringing up his not-so-secret secret! Lil’ homie has a gang of abilities (telepathic empathy, hyper intuition, premonitions, and psychometry) just bubbling up inside him at all times. His relationship with himself and his sixth senses is complicated, to say the least—he finds them burdensome, yet he cannot function without them, despite how much he argues otherwise. It’s a whole thing, but for a certified Telepathic-Empath™️, he sure is dead inside (which only gets worse after Wyatt OFC).

*Sorry for the shitty upload quality of the Emotional Sponge, idk why it looks so bad!

Domestic Duties

Not only can he slap together the best charcuterie board you’ve ever seen and easily untangle Christmas lights, but he’s also a man who can cook, clean, and keep a house. What can’t he do?

Hobbies? Interests?

Don’t be ridiculous, he didn’t have time for leisure activities! But when he had some occasional downtime, he would spend an ungodly amount of it doing facials and grooming himself. He also loved to go to the spa with Madame Eleanor. As far as reading went, he wasn’t into novels, but he would occasionally peruse short-story myths and legends, old fables, or read picture books in funny voices to Eleanor’s grandchildren. Primarily, he’d like to read trashy magazines, comics, and cookbooks. But let’s be real, he considered cleaning, gossiping, and baking his primary hobbies.

RIP Madame Eleanor Sullivan

(She’s been dead for about a year and a half when they story picks up)

First and foremost—above everything else—The Aid was Eleanor Sullivan’s literal live-in medically trained caregiver, which is why she bought him in the first place. They had a very close relationship for five years, and he did everything for her. When she died, his world was shattered, and he took her death really hard. Wyatt was jealous of his Mother’s relationship with her servant from day one, which is where part of his animosity comes from. Quick note—Eleanor was a posh, vintage-Chanel-wearing Grandma and would never be caught dead wearing a bathrobe outside. Eleanor was Queen of being That Bitch.

Enter: Wyatt Sullivan

These pics are pretty tame all things considered, but after Eleanor’s death, The Aid is now in a World O’ Hurt and the subject of Wyatt’s drug-and-alcohol-fueled rage. The Aid went from a high-class servant loved by his Madame and respected by her friends, associates, and family (besides Wyatt) to a human punching bag overnight. The beef between these two runs deep and maybe Eleanor isn’t as innocent as she seems. Stick around and you’ll find out all the Sullivan family tea.

To: Wyatt

Just some memes directed towards Wyatt and The Aid being painfully aware of his shitty situation (I got too many of these and had to sprinkle some in).

Where We’re at Now…

Quite the fall from grace, wouldn’t you say? Our boy is currently bed-ridden and zombified while having the worst time imaginable. He’s drugged up, fucked up, and can’t move half of his body! But don’t be fooled, this stay-cation is no fluffy recovery arc and you’ll meet some more distasteful Sullivans soon to come!

This took me an embarrassing amount of time to assemble, but I went the extra mile because this doubles as a reference guide. I had a lot of fun making this and I may make more (and way more chill ones that are just three pics, I swear) after I write Part 2 and introduce a gang of other characters alongside my most favorite-favorite guy!

[loverscrossmp3]

1, 3, 12, 25 <33 (also please add station to station link for everyone else because this damned tab won't allow me to link anything for hype as is necessary because i am 1/3rd through it and properly obsessed)

1. favorite fic you wrote this year

oh man. i’m back in the phase where i cower in embarrassment at the fact i’ve actually uploaded the stories i have, sooo this is difficult. ok after much thought i’ll have to say this side of the universe (bare & brief) and unpopular opinion? glitter and glow despite it being unbearably pretentious. like there’s things i’d change about both but these two i can usually bear reading back

3. favorite line/scene you wrote this year

one liners come to me so much easier than actual plot ideas so i’m usually quite proud of them? i’ll add a few from stand in your storm?

They’re walking down the street and she’s balancing on the yellow lines in the middle like they wouldn’t catch her fall if she only asked them to.

idek why i like this one !! it’s just… so james of him to think that tho, don’t you think?

You smile and roses grow in my rib cage, twisting until I can’t breathe.

fun fact i actually wrote this months ago in a folder in my notes titled ‘pretentious poetry’ and then when i was writing siys i was going through it and was like this is… so james. like she’s wonderful and lovely all around but even her smile makes him feel like the good kind of death. is that even a thing? (for james, yes it is)

He’s laughing behind her, keeping up to her pace and she is breathless and so full of air all at once.

man this scene was so much fun to make. like i could see it all so it made it that much easier to put onto paper.

She thrives at night when the moon is paler than her skin and the stars light her path. What she does not know is that the sun is also a star and she is more radiant than both.

so. pretentious. who gave me the right

12. favorite character to write about this year

ok like even tho lily in most of my stories is mega oc considering they’re all muggle au’s, i still have to say her bc she’s just !! everything i want to be !!!! idk the fun part of au’s is you can do a few switch-a-roos and no one can really complain cause like?? EYE never said this was canon. anyway, i just love kinda angry, kinda cold women !!! don’t know why !!! i’m rambling so long story short: lily.

25. a fic you read this year you would recommend everyone read

you think i’d make a rec list and it WOULDN’T include station to station?!!?? think again!

alright here’s a list of fics i’ve loved endlessly this past year to make this already long post even longer because i simply cannot choose just ONE! is that a joke!

anything by my baby ridi. god i love her so. but especially! station to station and of witness testimony. i kindly, respectfully, hate you for writing those because they make me feel like death (but the good kind - HA see what i did there) but also love you all the more cause fuck.

warm front by @jiilys and quite literally any of her other works. you’d believe me if i said i didn’t binge everything on her blog in the past year if i said so, right?

theogony and bond and free and [insert rambling essay about all of @clare-with-no-i ‘s stories bc i’m anything if not insane]

the last enemy series by @chdarling bc fuck jk rowling no one could make anything more canon than ch

football, calculus, and cappuccinos by @moonawrites i could write essays about this one. the cackles i’ve let out while reading? the tears? so fucking good

question list is: here pls ask me something so i can forget about the load of schoolwork i need to finish

[sk-lumen]

The Fragile Balance Between Friendship and Mental Health

When I first started my blog, I knew that I wanted to eventually tackle hard-hitting questions and themes that really delve into the vulnerabilities of our human nature: the light, the darkness, and all the grey areas inbetween. Because we hold not just one phase of the moon in our multiplicity, we carry all of them within us, which is what gives us depth and a true radiance when we honor all facets of our identity.

One of these grey areas is the fine line between being a good friend, and being a good friend to yourself by protecting your mental health.

So then, where is the fine line between being there for a friend who is battling depression, loss, or some other dark phase in their life, offering them the emotional support they need . . . and also maintaining the delicate balance where you don’t cross the boundaries of your own needs, where you don’t drain yourself of energy or have your own vulnerabilities triggered, to be tempted into the same pit of depression?

When you’re there for them, does it mean you have to cross the same abyss alongside their tumultuous journey? That you have to answer their calls at 3 AM to talk them down from a panic attack, or reassure them after a recurring nightmare, or decide on an intervention because they’d locked themselves up in their home for a week without eating much to anything and lying in bed all day? . . . Or do you keep a distance healthy for your mental health, and redirect them to a specialist, a therapist who is trained with the necessary mental and emotional tools to help them back unto their feet, but risk losing their friendship because they feel you weren’t there when they most needed you?

The truth is, there is no wrong or right answer there, as much as we wish there was.

Friendship, as beautiful as it is, does not justify compromising the integrity of our own mental health for the sake of another; that can only be a purely personal choice, and while a noble one at that, it is one which cannot be expected or demanded of someone we love simply because we love them. But even as we become aware of this bitter truth, it doesn’t change the fact that choosing to put a distance between a friend in need, inevitably causes them to feel betrayed and abandoned, especially if they did return the favor when it had been the other way around.

So, how do we navigate this grey space of making a friend feel supported, yet not losing our own selves in the process? I wish there was a one-two-three system of fixes, a guideline, a to-do list, but the problem with grey areas is that they’re never clear, definitive, or objective.

Do we reach out with a compass, redirecting them to more capable hands of a therapist? Do we step down from the comforts of our shelter, to trudge alongside them on their rocky journey, to wrap a blanket around their shoulders when they get cold, or offer... Read more

[edgeanescence]

cytina lore dump

i havent dropped some collected cytina info in a while, so i figured id share some stuff ive come up with for those not in my server lol

rambling under the cut since its super long cause i gotta give yall a good update for waiting so long

Misc.

In terms of pronouns and identity, neither one of them really cares what you use to refer to them as. However for the sake of clarity, I typically say he/him for Cyrus, it/its for Giratina and they/them to refer to them both. Usually the use of he or it will change depending on the one in control of the body.

Cytina does not have any of Cyrus’s old pokemon on hand. When Cyrus was dragged into the Distortion World, the pokeballs fell out of his pockets and left behind.

Cyrus in this AU has the last name of Morozov, just to distinguish him.

Cyrus and Giratina have conflicting favorite flavors. Gira prefers spicy while Cyrus prefers sweet, though Cy will lie and say he prefers dry because he thinks liking sweets make him sound childish.

Cytina will sleep coiled up in Origin Form even in the Distortion World. This is because Cyrus woke up with half of his massive body hanging off one of the floating islands once and it terrified him.

Abilities

Cytina can fly and levitate, obviously. They do not have a need for flapping wings to stay aloft however.

Since Giratina refuses to explain how to use moves to Cyrus, Cyrus has to learn all of Giratina’s moves on his own. He seems to be able to get the hang of physical based attacks sooner then special ones. Status moves such as will-o-wisp fall under special attacks in terms of Cy’s ease of learning.

Cyrus is capable of using Shadow Force to teleport short distances, however he typically has trouble preforming it and teleporting where he would like to. The fun melty thing happens at random when Cyrus executes it.

Cytina can only learn new moves when Giratina is in control of the body. If Cyrus is in control, nothing seems to happen.

Cytina, despite being half human, still counts as a Ghost/Dragon type. This comes with the expected ups and downs, as well as new ones such as not being able to fly in extremely cold weather.

Body

Cytina’s wings are gaseous except for the spikes. The gas part of the wings is able to be passed through, although it behaves strangely. Objects can phase through it, albeit its pace is slowed down considerably. A ghostly chill and strange pressure is sure to be felt by those who touch it, except for Cyrus himself, who is rather unaware of that fact. The large spikes cannot be removed at all, only moved around, which allows Cytina to use them as awkward fingers. He cannot feel pain or pleasure from them, but Cyrus does know if an impact was made in his wings.

Their eyes seem to glow bright neon blue in the dark.

They actually have a blue tongue; this is based off the original sprite coloring for shiny Giratina.

The metal on Cytina is pure platinum; as such they are over 600 pounds in weight, but the metal is easily damaged due to being softer then even tooth enamel. Eating is a pain with metal teeth, even if they are sharp.

In terms of pain, Cyrus cannot feel anything on his arms or metal parts. The metal parts are pure metal with no nerves inside them, and the wings are so gaseous that attacks do nothing to them.

Cytina does not get sick as badly as a human or pokemon would. The two conflicting immunities fucks up the viruses so they are less effective.

Cytina can die, however, they’re much like a vampire. Immortal, can live potentially forever, but if they’re damaged enough they will be slain. Their healing is faster then that of a normal humans, although not superhumanly so. Their metal parts heal extremely slowly and is almost unnoticable.

Cytina bleeds black; its actually pure shadow. When it drips from the wound it seems to look almost like tar, but the moment it hits a surface that is not Cytina, it dissolves in a sense. The shadowy splash remains on the ground a moment before vaporizing completely.

Tears and spit however, are neon blue.

Picking up objects in Altered Form is rather difficult if there is no lip for the spikes to balance on. Occasionally, Cyrus has to ask for help with things he simply cannot handle.

Communication

Giratina does not understand human speak well. Well, at least how to actually say words. It can understand sentences said to it, but has issues talking back when in control of the body. Its usually childish wording and clumsy pauses irritate Cyrus to no end.

Given the chance to finally speak though, Giratina will choose to talk to whoever about whatever it pleases. This includes mentioning things Cyrus does not want mentioned if Giratina was feeling especially petty that day.

Giratina and Cyrus communicate mentally with each other. Giratina cannot speak full sentences, but it does project mental images and feelings into Cyrus that he interprets. Giratina uses this as a way of influencing Cyrus’ choices and trying to prevent him from going back to destroy the planet. However this isn't always intentional and can result in Cyrus having impulses to play with poketoys or eat pokemon food.

Cytina can communicate with pokemon, but its exclusively through Giratina. If it was a normal pokemon, Gira most likely won’t try to communicate with it since Cyrus would have to be a middleman. If the pokemon had telepathy, Gira could hold a conversation with them. Cyrus would register this conversation as a headache because he doesn't understand pokemon speak. The only exception to this is if it was from a pokemon like Mewtwo that already can communicate with humans and pokemon alike. Now, if Giratina was in control of the body, Cyrus doesn't get headaches from the communication. Mainly because Gira will directly talk to whatever pokemon is wishes to speak to. However this might result in it using a mix of pokemon speak and human, so it comes out as a garbled mess. Cyrus still doesn't understand what was being said though unless Giratina tried to elaborate it.. Which won’t go well.

[isolaradiale]

"Yeah, well, I can do it by myself," mumbles the young woman who, busying herself at her desk, also takes the time to imitate her superiors under her breath. Mentions of 'the results could be dangerous if you get it wrong' are said to herself in the lone room, the tone one of full on mockery as Capella continues to type away at her brightly coloured keyboard. Despite her angry clacking at the keys, the various stickers attached to the tops of her fingers and knuckles remain in tact.

"Just because I like to spruce things up doesn't mean I'm an idiot--" continuing her rant, it seems that the AI's voice from the computer chanting 'WARNING' over and over again go unheard by the young woman. 

"I'll show them--"

'WARNING. COMBINATION CRITICAL. CONTINUE?'

"Yes! Stop interrupting me now!" yelling quite suddenly, Capella soon stops her venting and stares wide-eyed at the screen. Silence governs the office area for a few moments... Before a smile begins to creep onto her face.

"Oh, well. Would you look at that? A brand new anomaly... One no one has been able to do before! Hehe..."

☆               ★                ☆

Snowfall.

Nothing new about that. The citizens of Spirale would surely look upon the falling snowflakes with little concern, finding it to be the season where such a thing would happen (on an island, somehow). As the evening orange soon sets into a dark grey and eventually, black, the snow continues to fall slowly but surely from the sky. A few citizens might have noticed that something about the snowflakes seemed... A bit different but without having a closer look, nothing could really be detected and thus, onward into their homes did the citizens go for the night, hoping to get a good night's rest.

☆               ★                ☆

Upon waking the next day, however, the citizens would find sheets of ice layered on the ground, houses and any object outside. Funny; no rain had been heard to freeze over, as far as everyone was concerned... But not a big deal, right? Setting out for the day, the citizens go about their business as usual. Though... The ice itself ends up catching the attention of many. It looked like ice but at the same time, it was far too sparkly to be so; far too bright and almost crystalized. If one were to touch it, they, too, would find that it's not particularly cold to the touch like ice normally would be.

Not only that, but it's not... Slippery. Walking on it causes no slips or falls but the odd, uneven texture is apparent through the soles of everyone's feet and shoes. It takes a little bit but eventually, people begin to understand just what this strange 'ice' is, soon realizing it's not 'ice' at all.

The sheets of 'ice' are actually sheets of diamond.

The citizens can notice it now; how the odd snowflakes falling seem to be different and now, they are able to place exactly why. Some try to run back into their houses, hoping to avoid the oncoming ordeal-- only to find that they can't open their doors. The sheets of 'ice' have now become layered over certain areas and in this case, their own housing. Try as they might, there is no way to crack open the layers of diamond to get back inside. Again and again and again do some citizens try to destroy some of the sheets of diamond covering areas and places they need to get to, however, nothing works.

Because nothing is strong enough to cut through a diamond, after all.

☆               ★                ☆

So, what's happened?

Odd snowflakes have started to covered the isle of Spirale, coating some areas in a special sort of 'ice'... However, it's not ice at all; upon closer inspection, you'll see that it's actually sheets of diamonds covering the ground and various other things! No matter how hard you try, these special areas of 'ice' won't break. Even worse, as the 'snow' continues to fall every so often, certain locations and areas of Spirale begin to get closed off.

Wait, what?

Yeah! You know how yesterday you could get into your house and it started to 'snow' when you left this morning? Well, now there's a layer of 'ice' over it and you can't get back in! That sort of stinks, huh? Unfortunately, the 'snowfalls' are randomized so it's not really known when the special diamond flakes will strike next. 

Will the 'snowflakes' and diamond 'ice' affect things other than the environment?

Yes! Long story short, they will also begin to affect the local monsters within the the outer areas of Spirale, such as the Mistwood. Rumour has it that even new creatures resembling diamondized, giant yetis are sprouting from large deposits of the diamondized 'ice', creating even more danger for those who decide to venture outside of the main wards where it's arguably more 'safe'. The ‘ice’ will also accumulate on objects left outside, too, so make sure you know where your weapons and tools are at all times! Unless you want them covered in diamonds, that is...

Will the diamond 'ice' affect my character?

Nope! You're not under the threat of being turned into a diamond person... But you're still in danger from being stranded out in the cold and being attacked by diamondized monsters. Heck, you're also probably in danger of someone else brandishing broken pieces of diamonds and using them as weapons! That also kind of stinks, huh?

Is there any way to break down the diamonds and the diamondized creatures?

As hinted above, yes! If you are able to find already broken pieces from larger diamond deposits (caused by other diamonds themselves falling onto each other), you are able to use those as weapons as you so choose. After all, the only thing strong enough to cut a diamond is another diamond!

My muse slept in when the first snowfall started; are they trapped?!

Essentially you can have the 'snowfalls' affect your housing (or a designated area) after they woke up and came back home. Or maybe they're just trapped inside there until someone else can break them out with the aforementioned, makeshift weapons? That's up to you!

Well, my muse can phase through things and/or teleport; they’re fine, right?

Yes and no! The diamonds are unable to be phased through so no matter how hard you try, it’s just going to look like you’re angry at the diamond deposits. As for teleportation, well... It only works if the place you are teleporting to isn’t completely incased in diamond.

For example; someone’s house is completely covered. In that instance, you cannot teleport inside of the house. However, the library is only half covered and thus, you would be able to teleport to the side that has not been covered as of yet. Think of the diamonds as a sort of neutralizing agent when it comes to abilities!

Do drabbles count?

Yes! However, they must involve your character interacting with something related to the event (whether it be any of the ‘ice’ or the monsters or both) and not simply an in-character reflection or commentary on what’s going on. Drabbles must also be a minimum of 500 words in order to count as event participation.

I have another question!

If you have a general question that wasn’t answered here, or if you have a question about your specific muse or a specific ability in mind, please feel free to send in a message to the masterlist and we’ll answer it as soon as possible!

How long will this event run for?

The event will run until February 5th February 7th at 11:59:59pm!

[toflyandfall]

I just saw a photo of "What persona. Dick Grayson isn't a mask. Not like Bruce Wayne is" from Detective Comics #725 and I find it interesting that Dick and the rest of the bats, with the exception of Bruce, don't wear "masks" per se. They are who they are with or without the domino mask/helmet. The only time I can really think of Dick faking things is when he pretended to be an incompetent BPD cop. How was he able to avoid creating and living, half the time, through a "persona" like "Brucie"?

Oooh, this is a lovely, meaty question.  There’s a lot more analysis of Bruce than I planned because let’s be real, it’s kinda weirder for a guy to run around with half a dozen personas than for someone else to run around as himself.  I hope you still find it interesting, but if you want to skip straight to the more Dick-centric stuff, head under the readmore.

A simple but significant factor is that Dick thrives on the company of people in a way that Bruce does not.  I suspect if you talk honestly to many introverts, you will find they too have an extroverted ‘mask’ they put on to the larger world, though probably not quite so extreme.

Another factor is that the civilian social circles Dick and Bruce travel in are vastly different.  Though they each have a reason for being in those circles, that difference itself enables Dick to escape much of the scrutiny that Bruce’s public identity undergoes, because he doesn’t frequently associate with the much more media-hounded elite.

An interesting thing here is that the large difference in social circles between their civilian lives is actually caused by their own personal similarities: they are 100% committed work-a-holics.  It’s just that they have differing civilian approaches to their goals.

I want to start with Bruce because as you point out, his use of persona is distinct among the bats and his reasons for using them in part explain why Dick and the other bats do not.

Bruce is a child of privilege, he has always lived a lifestyle of privilege, regardless of the tragedies that have occurred during it, and his default view of the world, through no fault of his own, is natively that of the extreme upper class.  This drastically influences his perspective and approach to change, and changing the world is his perpetual goal, the reason he put on the suit in the first place.

Bruce works a top-down society approach toward systemic change, and he works it all the time.  This is actually my favorite but woefully under-emphasized part of him: he is not just someone who punches people on the street ‘for justice’, he uses his company, his money, and his social position toward substantial systemic change. This post does a wonderful job covering the ways he does this through his corporations and personal wealth, as does this one.  I cannot recommend either enough because I constantly want to push even the most casual Batman fans to understand: Bruce Wayne is not just a violent punchy puncher man.  He is a traumatized person genuinely trying to use all his resources including himself to make the world safer.

Detective Comics #725

Bruce has many personas he maintains, and he uses all of them according to what suits his need--Batman for places the law can’t go, Bruce Wayne the CEO pushing for systemic changes, Matches Malone for street information, and Brucie the society high roller for society information and social influencing.  He is rarely ever not in a persona and simply ‘Bruce’.

His top-down perspective of enacting change are what dictated the usage and necessity of these personas. He has the means and capacity to basically disappear from society if he so chose--he in fact does so to train during his younger years so successfully they don’t even know how long he was actually gone. 

The Batman Files

So he doesn’t need the personas.  Not Bruce Wayne, CEO, or Brucie, or any of them really, to protect his identity.  That tells us that Brucie is a deliberate choice he made at some point.  He could have been a recluse billionaire Batman indefinitely.  Even though he fully has the status and means to not maintain a job or a persona or, let’s be frank, a life outside the mask at all, it’s his own work-a-holicness that led to the creation of his public personas.  He’s an obsessive strategist, so if Brucie is a choice, that leads us to why?

Bruce does many philanthropic things with his money, but he isn’t the only rich person around, especially not in a city as old and corrupt as Gotham.   But he’s one of the very few ones doing good with it.

The comic you mentioned has a very beautiful moment where Bruce touches on that, and in full context you can feel how consumed he is by this goal of creating the Gotham his parents would have wanted.  Batman mentions he never sees himself in that place, and the morbid interpretation is that the city kills him before he reaches it, but the hopeful interpretation is that in that shining city, Bruce Wayne and Batman and Brucie and all his masks will no longer be needed.

Detective Comics #725

Back in the old days they’d call it noblesse oblige: the inferred responsibility of privileged people to act with generosity and nobility toward those less privileged. Thomas and Martha Wayne ingrained this feeling of responsibility into Bruce by example, and as all things related to them, he obsesses over it.  It urges him to fulfill expectations within segments of society he finds onorous for the betterment of society as a whole in order to carry out their unfinished works.

Enter Brucie.

Brucie serves a two-fold purpose.  Since Bruce has chosen to maintain personas among society, it becomes a false face to justify any oddities Batman might bring into the life of Bruce Wayne by setting himself up as a eccentric, popular social scion.  But that persona itself also allows him to manipulate the upper crust of society.

I have some insider perspective on the kind of society events Brucie attends.  They’re all about the who’s who of making connections, name-dropping and networking, and unspoken class-based elitism.  Charity events among the upper class have these things at the forefront and the cause is the background.  You don’t get your hands dirty, you don’t go out and make change yourself, you pay money to be socially seen and sometimes it happens to go towards a philanthropic cause.  If you want to raise money from the rich and keep people with deep pockets coming in the door, you have to have social currency yourself. This is where, and why, Brucie comes in.  I believe Brucie ws crafted to maintain Batman’s cover but still attempt to carry on his parents’ legacy to grease the wheels of the rich in the directions he chooses: one of generosity towards those less privileged. 

Superman/Batman #51

The inevitable flaw of Bruce’s approach to his personas and their philanthropy is that in a city rife with corruption, money distributed from the top has many opportunities to disappear well before it reaches the bottom.  As in many of ways they are complements to each other, Dick’s approach balances that out, because his approach to helping his fellow man starts out at the street level...literally.

Nightwing #153 (Nightwing: The Great Leap)

Dick, we know, does not come from privilege.  His mother was from a middle class family before she joined the circus, and despite being world famous athletes, most circus workers are lower to middle class.  The people he grew up with, was comfortable with, were all working folk who expected everyone to pull their weight right alongside each other.  He enacts this everyone-together approach in almost all aspects and phases of his life. 

Batman #615

Even once he had settled into being Robin and adapted to living at the manor, he didn’t feel belonging to a culture of privilege, materialism, or high society. He preferred shotgun in the limo to chat with the driver to riding fancy in the back.  Once he was able to start making his own decisions about where and how he lived, despite having both Bruce’s money and then later inheriting a substantial amount of his own, he chose mostly lower-class communal places.

Batman Black and White #6

Dick also doesn’t see the value of throwing money at a problem when there is an option to fix it with his own hands.  We see this frequently, from building his own car instead of buying a finished one or outsourcing the work, to deciding the best way to clean out the BPD was to start at the bottom and work his way up (literally), to quitting college because his classes never got prioritized over crimesolving.  Most of his day jobs ended for similar reasons. 

Nightwing #153 (Nightwing: The Great Leap)

Despite the showmanship training, he gravitates away from spotlight on the rich and wealthy, who are notoriously the kind of people who do not get their hands dirty or go out and take care of things themselves, and prefers to find or build communities around the kind of people who do.

Finally, Dick is an extrovert.  He doesn’t need to act extroverted as Brucie does because he is extroverted.  He likes people and likes being around people.  Whether by conscious choice or not, he tends to put himself in situations where he is surrounded by people in nearly all aspects of his life.  He chooses apartment buildings whose occupants frequently pass each other on the stairs; jobs that involve interacting with many co-workers, patrons, or students; and collects superhero teammates like Boy Scout badges.  And all of these behaviors come very naturally to him.  

He doesn’t need a mask or a role or a persona for those kind of interactions; his mask is pre-supplied as “neighbor” or “co-worker” or “teacher” by the situations he puts himself in.  It helps make him an exemplary leader, because just by acting authentically to himself, he automatically builds up little communities around him any time he arrives somewhere.

Bruce, on the other hand, is an introvert.  For him, interacting with people isn’t easy, automatic, or comfortable unless it has a purpose, but as a strategist, he knows the necessity of human interaction as a catalyst to achieving dynamic change. So he adapts personas to suit people’s expectations.  Extroverts have more social currency; the life of the party can generate more resources than a brooding wallflower.  

So, it boils down to just a few elements: Dick believes in living and interacting at the street level to accomplish the things that he wants to, and he is extroverted enough that the level of social interaction that entails is not a burden to him.  He surrounds himself with the types of people he is more familiar or perhaps more comfortable with, which happens to keep him further out from the media’s eye than associating with the upper crust does. The lower profile is more incidental than intentional, but it lessens his need to have a cover story for every single bruise and lets him get away with even less of a ‘persona’.

Bruce, on the other hand, is introverted and follows a more classist view that systemic change needs to be effected from the top down.   His personas are more of a self-assumed duty than a necessity, as a way of trying to carry out his parents’ legacy.  Any of his children could have chosen to follow his path in business or the high society limelight, but the sense of obligation toward it is something personal to him that most of them don’t share.

[saiilorstars]

Until That Day (One-shot)

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x OFC

A/N: Inspired one shot by, of course, FATWS. I just couldn't help it. You can also consider this as a prequel to the blurb (We Interrupt this Program) I wrote for them too! It’s fun connecting dots!

Chapter Summary: Since Bucky has failed to answer any of her calls, Chloe Winters decides to pull one over him and simply...meet him. Not everybody can make the once Winter Soldier jump but he does when he sees Chloe at the same restaurant.

Taglist: @ocfairygodmother​ @anotherunreadblog​ @maaaaarveeeeel​​ @stareyedplanet​ @perfectlystiles​​ @lenonizi​​

[If you’d like to be added to this OC’s edits/fics, let me know!]

Chloe’s Masterlist

It actually frightened Bucky how good she was. He had the training of all training and somehow, she managed to frighten him with how good she was. Chloe Winters was always making him feel things he shouldn't.

He actively avoided everybody these days, not because he didn't want to see them but because he didn't know what to do with them if they were around. He was in the worst phase of his life, as bad as it sounded, because for once in his life there was no more fighting. He was done with it and now all he had to focus on was...himself. As it turned out, that wasn't at all something he liked. Even worse, because he had yet to figure out how to go about it, he was pushing others away.

Like Chloe.

There she was, sitting on the other end of the counter with a drink in her hand as she talked with some plain guy (Bucky thought the guy looked horribly plain, anyways). He could believe that she was at the same restaurant by pure coincidence...if he didn't know how she was. And he liked to think that he knew her plenty.

Which is why he thought that guy she was with was exceptionally distasteful.

"Don't scowl, your face will stay like that."

Bucky blinked and looked at the elder man sitting beside him: the one "friend" he technically had at the moment.

Yori had an odd smirk on his face that Bucky didn't often see. "What?" he asked the elder man.

"You're scowling. You don't smile so much but right now your face is in grave danger of getting stuck with that scowl," Yori waved his finger in front of Bucky's face. "What are you staring at?"

Bucky dove his attention to his half eaten food on his plate but in the end his yearning (or perhaps jealousy) betrayed him. His eyes flickered to Chloe again. She was laughing with that guy.

"Aah," he heard Yori hum. "It's about time you know."

"What?"

"I was about to ask Leah if she wanted to go on a date with you—"

"What!?" Bucky nearly choked on his food.

"But you haven't stopped staring at that girl over there." By some miracle, Yori did him the favor of not pointing at Chloe. "She's pretty."

Bucky preferred to ignore the man for the moment. He made a motion for the waitress to see. "Can I get another beer?" As if that was going to have any effect on him.

"You're still scowling," Yori said.

Bucky scowled even deeper. "Am not."

"Are too. All you have to do is go over there and introduce yourself. She'll like you more."

"Yeah, I'm not doing that. We're having lunch and that's—" Bucky stopped, freezing altogether when he saw Chloe was no longer where she'd been. How the hell? He looked around as discreetly as possible but the restaurant was too crowded to spot her...if she even remained inside. Bucky glanced towards the entrance, the walls on either side were blurred with the heavy rain. What if she was gone?

"Your face is going to stay like that," Yori warned again. Bucky snapped out of his thoughts.

At this point, Bucky didn't think there was an actual chance of him not scowling. He accepted the beer from the waitress and didn't hesitate to take the biggest swig of his life.

"Can I get another strawberry pink lemonade, please?" Someone placed an empty glass between Bucky and Yori for the waitress to pick up.

Bucky actually flinched.

Chloe had a cheery smile on her face. She watched the waitress take her glass. "It's not polite to stare," she said suddenly. Her head turned in Bucky's way. "Or scowl, for that matter."

"He does that a lot," Yori said in-between chews.

"Yori," Bucky said. Chloe laughed and unknowingly brought a fuzzy feeling to Bucky's stomach.

"He is sort of a scowler," she agreed with elder man. "You know he used to smolder back in the day."

Yori paused with his lunch to look back at Chloe then Bucky several times. "You two know each other?"

Bucky gave a silent nod of his head. Chloe did the same but with an unmistakable whimsical glint in her eyes.

"I'm Chloe," she introduced herself. "And like it or not—" she threw a more sharpened look at Bucky, "—he knows me." A jab she wanted to take even when every part of her told her it was childish. Well, she might still be a child at heart and he deserved it.

"Here you go," the waitress returned with Chloe's drink.

Chloe was back to smiling like nothing. She thanked the waitress and grabbed her drink. "I'll be sitting over there," she told Bucky, "Make of that whatever you want."

He leveled her look with a wry smile. "Really?"

"He will be there," Yori said suddenly.

Bucky's eyes widened. "Wait—"

"He can be there right now, actually," Yori went on like Bucky wasn't currently begging (silently) for him to stop talking. "You want to have lunch with him?"

Chloe giggled. "No, no, you guys should finish your lunches. I'm a patient girl."

"Dinner, then?"

"Yori," Bucky said again. He was paying for all the times he pushed Steve towards pretty girls. This had to be payback.

Chloe looked between the pair, unable to decide who was the funniest. "We can discuss something later. Please, finish your lunches in peace." She cast an innocent glance at Bucky as she took a sip of her drink. "See yah!" She wiggled her fingers and took off.

"You cannot do that," Bucky was quick to tell Yori when it was just them again. "Why would you do that?"

"Because you were scowling again," Yori shrugged casually. "You already know the girl. It's even easier."

"You can't…you gotta warm up and I haven't danced since 1943…" Bucky had grabbed his beer for another long drink when his words registered in his head. Despite nearly choking, he croaked: "It feels like."

Yes, he did have history with Chloe and even though it wasn't all bad—those moments with her were the few precious memories he fought to keep right on the surface of his mind—he couldn't afford to mess things up even more than he already have.

And yet...

He found himself approaching Chloe after finishing lunch with Yori and the restaurant was less crowded. By that time, Chloe was alone. The guy she'd been talking to was long gone, with any luck. Chloe played with the straw in her drink.

"Took you long enough," she said before he even took a seat beside her. She raised her head, showing off a pretty smile. "For a while, I thought you'd sneak off."

For a moment, Bucky panicked thinking she'd read his mind...even though she technically couldn't. "I...was waiting for your friend to leave."

Chloe hummed. "Carlos is a co-worker."

Bucky actually hated how elated that one sentence made him. The good news is that he was a master of the straight faces. "Oh," he said simply.

Chloe patted the empty stool beside her. "I'm not here to reproach," she said as if she was once again reading his thoughts.

Bucky sat down and watched her call the waitress again for another drink. "Cute drink," he said once the glass was out of Chloe's hand.

She playfully rolled her eyes. "I'm working tomorrow and some of us can, unfortunately, get drunk."

"Is that why your friend was here, then?"

Chloe nodded. "He was explaining the situation."

"Interesting choice of venue..." Bucky remarked ever-so-casually. "I don't know much of S.W.O.R.D. but if they're anything like S.H.I.E.L.D. was, I doubt this crowded place was the right spot for secret missions."

Chloe lifted an eyebrow at him with an innocent shrug of her shoulders. "I've only been working with for a couple years. I don't exactly choose the spots."

Bucky tilted his head at her. She did the same. She could be an excellent mirror when she wanted.

"How did you find me?" Bucky finally asked her. Chloe tapped her left temple with a finger. Bucky nodded. "Of course."

"According to the Hivemind, there was a 99.9% chance of finding you in this location." Chloe thanked the waitress for her new drink. She side-glanced Bucky as she took her first sip.

"That Hivemind needs to mind its business," he told her, for the first time speaking with a light humor in his tone. He knew well enough that Chloe's abilities didn't always work under her control. The Hivemind she was connected to often gave her information she did not ask for. Though he wondered if this precise information had been requested. Did she really come to see him?

Chloe hummed. "Wouldn't that be nice? Of course that would have made my life a little more difficult in the past. Can't be the best hider if I don't know where the seeker is."

Bucky said nothing and gave a mere small nod. For years she'd been on the run from Hydra and was one of the who remained free of them in the end.

"You haven't answered my calls, Bucky," Chloe whispered. All the coolness she'd exhibited so far washed away. Bucky swallowed hard when she met his look and revealed a pair of eyes filled with pain. "You don't text back. You just...don't. Logically speaking, I should take that to mean you don't want to hear from me. If that's the case, I would rather you tell me in person, looking me in the eye."

"Chloe..." Bucky sighed, looking away as if to already defy her request.

"I won't say anything but I just need to hear it in person," she insisted. "After everything, I deserve that. And you deserve to have one less bother."

"You are not a bother," Bucky quickly clarified. She raised an eyebrow, silently asking him what the hell she was then because to qualify as a friend, he would actually have to talk to her. He sighed again. "Everything is just...so hard, okay? I can't get myself together."

"Of course you can't, you've only been here for what? Six months? After 90 years of hell, I expect the recuperation to be a long process." Chloe pushed her drink away from her and leaned towards him. "You and I were screwed over by Hydra. You were a hunter and I was a runner. I ran because I needed to, because I didn't want Hydra to catch me, and you hunted because you had to. You didn't have a choice. All that takes time to process and deal with, I get that, but what I can't figure out is why you won't let me be in your life again? I thought that in Wakanda we'd built something. Friendship, at least."

She was sparing them the almost encounters they had in those 2 years after the Accords. She was on the run again, this time with Steve and the others, but she always came to visit Bucky in Wakanda. It always surprised him to see her back, to see her wanting to spend time with him. He wasn't that stable to have any type of friendship and yet she kept coming back.

Bucky had met a couple women in Wakanda before Chloe, and they'd all been incredibly kind and mindful of his condition...but there was always something about Chloe. Chloe. It wasn't long before he found himself thinking about Chloe more than a friend, more than an aid. She came to help him, to spend time with him and discover parts of Wakanda and in the meantime he found himself falling in love with her.

The stupidest thing he could've done because there was no way they could ever happen.

And yet on a few occasions, they seemed to touch each other more often, longer than they needed to. The way they smiled at each other, their lingering looks...it was too much and sometimes, things happened. Chloe kissed him first. She apologized profusely to him immediately, going as far as saying she wouldn't come back to Wakanda if he didn't want to see her anymore.

The mere thought of never seeing her again scared Bucky like nothing ever had, and that was saying something. He had to kiss her back. She needed to know that she wasn't the only one thinking about things that shouldn't be.

Moments like those seemed to happen more often afterwards.

But they never had time to make anything official.

Then the blip happened.

And the rest was history.

"Bucky, please say something," Chloe said whilst trying to hide the desperation in her voice. "I'm trying really hard to be optimistic but if I'm just reaching, I'll stop and go. I don't want to get in the way of your recuperation. Should I...should I just go?"

And if you are alone, that is the quietest, most personal hell.

The damn shrink had a point and he knew it but it never stung so much before it dealt with Chloe. "...no." The single word had come out of Bucky in a frail whisper.

Chloe paused for a second, her head turning slightly as if waiting for him to take it back. Then, slowly, she straightened up on her stool. "I liked your friend," she said, catching him off guard with the quick change in subject. She pulled her drink back and took a quick sip. "He was cute."

Bucky raised an eyebrow at her. "Should I give him your number?" She laughed and within seconds, he did the same. Just like that, part of the ice between them melted.

"Do you want another drink?" Chloe asked, "Something cute?"

"Would it really make a difference, Chlo?"

Chloe struggled not to show the effect his nickname for her still had on her. She took another drink of her lemonade, a bigger one but she ignored the brain freeze. "Guess not," she mumbled.

Bucky let another moment in silence pass by before he was brave enough to ask her: "Why are you here, Chloe? Really?"

"You don't believe that I'd come to Brooklyn just to see you?" Chloe knew better than to ask. He always tried to be subtle about asking her why she kept coming back to Wakanda. Surely there had to be a better reason than to just see him. Her heart ached a little each time it happened. Bucky was so used to being, well, used that he couldn't straightaway believe somebody would want to visit him just to see him.

"I mean..." Bucky cleared his throat, eyes flickering away from her out of embarrassment, "You're working, aren't you? You've been very busy."

"I'm never busy for you," Chloe said with so much ease that it startled him. Her head turned slightly at him. "I was worried. You weren't answering me at all. Sam says you haven't talked in a long time now."

"I told you, all this...it's hard. I can't afford to be around you guys..."

"But you can afford to be around these people?" Chloe made a good counter-argument. "As sweet as that old man seems to be, he doesn't know you and it can't be easy sustaining a relationship with people you can't be completely honest with. I would know. Ever since I was 17, I've had to hide a big part of myself from people. You, Sam, Steve...you guys are the only ones who really know me. Do you want us to be around?"

"Yes," Bucky answered straightaway, "I mean, eventually...it's just hard." He was a broken record and he knew it. It frustrated him that he couldn't explain himself better. It was why he chose to stay away from people who knew him. It upset himself that he couldn't give them the proper explanations about why he was more reclusive, why he did the things he did. He preferred to spare them the trouble.

"You are not trouble to me," Chloe said quietly.

Bucky looked at her incredulously. "I thought you said you can't read minds."

"There was a 70% chance that you were putting yourself down," she explained with a light shrug of her shoulders, "I connected the rest of the 30% myself."

"That little Hivemind..." He pointed at her, earning a small smile from her.

"See, I'm trouble." Her eyes flashed a bright blue for show.

Bucky laughed shortly. Seconds later, he would realize it was the first honest laugh he had in a very long time. "I would like to say 'no you're not' but I think we both know that you are."

"Hey now," Chloe giggled. "I try to be on my best behavior every now and then."

"Oh, please. If there was ever anyone who embodied mischief, it's Chloe Winters."

"Hey!" Chloe playfully shoved his arm.

Bucky smirked at her. "Am I wrong?"

"You're a jerk!" She huffed. She took a dejected sip of her drink, though a big part of her was in a frenzy. She truly did miss being around Bucky. No matter how dark things were for them, it all seemed to fade when she was around him. They played off each other so easily, neither one had to try too hard. At least that's the way it felt for her. She could only hope that Bucky felt the same.

"I'm sorry," Bucky ended up saying, much like every other time when they bantered. He didn't like the idea of her being upset with him for any reason, even if it was all good-natured fun. He wanted to see her smiling at all times if it was possible.

Chloe rolled her eyes at him. "Sure.."

"C'mon, Chlo..." He reached over for her arm on the counter but when she moved it, he ended up taking her hand instead. He initially froze until the alarms started going off in his head screaming at him to pull back.

Chloe turned her hand underneath his around to hold it. Her fingers slipped between his gloved ones. "Don't pull away, please," she whispered.

Bucky swallowed hard and tried to focus on breathing, just breathing. He had trouble breathing for nightmares and memories but he hadn't had a moment like this since...Chloe. The last time they saw each other, she'd held his hand as well and unknowingly made it completely difficult for him to breathe normally. Even though this time he wore gloves, he could still feel her warmth pushing through the material to touch his skin. That wasn't one of her abilities; it was just her. He wanted nothing more than to touch her for real and feel her fingers against his skin. She always did that to him and she didn't even know it.

"I'm sorry," he felt the monumental urge to say, and perhaps repeat for days to come.

Chloe looked at him from the corner of her eye. She was pretty sure he didn't want her to see him like that. "I'm not here for apologies," she reminded. "Being honest, I was so worried that if I didn't find you, you would ultimately cut ties with me. Forget about me, even."

"I don't think I could do that even if I tried," Bucky stared down at their interlocked hands. Such a simple act was already bringing a rush of memories from Wakanda.

"Sometimes it feels that way," Chloe admitted. "What do you do when I try to call? When Sam tries to call?"

"Chloe..."

"Hey," the waitress stopped by their seats, "Sorry, James, we gotta close up."

Chloe took note that the woman was just being friendly and doing her job so she decided to direct all her irritation towards Bucky afterwards. "You're on a first name basis with strangers instead of caring for the relationships you already have!" She yanked her hand out from under his.

"It's not like that!" Bucky tried to say but she was already leaving money on the counter for her drinks.

"Isn't it?" she demanded. "Your phone's probably full of my unopened texts and unanswered calls. At this point, it's more mine than it is yours!"

Okay, maybe she had that point.

"C'mon, Chloe..."

"You know a lot of people consider me a bother but it would kill me if that's what you thought of me too."

"I already told you that you're not!"

Chloe shook her head and stood up from her stool. She slung her purse over her shoulder. "But you would rather not talk to me yet."

"Again, not like that! Chloe, please?"

Chloe rolled her eyes. Don't get upset, don't show you're upset. Because showing she was upset would probably only make Bucky feel worse. She would swallow her feelings down if it meant helping him get better. For that, it was better if she got going. She had very little self control when she was around Bucky and it was only amplified when he gave her that puppy-eyed look he was giving her right now.

"I should just go, Bucky," Chloe said and took off before he could say something persuasive.

Bucky was quick to follow her. "Chloe! C'mon, it's raining!"

Chloe saw the rain pouring down the windows as she neared the front door. Yeah, maybe it was raining a little too hard, but so be it. "I've noticed but I'm a big girl, I can handle some rain. I'll just call a taxi."

"You're in New York! Even I know it's impossible to get a taxi around here, especially when it's raining!"

Chloe pulled the door open. As soon as she did, she was slapped in the face by the cold air. She peered outside and saw the sky was dark and gloomy. Dammit. "I can walk," she said, plain and simple.

Bucky rolled his eyes. She was as stubborn as ever. "Do you even have an umbrella?"

Chloe's eyebrows raised. No, she did not. "I can walk," she insisted.

"Where!?" Bucky made a gesture at the streets. "It's pouring out there!"

"And yet, we can't stay here. It's fine," Chloe shrugged. "My hotel's, like..." She peered again to get another glimpse of the streets. Her eyes flashed blue as the exact information flowed through her lips. "Ten blocks from here."

Bucky's expression fell flat. "Chloe!"

She groaned. "I'm going!" She announced and walked onto the sidewalk. She regretted it as soon as the cold pellets of water hit her head and shoulders. It was freezing!

"Chloe!" Bucky went after her. The cold wasn't as bad for him. It was almost nothing, honestly, compared to the cold he'd seen in his days.

"I'm already walking!" Chloe flapped an arm to show her good pace. She was quick to bring her arm back to wrap around herself.

"Yeah, I see that, and you're not going to make it 10 blocks on foot!"

"Is that a challenge, Barnes?"

"Noo!" Bucky said fast. He learned early on never to challenge her because even if it was plainly clear that he would win (whether it was due from a physical advantage or he was just better at it), Chloe wouldn't back down. She was very competitive and while it was funny (and perhaps endearing), sometimes she could actually hurt herself. Right now, she may not be in danger except of getting a cold, but he still wasn't taking the chance. "Chloe, compromise time, please." He grabbed her arm to stop her. "Come back to my place and when the rain lightens up or stops altogether, you can go home."

Chloe shifted and not just for the heavy rain falling on her. "You want me to come to your place?"

Bucky knew exactly what he was asking and he stood by it. He already didn't sleep well and knowing that Chloe was on her own in the streets of New York under rain would make it even more impossible to sleep. He had to know that she was safe. "I'm 3 blocks away," he gestured to the street ahead of them. "You're going to get a cold out here."

"I may be cold but that does not mean that I'm going to get sick!"

"Chloe!"

"Fine!" She huffed. "Lead the way I guess."

"I guess?"

She shrugged.

Bucky hid his smile as he started the way. Bickering with her was always fun, especially when she made that face. Bucky looked over his shoulder and smiled to himself again. Chloe was right behind him, her face scrunched into what almost seemed like a pout. That was the face alright.

~ 0 ~

Chloe was shivering by the time they reached the apartment. She'd long ago forgot about putting up a front. Everything went out the damn window when her bones were actually hurting from how cold she was.

"I'm sorry, I don't have extra clothes..." Bucky hadn't really thought his plan through until they were already in the apartment.

"Sh-sh-shirt!" Chloe managed to say. "A-a-and a b-blanket!"

"Yeah," Bucky quickly agreed. He left her standing by the doorway in his haste to find her some warmer clothes.

Chloe let herself wander a few more steps inside. She didn't think Bucky would want any of the neighbors to see her. Plus, it was just damn warmer. She let her bag's strap fell to the floor. It didn't take long to notice how under-furnished the apartment was as a whole. Last time she'd been around, Bucky had just been putting it together...or at least that's what he had told her.

"You're a goddamn liar," she muttered under her breath. He would tell her anything to make her believe he was completely fine transitioning from the calm and peaceful life he had in Wakanda to the busy and noise lifestyle of Brooklyn.

"Hey," she soon heard Bucky call. He was making his way back to her and right away Chloe saw a gray shirt in his hands. "Obviously I don't have anything that'll fit your..." Interestingly enough, the words to describe her figure were lost on him. It wasn't like he'd spent a good part of his time admiring her.

"I-it's f-fi-fine," Chloe promised as she took the shirt from him. She absolutely hated the fact she couldn't talk without shuddering. Here he was acting pretty much normal for himself, making her appear more like a damn fool rather than a helpful friend.

"I left a blanket in the bedroom," Bucky told her.

"Y-you ha-ave those?" She lifted an eyebrow at him as of she were genuinely puzzled.

It took Bucky a short second to realize she was referring to the lack of furniture in the apartment. He rolled his eyes. "You're freezing to death and you still find time to be sarcastic?"

Her smirk was lopsided. "I-I can m-m-multi-task."

Bucky's own lips curved into what seemed like the makings of a laugh. "Chloe Rose, go."

Chloe thanked the heavens her body was too cold to be able to blush. Something about the way he said her middle name always gave her a tingle down her back. It was casual yet a sort of intimacy at the same time. Very few people knew her full name and even then, nobody seemed to say it with the same fondness that Bucky had.

"Oh, and hey Chloe?" Bucky called when she was down the halfway. "There's washing machines downstairs if you, um, want me to do that for you?"

"Wh-what?" Chloe's eyebrows knitted together. "N-No! You're n-n-not d-doing my-my laundry! I-I will!"

Bucky had expected that kind of answer so he took extra pleasure with his response. "Well if you want to go downstairs to do laundry wearing just a man's t-shirt, by all means...go ahead."

Chloe detested the smug grin on his face. "I-I-I f-fucking hate y-you."

"Soo...do you want me to do it then?"

Chloe turned away to keep heading for the room but she stopped right outside the door. "Hey, d-do y-you a-a-actually know h-how to-to use the machines?"

Bucky had also been expecting a jab like that. He was only unsure of when she would deliver it. "I'm not an entire idiot."

"Sure." Chloe pulled the bedroom door open and slammed it shut on her way in.

Bucky stayed right where he was, struggling to keep his laugh quiet and away from her. There were no dark moments when Chloe was around, she proved it every single time she was with him.

~0~

When Chloe returned, she was wrapped in a thick blanket. The t-shirt that Bucky could only do so much covering down to her knees. Her hair was no longer sticking to her face but was in need of a good brush.

Bucky was coming out of the kitchen with a mug in his hand. He'd dried up and changed as well, no doubt having already did the laundry for her. "You're cold so...coffee?" He awkwardly held the mug to her.

Chloe would've laughed at how out of place he looked at that moment if things weren't so complicated. Instead, she walked over to take the mug. "Thanks." She moved past him for the lone sofa chair he had. "How's the laundry?" she asked after making herself comfortable. She'd pulled both her legs up to the chair and wrapped her blanket over, leaving a small gap in the middle to move her arms. "Did you figure out the machines?"

Bucky rolled his eyes. "Yes. It'll be done soon but...I don't think the rain's stopping anytime soon."

"Seriously?" Chloe sighed, glancing at the window on the far end of the room. She could hear the rumbles of the thunder.

"This is yours..." Bucky was coming to hand her purse she'd left behind earlier. "Your phone's been buzzing..."

"Of course." Chloe mumbled a 'thanks' as she grabbed her bag from him. She opened it up with one hand and pulled her phone out. Sure enough, she had a bunch of missed calls from her co-worker.

"Sounds like you're a busy girl," Bucky remarked. On the one hand, it made him happy to see Chloe had rebuilt her life after Hydra and the mess of the blip but on the other hand, it scared him that one day all her business would make it easier for her to forget him altogether. It wasn't a particular fair thought considering his poor efforts to be in contact with her.

Chloe hummed, her eyebrows raising as she went through the unread texts on her phone. "Sometimes, I wish I had the super endurance you people have. Would make everything a little easier."

"You don't need it. You never did."

"Maybe now I do..." Something flickered across Chloe's face after reading one text. The crease of worry marked her forehead.

Bucky long ago learned to recognize it. "Is the mission big?"

"I don't know," Chloe looked up to meet his gaze, "I was just getting preliminary details from Carlos at the restaurant and suddenly now we have concrete facts."

"How bad is it?"

Chloe's shoulders half-shrugged. "Dunno. Something about New Jersey and Wanda? I don't know but I have to be there by tomorrow night."

"You need to leave right now?"

"Not in this rain—nothing takes off in this weather. I'll just get back to my hotel no matter what."

"Chlo, you can't. It's pouring and it's getting late. I can't let you go like that! It's New York!"

"But—"

Bucky raised his hands in front of him. "I know I haven't been the best to you but let me try to mend some of that by keeping you safe for tonight."

Chloe smiled softly at him. "You don't have to do that. I don't expect that from you, from anyone actually. I can take care of myself."

"I have no doubt but it's raining, Chloe. Please? Stay here and first thing in the morning I will personally walk you to your hotel."

"Again, you don't really have to—"

"Chloe!" Bucky relaxed when she smirked.

"Sometimes it's fun poking at you, but okay, I'll stay. Thanks."

Bucky nodded. "I know I don't have much but I do have a bed in the room so you can stay there."

"Yeah, I saw it..." Chloe also saw that it was perfectly made, almost like it hadn't even been touched at all. She wondered how long it'd been since he slept there. "Sure you don't want to take it? I'm not a stranger to sleeping on the floor, or couch for that matter."

Bucky shook his head. "Use it. I'll stay out here." Chloe lifted an eyebrow at him. She said nothing for a couple minutes but her stare was more than Bucky could handle from her. "What?" he eventually asked.

"You know I used to stay with Steve with sometimes back before S.H.I.E.L.D. fell. I used to think he was such a gentleman letting me sleep in his bedroom while he took the couch...until I realized that he didn't really want to sleep in his bed." Chloe watched Bucky shift on his feet. It was uncanny how the story repeated itself in different versions. "I asked him why that was. I mean, again, I've pretty much slept everywhere while I was on the run, and he confided me years later that the bed was too...soft. There were things that I couldn't understand but overall I got the gist that simple things like that weren't...as simple as I thought. They came with more meanings that, if you haven't seen certain things, you wouldn't really get it. I'm sorry that I don't get it but I'm here if you need something from me."

Bucky swallowed hard with her heartening expression. He could crawl into a hole at that moment and yet he wouldn't be able to do it knowing that it would take away that same heartened expression from her. "Chloe, I...I know you want to help and I'm thankful for it, I really am, but I'm just not sure what I need yet..."

Chloe nodded. She raised her free hand up to him and motioned him to take it. Bucky hesitated but the more Chloe pleaded with those eyes of hers, the closer he found himself to her until his flesh hand finally reached hers. The coffee and the blanket were definitely helping because she was much warmer than she'd been earlier.

"Whenever you figure out what I can do for you, give me a call," she said. "Give me a call, a text, even if it's small, okay?"

"Yeah," Bucky whispered. "It's...it's kind of hard to admit it's strange that people—mostly you—want me to talk to you that badly." His eyes were glued to her hand and he was acutely aware that despite holding her hand with his flesh hand, he was hesitant to squeeze or grip it.

Chloe's wry look went right over him. "Don't get all cocky with me," she warned.

"Asking me not to breathe, doll," he said automatically. Chloe smiled at the entire exchange. They'd started it in Wakanda and it would apparently continue even when they weren't exactly in the same places as they'd been before.

She squeezed his hand as much as she could. All plays and jokes aside, she met his eyes. "I've already lived in a world where you didn't exist. It was terrible. I don't want to repeat that again."

Bucky nodded silently. Her words carried a heavy weight that, as terrible as it sounded, he hadn't yet thought about. He was the first to disappear during the blip and that was that. Next thing he knew, he was back in Wakanda wondering where the hell everyone had gone. He fought some aliens and now he was in New York again.

For Chloe, the blip had happened and she was forced to live through the 5 years of disaster that followed because half the population had disappeared. She didn't get to magically go from one spot to the next. She had to come back to New York, figure out what the hell to do and then try to do it. Nothing was fixed because the blip was reversed, she still had to figure out how to live with the fact everyone was back now and at different places than where they used to be.

They were the prime example.

They used to be on a whole other level with each other before the blip. She would come by to Wakanda to see how he was doing and then spend days with him doing, admittedly, stupid casual stuff with him. They had fun with each other then; they had been finding their rhythm and sync and he liked it so much.

Now here they were, acting almost like strangers. It hurt her and it sure as hell hurt him too. He couldn't live like that. Whatever happened, he wouldn't be able to live like that.

"Hey Chlo, why don't you go rest?" He held his hand out for her to take. "Busy girl needs her sleep, right?"

Chloe playfully rolled her eyes at him. "I suppose I should for the mission but, really, what the hell could New Jersey have in store for me?" She chuckled and took Bucky's hand, allowing him to pull her up from her seat. "You'll be okay here, then?"

"Yeah." Bucky took her coffee mug from her and gestured the hallway for her. "I'll get your clothes for you later and leave them at the door."

Chloe agreed and headed for his room. She would find that the bed was truly neat and tidy, too much to have been used at least in the past weeks. She sighed to herself. She wasn't even going to pretend like it was shocking. All it did was break her heart. Instead, she made herself comfortable under the sheets and rested her head on the fluffy pillow. Her last thought before she dozed off was a lament that nothing around her smelled like Bucky.

~ 0 ~

When the scream echoed into the room, Chloe didn't initially realize that it wasn't her. She thrashed in the blankets over her trying to calm herself down until it clicked that she was already calm. She'd just been startled.

Two seconds flat is what it took her to jump out of bed and run out of the room. She sprinted to a stop in the living room, eyes wide and scanning the area for an immediate threat. The television was lit but on mute (she had to wonder if keeping it on mute had been for her sake this night) and across was Bucky, wide awake.

He had a nightmare, Chloe concluded. He was breathing far too heavily and even though it was dark, she was sure that he was sweating. She'd seen it all before. To Bucky's dismay, this wasn't the first time he woke her up in the middle of the night because of a nightmare. Some nights in Wakanda had seen the same thing.

"Bucky?" Chloe approached him cautiously.

"Go back to sleep," he didn't hesitate to say. He forgot who he was dealing with.

"You know I can't." She took a few more steps forwards and stopped a couple inches from his side. She bent down in her spot, trying to be the utmost careful with him. "Please, can I stay with you for a couple minutes?"

He was staring at the ground. He couldn't face her. "Go back to sleep," he insisted, though this time he put an effort not to make it sound like an order.

"I can't sleep," she said simply. "I won't talk if you don't want me to. I know I have a big mouth but I'll keep it shut, I promise."

To her delight, and frankly to Bucky's surprise, a small laugh slipped through his lips. He blinked at himself for it and shifted away from Chloe. He was more self conscious than ever.

Chloe knew that too and she wondered if he'd forgotten that this wasn't new to her either. His lack of clothes wasn't effecting her. The only new thing would be the now clear sight of the vibranium arm of his but truthfully all Chloe cared for was helping ease his nerves.

"We can use my powers," Chloe offered to him. "You know that I wouldn't be able to see your nightmares and I wouldn't get any details unless you open that door for me."

Bucky shook his head silently.

She sighed. "Bucky, let me help you. We can try for one minute and if you don't like it, I will go to my room—your room—and not come out until morning. I swear."

"Chlo, you don't have to do anything for me." Bucky finally looked back at her. "You shouldn't have to."

"Why not?" she challenged him to come up with a good answer. "Why shouldn't I want to help somebody I care for? Wouldn't you do the same for me?"

"That's not fair..."

"But it's an honest question. One minute, please?"

Bucky would end up agreeing for his own sake at some peace. Chloe's abilities were strange in that they allowed her to help people with internal issues. Chloe peacefulness they had dubbed it. She'd done it many times for him and for others in the past.

Chloe moved in front of him and sat on her knees. She held her hands out to him, palms facing up. "C'mon," she whispered.

"But my hand..." Bucky opened and closed his vibranium hand. All the times before had Chloe helping him with his flesh hand (his only hand at that time). "It's circuitry..."

"And? It's connected to you." Chloe smiled encouragingly and wiggled her fingers for both of his hands. He reluctantly agreed and slid his hands over hers.

Like always, he closed his eyes and tried to relax. It was probably the hardest part of the process but he always ended up doing it. He used to admit to himself that it was mostly because of Chloe but she wasn't going to hear that now. A light blue glow started from Chloe's hands and it slowly enveloped Bucky's. He could feel that relief flourish in his body. Everything he had seen in his nightmare began to wash away. The weight from his shoulders would lift for a moment and let him feel other things, the things he didn't have a luxury to with all the darkness he carried.

And since Chloe was right there, most of his feelings were directed towards her. They rushed up and suddenly, he felt a lump in his throat.

Chloe thought she was hearing things in the beginning. It was usually dead silent when she and Bucky did this. She cracked open an eye and was surprised to see Bucky's face was scrunched up. "Oh my...Bucky?" He pulled his hands out of hers so quickly that it startled her.

"I'm sorry." He wanted to turn away from her but she was just as quick.

"Hey!" She grabbed onto his wrists as best as she could. "It's me. You don't have to hide tears from me." He still didn't want to face her but she moved her hands up to his face to keep him from looking away. "Stupid question but did I make this happen?" she asked. "Because if I did, I am so sorry. Sometimes these powers get away from me and I do more harm than good."

"It's not your fault," Bucky mumbled. He sniffed. "There's...there's so much in my head that there's literally no room sometimes. Your powers—they make the room. Suddenly I'm getting to feel the things that I can't feel all the time." New tears pricked his eyes. "I don't know what to do with them."

Chloe nodded. "Okay! Okay!" She couldn't take it so she hugged him. Surprised and all, Bucky froze. Chloe's arms were wrapped around his neck, her body pressed against his bare chest and head resting beside his. "I'm here," she whispered to him. "I'm here." It was a silly thing to say considering if anybody could keep anybody safe it was him. She just needed him to know and understand that she would try to help him as much as she could and as much as he would let her.

Bucky slowly moved his flesh arm over her back. His other arm slipped under her hair to rest over the back of her neck. She was here and he didn't realize how much he truly needed her until right now. He missed having her that close to him. He missed smelling her sweet floral scent when they hugged. He loved her—he needed her.

"I'm sorry, Chloe," he said.

She pulled back a little, perhaps a mistake because they were a lot closer than she thought they would be. "For what? Dealing with stuff?"

"You're just so...kind, you know? From the very start." His hands touched her cheeks. He couldn't even begin to explain what he felt when Chloe smiled sheepishly at his touch. She didn't even flinch with the vibranium hand.

"Well, to be fair, you are kind of funny," she said. "I like funny guys."

Bucky laughed with her. He lowered his metal hand to his side. "I do try sometimes."

"Oh, I know you do. I've heard the stories." Chloe looked at him softly. "I'm always up to hear more. Any of your stories."

Bucky smiled at her. He tucked a curl behind her ear. "Maybe that would be nice. One story a week."

"Why only one?" she pouted.

"Because you're a busy girl."

"I'll make time, I promise."

"For me?"

Chloe deadpanned him. "Don't belittle yourself in front of me. I'd do anything for you."

There she went smiling again. Bucky couldn't ignore it this time. He closed the already tiny gap between them with a kiss.

Chloe was surprised but only because she hadn't expected him to initiate things this time. She was guilty of initiating many of their moments in Wakanda. Sometimes she wondered if his 40s origins would sooner or later think she was too forwards.

But he never thought that.

She was guilty of loving him too much and letting her feelings take charge. She rested her hand on Bucky's cheek and smiled with red cheeks that were hidden in the darkness of the room. Before any words were said, she kissed him again. Her hands lowered to his shoulders then came to wrap around his neck. Bucky pressed her body flush against his and for a moment allowed his feelings to take charge as well; a luxury he didn't have and whatever little moment he was granted, he would take advantage of.

And when he heard her laugh, muffled as it was before they parted, it was like his already heightened senses had been lit on fire.

Chloe was smiling both to herself and the situation. "I don't think that was the best of my decisions," she said sheepishly.

"I don't know, it seemed pretty good to me," Bucky said. It made Chloe laugh a little again. "They always are."

"Yeah, but those were different times, Bucky. It was Wakanda. Everything was more peaceful for you. The things we did and said might not have a standing today."

"I don't regret anything I said to you," Bucky said, wanting to leave that clear for her. "I struggle with everything right now, yes, but I still stand by everything I said to you."

"Everything?" Chloe finally looked him in the eyes.

Bucky nodded. "I love you, Chloe."

Chloe bit the inside of her cheek to hold back the stupid tears she felt pricking her eyes. "Am I...am I still your girl?"

A smile tugged at Bucky's lips. "If you want to be. I'm not exactly at my best..."

"You're trying," Chloe said, leaning her forehead against his. Bucky closed his eyes and focused on the warmth of her body and the touch of her hand on his shoulder. "And one day things might feel better for you. I'll be there if you want me to, and I want to. For now, can I stay with you for the rest of the night?"

Bucky's eyes snapped open. "What? No! No, go...you should go back to the room and rest. I can handle this, I promise."

"I trust that you can but I want to be with you," Chloe said. "Plus...don't laugh but I don't really like the rain when it's going hard."

"You don't like thunder storms?"

"I said don't laugh!"

"I'm not!" Bucky wasn't laughing at all but his smile seemed close to turning into one.

"Can I stay, please?"

Bucky ultimately nodded. He wouldn't deny that having her sleep right beside him would definitely help ease the nightmares. And, like she said, she was afraid of the storms so...they were helping each other out.

Chloe beamed (though Bucky didn't miss the brief relief that first marked her face) when he patted the spot beside him. She crawled to the spot and together they laid down. Bucky pulled the blanket over them but more on Chloe's side. She had scooted closer to him, her back to his chest. Little by little, Bucky moved his vibranium arm over her body. The idea was that if anything happened, he would be able to better protect her this way. And that's really what he wanted to do with his new life: be close to her and protect her. That's what his girl deserved.

Tomorrow she would wake up and leave to New Jersey for some mission but this time, when she left, Bucky promised himself and Chloe that he wouldn't let her go. She wouldn't disappear like he had made it before. They would talk more and see each other more. Because one day, they would be together again. For real this time. Until that day, he would try to make himself better for himself and her.

[bad-rper]

Your OC as a raid boss and all the fun details about location, phases, and abilities. (Glade)

There's two versions I can do. Normal Glade and Bad End Universe Glade.

Normal Glade -

Premise/Location: Possibly anywhere. If there was a raid of Stormwind encounter he'd be protecting the shop, he could be part of a council-type encounter with The Boys anywhere in Azeroth, or maybe just wandering on his own and chooses to do battle because he's bored/pissed. Likely more light-hearted and to-the-tired instead of to-the-death, unless the objective is to kill what he's protecting.

Abilities/Mechanics:

“CLANG!” - A wound-up overhead strike. Targets a random player in the group and follows the target as they move. Other players should line up along the path (shown as an arrow on the ground) to mitigate the shockwave damage caused by the strike.

Whirlwind - It’s whirlwind. Either countdown and melee gtfo or just more-or-less unavoidable damage that happens every once in awhile.

Predator’s Mark - Tank swapping mechanic--applied to player with the highest threat, increasing his damage output on them as it stacks.

“Bullshit” Buster - Charges a random caster and hoists them by the neck into the air. During this, they are silenced and require focus heals as their health will plummet quickly.

Berserk - Is what it says. At 20%> health his haste increases and his cooldowns reduce.

Also not a fight mechanic but if a female player /winks, /flirts, or /kisses at him, he’ll do the /kiss animation back.

Loot Table:

The Sayaadslayer - The large hunk of iron he wields allegedly deemed a greatsword. Crafted by Gladeriel’s mother, he alleges he slew scores of sayaad in the second and third invasions of the Burning Legion with its brutal might. (Canonically not the real thing unless he's killed.)

Gladeriel’s Lucky Chopsticks - Trinket. Gladeriel’s go-to pair for eating ramen before a great battle. They’re mismatched from two different sets and splintered to hell, but they “retain the flavor”.

Ring of Machismo - Ring. Given (or torn?) from Glade’s ear. A simple, thick, silver piercing that can likely fit as a pinkie ring for smaller races.

Quotes:

Aggro: “Mess with the saber: you get the claws!”

Ability: Bullshit Buster - “Quit your yappin’.” / “I’m takin’ care of this.”; “CLANG!” - “EAT... THIS!”

Killing player: “You can’t do it, kid!” / “You weren’t even tryin’!” / (Wipe) “What’re you gonna do, cry about it?”

Death: (Beaten) “This is... bullshit... Hhh.” / (Death) “I can... Keep fightin’... I can’t stop... Not while... *death noise*”

Satyr Glade -

Premise/Location: Glade succumbed to demonic influence and 'blessed' with the satyr curse. Who was once a protector--even if for only insular interest--is now a violence-lusting defiler. No set location either, likely a domain ruled by a Succubus or commanding Shivarra.

Abilities/Mechanics:

Though Gladeriel still is either seen with his sword or it is used as a set piece, he is unarmed in all mechanics.

Feral Frenzy - Similar to his “Bullshit” Buster mechanic from before but to any class. Pounces on a random player, swiping them in an uninterruptable flurry over several seconds.

Blood Slake - Succubus-subjugated slaves are released from their confines/portaled into the arena. With a short debuff that enthralls them to walk to Glade, he will crush them and regain health should they reach him. They can either be killed by the party or CC’d until the debuff expires and run away.

Defiled Path - Periodically, the stage area will be reduced with DoT ground from underneath Glade’s hooves, caused by an AoE stomp with a small knock-back effect. Position wisely.

Demonoid Phenomenon - At 20%>, he’ll transform into a perverted cross between a saber form and a satyr. Damage and haste increase as well as gaining a couple new mechanics:

Communicable Cruelty - A random player (not in the top two threat levels) will be inflicted with this curse. It increases the damage they deal by 100% but, after 5-10 seconds, will MC them. Cannot be cleansed.

Bloody Roar - A casted ability that is more-or-less an interrupting shout. Casters interrupted by this are silenced for 3 seconds.

Also, like with the other version, there is a reaction to being /wink’d, /kiss’d, or /flirt’d by a female player. Instead it’s an /y, voiced quote saying either “Hit me up after this--if you survive.”, “Gonna have to focus you. Your friends can watch.”, “You single? If not, I’ll fix that.”

Loot Table:

The Sayaadsworn - The Sayaadslayer corrupt. Does not glow with any ugly bright green as one might expect but, rather, splattered in coats of blood. Chiefly purple blood.

Blessing of the Son - Neck. A metallic ‘X’ dangling from a simply beaded string of leather. The metal is almost pure white as it shines. At night, it seems to absorb the moonlight.

Expanse - A dagger of some notoriety, forged by a long-forgotten practice. Its pristine blade is made of a metal so pure that it rejects any wear, sliding easy through flesh and cleanable by a mere flick. Missing its mate.

Quotes:

Aggro: “Let the night of blood begin!”

Ability: Feral Frenzy - “You!”; Blood Slake - “Lookin’ like a snack.”/“That’s right, come to Gladdy!”/(low health) “FASTER!”; Demonoid Phenomenon - “With this gift, I can do what those pansy-ass druids couldn’t!”

Killing player: “Worthless.” / (female player, rarely) “What a waste.” / (by proxy via Communicable Cruelty) “Don’t lie to yourself... It gave you pleasure.” / (wipe) “*inhale* Haven’t felt this good in decades.”

Death: “Finally... free.”

[wuyifankris]

Kris Wu in Harper’s BAZAAR, July 2020 Issue

“Only when there’s improvement, will you feel alive.”

"A person with his own way of thinking" - more and more people see this in Kris Wu. From starting off with films to continuing on with variety programs, he has skilfully executed his roles with a sense of control, clear self-recognition and steadiness. We see a young man who goes along the path set with his own rules, has definite goals, is dedicated to work, and is constantly improving. In several months' time, Kris Wu will be thirty years old. BAZAAR invited him to share more about his story, and discuss about the past twenty nine years of his life.

In this world, one must be full of vigour

If this is a letter for myself, I think I'll say: For the past twenty nine years of my life, I've lived a life with no regrets. Every task I've done, every decision I've made, the experiences at at every stage of my life, the honour, the applause, the slander... are all indispensable in my journey of growth.

Regretting is painful, and it's hard not to regret. I am well aware that I'm lucky in this aspect. But whether or not I regret, in the end, it all depends on myself.

I have a very straightforward attitude when it comes to my life. I will only do the things that I'm sure I want to do, anything else or other less than ideal alternatives simply do not exist in my field of consideration. Only little kids will have endless choices and dilemmas, as an adult one should set their goals at the highest standard and focus on accomplishing it well.

Therefore, there was never a "Plan B" in my life. I would never prepare a second plan for myself. I feel that this trait of mine is typical of Scorpios, as long as I am set on doing something, I will make sure it's done to the best that I can.

You'd ask, what kind of preparations will I make? Everything. I'll do every kind of preparation that comes to mind. I will be deep in thought about it every moment, every minute, every second, and even in my dreams. This is the kind of focus and effort I give towards my goals.

Before turning thirty, I have already found a very good balance. I'm getting closer towards it, and my goals in life are clearer.

But the "most important things in life" are not set in stone, and change at every phase. I will set long term goals and short term goals. For example music - music is very important to me, it's something which I have invested a lot of time in that I love and am passionate about. At the same time it's my career, my job. So of course, I will continue pursuing it. However, at the same time, this doesn't mean that there aren't any other parts in my life with new directions and new goals. Like racing, it's something that I really enjoy now. I will also continue to set new goals for  myself for small things such as this.

I have always strongly believed in setting and following goals, and it is because of them that I am motivated to constantly improve. But thinking about my life as a whole, I'll refrain from prematurely setting an ultimate aim for certain things. Instead, I will maintain an open mind and allow myself to constantly aim for new goals. Also, at any point in time I will not allow myself to become someone without any goals.

Persistently setting goals for yourself and ceaselessly moving forth is the way one can continue to live youthfully and enthusiastically. I think that this is also a good way to maintain a positive mindset. Only when there's improvement, will you feel alive. Otherwise, there may not be much motivation in your life, and it could become very dim.

Since we are in this world, let's live this life with vigour! This has always been my attitude towards life.

Amidst all the recognition from others, your inner voice is what matters the most.

You have to take control of your life

As one gets older, they will gradually realise that although judgements from others may affect a person externally or mentally, this is merely the icing on the cake.

When you work hard, you will receive honour and recognition. But amidst all the recognition from others, your inner voice is what matters the most. Whether you believe the things you do are meaningful or not, whether through doing them you can obtain value, it's your opinion that far outweighs other matters.

So I feel that for many situations, regardless of the outcome, regardless of how much honour and success it brings to you, what's even more important is whether you have enjoyed the process or not.

To me, music is a very good way of expressing myself and allows me to make a mark in history. It allows me to express certain things that cannot be put into words, which can invoke an emotional response from the listener. Listeners who resonate to the song will be drawn towards it, and as a result of our shared similar experiences, bring about "us".

Perhaps one day I'll get old, or not be in this world anymore, but throughout my whole life, all the music I've made will remain, and will still continue to reach people, whether they're still young or already aging. This is really meaningful and important to me. This is a joy that I have found in music, it's a motivation that will spur me on to continue to improve in this area.

Furthermore, you guys will be able to see a very clear storyline and path of growth in my works, which includes my passion towards hip hop now, as well as my love for traditional Chinese style. As I move forth in life, I continue to incorporate my observations and thoughts [into my music] progressively. When you guys look back on my works, you'll be able to find the answers in them.

My love for music has led me to be deeply immersed in related industries as well. Why do I like fashion? It's because fashion is closely linked to music. When I like one industry, I'll pick up all the skills that I can that are possibly linked to it. From singing to dancing, acting, fashion, producing music, writing lyrics, and even taking up directing roles at times. I hope that I can pick up all sorts of skills that are associated with the things I like. After all, it's always good to have more skills.

The more you know, the more you will want to treat the things you're most interested in with the greatest detail of effort and professionalism, as well as open explore new possibilities. Even if one day I am no longer a "popular celebrity", I will still find a place for myself in this world. I can also take a step back behind the scenes and lead the life that I want to live. I feel that this defines a person's values and worth. With such skills and confidence I feel that I can continue to navigate on this path towards the unknown. This is probably why I don't get anxious too easily too.

So you see, it's your interests that will carry you along to further places. These interests are a part of life. Your life is still in your hands, you have to take full control of it. Do the things that you want to do, let the things you truly believe in lead your way. This is what matters the most.

So if you ask what I'm chasing, I'll tell you that I'm chasing the lifelong mindset of non-stop improvement.

I constantly feel as if I'm in the middle of the ocean, not knowing when deadly waves will arrive.

30 is just a number

Actually I don't think that just because I'm turning 30, I've matured a great deal. There are many stages in life from birth till now that have made me grow. Perhaps every two years I'll encounter a somewhat major life problem or unforeseen circumstance.

I constantly feel as if I'm in the middle of the ocean, not knowing when deadly waves will arrive, nor knowing when it will turn calm and tranquil. Perhaps in the blink of an eye the waves become rough and choppy at night, and the next moment at dawn the skies are clear. This is already the norm in my life.

As a result, this cultivated my mindset from very early on in life. My moods wouldn't fluctuate that much, perhaps starting around 20 years old I was already pretty calm and stable. It also wasn't because I was at this age that I began to treasure time even more and work extremely hard, as I had always put in so much effort all this while.

30 years of age is just a number. I'll tell myself, I'm already 30 years old, I have to be more stable. But in fact, I did not define what I wanted to do in certain stages of my life merely because I reached a specific age. I feel that I shouldn't be affected by a "midlife crisis". At age 30, it's still early, after living for another 10 years it probably won't be considered middle aged. Even at that age, one should not use terms such as middle aged, youth, elderly, young person and such to define the stages in your life.

You should define what you want to do at each stage in life. Continue doing what you want to do according to your own pace and you will be fine. As for the things beyond our control - I used to dream of being a professional basketball player, but due to an injury it was not possible. Let it go if it can't work out, there will always be regrets in life.

Gains and losses, strengths and weaknesses are all often experienced in life. Missing something or messing it up it also part of life. When life isn't perfect, you don't have to beat yourself up over it. Because when you begin to do so, your whole system may break down and you won't be able to efficiently think of ways to solve the problem, and things may end up spiralling downwards.

If it's not done well, then continue to try, or switch to an alternate route. Don't rashly choose to berate yourself.

This isn't vanity or arrogance, but a form of self-awareness. If you wish to lead a happier life, you must possess a sense of self-awareness. No matter where you go, you have to stand behind yourself with utmost support, and be your number one fan. You have to say out with confidence: I think I'm still not bad.

Actually, I feel that during this stage in life, I am most curious about the things that I can't do well. The more I can't do something well, the harder I want to work on it. Once I've accomplished it through further determination and actions, I have once again levelled up.

But before that, I definitely have to be interested in the task. If it's something I don't like, no matter how good it is, I won't be envious of it.

This is a form of respect towards myself. Life is short, we shouldn't make do with too many compromises, nor should we waste it.

No matter how good an era is, if you're not in it, it can't be considered good. An era that doesn't include you is meaningless.

There are blazing flames in my heart

There are some people who may think that since debut I was a super idol, a big celebrity that's worlds apart from my peers. But that's not the case, my personal life isn't too different from other young people. I enjoy going out on my own, without a driver, bodyguard or babysitter... and I'll also go out with non-industry friends to shop, eat, and play basketball. I was able to lead the life that everyone had, there was just a little gap due to my career.

Setting aside career, I am someone who is very close to the era of 90s kids.

I feel that this is a very good era, of course, it's not because this era is a certain way that makes it good or not. I believe that: As long as it's an era that I exist in, it's a good era. No matter how good an era is, if you're not in it, it can't be considered good. An era that doesn't include you is meaningless.

Obviously, I still maintain this mindset with blazing flames in my heart. I still believe I'm a simple and pure person, otherwise I won't be racing cars at this age all of a sudden.

However there are many ways to define "pure", and many people believe that when a person is said to be pure, it's because they are good - have not encountered much, is a good boy, a great kid - then I'm obviously not someone who appears to be one.

But I believe that the meaning of pureness extends beyond this.

True pureness exists within your heart, it's whether you have undivided focus towards the things that you are passionate about, leaving behind all other reasons, whether you are still able to put in effort into the things you love, whether you are able to understand this world simply, whether you can treat every person you meet with sincerity, and whether you can face the world with a childlike gentleness and curiosity.

We all feel that once we step into the adult world, everything immediately turns boundlessly complex. But true pureness is understanding all of your past experiences. With such events and turbulent times, if you can continue to maintain pureness in your heart, you are pure.

This is the kind of pureness I possess. 

Perhaps it's because my goals in life are constantly changing, and small goals are constantly emerging, so I have always lived a life that's pulsing with vitality, and my galaxy is still blazing. Perhaps it's because I have gone through certain experiences, which surprisingly widened my heart.

Looking forward in life, perhaps I may encounter some stress when I reach 40 years of age. But I feel that even if I'm 40, I'll still be a very cool person, still continue to take part in car racing, and stay immersed in my studio making music. I also think that at that time, I'll probably slow down my pace in life.

Perhaps I'll spend more time to really feel this world at present, travel to places I've never been before, explore more and see more, discover life, experience life.

I believe that [when I reach] that time I will have an entirely different mindset than what I do now. I'm still nervous now because there are certain aspects that I am lacking in. I'm looking forward to having that mindset.

But right now, at 30 years of age, I'll take my blazing flames along with me and race forth!

translation: @wu_yi_fan

[fridlyckans0]

Training Your Dog Humanely: Part One

Welcome the Dog to the Human World

Have you ever watched The Dog Whisperer and thought, 'Wow, that guy is amazing! What a great way to train a dog!" I know I have many times. Cesar Milan teaches one basic principle about dogs - a dog is a pack animal by instinct. According to Cesar, your job is to become the pack leader, a dominant Alpha male/female with 'balance'. I guess by 'balance' he means you should treat the animal fairly, as they would expect to be treated in a wild pack. He gets very good and fast results with this method. I won't say it's a bad method, but it's not the way I choose to train my dogs and here's why.

There's one thing very wrong with the 'you're the pack leader' concept - it assumes the dog inhabits a dog's world, and for you to control it, you must behave as a dog would, the Alpha male or female of the pack. For the majority of dogs who are family pets this means the owner will treat the animal as though it had only instinctual processes going on in its head, no rational thought processes. To refute that thinking go and watch these two short videos of Lucy's behavior: Lucy Remembers Her Ball and Lucy and The Vacuum Cleaner (links appear at bottom). A dog does not inhabit a dog's world unless it's in a pack of dogs, roaming the wilderness like a wolf, bringing down prey and sharing its kill. This is not your dog. Your dog wouldn't chase its supper if it went hungry for a week! It would no more kill a raccoon and rip its flesh apart than would your six year old child! If you do have such an animal it's a sure bet that it's a dangerous dog, one that causes people in your neighborhood to cross the street to avoid.

If you become the pack leader, you've descended into the dog's world. Having done so, the dog will integrate well with other dogs, live in a pack happily, know its place in the human pack, and generally behave well, but it won't reach its full potential. When you adopted the dog into your family, you didn't decide to become a primeval growler, (which can work if you have the cahones to back up the threats), you decided to introduce an animal into the human world. As the two videos show, Lucy is an animal with human-like tendencies developed to the full potential of her smaller dog brain. She, like 99 percent of dogs today, belongs to a family, has been introduced to human concepts, and lives in a human world. It's better that you train your dog to live well in your world, rather than you in its, for the sake of the dog and yourself. You will have a much better companion, and so will the dog. The dog will learn to love humans above dogs.

Lucy is a thinking dog. Lucy will position herself at the ready depending on where a person places their foot behind a ball. She correctly anticipates which way the ball will be propelled by the positioning of the foot. She also cheats quite badly, arriving at the destination of a tossed toy before it gets there. Her brain has computed where you're likely to throw or kick an object. Lucy knows which way you will kick a ball simply by shifting your weight from one hip to the other, without even moving your feet! Better than a goalie in football (soccer).

Lucy knows several hundred concepts and commands, from Jump In The Boat, to Don't Go In The Street. She rarely plays now but when she was younger I would throw her ball into the street (a rural highway) and when she realized the ball had gone out of reach, rolling into forbidden territory, she would put on the brakes and stop before crossing an imaginary line. That line used to be a piece of yellow rope lying across the driveway about 20 feet from the street. After she learned the concept the rope was taken away, she was allowed to go out to pee on her own; I could trust her not to go past the imaginary line. That concept, Don't Go In The Street, is central to a dog being able to live happily in the human world. It's the difference between a deer or a raccoon crossing the road and your pet's thinking. It has learned that highways (a human construct not appearing in the dog pack vocabulary) are very bad.

Dogs have rational thought processes. Dogs have emotions. Dogs also have a conscience. Dogs learn to love. Dogs have language skills and can understand about five hundred human concepts with words. None of these things are in a puppy when you get them, they are learned behaviors.

A dog cannot do differential calculus, that's obvious, but it can reason out how to manipulate an owner into giving it food. Lucy was given a treat every time she asked me to go pee outside. If she gets slightly hungry, she has learned to ask to go outside, wait for thirty seconds and then come back in the house to get her reward. She will do this every hour or so until I've clued in and watch her. If she doesn't pee, the rewards stop, and so does the manipulative behavior since it's now a waste of time. But that shows you a dog can manipulate people. It isn't surprising really; a dog manipulates its owner many times during the day. If you rattle its leash, it will waken from a dead sleep and circle, pant and bark at the thought of going for a walk. That is doggy manipulation. The dog is saying how happy they would be if they went for a walk, and you're feeling guilty already if that wasn't your plan.

So higher reasoning aside, what can a dog do? It can learn. A dog can learn so many things you'd be surprised. If you simply teach it what it needs to know to function well in a human world, it would knock your socks off. Every day that Lucy and I wake up, we tell each other with hugs and kisses how happy we are that we have each other. Lucy loves humans, so much so that she almost ignores dogs. Can they make her food for her? Can they throw her ball? Her stick? Her little teddy bears?

There's a Border Collie in Germany that can remember any one of two hundred and fifty toys. Alan Alda of Mash fame visited this dog for Nova on PBS. The dog has all her toys in a big pile in one room. In another room she is shown a miniature sample of the desired toy (about one fifth scale). The dog leaves, enters the room with the massive pile of assorted frogs, teddy bears, squirrels, puppets, dolls, devils, Muppets, rummaging around and returning quickly, and surprisingly, with the correct toy. She does this flawlessly, even when it's a new toy that she's never seen before.

But once you've taught that dog human concepts, it's no longer a canine - it's a Canine Sapiens, a hybrid between dog and Homo Sapiens (which is Latin for Thinking Man). It cannot happily go back to the pack. Without wishing to conduct such an experiment, I went to England for two weeks and Lucy went to the kennel. The kennel belongs to a reputable breeder and Lucy had her own 'penalty box' (cage) placed inside a three by six foot kennel. There were other dogs there so you'd think she'd be fine, but these were 'Pack Dogs', dogs that the breeder keeps solely for breeding. One barks, they all bark. One runs around the yard, they all run around the yard. Lucy was having none of it, and their primitive antics had her stressed out. When I returned to pick her up she went wild with joy! She ran around the truck about ten times barking, crying, tail wagging, face licking, and all manner of expressions of love. I began to speak with the breeder about England but Lucy jumped into the truck through an open door and barked her head off so loud that she could not be ignored. "I guess I'm being summoned," I told the breeder. Man, was she happy to get out of there!

This is why several universities in the U.S. have stopped teaching gorillas and other primates American Sign Language in doctoral theses. Once the studies are over the animals are returned to cages in the zoo. No more riding around in cars for you! No more ice cream cones for you! The animals, now capable of reasoning to a degree, are back in cages languishing for the good old days with their human friends, unable to relate to the other primates around them. The universities have decided that it's unethical behavior to abandon them once they've formed attachments to their trainers. You need a PHD in behavioral psychology to figure that out?

It can be frustrating to try teaching a dog an advanced concept. If you find yourself yelling or getting frustrated with the dog simply back off. Stop. The problem is too complex for her present state of understanding and she doesn't know what you want. The solution is to break the problem into smaller steps. You didn't learn algebra before you learned to count, add, subtract, divide and multiply. You didn't learn to multiply until you learned to add the same number three times to itself. Dogs have similar minds to humans, except that they're somewhat limited in potential. But if you give the dog credit for being able to think with the ability of a three year old child, you'll be surprised at what they will learn.

Your dog has a conscience. How do I know this? Your dog dreams, which is a sure indication of a bifurcated mind with a conscious and a subconscious. The dog dreams after having a good day, or a bad day. When they've had a good day, they fall asleep and within five minutes enter the REM phase of their sleep pattern. REM stands for Rapid Eye Movement, and it happens almost right away in dogs. In humans it takes about an hour and thirty minutes. During REM sleep the dog can be whining, barking, chasing, wagging its tail, eating, chewing, swimming. You'll recognize a dog who is dreaming when you see it, trust me, but what that dream indicates is that it has a subconscious mind that's free to relive the experiences of the day. If it has a subconscious mind then it must have a conscious mind, because you can't have one without the other, unless it's in a coma.

if you need more information fridlyckans kindly cheakout our site.

[whats-ahead]

The most difficult fankid: Len Birch

Happy birthday to Len! In the past week we work shopped Len again and I don’t even think I made a post about the last time we did because I forgot so here’s current Len and some of the process of how it’s come to these changes. Things hopefully won’t change but it’s Len so it might 

Fun fact, did you know Axel and Len used to be the same character? Years ago (before we started this blog) we had a single chess kid. For reasons we decided to split them into two different characters. One stayed a chess kid (Axel) and we weren’t quiet sure on what to do with the other.

We eventually decided we liked the idea of Brendan as his dad. But that counteracted the fact we really wanted Len to live in Castelia. Mainly due to the fact he was a city kid when him and Axel used to be the same person. It was also due to the fact he was close to Hilda and needed to be somewhere for him to meet. 

So for a while we were just ‘okay his mom is going to be someone from Unova we’ll decide later’. It took long enough for us decide that I named a tomodachi life character in 2013 ‘Unova’ as the placeholder (yes I made all of the adults and forced them together for our kids in tomodachi life). 

Shortly after the ORAS contest designs we thought ‘oh this is perfect we can have Brendan do this for a short while, meet yancy, and have a kid with her’. It’s a crackship it doesn’t need much for it work. We specifically choose Yancy because she was an idol from Unova and fit. If we wanted it to make sense we would’ve chosen Lisia, a contest idol from his region.

Now why is this all relevant? Because we’re scrapping Len (and Larentia as a result) living in Unova all together now. Living in Castelia only made sense for Yancy out of the 4 of them so there wasn’t any point of keeping it? At this point we only kept it so Len would be forced to meet Axel and Lloyd (before was before Axel and Len were a ship if you’ve been following us long enough you’ll remember originally we had Len and Charlotte and scrapped that years ago) but they meet other ways so we really didn’t need to force that. Logically we should change ships to Brendan and Lisia but we like our crackship too much and our Lisia specifically goes out of her way to not have kids so it doesn’t work.

Now the Birch’s live on route 104. Specifically Mr. Briney’s old house. Which is right outside of Petalburg (where 3 other kids in hoenn live). Which of course changes a few things.

Larentia and Gale have always been good friends (another thing that used to be a ship that we scrapped simply because it just was not vibing with us). If anything they’re just closer now. Larentia originally only became a ranger because she knew Gale was there and hated living in Unova (they moved when she was 9 originally so she was never there long). Now she just goes because she misses her buddy.

The biggest change this cases is Adele and Len are now childhood friends. Which is something that logically should’ve always been a thing but we kept avoiding it for whatever reason. The ketchem’s move there when Adele’s 5 and the two become friends quickly. And of course Adele and Brendan are still BFFs (best fucking friends).

We also changed Len’s team. Len now only has a poochyena and we’re scrapping the rockruff/dog team. He befriended said poochyena when with his grandfather and it was scaring his grandfather and his thought was ‘oh this is a friend I’m going to keep it’. 

Because Len only have one mon now that makes contests (for when he does them) more difficult. It cases some issues in his first year but eventually he gets the hang of it. The bigger hung up is grand festivals require 3 or more pokemon so for those he’ll borrow (with permission) his dad’’s, mom’s, and sister’s pokemon. This also means we’re changing his design. We haven’t decided to what yet though. 

Other changes we’ve made that I don’t think I put on here (from the last rehaul not this one). Len only does contests for 4 years he’s traveling, he decides while he likes it theoretically he’s more of a supporter then someone who wants to do it. Then while he’s taking a year off for his sister he ends up joining (and quitting) the poke idol stars reboot while it’s still in development phases. Decides he doesn’t like doing that either and settles on becoming a connoisseur by suggestion of his sister.

Also he Axel Llloyd and 2 npcs have a online dnd group. Len dms while everyone else is a party memeber. Axel and Lloyd obviously know each other but everyone else sees each other as online friends. Axel figures out Len is their online friends right away but Len and Lloyd don’t figure it out till a couple of years. 

For how this changes the timeline it goes the following it

2034-2035 

Len and Adele do (regular) contests in Hoenn together. Len struggles a lot because he’s stubborn and refuses to change the way he wants to do things. Only Adele makes it to the grand festival so the two decided they’re going to try to do their own thing for a year.

2035-2036

Len goes to Galar to try out contest spectacular. There he meets Lloyd and Axel for the first time (in person). Because Axel can tell Len is the DM (through things he mentioned online that related to Len as well as his voice) right away and asks him to join him and Lloyd. Len agrees

Adele, not wanting to travel alone after traveling with her buddy convinces Autumn to travel in Johto with her when she learns she’s also in Johto. The two do super contests together. As for Autumn’s crush on Adele this is when it hits it’s highest and lowest point. At the start Autumn’s all ‘this is great we get to spend so much time together’ and the more time she spends with Adele the more she realizes she prefers her as a friend and grows out of her crush

Also during this time Adele and Harley become texting buddies because it’s a thing Adele always gets along with at least 1 of her traveling companions dad’s and May and Drew’s reaction to them being friends is too funny to pass up

2036-2037

After splitting up Adele and Len decided to go back to traveling with each other in Sinnoh for super contests. This is when they originally meet so much (if anything) changes minus the fact they don’t meet for the first time

2037-2038

(regular) contests in Kanto. Again this doesn’t change much from how it was before

2038-2039

This is when Adele and Len take a year off. Adele to mourn for Gale and Len because he’s worried about his sister who just got in an accident. 

Adele stays for around half a year and ends up traveling (without doing contests) with Jean and Bridge for the second half. 

Len gets offered a job through his mom to be part of the poke idol stars (often referred to as just pokestars) reboot. He takes it and is the center of Treaty for a short while with Noel and Kitty

His pokemon is a shiny poochyena (so sadly cannot use his own pokemon for the role)

He quits right before the reboot game releases which causes a lot of issues. He needed a replacement but fans didn’t want the exact character replaced so they made a new member for treaty

It’s scout he was pulled in by Marina for the role (yes this pisses Penny off) last minute and his character is a shiny pancham (gotta replace the only shiny with another shiny

Because of this his character didn’t get content at the release and was added a bit later. This made fans feels bad for him (as the voice not the character) and he quickly became the most popular voice actor of those introduced in the reboot. He lets the fame get to his head, stops talking to penny and then that plot line

2039-2040

Len’s done with contests and doesn’t want to be an idol. His sister suggests he becomes a connoisseur and he takes to that quickly. Like contests he’s doing his own thing and not following the exact root for that but he still manages to do his own thing well (eventually takes the root of becoming a teacher/guidance counselor)

Still wants to go back to traveling so he joins Adele who’s doing contest spectacular. Charlotte and Elise are here too.

I think that is everything. If anyone has any specific questions about how this changes things/relationships between characters feel free to ask! If anything it’ll make us develop this further and hopefully stick to this 

[thewolfisawake]

Since I’m in this brainrot alone, of course I’m just gonna end up thinking of a Hypmic AU with muses and their friends because I’m trash like that. Anyway, to avoid spamming my discord with the ideas, I’m just writing it on here. So a couple muses and those from @arcxnumvitae and @shxtteredillusions​.

Starting with Kesil just because he honestly doesn’t fit with the rest. His actually came first as I thought of him with his friends from a different platform. He would be rolling with his delinquent/probably doing some illegal shit friends. Their style is more like MTC with the rough and tumble, down and dirty sort of thing. His MC name is actually Shinigami because I gotta stick with his ‘thing’ no matter the AU! I do not know what his mic nor speakers would end up like. I think most of his themes are related to him as a killer as he in this verse likely only learned and became good with a hypmic just because it’s the only weapon he could have. I mean...he probably could sneak one regardless but since most weapons were phased to mics, he probably learned. His rap ability would probably be something like Death Reversal, basically he could deny himself or his comrades of being knocked out as it fits with his actual ability of death force manipulation. Of all the guys I think he’s most like, it’s probably Rio as I don’t feel he’s overly expressive. Not because of lack of feeling but just that cool under pressure sore of thing

--

Anyway onto the Bastion Kids because they’re my faves to mess with

Ofc Lucien’s the easiest to think of this crap for. I do not have a MC name because unlike the creators, I have shame. But probably something wolf related. I feel his mic would be pretty old so look like a carbon microphone (because I think I’m funny) and be pretty simple. Don’t know what his speakers would be like. I think his themes are actually rather mundane when outside of battle. But in battle, cutthroat bastard. He’s like absolute annihilation of his enemy, his words are like the maw of a beast, he’d rip you to shreds. His ability is Cornered Counter, basically as his energy dwindles, his attacks get more powerful. Basically you gotta be decisive with him because the longer he lasts, the more dangerous he is. So obviously his is most like Samatoki’s as it fits his aggressive tone and no back down attitude. 

I have a feeling he probably pissed off the Party of Words and thus if they had the chance to deal with him, they would’ve. Maybe he and his fam had differing views as to how to take this change in the world. I feel like he preferred the old ways but had to adapt to using a hypnosis mic in order to survive. And survive he did. 

Katarina’s was somewhat easier to do because she’s very clear in her presentation. I debate if she’d just straight up use her name or if it’d be something like Prima (either by itself or being Prima Donna), something denoting her regality. Her mic is likely a stand one fashioned like crystalline ice. Her speakers kind of hard to describe other than like a metallic feminine figure that kind of looks like a warlord, armed to the teeth with swords. Her themes are of betterment of the state of her surroundings, how she’ll change it with her own hands and utmost confidence of herself. Her rap ability I am still working on since while the idea currently works with her actual ability...what it ends up doing runs counter to her personality. It’d be called Dazzle and would basically redirect an opponent’s attack to someone else. However the issue is Kat can’t choose who it goes to. Since there’s not much I can draw from with the ladies of hypmic, I would go with CL for her sound although I found Chanmina while searching and thought this hits me for Kat. But if I had to choose a character, it’d be Ichijiku.

 I actually think her mother might’ve been a good soldier for the Party of Words but then she kinda sorta ended up falling in love with the enemy. Whoops. Except like the Party of Words didn’t know she did (supposedly). And so she left and went to be with Kat’s dad, who was a resistance member but wasn’t able to use a mic. So Kat is like the kid that was like...y’know we could live in peace if we’re not super oppressive. I feel like Petra taught her how to rap as it’s the only viable weapon for Kat so that’s what she uses. 

Crowe’s is a pain because he’s a pain. I don’t have a MC name either maybe Shadow? Too basic? I dunno. His mic either a headset or futuristic kind of shades he wears. I’m sure everyone finds it odd. His speakers look more like cameras and briefcases with like a dicey looking umbrella. It’s huge frickin’ homage to spy stuff y’all. And you’ll figure out the function of them when he turns his speakers on you. Electric volt briefcases, umbrella gun, that kinda stuff. His themes are pretty pessimistic, the secrets of others, the ability to get his hands dirty and what those dirty hands can and can’t do. His rap ability I feel would be based on his gorgon blood so likely named such (Gorgon) or Eyebite and would work where he paralyzes an opponent from taking their turn. Who I draw most for him is actually Jakurai although obviously his voice is no where as deep. 

If there had to be a traitor, it’s probably Crowe. He isn’t particularly happy about it but at the same time, it’s not like he’s brave enough to deal with his overlords. Not when he knows the things they COULD do. Or maybe he’s doing spy stuff on Chuuoku and is in a continuously perilous position but can’t or won’t talk to anyone about it. Basically he still has his paranoia but for a different reason. 

Hmmm Taylor’s giving me a lot of problems because I just can’t pin down a lot for her. I don’t have a name for her nor any idea what she’d go with. Maybe something food based? The only ones coming to mind are Red Velvet and Matcha. Her mic? I think she’d use a hand held mic. Kind of like the ones you do karaoke on in terms of shape. Her speakers? * confused noises * Her themes mmm....I think hers are rather upbeat although not without bite! Her rap ability still eludes me. If I’m thinking of sound, I would put it as something like Calliope although again her words are lighter than hers. 

I feel like Taylor’s family ended up with her parents not surviving the war and thus was left with Rhett to try to keep his siblings from being separated from him. She didn’t view a need to learn how to rap--after all a lot of the population doesn’t seem to--but her mind was changed after being kidnapped for ransom and subjected to the effects of a hypnosis mic. She ended up saved by then then ragtag kids and wanted to learn so that she was never in that position again.

Hooo boy, Emil has that instinctual attention to tone shift going mad. Oh god. I do not have a MC name for him either. I feel Prince would be far too on the nose. So something else. I think he’d have a stand mic, I think his would be like I think it’s a certain kind of ribbon mic? Like this? Makes me think of like old school announcers that fits with his lively personality. I feel like his speakers would be more like ice fragments that feels like they should be falling but don’t. His themes are like half light-hearted and inviting, about having a good time with others. But the other times it’s about masks and charades. He is the kind that has that tone drop and you can tell it’s another ‘presence’ to Emil. One that is vicious and will have you sinking. His rap ability is Frostbite, which would essentially have any battle of his become a race against time. His ability starts sapping the energy of his opponent and of course if they drop...it’s game over for them. His sound when light-hearted is more like Hifumi in like vocal tone but with Ramuda’s flow. Yet I feel like the perfect sound for his is Gentaro’s verse in Stella (Emil, I hope you know you are the biggest pain in terms of style) in terms of like how he sounds in alternating between cutting and light. 

I feel like his mom had stayed in the Chuuoku under the Party of Words but had seen Emil’s dad while outside of the ward. And then she fell pregnant and was in love with Emil when he was born despite him being a son than daughter. And when faced with either handing Emil over to his dad or leaving Chuuoku, she chose the latter. This was her baby. Emil had grown up with both but his mom passed away...his father suspecting it to be Chuuoku’s doing, moved away far from the ward. However Emil grew curious of the hypnosis mic that his mother had used when she was alive and so he ran off near Chuuoku, where he met a...unkind mentor (basically his grandma in normal verse stuff) that did teach him but did affect his candor. 

Cipriana I have also am having some trouble thinking things of. I do not have a MC name but I think it’d be cool if she chose one that’s like...reclaiming and being proud of her ‘runt’ status. Also am not sure about her mic. I think she’d have a handheld one though. As her mic, maybe they’re in the shape of spools with like threads all around and at least one connecting her her mic. Her themes I feel would be a bit like that somber hope? Like it sounds a little sad but it’s ultimately about a better day eventually. Which contrasts to how she is in a battle as I imagine she is very loud in presence since this is more or less a fight and she isn’t getting knocked down again (her mindset of chasing down Lucien absolutely frightens and intrigues me). I just thought of her ability being like By a Thread, where she essentially she cannot be ringed out and can be a little harder to knock out. Her set up kind of makes like a net or wrap around her to keep her from falling (also makes her look like a doll in some aspects, oooh callback). I think of her sound very much like Nemu. 

I do not know how she runs in this story except maybe that she was normal and just simply ended up in the whirlwind of hypnosis mics. Although sitting here now, I’m thinking if Arsenio had a mic and had used it against her--since it’s basically inflicting psychic damage--on her even though she didn’t have one (which is illegal btw). And Vini had it with his shit and used his own and having the same mindset as in her original verse, she actually took one of their mics and used her words against Vinicio, still causing their original rift...just worse. A lot of the same plotting from there maybe? Eventually she meets the rest of the kids.  

Aspis has been rather hit or miss. I am still thinking on his MC name but Yaksha has been in there. I am thinking of his mic to be handheld and I can’t think of anything particular for its design. I think of his speakers looking like demon masks with the speaker part within the mouth. It’s kinda intense looking especially since you know he’s so sweet. Gotta keep his contrasting aesthetic somewhere. His themes are usually about mundane things as well. Musings about those of his past and present. I feel he’s the least biting towards others in battles? Like a lot of battles are attacking something about your opponent or about one’s own ability. I think Aspis would rely less on tearing someone down. Not saying he can’t but I feel like it’s gonna be a bloodbath if he does. His rap ability would be called Katashiro, where he links to another person (usually an opponent) where when he is injured, that damage is shared between him and the opponent. Which coupled with his odd endurance, could drop whoever he linked with before he falls. If I think of his sound, I think of Kuko’s flow but also Ichiro’s lyrical way.

I feel like Aspis gonna have all the crap things of being a war orphan for himself. Pretty self-reliant and not one to take help because he kinda doesn’t know how to. But I think music saves him, I think Daza might be a DJ who even if she didn’t have a mic, she got him understanding of flow and the like. And it was just a comfort for him. She probably helped him obtain a mic. And he was friends and the like with Yukina until she went with the Party of Words. 

Aya’s is like Aspis’ hit or miss in terms of what I can think of. MC names are harrrrdddddd. I feel like her mic I alternate between it being the kind you see a cabaret singer use or a handheld. Maybe one of the first that does both??? I can’t think much in design other than ‘shimmery.’ Not like gaudy but like you watch her move or light hits just right and you see it shine...like her. Her speakers looks more like a theater. With like velvety curtain backdrop and everything. And her attacks look pretty until they hit you. I’m thinking like razor flower petals sort of thing. Her themes...mmm, I feel like overall it’s just ‘pop-y’ and light. It’s nothing like her battling. I feel she just sounds pleasant but then has some serious cutthroat bars. Despite this, I think of her rap ability being Renewal, being able to make others’ attacks stronger and cutting the damage they take. Super supportive skill which she probably took a while to figure out about. I actually found her sound while looking at other stuff. Which I think is Jeon Soyeon easily. 

Also not quite sure where she would be in the story other than I think Meg would’ve procured her a mic for her protection. And I think she cultivated her rapping to have a rap ability. And I feel like Meg was worried about it and wanted Aya away from eyes that would witness it. Because although it has no offensive power for Aya herself (at least not that anyone’s made her come to that point), it is useful for like...a team or ally situation. So useful for the Party of Words and what Meg wants to avoid. But she can’t really stop Aya from doing what she wants with her mic. 

[five-rivers]

Lethean

@ghostpetrol  Hello!  This is your Winter Truce gift!  :)  

This is mainly from your ghost king prompt, with a little bit of Skulker and friendly banter thrown in for seasoning. This wound up being much, much longer than I first expected it to be, and I hope it's coherent and enjoyable.  Happy holidays!

Read on FFN

.

Lethean

.

It was a town hall meeting about the ghost problem, so, of course, the ghosts had to show up. They didn't arrive in the usual way, however, which was swooping down on a crowd from the sky, or phasing through the ceiling. Oh, no. That was too pedestrian for these particular ghosts.

No. Instead, they tore the air open in dozens of great, green rents, and surrounded the assembled citizens of Amity Park in a matter of seconds.

But this was Amity Park. Ghosts were expected, not merely ironic.

There were ghost hunters in attendance. Many ghost hunters. The battle was pitched before the ghosts had fully entered the room.

The ghosts wore robes of black, gold, and white. Their skin was green, their claws long and sharp. Each one had a single, huge eye.

There was one exception, a ghost that looked slightly more human, though few present saw him. One ghost wore a purple robe, and held a long staff topped with a clock. A very few who he passed by later claimed he was crying, weeping, whispering, "I'm sorry," as he floated through the crowd.

As for the other ghosts, all anyone heard them say over the screams, ectoblasts, and ghost rays was "The King!" and "For the King!"

(Although there were a few that claimed the phrase wasn't "for the King," but "find the King.")

Then, as quickly as they had arrived, they were gone.

It took hours for Amity Park to realize that five teenagers had disappeared with them. After all, the five of them were always vanishing during ghost fights.

.

Danny awoke to the sound of running water. It was a pleasant sound, but not one he thought he should be sleeping near.

Nevertheless, he opened his eyes slowly. He felt languid and oddly heavy, though that might have been because he was wet.

Why was he wet?

He had been laying in the middle of a large, airy, atrium-like room, in a kind of depression with a drain on the bottom. The room itself was quite pleasant, and its numerous water features had provided the noise he was hearing.

He found what was in the room to be less so. There were people laying on the ground, scorch marks on the walls, and splatters of red and green on the floor.

He ran to the nearest person, a human girl with long, red hair. He checked her over. She didn't seem to be injured very much, except that she was unconscious.

On checking the other four, he found they were much the same.

They felt awfully familiar, but he couldn't recall where from. Actually, now that he thought about it, he couldn't remember any 'wheres' for them to be from.

This probably wasn't a good sign.

He looked around himself, trying to find a clue to who he was, or what he was doing here, other than his name. The only thing that really stood out to him was the complicated spigot set on the ceiling above the depression he had woken up in.

Then he saw the ghost.

His first impulse was to interpose himself in between the ghost and the humans, easily calling spectral power to his hands. But the ghost was crying, and he felt familiar in the same way the humans did.

He felt like family.

Danny let the ectoenergy he had gathered fade to nothing. He drifted hesitantly to the alcove the ghost was huddled in. It was on a balcony wrapping around the room, and Danny didn't see any stairs. He would have to fly up there.

"Hello?" he said, his voice echoing in the atrium. "Are you alright?" He floated up a little farther. "Can you help me? I think my- my friends are hurt, and I- I don't know what to do. Or why I'm here," he added more quietly, "or where I am." Or anything else, really, except his name.

"I'm sorry, Daniel," said the ghost, his voice ragged.

The ghost knew his name! That was a good sign, right? The apology... That was less good.

Danny flew the rest of the way up, and peered over the rail. He gasped. The ghost, who wore purple and definitely had a thing for clocks, was chained to the wall.

No longer cautious, Danny flew to the ghost's side. He tugged experimentally on the chains.

"Do you know if there's anything I can do? Is there a key?" He pulled a bit harder. The chain separated from the wall. "Oh. Huh." Abruptly, all the locks on the chains fell open. "Huh."

The ghost straightened, unfolding from the alcove. Danny flinched back at the sudden motion. The ghost was much taller than he had thought. But then, he suddenly wasn't. He was much smaller, younger, a baby. Then he was old.

Danny wilted back in confusion.

The ghost sighed, as if the weight of the world was on his shoulders. "My apologies, Daniel. I am Clockwork, the Ancient Master of Time." He returned to the appearance he'd had when Danny had first seen him. "I serve reality, the Infinite Realms, and the King of All Ghosts."

"Okay," said Danny. That sounded somewhat familiar. Not that he actually remember any of it, but he might have heard it before. But... King of All Ghosts? The term gave him a bad feeling.

The ghost put a hand on Danny's shoulder. "Daniel, what do you remember?"

"I- Nothing. I don't- My friends, I think they're hurt. They're unconscious. Can you help? I don't know what to do."

"There is nothing wrong. They are simply taking longer to recover from the purification ceremony than you."

"The what?"

"The purification ceremony," said Clockwork. "It is required for the King and his court to be purified with the waters of the five rivers, the Lethe, Acheron, Cocytus, Phlegethon and Styx, before the King ascends the throne."

Danny looked around, nervously, as if expecting a king to pop out of the floor.

"Daniel, you are the King."

Danny blinked. Oh. He hadn't expected that.

"Did something go wrong?" asked Danny. "You were chained up, and it looks like there's a fight. And I don't remember anything."

"Not remembering anything is part of the purification. It is to ensure that you are an impartial and fair ruler." Clockwork said the words almost as if they were physically hurting him. "As such, I cannot give you the details of what happened. Suffice it to say, there were some who did not agree with your nomination to the throne."

"Oh," said Danny again. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure you are the King of All Ghosts."

"No. That my friends are alright. They are my friends, right?" It wasn't like he had any evidence to back that up, after all. He could be wrong.

"Yes. They will be awake in just a few minutes, and they are your friends. Your very best friends."

Danny nodded, relieved in more ways than one.

"Shall we go down, and greet them?" asked Clockwork.

"I- Yes," said Danny. "Yes, that's a good idea."

.

"I don't get it," said the girl who called herself Ellie. She adjusted her ponytail again. She had done so eight times since they had say down. "You're saying he's the King of All Ghosts, but he's definitely human. That doesn't make sense."

Danny frowned. "But I'm not human. Not entirely. I'm half-ghost. Shouldn't I be saying the same thing, anyway? All of you look human."

"None of you are human," said Clockwork. "You are liminal spirits. You may appear human, but you have ghost cores. That is enough for you to be called ghosts."

"Cool!" said the girl who had introduced herself as Sam. "Does that mean we have powers? Dark abilities?"

"Of a sort, yes."

"Nice."

"Hey, Danny," said Tucker, "you don't seem too happy. Are you alright?" His fingers twitched, as if they wanted to touch something that just wasn't there.

"Of course he isn't," said Jazz. "He's just been given a huge responsibility he knows nothing about." Jazz was the first person he had checked on, when he woke up. "So have the rest of us, actually. What does the King's court actually do?"

They had left the atrium, and were sitting outdoors on violet grass under a swirling green sky. A few meters away from them, the ground abruptly ended. Clockwork had told them that they were on one of many floating islands in the Infinite Realms.

"That depends largely on the King," said Clockwork, half-bowing to Danny.

Danny squirmed. "It can't all be up to me. Can it? I mean, why even have a king at all, then? I could just, you know, not do anything."

Clockwork nodded. "You could choose to do nothing. Your mere existence is enough for the Infinite Realms. You inform their shape, their nature, and, to some extent, the nature of their inhabitants. For example, the last King of All Ghosts was a violent man. When he took the thrones, the environment of the realms became more hostile, more dangerous, less hospitable. Many larger islands fractured. Wars became more frequent. People as a whole became more aggressive. But there are other traditional roles, that you may take up, or not, if you so desire."

Wow. That made Danny feel even more apprehensive, if anything. He turned to the last member of the group. "What do you think, Valerie?"

Valerie shrugged, crossing her arms. "I think this whole thing is ridiculous, and I'm going to wake up in bed any minute now. I mean, ghosts, really? And you're in charge of all of them? No offense."

"No, that's fair," said Danny. He didn't feel kingly, that was for sure.

"Perhaps," said Clockwork, "I can bring you to your residence."

Danny looked back at the large building they had come from. "So... We don't live here?"

"No. This building is only used for the purification ritual."

"Wait," said Tucker, "how are we going to get there? Do you have a plane, or something?"

Danny turned to look at him. "You don't remember that we can fly? I mean, you've seen me and Clockwork flying."

"I must've gotten a higher dose of purification, or whatever," said Tucker. "I don't remember that at all. I thought that was a you thing. What about you guys?" he asked, turning to the others.

Ellie levitated up from the grass in response. Valerie clicked her heels together, and what looked like a high-tech surfboard popped out from the soles of her feet. The surfboard (hoverboard?) began to float, with Valerie on top.

Sam and Jazz, meanwhile, looked on with confusion. Then Sam snorted, and shook her head.

"Okay, Tucker, pure of heart, let's see if we can't figure this out."

.

The Observants arrived at the black castle only a few days after Danny and his friends had settled in. Clockwork ushered Danny to the cavernous throne room, and his friends gathered close around him, ready to fight, if need be. They had seen the Observants enter the castle from an upper window, and they had disliked the one-eyed ghosts on sight. None of them had yet determined why, and Clockwork wouldn't say anything.

Danny especially didn't like how Clockwork seemed to be almost afraid of the Observants. He hoped the little practice they had done with their abilities and powers would be enough, if things got violent.

He settled into the overlarge throne, very aware that he was wearing a t-shirt and pajama bottoms. Valerie, with her armor-summoning abilities, was really the only one dressed for a confrontation.

"Open," he commanded the doors on the far side of the room. They obeyed, swinging inward.

The Observants filed in. Danny pulled his legs up onto the throne. He probably shouldn't have, he knew it made him look younger and less confident. Too late. Putting them down might make him look indecisive, on top of all that.

The Observants stopped before the steps leading up to the throne. One of them raised up an elaborate chest, and eased it open.

"We have brought you your crown, your majesty."

So they had. The Crown of Fire flickered softly in the confines of the chest.

A second Observant raised a smaller box. "We have brought your ring, your majesty."

The Ring of Rage laid, quiescent, on the crushed black velvet lining of the box, the carved skull on its front glaring up at Danny.

Danny pushed up, out of the throne, and hovered a few inches over the ground. He flew down the steps to the Observants, and examined the Crown for several minutes. The Observants seemed to be holding their breaths, waiting for something.

Of course, they were ghosts. They didn't have to breathe. Even Danny didn't have to breathe, when he was in ghost form.

He reached down and picked up the Crown. The fires it was wreathed in immediately changed from a sickly, rotten green to a pale, icy blue-white. The Crown itself expanded and thinned. Danny tilted his head. He hadn't expected that. He lifted the Crown up over his head, where it stayed, floating.

The Observant closed the chest and quickly withdrew. Danny turned his attention to the ring bearer. It occurred to him, then, that they were afraid of him.

Why?

He'd ask Clockwork, but Clockwork probably wouldn't say.

He picked up the ring. It turned a dark, silvery gray, and the skull disappeared. Odd. He put it on the middle finger of his right hand. It fit perfectly. That Observant pulled back as well, disappearing among the others.

"Your majesty," said a third Observant. "It is time for you take up your responsibilities as King of All Ghosts."

.

Danny retreated in confusion. The Observants wanted a lot of things, most of which didn't really make sense to Danny. Valerie pushed the door firmly closed behind them.

"Alright," said Tucker, pointing at Danny. "If this is going to happen a lot, we need to get you some better threads. Like, something cool."

Danny looked down at his pajamas. "Yeah, probably."

"Also, we should probably look into the laws and precedents of the Infinite Realms, if we're going to be called on for advice."

"And by we, we mean you, mostly," said Sam. "Since you're the King. We'll help you, though." She elbowed Danny, lightly. "As much as we can."

"We can run interference, if nothing else," said Ellie, leaning into Valerie's arm.

"Thanks," said Danny, smiling slightly.

On the inside, he was freaking out. He had felt directionless ever since he had woken up, and that feeling was worse than ever. He didn't know what he was doing, or what he should be doing.

It was awful.

"Hey," said Sam. "Look at me, Danny."

"What?"

"It's going to be fine. Don't worry. According to Clockwork, we don't technically have to do any of this."

"Right," said Danny. It wasn't as much of a relief as it should have been. He felt bad. All his friends were trying so hard to help him, and he was basically useless, no help at all.

There was a knock at the door. "Your majesty, you can't just ignore your responsibilities. We will help you, advise you!"

Clockwork sighed, heavily. "You do not have to do anything, Daniel, least of all whatever they want." His words dripped with venom.

The banging continued. "Clockwork! Open this door!"

Clockwork jerked towards the door.

"Stop!" said Danny.

Clockwork stopped, and seemed to sag in relief.

"Can they make you do things?" asked Danny. "Were they the ones who chained you up before?"

"I cannot tell you."

"Why? Because they told you not to say anything?" asked Danny, suspicious.

Clockwork was silent. He wouldn't look at Danny.

Danny bit his lip, incensed on Clockwork's behalf. He threw open the door. The Observants weren't going to take advantage of him, and they certainly weren't going to take advantage of any of his friends.

He threw open the door.

"Your majesty," started the Observants.

"No," said Danny. "Whatever you're doing to Clockwork, you're going to stop. You can't order him around anymore."

"Your majesty," said what he was taking as the head Observant, "I don't know what he's been telling you-"

"Nothing. Which is the problem," said Danny. "Did you tell him not to? Were you the ones who attacked the purification ceremony?"

"No one attacked the purification ceremony!" protested the Observant. "We were running the ceremony."

Alarm bells started to ring in Danny's head. Big, nasty ones.

"You were running the ceremony." Danny looked between the Observants and Clockwork. "The ceremony where we all lost our memories."

"It was necessary," said the Observant. "All the Kings go through it."

"He's lying," said Jazz, suddenly.

"How do you know," asked Valerie.

"I don't know, I just do. How did you know how to use your suit?"

Danny turned a glare to the Observants. "Stay away from me and my friends. Including Clockwork. Don't you dare order him around anymore. Or else."

"Your majesty-"

"Get out."

"But-"

"Get out of our home. I don't want to ever see you ever again. Ever." He slammed the door.

"So, uh, we didn't have to forget our lives?" asked Ellie. "Is that the takeaway here?"

"No, I think the takeaway is our memories," said Tucker.

"That's one way to put it," said Danny. He rubbed his eye, angrily. "Clockwork, is there any way to get our memories back?"

"I can't say," said Clockwork, miserably. "I'm sorry, Daniel."

"That's the first thing you said to me," said Danny.

"It is."

"Because the Observants made you lie?"

"I can't say."

Danny groaned.

.

The Observants weren't the last petitioners. Surprisingly, most of them wanted to work in the castle. Cooking, cleaning, guarding, tailoring, doing various... castle-things. They wanted to fulfill their Obsessions in service to the King. Which was Danny.

Honestly, he didn't get it. He wasn't nearly cool enough to deserve that. He especially wasn't cool enough to deserve the praise the big white yetis heaped on him. But they were nice.

Danny was finally becoming more relaxed, too. Somehow, having more people around was helping him. He liked seeing what people were doing. He liked seeing them happy, and they seemed to like him helping them, and explaining various things to him.

Which was very good. Because he didn't really know a lot. Hardly anything, actually. He was pretty ignorant, sadly.

Right now, he was with a pair of tailors who were putting him into a suit vest with long tails and short pants. The vest was probably very nice, but Danny didn't know much about suits. All he knew was that it sort of made him feel sort of elven, or fairy-like.

There was a knock on the door, and Jazz stuck her head in.

"Hey," she said, "we have company. I think you'd better come."

"Is it the Observants again?" asked Danny. The one-eyed ghosts hadn't given up. He, Sam, and Tucker were looking for ways to keep them out of the castle.

"No. They're from the Far Frozen."

"Okay," said Danny. "Sorry guys, but I need to go."

"That's fine, your majesty, we are almost finished." The tailor waved her hand, and the stitching finished itself off. "Do you like it?"

Danny looked in the mirror, and smiled at the star patterns in the embroidery. "Yes, it's very nice. Thank you."

"No, thank you. It has been far too long since my work was worn by someone deserving."

Danny blushed. He didn't know if he was deserving.

"Okay. Well, bye," he said, slipping out the door. He turned to Jazz. "Did they say what they wanted?"

"Just that it was important, and you could help. They were worried," she added.

They entered the room where Jazz had left the yetis to wait. They both bowed immediately. Danny still wasn't used to that.

"Jazz said that you needed my help?" he prompted.

"Yes, Great One," said one of the yetis, rising. "I am Snowfall of the Far Frozen, and I have been sent by Chief Frostbite."

Danny nodded. He'd only met Frostbite the one time, briefly, along with a bunch of other leaders, but he liked him. He was big, soft, and friendly.

"The Far Frozen is in danger. A recent battle has displaced one of the Fire Islands, sending it flying towards the Far Frozen. The temperatures are becoming unbearable, and collision is imminent."

"What can I do?" asked Danny. He wanted to help, but he felt that averting a natural disaster on this scale was beyond him. "Do you need help evacuating? New homes?"

Deep-seated worry passed over Snowfall's face before being hidden again. "One of the powers of the King is redirecting the movements of the floating islands."

"Oh!" said Danny, brightening. Maybe he could avert a natural disaster. "How do I do that?"

The two yetis looked at each other. "We were hoping you knew."

"Oh," said Danny, much less energetically. "I guess I'll... go see if Clockwork knows."

.

Danny stood barefoot on top of a snow drift in the Far Frozen. The Far Frozen was beautiful and peaceful. The snow felt good on his feet.

Less good was the giant, flaming, erupting volcano floating a few miles above the island. He could taste ash on the wind. The tips of the Far Frozen's great glaciers were melting. He could feel the heat on his face

He reached into himself, into his core. Cold flowed out from him, chilling his surrounding. Snowflakes condensed from the air around him, and fell gently to the ground.

He looked over his shoulder at his friends. "Do you think it's getting farther away yet?"

Sam and Tucker were almost unrecognizable under all their layers. Both of them had relatively warm cores. Valerie was wrapped up in her suit, which was impervious to temperature changes. Jazz was dressed warmly, but not like Sam and Tucker. Ellie, meanwhile, had had much the same reaction to the Far Frozen as Danny, which was to say, she loved it.

"It is not," said Clockwork.

"Has it at least stopped getting closer?"

"No."

"Has it... Slowed down?"

"Yes."

"Well, that's progress, right?" He looked back up at the volcano before he got an answer. "What if I went up there, and just, you know, froze it? It'd still hit, but it wouldn't melt anything any more, right?"

"Daniel, you can do this."

"I know, I just don't feel like I can." The sentence came out as a very un-kingly whine. "It's a giant mountain! It's ridiculous."

"Maybe that's the problem," said Jazz. "Not feeling like you can do it."

Danny groaned.

"We all have weird powers," said Sam, teeth chattering. "Tucker has that electricity thing, I have my plants, you have ice, Jazz has mind powers... Why is this so much weirder."

"I don't know!" Danny threw up his hands, and glared at the approaching island. "Why won't you just go away?" he demanded. "You're hurting people! Go somewhere you aren't. This place is huge! You have plenty of room!"

"Ah, there we go," said Clockwork.

"Wait, what, really?" asked Danny, flabbergasted. "That's what worked?" But even as he said it, he felt a sensation of rightness settle in his core. It was moving away. The Far Frozen was safe. He had done a good thing, today.

"Note," said Tucker. "Talking inanimate objects does work, I'm not crazy."

"You are crazy," said Valerie. "You named that PDF-"

"PDA," interjected Tucker.

"-Janet. Who does that?"

.

The Far Frozen might be a snowbound wasteland, but Frostbite really knew how to throw a party. There was food, music, dancing, lights, everything.

Danny was maybe just a little intimidated by all the cheering they were doing, but, hey, it was still pretty cool.

After a while, though, the yetis calmed down or were distracted, and he was able to slip away and find a quieter side room to hang out with his friends in. He collapsed gratefully onto an icy couch.

"Wow," said Tucker. "That was a party. Like, the best party ever. I don't think I've ever been to a better party."

"I don't think we've been to any parties, except this one," said Danny.

"Huh?"

"We haven't been to any parties. Not since we lost our memories."

Tucker blinked. "Yeah, I guess you're right. I hadn't really thought about that. Maybe we should throw one when we get back to the castle."

Danny sighed, and was surprised to hear a nearly identical one from Ellie.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"I just-" Ellie sighed. "I don't want to go back to the castle."

"You want to stay here?" asked Sam, sounding shocked. "But, it's so cold."

"Well, it's really nice here, and it would be good to learn more about our ice powers, but, I mean..." she trailed off, uncertainly.

"What if we traveled around?" asked Danny. "I've been looking at some history things with Clockwork. Human kings used to do that, travel around and see where they were needed. I think we could help more people that way. The castle is kind of hard to get to."

Ellie sat up from where she had been laying. "That would be nice," she said. "I think I'd like that."

"We'd be able to learn more about the Realms, too," said Sam, thoughtfully. "But we should probably put a limit on how long we stay in any one place, except for the castle. So we don't put too much strain on anyone. Either our hosts, or ourselves." She gestured to herself and Tucker. "We don't all like the same things. Obviously."

Danny nodded. "We'll want to stay if we're in the middle of something, though."

"That's reasonable," said Sam. "Just-" She shivered. "Well, you get it. It's cold here. You two Phantoms probably wouldn't feel great about hanging out in a tropical jungle."

"That's true," said Danny. "What do you guys think? Val? Clockwork?"

"Sounds cool to me," said Valerie, shrugging.

"It will open many opportunities for you," said Clockwork. "It will, however, be wise to return to the black castle periodically."

"Okay, cool! I guess we're decided, then. Tomorrow, we'll have to ask if they have any maps here, and figure out where to go!"

.

"They don't look dangerous," said Valerie.

"They're really pretty," said Jazz. She sighed. "It's so cool that they're real."

"Are you kidding?" said Danny. "Do you see those horns? Those hooves? Feel that ectosignature? They're dangerous." He narrowed his eyes and peered over the large rock he was hiding behind. "And evil. Very evil. The most evil."

Grazing in the center of the floating island was a herd of unicorns. They were black and hot pink, with long, grey horns, and sharp teeth and hooves. Their manes were made of ghostly flame. On the other side of the island stood the flaming ruins of a once-thriving community.

Removing them was the latest task Danny and his friends had taken on. They'd been traveling and helping people for some time. Months, maybe. But it was hard to tell exactly, because the Infinite Realms didn't have strictly defined days and nights. Some of the individual Realms did, but not all of them together.

"Come on, Danny. They're animals. They don't have the awareness to be evil," said Sam. "They're just acting according to their nature."

"Either way, we still have to chase them off."

"No, no, that's not going to work," said Sam. "They'll either come back, or bother someone else. What we need to do is relocate them."

"What's the difference?" asked Ellie.

Clockwork wasn't with them today. As Master of Time, he did have other responsibilities. He had said something about a complex paradox he needed to untangle before he left.

"The difference is that one is humane, and actually fixes things, and the other just makes the problem repeat later."

"No, I mean, practically. What would we have to do differently?" asked Ellie.

"We'd need to find a place to relocate them to, first," said Sam. "Then we'd have to catch them, somehow, or guide them away."

"Oh yeah! Clockwork gave me a thing like that! Look." He showed them the shiny green and white cylinder.

"I've got something that looks like that, but square," said Valerie, "and redder. Actually, it doesn't look like that at all. Why did I think it did? Anyway, it catches ghosts. Yeah. I'm pretty sure, anyway. I haven't tested it."

"Okay. So, we can't just leave them here while we search for a place to put them. Sorry, Sam. They're just too dangerous. They might attack somewhere else. Once they're all caught, then we can find somewhere to relocate them to."

Sam sighed, but nodded. "You're right. So how should we approach this? Maybe Val and I could go around from behind, and we can kind of pinch them together?"

That was a good idea. "Yeah, I was sort of thinking-"

"Hey, guys?" said Tucker. "They're looking at us."

The unicorns were indeed looking at them, Danny saw. The closest stamped its hoof, and lowered its horn.

Danny swallowed. "Oh, jeez."

.

A few hours later, Danny and the others laid, out of breath and exhausted, on another, much smaller floating island.

"Okay," said Danny, weakly raising an arm. "That didn't go to plan."

"There was a plan?" asked an unfamiliar voice. "You could have fooled me."

Danny snapped upright, his first instinct being to defend his friends. Of course, their first instinct was to defend him, so all their various weapons and glowing fists wound up pointed at the hapless ghost.

The ghost in question was encased in silver armor modeled (very roughly) on human anatomy. He had rivets, a green, fiery mohawk, and sort of stubby legs. He also looked rather intimidated.

"Uh," said Danny, lowering his fists. "Sorry. Who are you?"

"I am Skulker! The Ghost Zone's greatest hunter!" He puffed out his chest.

"Hunter!?" screeched Sam. "You mean you hunt poor innocent animals?"

Skulker looked sideways at Danny. "What can I say that will make her not attack me?"

"Do you hunt animals?" asked Danny.

"It's not like I kill them! Make your girlfriend stop looking at me like that!"

"She's not my girlfriend!" objected Danny, quickly.

"I'm not his girlfriend!"

"You're back at that? Really?" asked Skulker. "I know your memories got erased, but really?"

"You knew us?" asked Jazz, with interest. "Is there anything you can tell us?" They had met several people who had knew them before, but their accounts of what they had been like were... confused. At best.

"You were the greatest prey I've ever had the pleasure of hunting!" said Skulker. "And also one of the best hunters. Except for me, of course. But that," he pointed back towards where the unicorn horn still was, "that was pathetic. What happened?"

"Well," drawled Danny, "it might have something to do with that whole memory erasing thing you were talking about. By the way, are you, like, really a tiny little ghost inside a robot suit?"

"Oh my gosh!" said Tucker, floating higher. "You're a mecha? That's so cool! How do you work?"

"I am cool," said Skulker, "and- Wait. How did you know that? How did you know about that?"

"I don't know. Your ectosignature is just kind of weird. But, back to you, you're a hunter? Have you hunted, you know, unicorns before?"

"They're actually why I'm here," said Skulker, proudly. "But then I saw what you were doing, and it was just so hilarious that I couldn't stop laughing long enough to properly pilot my suit."

"Cool. But have you ever caught one before?"

"No. Actually, you once saved me from being brutally dismembered by one. But, today, that will change! Today, I capture a unicorn for my collection!"

Danny tilted his head. At this point, no one was threatening Skulker anymore.

"By collection," said Sam, slowly, "what do you mean, exactly?"

"My collection," repeated Skulker, "on my island. I let all my prizes roam free, of course, so I can have the pleasure of hunting them again!"

"Okay. Yeah. That's good enough for the demon horses," said Sam. "We're teaming up and giving them to you."

"I- What? No, that's a terrible idea," said Skulker.

"That's a great idea!" said Danny.

"No."

"Yes!"

"I'm the Ghost Zone's greatest hunter! I don't team up with anyone."

"But shouldn't the Ghost Zone's greatest hunter be able to teach people how to be great hunters?" asked Jazz.

"Ohhhhhhh," groaned Skulker.

Danny smiled.

.

"Ssooooo," said Danny, sliding in next to Tucker. "You were a pharaoh before. I wonder how that works, what with your tech Obsession?"

"Well," said Tucker, vaguely waving his hands at the tall, shiny pyramids in front of them. "I don't think tech is my only Obsession. Protection isn't your only Obsession. But, I probably fell in here through a portal from Egypt. That happens."

"Speaking of which, do we even know what time period it is out in the human world?" asked Danny. "I've seen people from all over. Like, the farthest back person I've seen is from, like, prehistory, and the farthest along had this raygun thing going on for them. But maybe they were just Obsessed with science fiction."

"Who knows," said Tucker, shrugging. "Hey, I think- I think I need to stay here for a bit longer. I just want to, I don't know. Find out who I am."

"That's cool, dude. Take all the time you need."

.

"... and he just... gave you a sword?"

"Yep," said Jazz, looking down at the object. "I think he was an Ancient, like Clockwork. Fright Knight."

"So that's... That's Soulshredder," said Danny, pointing. "The sword that will send you to a dimension that contains your worst fears if you get cut by it."

"Yeah," said Jazz.

Danny rubbed his eyes, and sat down on an overstuffed chair. They were staying in a rather nice house in Logres-Prydain, which was a rather nice, large archipelago ruled by certain deceased and imaginary British monarchs.

They hadn't done anything there, except for playing tourist, Logres-Prydain was a very stable realm, apart from its fits of melodrama. Not at all like Albion, the other realm ruled by former British leaders, which had far more than the occasional colonial impulse. Still, it had been a nice, relaxing vacation.

Until now.

"Did he say why?"

Jazz shrugged. "He said that it belonged to the first defender of the King, and he wasn't doing that anymore."

"Oh. Well. I guess that makes sense. You're going to have to get sword lessons, though. I told you that you should have joined the rest of us when Frostbite gave us lessons."

"But the library."

"Yeah," said Danny, remembering. "The library. It was pretty cool." He paused. "Do you think Fright Knight would give you lessons, or should we get, like, the Green Knight, or something?"

"Uh. Since he kind of left right after giving this to me, I'd say the second option."

"Good call."

.

They stood over the hulking, but defeated form of Undergrowth, former Ancient of Plant Life.

Danny had never seen Sam look so awesome.

"How did you take control of his plants?" he asked, tapping one of Undergrowth's vines with his foot and freezing it. Maybe Undergrowth was tied up by Sam's plants, but Danny didn't want him to root himself again.

Sam shrugged. "I don't know. I think I might have done it before? It felt sort of familiar. You know how it is."

"Yep," agreed Danny. He sighed. "So, what do we do with him?"

"Isn't he wanted?" asked Valerie. "I think I saw a poster or two, back in Logres."

"Mhm. By the Observants, though," said Danny.

"Okay," said Ellie. "So what? Make them work for their keep, or whatever."

"Not a bad idea," said Danny. "I kinda feel like we might regret it eventually, but I don't really care. What do you say, we wear Undergrowth down until he fits in the thermos, take him to the Observants, and then go back around, pick everyone up, and go home?"

Sam stretched. "Sounds good to me. This whole thing," she waved at the ghostly jungle around her, "has given me some ideas about how to Observant-proof the castle."

.

"This is actually really cool," said Sam. "I thought it would be like a zoo, with all the animals in cages, but it isn't."

"I told you it wasn't," said Skulker, sulkily.

They had stopped by Skulker's island while circling back to Logres-Prydain to pick up Jazz. It wasn't quite on the way, but Sam and Valerie had wanted to see it. Sam because she was still suspicious as to Skulker's treatment of animals, and Valerie because she wanted to learn more about hunting. She really liked hunting. Almost to a disturbing degree.

Danny hoped she wouldn't wind up after his skin like Skulker apparently had been.

His life had been weird before. He wished he knew more about it, wished one of the ghosts he met would tell him something more than, Oh, hey, I used to fight you a lot, but I want to be best friends now.

He wished he knew why none of the ghosts would say anything. It couldn't all be because of the Observants.

Could it?

"Skulker," said Danny, interrupting. "What were our lives like?"

The ghost went quiet. "Complicated," he said, finally. "More than I ever knew about, even if I did hunt you and observe your behavior meticulously!"

"Wow," drawled Ellie. "That's not creepy at all."

"You lived with your parents, and your sister," continued Skulker.

"Ellie?"

"No, the red-haired one. You went to one of those human schools with your girlfriend and her," he pointed at Valerie, "and that tech-y boy."

"You mean Tucker's not from ancient Egypt?" Oh, boy, he hoped that wasn't going to turn into a problem later on.

"No. Why would you think that?"

"Long story. What about me?" asked Ellie.

"Honestly, I don't know where you came from. You're related to him, somehow, though."

"Oh," said Ellie, clearly disappointed.

"But that's really all I know."

"That's it?" asked Danny. "Do you know what happened to our parents?"

"No. It isn't like we were best friends. Oh, yes, that's right. You and the huntress used to be enemies. Once I pitted you against one another on this very island! Good times."

"Okaaaaaaaaaay," said Danny. "This has been fun and all buuuuuuuuuuuut I think it's time to go." He started floating away, awkwardly.

"Sure, whatever," said Skulker, waving. "Visit soon! I have to introduce you to my girlfriend!"

.

"Clockwork?" asked Danny. "Are you okay?" Ever since they'd gotten back to the castle, Clockwork had been acting nervous and stressed.

"I'm fine, Daniel," said Clockwork, fidgeting with the hem of his robes. "I am simply... anticipating."

"Anticipating what?"

"Certain... Events. That will happen."

"Like, bad events, or good events?"

"Events," repeated Clockwork.

"Give me a hint?" asked Danny, half-playfully. He leaned back in his chair, and played with the toes of his bare feet. He actually quite liked the suits with short pants the tailors kept giving him. He was less certain about the pocket watch, anklets and other decorations they were adding lately, but he did like the ticking sound the pocket watch made, so it was all good.

Clockwork shook his head. "No, Daniel. I can't tell you about the future. I apologize for being distracted. Now, where were we?"

"I think you were talking about the Swan Princesses, and the settlement of White Mountain?"

"Indeed." He waved his hand, and an image appeared in the air, like a holographic projection. "Now, if you will turn your attention here..."

.

"How do you like it?" asked Sam. She and Tucker had been working on a new barrier for the castle for the past two weeks. The result was floating, interlocking, shifting hedges of black roses grown over a framework of shiny tech. It was a bizarre, but oddly appealing combination.

"It's great!" said Danny. "But it isn't going to keep people who need us out, is it? As in, people who need us who aren't the Observants?" He'd asked the question before, but he felt the need for confirmation.

"It'll let people who ask for help in," said Tucker, proudly. "People who say they need help. My stuff will also give me alerts whenever something unusual comes up."

"So will mine," said Sam, quickly. "Not as quickly, but it'll be good as backup, if Tucker isn't available."

"That's really amazing, you guys. I wish I could have helped."

"Pft. It's no problem," said Tucker, waving his hand. "You've been really busy."

"Still," said Danny.

"No, dude. You were stopping a war, weren't you?"

"And averting a natural disaster," said Sam. "The Lethe flooding could have been a real problem."

"Not to mention rescuing all those guys the ghost hunters caught, and figuring out what to do with the ghost hunters," continued Tucker. "What did you do with them, anyway?"

Danny shrugged. "I just kicked them back out into the human world. I hope they don't come back."

"Anyway," said Sam. "There is something you can do with this, if you want to. We left room for your ice, and-" she took out a papery packet. "Tada! Iceflower seeds. Between the two of us, we should be able to make them grow, and then you can have just as much warning when someone is knocking on our door as we do."

"Cool!" said Danny. Then he grinned. "Literally."

Sam and Tucker groaned in stereo. "Seriously?" said Tucker.

Danny shrugged. "The pun was just sitting there. You couldn't expect me not to take it. But, really, Sam. Where did you get these? I thought Frostbite said they were almost extinct."

"Eh, well, I got help from the Far Frozen, and we all asked around. I'm thinking about starting a seed bank, or a botanical garden. You know, to preserve ecological diversity."

"In her copious free time, you know."

"Shut up, Tucker."

.

This was Jack and Maddie's fifth trip into the Ghost Zone. Every time they got further in. Every time they improved the Specter Speeder. This time was different, though. Last time, they had seen the Ghost King.

It had only been from a distance, and he had looked very different from when he had dragged Amity Park into the Ghost Zone two years ago, but their instruments didn't lie. He was the only ghost who could possibly have that much power. No other came close.

Maddie wished the encounter had lasted longer, that the Ghost King had stayed still long enough for their instruments to analyze his ectosignature and determine what his powers and weaknesses were. If she and Jack were to defeat him, and get their children back, they needed every advantage possible.

At the same time, Maddie knew they had been lucky. If the portal hadn't opened up before the Ghost King attacked them, they could have been killed. They hadn't been prepared to face him, then. Now they were. The Specter Speeder had been fitted with all of their very best weapons. They were ready. Ready to get their children back, or die trying.

The universe seemed to agree with them. They had yet to have a single ghostly encounter. The Ghost Zone was quiet, quiescent. The sky spun slowly around them, islands passing by in the distance.

"According to the ghosts we questioned," Maddie said, "the Ghost King's castle should be this way, and he should be in residence."

Jack nodded grimly. "I wi-"

"Don't say that word. Don't you remember what happened last month?"

"Sorry, Mads."

Maddie bit her lip. "So am I. I didn't mean to snap at you." She sighed. "I'm stressed. What were you saying?"

"It would have better," said Jack, cautiously, "if any of the ghosts had known why the Ghost King woke up again."

"It would have been nice to know what had woken him up in the first place," said Maddie. "But it doesn't matter. We're not trying to put him to sleep." A flash of odd color caught Maddie's eye, and she leaned forward, looking up through the windshield, to try to see what it was and where it had gone. "Did you see-?"

A bolt of fuchsia energy hit the front of the Speeder and splashed against the shields. Alarms sounded in the cabin as the Speeder was forced down. Maddie cursed, and began activating weapons. Why hadn't the ghost detector gone off?

Oh. Now it activated.

"Big ectosignature, Mads!" shouted Jack over the noise.

"The King?" asked Maddie, as green, then pink, hit the shields.

"Not quite that big, but- What's that?" The Speeder shook under another barrage.

Maddie yanked on the controls. "Two colors! There must be two of them!"

"The engines!"

"What?"

A temperature warning suddenly went off. Were they overheating? No, the engine temperature had dropped. An ice user? Like Phantom had been?

Maddie revved the engine, but it was too late. It had gotten too cold, and they were dead in the water.

Yet another fruitless trip. Maddie hit the steering wheel. They could probably fight their way out of this, with all their weaponry, and rig up a way back, but they'd have to go back to the drawing board as far as their rescue attempt went.

It was probably a good thing. If they were brought so low by these ghosts, they would have been destroyed by the Ghost King. But, still, it was so frustrating.

"Maddie, I can't get a lock!"

Maddie snapped back to the present, and frantically started pressing buttons.

Then the barrage stopped, suddenly and completely.

"Still only one ectosignature?"

"No, I have two, but one is so small, I can't-"

A red figure on a board swooped into view in front of the Specter Speeder. Maddie froze completely. That was Valerie Gray.

Yes, she was wearing that red ghost hunting armor, but Phantom had revealed her, back when the Ghost King had dragged Amity Park into the Ghost Zone. Maddie wasn't likely to forget that, or anything that had happened then.

"Ghost hunters!" shouted Valerie Gray, loudly enough to be heard inside the Speeder. "Disable your weapons, and open the doors of your vehicle."

A ghost girl appeared out of thin air next to Valerie. The board tipped somewhat, and the girl seemed to laugh, gesturing at Valerie with a teasing gesture.

The ghost looked like Phantom, almost like she could be his sister. His twin, even. That would be incredibly rare, among ghosts. But then, Phantom had always been an oddity, right up until he had disappeared entirely.

Maddie wasn't surprised he was involved in this, however tangentially.

She fumbled for the PA microphone. "Valerie Gray?"

The conversation outside stopped, as both girls turned their attention back to the Speeder. Valerie's mask receded from her face.

"How do you know my name?"

"You don't recognize us?"

"Kind of hard to, considering you're in that big thing. All I know is that you're the ones who've been harassing people and causing problems." Valerie crossed her arms. "Why don't you come out, then we can talk about whether or not we know each other."

Maddie lowered the microphone, and turned to Jack. "It's obviously a trap," she said.

"But she might know where Danny and Jazz are," said Jack, "and even if she doesn't, we have a duty to her, as well. She's a victim, too."

"She might be overshadowed," said Maddie, even as she nodded in agreement.

"She's definitely under some kind of control. Otherwise she'd never work with a ghost. But I think we have to risk it. For Jazz and Danny."

"For Jazz and Danny," agreed Maddie.

She pushed open her door and leaned out. The void of the Ghost Zone yawned dizzily beneath her, the ectoplasmic mists spiraling down forever. She waved at Valerie. "Alright, let's tal-"

The ghost girl was abruptly next to Maddie, and there were four of her.

"Gotcha," she (they?) said, grinning, as they grabbed onto her and Jack.

Maddie's vision blurred, and when it came back into focus, she found herself next to Valerie Gray, supported in the air by two copies of the ghost girl. Jack was similarly imprisoned.

"So," said one of the copies. "What should we do with these guys? Any thoughts, Val?"

Valerie Gray regarded them silently. There were streaks of red in her hair, and flecks of gold in her eyes. An affectation, or a side effect of living in the Ghost Zone for so long?

"You say you know me," said Valerie. "How?"

"You mean," gasped Maddie, trying not to think about the endless drop beneath her feet, "you don't know us?"

"No. I don't. What are you even doing in here? You're human."

"So are you!" said Jack.

Valerie shrugged. "Not entirely. I'm going to ask again, what are you doing in the Infinite Realms?"

"We're looking for our children," said Maddie.

"Oh, we can help with that," said the ghost girl. "When did they die?"

"They didn't," snapped Maddie. "They were kidnapped, by your king!"

Valerie snorted. "I highly doubt that. When was this?"

"Almost a year ago," said Maddie. "The same time you disappeared."

"Uh huh," said Valerie. "Well, it wasn't our king. He hasn't been reigning for that long, yet. I doubt it was the last guy, either. Last time I checked, he was still locked up."

"What were your kids' names?" asked the ghost girl.

"Their names are Daniel and Jasmine," said Maddie.

"Okay, cool. Hey, Val, what do you say we have our resident mind reader take a look at them?"

.

The floating island the ghost girl had set them down on was tiny. Barely large enough to pace on. If the ghost girl or Valerie had been on it with them, it would have been far too crowded. As it was, the two girls had chosen to float some distance above the island while one of the ghost girl's duplicates went to go get the 'mind reader.'

Maddie surreptitiously checked her suit's built-in weapons for the fifth time. Maybe it would be better to attack the ghost now, but then the absent duplicate would still be free to gather reinforcements. If the 'mind reader' was the ghost controlling Valerie, defeating it could free her, and get the Fentons an ally.

If not, then- then-

Maddie didn't know. She had come into the Ghost Zone with so many plans, but they had all depended on having the Specter Speeder, which was now a floating dot in the distance. More than that, she was distracted by Valerie's apparent amnesia.

Would Danny and Jazz remember them? Would they be under the control of ghosts as well? How would they get past that? They had expected them to be imprisoned, yes. They had even expected them to be hurt, or controlled. But amnesiac? That hadn't been something they had planned for.

"Here we come," said the ghost girl, above them.

Maddie looked up, and traced her gaze to two approaching dots. They grew larger and larger, until they resolved into humanoid figures. One was the ghost girl. The other...

The other was Jazz.

She had a blue streak in her hair, and her eyes flashed pale yellow-orange when she looked down at Jack and Maddie, but it was definitely Jazz. It was Jazz, despite her anachronistic clothing, despite the long, thin, and wicked sword strapped to her waist.

It was Jazz, and the blank look on her face when she met Maddie's eyes confirmed her worst fears. Jazz didn't remember them at all.

.

"They're telling the truth," said Jazz.

"They are? Really? You and Danny are their kids?" asked Ellie.

"That's what they think, anyway," said Jazz. She glanced back down at the couple. "They're also hiding enough weapons to equip an army."

"You should have seen their spaceship thing."

"And what Val said to them when they were in their spaceship thing. She sounded like Walker!"

"I did not."

"Did too!"

"Okay, okay," said Jazz. "But what should we do with them? Send them home? Get Danny? What?"

"Well," said Ellie, "what do you want to do?"

Jazz sighed. "I don't know. I'd just as soon not deal with this. I mean, we've all been curious about our pasts, but our responsibility is to the Realms, and they're, well. A menace."

"You don't feel anything for them?" asked Valerie, sounding surprised.

"I do, but..." Jazz shrugged, unable to explain just what she felt. "Anyway, they think we're being mind controlled or something. I don't think we can just get through to them. But if we just send them back to the human world, they'll come back. At least, that's the vibe I'm getting right now."

"It's like with the unicorns," said Ellie. She paused. "Does that mean we have to relocate them?"

"No, I don't think that would work. Or it might work," Jazz corrected herself, "insofar as getting them out of the way, but not in terms of having a satisfying conclusion. I mean, imagine if we left them on an island somewhere. We'd always be wondering and worrying about them, wouldn't we? And they'd always be trying to escape. But... I think you have a point, comparing them to the unicorns."

"Wow, thanks, Jazz. I was beginning to think that everything I said was wrong."

"Oh, come on. I'm just trying to talk myself through this."

"I get it, I get it. Go on. Tell me how I'm right."

"I think we need to give them what they want, at least partially, then they won't feel the need to come back. It might help us get some closure, too, as far as our former lives go."

"Meaning?" prompted Valerie.

"Meaning, we should take them to Danny."

.

"I'm getting a signal from the barrier," said Tucker. He was decked out in all his Egyptian gear, but also with a whole lot of tech. It left something of an odd impression.

Danny looked up from a pile of correspondence. "Oh, yeah? Is it the Observants?"

"No, it's Jazz, Val, and Ellie with a couple of humans." Tucker drummed on the table. "I'm going to go check it out."

"With the side effect of leaving us with all of this," said Sam. She gestured at the table full of letters.

"Hey, it's Danny's fan mail," said Tucker, pointing finger guns at the two of them. "Catch you later."

A few minutes later, he came back.

"Hey, guys. Problem. Big problem."

Jazz came in right after him. "I don't know if it's a problem, exactly, but Val and Ellie are outside the barrier with our parents."

.

"Is this what you were talking about?" Danny asked Clockwork. "That event you were talking about earlier."

Clockwork shrugged, misery evident in his motions.

"Is this the Observant's orders, still? I could smack their eyeballs right out of their heads..."

"What are we going to do?" asked Tucker. "Talk to them? Send them away? What?"

"How about we make them go through our maze?"

"Wh- Why would we do that?" asked Danny.

"I don't know. It sounds like fun. Oh! It might make them reveal their weapons. That would be good, right?" Sam shrugged.

"I guess, but I think that might be, you know, unnecessarily cruel," said Danny.

"Yeah, so?"

"So, that's bad."

"Is it?"

Danny shook his head. "Let's go to the throne room, and let them in. It sounds like a lot of their aggression to ghosts is them thinking that the 'Ghost King' is involved with our kidnapping. Which, I mean, yes, clearly I am involved in my own kidnapping, but, you get it."

"It would be good if they stopped attacking people," said Tucker.

Danny groaned. "Yeah. I can't believe I have to worry about my parents randomly attacking people."

"It isn't all that unbelievable. You're pretty violent."

"And you aren't?"

"Hey, I'm not denying it."

.

The ghost girl, who was apparently named Ellie, held Jack and Maddie as they and Valerie floated over a castle trapped within a ever-shifting framework of barbed-wire-like roses and ice.

It looked like a prison.

Slowly, the spinning layers came to a halt, revealing a path to the castle at their heart.

"Looks like they want to see you," said Ellie, flying down. She set the two humans down on the edge of the island, and then gestured at a huge pair of doors. "Go ahead," she said. "We're right behind you."

Maddie's lips twitched at the threat, but turned away. Let the ghost think Maddie was afraid of her. She and Jack walked forward, past the ghosts guarding the doors, and into a long, broad hallway.

At the end of the hall was a dais. On that dais was a throne. Jazz stood just beyond the last step of the dais, below the throne, her hand resting on the hilt of her sword. To the throne's left was Tucker Foley, Danny's best friend. He was dressed like something out of a documentary on Egypt. To the throne's right was Samantha Manson, decked out in poisonously bright flowers and a ragged green dress.

In the throne itself sat Danny, wearing a neat suit and a crown that burned with blue fire. The tips of his bare toes fell just short of reaching the floor in front of the throne.

"Jack and Maddie Fenton," he said, in a clear, carrying voice. "Please come forward."

Maddie looked over her shoulder at Valerie and Ellie. Their expressions suggested that Jack and Maddie had better start walking.

As they approached the throne, Danny pushed himself out of the throne and stood. Other than the odd clothing choice, Danny looked the same as he always had. Unlike the others, odd lights didn't shine from his eyes, and his hair wasn't streaked with strange colors.

"Hi," he said, in a more normal tone of voice. "I'm told you want to talk to me. To us." He smiled faintly. "I'm afraid none of us remember anything from more than, hm, call it eleven months ago, though."

Maddie's brain was still trying to process the situation.

"You really don't remember us?"

"I'm sorry," said Danny. "We don't. You seem somewhat familiar, though, if that helps."

It didn't.

"You're the Ghost King!" exclaimed Jack, suddenly.

"I am," said Danny.

"But," said Maddie, as the throne and the crown suddenly clicked into place for her, "how? You're human!"

"Only half," said Danny. He shrugged, and light rippled across his skin. His hair went white, his eyes green, and his skin darkened.

Phantom stood in his place.

Then, before Maddie could blink, he was Danny again.

"That's apparently enough," continued Danny.

"How..." Maddie couldn't get enough air to ask the question.

"I don't know exactly," said Danny. "But from what I've read, it can happen if a portal opens up on you." He tilted his head. "We would like to hear what we were like, though. Not many people will tell us. Are you alright?"

"Breathe, Mom," said Jazz. "Go ahead, breathe. Everything is going to be fine."

.

The room they were in now was much smaller. Almost cozy, despite all the death symbols and ghostly trappings. Maddie eyed a scythe hung above the fireplace suspiciously.

Jack had taken a ghost detector out of his suit, and was scanning the children. All of them had ectosignatures, but none of them showed up as so much as overshadowed.

"Why don't you remember anything?" asked Maddie as Jazz tucked a quilt around her.

Danny rolled his eyes, and the flames of his crown flickered higher. "A certain group of ghosts thought it appropriate to revive an archaic purification ritual which used the waters of each of the five great rivers, one of which is the Lethe, for my coronation. They have been punished appropriately." He shifted his weight. "But tell us, what were we like? What were our lives like?"

.

"Come home," said Maddie, her voice hoarse from all the stories she had told. "Come home, all of you. Whatever this is, we can fix this."

Danny shook his head. "We can't." His voice was rough as well. He had told his share of stories.

"You can. We can hide the changes to your appearance."

"No, we physically can't. We bathed in the waters of the Five Rivers of the Infinite Realms, including those of the River Styx. We're bound here. We can't set foot in the human world."

"You can visit, though," said Jazz. "Whenever you like."

"As long as you don't attack any of my subjects," added Danny.

"We can't leave you here," objected Maddie, "as slaves to ghosts."

"We aren't slaves," said Tucker, annoyance clear in his voice.

"But you don't actually have to leave," said Danny. "You could live here. The same prohibition against attacking people would apply, however."

Jack and Maddie exchanged a glance that conveyed thousands of words. "We would like that," said Maddie, returning her gaze to her son.

Danny smiled, and clapped his hands together. "Excellent! I'll see about having some rooms made up for you. Come on," he said, standing, "let me show you what we've got.

Maddie followed him out of the room, her eyes fixed on his crown. She wasn't giving up. This wasn't over yet.

This wasn't over at all.