#it's dead and gone but for those that got to experience early fandom understand | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

chalkrevelations · 3 years

Text

So, Episode 7 of Word of Honor, and where to start? No, I’m kidding, I know exactly where I’m starting, which is with some recognition of what a great job this show does of developing 98 percent of its multitude of characters, because the first two things I’m going talk about this week aren’t even Zhou Zishu, Wen Kexing OR Wen Kexing’s thirst (AKA, the three main characters of the show).

Well, I guess I’m really starting with the usual warning – this is a re-watch and so there are SPOILERS here, not only for this episode, but for most of the show. Scroll away and come back later if you’re trying to watch all 36.5 eps unspoiled.

SO, I mean, come on. Of course I’m starting with the Smartest Man in the World, who has finally shown up in this episode, and I’m reminded once again what an actual cinnamon roll, too good for this world, Cao Weining is. He’s maybe the single completely good character we meet – even Chengling wants to burn down somebody’s house at one point because he’s mad. But Cao Weining is almost too good to be true – and yet, there he is! Living his best life, being good, eating good, falling in love, and refusing to let his beautiful, clever, fierce girl’s neuroses come between them. I love him, y’all. And not just because he instantly falls in love with A-Xiang when he happens to see her beat up a bunch of drunk bro assholes in the inn where he’s having a quiet little lunch by himself before she storms into his life like a purple whirlwind. But let’s do think about this from his perspective, yeah? And let’s remember it as we watch the progression of their relationship, as we wait for the revelation we know is coming, and as – many eps down the line – he learns the truth of her. Cao Weining’s first experience of A-Xiang is someone who’s brave and capable, who defies outsized odds to come to the rescue of those in need, who doesn’t allow women and girls to be abused, who expects proper behavior from the representatives of the jianghu, and who is absolutely fearless in demanding just treatment and never even thinks to be intimidated when she faces unfair censure from an authority figure. This is the girl WKX raised, y’all. This is a girl who embodies everything Cao Weining has been taught to believe in as a cultivator. And this is the girl Cao Weining sees every time he looks at A-Xiang. Maybe, just maybe, this is the truth of her, and Cao-dage sees and understands it from the very first time he spots her, and anything else he’ll learn about her is really extraneous. (Hmm. I wonder what other relationship we’ll eventually end up seeing that kind of dynamic in, where someone truly knows you and believes in you, so everything else is unimportant?) Also, Cao Weining tells A-Xiang she’s very beautiful, and how many people do you think have ever told her that before in her life? He asks why he would want to fight and hurt her, and how many people – particularly men, given where she grew up – have ever told her that before? He buys her lunch – twice, because the first round gets cold. Remember a few episodes back, when WKX asked her who the second cutest person in the world was, and she responded that it was someone who would buy her a meal? Well, here he is. For bonus points, it is hilarious how badly WKX responds to Cao Weining’s very existence after ZZS points out the pair of them having a toast at the same inn that WKX and ZZS have stopped in WKX has dogged ZZS’s footsteps into. Poor Cao Weining doesn’t even get the shovel talk – although to be fair, he doesn’t get the full-court Ghost Valley Master press, either, so WKX must have been holding back somewhat – he just gets told to get out, before WKX grabs A-Xiang by the ear and delivers some scathing commentary on her taste in men, like he didn’t immediately fall for some rando who was tits out, drinking himself to death in the gutter.

ANYWAY, from the Smartest Man in the World, we’re going to move to Han Ying, My Beloved, who we see interacting with the Five Lakes Alliance again, this time in the person of Gao Chong, leader of Yueyang Sect and host of the upcoming Heroes Conference, da-ge of the 5LA. I had honestly forgotten we got to see so much of Han Ying this early on. What strikes me here is that this is a guy who I actually could believe is the second-in-command of Tian Chuang at what is it? 21 years old? When he’s doing his job, and ZZS is nowhere around for him to make pining puppy-dog eyes at, he’s focused and determined and a bit forceful and somewhat threatening and, frankly, appropriately arrogant for the job he’s been sent to do. He’s also wearing a cloak with a mini-Collar of Evil. He comes off as, dare I say, a capable leader of an assassin organization and a guy who’s able to do a proxy flex for his boss without looking completely ridiculous - which puts him one up on Duang Pengju, omg that asshole, and also makes me feel a little better about how I want ZZS to wreck him (or I guess, technically, him to wreck ZZS, because I’ve never seen a character (except Marcus Flavius Aquila, THANK YOU for your service, Channing Tatum) who put off such subby service-top vibes. WHY is there not more Han Ying/ZZS on AO3, fandom? I thought better … worse? … better? … of you.) When Gao Chong claims the Glazed Armor is a myth, Han Ying basically calls this older, respected zongzhu a liar and gets up in his face before refusing a dinner invitation and sweeping out in his mini-Collar of Evil with a credible “PAH.” My boy has layers, y’all.

What else? We start out the ep at Luo Mansion, a wedding scene, and I’m struck by how the Ghost Valley colors match traditional wedding colors, here. I’m thinking about how A-Xiang’s wedding dress won’t be red (and I think green was more common during the Tang dynasty?) although all the decorations will be, and I’m thinking about how we have this wedding as a book-end to that wedding, and I’m thinking about how it’s interesting that a girl who was raised in the Ghost Valley and protected by the Department of the Unfaithful meets a man who’s going to be so faithful to her in the same episode as this wedding with/of the dead. Ghoul, who’s one of the attendees from the Ghost Valley, also remarks that the red makes him hungry, so there’s a meat reference to throw into the thematic basket, I guess. (Also, hey. Ghoul is played by the same guy who’s Sun Yongren in Killer & Healer.) Lovelace (ugh) briefly menaces one of the Department handmaidens before Luo Fumeng shows up, and I think she’s Yun Zai or Hong Lu, one of the two maids that A-Xiang rescued from him, although I’m not positive, because her hairstyle is so different and hides a lot of her face, here. So, we’re all attending the “wedding” of Mu Yunge, the apparent fuckboy who got got a couple of episodes ago as bait for Ao Laizi when Changing Ghost got his hands (briefly) on the Danyang Glazed Armor. We did see a brief scene with Yunge in the last ep, when he woke up tied up in bed, being menaced by someone who appeared to be his dead lover – who hanged herself while pregnant with their child – but turned out to be Beauty Ghost using a face-masking technique similar to ZZS’s disguises. In the interim, Ghost Valley has kidnapped 10 cultivators as his wedding party, and – this is the important plot point – that includes Deng Kuan, head disciple of Yueyang Sect. We get to see some of Beauty Ghost’s ruthlessness here, as she carries in the dead woman’s memorial tablet draped in a red cloth – how’s that for some foreshadowing (my f’kn HEART) – to set it down in the “bride’s” place before Yunge is forced to bow three times. (Dead girlfriend was a Mo from Broken Arrow Manor, and I … am not sure if that is significant or not. Is she possibly related to Mo Huaiyang? Does anyone know which sect is associated with Broken Arrow Manor?) Beauty Ghost also kills two of the 10 “guest” cultivators for talking without permission as she explains the next event to them – cage match. Only one of them gets to get out alive. Deng Kuan, the best of them, apparently, pleads with everyone to not let themselves be divided, but we can all guess how this is going to go. I guess maybe he’s the other completely good character we meet, but he sure is a punching bag. He ends up the last man, sort of, standing, as he kills the final other person in self-defense, but not before getting stabbed, and he goes down and is out for the count.

Meanwhile, cut to Zhao Jing and Shen Shen drinking and gossiping at an inn on the way to Yueyang. Shenshen – Shenshen – continues to bemoan Chengling’s uselessness, and also talks about the torture the other Zhang family members underwent just in time for Chengling to overhear in the hallway, so thanks a lot for even more trauma, Shenshen. Zhao Jing is so sad about it all, y’all. He’s just so very very sad, can we just stop talking about it, Shenshen, because you’re making him sad, and he’s just going to let Da-ge figure it all out, OK? Uh-huh.

Fourth plot thread of the episode is ZZS skulking around, following Chengling, trying to convince himself that this kid is safe now that he’s turned himself in to gone to live with the 5LA, even as ZZS spots Tian Chuang spies in the ranks of the Yueyang disciples and among the dumpling vendors on the streets outside. ZZS follows the dumpling vendor, gives him a code phrase and almost gets his head taken off by a Scorpion blade for his trouble, before stabbing Dumpling Man in response. WKX picks this exact moment to wander back into ZZS’s orbit, taking the chance to flirt as Dumpling Man spits up blood and dies in the alleyway, because of course he does. WKX tsks, accuses ZZS of being cruel, and quotes some poetry about fair faces and poisonous hearts, which - like all of his poetry - has a double meaning, because which of them is he really talking about, ZZS or himself? ZZS notes that WKX is openly wearing the (Danyang) Glazed Armor because of course he’s looking for trouble, but WKX loosens his stays and clutches his pearls and replies that he couldn’t possibly be looking for trouble – him? Philanthropist Wen? He’s not a merciless killer like ZZS. Whereupon ZZS finally says out loud what he’s been clearly thinking since he started going on about what an awful person he is in the LAST EPISODE, which is why the hell don’t you stop following me around, then? There’s some more flirting, and WKX continues to follow ZZS around, and ZZS takes note that WKX is obviously flaunting the Glazed Armor out in the open, and then there’s a little sleight of hand when Famous Pickpocket Fan Bu Zhi, oh noes! Steals WKX’s Glazed Armor right off his belt when he isn’t even looking! before WKX continues to follow ZZS around, conveniently into the same inn where Cao Weining and A-Xiang are having lunch. After WKX attempts to chase him away, we discover Cao Weining has had his wallet stolen. WKX deploys his Sadness Eyebrows to convince ZZS to turn over his wallet to pay for Cao Weining’s and A-Xiang’s lunch. ZZS – who does an admirable job of refusing for a bit – finally caves, and WKX orders lunch for everyone, on ZZS. Now all we need is Chengling, because the fam is not complete without Goldbean.

#cao wening #gu xiang #han ying #liu qianqiao #beauty ghost #zhou zishu #wen kexing #word of honor #word of honor episode reax

29 notes · View notes

writers-blogck · 4 years

Text

Brand New Day ( Exorcist!Kageyama Tobio x Demon!Reader )

Warning(s): If you know what this is inspired by, then you my friend also pay for something you never thought you would actually pay for before. This does have mentions of WWII, Hiroshima, and homicide but nothing too in-depth. Title: Brand New Day Pairing: Exorcist!Kageyama Tobio x Demon!Reader Fandom: Haikyuu! Word Count: 1,962

The candles were flickering in the night's cold air, the whispers of their smoke disappearing in the dark. Everything felt like it was going through you. You flattened out your palm before hovering it above the flame. Even though the fire was interrupted by your hand, you couldn't feel a thing. Your skin didn't burn, you didn't even feel a hint of the warmth that the candle was emitting. A scream slipped past your lips as you hit the candle off of the table, toppling the small item to the ground. Before it could spread, a foot was already stepping on the fire to put it out.

"I told you, there's a spirit in there!" A shrill woman's voice trembled, refusing to move any closer than the entrance of the room. This had been your house years ago and yet it now held different lives. If you had it your way, you would have burned the building to the ground until there was nothing left but the ash of your memories. This family could learn to live somewhere else, you didn't want to have to share.

"Let me do my job. Take your family out to eat and when you come back, it will be dealt with." The boy with blue eyes spoke, setting his bag on the new bed. This used to be your room and they went and got rid of everything! How was any of this your fault?! It was their fault! Their fault! The flames of the remaining lit candles grew to ten times their size with your anger to fuel them. The woman yelped and was gone in a moment but the boy didn't react. Did he look....bored? You had never met anyone like this before. You didn't like where this was going.

You moved to push yourself in the corner of the ceiling, trying to put as much space between this new intruder and yourself. He was bringing out beads and vials of water. Some were clear while others seemed to hold a strange carmine color liquid. Wine, perhaps? The bottles were corked which kept you from smelling anything, though you wouldn't be able to smell anything anyway. You had lost that ability. How many of the five senses had you lost?

The first to go was touch. Whether the cold ice that resided in the icebox or the sharp blade of a kitchen knife, nothing could make you feel anything. You could no longer smell anything and while you didn't have the need to eat anymore, you believed you had lost the sense of taste as well. Would the other two disappear with time? Which would go first: your hearing or your sight? Which would you prefer? Would you be nothing but a mass of cells come next birthday?

"Now, we can do this the hard way or the easy way." Your eyes trailed over the boy's clothing, taking in what looked like a priest's attire. With how young he seemed to be, he couldn't be more than a trainee. He couldn't be older than sixteen. You had been that age....how many years had it been since then? You had died in the early morning, only having lived fifteen years before your own father decided to cut it short. While the rest of your family seemed to have moved on from the tragic house, you felt stuck. If you had to do something you pass over, you had no clue what it was. There wasn't a handbook for the dead or anything, though that would be helpful. What was the year now? It had been 1946 when you had passed, the bombing of your country having been the year before.

You had an idea as to why your father did what he did. Your country had lost the war and was forced to surrender. It wasn't in the code of honor to surrender, no matter the odds. That was something your father had believed strongly in. He was never the same after he came back from the war. It was coming up on the first anniversary of the day that Japan surrendered. It was a time to reflect and mourn those who had lost their life. For your father, it just reminded him of what he called his 'personal' disgrace. It all came boiling over and was done before your mother or any of your siblings could know what was happening. You had been the last to fall under your father's knife before he turned it on himself. Was that why you stayed?

It was strange to watch the boy in front of you. His eyes had passed over your form quickly, could he not see you? You wouldn't be surprised. No one seemed to be able to see you. There had been fleeting moments where a child's eyes may have lingered for too long or a dog sniffed at your feet but nothing substantial. It had been a lonely existence ever since that day. The house had gone unsold for decades. It wasn't until the history of the house began to fade into nothing but distant memories when they began to try to sell it.

"Who are you?" You asked, more for yourself than anything but the boy seemed to hear it as he whipped his head in your direction. You were just as surprised as he was, the two of you just staring at each other in silent curiosity for what felt like centuries.

"You're just a kid...." His voice was softer than before, the cogs turning in his head in an attempt to understand the situation before him. He hadn't been trained for this. Demons weren't supposed to look like this...He shook his head, forcing himself to remember that demons can make themselves look like anything. They would pull any trick that they had to if it meant they could feed.

"I am not a kid! I'm the same age as you! Are you a kid?!"

"No!"

"Then that means I'm not one either!"

The silence blanketed over the two of you once again, this time a feeling of tension joining it. Kageyama was confused and didn't know what to feel. He had to exorcise you, you were bad! Yet, at this moment you looked like nothing more than a scared kid, someone his age. He imagined himself being a demon, it didn't seem possible! Then...what about an evil spirit? You could just be a spirit-filled with malice and spite. Still, you were like a scared animal pushing itself as far into the corner as possible. You could have tried to hurt him when he walked in but you didn't.

The owners of the house didn't say that they had been hurt in any way. You had been destroying their property and making a mess of things but you hadn't attacked them. Kageyama had been taught about exorcising spirits that would scratch up the living and attempt to bash them with whatever items were around. Still, was it his place to question the situation? He was here to exorcise you and that was it. He needed to get the job done and return back to Oikawa, the exorcist he was apprenticing under.

"Are you going to kill me?"

Kageyama's eyes widened at the quiet whisper that barely made it to his ears. He had never heard anyone talk about exorcism as if it was death before. It was always a good thing but hearing the fear in your voice, he was beginning to doubt his own profession. He wanted to be the best exorcist and yet here he was, heart breaking at the sound of one tiny question. This wasn't his first exorcism and yet it felt just as hard.

"No..." He whispered out, not even noticing his own words. He had been told this was going to be an easy job, just one to give him some more experience. It wasn't supposed to present him with a moral conundrum that had no easy answer! He was still just an apprentice.

"Then why are you still here?"

"This is my house, by the way." You continued on, bringing his attention back to the issue at hand. You were slowly lowering yourself to be level with the boy, allowing him to look at you up close for the first time. Kageyama remembered the creatures he had dealt with and you looked nothing like them. They had been so ugly and you were so...Ah! He couldn't be attracted to a spirit!

"Well, new people are moving in and living here now." He cleared his throat, wrapping his beads around his hand in a silent prayer for God to help him during these trying times. He had been a faithful servant, hadn't he? So why was he being put in such a terrible position? Perhaps this was meant to be...Maybe Kageyama was supposed to discover the existence of nonviolent spirits. A new breakthrough...

"Well," You copied the tone of his voice, nose crinkling up in annoyance, "I was killed in this house so I think that means that I get to stay here."

Killed? Kageyama had read about angry spirits who were victims in their past life but they had all been dangerous. They were fueled by the anger and rage in their final moments which caused their soul to stay. Strong emotions were the only thing that could keep a spirit on Earth and so far, the only one that had been successful so far was anger. The need for revenge. Why had you stayed?

"I can't let you just keep living here. You need to leave."

"Why?"

"Because this isn't your house."

"It was."

"But it isn't anymore."

"But it was!"

"Yeah, but another family has moved in!" The two of you were going back and forth at this point, each raising your voice more than the last time. The flames of the candles were flickering as if a strong wind was present in the room, your emotions affecting the world around you.

"So what am I supposed to do?"

Kageyama pulled his book out of his robes, flipping through the pages until he found what he was looking for. Sometimes creatures were too strong to be exercised by one person which then meant it would need to be transported somewhere else. This spell was able to change whatever the demon or spirit was binding itself to. He could bind you to one of his items which meant he didn't have to exorcise you just yet.

If you weren't a danger to anyone, shouldn't they try to find a way to help you? That was what he was telling himself, ignoring the fluttering of his heart when your face was inches away from his. You were hovering behind him, watching his movements, and try to read what was written in the book. He was doing this to help you dammit, not because he thought you were super cute!

You were going to be the end of him. He could no longer go on with his training as he had before. You had added doubt into his small world. Exorcists weren't supposed to let a spirit stay and they especially weren't supposed to bind them to themselves! Yet, spirits were only supposed to be violent creatures, and yet here he was with a living (or not living) piece of proof. His superiors would have just exorcised you without a second thought. This wasn't how exorcists were supposed to deal with hauntings....Oh well, there was always a first time for everything.

"There is something that I can do but we are gonna have to set some ground rules first."

Oikawa would have to just deal with it.

62 notes · View notes

hippychick006 · 4 years

Text

Misha Panel

I’ve done this summary as it helps to have what Misha actually says to hand as more often than not, his stans misquote him. It’s also useful as Misha often changes things - as he appears to have done between his last virtual panel and this one. Note, I’m only focusing on the key parts where he talks about the show/Jared/Jensen. It is not free of anti castiel/misha comments where I disagree, though those are few and far between for a change. It’s long so putting under a cut...

- Misha confirms his filming finished in March prior to Covid [this comes up later in more detail]. Watching the last epiosode was an emotional experience for him. For him, it represents the end of a chapter of his life.

- Misha says fandoms not going anywhere [*hisses]

- Misha’s future work/projects?: working on senate race in georgia, publishing a book of poetry, couple of film projects he’s trying to get off the ground, one he’s not acting/directing in, the other he may act and/or direct

- Jack brought Cass back but we didn’t get to see it, what happened?: different ending originally that Covid restrictions made impossible to produce. Cool ending involved bringing back lots of cast members over the years. In the original ending, Castiel hadn’t gone to rebuild heaven, there was a different conclusion for him. Misha purposely did not read the last two episodes before they aired as he wanted to be an audience member. He knew a little about Castiel/Jack’s fate in the abstract, but because he wasn’t in it, he doesn’t know what the answer was. He thinks them rebuilding heaven was less boots on the ground and more at a spiritual level [so he’s talking at the metaphysical/spiritual plane level and not corporeal) so they are everywhere (e.g. in drops of rain as per Jack’s speech to Sam in 19). That’s what I’m understanding at least. He says that’s pure speculation though.]

- what qualities does castiel have similar to Misha?: there are a lot of similar qualities [backstabber comes immediately to my mind tbh]. Over time he and the character melded. Over time he evolved into something that didn’t quite fit in with either angels or humanity, he felt like an outsider which Misha has felt for much of his life. He became softer, more sensitive, he tried to do the right thing and be a good person. Oh wow, he says that in order to write to play to Misha’s strengths, the character had to “morph a bit”. I loved bad!ass Castiel, he’s my favourite Castiel!

- What one thing will he take with him from playing Castiel?: on a professional level, it was fascinating to play a character for so many years. He discussed with J2 recently that the characters really became part of them. He doesn’t think that will happen again, just due to length of time the played them. On watching Jensen’s death scene, he cried but it was more “That’s Cass’ friend Dean dying” It was weird to have a blurring of lines between yourself and your character but he thinks that’s what happened with all of them. He’ll take the character away, which will be a part of him forever.

- Misha made fortune cookes and put inside lewd and inappropriate fortunes

[I don’t get this next bit as earlier in the panel he says he didn’t read the last two episodes so didn’t know what was going to happen and gave the answer I documented above and now we have this next question where his answer seems to contradict that]:

- Is there anything more he can say about the originally planned finale?: He doesn’t want to be the one to reveal these state secrets, but what are they going to do, fire him? He feels someone might have said to him, please don’t reveal what was going to happen, but can’t remember for sure if it’s true. He says there was a version of Sam and Dean’s heaven that was populated with all of the people that were from their past that they have come to love. They could not do that because of Covid restrictions.

- Favourite behind the scenes memory of “The boys”: He doesn’t have a favourite memory, they were close friends for 12 years. They had laughing fits and fights and got pissed off at each other. Some of his fondest memories of being at work anywhere were working on Supernatural. He’s never going to be on a set again where there is so much mirth so he’s going to miss that for sure.

- he’s talking about Castiel’s wardrobe which is actually funny - e.g. original suit 3 sizes to big, sometimes showing blood and holes, sometimes being magically fixed, not wearing a tie, going back to wearing a tie... “Nobody complained about that too much...” [uh because some of us were watching other things and your own stans were looking at the background.] He stole some trenchcoats and has them in his closet.

- How do you prepare for emotional scenes?: it’s hard for him to get into that emotional state. To prepare for the Castiel’s declaration of love scene and taken by the empty, Misha needs to be off by himself and not chatting with people, so for that scene he sat on his own in a dark corner of the stage and ruminated on his own. Rob Hayter, stunt coordinator, noticed and stood sentinel and made sure no one disturbed him which Misha said was really sweet. Everyone stopped fucking around for that scene to allow them to do what they needed to do.

- How did you feel when you read the script when Castiel dies?: Misha knew for a long time that ending was coming, he’d been speaking to Rob Berens about it, he was really happy with it. It was the ending he’d wanted for Cass so when he read the script, he was really happy it had made it to the page [i bet it was Misha, how are those destiel sales going through your Stands company?]. It felt it was a little “risky and a little brave” for the show to do [on a fucking network that is number one in Glaad reviews? Are you being fucking serious right now?] He was happy to be a part of that [again sales] and have that character express love like that so he was happy with it.

[Okay, so notice in his last virtual panel 2 weeks ago, he was very happy, he’s now starting to do exactly what he did with Karla movie as he goes on to say...]

He’s seen “some people” [you mean lgbtq+ people?!] “complaining” about this is playing into the “bury the gays” trope which is an insidious and real trope in film and television storytelling in h/w over the years. Misha doesn’t think that’s what was happening with Castiel’s [he died second after the confession MIsha!] First of all Castiel isn’t dead, he’s in heaven working to rebuild it... [you didn’t know this 2 weeks ago, as far as you knew Castiel died and went to the empty]. So much good came from that declaration, because Cass was able to save Dean, which was essential to saving the world, so this declaration wasn’t so then fate strikes you down and you’re done forever. The declaration literally ended up saving the world. It was of Cass’ own volition, he wasn’t forced to do it, it was his choice, and he thinks that’s important, so maybe he’s naieve and doesn’t feel they are playing into that trope.

[You were absolutely playing into that trope Misha and you didn’t give a shit as you did no research on playing an lgbtq+ character so sincerely fuck off]

He’s glad that Castiel got to express that and have that ending. He thinks thats kind of important and he’s proud the show did that. [again fuck off, this was done for you and it showed] He thinks its a conversation they will continue to have as they continue to dissect it going forward [nope, consigned to the dumpster fire I’ve put the majority of the rest of Drabbernatural in]

- Do you think you will ever get an SPN tattoo?: He doesn’t have any but he’s thinking about getting tattoos relating to his children. Is that a sign of desperation that a true hasbeen will do? Should he get a tattoo of Jared and Jensen’s face. He could get a tattoo of Castiel’s face on his abdomen. He’s saying probably not. If they want to get one, totally supportive of that

- what is his favourite moment of the finale?: Dean’s death scene, masterfully executed, excellent performances from both Jared and Jensen in that scene and made him cry

- best memory of your last day on the supernatural set?: everyone being really sweet, lot of tears from cast and crew. The last scene he shot as Castiel was the last scene of the day on a Friday. Him, Alex, Richard S and Jensen all had to get to Las Vegas for a fan convention the next morning. They shot late and finished at 1.30, it was Cass goodbye and Misha’s goodbye to the show. He said they had to get a chartered flight because of the early flight [not sure why he’s saying this as I thought it was Jared’s plane they all travelled in?] He’s talking about going back - because of the issue with the plane - and they are all texting family, saying they love them, so it was such a strange night, he’d said goodbye to Supernatural, he said goodbye to Castiel and later on said goodbye to his kids because they thought they were going to die that night. :(

[Going to add that this puts to rest that Misha was due back for 19 and 20 even before covid, it confirms he was not going to be in either episode, though I maintain, they may have shot an extra scene while they had him to slot into 19 or 20]

- do you think Cass and the other angels got their wings back?: Yes, probably, they have Jack who is the new god. What a long and miserable experience that was of not having wings. Cass was so powerful when he started, he could snap his fingers and teleport and time travel and lost that with his broken wings and they didn’t come back. He doesn’t know why they didn’t fix him as Castiel would have been a much more powerful ally if he didn’t have to drive around in the pimp mobile [uh, for the same reason Sam lost his powers, deus ex machina]. He tells the story of Jared pressing buttons in the car causing the hydraulics to fail costing $10000 of repair.

- in your opinion, what colour are Castiels wings?: shit, I don’t know, I always thought they were black, but now that you’ve said that, they are rainbow coloured, how about that?

- What is the worst joke Jared and Jensen did to you?: [*cough fans looking for things to complain about or hate Jared on]: Jared and Jensen, as you know, they are not good people. He talks about directing an episode and they got excited in the week before, they were going to break into his apartment and steal his furniture, they had all kinds of nefarious plans, the crew tipped him off and told him to watch his home and car keys. They put a fish under the seat in his car and one of the crew told him. Jared removed the canvas on the director’s chair and laid it across so it looked like it was still the chair. Misha fell for that at least 5 times. That was pretty frustrating. Jared kept messing up his lines (which Misha said Jared never does) and Misha was directing in another room, Misha eventually went to see what the problem was and that’s when Jared pied him in the face. Everyone in the crew was complicit in the “assault”. Jensen brought him another shirt, said, “I’m sorry man, that’s sucks, that was too much.” Jensen then pied him in the face.

- What is the real story behind the handprint in the finale?: Um I don't know, but I think it was a nice touch, that was a really lovely callback that worked well. I can’t remember how we came up with that, or was it in the script, I can’t remember. Wasn’t it a good callback to the very beginning. [Again, this appears to differ from what was being reported two weeks ago so might need to go back to that panel if I can get access to it]

-What’s your favourite memory from offline/online panels?: It’s much more fun to be live and in person. I don’t know, I have had some really fun... [PANDERING ALERT COMING UP] Jensen and I have some really fun panels together in Rome. I don’t know why but we always just seem to have a real hoot there, talks about the resume off, they really enjoyed that. He had pizza delivered to a creation panel once. He talks about the Saturday night special and he can’t wait till they can get back to that.

[NOTE CYNICAL PART OF THIS IS FOR HIS FANBASE TO ONCE AGAIN CLAMOUR FOR MORE JENMISH PANELS. I DO NOT TRUST THIS MAN AT ALL]

- What was your favourite version of Castiel to play?: he had the most fun playing Lucifer because Mark P had left a great template to play Lucifer [you took the worst parts imo but Mark fucked his character up too]. He enjoyed playing the human parts of Castiel because it was fun to explore how to be human for the first time. Overall, just regular Cass. He wouldn’t have wanted to trade regular Castiel for other iterations. [A great question would be badass Castiel v late season wooby castiel preference]

#anti misha #anti castiel

32 notes · View notes

snowdice · 4 years

Text

Gaps in His Files (Part 12) [Relabeled; Refiled Series]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Logan/Patton

Characters:

Main: Logan, Patton

Appear: Remy, Virgil (but only in the epilogue)

Summary:

Logan Berry has learned many things the last 10 years: a lot of math and physics, a bit of humility, and how to be a hero being just a few. Through his education, his experience teaching, and his exploits as the superhero Bluebird, he’s changed in a lot of small and large ways. He has recorded these changes in well-organized documents and files. He’s even had to create two new file designations: a red one for files about his moonlighting at Bluebird, and a light blue one dedicated to his boyfriend, Patton.

When Bluebird is targeted by a memory device and all of those 10 years of progress suddenly disappear, Patton Sanders and Logan’s extensive files are left as his only resource to get those memories back. But what is Patton supposed to do when there are clear gaps in his files? And what does he do when he is one of them?

This is set 25 years before Sometimes Labels Fail though it’s story is completely independent of it and it is not necessary to read that one first.

Notes: Superhero AU, memory loss, past child abuse, past child neglect, unhealthy ideas about ones place in relationships, emotional suppression, self-deprecating thoughts, medical procedures mentioned, very brief unhealthy views of sex

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11

This one is very heavy. Patton is spiraling hard and expresses some very unhealthy deep seated views of himself and his role in relationships. So be warned and if you want to wait to read this, feel free. Basically all of the warning in the notes apply in this one except medical procedures.

Patton’s back ached from falling asleep on the floor next to the couch once again the night before. It had been horribly quiet in the apartment in the last 24 hours since Patton returned from the hospital to find Logan gone. He didn’t know what to do.

They’d defaulted back to looking through the files that they’d already pretty much read through at this point and Patton was starting to wonder if there was even any point. They’d looked through the red ones last night and the green ones this morning before rotating back to the blue ones which were now spread all over the coffee table.

Patton had snagged one of the fluffier blankets from the closet and curled up under it, but it didn’t make him feel any better. In fact, he might feel worse because he couldn’t keep insisting that Logan pet it like he normally would.

Logan didn’t even seem to care enough to voice his obvious unhappiness with Patton. His silence just made Patton feel worse and worse and made his thoughts spin and spin. Logan was tapping his fingers against the table thinking about something. Usually Patton would respond to that action with patient fondness, but today it just made him want to curl up into a ball wondering what he was thinking. Patton’s mind kept returning again and again to that place it had been in on and off the last two months except that place was getting darker and darker every time he came back around to it.

Ever since the rejected proposal, Patton had tried to figure out what it was about him Logan didn’t like. He’d tried all sorts of things. He’d tried not inviting himself over to his apartment as much, not being as pushy about Logan taking care of himself, offering sex less, offering sex more, not being as pushy about spending time with him, being more quiet, letting him decide what they did on dates, not talking as much about his job, not depending on him as much when he was stressed, not crying in front of him when he was overwhelmed. He’d tried. He’d tried so many things.

The problem was Logan. Or at least Logan before.

What Logan hated most in life was change and he’d clearly gotten used to how Patton naturally acted over the years. Thus, he kept getting distressed when Patton tried to change something.

When Patton avoided his apartment for over a week, he’d asked if Patton was mad at him and then since Patton had that Saturday off, he’d managed to cajole Patton into spending all day in Logan’s bed napping and cuddling.

The not pushing him to care for himself had only lasted a few hours. Patton knew it had to be annoying, but he couldn’t stop himself from reminding him to eat breakfast and Logan hadn’t seemed mad when he’d started back up. He’d even brushed a kiss across his cheek when Patton handed him a plate of bacon and breakfast potatoes.

He seemed to be able to tell when Patton wanted to have sex with a startling amount of pinpoint accuracy, like he had Patton down to a science. When Patton wanted it, but didn’t start something, he initiated it himself and he looked at him with abject confusion when Patton tried something when he didn’t want it.

He showed up to the hospital to take Patton to lunch in the cafeteria when he didn’t mention meeting up for lunch because he assumed the reason was that Patton was too busy that day. He pushed when Patton didn’t speak much, citing that he was worried something was wrong and he insisted on his input on dates before he’d move forward with any plans.

Patton had kept quiet about his job for three days before Logan had gone and talked to Remy behind his back to ask if something was wrong at work. Under pressure from both of them, he’d spewed out the buildup of stress all over the place. And it was so hard. It was so hard not to cry about it when Logan pressed soft kisses to his cheeks and temples and asked him if he was okay.

But now Logan wasn’t used to Patton and wasn’t set into patterns that he probably didn’t actually like, but just allowed because he wanted to be nice to Patton and was used to it. The problems with Patton were becoming apparent every time Logan side eyed him.

Patton had been hoping that maybe he could figure out from this version what parts of Patton he really did not like. Then Patton could hold more firm about getting rid of those things once Logan got his memories back. He’d definitely appreciate it after an adjustment period. That is if Logan even wanted him after this. He hoped he’d at least give Patton a chance to fix himself.

Patton was good at pretending. He knew how to cut pieces of himself off to get people to love him back. He’d had a lot of practiced. Make sure to do your homework at the dinner table at mom’s house so she knows you’re not being lazy. Cook when you’re at dad’s house so dinner is ready when he gets home from work, but make sure you’ve cleaned up by the time he gets home, so he doesn’t see you cooking. Don’t let grandma cook potatoes; she doesn’t like them and will blame you for them being on the dinner table. Never turn on the television at mom’s house; it rots the brain. Make sure the television is on the sports channel by the time dad gets home. Don’t touch grandma’s remote no matter how loud the volume is. Sit up straight for mom. Don’t cry in front of dad. Be quiet for grandma. Pretend dad doesn’t exist for mom. Call dad’s new girlfriend mom. Don’t try to correct grandma when she calls you by your dead grandfather’s name. Get good grades. Get into a good college. Get a job that pays well. Don’t complain. Don’t get in trouble. Don’t be gay.

Patton knew how to do it all. Logan had never asked it of him. Never, not once had he told Patton that he needed to fix himself or that he had to change for him; he deserved it more than any of them.

“We’ve talked a lot about me,” Logan said surprising Patton out of his churning thoughts especially since he had barely spoken all day. “but what about you?” he asked. “Tell me more about you. Tell me about our relationship. Why do you want to be with me or at least the me with my memories?”

“I…” Patton started. “There are a lot of reasons.”

“Then tell me one.”

Patton bit his lower lip. “You read my papers.”

“Your papers?”

“I’ve written a few research papers and you looked them up and read them and tried to understand them because you wanted to be able to talk to me about something I was interested in. That was the first time in my life that someone looked at me and it felt like they actually wanted to know me. And you kept doing things like that. You remember my coffee order and bring my favorite sandwich to the ER even when you know I’m in surgery and I can’t be there to see you so you just leave it with someone else to give it to me when I’m done. You eat the stupid cafeteria food at the hospital when I only have time for a 30-minute lunch just to spend time with me and after the first time we had sex, you got up early and cooked me an omelet because you didn’t know how to cook anything else. You try to find ways to help me feel better when I’m upset even though it doesn’t come naturally to you and you’re willing to throw popcorn in my mouth from across the room with your powers just because I ask even though you think it’s silly. You once took me on a picnic to a park 5 hours away because I mentioned how much I loved it when a group of us went there on a retreat during medical school even though you don’t like eating outside because of the bugs. And you didn’t even complain… well, I mean, you did complain, but only enough to make me laugh, not so I thought you really resented being there with me. When we go to parties and I say I want to go home, you pretend to get a migraine so we can leave early and sometimes we end up having sex in the car outside. And even though you complain about how annoying you think Remy is, you know he’s my friend so you still make a point to make an effort with him and hang out with him even when I’m not there. So…” he swallowed. “Yeah.”

“You really love me,” he stated, eyes intent on him and unreadable.

“Every part of me loves you Logan,” Patton said, gripping the soft blanket in his fingers. “You can have whatever pieces you want.”

“Whatever pieces?” he echoed.

Patton forgot for a moment that the man in front of him did not have context, that he didn’t and couldn’t understand what Patton was asking. “Look,” he said. “I know there is something wrong with me. I know there are parts of me that annoy you or make you angry, but if you just tell me what they are I’ll change them.”

“You think I don’t like all of you?” Logan asked.

“Clearly not!” Patton said, standing up suddenly and throwing the blanket off onto the ground. He paused and took a breath, forcing his tone to be calm and clinical, like he did when he got too emotional at work. “Look at this,” he gestured to the piles of files in front of him: blue, green, and red. “This is everything from your personal files to your work files to the files for your alter ego, but where am I? You have the receipt from the first fast food order you bought with your credit card, the invitation from your five-year high school reunion that you didn’t even go to, and your sixth-grade report card. But there is nothing in here about me. Not really. I am not important enough for you to keep. But I can be if you just tell me how. I can be whatever makes you happy. If you love me at all, I will rip myself apart until I’m what you need.”

Logan looked him directly in the eyes. “If I love you, I don’t want that.”

Patton blew up. “Then what do you want, Logan?!” He snapped his mouth closed and looked away, tears that had been building since Logan had lost his memory, since Patton’s marriage proposal had been rejected, since his mom had first called him stupid because he’d gotten a B on a math test in the 5th grade, springing to his eyes. “I’m sorry, I didn’t…” he swallowed and stood, a picture of calm. “It has been a stressful couple of days,” he said, flicking a tear off his cheek. “I think I need to go back to my place and rest for a while. I’ll come back tomorrow morning and we can… I don’t know, try aromatherapy or something.”

Before Logan could say anything more, Patton beat a hasty retreat.

Want to read more? Click below!

Part 13

#sanders sides #logan sanders #patton sanders #logicality #tsss #superhero au #memory loss #past child abuse #past child neglect #emotional suppression #self deprecation #gaps in his files #labeled universe #relabeled; refiled #adriana writes #unhealthy views of sex

107 notes · View notes

dryad-of-the-dogwood · 4 years

Text

Until the End

Fandom: Dragon Age

Rating: M

Word count: 2,505

TW/CWs: Major character death, violence, angst, saying last goodbyes, all that awful stuff.

This is a No Cure for the Calling story, an Alistair and Cousland go into the Deep Roads together story, and I never thought I would write this but Silhouette by Aquilo got stuck in the angstiest part of my head and I sobbed writing it down, but I still did it. Forgive me.

Until the End (read on AO3)

The moment Alistair found her sitting up in bed one morning, staring at the wall with her expression perfectly blank, he knew. Nalissa Cousland was vibrant and intense, whether her emotions were good or bad, and Nalissa Theirin was no different. If there was something too intense for her to feel, that made it too much for anyone in the world, because she was the strongest person he had ever known. And the only thing she couldn’t be stronger than was the Calling.

They had both thought they heard it once, years ago. The Inquisition—or more accurately, Leliana—had told them not to worry, that it wasn’t real, that the Inquisitor would handle it. And she had, somehow, however she had killed a darkspawn magister that kept him from being reborn into the next available blighted body. They had wondered, but not even Leliana had really known the answer beyond some combination of Rift magic, a dead red lyrium-corrupted dragon, and the power of an ostensible elven god. And so it had been yet another thing that wasn’t an answer, just like Avernus’ research had been a dead end, just like Nalissa had never been able to cobble together a cure from the Wilds flowers that had saved Ash warriors’ hounds or get a straight answer out of Grand Enchanter Fiona about whatever had cured her all those years ago. Finally when the mage had broken down into tears, she had admitted she didn’t know, couldn’t give an answer even to save the king and queen of Ferelden, no matter how much she might want to. And that had been the last lead before the trail had gone cold.

So when Nalissa looked up at Alistair, her eyes sunken and shadowed but still the same heart-wrenchingly beautiful sea green he had fallen in love with, he had read it on her face. The dreams were returning, she was hearing the whisper of the song, and her time had come.

It should have been him first. Why wasn’t it him? He had taken his Joining months before she had, he had been the one to perform that Void-forsaken ritual that had saved them at a cost that all these years later they still didn’t fully understand. It should have been him.

But it wasn’t, and he wept as he pulled her into his arms, even if she didn’t. Even if she locked everything away behind the mask of nobility that even after two decades on the throne, he had never learned to wear like she did. She was indomitable, his Nalissa, in everything except the Calling she couldn’t escape.

She very nearly physically fought him when Alistair told her he was coming with her. It was her Calling, not his, she had insisted, had shouted it at him in their bedchamber in a bout of hysteria he had never once seen her give into before. She had pleaded, threatened, tried to give him an order as Warden-Commander, but he had only smiled sadly and offered to travel to Amaranthine with her for trial if she wanted to bring him up on charges of insubordination. Only then did she cry into his chest, not for herself but for him, when she realized there was nothing she could do to talk him out of it.

He had promised her once, when they sat together in the grass on an early spring day during the Blight. He had promised her he would be with her until the end, and he meant it. An archdemon couldn’t keep him away. The fact that he didn’t hear the Calling yet wouldn’t either.

The preparation, that was almost worse than the realization. The landsmeet was a debacle, full of angry lords terrified of more instability so close on the heels of everything else the Age had brought upon Ferelden. But Nalissa hadn’t faltered, and she had given them the best solution she could: her brother, the man with the highest standing and the most experience in the country, even if he had balked at her suggestion. It felt like a repeat of history, Teagan had said, watching another Cousland put forth to the landsmeet as a potential king just like the teyrn’s father had been, only this time with no Theirin heir to dispute it.

But it was the sensible solution, they all had to admit. Couslands had ruled in Highever since before Calenhad himself was born, and the teyrn’s oldest child with his second wife was old enough by then to handle the teyrnir. Eleanor was a bright girl, as stubborn and dutiful as her father and her namesake put together, and she would take Fergus’ place well. Nalissa smiled with something like pride when the landsmeet voted in favor, even if her eyes shone a little more brightly than usual from unshed tears.

The Wardens were even more difficult. Alistair hadn’t stepped foot in Vigil’s Keep in years, but he refused to let her go alone, terrified she would leave for Orzammar without him. When the constables and senior Wardens began shouting and grappling for the Warden-Commander’s seat, he almost wished he wasn’t there to see it. The order, without Duncan, without Nalissa, wasn’t half so virtuous as he remembered. But she stood her ground as she always did, naming a stern-faced woman younger than half of them as her successor until Weisshaupt saw fit to replace her officially. Alistair didn’t know the girl, but he recognized the set of her jaw and the steel in her eyes, because he saw them in his wife every day. She would lead the Wardens well, if they allowed it, and he could only hope they did.

They returned to Denerim before setting out. Nalissa wouldn’t miss her brother’s coronation, even if it hurt to brave the noise of the crowds with the song ringing in her ears, even if she had to wear gloves to hide the mottled bruise-like marks on her hands that neither of them could pretend not to see any longer. She hugged Fergus goodbye for the last time on the steps of the palace, and both she and Alistair tried to pretend they didn’t see the pedestal at the gates, prepared for a statue that hadn’t yet been carved, with both of their names and dates etched into the stone.

Alistair Theirin, 11th King of Ferelden, Champion of Redcliffe, Hero of the Fifth Blight

Nalissa Theirin née Cousland, Queen, Warden-Commander, and Hero of Ferelden

9:10 Dragon - 9:52 Dragon

It was already written in stone, the end of both of their lives. The hardest parts were done, all the decisions that mattered had been made. But Maker, did that still not make it easier to set out on their final adventure.

It felt like a hollow echo, walking through the gates of Denerim and knowing they would never do so again. Camping along the Imperial Highway, like when they were young and free, now just the ghosts of two thoroughly overwhelmed new Grey Wardens tasked with saving the world. They had said their goodbyes to Oghren in Amaranthine, to Leliana at the coronation, written letters to Antiva meant for Zevran and to Par Vollen meant for Sten. Nalissa had even sent one to Morrigan, though who knew if that would ever be read. To their friends, to Ferelden, to Thedas they were already dead, but at least what little time they had left was theirs alone.

They spoke often of the similarities, of the differences, of what Wynne might have said to see them walking into death together one last time. Leliana would write a tragic ballad for them she would never share, Nalissa was sure. Zevran would have pointedly declared it was their last chance to join him in bed for the night, Alistair decided. But though they laughed and leaned into each other and drew every moment of pleasure they could from these last few moments of peace, both marked them for what they were: a collection of lasts.

When they finally made camp in the foothills of the Frostbacks, that final night before beginning the descent, they didn’t sleep. They made dinner together, joked how neither of them had gotten any better at it since the first time Morrigan had tasted the gray dreck they had boiled to the point of a tasteless paste and swore she would do the cooking after all. They danced around the fire, watched their shadows on the mountainside seeming to stretch into infinity. They looked up at the stars and whispered together how beautiful they were, without mentioning they would never see them again. And they made love slowly and tenderly, until they were too tired to do more than lie in each other’s arms sharing I love yous and every moment of the last half of their lives they wouldn’t trade for anything.

When the sun rose, they didn’t pack up camp. They put out the fire and left the tent and bedroll where they were, for whoever might find use for them, without ever quite discussing it. They wouldn’t need them again. There was no return journey to look forward to.

And they stopped at the entrance to Orzammar, drinking in the sun and the sky and the fresh air that didn’t smell of nothing but earth and taint. Nalissa hated the underground, hated caves and tight spaces, and her last breath before they stepped into the dark shook as she drew it, but she would not shirk this path and did it anyway. Alistair would have taken everything from her if he could, the corruption and the pain, the fear and the duty, but all he could do was squeeze her hand tightly and assure her again that he was with her until the end.

The end, he kept thinking, as they passed the guards of the dwarven thaig, as they were allowed past into the Deep Roads, as the great doors swung shut behind them with a final clang that rattled in his bones. His end would be lonelier than hers, he knew. As much as he feared it, as much as he wanted to never see those beautiful eyes empty and unable to smile back at him, he had to see her sacrifice made before he could allow himself to fall. That was another promise he had made, down here in the dark what felt like a lifetime ago. He would never allow her to become what the women taken by the darkspawn were twisted into. She would die a Grey Warden, full of fire and wild roars and singing blades. And he would die however he had to after that, even if it was on his knees at her side.

The sob that passed her lips as they paused in the shadows didn’t even sound like her. It was hopeless, shattered, things Nalissa had never been, and she clung to him desperately with tears spilling between them and soaking their armor. One last moment of fear. One more last.

When she dried her eyes and he did the same, he held her as he always did, tight against him even with the barrier of the armor they hadn’t worn together in years. Her head on his chest, his chin on her crown, their arms holding tightly to keep from shaking. Then he took her face in his hands, thumbs stroking her cheekbones that were now too pronounced, and told her that she was still the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. And she laughed, a laugh like they were young and foolish again and could still count years together ahead of them instead of hours.

She was fearless again, at the end. When they sensed the darkspawn moving through the tunnels and planned their intercept course, she was already bouncing on the balls of her feet, daggers whirling in each hand, giving him that reckless grin full of confidence and battle high that still took his breath away just as it had the first time. His shield was heavier from lack of use, his blade slower, but hers were so fast they were almost invisible as she cut through a wave of genlock assassins. And it twisted his heart in a way that he would never have recovered from anyway to see her so brimming with life and so close to death at the same time.

When Nalissa fell, she had downed an ogre, a hurlock emissary, and more genlocks than Alistair could count. Even the blade that finally slipped between her ribs was almost a matter of luck, a hurlock whose sword had clanged off a blade she had already parried and back toward her quicker than she could counter. And even though he knew it was what they were here for, that it had to happen before she became something unspeakable she would never want to be, the sound that ripped itself from Alistair’s throat was pure agony.

His sword and shield suddenly weren’t heavy at all, they were feather light and full of lightning as he crashed through two other hurlocks to the one that still held the blade and removed its head in one clean stroke. Nalissa had already hit the stone beneath her but both daggers were still in her hands and she stabbed viciously into the back of another hurlock’s calf. Blindingly beautiful even soaked in blood, fierce and deadly to the last. The last.

Alistair cut down the darkspawn she had injured, looked down to see her chest heaving, and dropped his shield. She looked straight at him even as she struggled for breath, shook her head, but he knelt beside her anyway. And again, even at the end, he could see the tears that streaked her face were for him.

She couldn’t make the sounds, but her mouth formed the words. I love you. And he sobbed it back to her, pressed his lips against hers, one last time, one last time. Her hand tried to raise to the back of his head as it always did, but it made it only halfway before it dropped and she went still.

Miles away in the deep roads, surely there were darkspawn or very unlucky dwarves that could hear the sound of Alistair Theirin’s anguish. Certainly more of them seemed drawn by his roars, bore down on him as he fought like a man possessed, with no shield but a dagger in his left hand that had fallen from hers. And it fell from his too at the end, when a viciously barbed pike caught the gap in armor on his left side. It should have hurt, but nothing hurt more than he did already. Nothing hurt more than falling beside her at last, seeing the faint smile still traced on her lips even as her eyes shone empty into the distance. Not seeing him. Never seeing him again.

But his hand found hers, before the last blow that turned everything dark. One last time.

(Also posted on AO3).

19 notes · View notes

komatsunana · 4 years

Text

My Reincarnation Isekai Villainess Rec List

So. I’ve gone and found myself in Isekai/Reincarnation/Villainess hell. For those who don’t know Isekai is a genre in which character(s) are transported to a different world. Initially you might be thinking “oh, she’s gonna share a both a series like Sword Art Online.” Oh no. You have underestimated the amount of taste I have. By which I mean I have none but that SOA is a taste I’m not here for.

Now a very specific sub-genre of that is the reincarnation one, particularly in which a character is reborn as a character from one of their favorite books or games from their previous, modern life. An even more specific sub-genre of that one is in which the MC is reborn as a villainess from that book or game, thus creating a bit of a challenge as villainesses usually are destined to die in the source material.

So! Here are my favorites, many of which are all 3 but some combine one or two of the above tropes. It’s my list so I do what I want. And most of my faves have a shojo genre tag, or at least a romance tag, because that’s where all the good stuff is:

Survive as the Hero’s Wife by Nokki

Canaria is reincarnated as the villainess of a popular cliche novel. Based on the novel, she is destined to be executed but can she prevent this from happening before it’s too late?

Why *I* like it: So this one was the one that really got me into the villainess reincarnation isekai genre! And it remains the top of my list. The huge draw for me in this one is that I actually really like the main couple! Like not even just lukewarm, I really like it! I’d read fic for it, if that existed. A lot of the villainess genre tend to portray the original heroine as vapid, unworthy of their status of heroine, or the actual villainess but in this case Gracie just turns out to be just an amazing strong woman who doesn’t actually need a man. (In fact I ship the three together full stop tbh lol). In fact, it’s a subplot that Gracie realizes (because of MC’s words) that if she wants to inherit her father’s title even though the law says a woman cannot... That she just should strive to change the law rather than be a tool with no use outside of marriage. And not to spoil anything, but she will definitely do just that.

And since I’m mainly finishing the rough draft of this list out of absolute RAGE at being made fun of for being into this genre.... A compilation of the main love interest, Cesar, because he’s absolutely beautiful. Look at those eyes! He’s such a great example of the sullen, dark love interest because he’s not those things when he’s with his wife, the MC!!! He’s so soft for her. And the whole point is that the love interest shows a different side to their lover right??

And like the great thing is Canaria, the MC, totally doesn’t notice for the longest time. She read the novel in her previous life so she’s *convinced* that one day Cesar will fall for the novel’s original leading woman, and she makes plans accordingly throughout their early days of their marriage. She completely hadn’t thought about the fact that since she’s not being a villainess this time around and not abusing him and everyone around her, and makes friends with Cesar... Like of course the course of events change. It utterly baffles Cesar when his wife keeps bringing up divorce because he’s so completely in love with her and you just gotta eat that shit up with a spoon because it’s so good and perfect drama but also funny.

There’s even a Halloween chapter where everyone wears costumes and basically I believe I was pandered to specifically.

Tbh, the arc going atm is sorta losing my interest but that’s because there’s political intrigue and I’m like just here for the romance lmao. So someone looking for substance and not just fluff might be more pleased than I. But it’s still on-going so. It’s just all in all a fun and great introduction to the genre imo.

I Reincarnated into an Otome Game as a Villainess With Only Destruction Flags by Hidaka Nami (Art) and Yamaguchi Satoru (Story)

Eight-year-old Katarina Claes is the only daughter of a duke, living her life peacefully and without incident until she hits her head on a rock... and then remembers that she is not actually the duke's daughter. She used to be an otaku who died on her way to school after spending the entire previous night playing Fortune Lover, her favorite otome game. After noticing that her current surroundings seem oddly familiar, she is shocked to discover that she has been reincarnated into the world of Fortune Lover as the villainess.

The villainess in the game usually winds up dead or exiled, so Katarina decides to use her knowledge of the game and its routes to avoid any bad situations. But is it even possible for the villainess to reach a good ending?

Why *I* like it: Ok ok ok, lol. So this one is probably one of the most well-known of the villainess reincarnation isekai genre atm! Particularly because of the anime currently running. And for good reason... the MC is so brilliantly stupid in the best of ways. While she plots on how to escape her fate of being killed or exiled by learning to sword fight and how to garden, she’s more or less seduced every capture target in this dating game... AND all the female rivals to boot AND heroine. The thing is that she is completely unaware and continues training for the day she is inevitably killed or exiled, as per the game’s original ending.

It’s just a silly, fun series and all the women’s feelings for her are taken about as seriously as all the guys’... Which isn’t much because absolutely no one really has a chance of getting this woman to understand they are all madly in love with her. Not a series to take seriously which is part of it’s charm, but it retains a lot of heart especially when it comes to the MC Katarina (affectionally called Bakarina by fandom) remembering her friend and family from her past life.

This series also has a manga spin-off about what if she’d been reincarnated while already in high school and bullying the heroine instead of a child... So basically she’s in hard mode, and yet she still succeeds in getting even more people into her little harem she has for herself.

Whether you chose to watch the anime or the manga (or the LN, which I haven’t got to) you can’t go wrong.

It Seems Like I Got Reincarnated Into The World of a Yandere Otome Game by Hanaki, Momiji (Story) and Setsuri (Art)

As a precocious child, Lycoris suffers from a strange sense of deja vu. On the day her father told her about her fiancé, she realizes that her fiancé was a character from an otome game she once played in a previous life.

“I am the heroine’s rival from the game?

And in the bad ending, I get stabbed to death?

What a joke.”

A story in which the protagonist is determined to avoid a yandere situation.

Why *I* like it: Hear me out! I know what you’re thinking... Yanderes??? But here’s the thing... Just by the MC being kind and getting 2 of the “yandere” characters out of abusive environments, they no longer end up as yanderes as they grow up. They aren’t those tropes any more! While the characters remain protective, they aren’t possessive and are happy to see MC branch out, if a little lonely. And the yandere that remain aren’t treated as hot, but annoying. So like sorry to disappoint if you think yanderes are hot but this isn’t the series for you.

Additionally, unlike other series of this trope, the MC is pretty quick to realize she just needs to trust her lover, that he will not turn on her and kill her as he did in the game nor will he fall for the heroine instead of her. It’s somewhat refreshing, as a huge part of the trope is the MC typically doesn’t realize until it’s spelled out that by not acting as a villain.... the rest of the characters don’t want to harm them... And might even have fallen in love with them.

Another fun aspect is how MC doesn’t remember things immediately, but only remembers things from her past life (and of how the game went) until it comes up. Additionally, she wonders some interesting things that aren’t even mentioned in other series like... What if she’s destined to be exactly like the game character? Will she be forced to be exactly like her? It’s a fun exploration of some common reincarnation isekai villainess tropes if you have experience with the genre!

Ascendance of a Bookworm by Shiina You (Art) and Kazuki Miya (Story)

A book-loving student and soon to be librarian ends up crushed to death by the pile of books during an earthquakes and wakes up as a five year old girl named Main in another world where books are scarce only available to the elite. Main, retaining her memories of her past life, decides to create and print her own books so she can read again.

Why *I* like it: So here is we depart from solely the villainess sub-genre (but only briefly!) Because there is another sub-genre of reincarnation isekai and that’s in which the MC uses the things they learned on our planet earth to re-invent things like shampoo and the printing press. And no other isekai does it better than Ascendance of a Bookworm imo. Main’s love for books leads her to recreating things she took for granted on Earth and starts selling them from a young age... Which might just end up saving her life as she ends up having a terminal disease that ordinarily she’d only be able to survive by being a slave to a noble... But by selling her products she has a chance to save herself!!! And the products she creates are available to commoners, not just the nobles who of course make it impossible for the poor to have nice things.

Additionally, a majority of this trope centers around nobles and royalty (and all the best ones are historical settings)... The fun thing about this one is that it actually centers around a povert stricken family. It’s a good break from the noble hierarchy within most isekai.

Finally, this series is the one that hits most closely to my feelings if I were to be reincarnated in another world... Which is to cry at the realization that I will never finish any of the on-going books and manga I had going on. That’s absolute hell, I don’t know how any of these MCs deal!! ;_;

btw there is an anime and manga both. Also LN but tbh almost all of these have LN.

Isekai Omotenashi Gohan by Shinobumaru (Story) and Medamayaki (Art)

Akane, an ordinary office lady, gets summoned to a different world along with her younger sister and pet dog. There, she ends up treating rare guests one after another with hospitality through meals!! Can she satisfy the citizens of a different world with home cooking...?!

Why *I* like it: Continuing our brief deviation from the villainess trope, Isekai Omotenashi Gohan is my favorite example of another subgenre of isekai - one without reincarnation - but one in which a “hero” is transmigrated to another world to save it... The problem? Oppsie, 2 people were taken. Sometimes in this sub-genre there is a question who the true savior is but in Isekai Omotenashi Gohan’s case they figure that out pretty quickly. They quickly figure out the MC’s younger sister is the savior. At first the older sister (Akane) is set aside as unimportant... But her sister only wants to eat the food her sister makes and it quickly becomes obvious that Akane’s role is important.

Akane makes lots of allies and friends by sharing the food from Japan and of course has a very subtle romance going on with her guard. But honestly I just enjoy this series as a person that likes food manga, like that’s it lmao, so much so that don’t be surprised when I make a best food manga list and yeah sorry Food Wars won’t be on it.

But fr, even if you don’t love the food manga genre try it!! It’s a sweet series and mixes domestic with fantasy in a great way. Plus only a few series are complete, with the rest being on-going, so if you want a complete and finished series try this one!

The Duke's Fiancee, Why She Had to Go to the Duke by Milcha (Story) and Golae (Art)

When Park Eunha dies in modern-day Korea, she awakens in the body of Raeliana McMillan, the eldest daughter of a nouveaux riche baron. However, this is no ordinary world; it's the exact same one as a novel she once read. Beloved by her family, it would seem as though she is in a fairy tale. But Raeliana is far from the main character—she is a mere plot device, whose murder at the hands of her fiancé instigates the entire story.

Raeliana has no intention to accept her fate quietly. She sets her eyes on someone in a position of great power—the vieux riche male protagonist Duke Noah Volstaire Wynknight—aiming to completely change the original story. Using her knowledge of future events, Raeliana offers information to Noah on the condition that he acts as her fake fiancé, but the Duke's two-faced nature throws a wrench in her plans!

Why *I* like it: This one is a fun one!! It really plays with different concepts that don’t often get explored in reincarnation isekai like where did the original consciousness of the character the MC became go??? Because MC only remembers her life on earth and is otherwise treated as though she has amnesia.... But is it amnesia? Is she another person entirely?

Also the humor is... great. Listen I refuse to give the best joke in the series just to make you read it but... the series is worth it just for this running joke.

Of course the romance is good too. The dude is kinda an asshole but she gives as good as he dishes out and it quickly becomes flirting anyway. I don’t want to say too much and give any thing away... but s’good!

Who Made Me a Princess? by Plutus (Story) and Spoon (Art)

The beautiful Athanasia was killed at the hands of her own biological father, Claude de Alger Obelia, the cold-blooded emperor! It’s just a silly bedtime story… until one woman wakes up to suddenly find she’s become that unfortunate princess! She needs a plan to survive her doomed fate, and time is running out. Will she go with Plan A, live as quietly as possible without being noticed by the infamous emperor? Plan B, collect enough money to escape the palace? Or will she be stuck with Plan C, sweet-talking her way into her father’s good graces?!

Why *I* like it: Ok, big sigh. How do I explain the pull ‘Who Made Me A Princess?’ has on me? Now a lot of the pull for many people is how cute the budding father daughter relationship the MC (Athy) has with her dad. But like, her dad is the worst and I want to fight him. On the other hand, most of the fandom hates Jeanette, the MC’s sister who has done literally nothing wrong except make everyone around her miserable but it’s not her fault ok, and I’ll fight the entire fandom in her honor. So it pains me to rec this series knowing that more than likely anyone who picks up this series because of me might have Wrong Opinions and I invite you to tell me just so I can shake my head about another wrong person existing in this world.

Never the less, this series is very cute! All the other series I have recced had the MC remember their past life at early childhood at the earliest, if not as a teenager. Athy? She has the misfortune to remember as a *baby* and it’s exactly as hellish as it sounds for an adult to be stuck growing up as a baby and suffer through the absolute embarrassment of having people feed and wipe her ass.

The MC was an orphan in her previous life and the book that she wakes up in is a shitty book even by her standards but then she really only skimmed it it sounds like that’s what interests me. As Athy makes changes to the original events of the novel and depth is added to the world, I start to wonder if the added depth was in the original novel or if the world had to add its own depth to stand as an actual lived in world?

Additionally, since I made the cover image Athy and her dad you might as well see her with her 2 love interests (and Jeanette!). People need to know who to ship, I get it.

Also I need a moment to appreciate, up close, the beauty of Athy’s eyes. So gorgeous.

Living as the Tyrant’s Older Sister by Aperta (Story) and Chyobab (Art)

When I opened my eyes, I was inside a fantasy novel world! The beauty I see in front of the mirror is the future tyrant’s older sister, Alicia! She’s not even a protagonist or an antagonist, but a character that doesn’t appear much and gets beheaded by the (upcoming) tyrant little brother. My life is all about escaping that fate from the novel. In the end, I seduced the male lead’s merchant friend who also doesn’t appear much and was about to leave the country with him. How-e-ver. The face of the man who spent the night with me was extraordinary, and was the male lead himself!

Why *I* like it: ……………...keke. Ok so this one is one I like just for the laughs. The love interest is an arrogant asshole, but see… The important detail the summary leaves out is that the MC’s… cousin (?) wrote the book that she woke up in! Moreover she’s the one that told her cousin to change the MC of her novel and make him good at everything and also make him a freak in the sack. Like who is really at fault here??? Lmao. Especially when she goes out intending to seduce a character she remembers being rich from the novel and accidentally bags the MC from the novel, aka the dude who kills her and her brother in the original novel.

In seriousness though, it really is funny. The facial expressions of the MC is just… chefs kiss. She’s got a pretty face but then she makes all these goof ass faces and I love it. If you need any more reason to at least give it a go, just know that at one point the male lead comes to check on her, expecting to find her crying and instead…. Walks in just as she screams FUCK at the top of her lungs and then begins a tirade of very creative curses including "Bitch oompa loompa ass bitch" which how can you not love her? Anyway the face the male lead makes after that has me maintaining that’s the moment he fell in love with her lmao.. but this is not Confirmed so it’s not a spoiler!!

EDIT: as of August 2020, I’ve since dropped this series. It remains on the list since I’d still rec it to people looking for a laugh.

Seduce the Villain’s Father by bia and dalseul

Upon opening my eyes after a bus accident, I found myself in the fantasy world of a webnovel I enjoyed reading... the only catch is, I reincarnated 20 years before the novel begins! Reborn as Princess Yerenica of the small Lebovny kingdom, I'm determined to change the future in order to prevent the series of unfortunate events that will soon occur!

Why *I* like it: How many times have you yourself had a suuuuuper side character be your favorite in a series and be depressed to see them done dirty? Well MC has a chance to fix that, to save a character that basically one appeared in prologue and basically prevent the birth of the villain character that later kills his own father… by seducing his dad, before he can marry the villainess!!

Yerenica is just adorable in her attempts to thwart the original novel. And like, I have to give her lots of respect for seeing the villainess character and having herself a good moment where she had to consider seducing her instead lmao. She knows when to let well enough alone though so she immediately boards back on the dad train, much to his chagrin because she keeps calling him father……………….. Even though he’s like…. Not a dad yet.

The characters are still relatively early on in their romance, but I have high hopes for it yet!

Edit: As of August 2020, I’ve dropped this series. It remains on this list because I think it’s a cute series and I think anyone who feels really strongly about the main couple will enjoy it.

Death Is the Only Ending For The Villainess by Gwon Gyeoeul and SUOL

Penelope Eckart reincarnated as the adopted daughter of Duke Eckart and the villainess of a reverse harem dating sim. The problem is, she entered the game at its hardest difficulty, and no matter what she does, death awaits her at every ending! Before the "real daughter" of Duke Eckart appears, she must choose one of the male leads and reach a happy ending in order to survive. But the two brothers always pick a fight with her over every little thing, as well as a crazy crown prince, whose routes all lead to death. There's even a magician who's enamoured with the female lead, and a loyal slave knight! But somehow, the favourability meters of the male leads increase the more she crosses the line with them!

Why *I* like it: So this one is another relatively new one added to my list, but it’s shot high up rather quickly!! The other otome game isekai’s that I have on my list are just like the real world, but the interesting thing about this one, is that it also retains otome game mechanics such as she can see the love interests love meter and also she can chose to use the video game script choices to reply to the characters, in the hopes of raising their love meter. This adds challenge, since she knows that if she gets any of the dudes to -10 she’ll be killed even as she sort of wonders if she truly would die or wake back up in reality.

What’s interesting also is that while she is the villainess character in the game… It ends up that the character was actually abused for years and that her title as a villain is unfair and that the game can be played as the villainess as even a player as a ‘hard’ mode compared to the heroine character. It’s up to her to turn things around and it’s actually a fun take on the villainess genre. I’m really looking forward to how things proceed even as my fears about which dude she’ll end up with continue to increase.

Finally, another layer I enjoy is that the MC lead a similar life in her previous life. She’d only just escape her own abusive family before she’d ended up here and MC just desperately wants to escape once again… using any means necessary.

The Villainess Reverses the Hourglass by SanSobe (story) and Ant Studio (art)

With the marriage of her prostitute mother to the Count, Aria’s status in society skyrocketed immediately. After leading a life of luxury, Aria unfairly meets death because of her sister Mielle’s schemes. And right before she dies, she sees an hourglass fall as if it were a fantasy. And just like that, she was miraculously brought back to the past.

“I want to become a very elegant person, just like my sister, Mielle.”

In order to face the villainess, she must become an even more wicked villainess. This was the new path Aria chose to take revenge on Mielle who murdered both her and her mother.

Why *I* like it: If you thought that this list might be in descending order, guess again! This one is one of my favorites. Now this one lacks isekai, but is a reincarnation of a villainess!! Rather the MC was an absolute horrible person in her past life, but finds out at the last minute that her ~pure~ sister had been leading her by nose into acting like a brat just seconds before she is executed. Now that she has a second chance, she’ll be a proper villainess and turn the tables on her sister.

In her last life, Aria never bothered educating herself so now that she’s a teenager again she actually has to learn things again (it’s not just like she gets to act like she’s a genius and good at everything) but she works hard at maintaining a sweet image and making everyone love her, even as she snickers behind their backs, all the while subtly setting her sister up for failure.

This is a proper revenge story, I’m promised by those who read the LN!! Revenge stories about women are rare to come back, especially one that doesn’t make revenge look like a total evil thing lol. What can I say, I have my interests. Anyway, it’s super cathartic to watch Aria slowly unfold her masterplan to foil her sister’s plans and take everything that her sister had cherished in her previous life. And all that not to mention the certain powers that Aria later discovers she has at her disposal... :3c

Beware of the Villainess by Bbongdda Mask (story) and Pureunkanna (art)

I became the villainess of a novel! Do I hate it? No! I find it rather nice. A duke’s daughter equals a jobless rich person. How can I miss out on a chance like this?! This is the best chance to just enjoy life. I should throw out the main plot and just live life how I want to! Not long after waking up as the villainess, I witnessed my fiancé, the crown prince and the novel’s male lead, cheating. I saw him embrace a lady other than I and he was smiling so bright. I was brought to tears… Just kidding, I didn’t cry! My tears are worth too much to be wasted on that garbage. Instead of tears, I yelled out, “Your highness, are you trash?”

Why *I* like it: Listen there are 2 ways to react to waking up as a villain of a series you once read… Either you turn the tables and become a good guy OR you can embrace it! The world the novel is based on has the basic premise of the pure and good heroine winning the affection of 4 bratty, horrible men. MC is the fiance of one of them and says fuck that. She also has some thoughts that none of these dudes deserve the heroine of the novel but this one is still pretty early on so the jury still out on if she’s going to save this poor girl from her fate of ending up with any of these absolute assholes.

This one is along the veins of the previously mentioned Living As the Tyrant’s Older Sister, in that the pull for this series is even less of the romance and more about the comedy aspect… Also MC’s facial expressions are…. Choice. Just so good. Enough with pretty girls making pretty faces!! We need more girls being ugly. It’s what we deserve. Yell at cheaters!!!!!! Tell them to fuck off!! Yes please.

Accomplishments of the Duke’s Daughter by Reia (Story), Umemiya Suki (Art)

Although she had reincarnated as the daughter of a Duke's house, by the time she regained her memories, the Ending was already here.

"After he cancels my engagement, the story would have me confined to a church. Where can I find my happy ending?"

Why *I* like it: I never read or watched Wolf and Spice but I imagine this is isekai Wolf and Spice… Well it’s got a lot about the economy at least lmao. That’s literally the only thing I know about Wolf and Spice. Anyway!! The twist in this one is that the MC remembers her past life just as she’s about to be exiled, the end of the original game. What the series focuses on is her life afterwards, as she scrambles to grab at any semblance of a good life… And she does so pretty quickly!

Her past life comes in handy as she sets to work managing a dukedom and fixes the economy!! Moreover, even though it pains my heart whenever two women are pitted against each other… It does a great job of putting into question the original heroine’s pure shtick as she spends extravagantly on dresses and would rather just donate to the poor one day, instead of Iris the MC who sets to work on fixing the economy and creating jobs for the poor and putting money into bettering their lives in the long run, rather than throwing money at them and running. Also, she’s grabbed the attraction of a mysterious man who takes a job helping her even though he is a prince aka the brother of her ex-fiance who he is fighting for the crown for.

And that’s it!! My list for now!! Tbh by next month there’ll likely be even more faves as I continue to add more and more series to my read list lol. Because this isn’t even a fraction of all the reincarnation isekai series I’m into, just the best for certain reasons.

BTW, if you’re like... wow this list sure is straight then true unfortunately. I’m waiting for the day “I Favor The Villainess” gets adapted somehow. Also there are several isekai in which a straight girl reincarnates into a yaoi novel but I haven’t found a true gem among them yet.

#isekai #i scream #long post #recs #this post was sponsored by pure spite #but frankly yes i know i didn't have to go this far #but this is just who i am... which is too much

81 notes · View notes

obsidianfr3sk · 4 years

Text

The Origins (Chapter 1)

Summary: Before the Renegades put an end to the Age of Anarchy, they were six kids trying to survive day by day in a city ruled by chaos and desolation. Is there a space for hope and kindness somewhere in Gatlon City? Maybe.

Sooo i’ve been playing around in my head with this idea for a six part fanfic that i have about how i think the OG renegade’s lives where during the age of anaychy and how they were as kids. we don’t really know a lot about their early years, so i saw this as an opportunity to experiment with some headcanons. i’m not an english native speaker, but i hope i’ll improve my writing skill with time (renegades fandom is non-existant in spanish).

here’s the link to the story in ao3, if you rather read from there: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25123756/chapters/60870652

but anyways, enough about me. hope you like it! :))

The world that’s waiting up for me

Age of Anarchy

Year 2

He was running at full speed. The air was cold and burned his throat each time he needed to breathe. His legs had started to hurt two blocks ago because of the hits he received during his fight with Fred, but Simon wasn’t going to stop now. He was leading the run.

He turned what he believed to be a corner, and ran into a dead end. Then, he looked around, hoping to realize that his brain was fooling him into seeing that, but no. There were four boxes full of rotten fruit, an enormous closet, and dozens of black bags…

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

It was obvious Fred had seen him get into that alley. Surely he was already fantasizing with the one hundred ways he was going to torture Simon as soon as he got his hands on him.

Simon heard his haunter’s fast and threatening footsteps. He analyzed his options once again. Boxes, bags, closet…

He stepped into a little puddle in his way to the closet. Closed its doors so fast, that he almost hurt his fingers. The closet wasn’t that large, so he had to remain still, so that damn old piece of furniture wouldn’t fall into pieces.

His socks were wet. Those were his best socks.

There was a minuscule space between the doors that allow him to see Freud running into the same dead-end Simon had.

But, instead of being confused, Freud grinned. The blood coming out his nose had dried and, with his crooked teeth, his appearance was even scarier than normal.

Simon still didn’t fully understand where he had gotten the courage to turn around and punch him right on the face. Laura had told him not to do that.

“Never hit the nose, Simon. You could kill someone.”

But Simon had done it. He had disobeyed Laura.

Laura had also advised him not to hear what Freud had to say about him. It was simpler than what he expected; Simon could bear with dignity all the comments about his ragged clothes, his old shoes, or his not so good looks. He could even bear when Freud started calling him “rat” and all his classmates followed the trend.

Laura would be so disappointed at him for using brute strength before words. His mother would be too. His father probably would say something between the lines: “My boy finally is starting to turn into a real man”, and the baby… well, she wouldn’t say anything. She was a baby.

But what Fred had said to him…

It comforted him knowing that if Laura had heard what Freud said, she would have hit him too.

“Where are you, little rat?” Asked Freud with a trace of mockery in his words. “Look at you. Running. Like a rat. Like your whore sister.”

The day was gray. A faint ray of light illuminated the blade of the jackknife Freud held. The image of that blade stabbing Simon in the chest, was enough for him to not get out of his hide spot and broke Freud’s nose.

“They said she tried to run,” Freud keep saying while he looked for him in a big trashcan, “but I don’t think so. I think she even enjoyed it.”

Freud kicked the boxes. Yeah, because Simon was hiding between that old fruit.

“And even if she hadn’t, I say it again: she deserved it,” Freud sentenced, disgusted by the stench that the fruits emanated. “Prodigies like her had always been freaks. Dangerous freaks. I don’t fucking care how many Ace fucking Anarchy appear to defend you and try to scare the shit out of us, we won’t bow before you. Do you hear me? WE WON’T BOW!”

Simon wasn’t a prodigy. Laura’s powers were creating bubbles. Since when bubbles were dangerous? Since when being able to make them out of thin air was an excuse to kill someone the way they killed his sister?

Before he realized, Freud’s eyes met his.

He had found him.

“No one humiliates me and lives to tell the story, rat.”

Freud opened the door wide, and Simon was ready to be stabbed when a third figure appeared behind the older boy.

“That wasn’t a nice thing to say.”

Freud frowned. He cleaned the blood off his face, and slowly turn around to see the face of the one who dared to defy him. Simon couldn’t help but poke his head over his bully’s shoulder.

He was a blond kid, not older than him. He wore black frame glasses, attached with a piece of tape. His blue eyes looked at Freud with disapproval with which no one had ever dared to look at him.

“Do I know you?” asked Freud after laughing his ass off.

“I’m just saying that, if you have a problem with someone, you report that person with the school’s authorities,” the blonde boy kept saying, ignoring Freud’s question. “It’s not good taking justice into your own hands. It just causes more trouble.”

“Shut up!” Freud screamed as he pushed the blonde boy into the same pond Simon had stepped in a few moments back.

The most surprising thing, however, wasn’t how calm the boy looked when he was facing Freud. It was that he never stopped talking.

“Is that a jackknife?” he asked. Freud looked at the object he carried “Do you take it with you to school? Sharp weapons are not allowed inside school grounds. I’m afraid I’m going to tell a teacher about this.”

Freud cried with hatred and lunged at him, the jackknife ready to kill him. However, the blade broke as soon as it made contact with the blond boy's side.

Before he could process what had just happened, a silver stake sprang out of nowhere and narrowly pierced Freud's shoulder. He managed to move just in time for it to only leave a deep cut.

Simon wouldn’t deny it: Freud almost getting pierced by a stake gave him a morbid sense of satisfaction. His scared, hurt, and confused gaze almost made him cry of pure happiness. How blissful (and relieved) he felt when Freud ran away from the scene.

Just like a scared rat.

The blond boy had dropped shoulders and glasses on the tip of his nose. From his looks, he looked like one of the sons of those businessmen, who lived in those big houses in the northwest of the city. However, his clothes were as old as Simon's. He looked apprehensively at the stake as drops of blood stained his gray sneakers. He didn't see that he had it while he was reading Freud about good behavior, and it was too big to keep in his pockets. It was as if he had created it out of nothing.

And maybe he had.

Immediately, he regained composure and smiled.

“You can go out now!” he exclaimed animatedly. “He's gone”

Didn't he see him standing in that old closet? He was literally in front of him.

As if hearing his thoughts, the blond boy turned to the closet and his face lit up. Simon wanted to run away when he saw him approach with abnormal enthusiasm on his part, but there was nowhere to move.

“Amazing!” the boy yelled. He looked in all directions and muttered, “You are like me.”

“Sorry?”

“Don't be scared, I'm with you,” he whispered. “My name is Hugh.”

He held out his hand. Simon accepted it out of sheer courtesy.

“How old are you?”

“Eight.”

“I had never met a prodigy my age.”

“I am not a prodigy,” Simon clarified.

Hugh's smile froze.

“But I just saw you use your powers.”

“I run very fast to run away from the gangsters,” he said sarcastically. “It comes naturally.”

He gave a loud laugh. Making him laugh was not his intention at all.

“No, I am talking about the other power.”

“What other power?”

“That you turn invisible!”

Hugh quickly covered his mouth and Simon released his hand. He hadn't realized all the time he had been holding it until now. Hugh had a very strong grip.

“Sorry, it was not my intention to shout it,” he mumbled. “I know that sometimes it is better to go unnoticed.”

“Have you stabbed someone else?”

His smile disappeared for a moment.

“I usually don’t do that.”

He did not believe him. There were times when people sometimes had to do things to survive that they were not proud of. But, well, Hugh could continue lying to himself. It was not his job to get him out of his bubble.

“Freud deserved that and more.”

Hugh looked up to protest, but instead said:

“You’ve done it again!”

To hell with this.

Simon raised his arms to push him away, just to realize he was wrong: Hugh was not crazy.

His hands... his entire body was completely invisible.

He moved his fingers and felt the movement. Then his legs. The atmosphere seemed to distort slightly every time he moved. He blinked hard, hoping that when he opened his eyes again, he would realize that it was all a dream, and he was lying down, with his sister preparing to take him to school.

However, he opened them and his sister was not there. He guessed then, neither did his mother.

It was just him and Hugh.

This can’t be true.

His mother and Laura were the only prodigies in the family. They always knew that there was a possibility that Simon was a prodigy too, but after a certain time, they began to realize that he wasn't. Before she died, his mother said she hoped the baby wasn't a prodigy, either. It was best for everyone.

Now, his family's worst nightmares had come true. How was he going to explain to his father what had just happened? How was he going to react? Was he going to kick his son out of the house? If that happened, where would he go? What was to become of him?

He was panicking, and Hugh wouldn't stop looking at him like he was a Christmas present under the tree. That didn’t help.

His hands appeared.

“Your power is so cool,” said Hugh.

“I swear to you, this is the first time I've done this,” he whispered.

Again, the frozen smile.

“Are you serious?”

“Completely serious.”

Hugh adjusted his glasses, shocked.

“I'm sorry,” he said awkwardly.

“Why?”

“Because ... this is not how origin stories should be,” he replied.

Oh, that.

“It doesn't matter,” he replied. He wasn’t lying, the topic never concerned him. However, now he had the feeling that he should be concerned.

“I've seen you at school,” said Hugh, trying to change the subject.

“Yes, I am the rat,” he blurted out angrily.

Hugh shook his head.

“I wasn't going to say that. You're Simon Westwood,” he corrected him. “You're Laura Westwood's brother. She worked at the pawnshop.”

“I was her brother,” he corrected.

“You are her brother.”

Simon did not want to continue arguing. He had already realized that it was not worth trying to win an argument over that guy.

“Did you create that stake?” he asked. “I mean, out of the blue?”

“Yes…” he replied showing him the stake. “I'm not proud. It's just that sometimes when someone attacks me like that, they just... appear? Like a defense mechanism or something. But I'm working on it.”

“What is it made of?”

“Chromium. That’s what my auntie says.”

Simon looked at the stake. There it was again, that morbid feeling…

“I've never seen a prodigy using their powers for good,” said Simon thoughtfully.

“I didn't do something good,” Hugh replied. “I almost killed someone”

Laura would have said, “Please, a shoulder injury doesn't kill anyone.” But Simon said:

“You would have done the right thing killing him.”

“What did he do to you?”

Oh, boy, what he hadn't done to him.

The insults, the teasing. Although, the beating was something new. Freud must have been bored of not receiving any reaction with the verbal attacks, so they evolved into physical attacks. The first was after Laura's funeral.

How crazy do you have to be to do that to someone who had just lost his sister?

That had been going on for two weeks now, and Simon put up with it, just like before. But he was never going to allow anyone to mess with her family.

“He said Laura deserved it,” he replied.

Hugh went silent.

He heard a pair of thunder in the distance.

“We should go to our houses,” Simon said.

He stood up and went to the street. Freud's jackknife was on the ground. The blade was next to the red, plastic handle. He took both of them very carefully and put them back together. It wasn't tight at all and surely was going to break in the slightest attempt to cut something or attack someone, but it was still menacing.

Without much thought, he picked it up and put it in his pocket. Just in case.

“Hey,” Hugh called out, still sitting in the closet. Simon turned to see “Where do you live?”

“Over there,” and pointed to his right.

Hugh smiled again. He hadn't realized he had dimples on his cheeks. Surely they had formed it after giving away so many smiles.

“What a coincidence,” he said. “Me too”.

Then Simon smiled back at him. It was an honest smile.

When was the last time he had smiled like that?

#renegades #renegades trilogy #archenemies #supernova #simon westwood #hugh everhart #fanfic #ao3 #the origins

31 notes · View notes

talesofafangirlwithadvr · 4 years

Text

June Picks!

And just like that we’re at the end of yet another month. I seriously do not know where these months are going. I think they’re going by faster now since we’ve been socially distant. I hope everyone is staying safe out there and can enjoy the start of summer while also being smart. It’s good to know we can always escape into TV and movies at home. Without further ado, here’s my monthly wrap up.

You know spoilers are coming....

DC’s STARGIRL

I gave some quick thoughts a few weeks back when the first episode of the latest DC TV show premiered on the CW. I really liked this episode and it got me pumped for the series, but since then I feel most of the episodes have dragged for me. Because this show has the DC streaming service feel, it makes you want to binge all the episodes, which is something you can’t do when CW airs it on a weekly basis. Most of the action occurs at the beginning or end of the episode, which serves as a great cliffhanger, which works well in this streaming format. Due to this format, the middle can drag...a lot. Going in I didn’t know much about Stargirl or the JSA. (My main knowledge comes from that special the Justice Society had in that one Smallville special all those years ago. There it was a bit of an overload of heroes, unlike here.) I love Pat and Courtney’s relationship. Every episode they bond more and I especially liked when she was complaining to him about how the other teammates don’t listen to her. He understood that really well. I am also just loving Luke Wilson as Pat. I think he works well for the role. Feels believable. I’m ALWAYS a fan of a new generation of heroes. While it was slower getting the team together, now that we have the core group I am especially excited. The latest episode (6) was one of the strongest for me and I am very excited to see this up and coming team train and get stronger. I’m also interested in learning more about the villains. I think it’s interesting how we are also meeting a lot of the villain’s kids who seem to not know their parents’ true identities. I wonder if we’ll be able to turn any of them. (Feeling it for Icicle Jr.) For our team, I’m really loving how it’s three girls and one boy. I think that’s a dynamic we don’t often see, especially in a group of superheroes. I’m still working out who to ship, but I’m really loving Rick. Can’t wait to continue watching. I hope we get more of these epic stance moments.

LEGENDS OF TOMORROW

Let’s continue on this superhero thread with another one of my favorites, which wrapped up its 5th season (crazy it’s already the 5th!) at the start of the month. I’ve said this before and I will continue to do so, Legends is THE BEST SHOW IN THE ARROWVERSE. It has been the most consistent and that’s not only because of a strong cast, the freedom to do basically anything they want with the plot and also being a mid-season show. I think where the Flash and Arrow often get tripped up is having too many episodes to fill, which forces story lines to be dragged out and filler episodes. With a 13 episode season you don’t get that. WARNING I’m going to jump into season 5 spoilers now!!

So, some of my overall thoughts for this season:

The Wave-rider has always been a revolving door for characters. This show probably has the most turn-over than any other show I watch. And it works, but for this season especially it felt like a lot of coming and going as I look back.

It was sad to see Ray leave. Not only is he one of my favorites, but he was one of the core crew that was left. He brought great humor and heart to the show. I loved his bromance with Nate over the seasons. I wish he could have come back for the finale. While I like that he left with Nora (because they are adorable) it just felt too fast (and that was with me knowing how many episodes he had left).

Charlie’s exit. I know she had a large part of the plot with her sisters, especially in the second half of the season, which means she’ll be missed even more next season. When she said she was staying in the finale I was like WHAT! It just felt so sudden and I didn’t see it coming.

The lack of Sara on the ship this season made me feel like she had other projects in the works. When she became blind I was like op this is it for her character. Now of course, I see how that worked into the overall story line, but with her abduction at the end of the season (meaning another absence) I’m curious if she is working on other things. I do love seeing Ava at the helm though. She makes a great captain. I just wish the two could be co-captains on the screen more often in future seasons to come. It hurt me too much to see Ava’s reaction to when she knew she was going to lose Sara.

At first I REALLY missed the original Zari. She’s the one we knew for a few seasons and now she was gone. That’s the main reason why I had difficulty liking Behrad right away. I do appreciate that they didn’t drag out the plot of discovering something in the timeline had changed. I liked how Nate had some memory and got that message from Zari. When Zari 2.0 showed up I missed our original Zari even more, but the more episodes she was a part of, she grew on me and I suddenly was worried to lose her. I was completely fine with having both Zaris on the Waverider (ha, ha, ha, but seriously). I think Tala did a great job of bringing two different incarnations to the character and seeing how Zari would have grown up if she didn’t have such a tragic backstory.

I can seriously go on and on about this season, but I think it’s best to leave for another post.

THE 100

If you follow me or have read other posts on my page you know I’m a 100 fan. If I’ve had strong feelings about an episode (positive or negative) you will probably see a reaction post. I haven’t watched this past week’s episode yet, so this will mainly relate to the first five episodes of season 7. I’m having a love/hate relationship so far, which honestly I’m not shocked about. The first few seasons of this show were definitely the strongest, but I’ve remained a loyal fan and supported it throughout. When the first episode of season 7 aired a few weeks ago, I instantly felt it wasn’t going to be a strong ending. I kept saying that the true ending happened when our characters went on the ship to look for a new planet and “ended book 1.” Since then the feel of the show has shifted and that’s especially true with this final season. It’s always been a sci-fi show, but now with the anomaly and this jumping multiple portals and planets it feels VERY SCI-FI. Like at times I don’t 100% understand how what they’re doing is possible. But I’m okay with that. I’ve watched Doctor Who and felt the same way and still had a good time. Going into this season, I thought the anomaly plot was going to be the one I disliked the most. But for me now it’s what’s saving this season. I am loving that story line over the one we’re having at Sanctum (where they are FAR too many new characters that I don’t care about). I absolutely LOVED the Octavia/Dioyza/Hope backstory episode. There were so many great parallels to Octavia’s own childhood and I was able to appreciate how much her character has developed. After seeing this episode, I instantly grew to really like ‘adult’ Hope as well as her dynamic with Gabriel and Hope. (It hurt me so much when Echo killed the man who was helping them get back.) I can’t wait for Hope to find her mom. (I saw pictures of the three of them together again, so I know it’s going to happen.) Speaking of not liking new characters, I DO like Levitt so far. That could be mainly for the fact that he’s also a fan of watching the 100. I was NOT expecting to see Bellamy at the end of episode 5. It brought me so much joy. I hope we don’t have to wait so long for the next time. (Because, come on-we know he’s not really dead.) I am upset that Bob is barely in this season. It’s not fair to him or the character. Even thought the Sanctum plot is bothering me I am loving the scenes Murphy is in. Talk about character development. He better make it out of all this at the end. I also enjoyed Raven’s story line with the radiation. I agree with a few people’s posts I saw about her not having a large plot last season and not being the Raven we know. I’m happy to see her being one of the main characters again. We might not get the ending we deserve, but I hope it’s one that isn’t horrible.

MARVEL RE-WATCH

What’s one way to spend your quarantine/social distancing? Why ranking all 22 movies in the MCU and then re-watching all of them (one a day) and re-ranking them with your new thoughts. With seasons ending early and less being on TV now was a fantastic time to do this. (Plus, I knew a few other people doing it so I felt inspired.) For some of these films, I think I had only seen them a few times and it was hard to remember what happened in certain ones over others. (I kept thinking stuff that happened in Captain America Civil War was actually in Captain America Winter Soldier.) I really enjoyed the experience and highly recommend it, whether you’ve watched these movies a countless amount of times or only once. Watching them in order of their release really made me appreciate all the Easter Eggs and planning that went into it. I longed for some movies and was not excited for others (I’m looking at you Guardians Vol. 2). It also made me feel a deeper connection to Iron Man (which made the ending even tougher-and I knew what was coming). The nostalgia was strong and I’m so happy to be a part of this fandom.

Sneak peak at my re-ranking that is still in the process:

Top 3)

Avengers Infinity Wars

Avengers Endgame

Spiderman Far From Home

Bottom)

Guardians Vol. 2

Thor the Dark World

Iron Man 2

AVATAR THE LAST AIRBENDER

Avatar was released on Netflix this month and something in me said now was the time to watch it. (That’s right, I haven’t watched it before). The hype for this series is crazy! I remember it being on Nickelodeon as a kid, but I had never watched it. I didn’t know much about it other than the main character had an arrow on his head and was the last airbender. (Yep, so not a lot.) Currently, I’m still very early in-I think about episode 9-but I already feel very invested. I like that the episodes are only about 25 minutes long. They’re quick watches, which allows me to watch a bunch without feeling guilty. After watching the first two I already felt like I wanted to learn more about this world and its characters. I think it’s really interesting how the elemental bending is used and how some characters can do it while others can’t. I also like how the avatar gets rotated within each bender and how the one before Aang was a fire bender seeing as how that is our main opponent in this first season. Coming into the show I was told by a friend that this is some of the strongest character development he has seen. That was such high praise and I cannot wait to witness it for myself. One of the reasons I love watching TV/movies and reading is because of the characters. I love bonding with them and feeling like I know them. I can already hypothesize who will change the most (my mind automatically goes to Prince Zuko), but I’ve been really good about spoilers, so that way I can witness it myself. Because I’m still so early on I can’t say much, expect that I’m enjoying it and will keep you posted on how my journey with Aang, Katara, Sokka and Zuko go.

VIOLETTA SEASON 2

I was ECSTATIC when I found out that season 2 of Violetta had FINALLY come to Disney Plus. It had felt like FOREVER since I had finished the first season (of 80 episodes. You know a show is good if after 80 episodes you’re like where is the next season of 80 more episodes!), but it was really only a few months. It feels great to be back at the Studio with Violetta and the crew. There’s a few new faces this season both with the students and the faculty. It always takes adjusting with new seasons/characters, but some of these characters I really don’t like. I know that’s good because you’re not necessarily supposed to like them, but I really want some of them gone. (I’m looking at you Jackie.) But with a show that has so many episodes, a lot of the story lines often get dragged out, so I don’t know when that will be. Again, Violetta has found herself in a love triangle (just like every other teenage girl, lol). This time Diego opposes Leon and is much different than Tomas in season 1. Where Tomas was passive and always wore a face of uncertainty/confusion, Diego is bold and won’t take no for an answer. At times I feel he borders stalker territory.

So far, I’m up to episode 20 and am getting more into it. I was missing out on the performances/ songs and now there’s starting to be more, which has me excited. I’m hoping not to watch this one as fast because I know most people say it is the best one, plus who knows when season 3 would appear on Disney Plus. For anyone unfamiliar with my first post about Violetta earlier in the year should check it out if they’re looking for a telenovela full of drama, misunderstandings love triangles, angst and music that will get stuck in your head. Definitely worth the watch!

WORLD OF DANCE

My favorite dance competition TV show is back and I could not be more excited!! There’s just something about World of Dance that puts me in such a good mood and I can’t wait for Tuesday nights. I’m just upset at myself that I watch the latest episode too soon and then have to wait another week. This season the judges switched it up by coming to the contestants last audition with the producers...or so they thought. I loved seeing their reactions when they walked into the room and Ne-Yo, Jennifer Lopez and Derek Hough were there. It was priceless. While I don’t have a dancing bone in my body, I still am able to appreciate this talent and love watching the contestants perform. What I really like about this show is the range of ages and types of dancers from soloists, duos, trios and groups. I like how each competes within their group until the final episode when they have won their category. The talent is already so strong as they finished the call backs (which was a new feature this season too). Some of my favorites are below. I can’t wait to see what happens for the rest of the season. I just hope the pandemic didn’t interrupt the filming. You can catch up on all episodes by watching NBC on demand!

AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST....

BEECHAM HOUSE

Ending strong with yet another Masterpiece Classic, Beecham House. This series, which aired earlier in the UK, premiered about two weeks ago here in the states on PBS. While I’ve heard that there will not be a second season and the outrage of that makes me worried for how this season will end. (After watching Sanditon earlier this year you really don’t know what to expect.) Despite knowing this already, I will continue to watch the show and enjoy what we have. Which I am so far. While only the first two episodes have aired, I already feel very invested. The first episode, specifically, leaves a lot of questions unanswered, which is understandable because they want to draw you in to watch the show. I was making a lot of speculations, but refrained from going into too much spoiler territory. (Surprisingly, I’ve been good! That’s impressive for me!) Some of my questions have already been answered in the second episode (but of course, there are more to go) and I was happy how I guessed. There’s so many characters and it feels like we’re gaining more with each episode. Despite, there being so many, I am able to keep up and like seeing new characters interact with one another. I also enjoy seeing a lot of familiar faces from Mrs. Patmore (Lesley Nicol) in a very different kind of role compared to Downton and Leo Suter who has been in a lot of my recent Masterpiece watches (Victoria, Sanditon). I love how he plays such a different character in each project he’s in. Really shows his range. With four more episodes to go I can’t wait to continue learning more about what’s going on in Beecham House and what their futures will be. I don’t know if the US numbers will help a chance for a second season, but I hope so!

Speaking of my previous Masterpiece watches: I really enjoyed World on Fire overall. It ended with some big cliffhangers and I am very excited it got a second season!!

What are you watching? Any requests of what I should tune into next?

15 notes · View notes

raywritesthings · 5 years

Text

Blackbird: In the Dead of Night 1/9

My Writing Fandom: Arrow Characters: Laurel Lance, Oliver Queen, Tommy Merlyn, John Diggle, Quentin Lance, Lucas Hilton, Sara Lance, Dinah Lance Pairing: Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen (Eventual) Summary: Oliver Queen returns to Starling City after five years away, three years after Sara Lance was found and rescued by her mother. More troubling to him is Laurel's abrupt and unexplained absence from the city for the same length of time that her sister's been home. Three years into the past, Dinah Lance makes a terrible choice. *Can be read on my AO3 or FFN (links to both accounts are in bio)*

After five long years away and all the time he had had for regrets and thinking about how he wanted to make amends, Oliver knew exactly where he needed to be when he returned to Starling City. He didn’t get the chance to act on that plan until Tommy asked him what he had missed most on their driving tour of the city he could once again call home.

“Laurel.”

His best friend barked a laugh and scratched at his ear. “Yeah, uh, problem with that plan. Laurel’s not here anymore.”

Oliver turned sharply to look at him. “What?”

Tommy shrugged. “She skipped town three years ago. No forwarding address, never answered any calls or emails. Never been back.”

“You’re sure?”

“Look, she left just before Sara came home. If that wasn’t enough to bring her back to Starling—”

“Sara,” Oliver echoed dumbly. “Sara’s alive?”

“Yeah. I guess you wouldn’t have known. She told the Queens she thought you had died, too.” Tommy shook his head. “Your mom and Thea took it pretty hard, not that they weren’t happy Sara had lived. Made things easier with the Lances, even if it didn’t fix their marriage.”

“Mr. and Mrs. Lance separated?” With every sentence, Tommy was sending him reeling and struggling to play catch-up. He’d known on some level that the things he had done before and the shipwreck itself would have affected the people around him, but it was still so strange seeing and hearing how much everything had changed.

“Yeah. That was less than a year after the shipwreck. Mrs. Lance moved to Central City, and Sara’s with her now.”

“What about Detective Lance?”

“Well, not so much a detective anymore,” Tommy told him. “He got busted down to officer and then I think he was asked to resign after his drinking got out of hand. That was probably about a year after Laurel left.”

And that brought them back around to the main issue. Laurel was gone. In all his years of yearning, recriminations, and vows to make things right no matter how impossible, he had never accounted for a scenario in which Laurel simply wasn’t there. It was unthinkable. She wasn’t just supposed to be at home...she was home.

“Laurel’s father got kicked off the force, and she didn’t even come in to check on him?”

“I guess she figured he’d be fine. He probably gets alimony, right?” Tommy pushed at his shoulder. “Let’s not worry about all of that, okay? You’re alive, Sara’s alive, and wherever Laurel is she’s probably happy to know she can hate you both in peace. So come on, where else did you want to go?”

“Nowhere,” Oliver answered blankly. He had absolutely no plan forward now that the one thing he had been determined to do — the one person he had wanted perhaps most to see — was out of reach.

“Sushi it is,” Tommy replied with false cheer and turned the engine on.

Their drive to the restaurant was interrupted when they were attacked and kidnapped, however, and Oliver’s hand was forced in debuting the man in the green hood much earlier than he had wanted to.

Jumpstarting his mission early caused him to make the decision to recruit his newly appointed bodyguard, John Diggle. Diggle was capable, level-headed, and a good man. He needed allies, as was proven when he had been unable to bring Jason Brodeuer down in enough time to stay the innocent Peter Declan’s execution. That one was still weighing heavily on his conscience.

And truthfully, Oliver needed him as a teammate just as much as a confidant.

“Reminiscing?” Digg asked one night as he walked up to Oliver at the computer.

He minimized out of the article he’d pulled up about the Queen’s Gambit wreck and his and Sara’s supposed deaths. Laurel had been mentioned in it by name. It was the last record of her he was able to find.

She’d been planning to go to law school before he left. But that took three years, and she wasn’t on the pass list of any state’s bar exam, which eliminated the possibility that she had transferred for her last year. And why would she have done that?

Diggle was still waiting for an answer. “Not exactly. There’s someone I knew before the island, someone I thought would still be here when I got back. But she’s not.”

“The girlfriend you cheated on.” Diggle shrugged at his surprised look. “I did my research, too, you know. Thought I should know who I was signing up with.”

“Well, the tabloids aren’t the best place to start anymore.”

“So why are you looking at them?”

Oliver turned his chair around to face Digg. “Tommy told me that Laurel left around two years after the shipwreck and that no one has heard from her since, even when Sara came home.”

“And that rubs you the wrong way?”

“It’s not like her.” Laurel would have come back to see her sister, to yell at her at least. And the idea that she’d just let him return to a comfortable life without making it clear how much he’d hurt her didn’t feel right, either. Laurel did not do the silent treatment. She was confrontational always.

“Well, maybe she just wants to get on with her life. Everybody else seems to. Has Sara even contacted you since you came home?”

“No.” And that was strange, too. He would have thought she would want to know how he survived, or to talk about their experiences. He still remembered when she had blindsided him on the island with a love confession, and perhaps his discomfort over that had kept him from reaching out.

Oliver turned back to the computer and searched for Sara this time, finding a few articles about her reappearance. A photo of herself and her mother leaving the courthouse sat over an article titled Mother finds daughter pronounced dead in shipwreck.

Mrs. Lance had been involved? Reading further, the article stated that Sara had washed ashore on an island with little connection to the outside world, but that her mother had been looking in the area and heard word of an American girl matching her daughter’s description.

There was nothing about the Amazo, Lian Yu, himself or the others, and he could understand that Sara might not have wanted to go into those details, traumatic as they were. He had covered up his own experiences to keep people from tying him to the Hood, after all.

But if parts of the testimony were partial or full lies, that made the entirety of it suspect.

Oliver studied Sara’s miserable expression in the photo. Something was off about all this. He needed more information.

“I’m going out,” he decided, getting up and crossing to the stairs.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” When he looked back, Digg mimed putting up a hood.

Oliver shook his head. “Not that kind of mission.”

—-

Quentin sat at his customary stool, working on his second glass. It was that or stay home and watch news reports about this Hood guy the police were totally inept at catching. It was obvious this nut had to be independently wealthy himself. They should have started looking into who among the elites had some kind of grudge or something to gain from all this upheaval. But his theories wouldn’t be welcomed around the station anymore, so he kept them to himself.

His peace and quiet was interrupted as someone took the seat next to him.

“Hello, Mr. Lance.”

At the familiar voice, he blinked and set the glass down, then looked to his right at Oliver Queen. “What the hell do you think you’re playing at?”

Queen raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Nothing. I had a question for you, that’s all. Then I will happily let you get back to your scotch. In fact, consider the next one on me.”

Figured he would consider everything good between them, no harm no foul. “If you think I’m glad to see you just cause it turned out Sara wasn’t killed out there, you’ve got another thing coming.”

“I won’t take up too much of your time, then,” Queen replied. “I just was wondering if you had Laurel’s new forwarding address.”

“Gotta be kidding me.” He scoffed. “You think if I knew, I’d tell you?”

“So she really hasn’t been in touch.”

“No. Guess she got sick of me.” Quentin prodded at his drink a couple times. “We got into it, just before she left. Said some things. I didn’t mean ‘em.”

“But you think she thought you did.”

“Well why the hell else would she have left? An- and who cares? Couldn’t be bothered to call or write, not even a peep when her sister came home. She doesn’t care anymore.” Quentin gave a single shake of his head and drained his glass. “None of ‘em do. Sara comes up every other Christmas. Talks on the phone sometimes. But she’s with her mother.”

He’d believed when he first heard the news that maybe there was a possibility for the four of them again. The chance to be a family like they’d had before. But Dinah had kept her place in Central; Sara hadn’t quite been the same bright, mischievous girl he’d lost; Laurel had never come home. His girls had all left him one by one.

“And Laurel’s alone? You know, I did some digging—”

“You think maybe you of all people should leave it alone?”

“—she was going to law school, right? But she hasn’t passed a bar exam anywhere in the US. Wherever she went, it wasn’t to continue law school.”

“Okay, so she dropped it. She never wanted to be a lawyer in the first place. It was the police academy,” Quentin mumbled. He’d kept Laurel from being an officer because of how dangerous he knew the job to be, yet look at him now. He hadn’t been anywhere near the precinct for a year and a half.

“Did she drop it between semesters or in the middle of one?”

“Look, Queen, what are you trying to say?”

“I’m not sure yet. I just have an odd feeling about it, I guess,” the man admitted, his brow furrowed. “It doesn’t sit right with me.”

“Look, I would’ve hoped that hearing your sorry ass turned up might have prompted her to come back here and give it a good kick. But she’s obviously washed her hands of the whole thing. Probably for the best. One way we’re different, she knew when to let things go.”

“That’s not the Laurel I knew.”

“Yeah, well turns out she didn’t know you too well, so maybe you didn’t know her, huh? Why do you care?” People around them were staring, but all he could feel was anger at the fake-concerned act Queen was pulling. It didn’t matter how stricken the billionaire looked at his accusation; it couldn’t be genuine. “You never cared about her! You broke her heart, and she was a damn fool to give it to you in the first place!”

“Quentin, I think it’s time to pack it in, alright?” Frank came down to their end of the bar and took his empty glass. “Don’t worry about your tab, you can get it the next time.”

“Great, just great.” He slid off his stool and staggered. Queen caught his arm to steady him, but he threw him off. “Tell you what, you find out wherever she went, tell her don’t bother coming back. I don’t need her. Never did.”

He stormed from the bar and back home, breathing heavily by the time he cleared his steps. He just didn’t have the energy he used to.

In the morning, he woke up on the couch in his clothes from the night before and his shoes untied but still on his feet. He shuffled to the toilet and relieved himself, staring at his bloodshot eyes and unshaven face.

God, what he’d let himself become over the years. And there was Queen, young and handsome and rich as ever. It boiled his blood.

But perhaps what felt worse was, as he contemplated the bits of their talk he could remember from the night before, he had to admit — the bastard was right.

It didn’t sit right that Laurel hadn’t returned. She loved an argument, always wanted the last word. And she cared. She cared more than most people ever bothered to. Hadn’t he always said she was trying to save the world?

Back when he’d first realized she had gone, he was just so angry. Angry that she hadn’t bothered to say anything. Angry she didn’t want to see Sara after her ordeal, the little he’d ever managed to get from her about it, that was. Angry that she’d left him. Because he did need her. Look where he’d ended up in her absence.

So what did it mean? Something wasn’t right. How the hell did he go about figuring out what the something was?

Quentin struggled into a suit and tie for the first time in years, then made his way to Laurel’s old apartment building. That was the first place he could think of that might still have some kind of record about her.

He got the number for the landlord on a sign right by the mailboxes. “Yeah, I needed to talk to you about a previous tenant in apartment 305. Dinah Laurel Lance. She was my daughter. It’s a bit urgent.”

Lucky for him, the landlord agreed to see him just after his lunch. Good service in a good neighborhood.

Quentin found the man’s office easy enough and was shown to a seat.

“You had some questions about your daughter’s use of the apartment?”

“Yeah, specifically the end of it. Was her lease up? I’m trying to get some family accounts in order,” he claimed.

The landlord opened and perused a file on his desk. “No, she still had several months. But she understood she was breaking the lease and told me to account for that with the check.”

“She told you?”

“Well, it was in writing. I never actually spoke to her about it. I suppose her mind was made up.” He took a piece of lined paper from the file and passed it to him along with a photocopy of the check. “Normally, I’d have asked the tenant to fill out the amount to be withdrawn, but she had already left the apartment and wasn’t answering any calls.”

Quentin supposed there wasn’t much the man could have done, especially with a note stating Laurel’s wishes. But right away, he spotted something off.

“This isn’t her handwriting.”

“It’s not?”

He looked up with a frown. “Nope.” The signature on the check held up okay, but then it wasn’t hard to scribble some cursive.

“Well, I’m not sure what to tell you, Mr. Lance. That note and the check were left in my mailbox one morning, and the bank accepted the check.”

“What about her stuff? Was it all cleared out?”

“As far as I remember.”

Someone else had written this note and the information on the check. Had someone else cleared out Laurel’s things as well? And for what purpose, to make it look like she’d moved?

The bank had accepted the check. The bank could also tell him more about the current state of Laurel’s accounts and affairs. Quentin stood up.

“Thank you, you’ve been a big help.”

He didn’t think this was a case of fraud on the landlord’s part. Either way, he’d learned everything he could here. Yet Quentin was acutely aware how little the bank would be willing to tell him without Laurel actually present. Back when he’d still been on the force, that hadn’t been a problem.

He needed the information, but he didn’t have enough information to get police involved. Unless...

He swallowed his pride and dialed the number for his old partner.

“Detective Lucas Hilton.”

“Hilt, it’s me. I need you to meet me at Starling National Bank if you’re available. I’m at the branch on Fifth and Gail Street.”

“Quentin? What’s going on?” He thought he could pick up the rustling of some papers on the other end of the line. “You sound like you’re on a case.”

“Something like that. But I don’t got the badge anymore, so you know. I wouldn’t ask, but it’s kind of a personal matter. Family.”

Hilton gave a heavy sigh. “Alright, think I can make some time. Give me twenty.”

“Terrific. I’ll be here.”

He was pacing by the time Hilt’s squad car pulled up, but he made an effort to stop as his friend walked up.

“So, what’s this about?”

“Laurel.” He watched Hilton’s eyebrows raise. “I went over to see her old landlord and asked about her lease. When she left, she had to break it. Only she did so via note, and the note the landlord had wasn’t in her handwriting.”

“Wasn’t that three years ago? What’s brought this up now?”

He wasn’t about to admit it was Oliver Queen of all people, so he gave an evasive, “Been doing some thinking. I think I missed some signs back then. Between Sara being back and everything…” He trailed off for a moment. “I just need some information about her account to be sure I didn’t get it all wrong.”

“Alright, let’s see what we can get.”

They headed inside and up to an unoccupied window in the line of tellers.

“Hi, how can I help you today?”

“I need you to tell me about the account belonging to a Dinah Laurel Lance. It’s part of a case,” Hilton lied as he flashed his badge.

The teller blinked. “Oh. Well, let’s just step into one of our personal offices and have a look.”

They both followed the woman and sat across the desk from her as she booted up and typed away at a computer. A frown started to form, which made the bad feeling in the pit of Quentin’s stomach grow even worse.

“Her account has been in some trouble for the last few years. There’s been no deposits. Most of her funds were garnished. Outstanding loans, credit card bills. There should have been a court order sent to her place of residence in the case of the credit card, but federal student loans don’t require one.”

“So she hasn’t been using it for, what, three years?” Quentin asked.

“Almost exactly.”

“And if someone was going to move cities or even out of state, they would have closed the account first, right?” Hilt checked.

“Well, we would have recommended transferring to one of our sister branches, but yes.”

“So what does that mean about where she is now?”

The teller blinked at him. “I’m not sure how to answer that. This isn’t really something common. It’s almost as though the account has been left open while it’s in probate.”

He gripped the arms of the chair and leaned forward. “I’m sorry?”

“Oh. Probate is—”

“I know what it is.”

Hilton touched his shoulder. “Thank you, Miss. That’s all the questions we have.”

His partner led them back out onto the street and over to the car. Then he blew out a breath. “Okay, Quentin. What are we looking at?”

“Laurel didn’t move. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but she didn’t just leave. Not on her own. Someone forged her note, I’d bet Dinah’s next alimony check that that same someone sent an email to withdraw her from law school, and the teller in there thinks she might as well be dead from her account activity.” He dragged his hands through his hair, yanking at tangles he rarely bothered to comb. “She’s missing, Lucas.”

Hilton watched him solemnly.

“She’s been missing for- for three years, and I didn’t notice.” His hand rested over his chest while his heart pounded loud in his ears. “How did I not notice?”

“There’s a lot that’s been going on in your life the last five years, Quentin. And whoever did this wasn’t an amateur. The important thing is that we know now. I’ll open a case at the station, but I think you should get home. You look exhausted.”

He didn’t want to go home, but he knew better than to show his face around the precinct. So he let Hilton drive him home. Quentin undid his tie as he entered the little apartment, and he dropped back down onto the couch.

Laurel was missing. It didn’t feel real. After all those years he’d spent resenting her for staying away — and he’d been wrong.

Worst of all, the person who’d pointed it out to him was the person he loathed most in the world. How had Queen known?

More importantly, how was he going to find his daughter?

—-

Three years ago

Laurel’s eyes were stinging with the tears she wasn’t quite able to hold back as she held the close door button on the elevator. She was thankful when the door slid shut before anyone could get on. She didn’t feel like being around people at the moment.

Why did he have to be so cruel? They were all each other had, and he—

Well, he probably felt justified blaming her. If she hadn’t dated Oliver, maybe he wouldn’t have picked Sara to cheat on her with. Maybe Sara wouldn’t have agreed and gotten on that boat. And maybe mom wouldn’t have left. If she were her dad, Laurel would probably blame herself, too.

It was the alcohol talking more than anything. She knew that. He just kept getting worse, especially now that he’d wrapped up the Mathis case and didn’t have work to distract him as much. Laurel wasn’t hoping for another serial killer, but there had to be something other than the drinking he could lose himself in.

She’d never been the favorite. Laurel had known that for a long time. She wasn’t the one who got souvenirs at the aquarium or pets for her birthday or special edition Rockets baseball caps. But she’d been the one they were proud of, and she’d told herself for years that that was enough.

Ever since the Queen’s Gambit had been lost at sea and Sara with it, that hadn’t been the case. Her mother had left without a phone number or an address to reach her at. Her father now found fault with every single action she took. If she went out with friends she was irresponsible; if she came to collect him at the bar she was a nag; if she wore a skirt instead of pants she was a slut, and no wonder Queen had gotten to her, used her to get to Sara.

That was the latest recrimination he’d given her tonight.

Laurel looked down at the pencil skirt she was wearing to match her blazer, the outfit she’d chosen for a mock trial showcase at her university he’d promised to come attend. She’d found him in the bar across the street after instead.

Laurel pressed the heels of her hands to her forehead, just barely choking back a sob. She was not going to have runny makeup over this, she was not.

The elevator dinged as it opened, and Laurel breathed in and out once to collect herself before striding down the hall, the picture of calm and unaffected on the outside.

It was dark in the apartment — too big for one graduate student; she’d rented it with the thought she’d be sharing it with the man she loved, and moving out or getting a roommate would be admitting that sad truth to her and everyone else — and Laurel set her briefcase down before flicking the light switch.

Nothing happened. Laurel tried again, flipping it back and forth a couple times with the same result.

Her lights weren’t working. Laurel frowned, torn between heading for the circuit breaker or her gun. It could just be a blown fuse, right?

Her hesitation cost her. Laurel took one step towards her desk and was suddenly seized from behind. Her legs kicked uselessly in the air as she was lifted off her feet, and some kind of dark cloth bag was shoved over her head.

She tried to yell out, but it was muffled. Something sharp pricked her neck before she knew no more.

#lauriver #laurel x oliver #laurel lance #oliver queen #arrow #tommy merlyn #john diggle #quentin lance #lucas hilton #sara lance #dinah lance #green arrow #black canary #blackbird #my writing

17 notes · View notes

thegoldendice · 5 years

Text

Love Is A Battlefield

Fandom - American Horror Story: 1984

Pairing - Xavier Plympton/Reader

Rating - Explicit

Warnings - Suicide, Violence, Mental Heath Issues, Sexual Content, Language, Religious Content

Chapter - 1/12

Read on - ao3, ff.net

Fic Summary - The year is 1984. You're a poor student living alone in L.A., plagued by your problematic relationships with a false friend and a disturbed ex. You meet Xavier Plympton, an aerobics instructor with a dark past, at the gym where you’ve taken a reception job. You quickly develop feelings for him, and you learn to your relief that he likes you too. Soon a deadly series of events befall you and the people in your life. Overwhelmed by tragedy and with your blossoming romance cut short, you are left a wreck. Six years later you discover that while Xavier is dead, he hasn’t quite departed. You soon realise that if you are to be with him and finally achieve true peace and happiness, you must take your own life and become a Camp Redwood ghost.

Chapter Summary - You inadvertently introduce your crush Xavier, to your frenemy Amy. You are left dejected when they appear to hit it off and plan to go on a date.

“Well that was awful. I seriously don’t understand why you dragged me along. Also, this place is a dump.”

Amy has a point. Montana’s aerobics class was a waste of time. You barely worked up a sweat while Montana was busy posing in the mirror as usual. Plus, the gym is a little shabby. You glance at Amy, the girl you’ve known since the age of five, the girl who you moved to L.A. with, the girl who everyone thinks you love like a sister. She’ll be pissed if you don’t apologise.

“I know it wasn’t great. I’m really sorry. I just feel if I work here I should try to be a little more active, you know?”

You are about to suggest grabbing coffee when the words die in your mouth. You really can’t face spending more time alone with Amy tonight. Sitting yourself down on one of the beige couches, you reach to re-tie your shoe.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

You look up, shooting a startled glance towards your friend.

“What!?” You hiss in her direction.

Blood rushes to your cheeks when you realise what Amy is looking at.

“That’s him!?” Amy’s laugh sounds sweet, innocent even, but you know that it barely conceals a cruelty that she hides just under her perfect surface. “Oh honey, you’ll never get him.”

Your eyes follow Xavier as he makes his way to the reception desk. You’re not the only one in the room watching him, with his perfect hair and those neon shorts that are ever so slightly too tight. Amy has always been able to tell when you’ve been interested in someone. She managed to wring it out of you a couple of weeks ago, demanding a description of him. You reluctantly told her, and vowed never to let them meet. You thought he was off work tonight.

Xavier stops briefly at the desk chair you usually frequent when you’re on shift, casting around for something he’s lost. You smile inwardly despite your panic, noting how predictable he is - forever forgetting where he left his keys. Montana passes him on her way out of the front door and blows him a kiss. He pretends to catch it. You shake your head slightly in an attempt to clear away the knowledge that they used to date. Your eyes find Xavier again while, to your relief, Amy saunters away to peek inside one of the occupied classrooms.

You’ve been in love with Xavier Plympton since the moment you first set eyes on him. It was a few months ago, during the first week of March, and even though you had no experience working a reception desk, the gym were happy to employ someone who wasn’t a complete airhead. Your first shift ended up being a hastily put together induction, followed by a tour from a manager you haven’t seen since. Xavier was the only staff member who bothered to ask your name. Your heart had beat a little faster when he looked at you with his striking blue eyes.

What could have gone the way of a stupid crush quickly turned into something quite different. Not only is he just so fucking beautiful, he’s also a decent person. Checking to make sure Amy is still occupied, you work up the courage to head over to reception, where Xavier has given up his search and has collapsed into your chair, absentmindedly picking his nails.

“Looking for your keys?”

“You know me.”

His smile is so disarming you are momentarily struck dumb.

“Fridge.”

You point to the mini fridge that sits under your desk, trying your best to attempt a sexy smile. Not that lost keys are sexy. To be honest, you’re the furthest thing from an expert in those matters. You cringe inside. Amy is always quick to tell you that you couldn’t seem like more of a virgin if you tried, even though you’re not one. Your mind takes you, against your will, to that one awful time with Scott in the back of his car...

“You okay?”

Xavier is looking at you expectantly. You shouldn’t have let your thoughts get away from you. You probably look like an idiot.

“Uh, yeah. I’m fine.”

You are about to say a reluctant goodbye when you feel arms wrap around your waist from behind.

“Ready to go nerd?”

Your heart sinks as Xavier’s gaze shifts from you to Amy. You’d hoped to keep her away from him. Guys just find her irresistible. According to your brother, who thinks himself worldly because he traveled Europe after high school, it’s because she comes off as sexually empowered. Whatever that means. You suspect it’s because of her long blonde hair and enviable cup size. Even the harsh gym lighting, which seems to wash out everyone else, makes her look vibrant.

Amy removes her arms and you turn, eager to leave. Before you can move away from the desk however, Amy strikes.

“And who is this? Weren’t you going to introduce me to your friend, Y/n?”

She holds out her hand to Xavier. It’s a ridiculous gesture for a girl in her early twenties, but somehow it suits her. Xavier shakes Amy's hand, smiling. You feel as though you’re invisible.

“Xavier Plympton. Hey, haven’t I seen you in my Slimmercise class?” Xavier cocks his head to one side, squinting slightly. “I’m sure I’ve met you before.”

Amy smiles at Xavier as though he’s her first scheduled meal after a period of starvation. You notice that sometime during the five minutes she left you alone, she applied shiny red lipgloss. You feel a little nauseous.

“I’ve never taken that class, but I’ve always wanted to. I love it here. How about I come along the next time you’re teaching? Maybe we can go for a drink after?”

Your heart sinks even further when you hear Xavier say,

“Sure.”

#ahs #ahs 1984 #xavier plympton #ahs xavier #fanfic #american horror story 1984 #american horror story #ao3 #xavier plympton x reader #ff.net

18 notes · View notes

tmrrwppl · 5 years

Text

Mal

“I’m Malcolm Breeds and welcome to Jackass!”

Full Name: Captain Malcolm “Mal” Sebastian Breeds, USMC

Faceclaim: Luke Mitchell

Fandom: The Walking Dead/Zombie Apocalypse

Ethnicity: American

Birthday: August 14th, 1986

Family: Mother: Deceased Father: Deceased

Birthplace: Ocala, Florida

Bio: Malcolm Breeds was born in Ocala, Florida. And from the time he was 8, he wanted to be a Marine just like his dad. Being raised in a military home, Malcolm was a respectful and disciplined kid, though he still had fun.

By the time he hit the end of his 8th grade year, his dad and him talked at length about which high school he would attend. Either the local school with a basic JROTC army program, or an almost one and a half hour drive to Apopka to be apart of the Marine Corps JROTC program there. The choice was simple for Malcolm. He wanted to learn everything he could.

That fall, he woke extra early, got dressed and ready for school and then road with his father to school, every day. His father listening to NPR and clutching a cup of coffee in one hand with the other on the wheel. Every day, an hour after school got out, or training ended, his father would be there, clutching another cup of coffee with a smile on his face.

When Malcolm got his learner’s permit at the end of his freshmen year, his father reclined in the passenger seat on the way to and from school, leaving Malcolm to learn by experience and his own basic knowledge of how to drive them safe.

He loved everything about the MCJROTC at the school, while as a whole, the school was a bit red-neck-y for his tastes. He excelled in biology and stage craft (his stress reducing elective every year) and was a core member of the drill team and the marksmanship squad.

By his junior year, he drove himself to and from school, working at Dunkin’ Donuts on the weekend and some evenings to put gas in his car for the week. While having a few friends from stage craft and MCJROTC, he didn’t much socialize outside of school or hangout, though with his own car and his father’s permission, did spend several nights hanging out in Apopka and staying the night at a friends every now and then.

By his senior year, everything was going great. He was a Cadet Lieutenant Colonel, being considered for Cadet Colonel. He was working with a recruiter for the USMC to get him signed up as soon as he graduated high school.

And then his dad passed away from prostate cancer. Malcolm didn’t understand how it had progressed so fast. He didn’t understand how his parents could hide it from him if it was that bad.

His dad’s final words to him were “Be strong, no matter what. Do what you want in your life, and do it well.”

He missed a competition for the funeral. They did okay without him, but he threw himself into training for the next, dropping stage craft to take a fully loaded course load of his final requirements to graduate and back to back MCJROTC classes (that he had to get his mother and Major to sign off on).

His recruiter, Cpt. Gregory Reynolds, was beside him every step of the way.

In the summer of 2005, he bid goodbye to high school, to Apopka, to his mother and Ocala, getting on a bus to Parris Island.

After boot camp and his School of Infantry(SOI) training, he returned home in time for his mother to be killed by a drunk driver. Two days after her funeral, Malcolm received his first orders for his Permanent Duty Station. Malcolm was to be stationed at MCRD Quantico.

After a few months of further training, he was shipped out to Afghanistan, participating in several operations there. Malcolm was in his element, every time he went out on an op, he didn’t worry if he lived or died. He just did what he could to serve his country.

He served two tours in Afghanistan, during which he was promoted to Captain, a paid position, and a leader of a good group of marines. During the last month of his second tour, while he was serving as gunman on what was supposed to be a quick security detail, his humvee struck an IED. It mangled the truck beyond recognition, killed the driver and sent a spray of shrapnel to Malcolm’s upper body, a piece scarring the right side of his face (eye only saved by his ballistic goggles) and wedged into his skull.

Recovering with one hell of a story and an adamant Colonel, he returned home and changed his status to Active Reserve when he resigned his contract. Cpt. Reynolds was there at the airport when he returned, suggesting that maybe Malcolm should take his new status and work in the Veteran Services Office at George Washington University, and get a degree in Architecture with his GI bill. A good thing for someone on active reserve to get into. To keep busy.

He dormed on campus, checked in with Quantico once a month and continued his own PT in the mornings before classes or work, helping veterans in his school with their academic careers and financial aid.

Malcolm also had an experimenting sexual relationship with a fellow marine who lived down the hall from him, coming to the conclusion that he was bisexual. Something he had never really knew about himself until he had enough downtime to test it out. He also had a non-serious relationship with a teacher’s assistant from the biology department. His life was good. And he was in a good place with the help of drinking and a really chill therapist who was assigned to him after he had accepted his PTSD emerged.

The occasional loud noise set him off in a panic, and on hot days he refused to go outside after he had a mild hallucination of being back in Afghanistan. And the nightmares of missions that had gone wrong and the what ifs of missions that could’ve gone wrong came for him some nights.

But… He was okay. He was good. He was safe and he woke up and reminded himself he was alive every day. Malcolm began to appreciate life again.

Until one morning, he turned on the news right as his cell phone started to ring off the hook.

He was being ordered to DC, because some sort of shit had gone down and people were eating other people.

It had taken him twenty minutes to pack his bags and throw them into his car, speeding to Quanitico for a briefing.

Malcolm was on security detail, armed with a rifle, a sidearm and a knife… and told to keep as many of his belongings on him as he could. Filtering through his possessions quickly, he left his computer and school books in a locker, only keeping three pairs of civvies, a leather jacket, a jean jacket, and a pair of boots in his bag. His cellphone was shoved on top at the last minute with his charger. The rest of the bag was filled with MREs. Enough to last him a few days should everything go completely FUBAR.

Patrolling the fences that had been brought up while politicians were evacuated, he got his first glimpse of one of the enemy.

And God damn, he missed Afghanistan.

The little girl’s cheek had been completely torn from her face, the jaw hanging limply by muscle as her small bloodied hands clawed at the fence.

Malcolm radio’d in immediately, describing the situation. His commanding officer replied back “Stab it in the head. Gunfire draws more of them.”

Malcolm was a good soldier. Malcolm had killed insurgents in Afghanistan to save his men. Malcolm killed that little girl with a quick underhanded jab into her eye socket, understanding that she was a threat.

Two nights later, their secured area fell.

His commanding officer shot himself, leaving a note that said “Abandon your posts and stay alive.”

As one of the highest ranking officers left, he ordered his men to follow those orders.

A year later found Malcolm living on the roof of a gas station 6 miles east of Alexandria. The men who had came with him had all went their separate ways to find their own families. Malcolm refused to leave, boarding the windows and fortifying them with the long forgotten skills from stage craft and his forgotten architecture major and built an elaborate system to get in and out of the building. He had even built himself a gunnery nest where he could see everything around him. A perfect vantage point. He spent his mornings raiding supplies from the local stores and shops, not traveling too far. His small armory (and a truck load of MREs) came from the Army’s pitiful barricade on the 495 bridge over the Potomac, abandoned except for the occasional biter.

Malcolm learned through experience that they didn’t bother you if you were covered in their guts, and he kept a spare long sleeve shirt and pants on hand for that.

There was no point to his hoarding and his defense building. It was just his military training keeping him sane. If he died, he died. But he refused to die bored in his gunnery nest. Reading, writing, doing crosswords and cooking canned goods over a gas stove were how he spent his days.

No one came for the precious gas in the pumps of his station. He shut them off after the first month.

He slept with a sock in his mouth, in case he woke up screaming.

He drank liquor to knock himself out and hope for no nightmares.

No one came except for the occasional biter.

And he let them pass.

“Be strong, no matter what. Do what you want in your life, and do it well.” Well, dad. What did you expect him to do when his only want in life was to continue surviving with no other purpose? He did it well.

When he woke one day, two years (or was it longer?) into the apocalypse, mildly hungover and pulling the sock from his mouth, he could feel something was different. Scratching at the beard he had grown used to in lieu of shaving, he peeked out of his defenses at the sound of a whistle.

Someone was at the pumps, testing them.

He was carrying a bat, wrapped in barbed wire.

Previously @fuckinsavior

Mal: [walks in] Sorry I’m late, I was doing stuff Dwight: [walks in after Mal, noticeably disheveled] HE PUSHED ME DOWN THE FUCKING STAIRS

#bio #b: Mal #why is that your best quote Mal #mal: It literally is all anyone needs to know.

3 notes · View notes

naruhearts · 5 years

Note

OKAY SO I've just spent the best part of an hour scrolling through your blog and reading a bunch of your destiel meta and I HAD to message you... I was one of the many people who STRONGLY believed destiel had a chance of being canon after season 8 (more like season gr8 am i right), but throughout the years I slowly lost all hope. However, S14 has made me 110% invested in the show again and YOUR META IS GIVING ME HOPE FOR DESTIEL, which is TERRIFYING. Your writing is wonderful and I'm STRESSED.

Got back from Washington late last night!

Oh my gosh @alovelikecas, your message really made my day and I’m SO glad you enjoy my meta xox (even when most of my meta looks like, to me, sloppy-ass writing, haha! I’ll probably make an end-season meta post after 14x20 — if I have the time — that touches upon SPN’s current and repeating themes since Season New Beginnings S12/Dabb Era, not to mention I have, like, some more unfinished meta in my drafts >.>)

Yeah I mean, I didn’t join Destiel land until Summer 2016, and before that, I was late to the Season 11 party, so I basically had no narrative context for anything, and I’ll copy-paste what I said here:

Looking back, one significant thing I recall? S11 gave me a sense of Destiel’s true narrative validity (as not a ‘fanon’ ship but organically developed in the canon) when I perceived it as a season that was ‘missing something’. Keep in mind I had no idea about Destiel yet while watching S11 at the time.

I was literally asking myself — repeatedly — why Dean/Amara seemed to contain odd narrative holes, considering A. Dean explicitly said that the non-consensual attraction he felt for Amara was NOT love and “it scares him”, B. Amara told Dean that ‘something stops you - keeps you from having it all’, C. Djinn!Amara stated that she can: ‘feel the love [Dean] feels, except it’s cloaked in shame,’ and D. Mildred’s iconic ‘You’re pining for someone’ —> which did not logically correlate with A and C, meaning: since Dean doesn’t freely love Amara and thus isn’t possibly pining for her — with female love interests as currently non-existent (I remember crossing off the dead/gone girls on a piece of paper lol) — who the hell was he pining for, then?

Originally posted by elizabethrobertajones

Obviously, without writing long-ass paragraphs of meta about it again in this post, S11 made sense as soon as I watched it within the Destiel context (especially after I read up on some grandiose pieces of Destiel meta (@charlie-minion was the very first person who inspired me to write meta; I followed her once I joined the fandom Oh my god, here we go, holy crap this subtext – I’m invested in this godforsaken ship because they’re in love with each other and I’m not getting off any time soon. The rest is history.

I’m aware that I do come off as positive (and I’m still Destiel-positive; whatever happens in 14x20 this week may or may not change that), but I hope you don’t mind if I use your lovely ask as an additional opportunity to clarify my meta standpoint: no one’s saying Destiel WILL become text.

The general Destiel meta community (all subfactions: Destiel-positive, -negative, -neutral, and in-between) is not the Most Holy Canon Word, and we aren’t SPN writers, and again, we can’t actually speak to the veracity of Destiel as guaranteed-gonna-go-textual, but we — a diverse pool of critical thinkers from all walks of life: particularly those who have some degree of experience in literary academia/English literature studies (fun fact: I was actually pursuing a Minor’s in English until I changed my mind - my first love’s Health Science/Biology, which I stuck with, but here I am doing lit-crit analysis on the side *wink*) — can speak to the veracity of Destiel as a real, palpable, and ever-substantial long-running romance narrative aka the love story between Dean and Cas IS THERE. I see it. We all see it. We didn’t pluck it out of the random ether one day. It naturally evolved across the show’s overarching narrative like some vast spiderweb, linked together by numerous character arc amalgamations of Dean Winchester and Castiel as separate individuals who were then brought together — who brought themselves together, by the sheer force of free will and choice — and are now inherent parts of the other’s story (and respective character progression).

I say this too many times to count: the entire point of writing meta? Personally, it enables me to appreciate the literary gorgeousness of Dean and Cas’ relationship as, first and foremost, a tentative alliance offset by the very moment Cas raised Dean from perdition (it’s a poetic beginning). Their alliance then inevitably proliferated into a rocky — at times, necessarily turbulent — friendship, then a deep profound bond…one that crossed platonic boundaries since S7/8 and is, ultimately, indelibly rooted in romance. Together, Dean and Cas build up each other’s strengths, complement each other’s flaws, and narratively motivate the other to self-introspect — to become the best version of themselves that they were always meant to be: self-actualized entities who let go of their painful, horrifying, psychologically/emotionally destitute pasts.

These above reasons and more are why I think Destiel belongs right up there on the shelf of Ye Olde Classics, similar to epics by John Milton, Shakespearian tragic dramas, Homeric characteristic cruxes, and the great Odyssey journey: a legendary journey, fraught with circumstance, that finally ended with Odysseus (now an enlightened man) returning to Penelope, the love of his life.

Channeling the scope of Homer’s Odyssey, Destiel is an incredible storytelling feat of obstacles, both internal and external, romance tropes, mirroring, foreshadowing, and visual cadence/emotion, enhancing SPN’s already character-driven main plot in that Dean and Cas try to make it back to one another; like Penelope, their love holds true despite everything. If Destiel were an M/F couple, we all know their love story would be absolutely undeniable to the GA.

I do understand the bitterness S14’s fostered in some viewers, though. I do understand that Dean and Cas seem distant (and yeah, it’s a noticeable difference compared to S12/S13), but I believe the Destiel subtext is still heavy and holds steady.

Right now, at this point, there remains multiple personal issues for the characters to solve, you know? Dean and Cas aren’t talking properly; their love languages stay mistranslated, although we’re persistently shown that they still understand each other on a certain level that no one else can, and the visual narrative keeps framing them as on-the-nose solid counterparts: a domestic-spousal romantic unit independent of Sam.

Originally posted by incatastrophicmind

They want to be there for the other. They need to quash the final remnants of their respective internal loathing (Dean’s self-worthiness, Cas’ self-expendability) before they’re able to give the other 100% of their time, efforts, attention, and love (as flawed and complicated but compellingly beautiful as it can possibly be). During the times Dean and Cas do try to talk shit out, extraneous issues continue to get between them.

As other friends/meta pals discussed with me, S14 is like S10 in that it’s confusing the cast/audiences. And exactly: S8, besides S11/S12/early S13, also belongs in the close-to-canon serious Destiel narrative transition! I can discuss the showrunning/writer problem of SBL (Singer + Bucklemming; @occamshipper hits the nail on the head) that tugs subtext – especially subtext linked to Destiel – back and forth, sometimes in the weirdest nonsensical ways, but I won’t go too far into it here. I agree, however, with the recent idea that Jensen does seem a bit confused as to where he should bring Dean emotionally this season (don’t get me wrong, I do NOT believe Dean is OOC; OOC is a completely different concept vs expected character behaviour). And if Dean’s consistently romance-coded past interactions with Cas are any indication, Jensen would also — in the same vein as all of us — want Dean and Cas to start getting their shit together. Long-running fictional characters like Dean and Cas, conceived over 10 years, are so well-written to the point where you, the author, can predict what they’ll do even if you just plop both of them inside a room and give them no direction, and I personally feel that nowadays Jensen is prevented from achieving Dean’s further internal growth/unsure how to act in the moment because of some dumb SBL scripts saying one thing while his character’s heart says another. Wank aside—

Season 15 should hopefully convey a much more logical subtextual perspective e.g. unbelievably amazingly cohesive Season Destiel 11 that aired after choppy S10. Not all hope is lost!! I also want to clarify that I personally LOVED Season 14 in general. It’s been mostly Emotion-centric constant, with Yockey, Berens, Perez, and Dabb usually making my top-rank SPN writer list.

Currently the narrative’s still allowing pretty significant (imho) wiggle room for the lovers to fracture apart and get back together, where their miscommunication comes to a dramatic head. We just saw Dean and Cas argue over Jack’s well-being in 14x18 and 19. Dean — besides putting Cas at the top of his You’re-Dead-to-Me-Because-You-Lied-but-I-Still-Love-You-Goddammit hitlist (for clear spousal-coded reasons) and taking Cas’ actions to heart (he’s the person he trusted the most who lied to him) — no doubt blamed himself for what happened, and Sam was, like I said, the mouthpiece of truth. TFW were all culpable. They all failed Jack in some way, shape, or form.

I’m not expecting anything for 14x20, but I’m nervous either way! Thanks for sticking with my long answer

29 notes · View notes

realityhelixcreates · 5 years

Text

Lasabrjotr Chapter 21: What Only Lives in Memory

Chapters: 21/? Fandom: Thor (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe Rating: Teen And Up Warnings: Mention of past sexual assault, Mention of past murder Relationships: Loki x Reader (Let’s try this again) Characters: Loki (Marvel), Reader, Brunnhilde(Marvel), Additional Tags: Post-Endgame: Best Possible Ending (Canon-Divergent), Here Comes Self-Reflection, Reader Had a Rough Time During the Snap, Loki Tries to Figure Himself Out Summary: Loki moves things forward, while reader reveals the past.

“Hey! Hey, you kidnapping bastard! Give me my daughter back, asshole!”

“That's about the reaction I expected, yes.” Loki said, holding on to his composure in the face of your enraged father. He was an entire ocean away, and merely a mortal man of no consequence, but there was still some intimidation involved. Loki wanted a favor from this man; information. Also, there was something...important, about not being hated by your father, specifically. “Alas, I cannot. It's isn't safe for her, I'm afraid. Her health would deteriorate once more.”

“Yeah, the spandex squad said the same thing. They said it was some kind of magic? Sounds like bullshit to me.”

“You have lived through invasions by both extraterrestrials, and robots, yet you find magic difficult to believe in?” Loki pointed out.

“Yeah, well, you can punch an alien or a robot.”

“I dare say, one can punch a sorcerer as well.”

“Oho? She's been throwing hands?”

Loki cleared his throat. “Your daughter has been...most emphatic on several points.”

Your father drew himself up with pride. “Good. You best listen. And you'd damn well better be treating her right!”

“Actually, that is why I wished to speak with you. I would like advice on how to treat her more properly. Specifically, I will be remodeling her room into a more permanent residence, and I wish to know what kind of things she likes to have in her home.”

Your father remained quiet for a few long moments.

“So she's really not coming back.” He said finally. “Damn. I know all girls eventually leave, but she just seemed happy where she was...” He sighed. “Okay, fine. If it's gotta be up to you to take care of her now, then listen up. She likes doodlin' so get her some art supplies. She likes them little fairy lights. If you're getting her decorative things, she likes birds, and seashells, and flowers. No pets. She doesn't like having little things underfoot. Get her some houseplants, but only if they have bright colors, or make flowers.”

“How about toiletries? Does she have a preference?”

“Eh, more flowery stuff. Whatever's on sale, usually, but you can do better than that, can't you? The most flowery stuff you can find. Candles or potpourri, or whatever. Uh, she likes Pokemon. Don't know how much that helps you.”

“It would help me more if I knew what that was, but I'm sure I can find out.”

“It's some video game about fantasy animals. It's easy to find. Oh, and she likes space too. Stars and constellations and stuff. Likes learnin' about what's out there.”

“Oh, I know.” Loki said, perhaps a little too confidently. Your father glared. “But not too well.” He added. “Space. It is a good subject. There is much out there.”

Silence stretched out uncomfortably.

“How is she, really?” Your father asked.

“Distressed. That is why I am doing this. A great many things have happened to her in too short a time, so I am attempting to counter them with comfort. Her illness has all but disappeared, but we must remain within a mile or so of one another, and cannot be separated for more than a few hours at that distance before she begins to deteriorate. Were you told of the assassin?”

“Yeah. I was told she wasn't badly hurt, and that you caught the bastard.”

“Correct on both counts. She suffered a cut, but it has healed completely, and he will be facing justice eventually. I may still curse him into an early grave though, no matter what his sentence ends up being. Hmm. Perhaps forget I said that.”

“Nah, no one's hearing a peep from me.” Your father fidgeted as a gray cat peeked its head into the screen. “No Momo! Get down from there. Hey look, if she's gotta stay with you from now on, there's some things you oughta know. She's got some...problems. There were some major health issues that ran in her mother's side of the family; brain tumors mostly. Took her mom and her aunt while she was still pretty young. She hadn't shown any signs of it, but two or so years ago, she had this weird episode...Started insisting that everyone was dead, and the world was ending. The doctor didn't find any evidence of tumors, but said she was acting like someone who had gone through some kind of traumatic experience. No one could figure out what happened. She was fine one day, and the next, she'd completely changed. Got way more aggressive, kinda obsessed with food, has panic attacks over some of the weirdest things. And whenever something bad happens, she goes from one hundred percent ready to fight, to meek and numb in seconds.”

“I...have observed some of those behaviors, yes.” So this was what it looked like from the outside. Someone who had survived the Snap and remembered it must seem to others as if some great change had come over them. An entire year lived like that would not leave someone the same as they had been before. It was a shame Loki could not tell him what had happened. That your father would never understand you like he did. That he didn't even truly understand you.

You were just about as alone in this world as he was, weren't you?

“So if you've got some kind of magic health care over there, just keep an eye on her brain, okay?”

“As you say. I shall keep a special watch over her mind. I appreciate you telling me this. All of this. It will be most helpful.”

“Yeah well, as long as you take good care of her, I can't complain. Still hate you though.”

Loki smiled smugly. “I would expect nothing else.”

*****

Loki spent his time between meetings searching through various storage rooms for furnishings. He'd found a very nice rug; blue and green and silver, patterned with knotwork and ravens. Bedding was a bit more difficult: you felt the cold more keenly, and needed either more, or heavier blankets. He was having trouble finding good matches, however. He didn't just want to throw things together like some kind of motley. You weren't a peasant anymore, and you should have better.

But just for now, maybe the brick red bed set didn't clash with the green and blue that much?

In the end, he was able to gather plenty of bird-themed items, mostly ravens, eagles, and swans, and no shortage of floral décor. He commissioned a space-themed mural for one of your walls, though he knew it would take several weeks to finish. There were very few seashells to be had, but he did manage to procure a small hand mirror that was shaped like a scallop.

Perhaps this would do for now?

He called for Saldis and two others to carry things back you your room, stood back and supervised while they laid things out. Fairy lights and Pokemon would have to wait until he figured out what they were, and where he could get them.

As the servants put everything into place, Loki was drawn to your desk, and the little stack of books there. Astronomy, of course. That made perfect sense. A history of Iceland. Good idea. The collected tragedies of Shakespeare. Good stories, all of them, but perhaps not the best reading material for someone of your delicate mental state. Ah, there it was. World mythology.

Brunnhilde said you had mentioned something about a mythology book that had led you to believe some mixed up things. Well, what did it say?

He picked up the book, leafing through it as the servants moved around him, hanging artworks on the blank walls, a pair of flower-themed lamps replacing the old one, rolling out the rug.

The temperature began to fall while he read the entry about himself, stone-faced, but radiating a quiet anger that everyone in the room could feel. The servants slowly came to a halt, staring at him in silent worry.

“Sire?” One of them finally asked, her voice barely above a whisper. His eyes snapped up from the book to look at them, and all three flinched back.

“You.” He said, pointing. “And you. Out.”

Both women hurried for the door, throwing apologetic looks over their shoulders at Saldis, who stood in place, bewildered and a little frightened.

“Saldis...Odasdottir, was it?”

“Yes, your Highness!” She squeaked.

“You can speak English.”

“Yes, your Highness! Fluently, Your Highness!”

“A useful skill. More importantly, can you read English? I trust you know not to lie to me.”

“No, Your Highness! No more than a few words! I have Roskva translate for me!”

“I see.” He snapped the book shut with a loud clap.”So you know nothing of the contents of this book?”

“No, Your Highness! Seidkona _____ asked for English language books, so I just brought back all that the library had! I don't know what any of them are about!”

“This one is full of slander.” Loki seethed. Saldis began backing away. “Written by our enemies to defame us, clearly. I will be confiscating it.”

Saldis began stammering apologies, but Loki held up a single finger to silence her. There were no lies in what she said. She was no saboteur.“If you did not know, you cannot be blamed. However, I would be alone for a time.”

She took the dismissal for what it was, vacating the room in an undisguised hurry. Loki could just barely hear Andsvarr asking her what was wrong, as he stalked to his room and threw the book into the fireplace. Drivel! A poison of words, pouring into your eyes, into your mind. No wonder you were so frightened!

God of Evil? Ridiculous! Evil wasn't something one could be a god of; it was a nebulous concept that changed from culture to culture, and across time. Anyone was capable of it, but none could rule it. And that nonsense with the horse... He didn't even know anyone named Angrboda! Where had all that come from?

He had been to Midgard once before New York, when he was a child, long before these concrete forests had sprung up in the place of the wooden ones. It had seemed like a very different world then, the storytellers weaving magic into their tales, spinning their words into decorative knots. He'd learned of the concepts of kennings and flyting from them...Was this what they had seen in him, or did it have some symbolic meaning, lost over the centuries? Did they see him as evil?

Or was it what had happened after? The burying of the old ways under the name of another god? Was that what had painted him in such a dark way? Or perhaps the author of the book had written it after the events in New York. Humanity had plenty of reason to consider him evil then, and a great many still did.

It didn't really matter right now. What mattered was that this had been influencing your perceptions of him, and now he had to reverse that. The room would be a very good start, a step in making this a real, permanent home for you. He would find out everything you needed, everything you wanted. He was a prince. He was a god! He could provide.

He sat down on his fluffy rug, watching the book slowly blacken and curl. It did matter. It mattered because it was part of the reason you weren't here. And he felt it now, now that you were gone, every minute making him more and more aware that you weren't there. There was a little, human shaped hole in the world, that only you fit into, and you were out of place.

When had you become important? He could no longer deny that you were. Honesty with the self was among the coping exercises he and Thor had had to adopt, once they realized that they absolutely had to be in this together. It was quite possibly one of the hardest things for him to do, to admit everything to himself, to open himself back up to all the emotion.

In the beginning, after he had been returned from death, all his walls had come down. Those had been hard times; he was nearly inconsolable, everything he had been through in such a short time was all there, up front. All the grieving he hadn't been able to do, all the anger and resentment, the self-loathing and loss of identity. Everything he'd never gotten the chance to heal from had all come down on him, all at once, and he'd thought he'd never stop crying again.

But once he had been given the chance to confront all those things, to work through them, to finally, properly mourn, when he'd put himself back together, and run dry of tears-and when Thor had done the same-that was when they had both decided to take the steps necessary to be better than they had been. For the people. For each other. And for themselves.

Communication with the self was easily just as difficult as communication with each other. Neither of them exactly had the hang of it yet, and it led them to mistakes like this. Mistakes like Loki believing that everything was just fine between you and himself because he wanted so badly to believe that it was. Tricking himself into thinking that your actions and reactions were those of a person in need of support and comfort from him, instead of a person who was afraid of him.

Five years ago, he would have seen it for exactly what it was, but he had been trying so hard to leave that version of himself in the past, where it belonged. He needed to be better now.

He needed to admit that you were important. He needed to understand why. You represented something to him; some kind of redemption. If he could take care of you, he could prove something to everyone, including himself. What was that thing? What did he need to prove? That he could be responsible?

That he was what he said he was. That he was worthy of being what he said he was. A Prince. A Ruler. A Leader. A Provider. A Man.

Not a monster.

He could give you everything. And he felt that you might even deserve it, you who had lost your mother, and then your world, and then your health, and then your autonomy. He could give you everything, and he kind of wanted to. But he had to step back now and take a different approach. It had to be for you, as much as it was for him.

He watched the book burn until it was an unrecognizable lump, thinking of ways to be better for you. Then he left his quarters in search of his brother. He had an idea that would set at least some of your fears at ease.

He passed Brunnhilde on the way, the Valkyrie carrying a sandwich on a plate. He stopped, then followed her.

“Is that for her?” He asked. “Because she hates that.”

“What? Well then what does she like?” Brunnhilde demanded. Loki listed a few things off the top of his head, and Brunnhilde headed back to the kitchen. “Guess I'll eat this one then. Heard you terrorized some of the maids.”

“I suspected one of them might be a saboteur. I was glad to find otherwise. I discovered a source of _____'s fear. That book you said she mentioned; I found it and I destroyed it. It will trouble none of us again.”

“That might not look good, you know. Might look like you're trying to destroy the evidence.”

“What evidence?” He sneered. “It was worthless. It was...do you even know what it said? It was like a parody, and it was deceiving her. I will find her other books.”

“You can't just curate her reading material you know.” Brunnhilde said, making another sandwich. “Not if you don't want to seem so controlling.”

Loki added a cup of skyr to the plate, and a spoon of redcurrant jam on top. “I'm not going to. I'm thinking of taking her into the nearest town, and visiting a bookstore. She can choose her own books, and not be stuck reading the same few over and over. I've already seen to her room, and so all that's left is to let her get some things of her own choice.”

Brunnhilde nodded. “That's better.”

“So, how are the Valkyries coming along? You mentioned a Buridag demonstration?” Loki asked, following her back out of the kitchens.

“About as well as can be expected for only having a year of training. There's a lot of work to be done, catching them all up. Lucky for us, most of them naturally gravitated towards combat lifestyles. The twins have a long way to go though.”

“Twins?”

“Valda and Velda. They're only about three hundred years old. They're having to start from scratch, but I can see the power in them. They're the real deal. They are also tiny children who can barely lift their own swords, and definitely can't wear armor. We can't have a demonstration without them, but there isn't much they can physically do. Maybe if I play up how important standard-bearing is, they won't put up a fuss.”

“One can hope.” Loki said with a smile. “Sibling rivalry can be a tough thing to navigate.”

“They get along well. Just because you and your brother had a rivalry for the storybooks, it doesn't mean everybody does. Speaking of, did Saga ever get back to you?”

“Yes. She's chosen fully sixteen texts to translate, and she will be doing each of them in seven languages. She's so happy. I was thinking of asking her to expedite the English translations, but I wonder if that isn't a little too selfish.”

“Well, technically, you're thinking of someone else, so it isn't 'selfish' exactly...” They stopped outside Brunnhilde's rooms. “Well, your Highness. You have some work to do, and I have some mouths to feed, so here is where we part.”

*****

“Dinnertime!” Brunnhilde announced, and you hopped up to receive it. Everything looked very tasty this time, and you tucked in without preamble. You'd worked pretty hard again today, not quite as hard as when you were practicing magic, but hard enough. The bath had been wonderfully relaxing on your sore muscles, but had done nothing for your appetite.

You should exercise now, eh? Surely this was a good start.

“So...” Brunnhilde said. “You're not a good liar.”

“Hrm?” You asked around a bite of sandwich.

“Whatever you told Borgljot, you've been in combat before.”

“Mrm.” You said, swallowing your bite. “Well, about that...I don't know if I would call it combat exactly...and besides, I didn't lie.”

“Oh? Oh. Because it technically didn't happen?”

“Yeah. Things went to hell during the Event, you know that. I can't imagine it was a walk in the park for you either.”

“Wasn't great. You wanna talk about it?”

You stopped eating. “I never have before.”

“You never had someone who believed you before either, did you?”

“Sure didn't.” You said quietly. “It's just, you know, everyone went a little crazy I think. You can't face a devastation like that and stay totally sane. And nobody really knew what to do. The guys were a pain in my ass, but there was this one guy specifically...his wife and kid turned to dust in his arms, and I think he just went completely insane. But quietly; no one noticed. He was always very nice to me, and normally, he wouldn't hurt a fly, but...he kinda started fixating on me.”

Everywhere you were, there he was. Being helpful. Complimentary. Said you reminded him of her.

“At first I thought it was a good thing. It kept the other guys from bugging me too much. See, out of three hundred and forty of us, only about sixty-seven made it through the Event, and only about a third of those were women. Some of those guys didn't even try to pretend that they weren't being predatory. But he kept the others away, and I appreciated it. For a while.”

Never saying anything creepy, but simply always being there, always ready to help out. You never found out how he scared the other men away.

“We had to try to keep farming in order to survive, but half the seeds had turned to dust too. We probably would have been okay, if the fields hadn't died, but we had almost nothing. Everyone was desperate. I was in charge of the potatoes. Had a good patch of them growing out in the East fields. One day, when I went out to tend to them, he followed me. Guess he just...finally hit that breaking point. Came onto me, using her name. When I told him off, he full-on attacked me.”

Mad-eyed, tearing at your clothes, sobbing and crying a dead woman's name.

“He wouldn't stop, so...”

Panic gave you the strength to knock him to the ground, desperation gave you the instinct to bring the sharp edge of your garden hoe down on his head.

“So I killed him. Chopped his head in half. I know what that looks like now.”

You didn't know when you had started trembling, but it was making your voice quiver.

“You were defending yourself.” Bunnhilde said. “It's a terrible, harsh edge of reality, and a shame that you had to see it. But you came through. Not gonna say it's okay, because it's not. But you came through.”

“It's...I think my problem is that I don't even think that's the worst part.” You said. “It's that, technically, it never happened. He's fine now. He's alive, his wife, his kids, all alive and well, and going about their lives. He's just like I remember him from before it all happened; sweet and harmless. He comes in to the bakery sometimes, after our cornbread. I'm sure he worries about me, because that's just the kind of person he is.”

“Well that's-”

“I hate him.” You interrupted. “I hate him so much. I should be glad that it all got erased. I should be glad that he's not a predator, and that I'm not a murderer. But I'm just so angry! He gets to have his family, and his sanity, and his life, and go happily about his business, and I have to remember what he did! What I did! It's horrible, isn't it? I shouldn't feel like this!”

“Honestly? I feel like it would be more wrong if you didn't.” Brunnhilde reached across the distance to take your hand. “None of this should be easy to accept. How long ago was it, that Thor crashed on this planet? Seven? That's seven years for your whole world to realize that there's more people out in the universe, get attacked by those other people, get nearly wiped out by one of those other people. Then a small percentage of you has to find out that even reality itself can be malleable. And then on top of that, you, individually, have to deal with mans inhumanity to man, and that is all a terrible burden to put on such small, human shoulders.”

“I'm going to be a seidkona.” You declared. “Just as soon as I figure out how. I'm taking this as an opportunity to leave that all behind. I never have to see that guy again. I don't have to hold on to the hatred. I don't have to project it onto other people, I can start moving forward again.”

“You don't have to push.” Brunnhilde warned. “You'll burn yourself out. Set your own pace. You don't have to do everything at once, in fact, you probably shouldn't.”

“Where should I start then?” You asked. Once you had decided something, you were always full of energy and raring to go. But maybe she was right. There was a lot to do, and if you tried to do it all at once, you'd get overwhelmed.

“What all do you have to do? What tasks and goals are on your mind?” Brunnhilde asked. “and out of those, what are the simplest or easiest?”

“Um. I've got to...I've gotta learn how to use this knife. And my magic, gotta learn that. I should learn the language. Gotta be ready for the trial, I'm pretty sure I'll have to testify. Kinda torn there, I mean, I want that guy to go straight to jail forever, but I don't wanna be in the same room with him ever again? I gotta... research seidkonas. Learn about the past ones, what they did, how they worked. I gotta...I gotta go back to my room. Make up with his Highness. I have to, but also, I want to.”

“You looked at your palm. “Gotta learn more about this thing, if there is any more to learn. Gotta...Gotta yell at Beli! He's the one that spread this whole seidkona rumor around, isn't he? Only him and Loki knew; I didn't even know! And then everybody knew except for me! That is not right!”

“Oh don't yell at old Beli.” Brunnhilde said, pointing at your food. You took the hint and began eating again. “For one thing, it's a waste of breath. So, out of those things, what is easiest? What will you start with?”

“Um. Well, you'd think going back to my room and making up with Loki would be easiest, but in reality, it's terrifying. Probably can't research if I can't read the language. The trial can't be prioritized; it'll just happen when it happens. So, looks like knife is the only choice.”

“Well, there you go. I also have a suggestion. You should have a better grasp of your surroundings. If you'd like, I'll get someone to show you around. Also, if you have hobbies, you know, something you just do for fun, then you should do that a little bit.”

“...I'd like to bake something, if that's all right? I used to do that for a living, and I really enjoyed it too.”

“I'm sure that can be arranged. Let's go do that in the morning.”

#loki x reader #loki (marvel)#brunnhilde (marvel)#valkyrie (marvel)#lasabrjotr

10 notes · View notes

stillthewordgirl · 7 years

Text

LOT/CC fic: Chances Are (Ch. 2)

What if Leonard had been stuck in the 1950s with Sara, Ray, and Kendra in season 1? And how the hell did they survive, anyway?

I was working on "Time & Tide" and got sidetracked by the whole "what if Leonard had been stop in the '50s in season 1 too?" question.

So I wrote it.

This is my Valentine to the CC/Legends fandom. Enjoy! (Five chapters planned.) Thanks to @larielromeniel for the beta. Can also be read here at AO3 and here at FF.net.

The morning, Sara thinks later, should have been far more awkward than it is.

They wake pretty much wrapped around each other, her head still tucked into his collarbone, their arms around each other, legs intertwined, his bare, hers covered with the silk of her slip, with all the very personal contact that implies. But when Sara blinks the sleep out of her eyes and peers up at him, Len's actually awake already, looking down at her, and there's actually a faint half-smile on his face—a real one, and not the usual smirk.

It's so unexpected that she blinks again, wondering if she's dreaming—it's not like he's never factored in dreams of hers, after all, although that's a fairly recent development, and their activities in those dreams been far more...interesting.

Then the smile is gone, but the steady, silent regard remains.

It does cross her mind to do something with all this personal contact—and she's pretty sure it crosses his mind too, simply judging by the shadow of speculation she sees in his eyes. But the moment passes, at least in part because of the possibility of Ray banging on their door to prove that he can, too, get up early. And after a moment or two, Len pulls away with a low murmur that Sara can't quite make out, rising and heading toward the bathroom.

They seem to have mutually decided not to talk about it. She can live with that.

For now.

But then she's alone, and there's no distraction from that realization that, yeah, they're still here, still in 1958, with no idea what happened to the Waverider, or if the others are OK, if they'll be back, how…

Sara swallows, hard, then pushes back the covers. She needs to move, or she'll keep thinking.

She's moving through martial arts forms when Len finally emerges from the bathroom, showered and dressed again in his black jeans and sweater, which fortunately are nondescript enough not to stand out as being out of time. From the corner of her eye, Sara sees him pause abruptly, his eyes drifting over her slip-clad body appreciatively before he clears his throat and moves toward the small desk in the room, picking up a pen from its surface.

Sara grins and, grabbing her own clothing, heads for the bathroom.

By the time she emerges, decently clad again and pinning up her damp hair, he's frowning at a list written on the pad of paper that'd been there. She perches on the edge of the bed, watching, enjoying the chance to study him while his attention is elsewhere.

"You and Ray are going to need to stop at a barbershop or get some shaving supplies, or you're going to start looking pretty scruffy soon," she says, finally. "Not that the scruff doesn't have its appeal, but it's not common right now. And as you've said, we want to stand out less, not more."

She gets a sigh of acknowledgement, and he picks up the chair and turns it around, sitting down to watch her in return, slouching, right ankle hooked over his left knee, as incapable of sitting in a normal fashion as he ever was on the ship.

Typical Snart. Sara represses a smile.

"Yeah," he agrees, a hint of reluctance in his tone. "We need some changes of clothing, too, and I need something more suited to the era." A glance away, a glance back. "I hate to ask, but you think you and Kendra can handle that? For all four of us?"

Sara snorts. "What, send the women to deal with clothing-type things? How stereotypically '50s of you." But she waves down his protest. "Kidding. Of course. And don't worry, I'll stick with black for you." She smiles a little at his snort. "And what will you and Ray be doing?"

"We're a few hours now from Opal City. I want to stop there and you two can hit up the department stores while Raymond and I get shaves." He gives her a hooded look. "Since we're not staying there, I think maybe I can even let him try to chat some people up in typical Raymond fashion, see what the tenor of the area is. I have…a destination in mind, but fallbacks are always good. And…and I need to find someplace to keep picking up some more money."

Sara nods in understanding. "One of these days, I want you to teach me that."

Len leans back in his chair. "Picking pockets?" he drawls. "Probably child's play for a member of the League of Assassins."

"Former member." She tilts her head and matches his posture. "And, yeah, I can knife someone between the ribs in a crowd and be out of sight before they even realize they've been touched, but it's not quite the same."

"Truth." He regards her. "And what do I get in return for the benefit of my…experience and finesse?"

The suggestive banter and the low purr of his voice are comfortably familiar, but given how they'd woken up this morning, the innuendo seems a lot more…immediate than before. Sara considers, briefly, how she wants to play this, then decides impishly to give as good as she gets. If nothing else, it's a wonderful and much-needed distraction.

"Ooh, I don't know," she drawls in response, smirking at him, smoothly slipping a knife out of her sleeve and turning it…one might almost say, fondling it…between her fingers. "I do have talents of my own."

Leonard's smirk grows. "Of that, I have no doubt. You're proposing an…exchange of talents?"

"Hmmm." Sara eyes him, then flips the knife around, balancing it on one fingertip, pleased she still has the callouses that allow her to do that. "I don't know. You'd have to convince me you actually have some…skill…to offer."

He looks almost insulted. "You're doubting my skills?"

She thinks that maybe they've both forgotten what's innuendo and what isn't. "I don't know, you haven't really bothered to demonstrate any of them for me yet."

Even as she says it, she wonders if she's stepped over the line, the one they hadn't even been aware of in the beginning, when they were just assassin and crook and hadn't yet saved each other's lives, nearby frozen to death together, played cards to get through the long days and now held each other to get through a long night.

But they have, now. They have, and she's not even sure where the line is anymore, or if she still wants it to exist. What happened with Lindsay…it'd woken something she'd thought was dead, gone in the pit, a stirring, a...spark.

She sees Len's eyes flicker, just a tiny bit. But he responds smoothly enough. "Are you saying you want me to arrange a demonstration?" He tilts his head toward her, but glances away, a certain tell, Sara knows, that he's entirely aware of the deeper undercurrents here, beyond mere innuendo. "Because I don't go where I'm not…wanted…"

"And here I thought you made a career out of it." She keeps her tone light. A stepping stone out of those deeper currents, if he wants it.

She doesn't find out if he takes it, though. Because at that moment, someone decides to pound on the door.

Their eyes meet in complete agreement and resignation and then Len rises, crossing to the door and throwing it open just in time for Ray's fist to very nearly collide with his nose. Sara, watching, snickers at the horrified expression on Ray's face and the very resigned one on Len's, and nods to Kendra as she peers around both of them.

Time to move on.

There's a candy vending machine in one of the hotel corridors, and coffee and take-out cups in the office. Raymond absconds with four of them, chattering up a storm and evading the manager's curious eyes, and they pool enough change to get four Hershey bars before heading back out onto the road.

It's not a good breakfast, Leonard thinks morosely as he sips his black—ugh—coffee, but it's something. He glances to the side, sighing silently when he sees the Boy Scout sitting there and not Sara, who'd ceded shotgun for the morning. He flicks his eyes up, just for a second, and sees her watching him in the rearview mirror, gaze unreadable.

There's trace of chocolate in the corner of her mouth and, as he watches, sitting there at a stoplight, she reaches up to rub it off with a thumb. Len, though, startled by his sudden image of kissing it off, jerks his gaze back down to the road.

Of all his problems right now, this is not the one he needs to obsess with. If it's even a problem. He drums his fingers on the steering wheel, frowning, then drives on as the light turns green.

It's been a long, long time since he's accepted touch, platonic or otherwise, as a comfort. But that's what it'd been, mutually, last night. Sara had been his touchstone in the night, a reminder that he wasn't stuck here alone, and he's pretty sure he'd been hers. It's unbelievable, but there it is. It would have been easy, very easy and very complicated, all at the same time, to let that physical comfort move on to something more intimate.

And they both know it.

"So, where are we going?" Raymond's voice is an awkward mix of tentative and assertive, and he reddens at the level look Leonard gives him. Still, he holds his ground, and Len acknowledges that the man has a right to know. So far, he's been dragging them along in his wake, and everyone's been shell shocked enough to let him, for the most part. But that won't last.

"For the moment," he allows, keeping his eyes on the road, "we're heading toward Opal City. Here's the plan."

He details what he's already told Sara, glossing over the fact that he also plans to find a business district and relieve a few stuffed shirts of their wallets. While he has no intention of admitting it to Raymond, no one in this car is a fool. They can figure it out.

There are murmurs of agreement at the idea of getting some supplies, especially clothing, and Raymond rubs at his jawline as if surprised to find a few days growth of stubble there. After the breakfast of candy and caffeine, an actual meal, if they can find a relatively…open-minded…establishment, sounds pretty good too.

"And…longer term?" Kendra asks tentatively, glancing at Raymond. "I mean, we can't just keep driving from city to city, and living on whatever you…find. When the ship comes back…"

But her voice trails off, and Len would be stunned if everyone in the car isn't thinking the same word.

If.

"When we stop tonight, we need a head-to-head. All four of us." He looks up again and meets Kendra's eyes in the mirror. "Trust me that far? I know it goes against the grain, but…"

"You haven't led us wrong yet." Sara's tone dares anyone to disagree with her, and he's surprised by how it warms him. "You were right that we had to get away from Harmony Falls. Kendra's also right we need to…figure out something more long term, but you said you have a plan. I want to hear it."

Leonard's surprised when Kendra actually reaches out and touches his shoulder, a brief tap that somehow manages to suggest support. He can hear the smile in her voice as she speaks; whether it's at Sara's immediate defense of him or something else, he's not sure.

"I'm OK with that," she says. "Ray?"

"Me too." The inventor nods, but glances around at all of them, looking stubborn. "But if you're the survivor, well, I'm the scientist. And I have thoughts about the ship. About signaling it. I'm not giving up. None of us should."

"Good."

Leonard's answer apparently startles him. Raymond blinks, then glances around again, nodding as no one argues. "Good? OK. Well, um…should we start a shopping list?"

"So, did you sleep with Snart?"

Sara had been expecting some sort of question on that front, but she'll admit, Kendra's directness startles her a little. Still, she thinks she manages not to show that reaction, settling for a raised eyebrow as she continues to inspect the menswear section, contemplating what the guys will need for at least the near future.

"Yes," she says, a touch dismissively, reaching out to touch the sleeve of a fine white dress shirt. Someone's going to have to do some ironing here, and it's not going to be her. "As in, sleep. We were both exhausted and we're grown-ups. What's with the voyeur thing all of a sudden?"

The other woman ignores the question, but shakes her head, a small smile touching her lips. They'd both been a little concerned that they'd stand out—Kendra for the color of her skin, Sara because, as Kendra points out, she pretty much always moves like she's looking for a fight. But for whatever reason, they haven't really attracted a second glance, and they've both relaxed a little as that became clear. It's good to be out of the car.

"Mmhm. You are adults," Kendra points out quietly, joined her in looking at an array of sweaters. "And you flirt constantly on…on the Waverider." She stops a moment at the reminder of the missing ship, then shakes her head and continues. "I guess I just wondered if it was going to be a thing."

"Why would it be?" Sara regrets the question immediately. She really doesn't want to drag this conversation out, she tells herself. Even as she's wondering what Kendra thinks she's seen. "Damn, some of these things are ugly," she murmurs, eyeing the sports shirts nearby. "I think we need to get that bright red-and-orange plaid one for Ray. Just because."

Kendra chuckles, but she's not distracted. "I was there, in that hallway, remember?" she says in a low tone. " 'Time to choose a side, I guess'? He chose you."

Sara frowns at her. "He chose the team. And the ship."

Her friend just gives her a look. "Right," she says, a touch drily. "Which is why he gave you this really long and intense look right before he did it. And why he picked himself up off the floor later during the fight and went staggering down the hall when he realized you'd gone after Mick."

"He was probably just worried about Mick." But that's still not a comfortable topic, and she knows it. "Gossip, really? That's not like you." Sara gives her an arch look. "We're going to have to get back to training if you have this much time on your hands here." Then she sighs, turning back toward the women's section. "If we can find something decent to wear. Dresses are fine sometimes but I really want some pants."

Kendra shakes her head, but apparently lets it go. For now. "We need some pajamas too," she says, lowering her voice impishly. "Unless you're sleeping naked…"

"Kendra…"

They all manage to meet on time at their rendezvous point, a diner Kendra had been able to identify as a relatively safe place for a meal even for their mixed group. The women are carrying shopping bags; the men are clean shaven, and each group breathes a visible sigh of relief at seeing the other.

Len pays for their food with someone else's money and Ray huffs a little, but he also didn't resist ordering a steak dinner and apple pie for dessert. Sara, pushing the last little bit of her coconut cream pie around the plate with her fork, smiles a little as they squabble quietly about whether to get a hotel somewhere in the city (Ray's vote, so he can explore the city) or head for the outskirts, where rooms might be cheaper.

"You two lovebirds can get your own room again if we do the latter," Len says finally, with the air of a man playing a trump card, and Sara very carefully doesn't look at Kendra. But she's pretty sure the other woman is smirking at her.

But, "I'm voting for that" is all her friend says. "Tip the waitress really well, Snart. That other table's giving her a really hard time."

The neat little motel just outside the city limits is indeed far cheaper than the downtown, just as Leonard had expected. He could've grumbled about millionaire inventors and how they don't realize how much things cost, but he holds his tongue, watching as Raymond (white and male and likely to be deemed the most honest looking of all of them, after all) heads for the office.

Kendra decides to stretch her legs again, leaving him and Sara alone in the car. Len glances in the mirror, but Sara has her eyes closed, her head resting back against the seat, and he hesitates, looking back out the window and second-guessing his impulse to offer Raymond and Kendra their own room again. He might want Sara's company again tonight, but he's not sure what she's thinking, and he's not sure what they're still dancing around, or how he feels about that…

But she, apparently, has been reading his mind. Again.

"You OK bunking together again, then?" Her voice from the back seat is soft, but matter of fact, and he glances over his shoulder, seeing her eyes now open, watching him.

"Fine. You?"

"Yep." She smiles at him briefly, something complicated in the expression, and he's still trying to decipher that when she stretches and opens the door to the backseat.

"Here comes Ray. I'm going to help Kendra carry the bags into their room," she announces. "I'm not sure which bags have her stuff and which have mine. See you in there for our little team meeting?"

Len nods, opening his own car door to check the keyring Raymond chucks at him and grabbing the bag with the clothing and assorted accoutrements they'd picked out for him. He opens the door to the room, flicks on the light switch…and snorts, unable to conceal his amusement.

"I'm starting to think this is the Boy Scout's idea of a practical joke," he mutters, shaking his head, dropping the bag and turning away from the king bed. "Or Bird Girl's."

If it was, neither reacts as he lets himself in to their room. Sara nods to him from where she's sitting cross-legged on the bed with Kendra, while Raymond's taken the armchair, from which he seems to be telling them about his experience at the barber shop. Len himself grabs the desk chair, turning it around and planting himself in the seat, leaning forward against the back.

Raymond stops talking as he does so, sitting up alertly, and the ladies glance at each other, then at Len.

He remains silent, though, and finally Raymond speaks up, looking at Kendra as he does so.

"I...we...trust you," he says, glancing at Len and then back at Kendra. "But we need to know where we're going, what this plan of yours is. If only to have something to work toward, you know?"

Len considers him long enough to make the inventor fidget, then shrugs.

"That's fair," he acknowledges. "Long term? OK, then." He looks at Sara, letting her steady gaze remind him of why he's doing this. "I know we all still hope the ship's gonna come back. But we need to prepare for it if it doesn't. To get work that's more than temporary, we need ID. Driver's licenses, birth certificates." He nods as Raymond makes a noise of understanding. "Licenses are only just starting to have photos on them, we can get away without them. We just need a good forger."

"So, how do we do that?" Kendra asks.

"I get into a bigger city, I can find someone. There's always someone." He knows his tone is cynical but, well, it's the truth. "We just need money. Hence the 'illicit activities' you're so scornful of. And I'm going to have to make a big score soon to do that."

I'm.

He's setting himself alone on that. Sara frowns at Leonard, knowing he sees the expression by the way his eyes flick to her and away. But Ray's still hung up on the 'illicit activities' part of things, and frowns at the other man, his expression slightly mutinous.

"Can't we, I don't know, take odd jobs or something?" he asks stubbornly. "I don't like stealing."

She can see Len visibly gathering his patience, but she's impressed when he restrains himself from the level of snark he'd no doubt like to use.

"One, that'll take forever," he informs Ray. "We don't have forever. Anything we scrape together, we'll be spending along the way on food and housing. Begin as you mean to go on, Raymond. The longer we scrape for survival, the more we'll look like we're...the sort of people who scrape for survival." A fleeting frown. "Trust me."

There's almost certainly a story there, but Sara merely nods in support, as does Kendra. Ray himself looks like he can't argue the truth of the words, but he'd certainly like to. Len heads him off at the pass by pointing at him.

"And," he says, "you have the best chance of getting the kind of work that has potential here, for the kind of place we could set up shop in. You want people to take you as white collar. Don't go down another road."

His voice is terse and Sara decides to give him a moment, even as Ray starts to ask. She speaks up, glancing at Kendra and finding understanding there.

"Kendra and I could find work," she volunteers tentatively. "We've both done the customer service thing. They might be a little less...stringent...than something more professional."

Len gives her one of his half-smiles, like he knows exactly why she'd spoken, but he also looks...reluctant. He shrugs after a moment.

"Yes," he drawls, fixing her with a direct look, "but you've never done it in the '50s. You'd be fine...until someone slaps your ass and finds himself trying to breathe around a knife."

Sara takes a breath, a little stung, but he pursues the comment, staring at her, eyes intense and direct.

"It's not you anymore, but...you got the bloodlust under control?" he says quietly. "Fully? Do you want to bet on it?"

She frowns and looks away, and he turns the look on Kendra, who's chewing her lip.

"And if some stuffed shirt gets a hawked-out Egyptian demigoddess in his face, it might be even worse," he says. "Savage will hear. Somehow, he'll hear. And we can't take him. Not yet."

For a long moment, all four of them are quiet. Sara doesn't know about the others, but she is, again, feeling the walls of their situation closing in around her, desperation rising like a tide. She can't stay here, she thinks wildly, can't stay in this stifling, close-minded world where she can't dare speak her mind or exercise any of her skills. Ray will be OK, and Kendra will manage: she's got a lot of history under her belt. But...

She hears Leonard clear his throat, and glances over at him.

His gaze is steady, fixed on hers. There's no judgment in it, and really no hidden message, not this time. But it grounds her, oddly, reminds her that there's someone here who gets her. It's not the first time she's thought that. It's not even the first time he's been a lifeline of sorts. ("Sara, don't do it...") But it's the first time they've been in quite this sort of situation, with so few safety nets. (No safety nets, really.)

She takes a steadying breath and nods.

After another minute, Len reaches into his back pocket and takes out a folded map, which he tosses onto the bed. After a moment, Ray reaches for it, and Kendra leans over to look.

Sara keeps looking at Len. He returns the look, then turns his attention to the map.

"This is where I think we should wind up," he says quietly. "Nickel City. University town. Northern university town. Quite liberal for the time, cheap housing, and work for someone with...advanced ideas about the sciences. The university's trying to make a name for itself that way."

He pins Ray with a look. The other man looks pleased for a moment, then concerned.

"I don't have any references, though," he says. "They'll want..."

"We fake it." Len cuts him off. "You baffle 'em with science-y bullshit; you're good at that. Get in the door. Take it from there."

Ray visibly tries to decide if he's been complimented or insulted. Kendra smiles at him, then looks at Leonard.

"And me?" she says folding her arms. "Since you've got this all figured out?"

There's a little asperity in her voice, but there's amusement too. Sara, watching, recalls that Kendra and Leonard haven't really interacted much. There's a…basic practicality, she supposes…to both of them that's not dissimilar, despite many differences

"There's a better chance than the usual of something that's not too…" He stops, considers. "…of opportunities that might not exist other places. Now, I'm pretty sure the concept of a 'barista'…" Smirk." "…doesn't even exist yet, but you should be able to find something, say, as a cook. If you don't want to play Susie Homemaker, anyway."

Kendra rolls her eyes at that, but Ray glances away and flushes, presumably at the notion that he and Kendra will continue to play married, then looks back.

"And you?" he shoots back. "What are you going to do?" He darts a glance at her. "And Sara?"

Sara starts to retort, but Len beats her to it. "Gonna have to work on that," he says, and there's an air of something off in his tone. Weariness? Sara eyes him as he considers his words again.

"Our skill set is a little…unique," he adds finally, glancing at her with a smirk as if the weariness had never been there. "And, no, Raymond, before you can ask, I'm not planning on picking up my former profession full time. For it to be effective at all, I'd have to devote more time than I'm hoping we'll have to it—and move around a lot more, which also goes against the end goal here." He sits back. "But I can only speak for until we get back home."

"Here's hoping," Sara murmurs, trying to keep her own pessimism from her voice. Kendra gives her a look, but Ray and Len continue their stare down.

"You certainly seem to be settling in for the long haul," Ray says after a moment. "Don't want to face what you did? To Mick?"

It's unexpected enough that Sara blinks at him a moment before standing up, ready to let him have it, verbally, anyway. They'd been no anger in Ray's voice, though, and no accusation, just what might even be a sincere query. Maybe that's why Len doesn't so much as flinch, just stares at him with opaque eyes.

"I did what I had to do, Raymond," he says, quietly. "Just like I'm doing here. Survivor."

There's that word again. There's got to be a story there.

Ray sighs. "Do you really think I'm that much of a fool?" he says with a little bitterness in his tone, staring at the older man. "Really?"

Sara almost expects Len to go for the easy score there, but no. He regards the other man for a long moment, then shakes his head.

"No, Raymond," he says, his tone tired. "I think you're an idealist. And while there might be good things about that..." He points at the inventor as Ray starts to open his mouth. "...though I'm never going to admit that out loud again, it's not always practical. And we have to be practical, right now, or our odds of surviving this relatively sane and in one piece dip dramatically."

And there's really nothing Ray nor anyone else can say to that.

"I'm sorry."

Sara glances up from where she's sorting through the clothing purchases, looking for the pajamas she'd bought. Len had gone for a walk after their little meeting, and she knew him well enough to let him go. If he wanted company or commiseration, he knew where to find her. "Why?"

He's taking off his boots just inside the door, not looking at her, and pretends (she's pretty sure it's pretending) that he doesn't hear her question. Sara thinks back, then sighs, putting down the neatly wrapped package and turning to him.

"What? About the bloodlust comment?" She shrugs. "It's true. I think I'd be OK...but I can't swear to it. And that would really mess things up."

He finally glances up at her and nods. Sara continues to watch him, wondering if she's going to get diffident, cold, snarky Snart back instead of the thoughtful, focused Len of the past few days. Both have their pluses, but she kind of likes the latter.

And she can't imagine the former being willing to hold her again tonight, and she sort of needs that.

If they're going to talk about Mick, she decides, now is not the time.

"You were easier on Ray than usual," she says instead. "Thanks for that. He's a good man, he's just..."

Leonard smirks, and "a Boy Scout," they both finish in unison.

"He's a pain in the ass," Len mutters, but his heart doesn't seem to be in the insult. "And a little too…" He thinks a moment. "…convinced that if he gives people that goofy grin, they'll do whatever he wants. Not that it doesn't seem to work out for him, but Raymond Palmer vs. all the institutionalized racism and sexism of the 1950s still isn't a bet I'd take."

He sits down on the bed next to her. "He thinks he can change the world. Sometimes the world doesn't change."

Yes, definitely the thoughtful version.

"I know" is all Sara says for the moment, then hands him the bag. "Here. Clothes. Make sure they fit. I tried to meet any observed…" She gives him a once-over, then lifts her eyebrows at him, trying to get a smile. "…sartorial preferences."

A momentary twitch of his lips as he takes the bag and gets to his feet is all she gets, but she'll take it. "Thanks."

"Got you some pajamas, too," she notes as he turns toward the bathroom. "They look like something out of a '50s sitcom, but they should be more comfortable." Than either all his layers or, for him, going without.

There's another flash of gratitude, and then he vanishes.

He's in there long enough that Sara simply shrugs and strips after a few minutes, putting on the loose silk pajamas she'd found for herself. A pale violet, they cover pretty much everything—far more than the slip of last night, actually—and were the closest thing she could find to work out in, at least at that store. After a moment, she tries out a spinning kick, smiling to herself when the material doesn't rip or pull too much. She can get Kendra training again, restore a little bit of normalcy, and maybe even convince Leonard to spar…

A movement from the corner of her eye catches her attention, and she drops her stance, turning. Len's standing there, watching her, arms folded and the usual watching-Sara smirk on his face. He's wearing the pajama pants…but the gray T-shirt she'd only seen in the very dim light last night, his forearms bare.

It's the most skin she's ever seen from him, at least in the light. Another measure of trust.

"Nice" is all he says.

Sara rolls her eyes at him, glad she'd managed to keep from reacting to his relative undress. "Some people this time don't seem to think women should be able to move," she informs him. "Or sweat. But these will do for now."

"Indeed."

Sara shakes her head, unable to keep back a smile. With a laugh, she drops back onto the bed, stretching her arms out over her head. It's late, really. She's a little tired, but not exhausted like the day before, and she hopes that she can sleep all right. And that the nightmares stay away this time.

"Jax and I told Stein, back in Harmony Falls, that the 1950s were only these...halcyon days of yore...if you were white, and male, and straight," she says with a sigh, staring at the ceiling.

After a moment, the light flickers off, and she feels Leonard drop onto the bed next to her, also stretching out, feels his eyes on her. She turns her head so she can see him, and smiles a little again as he studies her.

"Well, I suppose one out of three for each of us isn't too bad," he drawls.

She considers that, then tilts her head to consider him. He meets her gaze with a steady one of his own. Jax, when telling her about his escapade with Len and Mick in 1972, had showed her the newspaper clipping about Lewis Snart, complete with photo.

"Your mom?" she asks finally.

The edge of his mouth tilts up a little. "Yeah. She was...well, they called it mixed, back then. I suppose in these days that makes me nearly just as much a travesty by the standards of the time." He looks up at the ceiling. "She'd be 7, somewhere out there right now. Can't help thinking about it."

"Hmm." Sara hesitates. He's obviously feeling forthcoming, but she's not sure how far she can go with that. "What…happened to her? I know you pretty much raised your sister." He'd glossed over that during one of their card games, when the topic had wandered toward siblings, and regrets.

His expression darkens, a little, but he just sighs. "I have no idea. She was…just gone one day. Lewis said she left."

"Did you ever ask Gideon?"

A long pause. "No."

Sara wants to ask why. She doesn't. Instead, she just turns onto her side, moving toward him a little, reaching out to touch his nearest hand. And, after a moment, his fingers curl about hers.

Sara holds her breath, feeling like she's trying to tame some strange, skittish animal. A wild crook, she thinks, a touch hysterically. Well, it's been a few pretty weird days.

"Because if she cared so little about us—Lisa was only a baby—that she ran away and left us with Lewis, well, I don't want to know about it," Leonard said finally, quietly. "I have a few good memories of her. Just as well to let those lie. And if... if what I've always suspected is true and Lewis 'had an accident'…" His fingers twitch, and Sara tightens her grip an infinitesimal amount.

She doesn't ask the obvious question here, either. And after a pause, Leonard speaks again.

"Killed him once," he tells her. "I can't kill him again. So there doesn't seem to be much purpose in knowing."

He's not sure why he'd told Sara that, really.

The only one who knows is Mick, and even Mick doesn't know his inner thoughts on the matter. It's just not the sort of thing they talk about. Lisa just knows she'd left. If she's put together any suspicions—and she probably has—well, they don't need to share them.

He can hear Sara next to him, breathing in the darkened room. She doesn't need to say anything. He knows she gets it.

That's probably why he'd told her, actually.

After a moment, she tugs on his hand. Just a small tug, really. The same sort he'd given her the night before, an undemanding invitation to cross the space between them, to share warmth and comfort in the middle of all this uncertainty, this time that's absurdly decades before either of them were ever born.

Hell, Sara's parents probably aren't even born yet, he thinks—then decides he's not going to dwell on that one.

Instead, he accepts. He moves closer, and she moves into his arms with another sigh, resting her head against his chest and wrapping her arms around his torso.

Close. Too close? Leonard closes his eyes and reminds himself to breathe. This is safe, this is Sara. This is…OK.

He's not sure how long they lie there like that before he starts to drift off, but he's heading there when Sara speaks again.

"You didn't kill Mick," she says quietly, lips moving against his shirt. Not a question. Just as if…she wants him to know she knows.

But after a moment, he answers anyway.

"No," he tells her, staring into the darkness and thinking about one more reason he desperately needs to get back to the Waverider. "I didn't."

#chances are #captain canary #leonard snart #sara lance #legends of tomorrow

18 notes · View notes