#liminal flash family

[inkandarsenic]

My new favorite HC is that the Infinite Realms is Faerie. Danny died and is brought back by the magic of Faerie, making him more half Fae than he is half ghost. He’s been raised by the Fentons, though, who believe that Faerie is the Ghost Zone and that they’re ghost hunters, and so Danny, Sam and Tucker all just assume that he’s half ghost.

The Infinite Realms, however, are in fact infinite, and most of the ghosts Danny fights are in fact the spirits of humans who died in a place where the barrier between worlds was exceptionally thin, like ley line intersections or natural portals. They don’t realize that Danny isn’t actually half ghost because halfas are so rare. When Danny defeats Pariah Dark, he becomes King of the Infinite Realms (King of Faerie) after which his Fae qualities begin bleeding into his human half too. (Liminal Sam, Tucker and Jazz meaning they also start having Fae qualities? Team Phantom making everyone just slightly uncomfortable because they’re just a little too inhuman. Like uncanny valley vibes, they’re all just a bit off, but they’re just vibing completely oblivious to it. Ellie is like Puck from midsummer nights dream. Team Phantom eventually all becoming more Faerie than human through exposure and connection to Danny.)

If we go DPxDC on this, the liminal Batfam being just slightly off the way Sam Tucker and Jazz are, something people chalk up to them being bats, but Jason coming back more like Danny, a little more unsettling than the others.

The Speedforce being another corner of the Infinite Realms, and the Flash Family sometimes smile just a bit too wide, sometimes laugh just a bit too brightly, sometimes when people are around them as they run, they get the inexplicable urge to join in and never stop. (Flash Family being like the Wild Hunt or like the dancing until you die thing.)

The first time Team Phantom meets the Justice League + Constantine, everything in Constantine is screaming to stay as far away as possible from them, but the Flashes and Bats just completely disregard his warnings. The Kents and Diana also ignoring him because their nonhuman physiology means they don’t have that instinct to run. Damian thinks being around Team Phantom feels like being around the League.

[little-pondhead]

Your Ancient History, Written In Wax

-

Danny knew he should have put better security around the Sarcophagus of Eternal Sleep. It wasn’t even Vlad who opened it this time! The fruitloop was too busy doing his actual mayor duties because for some godforsaken reason, the man got re-elected.

No, it wasn’t Vlad. And it wasn’t Fright Knight, either. Nor the Observants. Who opened the Sarcophagus, then? Danny didn’t have time to find out as Pariah Dark promptly tore open a hole in reality and hunting Danny down.

The battle was longer this time. He didn’t have the Ecto-Skeleton, as that was the first thing Pariah had destroyed. The halfa had grown a lot over the past few years, and learned some new tricks, but apparently sleeping in a magic ghost box meant that Pariah had absorbed a lot of power. The bigger ghost acted like a one-man army!

Amity Park was caught in the middle of the battle, but the residents made sure it went no further than that. Vlad and the Fentons made a barrier around the town to keep the destruction from leaking. Sam, Tucker, and Dani did crowd control while Danny faced the king head-on.

Their battle shook the Zone and pulled them wildly between the mortal plane and the afterlife. Sometimes, residents noticed a blow from Pariah transported them to the age of the dinosaurs, and Phantom’s Wail brought them to an unknown future. Then they were in a desert. Then a blazing forest. Then underwater. It went on like that, but no one dared step foot outside of Amity. They couldn’t risk being left behind.

It took ages to beat him, but eventually, Danny stood above the old ghost king, encasing his symbols of power in ice so they couldn’t be used again. He refused to claim the title for himself. Tired as he was, Danny handed the objects off to Clockwork for safe keeping and started repairing the damage Pariah had done to the town. The tear he’d made was too big to fix, for now, so no one bothered. They just welcomed their new ghostly neighbors with open arms and worked together to restore Amity Park.

Finally, the day came to bring down the barrier. People were gathered around the giant device the Fentons had built to sustain it. Danny had brought Clockwork to Amity, to double check that they had returned to the right time and dimension.

Clockwork assured everyone that they were in the right spot, and only a small amount of time had passed, so the Fentons gave the signal to drop the shield.

Very quickly did they discover that something was wrong. The air smelled different. The noise of the nearby city, Elmerton, was louder and more chaotic. Something was there that wasn’t before, and it put everyone on edge.

Clockwork smiled, made a remark about the town fitting in better than before, and disappearing before Danny could catch him.

Frantic, Danny had a few of his ghost buds stay behind to protect the town while he investigated.

He flew far and wide, steadily growing horrified at the changes the world had undergone. Heroes, villains, rampant crime and alien invasions. The Earth was unrecognizable. There were people moving around the stars like it was second nature and others raising dead gods like the apocalypse was coming. Magic and ectoplasm was everywhere, rather than following the ley lines like they were supposed to.

Danny returned to Amity.

The fight with Pariah had taken them through space and time. Somewhere along the way, they had changed the course of history so badly that this now felt like an alien world.

How was he supposed to fix this?

-

In the Watchtower, The Flash was wrapping up monitor duty while Impulse buzzed around him, a little more jittery than usual. The boy was talking a mile a minute, when alarms started blaring an alarming green. Flash had never seen this alarm before, and its crackling whine was grating on his ears.

Flash returned to the monitor, frantically clicking around to find the issue, but nothing was popping up. No major disasters, no invasions, no declarations of war. Nothing! What was causing the alarm?

Impulse swore and zipped to a window, pressing his face against it and staring down at Earth. “Fuck! It’s today isn’t it? I forgot!”

“What’s today?” Flash asked. He shot off a text to Batman, asking if it was an error. The big Bat said it wasn’t, and that he would be there soon.

“The arrival of Amity Park. I learned about this in school; the alarm always gives me headaches.”

Flash turned to his grandson, getting his attention. “Bart,” he stressed. “What are you talking about?”

Impulse barely glanced over his shoulder. Now that Flash was facing him, he could see a strong glow coming from Earth. “The first villain, first anti-villain, and the first hero,” he said anxiously. “They all protect the town of the original metas. They’re all here.”

“Here? Now??”

“Yeah? They weren’t before, but they are now. The first hero said there was time stuff involved, which was what inspired me to start practicing time travel in the first place.”

“I’m not following.”

“It’s okay. We should probably go welcome them before they tear apart Illinois, though. The history I remember says that some of them freaked and destroyed a chunk of the Midwest during a fight with each other.”

“WHAT?”

[lilgynt]

my brothers leaving town and jesus whole event had me stressed out. it was good and nothing bad happened but i ran through a 500 mg weed pen within maybe. 2 to 3 days at least 85 percent and im still stressed.

[regonold]

Ok i just had an idea instead of so liminal they are basically ghosts already batfam they are the only people in Gotham to have no liminality

Now you may be asking how in Gotham its fannon that most people count as liminal with the amount of just pure raw death shit that happen ontop of the lazerus water shit

The answer? Lady Gotham she saw how proud batman was of being human and powerfree and still being able to keep up with the likes of superman or flash

So she started siphoning any ecto that builds in the batfam powrring herself and fulfilling the families pride of being completely human right?

This is how phantom fresh member pf tge league meeting batman for the first time is stareing because batman has no ecto contamination whilst most of tve other leaguers have a bit to alot

This is also why danny Fenton visiting Gotham cant stop staring at the uncanny valley of the wayne family i mean how they have no contamination that shouldn't be possible???

[a-god-in-crime-alley]

DPxDC prompt #1

(Or baby’s first fic prompt that’s more of a ficlette. It’s going under the cut because it ended up longer than a prompt. Sorry.)

Jazz is reincarnated in the DC Universe. Her new family is no longer in the picture and she doesn’t remember her past life at all. She ends up taken in by the League of Assassins. She is named Yasmina.

She grows up there, learning to be a skilled fighter and trains to be Talias bodyguard. Sometimes she helps protect baby Damian, even though she is only a teenager.

She grows up to be a tall girl with a strong build. Not willowy like Talia. She still has red hair but it’s darker now and naturally violet eyes because of a latent meta gene.

Talia eventually switches her to helping Jason during his training, acting as a go between. She occasionally has Yasmina spar with Jason to gauge how his training is going. The two teens get close, Talia sees this as a chance to manipulate Jason. She encourages Yasmina to pursue her interest in Jason, and encourage Jason to do the same.

(Talia is also kind of hoping Jason decides not to leave because she’s started to think of him as her own. Son, apprentice, just something intrinsically hers. She doesn’t want to give him back to her Beloved. She’s also seeing a bit of herself and Bruce in Yasmina and Jason. It’s nostalgic, but painful. She kind of wants them to have a better end than her.)

Yasmina and Jason end up spending a lot of time together. Feelings get stronger. They find a kind of happiness in each other for a time. It might be love blooming.

Then Jason’s training comes to an end. He still chooses to return to Gotham. Yasmina’s heart is broken, but when she looks in his eyes she knows Gotham is his first love. He’s just as Talia described The Bat to her, on one of her vaguely vulnerable days. Too determined. Too focused. The mission will always come first, even as he says he’s nothing like his father.

They fall into bed for the first time, desperate with the knowledge that they might never see each other again; And if they do, it might be as enemies. She sends him off with memories of her, and he ends up leaving something behind unintentionally.

That’s right, Yasmina is pregnant. But she doesn’t know that for a while. She hardly has any symptoms and miraculously, no miscarriage during all her training and any fights she gets into in that time.

Until her luck runs out.

She takes a killing blow for Talia, and earns her first dip in the Lazarus Pit. She goes in complete loyal to the League, she comes out with her memories as Jazz Fenton, and the soul of Danny inhabiting her unborn child.

She gets a medical check up after her Lazarus Spa day and look at that! Pregnant! Talia is kind of having flash backs. At least when She got pregnant and sent Bruce away, she Knew she was sending away the father of her child.

Talia helps Yasmina through her pregnancy and with the care of the baby; all with the understanding that this child will become Damian’s right hand. A couple years pass. Damian has gone to live in Gotham, and now 5 year old Danny (who kind of remembers his past life) is showing sighs of having suspiciously Lazarus water adjacent powers. Ra’s is getting nosy, uh oh. So Talia sends Yasmina away to Gotham.

Armed with the knowledge of her past and the skills of her present, Yasmina is determined to introduce her son to his father. Weather or not Jason will help convince The Bat to let them stay is another matter.

She also has to deal with her dip in the Lazarus pit activating her meta gene. Now she has her own Liminal powers to deal with on top of Danny’s ghost powers resurfacing.

(I know that was long. I know it’s practically a fic. I have no intention of writing more myself. If you want to, go ahead. But Tag me please I want to read a fic like this. This premise has been swimming in my brain like soup for days.)

[wolfjackle-creates]

Ghost!Robin Part 11

Time for another WIP Wednesday! I'm not sure if I'll have anything for next week. I'm working on a one shot right now as I can and wrapping up stuff for my final week of work which is taking a ton of time. Though I did get on a roll today and wrote a bit more than I'm posting, so maybe I'll have something.

Story Summary: Danny was invited to dinner at Wayne Manor to meet Jazz's boyfriend and his family for the first time. He worked hard to make sure no ghost business would interrupt the evening. But when he arrived, all he could focus on was the ghost of the dead Robin that seemed to haunt Jason. Looks like he was breaking his promise.

First, Previous

Word Count: 1.4k

----------

“Hn. What is the range on these devices?” asked Bruce.

Danny shrugged. “My stuff? From anywhere. I track through the Infinite Realms, not by Earth. GIW? Jason-Robin, they’ll be able to detect something from probably ten miles out of city limits, but they’d need to be within half a mile to get an accurate location. The Fentons? Mile or so. They get an exact location or nothing.”

Tim asked, “Is it likely the Fenton’s will come to Gotham?”

“Not sure,” admitted Danny. “But they sell commercially, so other ghost hunters might have their equipment. Jazz, pass the Fenton Finder?”

Damian couldn’t keep the incredulity out of his voice when he finally saw the blocky silver device with a circular, green screen on it and bits sticking up out of the front. “Why is there a light bulb attached to it?”

Even Robin looked at the device with a raised eyebrow and sent out a silent this real? his way.

“It flashes when a ghost is nearby,” Danny replied to both of them.

Tim hummed in interest. “Are the visible antennae necessary? Why are there multiple?”

“Most of my parents designs were cobbled together with whatever they could cannibalize from other household electronics and junk yards. Hence the less stream-lined appearance compared to the Guys in White’s stuff.”

He flicked the switch to turn it on and instantly the light bulb was flashing red, the radar screen turned on showing several dots in close vicinity to the center, and a robotic voice said, “You are surrounded by multiple ghosts. You’d have to be an idiot to not notice the ghosts all around you.”

Danny let it read out it’s warning again before flicking it back off. He had to laugh at the looks of complete bafflement on basically everyone’s faces. Even Bruce raised an eyebrow at it.

“Yeah, that’s my parents for you. FentonWorks designs are at least easy to spot. Not the the Guys in White’s stuff is much better. That horrible white on everything…” Danny shuddered. “I hate white.”

Bruce hummed. “Will you be able to provide us with some of these devices so we can study them on our own?”

Danny bit at his lower lip. “Probably. But it’ll have to wait until after I get you the information on how to safely work with ectoplasm. If Tim and Barbara are your big tech people, they’re not liminal at all and will have to be careful when handling it.”

Tim added, “We do have extensive experience working with toxic chemicals. Many of the Gotham rogues use chemical warfare.”

“Right. Yeah, I’ll have Tucker send you the safety sheets on it and we’ll see what devices I’ve got or can make duplicates of to get to you. I’ll be sure you get all three styles of hand-held trackers and their schematics. Maybe I’ll even be able to get you the schematics for a larger tracking system like what my parents have set up in Amity.”

Barbara nodded. “That would be great. What sort of set up do your parents have in your home town?”

“So they’ve set up sensors all over the city that detect ectoplasmic activity. The signal gets sent back to the computer in the ops center they built on top of their house, and they can pin the exact location of any ghost to within a foot or two anywhere within, like, five miles of the city limits. That data is also shared with the computer in their GAV.”

Jason bumped Jazz’s shoulder with his. “I know I’m gonna regret this, but what’s the ‘GAV’?”

Jazz sighed and answered. “It stands for Ghost Assault Vehicle. It’s a modified RV that’s basically a tank. Jack and Maddie simply have to press a button and a dozen ghost weapons will protrude from the vehicle and aim for any nearby ghost. And that’s without Maddie shoving her entire upper body out the window while holding a bazooka.”

“Yep. I regret asking. How badly am I gonna want to murder your parents by the time I’m done learning about them?”

“They are not my parents.” Jazz’s voice was hard.

At the same time, Danny answered, “Depends. How do you feel about genocidal mad scientists?”

Jason just let his head bang on the table. Robin flew over to him and patted him on the back. Jason seemed to subconsciously lean into the touch.

“Now,” said Danny. “I promised I’d show the rest of you these scanners up close.”

“That would be appreciated,” said Bruce. “We also have a few more questions about you and your parents.”

“And I need you to tell me more about these Lazarus pits because those sound like they’re a disaster.”

Alfred cleared his throat. “And I believe that will have to be the end of this meeting tonight. It is getting late and at least some of you will insist on going on patrol tonight still.”

A few people grumbled at Alfred’s words, but no one argued.

Danny made his way to the other side of the table and went over how to use the devices again. He pretended not to notice the way Jazz flinched when he turned on the Fenton Finder and it called out its warning again.

Jason did put an arm around her in response, though, so he figured she’d be all right.

“So that’s that,” he said once he turned off the last device. “I won’t be showing you any weapons until after we get you up to date on ghost biology and culture. If you run into issues in the meantime, you can call Jazz or me and we’ll take care of it.”

Bruce nodded. “We’ll be following up with our own experts as well.”

“Of course,” agreed Danny. “I figured. Now, you had some more questions?”

Tim asked, “You mentioned to me and Alfred that a member of Justice League Dark stopped by Amity. Can you tell us more about that?”

“I mean, there’s not much to tell,” said Danny. “It was John Constantine. And at the time I had no idea how famous he was. Would’ve asked for an autograph if I had, but oh well. This was shortly after I defeated Pariah Dark, the previous Ghost King. He came in, asked if I needed help. I told him I got it covered, he gave me a phone number, and that was that.”

Bruce hummed. “Yes, that sounds like Constantine. We will speak to him.”

“Why?” asked Danny. “It was exactly what I wanted. A check in to confirm I was okay and someone to reach out to on Earth if I got in over my head. It’s just by that time I started getting allies in the Realms. The big concern Earth-side was ghost hunters. And the worst of them were government sanctioned so I wasn’t sure if I should reach out to the Justice League since you guys also work with the US government.”

Jason let out a noise that Danny could only think of as a growl. “He should have spent enough time there to answer questions like that.”

Danny snorted. “Less than a week before he arrived, our entire town was removed from Earth and brought into the Infinite Realms for multiple days. Something would’ve been very wrong with him if he’d stuck around longer than it took to confirm it wasn’t likely to happen again.”

“I’m sorry,” asked Steph, “what is that about your entire town being transported off earth?”

“Don’t you know? My friends and I figured that’s why you sent Constantine to us.”

Barbara shook her head as she clicked around her computer. “There’s nothing in the Justice League files about it.”

“Huh. Well that’s how I became the Ghost King. The previous king was released by an idiot and lured to Amity. Ended up bringing the entire town into the Realms. His goal was to take over the town then the rest of earth. I defeated him in single combat while some other ghosts helped hold back his armies. No one bothered to tell me until later that that meant won his titles as well.”

Dick was frowning at him. “Why did you have to be the one to defeat him?”

Danny just blinked at him in confusion. “Who else was there? My accident is what activated the portal and started letting ghosts through. By making me half ghost, I had the powers necessary to contain the ones who caused problems. My parents were incompetent at best. So I just did what had to be done. Besides, if I hadn’t been an idiot, the portal never would’ve turned on in the first place. So it was my responsibility to fix it.”

----------

Next

And no one at the table liked that answer! The end of the dinner is finally in sight! I know I'm overlooking characters. I'll do some editing to make sure everyone gets a say before I eventually get around to posting this to AO3. (It's a good part of the reason I haven't started cross posting, tbh. That and I like to have stories fully finished before I start posting.)

Hope you all enjoy.

Tag List Part 1:

@addie-lover-of-stories, @justwannabecat, @gin2212, @amercurio, @regonold, @overtherose, @readerzj, @sjrose1216, @echoednonny, @deeterzz, @blu-lilac, @number-one-jew, @rowanaway-fromthisbs, @vythika96, @tired-yet-awaken, @themirrorghost, @emeraldcorpral, @all-mights-asscheeks, @darkhinauniverse, @blep-23, @phandomhyperfixationblog, @larkcoe1, @thegatorsgoose, @job-ross-the-second, @britcision, @lenacraft, @bubblemixer, @androgynouslordofescapism, @purefrickingspite, @leftmiraclechaos, @lizisipancardo, @starlight-sparks, @miraculousandmore, @gildedphoenix, @sometimesthingsfallapart, @letmesayfuxk, @phoenixcatch7, @skulld3mort-1fan, @abaowo, @dhampir-princess, @idkmrpianoman, @sarina-elais, @ballzfrog-blog, @undead-essence, @spookytragedyshark, @flyingpansaurus, @akintoabitch, @marivictal, @8-29pm, @justreadingthefanfics, @happybear135, @kisatamao, @spoopyspoony, @adorablechaos, @sara0055, @screamingtofillthevoid

[dent-de-leon]

Thinking about how Lucien wasn't able to sleep for months and months. How night after night, he kept trying to find respite, but the Somnovem never once let him rest. "Oh! You thought you were free! That's pretty cute. That's hilarious, actually...No, you're the Nonagon. That's forever. That lasts well beyond death, my friend."

Molly/Lucien being a dreamer in every life. A romantic. Lucien clinging to the fantasy that, "Once upon a time, there was a happy family." Molly watching all his dreams turn to nightmares of a screaming city, watching him slowly slip away from everything he knew and loved. "You don't dream of her anymore." "No, I only dream of them now."

And then when Molly is finally reborn, when finally he has the chance to sleep, he dreams so deep and vividly. He doesn't even wake until Jester casts Greater Restoration on him, and when she does, he bolts awake still reeling from what he'd seen. Like he's still lost in a dream--a lovely, happy dream.

"Oh...I was having the nicest dream...There was. Oh. There was a circus. And--ah, and this beautiful woman, in a--a red coat. And she was telling me secrets, showing me how to keep secrets. I...And oh, there was a--that sad angel, and--and there were adventures, and I was...we went everywhere, and saw..."

When Caleb asks, "What's your name?" he can't even answer at first, because he's still lingering on the warm memory of a distant dream. "I felt--I felt kingly. I felt very regal. Kingly...Sorry, what?" He sounds like he's still drifting in the memory of it. Like he regrets it when everything starts to slip through his fingertips in the light of day. "These faces aren't meaning anything...They're already fading...Is that me...?"

His first sleep since Lucien took the body, his first dream since Molly closed his eyes for the last time. And at the very least, it's a lovely dream. (It also breaks my heart that Kingsley dreams of Lestera that first night, just like how Lucien used to dream of Brevyn before the Somnovem.) But it seems Kingsley doesn't often have that luxury:

"Every now and then, your mind occasionally begins to recall memories through an occasional nightmare. Flashes of blurred memory, and time spent locked with another--familiar, yet revolving, revolting--place. The shell of loathing inescapable interior, looking out from your prison, pushing against your invisible binds. When your heart found the strength, giving all that you are to help those who gave you purpose in return. It was worth it. It was worth it."

"Yet on a rare occasion, that odd memory continues to return. That moment you gave yourself and broke your prison. The warm catharsis of letting go. And the strange black chains that wove through the city, now broken. The sound of them shattering between worlds, shaking you in that liminal space. The angry, unknowable, primal, ancient cry that you can never forget."

The fact that Kingsley is still tormented by nightmares of the city's end--and that it seems he always will be. The way Taliesin says, "And perhaps those chains will find some quiet in piracy." Like the pirate life is just something he threw himself into as an escape.

How King dreams so peacefully and happily of his life as Molly. How Lucien's folly still haunts him in nightmares over and over.

I really hope we get to see Kingsley in the Apogee Solstice with the rest of the Nein. And I hope he's been having better dreams--

[edutainer2022]

It's a weird, kind of liminal... moment the Mechanic and Scott have after Zero-XL. It wouldn't let me go. Their dynamics going forward (and the upended balance with Dad being back) fascinates me as they're interesting foils. It could be a tentative beginning of a friendship, a working relationship in IR, or, who knows...

OLIVE BRANCH

A tall figure was leaning on one of the work counters in his impromptu workshop, listlessly poking at one tool or other. Oh, snap! He really didn't have time for this! The Tracies, as he came to observe, were all very... involved - personal boundaries perfunctory at best and virtually non-existent since the Zero-XL mission came back a success. Even the ginger astronaut was planetside most of the time, in the middle of things - none of them straying too far away from a miraculously retrieved Jeff Tracy, trading stories, lapping up his undivided (well, divided six to seven ways, to be precise) attention. He wasn't a Tracy, nor did he have any intention of becoming one - so he cherished his space and solitude, thank you very much. Brains, for the most part, understood and respected that, letting him tinker at smaller projects in the bowels of the island, while the T-drive was being assembled. But this was not Brains snooping around in his nook. He really, really didn't have the energy for Scott Tracy.

- What are you doing in my hangar?

The younger man almost jumped in the air, clearly not expecting company. Seriously? The file said he was former military. Blue eyes flashed up in almost automatic defense. Okay, so maybe the Mechanic was somewhat amused by having five inches on the International Rescue Commander. The fierce leader was definitely not used to that.

- Interesting. I kinda thought this was my hangar.

- Funny you should mention it. I was under the impression it was your father's hangar.

The intended effect fell flat. Instead of riled up, Scott's sagged momentarily, shoulders dropped, the brilliant blue dimmed and downcast.

- Yeah, right, sorry. I'll get out of your way.

Huh? The Mechanic might not have been particularly proud of scoring that one up. The guy annoyed him on a good day with his holier than thou attitude and obsessive micromanagement. The Mechanic only ever fought for control to WIN. But he knew not to kick a man down, when he saw one (most times). Which was weird. Everyone else was floating on air, beholding Colonel Tracy like a godsend. The Mechanic was fairly sure the full assembly plus the British guests were up in the lounge this very moment too, completely engrossed in bliss and racing each other to showcase accomplishments and heroic antics. That was actually his cue to make the next move on his own... arrangements. He couldn't stretch their hospitality forever. Or tempt fate. Now was as good a time as ever, he guessed.

- Not a problem. I should be the one getting out of your hair. Soon.

Blue eyes shot back at him from the compelling oil stain on the floor, perplexed, then questioning. It obviously took Scott a hot moment to translate thought into words.

- I think you should stay on the island.

This. Was new. That was not so much an olive brunch, but an olive tree. The one thing they could reliably agree on prior to that was mutual disdain.

The Mechanic folded his arms, an automatic response to the mere chance of being vulnerable - being welcome. Being drawn into the circle by Grandma, when most of her family blinked out of the solar system possibly to be never seen again, was one thing. The Mechanic was under no illusion Scott Tracy could voluntarily stand to be in the same room with him under fair weather conditions, even grateful for his part in the T-drive or defense of the island.

- Why should I?

It was, of course, every inch the challenge it sounded like. Scott's gaze darted around the workshop, searching for inspiration.

- Brains loves working with you.

Lame one, Tracy. The Mechanic arched a brow, thoroughly unamused. The dregs of the barrel could really be more substantial. And yes, Scott walked himself into that one, so there was no backing out.

- Brains used to work perfectly fine without me in the picture. As he, no doubt, would again.

Blue eyes glanced over a half-finished mecha on the counter, then back to the floor. His fists found deeper way into the pockets. An evasive stance too, he knew. Scott Tracy was no better at asking for things than the Mechanic himself was. Least of all for forgiveness.

- Well, you're like... Grandma's fifth favorite grandkid. Stay for her.

That one was accompanied by a smile that didn't reach the eyes, focused on metal shavings on the bench now. The Mechanic arched a second brow and pretended to take the bait, if only to fill out the awkward silence.

- So, who have I yielded to?

A snort and another smile. This one rueful. And a forlorn stare in mid-distance the Mechanic was not sure even accounted for him anymore. THAT'S why he preferred to deal with machines.

- Virgil, obviously. He's Grandpa Grant through and through. Alan. It's a tie between Kayo and Brains. Gordon. Though he gets bumped up a tier when he's injured. You. Then John and I.

If Scott was amusing himself with the little charade - the Mechanic failed to see how. He wasn't giving an inch though, because they didn't cut each other slack, that was a given, so a tilt of the head and a fixed stare was the next unvoiced question. Scott shifted from foot to foot, clearly regretting it ever got this far. But the Mechanic was undeterred. Why the Astranaut and the Golden Heir, so far down the line? What kind of self-deprecating nonsense was that? Scott sighed. Words were obviously a problem again, though sadness rolling off the young man could be measured by tools at hand. He definitely preferred the machines. Emotions were not his forte.

- John is Mom. Looks much like her, speaks, moves. And I'm Dad... When Dad was gone I was there to remind...

- And now your Dad is back.

It was a simple statement of fact, colored by no assessment. No venom. He let "and you're hiding in the workshop of your sworn enemy, while everyone delights in your father's return" hang in the air, unsaid.

- And now my Dad is back...

And they don't need him to be Jeff Tracy anymore. They don't need him anymore, period. Scott snapped in time to an inner consideration, likely, along those same lines, and was suddenly in a hurry to leave. The Mechanic didn't know much about dealing with people and feelings, but he knew loneliness and despair when it stared him in the face. It took one to recognize one.

- Hey, Tracy! I don't need anything from you.

That earned him another hung head and a non-committal wave. Scott half turned away again, taking a long stride to the exit.

- But I could use some help. You any good with system updates?

He gestured to the assorted consoles around the work area. Blue eyes dragged up again and lit up for the first time since their strange conversation started.

- Brains lets me do solo updates on One.

That was a dubious recommendation, because, brilliant as he was, the shy engineer was under a totally false impression Scott Tracy had hung the Moon. But that was some serious shit-eating grin, dimples and all, so the Mechanic kept the idea to himself and kept busy with assorted switches.

[abalidoth]

whats your fav album/albums??

Like anyone else who was sentient and within earshot of a radio in 2012, I was aware of Call Me Maybe. It was inescapable, virulently catchy, an icepick of bubblegum straight to the tympaneum. As mocked as it was beloved, as society is unable to tolerate anything feminine.

I don't strongly remember my feelings about it at the time. I was probably self-aware enough at that point to not explicitly shit on it -- that was right around when I was making my first tentative steps towards not identifying as a guy. But my musical taste at the time skewed more towards They Might Be Giants and Imogen Heap so it wouldn't have been anything I sought out.

Flash forward to the summer of 2015. I'm in a bar in Ames, Iowa with a bunch of other mathematicians, there for the Graduate Research Workshop in Combinatorics. After a hard day of bootstrap percolation and RNA folding and graph discharging, we descended on this little college bar's trivia night like a swarm of LaTeX-using locusts. Combinatorists tend to be eclectic sorts, so trivia comes naturally to us, and I'm no exception; our four mathematician teams took the top four spots that night, and my team was first among those. There are a few other stories that came out of that night, but the relevant one is that I heard a little song over the speakers called I Really Like You.

Like Call Me Maybe, IRLY was uncompromisingly girly. But I was at a stage in my life where that was a balm to my aching soul. I had been slowly growing in my femininity month by agonizing month, living in the freezing wastes of Laramie, Wyoming. I wore skirts around the house, went by ze/hir pronouns online, but nobody in person knew. Every Friday afternoon my wife would paint my nails, and every Sunday evening I'd scrub the authenticity out of myself with acetone and a cotton ball. So the femininity of the song was appealing to me.

So, too, was the lyrical content. It was self-awarely about a liminal state in relationships, that hazy limerence where actual commitment isn't in the cards, but the feelings are strong, so why don't we ride them while we can? It's not that it hasn't been done before, but Carly Rae did it well. I added the song to the mp3 app on my phone and didn't think much more of it.

Cut to the summer of 2016. Brexit had just happened, I had just found out my dad was planning to vote for Trump. The sun over the Rockies was bright, but the world was feeling small and hostile. We were spending the week with my parents and some family in a mountain town in Colorado. Emma and I aren't the hiking sort, so when the rest of the folks went out in the wilderness, we decided to explore some of the little towns in the area. In one of those towns was a record store, and in that record store was a CD copy of E-MO-TION.

I recognized it as the album that had that song I liked from last summer. We listened to it in the car on the way back up to Laramie, and I liked it a lot. Now, we usually listened to music on the old iPod that was connected to our aux cable, rather than the CD drive. So that CD just kinda stayed there in the car.

November rolled around. Trump won the election. My dysphoria and my fear and my seasonal depression blended into a eutectic misery, greater than the sum of its parts, a suffocating miasma of soul-deep pain, that I had to keep off my face for the sake of my students.

I started listening to that CD in the car more and more. I memorized the track numbers, I knew exactly what stretches of songs were best for which emotions. That album became a lifeline for me. When I was driving an icy road in the dark on three hours of sleep, stressing about my lack of progress on my dissertation, and the intrusive thoughts came in that maybe, it wouldn't be so bad if the car spun out on the black ice?

I'd put on Making the Most of the Night. Carly Rae knew I was having a rough time, and here she was to hijack me, hijack me.

[cinturon-cadena]

DP x DC Smallville

Okay, I've been forming this theory for a while now, but this scene just cemented it:

The bottom of her boots? Fenton F??? There is no way you can't tell me those aren't Fenton-grade boots!

Hear me out. I have other evidence.

The principal in season 1 is a man of Asian decent named Kwan. Who else do we know named Kwan?

And to top it off, Smallville's Kwan has a son named Danny. Now obviously, his son isn't Fenton/Phantom, BUT assuming at least the class and maybe the entire town of Amity Park learns Danny's secret, it wouldn't be out of the ordinary that some of his classmates grow up and name a child after their town hero. Even if they never learn Danny's secret, Danny Fenton himself did lead the entire class against Ember and Youngblood, as well as exhibited other noble qualities, so it's not out of the question that at least one of his classmates had a child whom they named 'Danny'.

2. As discussed in this post, the whole 'Kryptonite-is-crystalized-Ectoplasm' theory. Now some of the more meticulous (me) might be wondering, 'if this theory holds up and Kryptonite-Ectoplasm is giving random people in Smallville super/ghost powers, then why didn't Amity Park have the same activity?' Why thank you, Skeptical Voice In My Head! I'll tell you why. First of all, Smallville has had 12 years-worth of exposure to the Kryptonite-Ectoplasm, that's why! During the course of Danny Phantom's runtime we only get to see ~1 year pass. 2 if we're being generous. In addition, despite having a literal portal to Hell the Infinite Realms open basically 24/7 in the town, along with near-daily/hourly ghost attacks, the citizens of Amity Park themselves do not seem to regularly come into contact with any form of Ectoplasm. Unlike in Smallville, where people are handling the stuff almost daily - hell, dozens of people just casually wear it as jewelry, and I guarantee more than 1 person has at least a meteorite rock or 2 in their home, as a keepsake. There is also a potential argument to be made about crystalized Ectoplasm-Kryptonite being more potent than the ambient radiation/gas/liquid stuff we see in Amity Park.

3. There is literally a canonical town near Smallville called Amityville. Enough said.

4. Which brings us to number 4. The Boots.

I propose that it is highly likely that Danny's class grew up through the events of Danny Phantom (sin Phantom Planet), and that Smallville takes place somewhere around ~25 years after the Portal opens. Kwan grew up to be a teacher, then principal, and named his son after Danny (whether he knew Danny's secret or not). Fenton Works continued on in some capacity, whether it's still the Dr's Fenton going at it or if Danny/Jazz inherited the family business, and at some point made a line of Fenton-grade combat boots. Heck, maybe Sam had a say in their design (it is the kind of thing she'd wear).

In addition, if this is ~25 years later, then Amity Park would be full of Liminals right now - probably keeping their nature on the down-low so the rest of the world doesn't know, or being held under a Team Phantom (Foley/Fenton/Technus) or GIW-mandated blackout. Either way, the general world knows Amity ParkVille exists, but not that Liminals live there (unlive?).

And because their exposure to Ectoplasm was much more gradual and they would have had enough cultural exposure to ghosts, they would adapt to their newfound Liminality powers much more effectively than the poor flash-exposured citizens of Smallville who end up insane because they can't handle the sudden influx of power they're granted. The citizens of Amity Park have the tech and know-how to deal with weird ectoplasm-induced ghost powers. They've seen and interacted with enough ghosts that the idea of Obsessions/Purposes/insert-headcanon-here isn't far-fetched and they'd know how to deal with it in a slightly more constructive way (or at least, be able to handle the ghostly aggression that Liminals seem to have, if Smallville is any indication).

SO, In Conclusion, Danny Phantom's Amity Park and Smallville are in the same universe, albeit DP is ~25 years ahead of Smallville's setting.

Just Saying.

[dark-elf-writes]

… imagine the vestiges during the Chosen One meetings, seeing this boy get the help they never did. Imagine them able to reach out and talk. The comfort they can give.

Jsjfjdndjdjdn echoes of Chosen Ones from years and years ago able to comfort the next generation and receive comfort in return.

Nana getting to see a sunshine boy with a bright smile and brighter eyes tell her he’s going to be the best one day and change the world for the better. She nods and tells him of course he is.

Yoichi standing by Cloud, welcoming his silence, welcoming him even more when the man reminds him it wasn’t his fault. That the actions of his brother lay on his shoulders alone and that Yoichi was never to blame for the way things turned out. He smiles and almost believes it.

Banjo laughing as he watches Percy drill with a sword that was definitely just a pen offering tips and tricks to make sure this kid makes it out alive.

Second sitting with little Harry, seeing flashes of another sad boy with green eyes locked away by a family who didn’t love him. It kills him that he can’t steal this boy away too, but at least he can reach out in this weird liminal place. At least he can pull the boy close and let him lean against his side as he rambled on about magic and wonder and a million other little things now that he isn’t afraid to be heard.

[doom-dreaming]

I know he's supposed to be pretty intimidating given his status but idkk John is kind of adorable. His small tooth gap he's had since he was a kid. The freckles on his face and possibly shoulders. How could I be even slightly scared of him. Look At Him. He's cute. Do you think at one point he smiled barely showing his teeth but enough for cortana to see his gap and do you think she felt just a little warmer at her core

Maybe that's why he's so reluctant to take the helmet off. The "human battering ram" reputation gets shot to pieces once everyone gets a look at those freckles and beautiful baby blues.

Jokes aside, I do like artistic interpretations of him that keep these features. I can understand how, realistically, the tooth gap may have disappeared once his baby teeth fell out or he lost the freckles he had as a kid, but I think keeping them into his adulthood is more fun. (And don't even get me started on shoulder freckles. Oh my god. Yes please.)

Also. Please accept this humble reimagining of that part in The Fall of Reach where Cortana finds out the truth about the S-II program. Now with 80% more (subtle) Johntana (because let's be honest, it was already kind of there. Thank you Eric Nylund.)

**********

Most of her processing attention is focused on the Pillar of Autumn. She doesn't need much to look at the Master Chief's full CSV - though she does mull over it more slowly than she'd downloaded it. Everything was the same as the public, polished version up until...oh. Interesting. She'd known the Master Chief, and the other Spartans, had been enhanced to perform far beyond the normal scope of human capability, but this...

Ever-curious but starting to feel a peculiar tightening within her code - some sort of...apprehension, maybe? - she pores over the grisly details of the operation. Growth hormones, muscle injections, bone reinforcements, literal brain surgery...and all at just fourteen years of age.

She pauses and turns this fraction of her attention away from the file, to the Autumn's C-deck. Twenty-five Spartans busy themselves with weapon maintenance, unpacking supplies, sparring. She scans the room, studying the details of each Mjolnir-clad superhuman body, near-identical apart from their mannerisms and the numbers on their chestplates. There he is. 117. She watches for a moment while he takes apart his rifle, inspects it, and reassembles it - all with confident, practiced motions.

She wants to be in tandem with him again, in that liminal space between the protective shell of his Mjolnir and his quick mind. Easy, Cortana, she chides herself. Yesterday's training exercise, as nerve-wracking and exhilarating as it'd been, had taken a toll on him. He needed the rest. And she had a file to finish.

Before the augmentations, they'd spent years training and studying, often under brutal conditions. Especially for... Her attention drifts to the next section of the file, where a picture is attached - a simple headshot of a young boy. His brown hair is tousled, as if he'd been forced to stop playing specifically to look at the camera. Sharp, intelligent blue eyes stare back at her. A scatter of freckles adorn his cheekbones like small constellations. He's smiling, but there's something rambunctious about the expression, a barely-contained mischief hiding in the quirk of his lips and the small gap between his front teeth. He looked...happy. Like a six-year-old should.

If her avatar had been visible, she would've frowned. He'd been kidnapped, taken from his family, and replaced with a flash clone. They, none the wiser, must've assumed their little boy died some weeks or months later, as flash clones inevitably did. She wasn't sure if the truth was any kinder a reality.

And Halsey had authorized every bit of it. Her processing drifts aimlessly for several cycles as she tries to comprehend the dissonance. Halsey cared so much for them, how could she have...? It was necessary, Cortana reasons. The fate of humanity rests on their shoulders. But a quieter part of her suggests that maybe the doctor's concern for her Spartans came from a place of guilt.

Snapping the wandering threads of her consciousness back to her core, she deletes the stolen files and turns her attention once more to C-deck. The Master Chief, immersed in a conversation with a few of the other Spartans, had taken off his helmet and set it on the bench beside him. Someone cracks a joke and the Chief flashes a quick smile. He's a fully-grown man now, obviously, but for a second, Cortana can see a six-year-old boy; in the gap that had stayed between his front teeth, in the freckles splashed over his cheeks and the bridge of his nose, in the way his eyes - even sharper now - glint with mischief.

"Whatever the Master Chief had been through in the past...it was done. He was in her care now. She would do everything in her power - short of compromising the mission - to make sure nothing ever happened to him again."

[sysmedsaresexist]

News Flash ⚡

The epistemological significance of possession entering the DSM

An absolutely incredible deep dive into the history of possession and DID-- covering patients, topics, philosophers, and clinicians from the 1600s to 2015.

It also explains how and why the cultural exclusion came to be added to the DSM 5, and what it means.

Important quotes below the cuts

The criteria would distinguish sharply between culturally sanctioned alterations of consciousness, which are a form of religious transcendence and/or a therapeutic technique, and peripheral pathological alterations of consciousness, which cause maladjustment and distress because they occur outside of ritual containment and are spontaneous, beyond the conscious control of the person. The criteria would also differentiate between the chronic course of Multiple Personality Disorder/Dissociative Identity Disorder, associated with reports of early physical and sexual abuse, and the typically acute course of pathological possession. The criteria would differentiate as well between the delusions of possession experienced by psychotic patients and the delusions of possession disorder; accordingly, Schizophrenia, Mood Disorder with Psychotic Features, and Brief Psychotic Disorder were listed as differential diagnoses, although no help was offered for making such differentiation.

Criterion B set up an impossible task for the diagnostician: how to differentiate between possession trance authorized as a normal part of a collective cultural or religious practice and spontaneous pathological possession trance, which, the criteria suggested, occurs outside normal cultural practice. Antze opposed the wording of Criterion B because, ‘[t]o the extent that any form of trance is recognized as such by members of a culture and therefore given meaning, it is culturally “authorized”, even if only as a form of illness’.

Janice Boddy (1992) pointed out that, while introducing possession as a disorder into the DSM-IV appeared to validate people’s distressful experiences by inclusion, it misleadingly suggested that culturally normative possession states are not distressing. Boddy insisted that distress is a regular component of most reported experiences of possession in ethnographic literature. More importantly, she argued that designating possession as a disorder reinforced (if unwittingly) the tendency of those in power to ignore the social and political contexts that precipitate the pheno-mena of possession. I understand this argument to mean that, for example, the suffering of a Sudanese woman possessed by a zar spirit carries potential meaning, not only for herself as an individual sufferer, but also for her marriage, her family and her community; the husband, the family and the patriarchal cultural collective need not engage with this suffering if they classify the behaviour as a psychogenic disorder. Anthropologists such as Boddy have demonstrated how so-called dysfunctional distressing possession is often a highly creative, politically informed response to intolerable collective situations. Boddy (1992) asked, ‘in whose interest would it be, then, to define possession cases as “disorders”?’

As Littlewood and Boddy emphasize, most so-called ‘normal’ experiences of possession manifest as conflictual, as demanding redress between the individual and the surrounding family or social milieu and, to the extent that these experiences partake of liminoid as well as liminal elements, they paradoxically affirm and subvert the norms of the culture or religion in which they are imbedded.

[shibaraki]

The argument happened as a result of your concern. Usually happy and willing to be doted on, Tomura’s sense of defeat had still been fresh, and it’d clung to his skin no matter how much he clawed at it. Thus your incessant reminders of his recklessness, the questions and the tears, was what ultimately lead him to snap.

So you backed off, leaving him alone to lick his wounds, to make peace with his own embarrassment and calm down. While you thought it for the best to give him time to process everything, the absence of affection and the hurt that’d briefly flashed across your expression before your exit had only exacerbated the itch.

Blood and skin beneath his nails, the curve of his pink throat raw and stinging against the cool air, Tomura sat on the damp doorstep at the back of the bar. Everything was wet, drenched with the putrid scent of expired food and whatever else had found it’s path to rot at the bottom of the dumpsters — it was hardly his family garden, not that he recalled much detail of it. Mercifully Kurogiri hadn’t come out to bother him nor to usher him back inside, and so he uses the early morning hours to replay the pained quiver of your lip after he’d cursed you.

He isn’t sure how long he waits there. Further down the pathway is an old streetlight bathing the walls in flickering orange luminescence and the roads are quiet. Without a clock time simply seems to be at a stand still, and his body feels as if he’s phased into a liminal space. At some point he hears the door handle lower, the inner workings clicking out of place as it’s opened. He hadn’t really expect it to be you, far more likely to be Dabi skulking off to the port again where the sky was clearest at night, but he’s intimately familiar with the warmth of your touch where it rests on his shoulder.

“Tomura,” you breathe his name and it’s strained with confusion, “what are you doing out here? I woke up and you weren’t there. You’re— you’re freezing!”

At the realisation you sink to your knees behind him and wrap your arms around his chest in an attempt to cradle him. He’s felt this before, though maybe not with you. Held against a soft warm breast, a hand combing through his hair, gently swaying back and forth.

“The quest went bust and I made you cry,” he says, unsurprised by the rasp in his voice. The phantom weight of his father’s hand covering his face bores a spike of irritation in his stomach and it weaves into his muscles, jaw tightening with gritted teeth.

His neck begins to burn again, and you kiss his jugular with gentle lips as if you already knew. “That doesn’t mean you need to sit out here and punish yourself,” you tell him.

But he did need to. You’d walked away from him, and that part was important somehow. His brow pinches as he meets your gaze, eyes still bright behind the curtain of his hair, and a shadowed memory slides jarringly into place.

“I’m sorry,” he mutters, watching you soften, rendered pliant with relief as you kiss him again. He’s not sure he deserves your loving forgiveness, but it doesn’t matter much to him either. Cold and sore, Tomura just wants to come inside.

And he can’t come inside until he apologises.

[tropes-and-tales]

Angels in Disguise, Part III

CW:  Heavy angst; talk of serious injuries and death; talk of suicide, trauma, and PTSD. 18+ only to be safe.

Word Count:  1778

AN:  Part of a miniseries.  Other pieces can be found here.

It takes him so long to wake up.  Benny has been seriously hurt, and after the surgeries to save his life, he stays in a coma for a while.  One week, then a second.  

He wakes, but he exists in a grey liminal space.  He drifts in and out like the tide, but even when he’s awake, he’s not entirely there.  Time passes in a flash.  The sun zips across the sky in a single blink.  

Blink, and it’s morning, the weak dawn light making his window rosy around the edges of the blinds.

Blink, and it’s the dead of night, the quiet hush of the ICU, the squeak of nurses’ sneakers on the tiled floor.

Blink, and he wakes with his mother dozing in the chair beside him, his hand held loosely in her own.

Blink, and he wakes up alone.

Everything is slippery:  time, his thoughts.  He forgets when he is, where he is.  He only knows two things for certain—who he is, and the fact that he’s been terribly hurt.  That he teetered so close to death that the black yawning nothingness when he falls asleep feels perilous.

But as the doctors dial down the pain medication, and as his senses roar back to life, he remembers a third certain thing.  

He remembers the woman who saved him.  The woman who eclipsed the sun as he lay bleeding out in the street.  The woman who held his life in her hands, who held back the outgoing tide of his blood in the middle of a war zone.

He wakes one afternoon and remembers you.  He turns his head and sees his mother sitting there, reading a paperback novel.

“Where is she?” he croaks, and his sudden words startle his mother.

“Who?” she asks.  She sets her book down, pulls her chair closer.  She smooths her hand over his forehead, and he feels like a little boy again—sick in bed, her cool hand soothing him.

“The woman,” he manages to say through his dry throat.  “The woman who saved my life.”

-----

No one seems to know about you.  

Benny’s family knows nothing about the woman who saved his life.  Henderson and Z visit, and they know nothing either.  They only know that he had been shot, but Henderson had pursued Merrimen with Big Nick that day.  Zapata had been hit too, in the knee, and hadn’t been there for Benny’s rescue.

No one knows anything.

Recovery takes forever.  His wounds heal slowly, then he needs PT to regain his strength, his stamina.  He shifts from the ICU to the regular part of the hospital, then he’s released with orders to continue PT.  

That’s just the physical side.  Benny’s head is a mess.

He knows, theoretically, what PTSD is.  He maybe even had it before that day:  police work is miserable, and Major Crimes sees the worst sort of shit.  He never slept all that well before, and he used alcohol and weed to cope.

This?  This is something else entirely.

His sleep is thin and restless.  He’s irritable.  Loud noises make him jittery which…he lives in an apartment in Los Angeles.  Loud noises are the norm.  

Moments from that afternoon flash across his eyes, vivid memories that spark against his senses.  The scent of spilled gasoline from a bullet-punctured gas tank.  The scent of gunpowder.  The iron scent of blood—his own.

The woman is in those vivid memories, and that is what keeps him semi-sane in the month after he is released from the hospital.  For every flashback that leaves his mouth dry and his palms slick with sweat, there’s the memory of you:  your beautiful face taut with worry, your steady hands keeping him alive.

-----

Benny uses up his sick time then is forced to take a medical retirement.  His leg injury is significant, and no doctor will clear him to return to work.  He gets half of his pension early, and that’s enough to live if he’s thrifty.

Benny Magalon has always been defined by his role as a detective.  He never married or had kids.  His friends are largely fellow cops.  Without that, he drifts.  He’s unmoored.

Another month passes.  He’s basically a recluse.  He skips his PT appointments, gets his groceries delivered.  The wide blue sky feels perilous to him, so he only goes out at night if he has to.  

He’s on a slippery slope.  He knows it, but he seems powerless to stop it.  Poor sleep, poor eating habits, too much drinking.  He loses weight but gets the soft, rounded face of a regular drinker.  His hands shake too much.  His family checks in on him—his mother makes it a rule to stop by once a week with a home-cooked meal—but he’s mostly alone.  

He knows better than most that this is what kills cops:  not always a well-placed bullet from a bad guy, but the ugly mundaneness of everyday living after a tragedy.  The whispering voice in the dark hours of early morning, asking him if it’d be easier to just end it.  He turned in his service piece, but he still has his own gun.  It’d be so easy to—

He pushes the thought aside.  He remembers his last glimpse of you:  kneeling in the street, covered in his blood.  You suffered to save his life.  He can’t make it be worth nothing now.

-----

It’s Connors that gets him back on track.  He stops by one evening, unannounced, with a six-pack and a pizza.

And a thin folder that he slides across the table to Benny as they eat.

“I looked into your mystery woman,” he says as he swipes at his mouth with a napkin.  “Honestly, I didn’t even think she existed.  Thought you had some near-death hallucination of…shit, I dunno.  Your grandma or something.”

Benny lifts his eyebrows.  “What changed your mind?”

“Talked to one of the EMTs.  He confirmed her existence.”

Benny feels his heart in his throat.  He traces his finger around the edge of the folder.  “And?”

“And, I did a little digging.  Detective-work.  Remember that?  So, a lot of the cars in that traffic snarl were abandoned during the shoot-out.  People got out and ran.  The entire street was a crime scene, and as they cleared it, the cars were towed.”

“Okay…”

“Towed cars were taken to three different impound lots.  Two of ‘em kept good records of who picked up the cars and when.  No woman matching your description came through there looking for their missing red sedan.”

“And the third lot?”

Connors takes a sip of his beer.  “Kept less than stellar records.”  A beat, and Benny’s heart is thudding so heavy in his chest that he almost misses the next sentence out of Connors’s mouth.

“No woman came through there either, though.  Because the red sedan is still there.”  He reaches out and taps the folder.  “She hasn’t claimed it yet.  I got her information from her tags, and I went through the car too.  She’s a vet, did you know?”

Benny nods.  “Yeah.  Well, I mean, I remember her wearing scrubs.  I thought she might be a nurse.”

Connors takes another sip of beer.  “It’s a good thing she got out of her car too.  I looked it over.  There was a pair of bullet holes right through the windshield.  Driver’s side.  Slugs are buried in the headrest.  Woulda killed her, instant.”

So many emotions at once:  your name is right inside the folder.  Your address.  Where you work.  But….

“She hasn’t gotten her car back?” Benny asks, confused.  “Why?  It’s been months.”

“Good news, bad new, bubba,” Connors replies.  “Good news is, I found her.  She has family in L.A.  I went and paid her parents a visit to see what was up.”

Benny swallows hard.  “What’s the bad news?”

The man’s face twists into a wince.  “Her parents said she kinda fell apart after that day.  There’s no easy way to say it, but she tried to off herself a few weeks afterwards.  Pills, I guess.”

“Fuck.  Fuck.  Are you serious?”

Connors nods.

Benny sits back in his chair.  Slumps.  Why didn’t he ever consider that as a possibility?  In his mind, he thought the worst thing you’d experience was the shock of that moment.  Maybe some lingering nightmares.  Maybe a stronger startle reflex when a car backfires or a door slams.

Suicide, though?

He sorts back through his memories of that day.  The memory of your face peering down at him, the memory of the feeling of your wrist when he managed to grab it and squeeze it.  He lays this new fact of your suicide attempt over those memories, and suddenly it seems obvious, the dark shadow that has engulfed you.  

Hasn’t it consumed him too?  Hasn’t his tired, tortured mind drifted to the comforting weight of his gun?  Hasn’t he been tempted by the thought of going to sleep and not waking up?

“Fuck,” he says softly.

“Good news, bad news, good news,” Connors amends from earlier.  “Her parents said she’s in some in-patient program.”

“That is good.”

The other man nods.  “Yeah.  They said they’d be willing to talk to you, if you want.  They thought she might be up for meeting you once she’s released.  Thought it might do her some good.  Help her recovery and all that.”

The feeling that washes over Benny…it’s an echo from that day.  Madness, then, and madness now.  He was dying that day, but he remembers the wild thought that you were the woman he’d been waiting for all his life.  He’d felt an undeniable link to you, sudden and strong, and in the months since then, he chalked it up to whatever synapses had been wildly firing as his brain flailed against his dying body.

But even now, sitting in his kitchen across from Connors, he feels exactly the same.  The same kinship that runs deeper than just two people who survived a traumatic event together.  He feels that same link to you.  He’s never been the sort of man to believe in any of that shit—coincidences happen all the time—but this still feels like fate.

Fate that you were there that day.  Fate that he was shot and you were there to save him.

Fate that as he was waking up from his coma, as he was rejoining the world, you were trying to leave it.

Fate that he has been sitting in his apartment, struggling the exact same way as you have been struggling.

Fate that as you saved him that day, he wants to save you now.  

[operatorsdiner]

It Does in Fact Bite: Entry 3.

The radio chatter hummed along inside the Subaru being driven, cool rain pelting against the windshield as Baylen drove toward the outskirts of the city. His nametag felt glaringly obvious as the seatbelt pressed the uncomfortable plastic into his chest, one would’ve thought that after 5 years of working at the restaurant, he would just keep the badge in the managerial office. That would be an obvious solution though, and little irritations like this reminded Baylen that he was human and not some soulless being from all the time he’d spent in liminal spaces. 

The night sky was darkening overhead, almost already at its deepest depths. It was autumn after all which meant the night air was brisk and night fell quickly over the hushed city. Baylen’s mind wandered elsewhere as he drove, allowing for muscle memory to take control as he drove through the winding suburban streets, eventually houses and gas stations became more and more sparse - before eventually it was just a wheat field and trees that surrounded the road on the edge of the city line. The distance between his store and the nearest gas station was a well-known annoyance, especially after the time he forgot to get gas before work when he was a novice employee and ended up stranded in the parking lot of their work at the end of the shift. Luckily for Baylen, it was nine in the morning, so they didn’t have to walk through the dark fields or forested areas to a gas station in complete darkness. Four hours and one comically large jerry-can later, Baylen was able to finally go home. 

His mind flashed through the time spent at the restaurant he currently managed; the crews that had come and gone, the amount of customers Baylen had actually brawled, and the multiple times people had attempted to rob the store at gunpoint. Good times. Baylen’s mind finally came to a focus as they tuned into the radio station playing, National Public Radio was a staple inside his vehicle, he loved hearing the local historians and scientists who spoke impassioned about their respective careers. Tonight's broadcast was different however, tonight's broadcast spoke of crimes and unheard-of horrors ravaging through their small city. The city was composed of around 17,000 people according to the last census - not that Baylen really believed that considering he only ever saw the same people whenever he went out. The young manager was not oblivious to the events occurring around him, of course, he’d taken note of the murders and kidnappings that became more and more prominent at the same time as… odd customers becoming regulars. The host of the news station urged caution and staying close to trusted others in this worrisome time in between bouts of news articles. 

Family of 6 found murdered in their beds, all of their faces disfigured.

Young woman finds photos of herself through her windows plastered to her front door.

Convenience store overnight workers found killed in a frenzy. 

The list of atrocities continued further, but Baylen turned away from them as his car finally pulled into the lot of the 24-hour diner he’d grown so accustomed to. The parking lot lights flickered at different frequencies, some flickered rapidly whilst others went in slow methodical blinks. Baylen spent many hours seeking out a pattern in the poorly maintained lights. They sighed as they looked inside the large glass windows and only briefly thought, ‘Damn this place really is like a fishbowl.’ As he watched the group of employees inside laugh and gossip at a booth as they rolled silverware. It was only three of them; the host, the head cook, and a server.  Baylen was covering for the other parts of the floor since both Dante and Enzo had caught some freak flu. Those two never got sick, so Baylen didn’t think twice about coming in for them.

Baylen sighed as he unbuckled himself, grabbed the backpack that sat slumped in the passenger seat, and headed inside the building. Baylen never really cared about parking away from the front door, he’s learned over time that being able to see your car is important in this kind of establishment. It was only a slight bonus that he didn’t have to be out in the chilled air for long. The small bell above the door chimed as he walked through the front entrance, and he prepared himself with a small smile and a wave as the three present gave their own variations of greetings.

Adrian Jones, the host of the establishment, was ever polite with their wave to their manager. They barely lifted their fingers as they folded the napkins around the utensils, and it was then that Baylen noticed Adrian was the only one rolling the silverware. It wasn’t surprising. Adrian’s deep black hair hung in waves that covered a portion of their face, obscuring it from the world. Whatever had been said most recently left a small mischievous smirk across their lips - Baylen did not need, nor want to know what led to that expression. 

Alex Johnson, the head cook, only gave a brief nod of acknowledgment as they kept their head down, quietly filling out what seemed to be the food order forms. Their other fingers tapped musical patterns into the cheap tabletop. Their long hair blocked all view of their face and obscured most of the paper they worked on. Baylen didn’t look long, he knew that prolonged ‘eye contact’ was something that unnerved them. 

Then finally, Wren Blight, one of two servers on the overnight staff sat lounging in the booth, crumpled in a way that most certainly wouldn’t be comfortable to Baylen - with one arm hanging across the back, the other holding up their phone as they doom scrolled through social media apps, with their legs kicked up on the table, ankles crossed. Their deep purple hair was cropped into a stylized mullet, framing the scars that went across their eyes. They gave a charismatic grin and waved to the manager as he entered, saying a quick, “Sup, boss?”

Baylen didn’t pay the crew much mind as he walked over to the clock-in station next to his office, tossing his backpack haphazardly toward the desks inside. Instead of turning around back towards his coworkers and the dining room, they pivoted on their feet to follow the hall down to the dish pit and walk-in cooler. Enzo had texted the manager a heads up that something had gotten into the freezers, and that it sounded large. Baylen knew that nothing could have gotten in without wanting to be there, but he didn’t think whatever got in there knew that the door locked from the outside upon shutting. 

It was only when he came to a stop in front of the tall freezer doors that he realized his heartbeat was pounding heavily in his chest, so intensely to the point that he could feel it in his fingertips. Though none of the anxiety he felt was shown across her face. She could not allow that fear to disturb anyone. Thus, they would deal with this overwhelming dread and whatever lurked inside the freezer alone. Baylen could hear it still - Enzo was right when they said the creature sounded almost akin to nails upon a chalkboard as it dug the tips of its appendages into the metal barrier. That metal was intended to keep in the cold and protect the food from within; Baylen supposed protecting the ‘food’ outside of the walk-in was its more pertinent duty now. The rotting fluorescent light cascaded shades of flickering yellows and blues across the room, one flickering panel stood out like a spotlight over the cold metallic door.

Baylen’s hand reached behind himself, wrapping his hand around the grip of the gun that had remained neatly tucked into the back of their dress pants. A glock 42 would not necessarily have been their first choice in going at a cryptid, but it was the only gun the manager owned. Her slender fingers gently traced down to the magazine, triple-checking that it was secure, before finally bracing himself for the inevitable. He drew his pistol, turned off the safety, and held it firmly in one hand at first - in an ideal situation he’d have someone else open the door, but his staff did not get paid nearly enough for this. 

They composed themselves with one final deep breath, before reaching out with his free hand and tugging open the cooler door abruptly. Nothing. Nothing could have prepared Baylen for the carnage inside; the deep gauges taken out of the metal walls, the industrial shelves deep rooted from their bolts that once attached them to the floor, the food in shreds littering the floor… The pale white creature that scuttled across the floor before launching itself up the back wall, holding itself the conjunction of the wall and ceiling. Its face was sunken in, devoid of most features - other than its eyes, or what could only be compared to eyeballs. The pitch black holes where the sockets sat on a regular face were accentuated by white irises, dilated, crazed. Ready. Like a knife slicing through butter, its long jagged fingers launched into the ceiling - digging all the way down to the knuckles as it reared back. The fiendish creature began to hunch on its legs, like a track runner about to do a long jump.

Baylen could barely prepare himself as it reared back, stumbling back on his heels - one, two, maybe three steps, he wasn’t sure at this point. He raised the gun, shaking in his hands, but he did not hesitate in pulling the trigger. 

BANG. BANG. BANG.

The creature screamed, screeching an ear-piercing roar as it launched forwards, feet and hands pummeling the floor as it ran towards them. Baylen didn’t stop. He had five more bullets, and he counted on each of them.

BANG. BANG.

The sound of the gunshots echoed off the metal pots and pans that littered the pit, Baylen’s arms were already aching as he stumbled back, the edge of his spine slamming into the corner of the wall that protruded out at the end of the hallway. 

The creature stumbled, black ooze splattering with every shot that landed. Baylen has never been more grateful for the fact that he grew up on the streets with a pistol in hand. 

BANG.

Another shot and the thing crawling the floor only five feet away turned towards the back exit, charging in any direction but towards the thing that hurt it. Baylen didn’t care, as he continued to fire the last two shots.

BANG. BANG.

The creature’s body reverberated as those landed, guttural growls gurgling out of its mouth. Feet over hands stumbling across the floor, before gaining speed and barreling out the back door. The sounds of its cries and footfall grew quieter and quieter, as the back door swung on its hinges. Baylen’s hand that held the gun lowered to his side, the magazine now empty the floor and walls covered in black ink-like splatters, bullet casings surrounded his once pristine oxford shoes. 

As silence encased the room for just a moment before the others ran to the back, Baylen turned to the empty dish sink and vomited.