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portalford · 3 years

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I Can Picture You So Easily

AO3

It hits Stan at the stupidest times.

Well. That makes it sounds like Stan just forgets, when really it never quite goes away — sometimes it’s just more.

Like now.

He’s looking in the mirror — he found it tucked way, way back in a closet (and he’s gonna skip right over that because when he got here the mirror in the bathroom was broken, cracked until you couldn’t see a thing and why was Ford—nope) — and he’s trying out a new look for Mr. Mystery.

Gotta keep it fresh, right? Accessorize?

Glasses aren’t accessories, unfortunately. He can’t go without them anymore.

(Really, he needed them years ago, but he was too stubborn to admit it, or too broke, or whatever, but he’s literally tripping over his own feet now. Needs must).

Ford wouldn’t be caught dead in this getup. No sense of fashion. So that’s fine.

The glasses—

(Ford started wearing glasses when he was six. Stan had laughed himself silly when they went to the drugstore and tried on the biggest, most obnoxious frames they could find. Ma had scolded, but she’d been too distracted checking price tags to do more than scold.

In the end, they went with some cheap horn-rimmed frames that Stan wouldn’t be caught dead in even now. Old-man glasses, at six. But that was Ford all over).

—they bring some stuff up. The twin thing sucks, sometimes.

(Looking in a mirror and seeing the changes, the lines in his face, the grey in his hair — does Ford have crow’s feet now? Is his hair going silver? It was always unmanageable — is it thinning like Stan’s is now, or is it still thick and flyaway, like it was when Ford was sixteen? Did he even live long enough to get lines in his face and aches in his joints, or is he forever twenty-eight, dead somewhere in the universe?)

Time to stop thinking.

Notice the differences.

Stan’s ears and nose are bigger than Ford’s, always have been. He’s heavier and his shoulders are broader.

(Has Ford gotten bulkier, fighting to survive? Or is still he halfway to gaunt, like the last time Stan saw him?)

Definitely time to stop thinking.

Stan flashes a smile, and yeah, that’s all him. Cheerful, magnetic, and a hundred percent fake.

Time to work the crowds.

*****

There’s an ad for the nice ink pens Ford saved up to buy when he was fourteen.

Stan turns it off.

*****

Mabel finds a picture, once.

“Grunkle Stan!” Her eyes are all lit up as she shows him the torn photograph. “I found this under a floorboard in the attic!”

If Stan ever had any doubts about his poker face, he can lay them to rest now. It’s all on the ropes and his expression is perfectly level, maybe even a little curious.

Mabel is still talking. “I didn’t know there were pictures of you before you were all old! Do you have any others?”

Oh.

Stan still forgets sometimes, even after everything, that most people can’t tell him and Ford apart.

He knows better.

The young man in the photograph is unmistakably Ford, taken while he was living in Gravity Falls. He’s got his head bent over that journal of his, but the photographer managed to catch the eager light in his eye, the edge of his smile.

Stan wonders who that photographer was, all those years ago.

A tug at his shirt reminds him he’s not alone, and he definitely can’t get messed up about this picture of his secret twin brother.

Mabel’s face has fallen a bit. “Grunkle Stan? Are you okay?”

Stan gives himself two more seconds to look at the picture — Ford just looks so happy; Stan can’t even remember the last time Ford looked like that, even before it all fell apart — and turns to Mabel.

“Yeah,” he says. He smiles and ruffles her hair. “Pretty good picture, huh?”

*****

The name is the worst.

Stan never thought identity theft could involve so little fun.

Usually he can get away with just “Stan Pines,” and that’s fine. That’s his name. That’s who he’s supposed to be.

Sometimes, though, that’s not enough for whoever’s asking.

“What did you say your name was again?”

He smiles. Lays it on thick. “Stanford Pines.”

“Could you sign here?”

He does. His blocky, uneven handwriting looks even worse than usual where he’s expecting to see neat, flowing script, the way Stanford Pines is supposed to be written.

“This is Stanford Pines,” someone will say. “Mr. Mystery.”

Stan smiles some more. Yes, Stanford Pines is certainly that.

Gideon is the worst. Stanford this and Stanford that and Stan’s never wanted to punch a child so much in his life.

“Stanford Pines!”

He smiles, and he lies.

*****

Dipper halfway drives him nuts sometimes.

It’s not like the kid’s a mini-Ford — he reminds Stan enough of himself, sometimes, though Stan’s not sure that’s great either — but he’s got the brains and the stubbornness and the love of weird nonsense, for sure.

He’s also got that obsessive edge, the drive that sent Ford right off the metaphorical cliff.

Usually Mabel tags along on the weirdness hunts — they make a day of it. They go out, just the two of them, and come back laughing and joking and shoving at each other.

That’s enough of a painful reminder, but sometimes Stan will catch Mabel sitting by herself, coloring or crafting with a little less energy than usual, and he’ll realize that Dipper’s buried himself in monster theory again.

He tries to keep the kid busy with chores and hustle, but it’s a losing battle.

It was the first time, too.

*****

There’s this old song that Ford used to love when they were younger.

It’s got no words, and Stan used to make fun of it — what's the point of a song with no words? But Ford insisted it had Meaning, capital M.

It comes on the radio now and then.

Depending on how masochistic Stan is feeling that day, he might let it play.

He still wonders what Ford heard in this song, and if Ford would hear it now.

*****

He realizes, one day near the end, that he’s been Stanford longer than he’s been Stanley.

What’s the point, really? What does a name matter if it’s so easy for someone else to take your place?

(Did Ford matter so little, in the grand scheme of things, that not one person could recognize him in a place he lived for six years?

Does Stan, in a place he’s lived for almost thirty?)

If he could just stop catching Ford in his reflection now and then, that’d be great.

*****

It’s not any better once Ford gets back (once Stan brings Ford back, the ungrateful bastard).

“Stanford!”

Stan’s got a smile on his face before he even turns around, and what’s wrong with him that he’s halfway made this lie into a Pavlovian response? Someone calls him Stanford, he smiles and lies.

(Stanford — the real Stanford — is in the basement right now. He doesn’t even exist, as far as anyone else is concerned. Stan is Stanford, Stanley is dead, and Ford is a nonentity.

What a life this is).

*****

“So how was it?”

Stan grunts. “How was what?”

Ford rolls his neck, wincing a little as he works out the unavoidable crick from hunching over a drawing for twenty minutes. “Being me.”

Stan shrugs. “Wasn’t hard. We’re basically the same person, y’know.”

Ford snorts. A long time (a lifetime) ago that comment might have gotten him worked up, but he’s steadier now, softer around the edges. “Very funny. I saw your lease renewal. You didn’t even change your handwriting, for heaven’s sake.”

“Ford, I rolled up to town, said I was you, and started a tourist trap. You had a total personality transplant and nobody noticed.” Stan grimaces. That sounded really bad.

Ford’s expression has gone rueful and a little sad at the edges, but he doesn’t seem like he’s about launch into full-blown self-recrimination, so that’s fine. “Yes, well. That’s what happens when you isolate yourself for six years and your only friend erases his mind to cope with the mistakes you made.”

And that’s Ford trying to shoulder all the blame again, but Stan keeps his mouth shut. They’re both too comfortable to argue right now. “Being honest — for once — it kinda sucked.” Ford’s looking at him, open and encouraging, so Stan keeps going. “Everyone thought I was you, and it—I wasn’t. I didn’t want to be.” Stan shrugs. “I wanted you you.”

Ford smiles, and it’s a little more worn than Stan remembers, but it’s real, and it’s him. “I understand. I met a few parallel versions of you on my travels, and they were you, but — they weren’t really you.” Ford closes his journal (his new one) and sets it aside, tipping his head back over his chair. More playfully, he adds, “I wouldn’t want to be you either, Stanley.”

Stan laughs. “Yeah? Couldn’t handle the salesmanship?”

“Have more self-respect than to wear any part of your wardrobe.”

“Says the man who wears sweaters in the summer.”

Ford lifts his head and smiles, and this time it’s almost exactly how Stan remembers — quick and a little crooked. “Fair enough.” Ford stretches, rolls his neck again. “For what it’s worth, Stanley, I am glad to be back.” A wry look. “Even if it’s going to take ages to sort out the criminal record you gave me.”

Stan slouches deeper into the couch. Any further and he’s going to slide off, but that’s a risk he’ll take. “Yeah, yeah. Talk to me when you’re legally dead.”

“You did that.”

“And?”

“I legally don’t exist.”

“I was trying to learn theoretical physics at the time, Stanford; cut a man some slack.”

Ford laughs, quiet. “Did I ever thank you for that?”

Stan cracks an eye open. He didn’t realize he closed them. “What, learnin’ physics? Because I’m pretty sure that’s some of the stuff that’s not coming back.”

Ford rolls his eyes. “For saving me.”

“Hm.” Ford’s thanked him several times, but lately it’s been less Ford kicking himself and more Ford cautiously trying to engage in the old back-and-forth they used to have, and Stan can get behind that one. “I dunno. Might have to say it again.”

“You’re burning through my gratitude very quickly,” Ford says mildly, “but all right. Thank you for saving me. You knucklehead.”

Stan never got called that when he was Ford. He thinks he’s missed it, at least the way Ford says it — like it means something completely different.

“Uh-huh.” Stan’s eyes are closed again. He figures he’ll just leave them closed. “Missed you too, nerd.”

And maybe there’s something to be said for being your own person.

It feels pretty good.

#gravity falls #gravity falls fanfiction #stanley pines #stanford pines #back on the angst with a happy ending train #feat. a side of introspection and melodrama!#i love it here

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plaguethewaters · 3 years

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fourth time’s the charm

so. @greenninjagal-blog . Fool me trice had me in tears and emotions so i MUST retailiate by giving you hopefully as much tears and emotions. Obviously, this being a sequel of Green’s fic, I highly reccommend going to read hers first and giving some love, she really deserves it.

*** Wc: 2182

Characters: Janus, Virgil, brief mentions of all the other sides.

Relationships: Janus/Virgil Cw: Crying, mentions of shouting and arguments, slightly heavy metaphores, implied kissing, self deprecation and blaming, mentioned oast arguments, identity theft? tecnically? but it’s just Jan doing his thing. (As always feel free to tell me to add more!)

Or: Janus and Virgil have a lot of feelings. Would be nice if someone taught them how to deal with it.

[after thought note, because I realized it might not be as understandable as I tought, the things in brackets are Virgil’s thoughts].

Janus woke up at the shifting of a light.

The corridor light, to be more precise, the one that only turned itself off when everyone was supposed to be asleep. Which meant it was either very, very late, or very very early.

He took a moment to let panic consume him, the looming shadow of every task he didn't do filling his head, before taking a deep breath. Roman had said he would take care of it, (or at the very least, he thought he had. His memories about that conversation were still way fuzzier than he'd like them to be, that with emotional fatigue and actual fatigue messing things up), and even if he hadn't there was nothing he could do now. He had to wait until the morning, survey the damage, and try to fix his mistakes as best as he could.

Taking another breath (funny how he'd almost had to remind himself to) he opened his eyes.

To Virgil.

Virgil, entering his room with a way too obvious "caught in the act" expression, and a tray in his hands carefully balancing what looked like biscuits and tea. (His favourite late night snack. Virgil's had been dark chocolate and milk, and he wondered whether it had changed as much as everything else).

"Uhm, Hi," He said, ever the most eloquent in his still half asleep state. "What are you doing here?"

"Patt told me to bring you something to eat."

Janus was pretty sure Patton didn't know of his current condition at all. And even if he had, there was a very low chance he'd decide to get him caren of at such an ungodly hour of the morning (which, glancing at his clock, revealed itself to be three o'clock), but he politely decided not to point that off.

[Patton had not, in fact, told him to do this. It just sounded like a less pitiful excuse than "I heard you were sick and I literally couldn't sleep until I'd seen you breathing".]

"Roman told us about what happened today." Virgil said, voice revealing as little emotion as possible, while he brought the tray over his nightstand and retreated.

And oh, there it was, the icy coldness of dread washing over him. He did not really know what would happen, now. A screaming match, maybe? He hoped not, not now when his throat was so obviously hoarse from crying, not when his brain couldn't have tried to keep up the mask of hate.

He'd end up doing something absurdly stupid, like being honest to someone who so clearly didn't want to hear the truth.

"I'm not... pleased. About you using my face to do your thing. You should contribute with your own appearance or, you know, ask. I still think lying this much is wrong, for both you and Thomas; we're going to hit a wall where either no one believes us anymore, or we have so much stress from keeping up with it all that we break down, " He sighed, "That being said, you probably did, something right. Roman hasn't smiled like that since, what, the christmas episode? Logan had lunch with us today, he actually talked about this book he's reading, even if he expected to be shut down at any moment; Patton has asked us to give him so space. He set boundaries Jan, I don't think I ever seen him do that. Hell, even Remus seemed more okay than usual. Whatever you've been doing, it made them really happy. Keep it up."

[There was resentment, in those words. A little bit of venom sliding over, a "why are they happy with you and not me?" hidden behind the praise. The old nickname, going out before it could even hit his brain, did nothing to alleviate the burn.]

Janus was silent for a long time, long enough to look like he wouldn't answer at all.

That was... way calmer than he'd expected this conversation to go. Less screaming was involved, and definitely less tears (on both parts).

Being accredited of what was probably Roman's work helped, surely (why would Virgil think he was the author of all of that?), but there was still a layer of doubt frizzling under his skin. The kind of hate they felt towards each other, that Virgil felt towards him, the years of resentment onto their backs... They didn't go away that easily.

[He had considered keeping up the hate and the hissing, to pretend like he still despised the Janus' very presence, but he was just so tired. Regret and rage were all encompassing, and took way more out of him than he'd like to admit.]

When Virgil went away, he hadn't had much time to think: anger and betrayal flooded his veins, his brain nothing but a mixture of tears and regret. He had fallen in a never ending cycle, blaming Virgil and then Remus and then finally himself, everyone and everything being at fault for things that didn't have a fault at all: he needed to direct his rage at something, and where all failed it was forced to turn inwards. Never, from those miserable moments to the present, had he ever thought to compare just how similar Virgil's function was to his. Protection was protection, be it through fear or deception, be it born of safety or happiness; making Thomas (and by proxy, his sides) safe and content, was all they ever wanted (even if it meant sacrificing everything. Even if meant sacrificing yourself).

Virgil would have never turned his own hate onto the others, not when there was a risk of hurting them. (When Janus' blaming couldn't find a scapegoat, it turned onto himself. Where had Virgil's hate gone, if not entirely on him?)

"What about you?" Janus said, words escaping his lips with almost no sound.

Virgil, halfway to the door, turned to him with a confused expression.

[He hadn't expected him to reply. He didn't think, after how much of an idiot he'd been, that Janus would ever want a conversation with him.]

"What about me?"

"You listed everyone except yourself. Are you happy?"

"Of course," came an answer, too quick and too bitter to be the truth. Surprising, for someone who lived with him for so long, not to come up with a more convincing lie; it was clear Virgil never really believed in it himself.

[He wanted to believe in it, oh, how he wanted. He'd been trying for so long to be happy, yet he couldn't, not with that hole in his heart heavier than any worry].

"Do you... Do you know why Roman knew I wasn't you?" Janus said, an apparent non-sequitur that still made too much sense, voice still low (don't raise it, don't scream, you'll make the same mistakes again-) and looking intently at his hands.

Virgil looked up, looking surprised. Janus couldn't blame him: with all the years he had spent admiring every inch of his skin, every thread of his favourite hoodie, every wrinkle formed with is smile, every note in his giggles of excitement, he could make a copy almost equal to the original. (Almost, always almost, could never come perfectly close to something so magnificent no matter how hard he tried).

He'd know Virgil like the palm of his hands, deeper than he'd ever known himself.

It didn't come to his mind that it wasn't the same for the others.

"I wouldn't have... expected. Him to notice, that's it. You make a good me."

"Neither did I. Apparently I had made a mistake in thinking he'd ever seen you actually happy."

"Ah, That." Virgil sighed.

Resignation, maybe, or shame: Janus wasn't sure, but neither of these option were pleasant. He looked intently at the other, asking him to continue with no bravery to speak.

[- those eyes, always staring, always seeing so deep into his soul in a way that shouldn't have been endearing and yet never failed to make his heart race-]

"It's not that I was never happy. I was. They make me happy, and very much so," he continued, thoughts going to a quiet christmas, to a hundred movie nights, to a thousand shared meals, "I love them as much as I'd like to think they love me. I just.. keep it covered around them too. At first it was just to, you know, scare Thomas off? Somehow? But then, thoughts started happening, with reasons and stuff, and I decided to keep it like that. It wears down every few hours, but I like spending time alone anyway ."

"But why?" He asked in disbelief, not able to fathom covering something so beautiful, the glow in his eyes he'd spent so long getting lost in-

"I was scared, okay? Of ... you."

Suddenly his thoughts stopped.

Virgil still wasn't looking at him. [He wasn't brave enough to.]

He felt as if he was about to cry, again. There sure was a trend to this evening wasn't there?

[Oh god, tears. Retry, retry quick-]

"Or, well, not of you you. The memory of you. Of the past, in general, and the past with you all. Being completely happy in the Light, comfortable showing emotions and like, content with the life I had chosen? It mean leaving you behind. It meant admitting I abandoned you, abandoned everyone and everything. And admiring that, meant also acknowledging the fact that I felt like shit about it. "

[Had he always rambled so much?]

"I missed my old me, and my old life, and it scared me so much. I missed you."

Janus left out a breath he didn't know he was holding. Everything in his body flooded with relief, veins filling with the happiness of reciprocation, the burn of an old feeling coming back to life, the sheer energy of the love he felt.

He knew that this was as much as a confession as they would ever have. They had never learned to deal with emotions as big as these felt, never knew how to put them into words in a way that would have made sense for anyone else. For them, something as simple as “I missed you”, said in a rush at three in the morning, when both their brains were too tired to keep up a filter, meant everything the words could mean and a billion times more. It meant love, in it simplest of terms that really, wasn’t simple at all.

And in that faithful moment, after what felt like eons and billions of seconds, like eras ending and worlds ending, like lakes of tears being spilled and blind joy being felt, their eyes met.

Eye to eye, [still beautiful as that first day], deep dark brown drowning in his own, technically the same as Thomas' but [so so different, sparkling with yellow and green and a rainbow of colors vibrant enough to blind] and somehow so dark and static at the same time, purple voids full of swirling emotions. It had been long enough for him to be accustomed to this, [the sheer pain of not having,] the pain of not feeling, [the pain of being so far apart you don't know where you start and the wanting ends], the pain of not having anyone near in the moment of need, stern and strict when he forgot to take care of himself over everyone, [calm and gentle during panic attacks,] a voice and a laugh for every sad moment [a tear and compassion when he didn't know he wanted them]; Yet it hadn't been long enough for him to forget the way those eyes spoke, [no words ever necessary,] an "I love you" hidden in their banter, [a "I'll be there for you" after a sleepless night.]

A "I will miss you" in the anger. [A "I'll regret this" in a betrayal.]

Soon hands followed where the eyes watched, words another time rendered useless in the heat of the moment. [He never knew how to actually say how he felt. Emotions were too complicated to be said so simply.] He needed to show him, to let all of his love for Virgil fill his body until it spilled over in his arms.

They rushed, fervent with the need and passion of a flower torn to shred, clinging to the last few strands of stem it has left; yet they were calm to the eyes of anyone else: the rush was in their minds, in the way they caressed each other's face, in the way they hugged as long lost souls.

Everything just seems so fast when the world has stopped moving.

Suddenly the came to a halt, lips inches away from one another. It was too fast, too fast to seem real and probably too fast to be right: they should have stopped, apologized, thought it through. They should have tried seeing how ridiculous this situation would've looked from an outside perspective, how impossible would be a sudden change from hissing at each other whenever they were in the same room, to caressing each other's cheeks in utter adoration.

They were never one to follow the standard, really.

"You know," said Virgil with a smirk, softly caressing his scales, [God they were so soft-] "We should maybe talk about all of, um, this. Like functioning adults."

"I think I have been a functional adult enough for today. I need a break," he snorted, taking the others hand and leading him to the bed.

As they came in contact, "I think we can talk tomorrow" was heard, a whisper whose origins couldn't count now that their bodies were fused in one, feelings encompassing and engulfing what little of physical they still had left.

When Janus fell on his back, with Virgil's lips a fire on his own and the pillows freezing on his back, his world drowned in purple and he was finally really truly happy.

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leverage-ot3 · 4 years

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notable moments from The Nigerian Job

(PART ONE)

leverage 1.01

note: there are A LOT of scenes in this one, but they are all important in one way or another in terms of notability, character-building, etc

Dubenich: I’m sorry Mr. Ford, sorry, I know who you are I’ve, uh, excuse me. I’ve read all about you. I know for example that-that when you found that stolen Monet painting in Florence you probably saved your Insurance Company what 20-25 million dollars. Then there was that identity theft thing and you saved your insurance company I don’t even know how many millions of dollars but I just know that when you needed them… What happened to your family is the kind of thing--

Nate (slams glass down): You know that part of the conversation where I punch you in the neck nine or ten times? We’re coming up on that pretty quick.

- - - - -

Dubenich: I’m serious. Look, look at the people I’ve already hired. Do you recognize any of these names?

Nate (going through file): Uh, yeah, I’ve chased all of them at one time or anoth-- Parker? You have Parker?

Dubenich: Is there somebody better?

Nate: No, but Parker is insane.

Dubenich: Which is why I need you.

Nate (laughs): No. I’m not a thief. (closes file)

Dubenich: Thieves I got. What I need is one honest man to watch them.

- - - - -

Hardison: I’ve been doing this since high school, bro, I’m Captain Discipline.

[Flashback]

(New York City Hotel, Five Years Ago)

Manager: They came straight from the airport and up to their room.

Security: So you never actually saw any of them then.

Manager: No, but the credit card numbers checked out.

Security: Break it down!

(Doors open to reveal Hardison sitting on a couch drinking orange soda while three beautiful women dressed as Princess Leia fight with lightsabers)

Security: Does that look like Mick Jagger to you?

Hardison: This is not the room you’re looking for.

what a fucking GEEK oh my god

like, his flashback is so tame compared to the others???

like, his version of criminality is hanging out with cosplaying pretty girls and watching them fight with lightsabers, all under the guise of pretending to be mick jagger

- - - - -

Hardison (holding up an earpiece): It’s a bone-conduction earpiece mic, works off the vibrations in your jaw.

(Hardison tosses it to Eliot who holds it to his ear)

Hardison (whispering): You can hear everything.

Eliot: You’re not as useless as you look.

eliot being subtly impressed with hardison is my religion

- - - - -

Hardison: I don’t even know what you do.

[Flashback]

(3 Years Ago Eliot, wearing glasses and drinking from a mug of tea, enters a room full of men in Belgrade, Serbia)

Eliot: I’m here to collect the merchandise.

(Most of the men pull guns. Eliot takes a long sip of his drink. Outside, the windows flash with gunfire. Moans and the sound of a body falling fill the air. Inside, Eliot calmly takes another drink. One man sits at a table surrounded by bodies that litter the ground. He places a baseball card on the table. Eliot smiles)

am I the only one that wants to know the context of this???

- - - - -

(Parker drops down between Eliot and Hardison, hanging upside down from scaffolding)

Parker: Can I have one?

Hardison: You can have the whole box.

(Hardison holds the box of comms up for her. She takes one and pulls herself back up)

Eliot: What are you going to do when she finds out you live with your mom?

Hardison: Age of the geek, baby. We run the world.

Eliot: You keep telling yourself that.

(Parker puts the comm in her ear, smiling)

ot3 moments from day one baby

also eliot goes from ‘baby’ to ‘oh god, I’m baby’ in 0.0000005 seconds

- - - - -

[Flashback]

(19 Years Ago in Kansas City, a ten year old Parker stands in her living room watching her foster parents fight. The foster father turns to Parker, holding a stuffed bunny while the foster mother stands in the background, crying)

Bill: You thought I wouldn’t find this? You don’t get bunny until you do what I say. So be a good girl or, I don’t know, a better thief. (walks out of room)

Foster Mother: Bill!

(Parker walks outside and down the walk. Behind her, the house explodes. She hugs her bunny and smiles)

for the LONGEST time I thought she blew up the house with her foster parents until I saw that john rogers confirmed they weren’t home at the time

also this gives HEAVY insight as to how even the smallest part of Parker’s childhood was

abusive, emotionally manipulative, etc

- - - - -

(Parker adjusts her repelling gear, caressing it as if it were a lover)

Parker: Last time I used this rig, Paris, 2003

Nate: You talking about the Caravaggio? You stole that?

- - - - -

Eliot (examining earpiece): Is this thing safe?

Hardison: Yeah, it’s completely safe, it’s just, you know, you might experience nausea, weakness in your right side, stroke, strokiness.

Eliot (puts earpiece in): You’re precisely why I work alone.

shut up eliot you’re about to be so far gone for them it will be amazing

- - - - -

(Parker dives off the roof)

Parker: Yeehaaaa!!

(Eliot and Hardison run to the edge and watch her fall)

Eliot: That’s twenty pounds of crazy in a five pound bag.

what’s the opposite of foreshadowing? because I’m thinking about the long goodbye job and it’s reference to this (also the SIGNIFICANCE in that episode in how both hardison AND eliot repeat this line, finishing one another. because they both are on the same wavelength by that point, so in tune with one another and in constant awe of parker.)

- - - - -

parker just ??? drops the fucking glass ??? onto the sidewalk below ??? like ??? what if it hits someone ???

- - - - -

Nate: Okay, you got any chatter on their frequencies?

[Electrical Room]

Parker: No. Why?

[Unfinished Office]

(Nate checks records)

Nate: There’s eight listed on the duty roster, there’s only four at the guard post.

[Electrical Room]

Parker: I can’t even tell how many guys are in the room. How can you tell who’s who?

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: Haircuts Parker. Count the haircuts.

[Electrical Room]

Parker: I would have missed that.

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: What?

[Electrical Room]

Parker: Nothing.

mastermind father and daughter in episode ONE

- - - - -

we love to see eliot beat up four guys in the time it takes hardison’s bag to fall to the ground

- - - - -

Eliot (empties gun and smiles): That’s what I do.

(Hardison looks impressed. Behind him, the door clicks open. He and Eliot smile and enter the server room together)

the FLIRTING ENERGY in this scene

- - - - -

Eliot: Did you give them a virus?

Hardison: (chuckles) Dude, I gave them more than one virus.

hardison doesn’t half-ass, pass it on

- - - - -

Parker: Problem. Those guards you ganked?

[Electrical Room]

Parker (looking at monitor): They reset all the alarms on the roof and all the floors above us. We can’t go up.

[Hallway]

Eliot: Every man for himself then. (starts to move away)

Hardison: Go ahead I’m the one with the merchandise.

[Electrical Room]

Parker: Yeah, well I’m the one with an exit.

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: And I’m the one with a plan. Now I know you children don’t play well with others but I need you to hold it together for exactly seven more minutes. Now get to the elevator and head down. We’re going to the burn scam.

[Elevator]

(Eliot and Hardison enter an elevator and begin changing their clothes)

Hardison: Going to Plan B.

[Unfinished Office]

Nate (packing his things): Technically that would be Plan G.

[Elevator]

(elevator doors open and Parker runs in. She begins changing while the men look away)

Hardison: How many plans do we have? Is there like a Plan M?

[Unfinished Office]

Nate: Yeah, Hardison dies in Plan M.

[Elevator]

Eliot: I like Plan M.

there are SO MANY things about this scene I want to discuss but here are the top ones:

1- nate calling them out as children? amazing

2- eliot and hardison canonically changed in the elevator together BEFORE parker dropped in, but they weren’t necessarily looking away in a backs-turned way when she came in (when they were still getting finished getting dressed)

3- parker being completely nonchalant changing with two men in the elevator? she must not really care about being naked in front of other people (as seen later in what I think is the morning after job (?), for example)

4- the boys look away to be polite but there is definitely interest in BOTH of their faces

5- so this is what the burn scam entails

- - - - -

parker takes shotgun while the two boys are in the back. I need to see the scene of them awkwardly sitting together in the back. possibly bickering.

- - - - -

Nate: All right, all right. The money will be in all your accounts later today.

Hardison: Anybody else notice how hard we rocked last night?

Eliot: Yeah, well, one show only, no encores.

Parker: I already forgot your names.

Hardison: It was kind of cool, being on the same side.

Nate: No, we are not on the same side. I am not a thief.

Parker: You are now. Come on Nathan, tell the truth. Didn’t you have a little bit of fun playing the Black King instead of the White Knight, just this once?

(they all walk away in different directions)

smh you’re all 0.000005 seconds away from becoming a family

“no encores” my ass

+ I love how hardison is the FIRST one to (immediately) bring up how awesome they worked as a team

- - - - -

(Nate walks slowly down a toward a large room where voices are coming from)

Hardison (holding gun): You mind telling me what happened to the designs?

Eliot: What makes you think I know what happened? Stupid.

Hardison: Look, forget you man. You did it when we were coming down from the elevator.

Eliot: Yeah, that makes sense doesn’t it? You had the file every second.

Hardison: Hold up Kujo, I did my part, I transferred the files.

Eliot: You better get that gun out of my face...

Hardison: What did you do?

Eliot: …or else I’m gonna feed it to you.

Nate: Hey!

(the men turn, Hardison pointing the gun at Nate)

Eliot: Did you do it? You’re the only one that’s ever played both sides.

Nate: Yeah, you seem pretty relaxed for a guy with a gun pointed at him.

Eliot (looks at Hardison): Safety’s on.

Hardison: Like I’m gonna fall for that.

Nate: No, no, actually he’s right, the safety is on.

(Hardison looks at the gun and Nate grabs it)

Nate (to Eliot): You armed?

Eliot (shakes head): I don’t like guns.

(Eliot looks pointedly past Nate’s shoulder. Nate turns, pointing the gun at Parker who is holding a gun on him)

Parker: My money’s not in my account.

(She walks around Hardison, raising her gun as Nate lowers his)

Parker: That makes me cry inside in my special, angry place.

Nate: Okay, Parker. (slowly reaches out to lower Parker’s gun) Now did you come here to get paid?

Hardison: Hell no. Transfer of funds man. Global economy.

Eliot: It’s supposed to be a walk away. I’m never supposed to see you again.

eliot could have IMMEDIATELY taken the gun away but it made hardison feel safe so he was humoring him

and how easily nate took the gun away? interesting, for a former insurance agent

“you armed?” “no, I don’t like guns” eliot sweetie I love you

also parker’s entrance tho

- - - - -

Nate: Then the only reason you guys are here is because you didn’t get paid. And you’re pissed off. (laughs) As a matter of fact the only way to get us all in the same place at the same time is to tell us that we’re not. Getting. Paid.

(a look of realization goes through the group and they all start to run. Nate opens a garage door and directs them out. Hardison trips on the stairs and Eliot pulls him to his feet)

Nate: Come on, come on, get up. Let’s go, hustle. Go.

(the others exit and Nate looks back to see a ball of fire headed toward him)

eliot: I hate you all, I work alone, I don’t care about any of you

eliot 0.000005 seconds later: hauling hardison off the ground so he doesn’t die in an exploding building because ‘I guess he’s by boyfriend now’

- - - - -

Nate: Have we been processed?

(Eliot waves ink covered finger tips at him)

Eliot: They faxed our prints to the State Police.

[Hospital Room B]

Hardison: Yo, if the staties run us man, we’re screwed.

Parker: How long?

Hardison: Thirty, thirty-five minutes depending on the software

- - - - -

Nate: Parker! Get me a phone. What we’re going to do is, we’re going to get out of here together.

Eliot: This was a onetime deal.

Nate: Look guys, here’s your problem. You all know what you can do, I know what all you can do, so that gives me the edge, gives me the plan.

[Hospital Room B]

Parker: I don’t trust these guys.

[Hospital Room A]

Nate: Do you trust me?

Eliot: Of course. You’re an honest man.

Nate: Parker, Phone.

[Hospital Room B]

Parker: This is gonna suck.

(she sticks her fingers down her throat and bends over)

Hardison: Oh. Hell no

the amount of times eliot brings up that it was supposed to be a one-time thing is HILARIOUS considering just how fast he imprints on them lmfao

also how they all immediately trust him, I’m soft

- - - - -

(Parker nods compliantly. The doctor and nurse leave the room. Officer checks her handcuffs then leaves. Parker and Hardison hold up the phones they stole. After a quick glance, they switch phones. Parker holds up the keys she stole and tosses them to Hardison before standing up and talking to the vent into the next room)

domestic pardison

- - - - -

(Hardison leads Eliot to a police cruiser that Nate and Parker are already inside of. As Hardison guides Eliot into the backseat he hits Eliot head on the top of the door frame. Eliot turns and growls at Hardison)

Hardison: Walk it off. Walk… get inside. Get inside.

(Eliot gets in the car)

I love chaotic (pre)boyfriends

- - - - -

Eliot: I’m gonna beat Dubenich so bad that even the people who look like him are gonna bleed.

Parker: You won’t get within 100 yards. He knows your face. He knows all our faces.

Eliot: He tried to kill us.

Parker: More importantly he didn’t pay us.

Eliot: How is that more important?

Parker: I take that personally.

Eliot: There’s something wrong with you.

okay to be fair eliot at least is open to and listens to parker’s reasoning before concluding she’s crazy

- - - - -

Eliot: What’s in it for me?

Nate: Payback, and if it goes right a lot of money.

Parker: What’s in it for me?

Nate: A lot of money, and if it goes right, payback. Hardison?

Hardison: I was just gonna send a thousand porno magazines to his office, but, hell yeah man, let’s kick him up.

these characterizations are so on point

- - - - -

SOPHIE’S INTRO LMFAO

+ how everyone else is horrified but nate just looks entranced

- - - - -

[Flashback]

(In Paris seven years ago, Sophie is cutting a painting out of a frame with several empty frames nearby. The door burst open and Nate enters with a gun in hand)

Nate: Freeze.

(Sophie grabs her gun and shoots Nate in the shoulder. He responds by shooting her in the back. They both clench at their wounds)

Sophie: You wanker!

so are we, as a fandom, EVER going to talk about this scene ???

- - - - -

(so apparently there’s a 250 text block limit for posts on tumblr so I guess I have to make more than one post for this now. the following part will be reblogged on this post immediately after. reblog that version instead please lol)

#leverage #notable moments #leverage season 1 #season 1 #leverage 1.01 #leverage 1x01 #the nigerian job #mine

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guessimjoiningthespidermanfandom · 3 years

Text

Blessing in Disguise

Peter Parker x bisexual!reader

Peter Parker x fem!reader

Peter Parker x black!reader

Peter Parker x villain!reader

Warnings: Hospitals, Explosions, depictions of pain, allusions to mania and depression, self harm/unhealthy coping mechanisms, mentions of death and the dead, gambling, potential underage drinking, theft, guns, gun violence, depictions of bullet wounds, and drunk people.

Word Count: 3.4k

Songs: All the kids are depressed- Jeremy Zucker, Everywhere- Chloe x Halle, Middle Child- J. Cole, She Knows- J. Cole, Breezeblocks- alt-J, Pussycat Doll-Flo Milli, It’s Been So Long- The Living Tombstone, Take me to Church- Hozier, Good Kid- Kendrick Lamar, Death of a Bachelor- Panic! At the Disco, Them Changes- Thundercat, Detention- Melanie Martinez, Recess- Melanie Martinez, Something for your M.I.N.D- Superorganism

A/N: I actually hate this chapter because I feel like the writing doesn’t flow. I feel like it’s to jampacked with things that don’t do anything to push the story forward. Anyway I hope you still read it anyways.

Series Masterlist Previous Part Next Part

I did the hand sign stating I’d stand. I knew I won for sure this time because I had a perfect hand of 21. The two other people playing against groaned as I was declared the winner yet again.

Swiping the chips for the 3rd time since I’d been at the casino. I decided to take my wins and make my way to the bar that our “target” was residing.

I had a hunch on where Carmen was but had no actual idea. I’d just text her. In the meantime I had this grown ass man to make a move on.

I was like 97% sure I had the right guy anyway. I looked much older than usual tonight due to Carmen being a makeup goddess and I gotta say flirting can get you a long way.

“Hey,” I spoke, sitting on the bar stool next to the man.

He looked up at me mumbling a quick hey.

“You expecting someone?”

“Nope,” He popped the ‘p’ “What about you?”

“Same as you,”

“Now I don’t believe someone as beautiful as you is here alone,” He moved his arm that much closer to mine. I pushed out a smile and giggled.

“I could say the same about you,” We made eye contact for a second “But no seriously, I’m just here with a girlfriend. It was my birthday yesterday but she wasn’t free so we came out today,” I lied.

“How old did you turn?”

“Twenty Two,” He nodded seemingly content with the answer.

“So you’re not around here are you?”

“Either you’re a genius or I’m just very bad at blending in, no I’m from New York,”

“Ah, I have some friends in New York, which part?”

“Harlem actually but I recently moved to Queens,” I lied again.

“Oh I don’t many from those cities,”

“If we're being honest I don’t know many people from Queens either my life’s been more hectic ever since I moved,”

“I hear you,” He informed me, leaning on the small backing the stools had.

We talked for about 15 more minutes, him explaining the switch between New York to Nevada. Then Carmen walked up to me and feigned drunkenness signaling she was done with her job. I made my way back. To the man who’s name I still hadn’t learned.

“As much fun as I was having talking to you, my friend is way too drunk to be out in public so we should probably head back to the hotel.” I sat back on the barstool turning my legs towards the man batting my eyes

“Could I possibly use your phone to call an Uber mine is dead?”

“Yeah of course you can…” His sentence fizzed off at the end in place of where my name would be.

“Ciara,” I filled in “And you are?”

“Jim” He started handing me the phone.

I used his phone for an entirely different reason than I’d claimed. The project Carmen had been working on was melting the wires together to fix the flash drive that works inside of phones. It hadn’t worked in years.

It took about a minute to duplicate the phone's data. I stuck the flash drive in my bra before going to give the phone back.

Just as I started moving a loud argument broke out, by the drunk accents I could tell it would soon get violent. Seeing as I had many experiences with an aggressive drunk. I wasn’t going to take my chances and began turning towards the main exit.

I heard the first shot echo followed by another. Soon everyone was shooting. Including Carmen who I think just wanted an excuse to shoot at people passing it off as “protecting her friends”.

She was closer to the exit than I was so she slid me the gun and I was able to ward off anyone shooting in our general direction. Not for long though. A bullet lightly grazed my dominant arm’s shoulder; it still dug in enough to do some sweet damage.

Fuck

What’s up with me? I haven’t been on my A game lately.

We were also out of bullets. Mostly because we weren’t actually expecting to have to fucking shoot at people. I ducked back down behind the bar trying not to get caught on the broken glassware.

“I think it would be a good time to do that thing?” I asked.

She rolled her eyes

“You know I hate doing it,”

“Well I’m literally bleeding out,” I dramatized pointing to my shoulder. “So if you want to get out of here not in body bags, do the thing,”

“Alright, just this one time,” She begrudgingly made her way out from behind the bar and away from me.

I covered my ears and closed my eyes as the glass around me rained down and the bar shook. I could slightly hear the cries from beneath my hands. Once she moved back over to me

“See that wasn’t so bad, birdy,” I scrambled up to my feet ignoring the pull in my shoulder.

I made my rounds grabbing Jim’s phone, cash, wallets, watches, and anything else that looked expensive from pockets and the ground.

I stood awkwardly staring at my feet as I slid from side to side with my butt planted on my skateboard.

“Hi,” I heard squinting my eyes looking up revealing a equally nervous looking Peter

“Hey,” I nodded at him.

The conversation wasn’t as awkward as I thought it’d be he’d apparently asked Liz to prom and he said yes. Which I was definitely super happy about because why wouldn’t I be?

Anyway who cares about that anyway. Props to Peter for not bringing up the whole ghosting everyone thing for like a week thing. Because if he didn’t bring it up I was going to act like it never happened.

We talked about everything and anything. From favorite candies or colors to our beliefs about life after death. I’d found out his favorite candy were skittles, favorite color: red and that he was Jewish but not necessarily religious and didn’t believe in heaven or hell but he believed in the eternity of a soul.

I’d told him that my favorite candy was F/C, my favorite color being pink and that I didn’t know what I believed in. I believed in a higher power but not that they were inherently good because of all the suffering on earth. I’d told him if they weren’t good and had abandoned us while alive. Why would they care or have any plan for us into the afterlife? I think that part is up to us, and what we believe. I’m trying not to think about death.

Then like clockwork he had to leave before 9 which is funny because it’s like he wasn’t even trying to hide his secret identity. He’d told me he lost the internship and normally his excuse to leave was the internship.

I just guess that means he no longer has Stark’s backup. He only had it for a while anyway he’d be fine without it again. Actually when I think about it, from his behavior he’d exhibited as Spiderman in the short few months I’d had the displeasure of knowing him as ‘Thorn’ he’d be weak. He was unconfident, relied on his tools far too much. Couldn’t see himself without the suit. So maybe he was really just going home. So he’d be fine.

I’d also be fine. No matter how much it didn’t look like it at the moment. I’d be fine. I was always fine. I was fine without my mom, without Rose, without my dad, without Olivia and any one else I’d ever been stupid enough to get attached to. I’d bounce back. I always did.

It’d taken Carmen much convincing to not sit around and babysit me 24/7 because of my shoulder. She was sure that I’d do something dumb and it would get infected.

I was sitting on MJ’s bed getting ready for homecoming. My neck jerked again as Bri attempted to detangle and braid my hair.

If I hadn’t spiraled into the Vulture, Kingpin and SHIELD, rabbit hole I probably would have taken better care of myself and my hair.

“Stop moving,” She tsked.

“Stop trying to rip my head off my neck,” I hissed back.

Bri did my nails back when we were still at her house waiting for MJ to pick us up. She actually did pretty good. I think she would do great at a cosmetology school. She's pretty much into everything: hair, nails, makeup the whole nine yards. She did all of that for me.

The make up was very simple, but I was still able to get my signature winged eyeliner. Winged eyeliner is something very dear to me mostly because Rose was the first to put me on it and I wore it everyday since. It kinda felt disrespectful to stop at this point.

The only thing left was the dress MJ had gifted me. Her mom bought her a dress but she still refused to wear dresses so she returned it for this one, she opted for a very nice pantsuit she already had. Then Bri's outfit of course matched her boyfriend’s.

I’ve never really liked school dances they’re always so overhyped, but I go to them all anyways, because then I get in on all the drama. It helped me build up my arsenal of knowledge about everyone.

I was sitting at one of the round tables near the entrance with MJ, Bri, and Olivia. We had a bottle of “Gatorade” open and out for anybody who wanted to drink it. I was about to drink from it when I saw Liz enter alone.

I made my way over to her.

“Where’s Peter? I thought he asked you?”

“I don’t even know he just ditched me,” She let out a deep breath.

“Aw I’m sorry,” I wrapped my good arm around her shoulder.

“Well don’t think about that asshole, you’re way out of his league anyway,” I assured her to which she let out a weak laugh.

“Come sit with me and my friends,”

A girl with knockers dancing all along her head came up to before speaking

“Why are you crying?”

I sniffed pulling my head from my arms.

“I miss my mom,”

“I miss my mom sometimes but I like my grandma too,”

“Where’s your mom?” I asked.

“I don’t know my grandma says she’s sick,” She shrugged. “Where’s your mom?”

“Well my grandma says she’s in a better place now but I know that just means dead,”

“Yeah my dad is dead too so I know what you mean, I’m Rose. What’s your name?”

“Y/N,”

“Y/N, that's a pretty name,” She smiled. “You wanna come sit with me and my friends Y/N?”

“Y/N!”

I jumped a bit at the voice before matching it to MJ

“What?” I asked in a harsher tone then necessary.

“Jeez sorry,” She reeled back “Someone is asking for you named Carmen. They said it’s important,” She waved her phone around.

My face dropped and I hoped no one caught it.

I grabbed the phone exiting the auditorium.

“Okay what’s up?”

“You know Liz’s dad whatever her name is but yeah, He’s gonna rob that plane that’s moving everything from the Avengers tower,” She rushed

“What!?”

Holy shit

That must be where Peter’s went. So he figured it out too. Kid’s smarter than I give him credit for.

“I’ll send you the location on your phone,”

“Why didn’t you just call me from there?”

“Because you never answer it,”

“True,”

“Y/N?” She whispered.

“Yeah?”

“Be careful,”

“Always,” I smiled.

I rushed out of the building not thinking about how I could get caught. Near the buses there was the new Shocker lying unconscious.

I took the webshooter I found next to him. Then made a run for it. Stopping to hot wire the nearest car, I sped to one of the locations that I knew Vulture’s team kept their weapons at. I was throwing everything in the same pile. Getting ready to destroy them.

Then the door creaked open.

I felt the bed dip as my brother sat next to me.

“Are you coming?”

I pulled the cover off my face

“Why should I?”

“Because you’ll regret it if you don’t,”

“No I won’t leave me alone,” I pulled the cover back over my head.

“You gotta eat something,”

“No I don’t leave me alone,”

“Y/N…”

I knew what he was going to say and I didn’t wanna hear it.

“She would want you to eat something,”

“Fuck you! How would you ever know what she would've wanted? No one here knew her and now one will ever get the chance to again so just leave me alone,”

“Y/N-“

“Don’t Y/N me, get the fuck out of my room,” He sat there for a second, stunned “NOW!”

As soon as the door closed and I flipped back over

I was shaken back into the present only to find that I was pinned under the man who’d entered the room before I zoned out. He reached for the nearest weapon. I wasn’t sure exactly what it was. Which is rare. I have a whole weapons catalog in my brain. Unfortunately for him he couldn’t grab it without giving me leeway to get from underneath them.

Unfortunately for me I put too much pressure on my arm in the seconds I took to grip my shoulder recuperating myself. The man had fired the weapon he had at the pile of weapons that I stumbled back towards.

The weapons then emitted purple light before exploding leaving me caught under some wood and concrete as the ringing in my ears only got louder and louder.

The fire around me crackled loudly and I bit my lip.

The smoke was only getting more plentiful.

I started coughing which only got more and more painful.

When I came to myself, I wasn’t choking anymore and the fire around me had died down. I was able to push myself from underneath the rubble holding me down. Not without lots of pain though.

The dress I was wearing was torn completely, holes big enough to see what I was wearing underneath it already.

So I just took it off.

It wasn’t like I was completely naked I was wearing boxers. Not like I haven’t left the house in a bra and shorts before. Also who gives a fuck I just almost died.

It was like 35° but I wasn’t cold in the slightest. I was actually kind of hot.

If my phone was accurate the plane had already made it near the edge of Queens and Staten Island. Rushing there I was seconds late as I saw the plane crash after I saw two figures fighting along it.

There was fire everywhere but I wasn’t thinking. I was just running because I couldn’t make out Peter’s shape and if he was dead-

I swear to fucking God if he was dead. Not again. I couldn’t handle another death.

Peter was saying something. No, pleading as the Vulture stood tall with his wings still intact. He was talking about how it was a nice try and he doesn’t know what he’s messing with.

Peter might not but I knew what this was. I also knew I wasn’t letting him get away with it.

The wings started producing visible waves of heat. Then it hit me, what Peter was trying to say. The wings were gonna blow. I got a head start and lunged towards the man. The element of surprise was on my side. That was until he used the wings to lift himself off the ground.

Now I was fine with parkour and other activities, but being lifted off the ground by someone else, someone who’d never interacted with me ever, is where I draw the line. Then Peter was shooting a web at the wings. To which Vulture dropped me to go after him.

Oh hell no.

“Give it up Peter,” He continued to get closer and closer as the webs were continuously cut through.

You know how people say they see in red when they get angry? Well the opposite of that happens to me I just see black. Remembering very little to nothing.

Last thing I remembered was fire just fire. From my fingertips, arms, head. It destroyed the wings in seconds, before they had a chance to blow up on their own.

Peter webbed up the man before moving out of my sight.

How the fuck do you get fire coming from your body.

Literally what the actual fuck.

I couldn’t breathe.

That’s what it was, I was dying, I was probably in some coma and this was a weird hallucination my brain pushed out in its final moments.

Okay this is it. I was dying suffocating in some coma.

Or even worse this wasn’t a coma and I was going to die with my body lit on fire literally.

“Oh my God,” I gasped trying to get air into my lungs.

I closed my eyes and when I opened them Peter was in front of me in a torn up ripoff suit.

“Y/N,” He moved trying to catch my eye.

“Y/N, Y/N breathe…”

I couldn’t really process his words. My mind was clouded with fear, fear and anger.

Before I knew it I was hitting my head so I wouldn’t hit anyone or anything else. It’d been a coping mechanism I used ever since I was 3.

Peter reached for my arms reeling back after his hands came into contact with my boiling skin.

“Y/N you have to calm down,” He moved in front of me.

I stopped moving my hands but it was still difficult to breathe.

The monitors beeped all around me and if I closed my eyes and concentrated hard enough. I could convince myself they were birds.

I could tell from the patter of the knock on the door that it was Rose.

“Come in!” I called out.

She picked up the clipboard examining it. As she did every time she visited. Luckily for everyone there was no nurse she could bombard with questions and criticism.

“How are you feeling?” She asked.

“Itchy, like my guts are on fire,”

To which she replied by singing the chorus to Girl on Fire.

“Anyway,” she brought us back after our laughter. “I got you pizza today since I’m sure you’re tired of McDonald’s,”

“I don’t mind McDonald’s actually, anything is better than hospital food. Well actually, their chicken strips aren’t that bad,”

She placed the box down on my lap. I lifted up the lid and was hit with the smell of the many herbs. I pat by my legs signaling she could sit down. She wiggled into the spot that the bar of the bed allowed.

“What are we watching today?”

“Uh…” I clicked on the TV “Vampire Diaries?,”

“That show is still going?

“Yeah, I don’t think it’ll ever end,”

Somehow the show turned into us dancing around the cramped hospital room.

We spun like the ballerinas in the broken jewelry box I got from my mom. Arms flailing around. The air conditioner made a rattling noise and a half eaten pizza on the bed. The situation was probably extremely weird or unpleasant from any other perspective, but because it was her it was perfect.

It was like the moment in rom coms where the camera zooms into the main characters dancing as the rest of the characters are put out of focus and they stare into each other’s eyes. I closed my eyes.

When I opened them I saw Peter’s eyes above mine.

His hands were immediately on my face making my look straight at him.

“Are you okay?” He breathed out.

I sat up feeling a pounding in my head and a pull in my lungs. I was met with the fact that I was definitely not on the ground. I was actually very far from the ground on some ride on the pier. My mouth was dry so it took me a minute to get the words out and when I did it hurt my throat.

“Yeah ’m okay jus’ tired,”

“Okay, well don’t go back to sleep because I think you have a concussion,”

“You’re acting like I died or something, how long was I out dang,” I joked I always hated when things got too serious.

“Uh probably...30 minutes? I don’t know I don’t have a watch,” He sniffed and that's when I realized he’d be crying.

“Were you crying? I knew you cared about me,” I smiled “It was only a matter of time before you fell in love with me, I’m irresistible”

He laughed weakly wiping his eyes “This isn’t funny,”

I looked up at him and started uncontrollably giggling. Soon Peter was laughing too.

The moment was interrupted by a squad of police cars pulling up. I absolutely did not want to get down but my tired muscles betrayed me. I was extremely exhausted. I literally could not move. I just had to go wherever Peter decided to take me. I honestly think I might have a few broken ribs. Nothing I haven’t dealt with before though. We stood off to the side watching as Vulture was stuffed into the back of one of the cars.

“So Spiderman?” I smirked.

“Uh.. no?” He said as if he’s questioning himself.

“It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone I’ve known for a while now,” I twisted my body to face him hissing as a sharp sting shot through my body “You're not very good at hiding it,”

“Hey!” He cried out “But seriously you can’t tell anyone,”

“I already said I wouldn’t, but if it makes you feel better I’ll pinky promise you, and everyone knows you can’t break a pinky promise,”

“Alright,” He sighed.

I tried to move closer again and was stopped by the pain in my sides.

“Okay well, the offer still stands, you’re just gonna have to come over here,”

Taglist:

@tomdiddlyumptious

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hellzyeahwebwielingessays · 4 years

Text

The Not-So-Amazing Mary Jane Part 6: AMJ #1

Previous Part

Next Part

Master Post

Now we’ve finally established all necessary contexts we can begin diving into the AMJ series proper. My intent is to break down each issue page by page.

Let’s get started.

We open with Mary Jane shooting a sizzle reel for the film’s investors. Evidently she is playing Mysterio’s super powered love interest.

Here we get into our first few problem but I admit it might not actually be a problem.

See, ASM v5 #29 established that MJ has already seen McKnight’s ‘reel’ so why are they filming another sizzle reel?

I admit to being in the dark about Hollywood practices so this might be perfectly normal and therefore not a contradiction. Let me know if that is the case.

This page introduces yet more problems though they too are rather minor.

The smallest of these is depicting Kangaroo as Australian. Last I checked (and I admit I might be mistaken about this) the Kangaroo was in fact NOT Australian. Or at least this version of the character isn’t as he is the second Kangaroo merely inspired by the original.

That’s a tiny nitpick but I thought I’d mention it. And it’s one that’s easily explained away. He could be emulating an Australian accent for effect or something like that.

The more notable problem is that MJ is deriding the script. This contradicts MJ’s statements in ASM v5 #29/830 where she is praiseworthy of the writing after immediately reading through some of it with Peter.

You could argue that perhaps MJ was commenting upon the script in general and not specifically her own part. As in her starring in this movie would be great for her career because the movie in general was looking to be great. Or alternatively the script for the sizzle reel was bad.

But consider that the script is directly based upon Webspinners #1-3, which (again I might be mistaken about this too) I do not recall ever featuring Mysterio’s would be lover as anything like a super heroine.

Again, this is reconcilable. Rewrites happen. Embellishments on the truth happen.

But to me the reality seems be that either Williams was unaware of the movie being based upon Webspinners (which is entirely possible) or that she wanted to go in another direction for the story.

Either way, it’s a weakness of the comic book but not a deal breaker of a problem.

This page also represents one of the problems from an analytical standpoint with this series.

There is a certain amount of ambiguity through the writing and art in regards to what Mary Jane (and other characters) might be thinking and feeling.

Look at MJ’s baffled face when looking at the Spider-Man actor on the above page.

My initial impression was that she could be simply weirded out by seeing an overdramatised version of her lover. In particular when he’s going over a tragic event in his and her own life (Gwen’s death).

It could just be bafflement over why that’d even be in the movie. After all what has Gwen’s death got to do with the life of Mysterio. I guess Spidey’s implication in Gwen’s death was public knowledge but it still has nothing to do with Beck.

Alternatively that facial expression might (and I emphasis this as speculation) represent MJ’s confusion and concern about that being included in a film. That is to say that’s something of a personal cut for Spider-Man and Mary Jane’s life. She could be wondering if someone knows the truth about Peter’s identity?

If the latter is the case it might go some way into alleviating and explaining other problems I have.

But I just don’t know, because the comic is not making it clear-cut. To my eyes that look says ‘this is so surreal’ and doesn’t say ‘This is concerning. Could Peter and I be in danger?’

However if that was the intention it might’ve been intended to then organically transition into the acknowledgment that there are literal super villains on set and the consequent page in which MJ comments that Cage McKnight fleeing is suspicious.

Here is where we’re starting to get into the bigger problems, but let’s start with a smaller one.

The scene implies that McKnight is a an actual person and a respected filmmaker. This is again contradictory to ASM v5 #29. There MJ referred to McKnight as very new, as someone who lacked an agent until very recently. The implication by Spencer was clearly that McKnight was a false identity that Beck invented. Williams/the editors is clearly ignoring that. That’s not a good sign, although it’s not irreconcilable. It’s entirely possible that MJ’s dialogue in ASm v5 #29 in-story was actually true.

Mary Jane comments that there are felons on set. She didn’t question this because Cage McKnight has a reputation for authenticity.

This line can be interpreted one of two ways.

a) MJ didn’t question actual criminals on set and didn’t do anything about it.

b) She phrased herself badly and what she meant was former felons, or that she presumed they were reformed/reforming felons.

The latter is a-okay, the former though....wtf?

MJ’s lived with a man who she knows spent most of his life torturing himself over allowing ONE criminal to walk free. She’s on set with a whole crew of criminals, including super villains and she’s shrugging it off? She’s not even questioning it?

‘Authenticity’ be damned, it’s illegal and potentially dangerous to knowingly harbour criminals, let alone super powered ones.*

But again, I’m willing to give the benefit of the doubt on that line. Between Cage’s reputation and the fact that so many criminals are working out in the open its not unreasonable for MJ to take it on faith that everything was on the up and up (even with the presence of super villains). After all the only confirmed super villain on set is the D (or Z) lister the Kangaroo who has at times been one of the good guys.

Mary Jane though is smart, socially savvy, can get a decent read of people and did study psychology for a time (she never completed the course but still). So she can tell something weird is up and it’s clear the intention is that she’s been growing suspicious for a while now.

In this essay series I don’t plan on praising the issues as that’s not the point. Besides I do that in other posts anyway. Nevertheless it’s worth pointing out that Williams really hits the mark on MJ’s personality here.

Her statements about Cage ‘claiming’ to have written this role for her (where she conveniently plays the love interest to a super person) and simply handing it to her imply MJ is detecting a trap. This touches on what I said above about her facial expression. About how it’s possibly intended to float the idea that she’s concerned that someone’s figured out Peter’s secret.

However, she could just as easily be thinking this is a trap specifically for her. After all, she’s been targeted by stalkers before (like Jonathan Caesar). That interpretation is arguably supported by MJ’s line about being scammed with an empty promise of stardom. Even if she doesn’t think this is some kind of super villain grand scheme of any kind it’d likely ring alarm bells for any young and (by stereotypical standards) attractive person in Hollywood; at least it would nowadays.

As we move onto the next page Cage reveals himself as in fact Mysterio and confesses he engineered this con in order to tell his life story.

He proceeds to inform MJ what is and isn’t real about the film and explain where the real Cage McKnight is. In doing so he admits that the film is happening through fraud, identity theft (sorry I don’t know the correct legal terminology) and the hiring of former felons and active criminals.

More specifically he produces (what he claims to be) a live video feed of the real Cage McKnight’s location on the Falkland Islands where he will be spending around a year on a film project that doesn’t actually exist. He also claims that this project is his last chance to do something good with the ‘time he has left’ (implying he is dying) and that he wanted to give the felons and criminals a similar chance to make something good and meaningful.

After being honest with her, MJ admits this situation is insane, but then agrees to go along with it.

First of all let me get this out of the way. Mysterio has actual active criminals on set but he also wants media attention. Isn’t that counter productive? The media are going to report that (some of the crew are obvious more than human, with green skin no less) and it’s going to cause both unwanted attention from the authorities and problems in general.

With that said let’s talk about the bigger issues with these pages.

Part of the problem in analysing them is that it we have to consider things from the POVs of MJ, Mysterio and our own (which is semi-omniscient).

We know Mysterio:

Is in the employ of the demonic Kindred who’s working a vendetta against Spider-Man.

Faked his own death again back in ASM v5 #24-25

Is doing this movie to make the most out of his time before he is dragged back to Hell

Is aware of Peter’s identity and that it’s highly likely he demanded MJ’s inclusion in the movie (whether of his own volition or on Kindred’s orders) specifically because of her connection to Spider-Man

Essentially we know Mysterio’s reasons for making the movie (including his limited time) are true…but they also omit certain important facts.

In other words…he’s acting.

He has legally (and more often illegally) worked as an actor. He was able to fool executives who literally work in the film industry where actors are basically a prerequisite. He is a massively skilled manipulator.

And here, the context the audience are aware of, conveys that he’s using the truth to get what he wants but is nevertheless withholding the real truth. Maybe this will be addressed later but at the moment it is beyond unlikely that Mysterio truly felt MJ was simply the only person to play his love interest. She is obviously there because of her connection to Peter.

Me personally though, I am not exactly certain Williams wrote this moment with the idea that Beck was being actively deceptive. My personal impression is that she was writing Beck as sincere and simply vulnerable because he knows he'll be returned to Hell soon. This vulnerability would be the reason for his opting for honesty. Now I don’t have any evidence to back that up I will admit, we will have to see as the series progresses.

But the most important thing about this scene isn’t our POV nor Beck’s, but MJ’s.

She is the lead character the person the story revolves around, her actions, decisions and agency is what is paramount in the context of this series.

From that perspective these three pages alone put us several layers into serious mischaracterization.

MJ wouldn’t help Beck because he’s hurt her loved ones

Even if he hadn’t she wouldn’t trust him because of the other horrible things he has done that she knows about

Even if she didn’t know about those things she knows his M.O. and abilities and thus wouldn’t trust him

Even if she sensed sincerity she’d not help him because he’s committed and still committing several serious crimes and unethical actions in this very story

Even if she believed those crimes weren’t so bad and that he was sincere she’d be smart enough to consider the possibility that he’s tricking her and double check what he’s told her

If she presumed (not that there is any evidence of this in the comic) that Beck was out legally and she ignored him obviously engaging in identity theft, she’d still double check those fact and learn that he has in fact escaped.

No matter how you slice this Mysterio is very much in the wrong here and so is Mary Jane. She even admits it’s insane and then agrees to go along with it.

Not only is she out of character to nuclear levels but even if this was a completely new villain MJ had never heard of before the mere fact that he’s clearly committed serious crimes to get to this point and is going to continue to do so (chiefly by impersonating McKnight) should be enough to make her her to bow out.

There is soooooooooo much more I could write about this because it cuts to the heart of the problematic premise as presented by the issue. However I will dive more deeply into that in numerous future instalments once we are done with issue #1.

Moving onto the next few pages, MJ predicates her agreement on the condition that her role be rewritten to improve her character.

This is a fact that she explains will actually improve the film over all. Their discussion occurs as Mysterio gives her a tour of the set and they chat about rewriting her character.**

During the course of this tour Mysterio unveils some of his film techniques and (at least seemingly) confirms what is and is not real about the production. Among the techniques he is using are his incredible holographic technology and his robot duplicates of the X-Men from ASM Annual #1.

This tour also includes a direct reference to Mysterio’s suicide from ‘Guardian Devil’, implying the artist and editor at least are aware of the events of that story. I’d like to imagine Williams is too. Regardless it’s problematic for the comic to acknowledge those events but treat Mysterio sympathetically in light of what he did in that story. And needless to say it’s problematic to write MJ as so chill around Beck in this scene/comic given how she knows about those events because she was in the story!

Anyway, MJ gets excited by the prospect of a spin off sequel. That in turn prompts one of the crewmen to imply she got her job through ‘womanly wiles’.

This enrages ‘Cage’ who assaults the man, an event witnessed and recorded by the surrounding crew. As she witnesses these events her self MJ has a curious facial expression.

Much like her expression seeing the actor playing Spider-Man, MJ’s face here is difficult to interpret.

It could mean any number of things.

Could she be viewing Mysterio as someone she’ll have to play carefully?

Is she thinking she’ll have to do her best to ensure he doesn’t get out of hand, whether it’s for her own protection or others’?

I do not know. It’s kind of vague. Hopefully it’s meaning will become clear in consequent issues, but if I’m supposed to understand clearly what it means in this issue then Williams or Gomez dropped the ball.

Something they didn’t drop the ball on though is Mysterio’s characterization. It’s worth mentioning out of fairness that this emphasis upon Mysterio as a passionate artist is extremely in keeping with his character and Williams handles him expertly on this front.

Beck finishes up his tour with a recreation of a scene from ASM #66-67 and MJ is delighted by the fun she and Mysterio are going to have in making the movie.

Notice that Beck directly references how this set piece is recreating a trap he laid for Spider-Man, how he used psychedelic gas to trick his mind.

In essence this is Mysterio simply stating outright to Mary Jane that he once tried to harm her boyfriend and even drugged him to that effect.

And MJ’s reaction to this is…to giggle with glee.

Really?

She doesn’t even show any hint of apprehension over that? We the readers aren’t even made privy to an internal tensing or recoiling on MJ’s part to this man just casually mentioning a time he sought to end the life of the man she is in love with?

Seriously, what the fuck. You better believe we’ll be talking more about this too.

Even from Mysterio’s point of view it muddies the waters of his motivations. As we extensively examined in prior instalments, it’s very likely that Beck knows Peter is Spider-Man, and thus by extension probably knows that Mary Jane is his lover. So it’s incredibly stupid on his part to blithely mention to MJ a time he drugged Spider-Man and tried to kill him.

Alternatively let’s say Beck’s hiring of MJ was in Kindred’s orders and he is unaware of the exact connection between her and Spider-Man/Peter. It’s still stupid because he’d still be able to deduce she very probably has something to do with Spider-Man because he knows Kindred wants her out of the way as he wages war on the wall-crawler.

The fact that Beck is written this way indicates Williams is unaware of the Spencer ASM issues which set up AMJ and/or doesn’t care and/or the editors aren’t doing their due diligence . Regardless it’s a major weak spot of the story. It either breaks the larger narrative that exists between the two titles or it renders Beck out of character via his stupidity.

The latter would be true even if Beck simply wanted MJ in his movie just because he liked her as an actress. He’d still be throwing out the fact he drugged and tried to kill someone (a former Avenger no less) in his past.

As the story progresses MJ and Peter have a chat on the phone where she makes a point of alleviating any discomfort he might have over making a sympathetic Mysterio biopic, claiming it is the Breaking Bad of super hero films. She continues by pointing out the career opportunities the role presents.

Peter raises concerns for MJ’s safety, suggesting she might find herself surrounded by villains; ironically unaware that Mary Jane is in that exact situation.

MJ assuages his concerns by reminding him of the time she defeated an actual super villain (the Chameleon, though he goes unnamed) with just a baseball bat.

MJ’s statements regarding the movie are arguably contradictory.

Earlier in her conversation with Beck MJ stated that the film empathizes with Mysterio and doesn’t apologise for it.

But then at the end of the story she tells Peter that the film actually isn’t glorifying Mysterio. Rather, it is making the Breaking Bad of super hero movies with an unreliable narrator.

This isn’t necessarily irreconcilable, but it is somewhat poorly communicated on Williams’ part. Breaking Bad’s defining message was that you shouldn’t be like Walter White. That he was in the wrong, even from the very start.

Why would Mysterio ever write a film about himself in that light? It doesn’t make sense and it would contradict MJ’s dialogue about how the movie empathises with Mysterio as a villain and doesn’t apologise for that. Breaking Bad wasn’t empathetic towards Walter White, it showed him very clearly as a monster and its final episode had him admit that fact.

Moreover if the film empathises but never apologises for Beck (and is directed by him personally) then isn’t that tantamount to glorifying him?

Because of this the issue leaves us with three possible interpretations of Mary Jane in this moment.

She is either:

Blinded by the prospect of fame and/or fortune and/or excitement and as such cannot see that the film obviously is glorifying Beck. To an extent we’ll talk more about this in a future instalment. Suffice it to say that’s very out of character

She is outright stupid, which is also out of character

She is deliberately lying to Peter about the artistic nature of the film project. There is a strong case (that we will get to) for MJ lying to Peter about Beck being out of character for her. However, were this a regular film production it might not be an OOC move for her. She wants to make the movie and alleviate her boyfriend’s feelings for the moment. Fibbing to keep their long distance relationship healthy and happy and hopefully being more straight with him when it’s over is not an unreasonable thing to do.

Options 1)-2) don’t exactly paint Mary Jane in a positive light, nor does option 3) necessarily.

MJ just isn’t this stupid, isn’t this capable of being star struck (she’s seen too much serious shit in her time for that) and lying to the love of her life about something like this is questionable. On the latter point it can be argued that there’d be no advantage of her lying to Peter about the project because he’s obviously going to find out when the movie is released.

Personally I suspect Williams never intended to imply any of the above interpretations.

I think she or the editors just didn’t catch that the dialogue at the end of the issue contradicts the dialogue from earlier. Which would be bad writing/editing but not demonstrative of Williams not fundamentally understanding the character. On occasion Stan Lee himself mischaracterized Spider-Man by accident.

Nevertheless a moment that reflects badly upon MJ.

The last moment from this scene involves a ’20 second dance party’ between MJ and Peter.

Its only relevance to this analysis is to exemplify some ways in which Williams nails Mary Jane’s character.

She’s flirtatious, she’s vibrant, she loves to dance, she loves to party, she can get the overly serious and often angst ridden Peter to emerge from his shell. Combined with MJ’s savvy earlier in the story, her tenaciousness and references to old continuity I can absolutely understand why Williams seemed like a good pick for the project.

But it’s moments like these that frustrate me about this comic (and I suspect the series going forward). It’s not that Williams fundamentally misunderstands Mary Jane but she drops the ball in a few places. Unfortunately those include drops that are so huge that they break the entire story. At least that will be the case if she doesn’t fill in the holes in her narrative.

The end result though is an extremely mixed bag wherein you have logic holes and mischaracterization so bad it debatably counts as (unintentional) character assassination but at the same time some of the absolute best Mary Jane or Mysterio moments ever! The 20-second dance party is going to be fondly remembered by every Mary Jane fan and MJ/Peter shipper forevermore, and rightly so.

But equally, unless properly justified in the future, MJ knowingly teaming up with Mysterio deserves to go down as one of the all time worst out of character moments for her ever.

The final relevant thing from the issue to talk about is the last page. It entails the Vulture’s gang of villains (the Savage Six) reading an article about the Mysterio biopic and deciding to head for L.A.

This is only really relevant for two reasons.

The first is the set up it supplies for future issues.

The second is that the article specifically talks about leaked set photos.

This further plays into the confusing nature of Mysterio’s scheme. He wants the media interest to act as a form of publicity (arguably this leak is an example of that) but he also has current villains on his staff. Wouldn’t the press be likely to find out about that and thereby jeopardize the project?

Reputation for authenticity or not, that’s extremely illegal.

With aaaaaaaall that said it’s time to move onto dissecting the status quo set up by this issue.

It’s all subject to change of course. Williams might address each and every problem eloquently at some point. But taking it at face value I am going to dedicate one (or more…) instalment(s) of this essay series to exploring the problems presented by this premise.

*We will talk much more extensively about this in a future instalment I promise you.

**By the way I don’t quite understand what MJ is asking her character to be rewritten into. She asks why she’s fighting without super powers but then says she should already be doing that in the story and that this is how she falls in love with the hero?????????????????????? Maybe I’m being dense but that just wasn’t clearly communicated to the readers).

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Master Post

#Amazing Mary Jane #Leah Williams #mjwatsonedit #mary jane watson #Mary Jane Watson Parker #MJ Watson #Spider-Man #Carlos Gomez #Mysterio #quentin beck #Peter Parker #Savage Six #Adrian Toomes #X-Men #vulture #The Vulture

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thomasanon · 4 years

Text

now this is quite the messy post and surely deserves some massive editing but you know what? i can’t really be bothered with it right now. so, welcome to Tom’s sleepover.

it’s not really a sleepover, i’m just lacking a better term for it (turns out we’re stupid dumb in this house). but, claps hands together. ANYWAY! this might be going on for a week. maybe more, maybe less, depends on whether you guys let this flop or not so it’s up to you really. now onto the good stuff.

here are some guidelines and disclaimers before we move forward:

first and foremost, obviously i’m not the real tom holland, just stating this out of common courtesy. identity theft is a crime and should not be taken lightly and with that said, i’m just here to have some fun and interact with you.

secondly, although this post only refers to roleplaying stuff for the most part i’d like to highlight the fact that my inbox and instant messages are always open for some good ol’ chatting, so don’t be a stranger and use and abuse of it.

as of right now i’m twenty two years old and although i’m of legal age to engage in nsfw content i most certainly won’t. there’s a lot of underaged people and i’d appreciate if this could be a safe environment for everyone. with that said, the best i can give you is fade-to-black.

now, when it comes to writing, my preference is to write in the third person and i do enjoy lengthier replies but to be fair with you, i much rather match to your rp style if mine isn’t your cup of tea. to start rp interactions you can just send one of the emojis down below or really just whatever you want. that easy, i promise.

and finally, if you wish to roleplay in the dms all i ask is that you mention it. as for those of you who would prefer to remain anonymous i’d appreciate it if you’d present yourself with a name or an assigned emoji.

pretty sure that’s it. now don’t forget to be a decent human being and be nice to each other. <3

RP Settings:

🧟‍♂️ -> apocalyptic world

🧚🏻‍♀️ -> fairytale of your choosing

👑 -> prince / princess

👩‍❤️‍💋‍👨 -> date night

🦋 -> platonic (can go as far as mutual pining)

🌑 -> a fanfic trope of your choosing

💫 -> whatever other scenario of your choosing

MISC:

🪐 + your name -> for name aesthetics

🕷 -> for my favorite line of whichever song is currently playing on the radio

💋 + 3 names -> to make me choose who i’d prefer to be handcuffed to for a whole day, who i’d introduce to my parents as my fake partner, and who i’d kiss to reenact a scene for a performance

🍀 + a tv show/movie -> i’ll tell you my honest opinion on it and who’s my favorite character

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wakraya · 5 years

Text

Epilogue Content Warnings

So as I said! Let me just. Pull these up real quick and talk about what each of them may mean for the Epilogue as a whole.

SPOILER WARNING FOR THE EPILOGUE BENEATH!

And let’s start with the characters actually!

John Egbert, Rose Lalonde, Dave Strider, Jade Harley, Jane Crocker, Roxy Lalonde, Jake English, Dirk Strider, Karkat Vantas, Kanaya Maryam, Terezi Pyrope, Calliope, Caliborn, Lord English: Obviously they would be here.

Aradia Megido, Tavros Nitram, Sollux Captor, Vriska Serket, Gamzee Makara, Eridan Ampora, Feferi Peixes: Also likely to be either mentioned or to have Ghost Shenanigans. It’s quite the Troll the Meowrails aren’t around though- Equius is not around I guess because he IS a Heir of Void after all. Nepeta not being there though, come on Hussie. that is just you Trolling us with another Dead Nepeta joke.

Aranea Serket, Meenah Peixes: Makes me think we’re not going to see the Dancestors at all. They’re the two more prominent ones, and part of the whole plan to defeat LE, so they would easily be mentioned.

Davepetasprite^2: Please come back, Birbcat.

Barack Obama: This is almost DEFINITELY Dave rapping.

Male Character(s), Original Female Character(s): Likely to be any new resident of Earth C. Honestly, just the Salamanders and Carapaces already fill this.

So now let’s go for the warnings! It should be noted, while all of these do appear, a lot of them are juxtaposed to be humorous with the more heavy-seeming ones, so let’s get into it.

Graphic Depictions of Violence, Major Character Death, Alternate Universe, Death, Incestuous Undertones, Meta, Manipulation, Rapping, Furry, Anthropomorphic Characters, Power Imbalances, Blood, Trickster Mode, Interspecies Relationships, Guns, Murder, Black Romance, Existential Crisis, Xenophilia, Daddy Issues, Robots, Gore, Aliens, Assassination, Theft, Ghosts, Mind Control, Teenagers, Possession, Kidnapping: This is just Homestuck 101.

Eating, Food, Clown Dynamics, Fridging, Feet, Early 20th Century Dance Movements, Clown, Honk, Faygo: These seem largely peppered in for the fun factor, and to break the... Concerning nature of some of the other ones.

The Economy, World War, Political Intrigue, Genocide, Political Rebellion, Fascism, Religion, Capitalism, Reality Television, Propaganda, Super PACs, Prison Camps, Gerrymandering, Revolutionary Rhetoric: This in general seems like it’s gonna be societal commentary talking about either Alternian or Earth Society, and perhaps some talk of stuff that’s happened in the past of Earth-C. With how messed up Alternia is and the stuff Condy did... Yeah it all checks in.

Xenophobia, Speciesism: The Snapchat Updates hinted at the possibility of anti-Human Trolls, and likely of anti-Troll Humans in the same vein, for literal Xenophobia and Speciesism, or grouped with the prior category for... You know. Sadly truthful commentary on social issues.

Misogyny, Sexism, Transphobia, Misgendering, Gender Transition, Nonbinary Character(s), Identity Questioning, Detransitioning: These are likely some of the ones that people are the most worried about- Specially regarding the one about ‘Detransitioning’. However... Honestly my two bets here are that, John is going to bump into Davepeta and have a brief moment of misgendering them before being corrected and some talk about gender identity, and that Dave may give John a big talk regarding identity and fucked up societal stuff.

Sexual Abuse, Rape, Non-Con, Dubious Consent, Slut Shaming: These may easily tie in with the previous one too, as V mentioned, these aren’t things we’re going to see at all, but they are going to get briefly discussed. So no one’s going to get coerced into anything. Bad themes but, stuff to talk about.

Child Abuse, Child Neglect, Abuse, Unhealthy Relationships, Domestic Abuse, Bad Parenting, Toxic Masculinity: I’m going to be honest. This. This just sounds like Dave’s gonna talk about Bro again.

Body Horror: This could be MANY things. Some awful wound described in full detail, it is gonna tie in with ‘Gore’ for certain. Maybe talking about Gamzee being split in half.

Alcohol Use, Drugging, Drug Use, Chronic Illness, Vomit, Addiction: The drug mentions already happened with Rose, and she’s medicating herself. Thankfully I trust she’s not falling in any sort of addiction, but the ‘Vomit’ tag could imply it’s gonna get worse before it gets better. Or maybe it’s entirely unrelated and Gamzee just barfs blood again.

Mental Illness, Depression: Someone get all of these Kids to a Therapist. Honestly.

Starvation, Suicide, Funerals: These are the ones I’m the most... Worried about. Suicide there could be talk of their Immortality, hell maybe it’s even a morbid but still joking thing that’s not serious, but I’m kind of concerned it may be more. Starvation though, I can’t... Think of anyone who could Starve, except perhaps Terezi having been outside searching for Vriska for so long, and I worry... And Funerals, please just talk about Mutie’s and Rose’s Funerals, please no one die. :I I mean except John, which I’m assuming may die, but I’ll talk about that later.

Poisoning, Pica: Another possible alternative for the ‘Vomit’ warning? It may also tie into some assassination attempt. There’s no ‘overdose’ tag, so I am ruling out the idea that Rose IS gonna start going too far. Like straight up. Pica is also a disorder in which someone eats non-edible stuffs, which could cause poisoning and vomit? But. Honestly? I think... Pica is just going to be Terezi eating chalk.

Friends to Lovers, Polyamory, Infidelity, Marriage, Cuckolding: Now BEFORE any of you crucify me for putting Polyamory and Infidelity together. I know. I’m not implying anything. BUT while it’s possible that like. Rose or Kanaya had some talk about their marriage. I think it could be quite hilarious if John saw Jade, Dave and Karkat like. Making out amongst themselves at different points and assume that they’re cheating on each other, or worse, that they tease him for having that come to mind immediately. ‘wow karkat i cant believe youre cucking me with jade im hurt’ ‘SHUT THE FUCK UP STRIDER, OH MY GOD-’

Pregnancy, Breastfeeding, Breastmilk, Diapers, Children, Babies, Milking: I know everyone’s IMMEDIATE thoughts is that someone’s gonna get pregnant. But honestly it could just be pregnancy talk and... Breastfeeding and Milking that’s just. That’s just gonna be ARquius isn’t it.

Eggs, Alien Biology, Ovipositioning: No! Stop! There’s not going to be any weird Troll Stuff! Shame on all of us. This is most likely regarding the Mother Grub, although I wouldn’t mind hearing more about Canon Troll Anatomy.

Cannibalism, Vore: I am. I am going to go ahead and think this is because of the drawing of Roxy eating a baby??? Honestly who even KNOWS at this point. Is Caliborn going to try to VORE anyone like a god damn snake? Good lord.

Mind Break, Rough Sex, Light BDSM: Remember that there’s NO sexual content in the Epilogue. Confirmed. So uh... Yeah. Okay I added ‘Mind Break’ here for humorous effect but honestly it may be better suited for some of the messed up warnings above, maybe alongside Mind Control? Oof. Rough Sex... I can imagine someone joking about it? Maybe someone gets really shameless with the innuendos. And Light BDSM I’m just going to say we’re going to see Clover. Or... Gamzee DID get tied up. Does that count?

Bimboification: This fucking one. This one is the one that throws me out for a limb the most. It may be relating to the Trickster Mode? It may also be related to Caliborn and him like. Objectifying the characters or something, but that isn’t as ‘ification’. Another thing that’s got me wondering is ‘Bimboification’. As FAR as I understand this term to go, the correct way of saying it is ‘Bimbofication’? So either it’s a typo, OR ‘Bomboification can apparently be used some times for specifically males? What I’m saying is, I can’t believe Lord English really is a Himbo.

Redemption: V... Vriska? Maybe. But also I kinda hope not. I’m really wishing ‘Redemption’ comes from everyone working their shit out together and being a big bunch of friends again.

Canon Compliant, Canon Divergent, Self-Sacrifice: Finally! The last ones! This is both Canon Compliant and Canon Divergent, which should be easy enough to parse through the Meat-Candy choice (And what I believe will be a split-path with the next update). Self-Sacrifice... Yeah that is what’s going to happen with John isn’t it? At least in the ‘Meat’ path. But I’ve talked already too much and gotten too Spoilery, ssssh!

So hey! These warnings don’t look so intimidating when you realize 90% were already things that happen in Homestuck proper, and the rest can be discussed in an adult manner without having awful things happen to people.

I’m mostly worried about people dying and getting hurt.

#Homestuck #Upd8 #Epilogue #Homestuck Spoilers #Spoilers

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yellowdistress · 5 years

Note

Could you do a story with teenage peter getting kidnapped again and his dad absolutely hugging him like if he let go he’d loose him after they find him))

Sure! But this won’t be considered canon ‘what we are’ verse, just cause I knew it’d be something that would have had to be brought up again at some point. So it’s still ‘what we are’, just not…canon? If that makes sense haha

I’ve always considered a plot like ‘Ransom’, you know that movie with Mel Gibson? This isn’t that, but it reminded me of that idea.

Peter was only thirteen, but he had just experienced the longest night of his life.

The threats on Peter’s life had been coming in since he could remember. Despite the fact that his father tried to hide most of them, Peter knew there were people out there who wanted to hurt him and his father. Whether it be for fame or money, or revenge, it didn’t matter. It was still smothering, gut wrenching and terrifying when it had happened. A split second decision that had led to a night of police chases and ultimately ended with their car crashing into a light pole.

Happy had gotten out of the car…After picking Peter up from Ned’s house. He was just going in the store for a minute to pre-pay their gas. Peter had sat alone in the car dozens of times, and he was mostly distracted by the homework he was trying to hurry up and finish before he got home, because it was meant to be done at Ned’s house and his dad would be mad if he got home and it wasn’t finished. Because then he would have to stay up late, and then he wouldn’t wanna get out of bed the next day.

But then the man in the hoodie had jumped into the driver’s seat…Had been carrying a gun in his hand.

It hadn’t felt real at first, because he hadn’t spoken to Peter for several moments when he sped out of the parking lot of the gas station. Peter didn’t even have time to be terrified at that point, not until the guy had glanced back, had pointed the gun…His face unshaven and mouth frowning deeply.

“Stark’s kid right?”

Peter had said nothing.

The gun made a sound, as he slid his thumb over the back, “Be good and you’ll go home soon. Hopefully ‘daddy’ is willing to pay to get you back. We’ll see if he likes you enough.”

And that was the beginning of their car ride. Peter didn’t know what the guy had been thinking, maybe the intention had been to take him out of the city. But all of his dad’s cars had trackers, and it didn’t take long for the police to start chasing them. For them to get run off the road. Peter thought of all those movies, where kids were kidnapped for ransom. Where the bad guys wanted money. Usually there was some sort of phone call, the gun was used, someone got hurt. But it didn’t happen that way. Peter escaped with a few bumps and bruises, after being thrown to the floorboard before the police swarmed the vehicle and he was pulled out so forcefully by a police officer that he almost had whiplash.

He had been practically thrown over the officer’s shoulder, carried away, the police lights flashing off his eyes as he watched the man with the gun, his face now bloodied from the air bag, being thrown on the ground and handcuffed. There were so many cops, more than Peter could remember ever seeing, maybe since New York. People had stopped on the street, there were men and women with cameras (Peter would find out later the police chase had been shown live and they had compared it to OJ Simpson’s…whoever that was.)

Then Peter was placed in the back of a police cruiser, a blanket wrapped tightly around him as he sat at the edge of the seat, the door open to the chaos but facing away from the cameras.

There he waited.

In retrospect, it seemed shorter than it was. The hours of sitting in the back seat, trying to be silent, not knowing what to say. Not asking questions, not crying, just knowing he was in a bad situation and his dad was going to kill that guy. He wondered where his father was, during all of that, if he had been told he wasn’t allowed to put on his suit and intervene. He could only imagine how angry he was, and Peter shivered at the thought where he sat, and his head hurt from the lights.

But then a car pulled up…and his father, Happy, and Pepper stepped out.

The cameras behind them started to flash even brighter as his father appeared, but he didn’t even seem concerned about the press as he immediately walked towards the cruiser. Peter stood, gripping the blanket tighter, and maybe if he was younger, not so self-conscious, he would have sprinted to his dad. But he felt…deeply shocked and worried and so Peter’s steps weren’t sprints, but they were wide strides towards his father.

The moment he was in arms reached, his dad wrapped him in a tight embrace.

His dad leaned down, almost like a tree, bending protectively over the small teen. His dad was in an expensive suit, maybe he had been at work when everything had happened, and Peter felt bad - even inconveniencing his father with his brief but big kidnapping…he felt bad.

There were so many voices, the clicking of cameras, but Peter’s father whispered in his ear, continuing to shield him, “Are you okay?”

The hug was so tight, his father’s voice was trembling. Peter bit down on his lip, the guilt rising as he replied, “Yeah…”

He paused, then.

“My homework is still in the car.”

There was a deep breath, “I don’t think you need that.”

When his father stood back to his full height, Peter was pulled close to his chest, having to peer up at the others with his neck turned at an odd angle. The hand continued to cup the back of his head, and Happy and Pepper were both standing in front of the line of press. Happy looked exhausted, and Peter tried to smile at him, but the adults were hardly looking at him…And he supposed it was because there were other pressing matters to deal with.

“Get us a different car, one the press isn’t going to trail all the way home,” His dad ordered sharply, “Tell the police if they want Peter’s statement they have to get it from our place, we’re not going to the police station tonight.”

Peter squirmed, but his father’s hold was firm. Fingers carded his scalp, but still no one was looking at him. Peter also noticed the way Happy nodded quickly and rushed away to do so, and Peter hoped his father hadn’t been mean to Happy about what happened at the gas station…It didn’t feel like it should have been his fault.

Pepper spoke to his father, “They’re going to need to know what happened, Tony.”

“Okay, well like I said, they can come to our place,” His dad repeated, sounding more frustrated, “Tonight has been the night from Hell, Pep. My kid just got snatched from a damned gas station. Give me that. I’m taking him home. At least until we make sure this was just one crazy.”

“Dad…” Peter breathed, trying to get his attention, but suddenly they were being waved away by Happy in the distance…Which meant he probably found a car. He was finally released from the embrace, and instead a hand wrapped around his own, pulling him away…

Peter didn’t get to finish before he was put in the back of an unfamiliar vehicle and brought home.

…

“Abraham Mennington. Thirty-two-years old, former charges for robbery and identity theft. Released last month on good behavior. Seems he has been watching you for a while, Mister Stark…”

Captain Stacy paused in his explanation and Peter wasn’t supposed to be listening, where he hovered in the mouth of the hallway, peering around the corner so that he could see the officers and Peter’s father and Pepper in the dark dining room, illuminated by the light above the table. Peter recognized Captain Stacy…he had met him at some of the city’s charity events that Peter had been brought to.

He then continued, “He had Peter’s school schedule in his computer database, wrote down when your driver would usually stop to get gas. It seems he was very prepared for this evening…but didn’t take into account that your vehicle would be tracked. From what we could tell, he planned to bring your son upstate to his mother’s old cabin. Wanted to hide out there until he could get his ransom demand…”

A pause.

“He was planning on asking for almost seventeen million,” Captain Stacy finished.

He heard his father sigh, and he watched him pinch the bridge of his nose. His dad questioned, almost too quietly for Peter to hear, “And how do you figure we approach this?”

“My honest opinion?” Captain Stacy questioned, “Up your security. Get the boy more protection, other than a former boxer. You’re Iron Man and one of the richest men in the world. Your son needs safety.”

“We’re attempting to give Peter a normal childhood,” This time Pepper spoke, “Surrounding him with bodyguards isn’t what we envisioned for him.”

Captain Stacy sighed, “With all due respect, it could be the only way of preventing something like this from happening again.”

Silence shriveled up, Peter felt shaky. Security meant smothering, and Peter already felt he was smothering sometimes. His hands trembled, and Peter was about to turn and go back to his room when Captain Stacy’s eyes left his father and Pepper’s faces, over their shoulders. They met Peter’s, and Peter felt heat rise in his face almost immediately when both Pepper and his dad turned as well. Peter gritted his teeth, made a small sound before he turned and rushed down the dark hallway, ducking into his bedroom and practically catapulting into bed.

It didn’t take long for his father to arrive.

“You know…” His dad hummed, leaning against the door frame as Peter peeked out from under the blankets, “I thought we talked about you eavesdropping.”

“We did…” Peter whispered.

“And?”

Peter pushed himself to a sitting position, poking out his lower lip petulantly. His father entered further, coming to sit on the edge of the bed and Peter scooted closer, pushing himself to his knees as to be the same height at the man. It made it easier to talk to him when he felt he was on the same level. His dad raised an eyebrow and Peter explained, “If you’re talking about me I should get to listen…You know…tonight it happened to me.”

His father stared a moment before he sighed, “Yes, but it’s our responsibility to make sure you’re safe. So we’re going to have conversations you don’t need to be there for.”

Peter crossed his arms over his chest, “Why, so you can decide if I have to be like those kids who never get to do anything fun cause they have twenty Happys chasing them around all the time?”

“Don’t,” His father’s voice was warning, “Okay? Don’t. You can’t begin to understand the gravity was what happened tonight. We caught this guy, but what would have happened if he had taken you further? Had gotten out of the city? Had been able to make that demand? I…I don’t even want to entertain that thought. So you’re…”

He trailed off, maybe thinking better but Peter wasn’t sure. Peter gulped thickly and asked, “What?”

“You’re too young to understand.”

Peter felt his stomach plummet. He felt nauseated with anger. Peter glared, he was always being treated so young…Like he was stupid or something. He resisted the urge to poke his father, to demand he listen to him and what he had to say. But then he couldn’t anymore, and he pressed his index finger into the man’s chest, voice wavering as he tried to sound adult, “No I’m not. You just - you never listen to me, and just cause some crazy guy grabbed me doesn’t mean anything, you can’t treat me like a little kid all the damn time - ”

“Hey,” His dad grabbed his wrist, stopping him from poking him, voice almost venomous as he held tightly, “One: don’t talk to me like that. Two: You are a kid. Whether or like it or not, there are things you don’t understand. You’re not indestructible and you’re my son, so I’m going to do what I have to do in order to protect you from crazy people like this guy.”

Peter’s face fell. He stiffened his mouth, but his eyes dropped and the bravery went away. The hand continued to hold his wrist and he heard his father sigh, voice going soft as he explained further, “Peter…I love you. And this guy could have hurt you. It wasn’t a game - or a movie with a car chase, it was real.”

“I know that,” Peter’s voice cracked, “I - I know. I was scared.”

His father made a face…As if he was suddenly taking that fact into account. The man’s head nodded and he tugged on Peter’s wrist, pulling him to his chest in another embrace, tighter than the one earlier. His dad held on and on and on and Peter said nothing…Just listened as time silently ticked on.

His father reassured, “I might not have told you…but even adults get scared so…that’s not why you’re young. It’s okay to be afraid in a situation like that.”

His father knew him too well. Knew his habit to fight down anything that threatened the perception that Peter could be older than thirteen.

#what we are au #biological father au

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blackjack-15 · 5 years

Text

Secrets and Killing — Thoughts on: Secrets Can Kill/Secrets Can Kill Remastered (SCK/SCK2)

Hello and welcome to a Nancy Drew meta series! 30 metas, 30 Nancy Drew Games that I’m comfortable with doing meta about. Hot takes, cold takes, and just Takes will abound, but one thing’s for sure: they’ll all be longer than I mean them to be.

Each meta will have different distinct sections: an Introduction, an exploration of the Title, an explanation of the Mystery, a run-through of the Suspects. Then, I’ll tackle some of my favorite and least favorite things about the game, and finish it off with ideas on how to improve it. If any game requires an extra section or two, they’ll be listed in the paragraph above, along with links to previous metas.

These metas are not spoiler free, though I’ll list any games/media that they might spoil here: SCK, SCK2, episode 1X14 of The Mentalist.

The Intro:

We’re beginning with Secrets Can Kill/Remastered, not only because it’s first, but also because it’s one of the easier games to analyze. The plot isn’t anything especially complicated, the suspects are caricatures, the locations are pretty barren — and all of this is true in both versions. It’s a short, unsatisfying game, which spawned a short, unsatisfying remake that fixed some things and ruined others.

The Title:

The title itself sounds like the murder occurred because Jake was keeping secrets (not because he was blackmailing people with them) — and it’s also incredibly vague — so as a title, I wouldn’t say it’s incredibly effective. The word “kill” is evocative, to be sure, but I think that’s the strongest part of the title by leagues.

The Mystery:

Nancy’s Aunt Eloise is a school librarian whose school finds a student murdered — so her first instinct is to call her plucky 18-year-old niece to come solve it.

The murdered student, Jake Rogers, has left cryptic messages in the school and the nearby diner, pointing towards not only what caused his murder, but also how to solve the crime and catch his murderer. There’s actually a really chilling clue that Jake tells us “will seal [his] murderer’s fate” — meaning that in the course of leaving these clues, Jake knew he’d be murdered.

Perhaps that’s a justification for the actual mystery being so /easy/ — the game can be beaten in under 45 minutes without too much trouble, sadly enough (obviously discounting the time spent in the original version switching discs).

The identity of the murderer/bad guy(s) is…honestly pathetic in both versions as well, with the biggest difference being screen time rather than complexity or plausibility. The remastered version nerfs the ending where Nancy stands for Truth, Justice, and Guns, and instead employs a rather ridiculous ending that’s meant to test you on your recall from the beginning of the game…but fails, because the beginning of the game was under an hour ago.

The Suspects:

Hal Tanaka (whose name in Japanese I’m guessing is actually Tanaka Haru or something longer but similar, since “l” isn’t a phoneme in Japanese, and no word can end in any consonant other than “n”) is a student at Paseo Del Mar who focuses very hard on getting the best grades he can possibly get —through both honest and dishonest means.

As a suspect, he’s pretty pathetic; there’s not a single minute where he’s even remotely plausible as Jake’s murderer, and he’s really just there to make sure that there’s “enough” suspects to seem more complex (and to pad out the run time of the game).

He also never pays for his plagiarism? Like the kid is a senior going into college and he just straight up copies the Big Essay? And it’s not really well written — if you’re gonna cheat, cheat well, Hal. It really bothers me that Nancy’s like “and he got his scholarship! Huzzah!” when the dude is a Stone-Cold Cheater.

Jake’s blackmailing him because of the aforementioned plagiarism, which…like, blackmailing is Not Right, but am I supposed to feel like Hal is the Victim here because he’s planning on taking a scholarship that he doesn’t deserve with his plagiarized paper away from another kid who does deserve it because they have the smarts and effort to write their own? Is that what this game is telling me to think? Because the game is wrong.

If Hal has the smarts to do Jake’s homework for the rest of the year, dude has the smarts to write his own essay. He’s a lazy coward, and I’d blackmail him too.

Connie Watson is the official tattletale (sorry, “hall monitor”) of Paseo Del Mar, and spends the game in the “student lounge” (what kind of bougie high school is this?) doing…nothing at all, honestly. I get that it’s the end of the year, Connie, but…go home. There’s no way school is in session, a murder just happened there.

She parades her Judo trophy-necklace around like she’s not being blackmailed for it and that, in 1998 or 2010, no one would recognize it? I mean we definitely know that Connie’s not getting a scholarship, girl is flat out dumb. She comes off better in the 1998 version where she at least gets to use those Mad Judo Skills, but she’s not an important character in either version, to be quite honest.

Connie’s being blackmailed because she won a men’s Judo competition…by wearing…a ski mask…yeah, there’s no defense for this, not in ’98 and not in ’10. Anyway, Jake is blackmailing her into going to the dance with him because he saw her taking off her mask (which she definitely should have done in a more secret location if she wanted it to be a secret?) but like…girlfriend is Flaunting her little neck-trophy, so I honestly don’t see what sway he has over her. It’s Very Wrong of him to do so, yes, yes…but he’s got no power here, and Connie’s an idiot if she thinks so.

She’s an idiot anyway, and once again is never even a consideration for Jake’s killer. What an interesting choice, to have two separate characters as the “dumb muscle” stereotype. And this one’s a girl! #feminism

Daryl Gray is the SBP of Paseo Del Mar, along with basically the manager (from what we see) of Maxine’s Diner, creepy escort, police contact…you name it, Daryl’s your bleach-blond guy.

He’s also super shifty; in the original game, he’s involved in drug trafficking, and in the remastered version, he’s selling his father’s company’s secrets. He also hits on Nancy a lot, but since Nancy never tells him to knock it off, that’s a Mild offense at best.

Daryl is being blackmailed in the original game because of the drug trafficking, and in the remastered version because of the whole leaking company secrets thing. Daryl 100% deserves to be blackmailed for that, as both of those things are Very Illegal, and he’s being Very Stupid about them. Yes, I understand that blackmail is illegal as well.

Hulk Sanchez is a character with as much subtlety as his name would imply, and is the star football player for Paseo Del Mar. Injured on the field and yet still looking to play college (and eventually pro) football, Hulk steals steroids and takes them, putting the “muscle” in “dumb muscle”.

Hulk is, true to his one-note character, being blackmailed for the whole “stealing drugs” thing (which seems to be his only character trait), as Jake wants him to deliver messages for him. Hulk by far got off the easiest, and if I were him and could be busted for both theft and drug use, would be thrilled that I was getting off this easy. Having no sense of perspective, Hulk instead rants to everyone about how Jake Rogers was a “punk” and how it’s a good thing that he’s dead.

Mitch Dillon, the school’s janitor, is the original baddie in the 1998 game, and is Unseen throughout the ENTIRE game, appearing only at the end to wave a gun around and punch Connie before being apprehended.

In the 1998 game, he’s buying drugs off of Daryl, whereas in the 2010 remake, he’s buying company/government secrets off of Daryl and selling them to Detective Beech. In both cases, Jake tries to blackmail him for his crimes, and he kills him. Both games see him arrested, but neither one actually treats him like a character, and he is, ultimately, a plot device that weakens the games.

Lastly, the remake introduces the character of “Detective Beech” (real name unknown), who also goes by “Uncle Steve” in his guise as Nancy’s police contact.

He is, of course, nothing of the sort, and has lost his journal with Gray Enterprises’ dirty little secrets that Mitch sold to him, and “hires” Nancy to find it under the guise of searching for Jake’s killer. Cartoonish and so obviously the Bad Guy that you’ll lose your voice yelling at Nancy to stop telling him things, he tries to kill Nancy when she finds out the truth and ends up trapped in Aunt Eloise’s kinky sex cage intruder cage thanks to Nancy telling him (repeatedly) the wrong combination to the safe. Yeah.

“Detective Beech” in-universe is a TV show mentioned in passing in STFD, VEN, and TOT, which makes the fact that Nancy fell for this disguise even sadder. That’d be like some criminal posing as an officer being like “call me Detective Columbo” and you being like “that sounds Plausible, yes”. Honestly.

It’s interesting that this game sets up a story where most of the suspects are “cheating” in some way or the other — Hal’s plagiarism, Connie’s joining of the competition, Hulk’s steroids, etc. I’m not sure this was purposeful, and I’m even less sure that it really means anything, but it’s interesting to note, regardless.

The Favorites:

There’s not much about this game that I like, to be quite honest. I enjoy Jake (more on him below), and Ned’s cheesiness as a phone contact, and the fact that it’s Mercifully Short.

Also Hulk is SUCH an enormous douche that it’s almost funny. And Aunt Eloise’s kinky sex cage intruder cage.

If I have to choose a favorite puzzle, it’s reading all of the signs Jake hid around the school/Maxine’s diner.

Or the ladle for the sheer stupidity.

The Un-favorites:

Everything else about the game.

The visuals are “blah” (except Remastered!Daryl, who is the stuff of effing nightmares), the characters are cardboard cutouts with a combined IQ of 7, and Nancy comes off weak and stupid as a result.

The villain(s) are one-note and boring, and the attempt to improve the game by remastering it made it easier to play (no disc-switching, faster loading, etc.) and had some campy yet cute easter eggs, but on the whole introduced new problems to the plot and took away Nancy Using an Effing Gun. Boo.

I have no favorite puzzles, as they’re all horrible or horribly easy. Nothing in this game stands out.

Well…maybe one thing stands out, but it’s not to the game’s credit.

The Fix:

The first (and biggest) thing I’d do to fix SCK is to set it in or near River Heights.

Yeah, there’s a throwaway line about this not being Nancy’s first case, but it doesn’t have to be her first case to make more sense in River Heights. It could happen in an adjacent suburb to River Heights as well, I’m not picky – it just should be local.

Now, that takes away Nancy being “undercover”, but honestly that’s not a big part of the game to lose, and setting it in a town next to River Heights pretty much solves the question of why would these kids talk to her if they knew who she was (though I don’t think that’s a problem; high schoolers, especially high school senior, are pretty apathetic about other peoples’ reputations and wouldn’t really care if a small-time amateur detective well-known in her own town but not nationally was there to ask them questions).

This fixes a few things, not the least of which being how Nancy is even allowed to be there in the first place. It’s ridiculous, no matter the time period, to think that Aunt Eloise would be notified of a student’s death, turn around to the police and the principal and be like “Hey, I have a niece! She sure has found some missing dogs!” and the authorities being like “Some lost dogs? A niece? Gee whiz! You got her number handy?”.

It’s a nonsensical way to get Nancy into the game that sticks out because there were sensical ways to ensure she could investigate.

Have Eloise working in a school a town over (and having previously lived in New York, to set up STFD), encounter the murder, think of Nancy, get the River Heights police chief to put in a good word for her with the other town’s police, and you’ve got a logical process of getting Nancy involved.

Make SCK Nancy’s first big case outside of River Heights (even if it’s just by a handful of miles) working with a different police force/school/etc., and suddenly there’s a justification for starting with this case.

The other big change I’d make is in the whole premise of the game.

Nancy Drew doesn’t tackle another murder until DED, and honestly it’s a good thing they waited for a good concept and a competent writer, because the one thing that stands out in the game is the premise: a person is murdered, and no one cares.

It’s one thing to have some of the characters not care, or be actively hostile to Jake Rogers while he’s alive, etc. etc. After he’s dead, no one’s shaken; sure, Jake has been blackmailing all of them, but the characters either intensely don’t care, or (in the case of Hulk, for example) are glad he’s dead, and have no qualms about telling you so.

Outside of your suspect pool, no one cares either; the most the teachers say is a line in an email noting that they’ll have to replace him for bulletin board duties. A student is murdered — a student that these teachers all knew, as he worked administratively for the bulletins at least — and they don’t care. Heck, Nancy doesn’t even care — she’s just there to poke her nose in and say some horrifically cheesy lines.

And honestly? I’m not okay with it.

Jake Rogers wasn’t a people person, and he was a jerk. His dream was to get enough money to go to an island and live a life of solitary luxury. He blackmailed people who broke the law (Connie is the weakest link here, but technically competing in the competition is Fraud because of the monetary prize, even if I don’t condemn her for it) for his own gain, but he was the definition of a temporary problem.

And an adult saw this kid as a temporary problem and used a permanent solution to fix it.

There’s the great episode in the first season of The Mentalist, 1X14 “Crimson Casanova”, where a woman having an affair in a hotel with a pick-up artist is shot to death.

At the end of the episode, it’s revealed that this woman, who cheated on and stole from her husband, was not the target at all — that a hotel employee who was in love with the pick-up artist’s ex-girlfriend tried to kill the pick-up artist in revenge for his treatment of the ex-girlfriend.

The following dialogue takes place between Patrick Jane (the titular Mentalist) and the murderer:

Murderer: “I’m not sorry. He’s dirt. The way he carried on with those other women, rubbing Katie’s nose in it? …I wish I hadkilled him.”

Jane: “But you killed Claire Wolcott instead.”

M: “I never meant to do that…but she shouldn’t have been doing what she was doing, should she? I mean, it’s not like anybody cares. Her husband was going —”

J: “I care! I care about Claire Wolcott! She was a living person!...You took her life!”

When his detective partner tries to calm him down, Jane responds with a simple statement:

J: “I…I just…I think he should be sorry.”

And that’s how I feel about Jake Rogers’ death.

Sure, he was a blackmailer. He, too, shouldn’t have been doing what he was doing. But he’s also a senior in high school involved in, let’s face it, petty crimes at most. He was a living person.

I don’t expect the murderer to be sorry, like in the above example. But a kid was alive, and now he’s dead, because someone murdered him in cold blood.

And I think someone should be sorry.

So how would I fix SCK?

Set it in or near River Heights, flesh out the characters, acknowledge the wrong that all of them do.

Make the culprit an actual part of the case.

Have actual puzzles in the game.

Acknowledge how terrible it is that Jake Rogers was murdered and that no one seems to care.

Have someone on his side, even if it’s only Nancy — Nancy, who shares so many similarities with Jake, who spies on those around her, who gathers evidence of their wrongdoings and, yes, holds it over their heads to get them to tell her what she wants to know.

Give Nancy sympathy for Jake, wanting justice for Jake, and you’ve won half the battle.

#nancy drew #nancy drew games #clue crew #secrets can kill #SCK #video games #my meta #nancy drew meta

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penprp · 5 years

Text

On P5/DCMK...

I saw a very interesting post earlier that compared P5 and Detective Conan/Magic Kaito, drawing parallels between Hakuba and Kasumi, and between Akechi and Shinichi. (Not reblogging because the OP does not need my word vomit clogging up their dash.) I’m going to have to say that honestly, I see it the other way around-- Akechi is Hakuba and Kasumi is Shinichi. I suspect the OP has seen a bit more of the Royal trailers than I have, of course… but I’m gonna do a bit of a deep dive into Hakuba and Shinichi’s character evolutions first, and then explain the way I see the correspondence. I know the OP was focusing almost totally on their relationships to Joker... but I’m going to nerd out a bit further.

Okay, so it all starts back in the late 80’s with the manga Magic Kaito. Aoyama’s first manga series, if you can believe that. Magic Kaito introduces us to Kuroba Kaito, teenage magician, prankster, and occasional pervert. (It was manga in ‘87, that was practically required.) He slapsticks his way through a school day, and then discovers that his father, long dead in an accident, was the legendary thief Kaitou Kid! But Kaitou Kid is holding a heist tonight! Kaito crashes, dressed in his dad’s old costume and learns that his father’s accident was actually murder, and swears to bring the culprits to justice. So right away, we’ve got the tone set-- a lot of slapstick and silly humor, with the occasional dramatic suckerpunch hitting when you don’t so much expect it.

That goes on for two volumes, with mostly silly stories about Kid escaping an army of robot surveillance cameras, Kid helping a little boy deal with bullies, Kid dealing with an honest-to-god witch who’s attempting to put him under her spell, Kaito and Aoko hunting ghosts that turn out to be a teacher trying to hide his research into hair growth formula… you get the idea. Then in 88, Kid went on hiatus, as Aoyama had moved onto his next manga, Yaiba!

Then we hit 1994. Yaiba has just ended, as has a short baseball-themed series called Yoban Saado, and so Aoyama comes back to Kid. His drawing style has evolved and so has his storytelling-- seven years of continuous work will do that to you. There’s still a lot of slapstick and silliness, but the drama has tightened up its act and is now setting snares for you instead of just punching you and running off laughing. It’s in this period of time that we meet Hakuba Saguru.

I should pause at this moment to say that Aoyama Gosho has some of the strongest special interests I have ever seen in a mangaka. The man loves Sherlock Holmes, Arsene Lupin, stage magic, and baseball, not necessarily in that order. He also loves working in a semi-unified world. Yaiba ended with a character announcing that “Kuroba and Nakamori,” IE, Kaito and his best friend Aoko, were finally going out. The new volume has a chapter in which Kid goes up against Yaiba in one of the most ridiculously slapstick things the series has done at this point. Remember this for later.

So into this mess comes Hakuba Saguru, transfer student. Hakuba’s role, as suits the slightly more focused and dramatic tone of the series in this volume, is to be an antagonist slightly more competent than Nakamori. His initals make him a reference to Herlock Sholmes, but as he’s half-British, reading his name in the Western fashion does evoke Sherlock Holmes. Really, at this point, Saguru is not narratively one particular reference as he is The Detective-As-Antagonist. He’s handsome, smug, confident, charming, brilliant, and basically a rival to Kaito in every arena, from school to romance to their nightly activities. His very first appearance has him ignoring the trick that the rest of the police fall for, forcing Kid to step up his game. Not long after that, he actually manages to realize that Kuroba Kaito is Kaitou Kid, and comes up with a clever plan to prove it. Unfortunately, he’s still in the Magic Kaito manga, and thus is thwarted by a witch riding in on her broom. (It makes sense in context.)

It’s towards the end of this volume that Kid learns of the gem Pandora, the reason his father was murdered, and vows to find the gem himself and destroy it. At this point, Kid switches from stealing various interesting baubles to targeting gems and only gems.

… And cue Detective Conan, which has been running for, as of this writing, twenty-five years. (Dear God.) This introduces us to Kudou Shinichi, detective and Sherlock Holmes otaku extraordinaire. One of the first things we learn about Shinichi is that he is incredibly privileged. (He’s also a huge dork, but I digress.) He’s handsome. He’s rich. His parents love him, but they’re out of the country, leaving him to live on his own with a ridiculous degree of freedom. He has cases to stimulate him. He’s a brilliant detective whom the police and media adore. The kids at school love him, though none can really be considered his friends except Mouri Ran, his best friend. Shinichi’s biggest problem in life is that Ran has a nasty habit of cracking concrete with her fists when he says something insensitive. Later flashbacks and retcons tell us that Shinichi, while he can be hugely thoughtless, is nevertheless instantly ready to throw all of that power and privilege behind protecting the weak and the innocent. He’s just… better with victims and witnesses than he is with normal social interaction.

Contrast this with Hakuba, who while, yes, he’s rich and charming and his father has enormous social and political pull as the Superintendent of the police... he’s still half-white. And thus will always be, on some level, an outsider. Neither manga does a lot with this, but it is still there.

Then he witnesses a drug deal, gets shrunk into an elementary-schooler, and it all goes down the tubes. Shinichi starts off as being very much like Hakuba-- or rather, Hakuba was a sort of proto-Shinichi. But Shinichi has twenty-five years of appearances and is the protagonist, so he gets the kind of character development Hakuba could only dream of. Shinichi loses almost everything and has to build it anew, without the privilege he had to begin with. In the process, he grows and changes, becoming more thoughtful and more appreciative, with less smugness and ego.

Into this world, Gosho decides to do one of his usual things, and drop Kaitou Kid in for a story. Holmes vs. Lupin, it’ll be fun, right? The fans ate it up, and so Kid became a regular guest star. After that, when doing Sunset Mansion, a story loosely based on Young Kindaichi’s “House of Wax” story, which involves a detective gathering, Hakuba Saguru was a natural choice. And here we come to one of Hakuba’s issues as a character.

It’s now the year 2000. Detective Conan, always more serious in tone than Magic Kaito, given the rampant murders, has progressed in the past six years. The art is better, the storytelling is more dramatic… And Hakuba’s previous narrative slot has been filled by Shinichi. What does Gosho do with him? I think a lot of the characterization that follows was Gosho trying to get a handle on who Hakuba IS, in a world where all the characters he played off of have changed so dramatically. In Sunset Mansion, he acts more like James Bond than either Herlock Sholmes or Sherlock Holmes. He’s handsome, charming, and dangerous, and while he’s not convinced of Kid’s essential benevolence, he is adamant that Kid is no killer.

Fast-forward to 2006. Hakuba shows up again for the Tantei Koshien, a detective competition that seems designed to play up the differences between Hakuba and Hattori Heiji, Conan’s best friend and fellow detective. This is quite possibly the most characterization Hakuba gets, and he’s… not shown in a great light. He’s scornful of Heiji’s impulsive nature and rash action, and lets his focus on thefts and frauds mislead him into identifying the wrong culprit. He takes his correction rather graciously, but hasn’t appeared in Detective Conan since.

And now it’s 2007. Kid is rabidly popular, enough that Gosho puts out another volume’s worth of Kaitou Kid chapters. Now that we’re back behind Kaito’s eyes, we see a combination of the goofy prankster in the earliest chapters and the smooth gentleman thief we’ve come to know in Conan’s tales. These stories are more tightly plotted, with more danger and escapes, the magic tricks used to set up a central “howdunit” for the chapter, and there’s a bit more character development. Kid also evinces more detective skills, as there’s often a mystery for him to get to the bottom of, as well as his own tricks for others to decipher. Hakuba makes a guest appearance, calling Kaito to give him information when he’s going head to head with another kaitou over a rare gem, and then shows up when Kid is threatened by a murderous thief named Nightmare. At the end of this case, he agrees with Kid in deliberately hiding the truth of Nightmare’s identity, as the man is dead and the truth would only hurt his family now.

Hakuba is still charming, flirty, and confident, and to be honest, still kind of smug. But now he’s being shown as someone capable of empathy, not a detective concerned only with the law, or even the truth. He’s come to understand that justice requires mercy. But we don’t get to see any of this happen, and he’s still only in a few pages in two stories out of five.

Hakuba and Shinichi both have complicated relationships with Kid that can’t be boiled down to “rival” and “enemy” quite so easily. The biggest difference, in my opinion, is that Hakuba is chasing Kid to catch and stop him, while Shinichi really sees Kid heists as a chance to match wits with an intellectual equal. Hakuba is concerned with Kid’s breaking the law, while Shinichi seems to consider that mostly a non-issue, being focused more on beating Kid as almost a matter of pride. He’ll give it back and nobody died, no big deal. … That said, Hakuba’s characterization in spinoffs such as the Magic Kaito specials is leaning a bit more towards actual rivalry, but that’s because in that continuity, he has bigger spiders to fry.

So why did I go into all that? We don’t know much about Kasumi, but we know a lot about Akechi, so I’m going to start with him. Visually, he resembles Hakuba much more than Shinichi, with the perfectly pressed appearance, light hair, and visually adult fashion choices. He’s a media darling, and is incredibly charming. Beyond that, in all his interactions with the Phantom Thieves before his reveal, he is apart from them, even when assisting them. His outfit is brilliant white and gold, rather than the blacks and reds of most of the team. He even tells them that while he will help them clear their name of murder, they have to stop thieving. This is all very Hakuba. Of course, it’s all a mask, but even so… he wants to stop the Phantom Thieves. He’s tied into the forces of law and order, both in his mask persona and as Yaldabaoth’s pawn. (Law and Order being two different forces here… although maybe not so different as they seem.) He’s strongly drawn to Joker and winds up helping him, despite what his position and duties would suggest.

Kasumi is… well, we don’t really know. Visually, however, as a thief, she strongly resembles Joker. We’ve seen that she seems to act as a Phantom Thief, even if she’s quoted as saying that she doesn’t believe in their justice. (“Thieves are boring,” Conan scoffs, right before meeting a nutter in a white top hat.) A lot of her visual shots are set up to suggest a strong parallel between her and Joker, and there’s a possibility of her being yet another Wild Card. Kaito and Shinichi are canonically said to resemble each other strongly, and while this is probably partially Gosho making fun of the fact that all his hot teenage boys look alike… he’s said there is a deeper reason for it.

This is all speculation, of course. We won’t really know until the game comes out. (Can we get a Switch port Atlus? Please?)

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leverage-ot3 · 4 years

Text

notable moments from The Beantown Bailout Job

leverage 2.01

(see link for a video on this episode that captured literally all of my reactions and will undoubtedly capture yours too)

Manager: You found that stolen Monet in Florence, saved your company a $25 million payout. That identity-theft case, you saved $15 million.

nate sees .00005 seconds of normal life and yeets the hell out

- - - - -

(The lobby is teaming with people when Nate walks in. A sign shows that Sophie is starring in The Sound of Music. He sees Parker at the ticket counter)

Parker: Picking up for one.

Ticket Agent: Last name?

Parker: Parker.

Ticket Agent: First name?

Parker: No. Just one name.

Ticket Agent: Great. I hope you enjoy it.

(Parker turns to see Nate across the room and smiles)

Hardison: Parker?

(Parker looks to her right to see Hardison. The sound of Eliot’s laughter from across the lobby draws Hardison’s attention)

Eliot (to women): All right. After the show, then. I'll see you.

(Eliot turns and sees the others. The all meet in the center of the lobby)

Nate: Eliot.

Parker: Nate.

Hardison: Parker.

Eliot: Hardison.

Eliot: So, how have you...

Nate: Good. Good. Great. You?

Eliot: Fantastic. Six months of traveling. Did a couple of big jobs.

Hardison: eah. Me, too. Great off time. Well, I bought an oxygen tank. Cool, nice.

Parker: Yeah, super. I've been really super, too.

Nate: Yeah, she didn't tell me that you guys would..

this is that dinner scene from shrek 2 right???

also, parker’s lil smile when she sees nate, hardison’s big smile when he sees parker + hardison says parker and eliot says hardison = ot3 acknowledging each other

- - - - -

Hardison: I didn't know you could sing.

Sophie: You know. Not as well as I act, but, yeah.

Hardison: Oh

- - - - -

Sophie: Uhhgh…

Hardison: Yeah, you know, I'm sure the reviews will be...

(Sophie hands Hardison her phone)

Hardison: …on the news website already.

Parker (grabs the phone): Really? Wow. "Never before has a production of 'The Sound Of Music' made me root for the Nazis. (Hardison gestures something like ‘WHY’ to Parker and she gestures something like ‘JDJSJSJ SORRY’ back)

POOR SOPHIE LMFAO

- - - - -

Sophie: No. No, no, no. Stop it. There is nothing you can say that's gonna make me feel better.

Parker: I know what could make you feel better. We should steal something.

Nate: No, no.

Sophie: Yes! We could do it together.

Eliot: I like this. Get right back up on the bike.

Parker: Bike of crime.

Nate: Didn't you earlier tell me how great your new lives were?

Parker: Yeah, well, I stole the Hope Diamond.

Nate: What?

Parker: (Everyone looks surprised. Eliot looks like he is going to say something.) And then I put it back. Yeah, 'cause I was bored. Didn't care.

Hardison: I spent three days hacking the white house e-mail. No buzz.

Nate: See?

Hardison: But we are doing some pretty hinky stuff in Pakistan. Hinky.

Sophie: Look, I'm miserable. They're miserable. (to Eliot) Okay, what have you been doing the last six months?

Eliot: I was in Pakistan. (Parker grins)

Hardison: You see what you did? You took the world's best criminals, hitter, hacker, grifter, thief, you took us, and you broke us.

Nate: No, no. I-I, what I did, I taught you how to help people. That's all.

Parker: Exactly.

Sophie: Yeah.

Eliot: This is the problem, with being the good guy. It gets under your skin.

Sophie: Look, Nate. You have to have some poor, little lost soul somewhere who needs a little extra-legal aid.

Nate: Look, we all agreed that we'd just move on.

Sophie: Yeah, but we're... We're thieves.

Nate: Not me. Look, it was great. It was fun. It was wonderful while it lasted, but I was drunk most of the time, to be honest with you. And I… A little crazy.

Eliot: Yeah, but you were good.

Parker: You were the best.

Hardison: We were the best.

Parker: Yeah.

Nate: Listen, really, I owe all of you. And I'm very proud of what we did. I-I really am. But I got my life back, and I intend to keep it that way. And I am not a thief. (stands up) It was great to see all of you. Good night. (leaves)

BIKE OF CRIME + also bruh let them have their found family, nate

- - - - -

(Nate enters the dim room and looks around. Behind him, the Thug opens the door and comes at him with a knife. Nate sees the reflection in a pot lid and turns to block the blow. Sophie comes in behind the Thug)

Sophie: Oi! Does your mother sew? (headbutts Thug) Stitch that.

(Thug runs out of the condo. Nate runs out after him, but Thug gets away. As he reenters the condo, Sophie hits him in the head with a cookie sheet and Nate falls to the floor)

Sophie: Ah! Bugger

she tried, your honor + her tough talk and then AH BUGGER

- - - - -

(the next morning, Nate wakes up on the couch to the sound of Parker eating. Parker is wearing a Nun’s habit, smiles and moves away. Sophie comes downstairs wearing Nate’s shirt)

Nate: That's my shirt.

Sophie: Yeah. I stayed the night to make sure you were okay. You what? But don't worry. I didn't look under your bed. I know that's where guys keep weird, kinky stuff.

Nate: There's nothing under my bed.

Parker (opens cupboard): This is all coffee.

Nate: Get out of there! (sees Hardison and Eliot at the table) What are you guys doing? (gets up) Come on, get out of here. Get all this stuff out of here. You're planning something. I know it. Come on. Get out of my house.

...

Hardison: Look, nobody else is gonna help that guy and his little girl. Okay, that's what we do. We help people. By the way, I compared Sophie's description of your attacker to the accident footage from the security camera.

(Hardison pushes a few buttons on the laptop and zooms in on the Thug’s face to begin a facial recognition search through various cameras in the area)

Hardison: Do you realize, on average, people are caught on security cameras 13 times a day? ATM cameras, traffic cameras. It's crazy, man, but we can track him. We can. Well, I lost him in this.

Eliot: Yeah, well, I found this empty briefcase belonging to a Matt Kerrigan at that intersection.

...

Eliot: Yeah, well, the problem is, these two cats went down to the safety deposit boxes.

Parker: Which is the only room in every bank, with absolutely no cameras.

Hardison: Which means we up, baby. (puts on a priest’s collar) They tried to kill Kerrigan for what was in the briefcase. We're gonna steal it back.

Eliot (laughs): She was dressed that way 'cause she's doing a con.

Nate: What, you thought she was dressed like a nun for no reason?

Eliot: It's Parker.

...

(Nate walks away)

Sophie (to Eliot): So, you going?

Eliot: I'm not going anywhere. The man has 700 sports channels.

Sophie: You want to see what he's got under his bed?

Eliot: N-no, I do not.

Sophie: Icky

- - - - -

(Parker opens her Bible to reveal a lock duplication kit with a depression in the plastic of the master key)

[Flashback]

(Parker takes the key from the Bank Manager’s pocket as Hardison talks, pressing the key into the form before replacing it into the Bank Manager’s pocket)

Hardison: And the children... The children thank you. They will send you a card just as soon as we buy them tiny pencils. And teach them how to spell. It's a two-step process, you see.

[Bank Vault]

Parker: Superglue and a heat-activated polymer to set it. Seven seconds, instant plastic key. (hands Hardison the Bible) Shake it.

Hardison: What?

Parker: Shake the bible.

Hardison: This is even more wrong.

(Hardison: takes the Bible and begins shaking it while Parker picks box 5076)

they’re so competent ugh

- - - - -

Hardison: I did look for you. For six months.

HE LOOKED FOR HER FOR SIX MONTHS

- - - - -

Parker: I think people are like locks. Really complicated and frustrating. But you can't force them. You have to take time and be fiddly.

Hardison: Fiddly?

Parker: You learn to be patient, and just wait until you hear the...

(the lock opens and the door swings wide)

- - - - -

(Hardison is sitting on the couch going through some paperwork and working on a laptop. Several boards have been set up with information about the case)

Nate: Now, this is not "gone." This is "more."

Hardison: Yeah, I, uh, I scanned the documents in Leary's box, but I wanted to print out a few pages.

Nate: I asked—I asked Eliot to get rid of this stuff. Now there's more stuff.

Hardison: Did you? Oh, we-we crossed, but didn't see each other. He didn't tell me.

Nate: Oh, that's how you're gonna play this?

Hardison: Oh, man. Look... (stands up and sniffs)

Nate: What?

Hardison: Is that... What is that aroma? That's that apple shampoo that's open.

Nate: You've been up in my shower, rummaging around?

Hardison: Man's in a strange bathroom, he's got a lot of time to kill... Nate, Nate, Nat-

I CANNOT

- - - - -

Nate: Grew up in the same neighborhood. The O'Hares are mobbed up. These are all mob businesses you're talking about here.

Hardison: Mob?

Nate: Where's Eliot?

Hardison: Oops.

Nate: What?

[Warehouse]

(Eliot is going through boxes when his phone rings. He answers)

Eliot: Yeah, Hardison. This is the third place I checked. It's all the same. What do you mean mob?

Thug: Hey!

(three men approach, one of them the Thug, who has his nose bandaged and is carrying a baseball bat)

Eliot: Oh, that mob. (hangs up)

hardison’s “whoops” followed by I HAVE TO WARN MY BOYFRIEND + in this episode we have eliot using a baseball bat as a weapon which is yet another piece in the continuation of eliot using things as weapons that are not supposed to be used as weapons

+ he apologizes to the guy that just had a nose job for beating him up and punching him in the nose he’s baby

- - - - -

(Nate opens the refrigerator to find it full of Hardison’s orange soda)

Nate: Seriously?

(Nate turns to see the island covered in food and dishes)

Nate: You know, guys, there is a dishwasher here.

Eliot: You're out of ice.

he literally can’t get rid of them + also I WONDER whose orange soda that is

- - - - -

parker robot dancing in the 80s jacket and looking DIRECTLY at eliot lmfao

- - - - -

Nate: What? Sophie, how do you catch mob guys?

Sophie: Ah, two glasses of Chianti and a story about my grandma in Sicily

- - - - -

Nate: Well, yeah. I mean, if you have a body in the trunk of your car, you're gonna drive under the speed limit, aren't you?

Parker: You know, when you're sober, your metaphors get creepier

- - - - -

eliot and parker sitting next to each other? cute

- - - - -

Hardison: Mr. Leary, I'm Detective Costello, with the Massachusetts State Police. This is Detective Costigan. I believe you met with our chief, Lieutenant Bonanno

more aliases to keep track of

- - - - -

Parker: We're investigating your colleague Matt Kerrigan's (air quotes) "car accident."

Leary: So you don't think it was an accident?

Hardison: Of course not. She did the finger thing. You got that. Everybody gets that.

Parker: Did I do it right?

Hardison: No. No. This guy just... (pulls picture from his pocket)

~ a few moments later ~

Parker: I did it right, didn't I?

Hardison: It was perfect.

Parker: I knew I did it right.

Hardison: It was beautiful execution. Absolutely.

Parker: Just like you taught me. I did it. (she smiles brightly)

Hardison: Yeah. Yeah, you did it. I like it. Yeah. (gives her a thumbs up)

SHES LEARNING IM SO PROUD OF HER

- - - - -

Eliot: Hey, this detonator - If I'm around the corner, is it still gonna be in range?

Hardison: Should be. I haven't worked out all the kinks yet. Sometimes the things just go off.

Eliot: Whoa, whoa, wait. Hey. I thought you said this thing was safe.

Hardison: Mostly. Mostly safe. I was very specific. Sometimes the frequencies get messed up.

Eliot: What frequencies, man? Huh? I got these things in my pants.

Hardison: Like, you know, a garage-door opener, a car alarm.

(a car alarm chirps then goes off, making Eliot jump. He moves away angrily)

Parker: What are the odds that Eliot's crotch will actually explode?

Eliot: Damn it, Hardison! (stalks off)

chaotic ot3

- - - - -

Sophie (shows passport): Annie Kroy.

O’Hare (grabs passport): Name's familiar.

Sophie: My family does business in North London with Terry Adams, and a couple of other organizations. We handle the money.

Nate (getting up): Yeah, see, what they do is they clean the money.

some people think that annie kroy is sophie’s true identity. I think, if anything, it would be her duchess alias but can you IMAGINE mob child sophie??? also, hi. im jackie and I wholeheartedly believe annie kroy has killed a man.

- - - - -

(Eliot is parked outside of the bank when Leary comes out, looking at files. Eliot hits a remote and the sound of gunfire fills the street as the squibs go off. People scream and Leary dives for cover. Eliot laughs and closes his window.)

chaotic eliot

- - - - -

Leary: And for that, the government hunts them down like dogs. People like me, we took billions from the banks. Billions. And what did the government do when they finally caught us? They wrote us a giant check and begged us to make it all better.

that’s disturbing

- - - - -

(Parker uses a taser on O’Hare and Hardison pulls up a recorder)

I think that was the first time parker tasered someone and we love to see it

- - - - -

Nate: So, how did you do it?

Eliot (gets up): Detonator, (holds up remote, reaches into his shirt and pulls out ketchup wrapper) ketchup.

Nate: Ah, the classics.

Sophie: Oh (hops happily), I love a good death scene

- - - - -

parker in a nun costume smelling money and saying “ahhhh” is certainly a mood

- - - - -

Leary: I was tricked. I was tricked. It wasn't me, you understand?

Bonanno: Somebody tricked you into bringing a briefcase full of evidence of your own crimes straight to the police? Come on, Mr. Leary. Nobody's that smart. Get him out of here

THEY ARE T H A T SMART

- - - - -

Zoe: Thank you. There are wolves in the world. But sometimes they're the good guys, I guess.

I didn’t like that whole metaphor because it felt kinda cliche but whatever, they ARE the good guys

+ bruh why is hardison wearing glasses??? him and eliot will sometimes wear them and honestly I don’t know who actually needs them and for what at this point ???

- - - - -

(Nate enters the condo to find that Hardison has installed five of six large monitors on the wall and is working on the last one)

Nate: Whoa, whoa. What are you doing there?

Hardison: I'm running this cat 5 cable to the--

Nate: Oh, no, no, no, no. You don't understand. No, I don't want to have these monitors in my apartment. No.

(Parker opens the door and walks in carrying a large painting)

Parker: Coming through!

Nate: No, these must go. What? No! Parker, no! Not that paint--I don't ever want to see that painting.

Parker: (shaking the painting as she talks in a funny voice) “Hi, I'm old Nate, and I live here, too."

Nate: You can't just break in here and start hanging--

Hardison: Oh, yeah, yeah. For repairs or renovation, your landlord has full access to your dwelling. It's in the lease.

Nate: What are you doing reading my lease?

Hardison: I bought the building.

Nate: You bought the... You're my landlord?

Hardison: Yeah. (holds his hand out for a fistbump) Yeah.

(Nate looks away, then hears the sound of a chain saw. He turns to see the end of a chain saw come through the wall)

Nate: No, no! No! No!

(Part of the wall falls to reveal Eliot holding the chainsaw and grinning. Nate coughs and both Parker and Hardison put their arms around him)

CHAOTIC OT3 + THEIR TIRED DAD

#leverage #leverage 2.01 #leverage 2x01 #the beantown bailout job #leverage season 2 #season 2 #notable moments #mine

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caroline-min-max · 5 years

Text

Two Timer

Caroline and the twins are in Arkham. An individual the three know all too well is also there and seems to have made serious progress in rehabilitation.

Supposedly it was a lovely day outside. Clear blue sky, warm weather, and some light breezes. It sounded like it would be a shame to waste it by staying indoors.

Caroline had no choice.

Good old Arkham Asylum again. Trapped inside until she could figure a way out or make an honest effort at rehabilitation (ha!). It was her home away from home that she hated to get accustomed to. She yearned to be free, away from the cramped cells and unwanted company of her fellow inmates.

Bunnies needed plenty of room and mental stimulation to stay happy and healthy. The staff should know this by now. Normally a hobby that she loved, Caroline was glumly putting together a puzzle during the time she was allowed outside of her cell. Thanks to her last escape she likely wouldn’t be allowed outdoors for a very long time.

At least they got her a new puzzle... This one should hopefully have all of the pieces. She sighed as she combed through the pieces in the box, pulling out the frame ones to put together first and setting them on the small table she was seated at. No matter the puzzle her approach was always the same.

“Hm?!” Caroline was startled by the sound of chair being placed in front of the table. She looked up, even more surprised by who was joining her. “Mr. Dent!” she exclaimed.

“Caroline,” Two Face replied with a nod. He knew that the two empty chairs that resided close to Caroline were being saved for two particular individuals.

A delighted smile spread across Caroline’s face. Two Face had been calling her by her first name regularly these days, an event that used to be quite rare. Thanks to his therapy sessions it seemed that the “Harvey Dent” side of Two Face was winning the battle between his split personalities.

She could feel it in his presence as well. His body language wasn’t so stiff, he hadn’t crossed his arms, and his eyes seemed softer as he looked at her. He was almost the man that she’d met all those years ago when he tried to put a case together for those responsible for turning her into a rabbit.

“I don’t suppose you want to help me put this together?” Caroline asked as she set the box on the table. She was only kidding, her relaxed ears popping up in surprise when Two Face grabbed a pile of pieces to root through, noticing what she was doing. “You’re in a good mood,” she said happily with a smile.

“Grace is coming to visit me today,” Two Face answered as he placed two frame pieces he found in the middle of the table. Once he’d decided to stay in Arkham to truly take steps to push back his ‘Big Bad Harvey’ personality her visits with Bruce Wayne had become weekly. “They think that I’ve made enough progress in therapy to have surgery.”

To get rid of the Two Face personality? Caroline wanted to ask. She knew that the Two Face side of him had sabotaged a surgery attempt before and she didn’t want any careless words to upset him.

“For...?” Instead Caroline pointed at the side of her face that corresponded with Two Face’s “bad” side.

Two Face looked over at her, nodding when he realized what she was asking.

“I’m really happy for you,” Caroline said genuinely. It had been years now since the accident that made him like this. It had to be hell for him... She couldn’t even imagine what it was like to have two personalities fighting for control of one body.

Harvey Dent had done so much harm as Two Face Caroline wondered if he’d even be accepted back into normal society, if people could understand it wasn’t really him who committed all those atrocities. It was lucky that Grace and Bruce Wayne had stuck by him; otherwise Caroline wasn’t sure if he’d be able to get through all this alone.

“You should make use of your therapy sessions,” Two Face remarked.

Caroline sighed. “I thought those were supposed to be confidential.”

“You have to actually say something in confidence first.”

Typical... Those sneaks were trying to use Two Face to make her spill her guts, huh? They sure liked to keep track and monitor the relationship the Gotham Rouges had with one another.

“This seems a little odd coming from the man who largely made me who I am today,” Caroline replied with a small snicker. Her smirk faded when she saw the guilt that washed over Two Face’s features.

“I wasn’t the one who did that, Caroline,” Two Face replied.

“I suppose not...” Caroline acknowledged. The voice that was coming out of the man seated in front of her wasn’t the gruff, gravelly one she’d grown so used to. It was softer in tone and had a hint of warmth to it.

...Maybe she was going to miss Two Face when all was said and done. She sadly realized he’d been a part of her life even longer than Harvey Dent was.

“So let me give you give you some better advice now.” Part of reforming for Two Face was while he understood his violent personality wasn’t who he really was he still had to take responsibility for those actions. Trying to set Caroline on the right path was his way of trying to make amends with one of his biggest mistakes. “Start opening up in therapy. Tell them what happened to you. Let them help you let go of all that anger and live a normal life while you wait for them to find a way to fix you.”

“I haven’t gotten my revenge yet and I don’t need to be ‘fixed’!” Caroline snapped, scowling. “YOU had a good life before your accident. I was getting my ass pinched at a scummy nightclub for their pocket change and then, after this happened,” she said as she grabbed one of her ears for a moment for emphasis. “Just as I thought things were looking up I found out I couldn’t even be a veterinarian because apparently how I smell freaks out most animals now. I have no reason to start trying to be a good girl again.”

“You’re going to get yourself killed.” It was a miracle that she hadn’t been already. Despite her small size she was bold and reckless; it was bound to get her into serious trouble someday. “Is it because of those idiots?” Caroline seemed to call the shots in their relationship but he worried if Min and Max pressured her committing crime sprees. He’d come to know them as the money hungry duo too stupid to pull off any major thefts on their own.

“No, and please don’t call them that,” Caroline answered sharply.

“If they cared about you they’d get jobs and let you stay at home.” If Caroline didn’t want to work there was no reason why the twins couldn’t support her. Maybe they even had enough cashed stashed away where it wouldn’t be an issue.

“I suppose I’ll sound just as delusional as Harley but they care about me more than you’ll ever know. We’ve been through so much together and, if I did want to go straight, they’d go along with it. We’re good as we are, Mr. Dent. Focus on your own recovery and leave me be. I appreciate what you did for me but I don’t need your guidance anymore.”

Caroline turned her attention to over Two Face’s shoulder when she notice two more familiar faces, completely identical to each other, approaching the table. They were hesitant to do so, walking slowly and stopping when they were right behind Two Face. They looked to Caroline for guidance on what to do. They’d noticed she seemed to be having a rather serious conversation with him.

“Have a seat, boys,” Caroline welcomed.

Min and Max continued towards the chairs Caroline saved for them. They pulled them back to sit down on, each taking a turn at giving her a quick kiss once they had. They’d missed their rabbit just as much as she’d missed them.

Two Face shifted uncomfortably in his seat at the sight. Caroline could do so much better than his former lackeys. It was yet another thing he blamed himself for since he caused Caroline to meet the twins.

“Are we interrupting?” Max asked.

Caroline shook her head. “Dad was just lecturing me.”

“How old do you think I am?!” Two Face asked as he thumped his fist on the table, making the laid out puzzle pieces bounce slightly.

“Oh... I don’t know...” Caroline pretended to think about it. “Fifty? Fifty-five?” she teased with a grin.

“You little brat...” Two Face replied before chuckling. If Caroline ever did start down the right path again he hoped that the confidence she’d gained as the White Rabbit would stick with her. She’d never have had the guts to joke with him like this before.

Min and Max glanced across Caroline at one another. What was going on here? Two Face was... Laughing? And smiling? They’d never seen their former boss like this. It was true that his friendship with Caroline had been completely mended for awhile now but he’d never behaved like this when they’d talked in Arkham.

One of the guards approached their table.

“There’s visitors for you, Harvey,” he said.

“Tell Grace I say ‘Hi’,” Caroline said as Two Face started to stand.

“Why don’t you tell her yourself?” Two Face offered. Grace hadn’t seen Caroline in all these years. Maybe having their connection rekindled would help in the younger woman seeing things his way.

Caroline’s ears fell as she smiled sadly. “I don’t think that would be fair to her.” She’d never say it to anyone but she was shocked that Grace had hung in there for all these years. Dealing with all of Two Face’s relapses couldn’t be easy and the last thing she wanted was to stress Grace out even more by showing her what she’d become. “I really do hope that you’re well on your way to stop meeting me like this.” She extended her hand, which Two Face reached forward and grasped in his.

Two Face looked deep into Caroline’s eyes and saw the fierceness of a woman who wasn’t done fighting. All the kindness, gentleness, and fear she had when she was younger was nowhere to be found. While his Harvey Dent personality wavered in and out the Caroline White he’d initially met seemed to be completely gone.

“Goodbye, Caroline...” Two Face said rather sadly.

“See you around, Mr. Dent,” Caroline replied, a little confused as to why his words sounded so final. She let go of his hand.

The trio silently watched Two Face be escorted away by the guard.

“What’s with Two Face?” Min asked, bewildered.

Caroline took a moment to respond, mulling over exactly what she wanted to say. “He’s finally getting his personalities sorted out,” she answered. “It’s good for him but it’s why I’ve warned the two of you not to say a word to the shrinks when they force us to meet with them. They WILL get inside our heads and start to influence how we think. We’re fine as we are.”

“Sure, Caroline!” Max replied.

“We don’t tell them nothin’!” Min assured.

Caroline was glad to hear it. She’d been worried about the sorts of doubts and ideas the therapists here would try to instill in the twins. She especially hated how they liked to use their relationship with her as a weakness.

There hadn’t been any therapy appointments for awhile, not since Caroline decided to mess with them and use the plots to books she’d read to lie about her life. She’d been found out and the profiles the psychiatrists had painstakingly put together were all thrown out.

“Well then...” With that sorted out Caroline felt it would be ideal to change the subject. “Did you boys go outside at all? I hate that I’m grounded; I heard that it’s nice out.”

“There’s a storm that’s starting to roll in,” Min replied.

Caroline seemed happy to hear that. “No loss, then! Have you two heard anything interesting while cooped up?”

The three continued to chitchat as the twins started to help Caroline with her puzzle. It was what they usually wound up doing, enjoying the time they were able to see and touch one another before it would be back to their cells again.

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Boredom taking hold of her in her cell, Caroline was dozing. She’d been laying on her back, gazing up at the ceiling on her bed, once again wishing she could be at home. Still without a solid plan to escape her eyelids had begun to droop. Just as sleep was hitting her she was startled by the sound of her cell opening.

Caroline shot upright, shocked to see Min and Max standing in front of her cell. Max had a key card in his hand and his eyes on her while Min was watching their backs for any guards with a gun in his hand. Seeing what was going on, the other female inmates were begging to be let out as well but the twins felt they had no time to help them.

Before her cell had completely opened Caroline ducked under the rising door.

“How did you two-” Caroline began, being cut off by the sound of an escape alarm going off. She winced from how loud it was.

“Later!” Min answered as he started running forwards, urging her to follow him and Max.

Caroline should have known better there wasn’t time to dawdle. She’d just been so surprised that the twins had managed to bust her out of her cell seemingly through their own volition rather than something she’d thought up.

As she followed them she became more and more puzzled as to how they’d pulled this off. As they ran past the hallway that led down to the men’s ward she noticed some incapacitated staff members on the floor starting to be tended to by other Arkham employees. This sort of destruction and havoc didn’t seem like something Min and Max could do by themselves.

They dashed out an emergency exit door that had already been busted open. There it started to make sense to Caroline when she saw Two Face in the process of hot wiring a car he’d broken into but led into another puzzlement.

“Mr. Dent, what are you doing?!” Caroline exclaimed as she ran up to the driver’s side just as he got the engine started. “I thought that you were going to-”

“SHUT UP AND GET IN THE CAR, WHITE!” Two Face thundered, some of his spittle hitting Caroline’s face.

“B-but...” Caroline stammered as she stepped back in alarm. What had happened to the man she’d recently shared such friendly moment with?

The twins needed to gently guide Caroline into the back seat with them; she was frozen in place from how scary and furious Two Face looked. It was a wonder that he’d even sprung Min and Max when he was in such a state.

Min had barely shut the door when Two Face floored it, a sharp turn making his passengers slam into one another as they were thrown to the left side of the vehicle.

“Are you you alright, Caroline?” Max asked as he quickly scooted back.

“Yeah...” she answered as the three of them quickly buckled their seat belts to avoid that happening again, Two Face showing no signs of slowing down. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d been smooshed in-between the twins but it was never so forcefully. “Mr. Dent, why are you breaking out?!” she tried again.

“It’s like you said, White...” Two Face replied gruffly, keeping his eyes on the road as they cleared the Arkham grounds, foot still glued to the accelerator. “I have to get my revenge and I don’t need to be fixed!”

“Wh...” Caroline’s brow furrowed in confusion. Did something happen? Or was this... Was this her fault? “Is this because of Rupert Thorne?” she guessed.

“They thought they could trick me and stab me in the back! I’ll show them!” Two Face was talking more to himself than to Caroline, fixated on how he was going to get back at his former best friend.

Although she was still in the dark Caroline wasn’t going to let Two Face throw away all the progress he made. Maybe it wasn’t too late. She unbuckled her seat belt and lunged forward, grabbing at the steering wheeling.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” Two Face shouted in alarm.

“Stop the car!” Caroline begged. She wanted to swerve the car into a ditch but couldn’t budge the wheel at all. Two Face was much stronger than her. “Please!” she said desperately.

Two Face roughly elbowed Caroline in the face, making her yelp and recoil back into her seat. “Keep her back there or I’ll throw all three of you out!” he shouted back at the twins.

The twins said nothing, looking over Caroline’s face instead to see if there were any visible injuries. Two Face struck her cheek which would likely wind up swollen and bruised later but it could have been worse. Their former boss was back to how they remembered him.

“Min,” Caroline whispered. “Your gun...” If Two Face wasn’t going to listen maybe she could make him stop by force.

“No way!” Min whispered back. “He has one too.”

“He already hit you, Caroline,” Max replied, re-buckling Caroline’s seat belt for her to keep her somewhat restrained.

Both Min and Max were furious that Caroline had been injured but being inside a speeding car wasn’t exactly the best of settings to fight back in. They felt it was best to comply with Two Face this time for their own well being and to avoid Caroline being hurt anymore.

Once they were back in Gotham Two Face stopped the car in an area he thought would safe for three recently escaped Arkham patients. No was around and he remembered the White Rabbit had a hideout around here. He ordered the three of them out of the car and took off again immediately.

“What happened?!” Caroline quickly asked, grabbing on to Min and Max’s sleeves.

“We don’t know!” Min answered. “He attacked the guards, grabbed his gun, and a key card. My cell was right next to his so he let me out and gave me card. All he said was ‘Get White and your brother fast; I won’t wait for you’.”

“You don’t have any idea where he’s going?”

The twins shook their heads.

Caroline turned to look in the direction that Two Face had driven off in, shoulders slumped and ears flat. “Then... I guess all we can do is be glad he decided to spring us too. Poor Mr. Dent... I wish I knew why...” It couldn’t have all been because of her, right? She’d made it clear their circumstances were different. She had encouraged him to return to his own life.

The twins placed comforting hands on Caroline’s shoulders.

“Lets go home, Caroline,” Max said gently. “We should get ice on your cheek.”

“Yeah...” Caroline reluctantly agreed. That’s all they could do for now. Maybe later they could find some of the men Two Face liked to recruit and see if they knew anything at all.

Regardless, it was another failed attempt. Caroline felt in her heart it was likely Two Face’s final chance after all these years. If he could come that close just for his other personality to win again all hope seemed lost.

3 notes · View notes

fountainpenguin · 6 years

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Question Meme: (Ignore this if you don't want to answer all these....) 1, 2, 3, 28, 31, 33, 40 (sorry i couldn't pick one)

40 Questions For ‘Fic Writers Meme

#1 - Describe your comfort zone—a typical you-fic.

Gradual character development spread across a piece with deepened, believable worldbuilding. You know, I often say I’m not into romance, but here’s the thing: A nice long, serious slow burn does a person good. I’ll happily accept romance if an author can really get me into the minds of the characters and make me want their relationship to develop as much as the characters do.

It’s shallow romance that rubs me the wrong way. Give me two characters who honestly, truly care about each other to the point where they’ll sacrifice something they love, or even be willing to let each other ago if it means the one they love will be happy. I love that. But if you’ve got one character who will pitch a fit rather than let their love be happy with someone else, you’re really working uphill with me.

Worldbuilding doesn’t have to be as deep and complex as my ‘fics tend to get, but I do love to see how different authors expand the same world in different ways. I’m not a big fan of horror and for some reason I just can’t get into sci-fi. I enjoy fantasy and biology.

Really, I love anything that doesn’t contradict canon. AUs? Eh, sometimes, but they’re not my favorite. I like behind-the-scenes, between-the-lines, believable futures, and backstory pieces with some nice worldbuilding. And some complex characters who don’t always make the best choices and then have to suffer the consequences for their actions. Yes. ‘Fics like those are very nice.

#2 - Is there a trope you’ve yet to try your hand at, but really want to?

A queerplatonic relationship that’s happy, healthy, and long-lasting. You would think I would let my aro/ace children be happy, but alas, ‘tis not to be! You could say I like to squash zucchinis. I am self-projecting my own insecurities. I made Bennett a horrible person to show the “worst possible relationship with an aro/ace who wants a sexless marriage” so that the hopes and dreams of the other aro/ace characters look more reasonable by comparison. I do that a lot.

Okay, I lied. I can think of six “official” queerplatonic relationships we will see in my FOP works, and one of them actually does have a happy ending. I mean, probably. I haven’t written it yet, so who knows?

Spoiler alert: Mario and Peach are the OTQP and I’m going to milk it. What can I say? I call ‘em like I see ‘em and canon literally gave us a plumber who’ll collect 120 Power Stars in return for cake, and a princess who turned down his hand in marriage after all the times he’s rescued her, but adores him anyway.

#3 - Is there a trope you wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole?

“We pretend to hate each other but secretly we’re both in love and will one day in the heat of the moment spontaneously confess our romantic feelings and form a mutual, caring relationship without any further character development.”

I don’t know if it’s because I’m a very serious, honest, straightforward person (being INTJ and all), or if it’s because I’m asexual, or if it’s a combination of both (or neither), but I can’t stand huge plots about people refusing to admit that they like someone. Love has always been a logical thing to me. I was sixteen before I found out sexual attraction was a real thing. I don’t really understand it, but I guess it’s possible to have physical feelings for someone even if you don’t logically want to? And you can’t stop yourself or turn it off? I honestly don’t know how that works, which is why the “I wish I wasn’t physically attracted to you” trope has infuriated me since childhood. I just didn’t get it.

Even before I realized I was asexual, I would have discussions with my mom about how if I ever had a crush, I would openly admit this to my friends if they asked. I wouldn’t protest or deny, as I see so many media characters do. Then it turned out I’m incapable of feeling physical attraction and I get friendship squishes instead of romantic crushes, so that happened.

As a general rule of thumb, you should trust the characters I write if they say they aren’t attracted to someone. If they like someone, they’ll tell you so. If they don’t, they’ll tell you that too. And if they’re confused, then it will be very clear that they’re confused. No means no. I’m very strict about that. Don’t read into it looking for signs that they’re being secretive even to the reader. They are not. I emotionally cannot bring myself to do that.

#28 - Share three of your favorite fic writers and why you like them so much.

Oooh. I’m going to say that Shaddic takes the cake on this one. If you’re a Total Drama fan, or even if you’re not, then “Daddy’s Characters” will break you deliciously like very few fanfics will. “Before and After” is just a step behind it. The emotion captured by these ‘fics is incredible, and I highly, highly recommend them if you’re into evil villains who are undeniably and yet realistically cruel. Both ‘fics revolve around Mike and his multiple personalities (“Daddy’s Characters” revolving around adult Mike and Zoey, married with a daughter and with twins on the way, coping with something horrid that lands a distraught Mike in prison, and “Before and After” being the trauma-filled childhood backstory ‘fic).

Shaddic characterized everyone perfectly. So horribly, painfully well. Ugggh, I love it. My gallery has Identity Theft on the way, which will revolve around Foop and Hiccup and some multiple personality trauma, but it won’t be as beautiful as Shaddic’s work. They’re honestly worth a read if you ever have the time one day, even if you aren’t a Total Drama fan. You really don’t need to know the show to enjoy them. And enjoy them (and suffer) you will. In all my years, I’ve never seen an evil villain portrayed so… villainously. Love it.

I’m also a fan of SelanPike- partially for sentimental reasons, I suppose. I remember reading her Mario ‘fics over and over eight years ago, and I still read them today on a regular basis. Crazy how time flies. They’re just ones that I love going back to. As most of you know, I tend to fall in love with background characters. Fawful, Kamek, and Doopliss fit those qualifications- and coincidentally, those three are Selan’s favorites too! Technically, it’s because of her that the 130 Prompts project came to be. I always loved her 100 one-shot challenge, and that’s sort of how I eventually decided to write my own.

I really admire Selan for her characterizations. Her Kamek portrayal is my all-time favorite. So is her Fawful, her Doopliss, her Bowser, her Bowser Jr, her E. Gadd… she’s just a master of character. Even her freaking Jojora is spot-on. I mean, talk about background characters, am I right? Ha. Her writing is excellent and she has some fun plots. I always enjoyed drinking up her fanart and reading her comics on her deviantArt too. Still do. She has such a fun, bouncy art style. Her 8-page comic about Fawful attending school in the Mushroom Kingdom after Kamek hits him with the truant officer threat gets me every time.

I highly recommend “Until Tomorrow” (Her post-“Superstar Saga” ‘fic about Kamek and Fawful attempting to revive Cackletta so Kamek can kick her butt in a magic fight and Fawful can get the mother figure he refuses to call his mother figure back), and her famous ‘fic “On My Own” (about Fawful coping with Cackletta’s death and eventually working his way up the Koopa Kingdom social ladder). “Fragmented Spectrum” is a wonderful, tense, horror-ish ‘fic as well, with my absolute favorite Bowser Jr. portrayal. Plus, I love the rivalry between Kamek and Fawful seen in “F.S.” with Fawful trying to draw magic circles that he decided must be 100% perfect to count as circles, and Kamek not even knowing how to deal with him and his technology brain. Beautiful.

Check out the rest of her gallery too. Her two FFN fandoms are Mario and Invader Zim. She isn’t active there anymore, but her ‘fics are worth the read. I will say that I’m not a fan of her ‘fic “Everything You Ever” because I feel that Cackletta was way too sweet and nice for an evil villain in that one. But then again, I haven’t read it in years, so who knows. I’m not crazy about Selan’s Peach portrayal either, but that’s where my third recommendation comes in.

GuardianM1234 is a recent discovery of mine, and she does not disappoint. I’m a big fan of her ongoing ‘fic “Smoke” (which updates twice a month right now and is nearing its climax). It’s basically the story of Peach and Bowser growing up, and the development of their relationship from being fairly friendly as children to their complex relationship as adults. I’ve never seen Peach portrayed so perfectly, and I adore her. Never thought I would, but I do. Guardian also has a very unique take on Mario that’ll really make you squirm.

I love Guardian’s writing because she pits characters in emotionally-difficult situations and lets them learn and grow. They make bad choices, but she demonizes no one. Not even Bowser. Plus, Bowser has a little sideplot with Clawdia going on (the canon mother of the Koopalings if you know your deep hidden lore, though since the Koopalings were recently ruled “not Bowser’s children” by Nintendo’s “official” canon, I don’t know if she will be their mother in “Smoke” or where Guardian is taking this ‘fic). Basically, what I’m saying is, Clawdia and Bowser roastfest. Be there. They crack me up. And Guardian’s TOADSWORTH is perfection. Please give that old boy his gossip.

Plus, Daisy takes Bowser shopping for wedding dresses once and he bribes her with a six-pack of soda. Nice, short chapters with a few pleasant hints of worldbuilding slipped in, and a LOT of character. Guardian is still somewhat new to fanfiction, but she’s very sweet and she would adore some reviews if you do read her work. If you love her stuff, give her a shout-out! She’s great.

#31 - Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant?

I fall halfway between this one. The answer is, sort of both! For my main fandoms, I have one rule: I don’t contradict canon, unless canon contradicted itself and I was forced to pick a side. Origin gets so deep into biology and Knots into culture that they feel more like original works than fanfics sometimes, because I’ll flesh things out as much as I want to. So that’s sort of a liberty I take with canon. But I never contradict canon if I don’t have to. I always comply.

It’s a puzzle. I love connecting dots behind the scenes. I love forcing everything that’s canon to be canon, even if it looks like it contradicted itself. If I can solve a plot hole, I try to. I will make ridiculous backbends to fit colorful Anti-Fairy eyes, Crocker’s ebb and flow of wealth, Miss Idaho’s “rare genetic condition that prevents her from aging,” Mary Alice Doombringer’s random abilities, and Girlfriend the cat’s sentience into Riddleverse canon, and I’ll love every second of it. I only cut a piece of canon out if I feel like I absolutely have to. It’s fun.

I can definitely enjoy reading ‘fics that stray from canon, and might even write them on occasion. But the reason why I write fanfics is because I loved the canon and I want to see it expanded, not taken away. I’d like to publish my original works someday, so if I’m not sticking close to source material, why would I write a fanfic that I could publish as an original work instead?

For the same reasons, I’d rather read a fanfic that expands on canon than eliminates it. When I fall in love with something, I fall in love with its world. I like ‘fics that blend worldbuilding aspects in with the plot they’re writing, even if it’s a short one-shot. I don’t love reading something that feels like its writer just inserted the names of popular characters into their otherwise original work so that people would read it. I want to have the little details and feel convinced that these are the characters (and the world) that I love. Personal preference.

In some cases, I default to realism over canon, such as by giving Cosmo the ability to recognize faces. In my psychology classes, I’ve learned that sometimes during investigations, police will show pictures to people and ask them to select the face that matches the one they were shown earlier. People pretending to be mentally handicapped in some way will often get the answers wrong on purpose in an attempt to maintain their facade, while those who are actually mentally handicapped will get them right. Just a nitpicky thing I do.

So I often favor realism over canon in certain ways, even if it possibly contradicts canon a bit. I respect canon and try to stay true to it as much as possible because I enjoy doing so, but I don’t consider myself 100% beholden to it, especially considering how many different contributors there can be to a project over the years. I do my best, but enjoying what I write comes first.

#33 - How do you feel about crack?

I can enjoy the occasional way-out-there thing, but I prefer serious stories in general.

#40 - Write an alternative ending to [insert fic title] (or just the summary of one).

Well, you didn’t give me a ‘fic you wanted to see an alternate ending to, but I do have a few short pieces I can share. You see, the “That Was Then” Prompt (the Jay Rhoswen and his studies about Anti-Fairies one) wasn’t supposed to end the way it did. Here is how it was meant to go:

Rhoswen scooted back hand over hand along the counter, his feet skittering in the vapor. What in the name of dust was he doing? He shouldn’t be looking at his wife’s counterpart more than at his wife! He shouldn’t be having these sorts of thoughts at all!

Anti-Shylinda placed her palms to his cheeks and gazed into his eyes. “No talk,” she whispered, and when she leaned forward, those burning lips closed over his.

As for whether that Seelie Courter chose to kiss the anti-fairy back once she’d started to draw away? Well… You ought to look to the term “Rhoswen syndrome” to answer that.

I didn’t like the idea of Anti-Shylinda being the one to make moves on Jay, so I scrapped it. Not only that, but the whole piece is written as snippets from Rhoswen’s journal now, so the voice here no longer fit the narrative.

At the end of the first chapter of Frayed Knots, “String Theory”, Anti-Cosmo cuts off the tips of his ears. I was originally going to expand the scene as follows:

Blood spattered the floor. With a hiss through my teeth, I withdrew the knife and dabbed the blood up with my sleeve. The stone might stain.

Recalculating, I dragged my stool over to the sink. The angle was awkward, but at least my blood would wash easily away. There, I slit off the tip of my ear, cutting carefully around my first canetis ring. Then I mirrored the action on the other side. Both rings bounced across the stone with a clink, click, clatter.

I uncurled my tongue and set the knife aside. Then I took the severed tips of my ears and held them to my head again. It took three agonizing minutes, but the smoke that filled my veins stretched out and wound around my fingers. It absorbed my ears and pressed them into place again. Full, soft, and whole. I fingered the gashes mother’s piercing clamp had left behind. Apparently, even regeneration couldn’t heal injuries left by an unenchanted tool. Useful information to know.

The canetis rings disappeared into my pocket. Then I got up and pushed open the window. I took a running start, dove out, and unfurled my wings.

However, I kind of liked leaving the chapter on the cliffhanger of “Oh my gosh, what did he just do to himself???” I also couldn’t include a sink in the castle in a time period when there is no indoor plumbing. Then I decided that I would rather give Anti-Cosmo permanent gashes in his ears he had caused himself, rather than ones caused by his mother, to always remind him (and everyone around him) of that day he stood against Anti-Fairy tradition. Kind of a shame to delete the scene since I like how it gave us information about smoke and Anti-Fairy healing right from the start. I might recycle it later.

Actually, if we’re talking about the original version of Knots, everything was supposed to be different than what it was. Here is another deleted scene that was originally planned to be the opening scene of Knots:

“Mum, I’m nine and a half minutes old. I’m not a baby anymore. Come on, please? You let Anti-Robin leave home to get his wand when he was only three!”

“You weren’t even born yet. How can you possibly know that?”

“He told me about thirty seconds ago, right before you came in here.” I grabbed my mother’s skirt in two tiny fists. “Mum, I’m going to be the only pup in the colony without a wand. What about our image?”

She wavered visibly, running her thumb along her staff. “Well…”

Father peered over his spectacles and frowned. “Now, wait just a minute here, Anti-Florensa. He’s just a pup. You can’t send him into the woods to gather the materials for his first wand all by himself.”

“But it has always been our family’s tradition,” she sniffed. “It’s not as though he’ll die. On the contrary, I’m more concerned about him killing valuable plants with his acid. Anti-Cosmo, you’re drooling again.”

I wiped my mouth. “Sorry, Mum.”

I really loved the “I’m nine and a half minutes old- I’m not a baby anymore!” idea, especially since there aren’t many times when you’ll have the chance to use it. As you can see, Frayed Knots was going to begin with baby Anti-Cosmo leaving his manor home alone to obtain his first wand.

But overall, in the end, I decided that it was more important to show the importance of smoke in Anti-Fairy culture, and we ended up with the scene we have now. Also, I really wanted Anti-Cosmo to grow up never knowing who his father was until several years after Anti-Robin had died, which meant I had to scrap or replace this scene in some way anyway.

The “Mama’s Boy” Prompt was actually written with the manor idea in mind, and I believe Anti-Florensa even uses the word “manor” in it. I added an author’s note to that piece several months ago mentioning that “Mama’s Boy” is semi-canon for now until Frayed Knots is finalized. A lot has changed.

Some other deleted scenes from the early plans of “Anti-Cosmo lives with his family in a manor near the Castle, and they are nobles but not royalty” include:

“I got something for you, kiddo.” Anti-Robin flicked an aluminum medal across the table that read #2 Son. I grinned.

“This is for me? Thanks! I love it!”

He tilted down his glasses. “You say, ‘Thank you, Father, for this generous gift.’”

I repeated the words, and he tousled my hair. “Now, go do second son things.”

“Yes, sir! I will! Thank you, Father!” With the medal swinging from my neck, I trotted happily off.

and

I clung to the frame of his office door, beating my wings to keep myself from staggering forward. I knew better than to cross the threshold, even though there was nothing I wanted more in the universe right then than to throw my arms around his waist and squeeze him in a hug. The bruise Mother had left on my arm hurt even more now than it did in the kitchen, somehow. My eyes slid back and forth across his desk.

“Where are you going?”

Anti-Robin calmly placed another folded shirt inside the suitcase. “Back to Anti-Scarlett’s.”

“With your other family?” I asked. “With her kids, Anti-Xavier and Anti-Tom?”

“Yes.”

“Why can’t I come with you? I want to meet them.”

“It’s a dad thing.” He closed the suitcase with two clicks and turned around. His eyes were steely calm, his frown very firm. “You’ll understand when you’re older.”

and

“ELEANOR!”

Anti-Robin and I grabbed our mouths and looked at each other, gaping with our eyes. Mother was over 150,000 years old. Her real name wasn’t supposed to be said out loud.

Father slammed a newspaper on the table, then stepped back and crossed his arms. “Might I inquire what the meaning of this is, ‘dear’?”

“Whatever do you mean?” she asked, not looking up from the end of her staff. She studied its base, then ran her polish rag across it again.

“Anti-Bryndin had the green fairy locked up, and I know you’re behind it.”

So, don’t feel too sad that Anti-Cosmo grows up without a dad in my works! It wouldn’t have been the best relationship anyway. Besides that, now that I’ve had time to think about it, this Anti-Robin portrayal isn’t that far off Ambrosine, and I’d rather H.P. and Anti-Cosmo had fathers with very different personalities.

If you have a really sharp memory, you may possibly remember seeing that medal around Anti-Cosmo’s neck when I drew my late-night FOP/Moana doodle dump that one time.

I also have oodles of scenes deleted from Anti-Cosmo’s visit to Winkleglint’s estate, since originally Scarletfeather was supposed to show up and Anti-Cosmo panicked when he couldn’t stop Scarletfeather from luring Mr. Thimble away. I could have filled another entire chapter with what happened during that study abroad week, but in the end I decided they were mostly self-indulgent and not important enough in the grand scheme of things to justify leaving in.

I’m skimming through my files of deleted scenes and I forgot I had this one too. Anti-Cosmo wasn’t supposed to have his intelligence test proctored by Ambrosine originally, as I was going to send him to this mental hospital facility. I decided against it, but here is a terrifying scene that we almost got. So, it’s technically an alternative ending too:

Dr. Gabriel handed me a piece of bark marked with the word Failed. “Don’t get cocky. Everyone has their limits.”

Failed? That lout outright failed me? I dropped the bark strip and looked up as Dr. Gabriel spread his wings. With a few sharp beats, he flew out of the pit. I chased after him, searching the platform above me with my eyes. So I couldn’t fly, and I was short, but I could make that leap-

“Oof!”

Or… perhaps not. I slid back down to the floor and landed on my rump. Never one to be deterred, I leaped back to my feet. Something to boost me, something to boost me… Oh! Snatching up his forgotten broom, I backed against the opposite wall, and then ran forward. I shoved the handle of the broom into the corner offered by the platform and the floor and launched myself into the air. Yes! Yes! Ahahaha! I hurtled out of the pit and went rolling across the ground. Dr. Gabriel spun around, his mouth falling open in surprise.

“Please,” I begged him, climbing to my feet again. My broken wings batted feebly behind me. “I want to gain a Fairy education. Level with me, doctor. You don’t want Anti-Fairies filling up your precious conservative school. And I don’t want Anti-Fairies filling it up either. True, we Anti-Fairies are known for our memories, but I like to feel special, and I shouldn’t want to chance anyone stealing my thunder away from me. You let me in, and I won’t breathe a word about your biases against my people.”

Dr. Gabriel studied me with idle coldness, clutching his tablets to his chest. He drifted a few steps backwards along the corridor. “Anti-Cosmo, your genius is entirely creative. You’re severely behind in your knowledge of technical skills, and you lack basic common sense as well as a sense of self-preservation. Because of this, we can’t recommend you be placed in any advanced programs. You’ll need to stay where you’re at.”

The corners of my mouth twisted into a frown. Then a sneer. “Frankly, Dr. Gabriel, I’m not particularly fond of that option.”

With that, I yanked out the can of forget-a-cin I’d nicked from his pouch when he’d been turned the other way. Dr. Gabriel had time to look horrified before I mashed the button down. My eyes were squeezed shut, but even so, the world around me lit with white. I let the empty canister fall to the floor and opened my eyes again to find the nervous fairy glancing around in bewilderment.

“There,” I said. “I’ve just put a block over this memory of yours. I do hope no one else would care to challenge me, or I will be forced to perform the same trick on them. Now, I demand that you, good sir, will have me enrolled in all the classes of my choosing. Is that understood?”

Dr. Gabriel’s wandering eyes finally latched onto me. His shoulders shivered, although he possibly didn’t remember why. He bobbed a bit lower in the air. Then his wings fell silent altogether, and he leaned his back against the wall. He slid down to the floor. “S-security! Security?”

His voice was too weak for anyone who wasn’t an Anti-Fairy to hear. I sighed. Covering my eyes again, I made a signal with my other hand. “Oh, dear. I do apologize. I really never do this, you must understand. It’s so messy.”

If he hadn’t been so hazy from the aftereffects of the forget-a-cin, I’m sure Dr. Gabriel wouldn’t have let me get away with as much as he did. As it happened, I walked right up to him and lay my claw against the karmic pouch on the left side of his neck. He yelped, but I knocked his clumsy hands away from me without any real effort. I braced my hand against my hip.

“I really never do this. It’s vile and crude. So sorry, I really am. But then again, well, perhaps I’m really not.” And with that, I sunk my fangs into his neck. Blech. He tasted of old mutton.

Dr. Gabriel screamed. He twisted, his shoulders rapidly seizing up. I rolled my eyes and kept my fangs embedded until his coughs turned to silence and he had frozen in place, as still as a stone statue. Only then did I wrench back my head, bringing the coils of his karmic weave along with me. Most of them were blue, but here and there a pink one surfaced, or a yellow. As the colourful threads of his life whisked above us, I stood back and traced one claw beneath my eye.

“Anti-Fairy tears consist mainly of sulfuric acid, of course. And I daresay you hurt my feelings quite a bit back there, didn’t you?”

Forcing myself to cry came as naturally as forcing myself not to cry always had. I captured the burning tear on the end of my claw and, very slowly, held it out towards the paralyzed fairy sitting against the wall. For several long seconds, I let him see it glistening there. Threatening to drip down on the place where I had bitten him. Which was still bleeding.

“I never do this,” I said again, truthfully apologetic. “It’s messy and you’ll be rather cross when you wake up, assuming you wake again at all. But it is true that I am crying, and here you are, lying so very still. We’re standing rather close, aren’t we? So close that I could touch you.”

Lacking the ability to move, all Dr. Gabriel could do was sit numbly, his mouth gaping. I lowered my claw towards his neck.

“But it’s only a single tear, isn’t it? Why should a fairy care if he made an anti-fairy child cry? No, a single tear cannot hurt your conscience. A single tear may sting your skin, perhaps, but it shouldn’t cause any long-lasting problem so long as no liquid in your body is particularly warm. Oh, wait…” Here I feigned surprise, and brought my claw a mere centimetre from his karmic pouch. Green liquid trickled down his neck. I smiled. “Why, internal Fairy body temperature borders on the boiling point, does it not? Oooh, I’d hate to see what happens when that acid comes into contact with your blood. I’ve heard it’s prone to such catastrophic explosions.”

There was, of course, no reply. Sighing, I withdrew my handkerchief from my pocket and wiped the tear from my claw.

“No, but I suppose I’m a gentleman, so I shan’t leave you comfortless. As I told you, I really never do this. I’m all boasts and bluster, really. That’s all I really am. Let’s get you cleaned up, lad.”

I was just wiping away the last drops of acid from his stunned face when the door opened behind me. I looked over my shoulder to find Anti-Jolene floating there with a clipboard in hand. She took in the threads of wild karma and my kerchief, and looked at me with her ears cocked forward.

“So… How is it going?”

I sighed and tucked the handkerchief away. “Dr. Gabriel and I have just finished, painfully. I say, are business deals with Fairies always so messy?”

She smiled a thin smile. “It would behoove us to find a neutral party who could settle things between our two races more easily, wouldn’t it?”

“I’ll be cleaning karma out of my fur for weeks,” I muttered, and went about gathering up his tangled threads so I could stuff them back inside his soul.

He was one messed up kid in this draft, that is for sure. Who knows? Perhaps I’ll find a place for this scene in the current version someday, if I ever need to send an older Anti-Cosmo to a mental health facility. For now, however, it’s deleted.

“This Is a Box” was actually supposed to end differently as well. And of course, so was “This Is Halloween.” Every once in awhile I’ll have a piece get away from me and end the way it wants, but most of them end the way I plan from the start.

Thanks for all your requests! I really appreciate your curiosity!

#Anon #asks #riddleverse mention #Ace Penguin #Mushrooms and more #FAIRIES!#Reading recommendations #130 Prompts #ridwriting #The bat with the hat #Bat cube and associates #Frayed Knots #Ask box games

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