#last night is also when i received the best comms in my entire life

[ribbonpinky-art]

barely keeping it together

[hansoulo]

whisper scarcely breathing

part four of “Pillar of Salt”

Pairing: Boba Fett/Princess!Reader (she/her pronouns, no Y/N)

Warnings: NC-17, NSFW, explicit language, mentions of canon-typical violence, fluff, hurt/comfort but without the hurt, bathing and/or being bathed, choking, female-receiving oral, loss of virginity, unprotected M/F intercourse

Word Count: 6.1k

Image Credit: (x) by @/365filmsbyauroranocte, not meant to be a representation of the reader

A/N: this one is for the boys with the boomin’ system 😩💦

༓ series masterlist ༓

The datapad that you’d left in the garden was thrust back into your possession one morning by the hurried hands of a maid. Truthfully, you had forgotten all about it. The mind, when faced with matters as pressing as the press of a mouth, tends to forget about inconsequential objects.

You’d never met the girl standing in front of you before, and she avoided your eyes while passing over the small screen. She seemed eager to be rid of it. You couldn’t say you blamed her. “‘S yours, miss. The bounty hunter said you’d lost it.”

Did he, now?

“Thank you,” you replied sincerely, careful not to let the datapad drop to the floor as you tucked it back into the deep brocade of your gown pockets. You didn’t have the wherewithal at first to ask her when he’d found it or found the time to return it. But you also didn’t have the common sense to keep your mouth shut. “Could I ask when he gave it to you?”

The servant ducked her head. “This morning, your Highness. I- I was in the loading bay when they left, think he was tryin’ to get a hold of you but didn’t have the time, told me- told me to keep quiet ‘bout it.” A bob of her throat signalled a nervous swallow. “Princess.”

Poor girl, you thought to yourself absentmindedly. Boba probably scared her half out of her wits.

“Really, I can’t thank you enough.” You touched a soft hand to the servant’s shoulder in an misguided attempt to soothe. She returned the action with a nervous smile, eyes still downcast and trying not to shy away.

You never realized how afraid they all were. Of you.

The realization made your tongue tangle in your throat, tripping over some lie about a fever and champagne-induced amnesia as explanation for your exchanges with a man so ill-acquainted.

Hopefully, the maid didn’t make a habit of gossip.

Hopefully, you stopped making a habit of Boba Fett.

⫸———————————————— ⫷

A chaincode, a datapad tracking number, and the rest of your life flashed in backlit neon. You silently cursed yourself for not putting an opening passcode on anything, including the datapad that you now held with slightly tremoring hands.

In your defense, it’s not like it held anything of interest. Mostly just holonovels and some pictures of things you found intriguing enough to want to paint or draw.

But now there was a thing of veritable interest stuffed into a new folder titled “Your Highness” and glowing in galactic basic.

BF-18378-3263827

You stared at the numbers until they morphed into a strong, stern-featured face, muddy in your imagination against the ink night invading your bedroom. Boba left his tracking number there for you. If you wanted to, you could use them to message him or comm him or leave a holoprojection message. Whenever you wanted. Right now, even.

When did he even find your datapad? Why he found it (and why he returned it with the aforementioned numerical contraband) was probably a more apt question.

There was quite a lot to think about. Best to take stock of the present moment, lest you lose your head and go completely mad. As if you hadn’t already.

The facts repeated themselves in a half-conscious mantra, screen slipping out of your hands and onto the pillow beside your head. Facts. Facts were good. What were the facts, again?

Boba Fett was arguably the most dangerous bounty hunter in the galaxy.

Boba Fett was not much of a talker.

Boba Fett was a piss-poor dancer.

And Boba Fett was an unfairly good kisser.

The beginning three points held little negative sway, with the first adding much more appeal than it should, the second a welcome relief, and the third being… sort of endearing.

It was on the last point that your mind lingered the longest.

You didn’t even realize you’d copied numbers into the screen’s communications system until its microphone crackled to life.

One breath, two breaths, stuck in your sleep-thick throat. No words from either side yet. Did you get the tracking code wrong? Maybe. Maybe.

Maybe you were dreaming already, imagining the wind outside to be the quiet, husky inhale that sounded from the other end of the receiver.

“Not falling asleep are we, princess?”

Your eyes shot open. “No. No, I’m…” the words croaked themselves out as you fought down a yawn, “I’m awake.” His low chuckle. “I called you didn’t I?”

“That you did,” Boba assented. Quiet amusement colored his accent. “And you called because…”

“I wanted to,” you said simply, without room for teasing. You were too sleepy to be ashamed of admitting you sought out his company, as foolish as doing so was. No use in hiding what both parties knew to be true.

He let out a noise of soft approval and it rumbled a pleasant sunburst between your ears. “You seem to want a lot of things, don’t you?”

Makes me want… want…

Want what, Princess?

Want you.

You can have me.

The memory snaked a fever flush down your neck, over the still-tender skin and lightly mottled marks. Boba was remembering it just as well as you were. You knew he was.

It gave you a rush, a weird sort of power trip. Because as stupid as you felt doing this, wanting this, he wanted it too. Enough to let your hands thread through his hair and around his arms, then to the scar above his left brow and across his mouth. Enough to let you do it again at the risk of being caught. Enough to leave you his tracking number, like you were two teenagers trading love letters and not legal adults with judgement better enough to do otherwise.

You stayed on the comm for two hours, and only went to sleep because Boba threatened to cut your link off if you didn’t.

⫸———————————————— ⫷

It had been almost five standard months since the first time you’d spoken. Typed words continued to be exchanged under your covers, day after day, night after night. Sometimes you’d fall asleep talking, peppering him with questions about his ship and his job until your throat ached with the effort of keeping yourself awake. Sometimes you did more than talk.

He never fell asleep. Never seemed to sleep, period.

What a strange man. Strange, dangerous, interesting man.

You often missed each other by a hair’s breadth. Courtly flurry and galactic bounty hunting didn’t make much space for private conversation. Boba was still taciturn. You were still naive.

And yet…

You liked him. He listened when you talked about botany and painting, neither of which you imagined interested him. He was arrogant and cocky and insufferable sometimes, but he listened. He told you about his job and regaled your sheltered curiosity with lurid, gory details. He told you about his father.

And one day he somehow, miraculously, had a set of Nabooan watercolors left for you in the garden.

Biting down a juvenile grin with every new message, you watched the quiet ping! of the datapad.

hi

Hello

are you busy?

In a way

how so

Had a brush with Hutt’s rancor

poor thing

Don’t get soft on me now

wasn’t talking about you

Very funny

I’m very, very sorry

Should be. The bastard nearly tore up my flight suit

… show me?

⫸———————————————— ⫷

BF-18378-3263827 HAS ATTACHED 3 FILES

⫸———————————————— ⫷

HOLOCALL DURATION: 02:45:35 HOURS

SAVE CALL RECORDING? PRESS YES/NO TO CONFIRM

Your damp hands tremored.

YES

⫸———————————————— ⫷

Six months, four days, and 20 hours. That’s how long it took for you to see Boba Fett again.

You’d started to think the entire ordeal was a mirage, an illusionary experience your brain conjured up for you as a one-time brush with what your life could have been. Who it could’ve been with.

But you did see him again. Foolhardy, reckless, and unplanned.

You didn’t listen to his explanation about having to leave in the morning, taking some third-rate bounty as an excuse to come back to Quas Killam for the first time in what seemed like ages—practically eons since his mouth had last been at your neck. He appeared on your bedroom balcony near midnight like an apparition, mounted by a still-burning jetpack that shut off with an arc of smoke.

You’d been sleeping, albeit fitfully, and woke the minute his knuckles rapped against the glass. You didn’t remember ever telling him where your bedchambers were, but given… everything… you couldn’t say you were surprised he knew. When he crouched down to shed the helmet, it made a soft thump on the plush carpet.

And then you kissed. And kissed. And kissed.

Boba’s fingertips dragged fire across your prickled skin with every pass. Whose breathing was whose didn’t matter. It was hard, heaving, and shared. Eyes closed, lips raw, every part of you dizzy. Dizzy.

The sneeze that left you was loud enough to knock his forehead against yours. Hard.

Feet stumbling until your legs hit the bedspread, you let your weakened knees carry you down into a sitting position atop the covers and tried to catch your breath. Boba only chuckled, seemingly unperturbed by the mild injury.

Of course your body had picked today to come down with a cold. And of course you’d forgotten to tell him.

In your defense (you seemed to do a lot of self-defending these days) you didn’t know Boba would be coming tonight. When you asked him a week ago—the last time you’d spoken—he’d said “soon.” Whatever “soon” meant, you hadn’t anticipated it being now. Your rumpled nightgown and deteriorating personal hygiene was evidence enough of that.

The day had passed in fitful naps, with you waving away all attempts at help until the servants who usually tittered about decided to give you a wide berth until tomorrow. They’d left the door locked and your curtains drawn, thank the gods.

“A hello would’ve been nice,” you mumbled. The lingering taste of him in your mouth mixed with the bitter medicine that you’d forced down a few hours ago.

Boba didn’t answer at first, only stalking forward with his silhouette glowing in light of the full moon. You brought your knees up to your chest to make room for him to stand in front of you. Every movement was bathed in slowness, in the reverence of caution and night-time silence.

His gloved hand brushed against your chin and tilted it upwards, thumb rubbing a small circle into your jawbone as he moved your face in one large grip. Left, inspecting a swollen mouth and puffy eyes, then right. Up to see the column of your exposed neck. Down to meet his bare, dark face.

He kissed you again, more gentle this time. “Hello.”

A soft whimper left your throat.

Oh, you hated it. Hated the way you sounded when he touched you, small and pathetic. Needy.

The balustrade doors were still open, and this fact was made known by a particularly biting gust of silver wind.

“You’re cold,” the man standing close to you noted with a deep downquirk of his mouth. Boba never had to conceal anything; his helmet did that for him. But when it was off, every thought flickered past his face in evening technicolor.

Your hands paused in their run up your arms to hold petulantly at your elbows, covered only by the thin fabric of your shift. Goosebumps rose against your neck with a new breeze and you fought down the urge to shiver.  “M’not.”

“And stubborn.”

You glared at him, but it held no real venom.

“I appreciate the concern,” you sniffled again and your body trembled slightly. “But I’m the picture of health. I really have never been—” here you sneezed rather violently, crumbling any remaining sense of composure and making the final words thick with congestion, “—any better.” Boba hooked two strong arms underneath your knees and around your shoulders. “Wh- what are you doing?”

“C’mon,” Boba grunted and lifted you to his chest in one swift, easy motion. “Up.”

“I’m already up,” you grumbled, a headache you’d thought was all but gone now throbbing from the quick movement. Armor pressed to your cheek and you let yourself go pliant, curling up into Boba’s broad chest. He smelled nice. Like the outdoors. The real outdoors—not manufactured gardens or stone courtyards. No, dangerous things. Like deserts and leather and guns.

You queried him as he walked in long strides across the room. “Where are you taking me? Should have you—” another sneeze burned your airways, “—have you arrested for treason. A high crime or misdemeanor of some sort, kidnapping royalty...”

He only scoffed, shifting your slack body into his one-armed grip when he arrived at the entrance of your adjunct refresher. The door opened with a soft click. “You talk too much.”

Your head rolled back to face him, pressed so close already that the attempt made you cross-eyed. “And you,” a polished finger jabbed lightly at his chest plate, “are up to no good.”

You were only joking, but Boba didn’t deny it.

Green was your favorite color, even before you met him. It was the color of gardens. Of mint leaves. Of insects and jewels. Of him.

Gods, he was beautiful. Did he know that? Would he ever believe you if you told him? He was achingly, painfully, humanly beautiful. It hurt like needles.

The man set you down to your immediate protests. Funny how quick you seemed to change your mind. “Don’t whine,” he chided when you did just that, pushing you forward by the small of your back.

You walked into the refresher confused, that same confusion compounding when Boba strode over to the marble bathtub in room’s center with a surety that belayed the fact he’d never once stepped foot inside here. Were all bounty hunters this self-assured? Or was he just so full of bathroom bravado that your sprawling floor-plan didn’t faze him?

Whatever the case was, said bounty hunter was now crouched down on the tile floor and twisting the tub faucets until they sprayed out a gush of hot water, quickly filling the room with heady steam.

 “Hot water helps.” A still-gloved hand dipped an inch into the filling tub and deemed it acceptable. “The steam’ll clear up those sneezes of yours. And the headache.”

“How did you know I-” your mouth opened and closed before you realized you didn’t do a great job of hiding your symptoms. Maker knows you looked a sight, all mussed and tired and sticky with cold sweat. He should make a run for it now, you half-joked to yourself. He’s only ever seen me stuffed into a corset and done up half to death.

He got up with a grunt and turned back towards you. Beskar and durasteel and tactical fabric suddenly made you feel, for the first time in your life, underdressed. “‘S not hard to tell, princess.”

“Oh,” was your only response as you pushed off the sink counter, fisting the fabric of your nightgown in an unconscious display of hesitancy.

Boba’s heavy boots made for the door.

It was probably just to leave you some semblance of privacy, but you panicked, not wanting to be left alone now that he was finally here. “Wait!” you burst out, reaching a palm onto his shoulder before he could exit. “Wait. Can— can you stay?” Of course he won’t stay, you dolt. He probably came to sleep with you, not babysit you. “Please?”

Both of his hands curled into themselves when he turned back to you, their leather squeaking in the tight flex. Then, they released limp by his sides. Each word was carefully measured, slow-simmering like a pot about to boil over. Like a trigger finger twitchy on a blaster. “If you want me to.”

You answered with a bobbing nod and a swallow. “I do.”

⫸————————————————⫷

Boba Fett had long since forgotten he was a man. Instead, he was armor. He was a code, a set of  strict (albeit grey) morals, the steadfast honor he’d been imbibed with from the years with his father and then the years of tearing emptiness after.

Bounty hunters had no time for attachments. They couldn’t afford to humor every batting eyelash with more than a self-serving flirtation, and he’d had his fill of those already. He’d overflowed his cup ten times over with shallow pleasantries and quick release.

But those days were long-gone. Had been for years now. Now he was practically puritanical.

Had been, anyway.

He didn’t like thinking of himself as impulsive, wanting to leave the trait behind in his younger years but not being old enough to shake it off completely. But he wasn’t impulsive anymore. He wasn’t.

You were going to destroy him.

Low-ranking royalty on some Imperial-occupied factory planet; sheltered and pretty. You had the brightest eyes he had ever seen and a temperament that took no prisoners, and you were going to destroy him.

Boba thought you’d make him leave, but you didn’t. You wanted him to stay and told him so.

So he stayed. His armor was peeled off in your presence for the first time— carefully placed on a chair in your bedroom—and he walked back into the refresher to see you untying your flimsy nightdress like it’d done you a personal wrong.

When it dropped beside your feet, it took every ounce of self-control Boba possessed to stop himself from eating you whole.

He heard you kick it to the floor (his eyes had since been very determinedly fixed on a fascinating piece of groutwork near his left foot) before you stepped into the bath, sighing in a way that made breathing a work harder than it should’ve been.

His looking away wasn’t a request on your part, you didn’t seem to mind either way, but he didn’t trust himself to do otherwise. Not until the sounds of splashing had subsided somewhat, signalling your stilled motion. “Boba?”

Now there was permission to walk. Look down. Right foot, left foot. Right foot, left foot. Right foot, the clawfoot of the bathtub. He had reached his destination.

A wet hand tugged at his belt loops and he finally allowed himself to look, meeting the sight of you sitting bare in the clear-blue water with legs pulled up to your chest. The arm not touching him was roped around your calves. Your chin rested on the wide, curved lip of the tub.  

If Boba had any self-respect, it had been snuffed out the first moment you opened your mouth, six months ago in that cavernous palace hallway with your failed attempt at bravado. It was haughty, short-lived, and adorable.

Maker, you were beautiful. Did you know that? Would you ever believe him if you told you? You were blindingly, effervescently, humanly beautiful. It hurt like needles.

The position of your chin forced your lips into a slight pout. As if you needed another weapon in your arsenal of ways to make him question his judgement. “Could you bring me the tray on the counter?”

Of course he could. He could bring you anything you liked. He would bring you a rancor, a dozen rancors, a fucking sarlaac if it meant you would smile all soft-like the way you just did when he answered yes.

Boba Fett, mercenary feared farther than he would ever live to travel and hunter too expensive for the Imperial payroll, was now a bath attendant. It was torturous in its sensual irony.

The tray was brought over in short order, cluttered with tiny vials of Maker-knows-what and bars of who-knows-how. Individually they probably all smelled nice, but crowded together the heavy scents only made his head spin. He set the tray down on the floor with a rattle and held up each mystery soap for your inspection. No. No. No. No, not that one. Gods, you were picky. No. No. Yes, please.

You were Miss Manners tonight apparently.

“It’s floating archidia,” you told him, mind running through an endless backlog of plant indexes as he handed over the soap. You sounded clearer now, less congested and more alert. Needed to drink water, though. “The flower that this is made with, I mean. Native to the planet Nubia, rumored to have euphoric properties.” You snorted and ran a thumbnail along the bar’s waxy edge, bringing up a curled pink piece. “Whatever that means.”

“Do you think it does?”

“Have euphoric properties?” you hummed, considering it for a moment. “Maybe. But maybe it’s just wishful thinking.”

“Wishful thinking,” Boba parroted.

The meaning of words can change when they’re repeated. Neither of your minds were on flowers.

His jaw tensed when you reached your other hand to his forearm, baring the rest of your body to the dim orange of the refresher lights’ night settings. The water rippled, warm now instead of steaming, and your fingers curled around the scarred skin of his wrist. “Take off the gloves,” you echoed, your voice suddenly desperate and distant as you traced over pale leather seams. “Please.”

He had refused the first time simply to toy with you. You weren’t used to being told no, and it showed. But he let you take off his helmet in a moment of thoughtless self-indulgence, scratching the part of his subconscious that itched to be touched, stroked, held. Shedding the helmet in front of someone else didn’t really mean anything in an honorable sense—at least not to Boba. Nothing tied him to the habit except a desire to keep himself and his motivations unknown. It was easier that way. Less messy.

He acquiesced. "Since you asked so nicely."

Wrinkling your nose, you guided newly-bare palms to knead gently at your shoulder blades. The skin there was soft and warm, pliant under his sandpaper touch. "Keep mentioning it and I'll go back to being difficult."

The soap made foamy bubbles across your back, over your arms and the velvet slope of your hips. Fingertips ghosted through the space between your jaw and ear, where he remembered sucking in a soft bruise.

He liked being known by you.

⫸————————————————⫷

You clambered out the tub with all the grace of a baby krugga deer and about as much shame. Which is to say, none at all. The subsiding cold had left you tired, bones like jelly and mind sloshing its thoughts around with no real order. Boba was here. Had stayed. Was standing in front of you now, watching tiny water droplets trail down your feet and letting you balance on his arm to keep you from stumbling.

A towel was wrapped around your shoulders. The press of his hot mouth against your forehead followed close behind. “Go sit on the bed.”

For some reason, you didn’t mind listening to him this time. Chalk it up to moldable exhaustion, you thought. Definitely not the fact that his voice sounded especially nice tonight, or any number of other questionable reasons.

He was going to ruin you. Or you would ruin yourself. Any way it was construed, Boba would play a part.

Still only in a towel, you drank the stale tea that sat on your bedside table and watched in mild interest as the mercenary’s shadow emptied out tepid bathwater with the thick glugluglug of the drain. It washed down soap and all your shared secrets.

Was it wrong that you still wanted him? More, now that he’d done this for you? Now that it wasn’t just cruel kisses and groping hands? What sort of a person did that make you?

Your mind whispered it when Boba walked back towards you. Someone lonely.

He helped you slide a new chemise on when you asked him to, quick and steady over the thin linen ties. I bet you do that with all the girls, you’d teased. No, he answered simply. Just you.

He was going to ruin you.

“Do you have to go yet?” you asked quietly and climbed under the covers. They were green today. Life enjoyed coincidences like that.

Boba crouched down on the floor beside your lying figure and shook his head. A wide fingertip smoothed away the crease between your brows. He was doing lots of touching. You were not complaining. “Not ‘til morning.”

“You might as well then,” you mumbled and lifted up the embroidered blankets with a sleep-slack hand. “No one’ll bother us, I promise.” you answered the empty air, too heartsick to comprehend any possible insinuations and too tired to realize the fingers tracing your brow bone had paused. “I told them all not to come back until tomorrow.”

His shirt and pants were shed in an unceremonious pile. You were already half-asleep when he climbed into the other side of the bed, slotting his legs against yours like puzzle pieces. Two question marks curled into each other, his chest to your back and his lips brushing your head.

“Goodnight, princess.”

⫸————————————————⫷

You were dreaming about him.

He was the burning sun that every single one of your thoughts had orbited around for the last six months and now he was invading your subconscious, dream-talons taking the form of dark hands rubbing soft circles against you and then invading your open mouth.

In your dream, Boba touched you softly and not at all, a tease even in your self-serving imagination.

Then you woke up, and it wasn’t a dream anymore.

Two thick arms encircled your waist with a grip unyielding in their strength. They’d pulled you impossibly close, pressed up against his sleeping body until every ridge of his muscled stomach could be felt against your back. Something else was against your back.

Your head reeled in its effort to sludge through the fog of sleep and reach the reality of masculine hips. They shifted in an unintentional grind against your legs until you couldn’t bite back the gasp that bubbled out from your voicebox, the sound quiet, keening, and lost in the shuffled sounds of fabric. It was still dark out. The water-clock in the corner of your room read 01:25:02.

You hadn’t put on anything underneath the new chemise. Why bother, when he’d already seen everything? Your body had grown to be a thing for display, a clothes-hanger and object to be prodded by strangers, and you’d long since rid yourself of any precocious modesty.

But this was different.

When Boba touched you, it wasn’t to sew flowers in your hair or drape a sash over your chest. It was simply to touch. The thought made you light-headed with newfound embarrassment, wiggling in his grip until you turned to face his sleeping form.

All the heavy things he carried on his shoulders during the day were gone now. His bottom lip pillowed out when he slept and he looked younger, the perpetual downturn of his lips now settled below the black hair at his temples. You felt a sticky sort of fondness settle in your chest.

“Boba,” you whispered, two hands placing themselves on his tanned cheeks. They traced the divots of scars and premature lines with all the reverence of worshipfulness.

“Mmm,” his voice rumbled with eyes still closed. A warm mouth kissed the side of your palm.

“Boba,” you repeated, more desperate this time but not knowing what you were desperate for. The space between your legs already knew what it wanted, hot and pulsing with a familiar dampness. Traitor.

“What do you need?” The question wasn’t accusatory, nor annoyed at your waking him. It was known that he would give you whatever you liked. Eventually.

You. Just you.

“I don’t,” you huffed, the fabric sticking uncomfortably to your now overheated body as you squirmed, “I don’t know.” Lie.

“Think about it and tell me,” he whispered, eyes opening in their dark, heavy-lidded expectation. The moon and stars suspended outside offered light enough to see the smirk on his face. His skin was the color of burnt earth and of gods. Somewhere, far away in the canopy of carefully pruned trees, a single lark let out its warbled cry.

There was an old adage about being like a lamb to the slaughter. You’d never touched a lamb. Never seen a slaughter. But somehow, you knew it was true.

This lamb, dumb and tender-hearted, was willingly sacrificied.

"I...'' the word left you in the arc of your exhale, one whoosh of air that rattled your chest already wracked with fevered tremors. "I- want you to-"

"You want me to what, pretty thing?" His voice was low, dangerous. It made every part of you want him more. "Say it."

You weren't used to cursing. It was never tolerated and you barely ever heard it, but you'd learned enough to know what he wanted you to say. Which word he wanted to hear, and what it'd mean he would do.

"F-fuck. Me." you choked out, biting your lip to muffle the embarrassment of having to speak it out loud. The word was filthy and raw between your teeth. "Please?"

⫸————————————————⫷

You were dying. Possibly had already died. Were ascending up or barrelling down, you didn’t care as long as his wet mouth stayed between your legs and never, ever stopped.

Wide hands cupped at your skin and kneaded wherever they could reach, simultaneously rough and supplicating. Every pass of his tongue was enough to make you feel possessed. He was killing you.

“Good. Good girl.” he said against your swollen skin when your hips arced off the bed, your spine and toes stiffening for what seemed like an eternity during the damp lightning finish. It sounded like a growl, animalistic and vibrating. A burning, sweet hurt.

Some people call it “little death,” a lady’s maid once whispered underneath her hand in a giggle. “Little death?” you repeated incredulously. That seems a bit dramatic, don’t you think?

You understood now.

Boba didn’t let up, never once letting his touch waver even as you buckled and swayed, all sense lost and all sensation compacting.  “Another,” he ordered. Your body listened, bending to his touch without complaint with eyes rolled back into your head.

You were dying.

⫸————————————————⫷

Boba let you lay against him in the downturn, rubbing mindless shapes into the bone of your wrists as you struggled to breathe. Your neck was cradled in one of his broad, bronze palms. It gave one tiny, imperceptible squeeze. An accident. A test.

You pawed at the hand resting heavy on your nape until it moved to leave completely, but was caught instead by your fingers and guided—slow and curious—to cup at your bared throat.

“Dirty,” the man noted in a dark rasp and rolled over to face you. There was a slight smirk in his voice, but that could’ve just been your imagination.

“I don’t see you...” your voice trailed off into a wheeze as Boba’s thick fingers pressed into the sides of your neck, “—see you complaining.”

He kissed you. And kissed you. And kissed you. An eternity was spent opening the seam of your mouth while he choked you softly, baring your pulsating soul with only your bedroom walls as witness to the present depravity. The air was filled with begging and grunting—simple noises that stuttered and left your sheets ruined.

You wanted more. You couldn’t help it.

His chuckle morphed into a groan when you reached down to touch him with widening eyes, squeezing him curiously after pulling down his boxers. “You’re a brave little thing,” Boba noted with a hint of greedy pride. “Never done this before, have you?”

Your own hands served as poor substitutes all these years. You shook your head no.

“D’you want to?”

Of course you did. This was the only thing you wanted. The only thing you would ever want, over and over until your body turned to dust under him. A million grains of fizzy, burning blaster powder. A million comets passing by a supernova.

You nodded and tucked your face into the space between Boba’s shoulder and neck, rolling onto your side and hooking a leg over his hip. Your chests met, damp with sweat as cool air flowed over bare skin. The covers had long since been pushed aside. “Safe,” you said in a heady moan over the shell of his ear. “Implant.”

Thank goodness for modern medicine.

⫸————————————————⫷

It hurt a little at first, but most of the discomfort melted away as he whispered to you, sweet and cloying praises alongside filthy things that you’d be hard-pressed to repeat in public. They wove together in an endless stream of baritone vowels, lapping over each other like ocean waves until everything was a gyrating, syrupy playback.

He let you move against him, mouth open and sloppy against your temple when you whined at the stretch. The hands at your back didn’t push. Only placated. “I know, I know,” Boba assured you with fingers rubbing sympathetic desire into your flesh. It would bruise, but you’d come to like the marks. Your hips bucked at their own accord when he pressed up against something tight, the friction burning a bright, numb spark. “Slow down,” he mumbled into your hair, “You’re gonna hurt yourself.”

Never in your life did you think this was how it would be. Your first kiss, more of a battle than it was a kiss, served as fuel for the expectations of your first time. Never in your life did you think he would be the one telling you to go slow.

It was for your sake, you knew that. But it was still surprising.

You huffed and bit the shell of his ear in childish revenge, blowing a puff of air where you knew it would tickle. Boba only growled and tightened his arms around your waist, rocking into you slow and deep. “Don’t tease,” he warned.

The new movements robbed you of the ability to speak until all you could do in response was lift your head from where it had rested on his shoulder, meeting impossibly dark eyes in lust-addled vision as a building pressure colored the entire world in shades of black, red, and green.

In a moment of complete and utter lack of propriety, you leaned forward, smiling like a woman deranged, and pressed a kiss to his nose.

Boba came undone the same minute you did. It was a rush of wet, rocking pleasure, spreading like thick webs of lighted fire from inside your blood and out to fill the room with quiet devotion. Panting, bursting, close, messy. You’d never felt so whole.

Your foreheads met and you went cross-eyed trying to look at him again. That’s all you wanted to do. Look at him. Uttered underneath his jaw, where the skin was smooth, was your finishing admission. “I love you.”

You didn’t say it to hear it repeated. It was just to give it a shape. Make it concrete. Said more to yourself than him, really.

But Boba did repeat it. Over and over and over. In the tangle of your arms. I love you. In the kiss to your breasts. I love you. In the towel brought between your legs. I love you. In the settled silence of new sleep. I love you, I love you, I love you.

⫸————————————————⫷

The watery light of dawn melted through heavy curtains and you awoke, body weighed down with lead and gold. Sweet soreness had made its home in your muscles and you were loath to get up, but the man you’d been using as a pillow had very rudely left his post.

“I have to go,” he said, already awake and standing sentry by your bed. You raised your head up from the pillows in groggy protest to meet his blurry figure. If you squinted, there were three of him standing there at once.

A shake of your head rid your vision of the doubles, leaving the lone man. He kissed you—quick and dirty, with tongue—and squeezed your exposed breast, prompting a low moan to tumble from your mouth before he slipped his blaster into the holster at his hip. It wasn’t even 6 in the morning and you were thoroughly debauched. What a scandal, you thought (not for the first time) with passing amusement. A bounty hunter and a princess.

Watching in a dim haze as Boba finished strapping on his amor, you tracked the reflection of the sun in the metal’s lazy movement.

He leaned over you. “I’ll be back soon.” Soon. What did soon mean? Another kiss, slow and careful on the bow of your mouth. One more on the slope of your forehead. For luck, you supposed. Whether it was for you or him didn’t matter much. “Promise.”

Slowly, as he climbed out onto your balcony and was gone with a flash of jetpack light, you wondered if it was a mirage; a dream, maybe. The entire night a hallucinatory haze, a figment of your overactive imagination and reckless romanticism.

But the towel left discarded on the floor and the pulsing ache between your legs was very, very real.

[nevertheless-moving]

Suicidal Misunderstanding XIII

Part I - - - - - - Part II - - - - - - - - - - - -  Part XI - - - - - - Part XII

Star Wars Time Travel AU #27

Cody waited impatiently in the entrance room to the hall of healing, ignoring the surprising number of Jedi who drifted by aimlessly. 

As far as he could tell they were coming in just to stare at him, make meaningless small chat with the tight lipped receptionist, glance around, approach as if almost to talk with him, then drift out again without having accomplished anything.

Embarrassingly, it took him several minutes to realize why they were behaving so oddly. In his defense, a) he didn’t have much of a baseline for Jedi behavior in temple. 

And b) when numerous vod had approached him today to try and find out ‘why the General had missed last night’s conference,’ and ‘why Cody had been unreachable for large chunks of time, that was seriously unlike him,’ and ‘why had Cody gone to the Jedi Temple and stayed there for hours upon hours yesterday morning,’ and ‘why haven’t you taken your bucket off today,’ and ‘why has no one gotten a comm reply from General Kenobi since Ghost Company went drinking,’ and ‘why isn’t Skywalker answering comms,’ and ‘why do the Jedi seem so riled up today,’ and ‘why are you and Rex so tense,’ and, ‘are you going to the temple now,’ and ‘what the kriff happened to my desk,’ well.

They just asked directly.

He had grown so inured to unfamiliar Jedi silently willing him to answer their own jedi-variations on ‘What the fuck is going on with Obi-Wan’ that he almost didn’t notice when Windu came to stand next to him. 

“Here as a visitor?” He asked the Master stiffly. He was almost feeling wound-up enough to fight for his place in line. 

“No, I’m waiting to speak with Skywalker,” he replied, temporarily placating the Commander.

An unfamiliar Jedi Cadet with a short braid on the side of their head walked in, attempting to look casual and failing miserably. The small furred padawan stared nervously at Cody and Mace, and actually managed to open their mouth. Windu raised a brow. They immediately snapped their jaw shut, bowed, and scurried out. 

Cody watched through the window as they joined a group of even tinier Jedi. After a brief conversation with lots of waving limbs from all parties, the group turned in unison to make eye contact with Cody’s visor. Cody inclined his head slightly. They all ran off, practically tripping over their robes.

“Wasn’t sure if the eyebrow would work,” Mace muttered. “It’s been 50/50 today.”

“I’ve just been hiding whenever I can,” Cody confessed.

Mace winced. “My apologies for the delay in putting out a statement. We’re still trying to work out - an adequate substitute. At least for the upcoming campaign.”

Cody nodded, “I assumed as much."

“I assure you, we’ve taken your thoughts into consideration. You’ll receive a notice of the Council’s final decision before we send out a mass bulletin.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Fortunately, finally, Anakin stomped into the atrium, followed closely behind by the Nautolan soul healer. 

“Ah, Knight Skywalker, do you have a moment? I’d like to have a word with you.” 

Anakin startled at Mace’s words, but recovered quickly when he noticed the slow moving crowd just outside the door. “Of course, Master Windu,” he said with a bow.

“Commander Cody, would you care to follow me?” Aerdo said with a smile.

Cody and Anakin exchanged grim nods as they passed one another, following the Masters in opposite directions.

- - - - -

- - - - -

“The situation in the expansion region is deteriorating rapidly. We had already intended to send the 212th to moderate the situation after Umbara’s latest declaration. But increasing separatist activity in the sector means that we cannot afford to delay or under-commit. The hyperlanes are being taken, and with them, republic control over crucial supply lines is now threatened. We must deploy the third system army, the day after tomorrow at the very latest. They’re our best equipped force for the situation, not to mention the only uncommitted division large enough to make a meaningful impact. There is no viable alternative.”

Anakin nodded at Mace uncertainly. He had been keeping up with troop movements before everything, and, trying to keep himself sane, had even checked the news in between cutting off the Chancellor and visiting Obi-Wan only to find him unresponsive again. But...why exactly was the Master of the Order telling him this?

“You’re not seriously thinking of sending Obi-Wan? I mean even if he miraculously wakes up tomorrow...”

Master Windu sighed. “No, of course not. Which is why I’ve asked you here.”

“You...can’t be asking me to lead them?” Anakin asked, feeling lightheaded.

“I admit, the council did consider it. You are the one of our most successful Generals. Not to mention the one most familiar with Obi-Wan’s troops. Between the fact that the 501st is also needed on Umbara and every other Jedi’s unwillingness to step in to the position, your name came up multiple times.” Mace pinched the bridge of his nose while Anakin stared uncertainly.

“No, I have not brought you here for a promotion. I want to speak with you about your opinions on candidates for the 212th...as well as to ask if you believe yourself capable of leading the 501st without...losing yourself. I’ve finished reviewing your civilian casualties and consider your observed losses- tolerable, at least.”

Windu looked exhausted at having to say that out-loud and Anakin fidgeted, biting his tongue.

“As long as you are under the supervision of another Master, and if you swear to me on Obi-Wan’s life that you will report yourself if you find yourself slipping- I leave the command of the 501st up to you.”

Anakin felt queasy. How could he help Obi-Wan if he was half a galaxy away, on what sounded like a long, protracted campaign. If he refused to go, that would leave both the 501st and the the 212th without their generals. Or...was this how he could help? Carry one of his burdens for him? He was more than ready to lead! Probably! He had been leading! Part of him longed to charge into battle immediately- wash off his helplessness with blood. Anakin didn’t know how to fix Obi-Wan mind, but he was good at fighting, good at war.

And that thought brought back the ever-lingering cold. How could he trust himself? His...violence... it might have driven Obi-Wan to suicide. He still didn’t know! And if he left he wouldn’t know for months! He promised Obi-Wan not to kill again- how the kark was he supposed to do that while being a General?! Did ordering people to kill count, or was that worse?

“I need to think about the 501st ,” Anakin whispered.

Master Windu nodded. “I appreciate that. You have until dawn tomorrow to decide- in the mean time, let’s discuss the 212th.”

“Who’s the top choice?”

“Master Pong Krell. He’s actually our only choice that wouldn’t require reorganizing other assignments significantly.”

“He’s...a good duelist.” Anakin said, trying to think about what he knew of the Besalisk, “What division does he command?”

Windu grimaced. “That’s actually why he’s the best choice... Of the troops he’s had direct command over since the start of the war, over 85% are dead. He’s never lost a battle but...”

Anakin closed his eyes, “Right.”

Plenty of excellent fighters among the Jedi made terrible generals. He’d have to look over the Besalisk’s military record- it could just be terrible luck. Plo Koon had lost an entire division to the Malevolence, but he still was one of the best.

“When you say he’s the only choice...”

“Most Masters I’ve breached the subject with were extremely reluctant at the thought- I don’t want to force anyone into a position beyond what they’re willing to handle.”

“I guess that makes sense...but it seems...off?” Anakin trying to articulate his uneasiness.

“Our method of ‘promotion’ has a tendency to elevate those who should perhaps not be taking on more responsibilities.” Mace acknowledged grimly.

“Because... good Jedi aren’t really ok with war. And you’re only promoting Generals who are fine with the whole thing?” he said thinking of himself. “Or can’t say no?” he added bitterly, thinking of Obi-Wan.

“It’s not an ideal situation” Mace agreed, lines around his eyes growing.

Anakin scrubbed a hand to his face. He had been doing more thinking about the ‘concept’ of war and violence in the last two days than he had the last two years of actual fighting. There hadn’t been much point before, war was happening regardless of his feelings. Not to mention the fact that there wasn’t time to quibble over these sorts of things in the field. As much as he was desperate not to disappoint Obi-Wan again, he didn’t really enjoying being forced to consider this stuff now. It made him...itchy.

“Have you considered just putting Cody in charge of everything?” Anakin finally asked.

“Of course, but the Senate would never approve...”

- - - - -

- - - - -

- - - - -

“...With those few exceptions, the only major thing left to restock is perishables. But that’s more your department than mine, sir.” 

Cody finished his report. 

Obi-Wan continued to lay still, looking frail in the large medi-bed. The restraints made the image that much worse.

“Fuck.” 

Cody swore and, for the first time since crawling out of bed that morning, yanked off his helmet.

“General. General Kenobi. Obi-Wan can you hear me.” he said hoarsely, leaning over the bed.

The General didn’t move.

“Obi-Wan if you can hear me- try and shift around a little bit. Blink. Do anything. It’s me- Commander Cody. I- please, sir. Just do anything, they said you- you did this on purpose so please confirm you’re in there. I’m- shipping off soon and, I- I just need to know that you’re going to be ok. Please. Anything.”

Cody hovered absolutely motionless, watching for any sign of response. But Obi-Wan continued as he had been, lifeless but for his slow and steady breaths. 

Cody collapsed to his knees, vision spotty. Gasping for air, he rested his head on the side of the bed, desperately trying to pull himself together. 

After several long moments he pulled of a glove, tentatively reaching for Obi-Wan’s hand. It felt cold.

“General, if this is some sort of- dark force attack twitch your hand, ok? Please. We’re trying to understand- we’re here for you, just clench your hand if you’re under attack and someone will come to help.”

Cody paced his breaths to Obi-Wan’s, pulse slowing down to match the wrist in his grasp.

“Obi-Wan, why are you doing this? I don’t understand.” Cody rasped. 

“You- you told me I was one of your best friends. You- I don’t know why you think so highly of me but please you have to know I think the universe of you. We all do, but I really do. You don’t have to fight anymore if you don’t want to, we’ll protect you, you know that. You have to know that. But I can’t- I can’t imagine the rest of the war without knowing you’re alright somewhere.”

Cody pressed Obi-Wan’s hand to his forehead, choking back a sob.

“You said you had a ‘last mission.‘ I don’t know what that means. You’ve talked about after the war- I don’t get why your life has to end with a mission. I'm not sure if I understood anything you said, but I’m right here and I would never hurt you. I don’t know what you saw but I would die first, ok? I want you to know that I would gladly die before hurting you so- so you don’t have to worry about whatever vision you had. Just wake up and tell me what I have to do and I’ll do it.”

Cody sat on the floor, clinging to Obi-Wan’s hand and continuing to breathe. 

Eventually, the door clicked open behind him. 

“Commander Cody? I’m terribly sorry but it’s been an hour...” Healer Aerdo’s voice came trickling in.

“I understand- is there time for me to say goodbye?” Cody rasped, not looking back. 

“Of course.” 

The door clicked shut and Cody stood jerkily.

“Goodbye, General Kenobi. Obi-Wan. I’ll take care of the men for you while you’re- resting. Please, I know I say this a lot but take care of yourself, ok?”

Cody pressed Obi-Wan’s hand to his forehead one last time before reverently resting it on the bed. Pulling his helmet on roughly, he turned sharply and marched out the door. 

Obi-Wan remained determinedly still.

Next: XIV

[miracle-sham]

Crack Your Bones and Say Those Lies.

| {Jasonette July 2021, Saturday Challenge 3: And They Were Roommates} |

| [Ao3 Link] | | [Masterlist Link] | | [Spotify Playlist Link] |

———

| After getting roped into the Vigilante life by Chat Noir, her friend and partner in crime, Maladroit tries her best to help fight crime to make the city a better place, if only Red Hood and his gang would stop causing problems. |

| Or alternatively, Marinette and Jason are roommates with secrets. Both have huge crushes on each other but more importantly, both are trying to juggle moonlighting as their secret identities. However, when watching the nightly news together, everything changes. |

| Word Count: 5,014. |

| Warnings/Tags: No Miraculous/Different Powers Au, Roommates, minor gang mentions/Red Hood is a gang lord, gun violence, Vigilantism, Identity Shenanigans/Mistakes, Miscommunication, some emotional hurt, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, and Domestic fluff. Also Oblivious, Protective, & Mutually Pining Marinette and Jason. |

———

| A/N: Hey! Sorry this is nearly a week late but where I live got hit with a nasty heatwave and I was barely able to write from sheer exhaustion from the heat. But on a happier note, I'm so glad I've finally been able to write and post a proper Vigilantes au (as in like Spidey style vigilantism with homemade gear and all!) Because that kinda Vigilante au especially combined with roommates is my favourite trope ever! Well maybe joint with Dragonrider AUs, but still! I've had multiple Vigilante Aus sitting in my notes and drafts so it's brilliant to finally release one into the wild! Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading this! |

| Also side note, Don’t Like? Don’t Read. Also also, please do not criticise any of my writing. This was written for fun and receiving criticism, even in a compliment/criticism sandwich, is the exact opposite of fun. |

———

It's Friday night, and Maladroit and Chat Noir are midway through their usual patrol of their slice of territory in the city.

“Race you to the billboard!” Chat Noir calls out, snickering in an almost cat-like-chitter as he launches himself forwards. Swinging over Maladroit's head with his grapple, he lands on the next roof ahead, in a perfect three-point landing.

Maladroit giggles, “Oh, you're so on!” She grabs her grapple and shoots. Swinging after him and onto the same roof. She instead, dive forward rolls for her landing and uses the momentum to propel her into a run.

Losing his lead due to the momentum loss of the three-point landing, Chat Noir vaults over a roof vent.

Forced to swerve to the side, Maladroit barely dodges a massive puddle of rainwater on her side of the roof.

Neck and Neck, the two raced across the rooftop. Closer and closer to the billboard they raced.

Nearly there! She thinks, c'mon! Reaching an arm out to slap the billboard—

Bzzt!

“Eep!” She yelps, startled by the buzzing crackle of her earring-comms. Unintentionally, she accidentally veers to the side and crashes straight into Chat Noir's side.

They collide with a loud thud, and two of them crumple into a pile.

“Graceful as ever, Mal.” A voice teases over her earring-comms. “Joking aside, didn't mean to spook you, sorry!”

Maladroit groans, “thanks,” and gingerly extracts herself from the vigilante limb pile.

“Gamer!” Chat Noir cheers, having heard him through his own disguised comms. “Got any crimes for us to fight tonight?”

There's a chuckle over the line, “Lucky you should ask, Chat, I do happen to have found some villainous plans for you to thwart.”

Chat Noir cracks his knuckles and stretches. “Oh? What are they?”

“Two which are time-sensitive.” Gamer adds.

Maladroit stifles a squawk, “Two! That are time-sensitive?” Her voice goes up a pitch on the last word, making it sound like a question.

“Uh-huh.” He confirms. “Chat Noir, there's a break-in at a jewellery store two blocks over from you. I'm sending you the directions now to your phone.”

Chat Noir does a two-fingered salute to the nearest security camera. “Got it, G! Detective Noir is on the case!”

“And Maladroit, we've got reports of sightings of Red Hood outside his usual area. By the Warehouses on fourth. There are no security cams around there so I've got nothing but rumours to go on. See if you can check it out and find out what he's up to.” Gamer informs her, sounding slightly irritated at the fact he's got little information to give her.

Maladroit nods, grumbling slightly. “When isn't he up to something.”

Slinging an arm around her shoulder, Chat Noir grins like the Cheshire Cat. “C'mon, Mal! It'll be a quick sweep and nothing will turn up like the last twenty times we've gotten this kinda tip-off!”

“You owe me ice cream from André's when we're in civvies tomorrow!” She huffs. “I made us macarons last time!”

“I haven't forgotten!” Chat Noir protests. “Anyway, see you tomorrow if we don't catch each other for the end of the patrol?”

Maladroit nods. “Yep! See ya later Minou!”

The two split. Chat Noir dashing after the directions, and Maladroit swinging towards the warehouses on fourth.

———

Breathe, Maladroit—reminds herself, perched on the rafters in one of the warehouses on fourth. Staring at the blood-red glowing mask of the red hooded villain, who happens to be oh so creatively named the 'Red Hood', leaning on the balcony railing on the opposite side of the warehouse to her rafter, and presumably glaring up at her.

“It's you again, Maladroit.” He growls, distorted by whatever voice modifier he's got wired into his mask.

She can't help but wince at the reminder of the word she had accidentally said the first time she had ever helped Chat Noir fight crime. Which irritatingly enough, stuck as her vigilante name. Especially since her second attempt at a name, Ladybug, didn't stick. She frowns beneath the black and red spotted bandana covering her mouth, and tightly grips her bladed yo-yo—with piano wire instead of string—of the same colour scheme.

“What are you planning, Red Hood?” She spits out, voice also modified by her bandana, a tad too grumpy and bitterly for the awkward-but-smiley "persona" she's supposed to act like (although it's not so much of a persona when that's just how she is almost all the time). But in her defence, she's had a rough day at uni, things have been awkward at home because of her crush on her roomie lately, and more importantly, Red Hood's lackeys have been a pain in the neck for the past week, so her reaction is more than warranted.

He has the audacity to laugh. “What makes you think I'm going to tell you, Pipsqueak?”

“Well,” Maladroit huffs, “I was hoping you were feeling considerate.”

Red Hood shifts his shoulders. ��Aww, sorry Pipsqueak. I'm not feeling particularly considerate today.” In a split second, he slips both guns from his holsters, spins them, and shoots.

Maladroit squeaks, instinctively tugging on her power, and dives off the rafter to dodge the shot. “Rude!”

She's just able to shoot her grapple off and swing up to another metal beam.

“How the fuck do you keep dodging my shots?” He snarls, gesturing at her with his guns in short angry-looking motions.

In response, she throws her yo-yo at him, tugging on her power again. The yo-yo spins through the air, slashing through the Red Hood's jacket sleeve and slicing a deep groove into the gun, then rewinds on the wire back to her. “What makes you think I'm going to tell you, Bullet Boy!” She parrots back, cheekily.

“Hey!” Red Hood snaps, aiming another shot at her.

Tugging on her powers once more, Maladroit yelps as she swings to yet another metal rafter beam in order to avoid the shot. “Your aim sucks!”

“Fuck you!” He retorts, firing off four more shots aimed at her head.

There's a horrifying moment as she barely manages to tug on her powers in time. The bullets barely skimming past her hood, one even tearing the fabric slightly.

“Mal!” Comes Gamer's terrified voice over her earring-comms, “I need you to pull back immediately! Red Hood and his gang have been spotted nearby and Chat can't get to you in time to back you up if you do get into a fight!”

She raises a hand to her earrings and quietly laughs hysterically. “Little too late for that, G! I'm uh currently staring… face to gun to him”

“Oh, fuck!” Gamer responds, voice going up a pitch. “I'm contacting Chat now. Try and get out if you can but prioritise not getting yourself killed, please!”

Red Hood fires his guns again. “Eyes and ears on me, Pipsqueak.”

Squeaking yet again, Maladroit desperately tugs on her power once more and swings to another rafter. Her heart thunders in her chest as loudly as his gunfire. She spits out a frantic, “no promises!” to both of them.

“I've informed him, your backup is on the way.” Gamer tells her.

The main warehouse doors clatter open with a resounding slam! Followed by the stomping of multiple pairs of boots storming inside.

Maladroit waves at Red Hood, the quiet terrified hysterical laughter practically bubbling out of her mouth. “Haha, well I'm afraid that's my cue to Bug Out!”

“Oh, I don't think so, Pipsqueak.” Red Hood taunts, shooting six bullets at her, rapid-fire. “I ain't finished with our convo yet.”

Squeaking for the umpteenth time, and really just giving him even more reason to keep giving her that stupid pipsqueak nickname, she riskily shoots her grapple, aiming and swinging towards the warehouse's large balcony windows.

“Get the fuck back here!” He snarls, voice deepening with fury. Pausing to reload before firing off more shots at her with abandon.

Maladroit wriggles midair, tugging on her powers to try and dodge the shots. She curls into a dive forward roll as the grapple forces her to land onto the balcony. The same one that Red Hood has been stood on this entire time. Oh, help me! She thinks, eyes widening behind her makeshift red with black tinted lenses, goggles-slash-domino mask.

He aims his gun at her once more. “Move and you fucking die, pipsqueak.”

Putting her hands in the air, she swallows a gulp of air. Her body armour is padded beneath her red, and black spotted, hoodie but it isn't bulletproof. And she can feel the straining exhaustion of overusing her powers clawing at her.

They're at a standoff. Still as statues, the both of them. It's almost poetic how they parallel each other. He's got his gun aimed at her, whilst she's desperately clutching at her grappling hook gun in one of her raised hands. Both donned in red. Both committing crimes in the eyes of the law. Two sides of the same coin, one and the same.

Maladroit feels sick to her stomach, staring down the barrels of his guns. Ever so slowly, she tugs on her powers. The window a little bit behind her creaks quietly enough that Red Hood doesn't seem to notice beneath the clamour of his gang doing whatever it is they're doing below.

She counts her breath and tugs on her power. A minute passes with no movement, no words, nothing happening on the balcony. Out of the corner of her eye, she can just see that it's now open enough that she should be able to make it out unscathed. Or at least mostly unscathed.

Closing her eyes, not that he can see, her power snaps. Instinctively she doubles over and slaps a hand over her mouth. Barely in time as a stifled scream is yanked from her throat, leaving her panting for breath. Her knees crash onto the balcony flooring. A bullet whizzes past her neck.

“Shit. What the fuck was that?” Red Hood grumbles, sounding genuinely concerned. He storms across the balcony towards her.

Maladroit can't help but flinch, bodily throwing herself back as far away from him as she can. Mind racing in panic.

He stows one gun back into a holster then reaches a hand towards her. “Hey, hey, hey. Calm down.”

“Gotta go! Bug-bye!” She squeaks out, wrenching on her power with all her remaining strength, and bolting for the window.

“I think the fuck not! Fucking pretending to be hurt.” Red Hood barks, ripping the gun back out of its holster.

Narrowly dodging the spray of bullets shot at her, Maladroit dives through the window and fires off her grapple. Safely swinging far away from the warehouse.

———

Carefully Maladroit drops with the ease of far too many nights of practise, onto the fire escape outside her bedroom window. She crouches and lets the shadows of the night hide her form. Creeping closer, she checks the windowsill for any marks or signs of tampering but it all comes away untouched. Content with her quick security check, she fumbles for the disguised piece of string wedging the window ajar in a way that's barely visible unless you know where to look for it. Got it! She thinks to herself, grabbing ahold of it and prying it, and the window above it, up and open.

Slipping through the open window, she sits on the sill to rip her thankfully not-too-dirty studded steel-toed boots off. Picking them up in one hand, she wiggles the rest of the way into her room and immediately resets the security measures, yanking the curtain down for privacy.

Maladroit then shuffles over to her bed. Tikki—her gorgeous fluffy red and dark brown miniature dachshund—blinks sleepily up at her, from the dog bed next to it. The puppy yaps in greeting before snuffling and curling back up to sleep.

She coos at the cuteness before continuing on. With the other hand not carrying the boots, she pries the blanket covered duffel bag out from underneath. Wrestling to unzip it in one janky and awkward motion, grunting slightly at the exertion. The metal of the zip digs in but the discomfort is mostly mitigated by the padded gloves and wrist guards she's wearing. The easy to clean plastic bag designated for temporary storing of her boots is dragged out of the bag and said boots are tossed in without a second glance.

Huffing, she starts to take the rest of her cross between mostly homemade and refashioned sports kit vigilante gear off. First, tugging down the hood of her hoodie and unclipping the black scrum cap hidden under it. It's dumped unceremoniously into a secondary plastic bag in the open duffel bag. After that, Maladroit removes the black neck guard and pulls her makeshift goggles-slash-domino mask over her head. Those too, are dumped into the other plastic bag. Then she unties the bandana with the nose guard underneath, from around her mouth and nose. Unsurprisingly, they're also dumped in the bag.

Next, she undoes the velcros on her red and black padded gloves, black wrist guards, as well as black elbow, knee, and shin pads. Also dumped into the other bag. With the outer protective wear removed, Maladroit pulls her hoodie over her head. Continuing on, she peels the padded rugby body armour and shorts off, and then the thermal under-armour. All dumped into the third and final plastic bag. “I swear,” Maladroit mumbles to herself, “getting changed out my gear never gets easier. And to think back when I had my last P.E. lesson at school, I thought I'd never have to touch this kinda kit ever again. Rip me.”

Lastly, Marinette—no longer Maladroit seeing as she is no longer in her vigilante gear—throws on her running-to-the-bathroom spare bathrobe to cover herself. She hastily shoves the three plastic bags into the duffel bag and kicks it under her bed. Purposefully leaving it unzipped but quickly fixing the blanket covering the bag, so that she can more easily grab her kit to clean everything later, whilst keeping it sufficiently hidden.

With that mostly taken care of, she nabs the mouthguard case, some clean pyjamas, and dashes out of her room—clinging awkwardly to the bathrobe. She hops in the apartment's shared bathroom, the rest of the place is silent, meaning her roomie, Jason, must have gone out. Still, Marinette locks the door regardless. If there's one thing she's learnt in her foray into the nightly masked vigilantism, is that one can never be too careful.

“Shit! Nearly forgot to take this out.” She grumbles to herself, just as she was stepping into the shower. Prying the mouthguard out of her mouth as she shuffles over to the sink, she gives it a quick rinse under the tap. Followed by a thorough scrubbing with her toothbrush and glob of toothpaste. She pops it into the mouthguard case and leaves it on the side of the sink for now.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Marinette finally allows herself to indulge in a good half an hour-long hot shower to get the grime from a night of crime-fighting off of herself.

She's only just drying off her hair, having already changed into her pyjamas, when the blare of the TV echoes through the apartment. Tensing up, her anxiety runs wild. It's what they get for living in the cheaper but slightly dodgy apartments where the walls are thin and the doors are thinner. Grabbing the mouthguard case, she wraps it up in the bathrobe and peeks out the bathroom door and looks down the hall into the open plan kitchen lounge. Jason's back, he's sitting on the sofa watching the TV.

Shoulders untensing, she finished drying her hair and heads out into the hallway. In place of a greeting, she exclaims, “oh! Jason, you're back!”

Jason flinches slightly and looks over his shoulder back at her. “Yeah, a friend had an emergency so, y'know.”

Immediately, concern wrenches at Marinette's heart, “oh no, I'm sorry. Are they… okay?”

He waves a hand in a so-so gesture and clears his throat awkwardly. “Uh, yeah. They're fine now.”

“That's good!” She says, nodding, as she makes her way fully into the lounge and the TV catches her attention. “Oh is it nearly the eleven o'clock news already? I need to watch this! Alya texted me earlier saying I have to, and she sounded really excited!” Glancing down at the bundle in her arms and flushes red. “Actually, I'll be back in a second!”

“I'll yell as soon as it actually starts.” Jason offers, smiling warmly at her.

Marinette just misses the smile, rushing back to her room, and throwing a quick, “thanks,” over her shoulder back at him.

Also missing his smile turn fond and the good-natured roll of his eyes at her antics.

Barely half a minute passes before she's bounding back into the lounge, with a sleepy Tikki at her heels. She plops herself down on the sofa next to him and hopes the blush on her face could simply be mistaken for the flush of running about like a mad thing instead. Tikki whines until Marionette picks her up and lets her on the sofa with them, padding over to the furthest corner to curl up in.

Jason points to the pink floral steaming mug on the coffee table, right next to his Pride Prejudice and Zombies themed mug. “Whilst you were in the shower, I made us both hot chocolates with marshmallows, my granddad Alfie's recipe.”

“Oh!” Marinette responds in pleasant surprise. She turns to him and positively beams, eyes shining with happiness. “Thank you so much, Jason! You're always so thoughtful!”

He blushes and rubs the back of his neck bashfully. “Yeah, well, I thought it's only fair since you normally make 'em. And I visited Alfie recently, and I promised to get you his recipe to try, so I thought it'd be a nice surprise for once!” He pauses and points at the big bowl also on the coffee table, “also I cooked us some popcorn.”

“Aw! Thank you again! I really appreciate this!” She scoops up the hot chocolate with slight reverence and takes a sip. Immediately her face lights up even more in joy. “Oh, this is delicious!”

Jason chuckles, “isn't it the best! I'll pass that onto Alfie though, he'll be glad to know you like it so much. Speaking of which, he's gonna give making them a try next time I'm up since I wasn't there long enough this time. Would you fancy coming with me to see him, then?”

Her eyes widen and her heart stutters in her chest, feeling close to bursting from happiness. “I'd love to! Do you have a date when you're thinking of going up?”

He nods. “Yeah, maybe around—”

But he's interrupted by the starting audio of the eleven o'clock news.

They both immediately shut up and watch the screen intently as the news anchors appear on the show. The starting discussion is somewhat boring, talking about the local billionaire Wayne-or-something business and a related upcoming charity event of some sort.

Marinette doesn't pay attention to it, but she does catch Jason wrinkling his nose and scowling at the conversation.

Luckily, the topic shifts quickly enough. “And now, over to our newest reporter, Alya. We hear there's been some rumblings regarding the conflict between local vigilante Chat Noir, his sidekick Maladroit, and the gang controlled by the infamous Red Hood himself.”

“That's stupid,” Jason grumbles, “Maladroit is a fully-fledged vigilante in her own right and not just the catboy's sidekick. That's like saying Nightwing is Batman's sidekick!”

Marinette frowns, very touched by his words and trying her damnedest to appear nonchalant. “I don't know… from all the-uh news clips, Maladroit seems like Chat Noir's sidekick to me. She's always hovering nervously near him like a strong wind would spook her.”

“C'mon! She's been reported to have held her own against Red Hood on multiple occasions, alone!” He argues, sounding rather offended on her alter egos behalf.

Scoffing, she shakes her head. “Clearly that's because he's going easy on her! He's never directly shot her, according to the reports clearly, he's soft on her!” The lies taste bitter on her tongue.

Jason splutters and flushes bright red, turning away from her slightly. “W-well that's obviously a testament to her skill and not Red Hood's mercy! He's always reported as being a merciless killer, why'd he be soft on her!”

“I don't know!” She makes a dying-choking noise as she flushes even more red than earlier. Shoving a handful of popcorn into her mouth to avoid having to respond any further.

Luckily, the news shows pans over to Alya standing in front of a screen showing a recorded feed of a warehouse. Not just any warehouse, but specifically the one on fourth that Maladroit had faced Red Hood in less than an hour ago.

Marinette feels her pulse quicken at the reminder of the close shave she'd had.

“Hey wait a second, those warehouses don't have security cameras at all? How'd they get this footage?” Jason complains, eyes narrowed at the TV.

It feels as though ice has been poured down her spine at his words. She freezes, body stiffening in shock. He's right… G said there's none because that's why he asked me to check things out. The only people who'd know this are Chat, Gamer, myself, and Red Hood and his gang. She swallows thickly and tries to subtly side-eye Jason. Oh no. I've been crushing on my roommate who works for Red Hood's gang? Oh god! The friend with the emergency was referring to Red Hood calling him into work!

She can't help but inhale a shallow panicked breath. He could've been one of the lackeys shooting at me and Chat this past week. Or, or I could've hurt him with my yo-yo. Or—

Jason turns to fully face, clearly registering the blatant panic on her face. “Hey, hey, hey, Marinette, you're okay, you're safe. What's wrong?”

“Are you working for Red Hood?” Marinette blurts out, accidentally, the words pouring out in an unintentional panicked rush. “Are you in his gang?”

He jerks back, fear, confusion, and hurt crosses his face. “Wh-what? What makes you think that?”

“His gang was just in that warehouse, and you were out on an emergency for a "friend". And how would you have known unless you were there tonight and working for his gang?” She chews her lip forcefully and winces as the taste of iron floods her mouth.

He reaches towards her, eyes widening concern.

She flinches back, suddenly reminded of how similar this is to that moment with Red Hood on the warehouse balcony.

Jason jerks back as if her flinching burnt him. Raising his hands, he leans away from her to give her some semblance of space. “Fuck. Look, I'm not going to hurt you! Have I ever hurt you whilst we've been roomies?”

Nervously, she shakes her head.

“I really care about you, Marinette. Hell, we've lived together for nearly a year now. I would never hurt you, okay! I promise.” Tears prick in his eyes, and he grimaces slightly, lowering his hands to rest on his lap. “Yeah, I uh, I'm working for him. But I do everything I can to keep work from following me home. I didn't tell you because I never wanted to scare you.”

Guilt gnaws at her. “I'm sorry! I shouldn't have judged. I—” She takes a shaky breath, “I really really care about you too. I'm just worried, what if Red Hood, or even Maladroit, or any of the other vigilantes hurt you? What if you get hurt in one of those gang wars?” Her words aren't lies but they're not the full truth either.

He sighs, “I can't promise I won't ever get hurt on the job. Maladroit and the other vigilantes do a lot of good but Maladroit especially is far too nice to hurt any of us. I've uh, seen her fight some of the others gang members, and been fought by her too. And out of everyone against the gang, she's the one who leaves us with barely more than a scratch at worst.” He rubs the back of his neck. “Most in the gang really respect her for that, y'know.”

Marinette's brain feels like the windows shutting down sound. “Oh. Oh.”

Sheepishly, he smiles half-heartedly at her. “Yeah.”

“So, is that why you were so adamant she's a fully-fledged vigilante in her right?” She asks, feeling bashful yet honoured whilst completely surprised.

Jason clears his throat and glances away. “Uh-huh.”

“Oh.” Her brain rewinds a moment. She splutters for a second, desperation racing through her. “Wait, she's fought you!?”

Full-on grimacing, he nervously laughs. “Left but a scratch!”

“Are you misquoting Monty Python right now? Oh good gods, that's the knight who says that after getting his limbs chopped off!” Marinette exclaims, looking every bit as horrified as her tone of voice conveys.

“Seriously, I've never gotten worse than a couple of minor cuts and bruises, I'm fine!” Jason reiterates.

She frowns and gingerly shuffles across the sofa closer to him. He keeps leaning back away, so she physically throws herself at him, pulling him into a tight hug. Incidentally burying her face in his shirt. “Okay, okay. Just, please let me know next time you get hurt. I've a friend who lived in a bad situation before, so I know how to help patch up minor injuries. Promise?”

Jason stiffens at the hug and slowly moves one hand to cup the back of her head whilst wrapping the other around her back. He shuts his eyes, cocking his head back and sighs. “Alright. I promise I'll tell you. And I'm sorry for keeping something this big from you. As I said, I was worried you'd be scared of me or that you'd get dragged into gang-related shit because of it.”

“You don't need to apologise.” Marinette mumbles in response, “I get it. I really do understand.” She bites at her sore bleeding lips again in guilt, her secret identity left unspoken on her tongue.

He shrugs, “so uh. I'm guessing you're still happy to stay roomies then, right?”

“Of course!” She responds without missing a beat hugging him even tighter.

Eventually, they release each other from the embrace to finish their now lukewarm hot chocolates and popcorn. The news continues playing, no longer forgotten in the background as the two try to act as if nothing has changed.

———

Jason collapses onto his bed with a heavy sigh. He pulls out his phone and rings a number on autopilot.

The dial tone plays as the line connects. “Hey, whaddup Jay?”

“Holy fucking shit balls, man.” Jason groans. “I fucked up.”

Roy hums, “like need help burying a body fucked up or what?”

Jason groans even louder, smushing his face into his bed covers. “My roomie is smart, right. I accidentally let a tiny detail slip when we were chatting whilst watching the eleven o'clock news as usual. And she now thinks that I'm in Red Hood's gang.”

There's a long pause, before Roy bursts into raucous laughter. “Holy shit, I'm dying! She's not wrong!”

“Yeah. I know. She ain't right either though.” He grumbles in response. “She was absolutely terrified when she realised. Nearly had a full-on panic attack and everything.”

“Oh fuck.” Roy helpfully says.

Jason grunts in agreement. “She was also real concerned that Red Hood or the vigilantes have hurt me.”

“Well, that's better?” Roy offers, sounding rather unsure of his own words.

“Yeah but she's taken thinking I'm some low-level member of my gang this badly, how the fuck d'ya think she's gonna take finding out I'm the big bad Red Hood himself?” Jason sighs. “I don't want to ask her out without her knowing this, 'cause it could endanger her.”

Roy hums again, “well, you've been roommates this long already and she's been completely safe from the Vigilante-Gang life so far.”

There's a gentle thump as Jason lifts his head and throws it into the sheets again out of sheer frustration. He relents, reluctantly. “That's true…”

“See. And since it sounds like she's not planning on moving out, clearly she doesn't mind living with you. Just ask her out to dinner already.” Roy adds, cheerfully.

Huffing, he rolls over on the bed. “I'm starting to feel like those weird girl slumber party ads with the creepy phone-a-boy games.”

Roy wheezes, followed by a thudding noise and the distant sound of his cackling.

“Wow. And to think I called you for help. I'm offended.” Jason goads with no bite, waiting a few seconds to hear Roy's response but it's just more laughter.

He rolls his eyes and ends the call, not like Roy will mind. Throwing an arm over his face, Jason barely refrains from grabbing his pillow to scream into. He doesn't, obviously. Because the walls are thin enough that Marinette might hear him and he's worried her enough this night as is.

Sighing like a lovesick protagonist in a period romance novel, Jason moves his arm to run his fingers through his own hair. A date. Just gotta ask her at some point, to dinner at a fancy-ish restaurant. It'll be fine, what's the worst that can happen?

Her terrified reaction on the sofa flashes through his mind, followed by the reminder of how small and scared Maladroit had seemed when she had fallen to her knees on the warehouse balcony. There was no way that she was faking the pain, like he'd initially thought. She had practically staggered in her mad dash to escape. And there's no way for me to find out whether she got to somewhere safe afterwards. God, she could be lying dead in some dank alleyway for all I know right now. Fuck, I hope she's okay...

He groans in distress and shifts in place. Already feeling like he really won't be getting any sleep at all tonight at this rate, thanks to his concern for those two.

———

| Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this little fic! Comments, Likes, and Reblogs are much appreciated! |

| I decided to go close to canon for names this time, hence why Chat Noir remains unchanged but Max is Gamer (because A. that was his Akuma name, and B. he's like Player from Carmen Sandiego in this, couldn't help myself), and Marinette is Maladroit (from the first thing she calls herself in Origins). |

| Oh, also whilst it's not explicitly stated in the text; Marinette/Maladroit's has the power of luck/being lucky, Chat Noir has the power of being unlucky, and Red Hood has "Perfect Aim" aka he's a hitscan. Which is why Maladroit is able to dodge his bullets by making herself "lucky enough" to dodge in time. |

| Also feel free to send me any comments with any questions you have regarding this fic, I'll be more than happy to answer! |

| @jasonette-july-event |

[hungrywhovianjedi]

Twin Moons

read also on my AO3 and my FF.net read the rest here prologue chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3

Premise of the story:  Obi-Wan never took Luke to Tatooine in fact they overshot the force forsaken dustball completely and instead Luke grew up on the planet Lothal being trained to become a Jedi like his father before him. Ezra Bridger is an orphan loner who only makes an exception to his solitude for one boy. The boy who helped him out when he was seven, and that Ezra always seems to get into trouble.

NOW FOR THE BIG REVEAL The cover of Twin Moons art is by the amazingly talented @sunflova​ 

He took it all back, when he said Luke was more like his mother he took it back, as he looked through the wreckage that was a speeder bike and tie fighter he admitted it. He raised another Anakin. Yet another Skywalker with a reckless streak that caused chaos wherever he went. This level of Reckless he hadn't seen in fifteen years!

He knew Luke was alive, despite his initial panic, he could still feel the steady if dull connection between them, and had felt the fear when Luke noticed he was starting to lose his sense of his mentor in the force.

More concerning was still the cold weight that had settled over Lothal, only that coldness made him glad Luke was not on this planet right now, a shadow had come to land on this planet, and it was better that Luke not encounter it. 

Feeling this darkness was like being pushed back in time, the worst night of his life. He was suddenly facing Anakin on Mustafar. He didn't know what brought him here, but Vader was on Lothal, and Ben was prepared for the worst. 

Although preferably he would avoid his former apprentice completely, and find a ship to follow Luke off the planet.  He knew the boy was frightened, could feel it in their bond. He sent a wordless reassurance through the force, and only hoped Luke would receive it. 

~~~~~~~

Anger burned through him, a red hot flame cutting through everything. The first thing he gets told upon landing is of incompetence. An entire shipment of arms lost to, as the reports and security footage said, two smugglers and children. He watched again the footage showed two young boys jumping a median on a stolen speeder. His eyes were drawn again to the boy driving a halo of golden hair, and a stern set to his mouth. There was something deeply familiar about the boy, but he couldn't place it. 

"Get me agent Kallus" He ordered, then after a moment of thought, "and bring me the sorry excuse of a commander that claims to be in charge of this battalion"

"Yes sir!" The trooper by the door saluted, and marched through the door. 

Stormtroopers, he sneered at the thought, he missed the Clones, he never had mishaps like this when he commanded the 501st. The Clones would have deftly handled the thieves, and he wouldn't have to get ISB involved. However the Clones were made dispensable, their advanced aging process taking its toll, and they were all but broken down shells now. They kept a few on to train legions of troopers, but otherwise they were dead or AWOL. One of these was his once Captain and Friend CT7567 Rex. He was disappointed when he heard that Rex's ship went down. 

To this day he still got the pang in his chest about the reality of that day. Ahsoka… Rex wasn't the only friend he lost then. 

"Good luck" the last words spoken between them,  he would never forget the pain of finding her saber in the wreckage of that venator, knowing that he inadvertently caused her demise. 

He clenched his fist, what was wrong with him? Why was he being haunted by the past of Anakin Skywalker after all these years, it was like something on this planet was pulling all of the things that he had buried to the surface. It all began with that presence, like a light in the darkness so much like Padmè it hurt. 

"My lord" the voice pulled the sith lord from his thoughts.

He turned to face the men who entered,  "Agent Kallus, Commander Arescko. It has been brought to my attention that the afternoon's fiasco, was in fact not the first of such disturbances to happen under your watchful eye, and yet these thieves, remain unapprehended" 

Arescko swallowed, visibly uncomfortable with facing Vader. "My Lord, these brigands knew our protocol, and were waiting in position" 

Vader folded his arms, "so it was your protocol to have a secured imperial comm unit stolen? Or was it your protocol that caused several casualties, and the loss of thousands of credits worth of stolen firepower? The fact is Commander, if you had been diligent in your duties these brigands would not have had the chance to ambush your troops. Reports across Lothal have spoken of this crew, and yet you did nothing to prepare your men for the inevitable attack"

The commander shook, trying to remain calm. He knew of Vader's reputation, and what usually happened to those who dissatisfied him. "I assure you my lord-"his words cut off sharply into choking gasps.

"I will not abide incompetence commander"

Kallus shifted uncomfortably as the commander's choked breathing faded, and Vader dropped the man to the ground. Kallus did not check if the man was still alive, he was certain that Vader would not have released him if that was the case. 

"Agent Kallus, do you know what these attacks suggest?"

"Yes My Lord. The Imperial security bureau pays attention to patterns, and this is shaping to form a spark of rebellion" he stood at attention, not wavering under the gaze of Darth Vader, "I assure you, since being deployed here, I have made preparations for the next strike these would be rebels make. I have set up a trap for them. We will crush this spark of rebellion"

"See that you do" Vader replied tersely, "and when you do, the boy on those tapes, bring him to me alive. There is something familiar about him"

Kallus saluted and walked out.

 ~~~~~~~

Space… they were in space, force knows how far away from Lothal, Luke could barely sense Ben in his mind, and it unnerved him. Ben was the constant in his life. Since as long as he remembered it was him and Ben. Going to the market, meditation training together, exploring the mountains of Lothal, training with his saber, each time Ben was there. His absence was like a cold dark spot in his mind. After watching the hyperspace jump, the man, who finally introduced himself as Kanan, had taken him to the cockpit where he met the pilot, Hera. 

He had to admit, he admired Hera's courage, facing down the Empire in an old freighter, and he was set slightly at ease when the Twilek told him they would be returning to Lothal as soon as she could calculate the next jump. 

"Let me go! You can't keep me here, take us back to Lothal!" Ezra bellowed as Zeb hauled him into the cockpit. 

Luke looked back to his friend and saw the noted relief the other boy showed. 

"Relax, that's exactly what we're doing" Hera's voice held an edge of humor.

Ezra looked panicked, "wait, now? With the Empire chasing us?"

Luke spoke up then, "it's okay Ez, she lost the fighters" he looked up at Hera, "she's an amazing pilot"

The woman seemed pleased with his praise, "like the kid said, we lost the fighters when we jumped and the ghost can scramble its signature so they can't track us when we return"

"Oh, that's pretty cool" Ezra looked stunned, but like always shook it off, and smirked, "alright, so just drop me, Luke and our blasters off outside of capital city"

The door slid open, Kanan and Sabine walking in

"They're not your blasters" Sabine stated, brushing past Ezra, shooting Luke a quick smile.

"And we're not going back to Capital City, jobs not done." Kanan finished. 

Luke bit his lip, Hera hadn't mentioned that they weren't being taken back home, "We're not?"

Hera shook her head, "we have a deadline to meet, then we'll get both of you back where you belong if that's still what you want"

Luke nodded, he really did, he missed his uncle, and he only hoped where they landed was close enough for him to reach Ben again. 

~~~~~~ 

Ezra was fuming, how dare these people refuse to bring them home! He didn't care about their job, he wanted his blasters so he could sell them on the black market and have a little cash to live off of, then there was the fact that Luke was acting weird. 

The blonde was usually so happy and talkative, he had barely said a word since they jumped onto this ship seeming almost fearful of the crew. 

Then there were these people they treated Luke like some lost little kid, and him? They treated him like a common Loth-rat he hated it. Ezra wanted to go home, wanted his best friend back, and never wanted to see this ship again!

He sat in one of the bucket seats in the cockpit, Luke in the other, legs pulled to his chest, head bowed and eyes closed. Ezra wondered if he was sleeping. 

"We're coming for a landing, you boys want to stretch your legs? We'll be here for a while" 

Ezra glanced again at Luke who hadn't even stirred, but he saw a smile on the other boy's face  that hadn't been there before. He always marveled at the way Luke could do that, just drop into total relaxation at the drop of a hat, he had seen the boy do it many times, at times it was almost like he was seeing nothing and everything at the same time. Ezra envied the ease with which Luke found peace, and sometimes wished he could be more like him. He knew he was brash and abrasive, but he couldn’t help it. Being the way he was, it was the only thing that allowed him to live on his own. It gave him the aura that kept people from messing with him. Be abrasive and they left you alone. It worked on everyone.

Everyone except Luke it seemed. 

~~~~~~

The force surrounded him, he gathered his fear and uncertainty and released it to the force. It took longer this time than usual to find his center and drop into a meditative trance, the alien sounds of the ship invading his thoughts. In the end, he latched onto the familiar. He reached out in the force and found Ezra, the other boys presence, a soothing balm. 

Luke breathed in, and out steadily, looking to lose himself in the force. Take his anger release it, his fear release it, his uncertainty release it. He took in a deep breath, and silently repeated the words Ben would tell him as the older man taught Luke to find his place in the force. 

Emotion, yet peace

He took the emotions that had been at war in him and pushed them away, they belonged to the force.

Ignorance, yet knowledge 

He released the questions that had been hounding him, force willing someday they would be answered, they also belonged to the force. 

Passion, yet serenity 

He pulled on the peace he found in the force, allowing it to swallow him whole, his passion now belonged to the force.

Chaos, yet harmony 

Chaos surrounded him, burning through Zeb and Ezra, Chopper the droid was certainly a character of chaos, but he wouldn't allow it to touch him, his chaos belonged to the force.

Death, yet the force 

Like many times he felt the caress of a woman's hand on his cheek, people didn't keep themselves in the force Ben said, but Luke knew he was wrong, in his meditation, he felt his mother, her hand on his skin, her voice in his ear. When he realized what it was, he sought also the touch of his father, but the force had stopped him, a black vortex before him, that threatened to swallow him. He turned from the vortex and released his mothers touch to the force. His life belonged to the force. 

Emotion, yet peace

Ignorance, yet knowledge 

Passion, yet serenity 

Chaos, yet harmony 

Death, yet the force 

This time like many as he moved through the force, he found a dormant tether, one that neither held taught nor hung loosely, it was formed much like his and Ben's, yet somehow deeper, he tried to follow it once when he was younger, but had only been shown a vision of a young girl looking around in a panic. He tried to speak through the tether once, like he did with Ben, only to be cut off from the bond completely with the force of a psychic scream. 

He once asked Ben, who told him it was a connection in the force that he was not yet meant to learn. Luke always wondered who the girl at the other end was, and why she never reached back, but after being cast out, he left it alone. 

Finally he reached for the bond that was always there and pulled lightly, almost crying with joy, when he was answered almost instantly. 

Luke! Where are you, what happened, are you safe?

I'm safe Ben, I'm in a ship heading back to Lothal, Ezra had a bad plan, we ended up getting chased by Stormtroopers the only way out was to jump on a ship with some smugglers, but I think they're okay…

We will talk about all of that soon, but for now I need you to promise me something Luke, stay where you are. If you are safe with these people, stay with them. Someone has come to Lothal, and it is safer for you to stay away from Capital City.

Ben, I don't understand, why wouldn't you want me to come home?

Luke. I promise, I will explain everything soon. For right now however, I need you to stay there. I will find you it is no longer safe here. 

Luke froze, and could feel a stab of ice into his heart, making him lose part of his grasp on the force. It almost felt like somehow someone was probing the bond. No not probing the bond almost consuming it a cold force that reminded him of the swirling darkness that surrounded the spot in the force his father should have been. It was terrifying he had never felt anything like it. The cold threatening to swallow him whole. It blanketed the force around them, and Luke almost pulled away, being calmed only when Ben once more spoke through their bond.

Calm down Luke, remember your training, the force will be with you, and no matter what or however far you stray I will be with you always

Ben I'm frightened 

The force has a plan for us Luke, and something tells me it doesn't end here. Remember Luke. I love you as though you are my own son, and I will see you soon, this I promise.

Luke was pulled from his meditation then, a rough hand on his shoulder

"Wake up kid, time to move, grab a crate, pull your weight" Zeb instructed, before he stomped out of the room. Luke looked outside and saw Lothal's twin moons shining through the front window of the ship.

[bi-naesala]

A small push, a story about two (clueless) people - A talk between brothers

Cody receives a call.

The morning of their departure, Cody wakes up even earlier than he usually does. It happens often when they are on missions: he can use more precious time to check that everything’s in order and that the troopers are well-equipped and know what they’re doing.

This isn’t the only reason why he’s up already: last night he received a message from general Maul, telling him the time of his arrival, which will be shortly. He doesn’t bother telling Kenobi about this, convinced that he must know already, and also maybe because there’s a tiny bit of hope inside him that like this he’ll get to spend at least a few minutes with the zabrak jedi alone; it’s not exactly a long time, but Cody is well aware that it would be foolish to hope for more - even more than how he already feels when he has these thoughts.

He sighs, shaking his head. He doesn’t need to think about that now.

 After checking his gear - spotless as always - Cody puts on his armor, leaving then his quarters towards the refectory. He’d rather eat now with the certainty that he’s going to be the only one - or at least one of the very few - around.

Not that he doesn’t enjoy the presence of his brothers, but before missions he’d rather have some time for himself in order to gather his thoughts and focus. He needs no teasing vod now.

As he enters, he’s pleased to see that he’s the first one there, good. At least like this he’s going to avoid very embarrassing situations like the one that happened yesterday at the showers; Waxer and Boil are always a big headache for him, the way only younger brothers can be, so he can’t deny having been a bit too happy when he assigned them to cleaning duty, that way they’re going to learn how to keep their mouth shut.

He picks up a tray and some food, but most importantly he takes two cups of caf - knowing well that he’s later going to refill at least one of them again - chuckling between himself at the memory of Helix harassing him for his “caf addition”, something that he clearly doesn’t have - he’s just blowing things out of proportion. He can’t be disappointed in him if he doesn’t see how much he actually drinks, right?

 Just as he’s sat down, ready to “enjoy” his breakfast, he receives a call from his comm. Weird, it’s not general Maul, is…

“Wolffe.”

“Hello there, Kot’ika.”

Cody tries really hard not to sneer at that name; no matter how many times he tells Wolffe to stop calling him that, his batchmate continues doing it without any consideration about how he feels about it. Typical.

“Aren’t you deployed?” he asks then. He knows Wolffe wouldn’t call him for no good reason, so he can’t help but to worry that something has happened.

Noticing the way he’s beginning to tense, Wolffe is quick to reassure him:

“Relax, everything’s fine here,” he says. “Actually, it’s nighttime here.”

“So why are you calling me now?” Cody asks, back to being wary. If Wolffe isn’t contacting him for an emergency, then it means he just wants to bother him. The smirk on Wolffe’s face only confirms his theory.

“A little birdie told me about a certain someone that you’re going to work with for the next few days…”

“Who told you?” Cody asks, only to realize that he knows the answer already. That little… “Rex is a dead man.”

Wolffe laughs at his words, something so rare that despite what caused it, Cody can’t even be that mad at him.

 “So…”

“So there is nothing to say,” Cody replies, firm. “I don’t know what Rex told you, but the relationship between me and general Maul is purely professional.”

What Cody says doesn’t match up with what Wolffe has been told and what little he’s seen - he can’t exactly say that he, Cody and general Maul being together is a common occurrence - which means that either the rumors are wrong or Cody’s lying, and Wolffe knows exactly which one it is.

“You’re full of poodoo,” he says in fact, “Big, stinky bantha poodoo.”

“Kriff off,” is Cody’s kind reply. Nothing unusual for the both of them.

 “Your pining is worse than Bly’s.” Wolffe can’t help but to say.

“What does Bly have to do with this? Besides, didn’t he get together with his jedi?” Cody asks, confused. Wolffe shoots him a completely unimpressed look.

“That’s why I said you’re worse than him.”

“That’s it! Next time we see each other, prepare yourself to have your shebs kicked!”

It’s time for their conversation to end, but not before Wolffe sends Cody a menacing grin.

“Oh, I’m looking forward to it.”

“Looking forward to what?”

 Both Cody and the holographic Wolffe turn towards the source of voice. While Wolffe casually greets him with an “Hi, Rex” Cody looks more pissed than his vod.

“What did you tell him?” he asks as Rex sets his trail of food right beside Cody’s, sitting on his left.

“The truth, vod,” Rex replies. “Maybe he can manage to get your head out of your shebs and face the truth.”

“There is no truth to face,” Cody says, waving his hand dismissively, “And even if there was… It’s not like I could do something about it, alright? So let’s just drop the subject before I decide that you are my least favorite brothers.”

 At those words Rex and Wolffe exchange a gaze, at least as much as they can while the other is on another planet entirely.

“Cody…” Rex tries again, putting a hand on Cody’s shoulder, who thankfully doesn’t shove him away, “We didn’t mean to upset you--”

“Speak for yourself, I’m just here to have a good laugh,” Wolffe interrupts him, though he soon turns serious again. “But enough joking around. What’s wrong Cody?”

“Is this like the Bly situation?”

“No, Bly was dumb.”

“Hate to break it to you, vod,” Rex intervenes, “But so are you.”

Cody huffs, but apart from that he doesn’t react much, which says a lot without the need to add anything.

“Maul’s a Jedi,” he says then, looking down at his trail rather than his brothers.

“So is Skywalker, and the dude’s married,” Rex points out.

“And general Secura is a Jedi too. It still didn’t stop her,” Wolffe adds, making Cody sigh.

“I know, I just… Ugh! I don’t know, actually!”

 Kote has always been difficult when it comes with emotional matters; it’s a curse he shares with Wolffe and Fox and many other brothers. They just haven’t been equipped with the right tools to deal with them.

Wolffe understands this quite well. Normally he’d leave his brother alone exactly for this reason, but he also wants him to be happy, and it pisses him off when he self-sabotages himself like this!

 “So you admit you like him, right?” Rex asks.

“I thought we had already established that,” Cody finally admits. It’s a step in the right direction.

“And you don’t think he’d be interested because…”

“Because why should he like me back?”

Wolffe remembers all the times he’s seen Kote and Maul together, they way they looked at each other, the way they fought together…

“That’s bullshit,” he says then. This time it’s Cody’s turn to roll his eyes, stealing Wolffe’s signature move.

 “I just don’t think it’s the right time now.”

This is even more confusing that Cody’s refusal to admit that he had feelings for general Maul in the first place.

“Why not?” Wolffe asks. He’s beginning to become done with all of this, but unfortunately he’s not there physically, so it’s not like he can bash Kote and general Maul’s heads together, so he’ll have to use his words for once.

“Didn’t you notice, my dear brother?” is Cody’s reply, “We’re in the middle of a war.”

“Didn’t stop the others,” Rex points out, though both he and Wolffe think they understand the sentiment. It’s certainly not an ideal time, but exactly because of the life they conduct he shouldn’t waste this chance. Although Rex doesn’t have enough courage to bring it up - because that’s a scenario he always tries his best not to consider - Wolffe doesn’t have this kind of problem.

“Cody, you could die any time,” he says in fact, voice deadly serious. “You’d rather die with the regret for what you weren’t able to do?”

 Heavy silence fills the refectory.

Wolffe’s words are true, but this doesn’t make them hurt less: in war nothing is certain, and as much as one can hope to come out of it unscathed, that’s not always the case, especially for them. If Cody doesn’t take his chances now, he might never be able to do it again.

“I’ll ask him after the war,” is what Cody says, and it’s final, both Rex and Wolffe can understand it from his voice. They could keep going at it for days and Cody still won’t change his mind. Stupid di’kut.

“As long as you do it,” Wolffe sighs. “Actually, if you don’t, then I’ll confess to him for you.”

“You won’t!” Cody squeaks immediately, which in turn only manages to convince Wolffe of the rightness of this choice.

“Oh I will, and it will be very embarrassing, trust me,” he threatens in fact, grinning almost manically at the juicy possibilities. He almost hopes Cody won’t confess anything now.

“I’ll bring a camera and the blackmail material,” Rex solemnly declares. Cody looks at him, betrayal evident in his eyes.

“You’re the absolute worst. You are not my brothers anymore,” he says, and after a tense pause… They all share a good laugh. See? In the end they love each other.

 “Well, this is nice and all but…” Wolffe begins, yawning, “I think I’m going to retire for the night. Don’t you dare do anything stupid out there.”

“Same to you,” Cody replies, while Rex wavers his hand to say goodbye.

Wolffe rolls his eyes one last time before signing off, leaving Cody and Rex alone in the refectory.

 “So…” Rex begins after a moment of silence. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“I’d say we already talked about it enough,” Cody replies immediately, sipping his - now cold - caf.

“Yes, but you’re also the king of repressing feelings, so…”

Cody gives Rex a half-hearted elbow.

“I’m not.”

“Yes you are,” Rex insists, though he doesn’t press the topic anymore, mostly because more people are beginning to arrive and he wouldn’t want to be overheard by someone who should mind his business.

 They keep eating their meal in companionable silence as the refectory becomes louder and more alive by the second.

Rex would love to stay more, but he’d better go fetch general Skywalker and commander Tano since he still hasn’t seen them around, so once he’s done he gets up, taking his trail in hand.

“Well, see you on the battlefield,” he tells Cody then. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

“I should be the one saying it,” Cody replies with a smirk. “I’m not the one who has to run after Skywalker.”

“Point still stands,” Rex retorts, and with that, he walks away, leaving Cody alone.

 This is the first time he admits his feelings to someone else. It was already a big deal when he finally did it to himself, but now more people know about them…

He’s not worried about the news going around because he knows Rex and Wolffe: they might love to tease him but they’d never betray his trust. Besides, he could sense that they asked him not out of simple curiosity but out of worry.

It’s true war is unpredictable, but he doesn’t feel like that alone is enough motivation to ask Maul out anyway. He doesn’t want to do it as marshal commander Cody, but as Cody and just Cody. This is something that he wants to cultivate outside the warzone, even if he knows that this way of thinking can be seen as naïve or too romantic, but that’s not going to change his mind.

He’d never tell it to anyone, but part of the reason why he wants to wait is that he still has to come to terms with this whole thing. It’s a lot, alright? Nobody on Kamino ever taught them this. It’s a new world that he’s navigating alone.

Is he afraid? A bit, even though he doesn’t like it, but well who likes being afraid? Nobody he supposes.

 He sighs.

Now it’s not the time to think about that: they have a mission and Cody must focus on it. He’s a professional, damn it; he won’t let his feelings getting in the way, especially in situations like this one where even a small distraction can lead you to your death.

The mission will always come first, as for the rest… he’ll just have to see, he supposes.

[r6s-imagines]

Heeey saw ur requests are Open, can you do a jackal imagine where he meets his number 1 fan( supposing r6 has a fanbase?in the games lore) and they explain to them how much comfort he ( without knowing ) has given them during dark moments and how they look up to him and tell him he is really strong,and when he goes back to base he feels really touched and low key cries?,sorry if its too much!

this is so sweet omfg yes pls

also, i switched up the end that you requested a little bit, same situation but different setting!

•••

jackal x reader >> biggest fan

•••

MASTERLIST

warnings: cursing, soft moments

•••

summary: a public appearance leads to a tearful confrontation.

•••

“i think a night out would be good for you, ramírez,” mira begged in spanish, leaning against the doorframe. “when’s the last time you spent a day away from your screen?”

“is that important?” he responded. “we’ve both got work. better have it done now than never.”

“we planned a food drive, few miles from here. you’re serving.”

“do i have to?” jackal didn’t mean that, his mind was overtaken with his occupation. perhaps his concerns were useless, and maybe a minute in the real world would refresh his system. for a moment, his mind flashed to his brother, and the conditions they grew up in. his heart ached at the thought of anyone else going through the same, and he suddenly arose, tying his long undercut into a bun and donning his policia jacket. mira nodded and departed, sending a reminder to the comms about the event.

the last time this much press was on ryad was that dismal day, and each flash and reporter that passed by while he sat in the car made him shudder. there’s a reason i’m always inside, he thought, exhaling, but his mind clawed at the thought, desperate to remove it from his conscience. nothing could ever stop these feelings, those of not being good enough, of never being there for anyone. he turned towards his teammate, lion.

“flament,” he began, folding his hands. “how do you do it?”

“how do you mean?” he replied, single eyebrow raised in surprise.

“through all the problems you’ve come through, how do you persist?”

“well...” he flexed his jaw, giving his full attention to ryad as he turned. “you won’t be able to help everyone, and i’ve come to terms with that. if i know someone can be saved, i do my best to make sure they don’t have the same life i did.”

you won’t be able to help everyone.

his throat tightened.

a large white building topped with a bell came into view, and the operators applied an anti-paparazzi scarf to save them from the press. flashes, screams, barks and praises came to jackal’s ears as he entered the church, prepared to receive instructions. him, lion, mira, buck and amaru stood in a circle in an attempt to block out the citizens’ shouts from outside. one by one, they shrugged off the scarves and received orders.

“you know your positions, we don’t need to chitchat, now, let’s get to work!” mira announced, nodding once. everyone parted, heading to the front doors which were already prepared by church staff. ryad found a station which was stacked with tinfoil-wrapped provisions.

morning turned to a warm afternoon as the line dwindled, the reporters quieted and the food was chilling. ryad’s theories were right: even a couple hours of fresh air seemed to detox his body, fill him with a new spirit that longed to be productive.

ryad turned to his right, watching buck stir the soup idly.

“thirty more minutes,” he mumbled. just as he announced the time, someone strolled up, puppy eyes immediately grabbing jackal’s attention.

“excuse me?” the person quietly said, removing their hood to show a young girl, around 19. “are you still serving?”

“absolutely,” ryad said, smiling. “is there anything specific you’d like? we’ve got a lot left.”

“um...” her eyes scanned across the tables, each operator fixing their gaze onto her. “what kind of meats do you have?”

mira’s eyes widened, turning towards her friend, and shrugged. ryad waved her off, looking back at the girl.

“hotdog?” he held up an aluminum wrapped hotdog, holding it out.

“without the bun, please,” she insisted, waving a hand.

“aren’t you a strange one?” lion added, leaning into the conversation.

“hm? it’s not for me,” she smiled lightly at lion, unwrapping the food and holding the hotdog in her hand. wordlessly, she tossed it up. to everyone’s surprise, a dog leaped into the air, catching it flawlessly and proceeding to finish it on the floor. “and... i’ll take some soup for me.”

“that’s incredible!” jackal called, leaning over the table to stick his hand towards the dog. “what’s his name?”

“he’s named after you...” she pushed a piece of hair from her face. “jackal.” ryad felt as if his heart swelled watching her blush in shame.

“why jackal?” he dared to ask.

“he’s a beagle. he tracks.”

she looked at her worn shoes.

“i’m a really big fan, sir,” she wiped her nose, stuffing her hands in her pockets. “i’ve seen all the good you do. i don’t have much, not a home or family. i wanna be like you someday.

“thank you, but it’s really the team that saves the day,” ryad insisted, grinning.

“no, i’ve heard about you on the news. rainbow six extracted hostage! rainbow six disarmed bomb! rainbow six secured a biohazard! if you weren’t there, your team would rush in blindly. you’re a legend, sir!”

ryad was taken aback by the honesty. not once did he consider himself a legend, let alone a truly valuable asset. he almost laughed at how many times he’s been banned from participating. it was his eyenox, not his talent, he told himself...

...but watching her speak about him so highly with her dog and puppy-eyed stare made him rethink. am i a good person?

he saw his brothers eyes, open to the ceiling. he heard the sirens and the reporters describe the murders. the last person to reassure him of his worth is long gone, buried under a mystery he’s spent his entire life uncovering.

“who are you?” ryad inquired, leaning on the table.

“y/n,” she bent down to pet jackal.

“y/n,” he repeated, grabbing her attention. “don’t let anyone tell you you’re worth less than you are. no matter the situation, things always get better.”

“th...thank you, sir,” she held her food close, taking off into a sprint with jackal behind her. ryad waved his hand in a gentle manner, left in a state of awe.

“what a niña extraña,” mira noticed, shouldering ryad. “i’m glad you came out today.”

“sí,” his eyes were trained onto the horizon. his eyes stung, suddenly feeling moist. “she reminds me of myself.”

“how’s that?” she asked.

“ready to take on the world,” he elaborated. “not afraid of a challenge.”

a single tear slipped down his cheek, weaving through his aged creases and stubble.

[gumnut-logic]

We’ll Be Home For Christmas 3.1

Title: We’ll be home for Christmas

Day Three - If not for the courage of the fearless crew – Part 1 Prologue | 1.1 | 1.2 | 2.1 | 2.2 | 2.3

Author: Gumnut

23 - 27 Dec 2019

Fandom: Thunderbirds Are Go 2015/ Thunderbirds TOS

Rating: Teen

Summary: The boys can’t fly home for Christmas, so they have to find another way.

Word count: 3823

Spoilers & warnings: language and so, so much fluff. Science!Gordon. Artist!Virgil, Minor various ships, mostly background.

Timeline: Christmas Season 3, I have also kinda ignored the main storyline of Season 3. The boys needed a break, so I gave them one. Post season 3B, before Season 3C cos we haven’t seen it yet.

Author’s note: For @scattergraph. This is my 2019 TAG Secret Santa fic :D I hope you enjoy it.

Please note that I am not a scientist, only an artist with mad librarian skillz. I may have stretched a few facts in places here, for which I apologise, though I did research a hell of a lot to get this written (at one point I was only writing one or two lines before I had to research another fact…it was a very long process). I hope you enjoy it anyway. :D

Many thanks to @vegetacide and @scribbles97 for cheering me on and their wonderful support through this craziness. And to @onereyofstarlight for geeking out with me over the setting.

Disclaimer: Mine? You’ve got to be kidding. Money? Don’t have any, don’t bother.

-o-o-o-

 Day Three - If not for the courage of the fearless crew

 When Virgil woke late the next morning, the yacht was already in motion. He sighed as he crawled out of bed, body groaning the entire way.

Stumbling into the living area, he didn’t even have to look for the coffee. John simply met him halfway and handed him a mug.

He inhaled it. The hot beverage ran down his throat and within minutes his brain was beginning to boot.

A hand landed on John’s shoulder in honest gratitude. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Okay, so that grin was a little smug, but the coffee was worth it. That and it was a novelty to have John for breakfast at any time. He squeezed his brother’s shoulder, blaming not enough caffeine for the sudden soppy.

His brother frowned at him. “How are you feeling?”

Okay, that fixed the soppy. He rolled his eyes. “I’m fine.”

The frown turned into a smirk. “Sure. Would you like some eggs? I hid the last of the bacon from Alan, so there is some if you like.”

The soppy returned. You’d think he was on drugs or something. Must be the sea air. “Thanks, John.”

His brother peered at him a little more before ushering him to sit down and busying himself in the kitchenette. It wasn’t long before the tantalising smell of bacon sizzling wafted through the living area.

“Hey! I thought we were out of bacon!” Alan was not impressed as he strode in, game console in hand. “You lied to me!”

John snorted as he placed the plate full of bacon and eggs in front of Virgil along with a glass of orange juice. “So, you would have eaten Virgil’s share?” The arched eyebrow was challenging.

“Nooo.”

“Sure, Alan.” John turned around and walked back into the kitchen obviously not believing his brother.

Alan sat down across from Virgil. “I wouldn’t, honest, Virg.”

Perhaps his littlest brother’s brain was not connected to his hand because Virgil had to slap it away from his plate almost immediately. “Sure, Alan.”

The bacon was good and the eggs just right. Mouth full, “John, this is divine.”

The snort from the kitchenette was loud, but the only comment he received in reply.

Virgil slapped Alan’s hand away again and glared at him. “So, who’s winning the game.”

Alan was immediately distracted. “I was, but then John pulled a stunt with a rogue asteroid, which I’m not entirely sure was legal...” His voice rose specifically in the direction of the kitchenette.

“Game allowed it.”

“Yeah, well, I PM’d the developers and they knew nothing about it!”

“Gregory never remembers what he programs. The guy does it in his sleep half the time.”

“Hah! Grez is totally cool. He said you’re a stick in the mud.”

John wandered back into the room wiping his hands on a tea towel. “Gregory is also a card-carrying member of the Flat Earth society.”

A snort from Alan. “So?”

“The man has been to space, Al. He designs video games, set in space. Explain the logic behind that?”

“Denial? Imagination? A little too much college night life?”

John threw the towel back into the kitchen. “All of the above. So, yeah, game allows it, it’s legal.”

“Well, I’m gonna whip your ass in the void between galaxies. Gonna stoke my ship with engines only you can dream of.”

Taking a seat at the end of the table, John did not appear concerned in the slightest. “Hey, Virgil, would you like to assist me in developing a fictional intergalactic drive.”

An arched eyebrow as he munched on bacon and glanced between the two of them. “Hmmm, sure.”

“Hey! No fair. No engineering brothers allowed. If you get Virgil, I get Brains.”

John grinned. “Go for it. International Rescue could do with one of those.”

Virgil snorted. He loved Brains like a brother, but the man did not know the difference between reality and fiction. Postulate an idea such as this, give him a few hours and he’d have a working theory. Let him go, and he’d build it. The game would be forgotten the moment Alan mentioned the concept.

“You suck.”

“Just using the tools at hand, Alan.”

Virgil blinked. “You just called me a tool.”

John shrugged and opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted by a string of profanity from their captain up on the bridge. The boat suddenly accelerated, swerving to port, and Virgil had to grab the remains of his breakfast as it tried to slide off the table.

A frowning Scott strode through the room. A worried glance at Virgil and John, he took the most direct route towards the bridge and disappeared. Alan dropped his console onto the lounge and darted after him.

At higher speeds, the boat began to bounce off the wave peaks. Virgil decided that staying put was probably in his best interests and apparently John agreed as he reached out and gently grabbed Virgil’s arm.

“I’m okay.”

“Just making sure.”

He didn’t bother responding to that.

Wherever the boat was going, apparently it got there quickly because it wasn’t at full acceleration for long and it slowed quickly to a stop, her hull wallowing in the water at the sudden lack of forward momentum.

As Virgil pushed himself to his feet, he glared at the hand wrapped around his bicep. John didn’t let go.

“If you fall on your face on my watch, Scott will kill me.”

“I’m fine.”

His brother still didn’t let go. This was ridiculous.

But apparently smother was in the Tracy genetic code, because John held onto him the entire way up to the bridge. Only to find it locked down and empty.

All three brothers were out on the bow of the boat.

He could hear Gordon swearing from here. What the hell had his brother all riled up?

It took his slow way onto the bow - those steps still hurt, damn it - for him to find out.

“It’s caught in her mouth. Goddamnit!”

“Hey, hey, Gordon. We can help her. Tell us what we need to do.” Scott’s voice was tense. Virgil read it clearly as pissed, but needing to calm a brother and fix a problem before blowing a circuit.

What the hell had happened?

“Gordon?”

His fish brother shot distraught eyes in his direction. “We’ve got a humpback calf caught in a gill net. A fucking illegal gill net. Here. I’m gonna string the bastards up and Mel is gonna skin them alive!”

Gordon stormed past Virgil and John, heading towards the back of the boat, thumbing his comms. “Mel, you got your ears on?”

Virgil turned to look out across the surface of the ocean and sure enough a single dark buoy appeared just off to port about fifty metres away. To his horror there was a weak whale spout just as his eyes focussed on the spot.

Scott strode past and gently clasped his shoulder, his eyes bleak before following Gordon aft. Alan hurried after him.

A glance at John found his brother’s professional facade well in place. Gordon could be heard yelling over his comms from the other end of the boat.

The whale breached again.

Shit.

-o-o-o-

Scott followed his little brother as he stormed down the length of his yacht.

“Mel, what the hell do you mean this isn’t the first time.”

“Don’t get me wrong, Gordon, I’m as angry as you, but these assholes know what they are doing. I’ve had the coast guard out here sixteen times in the last year and they haven’t managed to catch one of them. We’ve lost turtles, sunfish, rays and earlier in the season a humpback died of its injuries. We can’t locate the nets. They don’t appear on our scanners.”

“Well, they appear on mine and I’m not putting up with this crap.”

“Any help is appreciated, Gordon. If I knew you’d be able to detect them, I would have called you in earlier. If you can give us the locations, it would be much appreciated.”

“I’ll get John on it immediately. In the meantime, we have an injured calf and a distressed mother to attend to.”

“Do you want me down there?”

His brother paused a moment and dragged in a calming breath. “I’ll do an assessment. If I need help, I’ll call Kayo to come get you.”

“Keep me in the loop, Thunderfish. Play it safe. Mamma Humpback is going to be anxious.” A pause. “Sorry your vacation has been interrupted.”

“Screw my vacation. We’re gonna get these bastards.” Scott didn’t think he had ever seen his brother so angry. It was understandable. “Speak to you soon. A Little Lightning out.”

Gordon immediately turned to Scott. “We have a situation.”

Scott let his head drop just a little in acknowledgment. “Yes, we do. This is yours, Thunderbird Four. Tell me what you need.”

-o-o-o-

With the power of TB5 they discovered an intricate network of netting just to the west of the Kermadecs, trailing intermittently down their full length. To regular sensors they were invisible, but to IR sensors they were a flicker. A flicker John was able to focus on and bring up a clear picture.

Gordon, now dressed in his IR uniform, swore a bluestreak at how many nets were actually out there. John put him through to WASP Command and Gordon gave a very colourful report to the regional commander, who just happened to be a former squad mate of his. Her response was more formal, but no less colourful.

With tight expressions, Gordon, Scott and Alan climbed into the inflatable dingy and rowed their way out to the beleaguered cetacean. Gordon used the effort to push his anger into the oars. He couldn’t afford to have his thoughts clouded by the bastards who had done this.

Sensors told him the calf had a net caught in its mouth and wrapped around its right pectoral fin. The fine mesh hung down its left side, dangling into the depths where it had caught on a snag. The chances of it catching right there were ridiculously small, the waters so deep between the islands. But the net was hundreds of metres long, weighted, and, even tangled, it reached down far enough to snag itself on a submerged pile of rock.

Hell, he was going to need Four to get down that deep to get the net out of the water.

If the calf had been snagged while diving, she wouldn’t have been able to surface to breathe and would have drowned.

Bastards!

Scott darted a glance at Gordon. The aquanaut held his gaze. His eldest brother was dressed in an IR wetsuit. It was startling to see him out of his familiar uniform. Gone was his flight baldric and in its place, yellow slashed across his blue, visibility more the priority underwater. The only concessions to his commander rank were his shoulder patches and twin silver-grey bands on that yellow baldric. Alan was dressed similarly, but where Scott sported silver, Alan sported red. Neither had their helmets on.

Gordon had only mentioned the suits to Scott when preparing for this venture because he had hoped to enjoy some recreational diving. Their suits were far above average equipment, so why not use the best to have a little fun?

Scott had rolled his eyes, but five wetsuits had been thrown into their luggage. They had supposed to be used for sharing his world with his brothers.

Gordon swore under his breath again and tugged at the oars angrily.

“We’ll fix this.” Scott’s voice was calm, ever the commander when on duty. And on duty they were.

When he got his hands on those assholes...

“A Little Lightning to Inflatable. Mother Humpback is on the move towards you.” John had been tracking her frantic circles around her calf.

Gordon dropped the oars and grabbed his scanner. Sure enough, the worried behemoth was angling in towards them. She posed a serious threat despite their benign intentions.

“Roger that, A Little Lightning.”

The inflatable stilled in the water, three pairs of eyes stared out across the surface.

“Be quiet. Here she comes.”

Not twenty metres away, the mother surfaced, her spout spraying them all with angry water. Her huge mass coasted just under the surface and beelined to her daughter.

Gordon’s heart lurched at the distressed groans she made as she nuzzled her trapped calf.

“I’m going in.” He shoved his helmet on.

Scott caught his arm. “Are you sure that is wise?”

He caught his brother’s worried eyes. “You are just going to have to trust me. I know what I am doing.”

A bitten lip, but Scott nodded once and let him go.

Gordon slipped quietly over the edge of the inflatable and into the water.

-o-o-o-

Virgil stood on the bridge of A Little Lightning and swallowed hard. It was frustrating to be caught unable to do anything, but in this kind of situation, it wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling.

Usually, though, he was hovering in Two far above the surface.

John stood beside him, a mission hologram projecting from his tablet, his hands playing the portable controls as smoothly as Virgil played his piano. Eos spoke up quietly, relaying reports from WASP as the organisation swooped in on the illegal fishing organisation somewhere off to the west. His brothers’ vitals danced in one corner, the readout from the sensors and the now deployed sensor buoy hung beside them.

Virgil could only watch.

“Gordon, approach with extreme care. The mother is emitting infrasound, beyond our hearing. She is very distressed.” John’s voice was sharp, but calm as the sensors traced the sound pattern in the air before him.

Whispered. “FAB, John. I can feel it. She may be calling for help. Silence on comms.”

And Virgil realised he could feel it, too. A rumble in his bones, a wail so deep it could only be felt, not heard.

He closed his eyes.

He felt her shift octaves, the sound pulsing, her thrum desperate. It vibrated at the edge of his sensory perception, slipping in and out, barely felt in his body tissues, his fingertips, the sensitive incisions in his gut.

“Virgil? You okay?”

John’s soft voice startled him, throwing him out of focus. “What?”

He received a copper frown for his efforts. “You’re pale.”

“I’m fine.”

Green eyes narrowed, but his brother didn’t comment further. He returned to his holograms, bringing up a satellite lifesign read of the area.

“We’re receiving a reply.” John frowned. “Another. Several. Locating sources. Eos, give me a narrow frequency band and pinpoint.” The AI didn’t answer but several dots appeared on the satellite view. John waved a hand and zoomed in on a cluster in the Southern Ocean. The view focussed and cleared and Virgil was again amazed at Brains’ skill as the surface of the ocean appeared and a pod of whales was defined. They were all travelling in a south-easterly direction.

Over two thousand kilometres from the mother and calf. John zoomed out again and scanned for a closer answer. He found one but it was still fifteen hundred kilometres distant. Far too far away to return to help the distraught mother.

But then another signal came in, this one only three hundred kilometres away to the south-east. John narrowed in on the location, only to find another mother and calf.

“Is that the mother and calf we encountered two days ago?” The subjects of his painting.

“More than likely. Gordon did say it was very late in the season. The humpback whales migrate from tropical waters north-west to south-east across the Kermadec Ridge on their way to feeding grounds near Antarctica during spring. That places the nets in the optimal position to do the most damage.”

Virgil stared at the kilometres of lines denoting the position of so many illegal fishing nets.”

“Do you think WASP will be able to stop this?” His voice came out parched and cold, an echo of the anger building inside.

“They will do their best. Gordon won’t rest, you know that. I’ve also asked Penny to investigate. This impinges on Tracy Industries’ ecological interests so I have contacted the board.” His lips thinned. “We will find those responsible.”

The lines taunted him. How many? How many lives had been taken moments before sanctuary?

“Virgil?”

The mother shifted octaves again and he found himself closing his eyes.

A hand landed on his arm. Soft. “Virgil?”

He startled. John’s turquoise eyes were frowning at him again.

“She’s terrified.”

“Gordon will free her calf.”

“She doesn’t know that.”

Her thrum was in his bones, vibrating his very soul.

And then the calf cried out.

-o-o-o-

Gordon had always felt small beside his brothers, but floating next to a leviathan of the open ocean there was no comparison.

The mother humpback was nuzzling her calf, a mixture of chirps and groans vibrated through the water accompanied by the modulating infrasound, screaming fear across the Pacific.

Knowledge of cetaceans scrolled through Gordon’s mind, but instinct was yelling at him.

Never get between a mother and her baby.

But the baby was in pain and her mother was unable to help her.

He could.

He edged closer, ever quiet, calm.

Mamma shifted in his direction, her great head swinging around and tossing him about in the resultant wake. Gordon caught himself and took the opportunity to slip in even closer.

C’mon, beautiful, I don’t mean you any harm. I’m here to help.

He reached out and touched the calf’s flank.

The calf shifted away, crying out and her mother propelled herself forward towards Gordon.

He darted backwards, holding up a hand. “Hey, hey, I’m here to help.” She couldn’t understand the words, but perhaps the intent?

A groan wrapped around him, followed by a click.

“Gordon!” Scott’s voice echoed about his helmet.

And into the water around him.

Shit.

He scrambled backwards as Mamma reacted. Surging forward she nudged him hard enough to force him to the surface. “Woah!” He got a brief glimpse of Scott gesticulating at him from the inflatable, obviously agitated and then everything was bubbles.

He lost orientation for a moment and just settled for swimming away from the chaos.

“Goddamnit, Gordon, answer me!”

“Shut up, Scott. I’ve got this! Silence on comms!”

He dove.

Deep.

He relied on his suit to keep his body pressure static as he propelled himself fifty metres straight down.

Sunlight flickered turquoise and disappeared into the depths.

Mamma didn’t follow.

Gordon hovered there a moment, looking up at the silhouettes of the two whales and the dingy far above. Mamma returned to nuzzling her calf, her pectoral fins churning the water into bubbles with the smallest movements.

Okay, Gords, you’ve got this. Gentle, calm and persistent.

He began his ascent.

-o-o-o-

Virgil tensed as his brother was thrown from the water only to disappear and dive down deep.

Gordon’s snarl across comms at Scott was acid.

The mother’s call shifted an octave to the point Virgil could almost hear the clear C, F, and G notes hanging in the air.

Three hundred kilometres away, the second mother and calf answered and turned around.

Virgil stared at the dots on John’s map as they slowly began moving towards them. It would take them a good chunk of the day and night to reach the distressed calf, but the other mother was answering the call.

John’s monitor sketched out the answer, far below human hearing and far too distant to be felt.

A complicated, pulsating aria of sound.

It wove around the mother’s distress call, each note dancing with its partner, an answer in form as well as content.

Staring at the readout, he found himself humming the notes, switching cadence, following the thread.

The rumble in his throat spoke counterpoint to the song in his bones. It completed. It felt...reassuring.

“Virgil?”

“What?!” He blinked. Shocked at his own outburst as John took a step back, Virgil drew in a shaky breath. “Sorry.”

John’s voice was quiet. “What is it?”

Virgil stared at his brother, then back at the sensor buoy’s holographic display showing Gordon swimming up the water column. “Can we transmit sound into the water?”

It was John’s turn to blink. “Of course.”

“At infrasound levels?”

John pulled up the buoy’s specs and Virgil knew the answer before his brother could vocalise it.

“Wait there.”

He had an idea.

-o-o-o-

The sight of the abrasions on the side of the calf’s mouth physically hurt Gordon. He swam up slowly beside the calf on the other side from its mother. He kept quiet but made sure the calf knew he was there.

It edged closer to its mother.

“Hey, beautiful. I’m not going to hurt you.”

She whined, her sonics vibrating through him.

Mamma growled in the way only a mamma whale could and, blowing spray up into the air, drew in breath and dove.

She slipped below her daughter and targeted Gordon.

Oh shit.

He flung himself to the left and down. He could manoeuvre easily around her, but...

...her tail swung and he was caught in a rush of wake, bubbles and the need to avoid the whacking she was trying to give him.

“Okay, I get the message. But Mom, you’re going to have to back off or your baby is going to die.” The calf could last only so long before exhaustion and predators put an end to her struggles.

Mamma swam around in a tight circle and for a moment one of her great eyes caught his, her intelligence and fear glaring at him through the turquoise light.

His external mic picked up a single note.

What?

The note shifted and became more of a wail, cut off and was silent.

Mamma whale was still staring at him.

Another note. Again it was modulated, but this time his brother’s voice accompanied it, Virgil’s raw baritone holding the note for a few seconds before shifting down his range to another note. His keyboard, for there was no doubt that Virgil had his keyboard with him, emitted a series of low moans.

Gordon shivered.

His brother was playing infrasonic, he could feel it, no doubt using the transmitter on the buoy.

Mamma was still staring at him.

He could give his brother all the points for effort, but there had yet to be a case where humans could communicate with whales. Many had tried. Most were ignored. The most success had been achieved with touch, which is what Gordon was attempting to do.

If he could get close enough without having his head handed to him.

Virgil shifted from single notes to a more complex weaving of sounds, combining his voice with the keyboard in a way he had never quite heard from his brother.

Mamma blinked.

Clicked three times.

And let off a wail of sound that tore at his heart.

Virgil answered.

-o-o-o-

End Day Three, Part One

Day Three, Part Two

[thingr1]

oh well, i guess we’re gonna pretend

Rating: T

Warnings: Blood and Injury, Torture (non-graphic, mostly implied)

Characters: Tim Drake, Jason Todd

Summary: Robin!Tim gets caught and help comes from an unlikely source.

Cross posted: FFN and AO3. (A/N found on both sites)

For: @lurkinglurkerwholurks for the prompt: A character flipping into hardcore MINE mode over another when the latter is in danger or threatened (bonus points if the two characters are currently on the outs but nevertheless go totally Ride Or Die)

~o~

This was bad.

This was the kind of bad that Tim had managed to avoid so far since taking up the role of Robin.  He’d only hit the streets officially for the first time three months ago, post-many months of intense physical and mental training.  This was exactly the second time Batman and he were apart for longer than a couple of hours at a time.

It was almost funny, actually, how fast Tim managed to screw everything up.  After all, he took on Robin in order to stop Batman from spiraling into a hole he would likely never escape from alone after the death of his partner.  The death of his son.

As far as Tim was concerned, he had one job: Don’t die.  He would also be the first to admit that that was harder than he’d thought it would be.

He’d made a mistake.  He’d gotten caught.  He’d been—was being beaten.  And he wasn’t sure if Batman even realized he was gone.  They’d separated earlier in the night, exactly according to plan.  Tim on recon on one end of town, Batman on the other, chasing two different leads on the location of a major arms deal that was supposed to go down the next night.  They would then continue on their normal patrol routes, Tim flying truly solo for the first time, and meet back in the Cave afterwards.  It was a first flight.  A test of trust on the Bat’s end and independence on Tim’s.

Problem was, the empty warehouse Tim was supposed to investigate hadn’t been empty when he’d arrived.  Either someone tipped the mooks off that the Dynamic Duo was onto them and they’d moved up the date, or Batman’s information had been faulty.  Tim was leaning towards the former.  However, before he could comm the Bat and warn him of the change, someone had clubbed him from behind.

Tim wasn’t supposed to check in for…maybe another hour?  Two?  He wasn’t sure.  Time seemed to be dragging by unnaturally slow, and there wasn’t exactly a clock he could check himself on.  He’d passed out a few times, too, which didn’t really lend itself to accurate time keeping.

His only frame of reference?

The bruise count.  Turned out, baseball bats hurt when they were swung into flesh and bone rather than rawhide.  His ribs could attest to that.  The more time passed, the more aches and pains he accrued.

The other hint that he’d overstayed his welcome: He could no longer feel his hands.  They were strung up somewhere above his head, metal cuffs digging into exposed wrists and holding him up so his bare toes barely grazed the ground.  Come to think of it, he couldn’t feel those either.  Which was…concerning.

But on the plus side, if he couldn’t feel them, they couldn’t hurt.  Unlike his rib cage, twinging and protesting at his current position and every subsequent movement.  Actually, his cheek hurt now, too.  Which…ow.  Ow.

Tim’s head snapped to the side with the force of the next blow, and he groaned as that set his whole body rocking, reigniting the pain signals through to his brain.

“—listening, brat?”

Tim blinked his eyes open—when had they closed?—squinting under the pale yellow glare of the stereotypical bare bulb abandoned warehouse lighting and into the leering face of his captor.

Miles Bandini’s gold tooth glinted a tad too bright in the dim light.  A greasy combover made his forehead appear entirely too large, and a domineering sneer that could put Two-Face to shame completed the mob boss look.

The best part was, there really wasn’t anything special about this guy.  He wasn’t a psychopath, didn’t have a PhD in some random field, and hadn’t assigned a colorful, inappropriate persona to theme his wrongdoings.  He was just another crime lord who’d taken a shine to Gotham and the ease of criminal activity therein.

And Tim, like an idiot, ran straight into his trap.

Noticing Tim’s attention, Bandini’s sneer somehow deepened.  “I guess you’re still alive, then.  For now.”

Tim remained silent, mustering what energy he had left to raise his head and glare.

This seemed to amuse the crook.  He patted Tim’s cheek, right on the bruise one of his goons had left behind.  “Wonder where your big friend is, hmm?  It’s a shame he’s left you alone for so long.”

The henchmen chortled behind him.

“Look, Robin,” Bandini drawled.  “You seem like a nice kid.  So I’m going to give you one last chance to walk out of this building alive.  Answer two questions for me, would you?  Just two, and you get to see the sunrise.”  He leaned forward, hook nose only centimeters from Tim’s.  “Where is the Batman?  And how much does he know about us?”

Tim licked his cracked, bloody lips.  Tongue working in an effort to muster up what moisture he had left.  He opened his mouth.

Bandini leaned forward eagerly.

Tim spat in his face.

The man recoiled with a cry, hand flying up to where a mixture of Tim’s blood and spit now coated his cheek.  Beady black eyes met his, a murderous expression twisting the man’s features.

Tim barely had time to think “uh oh” before the crook pitched a roundhouse into his stomach.  Something in his chest shifted.

Pain exploded as every broken bone, every abused muscle, every organ screamed in protest, even as his voice choked out nothing more than a strangled unf.

Tim couldn’t breathe.  Tim couldn’t breathe.  What air he managed to pull through his mouth came in short gasps and wheezes, not remaining long enough or deep enough in his lungs to perform the appropriate gas exchange.  Spots danced before his vision, fuzzy black creeping in on the edges.

Bandini was yelling, the words distant and muffled as if through fabric, gesticulating wildly with something suspiciously shiny, silver, and gun-shaped at Tim.

With a detached sort of panic, Tim realized he was going to die.  Either from his injuries, or from the bullet the crime lord was prepped to gift him, didn’t matter.

Only a year into the job and he’d already failed his main objective.

Something cold and achingly familiar pressed into his forehead.  The barrel of a gun.

Tears prickled in Tim’s eyes.  I’m so sorry, Bruce.

The gunshot echoed through the warehouse.  Tim flinched.  The gun barrel slid away from his forehead.

Wait…Tim shouldn’t have been able to flinch.  He was…not dead?  For sure, everything hurt too much for him to be dead.

A low, ominous chuckle burst through the ensuing silence, echoing through the warehouse and sending a shiver down Tim’s spine.  The sound of something heavy landing on concrete slammed into his eardrums.

Welp.  Only one way to find out.  Reluctantly, Tim pried his eyes open, blinking in an attempt to bring the world back into focus.

The first thing he noticed was Miles Bandini collapsed on the ground at his feet, blood pooling around him from the hole in his chest.  The second thing was the bright red helmeted figure standing in the center of the room, back towards Tim.

“Well, well, well,” the Red Hood drawled.  “What do we have here?”

Whatever shock Bandini’s mooks seemed to be in began to wear off, half pulling their weapons, the other half taking an uncertain step back.

“Get him!” a voice—ah, the second in command accountant in the tweed jacket—screamed.

Quick as lightning, the Red Hood swung in Tim’s direction, gun hefted in one hand, knife in the other, and Tim flinched.   If he wasn’t dead before, he was definitely screwed now.  Hood pitched the knife in his direction.  But instead of slicing into Tim’s chest, it collided with the cable holding him up, cutting through the metallic fiber like butter.

Tim hit the ground with an oof, what little air he had managed to suck in abandoning him in one pained puff.

Ow ow owowowowow.

Fire lanced up his arms and shoulders as they were released from the strain of holding his weight, joining the steady inferno of what had to be at least two or three broken ribs in his chest.  His vision whited out as agony encompassed every inch of him, making him uncomfortably aware of every little hurt he’d received since being strung up.

Okay, Tim.  Breathe.  Breathing was good.  Breathing was life.

It really shouldn’t have been this difficult to pull in air.

Around him, gunshots rang off the walls and old shelving as round after round was shot off at the lone figure devastating their ranks.  Despite everything, Tim’s inner fanboy lit up.  This was as cool as it was dangerous—for the crooks and Tim alike.

It had been years since he’d last seen Jason fight.  Rather, fight in a way that didn’t involve Tim actively defending himself.  Jason was all muscle, visible beneath even the thick leather jacket, and yet he had the deadly precision of an expert marksman and the grace of a martial artist.  He used all of those things to his advantage as he tore through the mob, laying waste to everyone within his rather large range.  After all, how many people could claim to have been trained by Batman and the League of Assassins?  These amateurs didn’t stand a chance.

Tim just wished he had his camera.

And then, as quickly as the bloody battle started, it ended.  The Red Hood loomed in front of him, hovering almost protectively, gun pressed against the forehead of the last perp standing.

“The only one who gets to take a potshot at my replacement,” Hood hissed, “is me.”

Tim shivered.  From Hood’s tone, or the blood loss, he wasn’t sure.

Then Hood leveled a kick into the man’s rib cage, an audible crack sounding through the warehouse as the man fell to the ground with a howl.

“Tell your friends,” Hood said lightly.  Then, when the man gaped up at him: “Unless you’d rather join them…?”  He gestured at the limp forms of the bullet-riddled, definitely dead crooks scattered around them.

The guy was gone next time Tim opened his eyes.  Huh.  That was fast.

A brief thrill of panic shivered up his spine as Hood’s blank lenses suddenly leveled down at him.  Tim silently cursed himself.  He should’ve used the distraction to escape, should have unpicked the cuffs and scooted out of here before Jason turned on him.  Problem was, he didn’t think he could move even if he tried.

Jason cocked his head—almost considering.  He sighed, the sound echoing strangely through the filter and voice modulator.  “Guess if you bled out now, there would be no point, hm?”

Tim stared.  Not quite comprehending as the former Robin crouched beside him, rolling him over onto his back.  Which actually helped the breathing issue, but….

“I’m going to move you, Pretender,” Jason warned.  “This building’s rigged to blow, and that perp’s got the trigger.  Try to stay loose.”

One arm tucked under Tim’s neck, the other under his legs, and wow, okay, apparently they broke his tibia.

Tim blacked out.

He came to blinking up at the stars through a fire escape in an alley he recognized to be near the docks.  His body instantly protested his very existence, screaming as though he’d been dropped into a compactor and then thrashed in a woodchipper.  Dimly, he became aware of a shadowy figure over him, of gloved hands tightening a pressure bandage around his thigh.

It all came back in a rush—his capture, the fight, Red Hood—and Tim instinctively scrambled back from the man looming over him, heart pounding out of his chest.  He regretted the movement instantly as it jarred his broken body, his wrist apparently some degree of broken as it caved under his weight so he flopped gracelessly back against the pavement.

“Oi, hold still,” Jason snapped, “you’re making yourself worse.”

Tim froze at the command, staring wide-eyed at the crook who had himself beaten Tim to a bloody pulp only a few months ago.

This image didn’t fit.  It didn’t make sense.  There had to be some ulterior motive to saving him, perhaps some mind game to mess with Bruce.  What else would motivate Hood to help him out of the blue?

Resolve flared, hot and fast.  Tim wouldn’t allow himself to be used against the Bat again.

But Jason just continued twirling the fabric around Tim’s leg until he was apparently satisfied, snipping off the end and tying it off.  He snagged another pressure bandage and began work on Tim’s shoulder.  Not speaking.  Not even looking at him.

Slowly, Tim allowed himself to relax, mind spinning in confusion.

“W—Why?” Tim wheezed.  Wishing he could muster something a little more intimidating than the dry, barely audible croak that squeezed out of his throat.

Jason continued wrapping the bandages, quiet for long enough Tim figured he hadn’t heard him.

But then, “No one deserves to die without having a chance at fighting back.”  Quiet.  Angry.  And…if Tim didn’t know better, a hint of the growl Batman always got when he was feeling particularly protective.

Jason tied off the last bandage with a couple quick motions and stood.  He unslung Tim’s utility belt from over his shoulder, pressing the emergency tracker embedded in the side.  How did he know where—?

“Bats should be here soon,” Jason said, voice flat, which didn’t match the gentle pat he gave Tim’s uninjured leg.  “Don’t wait up.”

The older teen stood, his combat boots retreating down the alleyway the last thing Tim saw before his eyes closed against his will.

“Oh, and Replacement?” Tim heard, almost as if through a tunnel.  “Don’t expect a repeat performance.  This doesn’t change anything.”

Despite his swollen cheeks, Tim grinned against the pavement.  Of course not, he thought.  Inexplicably giddy.  Why would it?

Tim passed out to the sound of a grapple fun firing off into the distance and the rumble of a familiar engine echoing into the alleyway.

[commander-passiflora]

So I was going to wait till I was further along to post the first chapter of that fic, and I still am. But this is like pretty far in and can stand alone somewhat, and writing it broke me, so now you get to read it and cry too. You’re welcome. (This excerpt is about 1.1k btw)

Context: Dianach, my sylvari commander and current loml, and Trahearne were very much in love. Having to kill him was super hard for Dianach and he be suffering. A necro friend (Morgan) believes it’s her Wyld Hunt to bring Trahearne back, but has yet to succeed. The fic itself stays as close to canon as possible with minor adjustments for flow of conversation and major adjustments where needed to have, yknow, a plot. This is in Jahai, going through all the weird spots Kralk opened up. And uh. That poem. You know the one.

*** It had been nearly three years since Trahearne’s death (the Commander still had to stop himself from using the word “murder” in his darker moments), and since then, Dianach had managed to die, come back to life, kill a god, kill a lich, and start the battle against Kralkatorrik in earnest.

On most days, the memory of his lost love was a dull ache that he’d learned to live with, much like the searing scar he received from Balthazar’s sword. After coming back from the Realm of Grenth, it took a few days to recover. Seeing Trahearne like that--it hurt. He couldn’t pretend it didn’t. 

He tried not to think too much about Morgan’s work. She assured him she was getting closer, and that she was sure she could pull it off in time. But it had been years, and the initial hope she had given him had also faded into a dull ache. He had a lot of those these days.

He worried, too, what Trahearne would think if he ever made it back to the land of the living. Would he be disappointed in who Dianach had become? What he had done? What he had sacrificed? Would he blame him for plunging a sword into his chest, the way Dianach couldn’t help but blame himself from time to time? Would he be happy to see him? Would he...would he still love him?

***

“We knew Kralky’s foray into the Mists would make some weird things happen, but I need you to go scout the weird spots,” Taimi explained. “We need to know how bad the damage is. Plan around it. And it’ll help us calibrate the thingy Blish is working on.”

Trahearne hated it when I called him ‘Kralky,’ Dianach thought, a pang of longing running through him. He pushed it down.

“Yeah, okay,” he said. “What do you need me to do?”

“Taimi and I made these tracking devices,” Gorrik explained. “They’ll monitor the activity. Other than that, we just need you to go there and tell us what’s happening.”

“And we’ll go from there,” Taimi added.

“Alright, let’s get started then,” the Commander said, placing the trackers in his raptor’s saddlebag and heading off.

***

The first area had the same smell as the Heart of Maguuma, as the dragon’s back. The same feeling, too.

“Gorrik, you’re not going to believe this,” the Commander said, “but...there are chak here.”

“What?!” Gorrik exclaimed. “That--that’s impossible, they’re endemic to the jungle!”

“Well, they’re here,” the Commander said again. “I’ve placed the tracker. I’m moving on.”

***

The next place was...weird. Dianach couldn’t think of a way to describe it. 

It made him...see things. Like...Trahearne. 

He was already having a hard enough day. 

He dropped the tracker and left as fast as he could.

***

“I’m--I’m in Orr, I think, but it’s...like it was before it sank,” the Commander said. He couldn’t help but think of Trahearne, of how delighted he would’ve been at the chance to see Orr in its former glory, of all the notes he’d want to take, things he’d want to document.

“What’s going on?” Taimi asked excitedly.

“There’s charr and humans, they’re fighting.”

“Ohhhhh, I know where you are,” Taimi said knowingly. “Do me a favor, join the fight.”

“Um, okay?”

“I want to see if you can influence the outcome. Just jump in, let me know what happens.”

A few minutes and some dead charr later, “Taimi, it just...it just resets. Like it never happened.”

“Yes, I was right! Suck it, Gorrik!” Taimi said cheerfully. “What’s happening is that Kralkatorrik is opening holes between our world and the Mists, and these areas are part of that. It’s both distant times and places--possibly even different universes, different Tyrias--bleeding into spots they’re not supposed to be, but in a very controlled way.”

The Commander was finding a place to leave the tracker, when Taimi said, “Hey, Commander?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you see, at the top of one of the towers, there’s a tablet?”

“Uh, I think so,” he answered, looking up. “Why?”

“Can you--could you go up there and read it for me?” Taimi asked, her voice uncharacteristically tentative.

“...Why?”

“Just--just read it, please.”

Dianach sighed, called his springer, and hopped onto the platform. There was writing on the tablet, affixed to the tower wall. He moved closer, his heart racing for a reason he couldn’t fully understand.

The writing, the way it was spaced, it--it looked like a poem.

“Taimi, what is this?” Dianach asked, half angry, half terrified.

“Just--please, go, Commander. Please.”

He took another deep breath, stepped closer, and read the first line to himself.

Darkness pays Orr a visit.

“Taimi, no…”

“Don’t you want to know?” Taimi asked. “For him?”

“Why would it matter, Taimi?” the Commander shouted. “What difference does it make? The last line of some forgotten poem won’t bring him back!”

“But--but what if--what if we bring him back? Don’t you think he’d want to know?”

“I--okay. Okay.”

He closed his eyes, thought about that night in Orr, though it felt like lifetimes ago now, blinked back his tears, took a deep breath, and read, imagining it in Trahearne’s deep, melodic voice all the while.

“Darkness pays Orr a visit,” he said over the comms, trying his best not to break down. His voice cracked halfway through, though, and if he was going to do this, it had to be perfect. So he started again.

“Darkness pays Orr a visit.

With billowing robes of blackened silk,

She beckons us, arms outstretched.

I see my brothers walk forward, greet her as a friend.

So many fold themselves into her embrace.

And even over their cries, and the roars of the beasts,

I hear Darkness call to me with a promise.

But I close myself. I will not join her yet.

Another call is more beautiful,”

Dianach paused, choked out a sob, fell to his knees. And then he read the last line, “And I will chase it back to you.”

He let the tears fall for a moment, Taimi’s silence palpable on the other end of the line. 

“I’m coming back to the camp,” he spat, and left with one final glare at the tablet.

***

He cried the entire ride back. He wasn’t ashamed to admit that; Trahearne deserved it. His tears, his love, his aching heart cracking as the line replayed in his head over and over.

And I will chase it back to you.

Was Trahearne fighting the Darkness, somewhere in the Mists?

And I will chase it back to you.

Was he waiting, closing himself off, searching for a way back?

And I will chase it back to you.

Was he chasing the call? The one Dianach’s heart sounded every morning when he woke, and every night as he drifted off?

And I will chase it back to you.

Was he watching somewhere? Looking in on them, watching Morgan’s work, hoping for it to restore his body enough for him to return?

And I will chase it back to you.

Would he even come home, given the chance?

And I will chase it back to you.

Was Dianach’s call enough?

[gemmaheart]

The Killer Snake

Damian Wayne x Female Reader

Summary

Reader is a assassin for the Black Cobra, an ally to the League of Assassins. At the age of 15, she is the best killer the Black Cobra has. What will happen when a young bird comes face to face with this elusive murderer?

Warning: Talk of killing/death

Writer’s Notes: This will be multipart if you want or we can leave it here please comment if you want more. I can’t take very much credit for this writing as I got inspiration from many other fanfics (Not all DC). Also please excuse all grammar/punctuation mistakes, English is my first (only) language, I’m just not good with it in written form.

KEY:

y/n means your first name

y/l/n means your last name

y/n/m means your name on missions

h/c means hair color

e/c means eye color

f/c means favorite color

Narrators point of view

It was another boring day at the Wayne Manor for Damian. Titus was asleep after having played for a few hours. Dick was off in Bludhaven, probably with his girlfriend, Cory. His father was at work, he had complained about having board meetings all day. So with nothing else to do, Damian went down to the cave to train. Once he got into it he was so focused that he had gone four hours without stopping. Not wanting to wear himself out before patrol tonight, he put his equipment away and went up to the kitchen. Alfred was currently making dinner. His father would be home soon then. “What are you preparing, Pennyworth” Damian asked. Alfred, rolling his eyes replied (Insert fancy dinner foods here) as sarcastically as possible. Damian elected to ignore that sarcasm as starting a verbal fight with the butler was a sure way to lose his patrol privileges. “Very good” he replied “Sounds wonderful” he quickly added. Just then Bruce entered the house looking exhausted from his many meetings of the day. Damian was told to set the table for the three while Bruce got into something more comfortable for the remainder of the day. Dinner was quiet, as usual for the three men. It’s what was to come after that Damian was interested in. Suited up in his Robin uniform he waited for Bruce. They where soon in the Bat-mobile zooming through the streets of Gotham. They meet up with Commissioner Gordon on the GCPD roof. Tonight there was a big drug shipment coming into port, Black Masks operation. It was suppose to be simple. Take down the guards, stop the drugs from getting into Gotham. Nothing was simple in Gotham however. When the dynamic duo arrived at the East Docks there was a full blown gang war occurring. Black Mask and the Falcones were fighting for dominance, an even match. (Not sure how to write a fight scene for this, SORRY) After a long fight against two crime bosses and their many goons, Batman and Robin are able to get the upper hand. Chasing the crime lords off and stopping the drugs from getting onto the streets, Bruce and Damian report to Gordon,do a lap around the city, and head home for some well deserved rest.

Somewhere in the Arabian Desert

Another mission, another person to kill. Y/N receives her orders, her target was Robin better known as Damian al Ghul, now Wayne. This mission was assigned by the leader of the League of Assassins herself, Talia al Ghul, Damians mother. She sees her son as soft, his father teaching him to not kill his enemies as he was originally told. Ten years of training wasted, a son ruined by Bruce Waynes rules and morales. No more than a kill mission for y/n/m. At the age of 15, y/n y/l/n was a true assassin. With more than 200 kills under her belt, she was a prize among the Black Cobra, reserved for truly challenging targets. But before all this glory she was nothing. No home, no family, no anything. The Black Cobra toke her in, trained her to be a killer, gave her a purpose. She was loyal to them, owed them her life. She has never failed a mission. Now, y/n was off to Gotham City, to take yet another life in the name of the Black Cobra.

Several days later in Gotham

The Wayne’s where having a charity gala tonight. At their mansion, with at least 350 people, and y/n would be one of them. At her age she needed someone to go as her guardian, the man was named Henry Garcia, a wealthy man from Star City, with ties to the Black Cobra. He owed them for a supply of weaponry gone missing last month, this was his ticket. With Henry, y/n could get into the mansion to spy on her target without suspicion. Not that there would be much anyway, she was young, pretty, and his age so no one would question her watching the boy. She watched him for the entire gala, learning about him. For instance, he was introverted, not talking to anyone and keeping to himself. He had found a corner and not really left it all night. Men talked about business deals and future plans. Women gossiped about the latest scandals and raves over the others dresses, shoes, and accessories. Some people danced, most drank, some tried to do both. Damian just looked on, a frown on his face, clearly not happy to be here. All the while y/n studying him, collecting anything that could be useful for later. At the end of the gala Henry and y/n walked out, no one the wiser of what had happened, why Damian was being watched by the beautiful h/c in the f/c dress.

Two nights later on patrol

Damians point of view

The night was calm, the rain lightly falling from above, cleaning the air of the wretched pollution. Father and I had separated to cover more ground, he toke the East and I the West. There are warehouses along the river, all supposed to be empty but one had lights on, dim but noticeable. I radio father on the comms, telling him my location, and that I was going to look around stealthily. He agreed with that plan and said he would be there as soon as he could. With the conformation to enter, I went in through the roof, landing on a path above the main floor. It seemed there was nothing but as I continued to look around from above I spotted a man tied to a chair. I quickly recognize him as a man from our resent gala, Mark something. I see about ten people on the other side of the expansive warehouse. I alert Father of this development as the men move to interrogate the businessman. They want money and supplies his company makes, he refuses, they threaten him but he says nothing. They look at each other, seem to have a conversation with their eyes because a few seconds later, one of the men puts a gun to Marks head and pull the trigger. I make a decision, giving myself away to take the men out. It was easy, he was an easy target. I comm Batman to inform him of the news but I miss his response as I notice something on one of the men I toke out, a tattoo of a cobra. “Oh shit” i say, louder than necessary. Father is asking what it was that I found. I can’t answer as just then I get blind sided. (Still can’t write fight scenes. Just imagine two assassins fighting it out) It’s a girl about my age. This is a shock but I push that away fast. She runs at me and I pull out my sword. The sound of metal clashing can be heard through the whole building, she’s fast and strong. I manage to deflect most of the blows and jabs directed at me and deal some damage in return. Eventually she has me pinned to the floor, strangling me. As I loose air and start to black out, she lets out a scream of pain, Batman has arrived and planted a batarang in her shoulder. I’m dizzy from air lose but from what I can see from my spot on the cold, concrete floor she is a excellent fighter, keeping pace with Father. I notice she wears a simple suit with little to no armor, made to be flexible, much like Graysons. She is slim with long h/c hair tied back in a high ponytail, with a mask covering her face. She can’t fight forever though and soon lands back by my side, a sword to my throat and speaks, calmly, almost quietly, “Don’t move, that’s it, just stand right there” “Let me leave without hinderance and Robin here can avoid further harm” Father returns with “And if I don’t” the girl laughs “Oh I believe you will, his life is of value to you, not sure why though, he can’t fight worth shit” she looks to me, speaks to me but Father can hear it “We will meet again Damian, and I won’t be going easy on you” “How do you know my name” I manage to stutter out. Her answer is simple “The Black Cobra knows everything, thought you knew that Mister al Ghul” and with that she collects her now conscious men, walks past the dead body still tied to the chair and out the front doors like nothing ever happened.

[andrea-jacobs]

COMM 3P18

Chapter 5 - Uses and Gratifications

Media and messages are such a large part of our everyday lives, that we may consciously partaking in viewing and media consumption without much thought. When I’ve had a long day and climb in bed and put on Netflix, I, without much thought, turn on a show like Friends, or This Is Us and watch. What we may not consciously think about, but what still plays a large factor in our media selection is the uses and gratifications theory. As explained by Sullivan (2013), this theory attempts to understand why people choose specific media to consume and what motivates these decisions. The theory focuses on how people use media in their everyday lives as opposed to how the media influence people. When I think about it, I choose a show like Friends after a long day, as opposed to say, an information documentary, for a reason. I am searching for something to fulfil some needs – a show that can be easily consumed and is not too though provoking, something I can relate to my own life, and thus find a sense of belonging in, a show that is popular, so that should one of my roommates come in and ask to join, they can watch too and can even converse about, provided they know the specific show. All of these factors of gratification play a role in what may seem like an arbitrary selection. Because all of these factors arise in my own head and may even seem unconscious, it is hard for researchers to understand all motivations and gratifications that come into play when audiences member are making selections.

Some instances in which we make choices regarding media consumption are much more conscious and deliberate. For example, setting plays a large role as to what we choose to consume. It is probably obvious that when I am visiting my parent’s house, and have control of what we watch as a family on TV, I will not choose to stream a movie like 50 Shades of Grey for its mature content and themes that likely would not be comfortable to watch in an open setting with my family around. That said, many other factors will come into play when I make a decision, if my father is in the room, I will not choose a movie or show that would fall into the romance category, as he dislikes that genre. If my mother is in the room, I will not choose a movie or show that would fall into the action category as she dislikes that genre. As Sullivan points out, different scenarios, demand different gratifications to be met. At a time like this, with my family, we would likely watch a classic family movie or sports together. Both would trigger feeling of nostalgia and togetherness for us, as we used to watch those when I was younger together, and now with me being moved out, rarely get to experience that. We also search for something that relates to all of our interests. Sullivan also makes reference to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, in which scholars use a formulated hierarchy to explain human needs from the basics of food and water, to self actualization. In keeping up with the example above, of my family watching tv together, we are able to place ourselves on the third step of Maslow’s hierarchy – belongingness and love needs. Together we are able to consume a specific media text and find common meaning and value in it. We are also physically brought together and can use the connections these texts offer us to better connect to each other in our physical world.

This leads to the idea of even more social media consumption, and how certain media texts play such an integral role in how our society operates. As media messages today are simply unavoidable with technology constantly at our fingertips, the ones we choose to consume over other, especially in regards to news, speak to the idea that audiences seek out content that will give them gratification. For example, popular news stories that get shared around the world make for common topics of what can seem like universal interest. No matter your preferred news source, all will cover the same large topics, such as political elections, natural disasters, and other universally impactful events. That said, they will all have these stories told in a different way and will also have different smaller scaled stories in their publications. This was very evident on my last family road trip to Florida. We drove through many states, and stopped at many restaurants and gas stations along the way, almost all, always playing the news. At this time, the 2017 federal election was taking place and all news stories were focused on that. What I found interesting, was that depending on the state or even community we were in, determined the news channel they watched. In states like North Carolina, where we stopped for a night on the way, all the news stories we saw favoured the Republican Party, as many of the residents in this state agreed with Republican policies and ideologies. These publications met the desires, emotional needs, and even social needs, as it provided opportunity for conversation with others of many of the people in this community.

Chapter 6 - Interpreting and Decoding Mass Media Texts

Messages, no matter the type, can be interpreted in many different ways. Many factors contribute to one’s understanding of any given text. Sullivan (2013) explains that be it social class, gender, age, or any other demographical barrier, as well as simply having (or not having) prior knowledge, one person’s understanding of a message can be completely different than that of someone else. To send a well received message, the author must first have an intended audience and create the message in a way that will best resignation with them. When I was little, I had an older sister. Sometimes my parents would explain something to her that made absolutely no sense to me, just because of lack of knowledge on the particular subject. They would then have to reconstruct the message, or encode it, in way that would make sense to me, being four years younger. Sometimes I would assume I understood the message, and act as though I did, when really my decoding was not successful. As Sullivan (2013) outlines, individual’s values play a large role in their perception and understanding of media messages. As an example they use women’s responses to soap operas. This highlighted perception based on gender made me think of audience experiences I have had in which I had a different perception based on my identity. I have never had an interest in action movies, be it fiction or non-fiction, especially war movies, as I do not find an interest in learning about the severity of the violence of the war. That said, growing up I had a close friend who’s dream was to join the army. His grandfather was in the military and he was brought up to respect and admire the troops. He loved movies and books about war found deep meaning in them. As he was also a part of cadets, and had a general interest in the military, he understood all the coded language used by soldiers in these movies, he also understood the different rankings in the military and could identify certain badges and medals of honour that I did not. For that reason he was always very keen on watching movies about the wars and war heroes, where I was not. When we would watch war movies together as children, I could see the excitement and enjoyment he got from those films that I did not.

I think sporting events are one place where I really see mixed perceptions of the messages and mixed audience experiences. Viewers who understand the game are going to have a different experience from those who do not. Just like how those in attendance with emotional connections to one team playing are going to have different experience and find different meaning than those who do not. This was especially clear to me during the 2019 NBA finals this year when the Toronto Raptors won the O’Bryant Trophy, the entire country seemed to be excited and behind them, but for many different reasons. I have some older friends at work who have followed the raptors since the team first formed. For them this was a very emotional and meaningful event. They watched interviews of players and raved about the feelings of excitement they got when watching promotional ads and messages that supported their beloved team. This is because they had a deep connection to these texts. For myself, I have only watched a handful of basketball games in my life, and have a very basic understanding of the game. This was an exciting time for me, but mostly because everyone else was excited. I used it as an opportunity to visit Toronto to watch games in the street and felt part of a community, but did not feel much emotional investment in the games. I didn’t get anything out of post-game interviews or promotional ads because I didn’t even always understand what they were talking about. This also speaks to how polysemic the texts are as they were interpreted in many different ways.

Granelli and Zenor (2013) explain their theory on audiences interpretations of morally complex characters, using the show Dexter. Their work makes reference to four different dominant audience perspectives and use them to explain how audiences member react to texts in different ways. Personally, I resonated most with the perspective labeled as referential. I tend to compare texts, especially music to my own life in order to find meaning in it. I enjoy music that I fell most accurately depicts what I am currently going through. I tend to listen to country music as I find this genre to be the most storytelling of genres, with themes that I can relate to my own life, for example, the song The House The Built Me by Miranda Lambert depicts her going back to her childhood home, years after her family has moved out. In the song she explains how her father built that home from the ground up for her mother, and explains how she longs to go back to the place she made crucial memories. I too moved from my childhood home, that my father built and resonate with what she says, finding meaning in the message of the song. My friend, however, who has lived in the same house her entire life and has yet to move out, does not get these same feelings out of that song, because it does not relate to her life in way that she can easily connect with the message.

Chapter 7 - Reviewing Recetion Context and Media Rituals

I never really knew my grandmother, but my father always told me that when his family got their first tv, his mother believed the people behind the camera could see into their living room, and insisted they and the living room, was alway presentable in front of the tv just in case. This obviously is not the case, so how do content creators know what their audience is, what they want to watch and who in the family is watching? The way people watched tv in the 60s and 70s is quite different from the way in which we watch it today, witch is also different from how it was watched in the 90s. From the content shift on tv to the physical changes of tvs and living rooms, even in my lifetime, the way we consume media has changed drastically. The Social contexts in the moment that we are (or are not) consuming media has everything to do with how we consume it.

I grew up in a very tv friendly household. My mother was a stay at home mom until I was about six years old, and again when my younger sister was born when I was eight for two years. Although she considered herself very fortunate to be able to afford years off of work to raise my sister and I, she has admitted to me that at that time she felt very lonely all day, with no one around to talk to (for a real, adult conversation) until my father got home from work. I can remember as a child having not just tv on throughout the day, but specifically talk shows. These gave my mother a sense of contact and communication with others, though one way, talk shows have a way of making those watching feel as if they are part of a conversation. Rituals in our house also loosely followed the scheduled tv programming. In the early 2000s, my bedtime was 9pm. At that same time, there seemed to always be an “adult show” that came on tv that I was not allowed to watch. When the timer on the tv switched the show to NCIS, or Greys Anatomy, I knew it was time for bed. For me, this was annoying and I always almost put up a fight. For my parents, this was when leisure time began. Once they were finally able to put the kids to bed, they gave themselves one hour a night to watch whatever weekly special aired at 9pm.

The rituals my family had when I was young surrounding tv have changed quite a bit with the new convenience of streaming services. We no longer have to wait until Thursdays at 9pm to watch Grey’s Anatomy, as re-runs can be viewed at anytime via Netflix. Time is a huge determinate of media consumption. For example, as a student, I have very little free time. This has an impact on what media I chose to consume – if I have only two hours, I have to decide if I am going to use it to watch tv, read, socialize with friends, etc. As technology has progressed, we have the ability to watch what we want wherever we want. If I feel like watching tv while, cooking for instance, I can watch on my 5’ phone screen. This convenience, however, changes the viewing experience. Instead of distraction free-watching, on a large screen, we have the choice to consume media at any time and any place.

Viewing habits may also change depending on the dynamic of those living in the home. When I was younger and we only had one tv and what we watched was ultimately up to my parents. They had to make sure when my sisters and I were in the room, that what was on was appropriate for us. My parents generally agreed on what to watch, as there were somewhat traditional gender roles in my home, however, my father would never refuse to watch a program of my mothers choosing over it being to feminine, and vice-versa. That said, the remote was always in the hand of my father and if there was ever an issue in regards to connection being lost, needing to use new feature on the tv box, etc. It was up to himself or my older sister to figure it out.

When I was about eight years old, we got a second tv, that my parents decided to put in our family room, that my older sister and I used as a play room. I remember my mother and father spending hours re-arranging the entire room, just to add a box with a scree. They had to make sure the tv was against a wall with multiple outlets, that he could also run a cable to for the satellite. Then they had to reposition the couches and chairs in that room, so that they faced the tv, rather than each other. Although I loved having a tv in my playroom, this addition changed the dynamic of the entire room making the main focus the TV set. Having two TVs made a big difference in my home, as I finally had the opportunity to watch what I wanted all day, rather than having to suffer through my father’s desire to watch nothing but Sportsnet all day, and my mothers’ to watch talk shows and reality tv. There still, however, were some shows that we all watched together.

[miracle-sham]

Instead of Dead, Become Two Dragons in Red.

| {MaribatMarch2020 — Week 1, Day 5: Transformation} |

| [Ao3 Link] | | [Masterlist Link] |

| {Repost due to original post disappearing from the tags.} |

| Triggers/Warnings: Violence/Implied Violence, Animal Transformation, Explicit Language/Some Swearing, Implied/Referenced Character Death (but not really), Polyamory (not really a trigger/warning but if you don't like Polyamory then this isn't for you). |

| For Gotham vigilantes, rampaging magic-users always make for an interesting fight, that is of course, provided one doesn't get hit by any stray bolts of magic. However for Parisian heroes, it's just your typical Tuesday Akuma situation. |

| Word Count: 3232 |

==‹›==

| A/N: Hi! I'm not dead, sorry for how long I took to respond to comments, I got hit by a nasty cold then sinusitis so I lost basically all my Maribat March prep time thanks to that, so I just barely managed to finish this ficlet/oneshot for today, anyway I hope you guys enjoy, and if enough people enjoy it, I'll make a second part to this oneshot because I had to cut so much material and it'd be nice to be able to use it still. |

| If you want to be tagged in future oneshots/fics, or a specific Au, then comment or send me a DM/ask! |

| Also side note, Don't Like? Don't Read. Also also, please do not criticise any of my writing. This was written for fun and receiving criticism, even in a compliment/criticism sandwich, is the exact opposite of fun. |

==‹›==

Zzzzt-crackle-woosh, a purplish-black bolt of unstable magic flies through the air, just barely grazing passed Dragonbug's side as she flips across the gap between two buildings. Cheerfully, she calls out “Missed again!”

The villain, an amorphous black shadow with dripping molten gold eyes and donning a ruddy patchwork hooded robe (which suffice to say, looks suspiciously like a rip-off wizzrobe from the Legend of Zelda, that or a faceless Gregorian based cultist extra from a film or TV show), scowls furiously, “Oh fuck you! I'm trying my best here!” and blasts another bolt of purplish-black magic towards her.

Conveniently located on the roof she just landed on, is an air vent. She cartwheels behind it and manages to dodge the bolt by a good metre or so. “Well, your best sucks and so does your aim!”

The wizard-villain screeches in fury, “Well my aim wouldn't suck if you didn't keep moving like a goddamn Duracell bunny!”

Dragonbug snorts. “Yeah but firstly, I'm dragon and ladybird themed, not bunny-themed; the bunny theme's already taken anyway. And secondly, where's the fun in that?”

As soon as she says that, her earpiece crackles as Red Robin pipes up on the comms channel. “Ready to see some fireworks?”

“Oh, you bet!” She responds, all too gleefully.

There's a faint clink-woosh-woosh-woosh and out of the corner of her eye, Dragonbug sees a blur of a small round silver ball arcing through the air towards the wizard-villain who's quite stupidly standing in the same place. As the silver ball disappears from her view, she hears a clatter of clink-clink-clink followed by a bwoosh and a bright flash of white light. At this moment, Dragonbug is so glad the Miraculous suits protect against flashbangs of all things.

The wizard-villain screams and once the flash of light fades, Dragonbug can see that they've fallen to their knees, in the middle of the street.

Dragonbug frowns and eyes their form, then double-taps her comms. “Hey, is it me or does our rip-off wizzrobe-magic-cultist look somewhat unresponsive?”

Her earpiece crackles again as Red Robin answers, and really someone should give these things a maintenance check, the crackling can be so distracting. “Our wizzrobe-magic-cultist is looking pretty unresponsive to me too. It could be a trap though because I swear I didn't use one of my knockout flashbangs.”

She nods, despite the fact he can't see her; which upon realising this, she flushes red in embarrassment. After clearing her throat to compose herself, she tilts her head to the side. “That's concerning, unless our rip-off wizzrobe-magic-cultist is susceptible to flashes of light.” She pauses, frown deepening, “You don't think they've got epilepsy do you?”

There's a slight rustle before Red Robin responds, “No, that's not what an epileptic seizure looks like. Again this could be a trap, or they could just be stunned. Either way, we should hurry but be careful.”

“Right.” Dragonbug scurries over to the edge of the roof then flips her way down to the ground. As she lands, she just spots Red Robin vaulting across an overturned car. As he catches sight of her, she gives him a thumbs up, which he returns.

Dragonbug then nods to him and he nods back, silently communicating their plan. They both start to slowly approach the wizard-villain in a pincer movement, her to the left and him to the right.

Red Robin reaches to his bandoliers and whips out a pair of manacles. He skulks behind the wizard-villain and goes to handcuff when the wizard-villain starts cackling maniacally. The laughter is quickly followed by a forming orb of purplish-black light—the same light as the magic bolts.

Oh, fuck! Is Dragonbug's only thought as she immediately dives at Red Robin, who's started backing away; she uses herself to try and block him from the still-forming orb. Please let the Miraculous magic protect us both! She silently begs as the orb expands exponentially, unfortunately enveloping them both completely in a fraction of a second

The maniacal laughter is the last thing they both hear as they're violently launched backwards into an alleyway, and everything fades to black.

==‹›==

Kagami's lounging on the sofa at Tim's Nest and binging Netflix, when the red alert rings across all the comms units.

“Shit,” Oracle falters, “Red Robin and Dragonbug are down. Dragonbug's signature has disappeared from our systems and her comms aren't responding. All Red Robin's vitals are down, his suit isn't registering any more signs of life. But I'm still getting warnings that the villain they were fighting is still active, so everyone available needs to converge on Red Robin and Dragonbug's last known location.”

Fear immediately seizes Kagami's heart, no please, please don't be dead my loves. She double-taps her comms. “I'm suiting up as Kuro Neko, I'll be at the location in three.”

With that said, Kagami flings herself off the sofa. She glances around the room for Plagg who's halted in his eating of cheese and giving her a sad but cryptic look. Her eyes flicker to the window and he nods almost imperceptibly.

“Plagg, claws on.” There's a woosh as the poisonous green light washes over her, donning her in the Kuro Neko suit. She flexes her claws for a split second, tail whipping back and forth furiously, before darting over to the window and vaulting out of it.

As soon as she's out the window, Kuro Neko extends her baton down and begins pole-vaulting her way across the rooftops and over towards where her significant others were last.

==‹›==

When Dragonbug returns to consciousness, the first thing she notices is that she can't move, nor see, nor hear. But she can feel, and unfortunately that means she feels a strange painful pulsing throughout her entire body, as well as an excruciating aching sensation. The second thing she notices is that she's curled up on the ground and her head, or the world, is spinning somewhat. Anyway, I can safely say I'm not doing so good right about now, big ouch.

The first of her other senses to return is her hearing. Which immediately makes her hiss in pain from the sudden cacophony seemingly coming from somewhere above her? She pauses, then realises that something's not quite right, hey wait a minute, why'd my hiss sound so weird? Something's not right, although I suppose that's kinda obvious now, but still! Oh god, what if I'm dying, or I've been body switched, or—or—or—

Her thoughts are interrupted by a sudden scream of fury, ringing out from above. Which is good because it means Dragonbug doesn't get time to dwell on that particular string of anxious thoughts, but it's also bad because it's loud and causes her to whimper in pain from how loud it is.

“Where the fuck are they? What the fuck did you do to them?” A voice sounding very similar to Kagami yells out.

Wait a second, that doesn't make sense, Red Robin and I didn't call for backup, so why would Kagami suit up on her night off? Dragonbug muses to herself, brain immediately latching onto the next train of thoughts. As she muses, she slowly realises that she's starting to regain the feeling in her limbs. Which is another positive? However, the feel of said limbs, causes her mind to immediately blank and lose the train of thought. While her brain tries to figuratively perform an error message, she does finally manage to crack open her eyes, yay sight.

It's at that moment, Dragonbug's superhero experience/training kicks in. She quickly takes stock of her surroundings and quietly thinks to herself, oh fuck.

It looks like she's in a giant—no massive—version of Red Robin's suit. Have I been shrunk? She wonders for only a brief second as something moves, just out of the area of her view. She turns and squints at the movement. Not a second later, a roughly cat-sized red lizard shuffled into sight.

She squeaks in surprise, then has a minute of wait what because her squeak sounded weird and very concerningly not-human-like.

The red lizard tilts its head to the side and coos at her.

Dragonbug glares at the lizard and tries to back away. Emphasis on tries, because as she does so, she ends up tripping over herself? Confused and extremely concerned now, she glances down and oh.

What. The. Heckles. She slowly spins around, checking out her new form, because she's clearly no longer human. No, she's got a snout, scales, fur—well mane—, claws, a long snakelike body, and a tail. Spinning around, she catches sight of a gleaming piece of shiny silver metal. So does what anyone would in the same situation as her, and scuttles over to it to use it as a makeshift mirror.

The reflection that greets her is… frankly quite adorable but also she's now a tiny little lung/long dragon. Which to be fair, makes quite a bit of sense as she was using the dragon Miraculous and Longg is a lung dragon. Her scales are a pretty red with shimmery golden accents and her mane is a dark red-almost-black colour. Her eyes still have the golden yellow iris and sclera that the dragon Miraculous gives. And the rest of her is all done variation of the gold, brighter red, and darker red. So at least her colour palette doesn't clash. Okay, so the colour palette isn't the most pressing issue here, but also I don't know how to fix this or change back so y'know, I'd rather potentially be stuck like this permanently with a nice colour palette, than one that clashes. But also oh god please don't let this be permanent, there has to be a way to undo this!

In her panic, Marinette doesn't notice the red lizard slinking closer to her. As it reaches her, it gently prods her with one claw; startling her badly and causing her to squeak again, loudly.

The red lizard flinches back and Marinette realises that maybe, just maybe, that's not a random lizard. And that maybe the not-a-random-lizard is actually a drake. A European dragon that hasn't got wings. And Tim. Tim's surname is Drake. A coincidence? I think not! It's got to be Tim!

She stares at the probably-Tim dragon and makes a chirping noise because dragons don't have the same vocal cords as humans, so she can't exactly ask him if that's him or not. A minor nuisance, to say the least.

The red drake mimics her chirp. Then cautiously slinks up to her again.

This close, Marinette can see that she's probably around the size of a ferret, in comparison to him being roughly the same size as a cat.

He flops down half beside, half against her and makes a series of clicks and chirps. She can't help but to tense as he flops but as the seconds pass, she finds herself relaxing bit by bit until she's also flopped over.

Enjoying the peaceful impromptu not-quite-a-cuddle cuddle session with one of her significant others, Marinette does try to keep an ear out for any goings-on above, just in case. But all seems well.

That is until, not even three seconds later, the peacefulness is abruptly shattered by a cacophony of screams, yells, zaps, and loud bangs echoing shrilly from above, before ceasing just as abruptly as it started.

However, the unexpected cacophony still manages to cause Marinette to panic. She tenses with a low whine, hunching slightly, and holds her breath. Alert and anxiously vigilant, she can't help but survey the immediate vicinity again and again and again—looking for anything she missed initially or if anything's changed.

Tim shuffles and stumbles into a sitting position. He nudges her gently in the side of the neck with his snout. He makes a cooing noise, followed by a soft rumble—as if he were trying to imitate a cat's purr.

It takes a few seconds, but his actions start to help calm her down. She takes in a deep breath and mentally reassesses the situation. We've been turned into tiny dragons. We're inside-slash-underneath the Red Robin suit which is on the ground. Before we woke up like this, we were battling a magic-user villain who tricked us. We didn't get time to call in backup before we got hit but it sounds like backup arrived anyway. As far as we know, no one is aware of what happened to us or that we're in-slash-under the suit. We are currently safe for now.

As Marinette reaches the end of the reassessment, she feels much calmer. She makes a low trill-like-purr noise to signal to Tim that she's calmed down.

He sticks his tongue out in a blep and mimics the low trill.

Their second moment of calm is then also interrupted because apparently fate hates peace and calmness or something like that.

“I will ask you once more, Where. Are. They?” Kuro Neko questions.

There's a loud thump-snap, followed by the wheezing cackle of the Wizard-villain. “They're gone! Dead! Erased! Exterminated!” With its piece said, the wizard-villain continues to wheeze and cackle maniacally.

Marinette can't help but shiver in fear at the sound, barely able to squash the rising nausea.

A harsh snap sound echoes loudly in the street and the wizard-villain starts choking wetly.

Kuro Neko hisses something but the red robin suit muffles the words to the point of being indistinguishable.

The minutes drag by and the only sounds of note from above, are inaudible mutterings and the clattering of handcuffs and car doors. They must've handed the wizard-villain over to the police, Marinette thinks.

She's about to go nudge Tim to try and communicate that they probably need to go find somewhere to stash his suit and a place for them to hide until they can figure out how to turn back when a conversation between the vigilantes who arrived for backup catches her attention. Partly because of the topic, and partly because of how close the voices suddenly sound.

“They can't be dead, Red Robin's suit is still there.” Dick—or well more like Nightwing, since he probably arrived as backup as well—stresses.

“But Dragonbug an' her suit's gone. You'd think maybe that there'd be a little more left if just organic matter was destroyed.” Jas—Red Hood mutters, the vocal distorter in his helmet making his tone of voice sound strange.

Or maybe that's just a side effect of getting tiny-dragon-ified, thinks Marinette, things sounding stranger. Although I've not really noticed anything bar the distorted voice sounding weird.

“The Miraculous suits are made of magic, and anyway, Plagg says he can't feel Tikki or Longg's presence anywhere,” Kuro Neko admits, reluctantly. “If all living things in the vicinity of the orb were destroyed, then the Miraculous would have still been left behind.”

“And how d'you know that?” Red Hood asks, sounding both genuinely curious and mildly concerned.

There's a split second of almost icy silence before Kuro Neko responds with a clipped tone. “Akuma.”

“Ah, o'course.” Red Hood comments, voice getting closer again. “Hey, d'you think B will want to stick the Red Robin suit in a memorial case like what he did with my Robin suit?”

“Hood!” Nightwing exclaims in a horrified and almost scandalised tone of voice.

Red Hood snorts.

Marinette flinches, and so does Tim beside her, although probably not for the same reasons as her. I don't think I'll ever get used to how flippantly Red Hood jokes about his death. Even if most Parisians who've died in Akuma attacks use the same sort of gallows humour.

There's a few seconds of silence before someone grabs the Red Robin suit and yanks it upwards, causing Tim and Marinette to tumble out of it with a series of startled squeaks and clicks.

Red Hood is the first to respond to the situation, with an eloquent, “what the fuck.”

Marinette glances up and sees Kuro Neko holding the Red Robin suit and looking rather shell shocked, with Red Hood and Nightwing a few steps away.

“Oh, thank fuck they're alive.” Nightwing half mumbles, dragging a hand down his face in exasperation.

“My loves,” Kuro Neko murmurs leaning down and scooping up Marinette and Tim, “I'm so glad you're okay.”

They both squirm for a minute before relaxing into her arms.

Nightwing frowns. “We should bring them back to the cave, maybe call Zatanna and Wonder Woman.”

“To the cave then.” Kuro Neko nods, hugging Marinette and Tim carefully, making sure not to accidentally hurt or squish them.

Marinette looks up at her significant other and bleps. She then trills, content to be held for the journey back to the Batcave.

Tim however, wrinkles his nose and chirrups in protest, he squirms and tries to escape Kuro Neko's hold—probably wanting to return to the Nest and deal with this on his own instead.

Kuro Neko gives Tim a deadpan stare before expertly pinching the correct pressure point to temporarily paralyse him.

Red Hood gives her a quizzical stare.

“Akuma, as well as kwami.” She responds, sagely.

“Right…” He slowly mutters, shaking his head.

Marinette can't help but burst into laughter at that, only because she's currently a ferret-sized lung dragon, the laughter comes out as a stream of trills and chirps.

Red Hood narrows his eyes at Marinette. “Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, danger noodle.”

Marinette pouts, whilst internally promising herself that revenge will be swift and pasta themed.

==‹›==

When they finally arrive back at the Batcave. They're greeted by the sight of Batman and Robin at the Batcomputer.

Robin turns and sneers at them. “Of course, trust Drake to pull such an attention-grabbing stunt as this.”

Marinette immediately looks up from her snuggled up position in Kuro Nell's arms and hisses at Robin; Tim however, lets out a world-weary sigh.

“Robin.” Barks Batman, but the reprimand does nothing to quell Robin's hostility.

Fixing a glare at Robin, Kuro Neko starts to stroke Marinette's scales like an evil villain would stroke a cat (much to Marinette's delight). “Need I remind you, how you hesitated upon hearing Oracle inform us that Red Robin's suit ceased reading any signs of life.”

“That was not hesitation! I was merely preparing for Grayson or Fatgirl to become hysterical in their distress.” Retorts Robin, who then stalks away, scowling and red-faced.

Nightwing dithers between going after him or staying to check on Tim and Marinette.

Kuro Neko shakes her head. “Go after him, Marinette and Tim will be fine without you hovering like a mother hen.”

Nightwing flashes her a grateful smile and scampers after Robin.

Kuro Neko then heads over to the medical bay and gently plonks the two dragons onto a cot. “Batman, I believe we will need to do as Nightwing suggested earlier, and call Zatanna and Wonder Woman. As this is a magic situation and I am not as skilled or knowledgeable in regards to magic as my love is.”

“Hhrrm,” Batman growls, already calling up the Watchtower.

Kuro Neko smiles softly as she glances down at her significant others, eyes twinkling with mirth. “Let's hope they arrive soon, otherwise who knows what sort of trouble you two could get into.” She winks.

Marinette chirps, tail flicking side to side eagerly. Whilst Tim perks up slightly and tilts his head to the side, mind probably racing with hundreds of pranks and shenanigans they could pull off whilst in dragon form.

==‹›==

| Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this little oneshot! Comments, likes, and reblogs are much appreciated! |

| @maribat-march2020 | | @vixen-uchiha |

[corey-067]

Whump Prompt 26 - Shot.

I fear that I'll fail to bring across the depth of what's in my mind, yet again. But here we go! This only took me about 3+ weeks to write.

TWs: Blood, injury detail, PTSD flashbacks, sci-fi violence (Halo-typical) The worst of it is under the cut. I'd like to thank CIA391 from Halopedia for the info and chat we had about the Blamite and how it works, plus the Superfund peeps for keeping me motivated to write when it's been grinding to a halt.

"Arcus Actual, Arcus Two: we've got the spaceport on lockdown. Got a fair few Covie vehicles here, some gear they were trying to get out before we took 'em down."

"Arcus Actual. Nice work, Spartans. We'll be in touch shortly."

The Spartan ducked to the side, his armor blaring warnings at him as a beam rifle strike intended for Commander Lasky struck Corey's chest, his shields taking the brunt of the impact - though he staggered from the force of the shot. Captain Del Rio had sent Lasky and a small contingent of Marines to scout out a former Covenant supply depot - one which supposedly contained a number of Forerunner relics. "Keep your damned head down!" The Spartan-II snapped, suddenly realizing who he was talking to. "Sir." He muttered. 'Spartan time' was in full effect, and he searched for the familiar red glow of the Jackal's helmet, his eyes recovering quickly from the afterburn from the beam.

"Two o'clock high! Suppressing fire!" Corey bellowed into the comms, forcing Lasky into what passed for cover as though he weighed nothing. They could observe proper etiquette when his charge - his friend - wasn't in danger. Shots rang out, followed by the whoosh of an M41 rocket launcher. The satisfaction of the detonation was only surpassed by the squawk of the Jackal in question, and a grim smirk crossed his hidden features. Gesturing for the marines to circle the complex, Corey tossed a pair of grenades into what his motion tracker told him was the last holdout of enemies in play. They detonated, and bodies went flying.

The trouble with motion trackers was simple. They were perfect for detecting incoming threats, and he'd even worked with several of the toys that ONI had developed to identify the electronic frequencies which the Elites' active camouflage gave off. If a second sniper was set back outside of the forty-meter range of his motion tracker, but also immobile, they were incredibly difficult to spot, even for someone with a Spartan's enhanced vision. His hand was still on Lasky's shoulder, keeping the Commander down behind the nanolaminate wall when the shots rang out.

Corey's reflexes were perhaps the fastest of any Spartan-II outside of Kelly, and only Kelly had been able to defeat him consistently in terms of raw speed - with his HERMES-class Mjolnir armor he was practically untouchable. The sound of shattering glass pierced the whine of his shield monitor, as the first of three blamite shards from a needle rifle struck the top of the wall. He was moving, faster than Lasky had seen a human - Spartan or not - move. It wasn't enough. It saved his life, without question - he still had vivid memories of what one of those needles could do to an unshielded Spartan, as Kat had died before he'd even managed to catch her. Corey only managed to move enough to turn a lethal blow into a gut shot, the third needle glancing off of the top of his domed visor.

He dropped behind cover, and Lasky stared at him, calling for a medic on comms, but receiving only static in reply. There was a level of panic radiating from the commander that Corey had never seen, in all the years he'd known the man. "Lasky!" Half a tonne of Spartan slammed into the nanolaminate surface, and Corey could see that Infinity's commander was somewhere else entirely.

He was shocked that the blamite crystal hadn't detonated, the pink-purple shard was pulsing, threatening to do just that, and it'd lodged itself directly beneath his armor plate. It needed to removing carefully, and he didn't have an angle to do so. Lasky was miles, or perhaps years away, and Corey knew that he had to reach him.

"Lasky!" He barked again, with all the authority he could muster. In his mind, it was the voice of Chief Mendez, the authoritative bark he heard whenever he needed to push himself just that little bit harder. The part of a soldier's brain which resonates with that tone, drilled in from morning to night for years woke up, and he blinked rapidly, memories of the bodies of his classmates drifting into the background of his vision, threatening to resurface at any time.

Everything was a blur. Smoke and shadow, darkness lit by streaks of green and pink, the muzzle flashes of ODST's fighting a valiant, losing fight. Mehaffey had been protecting him, as well. "Get to the dorm! Go!" Her gestures were frantic, but she remained in control. "Go! Go! GO!" And then that sound, needler fire struck her chest, her shoulders and took her off of her feet. His mind was on a loop, deafened by the cacophony of this brand new war that had burst into their young lives in a blaze of plasma fire. A hand grabbed him, hard, dragging him into the light...

"Tom, I need you here. Now." Corey was holding the wound closed around the shard, he needed it gone, but it was all Tom could do to look his reflection in the face. He slipped back into it.

It was a nightmare; it had to be. Aliens? Here? Hastati was cut in half, only saved by the timely intervention of Master Chief 117. He never found out his name, if he even had one, just the number stenciled onto his armor. He trusted the Chief with his life, though he couldn't place why, and that trust was well placed, as he took fire, saving them again. Sully was hit but walking. General Black's lifeless eyes haunted him as he dragged his body from his Warthog, and fear kept his head down as he tried desperately to get the vehicle started. And then they were clear. It was incredibly surreal, escaping into the forest, weapons blaring around him as those creatures with shields fell, Chyler putting her years of rifle training to efficient use. They were retreating as the Spartan, and the cadre of cadets sped towards the Pelican. Someone yelled, he wasn't quite sure who, and the vehicle was blasted by the wash of a plasma grenade. The cadet slammed on the brakes, fearing that he'd send them off into the trees if he didn't stop until his vision cleared, the thump of a jackal hitting the windshield reminding him that he needed to get the engine running as fast as possible, but it wasn't working.

The report of a Battle Rifle firing jogged Tom out of his reverie, the Spartan beside him finding it in himself to take out the sniper, despite his injury. The first burst missed entirely, but the next was on point. Three rounds, spread further than usual because he was shaking with the effort to hold himself up pierced the Jackal's skull, killing it instantly. Corey could feel the blood beneath his armor's undersuit, and he dropped. It was far from the most blood he'd lost, but he knew he needed it sealing, and soon.

Gunfire wasn't enough to break Lasky from his waking nightmare entirely, and Corey was running out of options, aside from simply slapping his face.

"Tom? Tom?!" Each moment that he didn't react, Chyler's voice became more panicked. Once he realized what was going on, he screamed for the Chief, but he had no biofoam. They had to get her to the Pelican before she bled out, which would've been a challenge on a good day, and today was definitely not one of those. They ran as best as they could, panting breaths and Chyler's whimpers punctuated only by the staccato sound of 117's assault rifle and the roars of the creature that dwarfed even their savior. Terror propelled them forward, but that adrenaline only carried them so far. They were all exhausted and had been running on fumes since the invasion had started. They were cadets, not ODSTs; they weren't prepared for this. How could they be?

More Covenant troops were exiting the facility, and Corey would've typically used this time to rush the doors, blast his way through the Covie line and get inside, a tactic the Spartans had used to great effect on numerous occasions. His body geared itself up for the sprint, even before the logical aspect of his brain reminded him that he had to protect Tom until the Marines returned, and the pain told him that he was still injured. His shields refused to recharge, likely because of the Subanese shard sticking through his abdomen. Corey released his hold on the crystal, a strange combination of pulsing heat and cold, he pulled the fiberoptic camera from a pouch attached to his armor. The camera displayed on his HUD, and if he'd had more time, he'd have connected the Smart Link from his BR-55 as well, but as it was, he just had to make guesses. At the whine of a plasma grenade on the other side of their barrier, the Spartan covered the Commander's form with his armored body, the detonation shaking Tom out of his reverie, as tears streamed down his cheek, dripping onto his fist that appeared to be miming holding another person's hand.

Corey fired blind, adjusting the angle of his rifle based on the trace of each three round burst. He killed two of the new arrivals, though he managed to drive the rest back into cover, waiting for them to pop their heads up.

"You've seen this before, haven't you, sir?" The Spartan asked, noting Lasky's reaction as his eyes flickered down to the injury.

The Commander nodded; his eyes glassy with tears. Corey recalled John telling him what had happened during their evacuation of Corbulo - the way that his friend had died. Corey winced, though not from the pain. Along with Linda, he'd flown the Pelican out of there, but he'd not met any of the cadets when they reached their destination, not meeting Lasky until years later, during his pilot days.

"I understand that this is painful for you, sir, but I need you to focus." Corey rumbled. "The Marines will be back soon, but we need to take the first steps n- keep your damned head down, sir!" The Spartan's voice was warm and steady, holding a comforting certainty that hadn't been getting through to Infinity's XO until he got snappy. He wasn't feeling as confident as he sounded, but he knew that he needed to project that for Lasky's sake.

Lasky came closer, and as he took a closer look at Corey's wound, the remaining color drained from his face. He looked as though he was about to either vomit or vanish into his head once again, until the Spartan gripped his arm, hard. The pain was enough to keep him focused on the present. "Look, Tom, this won't kill me, but I need your help." He shook the Commander's arm, for emphasis. "Focus on my voice, Tom. Everything will be okay, and I just need you to focus on doing as I say. I'll walk you through it." He paused a moment, switching off his vocoder as he gasped with pain. "Freya, can you make sure that my shields don't recharge? Last thing I need is to be ripped apart because that energy overloads the crystal."

There was a momentary pause, and the alarm cut. "I've disconnected it from your armor's power supply, Corey. Just remember not to stick your head into the line of fire until after we've booted it back up. I'm not a fan of you injuring yourself." Despite the rich amusement in the AI's tone, he knew that she was entirely serious.

"Yes dear." He deadpanned, and for a moment her avatar glowed green on his HUD, arms crossed and shaking her head.

"What do you need me to do?" Lasky's shaky voice cut in. There he was - the soldier that John had described from Corbulo. Brave despite what he was feeling, or perhaps because of it. Corey passed him a biofoam canister, a small model which he kept on his belt for extended field missions, something that came in useful in this case as his suit's injectors were either empty, or the local one was damaged, and he hadn't realized. Ideally, the shard would've been removed with actual medical equipment, but it wasn't the first time he'd had to improvise in the field.

Finding a neatly folded square of slightly grease-splattered cloth in one of his belt pouches, he passed it over as well. Tom was shaking, perhaps too much to do what was necessary, and Corey's eyes darted rapidly from side to side as he searched the officer's face, searching for something for him to hold onto. He couldn't comfort him the way he did other Spartans, it simply wasn't enough for the vast majority of people. "Pop open the biofoam canister, ready to use. One layer of cloth around your fingers, to avoid any potential charge transference," Corey told him, forced steadiness in his tone. It might have been seconds, minutes or even hours since he took the hit, but he could feel that he needed this dealt with now. "Take hold of the end in one hand, slide it towards you, gently, as straight as you can. Biofoam goes in straight after."

"Okay." The Commander breathed, his fingers shaking.

"Tom, look at me. The Master Chief believed in you, all those years ago. If he were here today, he would still. I know that because I do. Right here and now. You can do this." Lasky's eyes hardened, his jaw setting at the mention of John, the confidence that he'd shown in Tom all those years ago still stirred something in him now. He wouldn't let him down.

His gauntlet-clad fist squeezed his battle rifle with enough force that the casing creaked, cracking under his powerful grip, heat, and cold, as well as jolts of electrical charge, coursing through the area of the wound as the subanese crystal shivered its way free. Tom inserted the biofoam end, and the sensation changed, a combination of a crawling itch, pain, and relief blending themselves together as the life-saving substance did its work.

"Save some, Tom." He gestured towards the crystal. "Coat that in it, and let's get it into the canister. It's rare that we see them like this outside of lab conditions, maybe it'll give us new answers." He was in too much pain to smile with any feeling, so out of reflex, two fingers came up in front of his mouth, swiping across quickly, as the Commander frowned, then realization set in.

[jamie-leah]

Dancing Shadows- Part 1

Bucky x Reader 

Summary: You’re a fire elemental that has been in love with Bucky for a long time. He doesn’t know and you can’t tell him because of his girlfriend. And with an enemy threatening you and everything you love, will you and Bucky find each other before its too late? 

Word Count: 2060

Warnings: mentions/implied sex, violence, angst, swearing?

A/N: This was originally going to be a oneshot, sat down and now 13,000 words later...so here’s another series. I’ll continue it if you want me to? Not a lot of Bucky in this part, but it will get better. Enjoy Lovelies! Permanent tags are OPEN, and tags for this series are OPEN!

Series Masterlist   One Shot Masterlist 

You lie awake in bed cursing yourself and your stupid broken heart. You look to the side at the clock and see that its 4 in the morning. You look on your other side and see the guy you brought home in the hopes he’d make you feel better since the alcohol failed.

You couldn’t sleep. You felt guilty and yet you had done nothing wrong. You sigh as you get out of bed. You pull on a pair of shorts and a shirt. You go to his side of the bed and shake him rather roughly until he opens his eyes. He gives you a lazy smile and you feel your stomach turn. It only gets worse when he speaks to you, “hey, what are you doing? Its still night time”. You ignore him as you pick up his clothes and shove them at him, “I need you to leave now”. You hope he’ll be quick and quiet, you hope no one finds out.

The guy, Dan? Derek? Dean? Looks at you in disbelief but he soon gets over it as he starts putting on his clothes, shooting daggers at you the entire time. You’re not really phased, being an Avenger will do that to you. You open the door to your room and pop your head out to make sure the coast is clear. Once you’re satisfied you turn back to Derek?

“Look Derek-,”

“It’s Daniel”, from the tone of voice you can tell the irritation is becoming anger.

“Okay, sorry Dan, but we both knew what this was and now I think its best if we go our separate ways”. You give him a quick smile before gesturing to the door. He sighs as he walks out the room and you close behind him. He carries on huffing and puffing and stomping his feet, so you stop him, “Hey Daniel, I know you’re feeling a bit annoyed by this, but can you please keep it down, I don’t live alone, and I’d rather not wake anyone up”.

He shrugs your hand off his shoulder, his features deepening in anger, “maybe you should have thought of that before inviting me back here”.

“Okay Dan, that was a little rude, but I’ll let it slide. But please don’t piss me off, I really don’t fancy killing you tonight”.

He scoffs, “killing me? You?-“

You cut him off with a shove towards the elevator, “you’re getting on my nerves now, just get to the elevator and leave”.

You didn’t jump when you heard the voice behind you, you were surprised but didn’t jump, “you heard her, I think it’s best that you leave”. You don’t turn around, knowing the voice of Captain Steve Rogers anywhere. Dan leaves pretty quickly after that, Steve telling F.R.I.D.A.Y. to make sure he leaves the building. And when the hall is finally silent you take a deep breath and face Steve.

You can see the concern written all over his face. Steve wore his heart on his sleeve most of the time and its one of the reasons you love him, he’s like the brother you never had. Sadly, you also saw disappointment somewhere in his eyes, “that’s the third time this week Y/N”.

You heave a sigh, having had this conversation for the third time this week, “I know Steve, I’m not great at maths but even I can count to 3”.

Steve shakes his head, “don’t deflect with sarcasm”.

“You know me so well Steve”.

“I do. I know you so well that I know if you keep doing this you’re going to hurt someone. You’re not always the best at keeping your emotions in check and for you that has consequences”. You know he’s right, but you’re not entirely sure what to do about it. Steve walks the short distance between you and engulfs you into a hug. The warmth from his bare chest a comfort to you. You feel a tear slip out before you can hold it back and he squeezes you a little tighter.

You mumble into his chest, “it’s getting harder and harder Steve…to watch him and her”. Steve doesn’t say anything, as he holds you tighter in the early morning light.

Breakfast came too soon. You weren’t ready to face the day, but these days you never were. You walk into the kitchen to find Sam cooking and dancing to the radio. Nat, Bucky, and his girlfriend Jessica were sitting at the island.

Your stomach tightened but you bit your tongue as you walked in with fake confidence. Sam turns around with a smirk, “there she is, our very own party animal. You were out late last night”. You laugh, and you cringe at the easiness of it. You hate how the lie is natural around Bucky and Jess. You hate how he doesn’t notice that its fake. “Well, you should know Sam, the night is meant to be enjoyed”.

You felt His eyes on you, but you willed yourself to focus on Sam and his reply. He whistles low, “sounds like someone had fun”. You don’t answer, unable to carry on the lie of how shit the night really was underneath the surface.

Instead you change the subject, “I hope that bacon is for me Sam”.

He turns to give you a wink, “you bet”.

You hear a giggle and you want to throw up. It causes you to look as you take in the smile Bucky gives to Jess, a secret joke passing between them. You catch Nat’s eye and find sympathy. You were sick of the sympathy. Your whole life just seems to be one huge pity party.

When F.R.I.D.A.Y. spoke, you were grateful she was asking you to head to the meeting room, not even waiting for the end of her sentence before leaving the room. When you reach the room, you find Steve and Tony all geared up. Steve speaks, “get suited up, there’s a situation at the World Health Organisation based in Switzerland. We need you to put out some fires”.

You don’t ask any questions. Before you know it, you’re taking off in the jet. It doesn’t take long to get there. There were more than a few fires to put out, half the building had collapsed. You turn to Steve as the jet lands, “what the hell Steve? This is a huge disaster, why isn’t the whole team here?”.

Steve looked out over the damage, “I…when we received the call for help they said it wasn’t that bad…”. As soon as the jet door was open Tony flew out into the fray. You run out with instructions to put the fire out and rescue anyone you can. It seemed that none of us knew who or what did this, but we didn’t have time to think about it.

In your comms you could hear Steve calling the tower asking for more help. You reach the ruins and run straight in. The roar of the fires drowning out the screams of people running outside.

Being a fire elemental meant that you could smother the fire, essentially absorbing its energy. Absorbing so much energy was draining and painful to contain and you were nervous at how big the damage was. But Steve reassured over comms that the others were coming.

You make your way through the building putting out the fires and finding a few survivors. You feel your energy drop as you make your way over rumble. You don’t hear anything behind you until you’re punched in the back so hard you go flying across the rubble. You feel the rocks tear at the skin on your hands and face. You land face down, pain racing up your spine. You manage to cough out, “Steve”, before you’re picked up by your scruff. You feel the ground leave you as you’re turned to face a man, bigger than Steve and Bucky combined, wearing a black mask that looked like a skull.

He stares at you, his eyes look black too, it unsettles you as you feel fear making it harder to regain control of your breathing. You hear Steve, frantic in your comms along with Tony. You bring your legs up, plant your feet on his chest and push. The guy lets go in surprise and he stumbles back as you tumble to the floor again. Even with the wind knocked out of you, you manage to roll back on to your feet as the assailant recovers.

You take a few seconds to figure out what the fuck you should do. You can’t risk using your ability right now, with so much stored energy you risk bringing the entire building down. You would run but he’s blocking the exit.

You can’t think further as the guy moves faster than you would have expected. You barely keep up with your blocking of his punches. You can feel your arms bruising already. You dodge a punch that was dangerously close. Your small size compared to him was the only advantage you had as you managed to run passed him. You head for the exit, not bothering to see if he was following. You finally speak on comms again, “Steve…I need…back up”.

You can still hear the guy behind you as you will your feet to move faster. Then you hear Bucky on the comms, “where are you Y/N?”. Your heart hurts and swells at his voice.

You manage to get out, “north side-“, before you feel yourself tackled to the rough ground. You’re flipped onto your back, stones and debris digging in as the guy straddles you. You squirm but holding onto the fire inside of you is taking everything you have. You struggle harder when his hands cover your neck, squeezing harder with each passing second. You try to focus on staying awake as your lungs scream for air.

You watch him close his eyes and breathe in while squeezing harder. When he opens his eyes, you were shocked to see them glowing purple. Then it hit you. You realised who he was and that’s when you realised the energy you had taken from the fires was growing weaker and weaker. He seemed to be taking the energy from you.

The edges of your vision were darkening, making his eyes seem more vibrant. Without warning he was ripped from you, your body automatically seeking air as you sputtered and coughed. You’re vaguely aware of Steve catching his shield until Bucky’s face comes into focus, concerned, and panicked. He cups your face, getting you to breathe along with him. When you finally feel like you can breathe again he helps you up. Every muscle protests the movement but thankfully the adrenaline is still pumping enough for you to push through it.

From the corner of your eye you see the mysterious guy get back up, flames licking at his fingertips, his hand aimed at Steve. You push Bucky out the way as you jump in from of Steve. The fire hits you with such force that you slide backwards, absorbing as much of it as you could. Over the roar of the fire you see the boys struggling to move from the spot they’re standing in. The guy looking at them with his eyes glowing again. You see his other hand come to life with flames but before he can use it you will the fire to your body quicker instead of fighting the flow. Soon enough the flames on his other hand die out as his eyes find yours.

You know you’re taking too much energy too fast. Your skin heating up as waves of hotness crash inside you. Your head is on fire and the pain brings you to your knees. You know the boys are yelling at you but the roar of the fire and pain in your head drowns them out and yet when the stranger speaks his lips don’t move. When you hear his voice, its as if he’s standing right next to you, whispering in your ear, “let go child. Your powers crave release”. When the last of the flames reached you, the guy was nowhere to be seen. But you couldn’t dwell on that fact as you felt the pain all over your body, the burning, consume you. You were unconscious before you hit the floor.

Permanent Tags: @glimmering-darling-dolly , @justakpopfan4 , @overlywhelmedfangirl

[solivar]

Quoth @eledhiel13 Talon Zenyatta?

It was so subtle that Jesse was not entirely sure that he wasn’t just losing his goddamned mind, finally succumbing to the weight from years of accumulated paranoia, sudden but inevitable betrayal, and a carefully cultivated outright inability to trust others long-term. (“It’s not paranoia if they’re actually out to get you, kid,” said the voice in the back of his head that he usually considered at least a cousin to common sense and which sounded rather suspiciously like the man who’d taught him just about everything he’d ever known about all of the above, plus psychological hardening techniques on the side.) It wasn’t even something he could solidly but a finger on so that he could say, “This. This right here isn’t right.” Not to anybody else, not without sounding like he was losing his mind. (“Observe. Document. Play it close until you have enough to actually bring others to the table.” Common sense was starting to sound a little irked with him and for good reason -- he hadn’t been out of the covert ops business long enough that this approach shouldn’t still be second nature. And yet he was having a hard time justifying spying on a teammate, even to himself.)

Observation the first: Tekhartha Zenyatta is an omnic. He was mostly humanoid in form but that was, ultimately, where the similarities ended. His faceplate was a convenient location for broad spectrum sensory arrays -- he never really had an expression that you could read, or an attempted lack of the same that could be equally telling. His voice was a carefully modulated synthetic approximation, one that he explicitly chose to keep on the warmly soothing end of the spectrum, even in times of high stress. He had no real body language -- no involuntary twitches, no nervous mannerisms, no subtle changes in stance or posture that could betray mood, direction of thought, an increase or decrease in tension.

Until he did. And it was subtle almost to the point of invisibility, the sort of thing you’d only notice after living with a body for months and getting accustomed to the way they did and did not act on a daily basis. A sudden tremor in the line of his shoulders; the set of his spine taking on a posture that could be assessed as almost furtive, encountered as he was in a part of Gibraltar he didn’t generally frequent; a visible change in the way he held his hands. Jesse managed to get a picture of it and ran an image search that yielded nourishes the divine feminine and seal of the inner source and silence arises and all senses awakened. No way to tell if that was good, bad, or freaky beyond the telling of it without consulting someone who might know more. The Shambali were notoriously terrible about checking voice messages and answering their email and the only other option at home was...Genji. So not really an option without also bringing him in.

Observation the second: Zenyatta’s balls. Orbs. Spheres. Floaty, glowy things that orbited him like his own personal planetary system. It wasn’t entirely clear, at least to Jesse, what exactly they were -- an intrinsic part of his body? Something he’d picked up somewhere along the way while he was doing his own stint as a wandering sage? Zenyatta’s brother Mondatta hadn’t had anything resembling them and neither had any of the monks occupying the Shambali monastery when he’d visited years ago, but he wasn’t sure how much that actually meant. They seemed to sometimes have a mind of their own, spinning off and following other members of the team, sometimes at a respectful distance, sometimes a bit closer, if that someone was one of the walking wounded, physically or otherwise, emitting something that wasn’t quite healing biotic field but which had a similar palliative effect.

Now they were hanging close to him all the time -- closer and quieter and darker than they’d been since the day they first met. The change itched at the back of his mind, but he couldn’t be sure it was a bad thing or a normal one. And, again, no one to ask except Genji.

Observation the third: Zenyatta was a creature of habit. He had, within the first couple days of his arrival at Watchpoint Gibraltar, crawled all over the place, explored it from top to bottom, and thereafter turned most of his attention to the areas outside the base proper. Jesse couldn’t really blame him -- the Watchpoints were designed for utility first and aesthetics second, if at all, and he couldn’t imagine finding anywhere inside it an adequate place for meditating on the fundamental spiritual oneness of all life, not when you had the option of floating up to an actual nature preserve located right next door. When he wasn’t roaming the paths on the Rock itself, or down at the beach, he could normally be found in the quarters he shared with Genji in the family accommodations block, or in one of the recreation areas where the team in whole or parts tended to congregate after meals or missions, or in the combat simulator when his presence was requested for team training exercises.

Zenyatta did not, as a general rule, attempt to socialize with Torbjorn, whose attitude toward artificially intelligent machines in general and omnics in specific was well documented, and thus he assiduously avoided the engineering lab, except on the four occasions in the last month when Athena’s internal monitors found him there when no one else was present, either absent in the field or at godforsaken hours of the night. Athena’s sensors had likewise detected him in the communications tower, the medical research block adjacent to the infirmary itself, the security drone bay. Some of that could be innocent -- his body needed maintenance like the rest of them needed regular patching up and, while he certainly could have asked Winston or Angela for help, it wasn’t impossible that he preferred to handle his own basic repairs himself -- but Jesse could not think of one damned reason why he would need to be in the drone bay, ever, much less three times in two weeks. And there was, of course, only one person he could ask about that.

Jesse flipped off his workpad and set it aside, security access logs and tiny bits of security camera feed scrolling across the inside of his closed eyelids. It was not completely beyond the bounds of possibility that a totally innocuous reason existed for all of these observations, individually and all together. It was also not beyond the bounds of possibility that he was simply calcified into an irreducible state of suspicious and untrusting by hardships untold and dangers unnumbered. He hoped he could find the answers to all his questions without breaking either the trust or the heart of his best friend.

Moving slowly, so as not to awaken the even less trusting man sleeping at his side, Jesse slipped out of bed, slipped his hat and gun belt off the headboard, picked up his boots and stepped out into the hall in his stocking feet. He didn’t put his boots on until he was past the accommodation block completely and out into the halls beyond that led to the main rec center, the kitchens, the exterior access doors. The communications array hidden in his arm interfaced smoothly with Athena’s systems and, taking her cue from him, she responded silently when he hailed her, text-only.

Good evening, Agent McCree, how may I assist you?

I need you to establish a secure location in the base, known solely to yourself and me. He opened a secondary communication line and input the Blackwatch command level access permission codes that, in years prior, would have allowed him to make such a request at any functional Watchpoint; Athena accepted them without comment. Deep Black level encryption protocols on all communications in and out and on any files locally stored on your servers. Feed me copies of all your security logs, the security drone recordings, the internal security camera records, everything, for the last three months to current.

The Blackwatch suite is located three levels down and below the communications tower, Agent McCree, Athena replied. I have reactivated its systems per your request, currently running diagnostics. The requested data is downloading and will be accessible at your arrival.

Thank you. He signed off and closed down his comms and thought, not for the first time, I hope to God you know what you’re doing.

Ώ

The Blackwatch suite was exactly that: two rooms located in an otherwise completely unused sub-basement three levels below the Watchpoint communications tower buried deep in the rock of the cliff itself, visited only by the occasional housekeeping drone if the relative shortage of dust on the work surfaces was anything to go by. He might not want to sack out on the cot in the next room or make use of the world’s tiniest refresher unit in the absence of a check on the plumbing, but the equipment locker was at least still fully stocked with useful odds and ends. The workstation powered up at a touch and came to life in seconds with Athena’s icon flashing in the center of the screen; he activated the workstation’s own intrusion countermeasure systems and turned his comms back on. “Comms check.”

“I am receiving clearly, Agent McCree.” Athena replied serenely. “Deep Black communication protocols enacted. My remote systems diagnostic found no hardware systems failures or inadequacies with regard to the equipment in the suite.”

“Thank you kindly.” The files he’d asked for were waiting, along with the onboard suite of analysis tools he needed to whittle all the raw data down to manageable; he started with the security logs.

“If I may ask...what precisely are you looking for?” A politely curious modulation to her generally sweet tone.

“I’m not sure myself.” He paused, considered, chose not to ask for her help in sorting the mess just yet. “I’ll know it when I see it.”

He saw it about four hours in, once the pattern analysis had run two passes on the security logs and come up with nothing and one on the video footage, just as he was about ready to declare himself wrongly mistrustful and possibly in need of rendering Zenyatta an apology, even if the monk never actually knew what for. Two hits, in relatively close succession, both on oddities in the drone hangar footage. Separated out and isolated from the rest of the stream of workaday images, the cause was clear: the recording had been altered, looped at least twice over a period of several hours, the timestamps adjusted to display the proper passage of time, the sort of thing that would be all-but invisible to anyone not specifically searching for such a thing. Twice in the last week, made to look as though the drone hangar were empty when he had the rather strong feeling it most emphatically was not.

Jesse flipped his comms back on. “Athena, my sweet, can you run a diagnostic on the drone hangar security systems and let me know if you find anything unusual?”

“Of course,” Athena sounded, as always, more than a trace element of amused at any attempt to sweet-talk her. “This will require a moment.”

“Take all the time you need.” He restarted the pattern analysis pass on the security footage, watched as the images flickered past at a rate faster than the average human eye could follow, every nerve alive and twitching.

Hits three and four were from the infirmary. A little over a month prior, Genji had come back from a mission that had, to put it mildly, gone spectacularly tits up after a relatively uncomplicated first and second acts, in a condition that reminded everyone who had known him back in the day and informed everyone who hadn’t that one of his in-action hallmarks was a certain reckless disregard for his own safety in the defense of others. Lucio’d been the medic assigned to the team and had done his best to patch Genji up in the field and hauled him home for repairs, the injuries well short of life-threatening but also well outside the kid’s level of biomechanical engineering expertise. They’d called Zenyatta in immediately, of course, because after Hanzo he was the next-nearest Genji had to family and, unlike his brother, the one with the actual ability to enhance his state of cyborg ninja chill to a level that allowed him to stay on bedrest for a couple days with only minimal protest. The alterations in the security feed occurred within hours of each other the first day back, looped to hide no more than a twenty minutes each, during those periods of time when Angela was neither consulting with nor checking upon her notoriously restive patient.

He checked, because basic investigative thoroughness required it, but he already knew, and the knowledge was a cold knot in his gut and sudden ice in his veins: all of the things he’d observed, everything he’d hoped this little exercise would let him unsee, had occurred after that mission, after those couple minutes of carefully concealed time at Genji’s bedside.

“Fuck.” Jesse breathed, completely heartfelt.

“Agent McCree, I have completed my examination of the drone hangar security systems. All appears to be in order.” Athena murmured in his ear.

“Thank you, Miss Athena, I appreciate it greatly.” He thumbed the communicator off and swore with even greater feeling. “Fuck a fucking duck.”

Athena’s security systems were most emphatically not in order. Athena’s security systems had been provably compromised at least four times. Athena’s ability to perceive and diagnose her own state of compromise was, in all likelihood, being actively interdicted. And he couldn’t be certain, at all, that his own poking around had not or would not draw attention or a response. Could not, in fact, be sure of anything but the actual black ICE built into the standard Blackwatch security suite, which would have to be good enough for now.

He pulled his cell out of the thigh pocket of his pants and powered it up. Blackwatch field doctrine suggested that agents deployed alone in hostile territory possess more than one method of communication in case the primary was lost, disabled, or otherwise compromised. He routinely carried at least three and the cell had the advantage of not being reliant on Athena’s network for connection, particularly once he made his way back above ground, typing with his thumbs as he went. Where are you right now, darlin’?

I still cannot believe you drop your Gs in text. Hanzo replied ten seconds later. In the kitchen preparing breakfast. You?

Out on the bluff, taking the lovely cool morning air. Join me? The sunrise was staining the sky over the Rock and the mist still hanging in the trees a vivid rosy golden -- red sky in the morning and he couldn’t help but think that might, just might, be a sign for more than just sailors.

I will be there momentarily. Coffee?

Please. Jesse leaned back against a convenient spit of rock, still cool from the night and damp from the dew, and considered.

Ω

Medlab had, by far, the single most secure intranet in the entire Watchpoint for a multitude of reasons, the greatest of which was Dr. Angela Ziegler’s thoroughgoing dedication to the confidential relationship between a physician and her patients, and not the least of which was that a solid half of her patients were carrying around as an intrinsic part of their bodies the sort of technology that at least all the governments of the Earth would sell their collective soul to possess. Genji was, of course, the prime example: partial cybernetic modification had been a thing since as early as the mid-30s but the entire fact of his existence represented a quantum leap beyond that relative plateau. And it was not for ego nor for aesthetics that he went around with God of War laser-etched into his breastplate; back in the day, his deployment in the field was a tacit admission that the precision application of lethal violence was, indeed, an acceptable resolution to any given situation his team might encounter. It was with this knowledge in mind and a certain quantity of regret in his heart that Jesse, once again ensconced in the untrammeled depths of the communications tower, cut right through the lab’s multiple layers of intrusion countermeasures using tools designed by some of the most exquisitely subtle, paranoid, and vicious intelligence operatives to ever make their living at a computer terminal, a task made substantially simpler by Angela’s absence from the lab and the fact that Athena had no part in maintaining its security, at the insistence of both.

It meant, baseline, that while Athena could request access to that particular internal network she wasn’t automatically and immediately aware of anything that went on inside it and thus his quest for information culled from the infirmary medical monitors might well go unnoticed for an appreciable length of time. (Hanzo had listened to everything he’d had to say over their morning stimulants of choice, his expression and body language growing progressively more still, until they reached the point where Genji’s brother turned off completely and the assassin who had spent ten years picking off half the Yakuza command structure in Japan and abroad, an assortment of corrupt officials both corporate and governmental, and no fewer than a dozen wanted war criminals without coming within even a long shot of being caught himself poked his head out and started talking tactics. Extracting information from the medlab intranet was entirely his idea, a trick he’d used while building his approach on a particularly well-defended ex-senior-military-advisor-turned-mercenary-despot whose departure from the mortal coil could not happen soon enough. Turned out, the asshole had a congenital heart condition and Hanzo hadn’t even had to shoot him to accomplish the terms of his commission.) If he found something, it also meant that, until he got to it, that internal network was at least secure and could be secured more completely by the addition of several nasty tricks courtesy of Blackwatch counterintelligence research and development. And this time he was at least not searching blind but had an actual time frame to concentrate on, and if something was there he would know in minutes instead of hours and --

Something was there. Right there, not even five minutes in. Angela must have stepped out -- Angela probably stepped out the instant Zenyatta arrived because Genji with one arm more off than attached and with some sad attempt at armor-piercing rounds still sticking out his chest was exactly the sort of Genji who would be insisting that someone else needed her attention more. (Nobody needed it more. Genji could be even worse than Hanzo that way.) No data for Zenyatta himself, of course, since he wasn’t attached to any of the monitors but Genji’s neuromechanical systems output spiked through the roof, his temperature redlined, and his internal comms produced four short-range, hugely information-dense transmissions spaced seconds apart, each one no more than a few seconds long themselves. Genji’s emergency systems came online, brought his temperature back down to normal, stabilized him. The whole thing took no more than five minutes total but since when did a hit ever really take a long time?

Bad news. Jesse typed with one hand and backed out of the medlab systems with the other, salting his path with tiny packages of pain and delight for anyone who might try to follow it back to its point of origin.

Genji? Hanzo replied, a heart-stoppingly full minute later, given his present presumed location in the Watchpoint.

Probably compromised. Definitely the origin of...whatever it is that got Zenyatta. Might be the same thing. Genji had done nothing to draw attention but, then, every characteristic that looked suspicious on Zenyatta was a perfectly ordinary aspect of his existence. That alone made him want to run the footage again and he was more than half afraid of what he would find if he did.

I am afraid I do not have any better news. It took five minutes for Hanzo to come back, during which Jesse heroically assumed he was maneuvering into a place where it was safe to type and not being horribly killed by his little brother. I selected six of the drones that were in the bay at random. Each one was altered in some way, some more extensively than others. A selection of pictures scrolled up the screen.

Is that what I fucking think it is? Jesse asked, half-impressed, completely appalled.

An explosive device of some sort, yes.

Jesse breathed in peace. You could say that. Breathed out stress. That is some kind of zero-yield tactical device -- probably not a nuke, we don’t have the components to cobble one together here, but I’m willing to bet they could and did make something pretty nasty out of the heavy pulse ordinance that we’ve got in the armory. Or maybe even something experimental that Winston was working on. Probably more than one. Athena had a solid two dozen functional security drones active at any given time, and more than half that sitting in assorted states of disassembly, in the process of being cannibalized for the parts needed to keep the rest functional.

Hanzo was silent for a perfectly terrifying length of time. I see.

I think we need to move up our operational timeframe a bit. Jesse pulled up a secondary screen and opened the eyes they planted around the Watchpoint during an exceptionally vigorous and thorough morning constitutional, finding the rest of the residents: Lucio in his own workspace in the medlab, clearly deep in the throes of composition from the look of intense concentration on his face; Mei in the rec center, curled up on one of the less enormous pieces of furniture and reading on her tablet with a cup of tea at her elbow; Reinhardt and Brigitte down in the engineering lab advancing the endless quest to make his armor even spikier. Genji was, in theory, in the combat simulator running his daily solo exercise regimen and Zenyatta --

Was nowhere to be found.

Get out of the drone bay RIGHT NOW.

He flipped back through the video feed just to make certain that he hadn’t missed anything: Lucio still in the medlab, Mei still in the rec room, the engineering lab now empty. Jesse took a deep, deep breath of calm, made certain doors to the suite were locked and the automated security precautions active, and began extracting potentially useful items from the equipment locker in the next room. He tended to prefer his own ballistic armor since it was custom built to personal specifications but there were always nifty little add-ons to be hung on belts or utility webbing, like that disruptor that messed with motion detection technology or the thingamabob that jammed all forms of wireless communication within a certain radius of its activation and the kinetic energy absorption mesh that Reyes had sworn by as a lifesaver right up until the day it completely failed to save his life. He took a bit of everything plus one the little medkits that came with an assortment of biotic-impregnated goodies for emergency field usage. Unfortunately, none of the ammunition was suitable for Peacemaker and in the back of his mind he was working out the quickest and least exposed method of making it back to his quarters and the box of assorted specialty rounds occupying the back corner of the closet when his phone rang.

Rang.

The number was Hanzo’s cell, the voice on the other end, when he picked up, was not. “Agent McCree.” The worst part -- the absolute worst-- was that while the voice was technically Zenyatta’s it also and absolute was not, too coolly, malevolently mechanical by half. “I must confess, I find myself in a bit of an awkward position. You see, I was explicitly warned not to underestimate you. The precise words used were ‘he’s smarter than he looks’ and ‘obfuscating stupidity is a real thing as far as he’s concerned.’ And yet, despite all these warnings...I seem to have done so.”

“Good of you to admit it,” Jesse drawled in reply, “But, in your defense, the accent tends to throw lots of people off.”

The laugh on the other end of the line sounded like two sharp, spiky things crushing something small and helpless between them. “Thank you. I will put that in my after-action report. Alas…”

Jesse flicked through the video feeds again and found both the rec room and the medlab empty. The floor of the rec room was covered in bits of broken ice and a couple puddles of something he desperately hoped was water.

“...I cannot permit either your charming accent or your attempts to thwart my mission succeed at their chosen tasks.” The quality of sound coming over the speaker changed slightly, taking on a hint of an echo.

“Then it seems that we’re at something of an impasse -- what should I call you? ‘Cause it isn’t going to be Zenyatta -- you don’t deserve that and neither does he.” There was just enough room on his arm’s internal storage to suck down what he needed out of the Blackwatch ICE archive but not enough to keep a constant running track of the eyes and their video feed, so he cut the stream.

The voice made a sound that would, on anyone else, have been a mildly disapproving tongue-click. “Such unnecessary hostility.”

“Trust me, I have not yet begun to be hostile, much less unnecessarily so.” Jesse kept an eye on the passive sensors lining the halls leading down to the hidey hole as he set to work, as quietly as possible, opening up the recessed wall panel that led to one of the four alternative exits from the nether regions of the comm tower. “Why don’t we cut the dancing around it and get down to telling me exactly what you want?”

“What leads you to believe I want something?”

“Because if you were only trying to distract me, Genji would’ve already been down here sticking something sharp between my ribs.” The motion detector hit at the top of the stairs leading down into the sub-basements; Jesse stopped what he was doing long enough to check specifics and then start the countdown on the workstation. “So let’s cut the bullshit.”

A brief silence. “Very well. I have someone you want, and you have someone I want. Let’s make a trade, shall we?”

That gave him a moment’s pause. “Really now.”

“Yes.” A certain silken menace in that single syllable. “My employers wish to extend an offer but they tend to prefer engaging in such negotiations...face to face. I assume that you would prefer that your partner exit this situation identifiable by something other than his dental work.”

“Well, if you’re going to put it that way -- “

“He can hear you, Agent McCree.” Again all sorts of smoothly malevolent and Jesse felt it turn his blood to ice and clear his head completely all at once.

“Hanzo.” His voice sounded almost preternaturally calm in his own ears. “Darlin’. I’m on my way. Promise.”

He cut the call off and slammed the phone on the edge of the workstation hard enough to shatter the screen and reduce the delicate internal workings to bits, then left it where it lay. The back exit dropped at least three meters straight down into pretty much total darkness, hand and foot holds cut into the rock to aid the descent; he pulled the recessed panel shut behind him and climbed as quickly as he dared, not wanting to risk an ankle since he rather felt he was going to need both of them in the relatively near future. The downward bore ended in a tunnel that angled off away from the edge of the cliff, back towards the bulk of the Watchpoint itself.

Up above, the countdown ended and, just as the door of the intelligence officer’s hidey hole slid open, the security countermeasures deployed, all of them, all at once. Even deep underground as he was, he heard the screaming, and added it to the list of things he was going to do something about.