#i sort of threw out the order in which they talk about stuff

[monarchisms]

so this is the unintentional part two of that summary post i made with geoff talking about the end of achievement hunter. for this post, i'm going to try my best to sum up what michael, trevor, and joe (but not alfredo because he was sick at the time 😔) have said about what will happen in the future on the penultimate episode of off topic, #403. there won't be a transcript this time as i am busy with schoolwork and stuff, so i'll try to make this summary as filled with as much accurate information as i can to make up for it :)

so basically,

trevor starts off by saying they'll be doing the last of various series to wrap everything up. he also notes that some of these finales will be "more nostalgic"

one of the series finales that's up right now is vs episode #150: joe vs BK. the game they played is cooking mama!

after the series finale of off topic (#404 lol), the final AH video ever will be a let's play in the remastered version of burnout paradise, and the cast will consist of geoff, jack, trevor, and michael. this is a callback to the first ever AH video they did back in 2008, and it's already been filmed! trevor says it was more emotional then he thought it would be :')

michael explains that the video will essentially be a ~70-minute podcast. in it, they'll talk more about the end of achievement hunter, where the cast members have went/what they've all moved on to, and new projects that they'll working on. he also says that he thinks that people will call this video "cathartic" while comparing the vibe to their old gta v series, sunday driving

not as important, but michael said that he was mindlessly driving and turning in burnout paradise in the same way that he'd run and jump in minecraft because he "fucking hated" playing minecraft lmfao

as said before, they decided to close AH and start something new with dogbark instead of continuing like they used to. michael acknowledges that in the last few years, most of the crew had already left rt in some way or moved on to other stuff within the company, leaving just michael, trevor, alfredo, and joe as the most consistent on-screen talent by the end. *bonus bit that wasn't mentioned until later, but alongside these 4, jarren from the post team will be their channel manager for dogbark :)

as this group makes videos for dogbark, michael says that their stuff will be both "tonally different" and "very fluid" as they're still figuring it out as they go, noting that they were balancing it and AH/let's play content at the same time

michael also talks about how he's been doing what he's wanted to do at AH for a long time, but there were some things he still couldn't do within the constraints the AH crew had put on themselves

while there will be some gameplay stuff on the dogbark channel, as mentioned in this episode and the channel trailer, they will primarily focus on live action content. trevor makes a point by saying that the style/theme in the trailer will "not be pervasive throughout the entire brand", and michael adds on to that by saying the trailer "is at 100, but every video won't be at 100"

michael and trevor make a point by saying that there will be more variety, as in "a dozen little formats", not necessarily like the shows/series they made at AH, with joe saying that they're not trying to "tie themselves down" to strict uploads and such, like they were when they were previously fitting into a mold at AH

trevor says that he has seen achievement hunter, and rooster teeth as a whole, having a unique challenge ahead of them. he refers to making content that appeals to an audience who had been following them since the early days while trying to also find new faces, both out there in the audience and internally at the company, in order for AH to stay around

he also points out how difficult it is to do that with a long-standing brand that has had different eras of content, since there would be an audience with differing expectations for them. with that, it became hard for the AH crew to balance said expectations with the authenticity they tried to show in the content they created. the crew has changed as people alongside their audience, and the stress that came with it was challenging

michael stresses that the group not only chose to make a new channel completely, they also had to fight for it for a while, and wanted to slow down on AH content before properly closing/archiving the channel to create dogbark. beyond the struggles of creating something new from scratch, they now have the challenge of preparing the audience for the jump from AH to dogbark while thinking about all the pros and cons before going forward

this week (the week of september 18th) and next week (the week of september 25th) are the last weeks of new AH content. after that, there will be a 1 or 2-day break before dogbark properly starts making new content on october 2nd. trevor feels like people will get a better idea of what dogbark is after a month or two of them uploading content

finally (subject to change, of course), they want to aim for full uploads every monday and friday, with patreon-like exclusive videos with rt first every wednesday and saturday. one of the confirmed things to expect is a first-exclusive podcast. the first week dogbark officially starts, all that content will be public as a sample of what to expect, and every week after that will follow that schedule

[froggy-demon]

Oh, Deer - Part Two

A/N: This is part two to my Alastor x OC slowburn story, I hope you enjoy <3

Chapter Summery: Lilly gets settled at the hotel and a stressful day of work leads her to getting a little closer to one particular staff member.

Part Three

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I woke up to my morning alarm blaring at me, shit I didn’t even think about how long it will take to get from here to work, fucking fantastic. And I have none of my clothes, also fantastic. I book it out the door and head to my old apartment. I grab a book bag I had laying around and stuff as much of my shit in it as I can fit, the less trips back and forth I can make while moving, the better. I change into an outfit for work, a pinstriped mini skirt and a turtleneck blouse with puffy sleeves with my trademark tights and kitten heel Maryjanes, throwing my backpack over my shoulder and getting to work as fast as possible. All in all, I was only 10 minutes late which is a fucking miracle if I’ve ever heard one. I busy myself by checking in with the other assistants and sorting out who is covering what assignments and shows today. Velvette slams open the studio door and is already looking pissed off, the day just started how can it already be going to shit? That question answered itself as behind her trailed in Valentino talking her ear off, switching between whining and yelling.

“Valentino it is time for at least one of us to actually do our jobs, fuck off already and find someone else to bitch to!” She yells at him and stomps off. This pushes him over the edge, he grabs a passing by assistant and snaps her in half, like it’s nothing. I duck my head down and find a way to be very busy and as unnoticeable as possible, hiding behind my clipboard as much as I can. 

“No you fuck off Velvette! Tell me what the fuck I can do one more fucking time! Try to run anything once I’m done with you precious shitty studio!” He threw the couch he had trapped that studio aid on just the other day against the wall and it smashed into a hundred pieces. He reached for a fleeing model and ripped her head off, damn and she wasn’t even an annoying model. He rampaged through the room and Velvette just ignored him and stomped my way. 

I straightened my back as she approached and tried to not seem bothered by the 10ft lunatic killing my coworkers and ripping apart anything else in his reach. “We are not getting off schedule, get my designers so we can keep our shit on the air! Get them here in the next five minutes while I get fucking Piss Baby out of here.” She Barked and I nodded

“Yes Ma’am.” She seemed pleased enough and walked off to order around anyone else still breathing. I used my ear piece to try to locate the desired designers, keeping my back to the scene behind me. 

“Designers, if most of your limbs are still attached, your presence is requited by Ms. Velvette immediately, bring what you have been working on for her and try not to be killed on your way.” I received 4 affirmatives and glanced back to see Velvette on her phone to presumably Vox. Thank Satan, this was definitely a big guns problem. I looked around at a few cowering workers near me and smoothed out my clothes. “C’mon, get this place straightened up. It’s a fucking mess in here, get a broom and a mop, now.” The three jumped up, though a bit reluctantly, and went in search for the cleaning supplies. I saw Velvette manage to force Valentino out the studio door and lock it behind him, hopefully keeping him out. I saw two of the designers come in and waved them over, having them stand up on a small platform that wasn’t totally wrecked and Velvette made her way over.

She was clearly still not happy, but at least wasn’t getting worse. Vox appeared next to her with a cheeky smile plastered onto his plasma face, contrasting her fiery attitude. I thought I saw him give me a small scowl, but I've never spoken to Vox, it couldn't be personal. He asked her where Valentino had gone and was back on his way. 

The day continued with far fewer bumps, minus the power outage caused by Vox's tantrum. Valentino stayed away so I guess Vox was able to calm him down well enough and Velvette stayed at a manageable level of pissed off until the outtage. 

“Fucking hell! Fine fuck him, everyone go the fuck home!” She screeched and no one was waiting to confirm that order. I grabbed my bag and booked it out of the building and back to the hotel. Alastor’s broadcast was all I could hear people talking about, though they kept it hushed so close to the Vs. Losing was not something they, especially Vox, liked. When I walked through the door I was surprised to find a new face in the parlor. He was a snake demon and Charlie was excitedly chatting with him while Vaggie stood to the side looking apprehensive. 

“Here she is!” Charlie exclaimed turning to me, smiling ear to ear. “Lilly! This is Sir. Pentious, he is our next guest at the hotel!” She motioned for us to shake hands, which I obliged. He seemed nervous, but still gave a small smile. 

“Ah, Lilly, it isss quite nice to meet another future redemption-ee!” He said and I tried to return his smile. 

“Lilly he blew up the hotel this morning.” Angel added dryly, I stopped smiling and looked at Charlie confused. Angel clearly wasn’t buying whatever the serpent was telling Charlie. 

“He said he is sorry! That’s what we’re all about, second chances!” She defended and really tried to sell it. I looked between her and Sir. Pentious, a little skeptical myself honestly. 

“If you are confident, I will trust your judgement.” I stated and turned to Angel, who filled me in on all of the details on the fight that had taken place that morning while Charlie taught Sir. Pentious how to apologize to Alastor. Geez, you go in for one shift and miss everything!

“Say, Dear, how did my little show go over at Vs HQ?” Alastor asked, appearing behind me and giving me a bit of a fright. He sounded particularly staticy. Angel rolled his eyes at his theatrics. I turned to face the demon and met his glowing eyes for a moment before looking back at Angel. 

“I couldn’t say for sure, but I’d say not well. Vox particularly was still glitching and zapping about when Velvette dismissed us after the power shut down. We couldn’t do anything with him fucking up all of the tech.” I said and he laughed, clearly pleased with himself and patted my head. Angel was deeply distracted by his phone, someone was texting him quite a lot, every few seconds his phone would buzz with a new notification. 

“Wonderful to hear! I’m glad I got my message across.” His eyes glowed a bit brighter, clearly there was some contempt held for Vox, and it went both ways. Seeing him like that sent a little zap of fear through me. I know what he’s done to those he doesn’t like to get what he wants, but he chooses to be so hands off with it this time? Maybe he just wanted to give a fair warning, I don’t know, but I do not want to get in the middle of it. “Speaking of your work,” He moved to stand between me and Angel now. “Why not find some new employment now that your housing is supplied? Something less television based maybe?” He eyed me, as though he suspected me of something. I tried to look past him to Angel again, but he blocked my vision, seemingly growing a little taller, a little more menacing. 

“Well, as much as I’d like to,” I said a tad nervous of the overlord in front of me “I can’t. Velvette owns me, my soul that is. As a day job it isn’t too bad at least.” I mumble the last sentence and Alastor raises an eyebrow at me. Angel is still preoccupied, but I see him throw a look my way when I mention my deal. 

“Deals aren’t usually Velvette’s style, she typically prefers to leave that work to the boys, how unfortunate for you then.” He says, returning to his normal chipper self and walks off. As he disappears I finally take stock of myself, I look like shit. There is dried blood on my shoes and spots of guts dotting my outfit for the Valentino’s carnage earlier, gross. 

“Angel, I’m going to take a shower and unpack a little you know where to find me if you need anything okay?” He doesn’t look up, clearly in a mood, sitting down on a nearby chair and crossing his legs over the arm and mumbles out an okay. I make my way upstairs, to my room, and then turn on the hot water for the shower attached to my room. After peeling off my clothes it felt good to let the hot water wash over me. The water pressure was better here too. A little refresh is really what I needed after today. Once I felt better I rummaged through my bag until I found my pjs, a pair of little shorts and an oversized t-shirt VTech gave out during some marketing campaign, it was at least comfortable. I started to unpack more and realized Niffty must have been here earlier because there was significantly less dust everywhere and my bed spread seemed freshly laundered. I will have to thank her the next time I see her. Just as I’m finishing up I hear some kind of commotion coming from somewhere in the hotel, what the fuck was that? I poke my head out and hear more noise, like someone is fighting, is that Angel Dust? I run down to the noise and meet Charlie and Vaggie walking up to the same disturbance.

Angel says that Sir. Pentious is working for the Vs, but I can smell the liquor on him from here, and the snake denies the accusation. Angel rolls his eyes and points out the video camera hidden between two books on the shelf, causing Sir. Pentious to panic. He screams into his watch to help him as Vaggie face palms and it's my turn to roll my eyes. Not only is he a spy, he’s an absolutely terrible one at that. I can hear Vox laughing at him though the watch, but Charlie has big doe eyes. He begs for a quick murder, but Charlie welcomes him in with open arms, despite protests from the three of us. After a set of profuse apologies, we head back to bed. 

Angel has his arms crossed, the whole walk. I want to say something, but he has been in a bad mood all day and I don’t want to accidentally make it worse. “Angel, y'know I-“ but he waves me off. 

“I don’t want to talk about it. Work shit, and we said work shit stays at fucking work.” He snaps, but sighs and I know he isn’t mad at me, just someone else. My guess, Val. I wonder if that’s what Valentino was raging about this morning, I hope for Angel’s sake it’s not. He slams the door to his room and I turn towards mine, just to be greeted by Alastor, he sure does have a knack for popping up. 

“Take off your shirt, Dear.” He glares at it, taking me back. This is a tone shift. 

“Excuse me?” I ask, taking a step back, not there there is really anywhere to go if you want to run from a shadow walking overlord at night. 

“Well, I’m going to burn it and I just figured you would want it off your body before I do that, but if you prefer,” Alaster smirked and lit a small fireball in his hand “you can keep it on!” He was very serious, I look back down at my shirt, I guess I set myself up for this one wearing a shirt with Vox’s face plastered on it, but hey it was a free shirt. I yanked it off and Alastor took two big steps towards me and took it from my hands, his eyes glowed devilishly as he set it on fire and watched Vox’s face burn away while he grinned ear to ear. “Much better! I appreciate your cooperation, however,” he bent down to my height and made me look him in the eyes. His voice grew more staticy as he said “I better not see anything else with his face on it here.” 

I nodded, it was all I could manage, I felt frozen in place and suddenly self-conscious as I realized I was in my bra and shorts in front of a murderous overlord, not exactly confidence inspiring for me. He stood back up straight and spun his cane, pleased with himself. “Very well, Goodnight!” He sang and I didn’t wait before quickly going into my room. Great, now I need a new sleep shirt, that will be a tomorrow night problem. I got into bed and curled up. I’m not doing amazing at staying off Alastor’s bad side, maybe tomorrow I will break that streak. 

The next morning I joined everyone else in the parlor downstairs, I had some time for once before I was needed at work. Charlie excitedly explained that we were doing some bonding activities as a group today, that it would help if we all trusted and got to know each other. I wanted to check in on Angel, but he was still hung up on his phone. Okay, so I’m going to have to make a second friend, it can’t be that hard can it? What do I have to work with? 

Niffty is a little… crazy… maybe not my first choice. Let’s see Sir. Pentious is eager, but do I have anything at all in common with him? Let’s see he likes building things? Nope. He likes being a leader, of his egg boys at least, uh in the right light sometimes you could kinda say I like bossing people around. I think that’s everything I’ve learned about him though, and I’m not really someone who goes out looking for a fight anymore, even if Cherri wants me to. Vaggie is a little too focused on Charlie I think to start worrying about anyone else, I can’t blame her, as sweet as Charlie is she is also a handful. I think Alastor is waiting for me to sneeze wrong to justify breaking my neck and is no where to be seen sooooo… my new friend is going to have to be Husk! The only hard part about that is he doesn’t really ever want to participate in our activities. I can work with that though. 

I take a seat next to Husk for activity time and give him a small smile. I haven’t really gotten what his deal is from Angel yet, maybe he just acts tough. “So, Husk, what brings you to the hotel? You don’t really seem like you’re here for redemption to me.” I ask trying to sound cheery. He just rolls his eyes at me though. 

“My job.” He huffs out, motioning over to the bar. Okay smartass. I fold my arms and lean forward towards him. 

“And out of all the bars in hell, why work at this one? Don’t tell me its for the dental insurance.” I quipped and he almost smiles. He leans back in his chair and looks across the room at nothing in particular. 

“Alastor, he tells me to go so I go.” He finally says. Ah, could Alastor really own his soul? I won’t press for now. Satisfied with the answer I sit back in my seat and he slumps down more in his, but then my phone rings. Velvette, why is Velvette calling me? I don’t hear from her that much seeing as I never have a day off anyway, not even extermination days. I hop up out of my seat so not to bother anyone and answer the phone. 

“Yes Ma’am?” I answer, stepping out of the room. She shouts that she needs me immediately, one of the models didn’t show up today and now she needs extra hands on deck and I better be there immediately. I try not to let her hear me sigh or sound disappointed. I guess I did get to sleep a couple extra hours which is more than enough to be grateful for. “Yes Ma’am.” I reply and she stresses I better hurry or I’ll be costuming for Valentino’s sets for the next year and she hangs up. I walked back in and the group looks up at me waiting for my explanation. “Okay guys, sorry to cut the team building short, but I’m needed at work sooner than expected, sorry Charlie.” Charlie looked disappointed. 

“Oh.. so when do you have a day you don’t work anyway?” She asks. “We’ll just catch you up then!” She beams at her great idea. Angel chuckles, Cherri probably has told him before if he knows my situation. 

“I don’t get any days off, sometimes I only work 10 hour days though!” I tried to make that sound like a good thing and gave her a thumbs up, but Charlie frowned again. 

“Well that’s not good, you’ll never have any time for our activities then!” She protested and started pacing. “Can’t you just say you need a day off for something important?” She looked at me with those big doe and and I shook my head, crossing my arms. 

“Some of us have jobs, dollface, contracts.” Angel points out dryly. He finally looks up from his phone to give Charlie a pointed look. It must be nice to be her. 

“There are no days off for me, if Velvette says come in I can’t say no. It’s just the way it is. Now she’s waiting for me, I have to get going.” I slip on my shoes and head for the door leaving a protesting princess behind.

I get there as quickly as possible and as soon as I walk through the door Velvette is tapping her foot waiting for me. She looks as pissed as usual, but it isn’t usually my direct fault that she’s pissed off. 

“Now, I happen to know that your apartment is all of five fucking minutes away so how the fuck did that take 25 minutes today?” She demands. Since when has she even known where I live? I straighten my back, I am not used to talking back to her, usually we even work pretty well together. “Well, spit out whatever pathetic excuse you have and get to begging for forgiveness! Some of us have important shit to be doing!” An assistant walked up to her and they quietly conversed while he showed her a different selection of blouses.

“I moved Ma’am.” I stated, adverting my eyes. She snapped her head away from her conversation to look at me again. 

“Well who the fuck told you to do something stupid like that? I need you near here for when I call you, fucking move back.” She said it like it doesn’t matter where I live or what I think if it doesn't serve her needs. She might own my soul, but that is not our deal. 

“Ma’am, with all the respect in hell, I cannot do that.” I stayed cool, that’s good. She walked over to me, until she was less than a foot away from my face. Her red eyes glowing and piercing into mine. 

“The fuck you will. As fucking kind as I am to you every fucking day, whose dick you’re riding just to crash in their shitty bed anyway?” She snapped at me, glaring at me while waiting for my answer. 

I took a deep breath. “Charlie Morningstar, Ma’am, well her hotel that is.” I added, looking down. Velvette was seething in front of me. She grabbed me and threw me to the ground. I hit my head hard on the stone floor, because exactly what I need is another head injury. 

“Don’t give me that kind of bullshit ever again. Remember who you are speaking to.” She spoke through gritted teeth. She materialized the link between us, the chain attaching me to her, our deal. I knew exactly what I signed, but she was right. I should have held my tongue. She used it to pull me to my feet in front of her. “Now get to fucking work.” She spat and let me go. I stayed on my feet and smoothed my outfit and hair, composing myself for the coming day. 

“Yes Ma’am.” I kept my eyes on the floor as she rolled her eyes. 

“Good, now get Kelly Killjoy’s suit options ready, it’s almost time for her to be on air, then come back to me.” And then she waved me away and I was happy to be able to walk away. I did as I was ordered, bringing the approved wardrobe to the news host's dressing room for her to pick from once ready. I raced back to the studio room to see what was next and Velvette sneared at me when she saw me. "Perfect, the seamstresses need a pin cushion, go be that until they are done with their projects.” And she turned away from me again. A pin cushion, this was going to be a long day. 

Twenty hours later I am still in the studio, but I have finished every task I’ve been given, skillfully I might add. Well, as skillfully as one can be a pin cushion, mannequin mover, and general studio bitch without a single moment to sit or even pee. I was back in front of Velvette awaiting her next order. She looked at me and shook her head. 

“Morning, cunt. Your outfit is hideous and you look more terrible than usual.” She said and zapped me into a new outfit, honestly the highlight of my day to have on something fresh, but really it was just a toned down version of her own outfit, but is all grey. Of course she would think her outfit was better. “Now perk the fuck up, I need you to set up the lights for the shoot we’re doing for my fabulous new clothing line today! And set up all the looks we created for it. Make sure those fucking models look right too, I can’t stand shitty sloppy work.” She said and I nodded, hoping it will be easy to learn how to set up studio lights. 

“Yes Ma’am.” 

After falling off a ladder more than once setting up the lights, organizing all of the set groups of items for the photo shoot, and labeling them, and then adjusting every single item on the models throughout the 10 hour shoot, I was ready to beg for Velvette’s forgiveness. I hadn’t had a drop of rest or caffeine in nearly two full days. 

Finally I was told to go home, but to be back tomorrow bright and early with a smile on my face. I don’t know what pissed Velvette off so badly in the first place that she felt the need to take it out on me, but maybe tomorrow will be different, unlikely, but maybe. I walked into the hotel and went straight to the bar, come to think of it that might be one of the best parts about living here. I slumped onto a stool putting my head down on the bar. Husk raised an eyebrow at me while he was organizing his bottles. 

“I wasn’t sure if you were coming back when no one saw you last night, where ya been?” He asked, he didn’t sound concerned, but he did sound curious. I picked my head up and propped myself up on my elbows. 

“Work. I’ve been at work since I left. Someone pissed off Velvette and that became my personal problem.” I muttered. I took a deep breath, I don’t need to bitch about my shitty day though that won’t have made it any better. No, I wanted a boost, I should go out I want to feel good about myself. I don’t want Velvette to be able to dictate my mood like this. 

“My, my, someone looks a little worked over,” Alastor sang as he walked up. “Did someone mistake you for a pin cushion?” He asked lifting my arm to inspect the hundreds of tiny and sore pricks in my skin. I pulled my arm away from him, trying not to humor him. 

“Hello to you too, Sir.” I said, holding back my irritation. I look at husk and he poured me a drink, I give him the best smile I could muster when he placed it in front of me. Alastor took the seat next to me, crossing one leg over the other and giving me his signature smile. I took a sip and let the warm feeling wash over me.

“Tell me, is television work loosing its charm? Such superficial work after all, but maybe that’s how you prefer it, dear.” He laughed at his own joke and tapped his cane on the ground. I drank more of the mixed drink Husk had made me, but it didn’t cool me off as much as I needed it too. I gave him another look and he went to pour me another but I looked up at him and motioned to just give me the bottle. 

“Aye, take it easy kid.” He said, but still handed it over. I took three big gulps and set it down. 

“Alastor, I’m not in the mood for your insults and condescension, I think I’ve had more than enough of those today.” I said dryly and took another drink. He looked at his nails, as if he didn’t have a care in the world, enjoying getting a rise out of me. 

“Oh, but I’m positive they haven’t been as witty as mine will be! Humor me won’t you? It’s been so boring today.” He leaned towards me, it was another request that didn’t really sound like a request. I couldn’t push back against Velvette, but I could with Alastor, maybe. I finished the bottle for some confidence and got out of my seat.

"No." I told him flatly, that should have been enough to get him off my back, but not Alastor.

"come now, don't tell me the big bad overlords you've worked for for years just now broke your spirit! Where's your moxie dear?" the demon quipped, leaning an elbow on the bar. I could feel my misplaced anger building, but shit he didn't have to be such a prick when I clearly was in a bad mood. I can't have five fucking minutes of peace?

“I told you, fuck off!” And stomped out the door, throwing aside the now empty bottle. 

Fucking Radio Demon, fucking Velvette! I’m more than that, I’m not just someone to shove around. I don’t have to take that, not when I’m not at work. She might be able to give me as much shit as she wants, hell she could actually assign me to fuck ass Valentino’s porno costuming I wouldn’t even care, but I will not go home and have some other demon make me feel like shit too. I’m worth something!

I look up from the sidewalk that I’ve been so concentrated on and realize I don’t really have anywhere to go, I’m tired of bars and clubs, but hell maybe it'll make me feel like a person again anyway. Maybe someone will talk to me like I’m just a fucking person. So at the next neon sign I see advertising a drink I walk in and order and get just that. It doesn’t take long, it never does in hell, until someone starts talking me up, buying me a drink, then another, and another, and then says we should get out of here. He's good looking for a demon, tall and thin with blood red hair and long black horns twisting out of it like a ram's. I agree. I follow him outside and he starts taking me down an odd way, its quiet and dark here, but maybe he lives on a quiet street in hell, what do I know. Then he turns around, smiling, and holding a handgun. It takes a moment to register. He closes the distant between us.

“What are you doing?” I ask, he laughs and grabs my arm. I’m not stable enough to avoid it and he pushes me up against the alleyway wall and points the gun at my chest. 

“I’m robbing you, dipshit, cough up whatever you have on you. I know someone dressed as pretty as you has a couple of bucks to spare right?” He sneers and shifts the barrel to under my chin. The only problem was I really didn’t have anything else. I had maybe a single dollar on me after buying that first drink and I don’t think that’s what he wanted to hear. 

Then all the sudden he was off of me, I fell a little and caught my breath which I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. What the fuck was that? I looked around and saw a familiar pair of eyes walking out of the darkness, blazing red. Shadow tentacles were holding up the attempted robber as Alastor emerged from the darkness, how is Alastor here? He was taller than his normal stature, and had a sinister smile, antlers protruding from his hair. This is the demon I’d heard on the broadcast those years ago, he had bloodlust in his eyes. 

“I don’t think so.” His voice was thick and distorted cutting up the still night, I could feel the energy pouring off of him. I didn’t know if I should stay where I was or get the fuck away from there at this point, but my legs felt too heavy to run very far. I looked up at him with wide eyes, it was like a car accident I didn’t want to watch him rip this demon in half, but I also couldn’t look away. He laughed maniacally as the sinner he held begged for forgiveness and his life. The Radio Demon drew him closer “Is that anyway to treat a lady?” Static filled the air and there was ringing in my ears, it felt like it was pounding in my head to the point that it was difficult to keep looking up. Alastor met my eye for one brief moment and then, unexpectedly, threw the creature across the city rather than ripping him in half. His piercing eyes didn’t change as he began to return to his normal self as he walked toward me having eliminated the threat. The static softened and I felt a weight leave my chest. “Terribly sorry for the fright! Charlie sent me to make sure you came back to the hotel in one piece tonight, I didn’t expect to find you in so much trouble.” He put an arm around me for support, but I shook it off. As uneasy as I felt I’m not sure if he was the one I should take it from.

“I wasn’t expecting any help, especially from you.” It came out as a statement of near disbelief, but I was still angry. Recovering from the personality whiplash Alastor had given me I took a few steps away towards the entrance of the alley. How am I supposed to see that and then trust him? “I can handle myself.” My knees wobbled and I leaned my palm on the wall again for support.

“Clearly.” He said sarcastically and smoothed his hair back where his antlers had disrupted it. “You sure did seemed to have a handle on that one! Next time I’ll just let it run its course, how’s that sound?” He adjusted his tie and grinned. More of his bullshit. I took another step back, I was certainly afraid of the power I’d just witnessed, but looking at him now he was just another demon.

“Whatever, I don’t need to take this bullshit, you can’t just talk to me like that because you’re used to being scary, I get enough of this every other hour of my day. Maybe you can treat Husk however you want because you own his ass, or other people are just too scared to say shit, but I’m exhausted! I’m too tired to bite my tongue and,” I was running out of steam, and those burning red eyes were still bearing into mine “it seems I’ll never get out of that cycle.” I slid down the wall to my side and held my knees to my chest. “I just, I’m tired of filtering myself to fit the situation I’m in. Just to please someone who can’t even tell the difference anyway. Putting up the right front to help maintain her goddamn brand. I can't do it with you too.” I sighed. How disgusting. Here I am shouting at someone who would love to rip my head off my body, just because my boss is shitty and unappreciative, and now I’m pitying myself for it on the ground of a filthy alleyway. This might just be my rock bottom. 

Alastor quietly walked to my side and placed a hand on my shoulder, sending a jolt through me. “If it’s any help, I’m condescending to everyone!” It was so stupid, so fucking stupid I had to let out a laugh. Geez, at least it isn’t personal I guess. I ran a hand through my hair, looking at my shoes in the dim light. “What was Charlie’s first lesson? Apologies.” I looked at him funny, his red hair nearly looked all black in this lighting, did he want an apology from me? He’s as crazy as Niffty if he thinks that’s happening. I picked at the ground next to my shoe to occupy myself. “Charlie also wanted me to apologize, I didn’t really mean to offend you. While I do find joy in watching the misery of sinners around me, on the other hand I am here to help Charlie and I can’t do that if I’m sending one of her guests spiraling now can I?” He offered me a hand up and I just stared at it for a second. “I’m sorry, Lilly.” He sounded as sincere as I’d ever heard him, which granted was likely a front to save face anyway, but I pushed my pride aside and took his hand, standing back up. It felt good to get that rant out of my system and it maybe even felt a little good to get an apology. I brushed the grime off of my skirt as best as I could, looking back at Alastor. He looked happy with his pep talk, but he kind of always had that demeanor so it’s hard to say. 

“Thank you Alastor.” Was all I managed to say. Pleased, he hooked our arms and pointed us in the direction of the hotel. We were quiet for a minute, I knew it was my turn to say something more, but I couldn’t figure out what was right. I kept dwelling on how he looked back in the alley, how the energy he put off felt all the way down to my bones. Even now it made my skin crawl, I’m quite glad to have made it onto his team I suppose because I would not want to be on the receiving end of that fury. “Why do you want to help Charlie?” I said it as soon as I thought it, but it brought me back to earlier. Husk is here because Alastor is here, but why the hell is Alastor here?

“A good question! It’s really very simple, I think Charlie will succeed and I like to be on the winning team. Plus,” He looked at me with a wicked look in his eyes, “If I’m wrong I’m no worse off and I get to watch everyone else suffer!” And began laughing. Not very comforting, but does make sense. Still I have a feeling Alastor is a few steps ahead in whatever plan he is hatching than he is willing to share. I wonder what else he was working up in his head, he’s difficult to read that’s for sure. The only actual emotions I’m sure he experiences are joy and anger. “If we’re asking intrusive questions now, I must say it’s been plaguing my mind, what exactly do you get out of your deal with Velvette?” He smirked, “Don’t tell me it’s for the dental insurance.” He mocked me, is there anything that happens in that hotel he doesn’t know about? 

“You mean besides a boss who won’t fire or fuck me? Well,” I chewed my lip for a moment. I always felt ashamed of my deal, how ironic as I landed myself in hell for the vice of pride in life. “You know it’s not easy starting out down here, one day I met Velvette and she, well she made it look easy.” In life I was the secretary to a man who ran a fashion magazine, I was so enthralled by his work I thought every piece that crossed his desk was genius. I fantasized about what I would design if I was able to. “When Velvette told me what she was doing down here I wanted in, hell a bit of me wanted to be like her, she told me there was only one way I could be on her team, but her success would be my success too and really I didn’t see any other opportunities coming my way. I was naïve and she was happy to take advantage of that. Don’t they all kinda go like that though?” I laughed awkwardly, mentally preparing myself for whatever shitty jab Alastor would make at my expense. He let me stew in it for a minute, or maybe for once he just didn’t know what to say. The sound of my heels rang in my ears as I was aware of his lack of response, buzzing with the city noises happening around us. 

“How unfortunate!” He used my arm hooked with his to pull me closer and gave me a sideways smile. “I would have given you a much better deal than that!” And winked at me. I gave a small laugh, right like being his tailor for the rest of my afterlife, how fun. He glared at the window of a TV shop as we passed it, Vox was giving some interview, but it distorted more the longer he looked at it. Just as soon as we had passed it, the screens returned to normal. Another mystery to Alastor. “Don’t worry dear, you aren’t the only soul in hell who has made an unwise deal. I think half the inhabitants of our hotel are in that very same boat with you!” As dumb as it is, it kinda made me feel better that I’m not the only sucker that I know. 

We reached the steps of the hotel and he followed me up. 

“Well if you need any emergency alterations you know where to find me!” I smiled and opened the door. After all of that I do think Alastor made me feel better, and I still have the entire $1 to my name that I could have lost, or worse. 

“Well someone is in a better mood than she was before.” Husk snarked from the bar and I shrugged. 

“I didn’t die so I guess I can’t complain too much.” I threw a wink to him and he let out a small chuckle. Alastor cleared his throat to regain my attention, which I gave him, clasping my hands behind my back.

“As happy as I am to have been of service tonight, I must bid you adieu my dear, I have much to do!” He gave my head a pat and made his way up the grand staircase without waiting for a response. I watched him go and disappear down a hallway off to whatever chores awaited him. I let out a well earned yawn and looked back at Husk. Is he always behind the bar? Where does he sleep? When does he sleep? I shook the thoughts from my head and waved him goodnight.

 I made my way up to my room but as soon as I drifted off to sleep all that filled my dreams was the image of Alastor in his demon form in the alley, but this time I was his prey. I would focus on his eyes and the intense fear they filled me with, shadow arms raising me higher and higher into the air as he laughed at my pleads for help. His whole body expanded and grew more wicked and disturbingly sharp. One of his claws dragged across my cheek, drawing blood. I woke up in a cold sweat and panting to catch my breath. I went to my bathroom to splash some cool water on my face, but struggled to feel much calmer. It was just a dream, but it was based on real events, even if they didn’t happen quite like that. I decided to throw on a robe and knock on Angel’s door, it was late, but hopefully he would be awake. He opened the door, rubbing his eyes. 

“Lilly? What the hell are you doin’ up at this hour?” He asked, one set of arms hugged himself and the other attempted to straighten his hair. I realized how dumb the truth sounded. ‘Oh I had a bad dream and wanted to talk to you’ I couldn’t say that, he would close the door in my face. 

I glanced up and down the hallway, surely even Alastor is asleep at this time of night? “I need to tell you about my day, now.” I tried to look very serious, but I was also pretty tired. Angel stepped to the side and let me in, giving me the first proper look of his room. It was very nicely decorated, it looked just like him. Everything was pink and there were little string lights hanging from the wall giving off a soft purple twinkle. 

He sat on his bed and patted the spot next to him. “What can’t wait until the mornin’ doll?” I took the seat and crossed my legs in front of me, pulling my robe a little tighter for comfort. “Husk told me you walked out pissed, but nothing else.”

“I just needed to get out. After the last two days of nonstop I just wanted to feel like a person and I didn’t here. Listen, to make a long story short, Alastor showed up to get me out of some hot shit. Apparently Charlie had sent him, but I saw him attack this demon and I, I don’t know I just can’t stop seeing it now. I’ve seen some fucked up shit here, I literally saw my coworkers get torn limb by limb a few days ago, but I don’t know something about how he looked at that demon.” I shivered. “How he looked at me after. It just, it freaked me out a little.” I pulled my legs up to my chest and rested my chin on my knees. Angel rubbed my back to sooth me. 

“Ah don’t worry about him too much, you’ve got Charlie’s stamp of ‘Do-Not-Kill’ on yah so he won’t lay a hand on you!” He crossed one set of arms “even if you want him to.” Apparently still making no progress in his flirtations. “Plus, if it’s dreams you’re worried about, maybe you just wish his arms were around you in another way!” He joked and lightly elbowed me in the side. I rolled my eyes at him and smiled. 

“Angel if you can’t pull him I’ve got zero luck, plus I am not interested like that. He’s just such a mystery I can't keep him out of my head.” I said, thinking on it I know shockingly few things about him for the amount that he seems to pop up and know things about me. 

“Oh baby, the best dick is!”  We both giggled and I felt a lot better. I asked him how his day was and he lit up. “Me and Husk got to have some quality time, if you know what I mean!” And he gave a cheesy smile. “We shared a drink is what I actually mean though. I think I’m breaking him down!” He beamed and then told me about how Husk had once been an overlord, until he was too far in the hole with gambling and ended up making a deal with our very own Alastor, confirming what I thought. Once I was caught up on the hotel tea I noticed my eyelids feeling heavy and the idea of getting some more sleep sounded better and better. Angel laughed and pulled the blanket over me and before his head hit the pillow I was out. 

Part Three

[unrequitedloveletter]

Forevermore- n.l x gn! Tidemaker! reader

Okay! This is part two, and in order for this to make sense, you’ll have to read part one! 

Fic type- hurt/comfort with a lot of nostalgia-type feels in it lol

Warnings- mentions of death

The day came during the summer, when you found yourself on a boat from Novyi Zem to Ravka on a six week long vacation. Just because you’d never quite thought you’d return did not mean that you were going to keep yourself from going, not when a part of you had begun longing for home, for butter week and laughter and dancing in the town square. 

Some part of you knew that you’d find your way to Os Alta, but it seemed that Tamar knew it better than you had, because when you were leaving the boat, you spotted her face, lips spread out in a grin as her gaze met yours.

“Oh, too long,” she said as you stepped off the dock and set your bags down. She hugged you tightly, and you hugged her back. “Oh, much too long.” 

“Too long indeed,” you agreed, grinning slightly as you pulled away from one another. “Missed you, Tamar. Hows the wife?”

“The wife is good,” Tamar laughed. “Though she, too, has missed you terribly. Did you have anything planned?”

“I had a room booked at the hotel twenty minutes out,” you said. “No coach, though. Nothing of the sort, actually.” 

“Well, I’ll have the room cancelled and refunded,” she said. “You need to stay at the Little Palace. Reminisce a little bit. I’ll be honest, I fear that Genya will kill you if she finds out you’re in Ravka and you haven’t visited. How long are you due to to stay?”

“Six weeks,” you said.

“Good,” Tamar nodded. “I took the royal coach. We’ll be behind Palace walls in three hours, tops.” 

You took up your luggage again, followed her unwittingly, some part of you being reminded of your friendship while you were at sea, her noticing the looks you threw at your beloved and teasing you for it, you laughing as she beat you at cards and won your rum ration for the taking. 

You rode to the Little Palace and talked throughout the entire time. Tamar gave you updates on Nikolai--including what the Darkling had done to him and the beast that came of it--and the rest of the people you’d known and loved. Genya and David. Zoya. Alina, it turned out, had faked her martyrdom, and was living with her beloved in Keramzin. It was all stuff she trusted you with, and you’d known Tamar long enough to know that you could’ve trusted each other with anything. 

You told her of your life in Novyi Zem, your flat and the stray cat that’d appeared on your windowsil and wormed his way into your home and your heart. You told her about the boutique, about the people you worked with and the ones you’d befriended. You told her about the kind souls who worked the market stalls, the laughter that carried through the city no matter which street you walked down. You told her about the baked goods that you always bought from the bakery across the street from the building you lived in, about the fact that the cat you’d taken in liked to use the inside of your winter kefta as a pillow. 

And then, almost suddenly, you were at the Little Palace, stepping out of the coach and barely having time to look to your right and  register Genyas face before she was approaching, and suddenly, you were hugging her and laughing and you couldn’t believe you’d stayed out of Ravka for so long, all of the feelings you’d neglected finally taking their chance to resurface. You’d missed everyone terribly. 

Zoya gave you a grin as the servants took to your luggage, offered you an elbow as you walked back through the Little Palace doors and Tamar returned to her duties as a member of Nikolais guard.

“Tamar knew about it, you know,” she said. “Cancelled the hotel the same day you’d booked it. Knew about the boat, too. A few of our spies in Novyi Zem reported to her in the same week you’d bought the ticket.” 

“I didn’t take much convincing,” you laughed. “I would’ve found my way back here even if she hadn’t intervened. Missed it too much.” 

“Missed the golden haired, brown eyed king too much, you mean?” Genya asked with a teasing laugh. You snorted ungracefully, internally denied it right off the bat, but you knew yourself too well. 

Some part of you had hoped he’d go to you before you went to him. Some part of you hoped you would return to your flat and find those disgustingly glorious hazel eyes staring at you as the man you’d once thought you’d marry sat, drinking kvas at your dining room table. 

Some part of you had hoped he’d say that he’d never stopped loving you and another part of you hoped he’d ask you to return to Ravka. 

Some foolish part of you hoped he’d ask you that so that you could have the chance to refuse him. 

The part of you that was not a fool knew you’d say yes, if he ever showed up at your flat and asked you to go back to Ravka. You’d never stopped loving him, only wished that you had. 

“Perhaps,” you agreed apprehensively. Had he missed you too? Was the love that had once been requited but had gone two years unrequited still there for the man you’d loved? 

Zoya scoffed. “Perhaps, Y/N?”

“Most definitely,” you allowed yourself a sad grin. “I missed him, yes. But I’ve missed you guys, too. I’ve missed David, I’ve missed Tamar and Tolya and I’ve missed Ravka as a whole. Two years is too long to go without visiting. Never again.” 

Zoya sighed. “You’re hopeless,” she said.

Genya laughed, but agreed, and the three of you were at the room that’d once upon a time been yours. 

“Go on,” Zoya said, “The refund for the money spent on the hotel stay awaits.” 

You scoffed, but turned the doorknob, opened it, and stepped inside.

You scoffed again as you found the money in bills laying atop a silk pillowcase colored a pale blue. You counted it out, and there it was, the money you’d spent and twenty dollars on top of it.

When you glanced up to the window, eyes searching for a desk somewhere because you had promised your friends in Novyi Zem that you’d write, your heart began to race. 

There he was. The Ravkan king, the man you once called your beloved. He was standing in front of the window, looking out to the scenery that was displayed outside it. 

“The additional twenty coin is what I’ve taken to calling an inconvenience fee,” Nikolai said. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience. That’s what it’s for.”

“What inconvenience, Nik?” You asked, using the nickname you used for him in past, in times of love and times before your relationship had crumbled and you’d run away from the rubble. 

You heard Nikolais scoff, and when he turned around, you caught a smirk playing on his lips. He looked like he had when you’d last seen him, when you’d fallen asleep in the same bed as him and been gone from the city by the next morning, though it was impossible not to notice the inky black stains on his fingertips. Left over from his spat with the Darkling, perhaps, or something that the volcra-like beast left in its wake.

“This one,” he said. “My being in your room. My having gotten Tamar to do as she did. My asking that she cancel your hotel, that she have her spies alert her the moment that you were seen purchasing a boat ticket near Novyi Zems docks. I’ve missed you.” 

You laughed. “Tamar respects my choices too much,” you said. “Zoya told me it was her doing, but I’d known it couldn’t’ve been. She never wanted me to go but she respected it when I did. You, however? Every decision of yours is calculated. You let me go because you knew you could get me back, you handsome fool.”

“You have always been the right person for me,” Nikolai said. “But in the middle of a war, in the middle of watching a living saint in her quest to destroy the Fold, it was not the right time. In no universe would it ever have been. You were the right person for me then, and I imagine you’re the right person for me now. I think you think the same thing.” 

You could’ve cursed him out, kicked his shin, punched him the face for the boldness of his words. You wanted to, and judging by the way that Nikolai grinned but rested a hand on the sword sheathed to the right of his waist, he knew it. 

But he was right. Two years, you’d missed him. Two years, you’d hoped he’d come strolling through your flat and sweep you off your feet like he did the first time. Two years, you thought of him every single day and two years, every single day you debated leaving Novyi Zem behind and purchasing a boat ticket back to Ravka. 

“So what then, Nikolai?” You asked. “What of it? Am I supposed to drop everything of the life I have built in Novyi Zem, leave behind my friends, my job, the cat who wormed his way into my heart when he sat on my windowsil like he bloody well owned it? I want this. I want us. I’ve missed you more than you will ever be capable of comprehending, but I cannot stand the idea of just leaving it all behind.” 

“You did much the same when you left Ravka the first time,” Nikolai pointed out. “You seemed to have no problem with it then!”

“I wept from the moment I got on that boat to the moment I docked in Novyi Zem,” you cut. “I could not stop crying for my first week. I didn’t want to go, Nikolai. I just knew that I had to. I built a life from the one I left behind. I cannot bear the thought of leaving it in the dust. I did that once, thinking I’d be able to survive it. Never again.” 

With the words, you left the money from the hotel refund on your bed, left your room and walked down the hall. You didn’t know where you were heading, but you were sure you’d figure it out eventually.

-

in the hours later, Nikolai found you at the lake. You were sitting on the dock, pants rolled a good few inches, one foot lazing about in the water whilst your other leg was bent, one arm resting against your knee. You occasionally flit your wrist, watched as the waves picked up and rolled at your will.

“I shouldn’t’ve asked you to leave it all behind,” he said. “I wasn’t trying to. I was just trying--fuck. I don’t know.” 

“If you asked me to now, I would,” you said. 

The hours spent by the lake had been hours of drowning in your own thoughts. You could holiday to Novyi Zem in the summer. You loved it there after you grew into it, but you hated it at the same time.  

Never being able to use your abilities as a Tidemaker, never wearing the amplifier you’d claimed for your own, they got tiring. Refilling the kettle, filling the basin when you needed to wash dishes, summoning when it was time to water some near-dead plants in your garden, it grew monotonous. You missed summoning waves as tall as the boats Nikolai loved to captain. You missed summoning water to the samovars, drinking the tea that brewed in them as you talked to Tolya and laughed at Zoyas quips. 

“You would?” Nikolai asked. “So then our spat was for nothing?”

You laughed. “Not for nothing,” you said. “If we’d not argued, I never would’ve thought about staying past the six weeks I’m due to spend here. I would’ve enjoyed my time, cried the entire way back to Novyi Zem when I left. I missed you lot every single day. It would’ve gotten worse, and I wouldn’t’ve lasted two months.”

Nikolai laughed as he took off his shoes, rolled his pants up and dipped his feet into the water. He wrapped an arm around your shoulders, let his chin rest against one of them.

“I used to call you my intended back in the day,” he said. “When we were nineteen, I knew that I would marry you. Tolya teased me for it relentlessly.”

“Your intended, Lantsov?” You laughed. “Because you intended to marry me? I resent how sweet that is. If I’m remembering correctly, I used to call you my most beloved.” 

Nikolai smirked. “Oh, and I’m the sweet one?” 

“The most charming, by far.” 

Nikolai shrugged, nodding his agreement as he did. 

Silence passed. It felt familiar, and you realized that it was the same comfortable silence that used to settle over the two of you in the years prior. 

The one that settled as you stood side by side near the prow of whichever boat he’d taken to captaining that time around, the silence that would settle as he wrapped his arms around you and pressed a kiss to your cheek, whispering “I love you” with the same sureness that you saw in his smile. It was the same silence that reminded you that life would not always feel as it did, that there would be a life after the war with the Darkling. You would be reminded that the two of you could make it past that. 

As the silence passed, you realized that you were wrong about it. Your relationship had not survived the war, but that wasn’t to say it could not begin again in the rubble that the war had left behind. 

“May I kiss you?” Nikolai asked as the sunset draped itself across the Ravkan sky. You noticed that it’d become a swirl of shooting reds, pinks, oranges and purples, teal-ish hues and orange spots behind the clouds. 

You let yourself grin. “Please.” 

And then you were adjusting, and Nikolai was moving forward, and his lips were against yours. You were wrapping your arms around his shoulders when you tilted back, laughter on both ends breaking the kiss before it really had the chance to start. 

Nikolai kissed you as you lay on your sides, his lips feeling like something familiar, something that said “welcome home,” in the sweetest intones and with the brightest, warmest smile. It was like being greeted by a lover long lost, which you supposed he was, really.

The two of you pulled away, grinning and breathless as your gazes turned to the sky. 

“I love you. I love you and I have missed you terribly,” he took your hand, interlaced his fingers with yours and kissed the back of it. “Would you, Y/N L/N, my once upon a time intended, do me the honors of staying in Ravka for the duration of the summer and the fall? Would you let me prove myself worthy of taking your hand in marriage?”

You laughed. “When you say it like that, it becomes so utterly undeniable. Of course.” 

Nikolai grinned, asked if you’d like another kiss. When you said yes, he pressed his lips to yours and you kissed him back and you were overjoyed to be able to do it again. He pulled away and the two of you stayed there, laying on the dock, more content than not. 

-

The winter came, and you’d moved into the Grand Palace full time. You once again began to laugh with Genya and Zoya, took interest in David and Nadia’s work in the Materialki workrooms. 

When Os Alta went too far into a drought, you and Zoya worked together and summoned storms that lasted days. 

You and Tamar sparred daily, laughing and talking as you threw your punches. You sparred with Tolya, let him recite his sonnets and read some of your favorite poetry books in the library. 

When the day of your wedding came in early December, it was certainly one of the best days of your life. There was kvas, iced wine, more champagne than you’d ever seen in your lifetime. There was dancing, laughter, an airy kind of contentment having draped itself over the venue. 

Nikolai found himself grinning that night, as you ran your hands along the black-stained fingertips that the beast created by the Darkling left in its wake. His hair looked golden in the lamplight, eyes looking ethereal to match it. He wore his usual self assured, kind smile, a twinge of love draped across his grin.

“You’re no longer my intended,” he said. “You’re my spouse. The person whom I shall rule Ravka alongside.”

You found yourself grinning. “I can’t wait.” 

And then Nikolai was kissing you and you were laughing as you fell back into the bed, contentment and genuine joy flooding and overtaking your every sense. 

Nikolai was the one. Two years ago, you could have argued that he was not, that he may have been the right person but you’d never quite find the right time. There was a right time for your romance, and the middle of a war was not it.

However, you’d done as you hoped. You’d built something from the rubble, and the thing that you’d built would stay strong forevermore. 

[1kari]

alright! recap of the last 3 hours. tldr neighbor got arrested for five felony charges and almost killed her husband 👍

so. shes been getting bad the past few days (saying stuff like “i dont give a FUCK how you feel” and “i wish you would just drop dead” to her husband, that sort of thing) and apparently she had another violent outburst and she left the apartment. so i went over to talk to him and see what was up to see if he was ok (he has terminal heart failure so like. i wanted to check on him)

while im there suddenly theres a POUNDING on the door, non stop, really angry knocking over and over. he tries to say like “what do you want” to her through the door but she doesnt stop. he tells me “just open the door before she gets more violent and breaks a window” so im like you know yeah ok. im scared as fuck but yeah so she gets angry at me and tells me to leave im like Yep was planning on it 👍 but her husband told me he didnt feel safe alone with her.

she starts screaming at him saying a lot of really irrational things and hes just like “look, what can i do to make it so we can talk like adults” and that sets her off. by this point i was standing outside the door to their apartment (he was in the doorway) and hes just like “should i call the cops??” because we both have peaceful contact restraining orders and she was in a place where it was likely shed get physically violent. i tell him look if youre afraid for your safety (which with her history he had every right to be) then id call them. shes still screaming the whole time this is happening too

i pull up the number for the police dept just in case, and as im doing that she grabs him, throws him inside, and slams the door shut behind them and i hear loud thumps like someone being thrown against the wall. im already on the phone with dispatch at this point because she Has tried to kill him in the past, and i hear him screaming “DYLAN HELP ME! HELP!!!” like ive never heard him sound so fearful before. i tell dispatch “i have to go in there and see if hes ok” and they tell me to stay outside and stay on the line

they send someone out, i hear more thumping, i’m feeling terrible because it’s likely she’s beating the shit out of him (i know what that sounds like cuz ive seen her do it before.) and, after this was all over, he told me she slammed him into the wall, threw him on the ground, kicked him in the head, and then tried to strangle him with two hands (he had the marks around his neck, too). he said he almost passed out but thats when the police knocked and she answered the door and went outside and i heard her be all “why are you here i didnt do anything” and this whole time im texting her husband and calling him and not getting a response so i was genuinely worried she killed or seriously injured him.

so they start questioning her, she starts getting progressively more defensive and aggressive, and once she asks “can i talk to him?” the cops say no, and she starts SCREAMING. when i say i have never heard someone scream like this in my life…. it was awful. she was screaming at full volume just like a bloodcurdling scream, over and over and over for 20 minutes while the cops are trying to get her in the car. i hear the cops say “stop kicking” and “stop resisting arrest” over and over and she starts saying things like “FUCK YOU YOU SON OF A BITCH IM GOING TO KILL YOU IM GONNA FUCKING KILL YOU” to the cops…… anyway.

so! she was arrested for five felony counts. 1) domestic violence, 2) violation of a court restraining order, 3) resisting arrest, 4) criminal threat, and 5) harm to officers. and depending on the situation she might be charged for attempted murder.

i felt bad about calling the cops at first because i was like “what if she really didnt do anything” but knowing she tried to kill him… i feel worse that i didnt go inside when he screamed for help but i honestly now think she would have tried to hurt me too and it’s better i called when i did. especially since the only thing that saved his life was the police knocking on their door when they did.

sooo she’s going to be in prison for probably at LEAST ten years. maybe upwards of 25 depending on what they do charge her with…. my god. anyway that was my night :)

[tbgblr2]

Cruising into new life - part 2

The next morning started early. Jodie had been raising early and trying to take naps during the day during her maternity leave for the last week or so – the joint terrors of pregnancy bladder, heartburn if she lays down and baby kicks resulting in a lot of interruptions.

Over night we had the announcement that we were now in international waters – we knew what that meant by our earlier briefing – and Jodie was desperate to see the oasis area and book a spa appointment – after a bit of digging around it seems that even these were included free of charge. We ordered breakfast to our room and after a quick shower, Jodie reached into the closet and pulled out the most luxurious, fluffy dressing gown I had ever seen. It was made with a pregnant woman’s proportions in mind too, covering her bump with plenty of room to spare.

As I was in the shower I heard the breakfast get delivered, and making sure that I had given plenty of time for the porter to leave so I didn’t flash him, jumped out of the shower, threw a towel on the bed and sat down ‘au natural’ to enjoy the food. During the meal Jodie kept on talking about spreading jams over certain parts of my anatomy and licking it off – but aside from that self same part of my anatomy springing up in anticipation nothing came of it. My wife is a terrible tease.

We flicked on the tv to channel 10 and just saw a message saying broadcasts will resume at noon, seems that Adriana at least has some time off from being in the front of the camera.

I spent a little while applying moisturiser to Jodie’s belly, and in appreciation, along with the sing song oohs and ahhs she provided me with, her hands spent a long while between my own legs, cock and balls being tugged and squeezed until I was a shaking mess, finally releasing myself all over that same belly I had rubbed a short while earlier. Life was good. And I had to rub goo into her belly all over again. Life was better.

We got a bit more of a chance of hand on body action as we applied our sun lotions, unsure what what the outside weather was like before we finally – and dare I say reluctantly – got dressed and headed out of the cabin around 9am several hours into our day already.

We started to deck 10 to explore the family areas first, waving hellos and nodding to people as we passed them. As we passed a couple using one of the wheelchairs Jodie pressed a hand into her back and gave an over emphasised groan. I took the hint and said I’d go back and fetch one, which she gave an appreciative ‘my hero’ look and kissed me deeply on the lips as thanks.

As I returned back I found Jodie in discussion with some sort of mothers club (or well I guess mothers to be club) as at least a dozen women, some with strollers carrying babies and small toddlers were huddled together around a selection of seats which had been pulled together.

As I approached with the chair I overheard snippets – usual stuff - stitches, tears, babies of so many pounds and labours of so many hours. War stories Jodie called them. She had never experienced it herself but her mother was quite candid explaining her birth and of course being a midwife had a lot of stories to tell herself which the ladies seemed more than happy with Jodie regaling them with. I stood off to one side, waving as she looked up to notice me, and with that I was introduced to the group. I’ll be honest and say that I was introduced to a few names and I couldn’t remember a single one of them in the commotion, but one thing I did find out was that the family I presumed were a poly couple (one man and 2 ladies in the check in area) was a little more complicated.

Firstly one of the women wasn’t romantically involved with any of the others – she was a good friend of the other lady who had agreed to be a surrogate for the first after they struggled to conceive their second child. Shortly after the second woman – now sporting a large bump herself – actually fell pregnant with twins and they were soon to become a family of 4 in a very much ‘oops’ moment – but all children were eagerly wanted. Seems the twin mother to be was only 7 months along but was allowed to join the cruise because of the surrogate wanting the family around should she go into labour on board. My mouth got away from my brain when I asked “do you all share a cabin?” The lady gave a good natured chuckle and answered no, but they do have adjoining rooms so she could go and tuck her friends in and give them a kiss good night if she wanted to.

The group spent another 15 to 20 minutes chatting, I just sat back and took in the view of various bellies being rubbed, itches being scratched and occasionally small lumps and bumps appearing across the bellies arrayed in a circle in front of me. As I said before – life was good.

We left the group after a while and headed off to our ultimate destination – the adult area and the oasis. I take no shame in saying that I was worried what was going to happen in the clothing optional area – I mean it’s no secret what turns me on and being offered up a veritable smorgasbord of pregnant ladies might make me… well… pokey. Which would be a tad embarrassing. However we ploughed on ahead, reached the fenced off area, swiped our key fob to get in and my jaw dropped.

The area wasn’t busy by any means but in front of me were around a dozen women and – after a quick head count – 5 men including me who were in various states of undress. Most had opted to go topless – either discarding the top half of their 2 piece sets or simply rolling down swimsuits, relaxing on loungers or sitting on the side of the pool. The pool itself was empty. Jodie asked one of the ladies with her legs in the pool about why it was empty and she replied that it was too cold. Hmm… maybe that could be a shock to the senses I need should anything start to stir.

We passed through quickly and on to the oasis as we planned where after a short walk we came up to the next door, swiped in and for sake of repeating myself, jaws were on the floor once more.

This area was basically a covered greenhouse with tropical plants decorating everywhere with a large circular pool in the centre and a river system running around the outside edge so in theory you could get to wherever you chose to sit down and rest without hardly leaving the water. The water wasn’t swimming pool deep by any means, waist deep at most so you could get around by wading through the water rather than having to swim.

It was busier in here than in the outdoor area – it was to be expected, it was still early in the day and the suns warmth hadn’t reached its peak yet, but it was also comparatively smaller, so perhaps less people seemed busier… I didn’t bother counting heads.

Jodie spotted somewhere for us to sit and dragged me over to it, pulling the dress she was wearing over her head to leave… nothing. In our time getting dressed this morning I had failed to register that she just put on a cover up over her naked body – the fact she had gotten dressed so quick just completely passed me by. She was breathtaking, and yes, my eyes were certainly focused on her than anyone else in here.

She broke my reverie with a cough, wiggling her eyebrows and gesturing towards my shorts. I smiled and pulled off my top and shorts in short order, standing proud and to attention, my cock like a flagpole on parade. Yeah she had done it. I guess get the embarrassing moment out of the way quickly.

My face was turned beet red though when I heard a wolf whistle. I turned and saw Jess wading towards us in the river system. I was clueless what to do. I mean we had only met this woman yesterday and here she was coming to meet us, breasts flopped down against her belly, not a whisper of hair between her legs, and me poking out and glistening at the tip.

She walked along, hugged Jodie and completely ignored the elephant in the room – or between my legs I guess. First thing she asked was if she could join us or if we wanted to be left alone – good on her – but when Jodie said to sit down, she was quick to pull up a lounger and slowly lower herself on to it, not a care in the world that she had nothing on. I guess being 21 and fit gives a boost of self confidence I was certainly missing in this situation.

We got talking, asked about her mother, and it turns out that she may be in labour. Nothing major, no rapid contractions or anything but she said it was just like it was when she was giving birth to her. She wanted to rest and see if anything developed. Of course this made Jodie giddy with delight and they got talking. Apparently she was 4 days early at this point but Jess had been born a day early so she wasn’t exactly expecting to get off the ship without another passenger in tow.

Jess abruptly changed conversation topics. Asking me if I could do anything about that… maybe cover it with a towel or something. There we go, my cock had been noticed. Seems Jess couldn’t stop glancing at it with how it was front and centre between us and whilst she knew it was wrong she had been without one for so long she was getting hungry… also little chance of single men on this cruise.

Jodie laughed and pulled a sock out of her bag and plopped it over the pole I had. “Not quite what I was thinking” announced Jess and we all burst into laughter.

Jess’s eyes wandered to the central pool and asked if it would be in bad taste to sleep with the staff. Our eyes followed hers looking wistfully off in the distance to see the hunky medical staff team member from the introductions in the pool, standing up waist deep but impossible to see if he was wearing any thing below. Jess and Jodie giggled what could only be described as a ‘wicked titter’ with Jodie telling her to go for it.

My eyes went down to water level and I noticed the face of Adriana submerged up to her neck in the pool. The thought she might be naked sent blood rushing back somewhere I was desperate to try and get rid of. And of course that was when Jodie and Jess decided to do a bit of matchmaking and set off toward the pool, asking me if I was coming.

I sighed and hoped that the water was cool enough to tamper down the blood rushing into places I really hoped it would avoid as I splashed into the river in pursuit.

We passed several couples relaxing in each others arms around the river route until we finally came to a pool entrance point and with a splash we all entered. It took a bit of dodging around floating pool guests until we approached our intended targets, Adriana’s eyes noticing us and smiling.

“Ahh once again we meet my good luck charm” her voice was practically purring. Glancing down into the water she added “I didn’t expect to meet so much of you I must say.” Thankfully I think the blood running to my cheeks took precedence this time and my lower half remained chill as I mentally thanked every god going for this situation.

“I would like to introduce you to my little brother.” She followed on, gesturing to the hunky medical team member. “He is Miguel, actually my twin, but he was born 20 minutes after me so I call him my little brother – he so dislikes the term.” Her beaming smile was left with a scowl from the man to get left.

“Charles feels that with me being so close to my time, I shouldn’t be let out without an escort. And Miguel here will be delivering the baby so he is as good as any.”

Jodie reacted first “your brother will deliver your baby?”

“Oh yes… I trust him very much and he is probably the most highly trained on the ship.” Adriana replied.

“But… it’s hardly what I’d want my brother seeing me down there.” Jess added.

“Ahh we have different cultures in my native Brazil. We are much more relaxed about nudity. It need not be sexual.” I swear she purred the word ‘sexual’

Miguel followed, his Latin accent much more pronounced than his sisters. “Indeed. I am my sisters biggest promoter. When she was dancing, there were many times that I helped her pick out costumes… many of them rely on no… how do you say – no panty lines. My attitude is that I have seen her naked on the day she was born, and an untold number of times since then.”

“How about anyone else” Jess blurted out, not entirely sure if she meant to say it out loud or just think it… but it was out there now.

Miguel looked at her. “I find great beauty in the female form. Perhaps we can meet to discuss practical examples.” My god that was smooth.

Jess blushed and fanned herself with her hand. “I may need to submerge myself it’s very, very hot in here.”

Adriana looked at me as the others were giggling. “Could you help me? It seems my brother is now a little busy, and I need help applying moisturiser.” I gulped. Looked straight at Jodie.

“Go. You’re married, she’s married, I know nothing will come of it, and you cannot say no to a lady in distress. A pregnant lady at that.” I was caught between a rock and a hard place. I agreed and was told to follow Adriana to her bed.

It was at this point that I realised that she was indeed naked under the water. My eyes hadn’t drifted above the waterline and reflections had obscured everything as we approached. She stepped out with her back to me and I know it’s a cliché, but if I hadn’t seen her from the front, you wouldn’t have told she was pregnant from the back. She raised inch by glorious inch out of the water like some sort of nymph, toned ass and legs eventually meeting my eye level with a shimmy.

Of course you know fine well which part of my anatomy reacted. I had no choice but to follow through and go with it. Jodie’s eyes followed me – Miguel and Jess focused on each other in the moment – and I’m certain I heard her say – or perhaps think - ‘oh dear.’ Yes I was following the most recognisable person on the whole cruise with a hard on.

Adriana’s eyes drifted down and no doubt took in an eyeful but didn’t say anything. She offered her arm to me to link as she walked me back towards her bed. A few steps along the route she actually pressed her hips into me and pulled me close announcing “your wife is very lucky.” I hoped she meant that I was willing to help rather than the size of the package. I focused straight ahead and tried not to look at her breasts in my peripheral vision as I answered “oh, how’s that.” Smooth. Nonchalant.

“Oh I can think of 2 reasons. And one of them shouldn’t be mentioned in polite company.”

My cock actually twitched. This woman was teasing me. My wife was watching my and hers ass wobble as we step away, her husband the guy who was running the show, and me caught with a woman who probably could be described by the word ‘vixen.’ My brain went ‘lithe, sexy, voluptuous’ in immediate response. Ok so that wasn’t helping the issue in the trouser (or lack of trouser) department.

We arrived at her lounger and she swished around and dropped down onto it with a grace that I wasn’t expecting for someone in such an advanced state of pregnancy, her head came around to be eye level with my crotch, and in that split second as it turned around in its route to looking to the side I could swear she was grinning. She brought back over a very expensive bottle of moisturiser (I’ll be honest I’ve no idea of brands of high end moisturiser but it was a very fancy, tiny bottle) and passed it over to me. As she laid her head back and relaxed into the lounger she purred “please be generous with it.”

I squeezed what must have been a quarter of the bottle between my hands and laid them down on her belly. The cold gel caused Adriana to flinch but she soon settled into it as my hands started to rub around in circles around the expanse of her belly. She let out soft moans and groans as my hands explored, my hands brushing the very top of her belly where her breasts rested down on them. I felt the baby within her belly move and roll, limbs poking out to follow the movement of my hands.

“Charlie likes that…” she let out breathily. “And so does his mother.”

“Charlie ?” I asked.

“Our baby is a boy. We were going to call him Charles Jr after his father, but Charles feels so… middle aged. So for now I call him Charlie. What about you?”

“We don’t know what we are having. We have about 5 names of each sex picked out and we will decide when we see it.”

Adriana groaned an acknowledgement that I had spoken but didn’t say anything else as my hands worked. This moisturiser was great, my hands hadn’t stopped moving in over a minute and still they were slipping and sliding as if I’d freshly applied it. Adriana’s body was glistening.

As she groaned another appreciative sound, her knees draped open leaving her completely exposed to me. My eyes bulged as her hand snaked around under the expanse of her belly and rested against her labia.

“Please… go… higher.” She was of course referencing my very intentional movements to avoid her breasts. It took all my willpower to say no… and I was breathing a sigh of relief as I heard Jodie announce herself behind me.

“Hi Babe.” My head turned to find my wife on approach. She was grinning. “We really need to find some way to deal with that.” All through the massage of course I was standing proud – I dare any straight man to do otherwise in that situation.

I coughed, unsure what to say as the lady I was massaging was sprawled, legs splayed open with her hand touching herself.

“Did my husband live up to expectations Mrs LeGrande?” She asked.

“My dear, please… Adriana. I’d like to think we were all friends here. And he is a magician with those fingers. I had almost nodded off. Do you know what happened to my brother and his lady friend?” She was of course asking for the reason why Jodie had wandered this way, but she was clever in hiding it.

“Oh those two went for some… privacy I think. So I thought whilst my husbands hands were all lubed up I’d partake in the service.”

“Oh please. Use my brothers lounger, and feel free to use this lotion. It would be a shame to not have those hands doing what they do best.”

Jodie looked wicked. “He can do much better, even with just 2 fingers.” I swear that Adriana shivered. Jodie grinned as she lowered herself down into the lounger opposite Adriana.

As I applied yet more of the lotion to my hands and rubbed up and down starting at Jodie’s belly, ensuring that in this case I covered her whole body from her neck to her toes as she laid back and enjoyed the sensual touches, the chilled moisturising gel leaving her body with prickles on it as my hand left any given area. Yet more groans coming from my wife as my head turned and caught movement of Adriana’s hand slipping in and out of her folds. She was playing a dangerous game… but of course no one is going to say no to the owners wife if they caught her masturbating in public.

I turned my head suddenly as I heard a pained grunt, Adriana rubbing a spot on her belly. “Braxton hicks.” I nodded. “With 2 days to go until my due date these get all too frequent. I try to hide them in camera. But why not let them go here. Oh… speaking of camera.” She looked up at the clock. 11 am. “I need to prepare for my afternoon. Could you please help me up?”

I offered an arm for her to brace herself on, not certain my hand would be a good grip with all of the moisturiser on it. Adriana made getting up look too easy. I mean I didn’t have a pregnant belly out in front of me throwing off my balance and I struggle to get up that easily.

She stepped into a pair of track suit pants and threw on a sports bra to contain her breasts as she turned to leave. “Oh please, before I forget. My husband and I will be holding a belly cast class this evening. I hope I will see you. It is in here. I’m expecting you both to attend. I want to see you put those hands back to good work.” With that she turned and strode away.

“Shit.” I said, my wife looking at me with a look of concern. “She left the moisturiser stuff.”

Jodie smiled. “I think she can likely afford to let it go.” She was grinning. We must have used probably half the bottle in 2 applications but she brought the brand up on her phones browser. It was $150 a bottle.

“Should we offer it back tonight?” I asked.

“Glad you decided we should go. I liked seeing that lady squirm.” Jodie was wicked in her own, good natured way.

[pencil-peach]

G Witch Onscreen Text: Episode 11

This is part TWELVE!!! Of my attempt to transcribe and discuss all the onscreen text in G Witch (and also just to talk about things I think are cool.) We have reached Episode 11: The Witches from Earth.

<<Click here to go back to Episode 10!

I have to hide..! (Under the cut)

So before we start, I had forgotten to mention something rather important in the last episode, that being that in the final scene with Prospera and Delling, we get a look at Quiet Zero (Or perhaps, the components that were being stored at Plant Quetta.)

We can see that the progress of this component is at 89%, almost completely finished. Bel comments later when she confronts Prospera that Aerial wouldn't need a permet score of 8 to complete Delling's original plans for Quiet Zero, and we can see that here, considering the machine is almost done.

Prospera also just outright gives Delling Aerial's Permet Score 6 data, telling him that with it, Quiet Zero can proceed to its final stage. I think it's really important to remember that the attack on Plant Quetta was not something Prospera had expected, especially with it having been done with Lfrith models. Her original plan was probably just to have Aerial reach Permet 8 and then just like. Kill Delling and take over Quiet Zero. (Maybe torture him a little. For fun.)

But the existence of the Lfrith models threw a wrench in that plan. A majority of her actions in season 2 were done in order to locate and destroy the source of the Lfriths, because the existence of an army of Gundams was a threat to Quiet Zero.

Anyway, speaking of the Lfriths, did you know that the show's OP changes slightly depending on what's happening in the story?

At the start of the show, this scene has Delling appear, and he fades out into Prospera.

But starting with episode 7's OP, shadowy images of Ur and Thorn appear behind Delling, and then disappear before Prospera fades in.

And in Episode 11 - 12, the scene is completely different, showing clearer images of Ur and Thorn, with Sophie and Norea appearing in front of them, turning to the camera.

Also, did you notice that the Ur and Thorn are color coded to Sophie and Norea, but backwards? Ur is colored like Norea, but is piloted by Sophie. Thorn is colored like Sophie, but piloted by Norea.

You'll have to excuse me, I'll probably be spending a lot of time talking about non text stuff as this episode is actually incredibly light on text...

In the opening scenes where the Earth House kids have just reached Plant Quetta, you can see Miorine silently moving away from everybody in both of these shots. Since our perspective is with Suletta for a majority of their conflict, we don't get to see a lot of Miorine's side, but I think it shows in these little moments. She doesn't understand why Suletta is acting so strange and it's frustrating her, so she's just avoiding her and hoping she sorts herself out.

A lot of their behavior in this episode is reminiscent of what they were like before they'd met each other.

Norea is sketching Thorn's face. Damn she's really good...I tried to draw Aerial one time and I got so mad I had to go bed early.

It's an understated thing but it's truly sad to me that Guel is nearly killed trying to defend the honor of his father's company in this scene, not knowing that his father was the one who provided them to the Dawn of Fold.

TEXT: T.S. - TO - D.O.F SYNC MAIN CONTROL SYSTEM MIGRATION: COMPLETED

This is the display shown on the monitor of the DOF member who hacks into its systems.

My best guesses as to the meaning of the acronym are: TERMINAL SYSTEM TO DAWN OF FOLD SYNC TRANSPORT SHIP TO DAWN OF FOLD SYNC TS might also stand for the name of the ship, which we don't know.

We get a look at the Earth House Space Ship's Map Data here, aptly titled EARTH HOUSE SPACE SHIP It's got everything. Two Cargo Unloading hatches, one at the Fore and Aft of the ship, 8 Mobile Suit Hatches across the middle, an Airlock, a Cieling Hatch, and a Bridge..! So cool...

I really love this scene where Nika and Miorine are talking about Suletta. I love how Miorine is just mostly confused the whole time. Cause she really just doesn't understand.

When Miorine says she'll send Suletta a video about Aerial, Nika asks why she can't tell her herself. And she replies, "Why?" Like, "Why would I do that? There's something bugging her, and she doesn't want to talk, so I'll just send her a video about it instead."

And when Nika asks her what happened between her and Suletta, she says "Don't say it like I did wrong." Like she probably didn't even assume there was a problem between them to begin with. In her mind she didn't DO anything, so what issue could there possibly be if nothing happened?

"Not everyone can be like you, Miorine." Nika concludes, and Miorine just says, "What's that supposed to mean?"

Miorine's never really met anybody like Suletta before. When she has a problem, she'll make it clear when she does. She's completely confident, and not afraid to stand up for herself, but Suletta isn't like that. At her worst, she can be frustratingly timid and scared, and won't say if she has a problem so as to not make any trouble for people. There are 5 days between the end of Episode 10 and the start of episode 11, and that whole time Suletta was probably acting really weird and avoidant, and Miorine probably just assumed if she needed something, she'd tell her. So she just left her alone.

That's why their eventual collision is so nice. They're communicating their needs.

I think it's really nice how Kenanji gained weight because it's been 20 years since Vanadis and it's treated as completely fine. Like yeah people tease him for it or are surprised when they see him but it's not presented by the story itself as like, a fall from grace or him letting himself go. He's still a strong and capable pilot, and he's still fully confident in himself. He just got fat. It happens !

(Also the delivery of the workers on "CAPTAIN KENANJI?!!?!" is another one of my favorite comedic line deliveries in the show.)

We also see in this scene where Jeturk's plant patrol fleet (Wormblood) are during the incident. They're heading towards the moon.

The completely emotionless way Prospera delivers this line haunts my fucking dreams. What's she thinking here? What is it about Suletta and the rest of GUND-ARM finally bringing to fruition Cardo Nabo's dream that fills her with such apathy? Such disdain? Is she bitter that it's the daughter of her family's killer that's bringing that dream to reality? Is it a constant reminder of the path she didn't, couldn't take? Is it the fact that the technology that could have saved her daughter's life wasn't allowed to be pursued until it was far too late?

Is she having to reckon with the infinitesimally small doubt remaining in her mind that maybe, just maybe, she did the wrong thing?

When Suletta calls Prospera on the phone, she tells her where they are, and that Suletta should come to see them. When Suletta starts running away from Miorine, she runs in the direction of C Block, towards her mother. (We know this because the rest of the Earth House students, which is where she started, aren't in C block when it gets disconnected from the rest of the plant.)

You should rewatch this scene and see how many times Miorine eats shit on a wall. Also this is one of my all time favorite Miorine frames. She is a kind of creature here.

TEXT: (Monitor) ELECTROMAGNETIC SPECTRUM CAMOFLAUGE SYSTEM OPERATIONAL

(Notebook)BIOINFO: IDENTIFIED PMET LINK: CONNECTED DESULTOR

Here we see the cloaking program Olcott, Bessie, and Gristan used to get close to Plant Quetta.

We also see what the Info on an unregistered Mobile Suit looks like, only displaying the status of the pilot and the MS.

Here we get a look at the control room for the plant. It's got a cool hologram...

The Desultors also launch COMP-JAM-PODS, which disables all normal comms within a wide area, and is why the DOF switch to a hopping transmission after launching them.

Here we see in the hallways that there are STRICTLY ENFORCED SPEED LIMITS (of 15b) within the hallways of Plant Quetta. (At least in C block.)

But when the Emergency Starts, all the signs change to EMERGENCY B1, with a reminder to PLEASE CHECK YOUR REGISTERED DEVICES, presumably for the B1 emergency procedures.

TEXT: EMERGENCY PLEASE EVACUATE EMERGENCY B1 OUT OF SERVICE COMMUNICATIONS NETWORK UNAVAILABLE TARGET AREA: Throughout PLANT QUETTA ACTION REQUESTED: Please put on suit and take shelter immediately. EVACUATION GUIDANCE: Please refer to faculty map below for locations of emergency evacuation suits and designated shelters for each block. C BLOCK MAP PLANT QUETTA Safety Control Center

The emergency alert sent out by the safety control center to everyone in the plant.

When Sophie and Norea prepare to disconnect C Block from the rest of the plant, the command prompt that appears on the monitor is C-BLOCK PLANT QUETTA PURGE.

Also, it goes without saying, but the Monitor UI and cockpit layout of Ur and Thorn are nearly identical to that of the base Lfrith models, complete with the real time Monitoring System updates on the lefthand side of the screen.

That's all for now! Wow...next episode will be the end of the first season...we've really come a long way haven't we..?

I...I'm glad we made this journey together....it means a lot to me that you've stuck with me for so long....(blushing a little)

Unfortunately I have reached the dreaded image limit...so I have no gift to share...forgive me....

Click here to go to Episode 12...if you want..>>

O--Or you could..go to the Masterpost...!

[alwaysahiccupandastrid]

“An Enemy of the People” + Meeting Matt Smith a THIRD time(?!?!)

I saw Matt Smith last night in his play, “An Enemy of the People” in London and I’m still super overwhelmed by it all, especially as I was up at 6:45am for work before I went to the show AND I ended up not getting home until 5am, but to sum up my experience last night with Matt:

I was sat in row A, which is the third row from the stage behind AA and BB, so I was SUPER close to the stage

THEY HAD A REAL DOG (German Shepherd/Alsatian I think?) ON STAGE IN SOME SCENES OMG OMG OMG I LOVED THIS SCENE STEALER

Matt was absolutely incredible, he had a full on like 5 minute monologue where he was shouting into a microphone about capitalism and the rot of government etc, and there was utter silence the entire time

It then turned into an audience trauma dump of sorts because they had some microphones given to audience members to air their grievances with the government/system/society, it was incredibly powerful

The rest of the cast were amazing too of course

I was in the “splash” zone because there was a moment where the cast were along the sides next to the audience while Matt was on stage and then they threw paint-filled balloons at him, and when they hit him they exploded so we had to have tarp pulled up over us just before it happened because the paint would have hit us

Matt has a DILF belly and I am 100% for it, at one point he lifted the bottom of his shirt to wipe the paint from his eyes and I nearly died

After the show, I went to stage door to try and meet him - but because it was a Saturday night in London it was a nightmare and so he could only do quick signatures and no pictures with people

I DID get my program signed by Matt ☺️🫶🏻

Also one of the other cast members (Zachary Hart) was talking a lot to my friend just before Matt came outside and he turned, saw me, looked me over and then went “I like your shirt! 🙂” (I was wearing a TNBC check shirt)

After the show, I was with some friends I knew from Twitter who were also huge Matt fans, and we went to a pub that was down the road from the theatre after they had changed clothes… and Matt and the cast were there?!?

Matt brushed up against me twice when he was going to/coming back from the bar and I nearly passed out like one of my friends had to take me outside because I was hyperventilating

(This is also an autistic thing though that’s unrelated to Matt because it was super packed and loud and hot in the pub)

After the pub closed, my friend said the bar in her hotel would be open until 2 so we went there, left our stuff in her room, and then we went down to the bar… and Matt and the cast were there too?!?

I’m genuinely not joking, we were NOT stalking him, we had talked about going to pub days ago and - as I said - one of my friends was literally staying at that hotel and the bar there was the closest one still open. To be honest, I was feeling anxious at this point because I was terrified Matt would see us and recognise us but also I was freaking out because I wanted to talk to him so bad as I didn’t get the chance at the stage door during the chaos

It’s a bar where they have music playing, like at a club, but there’s no dancing and they sit you at tables and take your drinks orders, and we were two tables away from the cast

Zachary walked past and said hello to one of my friends again, because he recognised them from earlier, and he grinned/shouted hello back when we waved and said hello

Matt walked past us and the friend mentioned above and I shouted hello at him and waved, but I didn’t want to bother him by going up to him because 1) it was nearly 2am, 2) I didn’t want him to be weirded out or think we were stalking him, and 3) I ’m 99% sure he was drunk because he’d been hanging about in the pub and then the bar for a total of four hours 💀 anyway, Matt smiled and shouted hello back

My friends went outside the hotel to smoke after the bar closed (I was the only one out of a group of 5 who didn’t smoke 😭) and the cast came out to leave, and one of my friends asked him for a picture but his co-worker Jessica Brown-Findlay apparently got mad at her and said “no, we are not doing that”. Matt was super nice to her though and said she looked great, and “know we love you!” before he left

(Side note: one of the other friends thinks Jessica was pissed off because when we were outside the pub earlier, her husband asked my friends for a cigarette and were chatting to him while they smoked (I was there under an umbrella absolutely freezing my tits off lol) and they said it might be a possessive thing? To be genuinely honest, none of us had any clue it was her husband even when he said “oh yeah my wife Jessie is in a play down the road”, like it genuinely didn’t click for any of us that he was talking about Jessica, and he approached us for a cigarette, not the other way around)

Unrelated to Matt but still relevant to understanding the night/my feelings:

I was very exhausted because I started my new job yesterday morning, was up at 6:45am because my dad insisted on dropping me off at 8am despite me not starting until 9, I was on my feet the whole day, I didn’t have time to run home and change so I had to do my make up on the train (luckily my uniform was given to me in the morning so I was able to wear my evening clothes, change into work clothes and then change back at the end of the day), my feet were super sore and blistered because I was wearing brand new trainers from work that didn’t fit properly… yeah. Anyway.

(Side note: I LOVE my new job so much, I am not complaining about it at all, it was amazing, it’s just unfortunate scheduling that I started on the same day I had the ticket for the play)

I missed my last tube and my last train home (last train was at 1am) and ended up having to borrow money to get a taxi to Piccadilly station from the hotel, at which point it was 3am and I was feeling very exhausted AND also emotional

There were issues with the tube because of the weather and so I had to wait an extra 30 minutes while also needing to pee and suffering from exhaustion, didn’t get on a tube until about 3:30? 3:40?

I think I was crying at one point after leaving the hotel because when I got to the tube station to wait for a train, a woman also waiting came to check on me and asked why I had been crying

I kept on dozing off on the tube between stops, and I’m very lucky I didn’t get robbed to be honest (probably because I had my bag on my lap and an arm resting over it)

I ended up in South Ealing at 4:15am, and I knew if I got a bus I wouldn’t be getting to the nearest town to me until 5am (and I still wouldn’t have been home) so I decided “fuck it, I’m spending £27 on an Uber I guess”

I fell asleep in the Uber and the driver was pretty annoyed about it, I ended up getting home at 5am - somehow I was able to remove the rest of my make up, message my friends to tell them I was home safe, get in my PJs and climb into bed

Here’s some photos of the stage before the play started, Matt at the end of the play (covered in paint), and Matt at stage door

(I did NOT take photos or videos of him in the pub or bar, because I want to respect his privacy 🙂🫶🏻 I am also NOT going to share the name of the pub or hotel/bar, not because I want to gatekeep or anything, but because of privacy and out of respect)

[classpect-navelgazing]

do you have an analysis where you talk about why you disagree with what canon has to say about classpects anywhere? i looked but tumble isn’t exactly the greatest at searching for stuff. i’m just curious to know what the issues are with what was said in canon

Sure. Though I don't know if I'd say I "disagree with canon" so much as I think the more someone tries to give us a straight up, clean answer on it, they're probably an unreliable source. My source is canon, but more holistically.

For me I think this started two places. First: I just..... don't really buy the idea of Pages being the Slow Burn class. I never bought it, honestly? As soon as I figured out how Jake English manages people and their expectations of him to get what he wants, it threw into question the whole concept of the class. Because Jake is the second most emotionally intelligent character in HS after Karkat, but he uses it for himself rather selfishly instead of for a greater cause. When Jake subtly or subconsciously tries to bend the story to his will, he's remarkably effective.

So, of course, I looked at Tavros. What does Tavros Nitram want? Well, he wants to have fun, to progress at his own pace, and to kind of do his own thing. I found it very interesting how the people around him sort of bent to what he wanted. No one stopped Tavros from dreaming on Prospit. He didn't do anything to get those mechanical legs, which he textually wanted, other folks took care of that for him. No one really stopped Tavros from playing the game (both FLARP and SGRUB) the way he wanted to. Aradia enables his allegedly bad class choice, Karkat orders Vriska to save his life, and when Vriska wants to force Tavros to play her way, Kanaya interferes. It's all very cohesive to me in a way that I genuinely do not know if the creator intended, but the pattern is absolutely there.

So, whoop, Pages Are A Slow Burn gets tossed into the garbage where it belongs.

The other one that really made me go "huh" is Calliope's Active/Passive thing. From the moment I read it the first time, I was like "i'm........ not sure that's a thing" and on every subsequent reread and relisten, I became even more certain she's just theorycrafting and its not borne out in the actual text. Which, frankly, fits into Calliope's whole thing of being a proxy for fans, particularly their speculation. She outright says to Dirk she gets carried away with her theorizing.

Like... for me its the Prince thing. I flat out don't think Princes are "The Most Active Class," at all, full stop. The idea is kind of silly to me. Eridan wasn't fucking Super Active, he just became extremely potent when he finally went off. And Dirk, similarly, is the king of Hurry Up And Wait. When shit pops off, he acts with incredible effectiveness, but the rest of the time he's zoning the fuck out, white lying about how cool he is, and fishing.

Same with Seers on the opposite end. Am I meant to take seriously the idea that Rose Lalonde and Terezi fucking Pyrope are the most passive class, nah. No sell. I literally and actually think I could make a better argument that Witches are more passive than Seers.

And then I just... don't agree with Calliope's verbiage of the classes. Dirk was not a destroyer of heart/soul, his most dramatic and effective moments in the story are harnessing his aspect, and in the conversation where Calliope tells Roxy her verbiage, even she says its a little esoteric and hard to grasp.

Calliope's trying to apply very firm wording and delineation to something that Terezi much earlier calls a "hyperflexible mythology." That reading of classpect frankly bears out a lot more, imo.

Which just led me to the conclusion that: all the stuff Calliope says, its her opinion. What I am interested in is action. What do these people do, what do they think of their aspect, how does it manifest.

My conclusion was basically: fuck passive/active, this is all about your role in the narrative. Which, in my opinion, fits very well into the two ways HS is structured: as a video game (the vernacular, the commands, the literalization of abstractions like inventory and leveling up), and as a stage play (the acts, the curtains, the intermissions).

[immaturityofthomasastruc]

IOTA Reviews: Reunion

Today's episode is a special one, as it teaches kids about toxic people in online message boards. Hey, Astruc? Do you remember that saying about glass houses and throwing stones? Asking for a friend.

Let's get into the eighth episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fifth season: Reunion

We start off at the Louvre, where Marinette and Alya are looking through the paintings to find more symbols of the Order of the Guardians, something previously established in “Feast”. Marinette ponders the idea of past Miraculous holders falling in love with each other, to which Alya gives one of the most contradicting responses I've ever heard.

Marinette: Miraculous holders are always pictured solo, but there had to have been some love stories between some of them. A Ladybug and a Cat Noir in love, it must've happened at some point, right?

Alya: Or maybe they just focused on the job and kept their lovey-dovey stuff out of their superhero lives, like you should. Preferably with a boy you've been in love with for a long time who's finally interested in you? Does a certain Adrien ring any bells?

Wow, not even a minute in, and I already have something to bitch and moan about.

First off, it's really rich for Alya to act like superheroes can't fall in love when she was dating Nino with the knowledge that they were both superheroes, and willingly blew her cover as Rena Furtive because she didn't want to break up with her idiot boyfriend, and ended up costing Ladybug the Fox Miraculous. It'd be one thing if it was like a “Don't make the same mistakes I made!” thing, but in the very next sentence, she tries to encourage Marinette to keep pursuing Adrien. Alya, you do know that even if Marinette starts dating Adrien, she'll still have to deal with her superhero life, right? It's a classic superhero trope that a hero's secret identity gets in the way of their love life, something this show did three different times last season (Truth, Lies, Rocketear). Cat Noir or Adrien, Marinette's love life will be complicated by her superhero life, and Alya basically said “Superheroes shouldn't date! Now, you should really think about asking Adrien out.”

Marinette tries to ask Tikki for advice, but Tikki casually drops another retco—more worldbuilding. Yeah, that's it. It's more worldbuilding, and nothing the writers threw in this season without thinking about how it could have been used in earlier episodes.

See, back in Season 2's “Befana”, Tikki gave Marinette a magical jewel called a Kwagatama, something all past Ladybug wielders have. For the most part, nothing came of it for about five years and three seasons. So naturally, the writers came up with something that makes no sense to introduce now. The true purpose of the Guardian seals is for the Kwagatama to be used for Reunion, a way to contact the spirits of the past Miraculous holders, albeit so only the user can see them, sort of like Al from Quantum Leap.

My problem here is that IT MAKES NO SENSE TO INTRODUCE THIS NOW WHEN TIKKI SEEMED TO ABOUT THIS THE WHOLE TIME! Think about a huge chunk of Marinette's angst last season stemmed from the fact that she has absolutely no guidance as Guardian, and had to learn from trial and error. If Marinette had a way to talk with any of the past Ladybug holders, why the hell didn't Tikki suggest it when she really needed it in the first place?!

Before Marinette can give the Reunion a test run, some Unfunny Marinette Slapstick happens, so she accidentally knocks over a painting, revealing a letter inside for Alix's father Alim. Turns out Alix left some photos detailing her adventures in a letter and hid it inside the painting, National Treasure style. Adrien tells Gabriel and Nathalie about this, and after he leaves, the two share an evil smirk.

Because I guess now they're on good terms again?

The letter reveals that Alix has been jumping around from time to time, meeting various historical figures, potentially screwing with history, and completely ignoring the secret identity rule since everyone in her class is reading this letter. Alix's older brother, Jalil, isn't happy.

Jalil: How could you let her go?!

Alim: Jalil, enough already!

Jalil: Alix was brainwashed by Ladybug! She forced her on a crusade without us and all you're doing is... nothing!

Alim: Your sister wasn't forced. She went into hiding in time so that Monarch couldn't take over the Miraculous of the Rabbit.

Marinette: Alix is helping Ladybug and Cat Noir restore peace!

Jalil: How could she help them if she's not even here? Can't you see this makes zero sense? Wake up, dad!

Alim: I was there when Ladybug gave her the Miraculous. Alix agreed to the whole thing. She was proud she could help.

“Oh my God, Jalil. Your little sister is just choosing to travel through time and stay away from home with little means of contacting the outside world. Don't be such a baby about it.”

Seriously, I get why they wouldn't want Monarch to get the Rabbit Miraculous, but you know what isn't helping keep Alix safe? TELLING HER ENTIRE CLASS THAT SHE HAS THE GODDAMN RABBIT MIRACULOUS! It says a lot that this is something I agree with Jalil on, and his first spotlight episode had him attempt to perform an ancient Egyptian ritual to revive Queen Nefertiti. But rather than focus on the family drama stemming from the absence of the youngest Kubdel, the true conflict of the episode happens.

Alim: Where are you hearing this ridiculous theory?

Jalil: Everybody's talking! Listen! (takes out his Alliance)

Alliance Lila: Akuma88 said: “We trusted Ladybug too blindly and she only made things worse when she let Monarch steal the Miraculous.” Antilady asks: “Who is Ladybug anyway? Why does she wear a mask? If she has nothing to hide, she wouldn't hide anything.” ChloeB says: “Ladybug is ridiculous, utterly ridiculous”.

You know, it's sad how the only positive thing I can say about the conflict is that at least they didn't make a flat-earther joke with these conspiracy theories.

Either way, this is something I had previously talked about during my review of “Illusion”. Rather than show Marinette dealing with the backlash to her losing all the other Miraculous last season, it's clear all the writers are willing to do is have a bunch of strawmen criticize her so the audience can't take their arguments seriously. Yes, most of Paris doesn't know what really happened, so the citizens are obviously misinformed, but that first guy made a decent point about letting Ladybug do all the work instead of the proper authorities. The whole reason Chloe was even namedropped was because the audience knows from earlier episodes that she has a bias against Ladybug, so lumping her together with anyone else who has a problem with her is an easy way to say “If the bad character agrees with these views, that means their arguments are invalid”. And once again, it's pretty hilarious that the lesson the episode is going for about online message boards when the creator of the show is well-known for his poor behavior online, to the point where this very blog was created to chronicle some of the things he's said.

After dodging Adrien's latest attempt to ask her out, Marinette decides to try out the Reunion, selecting Joan of Arc because that's the only character model the animators can reuse. But hey, if you're not a fan of overused character models, how about overused knight cliches?

Joan: Good morrow. What is your name, you clumsy young holder?

Marinette: Um, uh... M-Marinette.

Alya: What's the matter with you, girl, hearing voices or something?

Joan: They used to direct similar inquiries to me as well. You shalt become accustomed to it.

GET IT? She's a knight, so that means she has to talk like she's from a Monty Python movie. If you're somehow not laughing at this totally original joke, buckle up, because this is what all of her dialogue is like for the episode. Marinette tries to ask Joan for advice, but is quickly rebuffed because even though she supposedly fell in love with a past Cat Miraculous holder, and even though this was Tikki's idea in the first place, Joan isn't willing to help Marinette out. What, was she in the middle of a poker game with Oda Nobunaga, Shaka Zulu, and Dwight Eisenhower she really needed to get back to?

Back with Jalil, we see that he's so desperate that he willingly attracts an Akuma, offering to help Monarch if it means getting his sister back. Putting up his book, Monarch akumatizes him into the Pharaoh again.

The Pharaoh has a pretty sleek design. I like the gold parts and the interchangeable masks, even if they mean his powers are about as historically accurate as an episode of Yu-Gi-Oh!.

After the Pharaoh empowers his book with the powers of Maat, the Egyptian Goddess who represents the concepts of truth and justice, Monarch gives him the Turtle Miraculous' Shelter to protect the Maat book from being destroyed. Because as we saw with Manipula in “Determination”, simply being invulnerable to being destroyed automatically means victory. Oh right, she lost because the heroes outsmarted her. But I doubt that exact same thing will happen this episode, right?

Back with Marinette, Joan still refuses to talk with her because I guess being dead means she has a tight schedule and can't even bother to help out her successor. Before Joan can even end the Reunion, the Louvre is trapped in a giant pyramid where we see that the Pharaoh is using his powers to quiz people on the truth. Oh my God, the Pharaoh now has the powers of Kamen Rider Quiz. Run, you fools! Kamen Rider Zi-O is the only show in existence with more wasted potential than yours!

Marinette and Adrien transform into Ladybug and Cat Noir respectively, albeit still separated. When asked a question about who was the King of France on March 15th, 1423, Ladybug and Alya attempt to look up the answer online, only to get no signal. Thankfully, because the question just so happens to be set during the time when Joan was alive, she's able to give an answer: there was no king that day thanks to outside circumstances preventing a ruler from being properly recognized. Alya gets to safety, and Ladybug meets up with Cat Noir, who is struggling to answer another one of the Pharaoh's questions: What will the weather be like on July 14th, 200 years from now? It turns out that the Pharaoh was banking on that, as it's something only Bunnix would know.

Ladybug summons her Lucky Charm, a fountain pen, and takes a page from Doc Brown's book, writing a letter to Alix in the future so she can tell them the weather for that day by leaving her own letter in the past. After Cat Noir Cataclysms the Shelter barrier, the Pharaoh just creates a new one. Ladybug then comes up with another question: Is she really a hero, and did Alix leave of her own free will? The book obviously answers yes, and once again, the Pharaoh rejects the Akuma with ease.

Ladybug de-evilizes the Akuma, uses Miraculous Ladybug to fix the damage, shows Jalil another letter from Alix, and never learns Jalil willingly got himself akumatized in the first place.

Joan talks with Marinette and tells her about her past, where she fell in love with a Cat Miraculous holder from England, and the conflict with France forced them to give up their Miraculous and go into hiding. It's a simple backstory, but the artwork and narration tells a lot without going too into detail about things, keeping what happened after Joan and her lover gave up their Miraculous vague for a reason.

Marinette: And then you lived happily ever after?

Joan: I hope so, Marinette. I hope so.

Marinette: Huh?

Tikki: That's not the real Joan, Marinette. It's just her memory as a holder. She can't know what she did after she gave up her Miraculous.

Translation: "We don't want to tell the kids watching what really happened to Joan of Arc." So the episode ends with Marinette wondering if starting a relationship with Cat Noir is possible after all, even if it means she has to give up her Miraculous. Oh yeah, and Plagg gives Adrien a Kwagatama too, but it's not really that important.

That's a good way to describe this episode: it just... happened. Outside of the Reunion lore, not much really happened here, which has been a problem I've had with the last few episodes of Season 5 as a whole. Not much was enough to get me really angry, but at the same time, the writing was just mediocre in my opinion. Pharaoh's new power was just Truth again, and they tried to make him look smart, but all he asked were obscure trivia questions, not something that would really test how honest someone is. For an Akuma who already had it out for Ladybug from the start, the return of the Pharaoh was pretty underwhelming. It didn't help that the other lesson about avoiding misinformation didn't really work that well because it took a magical lie detector to resolve Jalil's trust issues towards Ladybug. Also, it's really weird how nonchalant everyone is about Alix being away from home and traveling through time with no guarantee of when she'll return, while Jalil's somewhat understandable concern about Ladybug possibly manipulating his little sister (who he didn't even get to say goodbye to) was just brushed off for that lesson about conspiracy theories and misinformation.

Even though the idea of Joan of Arc being a superhero sounds really interesting, not much is done with Joan as a character, and I think that stems from the fact that it's obvious that a show that airs on Disney Channel can't talk about the two things everyone knows about her: The supposed messages from God, and that she was burned at the stake. Without those key aspects of her life story, all the writers really had to work with was that Joan was a female knight. This is especially harsh, because even without that, you could have told a story about how Joan was in a similar situation to Marinette, being trusted with the Ladybug Miraculous at a young age (Historians believe Joan was seventeen when she first went to the battlefield, and the flashback in this episode implies she only became a soldier after getting her Miraculous), and how she dealt with the newfound responsibilities, especially in a tense time like the middle ages. Instead, all we got was more Love Square pandering that didn't even make sense for Joan to be dismissive of because she was a massive hypocrite, not only for dismissing Marinette's initial question when she had the answer for it, but also for essentially body shaming Cat Noir by calling him “Puny”. Because how dare that teenage boy not be as jacked as a battle-hardened knight.

Overall, there's not much I can really say about this episode. I doubt the Reunion will ever be plot-relevant again, so what's the point? The most I can say is that it was certainly an episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fifth season.

THE BIGGEST IDIOT OF THE EPISODE IS... JOAN OF ARC

While I have grievances with the things Alya, Tikki, and Alim all said and did, for the most part, that's connected to bigger issues with the season as a whole. The purpose of the Biggest Idiot Award was to judge a character's actions in the context of the episode itself. So while Joan of Arc was never officially knighted, it is my honor to present this show's take on her with the award. Joan was unnecessarily rude to Marinette, assumed she knew how to end the Reunion when it was pretty clear this was her first time using it, went on a long tangent while answering a question while Ladybug didn't have a lot of time to give the answer, and talked trash about Cat Noir for not being as buff as the knights she led into battle. She also didn't offer to give any advice in battle even though she knew she wasn't able to interact with the physical world, when the whole purpose of the Reunion is to impart wisdom onto the next generation.

[apocalypse-shuffle]

SAM | SAMHAIN (trick r’ treat)

────────────────────

────────────────────

“I Scream” (Sam & Platonic!Reader)

| Getting Sam to try some new treats when he comes back around for Halloween.

| Reader is always black unless I say differently

| SFW, trying new things, this lil demon has grown attached to you, sweets!, light playful scolding

| 1k+ words

There’s a little inconsequential tug on the bottom of your shirt and you look down to see Sam standing beside you.

Once you’re at Sam’s level Sam doesn’t do anything but point to the left, towards the sink. Even without words you can feel the tiny impatient pout it’s no doubt leveling at you.

You chuckle a little. “You really want that milkshake, huh?”

Sam gives you a small thumbs up (with both thumbs) and nods rigorously.

You laugh again before straightening back up and taking two shuffling steps to reach into the sink. In one of the mixing bowls you cleaned, after whipping up the cornbread that was now baking away in the oven, was a kids sized milkshake being defrosted in hot water.

After confirming that Sam would indeed eat anything personally deemed sweet enough you’d asked the little entity if it’d ever had ice cream before. At Sam’s confused head tilt you’d decided that getting it acquainted with frozen sweets was of top priority, and so this Devil’s Night you’d made sure to stock up on all sorts of frozen treats to taste test with Sam in between handing out candy and cooking dinner.

Unsurprisingly whatever hell he crawled out of once every year wasn’t big on sugar.

Unsurprisingly whatever hell he crawled out of once every year wasn’t big on sugar.

You shake the excess water off the cup before pulling on one of your drawers and taking out an orange silicone straw for the demon. You made extra sure that everything would be as soft as possible (while still holding its frozen treat integrity) in order to not startle Sam too much. Sam, who promptly snatches the milkshake from your outstretched hand, moves its napsack up to expose its mouth, and then takes the longest drink of the milky peanut butter cup substance that it possibly can.

You cringe lightly.

“Uh, Sam I don’t think that’s a good id - ah shit!”

The bugger’s already growled and threw the cup down before you could get to it. You stare forlornly at the small mess the milkshake is making before looking back at Sam. Just by Sam’s stance alone, arms limp at its side and mouth twisted into a sneer, you can tell the demon is less than pleased with its first try.

Sucking your teeth you pull a dish cloth from the stove handle and get to cleaning the cup after exchanging a disgruntled look with Sam.

The Halloween entity has taken to pouting at you, and so in turn you roll your eyes.

“Don’t look at me like that, I damn well know we talked about frozen treat edicate and the risks of brain freeze.”

Sam’s expression doesn’t change as you put the half empty cup on the counter and throw the dirty towel in the sink, but the entity does cross its arms with a little huff.

You give Sam the same energy right back.

“You could keep pouting or we can try that again. I promise if you actually listen to me, you’ll love it. And you love chocolate, which is in all the stuff I got, so if that doesn’t sell you I don’t know what will.”

A contemplative silence settles over the two of you before you start puttering around again. Sam quietly trails behind you as you cut off the stove and oven, throw the soiled towel in the washing machine for later, and answer the doorbell after it rings.

It’s a group of teenagers that begrudgingly say, “Trick or treat!” at you but you don’t do much but greet them with confusion as you hold your cauldron of candy close to your chest and lean against the doorway. Sam peeking at them from behind your legs obviously catches some of their attention but most of the kids are pretty caught up on the way you haven’t given them any sweets yet.

You hum.

“Is this like a group costume thing? Cause I’m trying to figure out what I’m seeing and it’s looking grim.”

“Oh!” A blonde boy off to the right of you exclaims, his hair is so badly dyed it’s painful. “We’re supposed to be the lost boys!”

One of the girls off to the side nods her head. A spiked choker and rosary glint off of her due to your porch lights as she excitedly takes over.

“Jake, Samson, Angel, and De’shawn are David, Marko, Dwayne, and Paul. While me,” she waves between her and two other similarly dressed girls. “Caymie, and Talia are the Bitches of Eastwick.”

Your eyes light up and you move to high-five all three girls. A grin splits across your face.

“Okaay, that’s what’s up. Here,” you dig into your pale and give each kid a good chunk out of your candy collection.

Behind you Sam’s giving them all really quiet but enthusiastic applause and the kids nod slowly back at him in thanks with awkward little upturns of their lips. They’re sweet kids, you hope Sam doesn’t end up going after them because they’ve broken one of the night's rules later. Truly.

“Be sure to respect the lit Jack o’ Lanterns you see! It’s bad luck to put them out!”

At the end of the walkway they laugh at your warning before you wave them goodbye then close the door. When you turn around Sam’s already watching you.

“How about we try again?”

The demon makes a small noise, shakes its head, and then pulls two chocolate bars from behind its back. You purse your lips, but well, chocolate bars are tried and true. With a vague shrug you take the offered treat and allow Sam to grab the curl of your fingers and lead you back to the couch.

You don’t bother arguing with him, instead settling back and then knocking your bars together in a toast. Clearly the demon wanted to watch The Invisible Man one more time before he left to peruse the streets more. You weren’t gonna argue.

NOTES: please excuse any typos and as per usual I hope you enjoyed.

Also - WOW- 100+ followers? Thanks y’all!! I know followers are pretty fickle, but I’m glad you like my random work enough to engage with it and my blog🧡.

[animehouse-moe]

Undead Unluck Episode 4: Do You Love The Change In Me?

You know, I was so ready to talk about the episode in terms of stuff like the extension of the SHAFT-style focus on eyes to things like Gena's hands and the incredible lighting and whatnot, but I mean, this just sort of takes the cake. Truly insane work that just threw all other thoughts out of my mind. Save for a select few though, which I'll detail below.

It was really interesting to find out during the episode about Gena requiring space to walk in her Unchange. Truthfully, it wasn't even something I factored into my theory that Gena was unchange, so very cool to see that. That said, I did clue into the fact that Gena was barefoot pretty early on this episode. Obviously, I didn't get the answer right away, but I still felt that something was up.

More interesting than that though, and really the main thought that remains in my mind is two things Gena mentioned.

The first is 'Rules', with an intentionally capital R. If I'm not mistaken Andy mentions rules (lowercase r) when explaining himself when he meets Fuuko.

That's all to say that we now have three categories given to us in this world: Negators, UMAs, and Rules.

If I were to take a stab at the order/hierarchy, I'd say that following the anime's order of events makes the most sense. That being that Negators are at the bottom, UMAs are in the middle, and Rules are at the top. Whether or not Rules are an animate or living thing in "this world" though I'm unsure of. What I am sure of is that they can change, which is very interesting.

Also, the "this world" thing. Maybe I'm reading too far into the idea of time travel or looping, but the grammar and use of it makes me feel weird.

You say "change the world", not "change this world". There's a few cases where you can reference the world via "this", but in all examples you're placing the world within a temporal boundary.

For example, "Change this world we live in". You are referencing the world in the present that you exist.

But yeah, maybe I'm just crazy because I've been told nothing's really wasted, but it just feels like another piece slotting into place with the idea of looping.

At the same time though, Gena's death certainly feels like the best "catalyst" for a doomsday clock. I mean, Unchange died? Just sorta on the nose I feel, but it makes me wonder what happens when a Negator dies.

Is there a cooldown before the ability is passed onto someone? They have to be passed on somehow because there's no way you get to the modern day with Negators unless negations are transferred/maintained within humanity..... that is, unless the time loop doesn't simulate the entirety of the world and instead it's actually like a sort of death game where people are giving negations at the beginning of the loop and once they die that negation is out of play for the rest of the loop. But then that also means that Negations were introduced artificially in the world, meaning there's someone that's able to do that. Would that include someone that created these rules for humanity? Did they create the UMAs as well? You might argue that UMAs could have been created by the presence of Negators as they mess with the rules of the universe, but considering the (proposed) hierarchy, it seems more likely that UMA would be formed by Rules, no? But then they would be animals or creatures, and the system for creating UMAs would be somewhat arbitrary. Unless that is, that Negators are the direct will of a Rule and that inherent connection creates the existence of a UMA within that system. But we don't have any UMAs to confirm if they have an existing counterpart as a Negator, or if there can even be a connection made between Negators and Rules in the first place.

But yeah, bit a mind boggler episode if you think about theory as you bounce around from a million places all at once. One wrong assumption causes the whole pile to collapse, and I think that makes wondering about theory incredibly fun and interesting. So much potential and so many option, but only one route will get you to the truth.

Really great Undead Unluck episode once more (I'm just begging David Pro hurries it up and we get out the other side of this crass sexual humor, put a real damper on the middle-ish of the episode where it appeared).

[piedpiperart]

Marked for Death pt 15

Chapter 14

“Do I have to go?” Tim scowled, which did nothing to deter Jason from ruffling his hair in amusement.

“Yea, Cone, you do,”Jason said, subtly pushing the kid further in front of him and towards the door of the school. “We talked about this.”

“Yeah,”Tim sighed, slumping dramatically. “Fine, whatever.”

“Great,” Jason said brightly, opening the door for the two of them. Tim sulked through the doors, clutching his backpack tightly. 

As much as Conan was putting on a pouting act, Jason could tell by the tight grip on his backpack straps. The kid was anxious, and maybe a bit scared. Jason didn’t know much about Conan’s life before they met, other than the fact that Conan had above average intelligence, hacking skills, and a grudge against the Black Organization. But also that Conan liked marshmallows and had no sense of self-preservation.

Jason was pretty sure Conan hadn’t been to school before, but there was a lot of stuff that was difficult for kids to learn on their own. It made sense that Conan had higher intelligence that allowed him to learn at an increased level. He hadn’t talked to Conan much about it, but Jason wasn’t worried about Conan being challenged in first grade. He made it clear that school was mostly for Conan to make friends and do something more fun than casework. He hoped Conan would make friends. 

Challenging Conan’s knowledge was easy for Jason to do at home, when they worked on cases together or figured out different coding techniques. Jason knew he wouldn’t get that sort of intellectual challenge at school, but that was okay. He’d talked with the teacher beforehand and made sure that she was okay with allowing Conan to work on puzzles or other things if he gets bored in class. 

“You know where to go?” Jason made sure, and Conan huffed. 

“Yes,”Conan rolled his eyes, but Jason could see his grip tightening on his backpack. 

“Want me to walk with you to class?” Jason offered. “I wanna see what your classroom is gonna look like.”

Conan squinted up at him. “You just want to snoop, don’t you?”

“Yep,”Jason said, popping the ‘p’. He didn’t mention to the boy that he actually wanted to make sure Conan got settled. “Gotta make sure Ms. Mouri has an epipen in the classroom.”

Conan groaned,”I told you, I won’t eat any walnuts. It’s never happened before!”

“But if it does, you’ll be prepared,”Jason added. Conan threw his hands in the air in exasperation. 

“How many do you have? I thought you only got one at the hospital. You know those things are expensive, right?” Conan said exasperatedly.”We already have one at home, one in my backpack, I’m pretty sure you gave one to the school nurse and Uncle Dick.”

“I’m just being prepared,”Jason grumbled. Over the past month, he’d begrudgingly let Dick meet Conan, and the man was now over at Jason’s at least once a week for movie night. He insisted on Conan calling him Uncle Dick, and had plans to take Conan to the museum this weekend as a reward for making it through Conan’s first week of school. Dick hadn’t mentioned it, but Jason was sure Bruce was jealous that Dick got to sp[end so much time with them. As it was, Jason only contacted Bruce when they had something on the Robin case, which was still slow-going. 

“For if I ever get attacked by a walnut,”Conan shot back. “I’ll be fine.”

“Alright, alright,”Jason said, still planning to give an extra epipen to Conan’s teacher. Conan didn’t know Jason’s gang had an endless supply of epipens to hand out to the street kids in case they couldn’t afford one.

Jason watched in amusement as Conan shoved himself at the colorfully decorated classroom door, pushing it with all his weight in order to get it open. He held the door open once Conan made it through and held back a worried frown at how Conan froze at the sight of eighteen other kids scurrying about the room. 

Jason nudged him forwards, pretending to look elsewhere when Conan shot him a glare. Instead, Jason waved to the teacher, a nice young lady with long brown hair and brown eyes. The teen went to greet the teacher when he felt Conan following close behind him. He shook his head fondly at the way Conan tried to hide himself from the other kids. 

“Hello, you must be Jason, Conan’s dad?” Ms. Mouri greeted, extending a hand that Jason shook politely. 

“Yeah, nice to meet you,”Jason responded. They talked briefly, Jason letting her know of Conan’s severe allergy and supplying her with a few fidget toys for when Conan inevitably got bored. She seemed nice, and very attentive to her students, many of which were milling about and greeting each other. 

Conan stayed behind Jason the whole time he was talking with Ms. Mouri, gripping Jason’s pant leg tighter when three kids approached him. “Well, I’ll see you after school Conan,”Jason called, walking out the door despite the look of absolute panic and betrayal Conan shot him. 

The doors shut all too soon, trapping Tim in a room with eighteen small children, most of whom were, sadly, taller than him. 

“Hi! What’s your name?” A small boy with brown hair asked as he bounded up to Tim. 

“Do you like heroes?” Another boy piped up, this one taller and darker skinned than the first. 

“Uh, I’m Conan and yes?” Tim said, stepping back a little to regain some personal space. He glanced briefly at the teacher in panic, but she only nodded at him encouragingly. 

“I’m Mitchell, that’s Amy and George,”the smaller boy gestured. Amy, the girl in the group, had short brown hair and a red headband. 

“Have you seen the class pet yet?” Amy asked, and Tim shook his head no. 

“Oh! You haven’t met Berta?”George asked, leading them towards some sort of terrarium in the corner,”Let’s go!”

The kids crowded around the terrarium, and Tim sighed internally. “Oh! Look!” Mitchell pointed to the left of the tank,”There!”

“Awww she’s eating,”George said, putting his hands on the glass. Tim had to stand on his tip toes in order to see, but the little turtle inside was kind of cute. It was stretching out its neck to take big bites out of some lettuce. 

“Is she a turtle or a tortoise?” Amy asked, pointing. “She doesn’t have flippers.”

“Sea turtles have flippers,”Mitchell stated, leaning closer to the glass to get a better look.”

“See the red spot on her head?” Tim pointed out. “That’s a common mark of the red eared slider, which is a type of turtle.���

“Oh, you’re really smart Conan!”George bounced in place. “You know a lot bout turtles.”

“Turtles live in water and tortoises live on land,”Tim added helpfully,”But because of the lack of flippers she can still walk on land.”

“That means tortoises can’t swim, so they must have big feet,”Mitchell added. 

“Yeah,”Tim said. “You’re really smart too for figuring that out.”

“Like a detective!”Amy exclaimed. “I wanna be a detective! Like Batman!”

“Me too!” Mitchell and George exclaimed. Tim was not sure how the conversation ended up here, and worried about keeping up with their attention spans. He was already tired. 

“We can all be detectives,”Amy said, but frowned. “We’ll need a group name! Like a club. A detective club.”

“My sister is in a club at her school, the Chess club,”Mitchell offered. “They meet every tuesday and thursday, and sometimes on weekends for compa- competitions.”

“We can meet during recess!”George added,”And as detectives, we can solve any mysteries at school.”

“What mysteries would be at school?” Tim asked. 

“Anything! I heard that Ms. Mouri had to get a new class pet because the last class pet went missing,”Amy said, bringing her hand up like she was whispering. “I heard from one of the third graders.”

“Aw no, another turtle?” George asked, but Amy shook her head. 

“It was a snake called Snippy,”Amy informed them, and the two boys suddenly became uninterested in the turtle. 

“Maybe if we find Snippy, they can live with Berta and be best friends!” George exclaimed. Tim was pretty sure that snakes and turtles needed very different habitats, but he wasn’t going to burst their bubble. 

“Then our first case is finding Snippy!” Amy exclaimed. She fiddled with her red skirt excitedly while the others rallied closer. 

“Wait, we still need a group name,”Mitchell added suddenly. “Like… the detective club?”

“Mystery Kids?” Amy asked.

“Detective Boys!” George exclaimed, pumping a fist in the air. 

“Er, Mystery Club?” Tim chimed in hesitantly. 

“I like Detective Boys,”Mitchell nodded. Amy nodded too. George was grinning, then they all looked at Conan. 

“Sure?” Tim said, shrugging. Despite the fact that not all of them were boys, Tim didn’t think the others would remember even forming a club tomorrow. Kids had a short attention span, right? 

“Detective Boys it is!” The three of them exclaimed. 

It was at that moment that Ms. Mouri called for everyone's attention, much to Tim’s relief. They were directed to their seats and Tim was less enthused when Amy, Mitchell and George dragged Tim with them when they ran over to their seats.

Tim crashed gracelessly on the couch, snuggling up to Kermit and burying himself in the blankets there. He couldn’t believe how much energy kids had, and he couldn’t figure out why he was so tired. 

“Rough day?” Jason chuckled from behind him. Tim heard him put his keys on the table near the door and take his shoes off. 

“We ran around outside so much,”Tim groaned. He had to endure two recesses and P.E. class, which was more activity and socialization than he was used to over the past month.

“All tired out, huh? You wanna take a nap and I’ll wake you for dinner?” Jason offered, and Tim shook his head. 

“‘M gonna work on the case,”He grumbled, pulling himself up to sit on the couch properly. School had ended at three, and Tim had wasted so many hours he could have been working on the case. He snagged the laptop from the coffee table, and started updating the program he was using to keep an eye on Gotham University students using CCTV cameras. 

Jason was not surprised to find Conan fast asleep on the couch an hour later. He was fondly amused at how worn out the kid was. Conan had spent the whole day around a big group of people after being around one or two for the past month. 

Dick had been coming around more often, but Jason still hadn’t trusted Dick around Conan alone much. He had to admit, it was definitely easier to trust Dick the more they reconnected. Dick seemed utterly smitten with Conan, and Jason was happy to have someone else for Conan to rely on. 

Neither Jason or Dick wanted Conan to be involved in any crime fighting, so both had been trying to keep Conan involved in normal kid activities. The park had been mostly unsuccessful, other than Conan finding a praying mantis to watch. He’d brought the bug over to Dick and didn’t realize the older man was not very fond of bugs. Jason had laughed his head off when Dick screamed. Conan had been afraid for the bugs' safety however, and ran over to Jason with it to take cover from Dick’s flailing. 

Jason smiled at the memory, and went over to close the laptop Conan was working on. He gently moved the kid over to lay down in a more comfortable position and brought the blanket up to tuck him in. Jason reached over and gently pushed his unruly black hair out of Conan’s face. To make sure Conan keeps with his sleep schedule, he’d make sure to wake him up in time for dinner. 

“-with Amy, George, and Mitchell,”Conan continued, gesturing with his fork as he told Jason about his first day of school. “We made a plan at recess, and figured we had to gather more information about Snippy before we made any accusations. Amy thinks someone kidnapped Snippy but Mitchell thinks he escaped.”

“What about George?” Jason asked. He was beyond happy for Conan making some friends. This was the most talkative his kid had ever been when not talking about a case. 

Conan scoffed,”George thinks aliens abducted Snippy, which is obviously impossible.”

“Not impossible,”Jason hedged, thinking about two aliens he’d met before. 

“Okay,”Conan rolled his eyes,”Not impossible but unlikely. Superman wouldn’t steal a class pet.”

“Who’s stealing animals?” A voice broke through, and Jason shook his head fondly. 

“Uncle Dick!” Conan perked up, abandoning his plate of food to give the man a hug after he shimmied himself through the now open window. 

“Close the window, Dickhead,”Jason called. He didn’t bother to tell him not to break in through his window. Again. 

Dick came into the kitchen with Conan on his hip, grinning like a loon. “I heard my nephew’s first day at school went well!” He cheered, giving Conan a hair ruffle before plopping the kid down in his seat. 

Jason smiled at the two as Conan launched into the story again about forming a club with his new friends. He figured it made sense that Conan managed to form a detective group, but he was glad their only case so far was finding a pet snake. 

As the two talked, Jason got up to get Dick a portion of the pesto, chicken and vegetable pasta he’d made. Dick gave him an incredibly soppy grin when Jason set it down in front of him and he had to resist the urge to give him a rude gesture in front of his kid. 

“I dunno, Superman might’ve taken him,”Dick said conspiratorially.

“That’s silly,”Conan told him. “Superman doesn’t need a pet snake.”

“But what if he needed a sidekick? Maybe he kidnapped him and gave him a little costume and he became Snippy the Super Snake,”Dick added, and Conan gave him a look so dry Jason almost spat out his food in laughter. 

“Superman hasn’t had a snake sidekick ever, and the snake doesn’t have any superpowers,”Conan argued. “If anything, one of the teachers just got rid of him for being too much to take care of or he died.”

Dick gasped,”No, he can’t be dead! You guys gotta find him!” “We’re trying,”Conan grumbled. “Only the third years talked to us about Snippy, and said that he was their class pet when they were in second grade and Snippywas supposed to be moved to first grade when they moved to third but he disappeared.”

“Hmm, that does sound fishy,”Jason added. 

“I have a few theories, but I’m gonna have to talk to the second grade teacher before I make any conclusions,”Conan stated, chomping down on some zucchini. Dick made eye contact with Jason to coo about Conan’s matter of fact way of conducting his investigation. Jason rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t deny that his kid was cute when he got invested in something. 

“You know, Dick was a cop for a few years, maybe he could help you with your investigation,” Jason offered, hiding a smile when Conan turned to Dick lightning fast. 

“What do you do when the crime scene has been cold for a long time?” Conan asked, and Dick paused dramatically while putting a finger to his chin. 

“Well, usually we look at past pictures or videos taken in the area, to see any changes with the scene,”Dick listed,”It could be small changes or big ones, and then you figure out which ones might be relevant to your case based on the victim or perpetrator’s actions. It might lead to finding evidence, motive, etc.”

Conan nodded in thought, and gave Jason a moment of clarity on his own case. The Robin case was now a month old at least, and there was no way of knowing where Tim had been abducted from. Barbara had been at least able to find cameras of Tim leaving Stephanie’s house and caught him again a few blocks away. There was a high probability that Tim was abducted that Friday night based on other cameras not picking him up around his house. 

But cameras weren’t the only things that could lend them evidence, Jason thought. Thinking about what Dick said, he couldn’t help but hope. Jason made a note to scour social media in and around Tim’s route home. Maybe someone got a lucky picture of Tim or the bad guys that Jason could go off of. 

Jason tuned back into the conversation, unsurprised to find Dick in an impromptu gymnastics lesson in the living room. They had moved the coffee table and couch off to the side, and Dick was on the carpet directing Conan in some stretches. Jason huffed a laugh, and got up to collect everyone’s plates. 

“This one’s called the pigeon,”Dick said, pulling his left leg in front of him to cross over his other leg like half a criss cross applesauce. Conan gave him a confused look but dutifully copied him. 

“Why’s it called the pigeon?” Conan asked, switching legs when Dick did. 

“I dunno, what would you call it?” Dick asked, moving to stretch his arms. 

Conan copied him, nose scrunched up as he thought. “Maybe flamingo? Because you stand on one leg?” 

“Ah yeah, but this one’s the flamingo,”Dick countered, pulling one foot behind him to stretch his thigh. Conan made a disgruntled huff. 

“Front flamingo and back flamingo?” Conan frowned.

“What about.. This one?” Dick said dramatically, bending backwards so far his hands touched the ground, making Conan giggle into his hand. 

“You’re silly,”Conan said, and Jason was happy to see the smile on his face. 

“Alright kids, movie time,”Jason directed. He relished in the amused and affronted look Dick sent him at being considered a child. Bold of him to do that when he was upside down on the floor, Jason thought. 

Jason sat down on the couch, heart filling with warmth when Conan burrowed into his side. He avoided looking in Dick’s direction, who was no doubt cooing over the two of them. Jason was busying himself with arranging blankets around the two of them when he felt a weight dip on the other side of the couch and a weight pressed against him. 

“Dick,”Jason sighed, not even trying to wiggle out of his brother’s octopus arms. There was a squeak in between them, and Jason could feel Conan trying to wiggle out from being stuck between the two. 

“Dick!” Conan squeaked, his one free arm flailing.

“Oh! Where’d Conan go?” Dick joked, looking dramatically around. “Well, I don’t see him, guess I should just cuddle Jason instead!” 

Conan only groaned in defeat when Dick flopped over him. Jason bit back a grin, knowing Dick wasn’t putting all his weight on the kid. “Oh man, gravity is just- so heavy right now,”Dick grinned. 

“...dad… help me,”Conan squeaked, free arm reaching out to Jason when both adults froze. Dick exchanged a wide eyed but excited look with Jason, who felt like he could barely breathe. 

“A-alright, I got you kiddo,”Jason huffed a laugh, reaching under Dick to free his son. Conan took a dramatic breath of air, sticking his tongue out at Dick as Jason sat Conan on his lap and tucked the blankets around him. 

Dick was grinning like a lunatic as he scooched closer to the two, cuddling up to them while Conan yelped and tried to push him back, to no success. Jason just held Conan close, mind racing. 

Conan called him dad. It was a thought running through his head nonstop as Dick gave up messing with the kid and started the movie. While Jason was beyond glad that Conan trusted him enough to call him dad… he was very, very worried about the small life currently in his hands. 

Jason was responsible for a human life now, and there was no way he wanted to change that. He was just terrified that he would find some way to screw it up. But looking at the three of them on that couch, his brother beside him. It was something he never thought he’d have again. He’d never thought he’d have a family like this again, and he would do anything to keep it. 

And, Jason found that he would do anything to bring Robin back to their family.

Chapter 16

[chewingonmylaptop]

What Happened Before

A prologue to a currently unnamed WIP I've recently dusted off

CW: mild mentions of drugs, child abuse, and death

My parents had more kids than they deserved. They were dubiously equipped to handle raising a goldfish but still they decided to try their luck on four human beings. I'm about ninety percent sure that they never would’ve had any children - or even made it to their one year dating anniversary - if it weren’t for me being born. So I guess that means apologies are in order for my siblings. I wonder if there’s an Edible Arrangement for years of childhood trauma and neglect.

Although my relatives would never admit it, I was definitely an accident. There's no way my nineteen year old mother decided on a whim to marry her twenty five year old boyfriend after four months of dating and then popped out a kid seven months later. And, no, I wasn’t a premature baby like my grandmother proclaimed to anyone who raised an eyebrow after doing the math. I was nine and a half pounds. There’s another Edible Arrangement I need to order.

They named me Dallas after the city where they met. Which was fine in Texas but when I was three weeks from my second birthday they packed us up and moved us to Indianapolis. I don’t know why I do, but I remember vividly what happened the day we moved in. I was standing on the ugly beige carpet of my new bedroom surrounded by boxes when I heard my mom scream from down the hall. Her water had broken and she was being a little dramatic about it. It was time for my new sibling to be born. I was ushered out of the house without my favorite stuffed fox. Of course, I threw a massive tantrum in the driveway. That was the first time I ever saw what was eventually dubbed the ‘rage vein’ in my father’s neck. The first time I was ever scared of him. I cried a lot then.

They named my sister Grace. For years she lamented that it was too boring but then she got over it. After all, you could only expect so much from a couple of white people from Texas. Grace Annaleigh Parker. Not kidding. I don't know if she still goes by Grace anymore. I honestly don’t even know if she still goes by ‘she’ anymore. It’s hard to talk about the important stuff. I try, but there’s something in our way. I wish I knew what it was.

We were close when we were kids. That's sort of what happens when you’re not too far apart in age. I think I was a good brother back then, all things considered. She’d steal my toys and I'd snatch them back but I wouldn't make a big deal about it. I never yelled at her or pulled her hair even though it was always in ribboned pigtails that were at just the right height for a proper yank of revenge. She didn’t make it easy for me, though. Whenever she got mad, her gut reaction was to fling the nearest object directly at my head. I still have a scar just above my eyebrow from a little metal train she hurled at me one day. I remember running straight to my mom screaming, sticky blood dripping down my face. I immediately stained the pretty pink dress she used to wear frequently but she didn’t say a word about that. She just held me tightly and rocked me back and forth, telling me I'd be alright and that it would stop hurting. She was always good at soothing us when we cried. She smelled like apples and soap made with honey. At least she did when we were that small.

Everything changed after Nate was born. He was the real premature baby. Grace and I weren't able to see him until after he left the NICU and by then he was nearly a month old. He was four pounds exactly when he came home and he cried for hours and hours and hours. Ao one could ever get him to calm down. He wouldn’t eat either. I vividly remember one day when my mom was sobbing on the floor with Nate red-faced and screaming on his back in front of her. I kept thinking: he’s so sad, why won’t she just hold him? I didn't know what to do. I was only six after all. But I knew what helped me when I was crying. So I picked him up. Maybe I'm making this last detail up to delude myself into thinking I was a better brother than I was, but I swear his crying got quieter. My mom's did too. but she still laid on the floor, her cheek pushed against the carpet, her puffy eyes staring at nothing. Word spread quickly through the family about the problems with Nate and, subsequently, the problems with my mom. He was born addicted to cocaine. And that was her fault entirely.

I didn't see much of my extended family after that. My father’s parents had already died and his siblings wanted nothing to do with my druggie mom. Except for my Aunt Leah. She was always sweet to us kids. She’d bring us treats and little dollar store toys every visit. I got the feeling that I was her favorite. Or maybe I just really needed to be someone’s favorite. My mom’s own parents shunned her too after piecing together what caused the problems with Nate. They were really intensely Baptist and thought she was walking down a path of sin. So from then on, they pretended she didn’t exist. Despite the complete ostracism from her family, my mom clung to Nate even tighter. It's like she was trying to prove that she hadn’t doomed him from the moment of his conception. He became her favorite child, especially once the endless crying ceased. Because of his size and overall pallor, he was dubbed the fragile one, the angel. We were never allowed to play too rough near him. Nap time was sacred and we were to be silent when he slept. We could never tease him, never chase him, never take his toys. His drawings held special places on the fridge and the walls. I was never much of an artist anyway. But this whole thing pissed Grace off and I was the outlet for her anger. She was much more likely to lash out both verbally and physically. But I took it all in stride. After all, I was the big brother. I was the protector. So what if that meant I took a few hits? She couldn’t actually do much damage, being so much smaller than me.

But I couldn’t really do much protecting. As the rage vein became a more looming visitor in our house, my mom shrank into herself. She lost a lot of weight and her eyes became more dull. She didn’t smell as sweet and she didn’t hold me as tight. I quickly got too tall to curl up on her lap and too heavy for her to carry around. But she carried Nate. Every day, She held him in her arms even when he was well into elementary school. His feet rarely touched the floor as he looked down on us from his throne in our mother’s arms. To be fair, he was always tiny and she didn’t have the strength to do very much. She spent most of the time resting. At least, that’s what we called it when she would lay in her bed silently in the dark for hours upon hours. 

Grace and I would ignore days like this; it was easier that way. But Nate would wait outside her bedroom like a puppy, waiting for her to come out. He would make drawings or scribble little notes and push them under the door. He would sing songs or read stories to her, telling us that she would come out when the world was nice again. Our father didn’t like any of that. He very much had a ‘suck it up and get over it’ to this sort of deep sadness and mental distress. But no matter how he screamed, Nate stayed put. That is, until our father would drag him away from the door by his shirt collar. Or by his arm. Or by his hair. The latter became the more frequent occurrence once it was discovered to be the most effective. I felt bad for Nate. But all I could do was watch from my doorway and prepare to receive Nate back into our shared bedroom. He would cry and cry and cry. I kept my hair short.

Jordan was born my freshman year of high school. There was nothing particularly notable about his birth other than the fact that he was the only one of us born with hair. Lots of it. Dark brown like our father’s. He was a quiet baby, at least compared to Nate. That time is still a blur for me. I really only remember waking up for school two months later and somehow just knowing that my mom was gone. She left in the middle of the night. Didn’t even grab anything she owned. Just left her wedding ring on the kitchen table. I think Grace saw her leave. But she won’t talk about it even to this day. Neither would my father and he wouldn’t permit any of us to do so either.

It was Hell on Earth for a while after that. Nate cried every single day, screaming that he wanted her and no one else. I would try to comfort him, wrap my arms around him like she used to do to me. But he would shove me away, kick my shins, scream at me to leave him alone. When he was inconsolable like that, my father would just yell. I became numb to the harsh words and the sound of hands smacking against flesh. What could I do? I could've stepped in. I should've stepped in. It’s too late now.

Grace became really possessive of Jordan. People liked to say she was stepping up to play mommy but I knew better. She just liked to treat him like a little doll and, when he got older, a little puppy. She loved having someone follow her around and idolize her. And, to be fair, she was easy to be impressed by. She was smart as a whip, fast as lightning, and tough as a bull. No one got in her way. I was mousy compared to her despite noticeably being nearly twice as heavy as she was. Jordan rarely ever came to me when he was in need of a playmate. But if anyone was being an actual mommy to him, it was me. The moment I got my driver’s license I also got a car seat and a lecture about how I needed to be more responsible and by taking my siblings to school and anywhere else they needed to go, I would become a better man. 

To this day I feel a little twinge of anger when I think about my father’s speech. I needed to learn responsibility? Hadn’t I been responsible enough? Hadn’t I been doing everything in my power to keep my family together for years? Hadn’t I been fighting to save my siblings from the literal Hell that had been creeping up around us for who knows how long? No. In his eyes, I was just a spoiled brat because sometimes at night I would curl myself up into a tight little ball, wrap myself in my blanket, and cry. I was a sniveling, sorry excuse for a son because I missed my mom. I was an embarrassment because I acted like a woman and coddled my brothers when they cried. He never gave me any fucking credit. And that’s why when his sister called and told me he was dead, all she heard from my end was silence.

[seventeensbabye]

《ᴘᴀʀᴛ ᴛʜʀᴇᴇ》

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◆ ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢs/ɴᴏᴛᴇs: 🧸 (ɴᴏᴛ ᴘʀᴏᴏғ ʀᴇᴀᴅ!)

◆ sᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ: ʏᴏᴜ’ʀᴇ ɴᴇᴡ ᴛᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ᴊᴏʙ ᴀɴᴅ ʟɪᴛᴛʟᴇ ᴅɪᴅ ʏᴏᴜ ᴋɴᴏᴡ, ʏᴏᴜ’ᴅ ʙᴇ ᴀ ғɪɴᴇ ᴍᴀɴs ᴀssɪsᴛᴀɴᴛ.

◆ ᴡᴏʀᴅ ᴄᴏᴜɴᴛ: 2.7ᴋ

◆ ɢᴇʀɴᴇ: ꜰʟᴜꜰꜰ, ᴊᴏʙ/ᴡᴏʀᴋ/ʙᴜsɪɴᴇss ᴀᴜ!

◆ ᴘᴀɪʀɪɴɢ: sɪᴍ ᴊᴀᴇʏᴜɴ x ʏ/ɴ (ꜰᴇᴍ)

◆ ᴍ.ʟɪsᴛ ◆:*:◇:*:◆:*:◇:*:◆:*:◇:*:◆:*:◇:*:◆ :*:◇:*:◆:*:◇

we ended off the night with a nice chat after he was finished talking about his other assistant, jennifer. it was 12 am now. after making some sort of stronger connection with a few laughs and talks we started to get quiet. “ well i’m gonna go to bed. you want to come with me? ” he said standing up. “ no, its fine. i’ll sleep on the couch. ” he chuckled. “ women aren’t supposed to be the ones sleeping on couches so if anyone was sleeping on the couch it would be me. ” i looked around. “ i don't have a problem sleeping on couches mr. sim. i’ve slept on many before. you can have the room to yourself. ” i felt too nervous to be sleeping in the room with my boss. “ okay ms. kim. ” he put is hands in the pockets of his sweats and walked to his room. he looked back at me. “ are you sure you want to sleep on the couch? you have no blanket. ” i nodded. “ its pretty warm in here so i’ll be fine. ” he shrugged. “ alright, well, goodnight. ” after saying it back he started to close the door but he left it cracked. after turning off the lights, no later than about 20 minutes, it started to get cold. almost freezing. i couldn't sleep which made it ten times worse. so instead of just sitting there i worked through the night. i ended up falling asleep around 3 surprisingly waking up around 6 am.

when i opened my eyes mr. sim was sitting next to me. i worked in the office because the room was way warmer than the living room. there was a chair sitting in front of the desk but he pulled it next to me. “ why did you work through the night? i wanted you to get some rest. ” i sat up straight rubbing my eyes trying to fully wake myself up. “ i’m sorry.. i just couldn’t sleep. ” he closed my computer seeing i left it open throughout the night. “ this is why i wanted you to sleep with me. i could’ve made sure that you really got good enough rest. from here on out you’ll have to sleep with me. ” my eyes widened. “ I have to? ” he nodded. “ you keep forcing yourself to work and yes most bosses would love you because they dont have to worry about anything but i care. i dont like when you overwork yourself. i’d rather you tell me you’re stressed-out, overworked, or even just tired then for you to keep working, making mistakes, and feeling drained. ” he placed his hand on my head, patting it gently. “ i dont want to have to remove you from the assistant job because you’re overworked so please get some rest more often. ”

i looked at him. “ okay, i’ll start taking my energy and rest more serious. ” he smiled. “ good, now, go to the kitchen and go eat. I ordered breakfast. ” doing so, i got up and walked out to the kitchen as he followed. we sat next to each other enjoying the breakfast he bought. after around 25 minutes we finished our food and started cleaning. he got up to wash the dishes as i threw things away and cleaned off the table. i was wiping down the table after he finished the dishes. he started to walk out to the living room but stopped after seeing me slightly too bent over the huge table trying to reach the middle of the table. his stare was scary. i wouldn’t have known how he was feeling if i turned around to look at him. i was too focused on the table to notice. i finally reached the middle of the table and finished wiping the table down. once i stood up he walked off and headed to his room. i walked back to the office to pack up my stuff seeing we had places to go today. i left the door cracked while doing so. no more than a few sendons later i heard a knock on the door.

“ yes? ” he opened the door walking into the office, this man was almost already fully dressed leaving nothing but an undone tie, messy dirty blonde hair, and shoes which were by the entrance door. “ i need you to help me with my tie and hair. ” i nodded and took his hand, leading him back to his room. i sat him down to do his hair first. i gave him a side part which made his features stand out way more than they do. he stood up once i finished his hair handing me his tie. luckily i knew how to put ties on people or i probably would’ve been fired. i took my time putting it on not wanting to make any mistakes. when i finished i stepped back. “ how do i look? i wont look in the mirror because i trust you. ” nervousness filled my body. “ why do you trust me? ” he sat down on the bed. “ you work way too hard for me not to trust you. ” i looked to the ground. “ well you look nice.. are you sure that you dont want to look in the mirror? ” i started to walk to the big mirror in front of the bed. “ no. now, get dressed. ” he sat some clothes on the bed for me then started to walk out. “ i’ll be waiting in the living room. ” he closed the door behind him and i started to get ready. my mind was still racing because of the amount of trust he’s putting in me.

i finished getting ready after maybe 10 to 11 minutes then walked out the room. “ i’m sorry for keeping you waiting, i was trying to hurry. ” he stood up from off the couch. “ stop rushing yourself. if we were running late i would’ve told you. ” he walked over to the door grabbing his suit jacket that was hanging off the chair. he tossed it on then slipped on his shoes while i grabbed my bag and walked over to the door. i put on my shoes then he held the door open allowing me to walk out first. he grabbed his bag off the floor and walked out locking the door behind him. we walked to the elevator and got on. “ oh, the suit should be here by tonight so dont worry about it. ” oh shit, how could i forget? fuck, i keep messing up. “ im sorry.. ” he turned his head towards me. i looked at my shoes and clutched my bag handle. his hand moved up and i thought he was going to fix his hair or something but no. he grabbed my chin and brought my head up. “ apologize again and we’ll have a problem. ” he went to talking casually with me and turned it around speaking all strict and scary. he voice got so deep in that moment. it honestly scared the living shit out of me.

“ do you understand? ” i slowly nodded. “ words ms, kim. words. ” i was still stuck on how my chin was still in his hands. “ okay, i understand.. ” he went from looking deep into my soul to looking at my very pink, plumped lips. he dropped his hand and walked out the elevator seeing we hit the first floor. i walked out behind him. we headed outside to his chauffeur (shofur) and got in the car. in little to no time he took off. dropping us off to a large extra fancy building in which this meeting was in. the chauffeur got out and held the door open, letting me leave the car first. mr. sim got out. the meeting was ultimately boring and i wanted to fall asleep so bad while they spoke. just 5 men debating on what their companies do best. american boss, mr. park states that his company is the best seeing as he runs microsoft being placed at #3 in the most top companies. mr. kim’s runs alphabet inc so he placed #5. the second mr. park states his is the best even though tesla is placed #8. but mr. lee argues that he has on of the best companies of all time seeing his is amazon placing #4. mr. sim stayed quiet until he’s had enough of the debates.

“ stop fighting, nobody beats the #1 top company in the world. that company being apple which is my company. do you understand? ” he did have a point, in all databases apple is the number one top company in the world at the moment. they all went quiet after hearing him speak. “ yes all your companies are okay, good, even great but my company? yeah, its the greatest. ” i sat next to mr. sim quietly as everyone's assistants stared at me. i looked down feeling a little nervous. mr. america started speaking again. all eyes went to him except mine and mr. sim’s. i felt as mr. sim came closer to me. “ whats wrong? ” he whispered. “ nothing.. ” i said, whispering back. his eyes scanning the room. when he turned his head back all of the assistants noticed and panned their attention back on us. mr. sim smirked. “ they make you nervous huh? its the competition of the assistants looks. you’ll get used to it ms. kim, don't worry. ” he whispered then turned his head back to mr. america.

the meeting continued for 2 hours. i was so tired already, i just wanted to leave. “ okay, now enough about companies, i want to take about our assistants. ” mr. lee said firmly. “ if this is about whose assistant is better, just be quiet. ” mr. kim said, irritated. “ we see each other every 6 months and jake hasn’t changed his assistant ever since he first hired jennifer. you used to debate with your life that she was the prettiest and most useful assistant that a person could have but she’s not here now.. where is she jaeyun? ” mr. sim looked slightly bothered. as if they put his life on the line. “ who is she? are you gonna lie and say she's prettier and better than jen? or did you already say it? you told her she was better? why lie to her? she looks a mess jake. where’s jennifer? ” jay tilted his head. “ don't you think that's a little harsh jay? ” mr. kim started to look worried.

“ no, not at all. he’s first in everything. we all admitted that jen was the most useful and prettiest assistant out and now he has her.. we still don't even know her name.” jay was just as scary as jake. “ her name is kim y/n. ” he said quietly. “ speak up jake. ” why is jen not here? ” mr. sim looked up at him. “ you really want to sit here and act like you don't know why? if you want her so bad, go get her. she’s meant for you anyway. right? ” jay started to get quiet. “ what do yo- ” mr. sim cut him off. “ you’ve been having sex with her since you first met her. she’s also been fucking your employees. the only person she didn’t touch was me. ” jay looked at the ground. everyone in the room was shocked. “ you guys didn’t know that huh? and yes i can admit she’s beautiful but you only agreed that she was the most beautiful assistant because you all know she looked better than your assistants. y/n is no different, it's just her first time. she got hired about 2 months ago. what do you expect from her? to be the prettiest and you just now met her? jennifer looked terrible, i was just able to create her looks based on how she worked. thats something you know nothing about. ”

“ sunno’s assistants look peachy and sweet, bold hair colors. sunghoon’s assistants looks a little more subtle but different because of their selected facial features. heeseung, he has more of a sexy/mature older ladies working under him but you? you pick them up off the street and don't even try to change their looks. ” jake stood up and held out his hand in front of me. i took his hand and he walked me to the front of the room. “ you dont think she’s pretty? jennifer's face was fake being something you got used to, she wore makeup and busty clothes. she was skinny and petite. you don't like her because of the hips, ass, boobs, and chunkiness. this shit could drive someone crazy, that someone being me. skinny girls aren’t my type. she is though. her clothes naturally don't fit, it's not forced. she looks naturally good so you don't like it. you can admit it jay. ”

“ whatever jake, this meeting is over. lets go. ” jay grabbed his assistant's hand and stormed out. everyone chuckled. “ why is he so mad? ” sunoo said. “ because he knows I'm right but i’m gonna head out now. ” mr. sim grabbed his things. “ by the way, are you coming to the party tomorrow? ” heeseung says while proceeding to stand. “ oh, that. yeah we’ll come by. i’ll bring jen too since she’s that important. ” jennifer? she already doesn’t like me.. why her? i grabbed my things and walked behind mr. sim as he walked to the door. “ i’ll see you then. also, make sure jay has his act together. ” jake stood there holding the door open for me as i walked out the office. he walked behind me staying quiet until we got on the elevator. everyone in the building was quiet seeing everyone were in meetings or something of the sort. it wasn’t going to be busy for the next 10 or so floors. we were on the highest floor, the 20th floor. realistically there are only about 4 elevators in buildings like this but in this one there was maybe 9-10 elevators to get on so two were usually empty. i stood in the corner as he stood in the middle. there was no one on the elevator but us. we stayed silent up until we got to the 18th floor, well i stayed silent.

“ you okay? ” mr. sim spoke up. i nodded and proceeded to keep quiet. he stepped closer to me. “ are you sure? ” i looked down to the floor feeling nervous. “ yes.. ” he continued to come closer until he was standing in front of me. my back pressed against the cold elevator wall. he placed his bag down next to him then pulled my head up. his face only maybe 8 inches away from mine. I looked up to see which floor we hit and we only got to the 15th. why was the elevator moving so slow? i wanted to just get off on the next floor but i had no choice but to stay on until we hit the 1st floor. in little then no time i was stuck in the iconic kdrama situation. my back against the wall while he was leaned in, hand on the wall, and the nerve wrecking stare they give you. i wanted to fall to the ground. “ sir.. ” he could hear the shakiness in my voice. “ jake. ” i was confused, why did he say his name? “ hmm? ” he chuckled. “ call me jake. ” it was clear as day that i was still in confusion. “ um, im sorry but may i ask why? ” he shrugged. “ i’m sorry i ju- ” he placed his finger over my mouth and cut me off. “ stop apologizing so much. i don’t like when you apologize. ” i wanted to ask why but questioning him would make me want to apologize more. “ i’ll try.. ” he shook his head in disappointment. “ i’m sorry, i mean i will. ”

he placed his hand on my waist. “ you just did it again ms. kim, if i don't tell you to apologize, don't apologize. do you understand? ” i nodded. “ use your words. “ yes.. ” he raised his eyebrow. “ yes what? ” i looked to the ground once more. “ yes, i understand. ” his grip on my waist got slightly tighter. “ look at me and say it, i’m not the floor y/n. ” i slowly brought my head back up. his eyes were attached to mine. “ i understand.. ” a smirk grew on his face as he removed his hand off my waist, grabbed his bag and stood back in the position he was first in. little did i know, we were already on the second floor. for a minute i would’ve been convinced that we were stuck on the elevator because it felt like 2 hours. he fixed his suit jacket as we hit the first floor.

the doors to the elevator opened and before he walked out he spoke. “ you did good today ms. kim. i hope you can keep it up. ”

ᴇɴᴅ. @seventeensbabye

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© seventeensbabye: all rights reserved. Reposting/modifying of any fic, or pieces of original writings posted on this blog is not allowed. Translations not allowed.  

[secretgamergirl]

Random stuff I need to vent about while I’m still alive.

So I sincerely don’t think I’m going to manage to stay alive much longer, and I keep going back and forth on whether that’s something I should mention publicly, or just keep quiet and not bring the room down. Today I’m kinda feeling like I should say some things.

So first because I know people will be all curious if I don’t say why I think this is the end, a lot of things are just kinda converging and odds are one of them is going to do it.

- I really was just barely getting by on Patreon donations. Since getting kicked off Twitter those have been steadily drying up, and I don’t really have a plan to get new people donating at a rate that’ll outpace that, so basically I’m just at a point where I have to go around begging and hoping for some increasingly miraculous act of generosity from someone that lets me keep the lights on for one more month. That’s not sustainable, and when I can’t cover things, that’ll be it for me.

- I recently got a couple new diagnoses of really serious medical things. They’re both incurable, they both could kill me. I’m doing my best with treatments, but that mostly means I’m taking like 10 different medications, they have serious side effects, I’m basically asleep all the time now, and something could just take a turn whenever.

- I’m still a big ol’ nazi target and get regular violent threats. Who knows what’s going to happen there? Plus odds seem pretty good Biden’s going to just get the one term here and the entire Republican party seems to be running on a trans genocide platform. That’s not going to help things.

So right now I’m kinda just taking things a day at a time. Doing my best every day to just be really randomly nice to the handful of people who still talk to me, and trying to focus on how I’m like a good decade or so past the average life expectancy for trans people as is. But, you know, we all have bad days, and sometimes it’s hard not to dwell on like, the various people in your life who just randomly stuck knives in your back and how things would be different if that didn’t happen.

The one that’s really eating at me tonight is this one person I knew a few years ago and really thought was a friend who just threw me under the bus in such a shockingly savage way. I don’t even fully recall the context for this. Either it was when some totally random stranger I’d never even heard of decided out of the blue that I was her nemesis and started this giant smear campaign against me, or it was when a really close friend was going through a bad breakup and her ex was just going out of her way to spread every possible horrific rumor about her under the sun, and I was standing up for her. Might have even been both at once, these sorts of hate campaigns do tend to converge.

So anyway, that sort of thing was going on, and this person I considered a friend at the time decided of her own accord to publicly stand up for me, write a quick little thing about how I legitimately bore no animosity to whoever and just kinda putter around trying to do nice things for people. And then I don’t think even a full day later, she pulled that statement down, and replaced it with this huge thing about me basically being the devil and how I “took advantage of her autism to confuse her” which... wow that’s a hell of a thing to say about someone. Like, first of all, I’m not convinced that’s even a thing. I know quite a lot of people on the spectrum, and I’ve been told there’s a good chance I’m on it myself, and like... increased susceptibility to evil viziers or whatever isn’t something I’ve ever heard associated with it. Plus you know, like, this whole initial defense was something this person decided to do on her own just based on her observations of how witch hunts against random trans people were happening, as happens all too often.

And this happened again a few years later too. Another friend was dealing with some real horrific stuff, on the order of nazis threatening their spouse’s employer to get said spouse fired and showing up at their parents’ house with violent intent, and they gave me the details and asked me to write up a quick explanation while they kinda went off the grid for a few days for safety. So, I did that, people started passing that around, including the bus tosser here... and then a few days later my usual dangerous stalkers saw people were sharing somethng I wrote and started in on some weird line of attack where I was making this entire story about someone else fleeing their home due to a coordinated nazi attack which uh... was actually getting independent news coverage at this point as they were back on the internet and giving interviews, as a secret means of attacking... someone?

So of course once again, the bus-tosser about whom I’m rambling with this story retracted her endorsement of uh... my relaying things for a friend that were all being independently confirmed by reporters, and once again condemning me as a vile trickster who mislead her. Which is extra impressive because like, we hadn’t talked in years here.

So of course I can make an educated guess at what was really up with these incidents. The sort of weird stalkers who try to get trans people killed really go all in on cutting off any support, so presumably one or more of them approached this bus-tosser and made some pretty serious threats that she would be next if she didn’t walk things back, and being in a particularly vulnerable position, she decided to throw me under the bus to save her own skin... multiple times. And honestly I’m not even upset with her for that. I know her life’s a really precarious tightrope walk (and if it was unclear this is decidedly not a situation where I want anyone trying to guess who this was).

Really I’m just stuck on how she could have just never said anything to begin with. If you know you can’t deal with the heat of having someone’s stalkers start to come after you because you’re interrupting their attack on their primary target, you can just look the other way. I’m a big girl, and I can generally take care of myself pretty well with these situations. Hell I’m the sort who ends up in these situations because I absolutely will stick my neck out like this for other people when I know they’re the victim of some messed up bigoted hate campaign. So pretending not to know me, or to know what’s going on is absolutely a move she could have made. Nobody would go threatening her. I’d just be dealing with ridiculous slander that holds no water from random anonymous hatemongers. But... no, she had to go and involve herself, get scared, and throw serious fuel on the fire in order to back up. And you know put me through the trauma of watching someone I thought was a friend publicly tell some particularly messed up lies about me.

But yeah. I have a lot of stories like that one about various people I’ve known over the years. It’s hard not to think about them when staring death in the face. Just kinda feels like I’m the sacrificial victim everyone’s redirected their personal demons to attack to minimize how many people are getting gang-stalked and threatened or something. And I don’t even mind filling that role for people just... let me pull that aggro by choice by coming to your defense? Don’t throw me under the bus? I don’t feel like that’s a super unreasonable request.

[noxsoulmate]

Tarlos - touching #5 - 🧡

Ali, my friend 🥰 I've combined two of your asks and also used the @tarlosweeklyprompts bingo - hope you like it 😘

I'm not a doctor, and a friend from the medical field only read the first part in passing and threw the medical term into the room... it might be completely wrong... but that would be one of the things I would clean up if I ever post these to ao3 😅 so for now, please remember that these aren’t beta-read.

Tarlos Weekly Prompts Bingo

Square 3: Carlos whump / worried TK

Touching

5. feeling their pulse

Kisses

29. hushed conversation in-between kisses

“Babe, I’m fine.”

TK didn’t know what worried him more, Carlos’ unfocused gaze or the way he slurred his words. What definitely worried him was the fact that he had no idea what was going on.

They were at home, on one of those rare days where neither of them had a shift, and Carlos had been cooking while TK had sorted first their mail, then had taken care of their bills. They’d talked and laughed and made plans for their first real vacation. And suddenly, Carlos had put the wooden spoon down, had mumbled something about feeling dizzy, and then had collapsed right there. Well, okay, so he’d managed to sit down before he’d actually collapsed, but in TK’s books, that didn’t make it any better.

It had taken a moment for his paramedic brain to kick in and push the ‘worried fiancé’ brain aside. Right now though, both parts of him were battling for dominance, while one hand was feeling Carlos’ pulse – which was far too weak – and the other was fumbling for his phone.

“You’re not fine. I’m calling an ambulance.”

“TK… don’t… overreact…”

He certainly was not overreacting and once he had related everything to the dispatcher, he tried to keep Carlos awake and in the present. Which became harder by the minute and had him thank the higher powers when the ambulance finally arrived. 

Giving all the information about Carlos’ health history and answering all the standard questions happened on autopilot, while he simultaneously made sure every kitchen appliance was shut off. Needing to keep himself busy so he wouldn’t interfere with his colleagues – he knew that nothing was more annoying than a relative of the victim trying to be helpful – he rushed to grab Carlos’ wallet with all his information, as well as his own, plus his phone and keys. By the time they had Carlos on a gurney and were ready to leave, TK was right by his side again.

Ready to spend their free day at the hospital instead of on the couch.

***

A syncopal episode, that’s what the doctors said.

Nothing big, nothing major, Carlos didn’t even have to stay overnight. Maybe, if TK hadn’t been in such a panic, he would’ve realized it himself; would’ve been able to assess the situation better. But he was only human and the love of his life had suddenly collapsed right in front of him.

He’d done the right thing, and that’s exactly what the doctor told him as well. There was a reason, after all, why first responders shouldn’t work on their loved ones.

Back home, TK was practically a mess but still tried to function as best as he could. He made sure to put away all the stuff from Carlos’ cooking, ordered them food, made sure Carlos stayed on the couch, brought him something to drink, checked on Carlos again, paid the delivery boy, even got out plates because he knew how much Carlos disliked eating out of the take-out containers. It wasn’t until everything was put on the table and TK was still fidgeting, trying to remember what to do next, that Carlos finally pulled him down on the couch, right next to himself.

“Hey,” he murmured, as if not wanting to startle him. “Babe, breathe.”

“I’m breathing,” TK mumbled, not really sure what to say or do.

He didn’t resist when Carlos lifted his hand and pressed it against his own heart, his big hand coming to rest over it. As if to make sure TK’s hand would stay in place.

“And so am I,” he assured him, voice still quiet. A moment later, he leaned in to brush the gentlest of kisses against TK’s lips. “I’m breathing, my heart is beating,” he whispered, pressing another kiss to the corner of TK’s lips. “I’m alright, thanks to you.”

“I didn’t do anything,” TK grumbled, angry at himself. Angry, disappointed… and definitely scared for Carlos.

Carlos sighed as he pulled TK into his side and moved until he was lying on the couch, TK held closely in his arm. TK wiggled, only far enough that he could look up at his man. The worry in Carlos’ eyes was prominent – which was crazy because worrying was TK’s job right now. Still, it was Carlos who spoke, voice still hushed, yet firm.

“TK, babe, I can’t have you beat yourself up over this. You called 911, you did the right thing.”

There were a thousand things TK wanted to say, wanted to argue about – but then he saw the deep circles under Carlos’ eyes. The man was drained and needed rest. What he didn’t need was to reassure him. But he would keep doing just that until TK would accept it (not that that would ever happen). Swallowing, TK realized that the only way to help his fiancé was by letting it go… at least for now.

“Okay,” he murmured, leaning in to press a kiss to Carlos’ stunned face.

“Okay? Just like that?”

“Well, yeah… I’m not gonna argue with you right now,” TK told him quietly, letting his lips hover close. “You need food and some rest.” This time, he pressed a kiss to the little frown on Carlos’ forehead. “So for now, I’m giving in. I love you too much to argue.”

A breathy laugh left Carlos, as he caught him tight and pressed a kiss to his lips. “That doesn’t really sound like ‘giving in’,” he whispered, closing the mere inches between their lips for a kiss before adding, “But I’ll take it anyway.”

“Good,” TK answered in between their kisses, hardly able to pull away far enough to speak. “It’s the best compromise you’ll get.”

“Too much talking.”

“Babe, no,” TK admonished, trying to pull back. Carlos didn’t let him move an inch. “Food, water, rest–”

“Cuddles and kisses,” Carlos retorted, stealing some more… not that TK was putting up a big fight.

It cost a lot of his willpower to finally break their kisses again, his voice far huskier when he whispered this time. “Here’s another compromise. You eat and drink two more glasses of water – and then we’ll cuddle on the couch for the rest of the evening… without me worrying. Okay?”

“You didn’t add kisses to the deal,” Carlos replied with a slight pout that had TK chuckle.

God, he was so rubbing off on that man.

“Kisses are always included. In all of our deals.”

“I like the sound of that,” Carlos murmured as he brushed his nose along TK’s, obviously seeking the best angle for their next kiss–

But TK pulled back, insisting on their compromise. Even though Carlos grumbled, he stayed adamant. So they ate and Carlos drank enough water to satisfy TK, and before long, they finally settled back down on the couch. Of course, TK couldn’t stop worrying for real – but he still let himself enjoy the moment. So he snuggled close, treasured every single kiss they shared, and reminded himself of the important fact; Carlos was okay, at least for now – everything else would be tomorrow’s problem.

As always, still slowly working my way through all the asks, thanks for being patient 😘 if anyone wants to, feel free to

Send me an ask and get drabbles in return 😊

(credit to @creativepromptsforwriting for the prompts as well as @tarlosweeklyprompts for the bingo board)